by Nerys Leigh
“Oh no, I’m not telling you about any of the others.” He pushed out of his chair. “Save your skills of persuasion for anyone we need to question.”
Smiling, she stood up. She was tall for a woman, only three or so inches shorter than him. Usually he had to look down at any woman near him. It was kind of nice not to have to.
She batted her eyelashes, gazing at him with exaggerated innocence. “Won’t you be teaching me interrogation techniques?”
He took her elbow and guided her to the door. “Only if you don’t try them out on me.”
On the recommendation of the hotel receptionist who now thought Val snored so loudly his wife couldn’t stand to sleep in the same room with him, they turned left outside, in the direction of a respectable restaurant he said wasn’t too far.
The moment they left the hotel, Val was on alert. And with good reason. They hadn’t gone ten feet before two men were eyeing Belle with the air of a pack of wolves stalking their prey. Val scowled at them until they had passed, then he turned to scowl at them some more until they looked away from her.
After a quick succession of three more men did nothing to hide their appreciation for her, Val stuck out his elbow and waggled it. “Please would you take my arm?”
She glanced at his elbow. “Why?”
“Because it’s easier for me to lay claim to you and warn away every other man if we look as though we’re actually together.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Lay claim to me? I’m not a piece of land.”
“You know what I mean. I told you, it’s dangerous here. The men need to know you’re under my protection.”
To his chagrin, she actually laughed at that. “You think these dangerous ruffians are afraid of you?”
“Hey, I can look threatening when I want to.” He stood up straighter and puffed out his chest to make his point.
She giggled some more, possibly to make hers.
“Look, will you just walk on my arm? Please? I know you can look after yourself,” he resisted the urge to roll his eyes, “but I’d just feel better if you did.” He waggled his elbow again. “Be kind to your husband.”
Still grinning, she slipped her hand through his arm. “Fine, if it will make you feel better.”
“Thank you.”
It did make him feel better.
Both because it let everyone know she was with him and for a whole host of additional reasons to do with her closeness that he didn’t care to think about at that moment.
Chapter Five
Horton’s Saloon, Museum & Theatre was a large, two story building with mock Doric columns either side of the entrance. A huge, intricately painted sign over the door proclaimed its multiple attractions of alcohol, gambling, nightly performances, and “fascinating collection of curiosities from around the globe and extensive range of stereographs to delight and titillate”.
Belle had been wondering what the ‘museum’ part of the establishment was. The fact that it was an actual museum, of sorts, surprised her. She’d assumed it was some kind of euphemism, given what else went on in the place.
She and Val entered a large lobby somewhat gaudily adorned with fake marble columns and gold painted paneling. To their left, a wide archway opened into the saloon and gambling hall which, despite it being only ten in the morning, already entertained a smattering of customers lounging at the tables and bar. To their right, a closed double doorway was marked auditorium. And in front of them another set of doors, these open, bore a sign proclaiming it to be Horton’s Museum of Delights – Entry 5ȼ.
It was the kind of place Belle’s parents would never have permitted her anywhere near back in New York and a frisson of excitement shivered down her spine at just stepping through the door. It was accompanied by a healthy dose of nerves, but she tamped those down. She was determined to prove to Val that she would be a good Pinkerton agent.
She glanced at him standing beside her. Much as she hated to admit it to herself, his presence was comforting. If anything went wrong, she knew he’d be there for her. She didn’t know how she knew, but she did.
A young man walked past them, came to an abrupt halt, and backed up a few steps. Her skin crawled as his gaze brazenly raked down her form.
“Anything I can do for you, Miss?” he said, his stubble-roughened face widening into a leer.
Val stepped in front of her. “Do you work here?”
The man glanced at him for a moment before moving to the side so he could see her again. “Yeah.”
Val shifted again, inserting himself between them. “Is Mr. Horton in his office?”
The man scowled at him. “Far as I know.” He leaned to one side to address Belle. “You need anything at all, my name’s Jacob Curtis. Just ask for Jake.”
Before she could reply, Val grasped her elbow and propelled her towards a door marked ‘private’ in the far corner of the lobby.
“Stay away from him,” he said, once they were through the door. “Men like him are dangerous.”
She stopped to fix him with a look. “I’m a woman, Val. You think I don’t know that?”
His frown turned to a smile. “Good point.”
The corridor they had entered was dim, with only a small window high up on one wall to provide any light, but the pine floorboards and white painted walls were clean. Belle wasn’t sure exactly what she’d expected of a place of such dubious morals, but this didn’t fit in with her assumptions. She’d expected it to be more… dingy.
Val led the way to a door at the far end of the hallway and knocked.
He was answered immediately by a booming, “Enter.”
He opened the door for her and she stepped into a spacious, airy room. Light streamed through a window to their left onto red painted walls hung with an eclectic assortment of portraits, landscape paintings, and framed posters advertising various plays and performances.
Behind a huge desk covered with an array of books and papers sat a slight man with graying brown hair and neatly trimmed beard and moustache.
He stood and held out his hand. “Valentine, good to see you.”
