5. Chapter Five

Chapter Five

T hey crossed the Colorado River by flatboat, ate the lunch of cold cuts packed by Miss Pickney, and sipped from their canteens while people teemed by. A farmer with a buckboard loaded with hay rattled past and tipped his hat. Two colorfully dressed women giggled on their phaeton, finger-waving at Junior, their ribbons fluttering in the wind. Junior tipped his hat and pulled his brown kerchief over his nose, going from respectable to bank robber. Isa noticed but said nothing. Later, when a group of boisterous young men rode by on flashy thoroughbreds, whistling appreciatively at Isa in her fashionable poof sleeves and broad-brimmed hat, Junior's loose fingers slowly grazed his Colt, his eyes steady on them.

The men laughed and made a quick escape.

"We need to get off the main road," he said, glancing behind them at the group's retreating backs.

Isa followed him off the main road onto a narrow, rocky trail snaking sharply along rugged terrain. She muttered complaints under her breath, thinking how it would add hours to their trip and for what? It didn't escape her notice that the brown kerchief made its home back on Junior's neck the longer they rode without encountering anyone else on the rough trail.

Junior broke the silence an hour into their journey east to Dogwood. "Is that city dude your beau?"

Isa reined Mirage closer to Champion. "What?"

He curtly repeated his question without looking at her, and she resented how distractingly handsome his profile was. There was not much he would approve of regarding her friendship with David.

"Is David my beau?" Isa laughed. "No, we're friends. We attended college together. Well, he only attended it with me during his last year. I tutored him through his final exams."

"Men and women can't be ‘just friends,'" he elucidated as though imparting some elementary knowledge on her such as the sky is blue or rain falls from storm clouds.

"Yes, they can," Isa argued, feeling the warmth of a promising debate bloom in her face and extremities. "Look at you and me. Or you and Lucy."

"Lucy's married. It's not the same." He ducked beneath a low-hanging limb, unconcerned by the disgusted face she made at him.

"David is also married, so it is the same," she countered.

Animation livened the stubborn set of his jaw. "What? You let a married man see you off, hold you, and look at you all moon-eyed? I saw you kiss him, Isa!"

That little peck on the cheek? That had been a friendly kiss! But a worrisome, slinking sensation crawled up from someplace within her, one she had long repressed and locked away. Isa disliked feeling shame and typically never acknowledged it if she did. Experiencing it now was like finding slime growing in the corner of a carefully manicured room. Junior had drawn attention to it like a Roman soldier blowing a horn during battle.

"I am not answerable to you," she said stiffly, chin in the air.

He nudged Champion ahead of Mirage, who reared her head unhappily at being cut off. "Let me guess, he's one of the half a dozen proposals you got?"

"One of three, there were no half a dozen —"

Junior laughed rudely. "Tell me about them, then. What was so wrong with them that you denied their hand?"

"It wasn't that anything was wrong with them; it was just that we didn't suit each other." Her brows were severe, low and dark over her eyes like the storm clouds overhead.

"How so?" He was staring at her, a mythological god in cowboy gear waiting to dole out judgment.

"You truly wish to know? Fine." She shrugged like it didn't matter a whit. Inside, however, she squirmed at the prospect of telling him about such intimate affairs. "Walter was my first proposal. He approached me one day as a dare by his friends and tried to humiliate me for being the only woman in Trigonometry class."

"Did you set him straight?" Junior asked.

"I bet him twenty dollars that I could get a higher grade in class by semester's end. He took the bet and made the rest of the semester most uncomfortable for me. I had no choice but to reply in kind. Remember the time you gave me chocolate sawdust?"

Junior refused admission, but his mouth curled up at the ends like a cat.

"Well, I suggested a truce and gave him chocolate sawdust decorated with a pretty ribbon. He was so receptive to the truce that I almost felt guilty when he spat it out during a lesson." Isa grinned, remembering the handsome Walter's watering eyes and red face. "Of course his tricks tended to ruin my clothes; he spilled ink on my skirts while I was working and hid buckets of molasses over doorways."

