THREE

The sun, when it broke, was low and hard, giving off red light through the broken clouds but little heat. The slanting sunlight caused a jewel-like glow to bounce off the morning dew. In the hollows, still deep in shadow, there was rime underfoot where the horses, their nostrils steaming, left circular imprints with their hoofs. We continued southward, me still holding Amy as I guided Bitterroot along the trail toward Diamond.

I saw no cattle on all the vast expanse of grassland, and that puzzled me. If Tag also noticed this, he made no comment. He continued to watch the backtrail, looking for the man who had been following us the night before. I could not see the man either, although if he kept to the higher slopes, the timber would continue to hide him.

Amy, who had complained at length about the breakfast of canned beans she had had to eat, became more restless. She chatted cheerfully as we rode, but squirmed so much in my arms that finally Tag offered:

‘I’ll take her for a while, Brian.’

Gratefully I handed her over to her brother. Amy released my coat reluctantly and was still pouting when we started on again, she riding behind Tag on Daisy.

‘I wonder how far the house is,’ Tag said. I could only shrug an answer. I had no way of knowing. How big was the Diamond? A few hundred acres? A few thousand? Tag had said that it was one of the largest ranches in Wyoming; if true it would be quite large. Many thousands of acres.

The breeze began to grow as the sun rose higher, turning yellow, and it shifted the manes and tails of our horses, chilling us through our coats. As the day progressed the temperature plummeted, and finally on the northern horizon we saw the beginnings of what I had dreaded all along: great stacked thunderheads, black against the crystal blue sky towered over the mountains, promising bad weather. It would snow and snow hard. If only it would hold off until we could find the Diamond Ranch house, or failing that, other shelter. I had no wish to be caught on the open plains with two children in the midst of a north country blizzard. The wind rose and the skies darkened. The land began to lift again and grow more wooded. Now there were oaks scattered among the pine trees, swaying barren and leafless before the sweep of the wind. Tag rode with his shoulders hunched; Amy was barely visible wrapped tightly in her striped blanket. The snow began to fall.

Wind-driven, the flakes struck against my eyes and stung my cheeks. I squinted against the weather and continued to guide the stolid Bitterroot through the trees, keeping the wind at our backs as a crude compass. Tag said something, but when I glanced at him his teeth were chattering so badly that I could not make out what he was saying. I knew we were in for a bad time if the snow continued, and the storm showed no sign of weakening. Along the high peaks black clouds snaked through the pines vengefully. The earth was in shadow and the wind whistled through the forest, snapping off weaker high branches, showering us with pine cones. I could not stop my shivering; my wolfskins were not enough to cut the chill of the flurries.

Then I saw, or thought I saw through the tumult of the storm, beyond the dark ranks of the pines, a structure huddled in the valley ahead of us. I lifted a pointing finger, but Tag had already seen it and with a glance at me, he heeled Daisy on. The little pony had little more speed to offer, but she charged gamely on down the slope toward what we could now see was a wide-spreading ranch house.

Diamond, I thought. It had to be, didn’t it? I was unjustifiably proud of myself for having delivered the children home. More, the thought of a warm fire and walls to block the cut of the wind cheered me as we approached the house. Smoke rose from a stone chimney at the log house’s center, but the wind whipped the dark smoke away before it could rise and plume. Probably half of the smoke was being thrust back down the chimney into the house itself. No matter – that would be a small inconvenience to us compared to the harsh weather we had ridden through. The snow had lowered, thickened and was now roiling past us as we guided our ponies toward the house.

Tag was young, but even this eleven-year old boy knew enough to guide our horses toward a nearby barn. The animals would be taken care of first. Inside the carelessly built barn, we dismounted, limbs stiff with the cold. I helped Amy from her pony’s back and she sighed and looked up at me with a weak smile.

‘That was getting to be a close one,’ she said, and I thought, for a nine-year old she was pretty brave. Two good youngsters, I decided, as I unsaddled Bitterroot and backed him into a stall and watched Tag, his sister helping as best she could, stabling Daisy.

Together they stood at the barn door, studying the dark form of the ranch house through the swirl and surge of the storm. They seemed suddenly confused, reluctant to proceed. I put on my best smile, walked between them and put an arm around each.

‘Ready?’ I asked and their heads bobbed silently. I led them once again into the teeth of the storm to march across the empty yard where already snow was drifted against the base of the oak trees there, and together we stamped up onto the porch of the big house.

I rapped on the heavy door with my knuckles. Beside me Amy shivered in her tightly wrapped blanket. Tag had his hands thrust into his pockets as far as they could go. His hunched shoulders were nearly to his ears. I rapped again, harder. The door opened.

