“That,” said Ellis.
“Okay.”
“Grade A Prime, huh?” asked Jasper, as they all bent at the waist to unroll the canvas.
“You better believe it,” said Clay, wincing inside, wondering if he was ever going to live that down.
Jasper was big and gruff, but his low chuckle was friendly enough. Evidently everybody had heard just about every last detail as to what had happened at the Rusty Nail.
Levi had been the only one from the ranch present, but that didn’t mean anything. Levi didn’t gab like that. Likely the story had travelled through some line of gossip, as there was always talk in the local community about Farthingdale Ranch, and about how Leland Tate, the ranch’s manager, was bringing the place back from the brink of disaster due to a guest who’d gone missing at the end of last season.
Clay didn’t like to think about how close he’d come to losing his dream job, and his memories of this particular guest were dim. Had he seen him at story hour, when Bill trotted out his best ghost stories? Or had it been earlier? Brody always swore that he remembered this guest quite clearly, and sometimes the two of them got to talking about it over lunch in the dining hall, but Leland always quashed such conversations, and so the discussions were always short-lived.
At any rate, it wasn’t Levi who’d been spreading the story about Clay’s ass, that was for sure. Though who it had been, Clay had no idea. The story would go as the story would go and the best thing to do was to laugh it off, to pretend it didn’t matter. After all, Leland himself said Clay had a nice ass, and that was good enough for him.
“Grab that pole,” said Jasper, ever focused on the work at hand. Which was what Clay liked about him for despite his don’t-talk-to-me nature, he always pulled his weight, was always on hand with the right tool for the right job.
“Got it,” said Clay.
Together the three of them set up the beige-and-blue canopies over the hay bales and broad logs that ringed the fire pit. If there was a soft rain, then story hour could happen. If there was a hard rain, then the rain would come down furiously at a slant, and no overhead-canopy would protect the guests.
Maybe the story hour would be moved inside the dining hall, but Clay knew Bill didn’t like the atmosphere, so the whole thing would likely be cancelled, to be rescheduled later in the week. Well, that wasn’t his headache.
After they set up the canopies, Clay went to the dining hall, going back to the kitchens, where Levi was cleaning up from lunch.
“Got anything for me?” asked Clay. “Sandwiches? Something?”
“I’ve got chili and cornbread leftover from lunch,” said Levi. “Would you like that? I could reheat it for you.”
Levi, quiet and reserved, had the best manners at the ranch, like he’d come from a different world, which most likely he had. He was also kind of beautiful, blue eyes, broad shoulders, with glossy chestnut hair that curled behind his ears. He looked more like a magazine model than anyone Clay knew, and it was always a wonder to him why Levi didn’t seem to mind being stuck in the kitchen all the time.
Sometimes, about every other week, Levi would pack up the chuckwagon to accompany a small, well-organized cattle drive that was mostly about camping under the stars and not a whole lot about driving cattle, at least as far as guests were concerned. Sometimes, since Levi wasn’t an experienced driver, Clay would get to sit on the driver’s side of the chuckwagon and guide the set of four horses.
He loved holding all those thick reins in his gloved hands and loved the rock-rock-rock motion of the chuckwagon. Levi’s open air cooking was always a treat as well. Though, with Clay being in the doghouse, if there was a cattle drive, he would not be the one going, alas, alas.
When Levi brought Clay a tray neatly arranged with a white china bowl full of chili, topped with sour cream and decorated by green onions, he wasn’t nearly as surprised as he pretended to be. What’s more, the tray also held a neatly cut and quite large cube of still-warm corn bread, and there were several gold-foil wrapped cubes of butter in a small glass dish. Everything was arranged as elegantly as if Clay had been a customer in a cozy, up-scale cafe.
“You call this leftovers?” asked Clay with appreciation as he grabbed the tray and set it on a narrow wooden table along the wall where cooks and their assistants could take a break.
“Yes, I do,” said Levi, dipping his chin down like he was still trying to get used to being teased about his fancy ways. “That’s the last of it, though. Leland said you’d be helping me in the kitchen till your black eye goes down, so perhaps you’d like to help me make more?”
“Sure,” said Clay, shoveling the food in as quick as he could. He still needed to shower and gas up the truck before heading out to pick up the accountant. “Soon as I get back, okay?”
“Where are you going?” asked Levi, using a large white cloth to wipe down his stoves.
“Leland hired an accountant,” said Clay. “His name is Austin Martin or something. No, it’s Austin Marsh. I have the slip of paper in my wallet.”
“Well, it’s about time Leland hired someone to do that for him,” said Levi. He came over to Clay and stood with his arms crossed over his lean, white-aproned stomach, as though to make sure Clay was properly enjoying everything Levi had prepared for him like he should be. “That man works way into the night. I can see the light in his cabin from my window.”
“So can I,” said Clay, which made him feel worse about causing Leland any trouble. “Though nowadays that light might be for something other than work.”
With a wink, Clay carried his empty dishes and used tray to the Hobart, and set everything in the carrying tray to be pushed through when the crate was full.
“Well, thank you for lunch,” said Clay with a wave. Then he hustled to the staff quarters, raced up to his room on the third floor, and hurried through a hot shower which stung his lip and made his eye throb even harder.
After he showered, he shaved, changed into clean clothes, grabbed his cell phone, and checked for the slip of paper in his wallet. The Motel 6 where Austin was staying was located almost all the way to Denver, it seemed like, and though the drive along I-25 would be quick, Clay sighed. He did not like big cities, preferring the quiet outlands of Wyoming or places like Nebraska. Too many people all zooming around made him itch. He knew a lot of people at the ranch felt the same, but sometimes you just had to head to the Big City.
Grabbing his hat, he headed down the stairs and up the service road behind the staff quarters to the tin-roofed shed where Leland’s truck was stored. Sitting next to the silvery goodness of Leland’s F150 was Clay’s yellow Toyota 4x4.
