Silver Lies Read online

  "What? Just a moment, child." She scrambled about, gathering the minimum needed to be decently clothed. In less than a minute, she flung open the door, still buttoning a dress over her chemise. "She isn’t in the room?"

  Inez heard a thump from the direction of the parlor. Reverend Sands appeared in the hallway, minus jacket and shoes, waistcoat hanging loose over his half-buttoned shirt. With his hair rumpled and the sleep still clearing from his face, he looked only slightly less disoriented than she felt.

  "Could she be in the kitchen?" He started to the back of the house, buttoning up his shirt and waistcoat.

  Joey jumped from one foot to the other, a small red grasshopper in flannels. "I just woke up. She’s not here."

  Inez finally registered the ancillary source of his discomfort.

  "Do you need a chamber pot, Joey?" At his nod, she led him back into the room and pulled the container from under the nightstand. A quick examination showed the big bed slept in, but the sheets no longer warm.

  Sands appeared, terse. "The back door’s unlocked." He headed to the parlor for his boots. "Looks like footprints outside, heading to the alley."

  Inez hurried Joey into pants and jacket and into the kitchen. She pulled on Mark’s old sturdy boots over her wool sleeping socks and tied Joey’s shoes.

  "Stay here." Sands came through the kitchen, buckling on his gun belt, his overcoat hanging on his shoulders.

  "We’re coming. Two of us can search twice as fast." She shoved her arms into Mark’s old greatcoat, ripping the lining in one sleeve in her haste.

  Sands shot her a dubious glance, which she ignored. Inez stuffed her waist-length braid under the coat and searched pockets for gloves. He yanked open the back door.

  It still snowed. Soft, silent, fast. Faint, regular depressions advanced to the alley.

  "Any reason she’d go back to the house?" Reverend Sands pulled on his gloves.

  "Her Bible." Inez’s heart beat hard, a hammer pounding the same nail over and over. "She left it in her bedroom. I lent her mine, told her we’d come back in the morning."

  Reverend Sands started down the steps. "I never should’ve returned her key."

  Inez gripped Joey’s mittened hand and hastened after the reverend.

  The journey to the alley and past the intervening lots was silent and cold. Inez heard only her own ragged breathing as she and Joey floundered through drifts, struggling to catch up with Sands, and thought only her own silent prayers: Please God, let everything be all right. Please God, not Emma.

  At the back fence to Emma’s house she saw, through the scrim of falling snow, the back door hanging open like the broken jaw of some gaping beast. The shadow form of Reverend Sands hesitated on the back porch, drew his gun, and vanished inside.

  Inez wavered, considered the wisdom of taking Joey any further. Dark apprehensions crowded, whispering like the falling snow. She could not retreat. Her fears for Emma forced her toward that dark doorway.

  She picked up Joey, pushing his face against her shoulder. "Hold on tight," she whispered. "And don’t look." Burdened with his weight, she wallowed through the shrouded yard and up the back stairs.

  Blundering into the kitchen, blinded after the dead-white world outside, Inez screamed as she collided with an unseen form. The form materialized into Sands, who crowded her into retreat. "Out. Get him out of here. Get a neighbor. Doc. The marshal."

  Inez caught a whiff of something sour, metallic.

  A smell she identified with panic. With blood.

  Her sight adjusted to the dim interior. The kitchen was a chaos of overturned boxes, smashed china.

  Inez pushed Joey toward Sands, forcing him to grab for the child. Freed of Joey’s weight, she dodged around the reverend and ran through the kitchen into the dark hallway.

  To the right, she saw a slice of the parlor, trunks upended, clothes and personal objects spilling into the hall. Immediately left, Joey’s bedroom. Beyond that, the half-closed door to Emma’s room.

  She shoved the door open.

  A broken china washbasin, scattered books, linens.

  A slashed bedtick, spilling out a wasteland of feathers.

  At the foot of the bed, what looked to be crumpled bedclothes.

  Until she saw the tangle of red hair and a blood-splattered, outstretched arm, fingers almost touching the Bible just beyond their reach.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  "Emma. Oh, Emma."

  Inez cradled Emma’s head in her arms.

  Blood, everywhere.

  A particularly ominous patch soaked through Emma’s thin dress and petticoat, pooling about her hips and legs. Inez touched the woolen stocking hanging from Emma’s neck. The fabric, now cut away, had left angry red marks impressed on her throat.

