Wilding In The West update

“Can’t vouch for this nag of mine,” Chad said, still friendly, trying not to cut his serving of soothery with any challenge. “I wager he’s longing for a hitching rail. And the doc’s got a hell of a story, if you’re wondering why the stage didn’t bear him to you.”

“That your way of askin’ to pass?” the Segundo questioned, before spitting damn close to the forelegs of Chad’s nag.

“It’s my way of asking why I’m yet in the daylight with sand and saddle still testing me instead of stretching my legs with a pitcher of water to salve me.”

“You talk like a cow shits, stranger.”

Chad shrugged and kneed his nag forward, in the segundo’s direction, giving him the choice to either stay in the way or get out of it.

The Segundo reined his buckskin up in front of him. “Nothin’ to say to that?”

“I only talk so much before I do things,” Chad said in a wooden voice.

“We don’t worry about saddle bums lugging their daddy’s guns around—not on the One Eye Ranch.”

“I say anything about guns?” Chad asked, and sent his fist out like an arrow loosed, connecting with the Segundo’s jaw and sending him backwards until the only thing connecting him to his horse were the reins still in his hand.

The two cowpunchers with him went for their guns. Chad was already covering them and at the click of his hammer being thumbed back, they made sure to keep their hands well clear of their holsters.

From the ground, the Segundo spat a curse, fumbled for his gun. Chad kneed his nag into stepping sideways. The Segundo’s horse gave ground and the Segundo had to give way himself, lest one of this four hooves came down on his parts.

Before he could sort himself from the dance he was doing with his former mount, Chad gave his nag the blunted rowels of his spurs and they were lancing forward, Solheim belatedly following after.

They rode up to the house, tall and finely built, with sign of fairly recent renovations, the face whitewashed. It was the old story, Chad guessed. Rancher makes good, takes a wife, the wife wants to live in a nice house, so the crudely built shack that was once good enough now becomes a mansion.

The telltale clue was the strand of bougainvillea that grew from one eave of the building to the hitching rail and water trough, beautifying the practical elements of a Western construction.

But there was another ingredient in the mix. The home had been built with high windows, and Chad saw a glint of glass within the frames, but they’d been chinked up, rocks protecting all but narrow slits like the murder holes Chad had read about in books on medieval history. Buckets of water littered the grounds—to put out fires, Chad had to think. And there were trenches dug out behind the fence, deep enough for a kneeling man, which Chad supposed would make a body near invincible in a shooting war.

This was either the homestead of a paranoid man… or one who was regularly visited by those that meant him harm.

Solheim seemed to see nothing out of the ordinary with any of this. As soon as he was off his horse, he was examining those pink-purple bougainvilleas, seeming enchanted with how the flowers grew along the vine.

Chad dismounted himself, tied both horses to the rail, and loosened their cinches for good measure. They could reach the trough from where the rail kept them. Chad appreciated that, while this paradise might’ve been built for the sake of a woman, the architect had managed some manly function to go with it.

“What’ve you brought me now?” The distressed voice came from the patio. It struggled for politeness with its next sentence. “Darn it all, I had that beeve all cut up to be just the way Rusty Earl liked for when he got back with the doctor—and you must be the doctor, hi, welcome—but now he’s lost track of you—where’d he get to? do you know?—and here you are, it’s lovely to have you—who’s this man?”

The feminine cyclone… which Chad took to be the kickstart of at least some of the reforms he’d seen… was an exceptionally lovely young lady, far too young to be the wife behind all these changes. She looked barely to be past schoolbooks and pigtails. The rancher’s daughter, had to be.

She had long, dark hair parted in the middle—a darkly exotic cast to her skin like a Spaniard, climaxing in spectacular brown eyes—and a slender but sweepingly curved body that made the most of the open-throated white shirt and fawn-colored riding skirt she had on. If she had inherited any of those good looks from her father, it was no wonder the man was so desperate to have any scarring undone.

“Chad Connors,” he introduced himself, collecting a besotted Solheim by the elbow and dragging him over to greet the young lady. “I’m not sure the story would make the best first impression, but the doctor here found himself waylaid and I took it upon myself to help him follow directions the rest of the way here.” He favored her with a smile. “It sure would be a shame for anybody to miss this place—assuming they’re welcome.”

The girl flashed a smile back. There were few new faces to be seen on a working ranch and Chad didn’t think his was so awful as to overrun its novelty. “The One Eye Ranch always has a warm welcome waiting for those who come with a white heart. You don’t happen to like son-of-a-gun, do you?”

Son-of-a-gun was a damn fine stew made from the heart, liver, kidneys, sweetbreads, and marrow of a freshly butchered cow. It was a rare treat for Chad and reason enough to work on a ranch, as far as he was concerned, as you could always count on a pot of it to show up on the supper table after some bloodwork.

“I’m not picky; I’ll eat whatever you feed me.”

The girl’s teeth picked at her lips as though his words had put a taste on it. “Connors, was it?”

“Chad.”

“I’m Hailey.” She offered her hand with upturned wrist. “Hailey Steinfeld, obviously.”

He took her hand and kissed it as gently as he could manage without drawing away as fast as a finger touched to a hot stove. It was a hard thing for a roughened man to gauge: overt enough to show he was a man, but subtle enough to show he was no brute. Hailey flexed her fingers when she took her hand back—Chad thought that boded well.

“And you must be Dr. Solheim, yes, mustn’t forget you!” she cried, facing him with the radiance of her smiling welcome.

He was as overwhelmed as Chad felt—offering his own hand for a kiss rather than taking Hailey’s. Thankfully, Hailey laughed at the mismade gesture.

“I’ve been so eager for you to see to my father’s case, but now that you’re here—of course—you must rest and eat and wash the trail from you! So much more waiting, but what’s a little more, yes? Especially when we’re all in such fine company. I believe you’ve brought with you a real-life cowboy, Mister, Doctor Solheim… yes, a regular gunslinger.” Her eyes darted back to Chad. “Perhaps even something of an outlaw?”

“Oh, no laws you’d care to see kept do I break,” Chad assured her. “I won’t even ask for a cup of coffee, if you think it’d make me selfish.”

“Nonsense! You shall have a glass of port and a seat at our table and the personal thanks of Mister Arthur Steinfeld, the finest gentleman this side of the Mississippi.” A thought quirked Hailey’s brow; her face was so expressive he could just about see it enter her head. “Irksome as yet more waiting is, it will give Father time to prepare himself for visitors. I don’t think he ever fully allowed himself to commit to the belief that you were coming, Doctor. I must go tell him the good news! You may wash up in the kitchen; we had a new pump just put in. But please, don’t spoil your appetites before dinner, or all you’ll have to sustain yourselves with in the evening will be my poor conversation! Chad Connors.” She repeated the name as delightedly as a child taking a lick at a lollipop. “Unless I’ve misheard the name, you are something of a badman!”

“None too bad, from what I’ve seen,” Solheim told her. “He’s been the picture of American nobility in his assistance given me.”

Chad tried not to let himself preen: “Horses did most of the work,” he muttered.

“Carrying us, you mean? Away from the bloodied band of Indians you left!”

Hailey squawked highly, both hands going to her mouth. “Don’t say another word! This tale simply must be told over dinner! Wait right there while I inform Father! I mean, no, in the kitchen, where you may wash. Not that you look dirty, Mr. Connors.”

“I just smell terrible.”

Hailey’s hands slid around—somehow he could tell they now hid a smile. “Mr. Connors, you smell fine enough for this purveyor of cow-meat. But wash up at any rate, Momma would hate to see her new pump go to waste.”