Four
Beck got out of the truck, catching his father’s attention with the door’s slam.
“About time you got back,” he said over the water. “You get that sourdough over to the pilot like your mom wanted?”
“I did. Surprised her with it, too. She was mighty appreciative.” Beck tipped up the brim of his Stetson, the memory of how she’d looked when the afternoon sun caught her russet hair, turning it almost copper in the light, still with him. “Her name’s Jackie Sinclair.”
“Nice name for a pilot.” His father angled the hose and knocked loose another clod of dirt. “The Kincaid place treating her all right?”
“She’s got plenty to fix, for sure,” Beck said.
Joe made a sound that was half derisive, half chuckle. “Roy never was much for upkeep.”
“She wants to hangar her plane in the barn. The doors aren’t wide enough. Going to take some effort to make it work. I said I’d help her when she’s ready.” His glance swiveled toward the timber line. “I rode up to the ridge with her to check out a few things, too.”
“Fire still out, I assume?”
“Yep. Dead.”
“We got lucky yesterday, thanks to her. Could have spread fast by the time we got to it.”
“When she circled back for one last look, she spotted a dark-colored pickup up there near the trees. She didn’t think much of it at the time, but now we both know it shouldn’t have been there.
” He briefed his father on what they’d found—fresh tire tracks, a suspicious burn pattern, even the broken ponderosa pine branch.
Joe frowned. “You thinking someone set the fire?”
“It’s a strong possibility.” Beck followed his father’s troubled gaze toward the ridge, where the dark scar of burned trees showed against the green. “We’ll have to keep an eye out. Can’t let up.”
“If somebody was poking around up there, might be worth knowing exactly how far north that east pasture line runs.” Joe shut off the spigot and leaned the tiller back on its stand. “There’s timber there, too, and plenty of grass that could catch. Miss Jackie needs to know.”
The thought of a fire starting on her land shot a chill through Beck. She was alone out there, with no one close enough to help if the flames took hold.
“Roy’s place always did sit in an odd spot,” his father said, coiling the hose.
“What do you mean?”
“Just never made much sense to me. Roy claimed that was his ground, but your granddad used to say the Archer line wasn’t where folks thought it was.
Used to run cattle through that east pasture every spring.
Said the grass came up earlier there.” Joe shrugged.
“He never called it the Kincaid place. To him, it was just ‘the east pasture.’”
Beck frowned slightly. “You ever look into it?”
“Never saw much reason. Roy was there forty years, and nobody argued about it, including your grandad, and he’d be the one if it wasn’t true.
” Joe turned toward the barn to store the tiller but paused.
“He used to keep track of those pasture lines. Had a map somewhere. After your grandma passed, he got a little careless with his papers, though. If there’s anything about that ground, it’s probably mixed in somewhere over in the cabin. ”
He could relate to his father’s need for solid information. “I’ll see what I can find.”
After Joe entered the barn, Beck headed toward his truck, his gaze sliding along the road and the land beyond it.
The Kincaid place.
The east pasture.
And now Jackie’s place.
He exhaled slowly. Whose was it?
The American flag hanging high on the pole outside of the cabin never failed to remind Beck there’d been a time when he never thought he’d see those colors flying again, and certainly not in his own front yard on his family’s ranch.
It’d been one of the first things he did when he got out of the Army and came home.
Erect that pole and hang the biggest flag he could find.
Folks could see it from miles around, like he wanted.
Respecting it like they should. Now, as he always did, he halted, saluted, then continued onto the porch, went inside the cabin, and closed the door behind him.
The main room settled around him in familiar silence. Late afternoon light slanted through the small kitchen window, touching the worn dinner table where his grandmother once served her family their meals and his grandfather drank his coffee every morning before heading out to do chores.
He never called it the Kincaid place. To him it was just ‘the east pasture.’
The east pasture.
Beck could almost hear Wade Archer saying it that way—plain and matter-of-fact, the same way he’d talk about the north pasture, the south pasture, or the timber.
Had to be a reason why he never tacked Roy Kincaid’s name onto that piece of land. If his grandfather thought of it as Archer pasture, there had to be something written down about it saying it was.
