Crossroads (A Piccadilly Publishing Western Book 8)

by Logan Winters

  Soon, from the Double O they could hear drunken roistering, but that did not mean that Barbara’s riders had arrived. It was seldom that the Double O was not filled with rowdy crews doing their best to get drunk.

  ‘I don’t see the horses,’ Flower whispered. ‘Where do you think Barbara had the boys tie up?’

  ‘Right out front, I’d wager. If something goes wrong, those men might have the need to leave town quickly.’

  ‘What could go wrong?’ Flower asked with anxiety.

  ‘A dozen things that I can think of. Maybe one of the other customers recognizes them and knows that they ride for Barbara. Maybe your father doesn’t manage to restrain Justine and she walks in, shooting. Maybe—”

  ‘That’s enough, K. John. I don’t need any extra worries—we’ve enough of our own.’ Her dark-green eyes were wide and star-shimmered. K. John wanted to say something else, but he simply nodded. Flower was right. They had enough of their own troubles, no matter that they had brought this all on themselves.

  Reaching the cross-alley on the far side of the saloon, the side that was not lighted, they made their way through the sparse shadows of the broken elm trees there and worked toward the back of the building. K. John breathed a sigh of relief—the fire-ladder was still in place. That had been one of the other concerns he had not shared with Flower. He had considered it possible that Clyde Willit, in a fit of rage, might have had it torn down so that he would lose no more ‘birds from their nest’, as Charlie the bartender had put it.

  ‘Gloria’s still up in her room,’ Flower said, pointing toward the second-floor window where a light burned.

  ‘Is that important to us?’

  ‘You bet it is. She’s the one I was going to ask to go down and spread the word among the girls in the saloon.’

  ‘If she doesn’t want to ... ?’

  ‘I’ll do it myself,’ Flower said, firmly. K. John stepped back a little and looked down into the girl’s star-bright eyes. That was the last thing he wanted Flower to attempt.

  ‘Let’s hope that Gloria is willing, then.’

  ‘I hope so, too,’ Flower responded. Her words were now emerging on short, tight breaths. She was frightened and had the right to be.

  ‘If we’re going to do it, let’s do it now,’ K. John said, stepping away from Flower to look up the wooden ladder to the lighted window. ‘We put Barbara’s boys on a schedule, let’s keep to our own. You’d better go first,’ he advised. ‘She sees my ugly face creeping in from the darkness, she’s liable to start screaming before you have a chance to talk to her.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Flower told him.

  ‘Gloria’s not the shy type?’

  ‘That’s not what I meant. I ... I meant that I don’t think your face is ugly at all.’

  ‘Oh!’ K. John said, rather stupidly. He could think of no other response. In the darkness it was difficult to read Flower’s expression. She seemed to be smiling faintly.

  About what?

  ‘You’re right,’ Flower agreed, ‘we’d better get moving. The saloon is getting awfully noisy. Barbara’s cowhands might be beginning their act.’

  Having said that, Flower Tremaine started up the plank and rungs of the ladder. K. John held back a minute, then followed after her. By the time he had made his entrance over the windowsill, Flower and the woman who must be Gloria had fallen into conversation. Gloria, a tall, robust woman with dark eyes and wearing a green satin dress, glanced at K. John without interest as his boots thudded against her floor.

  ‘You really mean to get everyone out of here? Right now?’ Gloria was asking.

  ‘We have to. Everything is set up, and we can’t spoil the timing.’

  Gloria was poking at her hair energetically, obviously uncertain.

  ‘Please, Gloria, you know how important it is,’ Flower pleaded.

  ‘It’s all so sudden,’ the woman stuttered. She said with some embarrassment, ‘I’m not really sure I even want to go away.’

  ‘You can always return if you choose,’ K. John said. ‘We’re not going to hold you prisoner.’

  ‘Please, Gloria, think about April and Sadie. Other girls like them who are frightened and desperate.’

  ‘You know that this is a crazy idea, don’t you?’ Gloria responded.

