Stands a Calder Man (32 page)

When she finished, she handed him the towel to wipe off the last bits of lather. “Come eat your breakfast before it gets cold.”

Webb wiped at his face as he stared after her, feeling vaguely puzzled. Getting up and crossing the room to the bed required an effort. He was breaking out in a sweat by the time he reached it, his strength sapped by that minor exertion. Ruth plumped the pillows to give him firmer support, then set the tray on his lap.

“Do you know you have never once asked me about the shooting, Ruth?” Webb realized. Everyone else had wanted a firsthand account, except her.

“Your father said it was an accident.” She avoided
his gaze. “I don't care how it happened or why. I just want you to get better.”

“A woman who doesn't ask questions. You must be a new breed,” he suggested dryly and watched her lips part as if she were going to say something, then come together again. “What were you going to say?”

“Nothing.” She shook her head, denying there was any question she wanted to ask him. “Eat your breakfast. I'll come back for the tray in a little bit.”

“Ruth.” Webb called her back when she started to leave. “Thanks for not asking questions.”

Her smile was small. As she left, Ruth wondered if it had ever occurred to Webb that she didn't want to know the answers.

It was well into the third week before Webb ventured downstairs. At first it was just for meals, and gradually it worked into longer periods. He didn't see much of his father. When he did, they had little to say to each other. They hadn't been on the best of terms for quite a while, and the relationship had become more strained since the shooting.

During his long recuperation, he'd had many hours to think about Lilli. It was better if he didn't see her again—better for both of them. Since she had made no attempt to contact him, he had to assume her decision to stay with her husband hadn't changed despite the shooting. Webb didn't want to share her. He didn't want an affair, never knowing when he could see her or how. It was better to leave the door closed.

The evening meal had been finished some time ago, but the three of them, Webb and his parents, were lingering at the table over coffee. Webb drained what was in his cup and set it back in its saucer. His father eyed him from his chair at the head of the table.

“Well.” The word was issued in a challenging tone. “Are you up to taking me on, Webb? I promised your mother I'd wait until you were stronger before we had our ‘discussion.'”

“Benteen—” His mother attempted to protest.

“It's no good, Lorna,” he cut in. “Postponing isn't going to change my mind.”

“He's right, Mother,” Webb agreed. “There's nothing to be gained by putting it off any longer.” He glanced at his father. “Shall we go to the den?” He received an affirmative nod, and both stood up at the same time.

“I'm coming, too,” his mother insisted and pushed her chair away from the table.

“No, you're not, Lorna,” his father denied. “This is one time when there's no room for a peacemaker. There are things that have to be said, and the talk is likely to get rough. I don't want you there. This is something Webb and I have to settle once and for all.”

This showdown had been brewing for a long time, Webb realized as he left the dining room, walking stride for stride with his father across the entryway to the den. He didn't know what was coming, but he felt ready for it. Now that Lilli was obviously lost to him, there seemed to be very little in his life that had any meaning. So there was really nothing to lose.

Inside the room, Webb paused and waited for his father to close the doors. When they were shut, he walked to the fire and poked at the glowing logs until a flame shot up. His side was still sore, and he wasn't back to full strength by any means, but he felt able to take on his father.

“Drink?” his father asked, and Webb shook his head in refusal. “Neither do I. It isn't going to help the taste of anything I have to say.”

“Then get on with it,” Webb stated.

Benteen Calder looked at him and grunted out a laugh. “That's the only thing you've ever said that sounded like it came from a Calder.” He shook his head in a kind of hopelessness and walked to his desk. “I guess you know this business with a married woman was the final straw.”

“I didn't exactly plan to fall in love with another man's wife,” Webb snapped. “But I don't expect you to understand that.”

“Do you know what you are?” His father tilted his head to one side, studying him. “You're a saddlebum. You may not drift from ranch to ranch, but you're just like them in all the other ways. You do your drinking and brawling and whoring with the boys. And you'll never amount to a damned thing. You're always taking the easy way, letting someone else do the worrying and give the orders.”

“That's your opinion.” Webb set the poker back in its rack, feeling the hairs bristling on his neck at the sweeping condemnation.

“Opinion? You've never shown me you're anything else,” Benteen shot back. “Do you see that map on the wall? When I was your age, I'd built that, fought for it, and owned it.”

“I'm tired of hearing what you did when you were my age!” Webb flared. “What do you expect me to do? Go out and duplicate it just because it was what you did?”

“No! Dammit!” His temper was ignited by the flash of Webb's. “I've been waiting for years for you to start shouldering some of the responsibility around here, but you don't even want to handle a roundup crew! Nothing you have said or done has shown me that you care what happens to this ranch!”

“Is this going to turn into another lecture about the ranch?” Webb demanded. “Because if it is—”

“No.” His father paused, breathing hard as his voice grew deadly cold. “This isn't another lecture. Because I realize you aren't going to change.”

“I'm glad you finally got it through your thick skull that I don't want anything handed to me,” Webb retorted with a trace of sarcasm.

“I got it, all right. And you're not going to get handed a thing, because I wouldn't put the Triple C in the hands of an unprincipled, irresponsible bum like you,” he stated. “You're not going to inherit the Triple C when I'm gone. You're not going to get one inch of this land.”

Webb stared at his father, trying to take in what he'd just been told. It was as if someone had just ripped out
his soul. A strange rage was building inside of him, thundering through his veins like a stampeding herd.

“You can't do that.” His voice was tight, hardly sounding like his own.

“The hell I can't.”

“Damn you to hell!” Webb was vibrating with the force of his fury. “This land is as much mine as it is yours! I was born on it! I've worked it and rode every inch of it!”

“Have you, now?” There was a hard, calculating gleam in his father's eyes. “You know damned well I have!” “Do you want it?”

