Crazy Woman Creek (29 page)

Still on horseback, the men slowly wandered to the picnic area where they rode between the rows of wooden benches and tables, looking for any evidence, no matter how small, on the ground or furniture that would lead them to Rose’s body. Finding nothing out of the ordinary there, they rode up and down the sparse rows of Ebenezer’s little fenced cemetery. Few trees in either area gave them relief from the sun, and in both places they found everything tidy and in order. Aleida Aeschelman’s burial mound had settled some since her internment in the spring. Someone, probably her grieving husband Faustus, had recently laid flowers at the base of her modest tombstone. The flowers were wilted but still held the blush of their original poppy yellow coloring.

“Cemetery looks alright,” said Luke, looking around from atop his stationary horse.

“Yeah, quiet as a graveyard.”

“Let’s take a look at the outhouses,” Luke said, ignoring Cyrus’ sarcasm.

Sheriff Morris rolled his eyes and exhaled noisily through his nose. Luke regretted his decision
to invite Cyrus along. Nevertheless the two men sauntered to the extreme rear of the church property. Because he was the younger of the two and lowest in rank, it fell to Luke to dismount and peer down into the two-seaters, which he had done in the spring as well in his initial search for James Rose’s body. Luke didn’t expect to see anything other than he’d seen before. His expectations proved correct.

It was a small church on a small piece of property. There was no place else to look for evidence of James Rose’s remains, so it was time to return to the church steps and begin their search on foot. They dismounted, tied their horses to a stout branch of a tree that shaded the picnic yard, and headed for the front of the building.

“Feel foolish out here, searching for a ghost,” said Sheriff Morris when they cleared the front corner of the church. He spat on the ground. “We’re wasting time. James Rose’s body went down that creek, I tell you. Some wolf got what the fish didn’t want. There’s nothing left of the bragging bastard.”

Luke looked at the oozy blotch of spittle Cyrus had deposited on the ground. “Cyrus, have some reverence. This is the Lord’s property.”

“This is dirt,” said the sheriff, kicking the ground with the toe of his boot. They stopped at the church steps. “And it’s all his dirt, as I see it.”

Luke decided to drop it. It wasn’t just the constant spitting. Like an old married couple, lately it seemed that all the sheriff’s personal habits
irritated him. Most of all, it rankled him to no end that his boss never made anything but derisive comments about Mrs. Rose. Luke’s outburst in the office earlier today was mere venting, a chance to let out a little of the steam that had built up like a pressure cooker inside him. But he hadn’t let it all out. He pursed his lips and bit back the blistering retort that rose to his mind. It was useless to argue with Cyrus. He saw things his way and that was that. Besides, they had important work to do.

They stopped in front of the weathered wood steps that led up to the side-by-side sanctuary doors, where they’d begun their search, and stood there, staring.

“Nothing here,” said Sheriff Morris, casting his eyes about the church steps, his disgust evident by his tone.

“How about those bushes,” said Luke, pointing to large hydrangeas thick with foliage and snowball blooms on either side of the
steps. “You take that one and I’ll search the other.”

“Alright,” said Sheriff Morris.

They used their arms to pull back upper branches and squatted and looked under the lowest branches of the leafy white hydrangea. They dropped to a prone position to look deep inside the bushes, their center stalks obscured by broad leaves and enormous blooms. After scarcely a minute Sheriff Morris grunted and lifted himself to a standing position. Luke was still squatting on the ground, peering through branches.

“This is harebrained,” said the sheriff as he swiped dirt and sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. “Rose left his horse at North-East Creek. If you insist on continuing this goose chase, we should do it over there. We’re wasting time here.”

“Dunn’s kid found his watch right here,” said Luke, pointing to the steps and standing up from where he had been pawing the bush. “And we still don’t have the body. This is the most logical place to keep looking for other evidence that could lead us to him. Maybe that’s why someone left the watch here, to point us to something else.”

“It’s suppertime. I’m going back to the Occidental.”

