by Janet Dailey
“What are you talkin’ about?” Fargo demanded. “I don’t remember anything about a letter.”
“That’s not my fault,” Tobe retorted a bit testily. “It says right here, ‘As a final request, the condemned outlaw asked to be allowed to write a farewell letter to his wife and family. The request was granted.’ ”
“That’s it.” The one-armed cowboy slapped a hand on the table and chortled with glee. “He told ’em in the letter where the money was buried. He didn’t draw a map. He wrote one.”
Chapter Six
A sharp pound-pound-pounding finally penetrated the layers of sleep. At almost precisely the same instant, Angie had a vague awareness of light against her eyelids. Quick to blame the source of brightness on a vehicle’s high beams, she rolled over onto her side and dragged the covers over her head to block the glare.
But no roar of an accelerating engine followed it, no crunch of tires rolling over gravel.
Instead, there came the probing query: “Angie, are you up yet?” The words registered, along with their implication it was morning, but Angie couldn’t place the woman’s voice. Somewhere a bird sang, its cheery trill providing another indication that day had dawned.
Not wanting to believe it, Angie pulled the covers off her head and opened one eye a crack. All the windows in the camper were closed, but they couldn’t hold out the invasion of daylight, only dim its intensity.
It can’t be morning yet, she thought with a protesting groan.
A second rap-rap came from the camper door, this time tentative in its lightness. The voice echoed it.
“Miss Sommers?”
With a brief flash of recognition, Angie realized the voice belonged to Ima Jane Evans. Part of her wondered what on earth the woman was doing knocking on her door so early in the morning. As much as she longed to go back to sleep, she couldn’t bring herself to ignore the summons.
“Just a minute,” she called in a sleep-slurred voice.
Fumbling with the covers, she slid to the edge of the bed, tucked up high in the camper’s cab-over section. Careful to avoid the low ceiling, Angie swung her legs out of the bunk and, more or less, lowered her feet onto the cushioned bench, one of a pair that flanked the camper’s built-in table. From there, she stepped to the floor and gave the hem of her T-shirt nightie a tug to make sure she was decently covered.
Still groggy with sleep, she pushed the tangle of her curly auburn mane away from her face and half staggered to the door, located at the rear of the camper. She opened it a crack and instantly recoiled from the blast of bright sunlight, throwing up a hand to shield her eyes from its harsh glare.
“Oh, dear, I did wake you, didn’t I?” Ima Jane guessed at once. “I’m so sorry.”
“That’s all right.” Angie continued to use her hand as a sun visor, blinking as she peered through finger slits at the woman on the ground. Belatedly she wondered, “What time is it, anyway?”
“A little after nine o’clock.”
“Nine?!” Her mouth remained open in shock. By nature, she was an early riser, usually up with the sun. The last time she’d stayed in bed this late had been back in her college days after she’d been up most of the previous night cramming for finals. “I never sleep this late,” she finally murmured, a remnant of disbelief in her voice.
“Obviously you were very tired,” Ima Jane concluded.
“Obviously.” But Angie thought it was more likely a form of letdown after all the tension and excitement of getting here. “What was it you wanted?”
A big smile lit the woman’s face. “I came to invite you to have breakfast with us.”
Breakfast. She hadn’t even had that vital first cup of coffee yet. “That’s kind of you.”
“Good. Griff said to tell you he’ll have it on the table in twenty minutes. The front door’s open and the coffee’s hot. Just walk right in as soon as you’re ready.” With a farewell wave, Ima Jane headed back to the bar and grill, leaving Angie staring blankly after her, trying to recall when she had accepted the invitation.
The promise of hot coffee ultimately galvanized Angie into action. Foregoing a shower to conserve the supply of fresh water in the camper’s holding tank, she washed the sleep from her face, brushed her teeth, and threw on a pair of jeans and a soft yellow T-shirt. After combing the snarls from her hair, she pulled it back and secured it at the nape of her neck with a yellow scrunchie to match her top. Makeup she kept to a bare minimum, a touch of mascara and a hint of lipstick. In record time, even for her, Angie swung out of the camper and crossed the empty parking lot to the bar and grill.
Silence greeted her when she walked in. After the noise and hubbub of last night’s crowd, it seemed unnatural, not a soul in sight. Feeling like an intruder, she hesitated.
“Hello? I’m here,” she called.
One of the doors to the kitchen swung open and Ima Jane poked her head out. “There you are. I thought I heard someone,” she replied, then said over her shoulder, “don’t worry about keeping anything warm. Angie’s here. You can dish up whenever you want.” She pushed through the door and headed straight for the bar area. “How about some coffee?” She lifted a coffeepot off its burner plate on the back bar.
“Please.” Angie crossed the empty room and quickly claimed the coffee mug Ima Jane set on the bar counter.
The woman’s dark eyes twinkled when she saw Angie wrap both hands around the mug. “I see you’re like me. I don’t function all that well until I’ve had my first cup.”
