Wounded (12 page)

“How is he?” Morgan asked. She was sitting on the sofa in the study, reading.

“Tired.”

“Thanks again for the flowers,” she said.

“Pretty gal like you needs pretty things around her,” I said in my best cowboy voice.

“You’re the one who’s tired,” she said. “I’ll pick up Gus tomorrow. You catch up around here. That will make three days into town in a row.”

I couldn’t argue with that. “Thanks, honey.”

I fell onto the sofa next to her. “You know, I never called anybody else sweetie and honey before.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Where’s our guest?”

“I think the young man has retired for the evening,” I said. “It was a rough day for him. He was nervous the whole time he was on horseback.”

“At least he’s a sport,” Morgan said.

“He’s a good kid.”

“He’s not a kid. He’s twenty years old.”

“He’s not a kid to you because you’re a spring chicken,” I said. “He’s a kid to me because I’m old as dirt.”

The phone rang and I walked across the room to the desk to answer it. It was Daniel White Buffalo.

“Another cow dead?” I asked.

“No, but Clara Monday thinks somebody took a shot at her,” he said.

“Say again?”

“She was over in the Owl Creeks, just riding along, and she says somebody put a bullet into the slope behind her.”

“Did she see anyone?” I asked.

“I don’t think so.” Daniel took a breath and listened to my silence. “I just thought you should know.”

“Thanks, Daniel.” I hung up.

“What is it?” Morgan asked, closing her book and leaning forward, seeing the expression on my face.

“It seems somebody fired a shot at Clara Monday.”

“Oh, my god,” she said.

“Daniel said he thought I should know.”

Morgan walked over and put her arms around me.

“Don’t worry,” I said. I knew, however, that she could feel my uneasiness. I stroked her hair.

In my dream, I was dragging a reluctant donkey around a large pen. I was afraid she was going to colic and I didn’t want her to roll. The vet had called and told me he would be right there, but that was hours ago. It was a hot day, sweltering, and I was drenched. The donkey would willingly walk a few steps with me then fall back on her heels, leaving me to drag her and her quarter-ton pendulous belly forward. Then she would stop and try to cough up something and I began to think it was choke and not colic. Susie came out to the corral and told me that the vet had called and that he was on his way and that he was all worried that the donkey was going to die and so she was all worried that the donkey was going to die and I said, “Well, she isn’t dying yet, so let’s wait and worry when we know enough to worry about.” This made her mad and she walked away into the house. I wanted to go after her, to tell her that my saying that was probably just a clumsy way of my expressing worry, but I couldn’t leave the donkey. Every time I tried to walk away from the donkey, she moved as if to lie on her side, so I would start tugging again. The vet showed up and Susie joined him as he walked toward the donkey and me. Just as they reached the gate, the donkey hacked up a black piece of plastic. The vet sighed relief and said, “So, it was choke.” He turned to Susie and said, “I’m sorry I got you all worked up.”

I said to the vet, “We were both pretty nervous, all right.”

“Well, I’ll take a look,” the vet said. “We’ll put a tube down her and pump in some oil to be sure everything’s going where it ought to be going.”

Susie had turned away and was marching to the house.

I followed her inside, but couldn’t find her anywhere. I looked in all the rooms and then in the barn. The vet was riding the donkey around in the pen. I looked out across the field and saw footprints in the snow, even though it was hot, but I didn’t follow them. I just went back into the house and tried to start a fire, but every match I lit went out and I became more and more frustrated. Finally, my hands were trembling and the matches wouldn’t even spark.

“John.” Morgan woke me. Her voice broke through and when I opened my eyes I saw the hint of sunrise through the window.

“Yes?”

“You were having a bad dream.” She used her thumb to stroke the furrow of my brow.

I put my arm around her and pulled her close. Her skin was bare and warm. “Was I kicking and screaming like a dang fool?”

“No, just muttering.”

“Sorry about that,” I said. “What time is it?”

“Five-forty-five. We’re burning daylight.”

“I might as well get up then.”

