Read Online Crazy Woman Creek by Virginia Welch - Free Book Online Page A

silk reticule a little more tightly than usual as she walked along the boardwalk on Main Street on her way to the general store. Fifty dollars was a lot of money. Her parents had spent that much on clothing and shoes for her in one shopping trip in the past, but never had she been personally responsible for so much cash. Certainly she had never carried such a large sum on her person.
    She was still thinking about the treasure in her bag and how to make it last when she heard a ruckus of men’s voices. She looked in the direction from where she heard the sound to see a crowd of men clustered in front of one of Buffalo’s six saloons.
    Nothing good here.
    Curiosity propelled her toward the noise nonetheless. On the opposite side of Main Street Lenora saw two men, one heavy set, the other of slight build and unusually short stature, trying to lift a third man onto a horse. All three were dressed like ranch hands with their wide-brimmed hats, oversized neckerchiefs to protect their mouths from trail dust, dungarees, dark shirts that never seemed quite clean, and rough boots. From their clumsy movements and slurred speech, Lenora deduced that they had spent a good part of the morning in one of the saloons.
    But what fascinated Lenora was that the heavy man had the third man over his shoulder, his arms about his friend’s legs and, absurdly, was trying to throw the poor pickled soul across the saddle. The little man was doing his part by valiantly pushing on the third man’s backside.
    “One, two, three!” said the heavy set man. On three the two men gave all they had into a united umphf! hoisting their friend onto the horse in one quick but sloppy movement, whereupon he slid to the other side of the beleaguered animal, landing head first on the ground, flopping limply onto his back in the dirt with a sickening thud. His overly large black hat fell off and rolled a few feet away in the dust. The crowd went crazy, whooping and laughing, cheering on the drunks, urging them to repeat the stunt.
    “You blashted jackass. Get up!” yelled the big man to his friend on the ground, as if the intoxicated man laying supine in the dirt had the capacity to do anything other than bask in the sun on a fine spring day. The heavy set man uttered a few cuss words Lenora had heard before along with a few particularly purple ones that surely no dictionary on earth contained. Inexplicably he aimed most of his ire at the little man, who defended his manhood with equally purple prose and obscene finger gestures. Lenora was embarrassed to be watching and listening to such a ribald performance, but the three men were so funny she found herself laughing right along with the crowd. 
    After cursing the prone man and vainly ordering him to stand several times, the heavy set man motioned to the little man to help him, once again, to push their friend onto his horse. Lenora watched as the heavy set man repeated his routine, picking up the third man and throwing him over his shoulder.
    “Heave! Heave!” cried the heavy set man.
    “I’m heaving, I’m heaving,” complained the little man.
    Just then the third man, half on, half off his horse obediently and heartily heaved his breakfast, fouling himself, the heavy set man, and the horse tack. The crowd guffawed.
    Useless.
    Lenora couldn’t take her eyes off the spectacle. She chuckled with the crowd as she watched the heavy set man ungraciously dump his smelly friend on the ground like a discarded old coat, and then, while filling the spring sunshine with ever more colorful English, proceeded to swat the sticky filth off his shirt with his hat.
    “A merry heart is as good as medicine.”
    With heart-stopping alarm, Lenora instantly recognized the owner of that masculine timbre and knew he was close. She spun around and was mortified to realize she had been observed by the handsome deputy as she laughed at the antics of drunkards.
    “Deputy Davies.” Lenora could feel a full-blown crimson rush