Rosamunda's Revenge

  ROSAMUNDA’S REVENGE

  By Alice Duncan

  (Writing as Emma Craig)

  ROSAMUNDA’S REVENGE

  Copyright © 1997 by Alice Duncan

  All rights reserved

  Published in 1997 by Dorchester Publishing Co., Inc.

  Leisure “It’s A Dog’s Life”

  Smashwords Edition September 2, 2009

  Visit aliceduncan.net

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This book is an homage to Wilkie Collins, who wrote one of my favorite books of all time, The Moonstone. I know it doesn’t read much like it, but it is. Honest.

  ROSAMUNDA’S REVENGE is for all of us who could probably survive without our furry friends but don’t think it would be worthwhile.

  Chapter 1

  Rosamunda took one look at the tall man striding across the lobby floor and knew him for a man who favored big dogs. Hunting dogs. Dogs with thick fur and lots of fleas. Dogs with bone heads. Dogs with little brains, big feet, no social graces, huge rumbling barks and bad breath.

  So she bit him on the ankle. She would have kneecapped him, but she couldn’t reach.

  Jedediah Hardcastle heard a strange, high-pitched snarl, the clatter of tiny claws against the wooden floor, felt something bump against his boot, and heard a rip come from the direction of his trouser cuff. When he looked down, it was to find a hairy rat attached to his left foot. Shoot, he already knew New Mexico Territory to be a wild place; until this minute, he didn’t know about the big rats.

  “Hey!” He lifted his foot and shook it. “Hey! Son of a buck!” It was a heavy blasted rat, too; must have weighed five or six pounds. And tenacious? Jed began to wonder if he’d have to shoot it before it would leave go of his trousers.

  “Stop! Stop that this instant, you vicious brute! What are you doing to my dog?”

  Jed lifted his head when he heard the feminine exclamation, intending to let the officious female know exactly what he thought of hotels that allowed huge hairy rats to run loose in their lobbies. As soon as he saw her, he felt his words dry up and his mouth drop open.

  A fairy princess in a fluff of sky-blue ruffles, she was floating down the staircase and headed straight at him. A vision in frills, its hair a mass of blond curls, its face an artist’s dream in painted porcelain, Jed knew it had to be something unearthly. He’d surely never seen a real, honest-to-God woman who looked like this creature did. If he had, he’d have been inclined to get engaged to her instead of the largish, uglyish Miss Amalie Crunch back home in Busted Flush, no matter what his parents wanted.

  Although struggling to maintain his balance whilst keeping his foot in the air was a perilous proposition, Jed whipped his Stetson from his head. It was an automatic reaction to a woman entering any room in which he resided. He was polite that way.

  After a second, he realized his foot still hung in the air with the rat dangling from it. The savage beast was making furious growling noises that might have sounded ominous had they been pitched an octave or three lower. Jed hardly noticed anymore, so busy was his brain in drinking in the sight of the vision in blue. Carefully, he replaced his foot on the floor without stomping on the rat. He’d always heard females disliked the sight of blood, and he certainly didn’t want to offend the fairy princess.

  As soon as his boot hit the lobby floor, the rat backed up, Jed’s trouser cuff still clenched in its teeth, and commenced snarling ferociously as it tugged. Since his trousers were made of thick, heavy buckskin, the lightweight vandal didn’t stand a chance. Jed endeavored to ignore it.

  He closed his mouth and gulped. The glorious apparition had finally made its way to him. He could see now that she wasn’t a fairy princess at all, but a woman. She was the most beautiful little thing Jed had ever seen in his life, but at the moment she looked mad enough to spit tacks.

  “Rosamunda! Rosamunda!”

  The incredible female knelt at Jed’s feet and put her arms out to grab the maddened rat. Jed thought about protesting. He almost lunged at her, afraid the beast was rabid and might forsake his trouser cuff and turn on her. The words she’d cried as she’d descended the staircase finally penetrated his shocked brain, however, and he blinked instead.

  “That thing’s a dog?”

