The Sons of Grady Rourke Read Free

Patrick could vaguely remember in his mother’s own voice.
    â€œAre you all right?”
    Sean turned back toward the iced windows. He laid his hand across the top of his tin cup as if to say that he was finished drinking.
    â€œWell enough.”
    O NE OF THE sergeants had stoked the fire back to life by the time their guests rubbed their eyes and climbed out of their blankets. Someone put a hot tin cup into Sean’s hand before his eyes were open.
    â€œThanks.”
    â€œAin’t nothin’, sir. You’ll need some heat in you just to make it to the mess tent.”
    The travelers were surprised to see that the sky was still the hard blue-black of morning twilight in the mile-high morning. Although the wind had stopped howling from the western mountains, the pre-dawn air remained painfully cold. The civilians buried their faces in the collars of their ankle-length coats that dragged on new, powdery snow. Half a dozen cavalrymen in blue greatcoats escorted their guests to breakfast. Low in the east, the sky over Lincoln, New Mexico, was just turning pink. When Patrick looked up, he could still see a few bright stars shining. The moon had set and the stars did not twinkle in the thin, brittle air.
    In the mess tent reserved for noncommissioned officers, the atmosphere was wonderful with the hearty scent of sourdough biscuits fried in bacon fat, strong coffee, and tobacco smoke. To Sean Rourke, the large tent smelled better than any woman he could remember. Breakfast comforted the brothers to their bones.
    By the time the brothers pushed themselves outside, the stars were gone and the sky was clear and blue. The blinding snow in the valley was too bright for either brother to make out where the plain ended and the western mountains began. The snow cap on Capitan Mountain to the north was too painfully bright to look at.
    The two travelers were surprised to find their mounts and pack horses already tacked and ready for the day’s ride to Lincoln. Two troopers held the reins and halters.
    â€œThank you,” Sean said to one of the soldiers.
    â€œThe smithy reset the hind shoes of the bay, sir.” The private glanced at the brown animal that had snow glistening on his whiskers. “Said one was coming loose. So he done them both to set the angles right.”
    Sean reached into his fur coat’s deep pocket.
    â€œWill you give your smithy a gold piece for us?”
    â€œNo need, sir. Besides, he won’t take it from you. The old man said you was a soldier once.”
    â€œThen tell your man that we said thanks.”
    â€œI’ll do that, sir.”
    The tall youth handed the leathers to the two brothers. Sean and Patrick mounted slowly with their heavy coats holding them back. The orderly stepped back and looked up at Sean’s ruined face. Gathering his reins, Sean straightened in the saddle and snapped off a brisk salute with parade ground precision.
    Both orderlies took one step back, squared their heels, and returned the military courtesy with equal dignity. Sean nodded and led his brother east across the ocean of unspoiled snow.
    T HE R OURKE BROTHERS slowly followed the frozen Rio Bonito eastward for ten miles. After half a day, the frozen river turned south.
    â€œLa Placita should be a mile beyond the bend.” Sean’s words came with a cloud of steam. He was not yet accustomed to calling the town by its new name, Lincoln.
    â€œI suppose,” Patrick stammered with lips too cold to work.
    Sean reined his horse northward, away from the Rio Bonito. Directly ahead, Capitan Peak glistened brilliantly high in the southern sky. Leaving the river trail, the men guided their horses between waist-high gray boulders. The sun gave the icy rocks the glitter of diamonds. Rounding a slight rise a mile from the river, they stopped side by side. Beneath them in the midday sunshine was a run-down ranch house and crumbling outbuildings. Without a word, they spurred their