The Bones of Paradise (37 page)

G
raver found her standing in front of the bank, arm clutched around her stomach, face damp and pale. Was she fevered? He placed a hand under her elbow and led her down the street to the café, took a table against the back wall, where he could observe anyone who entered the otherwise empty room. He ordered tea, which he thought she'd appreciate, but she shook her head and asked for a glass of water. When the girl brought it, Dulcinea nodded to the counter where the headache powders and stomach relief medicines sat in a dusty glass case, and pressed her fingers to the side of her head and closed her eyes. The girl quickly brought the powders, which Dulcinea dissolved in her glass and drank with a grimace.

Graver kept his eyes on the front window, watched Drum Bennett limp past in more of a hurry than he should be, followed by the judge and Harney Rivers. Now what were they at? As he considered the possibilities, he noted that dust coated several tables along with the corners of the room, where the mop pushed the dark, greasy dirt. Not enough business these days with the stock market up and down. Took longer for things to recover out here. Folks couldn't afford to spend their dimes and dollars on extras like a meal or even
a cup of coffee they didn't prepare themselves, especially during the fair and rodeo. That brought him back to Dulcinea and the ranch. He'd shouldered the burden of running the place, but how the hell was he supposed to do that with no money? He glanced at Dulcinea, who watched him with a slight smile on her face, and he felt the heat rise up his chest.

“I'm better now,” she said.

He considered his next words, then decided to go for broke. “I was thinking we might could go to the festivities. Rodeo starting soon.” He cleared his throat and straightened his shoulders. “I gave the men the day off. They're wanting to rodeo and, well, it sort of makes up for our being late with their wages.” He paused and stared into the cold tea, the film forming in the cup he held between both hands. He'd paid their entry fees with the very last of his money but didn't tell her that.

“They're wanting to know about entering the horse race. They won't go through with it if, if it seems wrong to you.” He watched her carefully as she pressed a trembling hand to her forehead.

She poured herself a cup of tea from the flowered pot in front of them. After a sip, she shook her head and pushed her tongue between her teeth as if to dislodge the taste.

“What does Hayward want to do?” she asked, listless.

Graver raised his brows, glanced out the window, and caught sight of Rose carrying Mrs. Bennett's satchel, followed at some distance by Percival Chance.

He shrugged. “Far as I know, he's entered. Don't know what he intends to ride, he and his brother—” There, he'd done it. He swallowed and picked up his cup and put it down again.

As if she'd been waiting for the words, she immediately announced, “He will ride my stallion.” Her face hardened with decision.

Graver shook his head. “No, ma'am.”

She tried to stiffen, and couldn't. Graver hated seeing her this way.

“He's at the livery stable.” She gathered her string bag and prepared to rise. He put a hand on her arm. She looked down at it, and her expression softened.

He stumbled on the words. “If I may, I might could accompany you to the rodeo, Mrs. Bennett.” He felt his face redden and tried to steady his hand, but something about her made him jumpy as a green colt.

She stared at him a moment. “Of course.”

He removed his hand and picked up his hat. “I took the liberty of asking Rose to bring you more suitable clothes.” He glanced at her dress. She always appeared so darn, what, he didn't know, but he liked it. He chastised himself, the woman was in mourning.

She picked up the skirt of her black dress and let it drop, then brushed at the front. “I suppose this would be a bit dampening on the festivities.” She shrugged then as if she understood that wearing black couldn't do a damn thing to change the fates of her husband and son. She looked out the window. “I'll see if there's a room I can use at the hotel. They usually keep one for the Bennetts.” She tilted her head and glanced at him with the slightest hint of flirtation in her eyes. “I can see myself to the hotel, if you'll come for me in half an hour?”

When he arrived, Graver was clean-shaven and wore a sky-blue shirt he'd bought from the peddler in July. The stiffness made him itch and he tugged on the cuffs of the too-short sleeves. It was the only shirt that fit his chest and shoulders once they filled to their former size with the extra food he'd eaten these past few months. The stiff collar creaked against his neck and he retied the dark-blue-and-black-figured scarf he wore underneath. He had half a mind to take the whole rig off and dump it in the water trough and start over, but he wanted to avoid shaming the boss. She was a handsome woman after all.