  “Oh, my poor, poor baby. Oh, Rosamunda, darling! Did that awful man hurt you?”

  Caught somewhere between utter astonishment and swelling indignation, Jed stammered, “Hurt it? Me? Awful?”

  “Ooooh! You horrid big brute!”

  She was looking at Jed when she said it. He swallowed hard.

  The irate enchantress hugged the rat—that is, she hugged the dog to her breast in a manner Jed would have envied if he’d had his wits about him, and backed up. Her blue eyes crackled fire, and her flawless cheeks glowed pink.

  “But—but—”

  Part of what she’d said was true: Jed was big. But a brute? Hell, He was the politest man he knew. Of course, since he lived in the relatively uncivilized environs of Busted Flush, Texas, perhaps he wasn’t the best judge. Still and all, he tried. Miss Amalie Crunch seemed to find his manners pleasing.

  “How dare you try to hurt my dog?

  That was enough. Jed could take a lot of abuse from people. In fact, he made a point of it, since to do otherwise would have been unfair to them; but even he could only take so much.

  “Now, wait a damned minute, ma’am. That thing attacked me.”

  “Did you hear that, Rosamunda?” the beauty cried, speaking to the animal in her arms. “The beast is swearing at us! Well, I suppose we might have guessed.”

  Jed lifted his hat in a beseeching gesture. “I beg your pardon, ma’am, but your—dog—attacked me.” He still couldn’t quite make himself believe that thing was a dog.

  And a pretty good job she’d done, too, in Rosamunda’s considered opinion. Because she was still mad at Jed on an instinctive level, she bared her teeth at him.

  He glared back, confirming him as a lout in Rosamunda’s estimation. Satisfied that she’d made her point, she subsided into Mistress’s arms and put on her best wounded air.

  “That’s right, sweetheart. You just tell that bad man what you think of a huge, hulking ogre who tries to hurt sweet, precious doggies.”

  Rosamunda, sensing victory, allowed herself to cease pouting. She smirked at Jed instead. His glare got hotter, but he didn’t reach for her. She considered it a rather large victory in her admittedly small life.

  By this time Jed was fit to be tied. He also felt an almost ungovernable urge to make this magnificent female cease feeling ill will toward him. “Ma’am, I’m sorry if I hurt your—dog. But I was just walking through the lobby, going to the desk to ask about the job I’m here for, when that—dog—up and charged at me and grabbed my trouser cuff. I didn’t provoke the attack, either. Honest.”

  He almost got lost in her big blue eyes. They were the blue of a summer sky. The blue of Luggett Lake on a clear spring day. The blue of bachelor’s buttons. Of Texas bluebonnets. Of— Jed’s imagination gave out and he merely stared down into them. It was a long way down as he was a very tall man, but it was worth it. Even if she did still seem mad, and possessed a voice shrill enough to crack glass, she was the most gorgeous female he’d ever seen in all his born days.

  She had a sniff that cou
ld make a large man feel really stupid, too. She demonstrated it on him now, in fact.

  Feeling more sheepish than he had since he’d mistakenly burst in on his cousin Willie and old man Huggenbaker’s wife back when he was fourteen, Jed said in the smallest voice he had in him, “I’m truly sorry, ma’am. Reckon I’ve never seen a dog like that before.”

  She sniffed again, and Jed tried harder. “You see, ma’am, I’m from Texas. We’ve got us big dogs in Texas. We don’t have no dogs like that.”

  Rosamunda didn’t care for the expression he gave her when he said it, so she growled at him again and had the pleasure of seeing his hands bunch up into fists. She’d already taken his measure, though, and knew good and well he wouldn’t use those fists on her. To do so would irritate Mistress, and he was trying to make an impression. Or correct the one he’d already made, rather. Humans. They were so predictable.

  “Any dogs,” Mistress said.

  “Beg pardon, ma’am?”

  “Any dogs. You don’t have any dogs like this in Texas. Nor, obviously, do you have much grammar.” She sniffed yet again.

  Rosamunda sneered and was pleased to see the monster’s neck turn red. It was a common reaction in human beings when they felt humiliated.

