The Beautiful Boss of the Double-B

By Thelma Knoles

 

By hiring handsome Jim Raleigh on her ranch, Beth hoped to make Carter Ganes jealous enough to propose to her. But in carefully stacking Cupid’s deck — Beth forgot one two-faced queen!

 

 

Chapter 1: Tophand — at Kissing!

 

BETH BARLOW tilted her curly brown head toward the cowboy who was detailing his qualifications as foreman for the Double B. Her brown eyes sparkled at the amazing inspiration that had struck her when this strange young waddie walked into the ranch office not fifteen minutes earlier.

“The name is Jim Raleigh,” the cowboy wound up.

“Jim Raleigh,” Beth repeated absently.

He spoke knowingly of work on the range, winter feed problems and fall roundups. But Beth was noting the vivid blue of his keen eyes. The way his thick dark hair sprang back from his forehead. The supple width of his shoulders. The long, lean hard-muscled look he had about him.

She smiled and a becoming flush tinted her creamy cheeks. “I believe you’ll do for the job,” she said, though she’d fully intended hiring the salty old hand who’d recently quit the Lazy Q.

Jim Raleigh fell silent, curiously studying the young owner of the Double B as though he savvied that she hadn’t heard a word he’d been saying. But Beth didn’t notice. She was thinking that if she hired a young, attractive man like Jim, maybe Carter Ganes would become a bit jealous. Her pulse quickened and began to gallop like a runaway team as she followed that train of thought.

Carter might even be roused to the point of bringing his dallying courtship to a climax and stating in so many words that he loved and wanted to marry Beth. He’d done everything but propose, and a girl had to do something in such a situation. Especially a girl with no kinfolks to help her, and no mother to advise her.

Beth brought her attention back to Jim Raleigh. Her bright smile faded and she said slowly, “I'd better tell you that all my help's been quitting for the last several months, and I can’t for the life of me savvy why.” She concluded honestly, “That’s the main reason I need a good foreman.” Her eyes clouded with bewilderment and anxiety. “It seems like the Double B is spooked lately.”

“I reckon you do need help, miss,” Jim allowed. A suggestion of a smile quirked his lips as he took in her smallness and loveliness.

From down the lane came a clop-clop of hoofs. Beth caught her breath and turned her head to listen. That would be Carter. If he should see her and Jim Raleigh talking and laughing together as he rode by the open window —?

Flirtation was a game entirely new to Beth, who’d never given any man a second glance till Carter Ganes came along, but she seemed to know just how to tip her head back and smile at Jim Raleigh. A dimple flickered in her cheek and her lips parted invitingly.

She stepped toward the cowboy. “I hope you’ll like the Double B, Jim Raleigh,” she said softly, almost breathlessly.

The thudding hoofbeats were rapidly approaching the house. Beth glanced past Jim out the window where any minute now Carter would ride by on his way to the hitching rack.

She darted that glance past Jim’s flannel clad shoulders, and the next second she was gasping in surprise. For the cowboy’s long arms shot out and closed around her. She had an instant’s glimpse into very close blue eyes dancing with a devilish gleam.

Then her new foreman’s mouth crushed down on hers. There was a wild drumming in Beth’s ears, a sense of whirling unreality when Jim finally raised his head. He released Beth as heavy footsteps sounded outside the office.

“I’ll be looking up the bunkhouse,” he said quietly, and lifted his battered Stetson from the window-sill.

Carter came through the door as Jim went out. Beth saw their eyes meet in a quick, hard look.

Beth dropped into the chair behind the desk. She felt as though her very bones were melting, and a strange, tingling warmth was on her like a drug.

“Who’s that jasper?” Carter demanded, coming on into the room and snapping his creamy Stetson down on the top of the desk.

Beth looked up at him with an uncertain smile trembling on her lips. Carter was the handsomest man she’d ever seen. Tall and large, almost heavy. His light hair was always beautifully cut and groomed and he wore well-tailored shirts and handmade boots.

“Well, can’t you answer me, Beth?” He grinned, at her. He looked just the same as ever, and she finally found her tongue.

“That’s my new foreman, Jim Raleigh,” she said, trying to speak lightly but sounding breathless.

“Where’d you pick him up?” Carter persisted, leaning across the desk and studying her as though to read what lay behind the soft brilliance of her brown-gold eyes.

She lowered the heavy fringe of her lashes. She felt a pulsing thrill of triumph. Her little plan had worked! Carter was suspicious. He was openly jealous. He was staring at her in a searching manner that was new and exciting. As for herself, she felt strangely exhilarated, keyed up to new experience.

“Oh,” she breathed softly, keeping her eyes on the scarred surface of her dad’s old desk, “I know him very well.”

It seemed that what she said was true. The lean, bronze face of Jim Raleigh with its blue eyes, the clean-cut lines of his head, even the supple, strong-muscled rider’s frame of him seemed dearly familiar.

Now Carter leaned farther over Beth’s desk and covered her small hand with his.

“Listen, Beth,” he said, looking deep into her wide-open eyes, “watch your step. There’s strange things going on around these parts.”

“What do you mean?” she asked, impressed by his seriousness, happy to see how concerned he was over her.

