The Dang Fool Woman And The Impossible Man
“Mrs. Amanda Healey?” Ben Cartwright doffed his hat and smiled broadly at the pretty little woman dressed in blue velvet. Her blonde hair was curled and stacked up under a perky little blue hat with a light blue plume that Ben was sure more by design than by accident matched her huge cornflower colored eyes. Also, she was a lot younger looking than he imagined her to be, given the teaching experience that her resume detailed.
“That’s correct, sir,” she seemed to be taken aback by his presence but recovered her composure, smiling up at the tall gray haired rancher. “And who might you be?”
Must be a bit jumpy from the long trip, he decided putting his hat back on his head. “Well, ma’am, I’m Ben Cartwright. I’m here to take you to Virginia City,” he again smiled and began to take her luggage from her.
“That’s fine, Mr. Cartwright,” she tightly gripped the bags. “I can handle them myself.”
“But, it’s no…” Ben started to say but was distracted by the arrival of…
“Excuse me, ma’am,” Hoss tipped his ten gallon hat to Mrs. Healey. “Pa, I’ve got to take off for Placerville. I should be back tomorrow afternoon.”
“All right, son, but wait just a minute,” Ben put his hand on Hoss’s arm. “Mrs. Healey,” he turned and addressed the woman who looked for the life of him like she was trying to slip away from him. He also took her by the arm. She frowned down at his effort to restrict her movement. “I’d like you to meet my middle son, Eric.”
Hoss rolled his eyes at his father’s use of his proper name.
“Eric, this is Mrs. Amanda Healey, our new school teacher.”
“Please to meet you, ma’am,” Hoss grinned down at her.
“Likewise, Eric,” she smiled at Hoss but looked annoyed at Ben as she pulled her arm out of his grasp.
“Could you excuse us a moment, Mrs. Healey?” Ben asked.
“Please take your time, Mr. Cartwright. I’ll just go into the store…” she said disappearing inside with her luggage.
“You can leave those…” Ben called after her but she was gone before he could get “bags with me” out of his mouth. He turned back to Hoss. “How much money do you have?”
Hoss looked at his father in surprise.
Ben cleared his throat. “I left this morning without taking any money out of the safe and the bank’s closed until Monday,” he explained.
“Well, Pa, I’ve got $40 but I do need money for me and Chubb to spend the night and to pick up something for Adam…” Hoss looked at his father’s hopeful face and caved. “I think I can spare $10,” he reluctantly handed over the money.
“Thanks, son,” Ben grinned. “You never know what emergencies might come up along the way when there’s a lady involved.”
Hoss studied his father’s face and thought he saw a glint in his eye that was suspiciously like the one that his little brother got when a pretty girl caught his fancy. So that’s where he gets it from. “I know, Pa,” Hoss shifted his thoughts back to his father when he realized he was waiting for some kind of a response to his comment. “Don’t spend it all in one place,” he laughed, untying his horse’s reins. “I’ll see you some time tomorrow,” he hauled himself up into Chubb’s saddle and rode away.
Ben turned and strolled into the store. Mrs. Healey was engaged in an animated discussion with the storekeeper. She abruptly broke it off when she saw Ben and moved forward toward him.
“You know, Mrs. Healey, it’s getting late and we have a fairly long ride ahead of us to Virginia City so we really should be going,” he smiled down at the petite woman and tried to take her bags again.
Amanda sidestepped his attempt again and cleared her throat. “I’m afraid that you made the trip from Virginia City for nothing, Mr. Cartwright. I’ve changed my mind. I’m not taking the teaching position after all.”
“What?” Ben looked at her in surprise.
“I’m not going with you,” she spoke up louder in case he was having problems with his ears. The storekeeper and the two ladies he was waiting on looked at the two of them curiously.
Ben smiled sheepishly at them, took the petite schoolteacher by the arm and pulled her and her luggage to a corner filled with saddles and harnesses so they might talk a little more privately.
“Mrs. Healey, we have an ironclad contract,” Ben fought to control his tone. “I should know. I wrote it myself.”
“Hmmm,” she thought, studying his face. “You’re a lawyer, Mr. Cartwright?”
“No, but…”
“Ever study the law?”
“No, but…”
“Then how do you know it’s iron-clad?” Amanda reached down in her carpetbag, took out some papers Ben knew to be the contract and ran her finger down the page. “What about this escape clause, Mr. Cartwright?”
“What escape clause?” he took the document from her.
“Paragraph III,” Mrs. Healey held up three fingers.
Ben looked at her in amazement and scanned the paragraph in question.
“It says that the contract can be cancelled at the option of either party,” she continued as he read.
“Yes. That’s right,” Ben nodded his head.
“Well, I’m canceling it!” Amanda crossed her arms over her chest and gave him a superior look.
“You can’t do that,” Ben protested assuming a similar stance to hers. “It’s too late.”
“Where does it say that it’s too late for me to cancel it?”
“But, Madam…”
“I said, show me where it says there is a time for cancellation, Mr. Cartwright.”
Ben quickly tried to read the document again.
“Find it?” she leaned over and looked up eagerly into his face.
He frowned down into her big blue eyes.
She batted her long eyelashes at him, smiling.
He ignored her and went back to reading.
“You’re not going to find it because it’s not there!” she taunted him. “Furthermore,” she continued, “The contract doesn’t say anything about me having to pay back any money that was advanced to me to come here, does it?”
“No…but…Mrs. Healey...”
“And there is no penalty specified if I decide to cancel the contract. Is that correct also?”
Ben was beginning to wonder if the petite blonde was a lawyer herself. “Now let’s be reasonable...”
“You don’t have a leg to stand on, Mr. Cartwright,” she smirked at him.
Ben fought off the urge to crumble the document in his hand and do the same to the little schoolteacher. “Madam, we will sue you, then, for specific performance…”
“…Of a labor contract?” Mrs. Healey raised her eyebrows. “President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and….”
“…Emancipation Proclamation….” the vein in Ben’s temple began to throb. “Now look here, you…” he shook his index finger at her.
“I believe that it covers this type of situation, too, Mr. Cartwright!” she poked him in the chest with her index finger.
“Good God, woman!” Ben threw his arms up in the air. “It covers slaves in the Confederacy!”
“And women are just as oppressed as any slaves, Mr. Cartwright.”
“I’m not trying to oppress you! I’m trying to get you to honor a legitimate and binding contract to teach, that’s all!” he bellowed at her. Again, he had let the volume of his voice rise to a level that attracted the attention of the mercantile’s other occupants.
