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  “Sir, you wouldn’t believe it, but the sheets were dirty.” The stranger sampled a drink, then showed his distaste for the local brew before taking another swallow. “When I informed the staff I needed the linens changed, they told me it wasn’t Wednesday yet. Can you imagine?”

  “Horrible.” Lewt offered his hand. “Harry’s the name. Harry West.” He’d learned a long time ago that people rarely remember common names, and he had no intention of ever seeing this fool again after tonight.

  “Walter Freeport the Fourth,” the stranger said. “I don’t know about you, Mr. West, but I’ve seriously considered backing out on this visit my family seems to think might be worth my while. If conditions near the capital are so primitive, what must it be like in the mountains?”

  Lewt played along. “I’m inclined to agree with you. One has to wonder what these princesses of Texas must look like if they have to search far and wide and offer passage from anywhere to eligible men. And I’ve even heard that the ranch is in the hills of Texas. The word mountain came when they translated the place from its Indian name.” He lifted two fingers at the bartender, silently ordering whiskey. “It’s said the ranch is so huge, Apache still make winter camps in its hills.”

  Fear flashed in Walter’s eyes. He took the whiskey delivered and downed it quickly. Then, somewhat calmed, he raised his eyebrow and studied Lewt’s clothes. He had the look of a man tolerating someone lesser than himself.

  Lewt grinned into his beer as he shoved the second whiskey in front of Walter. He was in. Accepted. It might be interesting to spend some time with the stranger. Lewt considered himself a good judge of character and had already figured out that Duncan hadn’t come face-to-face with Walter or he wouldn’t have sent the man a ticket. “This your first time west, Mr. Freeport?”

  “And my last,” Walter answered. “If I find one of the McMurray women to my liking, I’ll be making it plain from the beginning that we’ll live north with my family.”

  “Wise choice,” Lewt said, thinking this fellow didn’t have a chance of taking a McMurray anywhere. “The women here are beautiful, though,” he added.

  “Not from what I’ve seen. One of the girls who works here followed me to my room and offered her services. She wasn’t even pretty and when she had the nerve to touch me, I was forced to slap her hard.” Walter brushed at his coat as if the touch had left a stain.

  Lewt gripped the mug in his hand so hard he wouldn’t have been surprised to see the glass shatter. He’d like nothing better than to slam his fist into Walter Freeport the Fourth’s straight little nose. The girl he’d hit was just trying to make a living. She didn’t deserve to be slapped. “What happened?” Lewt finally asked.

  “She crawled away.” Walter smiled. “A woman who doesn’t know her place is a stain on nature. I’m telling you, sir, that if I weren’t a gentleman I might have kicked her to help her along the way.”

  Lewt watched Walter as he talked on about his philosophy, but Lewt had already made up his mind. If he had to tie Walter Freeport up in dirty sheets, this man would not be on the train at dawn. He didn’t even know Duncan’s cousins, but they deserved better than the likes of this man.

  As the evening passed, Lewt wasn’t sure when the idea crystallized into a plan, but he decided maybe he should take Walter’s place. At first he thought it might be a grand joke on his friend Duncan, then he thought it could probably be a great chance to see what a real working ranch was like and to see how a real loving family acted. It might be worth the trip to see what he’d missed out on. Lewt guessed, like everything else in life, family ties weren’t all they were cracked up to be. He could be nice and polite to the ladies. At least they wouldn’t feel like they’d been stood up. When Duncan got back, Lewt would explain everything.

  His mind made up, Lewt turned to Walter Freeport the Fourth. “Any chance you play cards?”

  Walter strutted. “I do, and I must warn you I’m quite good. What say you we pass the time with a friendly game?”

  Lewt grinned. No matter what he put on the table, he knew he’d be playing to help the women of Whispering Mountain out and it felt good. They might never know, but he was saving them from a horrible fate.

