My Foot's in the Stirrup . . . My Pony Won't Stand (Code of the West) (23 page)

Angelita shrugged. “Sort of. I traded for them.”

Pepper stopped combing her hair. “You what?”

“I went down to the train depot and—”

“Oh, no. Angelita, you didn’t . . .”

“I had my sewing project—”

“The baby mittens you’re knitting?”

“I wanted to let you sleep, so I went down to the depot. And this lady gets off the westbound and looks at me and says, ‘My, what an exquisite example of a primitive doily.’ Then she says, ‘Hubert, see if this little Indian girl will trade you for it. Don’t offer her money. I hear it insults them.’”

“Money insults Indians?”

Angelita rocked back and forth on her black lace-up shoes. “She offered to trade me a little brass hand mirror, so I said, ‘Sure.’ Those mittens were a mess anyway.”

“So you got a mirror?”

“Yes, but what do I need with another mirror? We all know how cute I look.”

“So you traded the mirror for a plate of cinnamon rolls?”

“Three plates. We get one plate every day for three days.”

Pepper held Angelita’s warm brown hands. “Sometimes you completely amaze me.”

“I even amaze myself. I don’t think I’ve ever met someone like me before.” She dropped Pepper’s hands and grabbed a big gooey cinnamon roll and sank her teeth into it. “You want me to go wake up Selena?”

“No, let her sleep. I’ve got some things to figure out first.”

“Is she going to stay with us awhile?”

“That’s one of the things I’ve got to figure out.”

Selena made a bruised appearance about noon. The three spent most of the afternoon and evening, lounging in the shade of the front porch discussing friends and enemies, good times and bad.

The next morning Selena wandered into the front room where Pepper and Angelita read the Bible.

“‘Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law doth he—’”

“What’s this word?” Angelita held the black book up to Pe
pper.

“
Meditate
.”

Clearing her throat, Angelita continued.

“‘ . . . meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever be doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.’”

“You take that all pretty serious now, don’t you?” Selena asked.

Pepper studied Selena’s battered, sad eyes and her beautiful flowing black hair.

“We’re trying to learn. I’ve changed a lot in the past year.”

“You’re sure not the same woman I used to know at April’s.”

“Is that good or bad?” Angelita asked.

Selena burst out in deep laughter. “I envied the way the men always headed straight for you when they walked in the front door of April’s. I hated you and would have liked nothing better than to bury my knife in that scrawny chest of yours a year ago.”

Angelita’s round eyes grew even bigger. “Really?”

“’Course, I was probably drunk and sipping morphine at the time.”

“Really?” Angelita gasped again.

“What about now?” Pepper asked.

“I still envy you. You pulled yourself out of that mess. You’ve got a home, a husband, a family. Even if you did have to lie and cheat and deceive to land him.” A wry smile crept across Selena’s face.

“Really?” Angelita’s mouth dropped again.

Pepper looked over at her. “Don’t you want to go down to the depot? I think the eastbound’s due in soon.”

“Are you kidding? I don’t want to miss one word of this.”

Pepper talked of Tap, the coming baby, their dreams of a ranch, her constant fear of his getting shot, and her recently acquired faith in Christ Jesus.

By evening the topic of conversation turned to Selena. All three sat on the front porch.

“If you could lend me the money to take the train to De
nver, I’d get a job and repay you,” Selena suggested.

“I’m sure that would be fine," Pepper replied, "But you won’t want to leave before those bruises heal. Stay a while.”

“Thanks. I’d really like to wait and visit with Mr. Odessa again. Do you know anything about him?”

“No, I never met him b
efore. But Tap’s told me all about how they used to live it up down on the Mexican border.”

“So he’s pretty wild?”

“No more than Tap used to be. Tap hasn’t seen him in a couple years. Sometimes men change.”

“And sometimes they never do.” Selena gingerly rubbed her bruised face.

“Why did that man Banner hit you, Miss Selena?” Angelita asked.

“Some men just like to beat on women, honey. What else can I say?” Selena glanced at Pepper for help.

“Dance halls are not very good places to work. Sometimes you see men and women at their worst.”

Selena leaned her head back and closed her eyes, as she pulled a large white brush through her hair. “Angelita, I’ve spent the last ten years trying to get rich men to like me and take care of me. Som
etimes I wish . . . I wish I’d spent those ten years trying to get a gentleman to take care of me. A man can own the biggest gold mine in the Rockies and still be a fool.”

“Really?” Angelita frowned.

A bandaged Tom Slaughter called on Pepper before dark. He reported the events of the previous day. “I’ve notified the authorities in Texas, Cheyenne, and Ft. Laramie. I’m on my way back out of town with a posse of fifteen men to assist Tap and the others up on the North Platte. Don’t you worry, Mrs. Andrews. Ol’ Tap told me to tell you he has ever’thing under control.”

She stood on the porch with Angelita at her side. Selena was in the open doorway. The hot August breeze chapped Pepper’s lips. Her skin felt very dry.

Everything under control? If it were under control, he would be home. What he meant was, tell her I’m doing those things that I can’t keep myself from doing. Like chasing wicked men. Having guns fired at me at close range. Galloping off into the dark. Thriving on living on the edge of death.

Everything under control.

Tapadera Andrews, you have nothing under control.

You wouldn’t have it any other way.

Pepper was surprised that the U.S. Marshal didn’t ride out with Tom Slaughter but seemed content to sit on the front porch of a vacant house across the street and spy out her every move.

