Tales of Western Romance (28 page)

He nodded, wondering if “here” meant in the
barn, or in the house.

“
Would you like something to eat?” she
asked. “A cup of coffee?”

“
Coffee sounds good,
thanks.”

With a nod, she pulled two mugs from the
cupboard, filled them from a pot that had been warming on the
stove.
“Do you take cream or sugar?” she asked.

“
Just black.”

She placed the mug on the table in front of
him, hesitated a moment, then sat down across from him, her cup
cradled in her hands.

It was obvious she was uncomfortable being
alone with him, and equally obvious that she was wondering if she
had made a mistake in bringing him into the house.

Blue Hawk took a sip of coffee. It was
stronger than he was used to.

“
Why were you – what did you call it?
Making a sweat? Why did you need to be purified?”

Blue Hawk stared at her, wondering how to
explain. “I wanted to ask the Great Spirit for something,” he began
slowly. “Something special.”

“
So you were praying?”

He nodded.

“
To the Great Spirit? Is that like
God?”

“
You could say that.”

“
And you have to be purified before you
can pray?”

“
In this case, yes.” He could see that
she wanted to ask what he had been praying for, but realized it
would be rude to pry into something so personal. “You said Indians
killed your father.”

“
Yes, three months ago. I hate them!
All of them! They killed him for no reason! No reason at all,
except that he was a white man.”

“
I’m sorry.” He couldn’t help wondering
why he was still alive. And, after a moment, he asked as
much.

She blinked back her tears. “Jase wanted to
kill you, but…” She shrugged. “I couldn’t let him do it while you
were unconscious, and…” She took a deep breath. “I know you aren’t
the one who killed my father.”

Blue Hawk knew that in the old days, most
whites wouldn’t have cared one way or the other. An Indian was an
Indian, and the only good Indian was a dead one.

At a loss for words, he glanced at the
newspaper on the table, blinked when he read the date: July 22,
1850. He had known he was in the past, but seeing the date in black
and white made it all the more real. No chance of running into his
father or anyone else he might know, he thought. His father and
mother hadn’t been born yet.

Lynnie glanced at the newspaper, then back at
Blue Hawk’s face. “Is anything wrong?”

He shook his head. “No.”

“
Are you sure?”

He grunted softly. “If I told you, you
wouldn’t believe me.”

“
I might.”

Stalling for time, Blue Hawk sipped his
coffee. Fox Hunter had warned him not to tell anyone who he was or
where he was from, but Daniel knew, somehow, that he could trust
her. “I came here from the future. 1921.”

She stared at him as if he had lost his mind.
And maybe he had. Hell, maybe he was dreaming the whole thing.
Maybe he was still in that sweat lodge on top of the hill.

“
That’s impossible,” she said,
finally.

“
I know. But here I am.”

She shook her head. “Impossible,” she
repeated.

“
I don’t blame you for not believing
me. You probably won’t believe this, either, but I saw you in a
vision before I came here.”

Her eyes widened. “That’s what you meant,
when you said, ‘it’s brown’, isn’t it?”

“
Yeah. In my vision, you were wearing a
white shirt and a calico skirt.”

Lynnie shook her head again. It couldn’t be.
How could he know about that skirt? Her father had bought it for
her a few days before he was killed. She had worn it to his funeral
and never again.

“
So,” he said. “What now?”

Lynnie stared at him.
What,
indeed?

That night, she lay awake long after she had
gone to bed. Not surprising that she couldn’t sleep, she thought,
all things considered. There was an Indian sleeping in the barn. An
Indian who claimed to have come here from the future. One of them
was crazy, and she didn’t know if it was Daniel, for saying such an
outlandish thing, or her, for believing him. And yet, why would he
make up such an outrageous story? Try as she might, she couldn’t
think of a single reason.

She blew out a breath. Sensible, sane people
didn’t believe in time travel, and yet, right or wrong, she
believed in Daniel. In some ways, she felt as though she had been
waiting for him her whole life.

