Warrior's Prize (Panorama of the Old West Book 15)

by Georgina Gentry

  Cleve protested, “But I understand that with all the gold and silver here, there are many rich families.”

  “Maybe,” Keso snapped, lifting a big trunk to one shoulder, “but the Evanses don’t hang around with any of them.”

  Wannie felt her face burn at Keso’s rudeness. “We’ll have all that in New York,” she reminded Cleve as they walked toward the buggy.

  “I’m already missing civilization,” Cleve said, “but I suppose it’ll be good sport to rough it awhile.”

  Keso made a rude noise as he strode along behind them, loaded down with Cleve’s luggage. Wannie was weary and upset over what she’d learned about her parents and now Keso was behaving like a hostile hick. She hoped Cleve wouldn’t be too bored and disappointed. There certainly weren’t any social events here like he was used to back East.

  Cleve looked at the mountains in the distance with distaste. “Is the house really a long way from Denver?”

  “I’m afraid it is,” she said.

  “Well, then, I’ll just think of it as a big adventure.” Cleve put his one small bag in the back and turned to Wannie. He bent his head and kissed her lightly on the lips. She no longer expected skyrockets; that was romantic foolishness.

  “Cleve,” Keso said, “I could use some help with your luggage.”

  He had paused and was glaring at Cleve as if he’d like to throw him over the buggy. Keso wasn’t used to being treated like a servant, Wannie thought.

  “I can’t imagine a station without porters,” Cleve said a bit huffily as he went to help Keso.

  There was some jostling as they both tried to help her into the buggy. “I’d like my fiance to assist me,” she said.

  Cleve put his hands on her waist and helped her up into the back seat of the buggy, climbing up beside her. “I brought you a small gift.” He handed her a jewelry box.

  “Oh, Cleve, you shouldn’t have!” She was thrilled as she opened it. “Look, Keso, a ruby pin with clusters of pearls! Oh, it’s gorgeous!”

  “A bit gaudy,” Keso said as he climbed up on the front seat and picked up the reins.

  She ignored him, oohing and aahing over the piece. “It is spectacular, Cleve, dear—help pin it on.”

  “I’d be delighted.” His fingers seemed to brush against her bosom as he pinned it to her collar.

  When she looked up, Keso was watching him as if he intended to break both of Cleve’s arms.

  “Ahh!” Cleve surveyed the pin with satisfaction. “I knew it would be the right piece. When we’re married, my dear, I intend to give you tons of fine things.”

  When we are married, Wannie thought. Would he want her if he ever heard the truth about her mother?

  “Keso,” she said, “are you going to drive or just sit there all day staring at us?”

  For a moment, she thought he was going to say something. Instead, he gave Cleve another black look, slapped the old horse with the reins, and the buggy started down the crowded street away from the station.

  He had promised and yet he was being cool and rude to Cleve.

  “Dearest,” she said, “we’ll give you a little tour of the town before we head back.”

  On the seat in front of them, Keso’s shoulders were squared in a hostile stance. “I told Cherokee we’d stop at the general store and pick up some supplies.”

  The horse clopped slowly along the dusty street filled with settlers, miners, and soldiers. In the heat of the day, many windows were open and music drifted from saloons.

  Cleve looked around. “This really is a growing town and bound to get bigger if half of what Governor Pitkin told me is true. Brewster Industries could sell a lot of plows and kitchenware here. Why are there so many soldiers?”

  “Because of all those settlers and miners,” Keso said over his shoulder. “It looked for a while like we might have trouble with the Utes, so the army beefed up its forces.”

  “Utes?” Cleve looked blank.

  “Savages—you know, like you see in the back-East dime novels,” Keso grinned.

  Sweat broke out on Cleve’s patrician forehead. “Are we—are we going to be in any danger once we leave town?”

  “Of course not,” Wannie snapped.

  “Don’t believe her,” Keso said. “Why, we might run into a war party on our way back to the cabin.”

  How dare Keso act this way. “You’ll have to excuse my brother,” she said and glared at Keso’s back, her cold tone leaving nothing to the imagination. “He’s always joking.”

  Cleve laughed a little too heartily. “I’m a good sport—I can take a joke as well as the next fellow.”

