Shadow of Legends

by Stephen A. Bly

  Rebekah leaned across the table toward Todd. “Did you send the lawyer down to the Gem?”

  “No. I didn’t want him to bust upon her like that. I figured she should deal with this on her own time and at a place of her choosing,” Todd explained.

  “I’m glad,” Rebekah nodded. “Did you send word to the Gem?”

  “No, this attorney was watching me as I left. So, I just hiked up here.”

  “We’ve got to go tell Abigail,” Rebekah insisted.

  “I’ll go,” Dacee June offered. “Todd can’t go or that lawyer guy might still be watching him. And I know Rebekah won’t go into the badlands. Besides, Mr. Swearengen lets me go in the back door of the Gem for free.”

  “Why does he do that?” Todd asked.

  “Because I run errands for the girls sometimes. Daddy knows all about it. Now, what am I supposed to tell Abby?”

  Todd pulled out his pocket watch. “I don’t think her show begins for an hour. Tell her that her husband’s attorney is in town looking for her, and I wouldn’t reveal her position until she tells me to do so. Ask her if she can come up before the show, and I’ll explain what I know.”

  Todd held the door open for a breathless Abigail Gordon and talkative Dacee June.

  “There was this man with a silk top hat, waiting for the first performance, and he asked me if I would like to attend the theater with him,” Dacee June gushed. “He had on a really nice black suit, didn’t he Abby?”

  “He was old enough to be your father,” the actress added.

  “But the point is, he noticed me and treated me like a lady.”

  Abigail wore a blue and brown plaid suit with bias skirt, plain waist, and leg-of-mutton sleeves. Her simple brown straw hat held three blue French silk roses. “He treated you like a woman. Whether he would treat you like a lady is yet to be determined,” she said.

  “This is one of Abby’s costumes,” Dacee June explained. “She wears this when she sings ‘Douglas, Douglas, Tender and True.’ It is a very wonderful song that I’m trying to learn to play on my pump organ.”

  “What is this about Dr. Gordon sending an attorney? How did he know I was here? What did he want? Did he have a court order?” Abigail queried.

  Rebekah motioned toward the parlor. “Would you like to sit down?”

  Abigail shook her head intensely. “I just want this man to go back to Chattanooga and leave me alone. It can’t be good news.”

  “How do you know that?” Rebekah questioned.

  “No woman ever got good news from her former husband’s attorney. He hasn’t contacted us in over three years; why would he do that now?”

  “Perhaps you should ask the lawyer,” Rebekah suggested.

  Abigail stared at Todd and held her breath. “Why don’t you meet with him and ask him?”

  “He won’t talk with me,” Todd explained.

  “Well, I’m not meeting with some attorney in my dressing room at the Gem.”

  “How much time do you have between shows?” Todd asked.

  “Forty-five minutes. The orchestra only has a thirty-minute break, but we get a little more.”

  “Why don’t I arrange a meeting here at our house for 9:15 P.M.,” Todd advised.

  “Yes,” Rebekah added. “That way he won’t know where you live and can’t pester you.”

  “What should I wear?”

  “What you have will do nicely.”

  “It’s boring, isn’t it?”

  “Well, it’s nontheatrical. That might be the right thing to wear when meeting an attorney.”

  “Will you sit in on the meeting with me?”

  “If you’d like,” Todd agreed.

  Abigail took a deep breath. “I’d like that,” she muttered between clenched teeth.

  Todd was on a second helping of sliced, boiled potatoes and thick, dark-brown gravy when Dacee June returned from walking Abigail back to the Gem Theater.

  “Boy, she sure is nervous,” Dacee June reported.

  “She loves her daughter and is threatened by an attorney showing up,” Rebekah reasoned.

  Dacee June brushed her long hair behind her ears. “If she loves her daughter so much, how come she has her stay with her mother in Omaha?”

  “She just wants to make enough money this summer to start a business in Nebraska.”

  “You can’t make that kind of money working at the Gem,” Todd added.