Of course, Jase thought she was crazy for
letting Daniel stay, and had told her so in no uncertain terms,
making it quite clear that she was asking to be murdered in her
sleep. He had warned her to keep a gun handy, and assured her that
someone would keep watch on the redskin all night long.

The redskin.
From what little she knew
of Daniel, he appeared to be more of a gentleman and better
educated than anyone else on the ranch, including herself.

She closed her eyes, trying to imagine what
life would be like in 1921. Instead, Daniel Blue Hawk’s image
quickly rose in her mind. Red or white, or in-between, he was a
handsome man.

She thought about what he had said, about
wanting to ask the Great Spirit for something, something that
required purification. Something special. She frowned. Had he ended
up in the past by mistake? Or was that what he had been petitioning
for, and if so, why? Why would a man want to travel seventy-one
years into the past?

It was her last thought before sleep claimed
her.

Chapter 8

Blue Hawk lay on his back, his arms folded
behind his head. He could see patches of midnight sky through the
cracks in the barn roof. He wondered what the woman, Lynnie, was
doing, and why she had agreed to let him stay, and if she thought
he was crazy or if, by some miracle, she believed him.

He should leave in the morning. He had come
to the past because he wanted to experience what it had been like
to live in the Shining Times, when the Cheyenne were wild and free,
and yet he was reluctant to leave this place. This woman. Perhaps
she was his destiny. Why else had he seen her in his vision? Why
else had be been sent here?

Now that he was here, what was he to do?

The question followed him to sleep and woke
with him in the morning. Rising, he stretched his arms over his
head, wincing as the movement pulled on his wound.

He was about to open the barn door when he
heard voices. Lynnie and the man, Jase, arguing. Peering through a
crack in the wall, he watched the two of them.

“
Get rid of him,” Jase said. “He’s
gonna be nothing but trouble. You don’t know a damn thing about
him, Lynnie. Not where he came from, not why he’s here.”

“
You seem to have forgotten this is my
ranch,” Lynnie replied, her voice tight. “It’s my decision who
stays and who goes, and right now, the odds of your staying aren’t
looking too good.”

Jase’s expression turned ugly. “I was foreman
of this ranch when you were no more than a knobby-kneed brat. I
fought Indians alongside your Pa, stayed with him through the lean
times while he was growing the herd, stuck it out when times were
hard and prices were down, and when someone poisoned the water.
Now, you’re gonna fire me ‘cause of some damned redskin?” He glared
at her. “I don’t think so.”

“
I appreciate all you’ve done for my
father and for me,” Lynnie said. “But I won’t have you deciding who
stays and who goes. I’m going to offer Daniel a job this morning.
If he agrees to stay, I expect you and the boys to treat him
right.”

Jase’s face turned dark red. “What kind of
job?”

“
I was thinking of asking Daniel to
break that rough-string we brought in last week. Wilks can’t do it,
since he broke his ankle. If Daniel can get those horses
green-broke by the first of August, we can sell them to the Army
when Sergeant Nichols comes by.”

Jase removed his Stetson, ran a hand through
his hair, and jammed his hat back on. “You’re the boss,” he said
flatly. “Just keep that Injun outta my way.”

Blue Hawk waited until Jase stalked off
before leaving the barn.

Lynnie smiled when she saw him. “I was just
coming to look for you.”

“
Oh?”

“
I’m about to fix breakfast, if you’re
hungry.”

“
Yes, ma’am, I am.”

“
Good.” Smiling, she turned and started
toward the house. When he didn’t follow, she turned around,
beckoning to him.

Blue Hawk fell in beside her. The silence
between them was palpable as they walked up to the house.

Inside, he sat at the kitchen table, sipping
a cup of coffee while she made pancakes, scrambled some eggs, and
fried up a mess of bacon.

Sitting there, watching her bustle about the
kitchen, he wondered why she wasn’t married. She was old enough,
and certainly pretty enough to catch a man’s eye.

