Untethered Page 4

  “The fact is it just ain’t safe for you girls to be out here swimmin’ in the nude the way you are,” he added.

  “Nude?” all four girls exclaimed in unison.

  “We are not swimmin’ nude, Mr. Thibodaux!” Cricket vehemently defended.

  But Heathro quirked a disbelieving eyebrow. “Then you all just come on out and prove it,” he dared. “I mean, looks to me that by the pile of clothes over there on those fallen logs…you girls are swimmin’ in the nude.”

  “We have plenty of clothin’ on,” Vilma assured him.

  But the ex-Texas Ranger shrugged. “Well, then…I suppose you girls don’t mind if I go ahead and join you…bein’ that you’ve got plenty of clothin’ on and all.”

  Four simultaneous female gasps ensued as Mr. Thibodaux unbuckled his gun belt, dropped it to the grassy bank, and then began to unbutton his britches.

  “No! N-no, no, no!” Cricket stammered. “We…we were just finishin’ up our swim, Mr. Thibodaux. I-I’m sure you’d like some peace and quiet…so we’ll just be on our way, if it’s all the same to you.”

  Heathro grinned, folded his muscular arms across his muscular chest, and said, “All right. I’ll just wait for you girls to come on out then.”

  Cricket felt herself blushing—the heat on her cheeks emanating from within her body feeling much hotter than what the bright sun was providing on the outside.

  She glanced to Marie. Her face was as red as a radish as well, as were the faces of Ann and Vilma.

  “You got us into this, Magnolia Cranford!” Vilma scolded in a perturbed whisper. “Now you can just think of a way to get us out!”

  “What’s the matter?” Heathro asked from the bank. “I thought you girls had plenty of clothin’ on. What’s the harm in gettin’ outta the swimmin’ hole with me watchin’ then?”

  Cricket looked to Ann and Marie for support, but they were as caught in the trap as she was. Frantically she tried to think of something—anything that would get them out of the swimming hole without Heathro Thibodaux seeing them in nothing but their soaking wet (and no doubt nearly transparent) underthings.

  “Um…we, um…” Cricket stammered.

  Oh, Heath was loving it! It was all he could do to keep from laughing. He’d caught them all right—caught these young innocents of Pike’s Creek without any kind of retreat.

  “Well?” he urged, almost losing his determination not to laugh. “Are you gonna get out or what? It’s hotter than hell out here, and I’m goin’ for a swim…alone or with company.”

  Again he began to unbutton his britches, unable to keep a low chuckle from escaping his throat when the preacher’s daughter closed her eyes and began reciting the Lord’s Prayer in a whisper.

  “Wait!” the Cranford girl called out. “Will you give us your back for just a moment, Mr. Thibodaux? Please?”

  Heath grinned. “Why, of course, ladies. Of course. My mama would be ashamed if I weren’t gentleman enough to allow you young ladies the chance to—”

  “Thank you!” the four girls exclaimed in unison as Heath turned around.

  He smiled as he heard the wild splashing behind him as the girls made for the bank—the sound of the preacher’s daughter calling the other girls to repentance as they scrambled out of the water and to their clothes.

  “You girls have a nice afternoon now, you hear?” he called as he heard them retreating faster than a tomcat with a firebrand tied to its tail.

  Chuckling to himself, Heath stripped off his britches, wadded them up, and tossed them aside. He began to strip off his underwear too but figured he’d better play it safe—just in case the mischievous young ladies of Pike’s Creek decided not to retreat all the way back to town.

  Heath didn’t waste any time. Diving into the swimming hole, he bobbed up, leaned back, and began floating. The sensation was refreshing—cool and soothing. He closed his eyes and just floated, letting the sun warm his face while the water cooled the rest of his body.

  He sighed, thinking that old Conq would surely be the death of him. He couldn’t believe how stubborn the creature was—not to mention strong. He’d have to do something to reinforce the corral fence, that was for certain.

  But suddenly, Heath’s musings over Conqueror scattered as a vision of the four young women he’d found at the swimming hole leapt into his mind. He frowned as that vision led to another—a far less pleasant and a deeply haunting vision—a vision of a group of other young women that were not so unlike the girls of Pike’s Creek. Only the images of the faces of the girls lingering in his mind now were gruesome—images of what they’d looked like lying dead on the canyon floor, their bodies broken and bleeding—their eyes fixed on the blue sky and blazing sun overhead—their dead, open eyes.