“Red Adobe cattle were rustled last night,” he said flatly. “Looks like the gang that worked the other side of the Huachucas are moving in on Santa Luz valley now. I’ve been expecting it.”

“Oh, Carter, that’s terrible!” Beth was shocked.

“I don’t want you to worry about it,” Carter said gravely, “but you see you have to, be careful who you trust.”

 

BETH sprang to her feet and walked around the desk. Forgotten were her coquetish schemes for making Carter propose, for making him jealous. She felt a twinge of shame. No wonder he wasn’t thinking of wedding bells when he was so worried. This was real, double-barreled trouble for Santa Luz valley.

Beth paused in front of the window and stared out at the rolling miles of waving grass. A mile or so away a curving line of cottonwoods marked the course of the river, the shallow Santa Luz. The green line cut south across the pastures of the Double B and crossed the border into Mexico. To the north lay Carter Ganes’ Red Adobe spread.

“Likely the Double B will be next,” Beth said dismally. For a moment she felt beaten, hopeless. So much had gone wrong since her father had been killed by a runaway horse a year ago. There had been accidents, losses through carelessness, and the last months her help had drifted away with vague explanations. Beth had been forced to conclude that no one wanted to work for a girl whose ranch seemed jinxed.

The moment of despair passed and Beth whirled around with her brown eyes wide and bright and a fighting look about her soft mouth. “Those rustlers better leave our cattle alone!” she cried. “Or we’ll make it so hot for them they’ll be sorry they ever tackled Santa Luz valley!”

She stood outlined in the sun’s bright glow, a small, graceful girl in her old ranch clothes. The sun struck gold from her short brown curls and her eyes flashed challenge.

Carter Ganes cold gray eyes warmed and sharpened. He moved toward her. “You’re lovely, Beth Barlow,” he declared.

Beth knew that he was going to take her in his arms, and surprisingly she didn’t want to be touched. She was too shaken by the news of the rustlers to think of love-making. From the corner of her eye she glimpsed the quick-striding figure of a tall cowboy moving among the horses in the corral. That would be Jim Raleigh.

Embarrassment painted the girl’s cheeks red. She evaded Carter’s reaching arms. To be kissed again in front of that window, so soon, was unthinkable. She moved briskly behind her desk. “I h-have to let that man from the Lazy Q know I won’t need him,” she murmured hurriedly. “He was coming out tomorrow.”

“I savvy.” Carter moved toward the door. Then he turned and said soberly, “But don’t trust that new hand too far, Beth.” A scowl crossed his face like lightning. “I’d swear I’d seen that hombre somewhere else —” His voice trailed off. Then he shrugged his perplexity aside. “Anyhow, call on the Red Adobe for anything, anytime, Beth.”

“Oh, thank you, Carter,” Beth said, and her voice was warm with gratitude. “You are a good friend.”

She watched him ride by the open window and reflected that she’d grown to depend on him more and more these past lonely months.

Carter bought the Red Adobe some six months ago, and though his clothes and his saddles and furnishings were much more luxurious and fashionable than anything Santa Luz valley had seen, Carter seemed content to raise purebred Herefords on the ranch north of the Double B. He had brought his foreman, Ed Thaw, and Ed’s redheaded wife, Doll. A slight frown darkened Beth’s eyes as she thought of Doll. The handsome, rather flamboyant woman gave Beth an uneasy feeling. She, alone, of the elaborate Red Adobe outfit, seemed out of place on the range.

She was snapped out of her thoughts by the sight of Jim Raleigh coming out of the corral. His weather-beaten Stetson was thrust far back on his head and he was whistling as though he hadn’t a care in the world. As though he hadn’t grabbed his new boss and soundly kissed her.

Beth’s little booted feet hit the floor with a bang as she sprang out of her swivel chair. It was high time to get things straight with that brash young waddie out there. She marched out of the house and down toward the corral, meeting him squarely beside a stand of blooming hollyhocks.

“Look here, Jim Raleigh,” she began purposefully.

“I was aimin’ to speak to you,” he cut in. “Few things I’d like to get straight before I’m officially on the payroll.”

“Why —” Beth sputtered and got no farther.

“Now, I like it here right well,” Jim declared, his eyes sweeping the corrals and pastures and house and coming back to her. “For personal reasons I’d like to work in Santa Luz valley. But —” the blue eyes caught hers now and impaled them on steely points — “I’m not puttin’ in time to make any other gent jealous. No, ma’am.”

“Why, you —” Beth exploded.

He shook his head at her solemnly. “When a girl sidles up to me and smiles real sweet while her eyes are looking past my shoulder, it just makes me plain loco.” His unsmiling blue eyes continued to study her gravely. “Just thought I’d tell you how it was, ma’am.”

Beth’s burning cheeks were the color of red hollyhocks just beyond her head. She found a little trouble speaking, but when she did her voice was low and icy.

“You can be sure, Jim Raleigh, that I won’t bother you, in any way, in the future.”

“Thanks,” he said gravely. “Now I see you need a foreman powerfully bad.” He cut off her protests before she could utter them. “Well, since we have everything straight between us, I’ll stay on at the Double B.”