  Six hours later, a very different Lewton Paterson stepped on the northbound train. He was dressed in conservative black from head to toe with thin wire-rim glasses on his nose. Nothing remained from his former life except the double eagle gold piece in his pocket he always carried for luck and a knife slipped between the stitching of his belt. Everything else, from his fine leather suitcases to his watch, spoke of old money and breeding.

  By the time Duncan McMurray got finished fighting at the Mexican border, Lewt would be on Whispering Mountain. If he did nothing else, he’d prove to Duncan that he could be a gentleman . . . someone worth introducing to the family.

  Lewt could play the gentleman. He’d learned early that men like to play cards with a man they consider an equal. He’d spent months polishing his speech and learning which fork to use on a fancy table. Now, there’d be no bets on the table. This time, he was gambling with his future.

  A hope began to form in his mind. If he could pass at Whispering Mountain, maybe he could take all the money he’d saved and buy a business. Maybe he could even marry and live a life in the daylight for a change.

  Lewt pushed his dreaming down. Hope was a terrible thing. It would keep you warm now and then, but when it died the cold always came back more bitter than before.

  CHAPTER 3

  DUNCAN MCMURRAY RODE THROUGH THE NIGHT surrounded by a dozen other Texas Rangers. He couldn’t help but feel like he was running away from his duty to the family, but this time, more then any other as a ranger, he was needed. Finding husbands for his three cousins would have to wait.

  Every man traveling with Captain Leander McNelly knew they didn’t have the numbers to do what had to be done. They all knew they were riding into hell and might not be coming back. Duncan laughed to himself, thinking the rangers had always been long on courage and short on brains. When they died in the line of duty, few commented, but when they won, despite the odds, they became legends.

  Since the War Between the States, bandits from across the border had been raiding cattle off ranches in Texas. At least a hundred fifty thousand head had vanished, not counting the hundreds stolen by small-time outlaws hiding out in canyons within the state. Someone had to stop them, and Captain McNelly seemed in a hurry to take on the job.

  After the war, Texas fell into chaos on many fronts. Most men who came home were heartsick as well as broken in body. They’d fought for Texas thinking of it as sovereign and free to step away from the Union. The issue of slavery hadn’t made them raise their guns, but it had made them put them down. Most were lucky if they came home with a horse and a weapon.

  Duncan had been a kid when the war ended. He and the girls had stayed at Whispering Mountain. Teagen, the oldest and the head of the McMurray clan, was too old to enlist. He ran the ranch and supplied as many horses as he could, while Travis, Duncan’s adopted father, stayed in Austin. His wounds as a ranger kept him from enlisting, and his battles were in the courts.

  Tobin, the youngest of the three McMurray brothers, was torn. In the end, he couldn’t fight against his wife’s people. He served as sheriff in town until the war was over He tried to keep peace in their part of Texas. He also bought a piece of land near Anderson Glen and plowed it every spring, then planted enough vegetables to feed the town through winter. Duncan and every kid at the ranch big enough to ride spent every Saturday all summer delivering food to those who couldn’t come out and harvest their own.

  Sage, the McMurray brothers’ baby sister, had married not long before the war. Her husband, Drummond Roak, joined Terry’s Rangers with his friends and fought. Few thought he’d make it home alive, but Sage never doubted. She just said that he’d promised he would. Three months after the war ended, he walked onto the ranch. He was so thin she didn’t recognize him at first, but on
ce he was home they promised never to be more than yelling distance apart.

  Duncan slowed his horse to a walk and smiled. Memories of the McMurrays, his family, kept him warm. He and Teagen’s girls were the oldest of the children, and it was probably time they all married and settled down. He only hoped at least one of the three men he sent north on the train would prove a match. They were all from good families, and none had a drinking or gambling problem. Boyd Sinclair already ran his family ranch, Davis Allender was well educated, and Walter Freeport the Fourth came highly recommended by a friend of his father.

