Firestick. William W. Johnstone

speaking mainly for herself?

      It was ironic, considering how Beartooth always had a smooth, easy way with women—albeit the certain kind he’d mostly come in contact with before—that here he was feeling flummoxed, not sure how to act or what to say, when it came to the first woman who might truly mean something to him. Flummoxation like this was enough to actually drive a man back up into the mountains!

      With Beartooth momentarily tongue-tied, Victoria followed up on her own remark by saying, “Before you wash up for supper, would you mind bringing in some fuel for the stove’s wood bin? Otherwise I might forget and then run short for tomorrow’s breakfast. And I really dread going out to the woodpile in the predawn hour.”

      “Sure. No problem,” Beartooth replied, grateful for the disruption of his awkward silence. “With all the chores you do around here, us fellas ought to do a better job of keepin’ that bin full for you—without havin’ to be asked.”

      “I don’t mind fetching some for myself, except, like I said, early in the morning. A rat jumped out at me one time when it was still too dark to see well, and I’ve been skittish ever since. And right now I need to stay here and keep an eye on those pies in the oven.”

      Beartooth’s eyebrows lifted. “Pies, as in more than one? I thought that was part of what I smelled. Peach, right?”

      “Sorry, but no,” Victoria said, knowing how fond he was of peach pie. “They’re both blueberry this time. But I promise to make peach next, before the end of the week. All right?”

      Picking up the bucket for hauling in the wood for the stove, Beartooth said, “I’ll hold you to it. And I aim to make sure you’ll have plenty of wood for the baking. In the meantime, though, blueberry ain’t exactly a hard sacrifice. So, you stay here and guard ’em good while I commence to fetchin’ your fuel.”

      CHAPTER 6

      “The boss sure ain’t gonna like it, I can tell you that much. Hell, I can guarantee it. He ain’t gonna like it one damn bit!”

      Firestick scowled fiercely in response to these words. “Your boss ‘don’t like it’?” he mimicked. “You think me or anybody else in this town likes those three jackasses showin’ up every two, three weeks and startin’ some new kind of trouble? Well, here’s a guarantee right back at you—nobody does. Least of all me. Tolsvord’s had plenty of chances to rein in the Dunlaps and Woolsey, but all he ever does is pay their fines and wag his finger at them and then turn ’em loose to come around and stir something up all over again.”

      “And that’s what he’ll do again this time. Pay their fines, I mean. Just tell me how much it is so I can let him know, and he’ll send somebody around with the money first thing tomorrow.”

      Firestick shook his head stubbornly. “Nope. I ain’t gonna make it that easy. Not this time. Oh, there’ll still be fines, don’t worry about that. Stiff ones, too. But they’re also gonna serve some time behind bars. If Tolsvord ain’t willin’ to tie some knots in their tails, by God, I am. Since they go around actin’ like what little brains they got is in their asses, maybe a knot down there close will help straighten out their thinkin’ a little.”

      Cleve Boynton was a tall, rawboned individual with bushy, prematurely white sideburns bracketing a weathered face that, more often than not, was gripped by a stern expression. The cause for the latter, at least part of the time, had to do with the fact he was the foreman for Gerald Tolsvord’s Box T Ranch and had wranglers like the Dunlaps and Newt Woolsey to deal with.

      “Doggone it, Firestick,” he lamented now, as he stood before the marshal’s desk in the front office area of the jail building, “you know the pickle I’m in with those three. You think I ain’t full aware they’re a bunch of . . .” He hesitated, eyeing the heavy wooden door that led back to the cell block. The fact that the door was closed gave him reassurance the men back there couldn’t hear him, so he continued, “Well, they’re jackasses, just like you said. But you also know the rest of the story—how the Dunlaps are kin to Boss Tolsvord’s wife. Her brother’s boys, I think. Anyway, she rides Tolsvord to keep cuttin’ ’em slack, and he rides me to keep tryin’ to get something re-semblin’ work out of ’em.”

      Firestick sighed. “I can appreciate the fix you’re in, Cleve. And, for that part, I’m sorry. But that don’t change a dang thing. I aim to send a message to them three, and Tolsvord, as well. You go ahead and tell him that. Put it all on me. That should leave you clear from takin’ any blame.”

      “I don’t know about that. I go back to the ranch without ’em, no matter what my story, the boss is bound to be plenty sore,” said Boynton. “Plus, I had work lined up for those yahoos tomorrow morning. Not having ’em there to take care of it—even given the half-assed job they usually do—will either leave it undone or force me to pull somebody from some other job.”

      “Like I said, I’m sorry for how it lands on you, Cleve,” Firestick told him. “But my mind’s made up. I ain’t gonna go easy on ’em, not this time.”

      “Okay. If your mind’s made up, I guess that’s all there is to it,” said Boynton, his shoulders sagging somewhat in defeat. He started to turn away, then once again hesitated. “The boss is bound to ask, so what do I tell him as far as how long you figure to keep ’em locked up? And you said there’ll still be a fine, too?”

      Now it was Firestick who seemed to hesitate. His brows puckered for a moment as if in deep thought. Then he said, “Okay. Tell him this. Three days and thirty dollars for each of the Dunlaps; four days and forty dollars for that weasel, Woolsey.”

      “That seems a mite steep, if you don’t mind my sayin’,” responded Boynton, frowning. “And why more for Newt than the other two?”

      “Because the little bastard sucker-butted me and loosened four of my front teeth, that’s why,” Firestick snapped back. “Likely be near a week before I can chomp into a good steak again. As far as the fines . . . well, that’s what they are, and that’s all I got to say on it.”

      Boynton’s frown stayed in place. “You basin’ any of that on some kind of legal rules or regulations that are in place? Or are you makin’ it up just to suit yourself?”

      “Hell, Cleve, you know Buffalo Peak ain’t got no legal mumbo jumbo in place on the books. The town council handed me and my pards some badges and hired us to keep a lid on things. So that’s what we’re doin’ to the best of our abilities and, in some cases, yeah, we’re makin’ it up as we go along.” Firestick paused, took a deep breath, and then exhaled through his nose. “Now, I’ve said what I got to say, and I ain’t in the mood for no more explainin’. So, go tell it to Tolsvord. If that don’t satisfy him, tell him to haul his ass in here to town and I’ll tell him to his face. Otherwise, all he’s got to do is send the money and I’ll turn his men loose as soon as they’ve served their time.”

      Boynton turned and stomped out, clearly not happy with the answer and not looking forward to passing it on to Tolsvord.

      After he was gone, Moosejaw, who’d been looking on silently from where he was seated in a chair tilted back against a side wall of the office area, said, “I kinda feel sorry for ol’ Cleve, the fix he’s in. He ain’t really a bad sort.”

      “Nobody said he was,” Firestick replied. “And I don’t like seein’ him squeezed in the middle, neither. But I can’t help it. The whole thing really falls back on Tolsvord not havin’ the backbone to stand up to his wife. If he did that, and then backed Cleve to make those three blockheads toe the mark like he does the rest of his crew, everybody’d be better off.”

      “Yeah, you’re right about that. In more ways than one,” Moosejaw allowed. “Nothing any good ever comes from a man lettin’ a woman run roughshod over him. It plumb ain’t natural.”

      Firestick eyed him under a sharply cocked brow. “You tellin’ me you’ve made those kinds of feelin’s clear between you and Daisy?”