  Inez tried to untie a second stocking knotted around one of Emma’s wrists.

  "Who did this to you, Emma? Who?"

  Emma’s eyes were half-shut, her face blue and mottled with bruises. Inez could barely detect the rise and fall of her breath.

  A thunder of footsteps pounded up the back steps and grew louder in the kitchen and hallway, accompanied by the urgent baritones and tenors of masculine voices. Inez tugged the dress down over Emma’s pale, blood-streaked calves, attempting a small measure of modesty for her unconscious friend.

  The company of men descended on the room like a cloud of ravens, dark winter coats swirling about them. Gloved hands lifted Inez from the floor, away from Emma’s limp body. Inez struggled to stay, clutching Emma’s unresponsive hand.

  "Mrs. Stannert." Doc’s calm rumble called her back from the edge of hysteria. "Let me do my work. There’s no place for you here right now." His voice rose to include the others. "Please leave the room."

  Doc delivered her to other waiting hands and crouched by Emma. He rapidly shed his coat and began to peel off his gloves.

  Reverend Sands herded everyone toward the parlor. Curly Dan and another deputy, faces apprehensive under their hat brims, ushered Inez to the parlor’s threshold and released her as if their duty and nerve ended at the doorjamb.

  Marshal Hollis snaked past them and walked slowly around the room examining the shambles and pulling at his tobacco-stained mustache. When he’d completed his circuit, Inez stepped forward to block his path.

  "You." She jabbed him with a finger covered with blood. Emma’s blood. "You find out who did this. Because if you don’t, I will. And I’ll kill him."

  Hollis scratched one end of his ragged mustache. Inez’s finger had missed his coat lapel and left a small red blotch on his sheepskin vest next to the badge. His tight green eyes focused beyond her. "Reverend. You was first on the scene, right?"

  "That’s right." Sands skirted an overturned box to stand by Inez.

  "So what’s she," Hollis jerked his chin toward Inez, "doin’ here?"

  Inez spoke up. "Since your response to our request for help yesterday was less than overwhelming," she could hear the deputies behind her shifting uneasily on their feet, "Mrs. Rose and her son stayed at my house last night. We thought it would be safer. When we awoke this morning, Mrs. Rose was," she faltered, "gone. We came here looking for her."

  "Uh-huh." The marshal’s narrow face thinned further with contempt. He chewed harder, glancing from Reverend Sands to Inez and back again.

  Inez realized that her undefined we invited any number of speculations. Some, no doubt accurate.

  Marshal Hollis looked around, as if searching for a place to spit. He finally brushed past Reverend Sands and muttered, "We’re talkin’ later. Alone."

  The marshal went out the front door. A moment later he was back, wiping tobacco juice off his chin. "You take that outta the room?" He pointed.

  Inez looked down at Emma’s Bible, clutched in her hand. The leather cover of the book was splattered with dark spots. "She came back for this."

  He snapped his fingers and held out his hand. Inez reluctantly gave it up, adding, "She reads to her son every morning—" She broke off, agha
st that Joey hadn’t even entered her mind until that moment.

  Reverend Sands squeezed her shoulder gently. "He’s at the saloon with Abe and Bridgette."

  Hollis flipped through the pages perfunctorily then handed it back to Inez. "Guess the young’un might need this," he said gruffly. "Curly, take Miz Stannert home. And Miz Stannert, I’ve got questions for you, too, so stay there ’til I come lookin’ for you."

  The thought of sitting alone in her house was more than she could bear. "Marshal," she said with equal coolness, "I’ll be at the saloon with Joey."

  Hollis grunted. Inez took that for consent and began to pull on the gloves she’d hastily stuffed into the pockets of the oversized jacket.

  Reverend Sands made a move as if to leave with her.

  "Nope, Reverend. You stay. You an’ me, we gotta talk."

  Sands squeezed her shoulder once more. He and Hollis then moved to the far side of the room, hands clasped behind their backs, voices low, shutting out everyone else.

  999

  Bridgette sat next to Joey at the saloon’s kitchen table. "Tish. Eat. Your mother would want you to keep your strength up."

  Inez watched by a tray of clean dishes, shot glass in one hand, towel in the other.