Beth opened her lips to order him to saddle his bronc and high-tail it off her land. But looking up into the steady blue depths of his eyes she found herself saying something quite different. In fact, she discovered that she’d hired Jim Raleigh, that he was quietly, coolly taking the running of the Double B out of her slender brown hands, before she knew what happened.

 

 

Chapter 2: Beth Savvies Too Late

 

NEXT day when Jim Raleigh saddled up and started to ride around the Double B range Beth felt a lightening of the load on her slender shoulders. Watching Jim loping away over the mesa, she felt free for the first time since she’d been running the ranch alone. Free to do as she pleased for a short time.

Naturally she was pleased to see Carter. She wanted to hear more about the rustling. And she wanted to offer her services and those of the Double B in stamping out the cattle thieves that threatened the valley.

She put on her prettiest blouse and discarded her work-worn jeans for a becoming riding skirt. She brushed her short bronze curls till they clustered sleek and shining around her flushed face. As she rode down the lane she looked with loving eyes over the horses in the corral. She noted how well the summer range was coming along. The rains had been right this year and the mesas rolled away, greening and billowing with feed.

She rode up to the imposing Red Adobe house, tied her prancing little pony, Chile, to the hitching rack and crossed the wide veranda fronting the house. On the point of knocking she heard a sound from Carter’s office, and decided to slip in and surprise him. She was disappointed to see that the luxurious room with its paneled walls and polished desk was empty. She stood hesitating, looking around. She might just as well go back out and knock, she thought, feeling suddenly shy and uncertain of herself.

Then she heard the deep-throated laugh of a woman. Beth’s surprised dark eyes flew to the closed door at the other side of the office. She recognized the laughter as being Doll Thaw’s. At the unmistakable intimacy in the tone of Doll’s laughter Beth felt a cold shock go through her.

She backed across the room, stepped into the hall. Her fumbling hand lost its grip on the door and it slammed lightly. Beth turned in sick dismay as Doll’s voice called, “Who’s there?”

Instantly the inner door of the office opened, and the wife of the Red Adobe foreman came out. She was clad in a bright, flowered wrapper. Her flaming hair swept her shoulders. She reached behind her and closed the door, and the wide sleeve of her kimono fell away from her plump arm.

Strange sensations were rocking through Beth. With an effort she met Doll’s cold, inquiring stare with as steady a glance as she could muster.

“I came to see Mr. Ganes,” Beth declared.

“Oh, I see,” Doll remarked after an embarrassing silence in which her light blue eyes boldly surveyed the girl. She shrugged, and the gesture molded the wrapper over her full, high bosom. “He isn’t in.”

Beth’s level eyes showed that she knew Doll lied. The rumble of Carter’s deep voice had accompanied Doll’s laughter, coming from behind the closed door.

“Thank you,” Beth turned to go, her small head high.

She walked swiftly to the door and out to the porch. Outside she breathed deeply of the clean dry air. She heard the door of Carter Ganes’ room close after Doll.

So. That’s the way it was. Carter Ganes and the handsome, bold wife of his middle-aged foreman. Beth dug her heels into Chile’s flanks and burned the wind for home. She felt a searing anger, directed at herself for having been so blind to the situation. For having woven her girlish dreams around Carter.

Beth didn’t want to go home yet. She wanted to go where she could get herself and her confused emotions straightened out before she faced anyone. She would ride by Willow Springs and take a look at Old Lil’s calf, which hadn’t been doing so well.

At the head of the ravine which led to the willow shrouded spring, Beth dismounted and tossed the reins over Chile’s head. Into the summer silence came the sound of quickly approaching hoofbeats. Beth looked back on the trail just as Carter Ganes swung his big black into sight.

Beth spun about and caught the pommel of her saddle, ready to swing up on her mount and flee. Then she decided to hold her ground. She turned back and waited for Carter, her face pale but composed.

Carter pulled the black to a prancing stop and stepped out of the saddle. “Had the devil’s own time catching you, Beth,” he declared.

“I never knew you were following me,” she said evenly.

“What’s wrong?” Carter asked, studying her with wary eyes. “I saw you riding away from the Red Adobe and thought maybe you were looking for me.”

A spark of anger lit Beth’s brown eyes. “I just dropped by to speak to you and — was told — that you weren’t in. I didn’t have any special reason for calling.”

She tried to keep her voice even, unrevealing, but in spite of herself the color flared in her cheeks and her eyes flashed.

Carter laughed and laid a big hand familiarly on her shoulder. Beth jerked away, but he didn’t seem offended. “Guess you ran into Doll,” he said indulgently. “Don’t let her rile you up, Beth. She’s used to having things her own way and she thinks she runs the ranch.” He shrugged his wide shoulders with negligent good humor. “Ed’s a good man so I sort of let Doll have her head around the place.”

“You don’t have to explain her to me.” Even to her own ears Beth’s voice was strained and unnatural.

Carter laughed indulgently, inviting her to understand the handsome, high-handed wife of his foreman, but Beth didn’t return his jollity. She’d noticed something that had faintly bothered her before. Though Carter frequently laughed his eyes always remained on guard, rather cold and watchful.

