The Warrior by Wade Everett

Author:Wade Everett
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: fiction
Publisher: Dorchester Publishing Co., Inc.

Chapter Seven

Lt. Col. George Barlow was going over the company commanders’ reports when his orderly knocked and let Len Kelly, the sutler, into the office. Kelly was a small, scrawny-armed man wearing a soiled shirt and a vest with a split up the back seam.

“Hate to bother you, Colonel, but one of my teamsters came in from Hot Springs, and he told me that a load of freight went out to the reservation and not in his wagon.”

Barlow’s first instinct was to brush this aside as a minor irritation, but some inner caution held him from this. “Sit down, Len. Do you know this for a fact?”

Kelly shrugged. “Davis wouldn’t lie to me. He’s got too good a deal going with Grover.” He shook his head. “Maybe you ought to ask Grover about this, Colonel. It strikes me as odd, and I wouldn’t want that little runt branching out on his own. Maybe he’s thinking of cutting us out.”

“Don’t include me!” Barlow snapped. “It’s bad enough to have to sit here and watch you and Grover pocket money without being lumped in with you.”

Kelly grinned. “Now, Colonel, don’t take that attitude. The fact that you turn down a share don’t make you less a partner. Earl and I, we think of you as one of the family.”

“Get out of my office,” Barlow said.

“I want you to check on Earl. He’s a sneaky cuss, even if he is my cousin. But I want you to check on him, anyway. I know you’ll do it after you think of it awhile. That’s only fair, ain’t it, Colonel? Your wife’s a proud woman, good family background and all that, and she’d up and leave you if—”

“All right, all right, I’ll send Grover a wire.”

“Uh-uh. You ought to get on your horse and go see him.”

“I can’t leave my post now.”

“Well, I would,” Kelly said and got up and left.

George Barlow sat with his fists clenched after Kelly left, and it was several minutes before he trusted himself to move. He scooped up his kepi and went through the outer office, speaking to the clerk as he passed. “Have my horse saddled and brought to my quarters.” Then he was out the door, his boots stomping the duckboards.

His wife was sitting before the front window where the morning light was good, working on some needlepoint; she looked up when he came in, surprised to see him. “Why, George, what is it?”

“I have to go to the reservation for a few days,” he said. “Is there any sentiment you wish me to convey to Earl?”

“You could ask him why he doesn’t write more,” Harriet said. “And he never comes to the post to visit.”

“I’ll remind him of that,” Barlow said and went into the bedroom to change into an older uniform. He took his rain cape and an extra shirt and rolled them all into a bundle; when he went to the living room, the orderly was there with his horse. “I won’t be longer than I have to be,” he said, kissing his wife gently.

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