"Are we still discussing someone who asked for your hand in marriage?" Junior asked disbelievingly.

"Hush, I'm getting there. I eventually grew angry enough with Walter to pay one of my friends to approach him and flirt a little. He was a fool for a pretty face and was completely enamored. Just as he was touching her cheek, a great giant of a man ran out and threatened to do Walter bodily harm for touching his intended. I'd never seen him so afraid; it looked like he was facing a firing squad."

Junior rubbed his face. "God, Isa, what if he'd gotten afraid enough to shoot someone?"

"Firearms are not allowed on campus. But not to worry, Walter discovered me. He heard me laughing by a potted shrub, and my friend fessed up that it was only a trick. If he'd had the brass to shoot anyone, it would have been me that day. The week the professor posted our marks, I was top of the class, and he was forced to give me twenty dollars."

"What, did he drop down to one knee and give you a ring along with twenty dollars?" Junior sounded doubtful.

"Heavens, no. He hated me for months. He didn't like me until he mustered the courage to ask for help with exams."

"Like David?"

"Yes, like David. They had mutual friends. That's how I earned money; I'd tutor some of the men in secret. In any case, once he got over his initial dislike of me, he would call upon me. One day, he asked for my hand in Miss Pickney's parlor. I told him no, and he hasn't spoken to me since."

Junior scratched the back of his head and glanced behind him; no one was there. "It can't be an easy thing, asking someone like you to marry them. I guess he had the brass, after all."

It was said as a compliment. Isa's chest heated as though a falling star lit her up from the inside out.

"Who was the second man?"

"Hm?" Isa blinked. "Oh. The second one was a professor."

" What ?" A flock of blackbirds took flight from a nearby tree, their angry cries fading as they flew to quieter woods.

"Yes, he was very enthralled with my brain, but he reminded me of a kindly grandfather. I was much kinder to him than Walter in my refusal. I made excellent marks in his class and didn't want that to change." Junior was shaking his head, so she wisely changed the subject. "You would know all this if you hadn't stopped writing me."

Narrowed blue eyes slid to her. "Were you always this whiny?"

"I don't know. Were you always this ugly?"

"Good grief," he groaned. "And I've got three more days of this?"

"As I've said before, you're welcome to go ahead by yourself. Don't stick around on my account."

He grunted something and jammed his hat down so far that the tips of his ears bent. Unmoved by his sudden crossness, Isa stopped fighting Mirage and gave the mare her head. It was far easier to enjoy the scenic trail when Junior wasn't in front of her to spoil it. The forest around them focused into an Albert Bierstadt painting: splashes of oranges, crimsons, and sunflower yellows amidst a backdrop of twisted, craggy trees bracketing a rock-laden trail. It took her breath away.

Hours went by, and the storm-dark skies became blacker until the landscape of vivid colors turned duller than dishwater. Isa eventually grew bored. And hungry. She was always hungry. She rummaged in her saddlebag and pulled out a sack of roasted, salted sunflower seeds. She popped a few in her mouth, and Mirage's ears swiveled back while Isa's teeth broke open the striped seeds. Isa gently pulled back on the reins until Junior sidled up on Champion.

"Are you involved in clandestine undertakings for the Texas Rangers?"

Junior's hips stopped moving so easily in the saddle. "What do you mean?"

Isa spat a sunflower seed out, joyfully watching it tumble pell-mell to the ground. Miss Pickney never let her eat them because it wasn't ladylike . "You disguise your face, you haven't stopped looking behind us since we left, and you're as jumpy as a puppet."

His answer was a grunt.

Undeterred, she tossed more seeds into her mouth and talked rudely around them. "Well, what sort of work do the Texas Rangers have you doing these days?"

"Nothing much." There was no inflection in his voice.

"The last you wrote about your work was when they made you lieutenant and sent you down to the border. Which assignment was that one?"

