by DJ Black
The Denver train pulled in with a screech of iron on iron that jangled the nerves of every cowpoke in town and might even have roused one or two of the residents on Boot Hill. Then with a judder and a hiss it came to a full stop in a great cloud of steam.
In the old days people used to come for miles to greet the train, but that was back in the '70s after the War Between the States. Nowadays few people paid it any attention.
Rachel Bedford had been just a girl back then, not that she would have been allowed to run with the other kids. Her parents thought that such behaviour was too undignified for a daughter of theirs. Well she didn't feel so dignified now, and not so very much older, she had come to realise.
At 25 she had come home, to whatever was left of it anyway. The porter dropped her trunk onto the rough wooden platform and extended his hand for a tip. After a glance at the trunk, perhaps her only worldly goods now, Rachel forced a smile, gave him one of the last coins in her purse and stepped onto the station.
"Oh my God," someone cursed, "she's back."
Rachel cringed. She had entertained a fantasy that she could re-enter the town unnoticed, but the town was too small for that. Two women threw her a look of scorn and whispers passed between them as they hurried away as if from the devil.
"Rachel Bedford is back," someone behind her took up the cry of the first voice and soon loud-hushed voices and the clatter of chatter, serenaded her as she considered what to do next.
"Best leave that there Mrs Bedford," a kindly voice said. It was old Mr Martin, the station keeper. "Leastways until you know what you want done with it. I'll send it along."
She nodded uncomfortably, especially at the implication that she might not be welcome at the ranch. She heaved a sigh that threatened to become a sob, which she hastily suppressed.
"Your husband is over at the saloon," Martin said casually. Then he added quickly, "The Lucky Strike, I mean."
The Lucky Strike was the more respectable of the town’s two bars; the other being for ranch hands, single men and widowers. Was the comment meant to be significant? What if it was? Rachel nodded and forced another nervous smile.
"I guess that's where I'm heading then," she said in a quiet voice to no one in particular.
Over at the Lucky Strike word reached John Bedford without anyone daring to approach him. The news had spread like a prairie fire and the streets were buzzing with it. One or two men at tables near him offered up pitying looks, but most just wore polite masks of curiosity.
I should never have married a woman more than half my age. The thought was a familiar one by now, an old friend he greeted every day.
"What are you going to do Mr Bedford?" The barkeep looked anxious.
"I'll have another beer," John drawled without looking up.
Behind him the swing doors clacked and he didn't need to look to know who it was.
"Hello John," Rachel said.
The hum around the Lucky Strike that had begun not five minutes before suddenly died and a man could have heard an ant going home for supper.
"You done gallivanting with slick city boys?" John said, without looking up from his beer.
"It was only one John... I thought... I thought I loved him, but he... oh John, will you take me back?" Rachel wailed.
"You made a fool of me in front of the whole town,.” John savours his beer, his expression sour.
"I... no I...," Rachel heaves a huge sigh and then she breathed a single word, "Yes."
"And you expect me to take you back?" John turned to regard his wayward wife as if seeing her for the first time.
"I guess not," Rachel whispers, her head dropping.
"You even got the train fare out of town?" John asks, a hint of concern touching his voice.
For a moment Rachel dares to hope that he still cared and risked a glance at him, but there is nothing in his eyes to support this. Crushed, she shakes her head.
"There is always work for the likes at you over at the Silver Garter," someone catcalled.
John draws himself up to his full and not inconsiderable height and glared in the general direction of the unseen heckler.
"What the hell has it got to do with you, any of you?" John lets his bitterness show for the first time since Rachel left him three months before.
"They're right though aren't they John?" Rachel says sadly, "I ain't anything but a whore."
"You watch your mouth," John growls at her, "Afore I tan your hind-end. Come to think of it, that's what I should have done in the first place."
John looked away at his reflection in the mirror and took another swig of beer. Who could blame her for wanting a younger man, he thought. The man staring back looked old. Not that many would think so. There wasn't one man in town that would cross him, not even the sheriff.
