Forget Me Not (20 page)

“Y'all about done?” Boots asked, having managed to hoist himself onto the bench seat with little more than a creak of his joints.

“I'm ready.” Josephine took one last survey of the cupboard, making sure the panels were closed tightly and the endgate secure. Then she walked down the side of the wagon and braced her hand on the edge of the seat. With a hop, she climbed on board. Without skirts to hinder her, she clunked her booted feet straight out in front without any care, then folded her hands on her trouser-clad lap.

“With y'all wearing those britches and that hat, you're fitting in with me and the boys,” Boots said around the stub of his cigar. “I used to think of you as trouble when y'all first came out to the ranch. But after what you did last night, with naming the stew and all like Luis would have done, I'm not thinking of you as a woman no more.”

Josephine didn't know whether to be flattered or depressed.

•  •  •

J.D. had gone ahead to search for the best noon camping location, as well as water. Its scarcity weighed heavily upon him, but he held out hope that there had been enough snowfall in the mountains for the high country grass to be plenty and the streams full. The natural grasses on the plains suited the herd, and as they plodded along beneath a sun that had grown pleasantly warm, they foraged on rye and bunch grass and the occasional white sage. Cane grass and alfileria weren't sprouting up the way they should. The dry winter worried J.D. If they didn't get some significant rain, the range land surrounding the ranch wasn't going to be able to support the cattle they'd left behind.

Heading east, J.D. caught up with the boys as they came west. He nodded to Gus and Jidge, Orley and Dan, then rode toward the end where Seth and Birdie managed the flanks, and finally to Print and Ace.

Print spurred his piebald in a spurt of energy, Ace lagging from the leeside, not far behind him.

“Hey there!” Print shouted through the muffle of his bandana. J.D. swung his kerchief over his nose so as not to choke on the dust.

Ace whistled through the noise. “Get on up there!”

Their calls were directed toward the slower cattle to get them to catch up with the rest of the herd.

J.D. moved in alongside them, helping to stave off a yearling that was heading into the brush. “Ho! Move it! Move it! Move it! Yee-haw!”

The cowboys slapped their legs with their gloved hands and zigzagged back and forth behind the herd to keep the animals together and moving in the right direction. They hardly ever touched the cattle, a true sign of knowing what they were doing. It didn't take a heavy hand to deal with animals.

J.D. nudged his spurs into Tequila's sides, bent on scouting the chuck wagon, whose cloud of dust couldn't be seen from this distance. Though Luis had
made his own way, he never strayed far from the obvious trail. Boots wasn't likely to lag behind for long. His absence made J.D. wonder if he'd encountered some kind of trouble.

The saddle horses made a close pack as J.D. went past them, Rio putting his fingers on the brim of his hat. J.D. nodded, then took off in a lope in the direction of the camp they'd broken this morning.

Covering the ground at a swift gait, he was mindful of the go-downs—the burrow holes of gophers and prairie dogs. A false move, and a horse or a cow could snap its leg. Mice and rabbits crept out from sage and grass to sniff suspiciously at the tainted air of man-made scars as he sped by.

Fifteen minutes later, still no sign of the chuck or Boots and Josephine.

Another five minutes of covering the terrain, and J.D. knew something had gone wrong.

•  •  •

There were occasions when the wagon had to cross a dry, barren section of a stream where the feathery dust, buoyant as mist, enveloped her and Boots, settling softly on the canvas and provisions like yellow snow. She choked on the arid grit in the air, wiping her face with a handkerchief she'd fished from her handbag. In spite of the unpleasantries, Josephine was glad the river was dry.

She didn't know how to swim.

Some two hours after they'd left camp, they'd come to their first indication of any kind of water at all. It was a pitiful-looking tributary, with skimpy greenery on the fringes. The banks were bald gray mud.

Boots set the brake and gazed at the thin trickle of water. He looked at the clearest spot, which flowed down the center over small rocks. The sun reflected off the rippling paths made by skimmers that barely touched the surface as they jetted across it.