Now into the moment’s silence there came a thrashing sound from the thick undergrowth about the spring. Beth and Carter both started and peered at the leafy screen. Beth caught a glimpse of red hide and said with relief, “It’s only Old Lil’s calf. I came over to see about it.”

She turned to find Carter close to her. “Listen, Beth,” he said persuasively, “I wouldn’t have any misunderstanding between us for anything in the world.” He tried to take her in his arms, but Beth stepped aside.

Strange. His smile was as genial as ever. He was just as confident and arrogant. He was even eager to have things right between them. There was an expectant, demanding look in his face that would have melted her to instant surrender a week ago.

But now Beth looked beyond him at the smooth line of the climbing hills and said with an effort, “We’ll have to work out a plan for fighting the rustlers. But not today.”

“I savvy, Beth.” Carter’s genial grin froze a bit. He stepped into his saddle and looked down at her. “But you don’t have to worry about the rustlers. Or anything else. Just leave it to me.” He jabbed his spurs down so that the black leaped forward violently. Carter looked back and called, “See you in a couple of days, querida.”

Beth looked after him with angry, helpless tears in her eyes. Carter evidently thought her jealous of Doll, and was willing to wait for her to get over it.

 

SUDDENLY a great loneliness welled through the girl. She’d built so much on a future with Carter. He’d seemed perfect. Big and sure and handsome. A shining knight. A prince among men. Someone like her dad, to look up to and place her trust in. And now he was revealed to her as a cheap philanderer. Deliberately Beth forced herself to admit that Carter had never spoken of marriage. He’d let his eyes and his kisses speak for him. And she had misunderstood. Desperately she kid her head against Chile’s saddle and sobbed, long, shaking sobs.

She didn’t see the willows part nor hear the cautious steps approaching her. When Jim Raleigh’s voice came from near at hand she started so that Chile shied away and she had to catch at the reins and pull him back.

“Crying doesn’t help anything,” Jim Raleigh said gravely averting his eyes from her flushed tear-stained face.

Beth drew a long, quivering breath and swallowed the sobs that were still rising in painful gusts.

“You were — back — there all the — time,” she gasped, her voice small and horror-filled.

Jim drew his tobacco sack from a shirt pocket. “I couldn’t get away without busting in on your little confab. I thought I’d better lay low till you left.”

“Then why didn’t you?” Beth demanded fiercely. She jerked a handkerchief from her pocket and scrubbed at her face. “I hate you,” she informed her foreman through the linen folds.

“Yes, I reckon you do,” he agreed, and thrust his tobacco sack back into his pocket. Then his voice hardened. “If you want that polecat so damn bad why don’t you fight for him like you had some guts, instead of bawling around.”

Shocked out of her grief Beth dropped her hands from her face and stared at him. He met her glance with a level blue glare that seemed to hold something of contempt, and a strange, hard anger.

He stared back at her till she lowered her eyes. She stood trembling, hating Carter Ganes and all the men in the world, but most of all she hated Jim Raleigh. The blaze of anger which swept her was hot and fierce, seeming to burn out the shame she felt over Carter.

Her face flushed brightly, her hands knotted into tight little fists. She whirled away from Jim’s unwavering gaze. She plunged into the willow thicket, knowing she had to get away from that unfriendly stare. That searching blue-eyed light that sought out her very soul and saw the quivering misery there.

There was a frantic bawl as Beth stumbled over the sick calf in a tiny clearing by the spring. She threw herself sideways to avoid hurting it. Scrambling to regain her footing she fell over an exposed root and went down. As she lay there panting she heard a savage roar and looked up to see a wild-eyed cow charging down the hillside. Old Lil!

From that angle the enraged cow looked as large as a charging elephant and as fierce as any jungle beast. Beth dug at the crumbling, leafy soil and tried to get to her feet. She was squarely between the galloping, bawling cow and the calf. Old Lil’s rolling eyes flamed red, and her opened mouth showed huge, yellowed teeth. Her horns spread wide and were as sharp pointed as swords.

Panting and sobbing, Beth struggled to her knees. She’d never make it. She couldn’t dodge the oncoming rush of the plunging cow. Then she was snatched from the ground and flung aside. There was a medley of hoarse bellows, the thin bawling of the calf, and an unintelligible shout from Jim.

Beth lifted her face from the crushed grass where she’d landed and breathlessly pushed herself up on her elbows. She saw Jim roll swiftly away from the charging cow, double to his hands and knees and spring aside as Old Lil made a short thrust at him. He had a reata in his hands and now it spun out in a low loop. The cow went down on her side with a crash.

“Got her,” Jim gasped, and moved up to hogtie the struggling animal.

He turned to face Beth who was gingerly feeling her bruised shoulders. She cried out in consternation, “Your arm’s hurt!”

Blood was seeping down his blue shirt sleeve from a spot high on his arm. Jim touched it and winced. “The point of the old girl’s horn caught me.” He grinned wryly. “That’s nothing to what could have happened to you.”

Beth had an overwhelming urge to help Jim Raleigh, to tenderly care for his wound. Impelled by a strange new feeling she moved toward him. His face was pale beneath its even tan.

“Let me see your shoulder,” Beth offered, her voice shaken with this new confusion, her whole being seeming to reach out toward him.