“Are you sure?” she glared up at him, her hands on her hips.
Ben turned his back to her, smiled again at the two ladies and the storekeeper who was wrapping up their purchases, counted to ten, took a deep breath and turned back around.
“Now, Mrs. Healey,” he thought he’d try one of the smiles that Little Joe always used to persuade a member of the opposite sex toward his way of seeing things, “I’m sure we can come to some kind of compromise agreement. School is scheduled to start in two weeks, after all.”
“Good luck trying to find me in two weeks,” Amanda smiled and nodded at the other customers as they left the store.
“Maybe you can tell me what you’re going to do instead of teach,” Ben being an old salt tried another tack.
“Quite frankly, I don’t believe it’s any of your business what I’m going to do, Mr. Cartwright,” Amanda took the contract from him and stuffed it in her carpetbag. She then noticed that the storekeeper had disappeared leaving the two of them alone in the store.
“What do you mean?” Ben demanded. “I am the one who hired you and got the school board to advance money to you to get out here! I am responsible for your being here, whether you like it or not!”
“No one is responsible for me especially you, you impossible man!” she declared emphatically picking up her bags and trying to move around Ben.
He took a deep breath and fought hard to control his voice.
“Tell me something,” Ben, hands clasped behind his back, circled the tiny woman like a vulture. “How many times in your sweet little life have you found yourself bottom end up over some enraged gentleman’s lap getting a well deserved serving of the palm of his hand?” he stopped his buzzard-like movements at precisely the spot where he could glare into Mrs. Healey’s huge blue eyes.
Amanda would not rise to the bait, however. “I suppose as many times as you have, Mr. Cartwright,” she stated matter-of-factly dropping her bags, crossing her arms over her chest, cocking her head and returning his glare with a stare.
The corners of his mouth twitched in a slight smile. “Then it’s a wonder that you learned to sit at all,” he snapped and began his circular route again.
Amanda sighed growing impatient with his tactics. “Is this your extremely tiresome and oblique way of telling me that you intend to beat me, Mr. Cartwright?’
“Well, someone sure should.”
“And you’re that someone?”
“Keep it up and I will be, Mrs. Healey.”
“You may be ‘enraged,’ Mr. Cartwright,” she picked up her luggage and turned on her heel to leave the mercantile, “But if you would hit a lady who you just met, then you are no ‘gentleman!’”
“That’s it!” Ben grabbed her by the back of her blue velvet skirt and sat her with her bags down hard on a keg of nails. “You’re going to listen to me, Amanda Healey or, by thunder, I will turn you over my knee right here in this general store!”
She defiantly looked up at him from where he had none too gently sat her and her luggage. Her mood quickly shifted from rebellion to grudging compliance, however, when she recognized the same fire in his brown eyes as she used to see in her late husband’s. He who fights and runs away will live to fight another day, she decided especially when her witnesses had all deserted her. She released her bags, one of which fell heavily on his right foot much to her amusement and his annoyance. “Well, if you’re going to put it that way,” she folded her hands in her lap and looked up at him smiling sweetly, “How could I not want to listen to you with the threat of you beating me hanging over my head, Mr. Cartwright?”
Ben shook his head in exasperation, moved the bag off his toe and sat down beside her on another keg. “Mrs. Healey, I propose that you give me two weeks of your time. Come back with me to Virginia City and get settled in at the accommodations that I’ve arranged for you. Meet a few of the families and the children. Then you can make up your mind whether you want to stay or not,” he smiled tentatively at her.
Amanda thought for a few minutes, considering her options. “All right, Mr. Cartwright. You’ll have my answer in two hours,” she held up two fingers in front of his face but crossed two fingers on her other hand behind her back.
“Two hours?” Ben looked at her in disbelief. “But…”
She raised her right hand to attempt to ward off any further words of protest from escaping from his mouth. “I just arrived on the stage, Mr. Cartwright, and there are a few personal things that I have to attend to before I set out on another long journey, whether it’s to Virginia City or somewhere else.”
Ben took a deep breath and sighed. “All right, Mrs. Healey. I’ll be back here in two hours,” he tipped his hat to her, stepped out the door and headed for the nearest saloon.
But I won’t be, Amanda heaved a sigh of relief, stood up, picked up her bags and went off in search of the storekeeper.
***********
Ben checked his pocket watch for the tenth time in three minutes. What could be keeping that dang fool woman? He grumbled and leaned against the ceiling post in the general store. He was wasting valuable time waiting for her when he could be halfway to Virginia City. “Excuse me,” he addressed the storekeeper who had his back to him sorting pairs of Levi’s. “Did you happen to see the woman I was with anywhere?”
“Been busy,” the little man grumbled moving a big stack of jeans from one shelf to the next. “Don’t have time to keep track of my employees let alone some crazy woman with notions of prospecting for gold,” he snorted.
The man’s statement took Ben totally by surprise. He reached out and grabbed him by the shoulder and turned him around to look at him. “What did you say?” he fixed the man with a glare.
“Your woman friend’s got some fool notion that she’s going to find a mountain of gold.”
Ben frowned. “She told you that?”
The man looked tentatively at Ben and started to rummage through a drawer under the counter. “No, she wrote it to me. She said that she wanted me to have a supply wagon packed and ready to go when she arrived on the morning stage today. Ah, here it is!” he pulled a thick sheath of papers out of the drawer and handed it to Ben. “Sent me this letter about three months ago. She sure got down to specifics. Just look at this listing.”
“And she paid for all this when?” Ben asked scanning the letter and accompanying pages.
“In advance,” the storekeeper pushed his spectacles up his thin nose. “All paid for in advance except for $10.00. All she really had to do was sign the receipt, go out the back door and take off. Here, look at the last page of her letter,” he took the letter from Ben and flipped it open. “She asked me to have everything ready to go as soon as she got here. See?” he pointed the section out to Ben. “She also says something about a teaching position in Virginia City that she originally planned to take but decided to forego … and something about Benjamin Cartwright being…”
“Me. That’s me! What did she say about me?” Ben demanded slamming his fist on the counter.
“Well…um…I…umm...”
“Yes?”
“I was supposed to keep Benjamin Cartwright occupied until …until…”
“…. She could get away,” Ben mumbled. “How long ago did she leave?”
“I guess a couple of hours ago…”
“…When I last spoke to her. You know what direction?”
“Due north to Pyramid Lake toward…”
“…Certain danger,” Ben finished the man’s sentence for the third time.
“Sorry, Mr. Cartwright. If I would have only known…”
“Thanks,” Ben started out the door.