“We should fill up the water barrel since half of it got used up putting out that fire.” But as Boots's gaze
further assessed the area, he shook his head. “But we won't get any from here.”

“Why not?”

Boots motioned upstream with his head.

Josephine then saw the decaying body of a bloated cow.

“Luis said that boiling killed the germs, and what germs weren't killed it made no matter as a cow-puncher's stomach was made of iron. But I'm not drinking water that killed a cow.”

A shiver worked through Josephine. She didn't like this place.

“Might as well make the stop worthwhile. There's a dead scrub over there. Its branches will do fine for the cook fire.” Boots wrapped the reins around the brake handle and stepped off the wagon seat.

Josephine wanted to check her pans of bread and her pot of soaking beans, so she climbed down after him, feeling the stretch in her legs. Boots had chastised her for not covering the spotted beans with water last night to soften them up in time for tonight's supper. And he'd declared her bread dough looked too spongy.

On a quick inspection, she saw that both looked fine, but the water from the beans had sloshed from beneath the lid a little and wet the inside of the cupboard.

Raising her hand to the sun, Josephine gauged that it was getting close to noon, and they hadn't been told where to make camp. Come to think of it, they hadn't caught up with the herd, nor had they seen the steady stream of dust being kicked up by the animals.

“I haven't seen any dust for a while,” Josephine ventured.

Ambling toward her with his arms laden with wood, Boots quickly answered, “Don't worry, I know where we are.”

“I wasn't, but—”

“Get in the wagon.”

Josephine folded her arms beneath her breasts. She would have really taken offense if she hadn't heard the slight tone of anxiety in his voice. Rather than argue with him, she did as he said and took her spot on the seat. He joined her after throwing the dry sticks and bits of wood into what he'd called the possum belly under the wagon bed.

Boots kicked the brake free, popped his blacksnake, then gave a yell and urged the frisky teams into a run.

He kept up a breakneck pace due south, crushing grass and bouncing over rocks in their way. She wasn't keen on compass points, but she remembered what Rio had told her last night about the North Star. To her way of thinking, they were going in the wrong direction.

She held her tongue for a good ten minutes. But after she glanced at Boots and noticed the sweat beaded on his brow and dripping down the side of his neck, she had to ask, “Are you certain of our course?”

“I am,” came the heated reply. Then he did something that put her instantly out of sorts. He shoved the four lines of leather reins at her. “Take over. Take over.”

Josephine was helpless to do anything else. The reins felt uncomfortable in her unaccustomed fingers. She didn't know how to thread them through as Boots had done, and there wasn't an opportunity to ask him. He'd reached into his back pocket and taken out a large red handkerchief and was swabbing his face. His complexion seemed ruddy, his perspiration increasing. He moved his gaze from left to right, then stared dead ahead with a befuddled expression.

Dear Lord . . . they were lost.

•  •  •

J.D. picked up the wagon tracks near a dingy riverbed with a low flow of water. Steering Tequila around a cluster of greasewood, he headed south—the apparent course they'd taken. Why in the hell would Boots go toward Dixon?

The terrain was rough and rocky with stones the size of a man's fist, this area once belonging to a wider and wetter portion of the Haymaker River; but the water source had since been dammed up by the beavers in the higher elevations, and what came through now was just a hint of what the flow once had been.

He left the area behind him, winding upward toward a flat section mottled with buffalo grass. From there, the grove imprinted by the wagon wheels was easier to read, and J.D. was able to regain his earlier pace. The countryside flashed by, an undulating expanse of desolate prairie occasionally broken by a lone scrub or sagebrush. In the far distance, he caught sight of a moving blur. Sunlight radiated off the white canvas, making it an easy mark to spot.

The chuck wagon.

“Pick 'em up,” J.D. ordered Tequila. The white gelding kicked his hooves into a smooth run and sped toward the wayward wagon.

Riding up next to the chuck, J.D. closed in on the driver's side, ready to lay into Boots with a streak of cussing. But once he got within the level of the box, he saw that it wasn't Boots behind the reins. Josephine held them.