  Joey looked at the fingers of dry toast stacked log-cabin style on the plate before him, his silent misery plain for all to see.

  "That’s right," Bridgette said, as if by merely looking at the food he could draw sustenance from it. "Eat one, there’s a lad."

  Inez shook her head, picked up the tray, and carried it to the barroom.

  Abe turned from counting whiskey bottles. "The boy eatin’ yet?"

  "No. Nor talking. He hasn’t said a word since he asked…" She bit her lip too hard, then rubbed it with her knuckles. "‘Is mama going to die?’"

  Abe’s pencil paused above the inventory list. "What’d you say to that?"

  "I told him, ‘If there’s a God in heaven, she’ll live.’"

  "Let’s hope you’re not settin’ him up to be a nonbeliever."

  "Emma’s got to live." Inez began arranging the glasses on the shelf under the bar. "Do you know what her last—well, almost last—words were to me?" She didn’t wait for his response. "She made me promise to look after Joey if something happened to her. To raise him as my own. Not that I’ve done such a bang-up job with William." Panic rose in her throat. "I can’t do it, Abe. She’s got to live."

  "You’ll do what you got to do and when you’ve got to do it, Inez."

  "Emma’s at the hospital. Doc said he’d come by tonight after Joey’s asleep. I’ve never seen him look so grim. Oh Emma. Oh God. Abe, if you’d seen her." Inez flinched from the memory of Emma crumpled on the floor, smeared in blood. "I can’t imagine who would do that. Some animal. Worse than an animal. A monster."

  Crouched below the level of the bar, she rested her forehead on the smooth mahogany edge. The dark hollow underneath smelled of wood polish, whiskey, and dust. "That dolt of a marshal better catch who did it. And they better string him up."

  Abe’s footsteps echoed on the raised plank floor. "Hope he catches the right man." His tone was dark. "Emma’s no fallen flower of State Street. Folks’ll be hollering for a necktie party, the sooner the better. The town is still all riled up over Stewart and Frodsham, and they were just a footpad and a lot-jumper. The law won’t have a chance."

  Inez remembered the midnight lynchings that had occurred a block away just before Thanksgiving. "In this case, Abe, I’d cast my vote with the vigilantes for swift justice at the end of a rope."

  Justice. The glasses lined up on the shelf, touching lip to lip. "Reverend Sands will be by later."

  "Hmmph." Abe’s footsteps approached and stopped.

  She turned her head. "What?" At that level all she could see were the knees of his brown worsted pants and his brown boots.

  His voice drifted down to her. "Thought you’d be on first-name basis with your reverend by now. After the dance and all."

  And all.

  Inez suddenly felt warm all over—her wrists, the back of her neck, behind her knees. She rearranged the glasses, staggering the line to make space for the last ones. "Where’s Useless? Today, of all days. We need his help if we’re going to be ready for New Year’s."

  "Sorry, sorry," Useless’ apologetic voice fumbled in from the kitchen. "Sorry I’m late. I can finish that inventory, Mr. Jackson. Or I can do the storeroom, if you haven’t yet. Jeez, it’s storming out there."

  Inez popped her head above the counter. "You look terrible. Are you all right?"

  He ducked his head, pulling his hat down. "Yes’m." His face looked frozen and raw. He snuffled and pulled the threadbare muffler tight about his neck, glancing back toward the kitchen.

  "Don’t get sick on us." Inez picked up the empty tray. "Mrs. Rose has had a terrible accident. I’ll be taking care of her son. So, you can’t count on me for a while, particularly nights."

  His head swiveled toward the kitchen. "That her boy?" His head swiveled back. "Jeez. I didn’t know she had a kid." His complexion mottled, like meat turned bad. "What, uh, happened to her?" His ungloved hands twisted in the muffler. Fresh scabs oozed on his knuckles.

  "I can’t talk about it. But someone will pay. If the law doesn’t see to it…" She gripped the edges of the metal tray until they bit into her fingers. "I will."

  "Now, Inez, leave the shotgun under the counter and let the marshal do what he was hired to do." Abe moved to unlock the front door. Early customers filtered in, along with the weak afternoon light.

  Inez lost herself in the routine of taking orders, pouring drinks, accepting money, making change, making small talk. Her half-trance and Useless’ increased bumbling caused more colliding behind the bar than usual. Abe finally sent Useless to the wholesale liquor dealer to place an order and extract a promise of next-day delivery. Inez checked the kitchen frequently to see how Joey was doing.