“There is a matter of $10 that she still owes me, Mr. Cartwright,” the little man scurried around the counter to block his exit. When Ben scowled down at him, he added quickly, “Mrs. Healey said you would pay me.”
Ben sized up the storekeeper. He knew he could easily move him out of his way but, in his experience, the smaller the man, the scrappier the man. And anyway, at the moment he wasn’t in the mood to tangle with anyone except a dang fool woman who he felt personally obligated to save from herself.
“All I’ve got is $9.50 on me right now,” Ben said remembering that he had spent four bits of Hoss’s money for drinks at the saloon while he was waiting for Mrs. Healey.
“I’ll take it,” the storekeeper stuck out his hand.
“Fine, but I want that letter in exchange,” Ben began to reach in his pocket.
The storekeeper thought for a minute, considering the value of Mrs. Healey’s writing. “Deal,” he handed Ben the letter and Ben reluctantly handed over all of the money that Hoss had given him. “Nice doing business with you, Mr. Cartwright,” the storekeeper called after him as Ben scrambled into the buckboard and took off toward Virginia City again.
**********
Adam and Sport were really enjoying their trip back from town. The weather was not particularly warm for August and there was a nice breeze blowing out of the mountains. Sport had decided on his own that there was no need to hurry and Adam totally agreed to allow his temperamental steed to set a leisurely pace. After all, he had no chores to do, his brothers were gone for the evening and his father was not due back until…. He frowned as he watched a buckboard pull out of the Carson City road about a quarter of a mile ahead of him. It couldn’t be….
“Come on, boy,” he clucked to his stallion. “Let’s see what’s going on.”
**********
“Dang fool woman!” Ben muttered to himself urging Jake down the road toward Virginia City at a fairly good pace. “…Emancipation Proclamation… Ha! … I’d like to oppress her backside but good… Where the devil would she get such a dang fool idea about finding…”
“If you’re expecting an answer from Jake, I wouldn’t hold my breath, Pa,”
Adam came up along side the buckboard.
I wouldn’t either, Jake agreed with Ben’s oldest son.
“Where are you going any way?” Adam shielded his eyes from the afternoon sun.
Ben took a really deep breath and tried to keep an even tone to his voice. “I’ve got to get Mrs. Healey.”
“Isn’t that why you took off early this morning to go to Carson City?” Adam was confused.
“Yes, but…”
“So you managed to lose the school teacher?” Adam laughed, shaking his head.
“I did not lose the school teacher,” Ben said in very measured tones. “She took off on her own.”
“So where are you going now?”
“To find her.”
“And how will you know where to look?”
“The storekeeper in Carson City told me she was headed north toward Pyramid Lake. She had a two hour head start on me but I think I’ve narrowed the gap considerably since I know where I’m going and I’m not loaded down with a lot of supplies.”
“Do you want me to come along and help?” Adam said half-heartedly.
Ben cleared his throat loudly. “I think I can handle one little woman by myself, Adam.”
“You seem to be doing a Jim-dandy job by yourself so far,” Adam said facetiously.
“Whoa!” Ben abruptly pulled Jake and the buckboard to a halt and glared up at his smart-alecky eldest son. “Do you have any extra cash on you?”
Adam deciding to live dangerously smirked down at his obviously annoyed father from his perch on top of Sport. ”Lady run off with your wallet too?”
“I forgot to get money out of the safe this morning, young man.” Ben’s tone conveyed the message that, even though it was August, Adam was skating on thin ice.
Adam recognized that tone as did Jake and Sport and immediately straightened up. “Well, ah…” he began to dig through his pockets, “All I’ve got is $5…I paid for the saw mill machinery and then had to pick up a few things for Hop Sing,” he motioned to the bundles that were slung across Sport’s rump.
“Fine,” Ben extended his left palm to his son who obediently put the money in it. “Let me have any extra ammo you’ve got and your rifle, too, come to think of it. By the way, what kind of things did you have to pick up for Hop Sing anyway?”
“I’m not sure, Pa,” Adam grinned and handed the parcels to his father. “Hop Sing said I wasn’t supposed to look. Quote, just give money to Number 4 cousin and pick up order, unquote.”
“And you didn’t look?” Ben eyed him skeptically, then checked inside one of them himself.
“Pa, I promised Hop Sing,” Adam sounded wounded.
“Well, did you?” Ben gave him a look that was designed to make an offspring quake if he was not telling the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
“Of course not,” Adam insisted, crossing his heart and holding up his right hand as if to swear an oath.
“Okay,” Ben still didn’t quite believe him but decided to let it go. “Thanks. These just might come in handy,” he turned and put the bundles behind him. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Giddy-up!” he snapped Jake’s reins.
“Now what am I supposed to tell Hop Sing?” Adam asked himself as he watched his father go off in a cloud of dust.
***********
Whoa!” Amanda Healey pulled her team to a halt. She stared at the sun that had sunk fairly low on the horizon and then at the watch that hung around her neck. The stagecoach station manager told her that she was to travel for an hour or so and turn left at the fork in the road to get to Pyramid Lake. The only problem was there were four roads, two of which went left and two went right.
Isn’t that just like a man! She shook her head. Well, Amanda, you’ve got a 50-50 chance, she sighed, then shivered. It really wasn’t as warm as she expected it to be for August.
Suddenly the silence of the countryside was broken by what sounded like rapid-fire gunshots and a horse drawn conveyance thundering toward her.
“What the devil…?” the petite schoolteacher turned in her seat in time to watch Ben Cartwright, Jake and the buckboard pull to a screeching halt in front of her wagon and effectively block her choice of either of the two left roads. The scowl on his face said it all as he tied off the big black horse’s reins, approached the wagon and grabbed the leads out of her hands.
“Going some place, Madam?” he said as another round of what seemed to be gunshots erupted.
Amanda summoned up all of her courage, straightened in her seat and glared at Ben. “I told you it was none of your business, Mr. Cartwright!”
“Wrong answer,” Ben muttered wrapping the reins of her wagon around the brake. He then visually located her carpetbag and valise and reached in the back of the wagon to retrieve them.
“Stop that, you impossible man!” Amanda jumped out of the wagon and tried to grab her luggage away from Ben. In response, he hoisted them up on his shoulders so she could not reach them, tossed them long distance into the back of his buckboard and turned back to her.
“What are you doing?” she demanded backing away from him as another burst of explosions sounded.