  Wannie heaved a sigh of relief as the buggy creaked down the dusty road and Keso reined in before the general store. Everything was going to be all right now. Cleve helped her from the buggy. “Now, dearest,” she said, “you just go along with my brother. There’s a shop down the street that’s supposed to have some new fashions and I want to take a quick peek while we’re in town.”

  Keso groaned aloud.

  “I said just a quick peek!”

  “Brat,” Keso grumbled, “you’ve already got more clothes and jewelry than you can wear.”

  “In her new station in life, she’ll need lots of fine things,” Cleve said in her defense and she gave him a warm smile.

  “The kind of people who are impressed with possessions aren’t people to bother with,” Keso said.

  “You just don’t understand the way the civilized world works.” Cleve’s tone was smug and lofty.

  “I reckon not. We judge a man by actions up here, not by what he can buy or who his ancestors were.”

  Wannie gave him a murderous look. “You two go on into the general store—I won’t be gone long.” She turned and hurried away.

  Inside the exclusive little shop, women from some of Denver’s wealthiest families were picking up baubles and examining them. Wannie sighed with pleasure as she looked around. Clothes and jewels were more than mere possessions to her. She barely remembered the dark beauty of her mother, but she remembered that clothes and jewels had been important to the duchess. In fact, the only time the woman ever noticed Wannie was when her governess dressed the child up so exquisitely that the duchess would smile with approval. She had been an indifferent mother at best.

  The oily little man bowed respectfully. “Ah, Miss Evans, what may I show you today? We have some lovely frocks to go with that stunning pin you’re wearing.”

  “It is beautiful, isn’t it?” Wannie smiled. “Just let me look around a bit—I haven’t time for any serious shopping, but I’ll come back and bring my fiancé.”

  The clerk rubbed his hands together greedily. “We can hardly wait to meet him. If you see anything you want, we can put it on your father’s bill.”

  Wannie nodded and began to browse through the shop. So many fine things. All the best families in Denver shopped here. After a few moments, she looked at the clock on the wall. “Oh, the time has gotten away from me—I’ll return another time.”

  The clerk nodded and Wannie hurried out the door. No sign of Cleve and Keso yet. The general store was about a half block away. She’d walk down there and let them know she was ready. As she started along the wooden sidewalk, a soldier stumbled past her and she shrank back from the sour smell of liquor, but he caught her arm.

  “Hey, girlie, let ol’ Clem buy you a drink.”

  “Let go of me—you’re drunk.” She tried to pull away from him, but he held onto her arm, weaving a little.

  “Don’t get uppity with me, baby. Now we’ll just go down the street and have one little drink.” He was a big man, she realized with sudden consternation, and very drunk. She looked around, but only women and old men brushed past them on the wooden sidewalk, none of them noticing her predicament. It was a hundred yards down the sidewalk to the general store and Keso and Cleve were not in sight. “Please let me go, soldier—”

  “Sweetie, you ain’t goin’ nowhere but with me to have a drink. How about a littl
e kiss?” He grabbed her, lifting her off the ground, and when she tried to cry out in protest, his wet mouth covered hers as he swung her up in his arms and started down the sidewalk.

  She struggled, protesting, but he kept walking. For the first time since the night the duchess had died, Wannie was scared!

  ELEVEN

  Keso sighed as he came out of the store with Cleve. What a pompous ass! What could Wannie possibly see in this dandy?

  Some confusion farther down the wooden sidewalk caught his eye. Then he heard an unmistakable sweet voice shrieking with terror and indignation.

  “Wannie?”

  A big, drunken soldier had his arms around her and she was fighting him off, hitting him with her reticule.

  “Egad,” Cleve gasped, “How dare he! I’ll get the law.”

  “Law, hell!” Keso took off at a run.

  She was as angry as she was frightened. “Let go!” She hit the man with her purse again, even as he grabbed her. “Help! Help me!”

  “You feisty little filly! Ow! Stop hitting me!” The burly soldier picked her up off the sidewalk.

