The door swung open just as Webb was about to reach for it. The cowboy lurching out the door nearly bumped into him, then rocked back on his heels to squint at him. The noise of loud, boisterous voices and the heavy-handed piano playing rushed out into the night.

“Where are you goin’, Johnny?” Webb let a faint grin lighten the hard angles of his face. “The party’s just startin’.”

The cowboy finally recognized him in the bad light and grabbed him by the arm to pull him inside. The air in the saloon was warm and stale, pungent with the smell of whiskey and beer. The smoke from cigars and cigarettes hung in layers over the long room.

There were a few locals in the saloon crowd, but mostly it was made up of the crew from the Triple C outfit. A couple of the cowboys were swinging two of the floozies around the room—dancing, by their standards. Riders without a female partner were dancing with each other. Some were leaning against the long bar, offering their encouragement and criticism of the dancers. In the back of the saloon, a poker game was in progress.

“Hey, boys!” Johnny shouted, his voice slurring slightly. “Look who finally showed up!”

Webb was greeted with a motley collection of shouts and demands to know where he’d been. Someone yelled his name from the right. His glance went in that direction just as a whiskey bottle was lobbed through the air for him. In quick reflex, he made a one-handed catch of it.

“You better get started!” Nate advised, waving a filled shot glass in a salute. “You got a lot of drinkin’ to do to catch up with the rest of us!”

Webb pulled out the cork and raised the bottle to his mouth, tipping it up and guzzling down a couple of swallows of the fiery liquid. His action was met with cheers from the rowdy cowboys as he was swept toward the bar.

The next morning he remembered little of what had transpired after that point. He heaved the saddle onto the back of his rangy black gelding, then had to rest a minute until the violent throbbing in his head subsided to a dull pound. He stank of cheap perfume and his loins ached. Every movement was jarring, sending shafts of pain from his head down. Gritting his teeth, Webb strung the strap through the cinch ring and tightened it. There was some consolation in knowing that the other riders saddling up felt as rotten and miserable as he did.

Gingerly he pushed his hat a little farther down on his forehead. It felt like it was sitting on a balloon about to burst. The black gelding snorted and shifted sideways, rolling an eye at Webb. He changed his mind about climbing into the saddle and grabbed the trailing reins to lead the horse out of the livery corral and walk some of the humps out of its back before climbing aboard for the usual morning buck.

A team of sorrels was hitched to the ranch carriage parked in front of the livery stable. The slanting rays of the sun hurt Webb’s eyes, and he dipped his chin down so more of his hat brim would shade out the sunlight. As Webb led his horse past the back of the carriage, he noticed his father standing by the front wheel. He felt the close inspection of those keen, dark eyes and bridled under it.

Stopping, he checked the tightness of the saddle cinch again and caught the movement out of the corner of his eye as his father approached. Webb gave no sign that he was aware of him, feeling the waves of irritability sweep through his system.

“I’ll be spending the next few days in town,” his father stated. “Your mother is riding back to the ranch with Ruth. If it wouldn’t be too much trouble, I’d appreciate it if you’d keep an eye on her while I’m away.”

His teeth came together as a muscle jumped along his jawline, but Webb merely nodded. “I’ll check on Mother.”

“Fine.” Benteen kept his lips thinly together, bothered that he felt he had to make such a request of his own son. “Barnie’s going to let Ely know, since he’ll be in charge till I get back.”

It would have been an opportune time to give Webb a taste of running the ranch in his absence if his son had shown any leadership potential in the past. But he couldn’t risk it, and that was another worrisome point to Benteen.

When Webb made no comment, Benteen felt goaded into continuing the one-sided conversation until he got some kind of response from his son. “If I can arrange a meeting within the next week and get this new Homestead Bill nipped in the bud—” He paused, noticing the unexpected flicker of disagreement in Webb’s expression. “Do you have something on your mind?”

Webb hadn’t intended to venture an opinion, but everything seemed to rub him the wrong way this morning. Instead of keeping his customary silence, he met his father’s narrowed look and decided to openly voice his differing view of the situation.

“I don’t see why it’s important to keep that bill from going through,” he said flatly. “This land out here still isn’t any good for farming. If anything, the proposal would probably be more beneficial to the cattleman than the farmer by extending his title to range he’s already using.”

At first his father’s reaction was one of impatience for his apparent ignorance of the bill’s ramifications, but it changed quickly, a speculative gleam appearing in his eye.

“That’s what you think, huh?” he challenged, something close to approval touching his mouth. “Well, you’re wrong.” His father appeared to mentally shake away any lingering tiredness, energy suddenly returning to him. “Unsaddle your horse, Webb. You’re going to attend that meeting with me. Nothing is ever secure—least of all, the Triple C.”

Webb started to reject the idea that it was important for him to be at the me

eting. Before he could say anything, his father read it in his expression.

“That’s an order, Webb,” he stated. “I’m not asking you.”

There was a testing of wills before Webb turned and hooked the stirrup over the saddlehorn to loosen the cinch. The black gelding twisted its nose around to snort at him to make up his mind.

The telegraph in Miles City was kept busy that week transmitting messages back and forth from the nation’s capital to arrange a date for the meeting that all parties could keep. When a train from the East pulled into the depot ten days later, Webb and his father were on hand to meet it. Asa Morgan, having arrived from Helena the day before, was with them.

As soon as the private railroad car was separated from the others and pushed onto a siding, they converged on it, crossing the cinder-bed tracks to swing onto the rear platform. A uniformed black man admitted them into the private car, bowing with servile respect.

The interior walls were paneled with oak, and a thick gold and green rug covered the floor. It was ten years, maybe more, since Webb had seen the large, muscled hulk of a man seated in the overstuffed leather chair, but he recognized Bull Giles immediately. One leg was stretched out in front of him and a cane rested against the side of the chair. A second, heavyset man was standing by the window, no doubt having observed their approach to the train. Turning, he stepped forward to greet them as they filed into the car. His ruddy face was wreathed in a welcoming smile.

“Benteen, good to see you again.” He vigorously shook his father’s hand, then turned his shrewd glance on Webb. He doubted if the man was in his thirties yet, but there was an age-old look of political cunning behind the good-natured facade. The old-young man with the portly build was a back-scratcher with an itch of his own. “You must be a Calder, too,” he guessed as he firmly clasped Webb’s hand.

“This is my son, Webb.” His father completed the introduction. “Frank Bulfert, the senator’s aide.” Then he included the third member of the Montana party. “And I’m sure you remember Asa Morgan, with the cattlemen’s lobby.”

Tags: Janet Dailey Calder Saga Romance
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