we started. Moodier. The men have noticed it too. You don’t talk much, and you haven’t joined in on singing around the campfire at night like you used to. Mostly you sit off by yourself.” He hefted himself to his feet.
Luke tried to shrug off the comment with a laugh. “Could be I’ve taken enough ribbing about my singing voice. A man can stand being likened to a bellowing calf only so long.”
Jesse didn’t laugh. “I’m trying to decide if you’re sorry you took this job. Maybe you only did it because it pleased your pa. Or maybe you’re fed up with trail life.”
Were his inner struggles that apparent? Luke bent down to retrieve his hat from the ground. The burden of responsibility had weighed heavily on him lately. Things always got dodgy at the end of a drive, when the men had been in the saddle for months with few breaks. Squabbles broke out, complaints about the food increased, and heated arguments about poker hands around the evening campfire flared up. Because it fell to him to mediate, it was natural that he’d feel these more strongly as the trail boss than as a hired hand.
But Jesse’s second guess hit close to home too. Luke’s thoughts had gravitated more and more often toward life off the cattle trail. What would it be like, to leave work every day and rest your head in your own bed?
Trail Boss. The words still brought a surge of pride. Pa had spent his life taking beef to market, and Luke had ridden beside him on many of those drives, but this was his first time as boss, and it didn’t feel as good as he thought it would. He wasn’t sure he liked the responsibility of men, cattle, and what happened to both in bad weather. He was starting to think he preferred the smell of fresh hay waving in the fields and rich fertile earth turned beneath a plow. On the other hand, if he failed this drive, Pa would skin him alive. His laugh this time sounded a little forced even to him. “Can’t see what that has to do with you not liking the Switzers.”
Jesse stooped, grabbed his shirt by the shoulders, and shook it out. Droplets of water sprayed onto the grass. “I don’t have anything against them personally. It just seems to me that when a man is struggling with something he can get distracted easier. And there’s nothing more distracting than a couple of helpless women, even if they are dressed like nuns.” He aimed a grin sideways. “I’d hate to see you quit and join up with the Aim-ish. You’d look stupid in the clothes.”
The sudden image made Luke laugh. He threw back his head and let the sounds of his mirth flow downstream across the running river.
When the moment passed, he felt better. Hours and hours in the saddle gave a man a lot of time to worry things over in his mind. Sometimes that was good, but at other times the worries swelled like an old woman’s ankles. Talking to a friend helped shrink them back down to size.
He clapped Jesse on the back. “You worry like a mother. My only thought right now is getting this herd to Hays on time. In order to do that, we need to haul this wagon out of the river.”
Then with a clear conscience, he’d leave the Switzers behind and get back on the trail.
Still dressed in denims and a Stetson.
NINE
The young Englisch boy driving their cart was apparently in a hurry and not afraid to push his mule. Emma clutched the side rails and held on as they bumped over the rough terrain. The ground beneath their feet bore thousands of hoof-shaped pits and gouges.
“There it is! Oh, my.”
Emma turned at Rebecca’s words, and followed the line of the river in front of them. She spotted the wagon easily, half in the water and leaning at an awkward angle. Maummi’s hutch was no longer covered but sat in the back, its polished finish gleaming warmly in the afternoon sunlight.
But the sun gleamed off more than the hutch. Three men stood on the shore, and two more in the water. The ones standing on the grass were dressed in vests and chaps and cowboy hats, but the two standing in waist-high water had stripped off their shirts. As they drew near, she recognized Luke and his saloon-loving friend. Spray from the river had wet their skin, and