“A child.” His tone changed.” Are you sure about this?”
“I got it from three different sources. The last one claimed she’d been to a doctor and—as the old saying goes—the poor rabbit died.”
“And when is this new Calder due to arrive?”
“Late February, early March is what I’m hearing.”
“I see. By the way, it seems likely that your Laredo Smith cowboy is a nephew. Hattie Ludlow’s first husband came from a large family—nine children, I believe it was. One of his sisters married a man named Smith. Of their six children, five are boys. We haven’t tracked them all down yet. I’m not sure it’s necessary, since he appears to be who he says he is.”
“That’s up to you. I was just giving you my read on the man.”
“Keep me posted. On everything. I don’t care how trivial the information sounds to you,” Rutledge stated and abruptly hung up. His hand remained on the receiver a moment longer as the beginnings of a smile lifted the corners of his mouth. “A baby,” he murmured, a scheming light in his dark eyes.
The moment of reflection was a brief one. Briskly, he pulled his hand from the phone and hit the controls on the armrest, pivoting the wheelchair away from the desk and sending it rolling away.
“Harold!” he barked the summoning call.
Almost immediately the burly manservant and nurse appeared in the study’s doorway. “I’m right here, sir.”
“Get me a cigar and a glass of bourbon.”
Bennett hesitated a second, surprised by the request for a cigar, but not so surprised that he didn’t know the order in which Rutledge wanted the two items. He delivered the drink first, then returned with the humidor, opening the lid to allow Rutledge to select his own. Using the tool designed for its specific purpose, Bennett then snipped off the end of the cigar, waited while Rutledge dipped it in the liquor, and held the lighter the proper distance from the tip.
Taking a chance that he wasn’t misreading the supremely pleased look on Rutledge’s face, he indulged his own curiosity. “Something to celebrate, sir?”
“Indeed.” The word rumbled from Rutledge like a lion’s purr. “It appears there will be a great-grandchild in the Calder house come spring.”
Startled, Bennett stared. “You mean—”
“Yes, the new bride is with child.” A craftiness was in his employer’s smile. “That could open up a whole new avenue.”
No more was offered than that. In silence, Rutledge puffed on his cigar, losing himself in thought.
Two days into fall roundup, the rain came. In some sections of the Triple C, it fell in a steady, soaking drizzle. Over the rest, it came down in sheets. Soil that had been little more than layers of dry powder quickly turned into a tawny-yellow gumbo that made treacherous footing for both man and beast.
Downpour or drizzle, no halt was called to the roundup. As long as no deadly lightning came out of the clouds, work would continue, though at a pace dictated by the inclement weather. There were no breakneck pursuits after escaping steers, no fancy rollbacks or quick cuts, not in that mud-slick terrain.
During those times when the rain fell in buckets, visibility was reduced to mere yards, forcing some areas to be worked two and three times in an attempt to ensure that no cattle were missed. And there was no slicker made that could keep a cowboy dry. Water always managed to seep inside and add its wetness to the bone-chilling damp air.
Yet the need for the life-giving rain had been so great that few grumbled about it—least of all Jessy. She was present because it was an unwritten rule on the Triple C that no culling of the herd would take place without the ranch boss there. Riders, working in pairs, quietly walked their horses into the gathered herd and went about the business of separating the steers destined for market. Any cow deemed too old or too weak to survive the winter was also cut out of the herd. It was hard, slow work for both horse and rider.
Partnered with Laredo, Jessy pointed her horse’s nose at a young steer. The wild-eyed animal snorted in alarm and swung in the opposite direction, only to be confronted by the sight of Laredo and his horse. It made an attempt to bolt past Jessy, but her horse jumped into its path, stumbled slightly, and righted itself. Laredo was there to fill the momentary void, blocking the animal’s escape. In seconds they had the steer trotting to join the gather.
Jessy followed, but only partway, pulling up when she felt an unevenness in her horse’s stride. She reined him toward the makeshift camp located some distance beyond the pocket of ground where the herd was gathered. Having spotted Trey sitting astride a claybank stallion at the lip of the rise, she angled in his direction. His hat was pulled low, and the collar of his slicker was turned up, but she recognized him instantly just the same.
“It feels like my horse lost a shoe,” she said when she was almost to him. “I’ll have to switch to another.”
“Grab a cup of coffee while you’re there. I’ll take over.” Lending action to his statement, he nudged his horse forward, moving past her toward the waiting herd.
That moment stayed with her all the way to camp. Taking Trey’s advice, Jessy left her horse at the picket line where the extra horses were tied and trekked across the muddy ground to the motorized chuck wagon. A heavy tarp, supported by upright poles, offered some shelter from the falling rain. Jessy helped herself to coffee from the never empty pot and wandered over to the fifty-five-gallon drum and the small fire that blazed inside it.
Behind her came the stomping sound of someone trying to dislodge clumps of mud from his boots. Jessy looked back to see Laredo duck his head under the tarp and head for the coffeepot. A mug of steaming coffee in his gloved hand, he joined her at the barrel, his hat pushed to the back of his head.
“Horse threw a shoe, did it?” he challenged. “You could have told me. One minute you’re there, and the next you’re gone. I thought the rain had swallowed you up. Good thing Trey told me where I could find you or I’d have been searching the puddles.”
“Right,” she said in a voice dry with disbelief, but the mention of her son switched the direction of her thoughts. “Do you know I didn’t have to tell Trey to take over? He told me. I don’t know if it’s getting married or having a baby on the way that’s done it, but he seems to have matured a lot over the summer.”
“You always hear, blood tells,” Laredo remarked idly. “Taking the lead comes natural to him, I’ve noticed.”