She pushed me back down. “Oh, yeah?”

“Why, do you have something else in mind?”

“Maybe,” she said.

“I get it,” I said. “You want us to sleep for another half-hour. I can do that.” And I turned over.

Morgan poked me in the side and made me jump. “You’d better show me some cowboy lovin’ or you’re in for it.”

“Oh, all right, if I have to.”

I fed the horses and groomed those whose turn it was. Then I worked Felony in the round pen for a while. He had really come along and it was about time to let him go home to Duncan Camp. He’d begun a fairly steady ride and his big body let him cover ground in a hurry, even if it did make him a little clumsy on steep terrain. I cantered around a few more times, then stopped in the center of the ring and looked up at the sky. The sun was out and the only clouds were well away over the mountains. The day promised to be mild, but those clouds were going to make things bad, I just knew it in my gut. I’d asked Morgan if she wanted to saddle Square and take a ride into the high country with me, but she said she was going to make bread. She suggested I take David up there. He and Gus were sleeping late. I figured that they deserved it on New Year’s Eve. I left Felony saddled and tied at the post outside the kitchen.

Morgan was measuring flour into a bowl next to the sink. David was at the table, dressed and finishing a bowl of cereal.

“How about a ride in the hills?” I asked. I could see that he was apprehensive. “Nothing fancy. You’ll be used to this in no time. It’s not necessary to ride a horse to work on a ranch, but it’s the fun part. Unless that leg’s going to give you trouble.”

“No, it’ll be all right.”

“We don’t have to go out,” I said.

“No, really, I want to,” he said. “I’ll just run and brush my teeth.” He left the room.

“I didn’t push him, did I?” I looked to Morgan.

She shook her head. “No. But it’s kind of cute.”

“What is?”

“That kid really wants to please you.” She cracked an egg into the bowl. “He looks up to you.”

“He doesn’t even know me,” I said.

“Well, that would explain it,” Morgan said.

“Very funny.” I poured myself half a cup of coffee. “You feed the puppy yet?”

“Yep. She’s really growing. She’s got a nice temperament.”

“And what are you making?”

“Cookies,” she said. “I woke up and felt like making cookies. I’m praying that David loves cookies because I don’t want to eat them all myself.”

“Is Gus still in bed?”

Morgan nodded.

I looked at the clock. It was almost eight-thirty. “I think I’ll check on him. You think I should?”

“Please,” Morgan said.

I walked up the stairs and tapped on Gus’s door. “Hey, Gus.”

“Yeah?” he answered.

I felt a load lift from me. “You okay in there?”

“I’m fine,” he said, gruffly. “That bus ride took it out of me. I’ll be down in a while.”

“You bet. No rush.”

I walked back down the stairs and into the kitchen. David was in the mud room, pulling on his boots.

“How is he?” Morgan asked.

“I think he’s just tired. He said he’ll be down soon.”

“Maybe I should take him up some juice,” she said.

I shook my head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

Morgan understood and went back to the counter. “See you later, sweetie,” I said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. “Sure you won’t come?”

“Have a good ride.”

“Ready to ride, cowboy?” I stepped out of my house shoes and into my own boots. “Let’s go pop some brush.”

David, like many people on their second time in the saddle, was tense and trying to feel in control, so he held the reins short in a tight fist and clamped his legs around the horse.

“Let her have her head,” I said. “Give her some slack. Relax your body. Let it go.” I took a deep breath and let it out to show him.

He eased up.

“Take another breath,” I said. “Let it all out.”

He did.

“Now, you relax and let the horse do the walking.”

We rode out through the south gate and toward the hills.

“How’d you sleep?” I asked.

“Pretty well. That room is nice and warm.”

“It’s the warmest room in the house and I have no idea why. It’s a little tight in there, I know.”

We rode on a ways and David began to relax a little with the App. She was a good horse, but she was still a thousand pounds of nonthinking muscle and I didn’t want David to forget that.

We started up a slope, my horse following his. “Take your downhill foot out of the stirrup on the steep. That way, if something goes bad you’ll fall to the closest ground and not under the horse.”