  Late afternoon, Inez exited the kitchen from another brief foray and almost bumped into Abe, who was looking for her. "Marshal’s here, Inez. Wants to talk with you."

  She removed her apron, smoothed her hair, and scanned the crowded saloon room. Marshal Hollis slouched by the bar, pants and coat crusted with snow, small icicles hanging from his frozen mustache. He clutched a tumbler in his hand, a bottle of Red Dog at his elbow.

  "We can talk in the office, Marshal Hollis." She led the way upstairs, posture as erect as if she was escorting him to the family drawing room.

  Once in the office, Hollis threw himself onto the small sofa without waiting for her to sit. He gulped down half the tumbler of Red Dog and cradled the glass as if the high thermal power of the remaining firewater could warm his hands through the soaked gloves.

  She sat in the office chair and waited. She didn’t have to wait long.

  "You think I’m stupid, don’t ya."

  Startled, she narrowed her eyes and said nothing.

  He banged the glass down on the end table. "Stupid and crooked. I seen it on your face, every time I open my mouth. Waall, don’t think that your friends in high places are gonna pull you or Jackson outta the fire, if you-all turn out to be the ones I’m after."

  Her mouth dropped open.

  He leaned back, fingers intertwined over his rough sheepskin vest. His coat and pant hems dripped onto the rug. "I know all about the coney from Saturday last. And I know about you sniffin’ around after Joe Rose’s dee-mise, in his office, the bank, the Recorder’s Office. You won’t back off. Waall, maybe what happened to Miz Rose is a dee-rect result of your meddlin’."

  "How dare you!" Inez half rose from her chair.

  "Siddown." He stretched out his legs. His coat fell open further, revealing a Colt .45, holstered for a cross-draw and only inches from his laced fingers.

  She sat down.

  "I haven’t figured it all out yet," he continued. "But I know the coney’s part of it. Old Harry, he and his buddies want the town cleaned up, but they won’t listen to me, es
pecially now that they got an ‘expert’ in town." He glared. Furious, excluded. "Gallagher thinks it’s all your husband’s and that nigger’s doin’, that you’ve been duped. Not me. Wouldn’t surprise me to find out you’re in it deeper than pig shit in a wallow. You’re a piece of work, Miz Stannert." His contempt was clear as rainwater. "Actin’ so proper when you and that reverend—" He stopped, jaw working. He looked around, stood, walked over to the spittoon, and spat. "He don’t look so lily-white to me neither."

  He returned to the sofa and sat, removing his wet gloves and squeezing them in one hand. Dirty water ran down his fingers and dripped onto the rug. "I’m here to make you a deal. I don’t like it, but I’ve been told to." His green eyes locked onto her. "Tell me who’s in the coney racket. What Joe Rose did for them. What he got that everyone’s so all-fired eager to get their hands on now, and what you’re lookin’ for. Tell me about that blackleg husband of yours and Jackson. You talk to me, right now, and you don’t get charged."

  She was stunned beyond belief. Nearly beyond response. "My husband has been missing for months! I had nothing to do with the counterfeit. How dare you make these accusations? And what do you mean about Joe?"

  "You deny bein’ involved?"

  "Deny it? It’s preposterous! You can’t arrest me. For what? On what proof?"

  "Okay. You had your chance." Hollis heaved himself out of the seat and towered over her, hooking his thumbs over his gun belt. "I’m lookin’ for a murderer and a coney ring. I’m sayin’, official-like, I want you and Jackson to sit tight. Not that this blizzard gives you any choice. You leave town, I’ll take it as a right-straight admission of guilt. And I’ll hunt you, Jackson, and that no-account Mark Stannert—wherever he is—to the Colorado state line." He tipped his hat, heavy on the sarcasm. "I can find my way out."

  Inez remained in the office, staring at the half-empty tumbler of whiskey by the sofa. The marshal’s defrosting outerclothes had left wet spots on the velvet upholstery and the braided rug.

  He must know about Abe and Mark’s past. If Hollis and Cooke know, so do others. Abe’s right, someone’s stacked the deck against us. Joe in with a coney ring? How absurd! Harry’s behind this, that’s clear. And what did Hollis mean by an ‘expert’?