  Heath grimaced as the memory of the blood still trickling from one of the girl’s cracked skull lingered. The visualization of the trail of blood trickling over the rocks of the canyon floor like a crimson stream would haunt him his entire life long. Heath knew it would—and he was glad. He deserved to be haunted—deserved to have an ever-present reminder of his weakness and failing eating at his mind for eternity.

  Opening his eyes, Heath held his breath and dove beneath the water’s surface once more. When he bobbed up again, he wiped the water from his eyes and surveyed the landscape around him. He wondered how everything could still look so green and fresh and lovely. How could the world still hold such beauty when such evil and ugliness existed in it as well?

  It was a question he couldn’t answer in that moment. And anyway, his head hurt from thinking on the past. With a heavy sigh he swam to the bank and pulled himself from the water to stretch out on the cool green grass.

  He heard Archie whinny, and he grinned. Archie was a good horse. And even though Conqueror was a pain in Heath’s rear end, his shenanigans made life a whole lot more interesting.

  The sky was a beautiful blue above, and a meadowlark was whistling somewhere nearby. The soft summer breeze in the cottonwoods stimulated the cicadas in their branches, and Heath closed his eyes, letting the soothing music of one of God’s most interesting insects lull him to reprieve.

  He grinned as he lay in the grass, listening to the cicada chorus. The Pike’s Creek girls had looked like they’d been caught robbing a bank when he’d stepped out of the bushes. And as he continued to think on the incident, he began to remember the conversation he’d overheard.

  “So the King girl fancies Hudson Oliver, does she?” he whispered aloud to himself. “And did I hear it right, or am I imaginin’ they said that Burroughs girl is sweet on Cooper Keel?”

  Heath chuckled then sighed. “Well, at least they got good judgment in character. Maybe that’ll make up a bit for the bad judgment in swimmin’ in their underwear.” Raising his voice a bit, he called, “Ain’t that right, Archie?”

  The horse whinnied its affirmation, and Heath continued to bask in the sun on the bank of the swimming hole—trying not to be disturbed by the fact that he kept wondering whom the Cranford girl was sweet on.

  ❦

  “Good night, Daddy,” Cricket said, pressing an affectionate kiss on her father’s cheek.

  “Good night, sugar,” Zeke Cranford said. “You sleep tight now, you hear?”

  “I will,” Cricket assured him. “Good night, Ada,” Cricket said, placing a quick kiss to her stepmother’s cheek.

  “Good night, Cricket,” Ada said, smiling. It was obvious she was pleased with Cricket’s gesture.

  As Cricket smiled at Ada a moment before heading down the hall to her bedroom, she reminded herself of how hard it must be for Ada—being a mother to a daughter who was only six years younger than herself.

  The truth was Cricket had been fairly mortified when her father had announced to her months before that he planned on marrying the new schoolteacher, Ada Hatley. Ada was only twenty-five years old, but the entire town of Pike’s Creek had considered her an old maid when she’d first come to town. Yet the moment handsome Zeke Cranford (the
most sought-after widower of Pike’s Creek at the time) had announced that he planned to marry the old maid schoolteacher, everyone began noticing how young Ada was.

  In fact, Cricket herself had been very unwilling to see Ada as anything much more than a peer when her father first began courting her. For pity’s sake, Ada could more easily have passed as her sister than her stepmother.

  Still, Cricket wanted nothing more than to see her father happy again. It seemed he hadn’t been truly happy since her mother’s death several years before. And if Ada Hatley could put the hop back in her daddy’s step, then Cricket would learn to accept it.

  Accepting Ada as her stepmother had proved to be more difficult than Cricket had assumed, however. Add to it the fact that Cricket was used to having all her father’s attention before Ada, and had to learn to give up most of that attention after Ada, and things had been somewhat uncomfortable around the Cranford house for the first couple of months.

  But everything was becoming more and more comfortable between Ada and Cricket—even if Cricket considered Ada’s never-ending chore lists a bit too extreme at times. Besides, Cricket secretly enjoyed the fact that all the other men in Pike’s Creek silently envied Zeke’s having scooped up Ada for his own.

