Leaden Skies

by Ann Parker

  “Well, Elliston did win the duel,” pointed out one literal wag as he collected from the grumbling losers. “And I think you oughta pay us double, because he did it without even pulling his gun!”

  The losers all groused good-naturedly and slapped Jed on the back. “So, Elliston, you going to share your sources with us next time?”

  “A reporter never shares his sources,” said Jed, then launched into a lengthy, somewhat slurred speech about the honor of the press.

  Inez wondered if any of the fourth estate were out covering the former president’s goings-on that Sunday evening. They all seemed to be present at the Silver Queen. And, she wondered if the streets of Leadville were unprotected tonight as most of Leadville’s finest also seemed to be participating in the celebration and rounds of drinks. Except for The Hatchet, who was sticking to his usual coffee with cream. He stayed with the other officers, down at one end of the bar, listening, talking occasionally, but mostly, it seemed, watching Inez.

  Every time she glanced his way, he was watching her.

  It gave her the creeps.

  She wondered if he were keeping track of her, just in case she decided to slip on down and question Flo at the jail or the girls in the parlor house.

  “Well, that’s that,” said Inez, turning to Abe. “I suppose John Wesley will need to find a different line of work in a different city.” She had a momentary pang for his mother.

  “He’s young,” pointed out Abe. “He’s got money. He’ll survive.”

  “If his mother doesn’t throw him out on his ear.”

  “Hey, Mrs. Stannert!” One of the officers waved an empty shot glass.

  She sighed and said to Abe, “And if no one is buying right now, I’m sure he’s going to want that on the house. I’d at least like to know I’m getting some protection for all the liquor we give to the boys in blue.” She grabbed a whiskey bottle and headed toward them.

  The kitchen door at the back flew open, and Bridgette came out, shawl wrapped around her.

  “Ma’am, I’m leaving now, but I just thought of something…Oh, good evening officers, and Officer Ryan! Why, Officer Kelly, does your wife know you’re here? For shame!…As I was saying, ma’am. Tomorrow night’s Rosary. Why don’t you bring that little rosary by the saloon tomorrow morning? Maybe I’ll recognize it. Goodness knows, it’s not common for a grown man to be carryin’ a child’s beads. It must have a story, and if there’s a story, I’ll find out, from the good father or from someone else in the parish. That way, when you take it to the police station, you can tell them about that tunnel and—”

  “Thank you, Bridgette. I’ll definitely bring it in tomorrow. Thanks so much.” Inez cut her off, afraid what else she might blurt out in her enthusiasm.

  Inez turned back to the policemen, whiskey bottle ready to pour for Officer Kelly and two others that suddenly had empty glasses to fill.

  One of the State Street patrolmen said to his fellows, “Let’s see if’n we can find an assembly of lewd wimmen on the boards, showin’ off their ankles t’ help sell beer! Oughta be good for a fine or two, whaddya say, City Collector Ryan? Shall we go enrich the city’s coffers?”

  The Hatchet said nothing. Only downed his coffee and left with the rest.

  Chapter Forty-three

  Later that night, Abe paused on Inez’s doorstep, looking over her little house. “Well, that was some evenin’. I think we took in more than we did the whole week, and that’s sayin’ somethin’. Inez, what’s all this Bridgette was sayin’ about the rosary an’ a tunnel an’ police an’ such?”

  “Well, there’s an underground passageway that connects Lynch’s saloon to Flo’s place. It’s there from the days when Mrs. DuBois owned both places. I think Lizzie’s killer used that tunnel, and that he’s but a hair’s breadth away. As soon as I show Bridgette the rosary, I’m taking it to the police. Or maybe the city marshal. I trust him more.”

  “Be careful, Inez. You don’t know who might be behind this. Could even be the law.”

  Inez looked off to the distance. The mountains cupped the city like a pair of hands: Mosquito Range on one side, Sawatch Range on the other. In the vast night, made darker by clouds that covered the stars, Inez couldn’t help but feel that the Almighty was watching the doings of Leadville. If He were, she thought, He’d be sick of all the greed, avarice, lust, lies that boiled in the town. It would be nothing for Him to bring those monolithic hands together and squeeze.

