“The afternoon train about 4:30 P.M. if all goes well.”
“But the race is at 1:30, and I promised Mr. Meyers that I’d—”
“The big race isn’t until Sunday, and I absolutely forbid my son to be at the racetrack on a Sunday afternoon and so does your father.”
Little Frank jammed his hands in the front pockets of his ducking trousers. “Tomorrow they’re runnin’ the local races. The two racehorses separate against all comers. And the only way to get people to enter is to have hometown boys ride their horses. Nobody wants to compete against professional jockeys. Mr. Meyers chose me and Eachan since we’ve been ridin’ them.”
Jamie Sue gently placed her hand on her son’s shoulder and was surprised at how muscular it felt. “You’ve been riding? I thought today was the first time.”
“It was the first time we raced them, Mama. We exercise them every day, of course.”
“I don’t remember you telling me that before.”
“’Nica and Tricia knew,” he reasoned. “I didn’t try to keep it a secret.”
“You knew that Little Frank was racing horses?”
“Exercising them, Mama,” Patricia corrected.
“Of course we knew,” Veronica sighed. “Everyone in town knew.”
“Well, I didn’t know. And I don’t think your father knew. And you will not race them again until your father comes home. Is that understood?”
“But Mama … I promised. I can’t break my word. Fortune men never ever break their word. Grandpa Brazos taught me that,” Little Frank pleaded.
I can’t believe this. I’m boxed in by a fourteen-year-old imploring family tradition. Somehow, Brazos Fortune, you’re behind all of this. “Perhaps your father will come home on the early train and we can discuss it with him.”
“Let’s send Daddy a telegraph and tell him we need him home by noon.”
“I refuse to spend our money on a telegram,” Jamie Sue insisted.
“Can I spend my money?” Little Frank asked, as he held up the greenback bill.
She studied the waiting blue eyes of a young man who had the affable Fortune men smile and a dance in his eyes. “It is your money, and you may spend it as you please. But that doesn’t …”
Little Frank grabbed her neck and kissed her cheek. “Thanks. I’m going to the depot to send a telegram right now. Do you girls want to come?”
Patricia’s eyes widened. “You mean, you don’t mind being seen with us?”
“I want all the boys to know you have a big brother and they better treat you good,” Little Frank announced.
“Is it alright if we go, Mama?” Veronica asked.
Jamie Sue pressed her fingers against her temples and nodded her head. “Go on. Don’t run. Come straight home. And don’t let Grandpa Brazos buy you a new dress or anything else!”
CHAPTER NINE
“Thanks for not bindin’ my hands and feet in front of my boys,” Holter told them.
Guthrie Holter rode next to Robert Fortune as the buckboard headed back up the dusty, narrow dirt road to Deadwood. His two boys, James and Paul, rode double on Robert’s horse beside Stillman Taite, a good fifty feet behind the wagon.
“I don’t get it, Guthrie. I pull you out of a railroad yard beating, give you a job, a room, a purpose, a good salary … and you treat me this way. I thought you were on the square,” Robert said.
“It’s hard to explain,” Holter admitted.
“We’ve got all morning. Give it a try.”
“Belinda, that’s my wife, always lived fast and likes money. But I loved her. Shoot, I still love her. And don’t ask me to explain that. But the reason I left was ’cause I just couldn’t make money fast enough for her.”
“She didn’t live in Sidney, did she?”
“We were only there a while. She was a travelin’ woman. So James and Paul ended up stayin’ with their grandma a lot in Rawlins, Wyomin’. I came north to find a better job. I kept thinkin’ I could find something that would satisfy her. But I got in trouble in that Rapid City train yard over a card game. That’s when you showed up.”
“Why’d you lie about your family bein’ in Sidney?”
“I wanted to sound more stable than I am. I wanted the job.”
“You wanted a job so you could rob jewelry merchants?”
“Yeah … well, it don’t matter, I reckon, but it was Belinda’s plan.”
