Walkers Creek - A Western Page 12

  'I wanted that Ranch,' Emily says, a sad note in her voice. 'I wanted that Ranch so badly and then look what a mess I made of it. Now there's nothing left there, nobody else to help me run it, no house to live in. Nothing.'

  'You could build a new house,' Laura says.

  'No, I can't build anything without help and all my help has deserted me.'

  'What about Sanchez?'

  'Sanchez? I haven't seen him since the rest of them left the ranch. For all I know he could have gone with them.'

  'So does anyone have someplace they'd like us to be heading for?' He asks impatiently, not being interested in who Sanchez is or where he might be.

  Nobody answers. How long is he going to be able to put up with this bunch of self-absorbed depressives? Perhaps he should offer to take the first watch and then just slip off and leave them behind.

  'Where do you want to go?' Emily says. 'You've had a lot of time since we left the house to think about it. I reckon you're the kind of man who always has a plan. What's your plan?'

  'I'm thinking I'm going to need a doctor to see about this wound. I don't reckon that Walkers Creek will be pleased to see me back, so I'm thinking of the little mining camp I passed through on the way here. We should be able to get there in a day or so, even keeping off the road.'

  The fire crackles.

  'You don't think we could go back into Walkers Creek?' Laura asks.

  'No, I said I didn't think I'd be much welcome. You'd probably do just fine. And I reckon Miss Nixon could probably still marry the mayor if she was that way inclined.'

  Emily snorts with disgust.

  'I don't have anything left, I've no reason to care where we end up. If you can think of a thing worse than ending up married to Jeremiah Humby then I think I'd be willing to try that just out of curiosity 'cos I don't reckon there is a thing worse.'

  'Maybe we could get to Mr Tanner's mining camp and send word to Walkers Creek to find out the lay of the land?' Billy suggests.

  Logan thinks that's a dumb idea and nearly says so. Any message they get back from the town is likely to be delivered by the bullets of a posse if their experience so far is anything to go by. But he bites his tongue and says nothing, realizing that they're agreeing to do what he suggests. He can lead them to the mining camp and leave them there. That will be good enough.

  Emily yawns.

  'We should get some sleep. Someone will need to keep watch in case we've been followed. We should take it in turns so we all get some sleep. I'm happy to do the first couple of hours, then I'll wake one of you to do the next couple.'

  They murmur assent and fidget with the blankets for a few minutes trying to get something close to a comfortable bed to sleep on. None of them look like they're used to sleeping in the outdoors.

  He gets up to walk around their little camp. He checks on the horses, still hobbled where they'd left them, and listens in the dark for anything that sounds like people on their trail. It is eerily quiet. Even the normal rustling sounds of wind and nocturnal nightlife seem to be absent in that sheltered gully.

  He climbs up the bank to see if there is anything to see. Perhaps the campfire of someone on their trail. There is no moon and the starlight is feeble. He can make out a red glint in the distance that might be the smoldering embers of the ranch house. He can't tell.

  He goes back to the fire, adds another small branch to keep it going a little longer and sits down and listens to the snores of his sleeping companions.

  He wakes with a start and makes an involuntary yelp at the bright light in his face. It takes a moment to realize that the bright light is daylight and he has slept past dawn. Emily stirs from under her blanket.

  'What?' she says, groggily. 'You didn't wake me for my turn on watch.'

  He doesn't say anything. There isn't anything to say. He is looking at the empty space where Billy and Laura had slept.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  'You fell asleep?'

  He doesn't look up and continues fussing with the fire, trying to get it lit again.

  'I can't believe you just slept and left them to--' Her anger is getting the better of her. She takes a deep breath. 'Where have they gone? They can't have got far.'

  Still he doesn't acknowledge her and carries on about the little camp as though they were the only ones who had ever been there. He reminds her of Sanchez, and in a way her father too. They were stubbornly unwilling to acknowledge their faults too.

  She wants him to say something to give her an excuse or an explanation even though she knows she'll shout at him for it. His silence is exasperating.

  'You don't care about them at all do you? You're glad they're gone. Did you tell them to go? Is that what you did? Whisper in their ear that they're not welcome and that they should just do us all a favor and go and die in a ravine somewhere on their own?'

  'They've chosen to be on their own. You can't blame them for that. Don't forget McLaren is after you, not them. I don't think Billy can have been in such a bad way after all if they managed to get away without waking either of us. They should be safe enough if they can get themselves back to town.'

  'That's it?' Finally she gets him to say something and all he can do is say that they wanted it so they must be alright? What about her? Doesn't he care about how she feels? Doesn't he realize she feels responsible for the state that Billy is in?

  'You want me to chase after them?' He stands and looks at her.

  'I want you to... I don't know...' The incoherence of anger.

  'Let me tell you how it is. Last night I thought I might take the first watch and wait until you were all asleep and ride off on my own. Yes, that's right, I was going to do what they've done.'

  So that's it. He hates her too. He wants to leave her behind and right now he's just annoyed that she didn't disappear into the night with the others. Maybe he didn't like her all that much in first place? Suddenly she hates him. All this time he has been stringing her along? She won't stand for it any more. She stands up abruptly and aims a slap across his face.