  Around her, women watched helplessly while men were melting into doorways and hurrying off down the street to keep from getting involved. Clem was so drunk, he swayed on his feet. She flinched from the cheap whiskey on his breath as he tried to kiss her. “Here, gal, stop this fuss.”

  “You bastard! Let her go.” Keso whirled him around, adding, “Don’t you know how to treat a decent woman?”

  “Keso!” She breathed a sigh of relief as the man turned her loose. She stepped away even as Keso’s fist flew like a hammer and caught the soldier in the mouth, sending him staggering backward into the hitching rail.

  “Get back, Wannie, I’ll handle this.”

  Her relief was short-lived as the man bellowed like a bull and charged at him. Keso side-stepped easily, brought a muscled arm down in a steel blow across the man’s neck and the soldier stumbled and fell.

  A crowd began to gather, mostly men eager to watch a fight. However, the fight was all but gone from the ugly drunk. He staggered to his feet one more time, blood and curses streaming from his mouth as he charged at Keso.

  The Indian ought him under the chin with a hard blow that lifted the man up off the wooden sidewalk. The soldier came down like a sodden blue bag, sprawling across the walk.

  A crowd had ringed them and now they congratulated Keso on the fight and more than one lady favored him with a flutter of eyelashes.

  “Oh, Keso, you’re hurt.” Wannie rushed to him, pulling out a dainty hankie to wipe the blood from his lip.

  He looked her over anxiously. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine.” She looked around. “Where’s Cleve?”

  Keso’s lip curled in disdain. “He went for the law.”

  She felt herself blush red with humiliation for her fiancé. “He—he—, well, back in a civilized place like he’s from, that’s what a man would do.”

  Keso laughed. “Out here, a man had better learn to protect himself and what’s his or someone will take it.”

  Cleve ran up just then, followed by two policemen. “I’m here. I got help.”

  “You’re a little late,” Keso said wryly, picking up his western hat and dusting it off.

  Wannie felt the amused glances of the people wit nessing the event and was even more embarrassed. “It’s okay, Cleve, I’m fine.”

  The policeman looked down at the sprawled soldier, then at Keso with respect in his pale blue eyes. “That’s a pretty big hombre.”

  “Not big enough, I reckon,” Keso shrugged. “He’ll be all right once he sobers up and sleeps it off.”

  The officer pushed his hat back and nodded. “He’ll spend the night in jail before I turn him loose. Been a lot of soldiers in town because of the rumor of Ute trouble. I reckon that’s all over.”

  “Let’s hope so.” Keso took Wannie’s arm. “Come on, brat, we’ve shown the Easterner enough excitement for one day.”

  The onlookers snickered, which both angered and embarrassed Wannie. She whirled on them. “Don’t you folks have anything to do but gawk?”

  “Hey,” the officer motioned, “a couple of you fellas help me get this drunk to jail, ’til the army can claim him.”

  The excitement over, the crowd began to melt away as the law dragged the soldier off the sidewalk.

  “Wannie,” Cleve explained as the three strolled toward the buggy, “I wouldn’t want you to think I was afraid. I really thought it would be better to go for the law.”

  Keso snorted. “This isn’t New York, Cleve. Out here, a man has to defend himself and what’s his.”

  “Oh hush, Keso.” Wannie was more than a little annoyed with his arrogance and Cleve’s humiliation as Keso’s strong arm on her elbow propelled her along the sidewalk to the buggy. “You did exactly right, Cleve,” she comforted him, “that brute probably would have hurt you.”

  “He was certainly hurting you, ”Keso pointed out. “If I hadn’t stopped in, no telling what would have happened.”

  “I was perfectly capable of defending myself,” Wannie snapped, brushing his hand off her arm.

  “Uh-huh—I saw that. Next time then, I’ll just stand back and watch.” Keso’s sardonic smile infuriated her. She was angry, embarrassed, and humiliated for Cleve.

  “There won’t be a next time,” Cleve snapped. “Wannie will be moving to New York just as soon as we’re wed. Father is right—the sooner we pen up all the Indians and civilize this wild country, the better.”

  “Attempting to pen up all those Indians is what’s brought all these soldiers into Colorado in the first place,” Keso said as he shrugged Cleve off and lifted Wannie onto the buggy’s front seat.