Each bump the buckboard took jarred the pain Robert still felt from diving out the train window. “And just how is that?” Lord, this guy double-crossed me, stole jewels, and put my life in danger … yet … there’s something about him I like. Friends and enemies aren’t that far apart sometimes.
Guthrie turned around, waved to his boys, then took off his hat. “I heard she was back in Rawlins, so I listened to your advice. I decided we ought to give it another try. I sent her a telegram to get her and the boys to move up here. She said they’d come up to Deadwood and look around if I sent them the fare but wasn’t promisin’ nothin’.”
Robert reached though a rip in his trouser leg and rubbed a raw spot above his knee. “How come you didn’t tell me that?”
“’Cause I never know if she will show up or not. If I make a big deal and she don’t show, well it’s humblin’ to say the least. Sometimes she just spends the travel money I send her and don’t follow through. Anyway, by the time Belinda got to Deadwood, she had cooked up this scheme to rob the diamond man. I guess she visited with him on the train comin’ up. Belinda gets along real well visitin’ with men, if you get my drift.”
Robert refused to look at Guthrie. “Why not rob him in an alley in Deadwood?”
“That salesman is the most cautious man in the world. When he’s in town, he keeps his samples in a safe in his hotel room. He has the jewelers come up and visit him to see the display. She said the best place to rob him was on the train. Catch him with his defenses down. I said I had me a good job and wanted no part of it. She says she’ll do it anyway, and take the boys with her and not come back. Said if someone chased her and started shootin’, it would be all my fault if any of them got injured. And I knew you’d be the one to go after her.”
Robert listened to the somber drone of Holter’s confession. Lord, it’s getting harder and harder for me to like that woman. What drives a woman to be that way?
“I tried to tell her it wouldn’t work what with you, me, and Stillman ridin’ the cars. She don’t listen much. She said if I’d help this time, we’d buy us a house in Rawlins next to her mama’s and she’d settle down.”
“Did you believe her?”
“Nope, but I wanted to.”
Robert rubbed his beard. “So, that’s why you wanted to take my place on the train, so the jewelry theft would go easier?”
“To tell you the truth, Mr. Fortune, I wanted to take your place so I could be sure you wouldn’t get shot.”
“She did shoot at me, you know.”
Guthrie Holter leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “But she didn’t hit you. Belinda used to be a trick-shot expert in Major MacGrueder’s Wild West Show. She don’t miss. Ever. For once, she followed my advice.”
“How’s that?”
“I told her if she shot you, your brothers would track her down anywhere on the face of the earth for as long as it took them.”
Robert stared out over the ears of the one horse pulling the buckboard. “You’re right about that part.”
“Anyway, the diversion was my idea. I figured no matter who was on the train … you, me, Stillman … we’d go after the baggage car robbers. I thought that she and the boys wouldn’t as likely get hurt if the security was busy elsewhere.”
“How did you arrange that part?” Robert asked.
“It was easy. Last time I was in Rapid City, I hollered across the platform to the agent that a trunkload of paper money was coming down in a big green wardrobe. I knew the train yard bums would hear it. We had no idea where they would try it. But we knew they would.”<
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“Someone could have gotten killed in that robbery.”
“I know … but they are so dumb I figured you and Stillman would have no problem. If they wanted to be safe, they wouldn’t have tried it.”
“What would you have done if they hadn’t provided a diversion?”
“I told her to forget the diamond man. But she would have thought of somethin’. She was convinced those diamonds should belong to her. She don’t change her mind much.”
“You’re stringin’ me along with this tale, Guthrie. But how about the letter to Moraine?” Robert pressed. “Did you write the hate letter?”
“It was my idea to try to keep you off the train. I stole the paper, of course. But I cain’t run one of them typing machines.” Holter glanced back at his boys, rubbed his chin, and shoved his hat back on. “Belinda clerked for a judge for a while and learned a lot … includin’ how to operate one of them. The judge called her the best operator he’d ever seen.”
