Trail of Passion (Hot on the Trail Book 7)

by Merry Farmer

  Gideon helped Lucy to sit on a small box in the back of the wagon near a rip in the canvas while he knelt on a pile of bedding by a third slit that had been made. “Maybe I should have been a spy instead of a scientist.”

  Graham laughed. “Not sure you’d have made a good one. You’re too full of dreams and ideas.”

  “Am I?” Gideon blinked, looking away from the split in the canvas to study his friend.

  “Sure you are,” Graham laughed. “You see the world in such positive light. I know I would have given up—on Estelle and on myself—a long time ago without you.”

  A glow filled Gideon’s chest. “Thank you, Graham. I don’t think anyone’s said such kind words to me before.”

  “Shh,” Lucy interrupted them, peering intently out through the canvas.

  Gideon dove for his peephole and looked out, but instead of catching Leopold in the act, they watched one of the farmer’s wives crossing close to Lucy’s wagon with a basket of laundry to be taken to the stream.

  An hour later, Gideon was convinced that Graham was right and that he would make a terrible spy. The waiting alone was torture.

  “This is worse than trying to catch prairie dogs,” Lucy sighed.

  “The prairie dogs were faster about taking the bait,” Gideon agreed. He sighed. “Maybe Leopold knows we’re trying to set him up.

  “Maybe he isn’t the one who did it after all,” Lucy mumbled, so low Gideon almost didn’t hear her.

  Gideon dragged his eyes away from his peephole to stare at her. “Do you think we’re wrong?”

  She sighed and sat straight, facing him. “Maybe. Maybe we should just let this go and put the past all the way behind us. We… we have quite a future to look forward to, after all.” She lowered her eyes. “If you ever get around to asking for it.”

  Gideon chuckled. In all the confusion of the last week, proposing had been blown clear out of his mind. It would have been best to wait until they had perfect conditions—a moonlit night, a gentle summer breeze, a romantic picnic—but surprise might be just as good as romance. The ring was still in his pocket, after all.

  He fished in his pocket until he caught hold of it, then slowly drew it out. “Miss Lucy Haskell,” he began. “I’ve been meaning to ask you.”

  “Yes?” She sat straighter. Even in the dim light of the closed-up wagon, he could see her flush with pleasure.

  “Would you—”

  “Hold on.” Graham raised a hand to stop him, eyes glued to his slit in the canvas. “There!”

  Gideon and Lucy both dived back to their own peepholes, so fast the wagon rocked. Gideon expected to see Leopold slinking his way up to Lucy’s wagon, perhaps even with a club or flaming torch in hand.

  Instead they saw Alvin, inching his way up to the tailgate, looking as suspicious as it was possible for a ten-year-old to get.

  “What is he doing?” Lucy fretted. “He’ll spoil the whole thing.”

  Alvin continued to creep up on the wagon. When he reached it, he swiped for the silver locket, holding it up.

  “Uh, have you considered that the boy might be your culprit?” Graham asked.

  “No,” Lucy dismissed the idea. “Not Alvin. He wouldn’t. He—”

  She ended on a gasp. Alvin stood at the back of the wagon, admiring the locket, but as he did, Leopold came rushing toward him, rifle in hand.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Hurry! Hurry,” Lucy shouted, all efforts to be subtle forgotten. She leapt for the back of the wagon, pushing Gideon in front of her. “He’s going to kill Alvin.”

  Her heart thundered in panic as Gideon stumbled out of the wagon bed, then turned to lift her down behind him. Time seemed to flow in slow motion. Lucy couldn’t run fast enough. She and Gideon scrambled around the edge of Estelle’s wagon and sprinted for the clearing where her wagon waited. They weren’t the only ones.

  “Stop right there,” Pete called from several yards ahead of them. He sprinted toward Leopold and Alvin from the other direction, making it there faster.

  Alvin cried out in fear, dropping the locket, and, of all things, leaping toward Leopold and throwing his arms around him. Leopold raised his arms, bringing the rifle up and out of Alvin’s way.

  “Alvin, don’t,” Lucy shouted, heart in her throat. She was convinced that Alvin was trying to tackle Leopold, to fend him off somehow. “Get back.”

