by Maggie James
“If you are able to fool the Injuns, then it was good that you did,” he said. “Are you all right? I mean, did they hurt you? You sure look a sight. I’m Buck Hawley, by the way.”
“I’m fine, Buck,” she assured him. “Just tired and hungry and thirsty, and I’m real anxious to get to Tombstone.”
They crawled down off the rocks, and Kitty groaned under her breath to see that the passengers—two women and three men—had got out. At the sight of her, one of the women collapsed into the arms of the man standing next to her, and the other turned and scrambled back inside to peer out the window in disgust.
Kitty made sure the passengers could not hear her as she warned Tom and Buck that they needed to be extra alert. “The Indians may be looking for me by now.”
Tom was still in awe. “How did you get away from ’em?”
“It’s a long story, and I don’t want to talk about it.”
Buck said, “Well, I don’t blame you. And don’t worry. We’ll keep an eye out.”
“I can ride on top to help out,” she offered. “I’m a good shot.”
“No. They’d pick you right off. It’s best you get on inside.” He handed her a canteen of water and a sack with soda biscuits and beef jerky. “Eat your fill, girl, and I’ll get us to Tombstone lickety-split.”
The passengers, quite vexed, had to make room for her, muttering among themselves all the while.
The stage began to roll. Kitty leaned her head back and closed her eyes. The woman sitting next to her coughed and covered her nose with a lace handkerchief. Kitty did not care. Neither was she embarrassed. All she wanted was to get to Tombstone and have the confrontation with Opal Chimes that she had been yearning for.
Finally, one of the men, curiosity getting the best of him, asked, “Was it terrible…being with those savages?”
Kitty’s eyes flashed open. She regarded him coldly. He did not care about her welfare. He just wanted to hear the gory details of her captivity. “No, it wasn’t terrible at all. They treated me well.”
The woman next to her made a face and said, “But everyone knows they’re no better than animals—”
“All animals aren’t dangerous,” Kitty crisply informed her. “And the Chiricahua could hardly be called animals, anyway. Their ways are primitive to ours, true, but we have to remember they aren’t civilized. They don’t know about our way of life.”
“They fled the reservation,” another man said sharply. “They don’t want to know. They’d rather live like the savages they are.”
Fixing him with a condemning stare and remembering Pale Sky’s words in parting, Kitty advised him, “They only want what is theirs—the land we drive them off of.”
The woman beside her worked her lips silently, reproachfully, for a moment, then snapped, “Well, if you think so much of them, why didn’t you stay with them? You sure look like you’d fit right in.”
“Yes,” the other female passenger said haughtily. “Why did you want to escape? If you must take up for them—dirty, ignorant barbarians that they are—then remain and be one of them.”
She exchanged a smirk with the other woman.
With a sigh of disgust, Kitty leaned back and closed her eyes again. Like Pale Sky had said—they would not listen. They never had.
She had slipped the flint knife inside her boot, glad Pale Sky had not made her wear moccasins, so she had a hiding place for it. She would keep it always as a memento of the kindhearted Indian woman who had set her free.
Whitebear would also be remembered. Though he had treated her, and regarded her, as no more than a pesky nuisance of a white boy, he had unknowingly awakened and stirred the woman part of her, and she feared he would haunt her dreams for a long time to come.
When the stagecoach reached the outskirts of Tombstone it was late evening. Tom stood up in the box and began shouting, “We found her. We found the girl the Injuns took. We got her…”
Kitty could see at once that Tombstone appeared to be unlike any other town she had passed through in the West. Busy, bustling, she sensed it was teeming with excitement.
She wondered what she would do after confronting Opal Grimes, which was first on her agenda. She supposed she would have to find some kind of a job fast. There had hardly been enough time to retrieve the map before fleeing the camp, and she’d had to abandon what little money she had left. But before she could look for work, she had to get herself cleaned up and find decent clothes. No one would hire her looking as she did.
By the time the stage rolled to a stop in front of the depot, a crowd was gathering.
