A Touch of Frost

by Jo Goodman

  “I know it,” said Thaddeus.

  “Can’t say I do,” said Ben. He took the note when the sheriff held it out to him.

  “That’s a map from here to there,” said Jackson. “Waterfall. The stream. The cabin. Even drew a little smokehouse, though I would have figured that for having collapsed years ago.”

  “So that’s where we’ll find her?”

  “Yes. We leave the money here, and that’s where they’re telling us she’ll be.”

  But she wasn’t.

  Chapter Eight

  Phoebe hit the back of her head against the tree trunk when she snapped awake. She rubbed her scalp and found thin scales of bark in her hair. She picked them out one at a time and flicked them away, wondering all the while how long she had slept. She could not remember nodding off, or even feeling the need to do so. One moment she was wide awake, and then she wasn’t. Afraid it would happen again, she stood, biting back a groan as she did. She was not merely stiff; she ached. There were kinks in her joints and knots in her muscles. Stretching cautiously, she turned at the waist until her spine cracked in a most satisfying manner. Something parted the underbrush, disturbed the branches, and she paused, head cocked, waiting. Remington had not told her what sort of animals she could expect to encounter while she waited for his return. Her experience with four-legged creatures was largely limited to the feral cats that managed the rat and mice population in and around the theater.

  Phoebe softly cursed her rescuer, but there was no real heat in it. Her lips barely parted around the words. She couldn’t fault him for not warning her about wild animals when she had more to fear from the ones who stood upright and carried guns. Phoebe’s eyes wandered to the mare, which was still tethered exactly as Remington left her. The horse had not stirred in any significant way in the last several minutes. She took that as a good sign. Whatever had moved between the trees was not a threat. Phoebe breathed out slowly, relaxed.

  She stepped out from under the canopy of pine boughs and stared up into the cloudless night sky. Turning her back on the moon, Phoebe cast her eyes across the deep blue dome that was an unfamiliar heaven. Stars glittered and winked. Some formed shapes that she knew from myth and literature and she marveled at their constancy.

  When her neck began to ache, she lowered her gaze from the heavens to the horizon. Here, too, was a view she had never known before. The scale of the mountains had been unimaginable to her until now. She liked to think that she knew something about canyons and passes and trails after years of navigating the streets and alleys of Manhattan, but this, this, was something else again. These magnificent mountains, with their snowy slopes and icy peaks glinting in the moonlight, were a revelation, and Phoebe found herself grateful for this moment, no matter how it had come about, that she was witness to this stark, naked beauty.

  She shivered, though not entirely because she was cold. The movement was enough to pull her out of her reverie. She returned to the deep shadows under the towering spruce. The blanket tempted her to sit. To avoid that end, she picked it up, drew it tight around her shoulders, and told herself to think about anything besides the cold in her marrow and the ache in her bones.

  It was inevitable, then, that she thought about him.

  Thaddeus had spoken at some length about his son, in part because he was proud, and in part because Phoebe was interested enough to ask him questions. While Fiona gave Thaddeus her polite attention, which did not involve actual listening, Phoebe hung on every word.

  Thaddeus Frost was a natural storyteller, and Phoebe believed he deserved an appreciative audience. She was that. His accounts of his son’s accomplishments were not boastful, but they were told in the context of life at Twin Star. Phoebe knew herself to be fascinated by the vastness of the space he described—square miles, not square blocks—and the activities that were utterly foreign to her—roping, mustering, and branding. As Thaddeus told it, Remington was reluctant to head east to school, although “reluctant” was perhaps an understatement since there were arguments that included colorful language and violent threats, and on at least one occasion, a physical altercation that ended only after Thaddeus put his headstrong son in a watering trough.

  “He was just a young’un then,” Thaddeus had said, smiling crookedly, even a little wistfully. “Needed to get it out of his system. Don’t know as I would try to take him down today. Don’t know as he would give me a reason.”