"You still could," Rachel said softly.
"I still could what?" John rounded on her.
"Give me a licking like my Pa used to," Rachel blushed to say it with so many to hear. "He even suggested it when we got married if you recall?"
John snorted and took another beer and then added, "I do. A wise man your Pa."
Rachel offered him a sad smile and, forgetting his anger for a moment, John laughed.
"If you take me back I'll mind you like Pa said I was to and take a licking for what I did." Rachel was blushing furiously, but some things needed to be said.
"If I gave you a licking for what you did, it would take until Christmas and you wouldn't sit down 'til the following Easter."
"I guess not, but I guess if I had it coming," Rachel said ruefully. "You could always hand it out on an instalment basis like that time you bought the piano from Sears."
It was a weak joke. They had once argued about her buying fancy goods on tick.
"I've half a mind to do it too," John growled.
"Then you'd take me back?"
There was a deadly hush in the room and one or two of the ladies who had crowded around the saloon door waited with arrested breath.
"You done with gallivanting, fancy talk and your spoilt ways?" John turned to face his wife now, drinking her in and hardly daring to believe that he could have her back.
"The first I can swear to. As to the other two, well I can't rightly say that I ever meant either so it would be up to you to teach me," Rachel said boldly.
"You said you'd take a licking?" John asked pointedly.
"Yes," Rachel gasped, but her eyes were wide and if she had a right to, she would have prayed to God and all the angels not to have the conversation in the middle of the Lucky Strike.
"Then call it what it is, I ain't no wife beater," John said sternly.
"John? I'm not sure..."
"A licking you said, but what did your Ma and Pa call it even when we were courting?"
"I was barely 18..." Rachel gulped and really did wish a host of heaven would carry her away.
"What did they call it? What did they do right up until the day we wed?"
"A spanking, they spanked... and sometimes..."
"How exactly?" John pressed her.
Rachel was puce now and her eyes scanned the room and saw about a hundred eager pairs of eyes witnessing her shame.
"I guess you ain't changed," John rasped, turning back to his beer.
"They spanked my bare bottom," Rachel said hastily, "And if I was real bad then either Pa took a strop to me or Ma would send me out back to cut a switch."
John nodded with satisfaction and drank the rest of his beer in one go.
"And that's what I'm gonna do," John drawled and turned to fix Rachel with a long hard stare.
"Yes John," Rachel said, blushing.
"Now you get over to the hardware store and buy yourself a spanking brush. A hairbrush will do, as long as you tell the storekeeper that it's for the other end. And I do mean tell him in a nice clear voice. If he ain't got one, then get a bath-scrubber or one of those fancy brushes for sweeping down your Sunday best." John let a smile flicker on his otherwise straight line of a mouth. "I got a room over at the hotel. Meet me there."
"Yes John," Rachel said, ducking her head and hurrying away.
As soon as she reached the swing doors to the saloon the crowd began to laugh and the hubbub quickly rattled round town that Rachel Bedford was going to get a spanking.
Rachel kept her head down as she crossed the street to the store. With any luck the store would be quiet and she could make a discreet purchase. She kept her eyes firmly fixed on the hem of her skirts where she held them an inch or two from the ground. She hoped the grey dress and the matching bonnet made her look like a sober woman, but it was a fool's dream for a woman whose reputation was already shot. Even from the restricted view of her dipped headwear, which did nothing at all to hide the sunset red of her face, she could see people staring and pointing at her. Her only hope now was that the whole town hadn't heard about her conversation with John.
"Did you hear?" It was an eager young voice, too shrill to pin on an exact age or gender, "Mrs Bedford is going to get a spanking."
"Ooh." The despairing wail escaped Rachel's lips before her dignity could call it back.
The outburst was met with peals of general laughter and Rachel hurried on until her feet were hard upon the sidewalk outside the store. There she paused.