There weren’t many places to look, and Beck was never one to intrude on someone else’s belongings, but since Beck had moved in, he’d known what belonged to his grandfather and what didn’t.
He turned toward the cupboards along the wall.
For as long as he could remember, their shelves held an old set of speckled gray enamelware his grandmother had used day in and day out.
A mismatched set of coffee cups, mixing bowls, and serving platters.
Above them, assorted Mason jars, lids, and rings.
But the top shelf—that one had been hard to reach, and as far as he knew, no one bothered to try. At least, not often.
Beck pulled the wooden step stool out from beside the icebox and positioned it under the cupboard. The stool rocked once, taking his weight, before settling firmly on the floorboards. He climbed up and opened the cabinet door.
The cupboard shelves were lined with yellowed shelf paper his grandmother would have cut to fit years ago. No doubt due to its difficulty to reach, the shelf was all but empty.
Except for one familiar cigar box.
Beck grasped the box in one hand and steadied himself with the other until both feet were back on the floor.
He sat at the table, and memories washed over him from when he was a kid, enamored by the beautiful dark-haired lady dressed in red that was printed on the label advertising El Producto cigars.
He lifted the lid, and the faint scent of cedar drifted out. No longer full of the cigars Wade Archer used to enjoy, it contained a few old pieces of horehound candy, butterscotch drops, a black leather jewelry box, and a stack of folded papers, yellowed with age.
He went for the papers first.
Most of them weren’t unexpected—seed invoices, a receipt from a horse sale, a faded repair bill for a Ford pickup—but nothing that looked like a boundary agreement or a map.
The last paper in the stack, the one at the very bottom, felt thinner, more brittle than the rest.
Beck unfolded it carefully. Across the top, written in his grandfather’s careful hand:
Memorandum of Understanding:
Roy Kincaid is permitted residence on Archer land adjoining the south pasture by mutual agreement for the duration of his life. Signed and Dated, Wade Archer, March 19, 1912.
Jolted by the words that jumped out at him, Beck leaned back in the chair. His gaze lifted toward the window, across the county road to where the old Kincaid house sat.
Adjoining the south pasture.
His grandfather’s voice echoed in his memory. East pasture.
Jackie Sinclair’s house now.
He read the memorandum again, slower this time.
Roy Kincaid is permitted residence…
Permitted.
Not owner.
If Roy had only been permitted to live there, then the land itself—
Beck sat very still for a moment. Only now did he realize there was more.
A second memorandum, below the first, written by his grandfather in different ink on a different date.
The penmanship was his, but less strong, less steady.
Another sentence, clearly written that would leave no misinterpretation:
After duration of life, said parcel shall pass on to my oldest grandson, Beckett J. Archer. Signed and Dated, Wade Archer, September 29, 1950.
For a long moment he didn’t move. His hand gripped the edge of the document so tightly the fragile paper should have crumbled.
… shall pass… my oldest grandson… Beckett J. Archer.
Just to be sure, he read the memorandum again. All of it. Every word.
He couldn’t be wrong. He didn’t want to misunderstand.
The east pasture.
The Kincaid place.
Jackie Sinclair’s place.
His grandfather had known the land could be mistaken for someone else’s one day. He was shrewd enough to put the deal in writing. In 1950, he’d been sick. Dying. He had to settle his affairs while he could, even though Beck was in the Army and would soon be gone to Korea.
Wade Archer had died before Beck could come back to say good-bye.
Before he could tell his grandfather of the honor he’d been given…
keeping the Archer & Sons legacy alive. That he would respect the land, grow and care for it, one day with his own family, his own sons, like his grandfather and father had done before him.
Before he could say thanks.
Unease dropped into his chest.
And now there was a woman living there. A woman with plans to make an airstrip, widen the barn doors for her plane, build her own aviation business, most of all.
Jackie Sinclair planned to stay.
Beck exhaled slowly.
She’d bought land that wasn’t Kincaid’s to sell.
Which meant it wasn’t hers to own.
Beck eased his grip on the memorandum. His grandfather had written it plainly enough. The land was to pass to him. Which left Beck with a truth he couldn’t ignore.
The east pasture was his.