  'Don't be so hasty.' He says, catching her wrist with his good arm. 'You see, I'd meant to go, but I didn't. Don't you want to know why I didn't?'

  She wrestles to get her arm free from his grip. She hates him for wanting to run away but she wants to hear him say that he stayed to be with her. She wants to pull her arm away but she likes the feel of his strong hand and the sensation of their physical contact.

  'I didn't go because I thought about you. I thought it would be kind of nice to still have you with me. Not just anybody. You. I thought you and me could really be something, and while I thought about that I fell asleep. I'm not proud of being a failure as a sentry, but I'm not going to cry because of how things worked out.'

  She likes that he wanted to stay with her. She is so angry with him for letting them down and falling asleep but still likes to hear him say he likes how things have worked out. The two of them. She stops fighting and lets him pull her close. She looks up into his eyes but still can't shake the feeling of responsibility for Billy and Laura.

  'I owed that boy,' she says, sad now rather than angry. 'He nearly died for me. Can't you see that?'

  'I see it, Emily, and the best way you can pay him back right now is to let him go.'

  It gives her a shiver when he doesn't call her "Miss Nixon".

  'They've been wanting to run off together for a while,' he says, holding her. 'They said as much last night. And I know you feel like you owe him, but you have to see that you've brought him nothing but trouble so far.'

  'They're just kids,' she says.

  'I know. But they're good kids.'

  She kisses him, savoring the warmth of his touch. She thrills to be so close to him and to be alone with him. It's a thrill, like a gallop on wild horse, exciting and scary all at once. Or is she just scared?

  She pulls away.

  'What's wrong?' he asks.

  'I don't know. It's like they're watching us. I don't feel safe here.' />
  He turns back to the fire and tries to coax some more flames from the embers.

  'I don't think they followed us from the ranch. They'd have killed us in our sleep if they had.'

  'That's reassuring.'

  They sit close together and watch the little fire recover. The darting flames and rising smoke bring to mind the fire at the ranch and she thinks of her childhood home and all her belongings. For some reason she thinks of the dress she bought from Mannion on the day she met Logan. She never wore it.

  She has nowhere to go now. The ranch was everything to her. It was her work and her play all rolled into one. It was her link to her dead father, her one chance to feel she was doing something he'd be proud of. If he saw it now? She tries not to think about what he'd have to say to her.

  Somehow it doesn't feel like she thought it would. She feels a sense of loss but at the same time a burden has been lifted. She has no home, but she has nothing to protect or defend any more either. She has nothing to prove, she can't fail any more than she has already. She doesn't need to fight to stop people stealing or trying to buy the ranch. The ranch is as good as gone. There is no more need for blowing up houses or shooting deputies. It is a relief.

  Logan has no home. That thought occurs to her too. He has nowhere in particular to go. They are both wanderers now. Somehow that's reassuring.

  She sits with her head on his shoulder, saying nothing, waiting together for the coffee to boil.

  'We should set off for the mining camp soon,' he says as he gets up. She notices that he isn't using his bad arm at all.

  She thinks about the mining camp and how unattractive it sounds as a place to go. She pictures a place full of dirty unshaven men with Humby's attitude to women.

  She really disliked the experience of being kidnapped by Humby. She thought she had coped with it well, but now she finds it's left an empty space where her self confidence used to be. She has sat here waiting for Logan to tell them where they are going next. She wouldn't have done that when they first met.

  She determines to take some control back. She isn't going to let men run her life, to tell her what she can and cannot do. She's not going to stand for that any more. She'll say where they are going and he'll do what she says. If he thinks he can dictate the way things are going to be then he's no better than Humby.

  'We're not going to the mining camp,' she says.

  'We're not?'

  'We're going back into Walkers Creek.'

  She waits for a reaction. He hands her some coffee and sits back down. He sits facing the fire and she wants to try to read the reaction on his face. Is he mad at her? Is he just thinking of a way to make her do what he wants after all? If he wants to fight about this, she'll fight him. This is her life and she's not going to give up the reins to anyone.

  'Okay.'

  'Okay?'

  'Sure. I mean, you've thought this through? You know the town better than I do.'

  Now she's angry with him for not making her angry with him. Of course she hasn't thought it through. She was expecting him to fight with her, to argue, to justify where he was going and to make it sound better than a sleazy cesspit.

  'You seemed pretty sure just now that they haven't been following us.'

  He nods, but looks puzzled.

  'So,' she's making this up as she goes along, 'we don't have anything to fear from them.'

  He doesn't say anything. It's as though he's waiting for her to say something stupid so he can overrule her idea and end up back with the mining camp option by default.

  'And anyway, I don't plan to spend the rest of my life being scared of my shadow and watching out for McLaren or whoever. I'd sooner face up to them and stick a bullet in them if I have to.'

  'Sounds like you're in the mood for a fight,' he says, laughing.

  'I'm serious.' She isn't laughing.

  He stands up and throws the dregs of his coffee at the fire.

  'You're right,' he says, 'we should stand up for ourselves and running away isn't the answer. We'll go back into town and act like nothing happened. Just breeze in and say hello to folks.'

