A Taste of Heaven Read Free Page B

strange
woman in his kitchen?
    In a moment, the tall, funny buildings of
Heavenly were receding behind her. And once more, Libby, with a
dozen questions in her mind, found herself heading for an unknown
destination and a future that was a complete mystery to her.
    Libby shifted on the hard seat, gripping its
edge as the buckboard bounced along. Charlie Ryerson led the little
contingent. He was the Lodestar's top hand, he'd informed her with
a bit of a swagger. Noah sat next to Libby, handling the reins
expertly. Overhead the clouds were closing in, and chill gusts
ruffled the short buffalo grass growing on either side of the road.
She hoped they reached shelter before it started raining.
    In her view, it seemed like days ago that
she’d set out for Heavenly instead of just this morning. The months
of nursing Ben in the confinement of his cabin had been enervating
and unpleasant, but not always as physically demanding as the tasks
she’d had to perform in the last two days. She tightened her grip
on the edge of the seat as the vehicle jounced over a rock.
    “Is the ranch much farther, Mr. Brad—um,
Noah?”
    “We’ll be coming to the Lodestar in another
mile ma'am.”
    That was a relief, Libby thought. “Tell me
about your ranch,” she said to the leathery cowhand. “Mr. Osmer
said it’s a big place.”
    Noah raised his voice to be heard over the
jingle of bridle and horses’ hooves. “Well, ma’am, the Lodestar’s
got about five thousand acres, and about thirty thousand head of
cattle grazing on open rangeland. Leastways, we did till this
winter. We figure we lost more than three-quarters of the
herd.”
    Five thousand acres, Libby marveled. She
didn't know much about vast land measurements like that, but it had
to be a lot. And they still had what—about seven thousand cattle?
Ben Ross had begun the winter with two hundred cattle, and his
ranch consisted of three hundred acres.
    “It must take several men to run a place that
big,” she said.
    “Yes’m, there's nigh on to twenny of us
helpin’ out.”
    Libby felt her eyes widen. She’d imagined
she'd be cooking for maybe eight or ten people. It was a highly
worrisome prospect to be stuck out on the emptiness of the prairie
with twenty men. Everything about this ranch seemed larger than
life. That is, life in Montana as she’d seen it so far.
    “Guess you ain't used to cookin’ for so many
folks,” he said rightly reading part of her thoughts.
    She shook her head. “No, the family I worked
for had just four people.”
    “Was it in one of them, big dressy houses?”
Noah asked. “I seen a few of them when I worked in the Chicago
stockyards for a while.”
    Oh, yes, it had been, she remembered, with
creamy walls and deep carpets. She hadn’t seen the main floors very
often. Mrs. Brandauer hadn’t liked the kitchen help to stray from
below stairs, and Libby always followed her edict. Until
Wesley . . . 
    “It was a very nice home,” she replied,
struggling to keep the emotion out of her voice. It was difficult.
If not for Wesley Brandauer, she wouldn't have married Ben. She
wouldn't have come to Montana at all.
    Suddenly curious about her new employer,
Libby asked, “What about Mr. Hollins. Is he easy to work for?”
    Noah squinted at the horizon. "Well, he don’t
like change, that’s for sure. That’s why me and the boys was so
worried about runnin’ off that cook.”
    Libby turned slightly to study Noah’s
weathered face. The three cowboys had been so persuasive, she
hadn’t thought to question their authority to hire her. “Do you
think my coming to work will be all right with him?”
    Noah didn't respond and she wondered if he’d
heard her. The only sound was the clopping of the horses’ hooves on
the rain-softened earth. She was about to repeat her question when
he answered. “We just have to hope so, but I couldn’t say for
certain. Mr. Hollins, he ain’t an easy one to figure. He likes to
keep to himself. Fact is, I never