“It’ll be all right,” Jim said brusquely, and pushed her aside. “You get back to the ranch, and I’ll take care of this calf.”

Surprised into blankness, Beth stood helplessly watching as he bent over the spindly-legged little creature. She noted the gentleness in his hands and voice as he reassured the calf. A painful lump rose in her throat.

Tears misted her eyes as she turned toward her pony. Jim didn’t want her to touch him. He’d made that clear. He despised her. And suddenly and completely Beth longed for his respect and — yes his friendship.

Riding back over the sunny wind-swept mesa toward home she carried the image of her new foreman’s face ever before her. There had been something bleak and resigned and stricken far back in his eyes when he’d looked at her tear-soaked face as she sobbed out her self-shame back by the willows. And there was something proud and untouchable in the way he turned away from her outstretched hand.

The next week limped by as though it were hobbled. Jim avoided Beth. He spoke to her only when necessary about the ranch business. She saw that he wore a bandage on his shoulder, but he again refused her timidly offered aid. He insisted his wound was only a scratch. He rode far and wide around the Double B every day, and came in saddle weary and gray with dust.

One night, as usual, Beth lay awake for hours, looking out the window to where the Huachucas raised their jagged peaks against the sky. Above the solid blackness of the mountains the sky was a velvety blue-black. It was hung with clusters of great, silver-white, glimmering stars.

Beth gazed till her eyes ached at the eternal, unchanging mystery of their cold radiance. There was something so distant, so bright and unattainable about their beauty that it frightened her. The stars made her feel small and futile, utterly unimportant. She desperately needed someone warm and strong to cling to.

Her restless thoughts flew to Jim Raleigh. Jim, who despised her for a cowardly cry-baby who lost the man she wanted because she wouldn’t fight for him. Cold tears slid from the corners of Beth’s eyes. Lying there alone, looking up at the starlit black sky she faced the fact that she loved Jim with a wholeheartedness that had no relation whatever to the thrilled adoration that Carter had awakened in her.

Through her unhappy musings came the united sound of hoofbeats down by the corral. Beth sat up and listened. Faintly she heard the creak of leather. She slipped out of bed and tied a woolly bathrobe snugly around her.

When she opened the door a bone-chilling wind struck her. She heard the usual night sounds around the ranch. The ever-present wail of coyotes. The bark of a distant dog. Shuffling of horses from the corral. She shivered and stepped out into the yard.

She walked around the corner of the ranchhouse, looked toward the bunkhouse and stopped still, staring toward Jim’s room, next to the saddle shed. Lamplight glowed in the window. Beth started toward the bunkhouse.

She almost reached the door, was moving along in the dense shadow of the hollyhocks near the window when she heard voices and froze. Jim’s vibrant murmur. And — Doll Thaw’s unmistakable voice. Then Beth looked in and saw them in the lighted bunkhouse.

Doll was asking, “Remember down Hassayampa way last year, cowboy?” Beth’s cold hands gripped her robe tight against the sudden pain in her breast. Doll was smiling at Jim. “So, I took a pasear over to see you.” She broke off and demanded, “Say, what happened to your shoulder.”

“Tangled with a calf’s mamma,” Jim replied.

Doll said, “I’ll fix that bandage for you.” There was a broken, throaty murmur. “Mmmm, nice muscles, cowboy... Now hold this right here, while I tie it.”

“Thanks,” came Jim’s acceptance.

Beth snapped out of her trance with a start. Chilled by more than the icy wind off the mesa, she backed away from the window, then turned and ran to the house.

 

 

Chapter 3: Redheaded Rival

 

SHE dropped down on the old horsehair sofa in the front room and her state of shock gave way to hot anger and pain. As clearly as though she were with them she could see the two in Jim’s room. The bandage would be white against Jim’s bare shoulder. His teeth would gleam white, too, when he smiled at Doll. Beth writhed on the slippery leather couch. Minutes, hours, it seemed, dragged by and she couldn’t go up to her own room.

When Beth could stand it no longer she went out into the night again. By now the pale dawn was lighting the pass in the mountains, and the stars were dimming. The door of Jim’s house was opening, and Doll’s voice came clearly when Beth rounded the corner and stopped in its shadow.

Doll was saying — “Where the line crosses the river. And don’t forget your part in this, pardner.”

“Tomorrow night,” Jim assured her.

The door closed and Doll went toward the corral. Beth stole back to the house. Her heart was cold and dead within her. Her suspicions of Jim’s treachery were horribly verified...

Next morning when Beth went to the corral for Chile she was surprised to find Jim still there. He saw her, and came to meet her. As he walked toward her in the bright morning sunlight she reached out and gripped a cedar post for support. For her heart had jumped in her breast, and was pounding painfully. She was trembling so violently that she felt he must notice it.

He came on toward her, his dark head bare in the sun, his shoulders swinging with supple grace. There was a proud and fearless spirit in the blue eyes that met hers unsmilingly. Beth took a firmer grip on the post and bit her lips to steady them. Her face was pale after the trying night. Her eyes looked large and haunted, deeply brown, with the golden lights lost in shadows.

Jim said quietly, “I want to tell you not to ride out at night.”

“Why?” she managed to ask through stiff lips.

