by Jean Barrett
Roark would certainly be interested in what she had just witnessed, Samantha thought, returning to the mirror to finish her hair. But her intention to share that scene with him was delayed by other events.
She was putting the last touches to her hair when she heard something outside the cabin. Or thought she heard it. She couldn’t be sure with the hum of the dryer in her ear. Not until she turned off the instrument was she certain of it. A roaring came from the other side of the front door. What in the—
Laying down the dryer, Samantha started toward the window to investigate. Before she could get there, the noise abruptly ended, and there was silence. Except, of course, for the uninterrupted rush of the shower inside the bathroom, which meant Roark wouldn’t have detected the roar. Nor, she presumed, did he hear the sudden banging on the cabin door. Samantha went to answer it.
Several minutes later the shower was turned off. The roaring sound had resumed by then. Roark couldn’t have missed it this time. And been alerted by it. Which would explain why the bathroom door burst open, followed by a wet body charging out into the main room.
A body, Samantha breathlessly observed, that was naked except for a towel snagged around its waist. The towel barely covered its wearer’s vital areas. The rest left nothing to the imagination.
Roark Hawke was an unsettling sight with his dark hair in wet spikes and drops of moisture clinging to his broad shoulders and chest. Water ran in rivulets on his muscular thighs, trickling down his long legs, as though he were some magnificent sea god emerging from the surf.
Now, why did she have to go and think something as wild as that? And why was he forever flying to her rescue in a state of undress? she wondered, remembering that night at the Morning Star Ranch. Remembering, too, how woozy the sight of his sleek body had made her.
“Would you please go and put some clothes on?”
“Not until you tell me what the heck is going on. What is that out there?”
By now the roar was receding into the distance, and the front door against which Samantha was leaning had been closed and relocked. “Relax. It’s just a motorcycle. A noisy one. I think he needs a new muffler. Do motorcycles have mufflers?”
“Who?”
“The young man who delivered this.” She held up the brown envelope in her hand.
“You went and opened the door to a stranger?”
“I was cautious. I kept it on the chain.” She waved the envelope at him. “It’s the stuff from the copy center. They were afraid you wouldn’t get there before they closed and were nice enough to send it over with—I think he said his name was Nick—who was coming in this direction, anyway.”
Roark relaxed. “Great. Let’s have it.”
He started toward her, one hand reaching for the envelope and the other doing nothing to hang on to the towel. Samantha could see it was in danger of sliding off him. She held the envelope behind her back.
“Not until you put some clothes on.”
He stopped and grinned at her. “I bother you like this, huh?”
“Just get dressed.”
He did, much to her relief, and a few minutes later they stood looking down at the contents of the large envelope, which Roark had spread out on the surface of the desk just outside the bathroom. Those contents seemed to consist mostly of photographs. There were a number of them, Samantha realized.
“What are they?” she asked, puzzled by the collection. “They look like—well, just a lot of rocks.”
“They are rocks. Or, to be more accurate about it, shots of the rock walls in the ravine where your grandfather claimed someone fired at him.”
“I don’t mean to be critical, but they don’t seem to make sense. Can any of them be useful to us?”
“Maybe, maybe not,” Roark said, sifting through the pile. His finger tapped at a photo of striated rock. “This one, I’m afraid, is just an example of Wendell being conscientious to a fault. These gouges here could have been cut by bullets, except they’re not fresh enough. They were probably worn in the stone by wind and water.”
The collection was accompanied by two lengthy, detailed reports of Wendell’s visits to the monastery and the Western Museum. Roark rapidly scanned them, apologizing for his trainee. “There isn’t anything worthwhile here, either, but I guess I can’t blame the kid for being thorough, when that’s what a good PI is supposed to be.” Indicating his intention to read them more carefully later on, he put the reports aside and picked up the last two items contained in the envelope. “Now these look a little more promising.”
“Photographs again,” Samantha said. “But I have to admit faces are more interesting than rocks. Who are they?”
Roark peered at the labels Wendell had attached to the bottoms of the photos to identify them. “This one is the abbot at St. James Monastery, and this other is the director of the Western Museum in Purgatory.”
“The people who will inherit my grandfather’s estate if I fail to complete the cattle drive,” she said.
“Not directly,” he corrected her. “It’s what they represent that will benefit. You know either of these two men?” Roark held the photographs toward her.
“I did meet the abbot when I was a little girl,” she said, glancing at the tall, smiling figure in his cassock. “I remember he was very kind. But this one…” She gazed at the mature, more sober face of the museum’s director. “I don’t know. I’m sure I never met the man, though it’s hard to tell. The resolution isn’t the best, but maybe…”
“The face is vaguely familiar? Yeah, I wondered about that myself, except as you say the photograph isn’t—”
Roark broke off, listening. Samantha had heard it, too. A sudden rustling noise from the direction of the bathroom.
“The window we left open!” he said. “There’s someone out there!”
Slapping the photos down on the desk, he tore into the bathroom. He was back before she could follow him.
“Did you see him?”
