McCrory's Lady

by Henke, Shirl Henke

  After all the bitter lonely years mourning the loss of her baby, feeling so cruelly cheated of motherhood, she was being given another chance. And this time she truly loved the baby's father. But that brought sober thoughts. Does Colin love me? Will he want this child?

  He had told her in no uncertain terms when they first met that he would never get over his first wife's death in childbirth. He never wanted the responsibility of fathering another child. Eden was the only heir he needed or wanted. And I assured him I was barren. He would think she had lied to entrap him.

  Maggie had been so certain for all those years that the doctor in Omaha was right. There had been so many men, each making her feel more defiled than the one before. She had hated their touch, washing, inside and out, after every encounter—as if to bathe away her whoredom like Pilate washing his hands of guilt.

  Put them in the past, she commanded herself. That part of her life was over. She had to think of the new life growing inside her now. And of the child's father and sister. Maggie leaned back and closed her eyes, to plan and to dream.

  * * * *

  Bart Fletcher was also bound for Tucson, arriving from another direction. After selling the Silver Eagle in San Luís, he had drifted up north into Arizona Territory as far as Yuma, a sinkhole of heat and dust. Briefly, he debated a return visit to San Francisco, as delightfully sophisticated as any city he had encountered in the United States; but at the last minute, some impulse drew him to purchase a ticket for Tucson. Now, as the brakes shrieked on the old Overland Stage and the driver yanked on the lines, cursing loudly as he rounded the corner where Pearl Street converged onto Main, Bart looked out the window, reconsidering his foolish attempt to locate Maggie.

  The town boasted over 6,000 inhabitants, a veritable metropolis by Southwestern standards, but it remained little more than a vast collection of adobe structures built in the pueblo architectural style. They differed from those in Sonora only in size and numbers. The streets were narrow and crooked, filled with all sorts of hard-looking Anglo gunmen and Mexican banditti as well as “knights of the green cloth” such as himself, nattily attired with flat crowned hats and brocade vests. Here and there, respectable Anglo females dressed in what passed for the latest fashions from back East wended their way down the busy streets, pausing to chat with businessmen in somber frock coats and starched white shirts.

  He climbed down in front of the Palace Hotel, one of the town's few two-story structures, actually boasting a porch and second-floor verandah around three sides of the building. Perhaps it might be livable. But for how long? Chasing Maggie Worthington was a fool's errand and he knew it. McCrory had married her and taken her to some godforsaken cattle ranch far to the north. The one weather-stained letter from her that had reached him indicated that much.

  Reading between the lines, he also recognized that the unlikely alliance was not making her happy. Perhaps by now—if he could locate her—Maggie might be willing to go to San Francisco with him, that Scots scalper be damned. He wondered if McCrory had told her about his past. Would it have made any difference to her? Probably not. Cursing himself for this surprisingly romantic streak at his advanced age, Fletcher sauntered into the cool embrace of the hotel's interior. First, he would secure the best possible accommodations, then attend to the most pressing business—the money Win Barker owed him. After that I'll decide what to do about pursuing Megs.

  Fletcher passed a most satisfactory afternoon, squeezing several thousand dollars out of that parsimonious old windbag Barker for the Mexican silver shipment from Sonora that Lazlo and his boys had robbed. For providing the information about it, Bart was owed ten percent of the take, which Lazlo had failed to deliver to him. Learning from McCrory and Blake about the gunman's fate at the delicate hand of Maggie's stepdaughter did not excuse Lazlo for defaulting. A deal was a deal and Barker had owed him. Now, they were square—or, Bart cynically thought, as square as one could ever figure on being with an oily character like Win Barker.

  He drove down the street in a small rig he had rented from Settler's Livery at a sinfully high price. Anything was preferable to soiling his cream linen suit by walking through the dusty streets, being jostled by Mexican women carrying water jugs or run down by muleskinners recklessly speeding by with overloaded wagons. He reined in the sorry nag and stepped out of his conveyance. A Palace doorman took the silver piece Bart flipped at him and drove the rig back to the stable. As the Englishman turned toward the hotel, his thoughts on dinner, the clatter of hooves and screech of brakes heralded the arrival of the evening stage from Prescott.

