Heart of the Hawk

by Justine Davis, Justine Dare

  She was steadier now, prepared, and answered evenly, “I didn’t lie for you, Mr. Hawk.”

  He shook his head. “They looked all over that alley that night. The marshal, and that little bald man who came out of the saloon, the one Pike called ‘Reverend.’ That one even looked right behind that barrel where that boy says he found that old six-shooter.”

  “Reverend Babcock? Then I’m not surprised he didn’t see it. His eyes aren’t what they used to be, and he’s always misplacing his spectacles. He’s been known to tipple more than a bit, too.”

  He studied her for a moment, intently. She made herself hold his gaze. Then, slowly, he said, “That boy . . .”

  She drew herself up even straighter. “Luke doesn’t lie, Mr. Hawk. He may be an orphan, and a little wild, but he’s a good boy. If he says he found it behind that barrel, then he did.”

  For some reason, either her defensive words or their vehemence, he smiled. She wasn’t sure if he was pleased or was mocking her, and it didn’t really matter which it was, not when he was having such an odd effect on her. Perhaps he’d been right, and she really was nervous just being in the same room with the notorious Hawk.

  “Besides,” she said quickly, filling a silence that was rapidly making her very uncomfortable, “what you said at your trial was right. A man would have to be a fool to come after you without a weapon.”

  “Was your husband a fool, Mrs. Dixon?”

  The soft—almost too soft—query warned her that she wasn’t acting precisely as a bereaved widow should act. But she found it difficult; if she felt anything at Arly’s death it was relief. Relief, and some uncertainty about her future. And she doubted that would come as a great surprise to most residents of Gambler’s Notch. She searched for an answer that would satisfy him, but not tell him any more than he already knew. She settled on the truth, if not the truth he was after.

  “Arly was just fool enough to try and sneak up on The Hawk in the dark.”

  He looked at her again, steadily, those bright blue eyes fixed on her with such intensity that she wondered what he could possibly be seeing.

  “Odd way to speak of your late husband.” His tone was mild, but Kate didn’t miss the note of curiosity.

  “I’ll not lie about it, Mr. Hawk. My husband was not . . . the kindest of men.”

  She saw his gaze flick to her bruised cheek, and resisted the urge to cover it with her hand. Instead she held her head up, as if daring him to comment. She realized the foolishness of daring a man such as The Hawk as soon as she did it.

  “He did that to you?”

  “That is my concern, not yours.”

  “It’s mine if he did it because I spoke to you. That’s about two weeks old, judging by the color.”

  She felt heat flood her face as she realized how ugly she must look. On her best days she was nothing to buy a mirror for, as her father had been wont to say; with this unsightly mark on her face, she must be truly uncomely.

  “It’s none of your affair, Mr. Hawk,” she reiterated.

  “Perhaps,” he said, “but it makes me feel less guilty about killing a man I had no quarrel with, to know he was the kind of brute who would strike a woman.”

  Guilty? He felt guilty? The thought that The Hawk could feel such a thing astonished her. But she didn’t dare linger on the revelation. Warning bells were clanging in her mind. She had to put a halt to this; he was treading too close to dangerous ground. She walked around the foot of the ladder, only stopping to turn and face him again when the solid bulk of the counter was between them.

  “I don’t care to speak any more of my husband, if you don’t mind. Was there something else?” she asked in her politest merchant’s tone.

  He didn’t answer for a moment, and Kate held her breath, wondering if he was going to accept her obvious change of subject. And her explanation. It would be very ill-mannered of him to call her a liar. Other than Arly, she’d become used to being treated with at least some amount of respect by the decent men of Gambler’s Notch. But she wouldn’t have expected the same of the man known as The Hawk. A killer for hire hardly fell into the category she would label decent men.

  At last he spoke, and Kate gave an inward sigh of relief at his words.

  “Only my thanks, Mrs. Dixon. Not many men would have done what you did. And most women would have let me hang and been glad to see it done.”

