"No, sir. Most of the officers are out on a field exercise, anyhow. I've got the papers over yonder in the stable. I'll have 'em ready by the time you're ready to ride. If you don't want to bother saddling him, I'll call a trooper to do it for you."

"I'd as soon do it myself, Flanders. You take care of the requisition form."

Longarm saddled the dapple with the same economy of motion that marked all his actions. He'd finished cinching the girth and had sheathed his Winchester in the scabbard that angled back from the right-hand saddle fender and was knotting the last rawhide string around his bedroll when a woman's voice spoke behind him.

"I don't know who you are, but that's my horse you're saddling."

Without turning around, Longarm replied, "No, ma'am. It's the U.S. Government's horse."

"Don't be insolent! Take that saddle off at once and find yourself another mount! I'm ready for my afternoon canter."

Longarm turned around. He doffed his Stetson as he spoke. "Beg pardon, ma'am, but I ain't about to do that. I need this one in my work."

"Just who are you? And what kind of work do you do?"

"I'm Custis Long, ma'am. Deputy U.S. Marshal from Denver. And I'm on a case, which is all I need to say, I guess." Longarm realized he was speaking arbitrarily, which wasn't his usual way with a woman, but this one was being just too d.a.m.ned high-handed.

His abrupt manner surprised and puzzled her; that was clear from the expression on her face. Longarm took the moment of silence to inspect her. He wondered if she kept one full black eyebrow higher than the other when she wasn't angry. But she wasn't what you'd call pretty, he decided; her features were just a mite too irregular. Her nose arched abruptly from the full brows down to wide nostrils now flared with displeasure. Her lips were compressed, but that didn't hide the fact that they were on the full side. Her chin was thrust out aggressively. Her eyes were dark, and her hair was dark, too. It was caught up in ringlets that dropped down the back of her neck to her shoulders.

She was wearing a cavalry trooper's regulation campaign hat, although it didn't have the regulation four dents in its crown. A soft, plain white blouse was pulled tightly over upthrust b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Her feet, in gloss-polished riding boots were spread apart to show that she was wearing a split riding skirt that dropped nearly to her ankles. Her hands were planted on her hips, and from one wrist a riding crop dangled by its looped thong.

Longarm's unconcealed inspection didn't cause her to drop her eyes or seem to embarra.s.s her. When she found her voice, she said, "Mr. Long, there are ten or fifteen other horses over there in the corral. One of them will be just as satisfactory as Tordo for your use."

"I'm sorry if it makes you mad, ma'am, but the plain fact of it is, where I'm heading for, my life might depend on me having the best horse I can throw my saddle on."

As though he hadn't spoken, she went on, "I'll find Sergeant Flanders and tell him to get you another horse. Meanwhile, you will take that saddle off Tordo at once!"

"I ain't about to do that, ma'am. Let's see, you'd be Lieutenant Stanley's wife, I guess?"

"What difference does that make?"

"Not one bit, Miz Stanley. Except it ain't going to do you no good to call the sergeant. He told me you'd be mad, when I'd made up my mind which horse I wanted. It didn't matter to me then, and it don't matter none to me now."

She stamped a booted foot. "Long, if you don't take that saddle off Tordo right this minute, I'll..."

"You'll do what?" Longarm had held his temper, but he was getting angry now. "I need this gray for my business. You just want him for funnin'. It's a government horse, and I figure my claim to it's just a lot better'n yours is. Now, I can't waste no more time arguin' with you. I got my job to tend to."

As Longarm turned away to mount the gray, she moved cat-quick, raising the riding crop to slash at him. As fast as she acted, Longarm reacted faster. He caught her arm as it came down and held it while he took the crop off her wrist and tossed it on the ground. She brought up her free arm to slap his face, but Longarm grasped it before the blow landed. For a moment, they stood there with arms locked, anger flowing between them like an electric current where flesh touched flesh. Then she relaxed, and Longarm released her.

They were glaring, eye to eye, when Sergeant Flanders came hurrying up. His arrival broke the tension. He said, "Now, let's don't you and Marshal Long go having words, Miz Stanley. I hope you ain't blaming me. I told him ..."

"It's all right, sergeant," she broke in. "Mr. Long's explained that you tried to tell him I laid claim to Tordo."

"I've convinced the lady my claim's better'n hers, sergeant," Longarm said. "Now if you'll give me that form you got, I'll sign it and be on my way." He took the requisition Flanders had in hand, rested it on the saddle and scrawled his name on the proper line. Handing the form back to the sergeant, he said, "Now, if you'll show me where the commissary's at, I'll swing by there and pick up some rations and be on my way."

Flanders pointed to a sprawling warehouse-type building a short distance away. Longarm nodded and swung into the saddle. Touching his hatbrim to the woman, he rode off, leaving them looking at his back as he made his way to the commissary. He didn't turn to look back at them.

CHAPTER 2.

Following the directions he'd gotten at the commissary while waiting for the rations he'd drawn to be a.s.sembled, Longarm rode due west from the quartermaster depot. The houses of San Antonio lay to his left; the city was just beginning to push northward. The line of closely settled streets stopped nearly two miles south of the army depot, although there were a few scattered dwellings, most of them marking small farms, between the bulk of the town and the military installation.

