Only 04 - Only Love

here before sundown.”
    Beau gave Whip a hard look.
    Whip smiled. Beneath his golden mustache the curve of his mouth was cold rather than reassuring, but Murphy was too far away to notice and the Culpeppers were looking only at Shannon.
    “Don’t git yer water hot,” Murphy said from the other end of the room. “I’m movin’ fast as I can.”
    “Move faster. The lady is in a hurry.”
    Something in Whip’s voice made the Culpeppers turn and look at the fair-haired stranger.
    Nothing had changed. He was still a big, easy-moving man with a bullwhip riding his right shoulder, a tolerant smile, and neither rifle nor revolver in sight. The Culpeppers each had belt guns, and no reluctance to use them.
    “You better take Murphy’s advice, boy,” Beau drawled to Whip, “and don’t get your water hot for nothin’.”
    As Beau spoke, his hand settled on his belt, just above the scarred wooden handle of his revolver.
    “You’re big enough for two,” Clim said, “but we’re four to your one, we ain’t exactly tiny, and we’re packing guns.”
    “I can see that,” Whip said.
    It was all he said.
    The Culpeppers muttered among themselves. They must have decided that the stranger was suitably cowed, because they began baiting Shannon again.
    “Why don’t you turn yourself around, darlin’?” Beau said. “As pretty as your butt is, I’d a damn sight rather look at your teats.”
    “Yeah,” Clim said. “We been wonderin’ all winter what you’d look like without them men’s ragsyou always wear. Are your teats dark like old Betsy’s, or are they red like Clementine’s?”
    “Clementine rouges hers,” muttered one of the Culpeppers. “And thet ain’t the only place she greases.”
    “Hell you say, Darcy,” Clim retorted. “I done left enough tooth marks on them teats to know what’s real and what’s rouge.”
    A small shudder went through Shannon.
    Only Whip noticed, for only he was looking for a reaction from the silent girl.
    Beau gets it first. Definitely. That boy’s manners need some real polishing.
    Whip took a step forward.
    “No,” Shannon said quietly, turning her head, looking right at Whip. “Ignore them. Their words mean no more than a dog breaking wind.”
    The Culpeppers didn’t hear Shannon. They were too busy arguing among themselves about what else Clementine rouged.
    Whip gave the Culpeppers a narrow, icy look and wondered how often Shannon had been forced to endure their lewd talk. Probably every time she came into town for supplies.
    Damn her husband for letting it happen, Whip raged silently. If he’s half as mean as his reputation, he should cut out their filthy tongues and use them for cleaning the barrel of his buffalo gun.
    But he hasn’t, and now it’s left for me to do.
    A movement at the back of the store caught Whip’s attention. Murphy was slowly lifting the lid off a barrel of flour. He handled the wooden lid as though it weighed more than a side of beef. His head was turned toward Shannon rather than toward the contents of the barrel.
    “What do you think, Floyd?” asked Beau overthe sound of the other Culpeppers’ arguments. “Is that little girl’s teats big enough to squeeze until they turn red and white and blue like a Yankee flag?”
    Whip tried to control the anger tightening his gut. It was a losing battle. He couldn’t stop thinking how he would feel if it were his woman shopping alone while men talked loudly about how she would look naked and what size her breasts were.
    If Shannon were my wife, when I came back from yondering I would hunt the Culpeppers down like the coyotes they are.
    The thought didn’t satisfy Whip. Sometimes a yondering man didn’t come back. And even when he did, nothing could erase the sickening memory of humiliation in his woman’s eyes.
    Damn Silent John anyway! If he can’t take care of a girl like Shannon, he never should have married her and brought her to such a rough place.
    “Well, Floyd,” Beau persisted. “What do you think about them teats?”
    Floyd belched, scratched his crotch thoughtfully, and said, “I think Silent John is a damned good shot.”
    “So what?” Beau retorted. “We ain’t touchin’ her. Thet was all we was warned about. Touchin’.”
    “And followin’,” Clim added.
    “We ain’t done thet, neither,” Beau said.
    “Not after the first time,” Floyd agreed.
    He pulled off his hat and stuck two fingers through two bullet holes in the brim.
    “Damn fine