A tall, dark eyed man in range clothes, a belted revolver at his waist peered out, frowned at me, taking in my round badger fur hat and wolfskin coat and demanded:

‘Who are you and what do you want?’

‘Shelter,’ I said. ‘And I’ve brought two cold children who need the same.’

‘Just a minute,’ the unfriendly man said. He shut the door, but left it ajar a few inches and I could hear words being exchanged inside the house. In another minute a woman with pale blue eyes, her blond hair knotted at the back of her head, opened the door wide. She too was wearing range clothes – jeans and a red flannel shirt – and she looked down at the children and said:

‘For goodness sake! Get inside, you three. What was Cole thinking leaving you outside in this weather!’

The children were hustled inside, Tag with some reluctance at having a woman’s arm placed around him. Inside across a plank floor I could see two men standing in front of a large native stone fireplace with an arched hearth. One of them was the dark eyed, mean-looking man the lady had called Cole. The other man was pale-haired like the woman who had ushered us inside. Both held a white mug of steaming coffee.

We dripped water on the floor as we were guided toward the fire. As I had guessed, smoke drifted back into the room, but it was not unpleasant. The fire was of cedar wood and the scent was fragrant. More, the room was warm. I already had the urge to shed my coat and hat, but waited until invited to do so.

‘I am,’ Tag said like a little gentleman, ‘Tag Bellows, and this is my sister Amy. Also, allow me to introduce our travelling companion, Mr Brian McCulloch.’ It was said in an adult manner, and I considered that I had again underestimated the maturity of the eleven-year old. Someone in his background had given him a good deal of polish.

‘Tag?’ The woman looked from one child to the other with wonder. ‘And Amy! Don’t you recognize me? Aunt Bettina, and that is your Uncle Grant. Has it been that long since we’ve seen you!’ Bewildered, she asked, ‘But where are your mother and father? Where are Peter and Rose?’

I waited, looking away as Tag again painfully recounted his parents’ fate. The blond man, Grant Bellows, his eyes concerned, listened closely. Cole’s lips were tight; he stared at the fire, one shiny boot propped up on a brass fire dog.

‘Terrible, terrible,’ Bettina Bellows said. She crouched now to take Tag’s hand and to look into the eyes of Amy. ‘Don’t worry now, you’re home.’

‘I’m plenty hungry,’ Amy said. ‘He only gave me beans to eat,’ she added, nodding at me. Bettina glanced at me and then laughed.

‘You’ll have a good solid breakfast. First, though we’re going to see that you bathe!’ And the kids were a sight after the long days on the trail west. Tag’s clothes were next to rags and Amy’s hair was tangled, her face smudged. As for me – well, I guess I never looked much better anyway. Standing there in my mountain gear: wolfskin coat, round badger-fur hat on my head, my fox-skin leggings, I must have looked pretty primitive to these lowland folks.

‘What about Brian?’ Tag asked. ‘Does he have to bathe too?’

‘Probably be a new experience for him,’ Cole sneered, increasing my dislike for him, but Bettina answered firmly.

‘We’ll let Mr McCulloch get started on his breakfast while you two clean up.’

‘He needs new clothes too,’ Amy said, ‘his stink!’

‘Well …’ Bettina said, flushing slightly. ‘We’ll see what we can do about that – if he wants to change clothes. Cole? You probably have clothes that would fit Mr McCulloch.’ Cole nodded.

‘I guess I might,’ he answered, but his tone indicated that he had no intention of loaning me any to wear.

‘I’ll dig up something,’ Grant Bellows said. ‘I’m sure I’ve at least got a shirt and an old pair of jeans.’

‘That’s settled then,’ Bettina Bellows said, standing, wiping back a loose strand of blond hair from her forehead. ‘I’ll have Laurel start some water boiling for your tubs. And have her set a place at the table for Mr McCulloch. Laurel! Where are you?’

‘Here, Miss Bettina,’ I heard, and a tall, dark woman entered the room from a side door. The scent of cooking drifted into the room with her.

‘We need some water for the children’s baths. Do you remember Tag and Amy, Laurel?’

Tag immediately rushed to Laurel, seeming to have a stronger memory of her than he did of his own aunt and uncle. As far as that went, she was a memorable-looking woman. Tall, slender, graceful in her movements. Her eyes were as black as obsidian, but gave off warmth. She crouched, clasped Tag to her aproned breast and smiled at Amy, stretching out a hand toward the girl. Without reluctance Amy also went to her and Laurel led them away presumably toward their baths.