  “It has occurred to me,” she said quietly. “The officers have access to nearly everything. And the power. But, who would stoop to killing a prostitute? And why? Even a policeman wouldn’t escape punishment, and censure.”

  “Hard to say.” Abe scrubbed the back of his neck, contemplatively. “You want me to go talk t’ Lynch tomorrow? Ask him ’bout that tunnel? You think Lynch might be part of this?”

  “It’s possible. But let’s not alert any more folks to the fact that we’re looking around. When Bridgette started talking this evening—” Inez winced.

  “You want me to sit outside your place with a shotgun t’night, Inez?”

  She laughed. “Abe. I’ll be fine. It’s, what, four hours to daylight? And besides, it’s going to rain again. No need for you to sit out here getting soaked. Go home to your wife. I’ll see you later this morning.”

  She searched her pocket for keys and her fingers brushed her pocket revolver. Just feeling its compact but deadly bulk gave her comfort. She unlocked the door, said good-night to Abe, went inside, and locked the door firmly. Then, thinking that she didn’t hear the bolt slide, she unlocked and locked it again.

  For a moment, she stood in the dark, listening. Only the usual sounds, the creaking and popping of a frame house settling. The wind moaning around the corners, whispering through invisible cracks and seams.

  “It’s all right,” she said aloud. “This is my home.”

  Just to prove the point to herself, she went into the parlor room, pulled open the heavy curtain to let in what little light there was. She ran a hand over her parlor grand piano, riffled through a pile of music, and wished that Reverend Sands were there.

  She placed the music in a neat stack on her piano and headed to her bedroom across the hall.

  With a sigh, she lit the small crystal coal oil lamp by her bedside and repositioned the glass chimney. She pulled her pocket revolver from her pocket, lay it on the nightstand, and then picked up the small rosary, running the beads through her fingers and examining the small figure on the tiny cross. Wondering who and where its owner was, she let it snake back on the nightstand. Inez settled into the chair next to the stand, picked up her buttonhook, and began unfastening her shoes. The house settled into a familiar symphony of pops and creaks as the wood floors and planks of the walls responded to the wind and the cold.

  Inez heard a small patter of timpani on her rooftop: Raining again. What a strange July this has been. No doubt General Grant must think Leadville as rainy and muddy as—

  Her bedroom door slammed open with such force that the glass doorknob hit the back wall and exploded. Inez gasped, prelude to a scream, and began to stand. An arm came around her neck from behind, brutally cutting off air, lifting her up and off the chair. Inez clawed, seeking just a little room to breathe.

  A heavy clank boomed off the floor. The attacker leaned toward the nightstand, dragging Inez with him. A black-gloved hand grabbed the small rosary. Inez saw, from her bent-over position, a lantern on the floor. A bull’s eye lantern, shuttered.

  A policeman’s lantern.

  The chokehold eased slightly. Inez gulped air just before a damp cloth wrapped around her nose and mouth. She caught the sweet whiff of apples as the cloth descended.

  No!

  She held her breath. She tried to kick backwards with her one shoe to take him off balance, distract him. But her attacker seemed to expect this. Prepared to just stand and take it, until she had no choice but to inhale.

 
Near dizzy with fear, heart pounding, lungs shrieking, in desperation Inez hooked her stockinged foot around the spindle-legged nightstand, and yanked.

  The delicate table lurched and tipped, the light from the coal oil lamp jumping crazily over walls.

  The lamp hit the floor by Inez’s bed with an explosive crash. Flames licked from the broken crystal base and lantern, kissed the bedclothes that draped from featherbed to floor.

  The nascent fire leaped up in a triumphant roar.

  Her assailant stumbled backwards. The cloth on her face loosened.

  Inez tore the cloth off, ripping it from his hand, and took in a huge gulp of fire-seared smoky air.

  A curse rasped from behind her.

  His arm clamped around her throat again, his hand seized her wrist.

  She wriggled desperately, kicked backwards again, more successfully, as he tried to push her toward the flames.

  She still had one hand free.

  The hand that gripped the buttonhook.

  Inez wrenched violently side to side. She finally caught a glimpse of his face.

  The Hatchet.

  Heavy curtains covering her bedroom window burst into sudden flames. In the blindingly stark light, The Hatchet looked like a beast from Hell itself, lips drawn back in a snarl, eyes black pits.