  “Some of the girls make a lot of money. You should see the dresses they buy straight from Paris,” Dacee June reported. “But I don’t guess they make it all from acting.”

  Todd glared at his sister, then said to Rebekah, “Perhaps he just needs to finalize some legal documents with Abigail’s signature,” Todd counseled.

  The banging on the front door brought all three to their feet.

  Todd swung open the solid oak front door. There with hat in hand stood Sheriff Seth Bullock. “Todd, I got word from Yankton that those two old boys from that botched stagecoach job escaped and might be headed this way. You and me are the only ones in town that they would recognize.”

  “And Quiet Jim. Did you tell Quiet Jim?”

  “Didn’t he go huntin’ with your daddy?”

  “No, he changed his mind and stayed in town.”

  “I’ll go tell him,” the sheriff said.

  Rebekah’s face revealed more concern than her soft voice. “Are they looking for revenge?”

  Todd rubbed his hand slowly across his chin whiskers. “If they had any sense they wouldn’t come within a hundred miles of the Black Hills.”

  Rebekah slipped her arm into his. “This region seems to attract those with little sense.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “It’s a lot of money,” Dacee June demurred. She toyed with the small locket on a gold chain hung around her neck and placed it, like a truffle, between her full, dark lips.

  Todd’s black tie hung loose around his neck like a miniature scarf. “And it’s almost midnight, Lil’ Sis. You want me to walk you home?”

  She rolled her eyes and puffed in such a way that it fluttered her curly bangs. “I live in the house next door. Why do you need to walk me home? You never asked that before.”

  “The house is dark, and your daddy is not waiting for you this time.” Todd brushed his goatee with his fingers. “Family just seems awfully valuable all of a sudden.”

  “You’re beginning to act like Irene Seltzmann’s father. Sometimes on a Saturday night, he actually walks her out to the privy, then stands guard.” Dacee June looked straight at Rebekah, who was crocheting a red, white, and blue doily. “Do I really have to leave? No decision has been made yet,” she whined. “As soon as I leave, you’ll decide something. Then I won’t know until tomorrow.”

  “This might be one of those decisions that waits until morning,” Rebekah cautioned, never losing a stitch.

  “Your sister-in-law is right, Dacee June,” Abigail Gordon concurred. “I’ve got a lot of thinking to do. It’s time I get some sleep, too.” She turned to Todd and Rebekah. “You will never know what an important place you’ve played in my life. I felt like I had an upper hand on Mr. Dover and Amber’s father tonight. I don’t think that has ever been the case before. I doubt I would have felt that way if he had accosted me in my dressing room at the Gem.”

  “Abigail,” Rebekah said, “now that you have found the stairway to Forest Hill, I will expect you to visit me again.”

  “I’d like that.” Abigail plucked up her small brown straw hat from the coffee table and tied the ribbon under her chin. “In fact, could I come and talk this over with you two again tomorrow?”

  “Which two?” Dacee June chimed in.

  “Lil’ Sis isn’t bashful,” Todd explained.

  Abigail g
rinned. “Yes, I’ve told her repeatedly that she’d make an excellent actress.”

  Dacee June cupped her hands under her chin and flashed a phony, toothy smile. “Yes, I could play the tomboy. Every melodrama has a tomboy.”

  “Don’t let her daddy hear you say that,” Todd added.

  The pose dropped off Dacee June’s face. “I still didn’t get an answer. Which two do you want to visit with?”

  Abigail brushed down her dress, then looked at Dacee June. “Why, all three of you, of course.”

  “You don’t live next door,” Todd added as he accompanied her to the door, “so, let me walk you home. It is quite late.”

  Abigail raised her eyebrows and glanced back at Rebekah.

  “I insist,” Rebekah said, then broke into a smile, “and I insist that Dacee June go with you also.”

  “I couldn’t agree more,” Todd said.

  “I’ve got to chaperon my thirty-year-old brother?” Dacee June groaned.

