by Sharon Pape
July 9th
A stranger came into the store today asking for Frank. He had a hard look to him, the kind of look that makes gentle folks shrink back. I can’t imagine why such a man would know my husband by name. Before I could excuse myself to find Frank, he came out of the storeroom carrying a twenty-pound sack of flour. Upon seeing me in conversation with the stranger, he dropped the sack on the floor and made straight for us. I don’t know how to describe the expression on his face. It was both grim and pleased, and I would be happy not to ever see it again. He called the man Hargrave but made no attempt to introduce him to me, which I find peculiar, because my Frank has always been the politest of men. He led this Hargrave back to the storeroom and shut the door behind them. They came out less than ten minutes later, and Hargrave walked past me and out of the store without so much as a “thank you, ma’am” or “good day.”
July 10th
Frank told me that he has contracted with Hargrave to find John Trask, so that he may be brought to justice for taking the life of our daughter, Betsy. Although I understand and share his desire to see Trask punished, it will not bring Betsy back. I don’t like the idea of Frank dealing with a man of such low principles. I fear that no good will come of their association.
July 11th
I was setting out the new bolts of material in the store this morning when I overheard Frank speaking in a hushed voice with his brother Max. He was telling Max that he’d instructed the gunman to kill Marshal Drummond as well. He said it cost double for the marshal as he’s a lawman. I could scarcely credit what I was hearing. This does not sound at all like the Frank Jensen I married. As soon as we were alone, I questioned Frank about it, and he did not deny any of it. When I tried to reason with him, he told me to stick to women’s business and leave men’s business to him.
July 25th
Two weeks have passed, and to the best of my knowledge, Frank has not heard anything from his hired gun. Perhaps this is why he is so impatient and irritable with the children and me. I know what troubles him, but the boys have no idea. Noah has told me that he misses the father he once had. I try to comfort him. Nothing is the same anymore.
August 5th
Frank is of the opinion that something has gone amiss with Hargrave. He asks everyone, especially strangers who stop into the store on their journeys, if they’ve heard of a gunfighter meeting his end. So far no one has.
August 6th
When Frank is not busy at the store, he comes home and paces from room to room, locked in his own thoughts and misery. I have tried talking to him, but he tells me to let him be. I feel like I’m losing another part of my family.
August 10th
Frank is gone. He woke me before dawn to tell me he was leaving. He said he must find out what became of Hargrave. If all went according to plan, the gunman would have returned for the rest of his money. If he needed more time, he was supposed to send word about his progress. They’d shaken hands on the deal. I didn’t point out that a handshake with a hired gun was not likely to be worth much. Frank already knows this, but he has clearly chosen to ignore it. When I told him I don’t know how I will manage the children, the house and the store by myself, he said he had faith in me. There was nothing more for me to say. I could tell by the emptiness in his voice that he had already left.
As Rory read the copied letters, she had the uncomfortable sense that someone else was reading along with her. She glanced to her left and met the startled eyes of the man in the aisle seat. He gave her a sheepish smile before quickly looking the other way. She refolded the pages and stowed them back in her handbag. She really shouldn’t be expecting privacy in an airplane, where people were crammed together like sardines in a high-altitude tin can. Reading the letters again would have to wait until she was home. She plucked the airline magazine from the seat pocket in front of her but found it hard to concentrate on the articles about great places to visit and expensive items to buy. The diary and letters were still uppermost in her mind, as they had been from the moment she’d first read them. One question in particular refused to be silenced or ignored. Why had Frank Jensen hired Hargrave to kill the marshal too?
Chapter 29
“I don’t take kindly to bein’ deceived,” Zeke said, his eyebrows lowering like dark clouds before an advancing storm. He was standing in the hallway outside Rory’s bedroom, watching her unpack. His hair looked more disheveled than usual, as if he hadn’t taken the time to “comb” it in his rush to confront her.
“I never lied to you,” she said calmly as she slid two tee shirts into the top dresser drawer.
“But you did trick me, so own up to it. Don’t go playin’ semantics with me.”
Rory looked up at him, realizing a second too late that her expression was a dead giveaway.
“Surprised I know a word like that?” he asked with the sly smile of the cat who’d just caught the mouse pilfering cheese. “It’s never wise to underestimate me, darlin’, in any respect.”
“Look, I just needed to get away,” she said in a cajoling tone, “and I figured if I mixed a little business with pleasure I could deduct the trip as a business expense.” It was a good thing she could think fast on her feet. The excuse even sounded genuine to her.
“No, you’re not gettin’ off that easy,” Zeke said apparently not buying any of it. “The truth is, you didn’t want me gettin’ in your way out there. I believe in callin’ a pig a pig if it wallows in mud and oinks.”
Rory started to shake her head.
“Don’t you try denyin’ it. It’s past time for some straight talk here.”