  Furthermore, the moment Heathro Thibodaux moved to Pike’s Creek—well, Cricket Cranford was more than merely glad that her father had snatched up Ada Hatley and carried her over their threshold. Cricket was forever thankful in fact that her father had married Ada before Heathro Thibodaux had come to town. No doubt Ada would’ve been as smitten by Heathro as every other woman was, had she not already been in love with Zeke. Furthermore, Ada was beautiful—a real dark-haired, blue-eyed beauty! Cricket figured that of any woman in town, Ada would’ve had the best chance of catching Heathro’s eye. Ada might just have managed to lasso Heathro for her own if she hadn’t already been married to Cricket’s father.

  Cricket frowned. Thoughts of Heathro Thibodaux being snatched up by any woman always made her feel a bit sick to her stomach. Oh, certainly she knew the day would come when he would marry someone. In truth, it was probably a miracle that he hadn’t been roped in by some woman’s feminine wiles already. But until the day came that the handsome ex-Texas Ranger was legally wed to another woman, Cricket was determined to dream of being the one to lasso him and tether him to her porch.

  “Heathro Thibodaux,” Cricket whispered aloud. She liked the way Heathro’s name felt on her tongue—smooth and sweet like a delicious secret. As she’d done every night for months before drifting off to sleep, Cricket let her thoughts linger on the handsome newcomer to Pike’s Creek.

  He was, without question, the most handsome man Cricket had ever seen—or even imagined, for that matter. In fact, the first time Vilma had seen Heathro, she’d called him a “tall drink of water” and said staring at him was more refreshing than swimming naked on a summer Sunday afternoon. Considering how stiff and perfect Vilma was, her scandalous description of Heathro Thibodaux was even more significant.

  As Cricket lay in the soft comfort of her bed, continuing to let her mind nest on thoughts of how truly wonderfully attractive Texas Ranger Thibodaux was, she giggled, thinking that looking at him was more refreshing than swimming naked on a summer Sunday afternoon. He was a tall drink of water—far taller than most of the other men in town—and his shoulders were as broad as the state of Texas itself. Sky-blue eyes, bronze skin, square jaw, and dark hair—and that smile! In truth, Cricket had only seen Heathro Thibodaux smile three or four times, but each incidence was something she’d never forget. His smile was bright and white, and the gold tooth he owned on the upper-right incisor of his smile only embellished the richness of it.

  That one tooth. Cricket’s smile faded as she thought of it. Oh, no doubt the flash only added to the splendor of his smile. Yet it also served as a reminder to anyone who had ever read or heard of what had happened in Texas one year before. No doubt it was a powerful remembrance to Heathro Thibodaux himself—a visual indication of true barbarity, pain, and loss.

  In that moment, Cricket wondered—when Heathro looked in the mirror each morning and saw that tooth, did he think of eight dead girls buried in the bottom of a bleak and barren canyon? Did he think of the eight dead girls that he, for no fault of his own, had been unable to save? After all, the outlaws who had cracked Ranger Thibodaux’s tooth, beat him nearly to fatality, shot him, and left him for dead were the same outlaws who had murdered the eight girls he’d been trying to save. Cricket was certain the poor man never once saw that tooth in his head without thinking of those girls. It was no wonder he’d quit rangering.

  Though Cricket had spent many a night thinking of Heathro Thibodaux, of the horror of what he’d been through, this was the first night she’d ever wondered about his tooth—the tooth she found so perfectly embellished his already stunning smile. This was the first night she’d wondered what he thought about it.

  Quickly she crept from her bed and to the chest at the foot of it. Raising the lid, she carefully shuffled through the many treasures she secreted there until she found the one she wanted to study again in that moment.

  Sitting down on the floor, Cricket unfolded the newspaper clipping she’d managed to squirrel away from behind the saloon when a cowboy had tossed it in the garbage barrel a year ago.

  “Abducted Young Women Found Murdered,” she read aloud in a whisper. Cricket had read the story many times. Yet each time she read it over again, a horrific sympathy for all that had happened to Heathro Thibodaux the summer before swelled inside her.

