Forget Me Not (23 page)

Reluctantly, J.D. admitted to himself that she was fitting in on the trail. But that didn't mean she fit in with his life.

He had nothing in common with Josephine. He couldn't talk to her about what was important to him. She didn't know the way of things. Ranch life was what he was good at. It was what he knew. Every bit of it Inside and out. It was a part of him. No matter what he and the boys would start talking about, whether it be a long-awaited letter from home, or the weather, or what was happening in town, the conversation always took a turn toward cattle.

Eugenia McCall hadn't had the West in her. He kept in touch with his mother through infrequent letters. At the end of her correspondences, she obligingly asked after Boots as a postscript, but nothing more than that. He'd write back when he got the chance. Those times when he sat at the big dining
table with paper and pen, he fumbled for how to phrase his thoughts. He wasn't much of a letter writer, having nothing to say to the woman who had borne him. Not that he didn't love her; he just didn't know her anymore. She'd been gone five years and hadn't come for a visit. He didn't expect her to. Nor would J.D. travel to Boston to see her. But it wasn't that he didn't care.

Just as Eugenia knew where she needed to be, J.D. knew where to hang his hat, too. He wasn't a plantation owner's son anymore who could afford to be idle or go where he wished on a whim. He was a cattleman employing more than a dozen men who depended on him. He had thousands of cows that didn't give a man a day of rest, no matter what the season. Leaving, even for a short time, was impossible for him.

J.D. eased back in the line, preparing to tell the drovers on his side about the water situation they'd be heading into the next couple of miles. They'd gone over it at the dinner stop, but whenever cattle got wind of water it could spell trouble, especially if the water wasn't enough to quench their thirst. The best plan to keep them under control was a plan that had been gone over a half-dozen times.

Turning in the saddle, J.D. caught sight of the chuck wagon, satisfied to see that Boots wasn't going off half-cocked today. J.D. wasn't wholly convinced by Josephine's story about her being the navigator. What puzzled him more was, why would she cover up Boots's mistake?

It would seem that the two had struck up an odd alliance of sorts. They seemed to be sharing a secret, an ill-formed bond of some kind that J.D. couldn't figure.

There hadn't been a single day gone by that J.D. had felt as if Boots was his ally. And deep down, buried in a place where J.D. would not feel the hurt, he was a little envious of Josephine.

•  •  •

Josephine sat next to Boots, her hand on the brim of her hat to keep the dust from sifting into her eyes worse than it already was. The heavy air was thick with the powder and the odor of cattle.

Resting her raised arm for a moment to get the circulation back, Josephine shook out her hand and leaned a little into the hard, uncomfortable seat. The small of her back hurt; her spine felt bruised. Her behind still hurt. She was achy. She was dirty.

The country was as flat as her palm, with little or no shade. When would they get to some trees? Some water? She'd jump in the first puddle she saw, as long as it was shallow enough for her to sit in without the water coming past her waist. Was anyone else bothered by the endless dust? The smell?

Apparently not Boots.

He sat to her left, his gloved fingers loosely holding on to the reins. His head periodically bobbed; his chin would come down toward his chest, then snap upward as he dozed.

The team of four mules, without directions from the driver, took it upon themselves to veer off from the grooved road that ran parallel with the herd. As they started to swerve left, Josephine opened her mouth to tell Boots what was happening. But before she could say anything, the wagon wheels hit a series of washboard flutes. The chuck bounced like a baby on its father's lap.

Josephine nearly flew out of her seat. Blindly grabbing for anything to keep from taking flight, she gripped the iron rail and Boots's shirtsleeve at the same time.

“Good gawd!” Boots hollered as he managed to get the team back on the beaten path. “Let go of me!”

She did, but only after they were safely traversing the old rutted cattle road.

Boots gave her a severe frown, the dust thick as fur on his brows. “What'd y'all go and knock me off the road for?”

“You drove us off the road.” Then she added gently, “You were sleeping.”

“I was?”

“It's the heat. I'm sleepy, too.” She wasn't really, but she didn't want Boots to know that.