Before she had gone, Bettina called after her, ‘Laurel, set a plate for Mr McCulloch, will you? It seems that he is the children’s savior.’

As soon as the door closed behind Laurel and the kids, Cole stepped toward me and asked savagely, ‘How’d you come to find the kids, McCulloch? In all that wild country?’

His voice was suspicious, angry. Grant Bellows calmed his friend. ‘Take it easy, Cole. The man saved the kids, didn’t he?’

‘I want to know how he happened to come along just when their escorts were gunned down.’

‘Sometimes things happen in strange ways,’ I said, not wanting to bring up the whole story of how I had been trailing Jason Grier on another matter of business: Sad Sam’s murder. Both men waited, but I said no more. Finally Bettina interrupted the cold silence. She touched my elbow and told me:

‘Laurel will have hotcakes and bacon going on the griddle soon. And there’s coffee ready.’

I nodded my thanks and followed the gesture Bettina made toward the kitchen door. Inside I found myself in a long white-plastered room with two plank tables and flanking benches and two iron stoves, one of which was lit. A pot of coffee and a white ceramic cup had been placed on the table. Laurel was busy with the children, it seemed. I peeled off my wolfskins, ashamed of that coat of mine for the first time, removed my round badger-skin hat and seated myself within arms’ length of the coffeepot.

After a minute Laurel returned, but she only glanced at me before putting two big black kettles filled with water onto the stove. I poured myself a cup of coffee and sat there alone as Laurel breezed back out, going into a hallway that led to somewhere in the back of the house.

The coffee was dark and hot. I sipped at it, feeling my bones warm as the heat of the kitchen comforted me. Beyond a single high, narrow window I could see the storm shifting and blowing. Large flakes pasted themselves against the glass pane and then were melted to slide away by the heat of the kitchen. I pondered my situation.

I was in a place I was not wanted. At least by the man named Cole, although Grant Bellows seemed nearly as suspicious of me, and Bettina Bellows’ welcome hadn’t been exactly warm. Well, I couldn’t blame them a lot. A stranger, dressed in north mountain-country furs knocking at their door with two children and what seemed a wild story about finding them in the wilderness. Maybe they thought I was trying to extort payment from them. Maybe they thought that I had done the killing myself.

My mouth tightened at the thought, although it didn’t matter what they thought. I did not care in the slightest. I had brought the children home. Now I was free to go on my own way.

Wherever that was.

How could I hope to catch up with Grier now? We were in the middle of a blizzard, and I hadn’t even a horse or a minimum of supplies. I frowned and lifted the coffee cup to my lips just as Laurel entered the room again. She looked my way.

‘What’s that frown for? Just a minute and I’ll have your food ready.’

‘Need help?’ I asked as she hoisted one of the big iron kettles containing hot bath water, using a hand towel for a hotpad.

‘I’ll manage it,’ she said with a faint smile. ‘I’m used to doing the heavy lifting around here.’

I studied her as she fussed with the pots, turned and went out again, opening the door with her toe. She was younger than I had first thought, my age or a little older – around twenty. Lithe, but certainly strong. Her face was cheerful now that she was working … and away from Cole and the Bellows. There was some sort of unhappy undercurrent here, but I had no need to understand it and didn’t waste my time pondering all of the possibilities.

I simply drank my coffee and before I had finished my second cup, Laurel had returned again and started flapjacks frying, with bacon sizzling in a second pan. It was a comfortable place to be, in this warm kitchen, watching a woman perform these small tasks for me. It was too bad it would have to end almost before it had begun. I moved my elbows so that Laurel could serve my breakfast and reflected briefly on what Sad Sam would say if he could see me sitting here, in what was a castle compared to our sagging cabin in the mountains, piping hot food before me. I thought I knew:

‘Quit gawking at that girl and stuff your gullet! That’s liable to be your last hot meal for a long, long time.’

As I was finishing up my breakfast, Tag returned to the kitchen, his face scrubbed, hair slicked back. He was followed by Amy who sort of flounced in, doing a little dance, holding her skirt up as she went to Laurel’s side. Laurel, stirring up a fresh batch of hotcake batter, glanced down and smiled.

I said to Tag, ‘Well, you made it home.’ I didn’t get the sort of cheerful response I was expecting.

‘To the ranch,’ he replied glumly. I supposed he was thinking that Diamond was not really home without his mother and father, and started to say something along those lines when he looked at me sharply and said, ‘Something’s up around here, and I don’t like it.’