“Trying to save our as…scalps, that’s what!” he quickly tried to close the gap that had developed between him and her. She, however, still continued to retreat from him. “Are you hard of hearing, Mrs. Healey?” he paused as more gunshot-like sounds were heard. “We’ve got to go…” he lunged at her and managed to get a hold of her by the arm.
“I’m not going anywhere with you!” she strained against him, digging her heels into the hard dirt surface of the road. “What about my wagon and supplies…”
“I don’t have time to argue with you, Madam,” Ben yanked the petite blonde to him, swung her under his arm and ran for Jake and the buckboard for all he was worth.
“Let me go!” she screamed trying to catch hold of his right leg to trip him up but to no avail.
“The entire Bannock nation is going to be down on us any second,” he growled tossing her into the buckboard’s bed like a sack of grain.
Mrs. Healey landed unceremoniously on her behind on top of her luggage. “Now see here, Mr. Cartwr…” she tried to scramble to her feet.
“Yaw-w-w-w!” Ben already had the reins and was urging the big black gelding forward at top speed.
Amanda lost her footing and fell once again on her backside as Ben did a quick turn to take them back in the direction from which they came.
This is beginning to get painful, she thought holding onto the seat support for dear life with her left hand so she wouldn’t bounce out of the wagon’s bed.
“Our only chance is to get back to the stage station!” he shouted back to her.
“That doesn’t make any sense!” she yelled trying to keep her hat on her head.
“Do you know anything about fighting Indians, Madam?”
“Of course I don’t!”
“That’s just what I thought,” Ben smiled to himself. “Yaw!!!” he steered Jake around the bend and right into the path of an Indian war party. “Hang on!” he advised as he pulled hard on the reins stopping Jake and the buckboard within three feet of the seven mounted Indian braves.
The warriors immediately surrounded them.
Amanda struggled to her feet, again straightened her hat and glared eye to eye with one of the men. He snarled at her but to Ben’s and the others’ amazement, she did not even flinch. In fact, she returned the snarl.
“It appears that I know as much about fighting Indians as you do, Mr. Cartwright!” she said smugly putting her hands on her hips and turning to address Ben.
The brave took that opportunity to grab her from behind and haul her kicking and screaming to the ground.
Ben looked up to heaven, sighed and climbed out of the buckboard to stand in front of the other Indians. He looked back and watched another brave catch Mrs. Healey’s other arm to try to help subdue the petite blonde.
“Good Chief Yellow Sky, I seek parlez with you,” Ben held up his hand and addressed the oldest of the Indians.
“We will have parlez, Ben Cartwright,” the old chief nodded. “Speak.”
“You have lived in peace with the white man for many years. It has been many moons since your warriors have painted their faces and taken up guns against the white man. I am unhappy to see your young braves wearing war paint and carrying guns once again.”
“We have known each other for many years, Ben Cartwright. We do not wish to go to war with the white man but we will, if we must.”
“Then why did you stop us, you horrible savage?” Amanda yelled kicking one of the braves who held her in the shins.
Both Ben and Yellow Sky paused to watch the scuffle between Mrs. Healey and the two braves. Ben shook his head and the chief looked at him sympathetically. He reluctantly decided it was time to come to Amanda’s rescue, or maybe it was the Indians’ rescue? He wasn’t sure at the moment.
“Chief, if you do not want to fight with the white man, why do your warriors fight against one weak, stupid woman? Order your warriors to release her so that we may talk.”
The Chief nodded and spoke to the braves who immediately let go of the little schoolteacher. She darted for Ben but not before she stepped hard on each of the Indians’ toes.
“What do you mean ‘weak, stupid woman’, Mr. Cartwright?” she raged up at him, straightening her hat and her skirt indignantly.
He did not respond to her question. Instead, he grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her none too gently to his side.
It was then that she noticed a strange fire in his eyes that made her think better of saying anything further for the moment. “Why did Yellow Sky stop us if you do not make war on white man?”
“That’s what I want to know too,” Amanda nonetheless chimed in again.
Ben took a deep breath and tightened his grip on her.
“She is your woman?” the chief indicated Amanda with a nod of his head.
Ben looked down at her and frowned. “Not exactly but for now, she is my responsibility.”
“She needs good beating, my friend.”
Amanda looked at the chief in shock. “How dare you, you heathen?” she intoned haughtily, waving her fist and taking a step toward the Indian.
Ben immediately restrained her by yanking her by the back of her dress back to his side. ”Quiet!” he ordered wrapping his left arm around her and placing his right hand over her mouth. “Behave yourself, woman, or I will beat you right now!” he growled in her ear, then again addressed the chief. “Rest assured, Chief, I will severely deal with this woman but good,” the corners of his mouth twitched up in a faint smile.
Amanda glared up at him, her eyes conveying her thought that his head would look oh so good on either a pike or a platter. Ben gave her a similar look before he continued to parlez. “Yellow Sky, what do you intend to do with us?”
“You are good man, Ben Cartwright. You have always been our friend. We have no quarrel with you or your woman. You may go on your way back home.” The chief motioned to his tribesmen to mount and moved toward his own horse. “But do not go any further north. You will not be safe.”
“I understand. Many thanks, old friend,” Ben began to drag Amanda quickly toward the buckboard, his hand still over her mouth.
“Ben Cartwright,” Yellow Sky smiled hauling himself up into his saddle. “We will leave you to attend to your woman,” his eyes sparkled in amusement. “Good luck.” He raised his hand in a farewell salute.
Ben let go of Amanda so he could return the Indian’s gesture. That was all she needed. She broke away from him and then tried to clobber him with a roundhouse to his face. He ducked fortunately and grabbed her from behind, lifted her up bodily and plunked her down hard on the buckboard seat.
Jake who was dozing suddenly looked around to see what was happening when he felt the wagon shake from the force of Mrs. Healey’s sit down.
“Young lady,” his voice was dangerously quiet. “I am this close,” he gestured with his index finger and thumb, “to following Yellow Sky’s advice. Don’t push me!” he roared shaking his index finger in her face.
She gulped looking down at her hands.
Ben quickly looped a rope through the handles of her luggage, tied it off, climbed into the seat beside her and glared at her. Then he gently clucked for Jake to proceed.
She sulked in silence for a while, contemplating her present situation. Then her temper began to flare. She opened her mouth but clamped it shut reconsidering whether this was the proper moment to cross swords with Ben Cartwright. She decided it wasn’t and settled in the seat, her back to him.
Lord, she had just met the man and he was already trying to run her life and tell her what to do! Well, she had had 14 years with her late husband and almost the same amount being her own boss and she was not about to return to having some man run her life and tell her what to do. The first thing she had to do was to figure out how to get shed of him and back to her wagon and horses and supplies. But how?