In no time at all, breakfast was ready. She
refilled his cup, handed him a plate piled high with food then sat
at the table across from him.

She was a good cook. He refilled his plate
twice, accepted a second cup of coffee, then sat back. “You’re a
mighty fine cook,” he said. “I didn’t think anybody could beat my
mom’s pancakes.”

“
Thank you,” Lynnie said, smiling. “I
take that as high praise indeed.”

“
You should,” Blue Hawk said. “She’s
the best cook in the valley.”

“
How long are you going to be here?”
Lynnie asked. “I don’t mean here, on the ranch, but here, in this
time?”

“
I don’t know. I’m not sure I can go
back.” It occurred to him that he should have asked Fox Hunter
about that before they went into the sweat lodge. The only thing
the old medicine man had told him was that it was possible to
return, if one wished it. Looking at Lynnie, Blue Hawk wasn’t sure
he wanted to find his way back, at least not right away. Maybe
never.

Lynnie cleared her throat. “I have a
proposition for you. My head wrangler broke his ankle and I need
someone to break about twenty head for me by the first of August
and I was wondering, that is, if you’d like to stay around, well, I
could use your help.”

Blue Hawk nodded.

“
You don’t have to make a decision
right this minute,” she said, her cheeks flushing. “Or get started
until you feel up to it.”

“
I’ll be glad to help,” he
said.

“
You know how to break horses,
then?”

“
You bet,” he said, grinning. “I had
the best teacher in the world.”

* * * * *

Blue Hawk spent the next few days taking life
easy. Most afternoons, he sat in the rocker on the front porch,
watching Lynnie do her chores. Work on a ranch was never really
done. There was always something that needed doing, whether it was
a corral gate that needed a new hinge, a hole in the roof that
required patching, or a bit of harness that needed mending. There
were chickens to feed and eggs to collect, bread to be made, fruits
and vegetables to be put up for the winter, sick animals to tend,
cows to be milked, cattle to be branded.

And horses to break.

A week later, Blue Hawk sat on the top rail
of the corral, studying the rough string. They were a good-looking
bunch, well-fed, clear-eyed. He especially liked a dun-colored
mare. She had intelligent eyes and near-perfect conformation. If
he’d had any cash money, he would have offered to buy her.

Grabbing a rope, he ducked into the corral.
The horses immediately bolted to the far side, eyes wide, ears
twitching forward and back as he moved slowly toward them.

“
Here now, nothing to be afraid of,” he
crooned as he shook out the rope and formed a loop. “We’re just
gonna get acquainted.”

The dun eyed him suspiciously as he
approached her.

“
Easy now, girl, no one’s gonna hurt
you,” he said quietly, and sent the loop flying.

When it settled around the mare’s neck, she
reared back, bucking and rearing, but to Blue Hawk’s surprise, once
she realized she couldn’t escape, she quickly settled down.

“
That a’girl,” he said, and led her out
of the large corral and into a smaller, breaking pen. He snubbed
the rope to a post in the center of the pen, then approached the
mare’s head, one hand outstretched. Snorting, she shied away from
his hand. “Hey, now,” he admonished softly, “let’s not make this
any harder than it has to be.”

When he approached her a second time, she
stood her ground, nostrils flared, ears twitching, as he stroked
her neck. Talking softly all the while, he moved his hands over her
withers, along her back, over her rump, careful to stay clear of
her hind legs.

After she’d grown accustomed to his touch, he
plucked a blanket off the rail and carried it toward her. At first,
she shied away, her eyes wild, but when she realized it wasn’t
going to hurt her, she stood quiet while he placed it on her back.
He let it sit there for a minute or two, removed it, and replaced
it several times. When she no longer paid any attention to what he
was doing, he slid the blanket up and down her neck then over her
legs and rump.

The saddle came next. She accepted it without
complaint, though she twitched her tail when he tightened the
cinch.

The bridle came next.

“
Now, for the hard part,” Blue Hawk
said, stroking the mare’s neck. “Just remember, it’s me on your
back.”