  ‘We know,’ Flower answered, ‘but it has to be done.’ Downstairs it was growing louder still, although no gunshots had yet rung out.

  Gloria sagged on to her rumpled bed looking uncertain. ‘What if I refuse, Flower?’

  ‘Then I’ll have to do it myself,’ Flower said.

  ‘You! What if Clyde Willit sees you?’

  ‘We’ll find out afterward, I guess. This has to be done, Gloria, can’t you see that?’

  ‘I suppose I can,’ Gloria said, rising again with some determination now showing on her face. ‘Is it all right if I run a brush over my hair first?’

  ‘We’re running short of time,’ K. John said in what Flower had termed his grumpy voice. She shot him a quelling glance.

  ‘Fine,’ Flower told the other woman, her eyes still flickering toward K. John, indicating—he thought—that he should know that a woman needs time to fix herself up, no matter the urgency of the situation.

  When Gloria had done, she rose, slapped her hairbrush down on the bureau top, smiled without amusement or pleasure at K. John, and then went out, her long skirts rustling through the doorway.

  ‘Thanks, Gloria,’ Flower whispered, holding the door. ‘Do come with us; you’re too good for this place.’

  ‘We’ve started it now,’ Flower said, settling on Gloria’s bed. She looked worried, as she had the right to be. K. John drew his Colt revolver, briefly checked the loads and stood beside the bed waiting for the night of the guns to begin.

  Chapter Twelve

  The roar of gunfire racketed through the night. K. John felt—or perhaps he just imagined he did—the vibration of bullets thudding into the flooring of the room. Minutes later, Gloria appeared in the doorway, looking frightened, wild-eyed, her hair displaced.

  ‘They’re coming!’ she panted out, and for a moment K. John froze, gun in hand, not knowing who she meant. Then he realized who she’d meant. There was the sound of little heels against the planks of the hall floor, many of them, and they burst into the room in a flurry of yellow silk, scarlet and black.

  Espying Flower across the room, they fluttered that way and clustered around her, all chatting at once—a group of flocking, panicking birds. K. John backed away instinctively; gatherings of many females had always made him a little nervous. He telegraphed a look at Flower, which said, ‘Let’s get going!’

  She apparently received the message for within minutes while the shooting continued downstairs, the brightly colored flock of females was assembled near the window and the first bird was descending, chattering back at the rest of them.

  ‘You’d better ask these girls to quiet down,’ K. John said, feeling that he was an intruder in their secret female ritual. A few of the women glared at him. Others seemed to understand the importance of silence.

  ‘There’s time enough for talking later,’ Gloria said at K. John’s shoulder. All of her earlier indecision seemed to have vanished. She looked now like a woman set to take charge of the fledglings. With more or less obedience the girls moved nearer the window in whispered near-silence. Flower had already gone out the window and disappeared into the night. K. John now caught the sounds of many horses—four or five—pounding their way toward the west end of town at a gallop. Barbara’s men making their departure, he believed.

  So far, so good. He moved forward now with a tight expression on his face, hurrying the girls along. Some appeared hesitant to leave at all, others seemed merely afraid of the height and insecurity of the weathered ladder. When the last woman had slipped out in a ruffled flurry of petticoats, K. John paused once more to look around the room and toward the door.

  ‘I’m next, I guess,’ Gloria said. In all of the commotion, sh
e had managed to shed her dress and now wore a rather baggy pair of jeans and a dark-brown man’s shirt.

  ‘I guess you are,’ K. John replied. He had a strong urge to open the door and peer out into the hallway, but he did not surrender to it. Men would be arriving, no doubt; someone would be wondering what had become of the saloon girls, but there seemed to be no rush to find the women.

  When Gloria’s manicured hand had moved downward in her descent, K. John blew out the lamp in the room and moved to the ladder himself.

  He paused once on the third rung as Gloria’s door was opened and voices from her room reached him in the night.

  ‘Gloria’s gone, too!’

  ‘Where do you think they’ve gotten to?’

  ‘Did anyone have a look in the kitchen?’