He slid a long breath through his teeth. It was a lot for a man to take in, for sure, and he didn’t know what in blazes he was going to do about it.
He refolded the paper carefully and slid it into his shirt pocket. The memorandum couldn’t be hidden any longer. His parents needed to know his grandfather’s directives. Beck needed to know what to do next.
But before he closed the cedar lid on the cigar box, the black leather jewelry box waited patiently for his attention. The leather appeared scuffed in places, worn soft at the edges. Gold edging in a narrow leaf pattern trimmed the outside seam.
In a flash of memory, Beck remembered the black leather jewelry box sitting on his grandmother’s dresser years ago.
Once, when he’d been little, she told him the old locket inside had come from an old Army friend of Grandpa’s.
After she passed, Grandpa must’ve tucked it away with the things he never quite found the heart to sort through again.
Odd how it’d been stored with the rest of the ranch papers, in an old El Producto cigar box, no less.
It seemed to Beck its elegance, its quality, deserved better.
He set it on the table and lifted the lid.
The brass hinge gave with a quiet ease, like it had been opened many times before.
Inside, nestled in cream-colored velvet, lay a sterling silver locket on a matching chain.
The front of the locket was embossed in a raised design, and the back was smooth.
Beck never claimed to be an expert on women’s jewelry, but lockets were usually meant to be opened so women could have special mementoes carried close against them.
This one seemed to be no different, and he pressed the clasp.
Sure enough, the locket opened, and on the inside left, the words “In God We Trust” were inscribed in the center.
A tiny second clasp, so small he nearly missed it, released a hidden compartment. Something lay tucked inside, but before he could give it more than a passing glance, the name etched on one side seized his attention.
Martha Washington.
The discovery pulled a startled curse from him.
The wife of George Washington seemed an impossible reality.
Beck turned the locket in his hand. It wasn’t flashy, but there was a weight to it—solid and well-made—that told him it wasn’t a cheap piece. The sterling felt almost cold against his palm and appeared to have aged well.
A folded piece of paper peeked out from a slit in the cream velvet, and he carefully pulled it out before replacing the locket in the case. The paper was thin parchment, and on it, someone had written a letter:
My Dearest Girl,
This locket would not exist but for my beloved. He entreated a trusted friend to fashion it for me, yet it is far more than a common ornament. It was born of love, wrought in silver, and shaped by steadfast devotion.
As you have now discovered, to awaken its wonder one need only place the locket upon her heart, and love shall surely find its way to you, thus fulfilling the locket’s true and intended purpose.
Love, like liberty, thrives when freely bestowed. When the time comes that you no longer have need of its guidance, pass the locket from one hopeful heart to another, that its promise may endure.
May your days be filled with the joy that springs from choosing love above all else.
And never forget that love, freely given, is the truest liberty we may ever know.
Ever yours,
Martha Washington
Fully stunned at what he’d discovered, Beck stared. There was more, notes written in feminine script, all dated through the centuries, declaring love for country and love in marriage, and it was then he quit reading.
He was out of his depth. This letter, and the women who had embraced it, was meant for someone other than him. What did he know of love, of commitment? Of the locket’s ability to bring love and fulfill its true purpose?
He blew out a breath. Martha… Washington.
Crazy stuff. No one would believe him, and he didn’t blame them. If he hadn’t seen her letter with his own eyes, he wouldn’t believe himself, either.
With the letter tucked back into its protective pocket in the lining, something compelled him to cradle the locket in his palm again for one last look.
This time, the sterling silver lay warm against his skin, deliciously warm, and his mind blurred from the embossed design so eloquently done to capture a thought of Jackie instead.
Not just a passing thought, but as clear as if she sat across the table from him.
The light from the kitchen window glinting on her hair, turning it a rich cinnamon.
The quiet steadiness of her green eyes fixed on the sky.
Skin kissed from the sun, as if she’d spent much of her time peering through the open side window of her Piper Cub.
Unsettled, Beck frowned. He hadn’t meant to think of her. Not now. Not like this.
And he’d had enough. His afternoon had already been turned upside down. He closed the black leather jewelry box with a firm snap, set it back inside the cigar box, and returned the whole thing to the top shelf where it belonged.