"Ain't you gonna go in?" It was another eager voice.
"Oh go to blazes," she said angrily, to more laughter.
Any hopes that the store would be empty were dashed by the small crowd of onlookers who followed her in.
"Mrs Bedford, how nice to see you again," the storekeeper Harris grinned, "Did you have a good... yes well, nice to see you home. A brush you wanted, I believe."
Rachel glared at him but couldn't hold her gaze and retreated back under her bonnet with a spreading blush.
"I have the latest thing from England, a Mason Pearson hairbrush, or would you prefer a good old American standard model," Harris gushed, "Very sturdy."
"Then you know what it is for?" Rachel whispered.
"What's that?" Harris leaned forward.
"You know why I want a brush?" She tried again only a bee's breath louder.
"I'm sorry Mrs Bedford, there does seem to be a lot of people in here today," Harris said craning his neck with one hand forming a trumpet to his ear.
"She wants to know if you know that it is for a spanking, if you follow me," one of the gathered matrons said in a loud disapproving voice.
The sudden onrush of laughter that greeted this caused Harris to start and pull a face.
"You mean it's not for the head, but is to be applied to the other... eh end, so to speak," Harris said uncomfortably, "Eh yes, I had heard something to that affect."
Rachel nodded, unable to speak. She hoped that this humiliation would satisfy John's instructions.
"The Mason Pearson's the best choice for that, but a trifle more. Otherwise you would be better off with the long-handled bath brush here, but that might be... well I don't have a small one ma'am, if you understand me."
Rachel fumbled for some coins; the Mason Pearson was far beyond what she could pay. She eyed the fearsome bath brush with horror and quailed.
"Mrs Bedford is a lady," Mrs Bailey, the parson's wife put in. She had been the only customer in the store before the horde had descended, although even she had already heard about the conversation in the saloon. "I am sure you can put the hairbrush on Mr Bedford's account."
Seeking agreement from Rachel with his eyes, Harris beamed at having made such an extravagant sale.
"Surely," he said happily.
Rachel hid her embarrassment behind her bonnet as Harris wrapped the brush in brown paper and then made an excruciating departure from the press behind her.
"Make way there, you vultures," the preacher's wife chided.
The hotel lobby was little better as far as Rachel was concerned. It seemed that today, everybody in town had business there.
"Mrs Bedford, how nice to see you," the clerk grinned. "Mr Bedford is already in his room. He is expecting you."
Rachel stared back at him blankly, too embarrassed to speak.
"Room number six, second right at the top of the stairs." The clerk hid a smirk by running his tongue inside his cheek.
Rachel nodded in acknowledgement and all but ran up the stairs.
For a moment Rachel had visions of her fancy eastern school and seeing her old head mistress. She remembered long minutes spent standing outside a door waiting to be admitted. Mercifully the hotel room door was ajar and she could see John standing at the window smoking a cigar.
Smoothing her dress she took a deep breath and then went in.
"John I..." Rachel paused at the sight of the old razor strop laid out on the bed. It had been her father's, given to John in half-jest when they first married.
"You got what I sent you for?" John said, chewing on the end of his cigar.
Rachel nodded, her eyes locked onto the strop. Then seeing her husband had turned to look, she added, "Yes Sir."
The 'Sir' came naturally, as it had when addressing her father at such times.
"Make your mind up to it, I intend to pay you out thoroughly," John said rather pompously.
She took comfort from his tone. He sounded more like the old John. The man she loved, even before her foolish flight, if she had but known it.
"Yes Sir," Rachel said as she stood up straight. Then she quietly added, "I love you John. I didn't know it until I ran off, but... do you forgive me?"
John looked back over his shoulder and studied her hard. Then he gave her a curt nod and murmured, "I will in good time."
Rachel pursed her lips and nodded. It was more than she had expected; certainly more than she deserved. Then she watched as her husband stubbed out his cigar in the tray provided and began to remove his jacket.
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