  So Remington had gone off to school, started poorly in the hopes of being called back to Twin Star, but when Thaddeus remained dug in, Remington’s pride would not allow him to fail. Thaddeus credited himself for his son’s success, but he did so in an ironic way that conveyed the achievement was all Remington’s.

  Until Phoebe met Remington Frost, she had imagined him in her mind’s eye as a younger version of his father, but it was obvious to her now that his mother had been the architect of his finer features. While his height and angular profile were likely passed to him from Thaddeus, his dark eyes and inky hair were not. Thaddeus had blue eyes and salt-and-pepper hair that had once been more brown than black. Remington had a slight slant to his eyebrows even when they were not being lifted in a sardonic manner. That slant was absent in his father. The bridge of Thad’s nose was broader than his son’s, and only part of that could be blamed on the fact that it had been broken in a bunkhouse brawl. Remington’s chin was set more narrowly than his father’s, the cheekbones higher and better defined. Their mouths were similarly shaped, each with a fuller lower lip, but Remington’s mouth curled slightly at one corner as if he were darkly amused or privy to a secret so profound that a gun to his head could not make him reveal it.

  It was a very fine mouth, she thought, pressing her own lips together. Intriguing because of the secret it might be holding back. Maddening because of the amusement it took no pains to hide.

  If Thaddeus Frost was a handsome man—and Fiona’s presence on his arm was evidence that this was the case—then Remington Frost was, well, he was just about as beautiful as a man could be and still have his feet firmly in his boots.

  Phoebe listened for the sounds of those boots now. Nothing. It never occurred to her that he would not return, only that he might not return before the strength of her shivering shattered her bones. Shifting and resettling the blanket across her shoulders did not help. She stamped the ground, walked around the tree in ever-widening circles before she spiraled toward it again, and briskly rubbed her hands together. When nothing she did helped any longer, she dropped to the ground and huddled against the trunk.

  • • •

  Remington pulled Bullet up hard when he heard the approach of men and horses. The horses were quieter than the men, which he supposed was good in this case because he recognized one of the voices right off. He waited until they passed some fifty yards away and then he followed. If they didn’t recognize him immediately, at least his position at their backs would make it more difficult for them to shoot him.

  There were three of them. That number alone would have made them suspicious if Remington had not been the cautious sort, but he could not think of a single reason that Sheriff Brewer’s deputy would have been involved in the robbery of No. 486, and it was surely Blue Armstrong’s Georgia drawl that he’d heard. Neither of the men riding abreast of Blue had the shoulder breadth that Phoebe had described, and certainly the deputy did not.

  Even as he thought it, Remington saw Blue raise his hand and halt the three-man search party. The horses shifted, but the men did not. They fell quiet, and it was into that quiet that Remington called out and identified himself.

  “Easy,” he said as they began to turn. “Don’t draw your guns or I might think I’m mistaken.”

  “Jumpin’ Jesus on a griddle! Like to scare us to death, Remington.”

  Grinning, Remington holstered his Colt and urged Bullet forward. He spoke quietly when he reached them. “Jumpin’ Jesus on a griddle? Th
at’s one I haven’t heard you use before.”

  Blue Armstrong, as much a fixture in Frost Falls as the canted sign above the Songbird Saloon, removed his hand from the butt of his weapon and lowered his voice to a whisper as well, or what passed for a whisper if one’s throat was full of gravel. “Been saving it for the right occasion. Seemed like it should be now.”

  Remington nodded at Bob Washburn and Hank Greely. Washburn managed the bank and Greely owned the livery. Neither of them were candidates to carry out a robbery and abduction. “Where are the others?”

  Blue used a thickly knuckled forefinger to tip his hat back a notch. “’Course you’d know there’d be others. Stands to reason, don’t it? Your pa, the sheriff, and Ben left the ransom for the little gal at Cooper’s Rock and then headed northwest. We’re the right flank, but except for you, we ain’t heard or seen nothin’. Sutherland, Hopewell, and Jeremiah Ripley are the left flank. I expect it’s the same for them, else there’d have been a dust up.”

  “Northwest from Cooper’s Rock?”