  Some intuition made him pause on the hotel porch. His elevated position gave him a good view of the disembarking passengers. He would have recognized that figure and the mass of dark auburn hair anywhere, even before she raised her head to smile at the stage driver who helped her alight.

  Dressed in a moss green linen suit with a peacock feathered hat perched jauntily on her head, Maggie looked like a prosperous territorial businessman's wife. She had gone respectable. But then, his Megs had always been a Boston bluestocking beneath the cool, cynical facade of bordello madam. He looked around and saw that she was traveling alone. No other passengers got off at this stop and no one was waiting to meet her. He began to shoulder his way through the motley and odoriferous crowd that always gathered around the hotels when a stage was scheduled to arrive.

  “So you really have shed your outer shell and reverted to Boston,” he said, taking her hand and raising it for a quick salute before tucking it beneath his arm proprietarily.

  Maggie looked up into Bart's ice blue eyes and let out a startled gasp. His goatee was freshly trimmed and his silver blond hair perfectly in place. He smiled at her with that sad-sweet cynicism she had always found endearing. “You said you might come to Tucson, but somehow I never believed you. It's wonderful to see you, Bart.” She squeezed his arm as they wended their way through the crowd and up the porch steps into the hotel.

  “You're more beautiful than ever, Megs.”

  Megs. How long since a man had spoken her name with such uncomplicated affection. “I really have missed you, you know.”

  “Then why did you leave?” The minute he asked, he regretted it. Her expression became shadowed. “Has McCrory treated you badly? Has he left you?” he demanded angrily, ready to kill the Scots mercenary for the pain he saw in her sad blue eyes.

  Maggie shook her head grimly. “No, nothing like that. I'm meeting him here. He rode ahead two days ago from White Mountain Reservation.”

  “The Apache preserve?” He raised an eyebrow skeptically.

  “They call them reservations, not preserves, Bart,” Maggie said with fond exasperation.

  “The way the Americans treat the bloody blighters, I'd think preserve is a more appropriate term.”

  Maggie chuckled lightly. “You and Colin agree on one thing, at least.”

  He stopped in the lobby beside a potted fern and looked at her strong, beautiful features. “No, we agree on more than that.”

  All I need is for Colin to find me here with Bart. She looked around, then asked, “Is there somewhere we could go to talk privately? And don't offer your room.”

  He raised his hands in mock surrender. “Just a thought to protect your anonymity? I take it your Scot is the jealous sort. We could go to the hotel dining room. The food is passable—for rustic American cuisine,” he added offhandedly.

  “I think it might be wise to find another restaurant nearby.”

  “Ah, then McCrory is jealous,” he said with a smugly raised eyebrow.

  Maggie forced a smile. “Colin doesn't even know I've come to Tucson. He told me to stay with Eden at the reservation, but...well, it's a long story, Bart.”

  “I've always been a good listener, Megs,” he said softly.

  “I know you have.” Suddenly Maggie wanted to unburden herself, to tell her old friend and mentor everything. Perhaps, it would help her to see her way more clearly—not that Bart Fletcher was exa
ctly unbiased, she reminded herself.

  By the time her baggage had been taken up to Colin's room, Bart's rig had been brought around. They drove to a small restaurant on Menger Street while Maggie explained about Colin's ongoing fight to end the exploitation of the Apaches and expose the ring of corrupt federal contractors headquartered in Tucson. “They've tried to kill him several times since Lazlo lured him into Sonora with Eden,” she concluded as they sat at a small table neatly covered with a blue checkered cloth. Maggie stirred the spoon in her coffee nervously.

  “He's risking his life tilting at windmills, Megs. Nothing he or anyone else can do will change the fate of those benighted devils,” Bart said regretfully.

  “Colin isn't a pragmatist like you, I'm afraid.”

  “I fear that's why you're in love with him, not me.” He sighed. “But he isn't making you happy, Megs. Is he?”