Kitty stepped out to meet a sea of curious faces.
“Glory be, she looks like an Apache,” someone cried.
“You sure it’s her?” another man called to the driver and guard as they got down out of the box. “Don’t look nothin’ like no white woman to me.”
“It’s her, all right,” Buck assured him.
Kitty had got out and just stood there, unsure of what to do next. Then she saw a tall man pushing his way through the crowd. His expression was stony, and he wore a stiff-brimmed hat and a black frock coat. But, most importantly, a silver star was pinned on his chest.
She walked to meet him. “Are you the sheriff?”
He raked her with skeptical eyes. “I’m the city marshal. Virgil Earp’s the name. Are you really Kitty Parrish?”
Kitty cringed at how everyone was murmuring among themselves as they stared at her like she was some kind of creepy, horrible thing. “Yes, I am,” she said stiffly.
“Well, I think you’d best come along with me. The army will be wanting to talk to you.”
He motioned her to follow, but she held back. “What for?”
“They’ll be wanting to ask you questions to see if you can help them locate where the Apaches are hiding out.”
“I’m afraid I have no idea,” she said—although she did. She could probably lead the soldiers to the camp—or close proximity, anyway—but had no intention of doing so. “And I’ve no time to talk to them, anyway. I’m looking for a woman by the name of Opal Grimes. Do you know where I can find her?”
“She works in my brother’s place just down the street—the Oriental Palace, but she won’t be there for a while yet. However if I were you”—the play of a smile came on his lips—“I’d get out of those clothes you’re wearing and into something else before I went walking around Tombstone. Folks don’t cotton to Indians around here, ma’am, and you sure do look like one in that garb.”
Kitty was undaunted. “I’d like nothing better, but, unfortunately, I don’t have anything else to wear for the moment. Now, if you’ll tell me where Miss Grimes lives, I’d be obliged.”
He pointed. “You’ll find some shanties down there. She lives in the second row on the end. She ought to be home at this hour, but if I were you, I wouldn’t take her by surprise. After the scare she got a while back, she’d likely shoot on sight what she thought was an Indian.”
“Seeing me will be a surprise no matter how I’m dressed,” Kitty said, not bothering to explain that Opal probably thought she was long dead. Besides, she was not going to just walk up and knock on her door. If Opal saw it was her, she would likely barricade herself and never come out.
Kitty created a stir as she made her way through town, but by the time she got to the shanties there were few people out and about.
She stood back for a few moments to study the place on the end. Spotting an open window in the rear, she crept close and peered inside to see a woman sitting at a table. She was wearing a robe and sipping what looked like whiskey. She looked tired, old, and unhappy.
Well, she’s about to be real unhappy, Kitty thought as she reached up to hook her fingers in the top of the window frame.
Taking a deep breath, she kicked off from the side of the shanty with her feet. Propelling her body backward and up, she then swung forward and through the window to land on her feet with a thud directly in front of the woman.
&nbs
p; “Pleased to meet you, Miss Grimes. The name’s Kitty Parrish.”
Opal dropped the glass, whiskey spilling across the table and on her robe. Her face went white, and she tried to get up out of the chair but stumbled and fell, sprawling to the floor.
Kitty reached down and grabbed her arm and yanked her up, then roughly slung her into another chair.
“Now we’re going to talk,” she said, feeling angry blood rush to her face as she righted the fallen chair and sat down across from Opal.
“You…you’re Kitty?” Opal clutched her throat with one hand, willing the words to squeak past the constriction of terror as she wilted before the blazing eyes. “But…but I thought…”
“You thought the Indians killed me like you paid them to do?” Kitty’s laugh was harsh. Well, you wasted your money, lady, because I’m free, and I’m here, and I want to know why in the hell you wanted to get rid of me.”
“But…but I didn’t…”
“It’s my uncle’s—my stepfather’s gold mine, isn’t it? With me out of the way, it’s all yours. So when you heard I was coming, you got the Indians to attack the stagecoach.”