Tag had that expression again, the one where he looked far too old for his years, too concerned with the world’s troubles. His sister prattled on to Laurel about something. Finally I asked:

‘What’s troubling you, Tag?’

Instead of answering, he said, ‘Will you stay on for a while, Brian? I know you’ve got places to go but … in this weather you won’t get far anyway, will you?’

‘I don’t suppose so, no,’ I had to agree. ‘But why, Tag?’

‘I’d just feel better that way,’ he said. Then he looked up and smiled as Laurel delivered a tall stack of hotcakes and homemade brown sugar syrup to the table. Tag was engrossed in his eating, no longer in the mood for conversation, and so I rose.

‘Is there any of that hot water left?’ I asked Laurel. She looked me up and down and told me:

‘I can boil some more. You want to take a bath, too?’

‘Yes, I’d like to,’ I answered without confessing that I could barely remember the last time I had had a real bath and it would seem like heaven to me to soak in warm water. Maybe she understood all of that without me saying a word. She was a woman who seemed to know much. Maybe she could tell me what Tag was upset about. I would ask her later.

For now I followed her down the short hall to the bathroom. There was a small entry room with a wooden chair and glass mirror and beyond it the actual bath. The porcelain tub was still damp from the kids’ scrubbing. A few damp towels lay scattered on the floor.

‘I’ll clean this mess up for you,’ Laurel offered, starting to collect the towels, but I stopped her.

‘I can handle that, I think. You’re already doing enough.’

She nodded her thanks and scuttled away again. I wondered, as I stepped into the tiny bathroom and began discarding my furs, who Laurel was and how she had come to be on the Diamond. I stood in my twill trousers and long john shirt waiting for Laurel to return with some hot water. I picked up the towels and placed them over the back of the chair in the other room to dry. Waiting there, I thought I heard someone hailing the house from out of the storm. Curious, I stood on tiptoes to peer out the high window. Past the snowflakes obscuring the glass I saw movement.

I squinted, wiping at the window fog with the back of my hand. A rider was approaching on a dark horse. He paused in the yard, not swinging down. I could not make him out clearly, but saw that he was dark, wore a black hat and that his mount was a spotted pony. Someone from inside the house, bulky in a thick coat, strode to where he waited. The two men had a brief conversation, and then the horseman started his pony away at a walk. I thought the man he had met was Cole, but he kept his back to me and before I could make certain, Laurel came through the door with a huge iron kettle. Struggling through the doorway she upended it into the tub, spilling steaming hot water into the bath.

‘One more trip,’ she said with a weary smile, and I nodded, waiting while she returned to the kitchen for more water. I looked out the window again, but saw only the snow falling through the black oaks of the ranch yard. Mentally shrugging, I sat down on the chair, waiting for Laurel to return so that I could begin my bath.

When she had come and gone again, I lowered myself gratefully into the tub. I soaked and scrubbed until the water was cool and then stepped out, toweling myself hard enough to rub the skin off. Stepping into the entry room I saw that someone had placed a blue flannel shirt and a faded pair of black jeans on the chair. My furs were missing.

Dressing, I heard a tap on the door. When I opened it Tag stood there holding a pair of cowboy boots. ‘I got these for you,’ he said, handing them over. ‘I had to guess at the size.’

‘Where are my own clothes?’ I asked, knowing that I would be traveling on again soon, and in the winter cold my own garments, as shabby as they might seem, were more suited to my journey than ranch garb.

‘I think Laurel said something about airing them out. Brian, no offense, but you were kind of gamy-smelling.’

I tried the boots, tugged them on and found that they fit surprisingly well. Old, scuffed, but useable. All I needed now was a Stetson. And a shave.

‘You look good in those,’ Tag said as I stood. ‘Have you ever been a cowboy?’

‘Only for a short time,’ I admitted. ‘Two summers ago Sam and I were hard up for survival money and we took a job on a Montana ranch – the Cable, if you’ve ever heard of it. I did my share of roping and branding, though I had a lot to learn from the old-time hands.’

I should have been surprised, but was not, to spot the closed razor resting on a fresh small towel in front of the mirror.

‘You people have decided to scrub me all the way down, haven’t you?’

‘To see the new you,’ Tag said. With a little grin he added, ‘It was all Laurel’s idea.’ Then his worried frown returned and as he watched me soap my beard, he asked, ‘Did you see him, too, Brian?’

‘Who do you mean?’ I asked, stropping the razor. I studied the boy’s worried face in the mirror.

‘The rider. The one who just arrived. I saw him heading toward the bunk house. The man with the spotted horse. He’s the one who was following us back down the trail.’