  Lucy and Gideon skidded to a halt in the clearing in front of her wagon. Pete had reached there first, Josephine not far behind. Mr. Jackson dashed onto the scene as well, along with a several other members of the wagon train. Leopold had been caught by more than just Lucy and Gideon, the entire train would see what he’d been up to now.

  Except that the pieces of the puzzle didn’t exactly fit into place.

  “What are you doing?” Leopold shouted at them, fury painting his face. He lowered his arms, holding the rifle out to one of the men who had dashed onto the scene, then closing Alvin in a protective embrace. “You’ve scared the boy half out of his wits.”

  Lucy’s jaw hung open as she stared at the image in front of her. Alvin was clearly upset, whimpering as he clung to Leopold. “But,” she started, letting her shoulders drop and breathing out in confusion. “But you tried to kill Gideon.”

  “I what?” Leopold snapped.

  “The chlorine,” Lucy pushed on, gaining strength as she went. “All those jars that were smashed. You smashed them after I told you about Gideon’s involvement in the experiment that killed your son.”

  “I did no such thing,” Leopold balked. His normally expressionless face was tight with offense now.

  “And… and the fire,” Lucy went on. “You set the fire to finish the job and to kill Gideon.”

  Leopold bristled with indignation. “Miss Haskell, I am not now nor could I ever be a murderer.”

  “But… how….” Lucy pressed a hand to her forehead, working to figure out what was suddenly a mess in front of her.

  “I think there’s been some kind of misunderstanding.” Pete stepped in. “It’s time we got to the bottom of this.”

  “It certainly is,” Leopold growled.

  An uncomfortable ripple passed through the scene. Lucy shot a wary glance in Gideon’s direction. He looked just as confused as she was, but took a step closer to her, taking her hand. It was a comfort, if only a small one.

  “I guess I’m just gonna have to come right out and ask,” Pete began. “Mr. Diver, did you destroy Gideon’s chemicals and try to set his wagon on fire?”

  “No, sir, I did not,” Leopold answered, chin held high.

  Pete glanced to Gideon and Lucy, lifting his brow in question. “Do you two have something you want to add?”

  “Only that the circumstances and the scant evidence we have points to you, Mr. Diver,” Gideon answered with far more calm than Lucy could have managed.

  “The circumstances I understand,” Leopold said, tight and clipped. “But what evidence?”

  Gideon pointed to a flash of silver in the grass by Alvin’s feet. “The locket. I assume that it belonged to your late wife, considering it has a picture of you and a young man who I assume is your son in it.”

  “Yes, the locket,” Leopold said. He loosened his hold on Alvin, holding him at arm’s length. “Where did you find my locket, son?”

  Alvin mumbled.

  “Sweetheart, I can’t hear you,” Lucy said.

  Alvin drew in a shaky breath and said, “It was just sitting out on the wagon right there.” He pointed to Lucy’s tailgate. “I saw it the other day, when we were fishing for prairie dogs. I thought it was pretty and that… and that I could steal it for you.” He lowered his head in shame.

  Lucy sighed and was about to repeat the scolding she’d given Alvin for wanting to steal things for her before, when Leopold said, “Son, a gentleman never resorts to thievery to find a token for a lady. Do you understand?”

  Alvin nodded, head and shoulders still lowered.

  “Good.” Leopold n
odded. “Now, would you be so kind as to return my wife’s locket to me?”

  Alvin rushed to scoop the locket up off the ground. He hopped over to hand it to Leopold, who opened it. A faint, tragic smile lit Leopold’s face.

  “Thank you,” he said. “I was devastated when I thought I’d lost this. Where did you find it?” He turned to Lucy and Gideon.

  “It was in my wagon,” Gideon said. He wore a look of uncertainty, in spite of how noble Leopold appeared right then.

  “Your wagon?” Josephine asked, taking a step forward to peer at the locket in Leopold’s hand.

  “How did your wife’s locket end up in Gideon’s wagon?” Pete seconded the question.

  “He… he must have dropped it when he climbed into the wagon to destroy the chemicals,” Lucy ventured. Somehow the accusation didn’t feel right now. The man who Alvin had turned to for protection couldn’t be the same murderous villain that existed in her imagination, could he? “And what about the rifle you were carrying when you raced out here?” she pushed on. “Why were you racing up here in the first place if not to destroy the rest of Gideon’s things?”

