His Cure

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"There you are." Arthur said as he walked up behind me. "What are you doing over here?" "Hiding from Miss Grimshaw." I replied with a slight smirk. "She still giving you the run around?" He asked as he sat down next to me. "Yep. Remind me to never lay in again..." I groaned as I rubbed my eyes causing him to chuckle slightly as he pulled out a pack of cigarettes and lit one. "She's exhausting!" "Oh, trust me. I know." He responded as he passed me his cigarette.
"Miss Cheban!" Miss Grimshaw called out as she spotted me. "Goddamn it..." I muttered as she stormed towards us. "I heard that, I have excellent hearing. If you don't want to work hard then wake up before midday!" "I did wake up before midday!" "Eleven fifty five does not count, Elizabeth!" She argued. "Now, stop complaining and come help Miss Tilly with the rest of the laundry." "She can't." Arthur spoke up for me. "She's helping me and Hosea with somethin'. Speaking of, we should be going." He added as he stood up. "Fine." She muttered as I walked with Arthur towards the horses. "But, Miss Cheban, up bright and early tomorrow please!" She called out as I waved over my shoulder.
"Thank you." I sighed to Arthur as we mounted up.
"What are we doing anyway?" I asked as we began to ride out of camp. "We stole some moonshine from the Braithwaite's so we gon try sell it back to em." "God it's like the inbred version of Romeo and Juliet..." I replied causing him to laugh.

"Hosea?" Arthur called out as we approached a wagon filled with bottles of what I had to assume was moonshine. "Wow, we could have one hell of a good time with this." I said as I looked around. "But we could have even more fun with the money we get if we sell it." Hosea replied, walking out of the shadows, making me jump. "Jesus! We need to get you a bell or somethin'..." Arthur exclaimed as Hosea laughed. "Right, let's go sell this stuff, shall we?" Hosea asked as he jumped up onto the wagon, closely followed by Arthur. I hopped onto the back and we began riding towards the Braithwaite mansion.
"You seem quiet, Liz." Hosea asked as I watched the road. "Oh, what? Yeah, just tired. Miss Grimshaw's had we running round all afternoon." "Sleep in?" Hosea asked with a chuckle. I nodded before replying, "Never again..." "Why'd you sleep in? You're usually one of the first awake." He questioned as we turned down the path to the manor. "I was up late." "Doing what?" He asked. Think of something. Think of something. "Uh..." I began, trying to come up with a believable lie. "She was helping me with the finances." Arthur quickly butted in. Thank god for that.

"State your business!" One of the guards yelled as we approached. "Hello, gentlemen!" Hosea exclaimed. "What's in the wagon?" One of the men quickly asked. "Moonshine, my fine fellow! May I speak with the man of the house?" "The man of the house is a lady. Mrs Cathrine Braithwaite." "May I speak with her? I want to discuss a business opportunity. I mean no harm! You may happily shoot me if I do." Hosea exclaimed. "Okay, okay, she's in the house." One of the men replied as he hopped onto the back of the wagon with me.
Mrs Braithwaite quickly opened her front door as she saw us approaching.

"What you want?!" She shouted, clearly she didn't like outsiders. "Found something... out in the hills. Thought, thought maybe you was in the market for it." Hosea replied as he and Arthur jumped down from the wagon and I quickly followed. "For what?" "Some liquor." "I ain't in the market for what's already mine!" She shouted. I knew this would happen, Mrs Catherine was a very powerful woman who didn't like competition. "Way we see it, it's ours. What with us possessing it and I-I checked all over, for the life of me I couldn't see your name on it." Hosea replied but I quickly pulled out my gun when 3 armed men walked out of the house behind her. "Relax! I ain't here to rob you." He quickly added as he pushed my gun back into its holster. "We wanna do a deal. What do you sell that stuff for?" "Dollar a bottle." "Then give us fifty cents." Hosea replied as I watched him try and figure out the price so I quickly did the maths in my head for him. "I can see sixteen bottles, if you include the boxes at the back, which by the size of them I assume have two bottles each, you've got about twenty eight bottles. Twenty seven and a half if you consider what we used at the party. A dollar a bottle would get you twenty seven fifty so fifty cents a bottle would get you thirteen dollars and seventy five cents. We'll sell for seventy percent, fifty for the half the price of a bottle and twenty as a finders fee, which would get us a profit of nineteen twenty five." I said as I smiled at her before looking over to the boys. Arthur looked the most shocked I think I'd ever seen him and that's including the time we kissed. "What?" I asked as I looked at them gawking at me.
"It's already ours." Cathrine piped up. "Look on it as a reward, for finding the property." I replied. "Alternative is, we go sell it some place else." Hosea added as he saw their hesitation. "The alternative is you get shot." One of the body guards exclaimed. "Now, who wants to get shot over a bottle or two of liquor?" Hosea asked which caused one of the men to point a shotgun at him. I quickly placed my hand on my gun again, ready for battle. "Pay the men." Mrs Braithwaite laughed as one of the men pulled out a stack of cash and threw it towards us. "Pleasure doing business with you." Hosea said as he caught the stack. "And listen, we didn't take it... least not without orders from-" "Oh I know exactly who gave you your orders. Old Sheriff Gray!" She cut him off. "You know what? I don't want it. In fact sir, now you can do me a favour, there's an extra ten bucks if you do. Drive the stuff into Rhodes head over to the tavern run by Mr Gray, and give the stuff out for free!" "Momma!" One of the men called out. Huh... not body guards, sons. "Hush now! I believe they call that a promotional expense." "As you wish madam." Hosea replied with a laugh.
"You boys come back sometime and tell me how you made out! Maybe we'll play a little cribbage." She added as we walked back to the wagon.
"Next stop, the Rhodes saloon." Hosea said as we began to ride back up the path. "How the hell did you do that?" Arthur asked as he looked over his shoulder. "Do what?" "The whole price thing." "Oh, that. It was easy. Fifty cents is half of a dollar so seventy percent of the price for one, times the twenty seven and a half—" "No, I meant, where did you learn to do that...?" "Oh, me and an old friend used to sell horses for extra money. The stables are usually straight up bout the price but fences have a habit of tryina scam you so I had to learn." "That was very impressive, Miss Cheban. I think I'll be coming to you in future for help with money." Hosea replied with a smile.
"Hang on... didn't you say Liz was helping you with finances last night?" Hosea questioned Arthur after a moment. "Yeah...?" Arthur nervously replied. "Then why are you surprised that she's good with numbers?" "Oh...uh...she... well we-" Arthur struggled. "There wasn't much maths to do. It was more figuring out who had donated what and when." I quickly answered for him. "Right..." Hosea suspiciously replied but quickly moved onto a new topic about some bonds they had stolen from Cornwall so I tuned them out and got lost in my own thoughts again.