“Yes!” He had resisted it for so long that it came as a shock how desperately he wanted this ranch. He belonged to it. It was as much a part of him as his heart. “And, by God, I'm not going to let you take it from me!”

“If you want it, you're going to have to fight to get it,” his father challenged. “You're going to have to show me that you've inherited some guts from your mother and me, because I don't think you have what it takes to hold on to a place like this.”

“I'm a Calder, aren't I?” Webb retorted. “I'm your son.”

“I don't know if you're a Calder.” Benteen looked him up and down. “But you'd better be able to fight like one, because you're taking me on. You've got a helluva lot to learn, boy. You might do all right in a stand-up fight. What happens when it's down and dirty?”

The challenge was a figurative one and Webb knew it, but his combative fever was running high. Physical violence would have been a welcome release for his anger. So Webb responded to the taunt with a half-serious invitation.

“Why don't you and me tangle right here? We'd settle that question real quick,” he declared.

The prospect seemed to amuse his father in an arrogant kind of way. “Are you sure you don't want to
wait until your wound has completely healed and you've got more of your strength back?”

“No. I figure it would put us at an equal advantage, 'cause you're old and slow,” Webb countered.

“Fists never win as many fights as brains do. You're thinking with your gut right now, boy. And that isn't the way to get this ranch from me,” his father stated. “All you're doing right now is proving to me that you don't deserve it. You talk big, but you haven't shown me anything.”

“We'll see about that.” Webb agreed that no more could be accomplished with words. He swung away from his father and let his long strides carry him from the room.

Benteen watched him from the center of the room. He stood tall and straight, his big bones fleshed out and his dark hair frosted with gray. The expression of anger and taunting challenge that had been on his strong-lined face gave way to pride, and the gleam in his brown eyes misted over with tears. A second after he heard the sound of a pair of boots climbing the stairs, Lorna came hurrying into the room.

“What happened?” She searched his face, expecting the worst after the angry, shouting voices she'd heard and the way Webb had come charging out of the room. “Webb isn't leaving the ranch?”

“No.” He reached out to take her in his arms and gather her against his chest. He rested his chin atop her head and closed his eyes, trembling relief and gratitude all mixing together. “I finally have my son.”

“I don't understand.” Lorna shifted in his hold and tipped her head back to look at him.

“He's going to fight me to get the ranch.” Benteen was smiling. “I called him in here tonight to tell him he wouldn't inherit it.”

“Benteen!” She was shocked at the statement, and more than a little angry.

“I had no choice.” He defended his decision calmly now that he knew the outcome. “Up till now, he hadn't shown me he gave a damn about it. Deep down, I think
I was hoping he would react the way he did, but Webb has disappointed me so many times.”

“But what happens now?” Lorna didn't see how it was going to work.

“Go up to his room, but don't say that I sent you,” Benteen told her. “Tell him that a ranch this size has never been successfully run from a bunkhouse. And tell him that if he expects to have any authority, he's going to have to take it—and it isn't just a matter of giving orders. It's taking charge.”

Once he had cooled down, it hadn't taken Webb long to figure out that he'd played right into his father's hand. But there was a difference. They weren't playing against each other. They were partners.

On the first day of spring roundup, the morning gather of bawling cattle was bunched about a hundred yards away from the chuckwagon where the bulk of the cowboys had collected. Webb was standing a little off to himself, not joining in with the men and trying to be one of them.

The branding fires were hot, the irons lying in them, ready for an afternoon's work. Webb swirled the coffee liquid and dregs in his cup, mixing them together before drinking the black and bitter stuff.

In a curious flash of memory, he recalled another cup of coffee he'd drunk on a stormy night and the auburn-haired woman who had poured it for him. His thoughts turned to Lilli at odd times, coming to him without warning and stabbing him with their futility. She had said no to him. And the very fact that she hadn't attempted to contact him or make any inquiry about him told Webb she hadn't changed her mind. She intended to stay with the man she had married. Even though he had thrown all his energies into the ranch, he still couldn't forget her.

He shook out the last drop of coffee and wandered over to the wagon to toss his cup into the wreckpan, aware the men were waiting for his signal to start the afternoon's work. But he paused there to light a cigarette, not making a move toward the saddled and fresh horses. In addition to Triple C riders, there were reps from other outfits on hand to claim strayed cattle and drive them back to their home ranges.

Nate ambled over to throw his plate and cup into the wreckpan, then paused to stand with Webb. “Sure feels good to be back on the payroll again after bein' flatbusted all winter.” He took out his tobacco and papers to roll himself a cigarette. “Well, boss, are you about ready to slap down a few calves?”

“Soon enough.” Webb smiled faintly at the term signifying his authority. It didn't grate as he thought it would.

The majority of the riders, especially the older hands, had regarded his step-up with silent approval, even though they were watching to see how he'd do. Webb didn't mind that, either, because it meant he'd be earning their respect—and they were going to expect more from him than they would from one of their own. It was crazy that he hadn't looked at it that way before.

Maybe he'd finally grown up. Maybe it had taken losing some of that hot blood of youth and getting cracked over the head. It was for certain a lot of hard lessons had been learned. He had wanted Lilli and Lilli had wanted him, but that hadn't made it right. Knowing that didn't make it any easier, but at least he was beginning to accept it.

He was doing it again—thinking about Lilli instead of concentrating on the business at hand. His glance ran to Nate, observing the miserly way he licked the tobacco paper together, conserving his spit for the long, dusty afternoon ahead of them. Roundups were brutal on a cowboy. Rain or shine, he worked every day until his muscles were too weary to know the difference, and never got enough sleep. It would be a grueling six weeks or longer.

“Why don't you smoke ready-mades and save yourself all that work, Nate?” Webb asked.