From the line of cowboys ahead, J.D. swung around and headed their way. As he approached in a canter, dust puffed beneath his horse's hooves, and the fine powder fell off his cotton duster and the edges of his hat. He reined short of the wagon and fell into pace with them. A red kerchief was tied at the back of his neck, the triangle-shaped front over his nose.

When he tugged the kerchief down, the lower portion of his face was a shade darker than the slash of his exposed forehead where the fine grit paled his complexion.

“We'll be coming up to Long Creek in the next mile,” he advised. “I want you to stay off to the left, just the way you have been doing. We're going to have to turn to keep the cows from running.”

“So y'all said,” Boots replied, hunched over with his elbows resting on his knees. The jangle of tack minced his words.

“And I'll say it again.” J.D. pushed the kerchief back into place and sternly warned, “Keep to the left.”

“I heard you.”

“Just making sure.”

J.D. looked pointedly at her while touching the brim of his hat. “Josephine.”

Then he spurred his horse forward and rode off. Her gaze followed him, as did her thoughts.

“Why'd your father shoot himself in the head?”

Boots's blunt inquiry caught her so off guard, he could have knocked her over with his words. She spied him gazing intently at her, waiting for her reply.

Josephine had nobody to blame but herself. She
never
would have mentioned the details of his death if Boots hadn't said such a thing to J.D. about Hazel
doing him in. She'd felt sorry for Boots when he'd gotten them lost. She'd seen the confusion on his face, the desperation. For Josephine, the way her father had died was a scandal. The gossips on Fifth Avenue had had a field day. The New York papers gave the incident front-page coverage, and yet his obituary was short and to the point. Nobody seemed to remember all Andrew Tilden had done for the city.

Instead, society's tittering had feasted on him taking his own life. The viperous talk was a constant source of humiliation for her whenever she went out in public—which became increasingly rare. She wasn't so wounded as to let the painful words affect her grief or make her hide forever in shame. It was just that
suicide
was a word associated with . . . cowards. She'd been told this by Hugh, who never let her live it down.

Andrew Tilden had been one of many to be ruined by what they were calling Black Friday. But only two others had taken the same way out of their despair.

Josephine licked her dry lips, suddenly longing for a cold drink of water to soothe her throat, which had gone tight. “My father's money was invested in Wall Street, and when the market crashed this past September, he was financially ruined.”

“He did himself in because he lost all his money?”

She didn't like the tone of Boots's voice. It grated with caustic and judgmental censure. “I suppose you could say that, though I don't—”

“Let me tell y'all a thing about money,” Boots cut in as he faced forward, his profile grim. “I used to have a forty-room home that any Southerner would be proud to sip a julep on the veranda with me. I built up a cotton plantation from nothing more than resolve and ingenuity. Then the gawddamn war came and took our livelihood away from us. That gawddamn war . . .” he repeated softly, the words fading on his lips. His slack mouth hardened. “And when it was over, those Yankee bastards took me for all I had.
I ended up with nothing but a pile of debt and taxes that I couldn't pay. They got the house and all the land. All I had left was Eugenia and the boy there.”

Boots's gaze strayed to J.D. riding toward the drag men, and Josephine couldn't tell what Boots was thinking.

“Y'all didn't see me blasting a big hole in my head,” Boots spat, pitching his burned-out cigar over the side of the wagon. “But I'll admit, I did my share of liquor tossing.”

Josephine's heartbeat tripped against her ribs. “That was a very unkind thing to say.”

“Maybe. But it's the truth. Money can be made again if a man has a willingness to work for it.”

“You didn't know my father. You didn't know the situation he was in. He . . .” But she couldn't finish her defensive line of thought, because part of what Boots was saying was the truth. A stronger man wouldn't have given up. Her father had her to live for, and yet she hadn't been important enough for him to fight back and start over.

Lowering her chin, Josephine held on to her tears. “I don't want to talk about it anymore.”

“Suit yourself.”

And that was that. In the seven months since she'd buried her father beside her mother, she'd made excuses for him. Not only to herself but to Hugh. To her friends. But there was no excuse, and Boots knew it.