Junior was quiet for so long that she opened her mouth to repeat the question when he gritted out, "Rogue Rangers."

"Texas Rangers go rogue?" She gasped at this exciting bit of news and turned in her saddle.

There was only stiff, foreboding silence from her companion.

"Oh, come on, Stone, I want details. It cannot be so serious and secretive as all—"

"You don't know a damned thing about it, Isa, and it's gonna stay that way. You understand?" His voice cracked like thunder.

Isa's titillated expression soured. "Well, pardon the hell out of me!" The retort was muffled behind a cheek full of sunflower seeds, dulling its edge.

A flash of lightning in the distance brought the animals to a halt, and the resounding crash of thunder spooked Mirage. The mare bolted. For an eternity, Isa did corrective maneuvers, keeping the half-trained mare's head up high and turning her in circles. Meanwhile, the storm rolled closer. Dense, steely storm clouds settled heavily above them, darkening the woods and dropping the temperature. Treetops went from gently swaying to lashing back and forth. Red and orange leaves rained down upon them, violently torn from limbs by the force of the wind.

They needed shelter, fast.

"Where are we?" she shouted over rushing leaves and creaking limbs.

"Just outside Brenham," Junior answered, his deep voice carrying. His face had paled beneath his tan, and he kept his rope in hand to lasso Mirage if Isa failed to control her. "We should be close to the fork that'll take us to the main road."

For twenty minutes, they traveled, their animals' manes and tails tangling in the wind. Isa's skirts flew up twice, and her hat was in constant threat of taking flight. Cursing, wishing she was wearing the trousers Miss Pickney had so heartlessly confiscated, Isa tucked her skirts beneath her legs. Reminded of her guardian's mercilessness, Isa doffed and stuffed her bothersome hat in the space between her saddlebags and gunnysack. They arrived at the main road just as the bottom dropped out of the sky. Isa stubbornly looked away when Junior furtively tucked his kerchief back over his nose. Let him act like a member of the James-Younger Gang.

She was far too involved in her own dilemma.

There was nothing Isa hated more than to ride while wet. Raindrops on her bare head made her scalp itch like it was crawling with bugs. Moisture trickled down her neckline, soaking her collar. She gritted her teeth and followed Junior along the main road—her horse was finally, mercifully, serene—to a nondescript building with a tiny sign with "Hostel" painted in yellow and outlined in black. They tied their horses to the hitching post and shuffled inside, boots squishing with every step. It smelled heavily of cabbage and the mustiness of improper airflow, and Isa's eyes followed the plain paneled walls to the single tiny window that was painted shut. In a little back room, a strapping man was hunched over a desk. His complexion was ruddy, and his thinning hair lay like corn silk along his scalp.

The door, too tight in its frame, squeaked shut behind Junior, alerting the proprietor.

The man made a little exclamation of pleasure. "Oh! Hello. You need a room?" His accent was strong with softened h's and gargled r's. Brenham was known for its vast population of German immigrants, who had arrived in droves the decade before. Fluent in the language, Isa perked up.

" Ja, zwei ." She could only hope the man had two rooms.

"Oh!" This time, the man's robin's-egg blue eyes widened. " Sind Sie Deutscher ?"

Smiling, she mopped her wet hair out of her eyes; it had fallen around her shoulders in the downpour. "No, I'm not German. But I speak it."

"Leon Meyer." He bowed a little, chortling.

Junior cleared his throat and pulled his damp, flat case wallet from his vest pocket. "You got two rooms?" He was unnecessarily stern.

The hostel owner rushed to obtain what looked like a ledger from the desk in the back room, glanced through the last page's contents, and scratched his scalp with a pinky nail. "Ah, no, we have but one room, Herr . Many have looked for shelter this day."

Junior's red lips turned down at the ends. Beneath his bearded chin, his kerchief hung limp, revealing the shining white scar stretching across his neck beneath the jawbone. "You sure there's only one?"

Leon Meyer's eyes drifted low to the dull glint of metal at the younger man's hip, and his friendly smile slackened.