  “No,” he laughed. “You are going to chaperon the rumors.”

  Dacee June scooted over next to him. “What rumors? I haven’t heard any rumors.”

  “See what a good job you’re already doing?” He tossed his arm around her shoulder and led Dacee June out the door.

  Rebekah was laying on her back in bed when Todd returned from the stroll down to the Gem and the hike back up the hill. He yanked his boots off with the bootjack at the door, then pulled off his tie and vest.

  The lace collar of her flannel gown tickled her neck. She tried to tuck it under the cotton sheet that was pulled up to her chin. “Did you get your ladies safely home?”

  “I reckon they are safe. One of them sleeps with a revolver.”

  “The sixteen-year-old?”

  “Yes,” Todd reported. “Do you think she totes that gun too much?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “I suppose Abigail has learned how to take care of herself, too.”

  “She’s a determined woman.” Rebekah could feel the cold sheets as she wiggled her bare toes. “It’s a tough situation she’s in, Todd.”

  He rubbed at the back of his neck. “I know.”

  “She did get a generous offer. With a five-thousand dollar nest egg, Abigail could move to Omaha and open that business she wants.” Rebekah raised the sheet and fanned her suddenly flushed face.

  Todd carefully hung the white shirt on the back of the wooden chair. “But, I certainly understand her hesitation. It’s a dramatic step to sign a legal document that neither she nor Amber will ever visit nor contest the will and/or estate of Dr. Gordon. It’s like saying that Amber has no father at all.” The polished wooden floor felt cold and good on his bare feet.

  “He’s trying to totally disinherit his daughter for $5,000. How can a man do that?” Rebekah plopped both arms above the covers and pushed the sleeves of her gown up to her elbows. “How can he marry a woman, have a child, commit adultery, ignore the child . . . then buy them permanently out of his life? What kind of man is that?”

  “You’re asking me?” Todd folded his light wool trousers across the chair.

  “Not exactly the way Fortune men act, is it?”

  Even in the shadows of a flickering lantern, he thought he saw her brown eyes sparkle.

  “It would be a permanent disgrace for any Fortune to act such.” Todd flipped back the white cotton sheet and crawled next to Rebekah. A lone kerosene lamp on the nightstand illuminated the room. “But Abigail is right. If she doesn’t take this, Amber might well get absolutely nothing from the man. He must have a lot of assets to protect.”

  Rebekah rolled her head toward him. Her hair made the pillow feel like silk against her cheek. “I hear he owns a lot of race horses.”

  Todd reached over and stroked the bangs out of her eyes. “He doesn’t want little Amber to show up some day wanting one of his precious ponies, I guess.”

  Rebekah pulled his hand to her lips and kissed it. It felt strong, calloused. “I suppose he wants to save them for his stepchildren and any more he and his new wife have.”

  “If she takes the money she gets to live with her daughter and do something besides acting,” Todd noted.

  “I understand she’s a very good actress.”

  “But traveling from theater to theater is a difficult way to raise a daughter.” Todd let his hand slip down lower than her face. “And she must eternally keep her daughter away from the girl’s father.”

  “Or, Abigail could refuse the offer, and pray that father and daughter could maybe, just maybe, be reconciled in the future.” His hand felt warm and Rebekah closed her eyes. Her thoughts wandered.

  Todd slipped his hand into Rebekah’s. “How do you feel about Abigail’s dilemma?”

  “Guilty.” Rebekah reached back with her free hand and turned the lantern off. “I’m relieved that it’s not me who has to decide, and that makes me feel very guilty . . . very happy with my situation, and very guilty.”

  “Sort of like the song, ‘It’s your misfortune and none of my own,’” he said as he tugged her closer in the darkened bedroom.

  “Exactly,” she whispered. Without seeing him, she knew his face was only inches away. Rebekah slipped an arm around his waist and laid her head on his chest. “I’m sure we’ll have our own misfortunes, but I’m glad that isn’t one of them.”