“We haven’t searched inside yet,” said Luke, looking at the sanctuary doors. He took off his hat and started to swat at the dirt on his shirt and pants.

“If James Rose’s body is in there,” said the sheriff, jerking his bare head toward the doors, “he’d be singing in the choir by now.”

Luke took a deep breath and put his hands on his hips. “We’re obliged to conduct a thorough investigation, Cyrus. We’d be negligent if we didn’t search the sanctuary.”

“Fine, go on in. When you see James Rose floating around the ceiling, throw a rope on him and drag him back to town. I got business with him.”

“Two sets of eyes are better than one,” said Luke, barely managing an even tone. He was determined to not get into it with Cyrus, though his ire was rising like mercury in August, clear to the back of his neck.

“That’s true, ain’t it?” said Sheriff Morris. “But extra eyeballs only help with things you can see. We’re talking about ghosts, and they’re invisible, so having me with you won’t help your odds, will it deputy?”

Luke huffed noisily, gave his pant leg one last swat with his hat, smashed it onto his head, and started up the steps of the church. At the top step he put his hand to the weathered brass door handle and turned it. Strangely, the door was locked.

“Well, well,” said Sheriff Morris, smarmy as ever. “Old Man Rose locked us out. Must have heard us crawling around out here looking for his goddamn carcass. Poor damned soul. Can’t abide the thought of being resurrected only to be condemned to living with that overdressed, whiny female. Hell is better.”

“That’s enough!” shouted Luke, descending the steps in one quick movement. “Enough!” He stopped directly across from his boss, fists raised, ready to knock the lights out of those smart aleck eyes. The thought was most appealing.

“Hmpf,” grunted the sheriff. Ignoring the imminent threat to his life, he bent over to pick up his hat, which had fallen off his head when he was on his belly under the bush. He slapped the hat against his thighs to shake off the dust as Luke had done. Then, still clutching his hat, he stood up straight and faced Luke, unfazed by the outburst from his deputy, who was at least a head taller.
Finally he said, “Appears that all the stories I hear around town about you and the Widow Rose are true.”

“Not...one...word,” said Luke through clenched teeth. He still had his fists raised, ready to strike. “Whatever you’ve heard is a lie.” He realized he was acting crazy—crazy enough to add fuel to the gossip fires burning around town. He was wearing his heart on his sleeve, and dumb as Sheriff Morris was, he was smart enough to read Luke’s sleeve. But Luke didn’t care. He was sick of Cyrus’ mouth. “I don’t care what you say about me, Cyrus, but I won’t listen to another dirty word from you about Mrs. Rose, you hear?”

Luke had a sudden vision of himself, on his horse, out of work, every worldly thing he owned in his saddle bags, headed out of town southward to Fort Laramie. He liked being a law enforcement officer. He didn’t necessarily want to go back and live with his brothers and pa, though he didn’t mind the ranching life. But he had had all he could take of Cyrus Morris. If he must go back to ranching tomorrow to get away from Cyrus’ daily spew of verbal filth, he was ready. It would not be difficult. What would be difficult would be to leave Mrs. Rose behind, all alone and helpless, on her ranch so very far from town. The thought pained him.

“Put your fists down, you stupid love-struck fool,” said the sheriff, returning his hat to his head. “I won’t say
any more about Mrs. Rose, but you keep her out of my office. She gives me dyspepsia.”

Slowly Luke’s hands dropped to his sides. He knew at that moment he would have no more trouble with his boss. He also knew that he had just received all the apology he would ever hear from Sheriff Cyrus Morris. He felt spent but relieved, the fight fizzling out of him like a leak in a soft balloon. After a few charged moments of silence, and not knowing what else to say, Luke pointed to the four-foot-high wooden steps.

“I’d take apart these boards to look for his body, but we would have smelled it by now if it were stuffed in there.”

“True,” said Sheriff Morris, turning back to the church steps. They both stood staring at the steps a few seconds. Sheriff Morris shook his head. “What did his widow say when you showed her the watch?”