“Just a glimpse of someone taking off into the woods back there, not enough to tell anything. I’m going after him. Stay close behind me, Samantha.”
She had learned the wisdom of that from the stampede and gave him no argument as they raced out of the cabin. Her mind, thinking about what had just happened, was as active as her legs that carried her in Roark’s wake around the side of the building.
Whoever had stationed himself by the open window had been there for a purpose, an obvious one. He must have been eavesdropping on their conversation. How much had he heard, and how vital had any of it been to him? Enough to constitute a threat in their pursuit of him?
That pursuit was hampered by the rapidly failing light. The woods into which the intruder had fled behind the cabin were almost as dark as full night. That didn’t stop Roark from following him. Samantha, at his heels, hoped his night vision was better than hers. She could barely see where they were going and almost smacked into him when he came to an abrupt halt.
“Listen,” he whispered. “Hear it?”
Samantha strained her ears. She could detect nothing but the eerie silence all around them. And then off to their left came the snapping of a twig. Someone was moving over there.
Roark launched himself in that direction. Samantha tried to follow and bumped blindly into a tree, where she decided to stay put. Hugging the trunk, she waited. Seconds later came the sounds of curses and two bodies locked in combat. The darkness was so total now that she couldn’t make out the struggle.
A minute later there was the crashing noise of someone taking off through the underbrush, then the sound of swiftly receding footsteps. A tall shadow emerged from the trees and joined her.
“He got away,” Roark reported. “There’s no point in going after him. There’s no light left now.”
“Could you tell who it was?”
“I wasn’t able to hang on to him long enough for that. He was like an eel. Come on, let’s find our way back to the cabin.”
“Wait. There’s
something I didn’t get the chance to tell you.” She went on to describe Shep’s encounter with the stranger out under the cover of the trees. “It struck me there was something funny about their meeting. Do you think it’s anything to worry about?”
Roark was thoughtful for a moment. “Probably not. Shep mentioned something about needing to get permission to water the longhorns at a private pond on the next section of the trail.”
“You think that’s all it was?”
“I’ll ask Shep about it. Let’s hope his explanation is an innocent one. But either way,” he said grimly, “we remain cautious, because anybody in this outfit could be the enemy. It’s even possible Shep’s visitor was our eavesdropper at the window. Right now there’s only one thing I know for sure. Before this drive is finished, I mean to find out just who our enemy is and why.”
It took them a few minutes to find their way through the black woods and back to the cabin. Once there, Samantha was relieved to be inside again and with the lights on.
“I don’t know about you,” she said, “but I could use those laundry facilities in the other cabin.”
“Good plan.”
They began to collect their things. Samantha couldn’t find a pair of socks she had discarded before her shower and wondered if she had left them on the desk, maybe buried under the contents of the envelope. She started to gather up the photographs and Wendell’s reports, and that’s when she noticed that two of the items were missing.
“Roark, they’re not here!”
He joined her at the desk. “What aren’t?”
“The pictures of the abbot and the museum’s director.”
“Are you sure? Let me see.” He took the stack from her and went through it. “You’re right. They’re gone. Did you check the floor? Maybe they slipped down behind the desk.”
Together they searched the room. Roark even moved the desk away from the wall. There was no sign of the photographs.
“What happened to them?” Samantha asked. “Do you suppose…”
“Yeah,” Roark said, understanding what she was saying, “I think that’s exactly where they went. Whoever got away from me managed to double back here, sneak inside while we were still up in the woods, and grab the photos. And he didn’t have to waste a second searching for what he wanted. He knew just what those photos were and where they were.”
Samantha nodded. “From having overheard us talking about them while we stood right here. The mystery is, why? What is there about those two pictures that would compel him to steal them and not take either of the reports that accompanied them? Or to bother with the other photographs. Unless—”
“No, the rest are all still here. I counted them when I went through the stack.”
“Then why?”
“You tell me. Which maybe you can. Sit down, Samantha. It’s time we talk again about who benefits from Joe Walker’s will in the event that you don’t.”
She perched on the edge of the bed. “Are you thinking this theft is connected with that?”
“It’s a strong possibility.” He turned the desk chair around and straddled it facing her. “Let’s start with the St. James Monastery. Why would your grandfather leave half of his estate to a monastery? Was he that devout?”
“Hardly. I think it must be because of what happened during the Great Depression. Times were so bad that my great-grandfather would have lost the ranch if the monastery hadn’t helped the family to survive. Joe was just a boy then, but he never forgot it. After he inherited the Walking W, he made an annual generous donation to St. James.”
“So, gratitude. That’s understandable. What about the Western Museum in Purgatory?”
“I should think that’s fairly obvious. The museum is dedicated to displays of everything connected with Texas and ranching, and since that was my grandfather’s whole world…”
“Right. It’s all pretty straightforward then, nothing out of the ordinary about either of these two institutions dividing his estate if you fail to qualify.”
“None of this is getting us anywhere, is it? We’d agreed back in San Antonio that St. James and the museum are probably above suspicion, and that in any case neither one of them is desperate for funds.”