She was even more surprised when she went to bed early that evening that she actually went quickly to sleep.

The violent knocking at the front door brought Pepper to her feet even before she opened her eyes. She padded across the living room in the dark. A flicker from a light behind her caused her to look back. Angelita clutched a candle. Selena stood guard at the kitchen doorway, a carving knife in her hand.

“Who’s there?” Pepper called out.

“Your husband’s over at the livery, and he’s bleedin’ bad.”

“Tap’s hurt?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’ll be right there,” she called. “Go get a doctor.”

“I reckon it’s too late for that.”

Angelita started to cry. Selena rushed to Pepper’s side.

“I’ll be right out. I must get dressed.”

“You’d better hurry if you expect to talk to him,” the man on the porch shouted out.

“O God, our help in ages past, our hope for years to come, our shelter from the stormy blast, and our eternal home.”
The lines from the ancient hymn ran through her mind as she rushed back into the bedroom and began to dress.

“It’s going to be all right, Angelita. The Lord will take care of Tap .
 . . and us.”

“He’s going to die, and I’m goin’ to have to go live with that lady and her five ratty kids,” Angelita wailed.

“Don’t be silly. If anything happened to Tap, I’d need you all the more.”

Angelita sniffled and wiped her nose on her nightshirt. “You would, wouldn’t you?” She carried Pepper’s shoes over to her, helped her put them on, and began to lace them up. “Aren’t you scared, Mrs. Andrews?”

“I’m scared and peaceful at the same time. I don’t know if I’m just in shock or if it’s God’s special grace for me. Either way, we’ll just have to trust Him, won’t we?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Selena appeared at the bedroom door, fully dressed, her long black hair flowing down her back.

Pepper pulled a knit shawl across her shoulders.

“I’m going with you,” Selena announced. “I’m amazed that you can act so calmly.”

“So am I. The baby isn’t even doing the splits.”

“The splits?” Selena asked.

“Oh, sometimes he seems to kick both sides of my sto
mach at the same time. But not now. He’s real peaceful. It’s like the Lord is saying, ‘You can handle this, Pepper girl.’ . . . Are you ready?”

“I’m staying right here. I don’t like it when people I love get hurt a whole bunch,” Angelita declared.

“Should we take a gun?” Selena asked.

“What on earth for?” Pepper walked over to the front door and put her hand on the latch. “Someday I expect to go and find Tap dead. I’ve always known that. But it won’t be t
onight.”

“How can you say that?” Selena quizzed as she scurried to Pe
pper’s side.

“Because he said he had it under control, and I believe him. This is a crazy night. Angelita, lock the door behind us.”

“And I’ll pray for Mr. Andrews.”

“Pray for all of us,” Selena added.

The dark shadows on the front porch flickered from the unsteady light of the lantern. To the south a dog howled. Up above stars glimmered. A distant sound of hoofbeats rolled up the street. The worn wooden porch floor creaked a bit as they descended the steps.

“Hello,” she called. “We’re ready to go.”

Like a winter squall, a sharp, brisk chill slid from the nape of her neck down her spine. She even shuddered at her tailbone. No words, no sight of anything, not even a hint. Just an inner feeling, soon followed by a deep, hate-filled voice. “Two birds in one trap. Cain’t do any better than that.”

Selena spun around first. “Banner!”

“Mr. Cabe?” Pepper strained to see the man holding the shotgun on them. “What is the meaning of this? I was told my husband was seriously wounded.”

“He will be, ma’am. I guarantee.”

“Tap’s not hurt at all? You used this ruse to get us out of the house?” Selena snapped.

“It worked, didn’t it? Come on, ladies, we’re going for a li
ttle walk.”

“We aren’t going anywhere,” Selena protested.

Colton Banner raised his revolver to strike her with the barrel.

Selena pulled a knife with a six-inch blade out of the sleeve of her dress and waved Banner back.

“You don’t have ten men to hold me down this time, Banner,” she growled.

He pointed the revolver at her head and yanked back the hammer. “It only takes one bullet to stop you.”

“Then you better pull the trigger. You might kill me, but you aren’t ever going to beat on me again. There are worse things than dying.”

“He won’t shoot you, Selena,” Pepper interjected.

“Why not?” he growled.

“Because if you wanted to shoot us, you’d have done that the moment we walked out into the yard. I presume you think that kee
ping us alive will help you bushwhack my husband.”

“She’s right, Banner. Back off,” Cabe cautioned.

“I’ll do what I want with this woman,” Banner shouted.

“Not until we do away with Andrews and the other one,” Cabe insisted. “Start walking toward the livery.”

“Not when you use that tone of voice,” Pepper challenged.

“You’re crazy, lady. Get movin’, or we’ll shoot you.” Cabe’s voice cracked with anger.

Neither woman moved.

“Please,” he shouted.

“That’s better.”

Pepper had always assumed that Pine Bluffs had some nighttime activity, much like Cheyenne, only on a smaller scale. She was di
sheartened to discover that not one light was on, that not one person stirred in the entire town.

Where’s that U.S. Marshal now? I heard hoofbeats. Surely someone will see us.

Selena refused to surrender her knife and returned it to her sleeve and walked on the right side of Pepper. She felt Selena’s left hand slip into her right arm. Pepper squeezed it.

Banner led the way down the silent dirt street to the livery. He carried his revolver in his right hand. Wesley Cabe marched behind them with the short double-barreled sho
tgun pointed at the women. As they approached the big double doors of the livery barn, Pepper halted with a glance at Selena.