“Okay,” she said. If he was insisting on the bare-naked truth, she would give it to him. She walked over to the doorway, stopping inches from him, the threshold between the bedroom and the hall lying between them like a disputed boundary between hostile nations. “You’ve been so paranoid about keeping some secret or other from me that I thought you’d prevent me from finding out anything, including the name of your killer.” She was speaking in a calm, reasonable voice, hoping to keep the tension between them from escalating. “I can’t work in handcuffs or with blinders on.”
Zeke didn’t have an immediate comeback for her. Judging by his unsettled expression, he seemed to be wrangling with her accusation, trying to decide what response would best serve him.
“Why are you so concerned that I’ll find out this secret of yours?” she went on. “Everyone has something they’re not proud of. How awful could it be?”
“Why do you feel the need to stick your nose into business that ain’t yours?” he countered.
“Your life became my business when you insisted I find out who killed you,” Rory reminded him, her tone sharpening in spite of her efforts at détente.
“Well then, I’m takin’ you off the case.”
“Too late. I already have the answer,” she shot back. “And as it happens, that’s all I found out. So it seems your big secret went to the grave with you.” Damn, this wasn’t at all how she’d imagined telling him that in spite of all odds, she’d found out who’d killed him. Talk about blowing a presentation.
The news seemed to hit Zeke like a round from a.45, his image wavering under the impact. “What…what are you saying?” he asked, stumbling over his words. “You know…you know for honest and true who shot me?”
“Yes.” Rory had never seen the marshal quite so off balance before, and she had to admit that she was probably enjoying his discomfort more than she should. But he was the one who’d insisted she continue the search her uncle Mac had started, and now that she’d succeeded, he was acting like a pro surfer pulled under by a wave he hadn’t seen coming.
“Do you plan on sharin’ that information with me anytime soon?” he asked once he’d regained some of his composure.
“I think you should read it for yourself so that you get the context and all.” Rory had come to that conclusion during the flight home. News of this magnitude needed to be couched in the proper terms.
“Why can’t you just give me the answer without all the fanfare?”
“Humor me, please.”
“Fine,” he grumbled, “but I’m not a patient man.”
“Gee, I never would have guessed that on my own.” She wriggled past him and took the stairs down to the bench in the entryway, where she’d left her handbag.
When she walked into the kitchen, the marshal was pacing around the center island as if he’d been waiting untold hours for her to arrive. Hobo, who’d been passed out under the table after the excitement of her homecoming, was now pacing at Zeke’s heels like a mutant shadow. The dog looked up at Rory with a baffled expression that clearly asked why the marshal and he were going in circles.
Since Rory couldn’t offer an explanation he would understand, she shook her head and smiled in commiseration. The marshal was often an enigma to her too. She set her handbag on the table and pulled out the photocopies of the diary and letters. As soon as she put the thin stack of them at Zeke’s usual seat, he abandoned his pacing and his faithful shadow to pop into his chair. Hobo lay down beside the island as if prepared to follow should the marshal choose to continue his strange journey.
Rory took a seat beside Zeke in case he became too excited or overwrought to turn the pages without flinging them across the room. Apparently of the same mind, Zeke didn’t even try to turn them himself. Instead, he gave a little nod as he finished reading each page. Although he didn’t make any comments while going through the diary entries, when he reached the one about Frank hiring Hargrave, she noticed his jaw tighten. It wasn’t until he started reading the letters that Rory was able to see waves of emotion pulling at his face.
August 22, 1878
My dearest Katherine,
I have been gone for nearly two weeks, and I already miss you and our boys desperately. Please be assured that I would never have left if there had been any other way. I discovered today that Hargrave’s body was found in an abandoned barn in the New Mexico Territory, half a day’s ride from Albuquerque. He’d been shot to death, but no one seems to know by whose gun. I must assume that Hargrave found either Trask or Drummond and was in the end outgunned. I am left with one last choice in this matter. I can look for these men myself, or I can give up and come home. Please trust that I have searched my heart well before deciding to continue on. Were I to come home now with this business left unfinished, I would not be able to live with myself, and over time you and the children would also find it impossible to live with me.
Your devoted husband,
Frank
August 28, 1878
My dearest Katherine,
Time has lost all meaning for me. I sleep when my eyes will no longer stay open. I eat when there is time and food available. I count myself lucky that there have been enough sightings of Trask and Drummond to make tracking them possible. It came as something of a surprise to me that the marshal had left his jurisdiction and is hunting Trask too. I wonder if guilt pushes him, or if he is driven only by the habit of his profession. In any case it makes my work easier. I will write again when I can.
Your loving husband,
Frank
September 7, 1878
My dearest Katherine,
I had to leave my horse in Colorado and continue by train to New York City and then onto the Long Island. At a farmhouse in a town called Huntington, I finally caught up with both Trask and Drummond. As fate would have it, I came upon them in a rather dramatic standoff. The marshal had his revolver on Trask, who was holding a young woman at gunpoint. I did not allow myself to think about what I was about to do for fear that my resolve might come undone. There is no need for you to know the details of what transpired there. Suffice it to say that I sent the marshal to his reckoning and wounded Trask, although he managed to get away on horseback. Once I saw that the girl was in no grave danger, I took off after him and tracked him to another town, where he had stopped to seek medical attention. At the first opportunity, I dispatched him to what I can only believe is his eternal damnation.