How she disliked him for having the nerve to speak what she'd been thinking in her heart. Just when she was feeling compassion toward him, he went and said something hurtful. She could see why J.D. didn't get along with Boots. He could be mean-spirited without even trying.

•  •  •

The herd smelled the trickle of water in Long Creek, scant that it was, a mile away. They bawled and moaned for a drink. Gus and Jidge had to hold
the strong leaders back, while down the line Print and Ace whooped and cursed, popping down their ropes to keep the weaker ones going.

The herd thundered into the flat wind that carried the smell. J.D. swore thickly.

“Hi-ah! Hi-ah!” J.D. called as Toby cut off a half-dozen heifers set to stampede.

Jidge, Dan, Birdie, and Ace were on J.D.'s side, and they went into overseeing the cows, many with their tongues hanging out, dry and dusty, and eyes sunken. Their tails went up, and they broke into a hurried and heavy-footed trot. J.D. wanted them to turn right, so Gus dropped back, and Jidge started pushing the herd over. Orley and Dan followed up the same way, and so did the flank and drag men, until the cattle were cutting a curve. This way, they'd protect the drags from harm by saving them a couple hundred yards since they were the weakest of the bunch.

Even with their precise maneuvers and the reliable horses and dogs, they couldn't stop the inevitable. The whole herd moved like one big animal and lit out for the water.

Birdie's horse cut up some, nervously dancing as the cattle surrounded it and pressed in. Birdie tried to turn the dun, but he wore Mexican spurs with long rowels and bells on them. His horse kept shifting to the left, then the right, trying to get away from the cows pressing in. All the jerky movements caused Birdie accidentally to catch his big spur in the cinch ring. J.D. watched as he struggled to free his boot, but he couldn't get it out.

The dun began to buck, trying to fling Birdie out of the saddle. His Colt six-shooter went sailing, then the Winchester. Without a moment's thought, J.D. rode directly into the herd and headed straight for Birdie's thrashing dun. If the cowboy fell off, he'd be trampled to death.

J.D. got alongside Birdie's horse, made a grab for
the cheek strap, but he missed. He tried again, this time successfully getting hold of it. Swinging his leg over his saddle, he prepared to dismount, but his own spur caught on the cantle. For several paralyzing seconds, J.D. was stretched out between Birdie's horse and his own. The dun was moving like a maniac, while Tequila shifted to stay still so that J.D. could get free. He did so, landing on unsteady feet. He held on to the pommel of Tequila's saddle, keeping the horse close for protection.

Reaching for the quick release knot on Birdie's cinch, J.D. got it on the second try and gave the latigo a firm jerk. A stirrup smacked J.D. on the side of the head, and the saddle came off just as Birdie—minus the boot that he'd slipped his foot out of—went through the air. He crashed in the dust with a grunt, falling in the midst of running cattle, the dun taking off with nostrils flared and ears back.

J.D. snagged the back of Birdie's collar and yanked him onto his feet toward Tequila; the horse had enough sense to stay still with cattle mooing past. Pressing Birdie between Tequila's belly and his chest, J.D. waited for help.

Seconds ticked by with agonizing slowness as the cows went around Tequila, their flanks bumping into J.D.'s legs. Finally, Ace and Jidge came, Ace hauling Birdie up into his saddle and getting him out. J.D. snatched Tequila's reins in his gloved hand, slid his boot into the stirrup, and mounted. He rode a quick zigzag path through the herd to the edge where Ace had let Birdie slip out of the saddle to his feet.

J.D. couldn't stop and ask him how he was. Instead, he and Ace joined Jidge and the other boys in trying to control the herd.

Once the cows hit the creek and churned it to mud, they'd lose any chance of drinking what little there was. Loping around the crying group of animals as they stood in the sludge, J.D. noted several were
down. Two newly born calves, a few of the old heifers, and a three-year-old that had given birth two weeks prior to them setting out. He couldn't find the calf.

There was nothing he could do. The cows would eventually calm, but until then he and the boys were fighting a losing battle trying to subdue them in such a big cluster. Eventually, they'd spread out and could be put into ranks again.