Opal shook her head slowly from side to side. “No. No, I would never do that. And why would I have sent you his part of the map…his money…if I wanted it all for myself?”
“I wondered about that at first,” Kitty said, “because it didn’t make sense. But the Indians were definitely looking for Kitty Parrish, and the only way they could have known I was on that stage was for you to have told them. You were the only person who knew. Besides that, I heard them mention your name.”
“My name?” Opal gasped, both hands slamming the table as she went rigid in the chair. “How could they know me?”
Kitty sneered. “They knew you, all right. Now enough of your lies. I want to know…” Her voice trailed off, seeing the expression on Opal’s face. Opal looked deep in thought, forgetting Kitty was there.
And then she slapped her hands together and exclaimed, “Of course. That’s it. That’s why he was here—the Indian. He knew about the map to Wade’s gold mine, and he wanted it. I told him I didn’t have it, that I’d sent it to his niece—to you. He went away, but when I came home from work that night, I had a strange feeling he had come back.
“Your telegram and letter”—she pointed at the stove—“are hidden behind there. He must have found them, and evidently he could read, so he knew when you were expected. It all adds up.”
“Not to me. How would he have known about the map in the first place?”
“I’ve no idea. But you have to believe me,” Opal gestured helplessly, eyes imploring. “I would never do such a thing, Kitty. I wouldn’t want you harmed for anything in the world. You…you’re a part of Wade, and”—she swallowed and blinked back tears—“I loved him, you see. I could never hurt anything that was his.”
Kitty was starting to believe her, because, after all was said and done, it just wasn’t plausible that she would have gone to the trouble of even telling her about Daddy Wade’s death if she wanted everything for herself. “But the Indian—Whitebear, he was called—I heard him say your name to his mother. And I know it was me he was looking for, because he asked me if I had met a passenger named Kitty Parrish.”
Opal poured herself another drink with shaking hands. She offered one to Kitty, but she declined. “I don’t know,” she said. “Unless…” Her voice trailed off once more.
Kitty prodded, “Go on.”
“Wade used to talk to me about his partner, Dan McCloud, and how he was a strange old codger. He had a little farm somewhere, and he’d disappear for days at a time, and that’s where Wade figured he went. There was a woman somewhere, too, but he never talked about her except when he was drunk, and then Wade couldn’t make out what he was saying. He had a son, and the reason Wade knew about that was on account of Dan saying if anything happened to him he wanted him to have his share of their strike.
“Wade figured the woman was Indian,” Opal went on to say, “because he always wore an Indian amulet around his neck, and when he was drunk and mumbling about loving somebody, he would stroke it and cry. Wade suspected Dan had a son by her, and that he was a half-breed, and that’s why he never came around.”
Kitty paled.
“Kitty, what’s wrong?” Opal got up and rushed to her side. She pressed a hand to her forehead. “You can’t be well, not after being with those savages. Let me fetch the doc to give you a going-over, and I’ll fix you some soup and tea. We can talk about all this later. I just want you to believe me when I say I had nothing to do with you being abducted. I swear it, and you’ve got to believe me…
“I do,” Kitty cried. “And I think I know what’s going on here.”
“What…”
“Whitebear is a half-breed. His father was white, and I think”—she drew an excited breath—“I think Dan McCloud was his father. That would explain why he wanted the other half of the map…and why he wanted me.”
Opal whispered raggedly, “Oh, dear Lord…” and collapsed to her knees.
Ryder stared down at his mother, chest heaving with fury.
“I know you are angry,” Pale Sky calmly said. “As I knew you would be. But I had no choice. Coyotay found the tiswin and became crazy. I knew if I did not take Billy Mingo from the camp and set him free, Coyotay would take the revenge he had been thirsting for. You were not here to stop it. I did what I thought was right.
“We have no business with slaves, anyway,” she went on as she returned to her stove. “We have enough to worry about taking care of ourselves.”