I send this letter to you as I am about to board the train to make my way home. I ache to see you and the boys again even as I wrestle with the knowledge that I have become a killer myself. Yet for me that is an easier pain to live with than the pain of letting our Betsy’s death go unpunished. I will not try to justify my actions by claiming that I did it to save other young girls from the same fate, because this was not an act of altruism. It is important to me that there be no lies between us.
Please embrace our boys for me and tell them I will be home before too much longer.
Your loving husband,
Frank
Zeke vanished from his chair the instant he finished reading the third letter. Before Rory could ask if he was okay. Before even offering her a “thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” she called out to him and then was immediately sorry for the sarcasm in her tone. She wasn’t being fair. She shouldn’t be putting etiquette before compassion. Big deal if he hadn’t rushed right out and sent her a thank-you bouquet. The guy deserved a break. He’d waited for more than a hundred years to find out the truth about his death. It was understandable if he needed some time alone to absorb it all. She was always criticizing Zeke for his lack of patience, and now it seemed she could use a few lessons in that gentle art herself. Where had she misplaced her much-vaunted sensitivity for that matter? By the time Rory finished scolding herself, she felt positively wretched. Apologizing would make her feel better, but without Zeke, there was no one to apologize to. She’d just have to keep busy until he was ready to return.
In that spirit, she headed back upstairs to finish unpacking her things. Hobo trotted past her and had already made himself comfortable on her pillow when she reached the bedroom. He remained asleep there even after she’d put away the suitcase and gone into the study to deal with what was sure to be a ridiculous amount of e-mail that had accumulated while she was gone. She was waiting for the computer to boot up when she noticed the sheet of paper lying in the printer tray. It turned out to be from a Pennsylvania newspaper dated April 2, 2003, and it contained several short articles and a photograph. Either Zeke had printed the page for her to see, or Hobo had recently grown an opposable thumb and an interest in detective work. Her money was on the marshal.
She was immediately drawn to the headline, “Suicide Linked to Scam.” But when she started reading the article, the very first line made her stop short.
York, Pennsylvania: Police have named Thomas Kent a person of interest in the Ponzi-like scheme that may have led to the suicide death of Jill Harrison.
“Thomas Kent”—the name rang a bell in Rory’s mind, though she couldn’t quite place it. She assumed that since Zeke had left the printout for her, the article had to be related to Brian’s death, but she couldn’t see the connection. She held the paper directly under the desk lamp to get a better look at the small photograph. It showed two women in their late thirties or early forties decked out in evening clothes. The caption beneath the photo read, “Jill Harrison with her sister Paula Imperiali in happier times.” Rory stared at the picture more puzzled than ever. Although she’d never heard either woman’s name before, she immediately recognized the woman identified as Paula.
Chapter 30
Paula Imperiali’s face had been etched into Rory’s mind when she came barreling down the center of the road, forcing Rory onto the shoulder. She was the woman Rory had sketched and asked Leah to run through the police database. No matter how much some women teased their hair or how much mascara and lipstick they applied, they never really looked any different. Paula, with her sharp features and utilitarian haircut, was clearly one of them.
Rory sat back in her chair, thoughts swirling madly around in her head like lights from a disco ball. She wished Zeke was there so she could ask him how he’d found the article and if he’d printed it out only because he too had recognized Paula from the sketch. Since Rory had no idea when Zeke might return, she did
a Google search that turned up several women who shared the name “Paula Imperiali.” But with only a name to go by, even Google wasn’t much help in narrowing the field. In the best of all possible worlds, one of the Paulas would have been listed as a skilled break-in artist and stunt driver. That not being the case, Rory set aside the article and her questions until Zeke was “back in town” and resigned herself to tackling the fifty-two e-mails waiting in her inbox.
She’d made it through a quarter of the e-mails when she remembered why the name “Thomas Kent” was familiar to her. It was one of the aliases Brian had used as he’d hopscotched across the country, leaving misery in his wake. Zeke had suggested doing Google searches of the names on all the false IDs to see if he could round up any useful clues, but until now the results had been dismal. While Rory was away in Tucson, he’d obviously hit pay dirt with the “Thomas Kent” pseudonym. It occurred to her that she might be able to follow up on the trail Zeke had left her. If she could learn more about these sisters, she might find a clue to the con man’s killer. She logged out of her e-mail account and found her way to the newspaper from which Zeke had printed the article. Then she checked the obituaries for that day. No mention of Jill Harrison. Rory checked the previous day’s obits and found it there. According to the short memorial column, Jill had lived a normal, unremarkable life and had been well loved by family and friends, who were all devastated by her loss. She was survived by her husband, Daniel; her son, Ryan; her sister, Paula Imperiali; and her mother, Dorothy Johnson.