“Stop those mules,” J.D. hollered above the ring of tack.

Boots looked up in confused surprise, but the expression on Josephine's face was one of instant relief. She hesitated, clearly uncertain how to go about stopping a moving team of four mules.

J.D. motioned with one arm. “Pull back.”

Josephine didn't exactly follow his directions, but she managed to get the job done by practically lying flat on her back. “Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!” she chanted, her knuckles white on the leather ribbons.

Easing his own mount to a standstill, J.D. crossed his hands over the pommel of his saddle. “What in the hell are you doing out here?”

J.D. could have sworn he saw Boots pale a shade beneath the brim of his old hat. His brows creased into deep furrows, and his hands looked unsteady.

“I don't remember,” Boots mumbled in a tone quiet and forlorn—so unlike his normal baritone. J.D. could barely hear him or comprehend that the words belonged to Boots.

“Never you mind about him,” Josephine responded. “It's my fault.”

Boots's gaze lifted to her. She was undaunted by him, continuing with her explanation while she fidgeted with the slackened reins. “I wanted to see what it was like to drive the wagon. Boots told me I was going in the wrong direction, but I didn't believe him.” She wet her lips, looking down, then up and past Boots, who continued to stare at her. “He's steered me wrong before, that's why I didn't think he was telling me the truth this time. He said to go the other way, but I thought you'd gone this way. That's why we're here.”

J.D. looked from Josephine to Boots, waiting for Boots to lash back at her or, at the very least, make some sarcastic remark.

Boots sat there, looking china-fragile and totally unlike his hard-edged self. His shoulders slumped forward, making him appear short when he really wasn't.

“What happened?” J.D. finally asked Boots, not fully convinced Boots would hand over the reins to a woman, much less Josephine Whittaker.

The short whiskers on Boots's leathery cheeks glistened in the sun. “She said all that needs to be said.”

“I'm glad you came along when you did,” Josephine said in a rush. “I suppose this means dinner is going to be a little late. Just where do we go to make camp?”

J.D.'s eyes narrowed on her, taking stock of the way she refused to meet his gaze. She'd handed the length of reins over to Boots, who wove them through his
gloved fingers. “First, you turn around. Then follow that ridge over there about five miles until you get to a spot known as the Belanger Cliffs. Boots has been there before.”

“I know where it is,” he snapped, the old piss and vinegar coming back.

“I reckon you do,” J.D. returned calmly, determined not to start a full-blown argument with Boots. Swinging Tequila around, J.D. said, “Take care over these rocks.”

J.D. nudged his horse into a gallop, but not fast enough to leave the chuck in the lurch. The mules could hold their own pretty well and cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time, even with the wagon in tow.

Josephine watched J.D. move out, her hands curled in her lap while she sat in silence. If he hadn't found them, she wasn't sure what they would have done. She'd carried on in the direction Boots had pointed them, uncertain how to turn the mules around, and uncertain that they truly were going the wrong way. At least now J.D. was here. He gave her a sense of relief, but she remained troubled by Boots's disorientation.

Boots finally asked, “What'd y'all do that for?”

“What?” But she knew full well.

“Tell J.D. what you did. I was the one who got us lost. How come y'all said it was you?”

“I was thinking of what you told J.D. at the table the other day.”

“I say a lot of things to him.”

“You said you wanted to be shot in the head if you got forgetful.” Her eyes were settled on the man they discussed as he trotted ahead of them.

“I didn't mean it.”

“I would hope not.”

“Is that why you said you got us lost? Y'all are afraid I might just have Hazel do me in because my memory is going?”

“That's nothing to joke about.” Her voice faltered,
then she stared pointedly at Boots McCall. “You may think you're entertaining when you make such morose commentary, but taking your own life is serious.” She inhaled a gulp of air. “My father shot himself in the head. I can assure you, I was not laughing when I found out.”

Then she faced forward, dismissing Boots—for once, before he dismissed her.

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