“Like I did to you?” He rode closer. His leg brushed against hers. “Think, Betsy. What did I say when we first met? I told you to leave me alone. I told you that I didn’t want to talk to any women because I feared for my reputation. Remember that?”
“You weren’t very friendly, I do recall.”
“And this is why. Her accusations drew questions about my character and affected my job, but anything I said to defend myself was seen as unchivalrous toward a lady. I couldn’t win for losing.”
“I can’t imagine how frustrating that was for you.” She let her eyes linger as some of the angst melted off his face.
“You don’t blame me?”
“Not at all. Especially since I’m the one who informed her of your whereabouts.”
“Wait.” Joel stopped on the road. A mischievous glint danced in his eyes. “The Dashing Deputy articles were distributed in Fort Worth, right?” His gaze settled somewhere on the horizon. He already knew she was to blame, so what was bothering him now? “I wonder how many people in Garber read about my brooding eyes and strong jaw. How many could tell I’d stolen the heart of the famous E. M. Buckahee?”
Betsy reined her horse into his, pretending to smash his legs, but it was only an excuse to bump against him.
Joel tsked. “Assaulting a deputy. Gonna have to write you up for that.” But instead he caught her hand. Would he still want to hold it after she shared her opinion?
Betsy tightened her grip. “Joel?”
“Mm-hmm?”
“I can’t help but think that you need to go back to Texas.”
His face tightened. “I can’t. If I want to be a deputy and someday a sheriff, there’s no reason to go back.”
“But you miss Texas and your family. And there’s your name to clear. Like you said about Scott—”
“We’re here,” he interrupted.
His brow was troubled. Betsy didn’t like it. She didn’t like there being anything in the world that could disturb her man like that, but for the time being, she had to set it aside.
First they had a problem that was closer to home.
Chapter 42
The wind whistled above them like a lonesome banshee looking for a place to rest. Joel’s boot splashed in a puddle at the bottom of the ravine. The jagged rocks and broken tree limbs made the place feel like a valley of the shadow of death, even if no one had died there. With all the debris and boulders, a body could’ve been lost down there, which was why he’d come back despite Calbert’s claim to have checked it. Now he was here again, but this time he was looking for something smaller. Something that both Scott and Sheriff Taney had mentioned—a Bald Knobber’s mask that’d been worn by their assailant.
Betsy scrambled over the rocks and thrust a stick into dark crevices. “It hasn’t rained enough to wash anything away,” she said, “unless there was rain up on the mountain.”
“We’ll go downstream a bit, just in case.”
He didn’t know what finding the mask would prove, just that he had to do something for Scott. Scott was a good kid—in fact, he’d soon be family—and Joel couldn’t let this mistake ruin his life.
“I’ve got something!” Betsy called.
Joel turned to see her with one arm swallowed up by a hole in the ground. Her head was turned and she squinted against the sharp branches that guarded the den.
“Get your hand out of there,” he ordered. “You’re going to get bit.”
“It’s almost free.” Her eyes widened. “There!” Slowly she pulled her arm out of the hole to produce a battered piece of burlap.
With two horns.
“Some animal wanted it for its nest.” Betsy shook it out straight. Clumps of mud sloughed off as she straightened one of the horns. “This mask is different from the others. Look.”
Joel’s mind spun as he took the mask from Betsy. It wasn’t like Fowler’s hood. Like Betsy’d said, it was different, and different from Pritchard’s, too. This mask wasn’t painted in the same way, and the horns were stuffed, not solid like the others. Someone hadn’t gone to Bald Knobbers’ Academy and learned how to fashion the hoods in the correct manner.
“The others have horns made of cork,” Joel said.
“I remember back when I was a pup, everyone would sit on their porches of the evening and whittle on them,” Betsy said.
Joel pushed his hand up the neck of the mask and jammed his fingers into the cone. He pulled out a handful of its stuffing.
“That’s not the work of any seamstress.” Betsy leaned over him for a better look. “Those horns are pathetic. What all is stuffed in there?”
“Feathers.” Joel sent a dozen gray feathers floating in the air. “But it looks like they started with cloth scraps before they resorted to tearing up their tick.”