“Thank you, madame,” Charbonneau said, bowing from the waist as he swept the silver into his drawer. “A pleasure to do business with you.”
They returned to the wagon in the hitching yard behind the hall of records.
Tala placed her brown paper parcel in the rear of the bed, took the cherry box from its wrapping, and set it upon the spring seat between her and Jonah. She drew the certified court order from her pocket, rolled it into a neat cylinder, and laid it inside the green velvet compartment. Beside it, she placed the eagle feather that Noche had brought down from the mountains.
She closed the cherry lid, turned the small brass key until the bolt clicked home, and slipped the key onto the leather thong around her neck, where it hung beside Mary Reed’s silver thimble.
Jonah stood by the horses’ heads, checking the harness for the morning’s return journey. He looked at her sitting upon the spring seat with the cherry box beside her, her profile sharp and calm against the darkening sky where the first stars were beginning to appear over the Santa Catalinas.
“Where do we sleep tonight, Tala?” he asked.
It was a question he had never asked before. For five months, he had made every decision regarding the camps, the roads, and the horses, leaving her only the choice of her silence and the boundary of her door. Now, standing on the gravel of the territorial capital with the court order signed and the law satisfied, he deferred to her.
Tala looked across the plaza toward the south, where the road led out into the open desert toward the San Pedro and the high peaks of the Peloncillos.
“We do not stay in this town,” she said. “The air in the plaza smells of old papers and tobacco spit. We will drive four miles out to the spring at the base of the mountains, where the horses can have fresh grass and we can sleep under the scrub mesquite.”
Jonah nodded once, his grey eyes reflecting the lantern light from the livery stables.
“Aye,” he said, climbing up to the wagon box and taking the reins. “The mountain air is cleaner. We’ll make camp by the seep before the second watch.”
He released the brake, the team stepped out into the evening cool, and the light spring wagon rolled away from the territorial courthouse, heading back toward the vast, untamed benchlands where no man’s writ held sway over the wind or the stars.
They had been back at the Peloncillo ranch for six days when the black top-buggy returned.
It did not come with the rough clatter of Deputy Vance’s borrowed rig, nor with the heavy, threatening tramp of Jack Crow’s border riders. It arrived at ten o'clock on a bright, still Monday morning, its varnished hickory wheels spinning smoothly, its single black horse—a well-groomed standardbred gelding with a shiny coat and trimmed fetlocks—trotting with the light, rhythmic cadence of a town rig.
Sitting on the leather seat was Bradley, the attorney from Prescott. He had discarded his traveling duster for a well-brushed frock coat of dark blue broadcloth, a clean white linen shirt with a silk cravat, and a grey beaver hat that sat straight upon his pomaded hair.
Tala saw him from the wash bench, where she was scalding milk pans with boiling water from the iron kettle. She did not run to the kitchen, nor did she reach for the Springfield rifle that stood behind the door. She emptied the steaming water into the cedar bucket, wiped the tin rim of the pan with a clean linen cloth, and set it upside down on the scrubbed pine bench to dry in the sun.
Jonah was in the blacksmith shed, drawing down the point of a plowshare on the anvil. The ringing of his hammer—clink-clang, clink-clang—stopped as the buggy drew up before the veranda steps.
Bradley set the iron brake, stepped down with great care onto the gravel, and tied the gelding to the clothesline post with a braided halter shank. He carried a flat leather portfolio under his arm and removed his beaver hat with a flourish as he approached the porch.
“Good morning, Miss Tala,” Bradley said, bowing slightly with a smooth, professional deference that had been entirely absent during the hearing in Tucson.
Tala stood beside the wash bench, her apron tied over her indigo skirt, her hands resting quietly at her sides. She did not return the bow; she did not speak. She looked at him with that long, impassive gaze that made white men feel as though their clothes were made of thin glass.