“There’s got to be a motive somewhere. And my job is to learn it.”
“How?”
“Don’t know, but I will before I’m through.”
They were both silent, and then Samantha remembered something. “Dick Brewster’s party tonight. I don’t know about you, but I’m in no mood to celebrate. I suppose, though, we have to be there.”
“I wouldn’t mind sharing a dance with you,” Roark said with one of his wicked smiles. “And who knows. Maybe tonight will turn up something worthwhile, because I intend to have my eyes on every member of the outfit. People at a party can be damn interesting. And sometimes revealing.”
Chapter Seven
Depending upon your point of view, Samantha thought, this party was either as interesting as Roark wanted it to be or an absolute washout.
She was personally inclined to favor the latter opinion, although she couldn’t argue with the setting. With the sky above them spangled by stars, an orange moon just beginning to peek over the distant mountaintops and the campfire around which they were gathered providing a comforting glow, she supposed the mood was as ideal as any greenhorn yearning for the romance of the old West could want.
She couldn’t say the same about the moods of the company. With a few exceptions, they could be defined as dismal. Cappy Davis, his normally uncommunicative tongue loosened by beer, was one of those exceptions.
“Nasty business, castrating. Bet we castrated and branded two hundred head that day. By the time I got back to the bunkhouse…”
Samantha wished that Dick Brewster hadn’t suggested they swap stories. Cappy’s ranch tales about the old days before mechanization were much too graphic, as well as being exaggerations. She much preferred the old man entertaining them with his mouth organ, which he had earlier been persuaded to do. Cappy’s harmonica had blended with Dick’s smooth voice singing Western favorites that even Samantha had enjoyed.
“Sure you won’t have one, Sam?” the horse wrangler urged, offering her a can of beer as Cappy wrapped up his story.
“No, thanks. I’m fine with my soda.”
Poor Dick. He was genuinely enjoying himself…or trying to.
Ramona, making an effort to support him, kept pressing snacks on the company that no one really wanted. Her manner was as hearty as Dick’s, but far less genuine. Samantha could see she was still worried about her son.
And with good reason. Ernie, along with Alex, was consuming far too much beer. The two of them sat there and glared at each other. Shep was in no better condition on the other side of the campfire. He remained silent and gloomy, though he hadn’t touched the beer himself, leaving Samantha with the impression that he didn’t approve of alcohol. The trail boss’s problem was obviously something else, possibly connected with that meeting she had witnessed this afternoon.
As for Roark settled beside her…well, he was as quiet as Shep. From time to time, Samantha cast her gaze in his direction, watching him watch the others while he slowly, unconsciously flexed the fingers of the hand he had injured in the rodeo competition. She knew Roark was observing them, waiting for an interesting development that had yet to occur. It was a rare opportunity with the entire outfit assembled in one spot, a situation made possible by the two young men from town who’d been hired to take care of the herd for the evening.
But Samantha no longer cared about that opportunity. At the moment, as tired and dispirited as the others, all she longed for was the end of this dreary affair. But Dick wasn’t about to let his party die a quiet death.
“Hey,” he said, surging to his feet, “this is getting dull. It’s time to make happy.”
Producing a battery-powered radio from his saddlebag, he tuned into a station playing golden oldies. A loud and lively “Rocky Mountain High
” issued from the speaker.
“Ah, this is more like it.” Leaning over, the good-natured horse wrangler extended a hand to Samantha. “Come on, Sam, dance with me.”
He was so enthusiastic about it that she didn’t have the heart to disappoint him. She permitted him to raise her to her feet and lead her onto the floor. In this case, the floor was the hard-packed earth of the level area out in front of the cabins.
“You having fun, Sam?” Dick asked her as he spun her around the clearing. “I’m having fun.”
“I’m having a fine time,” she lied.
Unruly blond hair swinging over his eyes, he turned his head to call out to the others. “Come on, the rest of you dance, too.”
Alex needed no further invitation. Springing to his feet, he hurried over to claim his own turn with Samantha. Dick surrendered her and went off to dance with Ramona.
Samantha didn’t like the eager flush on Alex’s face as he danced with her. Made bold by all the beer he’d consumed, he leaned toward her with a confession that was slightly slurred. “You are so beautiful, Sam. Do you know how beautiful you are?”
Samantha sent a look of desperation in Roark’s direction, hoping for a timely rescue. All she got back was an amused expression that told her she was on her own. Damn him, why wasn’t he asking for that dance he had earlier promised he wanted to share with her? On the other hand, maybe it was just as well she wasn’t in his arms.
In the end, it was Ernie who saved her from needing to respond to Alex’s embarrassing admiration. He swaggered forward with the determined intention to cut in on his rival.
“My turn.”
Alex swung his head, scowling at him. “Go away. Sam doesn’t want to dance with you.”
“Who says?”
Afraid of a scene, Samantha swiftly intervened. “It’s all right, Alex. I’d like to dance with Ernie.”
Alex hesitated and then reluctantly left the field.