  “One death was enough. I had no wish to see more.”

  He didn’t say what she suspected he was thinking, that it was indeed very strange that she didn’t wish to see the killer of her husband punished, regardless of the circumstances. Instead he glanced around the store.

  “What will you do now?”

  That, she thought, was the very question she’d been tussling with since Arly’s death.

  “I will run the store,” she stated firmly, as if saying the words for the first time out loud could make them true.

  “By yourself? A woman?”

  She quivered inside, then ordered herself sternly to stop. She would have to become used to such reactions. She knew that the idea of a woman alone running a business like this would cause consternation. At least until people got used to the idea.

  “Of course,” she said, proud that she sounded, to her ears at least, confident and composed. “I’ve done so often, when Arly was gone.”

  And frequently when he was here, she added to herself, remembering all the times when he’d been too unwell from a long night of drinking to open up the mercantile in the morning. All the times when she had borne the brunt of his drunken ill humor, and worn the marks of it for days afterward. Just as she was wearing one now.

  But no more. Never again. This was the last bruise she would ever watch people stare at, the last time she would count the days until the last of the mottled colors faded away, before the ache subsided so that she could move freely again. Never again would she have to cower in fear, wondering if this was one of the times when the blows would be followed by something even worse.

  And all because of this man.

  An emotion that she could not deny was joy welled up inside her, but she knew she didn’t dare let it show. She tamped it down, and said the words again, just to hear them.

  “I will run the store.”

  Something flickered in his eyes, something Kate thought for one silly moment might have been admiration.

  “I believe perhaps you will,” he said. He put his hat back on and touched the brim in what was nothing less than a salute. “My thanks again, Mrs. Dixon.”

  She didn’t know what to say to that, so she merely nodded. And watched intently as he turned and strode out of the store, moving with a lithe grace that brought home to her what a ponderous man Arly had been. She stepped out from behind the counter into the center of the store, her gaze still fastened on that tall, black-clad figure as he crossed the street, headed for the livery stable.

  This must be what that book about Shakespeare’s plays had called irony, she thought. She’d spent a long time studying that book, trying to work out the difficult words and more difficult meanings, hoping someday to be able to read the plays themselves. She’d had to sneak it at night, when Arly was snoring noisily; he hated her wasting time reading, especially about silly things written by a man long dead in a foreign country.

  But this had to be it, that irony she’d tried so hard to understand. Irony, that a man like Arly, a man most would call a decent, law-abiding, solid citizen, had been a lumbering, clumsy oaf who ran to fat and jowliness; while a man most people feared, a man considered a heartless killer, a man who stayed in one place no longer than it took to kill whatever hapless soul was his target, looked like an angel come down straight from heaven.

  More likely cast out from heaven, Kate amended silently. Lucifer, the fallen angel, perhaps, shunned by
the righteous and fit only to reside in hell.

  She nearly laughed aloud. A fallen angel with the grace and manners of a gentleman. She wondered if she’d perhaps gone a little touched in the head after Arly’s death, thinking such fanciful thoughts.

  Or perhaps it was simply the realization that for the first time in her life, she was free. There was no one to tell her what to do, no one to answer to, no meaty fists to dodge, no ugly, evil nights to dread. She was free.

  She twirled around, her arms outstretched. A tiny giggle threatened to escape her. She clapped a hand over her mouth to stop it. Then she remembered she didn’t have to, and let it out. It became a laugh, and she spun faster, feeling every uneven spot in the crude wood floor through her worn kid slippers, but not caring.

  She was free.

  She was free, and nothing could mar this joyous feeling. Nothing.

  Except the memory of a man’s eyes, and the words he’d so unexpectedly spoken. It makes me feel less guilty about killing a man I had no quarrel with.

  She stopped spinning, swaying a little as she came to a halt. “Who would have thought it?” she whispered to herself. The Hawk feeling guilty. How was it possible? He’d killed so many. A dozen, if Luke’s excited, nearly worshipful stories were to be believed.