  ‘That’s where Sadie would choose to hide ... ’ A muffled laugh followed, the door was closed, and then the room was silent again. K. John continued on his way, a cold sweat now coating his neck and back.

  The night was quiet, warm, as K. John dropped from the ladder in the midst of the gathered females.

  ‘Keep moving,’ Flower encouraged the women in a whisper.

  ‘Where?’ a trim little blonde asked, not quite in tears. Flower took the girl’s arm, turning her.

  ‘West along the alley. We’re heading for Nazareth Road.’

  The girl continued to show reluctance until Gloria took charge and moved her along, not too gently.

  Flower lingered beside K. John as he watched the women flutter away, some still exchanging whispered chatter.

  ‘What are you thinking, K. John?’ she asked. K. John let his eyes drift to the starry sky before answering.

  ‘Too many women.’

  ‘You don’t like them?’ Flower asked with an imp’s smile.

  ‘I like them fine in small clusters ... or alone,’ he replied, lowering his gaze. Then, surprising himself more than Flower, he bent his head and kissed her full on the mouth.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ she asked as they proceeded arm in arm after the others.

  ‘Nothing. Just something your father asked me.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘I said it was nothing,’ K. John answered, returning to his grumpy voice. Flower frowned, her pleased smile of a minute before vanishing.

  ‘Should we check on them? Father and Justine, I mean.’

  ‘I know who you meant. Do I think so? No. Whatever we might wish to know about, it’s probably already over. Let’s take care of our end of the business.’

  ~*~

  They reached the schoolhouse half an hour later, following the weaving, multicolored cavalcade of confused, excited saloon girls. K. John had insisted that they take the time to recover their horses before following even though that meant more risk of being noticed and captured.

  ‘I won’t be left afoot if something goes terribly wrong here,’ K. John had said, and Flower had agreed that it was something that must be done. While they walked through and lingered in the awakened town, Flower kept her eyes open for her father.

  ‘Where do you think those two got to?’ she asked. K. John could only shake his head.

  ‘They’ve been warned. Maybe the sense of what we were telling them finally sunk in.’

  ‘They were both pretty determined to do Clyde Willit in.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean that they were capable of busting in and actually doing it. Flower, I know you want to take care of everybody, but we just can’t do it if they wish to be reckless. Let’s turn our attention back to the young women.’

  She nodded with unwilling agreement and they found their horses, mounted and began riding the western trail out of Crossroads. The schoolhouse, when they found it, was lantern-lit, filled with mingled murmuring. Barbara Casey met them at the door as they stepped up on to the porch of the unfinished building. Gloria seemed to be in charge of maintaining order inside.

  As they entered the schoolhouse there was a small group of girls holding an impromptu dance in one corner of the room, a few standing around looking simply bewildered by events, and some who set themselves apart, sobbing softly.

  ‘Well, Flower,’ Barbara said. ‘It’s your party. Better try to take charge of it.’

  ‘I will—let’s sort them out,’ Flower answered, her face a little grim now. She ascended the small, stage-like area apparently originally intended for a teacher’s desk and called out so that everyone could hear her, ‘Listen to me, please!’

  When she went on the room was quieter; everyone was listening. ‘Those of you here who are sure they wish to stay with the Double O may leave right now. All we ask is that you do not inform anyone where we are. Those who are undecided are invited to stay. Those who wish to leave that dirty rat Clyde Willit—welcome!’

  A couple of the girls gathered their skirts and immediately started toward the door. Beside K. John Gloria also shifted and turned that way. ‘That’s Rebecca Piggott,’ she said to K. John, gesturing after one of the two girls. ‘I’ll follow her along and impress upon her the need not to reveal our presence out here.’

  The women obviously had some kind of history between them. K. John did not try to guess what it might be or question Gloria’s judgment. He did notice as his eyes shifted that way that the four riders Barbara had brought with her had drifted in out of the darkness, two of them looking a little too bright-eyed, probably from liquor, and quite pleased with themselves. Eric Styles stood to one side, leaning against the wall, his arms crossed, his expression tight. Arnie Brewster stood near him, his face reflecting a different sort of grimness. His, K. John guessed, was the knowledge that as Brewster had expressed earlier, they would not manage to finish this business without gunplay. Clyde Willit just wasn’t going to stand for it.