Luke hesitated, took a deep breath, and kept his eyes on the steps. The churning in his soul began again. He should have showed Mrs. Rose the watch when he had the opportunity at Aeschelman’s, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not yet. But he must. But not yet. But he must ...

“I haven’t showed it to her yet.”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t want to upset her. I was hoping to find something over here, some kind of evidence to prove he was really dead, before I rode out to her ranch with it.”

Sheriff Morris regarding him skeptically, but to avoid more scrutiny Luke intentionally stared at the steps, as if he were waiting for James Rose to come oozing out of them like a genie escaping from a lamp. Luke knew anything he said would sound defensive, but he plunged right ahead, feeling he had no choice but to elaborate.

“And I wasn’t sure if it was his when Dunn’s kid brought it in.” While that was technically true, all Luke’s doubts about the owner had been dispelled once Mrs. Rose
had provided her husband’s full name. Sheriff Morris, Sam Wright, and Etta Nolan had described it as an expensive gold watch. Luke couldn’t think of a man he knew in town who owned a time piece of such fine workmanship as the one that burned a hole in his pocket right now, except for Edwin Morehouse. And Luke had already inquired: Morehouse wasn’t missing a time piece.

“It’s his.” Sheriff Morris spat on the ground.

“We’re done here. Let’s go,” said Luke, hoping to head off any more uncomfortable questions. He was frustrated at finding nothing near the church that pointed to James Rose, yet he was relieved at finally airing the bad feelings that had been bubbling under the surface for some time between himself and Cyrus. In the morning he would question Reverend Thomas and ask for the key to the sanctuary door so that he could look around the inside by himself. He wouldn’t bother to ask Cyrus to accompany him. Cyrus was convinced that James Rose had perished in the North-East Creek. The sheriff was entitled to his opinion. Luke was convinced of nothing.

Luke woke up in his cramped, dark room at the boardinghouse with a sense of heaviness, and he couldn’t figure out why. Then he remembered the unpleasant business he must tend to this morning. He must question Reverend Thomas and search Ebenezer Christian for clues. Reluctantly he got out of bed, performed his morning ablutions, and then descended the narrow staircase to the boardinghouse kitchen. After breakfast he grabbed the sandwich he had asked Mrs. Byrne to pack for him the night before and headed for the sheriff’s office.

It was a beautiful, early August morning in Wyoming Territory. Puffy white clouds, wispy around the edges and thin in some places, fat in other places, floated peacefully across a deep blue sky. The temperature was moderate, and soft northerly breezes promised to keep pedestrians from becoming too hot toward noon. Main Street bustled with shoppers and teamsters. Merchants kept their doors open to catch the fresh air and, hopefully, the interest of passersby.

Luke looked down the street wistfully. A pristine morning like this wasn’t fit for questioning his pastor about evidence found on church property of a crime in which the minister could possibly be implicated. No, a morning like this was the perfect backdrop for a buggy ride into the country and a picnic with a pretty lady. His thoughts and eyes turned east
ward to Mrs. Rose, alone on her ranch nine miles from town. He wondered what she was doing at that moment. He wondered what she was wearing. He wondered if her hair was loose, hanging down her back, shimmering in the sun, or if she had it pulled back into a soft knot as she often did. Her motherly condition would be evident soon. It occurred to Luke that being in a family way—even with another man’s child—could not detract from Mrs. Rose’s beauty. Pregnancy accentuated her womanliness.

Luke shook himself. It was not only vain, it was wrong to woolgather about Mrs. James Rose. She was still married to that phantom rancher, that ghost, wherever he was. Irritated, Luke silently cursed his lot. James Rose’s stupidity had caused problems for a lot of people in this town, most of all his innocent wife. Why did the foolhardy rancher have to go and get himself killed or lost or killed and lost and create this blasted daily temptation for
Luke? The strain, mentally and physically, of having Mrs. Rose so close but out of reach was killing him.

Sam Wright needed checking on. Luke resolved to stop torturing himself with thoughts of Lenora Rose and keep his mind on his work. In a few minutes he was turning the handle of the door to the sheriff’s office.