She swiped a strand of hair from her eyes and crossed her arms. “I was wondering if you were displeased with the doctor because he wasn’t able to help you.”
His chair scraped the floor as he stood. “LeBeau gave me quinine for my stomach. What other help do I need?” Once upon a time, he’d known how to hold his tongue and his temper. Before the war. Before Andersonville. After his return home, the laudanum settled him down to a bland numbness as long as he had his regular dose. Turned him into a rabid lion when he didn’t.God, help me conquer the lion.
Cora pressed her lips together and glanced away.
She didn’t need to speak what he already knew. He reminded her of her father. The man she had zero respect for. A man who couldn’t be trusted.
He tossed his napkin on the table. “For your information, Cora, I have a family back in Philadelphia. One that respects me. My sister, Evelyn, misses me dearly. And my father is eager for me to finish my business here and return home so I can become the managing editor of his partnership’s newspaper. Imagine. And on top of that, though I know it may be difficult for you to believe, I have a girl waiting for me in Philadelphia. One who isn’t pleased about my side trip to Texas. She’s anxious for me to make good on our delayed betrothal announcement.”
Cora’s head jerked.
He snorted. “I didn’t come to Texas to fight with you for the privilege of helping you. I’m done.”
Jaw clenched, he marched out the kitchen door before he said something he’d regret.
Ben slammed the stable door behind him. He had half a mind to grab his horse. If he had a horse. Ride out of here and be done with Cora and the ranch for good. She didn’t deserve or even want his help. He’d had enough of her ingratitude. She looked down her nose at her father—the man who seemed to have enough faults to pave the way from here to Dallas—but she’d likely inherited a double portion of the man’s stubbornness.
If it wasn’t for Charlie, he’d leave tonight and move into the boardinghouse in town. Let Cora find out how well she could do on her own without his help. Sooner or later, reality would knock that uppitiness right out of her.
And what about that look Cora gave him when he’d mentioned Olivia? She was probably shocked that a woman wanted to marry him. Well, he had news for her. There’d been a number of young ladies who’d shown marked interest in him the spring of 1863 when he’d come home on furlough. Olivia stood out amongst them all. He’d eagerly courted her and written to her in the months between his return to the field and his capture at Chickamauga. After Andersonville, he hardly knew who that young man was. That spring seemed like another lifetime.
And here he was in Texas dealing with the most contrary woman he’d ever laid eyes on. Jeb probably had no idea what his sister was really like after their years apart. Ben scuffed his boot against the ground. Bits of straw and dust flew as he slugged over to the post, dug a Lucifer stick out of his pocket, and lit the lantern to dispel the almost dark. The metal lid clanked down ashe blew out the match. The sorrel snorted, probably as ornery as its owner.
He grabbed a curry comb, then tossed it aside. He wasn’t about to look after Cora’s mare for her. He’d feed the animal and water it. The same for Charlie’s quarter horse. Not that he’d mind helping the boy with his animal, but Charlie enjoyed the task, had a real bond with his mount.
Ben stomped to the well and back, sloshing water as he returned, glaring at the lamplight which poured from the kitchen window of the double cabin. A light flickered to life in a different room. For the frontier, it was a good-sized home, with four rooms, a wide hall in between, and a loft. A home built for a family. His step slowed. Cora had lost so much. And Charlie had barely found his place in this world.
A waning moon just shy of full hovered above the horizon in the shadowy dusk.
Eyes glowed at Ben from the corner of the smokehouse and scurried toward a patch of sage. A possum. It’d probably found a hole under the fence or swung down from a tree branch.
An image flashed. A different palisade, fifteen feet tall beneath the scorching heat of South Georgia. Henry Dawson, out of his mind with fever and dressed in filthy, shredded rags, stumbling across the dead line. Ben yelled and hobbled toward him. Too late. A bullet from a Rebel guard sliced through Henry’s chest.
A stench filled Ben’s nose. He blinked away the past. Cora’s yard returned. Still, bile rose in his throat. The wretched odor of twenty thousand unwashed bodies, many of them more dead than alive, mixed with the rot of the already deceased, engulfed him. A cold sweat broke out on the back of his neck and beaded on his forehead. He dropped the buckets and raced to a patch of sage, losing his supper.
Hands shaking, he swiped his mouth and made his way to the stables with the horses’ water.
In his bunk after midnight, sweat soaked his shirt. Another dream of camp. He clamped his watch shut and swung his legs over the side of the bed. Tonight, the need for laudanum pulsed like a hot coal in the center of his mind. He got to his feet. He needed air.
CHAPTER 12
Cora threw off her quilts. Three hours of tossing and turning were more than enough. She swung her feet to the rough-hewn floor. Her stomach twinged, as unsettled as her thoughts.
When would she learn to hold her tongue? There’d been no need to confront Ben about his struggle with laudanum. Not after all the generosity he’d shown them. Careful not to bump into the cedar chest at the end of her bed, she crossed to the shuttered window and pressed her forehead against the sash. How could she be so stupid?
It was her father. Anything related to him made her feel like smashing another whiskey jug. But Ben was not her father. He could not be blamed for her father’s sins. She didn’t deserve to have Jeb as a brother. With his dying breaths, Jeb had worked to secure her provision and protection. And what was she doing? Everything short of pointing a shotgun at the man he’d sent.
Her fingers brushed against the cool, smooth wallpaper that covered the planed logs. A bit of civilization and frivolity, a gift from her father to her mother when this room had been theirs, and he had yet to succumb to the bottle.
The wooden sash pricked her forehead. What did Ben mean when he said he was done? Done fighting or done helping? What if he actually left and didn’t come back?
All he had keeping him here was his promise to Jeb. Ben had a girl waiting for him back in Pennsylvania. Cora swallowed hard. She hadn’t imagined him being in love. And here she’d been worrying he might have his sights on pursuing her. Foolish thought. Why couldn’t she have just taken him up on his offer to oversee the cattle?
She needed air. This house was like a prison at night, stuffy and too warm, with its locked shutters. She stumbled through the dark to fetch the key from the top of her bureau and returned to the window to shove it upward. The padlock rattled as she twisted it off and thrust the shutters open.
Cool night air smacked her in the face. She inhaled the scents of grass and pine. Cicadas buzzed in the distant trees. Footsteps.
Her muscles snapped taut. Indians? Surely not. Her heart thundering, she leaned over the sill and grabbed a shutter. Something moved by the corral. Not an animal. She stiffened. Not an Indian either. She exhaled. Ben.
