It was just stage business, Freddy reminded herself with a heavy sigh, trying again to swing the damned lasso. Her arm ached, and her muscles were sore from yesterday’s session.
“Not like that,” Drinkwater said, examining Les’s knot. “Here. Let me show you again.” Les stared at the rope in her hands, then threw it down, burst into tears, and ran toward the privy, her skirts flapping.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Freddy said to Drinkwater, who was looking after Les like he didn’t know whether to give chase or let her go. Les was such a baby.
Drawing a breath, she swung her newly tied lasso next to the ground, trying to get it spinning, then suppressed a swearword when the rope caught in her skirts. Drinkwater played out his lasso and showed her. Again. He made it look so easy that she felt like screaming.
Once more, she fixed the size of the loop before she set it spinning near her feet, careful to keep her skirts out of the way. Then she jerked her wrist and the rope flew up and smacked her hard under the chin. Stars exploded in front of her eyes as she fell to the ground.
She could do this, she had to. On the next attempt she got the damned thing off the ground and over her head without hitting herself in the face. The loop collapsed, but not before it fell over her. She’d managed to lasso herself, but she’d gotten the rope spinning in the air.
“You’re spinning it from right to left,” a voice said behind her. “Spin it from left to right.” Whirling, she stared at Dal Frisco who was standing hip-shot and relaxed, grinning at the rope caught around her waist. He looked at Drinkwater. “Find something else to do, son, I’m taking over here.”
Pushing the rope down her skirts and stepping out of it, Freddy coiled it and watched Drinkwater tip his hat, then amble toward the corral. Frisco would have to appear in time to see her lasso herself.
Walking forward, he took the rope out of her hands and inspected her knot. “It occurs to me that we can hit the trail with a few unbranded steers or with a few less than we’d hoped to take. But this drive goes nowhere without at least one Roark sister in the outfit.” He looked up as Les returned, holding a hand over her lips.
Frisco spun out Freddy’s rope, twirled it on the ground then with a flick of his wrist moved the rope over his head. His elbow came up, the rope dipped down, and he deftly lassoed the steer head that he’d nailed to one of the sawhorses. As he walked toward the sawhorse to retrieve the rope, he called over his shoulder. “When are your trousers going to be ready?”
“Sometime next week,” Les answered, rubbing her forehead as if she had a headache.
“Not good enough. I’ll send down to the bunkhouse and get some pants up here today.”
Frowning, Freddy took back the rope he handed her and extended her aching wrist and arm to twirl it next to the ground. She had the twirling part down pat, even when she reversed the spin as he had advised, so all she had to worry about was snagging her skirts.
Her rope skipped against the dirt and flipped out of control, whipping up and tangling in her skirts again. “Damn it to hell!” She wanted to justify Frisco’s confidence that she could learn this. It puzzled her that she wanted him to think well of her, but she did.
He looked up from helping Les. “You learn to talk like that while you were traveling with the theater people?”
Bending, she yanked the rope away from a twist of skirts and petticoats. “I learned words to make a preacher blush just sitting at the dinner table, Mr. Frisco. Pa seemed to think an ‘excuse me’ wiped cussing out of our memory, but it didn’t.” She looked up at him while she pushed down her skirts. Lord, her arm ached. “I didn’t use those words, though, until after I quit the theater.” She shrugged, telling herself that she’d been wrong. She didn’t care what he thought about her. “People expect the worst of actors. If a swearword hits the air, all it does is confirm what people are thinking about me anyway. It makes no never mind to me.”
“I catch your point, Miss Roark,” Frisco said. Standing behind Les, he covered her hand with his and set the momentum of her twirling speed. Gradually, guiding her hand, he brought the rope up until together they had it spinning over her head, then he tilted her elbow. “Release it,” he ordered, withdrawing his assistance.