That made David tense up again.

“I told you that because it’s true and because you should never forget you’re on a horse when you are, in fact, on a horse.”

“Have you ever been hurt on a horse?” David asked.

“Sure.” I looked down the hillside at the frozen creek. I thought about Susie and didn’t say anything else.

“John?”

“Yeah?”

“Something wrong?”

“No, not at all. How are you doing up there?”

“Good. I feel pretty good.” He looked up the slope. “What kind of animals do you have around here?”

“Elk, antelope, deer, the occasional mountain sheep. We have bears, black and grizzly. They’re all sleeping right now. And of course we have coyotes and a wolf now and again.”

“Everything is so beautiful,” he said.

“Take the trail to the left,” I told him. “I want to show you something.”

We followed the trail to a ridge that overlooked a lower hill and beyond that was the Red Desert, red in the midday light, just like its name implied, stretching out forever, a butte standing sentinel in the middle of it.

“My god,” David said.

“This is why I live here,” I said. “Every time I come up here and look at that I know my place in the world. It’s okay to love something bigger than yourself without fearing it. Anything worth loving is bigger than we are anyway.”

“That sounds almost religious,” David said.

“I wouldn’t know anything about religion,” I said. “I know this is my life and this is my place.”

“My mother is a Catholic,” David said.

I nodded.

“She’s full of guilt. I don’t think her religion makes her happy.”

“Well, that’s no good,” I said. “Come on, let’s head back. I’m starting to feel the cold.”

Gus was up and playing with the coyote, who had taken to the game of fetch. Gus would slide a balled-up sock across the kitchen linoleum and the puppy would scamper after it, grab it, and then demonstrate her instinct by shaking the thing until dead. Only then would she drag the by-now-unrolled sock back to Gus.

“What a gorgeous day,” I said, looking out the window.

Gus balled up the sock and threw it again. “Do you want green beans or spinach with dinner?” he asked.

“Whatever you want,” I said. “Where’s Morgan?”

“She’s in the study going over her mother’s papers.” Gus groaned as he pushed himself up from a knee and into a chair. “Speaking of which, I’ve got some papers I want to go over with you.”

“Okay,” I said.

“How’s the boy?” Gus asked.

“He’s good. I’ve got him out there grooming a couple of animals.”

The phone rang and I picked up. It was Howard.

“Almost Happy New Year,” I said.

“So, how do I get to your place from Highland?” he asked.

“Excuse me?”

“Surprise. I’m in Highland. I rented a car in Denver and here I am. How do I get there?”

I gave him directions. “See you in a while,” I said. As I hung up David came into the house, sat on the bench in the mud room, and began to remove his boots.

“What is it?” he asked, noticing what must have been puzzlement on my face. “What’s going on?”

“It seems your father is on his way here.”

“What are you talking about?”

“He just called. He flew to Denver, rented a car, and now he’s in Highland. He’ll be here in about an hour.”

“Fuck,” David said.

I nodded.

“Fuck,” he repeated and walked away in his stocking feet toward his room in the back.

Morgan came in. “What was that all about?”

Gus said, “We’re having company. The boy’s father is on his way.” He turned to me. “Put on some tea water.”

THE DAY HAD GONE SOUR
in more ways than one. The sky had turned slate gray and was beginning to spawn fat snowflakes. Weather Wally had actually predicted heavy snow and the face of the day had caused me to summarily dismiss him. I was standing out in front of the house in the near dark watching the storm get bad. It had been two hours since Howard’s call and I was growing concerned. Zoe and the pup were out sniffing and taking care of matters.

David came out and joined me. “It’s so cold.”

“This is blowing in out of the north. I sure didn’t see it coming. Maybe you should go back inside.”

“No, I’m okay. Hey, I wanted to thank you for the ride today. That was great, beautiful.”

“You’re welcome. You looked good on horseback. How’d it feel?”

