"Filthy habit, hate to start." Cord plucked the cigar out of the air as Frank threw it.

With the cigar in the corner of his mouth, he searched his pockets for a match, and finding it said, "You surprise me, Frank."

"Like the marshal says, I get foolish now and then."

Cord struck the match, then paused. "Got to tell you, Frank, over all the years, you never struck me as particularly foolish." He brought the match to the cigar tip. "You've got a foul temper you can't seem to get a hold of." He shook out the match. "You've got a reckless, crazy streak that would scare h.e.l.l out of a sane man." He took a pull on the cigar and let the smoke out, and then one side of his mouth pulled into a sardonic half smile, "and, of course, you're mean as a snake."

Frank's jaw dropped open as Anne gave a half-smothered giggle. Then Ephraim gave a shout of laughter. Soon the whole room was rocking and howling, except for Cord, who laughed only with his eyes, and Frank, who was too red-faced to get past a grin.

CHAPTER 45.

THEY ALL WANTED TO KNOW about Denver then, about Marie and Paul. Cord let Anne do the telling, but Ephraim asked him directly. "Does this mean you and Marie buried the hatchet?"

"Yeah, you could say so. They thought we'd be leaving here, but she said if we weren't she'd like to visit, see the baby. Maybe in the spring or summer."

Martha said, "A letter is overdue anyway. I'll write and let them know - once everything's settled."

The men headed for the parlor, and Cord said he'd go let Leona know Anne was all right. As he expected, Anne showed no desire to see her mother if it meant going back to the Wells house. He turned at the door. "Annie, why don't you go lay down? You won't miss anything."

"I'm not tired."

"Indulge me." He knew at once he'd made a tactical error. Maybe she'd kept her promise to see Craig without a fuss, but she thought he was being overprotective and was about to say so.

"If I indulged you, I'd spend the next four months wrapped in something soft and fuzzy being carried back and forth between the bed and the rocking chair. I imagine for exercise you wouldn't mind if I cooked a little, so long as I didn't do anything really strenuous - like beat an egg."

He toyed with the brim of his hat. It was a matter of whether he wanted to do what was necessary to get her to take a nap. Craig might have said she was all right, but he also said it wouldn't hurt to be extra careful for the next couple of weeks. What the h.e.l.l. He kept his face and eyes carefully expressionless. "I happen to know my daughter is tired.

Been bouncing around in a buggy too many days in a row and got upset over Craig poking at her like that."

If they were home she would undoubtedly tilt her head and tell him he could have his own way if she could have a kiss, and if she pulled that here and now, he was going to grab her and kiss her until she pa.s.sed out. Perhaps she saw the determined glint in his eyes. She regarded him steadily, also poker-faced. "You two certainly established an instant rapport."

"Blood tie."

"All right, drat you. Your half of this baby can have a nap. My half isn't so delicate."

She was gone with an exaggerated swish of skirts.

Martha said, "Do you have any idea of the kind of surprise your brothers are in for sooner or later? Or are you doing it on purpose?"

Cord put his hat on and pulled it low, hiding his eyes. "Grown man walks around with his eyes shut tight, he shouldn't be surprised if he b.u.mps into something he didn't see.

You aren't trying to convince anybody of anything they don't want to believe."

Martha laughed. "You win. I just hope I'm there when the blind men hit the wall."

ROB ANSWERED THE DOOR AT the Wells house. He avoided Cord's eyes, and his only greeting was, "Why bother knocking this time?"

Cord didn't reply, just followed Rob to the kitchen, where Leona was trying to start lunch with shaking hands. Seeing Cord she sank to a chair at the same table where he'd sat with Rob what seemed like a lifetime ago.

Looking up at him with swimming eyes, she asked, "Is she all right?"

"Fine. We came in to see Craig, and he says she's fine and so's the baby."

"That marshal...."

"You slowed him down. He's checking back East to see what's what."

"Did they tell you?"

"Yes, Mrs. Wells, I'm sorry it came to this."