He had returned to the camp only moments before, moving his horse as fast as he dared up the last inclines after hearing from a sentry about the captive’s escape. Everyone was sure Pale Sky was responsible, the sentry had confided.
He had burst into her wickiup and did not even have to ask, for she had faced him squarely from the onset to admit everything.
She began to stir the pot of chokeberries she was making into a kind of jam.
The only sound was Ryder’s heavy, angry breathing. “It is nothing to be upset about, my son. Now rest yourself, and I will make food for you. I know you are hungry after such a long ride.
“And tell me,” she cast a smile in his direction and changed the subject in hopes he would calm down, “did you learn when the woman, Kitty Parrish, will arrive?”
“No. She’s already arrived, Mother.”
Pale Sky’s head jerked up.
“She is probably in Tombstone by now.”
“Are you sure? There must have been a stage you did not know about.”
“No. I had the right stage. As a matter of fact, I had Kitty Parrish.”
Pale Sky looked at him as though he were daft. “What nonsense is this?”
“Billy Mingo was not a boy. Billy Mingo was Kitty Parrish pretending to be a boy, and you,” he said with cold finality, “let her go.”Chapter Ten
“I called him Daddy Wade and I couldn’t have loved him more if he had been my real father.”
Opal nodded with understanding. “And I know he loved you like the daughter he never had. That was why I wrote and did what he asked me to—sent you the map and the money. He talked about you a lot, Kitty. He was hoping one day you’d come out here. I’m just sorry things didn’t work out.”
She bit her lip, and Kitty patted her hand. Once she had been convinced Opal had nothing to do with Whitebear looking for her, Kitty had immediately taken a liking to her. True, she had a hardness about her, probably because her job required her to deal with men who sometimes drank heavily, but also Opal had a gentle, caring side. Kitty thought she had probably once been very pretty, too, but now her face was lined, her eyes lackluster.
“I know you must have cared about him, too,” Kitty said. “The two of you had been friends for quite a while, because I could tell you had been writing his letters for him the past few years.”
“I loved him,” Opal was quick to admit. “He wa
s the finest man I ever knew. I would’ve married him any time he wanted me to, but he was hell-bent to get the money to get us out of here first.”
Hesitantly, Kitty asked, “Do you feel like telling me how it happened…how he died?”
It was the morning after Kitty’s arrival. The previous evening Opal had not had much time before having to go to work, and they had talked mostly about Whitebear. Now they were both sure he was Dan McCloud’s son and the Indian who had terrorized Opal.
When Opal had returned in the wee hours, Kitty had been dead to the world, and Opal did not want to wake her. They were now having breakfast—eggs, salt pork, griddle cakes, and coffee. Opal had insisted on cooking a hearty meal over Kitty’s protest that she should not go to the trouble.
“Yeah, I can talk about it,” Opal said as she absently made circles on the table with her coffee mug. “But it still hurts. I think it always will.” She glanced up suddenly. “Did you find everything you needed last night? I meant to tell you to take the bed. I would’ve been glad to make a pallet on the floor like you did.”
Kitty could have told her there really wasn’t much to find in the cramped little two-room shanty. The furniture was sparse, too—table, chairs, and stove in one room; a bed and chifforobe in the other. “I was fine, really. Actually, I’m used to sleeping lately with nothing between me and raw earth but a few animal skins. And, yes, I found everything. I had a nice bath, and your nightgown is a little large, but I’m grateful for the change.” She gestured to herself.
“Well, we’ll get you some decent clothes today. I thought after you eat we’d go shopping. There are a few nice stores in Tombstone where you can find fashions from back East, and—”
Kitty dismissed that suggestion with a quick wave of her hand. “Overalls are all I need. Maybe some new boots. I think I’ve worn mine out from all that walking, and…” She fell silent to see Opal’s disapproving scowl. “What’s wrong?”
“Kitty, you can’t continue to dress like a man.”
“Why not? I always have. It’s comfortable.”
“Folks will think you’re odd.”