Belle glanced around, expecting to find someone bigger to own the booming tone that had bid them enter. Surely such a voice couldn’t have come from this man who looked more like a banker than anything else. But there was no one else there.
Val moved forward to shake his hand. “Belle, may I present James Horton, owner of this fine establishment, and several others besides. James, this is Isabelle Stevens. She’s training to become one of the new wave of female Pinkerton agents.”
She walked forward and held out her hand. “It’s a pleasure, Mr. Horton.”
“The pleasure is all mine, I assure you.” He shook her hand firmly but gently. “Female Pinkerton agents, you say?”
“Certainly,” she said. “We can investigate just as well as any man.”
“I’m sure you can,” he replied, smiling. “And it’s about time Pinkerton hired more of you. But… Stevens?” His gaze flicked between the two of them. “That’s quite a coincidence.”
Val cleared his throat, looking awkward. “Belle is my wife.”
Mr. Horton’s eyebrows shot up. “Well well, not much surprises me anymore, but you’ve managed it. I never thought I’d see the day when Valentine Stevens got married.”
“It’s complicated,” Val said.
“And temporary,” Belle added.
“Archie Gordon’s idea.”
Mr. Horton chuckled. “Don’t be so quick to dismiss matrimony. Each of my wives has brought light and joy to my life.”
She couldn’t help wondering how many wives he’d had, and why, if they were such a joy, there’d been a multiple of them.
He waved them into two chairs set in front of his desk.
“So you’re having some trouble with possible sabotage?” Val said.
Belle pulled a piece of paper and a pencil from her bag.
“If that’s what it is. If you ask me, it’s doubtful, but the producer o
f this new show starting next week is worried about it, and I expect this one to make me a substantial amount of money. So if she’s worried, I’m worried.”
“What’s happened to make her worried?” Belle asked, her pencil poised to jot down notes.
“It started five days ago, the day after they arrived. Miss Maria Wheeler and her Burlesque Beauties. She’s had exceptionally successful runs in New York, Philadelphia and Boston, and now she wants to ‘conquer the west’, as she puts it. The woman knows what she’s doing, too. She’s planning on touring theatres right from here to the coast. With the number of men starved for the sight of a woman, she’ll make a fortune. I was lucky to get her here. This is her first time trying out a touring show and she wanted to test it out somewhere before taking it on the road, so she’s doing a couple of weeks of rehearsal here, then the show will run for three weeks, then she’ll move to my three other theatres, then go on from there.” A satisfied smirk spread over his face. “It’ll be huge, mark my words. Men will be selling their souls to see these scantily clad women perform.” Mr. Horton was clearly a man in love with a profit.
“Watch out, Jim, there’s a lady present,” Val said, smiling.
Mr. Horton nodded to her. “My apologies, Mrs. Stevens, for being vulgar. To answer your question, a number of minor incidents have occurred, any one of which could be construed as just an accident, but together might, and I say might, constitute a pattern. Scripts going missing, scenery damaged, a fire in the room where all the costumes are being stored. While they were rehearsing on the stage two days ago, one of the backdrops somehow worked free and the whole thing came down. It was a miracle no one was hurt. After that, I called Archie Gordon.”
“Not Sheriff Carr?” Val asked.
“What would I say? The sheriff’s got enough on his hands trying to keep law and order in this town. He hasn’t got men to spare for a series of probable accidents. But if Miss Wheeler thinks I’m not doing anything she might take her show elsewhere, and I very much don’t want her to do that. I’m afraid she’s not here right now, but if you come back this afternoon I can introduce you.”
Belle paused in her writing. “You have other performances going on here right now, don’t you?”
“We do. A show every night plus matinees on Wednesdays and Sundays.”
She raised her eyebrows. “You have entertainment on Sundays?”
He nodded. “Forgive me for being frank, Mrs. Stevens, but most of the men here don’t have much to do with God. Sundays are the same as any other day, except many of them don’t have to work and they need something to do with their time and money. Some go to church, but most prefer drinking and entertainment. Sundays are my best days.”
It occurred to her that if anywhere needed God, it was Cheyenne, but she didn’t say it. She wasn’t there to judge, she was there to investigate.
She resumed her note-taking. “Have any of these incidents happened to the other shows you have running?”
“No, just the burlesque. Which, admittedly, does give me pause for thought.”
“Anyone you know of have any reason to not want the show to play?” Val asked.
“A burlesque show with jokes and women wearing tights? In Cheyenne? Not likely. If anything, it’s the opposite. I’ve been advertising in advance, building up the anticipation, and the men are desperate for it to start. There is a small group of women who have set themselves up as some kind of moral campaigners in the town, although they haven’t been very successful, obviously. But I wouldn’t credit them with this kind of thing. They’re women, after all.”
Belle stopped scribbling and looked up from her notes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
The smile slipped from Mr. Horton’s face. “Uh, no offence meant. Just that, you know, women are the gentler sex. They wouldn’t stoop to anything like setting fires and sabotaging scenery.”
And she was just beginning to like him. “Women can do most anything they want to, including perpetrating criminal acts, or becoming a Pinkerton agent.”