  'Exactly.' That wasn't quite what she had in mind, but then she's not quite sure what she did have in mind.

  'I'm joking,' he says, 'you really think we can act like nothing happened?'

  'Why not? I can't think of anything that'll annoy them more than to see that we're not troubled by them or what they've done.'

  He shakes his head.

  'You're crazy. You'll get us killed.'

  So she has said the stupid thing that he will use against her and they will end up running away to a miserable life of fear and poverty. She is disappointed that she couldn't think of a better idea than going back to Walkers Creek. She's disappointed that she couldn't think of a decent reason to go back, or a way to do it safely. Why couldn't she just think before opening her mouth?

  'No,' he says abruptly, 'you're crazy, but I love that you're crazy. Let's do it.'

  They discussed using the trail over the hill to come into the town the back way, but in the end decided that if they were going to hold their heads high in Walkers Creek then they should do it by riding up the main street. They ride their horses noisily over the wooden bridge over the creek.

  'I think we should see Mannion first,' she says. 'I need to thank him.'

  'He's one of the good guys isn't he? Are you sure we won't be bringing him more trouble than he can handle?'

  'You could be right, but I want to know what's been said about me, about the ranch and about you. Mannion is the biggest gossip in town. We need to know what we're up against.'

  They tie up the horses outside the shop. The street is busy with people but nobody pays them any mind. They are right, there is no need for sneaking about. That only attracts attention and suspicion. They belong here, they just need to look as though they do.

  Looking up the street she tries to pick out faces that she recognizes, to spot the glint of a gun barrel in the sunlight. She feels off-balance with fear and excitement. Anything could happen now. She checks the rifle but leaves it in its scabbard on the saddle. She checks the tiny useless derringer that she's tucked in her belt. It's as though she's standing on a rocky outcrop high above the valley and is trying to see how close to the edge she dares to stand.

  They go in.

  'I'll be with you in a moment,' Mannion calls from the back of the shop as the front door slams shut.

  She looks at Logan, unsure of what to do next. Are they in a hurry? Do they need to get him out front straight away? Should one of them be keeping watch at the front of the store to see what's going on in the street?

  Logan is examining the stains on his hat. Then she notices that he's spending more time looking at the street in the mirror than at the hat. He's keeping watch, but pretending not to. She heads to the back of the store.

  'It's just a social visit,' she calls out.

  'Miss Nixon?' Mannion rushes out from his cupboard and gives her a big hug. 'I've been so worried about you.'

  'I'm okay. I can't say the same for the ranch. That's your horse out front. I wanted to return it. I don't know how to thank you for what you did for me.'

  'I got away with it.'

  She sees the bandage around his hand for the first time. She hurts all the people closest to her.

  'Why did they...?' She feels sick at the thought of what they have done to him. 'Who did this?'

  'This?' He holds up the bandaged hand. 'This is the work of your homeless friend McLaren.'

  The word "homeless" cuts deep and she's sure he meant it to. He knows, even though she never told him, that the explosion at McLaren's house is her fault. That all this is her fault. They both can see that everyone who tries to help her gets hurt and that is her fault too.

  'He burned the ranch house,' she says.

  Mannion nods.

  'Have you seen him since?'

  He shakes his head.

  'He hasn't come back. The sheriff went after
him with some deputies when he heard what was going on.'

  'That's her!' Logan shouts out suddenly and he heads for the door.

  'Who?' She runs to see what has bothered him so much.

  'The Mexican girl, the one I told you about, that's her.'

  'I thought you were making it up, just an excuse to come and find me, like your tall tales about the farm and the dogs.'

  Logan laughs. Neither of them has laughed for a while.

  'Señorita!' he calls out as he rushes into the street. The girl either doesn't hear him or chooses to ignore him.

  'Maria!' Emily shouts. She recognizes the girl. It is Sanchez's daughter.

  The girl halts a little at the sound of her name.

  Emily calls again. The girl comes over, looking nervously at Logan who has stopped by the door of Mannion's shop, still trying to understand how Emily knows the girl.

  '¿Dónde está tu padre?'

  The girl shrugs.

  Emily's limited Spanish skills are defeated. She doesn't know how to ask for any more information but she is desperate to see Sanchez again. She needs his help. He will be able to make everything alright again. He will know what to do about Humby.

  'I need him.' Emily pleads in quiet English.

  The girl shrugs again, never taking her frightened eyes from Logan who still stands behind Emily at the door. The girl turns on her heel and runs away clutching her skirt. Emily makes a grab for her arm to stop her running away and misses, landing inelegantly on the floor.

  Logan comes over and offers her his good arm to help her up.

  'How do you know her?' he asks.

  'Her father works for me. Or rather he works with me, he was a friend of my father's. I really wish I'd listened more when he tried to teach us Spanish when we were little.'

  She pulls herself to her feet and dusts herself down.

  'So, her father, he's Mexican?'

  'Of course,' she laughs.

  'And he worked for you?'

  'Well with me, rather than for me.' She can't quite see where these questions are going and is suddenly aware that they are standing out in the street where anyone could see them and she feels vulnerable. She starts to head back towards the shop but Logan is standing in the way.