  Jed didn’t have time to defend his improper use of the English language, because Mistress continued, “I’ll have you know this is very much a dog. She’s a Yorkshire terrier, and she’s a direct descendent of the great Huddersfield Ben himself. Her pedigree is impeccable.”

  Rosamunda thought she heard him mutter, “I’d like to peck her.” She wasn’t sure, but she snarled anyway. Her snarl earned her a hug and a stroke from Mistress, which made it worthwhile.

  The monster finally decided to give up. Clutching his hat in both hands, he said, “Well, ma’am, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt your—your dog. Er—Rosie.”

  “Rosamunda,” Mistress corrected.

  Rosamunda snarled.

  “Oh. Yeah, whatever you said. Now, if you’ll please excuse me.”

  “With pleasure,” Mistress said grandly.

  Jed felt like a chastised schoolboy when he finished his interrupted journey across the hotel lobby and finally made it to the registration desk. At least the desk clerk seemed to understand.

  “Met the princess, did you?” he whispered sympathetically, casting a furtive glance around Jed’s large frame.

  With a gusty sigh, Jed said, “Reckon I did.”

  “Damned dog yaps at everybody. You’re the first one I seen it go after,” the clerk said.

  “It bit my foot.” Jed still had trouble believing the stupid hairy rat had done such a thing. He couldn’t decide whether its outrageous behavior betokened phenomenal bravery or absolute insanity, although his inclination leaned towards the latter.

  The desk clerk nodded in compassion.

  “Well, I got other business to attend to besides fighting off pork-chop terriers,” Jed told him. “I’m here on a job.” He reached into his jacket pocket, withdrew a crumpled paper, and smoothed it out on the countertop. “Lady by the name of—” Jed stopped, drew in a big breath, and said precisely, “Tack-eye-ta Grant-ham.”

  The desk clerk’s eyes widened. He murmured, “Whoo-ey.” Then he said, “I’m right sorry, mister.”

  Jed said, “Sorry? Why—” and got no further because he heard, from directly behind him, a shrill, shrieky, “Who?”

  He turned, startled, to discover that same magnificent example of feminine beauty he’d so recently encountered. The snot-nose terror was still in her arms, too, and it still smirked at him.

  “Who are you looking for?” the vision asked.

  She sounded horrified, and an uneasy feeling began to slink up Jed’s spine. He picked up the wrinkled paper, glanced at it, and tried again. “Tack-eye-ta Grant-ham.”

  “Oh, good heavens! There must be some dreadful mistake.” The woman drew herself up to her full height, which must have been all of five feet and an inch or so, and said, “I am Tacita Grantham, sir.” She pronounced it Tass-i-ta Gran-tham.

  “You?” Oh, shoot; he should have guessed.

  “Yes. I. And I don’t believe we shall be doing business together.”

  All in all, Jed supposed he wasn’t sorry to hear her say so. She might be pretty, but his first impression of her made him suspect her beauty, like that of most folks, went only skin deep. Still, he was troubled. He pushed his hat back on his head and stared down at the female holding the rat. “Well, ma’am, what do you aim to do instead?”

  “I shall find another escort,” she said regally.

  Now it was true that Jed Hardcastle had a great appreciation of feminine pulchritude. And it was also true that this creature was about the finest example of such he’d ever seen in his entire life. If circumstances were different, and in spite of his standing engagement to Miss Amalie Crunch, he’d delight in spending any number of months guiding Miss Grantham from the wild and woolly territory to the glories of San Francisco. A fellow could generally make a female shut up if he went about it the right way. Jed wasn’t a fool, after all.

  In this case, however, he wasn’t so sure. As gorgeous as she was, he’d already discovered her to be a shrew. And that damned thing she called a dog would be a pain in the ass, too. Or at least in the trouser cuff. He wasn’t certain he’d enjoy spending several weeks in the company of a bitch and a bitch, no matter how pretty one of them was.

  Jed’s first impulse was to tip his hat, utter a friendly thank you, and depart, thanking his guardian angel for a lucky escape. Two things prevented him from doing so.