Leona seemed to gather strength from these words. "You didn't cause any of the trouble right from the beginning, and neither did Anne. I choose to believe that my husband was suffering this last year and a half or so from a brain disease, or a growth, or something. But however you look at it, you and Anne have done the suffering and bear none of the blame, and I know that."

"Will you be all right?"

"Yes. Robert will open the shop again Monday, and finances are no problem. We'll be fine." Her voice thickened. "Can I see her? How does she feel?"

"Maybe not today. There's been enough excitement for a while, but next time we're in town, sure. She knows whose side you were on. Fact is we were a little worried about leaving you there. Thought later maybe we should have brought you out with us."

"They were too busy tearing at each other to bother with me."

"Glad to hear it, ma'am."

"Would you call me Leona?"

"Guess I might manage it."

Rob had been listening quietly, but now he asked, "Tell me one thing. What you said when you left here, were you just getting even, or were you afraid I'd send a wire?"

Cord examined Rob carefully, noting particularly the new firmness around the mouth, the loss of the petulant look. "Little of both, I guess. If you'd had another change of heart it might have taken me years to track her down - if she lived through it."

This seemed to satisfy Rob, but he asked then, "And how does she feel about me now?"

"She won't speak your name and doesn't want to hear it."

Rob's throat moved convulsively. "And you?"

Cord shrugged. "You didn't have to tell me the whole truth that night, so I guess as far as I'm concerned we're even."

"If you can make her listen at all will you tell her how sorry I am?"

"Already have."

Cord started to leave then, and Leona rose, surprising him with her hands on his arms.

"Before you go I have to tell you something."

He waited, looking into the pain-filled, pale face.

"In all my life I have never been so glad to see any human being as I was to see you that night. From here to the grave, I'll never forget how I felt. I am proud that you are the father of my first grandchild."

There was no answer to that. "Take care of yourself, Leona." He let himself out.

CHAPTER 46.

THE NEW RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN HER husband and her mother had Anne almost gritting her teeth with envy, for Leona adopted Helene LeClerc's ways and thought nothing of greeting her son-in-law with a kiss every time she saw him.

It was also no time before Anne learned from Luke and Pete, who kept no secrets, that when they accompanied Cord on his Sunday visits, her brother was now included. In fact it sounded as if the four of them were having Sunday afternoon poker games while she visited with her mother, Judith, and Martha. She felt no forgiveness toward her brother, but said nothing to Cord either. Rob was still keeping company with Nancy Lee Weinert, and the whole town expected an engagement to be announced after an appropriate lapse of time after Edward Wells' death.

Things were also better with the Bennett family. There was unquestionably a new ease among the three brothers, and if Frank or Ephraim occasionally made remarks that showed they had not changed their att.i.tude about the marriage, Anne was finally able to adopt Cord's way of handling it - she ignored them.

Cord suggested they give Leona a buggy horse for Christmas. Anne thought it was a grand idea and threw herself into the project with enthusiasm. She chose a chestnut gelding she named Reynard for her mother. When she realized Rob was going to take part in the gift by sneaking Molly's old harness out of the barn for inspection and repair and getting the buggy to the carriage maker for a going over and sprucing up, she almost balked, but in the end she said nothing.

They decided to present the horse to Leona on the morning of Christmas Eve. Cord told Anne that Rob had promised to make himself scarce that morning. She a.s.sumed that meant he would visit the Weinerts. They decided Christmas Eve and Christmas morning would be their own. Anne had blithely accepted Judith's invitation for Christmas dinner at the main ranch without even thinking Cord might disagree. He said nothing.

The two Bennett boys, Cord, and Rob were indeed desecrating Sunday afternoons with poker games. Pete and Luke were enthralled at the prospects of the coming Christmas dinner. They proposed taking bets as to the ultimate winner of the inevitable confrontation. Rob questioned Cord. "What confrontation? What are they talking about?"

Cord concentrated on his cards, ignoring the question. He found the prospect bleak and wasn't drawn in by the boys' gleeful antic.i.p.ation.

Luke said, "Our Aunt Hannah is coming to visit for two weeks, and she'll be there.

When Anne and Aunt Hannah meet, there's going to be fireworks."