  She plunged her buttonhook into the nearest pit.

  He screamed, and let go. His hands convulsively cupped his eye, the buttonhook hanging in the socket.

  Inez shoved him away. Away from the door and her escape.

  The Hatchet stumbled, his boot kicking the police lantern over. Like a can in a child’s game, the lantern rolled toward the inferno that had been her bed and sanctuary.

  Inez raced past The Hatchet, who was now bent over, hands cradling his face.

  She was out of the bedroom. Sudden heat and flash bathed her back as the additional liquid fuel from the lantern fed the fury behind her.

  Coughing, choking in smoke, feeling seared, Inez looked wildly to the front door.

  Too late!

  The thin wood walls of her home were no barrier to the fire’s energy. Flames consumed the front door, lapped across the inner entryway wall, raced along the molding, and headed for her parlor.

  My piano!

  Then, the screaming began again, and didn’t stop.

  She looked, once, back at her bedroom. A curtain of fire filled the doorway and began working in the other direction. Flames licked hungrily along the wall, spreading to the floor, heading to the back of the house.

  There was no choice.

  She clapped her hands over her ears to block out the inhuman sound, and she ran. Ran toward the back of the house, trying to outrun the flames jumping down the hallway.

  Despite her covered ears, she could still hear The Hatchet, getting weaker, his screams now drowned out by explosion after explosion rocketing behind her as lamp fuel exploded, drapes burst into spontaneous flames, varnish blistered and peeled, taking everything, everything, into oblivion.

  A torrent of cold air flowed past her, rushing, tunneling into the hallway. Her shoulder flared in pain as she clipped the kitchen entryway. One of the panes in the back door was shattered, mute testimony to The Hatchet’s entry.

  Gripping the knob, her ticket out of the inferno, she twisted it, yanked the door open, and fell, gasping, into her back yard. She crawled away from the perdition that had been her home.

  Through her own coughing and crying, she heard voices at the front of the house, alarmed voices raised in cries for help.

  Then, she was aware of something more.

  Rain.

  Cold, cold rain, pattering on her skin and her clothes. Tapping on her splayed fingers, drumming on the flagstones that her husband had laid out so carefully to form a walkway to the privy, in what seemed another lifetime.

  Inez leaned forward over her hands and vomited.

  “Mrs. Stannert!” A voice, at first unfamiliar, but full of relief came from above her.

  A warm jacket settled over her shivering shoulders. It was only then that she realized, in some distant way, that her clothes had been smoldering. Now, charred bits hung from her neck, the remains of a lace collar. She moved her fingers experimentally. They all were there, all working.

  A hand pulled her up to sitting and snugged the jacket around her. She looked up into the worried face of Cecil Farnesworth, mapmaker.

  “Mrs. Stannert! I saw the fire and I didn’t dare to hope. I thought I was too late.”

  She buried her face in her hands. Cecil continued in a rush, as if with the opening of the leaden skies, the bonds that had held him had also eased. “It was Officer Ryan. I talked with Lynch, the saloonkeeper, but he wasn’t nearly as forthcoming as his partner, McCarthy. You see, the entrance to the passage was in a room that Lynch rented out by the hour. He’s got, well, a couple women working there.”

  She heard Cecil clear his throat, embarrassed.

  “In any case, all this last week, McCarthy told me, since a few days before Grant’s arrival, the room’s been rented by Ryan.” His face twisted. “McCarthy also said that Lynch was sweet on Lizzie. I guess he’d hoped she’d come work for him. But that’s neither here nor there.”

  Inez finally spoke, the light of fire bringing out the truth. “The Hatchet knew about the tunnel. Where it connected. He killed Lizzie with Molly’s help. She put Lizzie in Flo’s room, most likely as insurance, just in case Flo was right and Lizzie wasn’t dead from the cold, the liquor, the drugs.”

  “Most likely that was it. Yes.” Cecil sat down on the ground, unaware or uncaring of the mud.

  “And The Hatchet. He set the fires?”

  “Probably.”

  “Why?” said Inez aloud. “Why would he bother with Flo’s business? Why warn me to stay away? What business would he have—” She stopped.

  Business.

  Flo’s third partner.