And I wonder how much that wisdom cost the judge? “So she typed the note?” Robert asked.
“Yep. I told Belinda to tell Moraine something about a meeting with you to work things out. I figured I’d just take your run. I swear I didn’t know until he showed up screaming what she had typed on that paper.”
Robert kept shaking his head. Lord, I don’t even know what to say. This man deceived me before. How do I know he’s not deceiving me now?
“So, what happens to me now, Mr. Fortune?” Holter asked.
“You face Judge Bennett’s court, of course. You didn’t blow up the baggage car. You can’t be tried for shouting information at a depot. You didn’t assault the jewelry merchant, but you drove the escape rig and helped plan the whole thing. No one got killed or seriously injured. I suppose a year in the state prison. What about James and Paul? What happens to them now?”
“I’ve been ponderin’ that ever since Belinda took off last night.” Guthrie rubbed the back of his neck and stared off at the tree-covered horizon. “You’re the only friend I’ve got around here.”
Friend? I just arrested you at gunpoint.
“I’m goin’ to ask the biggest favor of my life and one I don’t deserve. Could you and your wife take the boys until the judge decides, then see that they get to their grandma’s in Rawlins? She loves them as much as I do. Belinda loves them too, you know.”
“We’ll help if we can, Guthrie. But your Belinda rode off in the night and left you all.”
“She has a good heart even under all that. It’s like a disease sometimes that makes her do things she regrets later on.”
“It’s called sin, Guthrie … sin. And there is a cure.”
Guthrie Holter lowered his voice. “You going to start preachin’ Jesus at me?”
“Can you think of anyone who needs it more?”
“Only Belinda …” Holter murmured. “Only my darlin’ Belinda.”
Robert closed the front door of the house and returned to Lincoln Street where Guthrie Holter waited in the wagon. Stillman Taite, James and Paul Holter were on horseback.
“No one’s at home. I don’t know where they are,” he said as he crawled back into the wagon.
“Ain’t you goin’ to change that dirty torn suit?” Taite called out.
“Not until I get the boys situated. We’ll go by the hardware. Someone there will know where my wife is.”
Robert drove the buckboard down the steep slope of Lincoln Street and turned right. They rolled past the Merchant’s Hotel. “Can’t remember when the front porch of the Merchant’s was empty like that,” Taite called out.
Robert pulled the buckboard up in front of a huge brick building that read “Fortune & Son, Hardware.” On the front on the tall oak-and-glass doors was a hand-painted sign: “Closed.”
“What do you mean, closed?” Robert grumbled. He stood up in the buckboard and pushed his hat back, then looked around town. “Do you see any smoke, Guthrie? Last time this store was closed in the middle of the day, the lumber mill was burning down. How about you boys?” he called to James and Paul. “You see any fire or smoke?”
The older, James, with dark hair parted in the middle and slicked behind his ears, called back, “No, sir, we don’t see any fire.”
“Have you told them what’s about to happen?” he asked Holter.
“Nope. Kind of hard to figure the words.”
“Tell them you did wrong and when a man does wrong there’s punishment, just like there’s punishment when a boy does wrong.”
“Where we headed now?” Taite called out.
“I suppose I should try the phone company or Abby’s dress shop … or maybe the doctor’s office. If Daddy took sick … every family business will be closed.”
He slapped the lead line and the single horse trudged north. “I been thinkin’ about your preachin’,” Guthrie said. “I think when I get out of jail, I’m going to give it a try.”
“Give what a try?” Robert asked.
“Like you said … Jesus.”
“It won’t work, Guthrie.”
“What do you mean, it won’t work? You said He’d forgive me of everything I did wrong.”
“That He will.”
“Then why won’t it work?”
“Because you’re approaching it like a new system to win at Faro. You’re going to try it out and see if the results are better. He wants everything and He wants it right now, not later.”
“All or nothin’?”
“That’s about it.”
“That’s what I figured you’d say.”
“And what do you say?”