  In the dark of the room, Todd ran his hands gently through her hair. Like gentle strands of silk, it tickled the soft flesh between his fingers. “It seems strange to have Olene show up on the same day that the Chattanooga lawyer arrives. For us, this deal about selling the hardware store might be just as crucial a decision as Mrs. Abigail Gordon’s.”

  She held him tight and listened to his heartbeat, a sound of which she never tired. “But our decision is much more academic. It doesn’t involve our children.”

  Todd stopped stroking her hair and laid his hands on the sheet behind her head. “Doesn’t it?” he probed. “Of course it involves our children.”

  Rebekah pulled back a little, but left her arms at his waist. “What do you mean?”

  Todd flopped his arm back on his side of the bed. “I mean, you don’t want to have children in Deadwood. You’ve made that quite clear. So the number and ages of our children, if we have any, is directly affected by selling the store, isn’t it?”

  She pulled away from Todd. The back of her head pinned his other arm beneath her.

  Todd took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Now she’s angry . . . and I don’t know what to say next. But it’s the logical conclusion. Why doesn’t she think these things through?

  Finally, she spoke softly. “Are you going to invite Mr. Olene to lunch?”

  His reply was curt. “I told you I would. I presume the other subject is concluded.”

  She turned her back to him but held onto his arm beneath her head.

  He could hear her start to sniffle. Todd Fortune, you have no idea in the world how my heart aches to have children, and how terrified I am of raising them. “Todd, I’ve tried to like Deadwood. Really, I have. I just don’t know how to live in a town like this.”

  She rubbed her eyes on his arm. He could feel the hot tears. Lord, sometimes I just don’t know how to talk to this woman. “I reckon Deadwood isn’t much unlike any other place,” he murmured.

  Rebekah rolled over on her back. “See, that’s the problem. It is different to me. You and I are so dissimilar. This evening the sheriff came to the door to warn you that two gun-toting, violent, lawless men have escaped and perhaps headed to Deadwood. If they do, they could try to take revenge against you. You and the sheriff shrug that off as if it’s an everyday occurrence. Well, it’s not an everyday ­occurrence to me, Todd Fortune. The thought of men in this town looking for a way to gun down my husband absolutely terrifies me. It makes me want
to hide under the covers of my bed and never, ever come out!” she sobbed.

  He rolled over, almost on top of her. “I’m not too fond of the idea myself, Mrs. Fortune. You reckon I could just hide under the covers with you?”

  She reached up in the dark of the room and rubbed his cheek with the palm of her hand. “You can hide under my covers any time you want, Mr. Fortune,” she sniffled. “But, what do you intend to do about those gunmen?”

  He leaned down and brushed a soft kiss across her lips. For a split second every worry in her mind melted. “I suppose I’ll pray a lot,” he whispered.

  Her voice was much, much more relaxed. “Are you going to pray right now?”

  Todd lowered himself down until their noses touched in the darkness. “No,” he whispered. “I’m not going to pray right now.”

  It was almost noon the following day before Todd had a break in store business and stepped out on the wooden sidewalk to gaze down Main Street.

  The crack of a bullwhacker’s whip and the adjoining shout caught his attention as dual freight wagons plodded their way up Main Street. There were also loaded farm wagons, buckboards, and horsemen crowded in the streets. They were all going somewhere. Doing something. The sidewalks, too, seemed crowded with busy people.

  Only the white puffy clouds in the sky sauntered along.

  It’s a hard-working town.

  The perfect spot for a hardware store.

  But Rebekah hates this gulch. I know that. I wonder why you bury earth’s treasures, Lord, in such desolate locations. I love this town, probably for the very reasons she hates it. It’s rough, coarse, independent, and sometimes violent. But it’s a town that produces. Using the genius of engineers and mining geologists and the backs of a thousand strong men, gold is dug out of the ground and shared with the entire world. No one has to remain poor in Deadwood. There are no frills. No pretense. No protocol from the past. Nobody cares what you used to be. You get a new chance to prove yourself.