“Better. Not bad, really.” He jumped a little to keep warm. “I liked it. Jesus, I’ve never been this cold.” He looked at the snow in the sky above us. “John, have you ever been hurt on a horse?”

“Sure. But hell, you can get hurt getting out of the bathtub, but you’re not going to stop taking baths.” I looked at the boy’s face. “My wife was killed by a horse. Actually, she caused it. She tried to get on a horse that wasn’t ready when she wasn’t ready and things got bad in a hurry.”

“Jesus.”

“Six years ago. I miss her.” I spotted headlights on the ridge. “There he is,” I said. “You’re sure you’re all right?”

“I’ll be okay. I’m a little nervous.”

I nodded.

He pulled his jacket tighter around his body.

“It’s going to get colder, too,” I told him.

The car bounced along the drive toward us and stopped. Howard got out and so did a woman.

“Who’s that?” David asked me, softly.

“I don’t know,” I whispered. The woman was wrapped in a long down coat and her blond hair squirted from the edges of her fuzzy cap. I walked toward Howard. David hung back.

“John!” Howard greeted me with a hug. “John, I’d like you to meet Pamela. Pamela this is the famous John Hunt.”

“Hey, John,” Pamela said. She was young, young enough that I took time to think that she was young.

Howard had the back door open and was pulling out a couple of bags. “The drive over here was a mess. The snow is getting bad.”

“Let me take one of those,” I said.

“No, I wouldn’t hear of it,” Howard said. He turned and looked toward David and the house.

“And is that my son?”

“Hi, Dad.”

I wrested one of the bags away from Howard anyway. He walked with Pamela toward the house. I followed.

“Pamela, this is my son, David.”

“David, this is Pamela.”

David nodded a greeting. Howard tried awkwardly to hug his son while he held a bag slung over his shoulder.

“Let’s get inside where it’s warm,” I said. David led the way and I brought up the rear. I cast a glance at the snowy night, before entering. Howard made all the introductions. Pamela was even younger in full light. If she was older than David, it was only by months.

“What a sweet house,” Pamela said. She unbuttoned her big lavender coat and peeled out of it. She needed the coat. The blouse she wore worked hard to contain her breasts and her low-slung jeans revealed occasional flashes of her navel. Her boots were oddly appropriate for the weather.

Morgan showed absolutely no reaction, good horsewoman that she was, but Gus turned away and walked into the kitchen. He said over his shoulder that he would put on some coffee and water for tea.

“I’m very pleased to meet you, Morgan,” Howard said.

“Me, too.” Morgan looked at the luggage. “You’ll be sleeping in the study. It’s a sofa bed and we hope it doesn’t kill you.”

“We’ll be fine,” Howard said. “Won’t we, Pamela?”

“Of course,” Pamela said.

David stood at a distance and watched, his face fairly blank. His eyes were angry, his body showed fear, his fingers tapping against his thigh, his Adam’s apple moving with his swallowing.

“I’ll help Gus while Morgan shows you the study,” I said. I walked into the kitchen and closed the door.

“That young lady needs to put on some clothes,” Gus said. Gus shook his head. “What is that man thinking? Why’d he bring her here?”

“I don’t know, Gus.”

“Why is he here at all?”

I shrugged.

David came into the room.

“How are you?” I asked.

David barked out a laugh.

“That’s what I say,” Gus said.

Morgan came into the kitchen, looked behind herself as she closed the door. “What is wrong with that man?” she asked. “They’re freshening up.”

“I hope that means getting dressed,” Gus said.

“Thank you,” Morgan said.

“I’m sorry, David,” I said.

“Why is he here?” David walked to the window and looked out at the snow. “Hell, he can’t even leave now.”

“Got that right,” Gus said. He sat at the table and whistled for the coyote. Emily came and sat to have her head stroked.

“Well, they’re here,” I said. “Let’s make the best of it. Gus, do we have enough food?”

“Plenty of food,” Gus said.

“They’re coming,” Morgan said and stepped away from the door toward me.

“That room will be just fine,” Howard said.