His eyes hardened and he said briefly, “Likely to be trouble.”

Beth waited for him to say more, but he didn’t. Then hot anger came to her rescue, swiftly driving the weakness from her body.

“Listen here, Jim Raleigh,” she declared firmly, “this is my ranch. If there’s trouble coming I want to know about it and I want to help fight it.”

A bitter smile tugged at his mouth. “You’ll be safer, and happier, if you keep out of this. You can take my word for that.” An odd expression, a sort of pity, flashed through his eyes and was gone.

“Why should I take your word for anything?” Beth blazed at him. “What do I know about you or what you’re really doing here.”

His face set like granite. “Reckon you’ll have to trust me for a while.” His eyes held hers demanding surrender to his will. “You’ll keep to the house after dark?”

Beth opened her lips to tell him in scorching words that she’d do as she pleased. But she thought better of it. She nodded and turned toward Chile.

She waited till Jim had ridden out of sight before she hit the trail for the Red Adobe. She forced herself to coolness as she told Carter about Doll’s visit to Jim. She held her voice and eves level, and kept her slim shoulders square and straight.

Carter’s face was deadly cold as he listened. He said briefly when Beth finished, “I’ll take care of them.”

“What can I do?” Beth asked.

“Sit tight and don’t let them know we’re wise.” His narrowed eyes looked at the girl without seeing her. “Just leave everything to me,” he said almost softly.

As Beth rode home in the bright sunlight she shivered uncontrollably as though she carried a cloud within her, a cloud that blotted out the warmth and glow of the sun. She kept seeing Carter’s cold, opaque eyes.

She’d gone to him as one rancher to another. She’d briefly forgotten all the foolishness of, lovemaking and broken dreams between them. This was a case of the Double B and Red Adobe fighting for their very existence, fighting against unscrupulous cattle thieves, and the two ranches would have to stand together.

But Carter had said, “I’ll take care of them.”

Instead of feeling reassured Beth was more bewildered, more frightened and alone than ever.

That night Beth waited till darkness before she slipped out to the corral and saddled Chile. As she rode quietly away from the ranchhouse she glanced back at the lamplight showing around the edges of the drawn curtains of her room. Jim — or anyone — would be deceived into thinking her there, meekly waiting at home while rustlers prowled Santa Luz valley, perhaps this very night picking off choice Double B stock.

As she rode in the dark, across the familiar pastures and into the shadow of foothills Beth reflected that the Double B was in a perfect location to tempt cattle thieves. Any number of cattle could be driven across the border here. Especially if the ranch foreman was working with the rustlers. And if the owner was a foolish girl who could be so easily blinded by a man’s flashing smile and high-handed manner. By vivid blue eyes and a wide, curving mouth.

Finally she heard what she’d been expecting — the distant sounds of cattle being driven. A cold sort of glaze ran over her body. She drew Chile to a halt and sat tense and listening. Her eyes peered into the darkness at the crooked, twisted silhouette of wind-bent scrub oak lifted against the horizon. An owl hooted dismally. The night was cloudy, with the moon chasing in and out of clouds like a scared ghost.

Then the sounds came again, floating on the stirring wind. A thin, restless sort of bawling. A muted thudding of hoofs.

Beth felt waves of cold running along her nerves. Yet she had never felt more self-possessed. She swung Chile along the hillside, keeping safely down from the rim. If she followed the narrow trail across the foothills she’d come out near the point where the Santa Luz crossed the border into Mexico.

Ocottilo wands whipped across the trail and she mechanically dodged them. Overhead the huge silver-white stars showed through rifts in the clouds. The night wind whistled through the hills, growing more chill each moment. It lifted Beth’s short curls and brought stinging tears to her eyes. Creeping, fleeing things slithered off through the grass as she rode along the trail.

Her first high courage began to fade away. She felt frightened and alone and pursued by strange evil shadows in the night. If she’d stayed home she’d never know for sure about Jim. She resolutely beat down the treacherous thought. She must face the truth tonight even though it broke her heart.

Chile’s hoofs chimed on rock as she topped the crest of the hill. Below she caught the glint of the waters of the Santa Luz where it flowed under the barbed wire fence and so into Mexico. Beth turned and looked upstream.

The dim cold moonlight shone on the tossing horns of a band of cattle who were just coming into sight. Swiftly Beth dismounted and went down to the river on foot, hurrying, feeling her way as the moon slipped behind a cloud.

There was a clump of willows and poplars on the very brink of the river. Beth headed for their shelter, slipping through with an almost panicky sigh of relief. Her heart was bounding in her breast and her hands were chill and damp.

There was a stir of branches near her. She went rigid. Then she was struggling in a cruelly tight grasp, her scream of terror smothered by a hard hand covering her face.

 

 

Chapter 4: Gunfire Cleanup

 

“BE QUIET,” Jim Raleigh ordered in a low tone, “or I’ll hogtie and gag you.” Beth went limp against him. He went on, sounding angry, “I might have known that you’d butt in and make trouble. Why didn’t you stay home?”

She strained her head back against his arm and her dark eyes flashed the defiance she couldn’t speak.

Jim went on harshly, “I can’t take time to get you out of this.” His eyes were bright and hard, holding hers. “So you either promise to keep still or I’ll tie you up. How about it?”