  One of Barbara’s cowboys watched the girls leave and then lingered in the yard, listening. K. John returned to the inside of the school where Flower was still trying to field questions from the gathered girls.

  ‘I want to make my break,’ one of them was saying. This was the quite young blonde K. John had now identified as April. ‘I can go back to my father’s farm, but how am I to get there? And what if they come after me?’

  ‘At least you have an idea of where you’d like to go,’ another woman spoke up. This dark-haired, slightly plump girl was named Daphne. ‘I don’t even know where my family is. I may have an aunt over in Las Flores, but I can’t write her and expect a reply in a week’s time, if that! In the meantime, what am I supposed to do?’ Daphne demanded. ‘Camp out like some plainsman?’

  There was a small murmur of agreement from some of the other girls. Flower tried to stem the tide of unrest. True, she knew, she had planned this all too hastily—or not planned it at all. She looked desperately toward Barbara, the one person who did have space to take in a few of the girls until they could find their way home, but K. John saw Barbara shake her head regretfully. She was not willing to take in any boarders at her ranch, filled as it was with unmarried young bucks; not with Clyde Willit on their trail.

  Justine Masters, similarly, had space to offer lodging to a few of the girls for a time, but Justine was not even there, and there was no telling what her reaction would have been—probably negative.

  One of the girls, more rebellious, more fed-up, and bolder than the others, spoke out. ‘Give me a horse and I’ll be on my way tonight. Damn Willit and his men!’ This one, a brunette called Theresa, was the exception. But, as with the others, they could not offer her more help. They just didn’t have a horse to give her.

  Flower continued to plead with the girls, to try to convince them that their freedom was more important than another night of comfort at the Double O. They wanted to believe her, K. John saw, but they had been yanked too rapidly from their cozy confinement into the cold world outside, and now they found themselves lost and confused.

  Flower’s plan, noble though it might have been, seemed doomed to crumble in front of her eyes.

  Gloria spoke up. ‘If I could hide o
ut until the morning stage; if someone would trust me with the price of a ticket east ... I’d be gone.’

  But she did not know where to go until morning, and no one was in a position to offer her money for the coach. In the corner of the room, one girl began to sob softly again. Flower was doing little enough to comfort them.

  Standing near the door beside Arnie Brewster, K. John himself felt that the cause was nearly lost despite Flower’s good intentions. The young cowboy with the red mustache who had lingered outside came in and spoke a few hurried words to Brewster. The scar-faced man turned toward K. John and asked:

  ‘What is this place supposed to be?’

  K. John was baffled for a moment. ‘Only a place to halt temporarily for refuge and conferring.’

  ‘“Temporary” is the right word,’ Arnie Brewster told him. ‘This man is Carl West. He tells me he hears horsemen approaching from not far away.’

  ‘That woman—Rebecca—must have told them where we were.’

  ‘S’pose so,’ Brewster drawled. ‘The question is, what do we do now?’

  ‘We fight!’ Eric Styles, who had been on the edge of the conversation, stepped forward. His face was young, tough and looked eager for a gunfight.

  ‘Bad idea,’ Arnie Brewster told his boss, and K. John agreed.

  ‘Well,’ Styles said, stiffly, as he studied the assembled women gathered around Flower. ‘What would you suggest? We can’t just gather the herd and start driving them.’

  ‘You’ll get these women hurt if we stand and fight here,’ K. John said, although the others were aware of that. ‘If we try to flee with this bunch, there’s no way at all we’ll reach any place safe.’

  ‘You eliminated all of the choices,’ Arnie Brewster said. ‘The only option is to let Willit have his girls back and we run to safety ourselves—assuming we can.’

  ‘No, that can’t be done. We can’t desert the women.’ K. John shook his head. Not now, not when they were free. The question was what, outside of a wild, unwinnable bloodbath, was their choice?