  A few of the people who had come to see what the fuss was hummed and nodded and turned to Leopold for answers.

  Leopold blew out an impatient breath. “I had gone for a walk. Walking on the prairie has been a balm for my troubled soul these past few weeks. Mr. Evans had warned me earlier that there could be wild animals or renegade Indians in the area, and that I should go armed if I planned to walk far. I borrowed Mr. Butler’s rifle.”

  The man who he’d handed the rifle to nodded to confirm the story.

  “When I passed back this way, I saw Alvin sneaking up to the back of Miss Haskell’s wagon. He looked as though he was getting into mischief, so I changed direction to see if I could stop him from causing trouble. Then I saw the flash of silver, knew it was my wife’s locket, and,” he lowered his head. “I’m afraid I was so overcome with emotion that I rushed forward and frightened poor Alvin. I’m sorry, son.”

  “’S okay,” Alvin mumbled.

  “But that still doesn’t explain why the locket was in Gideon’s wagon to begin with,” Lucy huffed with impatience. “Lockets have neither legs nor wings. The only way it could have gotten in there is if you were in Gideon’s wagon, Mr. Diver.”

  Lucy’s accusation was greeted with more hums and murmurs from the growing crowd of onlookers.

  Leopold frowned at her, clearly unamused. All at once, his expression snapped to understanding. “I was in Dr. Faraday’s wagon,” he said.

  “You….” Lucy let her arms drop, as confused as ever. He admitted it.

  “When?” Gideon asked.

  “That first day,” Leopold said. He winced, rubbing a hand over his face. “I’ve been missing the locket since that first day in Ft. Laramie. It all makes sense now.”

  “Forgive me,” Pete drawled, “but it doesn’t make a damn bit of sense to me.”

  “Me either,” Lucy admitted.

  Leopold shifted, then nodded to the circle of people who had come to watch. Lucy turned to see that he nodded at Tim, tucked protectively against Estelle’s skirts as she and Graham watched with confused frowns of their own.

  “That first day, when I joined the wagon train, that boy had gone missing. Everyone was searching for him. My son ran off once.” He paused, took in a breath to collect himself. “I joined the search as soon as I could. If you will recall, Dr. Faraday, Miss Haskell, you caught me searching in the back of Dr. Faraday’s wagon for the boy. It must have slipped out of my jacket pocket and into your wagon then.”

  Silence followed his story. Lucy’s stomach pinched. It made sense. He very well could have lost the locket then. Gideon was always shuffling things around in the back of his wagon. He could have pushed it deeper into the wagon bed without even realizing it.

  “But if you didn’t destroy Gideon’s chemicals and try to set the wagon on fire, who did?” she asked, faint and lost.

  “Good question,” Pete seconded her.

  Leopold sighed and fixed Alvin with a stern look. “Son, would you care to tell these people what you told me?”

  Alvin shook his head furiously, looking as though he wanted to sink into the ground.

  “Alvin?” A stab of pain hit Lucy’s chest at the inadvertent admission. He couldn’t have. He was too sweet, and he was only a boy. “Sweetheart, you didn’t.”

  Alvin’s lower lip quivered and his face pinched with tears. At last he burst out with, “I didn’t mean to, Miss Lucy. It was an accident.”

  Leopold cleared his throat. “The whole truth, son. Truth is always better than lies in cases like these.”

  Alvin sent a pleading look to Leopold. It struck Lucy as Leopold nodded in reply that he was a perfect grandfatherly sort, that he’d likely been a wonderful father to his son. A fresh wave of grief struck her, and it was all she could do to keep from weeping aloud—for his loss, for Alvin’s losses, and for her own heartache.

  Alvin kicked the ground, then turned to face Lucy. “I was mad,” he said. “I wanted you to marry me and be my sweetheart, but you kept spending all your time with him.” He pointed at Gideon, still resentful. His resentment wilted to shame. “I got so mad that I smashed up his things.”

  Lucy gasped. Gideon tensed beside her, but took a long breath to steady himself. “I’m sorry you felt the need to do that,” he said—tense, but not angry.

  “And… and then Miss Lucy said she’d help with my sums, but she didn’t.”

  “So you felt the need to burn her to cinders?” Josephine asked, an uncharacteristic frown on her face.