Silently she studied his face for the next ten minutes trying to determine when would be the most appropriate time for her to ask “What about my wagon and my horses and my supplies?”
“What about them?” Ben demanded glancing over at her
Obviously he still was upset with the run-in with the Indians. Nonetheless, nothing ventured, nothing gained, she thought. “We have to go back for them!” she managed to whine like a five-year old.
“Didn’t you hear Yellow Sky warn us about us going north?”
“But I paid good money for the wagon and the horses….”
“And I just saved your scalp, woman!” he thundered.
“Thank you very much even though I don’t remember asking you to. Now about my money?”
“What are you talking about? What money?”
“Well, because of your actions in ‘saving my scalp,’ I expect you to pay me for my losses, i.e. the horses, wagon and supplies.”
“I paid you money in advance as a teacher…” Ben was incredulous. One would think that she might be a trifle unnerved by an Indian encounter but not her.
“…And I paid exactly that much for the supplies and horses and…” the petite blonde paused as she watched him pull what looked like her letter to the storekeeper out of his inside vest pocket.
“Seems to me, Mrs. Healey that you paid $300 less than I advanced to you,” Ben put the reins in this left hand and opened up the papers.
“I had expenses to get here…” she tried to explain.
“…And I saved you, “he insisted, stuffing the letter back in his pocket.
“I didn’t ask you to I told you! I want my money that I spent on the supplies now!”
“Only if you agree to teach. And, yes, I know about specific performance and the Emancipation Proclamation!" he added as she opened her mouth to no doubt make the same argument she did before. “In fact, you owe me $9.50 that I had to pay for your wagon and horse and supplies,” he held put his hand dramatically, “And I’d like it now!”
“I don’t have any of your money left.”
“I’ll take it out of your teacher’s pay when we get back to Virginia City.”
“I am not going back there with you and I am not taking the teaching position, Mr. Cartwright!” she crossed her arms over her chest and began to pout.
“Well, you’re not going to go off and look for gold, either, Madam” he glared at her. “Right now I’m the one with the horse and the buckboard and food and $5.00,” his voice began to crescendo. “Now unless you want to walk…”
“You have food?” Amanda’s eyes lit up. “I’m starved.”
Ben couldn’t believe how quickly her mind shifted gears from money and teaching to food. “Well, I really haven’t had time to eat myself since you left me waiting in Carson City…”
“Where is it?” she looked at him anxiously.
“There’s a basket back there behind the seat,” he motioned with his head. “My cook packed it for me this morning for our trip.”
“Well, I should have guessed that a man like you would have a cook,” she sniffed eyeing him up and down. “You probably oppress the poor woman the same way you try to do with other women.”
“Madam, my cook is named Hop Sing and HE is Chinese. Furthermore, I do not oppress anyone. In fact, I am particularly nice to him since he is the best damn cook in the whole Comstock and I don’t want to lose him. If anyone is oppressed in my household, it’s me!” he yelled.
Amanda covered her left ear with her hand, indicating her discomfort with his volume. “But what about your wife?” Surely the little dear is meek and mild as a dormouse being dominated by a man like you!”
“I am not married.”
“It’s no wonder,” she shook her head.
Ben fumed. Why did I come after her in the first place? “You know, I’m beginning to have second thoughts about hiring you to be our new schoolteacher, Mrs. Healey,” Ben watched her move to a kneeling position on the seat and reach for the basket that had shifted its position toward the back of the buckboard. “Your resume is impressive but obviously you have no problem lying and I wonder if you would allow your students the same luxury.”
“How dare you, Mr. Cartwright?” she started to rummage through the picnic basket. “I did not lie to you.”
“You told me that you would be at the general store in two hours.”
“I most certainly did not. I told you that you would have my answer in two hours,” she held up two of her fingers to illustrate the number. “I did not say that I would meet you in two hours,” she held up the same two fingers again.
“So you equivocated?”
She paused to think a moment as she pulled a sandwich out of the basket. “I guess that’s the correct term,” she sat back down in the seat, opened it and laid it on the wooden seat between the two of them.
Ben shifted the reins to his left hand and picked up half the sandwich with his right. He took a big bite of what proved to be roast beef and cheese with mustard. “So,” he finished chewing the bite and swallowed it. “How is that different from an outright lie, Mrs. Healey?”
She swallowed what was in her mouth and turned to look him in the eye. “I already explained that, Mr. Cartwright.”
“My oldest son Adam is a world class equivocator. When he was younger, many times he found himself not being able to sit down for a week because of his selective answers,” Ben looked at her pointedly. “Even now I’m tempted to tan his hide because of his equivocations.”
“And here we go again with another veiled threat to beat me,” Amanda threw up her hands in exasperation.
“I didn’t say any such thing!” he said wearily.
“You implied it!”
“Seems to me, Madam, that you doth protest too much. Could it be that you may now believe that you lied to me and deserve a trip over my knee?”
She did not answer him right away. “As my students would say, I crossed my fingers behind my back so it doesn’t count anyway,” she declared smugly.
“When my youngest son Joseph was five – he’s a prevaricator -- he thought that doing that cancelled out any lies he told me too,” he reached for the canteen. “I never thought it did,” he took a long drink and offered it to the petite blonde.
“How many children do you have, Mr. Cartwright?” she took a drink herself, trying to change the subject away from lying.
“Three, all boys. You met the middle one Hos…Eric. He never lied to me,” Ben decided to keep the theme going in spite of Mrs. Healey’s misdirection tactics. “He always got caught up in the lies of the other two boys and received the same punishment as the other two got.”
“Sounds like you’re an expert on lying, Mr. Cartwright,” Mrs. Healey daintily bit into her half of the sandwich.
“Let’s just say I know one when I hear one,” Ben flicked Jake’s reins and frowned at the setting sun. “We’ll be back at the stage station in about half an hour.”
“Again, I ask you, why do we have to go there?”
He took a deep breath. “Jake is a big strong horse, Mrs. Healey,” he said patiently. “But he can’t keep moving all night. He needs to rest and get some decent food and water. The stage station will have a place where we can bed him down for the night.”
“And us?”
“There might be a room inside or we might have to bunk in the barn.”
“Well, I don’t know…” Amanda became very quiet.
Ben noticed. “You didn’t tell the station manager who you were, did you?”
“He never asked,” she still appeared that something was troubling her.