Pete added, "Aunt Hannah has a tongue the Army should rent - as a weapon."

"And Cord's her favorite target." Joyful antic.i.p.ation was all over Luke's face. "Can you imagine what your sister's going to do when Aunt Hannah starts in? I figure less than five minutes from introduction to explosion."

Rob had indeed matured a lot lately. After another quick look at Cord, he began studying his own hand carefully and dropped the subject.

Other than the dinner at Frank's, Cord was looking forward to Christmas like a small boy. It seemed impossible that anything could be as good as he remembered from the year before, but it was. It was better.

They brought Reynard to town the morning of Christmas Eve, hitched him with Leona's own harness to her newly refitted buggy at Ephraim's, and drove to the Wells house. As promised, there was no sign of Rob. Leona was ecstatic. For the first time Cord saw signs of Anne's spirit in her mother. After two blocks through town at a jerking all out gait, he could take no more. Leona's Christmas present was going to have to include a few driving lessons.

"But, Cord, dear, it's no fun to go so slow."

"More fun for the horse than all that whip waving and rein slapping."

In the end they went to an empty field, he designated certain rocks and trees as markers, and showed her how to do smooth turns and stops and starts. "I suppose I do see how aiming for such - precision - is an advantage."

"Mm. Not only that, you won't tip over and crush my wife and your grandchild."

A quick check on Anne in the back showed her holding on for dear life, sliding from one side of the seat to another around the corners, and having a grand time. Now she leaned over his shoulder, raising her voice to be heard over the sounds of the horse's hooves and buggy wheels. "I'd have warned you, but I forgot what it was like. Mother always drove like this. Mollie just got used to rushing everywhere."

They spun back through town, Leona driving and speeding up again, waving and halloing to everyone she saw whom she knew. The two women laughed gaily, and Reynard was decked out in flowing red and green ribbons from foretop to tail. Cord tugged his hat down so low he could barely see. It was as embarra.s.sing as h.e.l.l - and fun.

They unhitched and put the horse up in his new home in the little barn behind the Wells house and headed in for coffee, Leona hugging them both like a happy child.

They surprised Rob hunched over coffee at the kitchen table. He stood uncertainly, discomfited by the daggers in his sister's glare, and quickly disappeared.

Anne said, "I thought he'd be over at Weinerts' or something."

Leona said, "Actually, dear, I don't think your brother will be seeing any more of Miss Weinert."

"Why?"

"I have no idea. He won't tell me."

"Hmp. He probably did something outrageous, like tried to kiss the prim little b.i.t.c.h."

"Anne!" Leona gasped.

"Mother, have you noticed that whenever I say something like that you have a ladylike conniption, and when my husband says something twice as bad, you smile indulgently?"

"Well, no, dear, I haven't."

"Strange. Everyone else for twenty miles in all directions has."

Leona smiled at them both. She looked more like her daughter all the time Cord thought.

Christmas Eve was one of things even better than he remembered. Of course, this year when Anne turned her face up towards him in the light of the candles on the tree he had no reservations about kissing her thoroughly.

He asked, "Next year will we need a fence around the tree? Because of the baby, I mean."

"No, I don't think so. The year after that will be a problem, I think."

Year after next. Last year he had hoped for another few months with her. Now he could really believe in year after next. He felt a fleeting pity for every other man in the world.

ANNE HAD MADE THE SUITING material she had bought in Denver into a black suit for Cord that looked every bit as good as she had imagined. So did the snowy white shirt that went with it. The suit and shirt weren't his Christmas present this year, though. A black Stetson and silver hatband were. Leona had also given him a silver belt buckle, and as they dressed for Christmas dinner with the Bennett family, Anne could tell he was half-embarra.s.sed by the abundance of finery.

He had given Anne a brooch made especially for her, a gold tigress with eyes of silver. Armand LeClerc's sketches that were part of the present enchanted Anne as much as the pin itself. Armand had started by copying a drawing of a tiger from a book and worked from that until he came up with a version that was feminine and yet still obviously a tiger.

She had modified a dark green dress with white lace inserts to fit over her expanding waistline, and looked at Cord shyly when she was all dressed.