Next to her, Val laughed. “She’s got you there, Jim. Plenty of female criminals around, and soon there’ll be plenty of female Pinkerton agents to catch them.”
Mr. Horton’s smile returned. “I stand corrected. Although I still doubt this particular group of women would do any of that. They’re just not the types. I can give you names if you’d like though.”
“Thank you.” She glanced at Val and he gave her the slightest of nods and smiled.
She could investigate just fine. And she didn’t need to be married to do it.
~ ~ ~
“You did well in there,” Val said to Belle as they walked back outside. “Asked a lot of good questions.”
He was also impressed at how she’d written everything down, without him even suggesting it. He’d done the same thing, when he first started.
“Can I ask you something?” she said.
They paused to allow a wagon to trundle by before crossing the street.
“You can ask me anything you want, anytime you want. You won’t learn if you don’t.”
She’d already heard about his previous humiliating visit to Cheyenne. She couldn’t ask anything worse than that.
“Why weren’t you taking notes in there?”
He shrugged. “I used to, but now I generally just remember what people tell me.”
“Do you have an infallible memory?”
“Well, no, but it’s pretty good. It’s served me well.” And maybe he was also getting just a little lazy about it.
She looked at him sideways. “I prefer to make sure I have all the information I need, rather than trusting in something that’s just ‘pretty good’.”
He barked a laugh. Working with Belle was going to be entertaining, if nothing else. “Aren’t I supposed to be the one doing the teaching here?”
She shrugged and smiled. She had one of the prettiest smiles he’d ever seen, tiny wrinkles creasing the corners of her sparkling blue eyes and her full pink lips opening to reveal straight white teeth. Of course, working with her was going to be pleasurable for reasons other than just entertainment. He also didn’t object to having something nice to look at.
“So what are we going to do next?” she said. “Are we going to question those women Mr. Horton told us about?”
“Might as well. We have the time before lunch. Then we’ll go back to the theatre to question Maria Wheeler.”
A man walking towards them looked Belle up and down, a leer stretching his face. Val scowled at him and moved closer to her. When the man had passed, he held out his elbow.
She heaved a sigh. “Are we back to this again?”
“Yes, we are. It’s my job to protect you and that would be a whole lot easier if you were on my arm.”
Rolling her eyes, she moved to his side and slipped her arm through his. “Better?”
He patted her hand and tried to ignore how her simple gesture that meant nothing had made his chest shiver.
“Much.”
Chapter Six
Talking to the group of campaigning women turned out to be fruitless. Val gave Belle the task of questioning them, but there were only six women in the group and she didn’t get the impression any of them would so much as carelessly toss aside an item of litter.
She didn’t envy them their self-imposed task of cleaning up a town like Cheyenne, but she wished them well and determined to pray for them every day. On their own, they didn’t stand a chance, but with God’s help anything could happen. The fact that Belle was there, learning to become an actual Pinkerton detective, was proof of that.
After their visit to the women, she and Val went to see the sheriff. A professional courtesy, Val said, just to let him know they were there conducting an investigation.
Thomas Jeff Carr seemed young to be the sheriff of the whole of Laramie county, but Val said he was a good man and well up to the task of cleaning up the town. Sheriff Carr also vouched for the ladies she’d questioned, wh
ich was reassuring. She was sure they had nothing to do with the sabotage, but having their innocence confirmed by no less than the sheriff banished any lingering doubts she might be wrong.
From the sheriff’s office they went to the same place they’d had supper the evening before for lunch, then returned to the theatre.
The saloon was more full this time than it had been earlier in the day. The men Belle saw drinking looked, on the whole, like a rough bunch and she was glad they weren’t investigating in there. Despite what she’d told Val and Mr. Gordon back in the Pinkerton offices in Denver, she’d lived a relatively sheltered life so far, thanks to her parents’ determination that she and her sisters grew up as refined as possible despite their lowly circumstances, and saloons were an unknown quantity to her. Although as a Pinkerton agent she imagined she’d need to get used to such places. An agent never knew where they’d be sent next.
She wasn’t sure if the shiver that idea sent through her stomach was fear or excitement.
They headed for the doors leading to the auditorium and entered an unexpectedly grand room. Long and narrow, with boxes set into the walls and a stage at the far end, the Horton Theatre boasted red upholstered seating, matching scarlet curtains to either side of the stage, two huge crystal chandeliers, and a painted ceiling that Belle had to look at twice.
“Yes, that’s exactly what you think it is,” Val remarked.
She lowered her eyes, blushing furiously and vowing never to look up again.
“Mr. Horton calls it ‘the pleasures of the gods’,” a voice said from the gloom of the very back rows. “I’d just call it an orgy, myself.”
A shadow resolved itself into a face and Belle gave an internal grimace. Of all the people she didn’t want to see again.
“I thought you’d be back,” Jacob Curtis said, grinning. “If you’re looking for me, here I am.”
“She’s not,” Val snapped. “We’re looking for Miss Wheeler.”
Mr. Curtis nodded towards the stage. “Right down there. You an actress?” he asked Belle. “’Cause you’re pretty enough.”