  Sunday last, Texas Rangers found the bodies of the eight young women abducted from Turner Bend one week previous. All had succumbed to death. The eight promising young women of Turner Bend, having been abducted by a heinous band of outlaws one week previously, met their death on the rocky bed of a canyon, having been pushed over the canyon ridge ledge while tied together at hands and feet. Near the bodies of the dead young women, Texas Rangers found one of their own, Ranger Heathro Thibodaux, clinging to life, but only just.

  Shortly after the Texas Ranger posse set out in search of the abductees, Ranger Thibodaux argued that the band of outlaws was traveling with the girls to New Orleans, while other members of the posse insisted the miscreants were mapping Mexico as their destination. Ranger Thibodaux broke from the posse and tracked the outlaws and their young female prisoners in a solitary manner. However, when he came upon the outlaws and their victims, he was but one man against ten and was beaten, shot, and left for dead. Barely conscious and unable to move to assist the eight abducted young women, Ranger Thibodaux watched helplessly through swollen, bloodied eyes as the outlaws discussed the matter of his arrival. It was decided among these evil abductors of innocence that if one Texas Ranger was near, then a full posse would soon follow. Thus, Ranger Thibodaux, wounded and slipping in and out of consciousness, witnessed the most gruesome of acts as the outlaws murdered the eight Turner Bend innocents.

  “They tied their hands and feet,” Ranger Thibodaux reported, “tethered them together loosely, and pushed them over the rim of the canyon.”

  Ranger Thibodaux suffered a broken arm, a broken leg, broken ribs, a broken hand, a cracked tooth, three gunshot wounds, and various bruising and lacerations. He was unable to assist the Texas Ranger posse as they identified and buried the eight young women from Tuner Bend.

  While recovering from his injuries in San Antonio, when asked if perhaps it may have been better for the Turner Bend young women had he not come upon the outlaws at all, Ranger Thibodaux answered, “I would rather see those girls dead on the floor of the canyon and know their souls are safe in the arms of the Lord than to live my life knowing those outlaws had reached New Orleans with the girls alive. They’re far safer in death.”

  Witnesses report that many who heard Ranger Thibodaux’s response spat on him, calling him a coward and a devil. Yet with rumors of white slavers operating in Texas and the New Mexico Territory, there are many who support Ranger Th
ibodaux’s estimation.

  Regardless of whether Ranger Thibodaux was amiss in his actions and opinions, the township of Turner Bend mourns for those eight bright and beautiful blossoms that were lost. They were and are: Minnie Edwards, aged 16 years; Hattie Campbell, aged 17 years; Dora Murphy, aged 18 years; Ruth Wallace, aged 18 years; Hazel Palmer, aged 16 years; Charlotte Berry, aged 17 years; Pauline Elliott, aged 15 years; and Dorthia Gilbert, aged 15 years.

  Cricket exhaled a heavy sigh discouragement and pain. She shook her head, brushing the tears from her cheeks as she folded the clipping and returned it to its place in the old wooden chest at the foot of her bed.

  It was all so unbelievably horrific, so painful, so heinous! She thought too that Ranger Thibodaux had been right: all eight of the girls who had died were free from their pain and misery, safe in the glories of heaven. And yet their families were left to mourn them—to drown in a grief that even ever-sympathetic Magnolia Cricket Cranford could not imagine.

  And what of Heathro Thibodaux? As always, it was Heathro that Cricket felt most sorry for. What a burden it must’ve been to bear—to know that he was correct in his estimations that the white slavers meant to take the girls to New Orleans. But because none of the other Rangers had believed him, every girl had died—and Ranger Thibodaux had helplessly watched as they had.

  With another exhaled sigh of near despair, Cricket crawled back into her bed. She closed her eyes and listened as the fragrant evening breeze of summer caressed the leaves of the trees outside her open bedroom window. She could hear the crickets underneath the back porch as they played their soothing song—hear the croaking of the bullfrogs along the banks of the stream and the melodic tinkling of Mrs. Maloney’s wind chimes in the distance. She inhaled deeply the aroma of the breeze, of fresh-from-the-oven bread that someone in town was baking—the sweet scent of the summer grasses, wildflowers, and the mellow bouquet of the small herd of cattle that Mr. Burroughs had driven to town in order to load onto the train the next day.