  She laid down the spoon and sipped the coffee. “I'm just so afraid for him, Bart.” She looked up, feeling those piercing pale eyes on her. “You always could see through me like glass. No, Colin hasn't completely grown reconciled to our marriage. A man such as my husband doesn't like being forced into anything, but there are times...” Her voice faded away as she recalled their tender interlude at the reservation. “Well, let's just say I have hopes.”

  “But?” he prodded.

  “There's a new complication, one I haven't told a soul. I even swore the doctor to secrecy.” She took a deep breath, as if unable to believe it herself, then whispered, “I'm pregnant, Bart.”

  Bart Fletcher sat speechless for a moment, stunned. Then, he saw the glow in her eyes, the pink flush on her cheeks. She wanted McCrory's baby. Hell, she had always wanted a child. “Are you absolutely certain? Who is this doctor who told you? After all the years in your former profession, Megs, I find it difficult to believe.”

  “So did I at first, but the symptoms are quite conclusive and Dr. Torres is a very fine physician. I didn't want to let myself hope either, but it's true.”

  “I'll be damned,” he mused, then frowned. “A rich man like McCrory without a male heir should be delighted. Why is this a complication?”

  She fidgeted with her cup and saucer as the waitress arrived to serve bowls of thick spicy chili along with a plate of warm tortillas. When she left, Maggie replied, “Colin's first wife died trying to give him that son and heir. He never wanted any more children—and I assured him I couldn't have any.”

  “You're a strong woman, Megs. And you look to be in the bloom of health. There's more, isn't there? Surely, the bastard wouldn't accuse you of infidelity!”

  “No, nothing like that, Bart. He'll know it's his.”

  “Then what?”

  “I don't want to hold him just because of the baby. We'd talked about an annulment...” Her cheeks reddened at the obvious absurdity of that now. “Or a divorce once Eden was all right, but now he’ll be bound to me even after her future is secure. I’ll never know if he really loves me.” Her voice broke and she shoved the rich food away, her appetite fled.

  Bart watched her fight back tears and reached across the table to clasp her hand in his. “McCrory's a bloody fool. If you can't be any more certain of his feelings than this, you ought to leave him—or is the girl still holding you?”

  “I'll always love Eden like a daughter, but she's making her own life now. She's going to marry Wolf Blake.”

  “That half-breed gunman?” Bart asked incredulously.

  “None other. His father is a prosperous merchant in Texas and wants to reconcile. Wolf is willing to do it for Eden's sake. He’ll make her a fine husband, Bart.”

  Bart drummed his fingers on the table as he considered how to say what he wanted to say. “Megs...if your noble Scot”—he stressed the words angrily—“can't make you happy, he doesn't deserve you. You've done your duty to Eden. If she's taken care of, why stay where you're not wanted? What I'm trying to say—bloody poorly, I fear, pet—is that I love you. Come with me, Megs. I've money enough for us to live in grand style in San Francisco. I'll even become a model father for your child.”

  He knew even before he finished his declaration that she would refuse. She smiled though tears filled her eyes, adhering like silver crystals to her thick dark lashes.

  “Bart, you are the dearest friend I shall ever have and I do love you...as my friend. You deserve to be loved by a woman who will return your love fully. Not by one who will burden you with another man's child.”

  “In other words, you love that blighter, no matter how the bloody fool treats you.” He sighed.

  “It may not be that bad, Bart. There is a chance. Over the past few weeks, we seem to have grown closer. Perhaps, the real test will be when Eden's future is settled. The reason I've come to Tucson is to convince Colin that Wolf is the right man for his daughter. I think he'll accept that once he understands about Wolf's family and Eden's feelings in the matter. Then...”

  “Then, you'll know if he still wants you for yourself—not for Eden, not because of the baby,” he said gently. “I think he will. He'd have to be insane to let you go.”

  “You're very dear,” she said, holding his pale, soft hand, so utterly unlike Colin's dark, callused one.

  “It'll all work out, Megs,” he crooned.

  “Perhaps.” She bit her lip. “If only Win Barker and his cohorts don't kill Colin before this is all done. He's come to Tucson to have a face-off with Barker.”

  “I've had dealings with the man. A real snake in the grass—speaking as one serpent of another,” he added wryly.