He cleared his throat. “Madam, you are perfectly safe. I am too tired and too angry with you to try to take any liberties, I assure you. We probably will have to tell the station manager that we’re married to stave off a lot of questions however…”
“I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man on earth!” the little schoolteacher finally snapped out of her thoughts.
“Nor I you, but we’ve got to do what we’ve got to do for the sake of the…” he paused to consider his choice of word briefly, “…horse,” he decided.
“Wouldn’t we be telling a lie, Mr. Cartwright?” she looked at him critically.
“I imagine but it’s a lie of necessity and it doesn’t hurt anyone. In fact, it actually helps someone.”
“Who might that be?”
“Jake,” Ben guessed that she had a soft spot in her heart for the big black beast of a horse if she was that concerned about her horses.
“All right,” she smiled faintly. “For Jake’s sake, I’ll play along, Mr. Smith.”
“Mr. Smith?” he looked at her quizzically.
“We can’t use our real names. I don’t know what your reputation is like, Mr. Smith, but I intend to protect mine,” she said haughtily.
“Very well, Mrs. Smith. We’ll see how obedient a little wife you can be,” Ben smirked and cast her a sideways glance.
“And how doting a husband and father you can be, Mr. Smith. Right, Jake?” she giggled, reached forward and patted the big black gelding on the rump.
Ben sighed and vowed that he would never volunteer to pick up another schoolteacher again unless it was a male one.
**********
“Old Horace found us some blankets,” Ben announced coming into the barn. “I’ll fix a place for you to sleep. Mrs. …Smith?” he called looking around with more than a little concern that she had slipped away from him again.
“I’m in the stall with Jake. I decided to change into something else to sleep in,” her voice drifted over the partition.
“You changed in front of Jake?”
“I believe, Mr. Ca…Smith, he is only interested in four legged females,” Amanda held up four fingers over the top of the stall.
“I hate to correct you, Mrs. Smith,” he smiled mischievously, “but Jake is not interested in any female anymore.”
“So in any event, I made the correct choice in undressing in front of him instead of in front of you,” she peeked over the partition, her big blue eyes sparkling.
Ben chuckled, shook his head and went back to his work.
“Do you have an extra blanket I could have, Mr. Smith?”
“Here you go,” he tossed the cover over the stall.
“Mr. Smith, I’m curious. Since you have three sons, I assume you’ve been married before,” the petite blonde folded up her dress and draped it carefully over the partition.
“I’ve been married three times before. I lost all of my wives under unfortunate circumstances. And the first Mr.…. er….. Smith?” he raised his eyebrows.
“He was a minor magistrate of the New York State court,” she leaned against Jake to take off one of her shoes. He nuzzled her slightly with his nose but she somehow managed to retain her balance.
“I wouldn’t have guessed,” Ben muttered rolling his eyes and taking off his gunbelt. He put it down on the floor beside a barrel that held a kerosene lantern.
“After he passed away, I went back to teaching,” she continued patting Jake’s neck and coming out from the stall, the blanket wrapped tightly around her. She was in her bare feet and carried her shoes in her left hand. “Where do I sleep, Mr. Smith?”
Ben studied Amanda briefly, his mind wandering as to what she might have on under that blanket. His disconcerting conclusion was not much.
“Um… right here,” he motioned with his hand.
“And you are sleeping where?” she moved cautiously across the floor.
“Right here,” he said matter-of-factly easing himself down on the blanket he had laid out parallel to hers.
“Is it necessary for us to sleep so close?” Mrs. Healey frowned down at him.
Ben sighed wearily. “Yes for two reasons. One, we’re supposed to be newly married and two, I want to keep my eye on you,” he rested his head on a rolled up blanket and turned on his side to face the barn door.
“Pretty tough to keep your eye on me if you’re facing in the opposite direction, isn’t it, Mr. Smith?” she smirked slightly. “Maybe you should sit by the door so I can’t run away?” she suggested moving so she could look down in his face.
He looked up at her and chose to ignore her remarks. “Just get into bed, please, so I can blow out the light.”
“I don’t know…” Amanda was still hesitant as she moved back to the vicinity of her blanket.
Ben yawned. “Here,” he reached over, picked up his gunbelt and plopped it down on the floor between the two blankets. “If I make a move toward you, you can shoot me.”
“Is it loaded?” she asked sitting down gracefully and drawing her legs up under her.
“Of course, it’s loaded,” Ben was astounded she would ask such a question.
“Show me,” she eyed him suspiciously.
Sighing, Ben hauled himself up into a sitting position again. He pulled the gun out of its holster, opened the chamber and counted six bullets touching each in turn so she could see. “Satisfied?”
She nodded.
“Is there anything else?”
“I sometimes need a drink of water during…” Amanda began to rearrange the hay that was under her blanket.
Ben sighed again, got up, retrieved the canteen from Jake’s stall and dropped it beside his gunbelt.
“Now, young lady, is that it?” he asked standing over her, hands on his hips looking very much like a father who was at the end of his patience with his five year old.
“I guess so…” she smiled innocently up at him.
“Good,” he blew out the lantern, eased himself down on the floor in his makeshift bed and rolled to face the barn door again.
“…Except…”
“Except what?” he did not bother to roll back to see what she wanted.
“I forgot to say good night to Jake.”
“Go ahead,” Ben told her gruffly pulling his blanket tightly around himself.
“Good night, Jake!” she called to the big black horse. “Have a good night’s rest!”
Ben noticed the warmth in her voice and, for a moment, began to consider whether somewhere under that feisty exterior there was a gentle, sweet woman after all. He closed his eyes again.
“Oh, and Mr. Smith?” she whispered softly.
“What now?” he growled. This time he did roll over toward her and found himself gazing into her big blue eyes.
“Sweet dreams,” she smiled and closed her eyes.
“Good night, Mrs. Smith,” he smiled, yawned again and drifted off to sleep, not bothering this time to turn away from her.
**********
Ben stretched and yawned and then grimaced as a sharp pain shot through his left shoulder. He had read that there were over 200 bones in the human body and he was sure he ached in every one of them. He definitely was getting too old to be sleeping like this, he thought massaging the shoulder.
“Mrs. Smith!” he called standing up and stretching out to his full six-foot height. No sound except Jake munching on something in his stall. “Mrs. Smith?” he called again surveying the barn. He quickly strolled to the big horse’s stall and looked into it. Her dress and shoes were gone and so were both of her bags.
“I swear I’ll kill her,” he vowed snatching up his gunbelt from where it lay on the floor. “Dang fool…”
“Not so fast there, Mr. Smith,” Horace the station manager appeared in the doorway. He had a shotgun in his hands and appeared to be targeting Ben with it.
