Petra Read online

  *Sand Hills Sioux, Western Settler Saga I

  He picked up the eraser and drummed it on the big oak table, a present along with matching chairs from sister Katherine and her carpenter husband Jeremy which he built from scratch for Adam’s wedding. Solid as all Jeremy’s furniture was, Sis added a special touch, working some months to burn small symbols meaningful to the couple around the edge. It was a prized possession and one, at the moment, taking a mite of punishment from Adam’s disgruntled attitude.

  Tossing his hat on the table, Step sat in the chair opposite the fireplace, liking the heat it put out less than Adam, always pleased that his wife Kate and he were in agreement over keeping their house cool even in winter. Always feeling the warmth in Adam’s dining room stifling, Step still remarked often on how the big stone fireplaces Adam and Stoney had built in each of their homes kept cold away better than any he’d ever known. For his own taste, rooms with small iron fireboxes made atmospheres more pleasant for sitting and talking or reading.

  The brothers sat, accustomed to saying more without spoken words than most folks could with a book full of them. Finally, Adam tossed the eraser aside and looked up, impatient for whatever was on

  Step’s mind this day. It wasn’t like him to leave the Sheriff’s office unattended during duty hours and, moreover, Adam was mindful of getting ledgers in order before his children and wife arrived home for supper. Overseeing the many strange little ventures the kin had interest in took much from family life he little liked sacrificing.

  Step shifted in his chair. Adam’s impatience grew as much from discomfort with the grey season and annoyance with his ledgers as with Step staying quiet. Only a furrowed brow on his brother’s face and that Step wouldn’t make eye contact kept him from speaking, both features most not like Step under ordinary circumstances. Often named as impatient by many, Adam was not until he became so and now decidedly was.

  Lifting his cup, Step took a drink. Looking across the rim, he stared direct at his younger brother. Deciding finally what was needful saying wouldn’t be until said, he advised, “Anton Petra is in town.”

  Adam’s eyes tightened. “He’s asking for you.” Step added.

  “Say why?” Adam asked, cocking a brow as Step shook his head imperceptibly. “Make a threat?”

  “Nope. Just asking for you. Stopped in Mandano’s just before nooning, had some grub first then asked where you’d be found.”

  Adam shrugged his shoulders. “Not hard to find if he was mindful.”

  “That’s what was said, as I’m told. Seems Petra isn’t interested in coming out this way. Was told he’d wait ‘til you come to town then took up a room at the Hotel.” Pausing, Step brushed the star on his vest absent-mindedly, adding then, “Seemed to recall the name so took out journals the Marshal’s kept, read through notes left. He’s a man hunter known for killing from ambush.”

  Adam stared over Step’s shoulder into the living room. The furnishings were simple, Western style and mostly fashioned by Jeremy and purchased from him by their agreement. The rest, including their favorite roll-up desk, had been bought with cash and shipped up from Denver or Santa Fe. Owning the freighting wagons made it a sight less costly to buy in either city, a fact Kate and Sis were more inclined to use to their advantage than his own wife. An oil painting on the far wall caught his eye, her gift to him on their second wedding anniversary depicted a band of fur and tasseled woodsmen fighting Indians in forests back east as she’d learned their Pa had done in earlier days. As eldest brother Mitchell did in their time, Pa served the Army just as his Pa and grandpa had in theirs all toward creating the great nation they lived in.

  “Always wondered if he’d finally show up.” Adam offered, betraying no emotion. “Promised me someday he would.”

  Much of Adam doing well for himself sprouted from three years as a US Marshal*, connections that post allowed him to make and many benefits it offered a young man of enterprising nature. His kin had success, also, after arriving rooted in soil Adam had found and cultivated. Without hard work shared among them, few of their doings would have been possible but together they built Morale and much of northeastern Colorado into a commercial and business center unmatched outside Denver itself.