  “If something happens to Colin...” Maggie bit down on her knuckle, pushing the thought away.

  “You really do love the bloody bastard, don't you?’ She nodded her head, then whispered, “More than I would ever have believed possible.”

  * * * *

  After seeing Maggie safely back to the Palace Hotel, Bart Fletcher drove up Jackson Street and around Stone up to Congress, deep in thought. He pulled up in front of the huge adobe mercantile that filled a whole city block. Winslow Barker and Co., General Merchandisers was emblazoned across the front. A plan was forming in his mind. “Bloody hell, it's worth a try,” he muttered as he climbed down.

  A light glowed from the second-story window in front. Barker usually worked late, counting his ill-gotten gains for the day, no doubt. Fletcher went around to the alley door and rapped sharply. In moments, he was ushered into Barker's private office.

  Chapter Seventeen

  White Mountain Reservation

  Caleb Lamp squinted through the darkness, then rubbed the grit from his eyes and took a step closer to the window. Damn, but he hated being this near the contagion! Just thinking of all those dirty, diseased Apaches lying on pallets inside his post made him furious. He eyed that Jew doctor with the greaser name as the physician walked through the door into his office. Torres was a troublemaker, almost as big a one as Colin McCrory.

  The agent had returned to the post only when he received word that smallpox had broken out in the coal mines. His Coyotero police guarding the slaves had fled, leaving the savages free to take their sick companions to the doctor. If they were able to communicate with Torres about the conditions under which they worked, such testimony would not only cause his immediate dismissal but imprisonment as well. Damn Win Barker, safe in Tucson while he took all the risks!

  Nothing for it, he would have to go inside and instill some fear in the heathens by showing himself. The whole place looked like a Civil War field hospital with bodies lying everywhere, moaning in feverish delirium. He made his way across the room, scarcely daring to breath, followed by three of his hand-picked guards—one white, two Coyotero.

  Lamp had learned that Torres had quarantined Tome and Echiva, two of the escaped slaves, in his office. Echiva's eyes were glazed with fever as he lay on a pallet by the window. Tome lay beside his companion, mumbling something to Torres while the doctor listened. That spoiled little high-and-mighty daughter of McCrory's was sitting betwe
en the dying Indians, wiping Tome's forehead with a cool cloth. Lamp stopped beside the open door to eavesdrop.

  “If what you say is true, this is very serious, Tome,” Dr. Torres said, trying to gauge how badly the fever had addled the Apache's faculties.

  “Is true. Agent Lamp uses reservation police to force us. Hold rifles on us. Make us dig.”

  “The agency negotiated a contract with a mining company in Tucson for coal rights on reservation land. Your people were to get a share of the profits,” Torres said.

  “No share. Only slavery,” Tome whispered hoarsely.

  “He does not speak false,” Echiva said as one claw like hand tugged on the doctor's sleeve. “Ask the old one you call Blue Braid in the mine camp. It is at the fork of Fox Creek. You will see we speak true.” Echiva's speech exhausted the last of his strength. He fell back on his pallet, sightless eyes staring at the ceiling.

  Torres quickly examined him, then pulled the blanket up over his face with a muttered curse. Tome would join his companion momentarily, he feared. “We'll have to send word to Colin at once,” he said, rising as Eden did the same.

  “You'll just have to pardon me if'n I don't see it that way” Lamp said with a snarl. He stood behind the two figures, gun drawn and leveled at Torres's back as he closed the door to the office. Damn, now he'd have to dispose of these two and try to hide the bodies!

  “You can't kill us with all those witnesses outside,” Eden said with far more calm than she felt.

  Lamp laughed harshly. “Witnesses, shit! They's Apach!”

  “But Miss McCrory's father isn't,” Aaron Torres said reasonably as he turned to face Lamp. “If you harm his daughter your life won't be worth a red cent, Caleb. Don't be a fool. Get out of the territory while you still can.”

  “Not till I collect what's owed me, but you're right, I can't kill you without raising a real ruckus.” He appeared to consider for a minute, then laughed. “But if you was to have a little accident, say have that buggy of yours get out of control and turn over, maybe by that steep ravine on the Prescott road…”