Oh-oh. Ben just knew this had to be the handiwork of one pretty little schoolteacher. “Where is Mrs.…?” he stammered, holding the gun belt out to his side to show the man that he did not intend to use it.
“The little lady hopped on the first stage headed for Fallon about 20 minutes ago,” the old man drawled glaring at Ben. “Poor thing was carrying on about what a brute you were and what a mistake she made marrying you after only knowing you for one day.”
“Listen, Horace, “Ben took a step back. “That’s not true. I didn’t even touch…”
“I don’t cotton to men who abuse little women, ‘specially one that is as sweet and innocent as your little Mrs.,” the station manager scowled at him.
“Take my word, Horace. She is neither sweet nor innocent,” Ben insisted keeping his eye on the man’s face and the barrel of the shotgun at the same time. “I appreciate the information and I promise I’ll let her know about your concern when I catch up with her,” he made a move toward putting on his gunbelt.
“Hold on there, Mr. Smith. Before you go running off anywhere, you owe me $5! Pay up or your honeymoon ends right here and now,” the stage manager pointed the double barrels of his shotgun at Ben’s nether regions.
Ben gulped, his eyes wandering down to Horace’s chosen target, and considered the all too real possibility that he like Jake might not be interested in any female anymore if he wasn’t careful.
“How did you get to $5?” he asked smiling agreeably.
“That’s 6 bits for your monster horse,” Horace motioned to Jake who was contently chewing on what Ben thought had to be half a haystack. “6 bits for you and your Mrs. …”
“…She is not my Mrs.….”
“You said she was last night…” Horace looked confused.
“Never mind,” Ben began to reach in his pocket.
“And $3.50 for her stage ticket. She said you would pay…”
“Of course she did,” Ben mumbled.
“…so that totals up to ...”
“…$5.00. Here, that cleans me out,” Ben handed the money to the man with his left hand while cautiously pushing the shotgun barrel away from him with his right. “You said Fallon, right?” he strapped on his gunbelt and moved to retrieve his ‘monster’ horse.
“Yep,” the station manager turned to leave but turned back. “By the way, Mr. Smith…”
Ben stopped in mid track.
“She told me to tell you that she never wants to see you again.”
“The feeling’s mutual I can assure you!” he yelled and moved into the stall.
“Sorry, Jake,” Ben patted the black gelding’s muzzle as he arranged the harness hardware over his head. “We’ve got to go after that dang fool woman again.”
Jake whinnied and shook his big head, clearly annoyed that Ben was interrupting his breakfast.
“Listen, at least you got to watch her undress,” he said leading the horse out of the barn.
**********
“Something wrong there, partner?” the stage driver yelled down to the tall gray haired rancher who managed to get his attention.
“I’m here to retrieve your passenger!” Ben yelled up to him as he drove along side the stage. “It seems she made a mistake and does not really want to go to Fallon, sir!” he thought it best to be polite since he was interfering with the schedule of a public conveyance.
The driver looked him up and down. He turned to have a brief discussion with the guard on his right. The guard shrugged. The driver then signaled Ben and brought the stagecoach to a slow steady halt. Ben grinned, thinking to himself that he might have had a future as a hold-up man, and stopped Jake and the buckboard exactly at a place so he could easily talk to the driver and guard.
“Driver, what I do is none of this man’s business!” Amanda stuck her head out of the coach window.
“Hello, darling,” Ben took off his hat and smiled sweetly across at Mrs. Healey. “I’ve come to take you back home.” No hint of temper was revealed in his tone.
“Didn’t you get the message that I never wanted to see you again, you impossible man?” she glared at him.
“I know you don’t mean that, sweetheart,” Ben said calmly. “Driver?” he stood up in the buckboard and crooked his finger at the man. “Could I talk to you privately for a minute, please?”
The driver glanced again at the guard who shrugged again but nevertheless leaned over so Ben could engage him in confidential tones.
“Don’t listen to anything he says, driver!” Mrs. Healey warned. “He’s a big liar even though he’ll tell you he isn’t and a deranged lunatic who claims to be married to me and has been trying to drag me off to Virginia City where I don’t want to go for two days now!” she held up two fingers.
The driver chuckled, reached behind him to retrieve Mrs. Healey’s luggage and handed it down to Ben.
She banged her fist on the side of the coach in exasperation and pulled her head back inside the stage.
“Just get a move on, mister,” the driver drawled as Ben secured Amanda’s bags in the buckboard. “We’ve got a schedule to keep.”
“If you help him, you’ll be an accomplice to a kidnapping!” she shrieked as Ben wrenched open the coach door, jumped in and took her by the shoulders, lifting her slightly out of her seat.
“Listen, young lady, and listen good,” Ben shook her staring her straight in her blue eyes. “This is the last straw. If you don’t come along with me right now, you’re going to wish that you had never heard the name Ben Cartwright.” Even though he was whispering, the murderous intent in his tone was clearly evident.
“I already wish it!” she shot back at him, her eyes flashing.
He took a deep breath and let it out in an effort to calm himself down. When he got a grip on his temper, he continued. “Madam, just in case you are still having trouble deciding, I have one word for you: PRISON,” he released her shoulders and set her back down in her seat hard.
She stared at him in shock. PRISON? She mouthed the word, turning its implications over in her head.
While she seemed to be temporarily paralyzed by his one word, Ben grabbed her arm, stepped out of the stage and dragged her after him.
“Everything work out fine, folks?” the stage driver called down to the two as Ben took Amanda by the elbow and led her to Jake and the buckboard.
“For now, yes,” Ben smiled up at the old man as he helped her up into the seat.
“A word of advice from an old married man, Mr. Smith,” the guard rested his rifle across his knee. “A firm hand applied in the right place just might be the answer to your ‘problems,” he indicated the petite blonde with a nod of his head.
“Humph!” she sniffed and turned her back to Ben and the men.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Ben climbed up on the seat beside her, clucked to the big black horse and steered the buckboard out of the way of the stagecoach and back toward Virginia City.
**********
About two miles down the road, Ben had to say something to Amanda or he would have burst. "I have never been angrier with anyone in my whole life!” he was steaming. “The only reason that I don’t blister your backside right now is because you've got to be able to sit down to get to Virginia City!” he glanced over at Mrs. Healey. “So what do you have to say for yourself, young lady?”
“You lied!” she turned toward him and yelled right in his ear.
“What?!?!” he yelled right back at her.
“You just told those people back there we were married!”