"Alright, this could get ugly. You and Dutch already have that thing going on in town with the sheriff." Hosea said after a while which caused me to perk up and listen. "Yeah, Mr Gray." Arthur replied. "That's it. Now we're inserting ourselves in his blood feud... we'll need something." I instantly knew what he meant. Hosea had a habit of dressing us up and making us prance around like monkeys. "I'm not playing dress up." Arthur quickly said. "Amen." I replied, agreeing with him. "You know how I feel about that." "Of course you're not, you're... a clowns idiot brother." "Hosea, please..." Arthur objected as I giggled. "I'm the clown, you're the idiot, just... look sad and keep quiet. Even you can do that Arthur." "Do I have to..?" Arthur moaned as Hosea pulled out a hat. "Put this hat on, smoke this pipe, bring your lip forward just a little bit... squint. Perfect!" "What about you?" Arthur asked. "Shh quiet. You can't speak. You're turned idiot." Hosea replied before putting on a funny voice and saying, "Quite broke poor mammy's heart." Arthur grunted in annoyance. "There there, Fenton, there there. Don't get mad now!" Hosea exclaimed which caused me to laugh. "I don't know why you're laughing, Martha! Your brother needs our help." He added, roping me into his games. "Ugh..." I groaned as I hopped down from the wagon when we had arrived at the saloon. "See, not so funny when it's happening to you." Arthur whispered as he picked up a couple of bottles.
After Hosea had convinced the men working there to let us take over for a few hours, we headed inside and began serving drinks.

"Over here Fenton!" One of the patrons called out causing Arthur to pour out another drink and slide it across the bar.

A few shots in and I was slightly tipsy. "Fenton!" I jokingly called out as I walked over to the bar. "Hello dear brother." I laughed as I leant on the bar. "Martha! Stop bothering your brother!" Hosea called out from across the bar which caused me to laugh more. "Fenton, follow me..." I smugly muttered as I walked out the back. "What is it, Martha?" Arthur jokingly asked. "Shhh, you're turned idiot... you can't speak..." I whispered as I took the pipe out of his mouth and moved closer. I suddenly realised that I must have been more drunk than I thought, sober me would never be this confident.
"Martha..." Arthur groaned as I got closer and closer until our lips were touching. I slid my hands up and down his chest as we made out. "Liz..." Arthur tried to speak between kisses but I wouldn't let him. "Liz." He repeated. "Elizabeth." He said as he gently held me back by my shoulders. "You're drunk..." "And?" I questioned as I went to lean in again but he stopped me. "And, I'm not going to take advantage of that." "You're not. I want it." "Liz, you're too dr—" he began but we were quickly cut off by the sound of shouting. "Shit." Arthur muttered as he ran back into the main bar. I tried to follow him but I was stumbling all over the place.
As gunshots filled the air I tried to pull my gun out but dropped it in my drunken panic. "We need to get out of here!" Arthur called out to Hosea. "Yeah! Where's Liz?!" "Over there!"
"Liz, we have to leave!" Arthur shouted as he helped me up off of the floor.

"What?" I asked as he helped me into the back of the wagon. How did I get here? I kept blacking out.

"She's drunk." Arthur replied to Dutch as he helped me to my tent. When did we get back to camp...?
"Okay, lay down and sober up." Arthur said as he gently laid me down on my bed. "Don't go..." I giggled as I grabbed him by his shirt and kissed him again before blacking out again.