  Number one, he was pretty sure she wouldn’t be able to find a competent man to lead her from the Territory to San Francisco. Not in Powder Gulch, she wouldn’t. Of course, there wasn’t another man from Texas to the Arizona Territory as competent as Jed himself, but there were others who were fairly good and could work in a pinch.

  Number two was indirectly tied in with number one. No matter how much he didn’t like her, his brain rebelled at the image it created of this vibrant, beautiful woman’s desiccated corpse lying on the desert floor with vultures perched on those blond curls and pecking at her eyeballs. He didn’t have the same compunction about the animal in her arms, but still . . . He removed his hat politely and held it in front of his lone-star belt buckle.

  “Uh, ma’am?” he said, wondering how to advise her of his scruples without being crude.

  “What?”

  Her scowl rankled. So did her abruptness. As sharply as his drawl would allow, he said, “Ma’am, we may not hold with grammar or bog-hole terrors in Texas, but at least we have us some manners.” She stiffened up like one of his grandpa’s coon hounds on the scent, but Jed didn’t give her time to respond. “I was going to point out to you that it may not be easy for you to find another fellow to guard and guide you in Powder Gulch. This place ain’t—isn’t—a big metropolis, you know.”

  He’d obviously struck a nerve when he mentioned manners. Her cheeks blossomed a bright cherry red, and Jed felt a mad impulse to grab her and kiss her silly. He’d never do such a thing. Not even if she asked. Not only was he too polite, but he was so big and she was so small, he’d probably squish her to death.

  “Yes, I’ve already noticed that,” she said stiffly, apparently deciding to ignore his barb about her lack of manners.

  “According to the letter your lawyer wrote, you’ve got to get to San Francisco by July.”

  “Yes. Yes, that’s true.”

  “Then, ma’am, I suggest we start over on a better footing and try again.”

  # # #

  Rosamunda didn’t care for his choice of words, objecting to the “footing” part, and showed him so by lunging at the big ugly thumb folded over the brim of his hat. She missed his flesh, but managed to sink her sharp little teeth into the brim of his Stetson. It was thick and dry and tasted icky, but she had a point to prove so she held on, growling.

  “Hey!” he cried, pulling back on his hat. “Hey
, Rosie, leave go my hat!”

  “Rosamunda! Let go of that awful man’s hat!”

  Tacita sounded peeved. Rosamunda, sure of her position in the universe, figured her irritation was directed at the monster who had dared call her by the ridiculous name Rosie. Nevertheless—and even though she didn’t appreciate being called a bog-hole terror any more than she appreciated being called Rosie—after giving her head one last vicious shake, she released the hat. She was pleased to see a perfect half-moon of tooth prints on the brim. A little more time and she’d have gnawed a chunk right out of it.

  “Damn,” the oaf mumbled, eyeing the holes in his hat. He gave Rosamunda a good hot scowl. She sneered back. Rosie, indeed!

  “Obviously,” Tacita said icily, “since Rosamunda has taken you in such dislike, a business association between us would not prosper. Thank you for your time, sir, but I shall spend the next few days searching for another guide.”

  The brute looked annoyed. Rosamunda smiled.

  “Look here, ma’am, I come—came—all the way from my home in Busted Flush, Texas, to Powder Gulch in the Territory to fetch you. That’s a long way to come and not get the business.”

  Her lips pinched tight, Tacita said, “I shall pay you for your time, sir.”

  Jed was very grumpy when he said, “Thank you, ma’am. I aim to stay here for another week or so. If you change your mind, you just look me up.”

  Lifting her chin so high it almost came level with Jed’s shoulder, Tacita said, “I’m sure that won’t be necessary. Will you be staying in this hotel?”

  “Powder Gulch doesn’t have another one,” he pointed out irritably.

  Tacita’s chin rose another fraction of an inch. “Fine. I shall leave a bank draft with the desk clerk.”

  She turned on her heel and bore Rosamunda away. Rosamunda wriggled in her arms until she could peer over Tacita’s elbow at Jed.