“That’s fine, Mr. Bellaugh,” Dag said. “Does your offer depend on the grade, then?”
“Not particularly. But I want to know what I’m buying.”
“Are you going to raise the cattle yourself or resell them?”
Bellaugh lifted a hand to summon a waiter whose eye he had caught. “First, a little whiskey,” Bellaugh said, “and then we’ll talk business.”
Bellaugh ordered a whiskey from the waiter and then turned back to the men at the table.
“How many head did you arrive with, Mr. Dagstaff?”
“Purt near four thousand steers and cows. Some calves.”
“I contracted for less than that.”
“Yes, you did.”
“Depending on the tally, I’ll take them all. You throw in the calves. I’ll use those for breeding stock, maybe.”
“Fair enough.”
“Forty dollars a head,” Bellaugh said. He took a sip of his whiskey.
“Forty-five,” Dag said. “That was the price we agreed on.”
“For prime stock, yes.”
“Far as I’m concerned, the whole herd is prime stock.”
“Forty-five, then.” Bellaugh extended his arm across the table and the two men shook hands.
The waiter brought plates of food for Dag, Matlee, and Flagg. The three men tucked into the food. Dag heard something crinkle. He looked up and Bellaugh was holding an envelope in his hand.
“Almost forgot,” he said. “This came for you yesterday, Mr. Dagstaff.”
Dag reared back in surprise. “For me?”
“Yes, sir. It’s addressed to you in care of me.”
“Yeah, I left your address with my wife before I left.”
Bellaugh handed the letter across the table.
Dag looked at the return address. “It ain’t from my wife,” he said, his voice heavy with dread.
“Open it, Dag,” Flagg said. “Might be good news. Wasn’t your woman expectin’ a baby?”
“It’s way too soon, Jubal.”
Dag looked at the name on the return address. It was from Carmelita Delgado, the woman who was watching after Laura. He opened the envelope. The letter from Carmelita was in Spanish, but he knew the language.
Then he read the first line and his heart squeezed tight in his chest.
Tears began to flow down Dag’s cheeks as he read the rest of it. He read it again and more tears flowed from his eyes. He looked up at Flagg and Matlee.
“Laura’s—Laura’s dead,” he said. “She had a miscarriage and lost the baby. They—they couldn’t stop the bleeding.”
“I’m sorry, Dag,” Flagg said softly.
“My sympathies, Dag,” Matlee said. “I’m awful sorry.”
“Mr. Dagstaff,” Bellaugh said, “please accept my condolences and my deepest sympathies.”
But Dag didn’t hear them. He thought of Laura dying all alone, but he could not yet believe it. He could see her face now, shining, glowing with the life that had been inside her. He heard her voice and her laughter and he smelled her fragrance, felt the softness of her hair when she brushed her face against his cheek.
He took a deep breath and wiped the tears from his face.
Then, he just sat there, staring back through time, thinking of the day he had left Laura to ride north with the herd. He thought of their last kiss and her arms around him, squeezing him, her breasts burning into his chest.
“I ain’t hungry no more,” he said, numbly. “I think I’ll have one of those whiskies.”
But the liquor didn’t take away any of the pain; it only deepened his sadness.
Chapter 26
Dag felt strange riding back home with the Colorado winter breathing down their necks, the Rockies mantled in snow, the pale yellow sun weakening with each day. They all rode together with Fingers, Jo, and the chuck wagon as the centerpiece to their ragged formation. Fred Reilly, who rode for Barry Matlee, was in jail back in Cheyenne. He had been in a fight in a card game with a bunch of slickers, lost his temper, and shot the dealer at point-blank range.
Some hands were nursing sore jaws and busted heads, but they had memories to take back with them to Texas.
Jo had bought two pretty dresses in Cheyenne, and she grew more beautiful, Dag thought, with each day’s passing.
They stopped over in Pueblo, homesick for Mexican food, then continued on over Raton Pass and into New Mexico, with the larder in the chuck wagon full. Some of them had taken scatterguns up on the Colorado prairie and shot game: doves streaking south for Mexico, prairie chickens, and top-knotted quail such as none he had seen before.
They rode through the gathering chill of New Mexico, followed the Canadian, crossed the Mora, and felt butterflies in their stomachs as they neared Texas. They knew they were making better time than they had on the drive up to Cheyenne. Jimmy had sold off some of the horses in Cheyenne, so the remuda had shrunk considerably. All of the hands, including Dag, switched horses daily, so that they always had a fresh mount each morning.
Flagg had been offered a job by James Bellaugh, but he had turned the offer down. Bellaugh had warned them of thieves who might attack them and rob them when they left Cheyenne, and while they had seen a few suspicious riders, none had attacked them. There was safety in numbers, Matlee kept saying, which showed Dag just how scared he was of being robbed.
A few times, Indians trailed them, but a show of rifles soon left them in the dust and they encountered none brave enough to sound the war cry.
Dag felt hollow inside, the emptiness filled with an unutterable sadness that his Laura was dead and that he would be going back to an empty house. His mind was full of memories and they crept into his dreams each night.
Jo tried her best to comfort Dag without imposing upon his grief or intruding into his private thoughts. But she was grieving too, not only for Laura, but for Dag, who seemed to be trying to avoid being alone with her.
They crossed into Texas and headed south-east. The two drovers from the Double C said their farewells and took the money Dag gave them and thanked him profusely. They were good men, he knew, and perfectly trustworthy.
“You say howdy to Gus and Janet, hear?” Dag said, just before they rode off.
“Y’all come back,” Tom Leeds said, with a tip of his hat.
“Y’all are always welcome at the Double C,” Sutphen said.
Dag watched them go and there was a sadness in that parting too.
Into the warmth of Texas, they rode, and down the Palo Duro Canyon with its striated colors painted brilliant by the sun, and the smell of Texas full in their nostrils with each passing day, long days when their pace quickened.
“Felix, what are you going to do when you get back?” Jo asked when they were sitting by a stream, eating a basket lunch she had packed for just the two of them.
“I guess I’ll grieve some more for poor Laura,” he said, “and then get to goin’ on best I can.”
“I’m so sorry. I know you’re hurting real bad inside.”
“I can’t really talk about it, Jo.”
“Someday you’ll have to, Felix.”