  Deep down Duncan knew none of them were good enough. No man ever would be. At different times in his childhood he’d hated all three girls and loved each one. Emily, just older than him, had been his best friend when they’d been about twelve. They’d ridden the ranch and built forts all one summer, but after she went away to finishing school she barely spoke to him. Rose always drove him crazy bossing him around, but he knew she’d be at his side if trouble came. And then there was Bethie. Who couldn’t love Beth? Sometimes he’d just stare at her, wondering how she could have been born so beautiful. He was in love with her until the fourth grade when she started calling him Duckie instead of Duck. A nickname of Duck was hard enough to live down. Calls of Duckie from the other guys got him into a dozen fights that year and cured him of loving Bethie.

  “You’re getting behind, McMurray,” Wyatt Platt said as he passed like a shadow in the darkness.

  “Just resting my horse, Wyatt. I’ll catch up,” Duncan answered. His body might be heading into a fight, but tonight his mind was only on thoughts of home.

  “I almost rode right into you. With that black horse you’re darn near invisible.” Wyatt never learned to whisper. He talked as he lived, at full volume.

  Duncan laughed. “I could say the same about you, but I’ve been smelling you for half a mile. Did you ever think about giving the folks around you a break and taking a bath?”

  “Is it spring?” the shadow beside him asked. “My ma always sewed me into my long johns in late September and didn’t cut them off me until March. She swears that’s why she raised six of the healthiest kids in Tennessee.”

  Duncan laughed. “More likely no one with a cold would get within ten feet of you. All those brothers and sisters still alive?”

  “Yeah, all except me are married and raising families.”

  “Did you have any trouble getting the girls married off? I got these three cousins who don’t seem to take to the idea much. They’re all in their twenties and some folks are commenting that they’re getting pretty ripe on the vine.”

  “Nope,” Wyatt answered. “My oldest sister was married to three different men during the war. She figured whichever one came home first was the keeper. Course, she packed up and left for Texas the day after the first one arrived just in case the other two didn’t see it that way.”

  “He didn’t mind that she’d been two-timing him with two other men?”

  Wyatt laughed. “I never heard him say. He did tell me once that he was lucky he didn’t have to pay for the lessons her third husband taught her about how to act under the covers. They’re living down by Galveston and last I heard they had so many kids they stopped naming them and just started numbering. So, I’m guessing what she learned they’re still practicing.”

  Duncan smiled with his friend. Wyatt was five years older and tough as thick jerky, but he never believed in giving up. He’d die fighting.

  Wyatt’s shadow moved on, vanishing in the night. Duncan wouldn’t count him among his closest friends, but they’d cover each other in any fight. Because they both followed Captain McNelly, they were alike in the way they felt about protecting Texas.

  When the rangers had been reorganized after the war, a second group called the Special Force was formed under a thirty-year-old captain named Leander McNelly. McNelly might be thin as a fence post and look half sick most of the time, but he had thirty rangers riding to his call tonight. The captain had learned by messenger that Juan Flores had stolen a herd of cattle and crossed the Rio Grande, thinking he wouldn’t be pursued. The captain was determined to capture Flores even if he had to cross the Rio to do it.

  Duncan wanted to be there, to fight and to be part of history in the making. He’d help the girls get married off and add lots of kids to the family tree, but Duncan had a wild streak he knew would never allow him to settle down.

  They rode until the sun was high, then turned their horses out to graze while they slept a few hours. By dusk they were near the border. Thirty rangers met three companies of U.S. Cavalry camped along the river’s edge.

  Captain McNelly talked to the soldiers while Duncan and the others rested. They knew what was coming and they knew they needed to be ready. Duncan checked his weapons while Wyatt checked his saddle. None of the rangers talked. The time for talking was over; soon it would be time to fight.

  A little after midnight McNelly gave the command. Thirty rangers swung onto their horses and stormed the Rio, heading straight across to Juan Flores’s ranch, called Las Cuevas (“The Caves”).

  Duncan McMurray rode in the middle of the group. The river was tricky and the far side looked steep, but that didn’t bother him near as much as the fact that not one cavalryman followed.

  His mare took the water well. McMurray horses were raised on a ranch surrounded on two sides by water. By the time he was twelve, his uncles had taught him how to handle a horse in currents.