  She stood there for a long moment, pensive, pondering . . . and just a little bit vexed at the pall that had been cast over her exultation.

  JOSH SMILED IN satisfaction as he slipped his poke into the pocket of his black frock coat and stood up from the table.

  “Gentlemen, thanks for the game,” he said to the other three poker players, who looked just as happy to see him go. He’d stopped with the last hand because he’d seen a couple of the losers were on the edge of becoming testy about it, and he didn’t want to push them over that edge. He’d taken some of their money, but not a lot, not enough for them to complain.

  It had taken longer than usual, nearly two days, since he’d been playing very conservatively in order to not draw any more attention than he already had in this town. He’d intentionally spread his winnings out over as many different players as possible, and not many townspeople, but men from the surrounding territory who were passing through and stopped to wet their throats. And he’d never won or lost big enough to cause any dissension. Occasionally, a player would begrudge his withdrawing from the game a winner, but they seemed to quickly remember who they were dealing with and withdraw the objection; he knew they were thinking that the paltry few dollars he was walking away with weren’t worth dying for.

  But now he had enough for his immediate needs. Enough to pay for his own room at the rather rickety building called—facetiously, he had to assume—the Grand Hotel, a room given to him, he was sure, on the strength of his reputation alone. The clerk had been far too afraid to ask for the usual payment in advance. And he had enough now for Buck’s keep, and the reshoeing the smithy had done for him. Rankin seemed a good man, and Josh was glad he’d be able to pay him.

  And he’d have enough left to lay in a few supplies. Enough to get him on his way out of Gambler’s Notch, a place he wouldn’t be sorry to see the last of. Maybe even enough to keep him going for a while, until he decided what to do with the rest of the life he’d had handed back to him. Next to that chore, winning enough of a stake to move on seemed easy. It would take one of Gramps’s allegories to show him the way. Or maybe that magical book, the one that was supposed to guide the Hawks, because this Hawk had certainly lost his way a long time ago. Probably the first time he’d taken a man’s money for the use of his Colt.

  With a final nod to the men who were already dealing the next hand, he walked out of the dingy, dark building that served as a saloon. Someday, he thought, he’d like to see a building with real windows again, windows on all sides, to let in the light. He got mightily tired of the dimness of most of the places in the kind of town he frequented.

  The afternoon sun sent the shadows of the buildings streaking from west to east across the wide dirt street. Soon it would drop behind the Rockies and be gone, but the warmth of the day would linger; in a few weeks spring would give way to the territory’s short, hot summer on the high plains at the foot of the mountains. Still, he felt the coolness as he stepped into one of the shadows. A tall one, and he knew without looking—he’d been working hard at not looking—that it was the shadow of the mercantile.

  He’d learned a lot in the past three days. Mostly from Luke, the slightly wild kid who lived, at the grace of Art Rankin, in the loft over the livery stable. The kid who’d found that battered old Dragoon Colt behind the rain barrel, and who had been more than willing to tell his story again, especially to the famous man he boasted of saving from the hangman.

  Josh no longer doubted that Luke had indeed found the weapon exactly where he said he had. He supposed it was possible Dixon could have had it in his hand and he hadn’t seen it. And he supposed in the aftermath of firing his own weapon, with the Peacemaker’s loud report, it was possible he might have missed hearing Arly’s weapon hit the back wall of the saloon and slide behind the water barrel. Possible, but not probable. His life depended on not missing details like that. True, he hadn’t been expecting an attack—no more so than he always was, anyway—but the likelihood of him not seeing the Dragoon in Dixon’s hand, not seeing it go flying when he was hit, and not hearing it land wasn’t very high.

  But Luke had found it there.

  And Mrs. Dixon swore she hadn’t lied for him. He believed her; when she’d stared up at him and said it, he’d known she was telling the truth. And Lord knew she had no reason to lie, not for his sake. No matter what kind of man Arly Dixon had been, life was hard for a woman out here without a husband.