  The deputy nodded. “Saw them go but we’re charged with scouting for the robbers, same as the others. Brewer told us there’d be a message waiting for them at the rock telling them where to go next. I figure it’s the cabin up on Thunder Point. Our instructions are to stay around here. Keep a look out. Sooner or later, someone’s comin’ for the money.”

  “Hmm.” Probably later, Remington thought. If he’d heard the deputy talking, then there was good reason to believe the robbers had also. Maybe they would try to make their approach from the left, in which case there was a fair to middling chance that the other search party might spot them, provided, of course, that Sutherland, Hopewell, and Ripley were not also given to noisy speculation.

  Remington directed the party to the tree line where there was better cover. “She’s not at Thunder Point,” Remington told them when they’d settled their horses.

  “Of course she ain’t,” said Armstrong. “Because you ain’t. Your pa, once he knew for sure that you were on the train and headin’ out to find her, figured you for being her best hope.”

  Bob Washburn pushed his spectacles up the bridge of his nose. “It seems Thad did not misplace his faith. Where is she? Close by?”

  “Not as close as I’d like.”

  “But she’s safe,” Greely said, seeking confirmation.

  “Yes. When I left her, she was safe.”

  Blue raised his knobby chin a few degrees so he could scratch the underside. His mouth quirked and he moved it back and forth several times as though swishing a mouthful of water. “Now, see? That’s what I’m not understanding. Why ain’t she with you? Why did you leave her?”

  Trust Blue to get right to the point, Remington thought. He avoided the explanation by asking, “How did anyone know to leave the ransom at Cooper’s Rock?”

  “Damndest thing, that. Some lady from the train saw Miss Apple’s reticule on the lobby desk at the Butterworth and made sure it got handed over to the sheriff. There was a notepad inside that had a message about the money and where to put it. Bob here took it right out of the bank’s safe.”

  Mr. Washburn modestly waved his contribution aside. “Brewer couldn’t find anyone who saw it being placed on the front desk, but a number of passengers saw it lying there.”

  Remington considered the possibilities. “The woman who returned it. Was it Mrs. Jacob C. Tyler?”

  “That doesn’t sound right,” said Washburn. He looked to Blue for help, but the deputy shook his head, helpless to recall the name.

  Greely said, “Bancroft. Her name was Bancroft. I heard Ben tell someone.”

  “My second guess,” said Remington. “Miss Apple’s reticule was on that lobby desk because one of Miss Apple’s abductors put it there.”

  Greely nodded. He had a long face, eyes that were set a fraction too close to his nose, and a thin slash of a mouth. He rarely looked anything but grim. “That’s what Brewer thinks. Your father also.”

  “Bold,” said Blue Armstrong. “Bold as the painted mouth on a whore. To walk in the hotel like he was one of the others, set the bag down, and disappear again, well, that’s bold.”

  Remington wondered if that were strictly true. “He probably stayed in the hotel long enough to be certain the reticule was found and his message was delivered. He couldn’t leave it all to chance. At least I wouldn’t.”

  The deputy once again adopted what passed for his most thoughtful pose, tipping his chin and scratching the underside with his fingertips. “No, you wouldn’t, by God, but then you have your daddy’s brains and a college education.” He pronounced it “edgy-cation.” “It’s my opinion these fellas aren’t that smart.”

  Remington did not disagree with the deputy. He’d held that same opinion early on. He had only recently begun to revise it. There was more planning than he had originally thought, and much less happenstance. He had even come around to wondering if Mr. Shoulders might have noticed Phoebe’s breadcrumbs and let them be, and if that were so, it followed that Shoulders was not concerned that he could be caught. What the man wanted to do was set the odds in favor of Phoebe being found.

  “I am going back for Miss Apple,” Remington said. “You better stay in the area, continue to scout it out, but I don’t think you’re going to come across them. Most likely they suspect a trap’s been laid. Wherever you are, they are somewhere else.”

  “Then shouldn’t we go with you?” asked Mr. Washburn.

