Jacob Payne, bounty hunter, pulled up the collar on his coat and smiled to himself. He had been waiting for this for months. Temperatures closer to thirty than to eighty was what December was supposed to feel like. Here in Tucson there wouldn’t be too many weeks of weather this cold, not like back in Virginia, but he would enjoy it while he had the chance.
Jacob hurried down the busy dirt street through town, reveling in the piercing cold even in the middle of a sunny day. He wanted to be early for meeting Bonnie Loft as she finished her shift at the San Xavier Cafe; he reminded himself he had plenty of time to enjoy the cold weather. It should hang around for at least another couple months. He hoped. What was Christmas without a coat at the very least?
Even from a distance Jacob could tell that the cafe was crowded—strange for the middle of the afternoon. As he opened the door and crossed the threshold, though, he understood why. Coming inside from the cold, in from the outdoors, the San Xavier Cafe was a welcoming haven. Whatever Mrs. Everill had been cooking all morning had made the entire place smell of cinnamon and cloves with an undercurrent of butter. Jacob took a good, deep whiff of the spiced air as he looked around.
There wasn’t an empty table in the place. Everywhere he looked, Jacob saw his friends and neighbors talking and laughing over their meals. Men that Jacob knew should be out tending to stock or repairing a roof lounged at a cafe table clutching a mug of coffee. Women that Jacob recognized as busy wives and mothers leaned their heads close together, whispering and laughing at whatever gossip they shared.
Tucson was booming. They had just gotten their first newspaper a few months prior, and word had it that Phoenix (over a hundred miles north) would soon be an incorporated city as well. The Territory of Arizona was filling up, and though Jacob had come west to give himself a fresh start away from people, he had to admit that finding himself in a place surrounded by friends and neighbors, by people he cared about, was a welcome surprise.
Mickey, the bartender, waved Jacob over from where he stood in the doorway to the cafe.
Shrugging off his coat, Jacob made his way over. He found a lone barstool in between two pairs of men, and leaned forward to be heard over the din of the room.
“What’s all this, Mick?” Jacob asked. “You all giving away some free pie or something?”
“Ach, no. The few days before Christmas have been our busiest the last few years. Mrs. Everill claims it’s a combination of the cold outside and folks not wanting to work if they don’t have to and the general feelings of community and generosity as the holiday approaches. I’ve seen men get into fistfights after arguing about who was going to pay for that next round of drinks.” He shook his head as Jacob laughed.
“Well, I promise not to fight anyone who wants to buy me a drink.”
Micky waved him off. “You don’t worry me, Payne. I know you’re not staying.” He pulled out his pocket watch to verify the time. “Bonnie should be out here any second and then you’ll whisk her away, won’t you?”
“If she wants to be whisked away I am happy to be the man to do that job,” Jacob averred.
Mickey chuckled as he turned to give another patron his attention.
Jacob turned around and leaned with his back to the bar. From this spot he could watch the happenings in the cafe. Though he wasn’t currently hunting down an outlaw, and didn’t have any intentions to take a new job until January, he couldn’t very well turn off his instincts. Jacob surveyed the room carefully, looking for suspicious behavior, for men who were trying to hide something or strangers that seemed out of place. This was what he was best at, after all. Watching. Listening. Observing. And homing in on the outlaw that was trying to evade capture.
Bonnie Loft shyly stepped into his line of view. Jacob smiled widely at her and quickly hopped down off the barstool.
“Miss Loft,” he said, unnaturally formal and bowing slightly.
“Mr. Payne,” she replied.
“May I escort you out of the cafe?” He offered his arm as he over-enunciated each of the words, figuring if he was going to play into the formal nature of their meeting he might as well go all the way.
It worked. She laughed and took his arm in response. He led her out of the San Xavier Cafe, not even bothering to say good-bye to Mickey.
The couple didn’t speak again until they had exited the crowded building and were back in the cold, relative quiet of the street.
“You sure you don’t mind doing a little shopping with me, Jacob?”
Bonnie huddled close to him against the cold and Jacob stood up a little straighter, proud to be the one to provide that protection for her.
“I can’t think of a single thing I would mind doing with you,” he promised her.
“I’d like to send some gifts back home to my family.”
“That’s very generous of you.”
She shrugged, looking into the big front window of the hardware store they passed. “Family is family. I honestly don’t know if I will ever see them again, so this is just a little way I can make sure they know I’m thinking about them.”
Jacob was silent, thinking about his own family back in Virginia. He had sent them one telegram when he had arrived in Tucson almost a year ago, just so they would know he was alive, and know where to find him if they absolutely had to. But beyond that he hadn’t had any desire to contact them again. After losing his wife and son, Jacob was more inclined to feel like he had no family at all, rather than thinking of his brothers as family.
“This is your first Christmas since leaving Virginia, isn’t it?” Bonnie continued.
“Yeah, it is. But …” He faltered, embarrassed for the first time by his distance from his family.
“Well,” Bonnie said, picking up the thread and saving him from having to defend himself, “this year you can come with me to the Nativity play at my church.”
“That might be nice,” he agreed. “It’s the night before Christmas?”
“Yes, but I promised to help with the costumes. Somehow in the next few days I need to put together outfits for the shepherds and Mary and Joseph and all.” She laughed at the thought. “You’ll be in town, won’t you?”
“I will. I already told the marshal. I’m not planning on taking any new jobs until at least the new year. I have plenty of things to take care of around home and I don’t need to be leaving the warm home fire at the holidays.”
“The warm home fire of your boarding house?” she teased.
“Oh, well.” He grinned. “It’s an expression. I’ll have a warm home fire sometime.”
She smiled up at him and seemed about to say something further before turning her attention to the store on their right.
“Here we are,” she announced. “Can we go in there?”
In answer, Jacob opened the door for her, ushering Bonnie into the warm interior of the Tucson General Store.
This town was growing and they were getting more and more specialized shops, but the general store, run by the Towers family for the last six years, would always be a pillar. As they entered, Jacob noticed the store was almost as crowded as San Xavier Cafe had been, mostly women with arms and baskets full of all the supplies they would need for a festive family holiday in the next few days.
“Are you here for anything specific?” he asked, looking around.
Bonnie shook her head. “I have some ideas, but it’s more that I’ll know it when I see it.”
Jacob nodded. “You lead the way, then. Consider me your packhorse. I am at your disposal.”
Bonnie beamed at him and tugged his arm gently, leading him down a crowded aisle between shelves of cooking utensils and barrels of dry food stuffs. Though Jacob felt completely out of his element, he enjoyed his busy afternoon of shopping with Bonnie. After a thorough search, she settled on a bolt of calico fabric for her parents, along with other small things for herself and her fellow lodgers. Simple though it may be, she thought that whatever her mother made with the calico would remind them of their daughter. She worried about the cost to ship it all the way back to the east coast, but reconciled herself with the fact that she would not be going herself. She needed to send them something.
“I’m only partway through writing my letter to them,” she told Jacob, as Mrs. Towers packaged up her purchases. “I want to tell them everything, and give them a lovely thick envelope to pour over.”
“That’s thoughtful.”
“You don’t think your family would like the same thing?”
Jacob thought briefly before shaking his head. He couldn’t remember his brother ever reading anything other than the Bible and his account ledgers. A letter would just confound him; he would find it wasteful.
“That’s not the kind of family we are,” he said simply. The bounty hunter gathered up Bonnie’s packages in both arms. “You’ll have to lead the way.” He indicated the door to the store with a nod of his head. It was far too crowded inside for them to walk side by side. “I’ll walk you home.”
She smiled at him again, her warm and grateful smile, and led him to the street.