When Graver saw her standing with Drum Bennett without
doing the old man any bodily harm, he grew uneasy, almost turned on his heel and left, then Drum saw him and lifted his chin and said something that made her turn.

What was she playing at? Graver nodded at Drum and waited until she'd concluded her conversation, then touched the old man's arm with her fingertips. If Graver hadn't seen the snakebit expression on her face when she turned her back to Drum, he would have suspected he was having the vapors. Drum gazed after them with the half smile of the snake that got the mouse.

“Ignore him,” Dulcinea hissed as they headed for the door.

She wore a black buckskin divided riding skirt trimmed in fringe and a matching black vest beaded with red and yellow flowers over a white silk blouse with full sleeves gathered at the wrists. On her head was a black flat-brimmed hat to match her boots. She didn't wear her wedding band, he noticed, nor that wider one that had belonged to her husband on her thumb as she'd done since his death. As they walked toward the fairgrounds, he saw men turn to stare.

The entry parade at the rodeo was led by two trick riders dressed in white mounted on twin brown-and-white-spotted horses. Graver clapped enthusiastically and held his breath, but in the back of his mind the image of his own girls learning to sit the old horse dimmed the bright scene like a hand closing over a gold coin.

A group of seasoned cowboys came next, men who rode carelessly, shoulders rounded, legs stiff, rein hands raised as they clutched their hats and spurred their horses to a fast gallop past the crowd as if they had little time to waste. Graver could feel Dulcinea restless beside him on the splintered bench until three flag girls came trotting in, glancing anxiously at the snapping cloth over their heads and then at each other to keep their horses abreast and to not drop the flags. The crowd rose, placed their hands over their hearts, and the little band by the announcer's stand broke into “America the Beautiful,” the tempo too slow and the piano off key.

After that it was a group of Sioux riders in full regalia. They pulled a travois and whole families walked alongside. The men
were mounted on horses decorated with war paint and feathers. Some Horses and Rose walked in the middle of the group, with Lily leading Dulcinea's dog painted with a circle around his eye and a feather tied to the rope around his neck. Graver hoped she wouldn't notice, but she gave a sharp intake of breath and pointed her chin at the ring.

“That's my dog.”

“Yes, ma'am,” Graver said.

“Looks happy, doesn't he? And what horse is that?”

Graver squinted. “Must be their pony.” He was puzzled at Rose's miserable expression. Some Horses beside her, determined and grim in his long war bonnet and the beaded outfit from his picture, led the horse.

“Hayward's on my stallion,” Dulcinea murmured. “Sits him well.”

The rest of the parade was rodeo clowns pushing each other in wheelbarrows, a line of local cowboys in wooly chaps and bright scarves, and girls in flowered shirts and pants.

“I thought he was supposed to ride him in the race.” Dulcinea stared at him until he turned to face her.

“He's warming him up?” Graver tried to still his face. She tightened her lips and frowned.

He was saved by a series of firecrackers set off by one of the town boys, which startled some horses to rear and buck and spin. Graver noted that Hayward sat forward, pushed his feet down in the stirrups and grabbed the horn while the stud stood on his hind legs and teetered, on the verge of going over backward, then came down again.

Dulcinea grabbed hard onto his arm but didn't utter a word as her son spurred the horse into a gallop and guided it safely around the motley circus and out the gate.

“Boy has good instincts on a horse,” Graver said, and she nodded, face pale.

As soon as the ring cleared, the rodeo commenced with saddle
bronc riding, followed by steer wrestling, then bareback riding. Willie Munday rode his saddle bronc to a standstill but scored low because it hadn't bucked very hard. Larabee tried steer wrestling but jumped too late and missed the steer entirely, his horse coming to a stop and staring at him balefully. Then they worked the chutes and encouraged the other men. When the calf roping came, Jorge and Irish Jim tied for the fastest time and had a runoff that resulted in Jorge winning when Irish Jim's pigging string came untied and the calf jumped up and trotted away. Jorge rode around the ring at a dead run, whirling his lariat over his head like a trick rider, while the crowd hooted and clapped. Dulcinea's cheeks glowed pink and Graver was happy to see her laugh. When she sat down, she put her hand on his arm.