  Remington shook his head. “Brewer’s expecting you to be here. So is my father. This is where I’ll return. Watch for me. For us. And for God’s sake, don’t shoot. We might be leading the horses, not riding.”

  • • •

  “How close do you reckon they are?” Willet Putty, one of the pair now wearing a blue kerchief around his neck, not his face, put the question to his brother.

  Doyle Putty squinted hard at the hidey-hole where he’d seen a fortune being tucked away. “Can’t say.” He was lying flat on the ground with a good view of the bluff as long as he kept his eyes narrowed and his chin tucked. The tucking wasn’t difficult. He hardly had a chin to speak of. Willet was on his left; Natty Rahway was on his right but ten feet distant. “You think it’s safe to go out there, Natty?”

  “You go on,” Natty said, shrugging his broad shoulders and wincing only slightly. “Give it a try. If you get shot, then Willet and I will know it’s not.”

  Doyle was up on his haunches before he fully understood the consequences of what Natty was saying. He dropped back down and jabbed Willet with a sharp elbow when he heard his brother chuckle.

  “Seems like we’ve been waiting an age,” said Doyle.

  Natty pulled himself up on his forearms. “We all saw them split. I said then that one of us should tail each group, but you and Willet wouldn’t have any parts of that.”

  Doyle’s lip curled. “Yeah, because you wanted to stay with the money. Me and Willet think it should have been one of us that followed Thaddeus Frost to the rock.”

  “No point in having that argument again. Here we are. Here we’ll wait.”

  “Should’ve kept the gal with us,” Doyle grumbled. “Insurance. Plus, she was prettier than you.”

  “You think there is a rock they wouldn’t have turned over to find us? I sure don’t. We knew how this would go when we agreed to do it. Besides, you and Willet have plenty of spoils to split between you.”

  “Sure, but we have to find buyers for everything except the cash. That ain’t easy.”

  Natty was not sympathetic. “Your problem. And didn’t I offer each of you the opportunity to stay at the cabin?”

  “Uh-huh, and like I said, you wanted to stay with the real money.”

  “She is the money, Doyle.”

  Doyle spit. “The money’s the money, and it’s right over there.”

  “So are three men on horseba
ck across the way. Opposite the bluff. Go on. Look. They’re riding single file, weaving through the trees. You can just make them out. Can’t say for sure which one of them is Jeremiah Ripley, but he’s the one I was told about. The sharpshooter. The one that can put a bullet in your skull from sixty yards. He’s not quite that far now. You want to chance it?”

  “No.”

  “What about you, Willet? You want to go?”

  “No. Never said I did.”

  “Then the prudent thing is to wait.”

  Watching the riders position themselves opposite Cooper’s Rock, the Putty brothers agreed that what was prudent was best.

  Chapter Nine

  She was sleeping when Remington came upon her, the blanket wrapped around her like a chrysalis so that he could only see the top of her head. Knowing that she had to be exhausted, it didn’t seem right to wake her and so he stood there, waiting to see if she’d sense his presence and come around on her own.

  The silver comb that she had left behind on the trail for him to find was lying on the ground near the crown of her head. He wondered if it had finally lost its mooring in her thick hair or if she had taken it out. He bent, picked it up, and turned it over in his hand. He wasn’t partial to practicing the kind of law that would put him in a courtroom, but he thought he could make a case that Phoebe Apple was guilty of a crime against nature when she twisted that dark cascade of hair into a knot and stabbed it with the comb. It seemed to him that some kind of penalty should be exacted, and right now, it would have to be the price of the comb. He dropped it in his vest pocket, reckoning that he had as much right to it now as she did, and if she thought differently, he wouldn’t mind clarifying his position to her. She’d argue her own points, of course. It would be like law school again, moot court, this time with Phoebe Apple as his worthy adversary.

  He remained hunkered beside her, waiting for her to stir. When she did, it was because a shudder went through her. It was no gentle stirring, and still she did not wake. The cocoon that was the blanket changed shape as she drew her knees closer to her chest and burrowed as deeply as she could in the bed of pine needles.