Guthrie pointed across the street. “I’d say the telephone exchange is locked up tight.”
The telephone exchange business office had all the blinds drawn. Lord, not Daddy, not while I was out of town. I moved all the way to Deadwood to be with family, and this can’t happen with me out of town! “This is crazy!”
“You want me to go into the grocery and ask?” Taite called out. “Looks like it’s open.”
“And tell them that I’ve lost my family and has anyone seen them?” He looked up to see the long black queue of an oriental man in a red-flowered silk shirt scurry across the street. “Mr. Chin!” Robert called out.
The short, older man stopped in the middle of the street and turned toward the wagon.
“Young Fortune!” he called out.
“Mr. Chin, have you seen any of my family?”
“Oh, yes, big horse!”
“What do you mean, big horse?”
The old man smiled and scooted across the street.
“Mr. Chin … I’m lookin’ for Sammy. Have you seen him or his wife?”
The wrinkle-faced man once again smiled. “Ah, yes … big horse!”
“Mr. Chin, have you see Daddy Brazos?”
The smile stiffened. “I tell you, big horse! I go now.” He ran down toward China Town.
“A big horse? Daddy rode off on a big horse? Was run over by a big horse …” Robert mumbled.
“If your daddy was injured, where would they take him?” Guthrie Holter asked.
“Up to Dacee June’s or Todd’s. They live next door up on Williams Street on Forest Hill. I’ve got to go up there.”
Guthrie Holter pointed to the large brown horse. “This one tired pony will never pull us up there. He’s been doing extra duty all mornin’.”
Robert stood in the buckboard and surveyed the street. “James and Paul, come sit here with your daddy. Let me ride that black horse up to Forest Hill.”
He put his hands on Guthrie Holter’s shoulder. “Tell them what’s going on. Tell them the truth. They need to hear it from you.”
“What do you want me to do?” Taite called out.
“Shoot him if he tries to escape.”
“You’re joshin’ me.”
“He won’t try.”
“How do you know?”
Fortune pointed back to Guthrie Holter huddled with his two boys. “He has too much to lose
.”
The sorrel still had some spring in his step after packing the little boys all morning. But what strength he had dissipated when Robert spurred him straight up the steep incline of Shine Street. The horse was lathered and breathing hard when he rode up in front of the mirror-identical Williams Street houses at the top of seventy-two steep city steps.
Robert was surprised to find both front doors locked.
And no one responded to the knocking.
Dacee June took those three babies somewhere? And Rebekah’s five? They’re all gone? And my family too … like they were plucked right up into heaven … but I’m still here.
Robert stared over the tops of the buildings of Deadwood’s Main Street, toward the flat area across Whitewood Creek, near the old site of Claim #1.
Half the town must be at the racetrack … but the race isn’t until Sunday afternoon! What are they doing there?
He wandered across the porch of Todd and Rebekah’s house and gawked at the throng of people at the long, skinny racetrack that ran parallel to the creek.
“A speech? Did the governor come to town? Or the president?” he mumbled aloud. It’s some kind of political rally, and the entire Fortune crowd is there. Except me.
Shine Street was too steep to ride the tired horse down, so Robert walked him back down the hill and across Main Street.
“What did you find out?” Taite called out as he approached.
“No one’s home, but there’s some big doin’ at the racetrack.”
“The local races,” Taite answered. “I lost a day with this all-night chase and plum forgot it. Today is them local races!”
“What local races?” Robert asked.
“Anyone who wants to challenge the big gray or big black horse can do so … up to eleven other horses each race. But it’s local riders only. Even on them racehorses. I reckon everyone’s over there.”
“Not the Fortune family. We don’t go to horse races. Well, Sammy might be there. He used to racehorses down in the Territory, but not the rest of the family.”
“Findin’ one of ’em is better than none,” Taite suggested.
Robert mounted the sorrel and glanced over at the wagon. Two teary-eyed boys clutched their father’s arms.
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