  “Inez!” Another voice. Well-known. Beloved. Welcome.

  Familiar arms came around her this time, offering sanctuary, and lifted her up in an all-encompassing embrace.

  Reverend Sands voice ran over her like a lover’s touch. “I saw the flames from Harrison. I thought…”

  She clung to him, fingers wrapped in the overcoat. “I’m fine. But my house. My piano. All my things. The Hatchet. In there.”

  His arms around her tightened.

  She rested her head wearily on his shoulder.

  “The Hatchet? Officer Ryan?”

  “Yes.”

  She felt him shake his head.

  “Let’s get you to someplace warm. Where do you want to go?”

  “The Silver Queen.”

  My second home. The only one I now have.

  Chapter Forty-four

  By Monday mid-morning, Inez had steeled herself for the expected visitation from representatives of her church. She knew they would come, to offer clothes, food, and spare blankets to one of their own. Of course, the church women would not set foot in the saloon where she now lived, so they had harried their hapless husbands until three could be found to make the requisite call.

  Inez, nursing her second cup of coffee of the day, rose when Sol brought them back to the kitchen area, and thanked them for their offerings. Bridgette interrupted their visit when she arrived breathlessly late that morning.

  “Oh, ma’am! I’m sorry, but it took forever for me to get down the Hill and through town. The whole of the parish is buzzing with what happened last night.” She looked askance at the baskets of food and small bundles of used clothing and blankets on the table.

  “Goodness, ma’am,” she said after the church members left. “Don’t they know I’ll be sure you eat well and proper and that you’ve plenty of clothes and such upstairs?”

  Inez stacked the clothes on top of the blankets. “They’re just trying to exhibit Christian charity, Bridgette. It’s the thought that counts.”

  And thought
was all that was left to her this morning.

  She turned the coffee cup around and around, its revolutions echoing her spinning thoughts. There was one person who could help unravel the last mysteries behind Lizzie’s murder. But she was, as far as Inez knew, still in jail. And Inez hadn’t the energy yet to go and see her.

  Bridgette, hovering as she did, also added her own stream of commentary and inadvertent information. “Well, ma’am, it’s just so sad. Your home. And such a pity about Officer Ryan.”

  “Yes,” said Inez, spinning the cup. She, the reverend, and Cecil Farnesworth had agreed. Until more was known, it seemed best to let people believe The Hatchet had died in the fire trying to rescue her. “I’ve no desire to pursue this further,” Inez had said wearily to the two men, while unlocking her office door in the dark after-midnight hours of Monday morning. “Who will believe us? We have no proof. And those who know won’t talk.”

  Bridgette kept up a steady stream of comfortable chatter in the face of Inez’s silence. “On my way here, I was stopped by Mrs. Kelly. You know, Officer Kelly’s wife? She says, it’s just tragic, tragic, that Officer Ryan died in the flames trying to save you. Because, he told her once, soon after he came to town, about his little daughter. She had perished in a fire not two years ago.”

  Bridgette paused, wiped her eyes, and crossed herself. “The missus apparently just never got over it. That’s why she and Officer Ryan…well, why she’s not up in Leadville with him. But, Mrs. Kelly says, Officer Ryan nearly died himself in trying to save their little girl, and ended up burned all over, lungs and throat damaged from the smoke. It almost took his voice. Not that one would know, since the fire didn’t reach his face. But it apparently caused him pain, every day. He hardly slept from the pain and the demons, I gather. And Mrs. Kelly’s brother was Officer Ryan’s physician, so she should know. I’m truly surprised that Officer Ryan never turned to drink, in the face of such an awful thing. He was a saint, a saint. Mrs. Kelly told me that he refused to take to the bottle, because her brother said that Officer Ryan found relief through chloroform. Chloroform, can you imagine? Thank goodness for miracles of modern medicine. Although Mrs. Kelly also whispered that Officer Ryan wasn’t above taking a wee bit of something else when the pain was too severe, on occasion. Opium, she said. Humph. She said her brother swore on the holy cross this was so. But only after she’d nearly forced him to say so, I suspect. Or maybe she made it up. I don’t know that I’d believe everything that Mrs. Kelly says. She tends to let her mouth run ahead of her thinking, if you know what I mean, ma’am.”