Beth felt dizzy. A wet, dank smell came from the river. A bullfrog plumped into the water from the bank. Nearer came the sounds of the trotting cattle. Slough of hoofs in sand. Creak of saddle leather. Even a muttered curse floating out on the breeze.

She could hear the hard pound of Jim’s heart against her cheek. Her own fury and terror and defiance merged into a wild excitement that swept through her.

“Well?” Jim demanded huskily. His eyes were narrow slices of light fixed on her face. “Make up your mind. Pronto!”

Beth nodded. His grip relaxed, though he still kept his arm around her.

Jim said quickly in a low, flat undertone, “This thing’s going to be busted wide open tonight. What I’ve waited and worked for over a year. Now, Beth, no matter what happens don’t you make a sound.” He turned his head to look down at her. “Get me?”

Then the cattle came even with them, were being driven through the sandy, shallow water. Beth’s eyes felt strained as she stared at the swiftly trotting, dark shapes. The moonlight was dim but she could distinctly read her own brand, the Double B.

There were only two riders. Wiry men riding low in the saddle, seeming unafraid, unsuspecting trouble. Beside Beth, Jim crouched, leaning forward. He stared toward the rustlers, tensed as they came into a patch of light. He dropped back as they rode on. Beth heard him swear softly. Evidently he was disappointed.

Kneeling there in the brush Beth was so rigid that her muscles ached. She cautiously brushed a sharp twig out of her face. Slowly she let the breath from her aching lungs. She felt as though groping through a fog of bewilderment. Suddenly Jim’s hand shot out and gripped her arm.

From upstream came the double hoof-beats of two approaching horses. In a moment they came into sight. Beth recognized Carter Ganes on his big black. The horses slowed and stopped. They were near enough for Beth to see the expression of cruel purpose on Carter’s handsome face.

Jim moved swiftly, silently. A gun rested in his hand. Beth held her breath. The second horse shifted so that the moonlight gleamed from a crown of red hair. Doll Thaw!

“What did you drag me out here for, Carter?” The woman’s voice came in a hoarse gasp. She looked around and added more naturally, “Isn’t everything going like you planned?”

“Maybe,” Carter replied. “And maybe more than I planned.” His voice was silkily cold. “Maybe I didn’t want you to miss out on any excitement, Doll, since you find it so dull in the valley.”

“Quit stalling!” The woman flashed around at him. “You know why I find it dull! You know I’m sick and tired of watching you honey up to that black-eyed cutie.”

“Maybe you’re so sick of it you took a little pasear over to see her new foreman.” Carter’s voice chilled even more. “Maybe you gave him a little tip, figuring you’d get rid of me and join up with him.”

There was a short, ugly silence. Willows rustled in the breeze. The water lapped coolly at the bank. Jim was as still as though made from granite and Beth held herself in painful tenseness.

Doll Thaw made a choked sound. Then she laughed, a forced, harsh laugh. “Carter, you always were too smart for me. But what I figured was this. To throw a scare into you so you’d leave the country with me. Tonight.” She threw out a pleading hand. “Honest, I was going to warn you not to come down here tonight.“ Her voice showed a tinge of defiance.” That Barlow girl was always coming ’round the place. She expected you to marry her.”

Beth winced and Jim shot her a warning glance.

“You know what the game was, Doll,” Carter retorted in a cold fury. “What did it matter what she expected? I had to blind her to what went on. I had to use this ranch to get the cattle into Mexico.” His cutting voice took on a sharp finality. “But you got cold feet and spoiled the best deal we ever had just when it was about to wind up. I’d have got rid of this foreman of hers like I did the rest and then bought her out cheap.”

“Let’s get out of here, Carter,” Doll broke in uneasily. “Let’s ride across the border. There’s still time.”

“Afraid of the trap you set?” Carter jeered. “Listen, Doll, I’m through with you. And you play the game now or you’re through with everything — for good.”

“What do you mean?” Doll whispered hoarsely.

“Wait here where Raleigh can see you when he comes up. That’s all. Just wait out where the moon’ll shine on your hair. He won’t shoot you.”

“Then what?” It was a dry croak.

Carter laughed. He turned his horse and the light gleamed on the gun in his hand. “Tomorrow someone finds the new foreman of the Double B. Killed while crossing cattle into Mexico.”

“Carter, wait!” Doll’s voice broke on a harsh scream. “What about me?” She urged her horse toward him.

“Stay there!” He jerked his hand and the gun glinted blue in the moonlight.

But the frantic woman jerked her horse around so that it reared and pawed the air. It came down with a jarring thump and she spurred it forward.

Ganes’ gun snapped up. Doll screamed as a double report cracked out. Beth felt a scream tearing through her own lips. Jim was springing forward, his smoking gun in his hand. Carter’s weapon lay on the bank of the river and he was reaching swiftly into the saddle bag.

“Hold it Ganes,” Jim shouted, running forward. “Reach, pronto!”

Beth was following Jim. Was right at his shoulder when she felt a cold sensation, sort of a crawling along her backbone. She spun about to see Doll, her face white in the moonlight, her arm outstretched. Beth gazed in horror at the lifted gun in Doll’s hand. The other woman looked like an avenging fury with her red mane flying wild in the moonlight and her face contorted with hate and terror.