  Now that the excitement was ended Wannie felt a giddy feeling sweep over her. “I—I think I’m going to faint.”

  “Quick, smelling salts!” Cleve said. “Do we have any smelling salts?”

  “Not hardly!” Keso reached out and pushed her head down between her knees. “Sit there a minute, Wannie, and take some deep breaths.”

  What an embarrassing position. She wanted to argue, but it was difficult with her head down between her legs.

  “Smelling salts,” Cleve said again. “Are you sure she doesn’t need smelling salts?”

  Keso ignored him and when she attempted to answer, it was only a mutter with her head pushed down the way it was. She finally managed to slap Keso’s hand away and raised her head to take a deep breath.

  Cleve’s face was paper white. “Are you all right, my dear?”

  “Here, brat,” Keso said and poured water from a canteen onto his handkerchief and mopped her face with it. “Okay now?”

  She managed to nod and held the cool, wet hankie against her hot face. In the background, Cleve sounded almost silly asking again about smelling salts. She reached out and gave Cleve a reassuring pat on the arm. “I’m okay now. I’m not going to swoon and fall off the seat.”

  “Well, I should hope not,” Cleve said peevishly. “What a spectacle that would make.”

  Keso’s grim mouth twitched as he climbed up on the seat next to her and took the reins. “You coming, Cleve?”

  Cleve looked from one to the other as if he might say something, then finally climbed up in the back seat by himself. She started to protest and move to the back seat beside her fiance, but as she started to rise, Keso slapped the horse with the reins. “Giddy-up.”

  She plopped back down and turned to look at Cleve rather helplessly. “It’s only a few hours up the mountain, dear.”

  As the buggy moved away from the sidewalk, Wannie heard a man in the crowd say, “Did you see that fight?”

  “Sure did. Wouldn’t catch me gettin’ crossways with Keso Evans.”

  “Who’s the dude?”

  “Some fella from back East. Pretty, ain’t he?”

  Keso stared straight ahead, but he chuckled.

  Wannie, her face burning, turned and yelled back at the crowd,
“Don’t you folks have something to do?”

  “I went for help,” Cleve explained again as the buggy moved away. “It didn’t seem quite civilized to get into a fist fight.”

  “You did the right thing, dearest.” Wannie reached back and patted his hand in reassurance. Such fine white gentleman’s hands, she thought. She glanced over at Keso’s hands. They were big and dark-skinned. Keso had callouses on his strong, capable hands.

  She felt vaguely disloyal to her fiance for the unfavorable comparison. “Cleve, I’m sorry your visit has gotten off to a bad start. Denver isn’t always this lawless.”

  “No,” Keso said, “usually it’s worse.”

  Here she was trying to comfort Cleve and her brother had to be a smart-aleck. She reached across the seat and pinched his leg hard enough to take a piece out of it.

  “Ow!” Keso exclaimed. “Since when does a lady pinch a man?”

  “When he needs it,” she said and smiled a little too sweetly.

  “In the excitement, I nearly forgot,” Cleve said and reached into his coat pocket. “I saw you come out of that shop, so I went in there while I was waiting for the police and asked what you’d been looking at.” He handed her a small box.

  She took the box, breathless with anticipation. “Cleve, you shouldn’t have!”

  “I can afford it,” he said with a careless wave as the horse clopped along. “It isn’t nearly so fine as what I could get back East, but it’s probably the best Denver has.”

  She opened it, revealing several magnificent gold bracelets. “They’re beautiful! Look, brother, aren’t they grand?”

  Keso grunted. “Yeah, grand. Let’s hope Daddy can afford it.”

  “Keso—” she started to reprimand him for his rudeness, but was interrupted by Cleve.

  “I’ll have you know it came out of my allowance at the company.”

  “Hmm,” Keso said. “Now, brat, where would you wear all this fancy jewelry out here?”

  “In case you’ve forgotten,” Cleve reminded him in a cool tone, “we intend to live in New York where Wannie will have plenty of opportunities to dress up.”

  “New York,” she said and held the bracelets up and watched the sunlight sparkle on them as the buggy moved along the road. “All my dreams of excitement, fancy parties, clothes.”