“It’s sweet,” Pamela said. “It has a real, ranchy, rustic feel. And I like all the wood.” Then she spotted the puppy under Gus’s hand. “Oh, look at the puppy. What kind of puppy?” She made kissing sounds to call the dog, but as long as Gus was touching her, she was not moving.

Gus stopped petting Emily. “She’s a coyote,” he said. “Her mother was killed and she lost her leg.”

“Oh, poor thing.” Pamela squatted and I was fearful her breast would pop free. She kissed again and this time the puppy hopped over to her. “Poor thing,” she said again.

Zoe watched from the corner, stretched out on her bed. She was attending mainly to David, I assumed because he appeared upset.

The coyote wandered away in midstroke and sat again beside Gus.

“You’re welcome to build a fire in the little stove,” I said. “The big stove in the other room keeps things pretty warm, but that one’s nice when lit.”

“Thank you,” Pamela said.

Howard walked over and put his arm over David’s shoulder. “It’s good to see you, son. I came so I could have a little time with you.”

David looked at his father and then at Pamela. “I promised Gus I’d help get the meal ready right now.”

“Of course,” Howard said. Then he looked at me. “Oh yeah. Pammy, would you run to the room and get that gift?”

Pamela left the kitchen.

“I brought you a little something,” Howard said. “This is a really nice place. I’m looking forward to seeing it in the light.”

“I talked to Mom,” David said.

“And how is she?” Howard asked.

“She sounds really strong now,” David said. “Like she’s found herself somehow.”

“That’s great,” Howard said. “That’s what I always wanted for her.”

Pamela came back into the room and handed me a wrapped bottle. I thanked her and stared at the blue ribbon.

“Open it,” Howard said. “It’s a bottle of Scotch. I thought I remembered that you like Scotch.”

“Thank you.” I peeled down the paper and looked at the label. “Glenturret,” I read. “I’ve never heard of that.”

“It’s a nineteen-eighty,” Pamela said. “It’s aged in special cherrywood barrels. It’s got a nice flavor.”

“Thank you. What a nice gift.”

“Pamela knows all about whiskys and wines,” Howard said.

“I’ll bet,” David said.

“Is that your business?” Morgan asked.

“No, just a hobby,” Pamela said.

“What is your business?” David asked.

“Our flight into Denver was as smooth as silk,” Howard said. “That’s some airport. We had a little trouble with the rental car. You see they stuck us in that midsize. I reserved an SUV, but they screwed it up. It would have been good on a night like tonight.”

“No kidding,” David said.

“Why don’t we go into the other room and let Gus get on with the meal,” Morgan said.

“That’s a good idea,” Gus said. Then, to David, “And you stay in here and help me, youngblood.”

Morgan followed Pamela and Howard out of the kitchen. I started after them and stopped at the door. “Are you okay, David?”

David nodded.

The guests, Morgan and I sat in the living room. The stove doors were open and the fire actually looked beautiful.

“It’s like a postcard,” Pamela said.

“Let’s break open that Scotch,” Howard said.

“I’ll get it,” Morgan said. She touched my leg as she got up.

“So, it was a messy drive,” I said.

“Just awful,” Howard said. “I could hardly see the road.” He looked at Pamela beside him. “But Pamela helped. Right, Pammy? We got gas in that funny little station at the edge of town. I went in to pay first and he told me to go ahead and pump it and then come back and pay.”

“So trusting,” Pamela said.

“You don’t do that in New York, I can tell you that.” Howard smiled at Morgan’s reappearance with the whisky. “There we are.”

Morgan put the tray with the bottle and glasses on the coffee table. “I thought I’d let you pour your own. I’m having water.”

“If you don’t mind,” I said, “I’ll have water as well.”

“It is early,” Howard said. “But it was a long drive.” He leaned forward and poured a little into two glasses.

Morgan poured half her water into my glass.

“To the new year,” Howard said.

We touched glasses and drank.

“That’s exquisite,” Howard said. “You’ll have to try this later.”

I nodded. “So, how is the law business?”