“That was wonderful, wasn't it!”

Graver nodded and returned her smile, then a peculiar thing happened—their gaze held a moment too long and he felt the flush rise up his neck into his face, and he couldn't drop his eyes. He wondered about the freckle below her eye, and the bump in her nose, did she always have them? When he put his hand over hers, he couldn't have stopped himself if someone held him at gunpoint.

“Oh,” she said and tried to change the way her lips parted in a smile, but she couldn't make them stop.

He watched her struggle to compose an expression and rubbed his fingers softly over hers, the way he'd gentle a startled horse.

There was a break in the action and Larabee came up the stands to collect them for the race. The scent of spit-roasting beef in preparation of the night's supper made their mouths water, and Graver searched for something to feed her, settling on fried chicken sold by the piece. He had just enough for one each, and felt again the pangs of being a man without money to treat a woman right. Larabee hung around them, giving Graver the eye until Dulcinea waved them away.

As soon as the men were out of earshot, Larabee said, “You can't put that stud in this race. He's too old. I could outrun that horse on one leg.”

Graver nodded. “Where's the boy?”

“Brushing it. Got him shined up like Fourth of July and Christmas both.”

Graver raised his hand. “I'll take care of it.”

By the time they reached the horse preparation area to the west of the stands, Hayward was settling his saddle on the stallion, which pawed the ground and arched his neck in anticipation, already splotched with dark patches of sweat.

“Bring the chestnut.” Graver nodded to the horse tied to the rope stretched across the bare lot for the racers.

“Son.” Graver put his hand on the boy's shoulder, who immediately dipped and twisted away. “You can't ride this horse.”

Hayward's eyes blazed and his body turned rigid. “Like hell! My mother wants her horse in this race.”

Graver patted the air between them. “It's not that.”

Larabee stopped the chestnut beside them, careful to stay out of the stud's reach. “That horse of your mother's will still be trying to make it home come supper. Remember how much slower he is than Red here.” He spit to the side and gave a quick chew on the wad in his jaw. “Now this horse, your pa bought him for this race. You know that?” He grinned, exposing blackened teeth and brown juice that threatened to drip down his shirtfront.

Graver nodded. “He'd want you to ride him. Give the men something to feel good about.”

Hayward looked at the horse, then his boots, then the stallion. For a long minute Graver thought the boy wouldn't bite, then he nodded. Larabee handed him the reins.

“Go light on his mouth, hold him to the pack till you round the last turn, then set him loose and hang on. And don't whip him. He'll get you there.” Graver patted the horse's neck and watched the boy mount, settling lightly in his mother's flat saddle. He'd do.

Hayward gave them a curt nod, bit his lip, and shrugged to loosen his shoulders as the chestnut danced and tossed its head.

“Your pa'd be proud of you,” Larabee called and spit again. Then he turned his head to the side and muttered, “Hope he stays on.”

They found the other hands waiting for the race, exchanging bets. Graver looked over the gathering crowd for Dulcinea and was relieved to find her occupied with Tookie and Evan Edson from the Crooked Post 8. She was drinking lemonade and smiling at something the other woman said as her son rode by on his father's horse, and missed his anxious search for her.

There were more than twenty riders and horses, including Percival Chance's long-legged Thoroughbred mare, Rose on their Indian pony, as well as other locals and several cowboys who traveled on the rodeo circuit. At the end of the ragged line, Graver spotted Irish Jim bareback on a rough-looking bay horse he'd never seen before. The horses pranced and shook their heads and pawed in response to the noise and rising tension of the onlookers until finally the announcer read the rules and fired a pistol in the air.

Two horses bolted, and a couple spun and tried to run the other direction. By then the dust rose in clouds and someone with a spyglass shouted, “They're off and running, a bay and chestnut in the lead.” Chance's Thoroughbred was behind the leaders, and two others paced behind them with the main bunch back a ways.