“Desperate times call for desperate measures, Madam!” he told her in very measured tones. “Anyway, that was a small one compared to all of the whoppers you’ve told me since I met you!”
“I am not talking to you, Mr. Cartwright!” she sniffed haughtily.
“I'll bet,” Ben muttered to himself. “What did your late husband teach you about fraud, Madam?"
She did not respond verbally. Instead she folded her arms across her chest and glared at him.
“I should have known that you would have been deficient in that piece of information since you are so skilled at twisting the truth,” his insult was calculated to make her answer. It worked, sort of.
“I know what fraud is, Mr. Cartwright,” the petite blonde said evenly. “You just continued to perpetrate one a few minutes ago with…”
“Then you must know what the usual punishment is...” he interrupted her, ignoring her reference to him.
“Under New York State law, one to three years with time off for good behavior,” she ticked off the sentence by rote.
“Which I wouldn't count on if I were you,” Ben added sarcastically.
“Humph! I'm not talking to you,” she turned her back on him again.
“You already said that,” he reminded her angrily.
Two minutes passed during which time he counted to 10, oh, 20 or more times by his estimation. It didn’t help. Finally, he cleared his throat and continued. "Madam, my first suggestion at your trial would be to lock you up and throw away the key. Then, I'd tell the court that solitary confinement and a diet of bread and water would be in order."
“That sort of thing is not done anymore, Mr. Cartwright. It's obvious you know nothing about the law,” she told him emphatically, still not looking at him.
“Well, I'm going to suggest it anyway!” he was even more emphatic than she was in his tone. “You've got to be taught a lesson, Mrs. Schoolteacher, that you cannot take money under false pretenses!”
“What do you mean ‘false pretenses,’ Mr. Cartwright?” This time Mrs. Healey twisted around to address him.
Ben looked at her in astonishment. “Surely you're not going to tell me that you didn’t take the teaching position under false pretenses now, are you?”
Amanda took a deep breath, stood up slightly, grabbed the sides of his head with both hands and turned him to face her. “I did not take the teaching position under false pretenses,” she looked him straight in his dark brown eyes. She then released him sitting back down. “You see, Mr. School Board Member…”
“…President…” he muttered.
“…Excuse me, President,” she corrected. “And non-lawyer," she slipped into her educator mode, “Under the terms of our contract which you pointed out so proudly that YOU drafted,” she poked him in the forearm with her finger to emphasize YOU.
Ben looked up to heaven for strength.
“…I do not officially start to work for the Virginia City School until the first day of school. I believe you said that that was two weeks,” she waved two fingers in front of his nose, “From yesterday.”
“You said you were canceling the contract because there was no time period in which you had to cancel it nor was there any penalty for cancellation, didn't you?” Ben's blood pressure was ready to reach an all time high.
Mr. Healey looked at him and smirked. "Is there anything left in your picnic basket, Mr. Cartwright?" she suddenly remembered that she had not had breakfast and turned to kneel on the seat to reach in the back of the buckboard for the food.
In this position, the petite blonde presented a tempting target for him to vent his anger and frustration in a way that had been threatened by him and at least twice in the last two days had been suggested to him by others. He pulled back his right hand and poised it over her derriere. It took all his intestinal fortitude not to do it. He reluctantly returned his hand to Jake’s reins, took a deep breath and calmly asked her to please respond to his last question.
“My dear Mr. Cartwright," she handed him an apple, “I simply changed my mind about canceling the contract. Furthermore, I cannot be charged with taking money under false pretenses until I fail to report on the first day of school and I now plan to report. Finally, paragraph X,” she used both hands to indicate the number this time, “Of the agreement provides that all notices, additions, alterations and modifications to the contract had to be in writing. So there really was no way for me to cancel the contract except in writing and you would have had to, of course, agree to accept my cancellation also in writing which you did not." She gave him a superior smile, sat back down on the seat and took a bite of her apple.
Ben was flabbergasted. I should have swatted you when I had the chance. “Are you telling now that there was no way you could cancel the contract after all?” he said angrily tossing his apple away in a fit of temper and glowered at her.
Mrs. Healey was the one to look at him in astonishment this time. “Mr. Cartwright, that was a perfectly good apple. If you didn't want it, I'm sure Jake would have liked to have it!” she scolded him like he was one of her misbehaving pupils.
Ben was taken aback by her chiding tone. At the sound of his name, the big horse shook his head and neighed as if he too was rebuking his owner.
“Benedict Arnold,” he mumbled to Jake under his breath. He turned back to Amanda. “Answer me, Madam, before I change MY mind and decide that you don't necessarily have to be able to sit down to get to Virginia City,” his tone deepened dangerously.
“I just told you I couldn't cancel the contract, Mr. Cartwright! Are you sure you're not hard of hearing?” she teased him.
“You mean to tell me that I have been chasing after you for two days to get you to fulfill your contract and you're now telling me you're ready to do just that?”
“Isn't that's what I just said?”
This time Ben decided to count out loud to “…Ten. Could you be good enough to tell me why you told me you were canceling the contract in the first place?”
“As I said before, Mr. Cartwright, it's really none of your business but if you must know, I planned to take a little vacation before I started my new position.”
“And you dragged me into your ‘little vacation’?” he roared.
“I didn't ask you to come along with me, you impossible man!” she laughed at him. “It’s your own dumb fault! Honestly, are you a professional busy body who enjoys poking your nose into other people’s business or just mine?”
“You’re just asking for a spanking, aren’t you, young lady?” he growled in her direction.
“You know,” she tossed the apple core nonchalantly away, “I’ve known you for less than two days and you’ve already threatened me with physical harm no less than five times,” she turned and held up her gloved hand in front of his face to emphasize each number with her fingers. “Do you generally threaten to beat women to get them to come around to your archaic way of thinking or is it just me?”
Ben abruptly stopped the buckboard and grabbed her hand that was obscuring his view. “Only you, three wives who have passed away, and spoiled little brats, which brings me back to you,” he looked her straight in the eye. “And, for your information, I only threaten for so long then I do.”
“Do what?” She ventured to ask but his glare spoke volumes clarifying his answer to her question.
“If I were you, little girl, I’d be on my best behavior because you never know when I might ‘do.’” He then released her hand and urged Jake forward again.
She gulped. No one had ever dared to call her little girl since her late husband did and when he did, she knew she was in deep trouble. She took a quick glance at Ben and immediately concluded that she was and he might ‘do’ any minute. Her best bet was to mend a few fences as fast as she could.
***********
Ben was lost in his thoughts. They had traveled in silence for almost an hour. What had started out as a gray overcast day had turned into on