“Jim!” Beth cried, and threw herself forward to shield him from Doll’s leveled gun. “She’s gone clear loco,” Beth sobbed. “She’s going to shoot!”

Jim pushed Beth down and crouched over her. A bullet whistled close above them and there was a roar of pain from Carter.

Beth’s ears ached with the sound of close shots. Her nostrils burned with powder smoke. Her slender form was crushed under the weight of Jim’s protecting body. For a moment’s confusion she couldn’t realize what had happened.

But she heard the sharp clatter of hooves, and the wild, hysterical laughter dying away on the wind as a horse plunged up the bank and away on the foothill trail. Then she became aware that Jim had moved away. She stumbled to her feet. Jim was leaning over Carter whose big figure sprawled slackly on the ground.

Carter stirred and looked up at them. Jim said quietly, “You’ll be well enough to stand trial, Ganes.”

“I know who you are now,” Carter muttered thickly. “You’re that rancher from over Hassayampa way. It was dark that night —” his voice trailed away.

 

“YEP,” Jim agreed grimly. “That night you cleaned out my spread.” He straightened and looked down at the big man. “Took me quite some time to track you down, Ganes. I had to go slow, because I was working blind. I didn’t know who you were by daylight.” He took a deep breath as though forcing himself to relax.

Carter fumbled toward his shirt pocket and bit back a groan. Jim promptly fished the makings of a smoke from his own pocket, rolled the cigarette, lit it and handed it to Carter who took it awkwardly in his left hand. “Where’d Doll come into it?” he asked.

“I remembered seeing her around at the time of the rustling,” Jim explained. “That’s what finally put me on your trail.” He shot a strange, reluctant glance at Beth, who was waiting with wide eyes fixed on his face. “Doll was afraid you’d two-time her on this deal so she came over one night and gave me a hint about what was going on. I reckon she meant to make it too hot for you to stay around here. She figured you’d clear out of the country with her.”

A cruel smile flickered across Ganes’ mouth. He moved and then cursed.

“Ride to the ranch, Beth,” Jim said quickly. “Get a wagon and a couple of the boys. We have to get Ganes in to the doctor and the sheriff.”

Beth obediently turned away. But something about the way Jim had looked when he spoke of Doll bothered her. There’d been something strange, too, in his eyes when he looked at her standing so quietly beside the wounded man. Suddenly she realized the fact that Jim Raleigh pitied her! Why, he thought she loved Carter Ganes! He was sorry for her.

It was almost sunup when they finished their business with the sheriff and rode wearily back to the Double B. When a cowboy took their tired mounts away, Beth and Jim stood alone together. They looked at each other warily. Beth felt a helpless confusion filling her. She didn’t know what to say.

Jim said soberly, “Reckon you won’t have any trouble keeping help or running your spread now, Beth.” He fumbled his hat in his hands.

“Are you — in a hurry — to move on?” she asked through the tightness in her throat.

“Reckon I better,” he said shortly. His voice turned husky. “I’m sorry, kid, it had to turn out this way. That it had to be Ganes who was doing the rustling and that I had to get him.” He drew a long, weary breath. “I’m sorry you had to be in on the finish.”

Beth said nothing. She felt the tears stinging her eyelids, felt them ready to slip down her cheeks and splash on her dusty hands. In a minute now Jim Raleigh would go out of her life. And the sun might just as well never come up again. It might just as well be forever the cold, gray dawn, because all her reason for living would be gone.

Jim stirred uneasily and edged toward the saddle shed. Beth became desperate. She must stop him. She summoned all her strength, shook the tears off her lashes and moved closer to him in shy, hesitant steps.

“I’m s-sorry you don’t like the Double B well enough to stay, Jim,” she said softly. She couldn’t force herself to meet his eyes, so she stared fixedly past his shoulder.

Jim stopped in his tracks. He started and looked quickly over his shoulder as though to see who she was smiling at. He said on an explosive breath, “Well, what the hell? All over again?”

She swayed toward him, and her dusky lashes fluttered over her eyes.

“Beth Barlow,” Jim stated grimly, “I warned you about what happened when girls cooed at me and looked past my shoulder.” His arms shot out and he caught her close. She gave a broken sob of happiness and clung to him.

He kissed her hard. Then more gently. Then very sweetly.

“There’s no one else around,” he said softly into the touseled bronze curls. “So I reckon this time it’s meant for me.”

Beth stirred in his arms. She felt a great welling happiness and a humbleness at how much his tone revealed. The jealousy and anger and hurt that had been boiling in him ever since that first kiss in the office.

She raised her eyes to his, let him see the shining glory of her love. “It’s been you since the first day,” she confessed.

“This is for keeps,” said Jim. “We’re getting married, pronto.”

Over the lowest hump of the mountains the sun poked a dazzling arc of golden rays. A mockingbird trilled from the top of the barn. The scent of coffee and bacon wafted from the kitchen. Beth felt all this as a beautiful background for their kisses. Her beloved home was safe. And she was in the arms of her husband-to-be.

 

THE END