Longarm was taking his time, getting acquainted with the habits of the gray horse. Tordo had been well trained. The animal responded to the pressure of a knee and the touch of a boot-toe with as much readiness as it did to the rein. For the most part, after he'd satisfied himself that the dapple was the kind of mount he could trust, Longarm let the horse pick its own way across the gra.s.sy, tree-dotted plain that sloped gently to the banks of the San Antonio River, half a mile ahead of him, now.

He'd reached the riverbank and was looking for signs of a ford when thudding hoofbeats caught his attention and he turned to look behind him. Mrs. Stanley, mounted on a roan that must have been her second choice of the horses in the corral, was overtaking him fast. Subconsciously, Longarm noted that she sat on the horse well, holding to the saddle easily as the roan loped toward him. He reined in and waited. She drew alongside and brought her mount to a stop.

"if you're looking for a ford, the best one's only about two hundred yards upstream," she said. "If you don't mind company, I'll ride with you a little way."

"If you're scheming to talk me into swapping horses, you'll just be wasting your time," Longarm warned her. "Otherwise, I'll be right pleased to have you ride alongside me, Miz Stanley."

"I promise that I won't try to persuade you."

She seemed to have gotten over her fit of anger; her voice was light and pleasant. "I really rode after you to apologize for the way I acted back at the depot. I don't usually behave so thoughtlessly."

"Wasn't no need to come apologizing, ma'am. I don't hold grudges over things that don't amount to a hill of beans."

"Just the same, it was childish of me. I understand why you'd need the best horse you can find, in your job. It must be a dangerous one."

"I reckon it is, sometimes." Longarm wasn't given to dwelling on the dangers of his work. In his book, a job was a job, and you did it according to your best lights.

"Here's the ford," she said, pointing to the spot where the river's green water took on a lighter hue as the stream spread out to run wide and shallow over a pebble-covered underwater limestone shelf. Turning their horses, they splashed across through water only inches deep.

"Guess you must ride this way pretty often," he suggested after they'd covered a few hundred feet on the west bank of the river.

"Almost every day. Riding's about the only relaxation I have in this dull little town. Especially now, when my husband's away on a training exercise."

"Funny. I never figured San Antone was so dull."

"I don't suppose it would be, for a man. You've got the gambling places and the dance halls and saloons. But all I've got is the company of other army wives, and we get bored with one another after a few gossipy afternoon teas. At home, now, it's a different thing."

"Where's home to you, Miz Stanley?"

"New York. It's never dull there. There are the Broadway shows, musicals or dramas, tea dances at most of the big hotels."

"I can see there'd be a difference. Can't rightly say much about New York, I never get back there, myself."

"You should, some time. It's worth the trip." She pointed to a thickly-wooded area that lay just ahead of them, where trees in closely s.p.a.ced clumps spread across a wide patch of gra.s.sland that ended on their right at the foot of a high, white bluff. "Of course, you won't find that in New York. The nearest thing to open country there is Central Park. Though it's very much like that stretch ahead of us. Perhaps that's why I feel at home when I see it."

"I recall this place from when I was here a few years bac! They call it San Pedro Springs, don't they?"

"Yes. It's one of my favorite spots. On Sundays and holidays it's overrun with families having picnics, but on days like today, in the middle of the week, it's as deserted as the Forest of Arden."

"Can't say I been there, either. Matter of fact, I never even got to prowl around that stretch of woods up ahead except once when I was in San Antone before."

Mrs. Stanley seemed compelled to talk. "Sometimes I bring my lunch out here and stay most of the day. I've found arrowheads and pieces of old Mexican army equipment from the Texas-Mexican war of fifty years ago."

"You interested in history, then, Miz Stanley?"

"Not especially. But it gives me something besides gon gossip to think about."

They were approaching an especially large growth of hachberry and pinoak trees bordered by low-branched chinaberry trees that formed a wide belt around the taller growth. Longarm kneed the dapple to turn it and skirt the edge of the motte, but the lieutenant's wife was reining in.

"There's a beautiful spring in the middle of this grove," she said. "I just can't pa.s.s by it without stopping for a sip of water."

Longarm thought the excuse was flimsy, almost as flimsy as her story of having ridden after him to apologize. His work took him to army posts quite regularly, and he'd met bored, restless army wives before now. Almost from the time they'd crossed the river he'd been getting the groin-twitches that he felt whenever he was with an attractive woman who was obviously making herself available to him. He pulled rein and swung out of his saddle before she was quite ready to dismount.

"I'm pretty thirsty myself. We'll go get some of that spring water together."

He moved to help her from her horse. She was riding sidesaddle, with her right leg hooked over the horn, and had to swing The leg high over the pommel to free it. Longarm caught her booted foot in one hand and steadied her to the ground, his free arm pressing up the back of her thighs, over the soft bulge of her b.u.t.tocks to her waist. She was beginning to tremble even before both her feet were on the ground. The trembling increased as he pulled her to him and sought her lips. They locked together, tongues entwined. Longarm felt himself growing erect as she rubbed her hips across his crotch.

She felt the swelling beneath his jeans, pulled away, and panted in a half-whisper, "Hurry! Let's go into the grove! I want you right now, this minute!"

The End