Oh, for heaven's sake. "One room will be perfect, thank you, Herr Meyer." Isa scowled up at Junior, the only man she'd ever had to look up at besides her brothers and father.

Perhaps noting his guests' impressive heights and similar coloring, Meyer cautiously asked, " Sind sie Schwester und Bruder ?"

" Ja ," Isa lied. "We're sister and brother."

"Izzy—" Junior growled under his breath.

Isa cut him off without fluttering an eyelash. "Do you have a bundling board?"

Comprehending, Mr. Meyer nodded and bent beneath the counter, his fine hair swaying around his face. He pulled out a large plank used to separate two unmarried people in a bed. He accepted Junior's coin, wrote a receipt for one room, and chatted animatedly with Isa in his native tongue. Isa enjoyed this exchange until she caught a glimpse of the names Junior was writing in the hostel ledger.

Robert and Silvia Winslow.

Junior stepped forward, blocking Isa's view, and she saw a glint of a ten-dollar gold piece. "This is to keep our presence here to yourself. Do you understand? Don't answer any questions about us."

When Mr. Meyer wiped his palms on his sturdy brown trousers, Isa crossed her arms. There was no need to frighten the man! The hostel owner soberly pocketed the coin, leading them up a rickety staircase and down an unlevel hallway. They passed a couple of ripe-smelling railroad men leaving their rooms and reached the last door on the right. Mr. Meyer unlocked the door to a small, quaint room. There was pink everywhere. The curtains, the ruffled bed, and even the doilies on the washstand were embroidered with tiny pink rosebuds.

It was the beige, paneled divider in the corner, however, that excited Isa. She could change out of these wet clothes! Through a tiny square window, the world outside was gray and damp.

"Is there anywhere to bed our horses down for the night?" Junior asked, pocketing the key and lifting the wooden plank from the other man's arms.

"Er, ja , a stable in the back."

"Got any feed?"

"Hay is a dollar."

"That'll do." Another transaction was made, and Junior turned to Isa when the proprietor finally quit the room. "What were you saying to him downstairs?"

Disliking his tone, Isa seized the bundling board from his hands. "I told him all of our plans in detail for the next few days, including the fact that you're a Texas Ranger hiding out from someone." His jaw turned to stone, and she shook her head in amazement. "How stupid do you think I am? I didn't say anything of importance!"

Junior wrapped his fingers around her arm, pulling her closer. "You didn't say anything about where we were going?"

Isa looked down at the offending appendage that was wrapped around her biceps, pulled it off with two delicate fingers, and said slowly, "No, I did not tell him where ‘Robert and Silvia Winslow' were traveling. Get that bee out of your bonnet."

"And you didn't tell him our real names?" he continued in an angry whisper, cracking the door to look down the hallway for anyone within earshot.

"No!"

"Because if I was on a mission for the Texas Rangers, it wouldn't be real smart to bust my cover."

"For Pete's sake, Junior, all I did was ask the man where he hailed from."

"Oh."

"So you can stop shouting at me."

"How could I be shouting when I'm whispering?" he hissed, pulling their room key out and ensuring their lock engaged properly. It did. He then prowled to the window and tested if it was tight within its sill. "I'll bring the saddlebags in and put the horses in the stable. You can ask about supper. I can't argue with you on an empty stomach."

Isa scoffed. "You're just as useless arguing on a full stomach. I don't see how eating helps slow wit."

Junior glared at her and pointed to the side of the bed closest to the door. "That's my side."

She tore her narrowed eyes from him and hauled the heavy bundling board to the bed, settling it in the center. It wouldn't stay upright. "I didn't want that side, anyway."

"Good." He strode to the door and unlocked it.

Before he walked out, she blurted, " Is someone following you?" She couldn't conceal her suspicion any longer.

Only his profile was visible, but she could see his left nostril flare. "No."

Liar .

"Well, you're acting like—"

The door shut in her face.