  Before dawn the rangers would be facing down two hundred raiders. The thought made him laugh suddenly. Every ranger he knew would say the odds were about even. The only thing that really bothered Duncan was the fact that they would be fighting on Mexican soil.

  Duncan kicked his horse and moved past some of the others. If he was riding into hell, he might as well have a good view.

  CHAPTER 4

  November 20, 1875

  LEWTON PATERSON SETTLED INTO THE PRIVATE CAR Duncan had reserved for the three men traveling north. His friend had paid for the entire car, probably planning to get to know the men before they reached Whispering Mountain. Though the train car wasn’t plush, it was comfortable with a stocked bar. There was a seating area for six and a game table for four as well as a few chairs by the windows for those who wanted to watch the country moving by in solitude. The car cost Duncan ten times what three seats up front in standard would have cost, but McMurray obviously wanted to impress the men.

  Remembering Walter Freepost the Fourth from the saloon last night, Lewt doubted the man would have been impressed, but Lewt was. He’d spent more time riding with the horses than in seats on trains, and even a simple car like this seemed pure luxury.

  I could get used to this, he thought. Who knows, they might like me at the ranch. Maybe I could just pick the McMurray woman I like best. Maybe she wouldn’t think being married to me was so bad. Every time we travel I’ll insist she has the best, and, of course, I’ll be right by her side. There was a time when he’d thought the good life was eating regularly; now he wanted more, but dreaming wouldn’t make it happen and he knew this journey would be no more than a dream. In real life, rich women from good families don’t marry gamblers. But if he was going to dream, he planned to at least let the next few days be a good dream. At the end of the week he could go back to reality.

  He recalled how peacefully Walter the Fourth had been snoring as he and the bartender from Crystal’s loaded him on a train heading to California just before dawn. Lewt had changed clothes with the man, of course, and taken half of his luggage in one turn of the cards. Like most bad gamblers, Walter wouldn’t accept his losses and quit. He kept offering Lewt more and more to toss into the pot. Lewt made sure that once the man sobered up somewhere in the territories, Walter would have enough money for passage back home, though he doubted Walter would have done the same for him if the cards had played out differently.

  Lewt had worked three months, spending only what he had to, sleeping in borrowed bunks and eat
ing the salty, free food on the bar, in order to save enough to buy the suit and ring he’d packed away. At the time he saw it as a symbol of wealth, but he wouldn’t wear it for this trip. For the next week he’d play his part. Maybe even flirt with the ladies a little.

  If Walter Freeport the Fourth was fool enough to come back to Austin, he’d never find the Harry West he’d had drinks with last night.

  Lewt smiled. The ladies didn’t know it, but even if they picked him as a husband, they’d be doing better than Walter. If he ever had a lady at his side, he’d treat her like a queen.

  A rattling came from the platform as suitcases and feet hit the metal steps. Lewt turned to welcome the other guests for the trip and size up his competition.

  A young man in his early twenties stepped in first loaded down with bags. He wasn’t tall, but he had a wide smile and a good honest face. If Lewt were guessing, he’d say the young man was not more than a year out of school. Probably one of those big colleges back east.

  Behind him stood a short woman who barely fit through the door. She carried a birdcage and wore a hat almost a foot high as if the feathers and bows would somehow make her taller.

  “This is it, Mother,” the young man said. “Isn’t it nice? I’m sure we’ll be comfortable here.”

  The little lady’s cheeks dimpled with pleasure. “Lovely,” she said in a sweet voice. “I’m sure I’ll be fine, but I worry about coming along, Davis. It isn’t right to just show up.”

  “It’s all right,” Davis said as he settled her on the small love seat across from Lewt. “I’m sure no one will mind. I’ve no doubt the McMurrays are as used to entertaining on a moment’s notice as we are at home. When Uncle Phil wrote Duncan, he said the Allenders would always be welcome at his family ranch. Besides”—he winked—“they’ll love you. Everyone does.”

  Lewt stood politely and introduced himself, using his own name but adding the Third to it, hoping that would add respectability.