The incident impressed Will and the others and gave them some fresh meat that was a nice break from the salt pork and beans they’d been eating for every meal since leaving home.
Nights when he wasn’t watching the herd, Will would sit by the fire, thoroughly exhausted, swapping stories with the other men or just sit there, staring into the flames, listening to the night guard sing their soothing songs to the drowsing cattle. During these quiet times, Will’s mind drifted home. He missed Maggie and his family and hoped they were okay but stopped short of worrying. Fretting did no good, of course, plus he suspected they were fine.
After all, none of those who might come hunting him in his absence—Rickert, Pew’s men, the Weatherspoons, or the bluebellies—had any cause to bother the women. They had done nothing.
And if someone did trouble them, well, the women had Mama’s shotgun and the derringers.
He had considered leaving the Dragoon behind, too, but had let Rufus borrow it instead.
After all, Teal and men like him were down here in the Thicket, not to mention the garden-variety bandits he knew lurked here and there among the pines.
They hadn’t encountered many folks during their time here, and most of those had been friendly enough, but a few times, men had stared like hungry wolves from a distance and skulked away into the brush when Will had hailed them.
These men were uniformly dirty, ragged, and bearded. Will reckoned they feared the drovers’ number and firepower, but the return trip might prove downright interesting.
Give those swamp rats time to band up, they might try an ambush.
But again, it wasn’t a thing to worry over. Will just stayed ready and made sure they had a guard posted all night.
The real danger, of course, was Teal.
When they’d first ridden into the Thicket, Will found himself hoping they’d cross paths with the murderer. He ached to avenge the deaths of Maggie’s family and others like them. Then there was the bank, of course, and all the hard-earned money Teal had stolen from Will and others. Beyond that, it enraged him, a man like Teal robbing and raping and spilling innocent blood while still wearing the gray.
Through four years of battle, Will and the other men of the Fifth had battled valiantly and honorably, fighting in support of a higher ideal, the defense of their republic and freedom against an invading army.
Teal’s crimes were a mockery of those sacrifices, those ideals. They were nothing short of treasonous. Not against the Confederacy, exactly, since the Confederacy was dead and dust, but the Republic of Texas and those ideals for which Will and his brothers-in-arms had fought over those long four years.
So yes, he wanted very badly to kill Teal.
But the longer they were in the Thicket, the more this urge abandoned him, and by this night, a week into things, with a herd of nearly three hundred head bedded down nearby, lowing softly, Will had begun to hope that they wouldn’t clash with Teal this trip but another time instead.
That, of course, is the trouble with having something to lose. It makes you cautious. And having gathered six thousand dollars’ worth of cattle, Will had plenty to lose.
“What do you think about turning back tomorrow?” he asked Rufus after the others had stretched out on their bedrolls.
“You missing Maggie, partner?” Rufus asked with a grin.
“You know I am, my friend. But that’s not my main reason.”
“You don’t want to push our luck?”
“Something like that.”
“Every day, we’re chasing out thirty or forty head of cattle. That’s a lot of money, partner.”
Will nodded. “It is. But every day is also a chance to run into raiders and lose everything.”
Rufus nodded. “How much money we made, do you reckon?”
“By my count, fifty-seven of those cattle are mine. A hundred and twenty-six belong to Forester. And sixty-nine are yours.”
Rufus’s smile gleamed in the firelight. “How much money is that?”
“Your share?”
“Right. I know I owe you some money for the men.”
“Drop in the bucket compared to what the cattle are worth.”