  Alvin shook his head hard, crying all over again. “I didn’t know Miss Lucy was in there with him. I thought she’d gone to bed in her own wagon.”

  “It’s not any better that you were trying to kill Gideon,” Josephine said.

  Alvin’s eyes flew wide in fear. “I wasn’t trying to kill no one.”

  “Listen to the boy’s story,” Leopold added, jaw clenched. “He came running to me as soon as the fire got out of control. Tell them what you were trying to do, Alvin.”

  All eyes snapped back to Alvin, tears streaming down his face. “I wasn’t trying to hurt no one. Only, one of the other orphans from our wagon gave me a stink-bomb. Said if I lit the fuse and shoved it into the wagon, it would stink up the place good. Except when I went to light it, the canvas on the wagon caught fire.”

  “Because it’s treated with oil,” Gideon finished, letting out a breath. “To keep out the rain. That’s why it caught fire and burned faster than it usually would have.”

  “I’m sorry,” Alvin wailed. “I didn’t know Miss Lucy was in there. I didn’t know it would burn the wagon down. I wasn’t trying to hurt nobody.”

  “I told you it was those rotten orphans,” Viola remarked somewhere behind Lucy.

  It was the last straw. Lucy whipped around, fury in her eyes. She scanned the crowd until she picked Viola and her smirking friends out. “Is that all you have to offer?” she shouted. “Throwing stones at ten-year-old boys? He made a mistake. A bad mistake, yes, but still just a mistake. We all make mistakes, every one of us. Nobody is perfect, least of all you.”

  “Well,” Viola huffed.

  “If you think you can go around pointing fingers at other people for the mistakes they make, then I feel sorry for you, because every time you point at someone else, you’re pointing right back at yourself too.”

  She whipped back to face Alvin, stepping toward him. “Alvin, sweetheart, I’m so sorry I let you down. I’m sorry I did things that made you angry, with me and with Gideon. I accept your apology. I only want what’s best for you. But it’s time that you understood that I love Gideon, with my whole heart. He’s the man I want to spend the rest of my life with.”

  She turned back to Gideon with a smile that started in her soul, zipped through her heart, and lit her face. “Gideon is a good man, a smart man. Yes, he’s made some mistakes too.” She turned to
Leopold. “We’ve both made mistakes. I was wrong to assume that you were looking for revenge because of your son’s death.”

  “I was looking for revenge,” Leopold declared with a solemn nod. Lucy gasped, stumbling back. “Revenge and answers. At least, that’s why I tracked Dr. Faraday down and came west to join this wagon train.”

  “Really?” Lucy pressed a hand to her chest.

  “Yes. But it didn’t take more than an introduction for me to see that my anger was misplaced.”

  “I don’t understand,” Gideon said, head lowered in respect. “I am to blame for your son’s death. I was involved in those unspeakable experiments, something I regret with every fiber of my being.”

  Leopold shook his head. “You may have been involved, son, but I could see right away that you were a victim of men higher up than you as much as Michael was. I expected to find a greedy, spiteful, evil-hearted man with no scruples when I tracked you down. I expected that I would hurl accusations at you and demand the truth. What I found instead was a humble man, intent on helping people.” He paused, turning to Lucy. “And a spitfire of a woman who evidently doesn’t care what people think of her and will tenaciously seek after the truth, no matter what it takes.”

  “Me? I….” Lucy had no idea how to respond to that.

  “I am so sorry.” Gideon took a step forward, spreading his hands for Leopold in a gesture of surrender. “If I could go back and make different decisions, if I could tell the men in charge of the project that what they were doing was evil, if I would have stopped them somehow.”

  “But you couldn’t have stopped them,” Leopold said, soft and mournful. “Men in power don’t think of honest people—like my son, like you—as humans. They see them as pawns in their games. You are no more to blame for the deaths of those men than young Alvin here. My son’s death, the death of all those young soldiers, was not your fault. I forgive you for the part you unwittingly played.”

  To Lucy’s astonishment, Gideon broke down into tears. “Thank you,” he breathed, as though he’d just been handed the most precious gift imaginable. He drew in a shuddering breath, his body sagging as though the weight he’d been carrying for too, too long had just rolled off his shoulders. “Thank you.”