  “Mr. Hawk!”

  He turned his head to see Luke running toward him. The boy had taken to following him around, and although he recognized the signs of incipient hero worship, Josh hadn’t had the heart to send the boy away.

  “You headed for the stable?”

  Josh nodded. “I owe Mr. Rankin some money.”

  “Aw, he don’t care if you’re late, s’long as you pay him. He’s a nice man.”

  “Yes, he is.”

  “I like your horse. He’s a real good ’un, isn’t he?”

  “He’s got enough bottom for any man,” Josh agreed. “Thought I’d give him a little attention this afternoon. Think you could round me up a brush, maybe a currycomb?”

  “You bet!” Luke yelped and headed off at a run. By the time Josh reached the stable, the boy was already haltering Buck in the big corral.

  He found Rankin, a man who had a strength in his powerful chest and shoulders that belied his short stature, out back at the forge, working on a pair of metal hinges. Josh paid what he owed for the work and Buck’s board, plus another day in advance. The quiet man took the money and his thanks with a nod and nothing more; he was a man of less than few words, Josh had discovered.

  He walked over to where Luke had tied the big buckskin up to a post at the side of the barn. The horse craned around to look at him, and whickered softly.

  “Hey, you old sugar eater,” Josh said, grinning as he did so; Buck was a long way from a pampered animal. He was tough, strong, fast, and loyal, and a man couldn’t ask for more than that from a horse. He patted the golden-brown neck, then rubbed up under the shaggy black mane. Buck whickered again.

  Josh shrugged off his coat and pulled off his string tie. Luke was there in an instant to take them and lay them carefully over the fence railing. Josh smothered a grin, rolled up his shirt sleeves, and picked up the currycomb Luke had found for him. He began to run it over the golden-brown coat, thinking rather inanely that it was nearly the same color as Mrs. Dixon’s unusual eyes. Shaking off that foolish thought, he worked his way down to the buckskin’s muscled rump. He didn’t speak, teasingly curious about how long the voluble Luke coul
d stay quiet. Not long, he soon found out.

  “You’re not leavin’, are you?”

  “Not today,” Josh answered.

  Seemingly relieved by this, the boy chattered on for a while. Josh only half listened as he curried the horse, at least until Luke started in about the widow.

  “I don’t see why a lady can’t run a store, do you? Miss Kate’s a lot smarter than old Arly was. She was usually the one workin’ in there anyway. An’ she’s real good with numbers; does all kinds of addin’ in her head.”

  “Did someone say she couldn’t?”

  “Aw, just ol’ Reverend Babcock. He’s always goin’ on, telling people what they should or shouldn’t do.”

  “I think that’s what a reverend does.”

  “Well, he does it too much, if you ask me. He shouldn’t be botherin’ Miss Kate, not with her husband just dead and all.”

  Josh went very still for a moment, but Luke didn’t seem to find anything odd in bemoaning the widow’s state to the man who had put her in that circumstance. When the boy didn’t go on, Josh resumed his task.

  “Is he . . . bothering her?”

  Luke shrugged. “Nah, not really. Just talking big words at her, like he does.”

  “Big words?”

  “Yeah. Tellin’ her the town’s givin’ her some time, because of her recent beriv . . . beave . . .”

  “Bereavement?”

  “Yep, that’s it. But that it wasn’t proper work for a lady to be in business. Old goat.”

  Josh managed not to laugh at Luke’s sniffingly disdainful assessment, but he couldn’t stop his grin.

  “She told ’em to go do their business elsewhere,” Luke said as he handed Josh a brush to take to the buckskin’s legs. Josh smiled at the pride in his young voice; obviously the liking between the two was mutual. “Said she’d either run the place or sell every bit of stock and close it up forever, and they could go all the way to Rock Springs for their coffee and tobacco. That hobbled their lips right quick.”