“Boring. Basically, I don’t like my clients. Every one of them thinks that he is my only client. They call me at home and expect me to remember the details of their particular cases.”

“Howard is a tax attorney,” I told Morgan. “In college, he wanted to be a civil rights lawyer.”

“So, what happened?” Pamela asked Howard.

“Marriage and kid,” Howard said, flatly. He leaned forward and poured himself a little more Scotch. “When you’re young, it’s easy to be idealistic. It doesn’t cost anything. Now, John here, he’s managed to stay idealistic. He said he wanted to live on a ranch with horses and that’s what he’s done. But John isn’t like the rest of us. He built this place all by himself.”

“I had plenty of help,” I said.

“That’s a John thing to say.” Howard laughed. “This man is amazing. He’s always been better than me at everything. Well, part of it was that he claimed to not want as much, but I don’t know if that was true. What do you think, John?”

I shrugged. I didn’t know what to make of his words or even the situation for that matter, perhaps especially the situation. I looked at Morgan and I could tell that if she knew of something to help me out, she would have been doing it. I had a mind to excuse myself to the kitchen for some reason or another, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave Morgan alone with them.

“What do you do?” Morgan asked Pamela.

“I’m a paralegal,” Pamela said. She said it without conviction, as if in some way it was not true.

“Pammy used to work in my firm, but no longer.”

“I hope there was no problem,” Morgan said.

“Only that we’re getting married,” Howard said. “My firm has a policy against fraternization.”

“Congratulations, Howard,” I said. “I don’t suppose David knows anything about this yet?”

Howard shook his head.

We sat quietly for a while. Pamela reached over and held Howard’s hand. I studied the man. He had been a friend for a long time and in all that time I was always confused about why he was my friend. We had little in common, aesthetically, socially or politically, and we’d never run in the same circles. Still, I had been the best man at his wedding and I was called the godfather of his son, though there was never any official church business. Susie had always flat-out hated him. Right at that second I was finding him somewhat objectionable and it made me feel bad about myself.

“We’re getting married, too,” Morgan said.

I smiled at her. It was the perfect thing to say. It eased the tension in the room and served to bring me back to the positive stuff in my life.

“Yes,” I said. “Somehow I managed to trick her into it.”

Gus stuck his head into the room and announced dinner, stating that it would be served in the main dining room.

“He’s referring to the kitchen,” I said.

At the table we sat in a painful stew of silence. The elk stew and the potato pancakes and the asparagus might have been as delicious as it all looked, but I could not taste any of it. I was worried about David and about what Howard might say and about what Howard would say and about what Gus might say as he watched Pamela lean her breasts over the table as she reached for the bread.

“Mother’s fine,” David said, for no apparent reason. Except that the reason was all too apparent.

“I’m glad to hear that, son,” Howard said. Then, “Gus, this meal is fantastic. What kind of meat is in this stew?”

“Elk.”

“You hear that, Pammy? Elk. We’re on the frontier.”

We were having wine with dinner and David was on his third glass. I didn’t know how to slow him down. Then Gus caught his eye and said, “Go easy on the wine, son.”

“David,” Howard said. “I need to tell you something.”

“What? That you’re going to marry Pammy here?” David laughed, but the silence that followed his comment made him silent, too. “You’re not serious.”

“I’m very serious,” Howard said. “Pamela and I have thought about it and we’ve decided it’s the right thing to do.”

“What do you know about the right thing to do?” David said.

“Son,” Howard said.

“Don’t
son
me.” David shot me a glance, as if for help. “You haven’t asked me once how I’m doing. I mean, really asked me. Well, I’ll tell you. I broke up with Robert and I’m in a lot of pain.”

“Robert,” Howard said with disdain. “There will be other Roberts and there will be more pain. I don’t understand the
Robert
thing.”

“Of course you don’t,” David said. “You don’t want to understand. You won’t try to understand.”

“Have you ever been with a girl?” Howard asked.

I scooted back from the table, my chair making the sound I wanted. “David, we’d better go check on the animals. It’s going to be a rough night out there.”