“Sad but true,” Angie admitted, savoring that initial jolt of caffeine.
Ima Jane poured a cup for herself, then motioned toward a nearby table with place settings for three. “Have a seat,” she said as she emerged from behind the bar. “We always have our meals down here even though we have a little apartment upstairs. It doesn’t seem to matter what Griff is preparing; there’s always something he needs from the kitchen down here. Personally, I think he just likes cooking in the big kitchen best.”
“We all tend to be creatures of habit,” Angie offered by way of a response, and sat down at the table, more interested in drinking her coffee than making conversation.
To Ima Jane, silence was clearly something to be avoided at all times. “Isn’t that true,” she agreed and hopped to a different subject. “After we closed last night, I rearranged the pictures and found a place to hang the old newspaper stories about your outlaw ancestor.” She motioned toward the wall behind Angie. “It looks good there, don’t you think?”
Obligingly Angie glanced over her shoulder to note the location of the framed articles. As she turned back, a man came out of the kitchen deftly balancing a large serving tray.
“It’s a perfect location,” Angie remarked, then caught the aroma of spicy sausage and a faint whiff of vanilla mixed with cinnamon. Hunger suddenly gnawed at her empty stomach.
“If you’re talking about those old newspaper articles, they’d better look good hangin’ there ’cause I ain’t movin’ any more pictures around. Last night was enough,” Griff stated in a grumbling voice and lowered the serving tray onto the table next to theirs. “She messed around here for two hours makin’ me switch things around, movin’ this one here and that one there, then changed it all around again.”
His complaints failed to make a dent in Ima Jane’s warm smile. If anything they seemed to amuse her. “Don’t pay any attention to my husband,” she said to Angie. “He isn’t happy unless he has something to gripe about.”
He responded with a loud harrumph, then nodded curtly to Angie when Ima Jane made the introductions. Before Angie had a chance to acknowledge him, Griff turned away and lifted two individual platters of food off the serving tray. He set one before Angie.
“We’re having French toast and sausage this morning.” The announcement had the ring of a challenge.
“It’s one of my breakfast favorites.” Angie unwrapped the silverware and laid the napkin across her lap.
“Then you’ll love Griff
’s version,” Ima Jane informed her, as she dipped her knife into the mound of whipped butter on her plate. “He makes his own cinnamon-raisin bread, which is delicious all by itself, but the recipe for the egg dip is one of his most closely guarded secrets. The one for his sausage is probably second. He made it, too. In fact, everything he serves is made from scratch, including the butter.”
“You churn your own?” Angie asked in amazement.
“Always,” Ima Jane inserted when her husband only nodded. “We have this wonderful Guernsey cow named Molly that gives us the richest milk. Griff used to milk her himself every morning and night, but it got to be too much. Now we have Andy Fry do it. He lives here in town with his folks. Next year he’ll be getting his driver’s license and he’s trying to earn enough money to buy a used pickup.”
Angie started to ask if the syrup for the French toast was homemade, but one taste and the flavor of it reminded her of the brown sugar syrup her grandmother used to fix.
For a moment there was silence at the table while they ate their first few bites of breakfast. But it didn’t last. To no one’s surprise, Ima Jane was the one who ended it.
“The tongues really started wagging after you left last night, Angie,” she remarked, fastening bright eyes on her.
“Did they?” Angie murmured, for something to say.
“Did they ever!” the woman declared in exaggerated emphasis. “The place was absolutely buzzing. No one could stop talking about the letter, and speculating about what might have been in it.”
The fork with a bite of sausage on its tines froze in midair, halfway to her mouth. “The letter?” Angie tried for ignorance.
“Yes, the letter Ike Wilson wrote to his wife. You know, the one mentioned in the article about the hanging.” With her knife, Ima Jane gestured toward the framed newspaper clippings on the wall behind Angie.
“Oh, that one.” She breathed a silent sigh of relief. Until that moment, Angie had forgotten there had been any reference to it in the newspaper stories of the day.
“Everyone is dying to know if your family still has it. It’s terrible the way people tend to throw old letters away, without a thought of the interest the next generation might have in such correspondence.” Ima Jane didn’t come right out and ask whether it was still in existence, but the inference was clear.
Nodding, Angie stalled while she tried to decide how much she wanted to tell about it. “History scholars are always bemoaning the loss of old letters and journals that are thrown away by people who don’t understand their value as doors to the past.”
“I can imagine,” Ima Jane murmured in empathy, then waited several beats until it became obvious Angie wasn’t going to answer voluntarily. “So, does your family still have the letter Ike Wilson wrote before he was hanged?”
“Fortunately we do.” Deliberately Angie stuffed a forkful of food into her mouth, making it impossible to talk and chew at the same time.
“You do!” Losing all interest in the food before her, Ima Jane lowered her fork and focused her attention on Angie with undisguised avidity. “What did it say?”
“The kind of things you would expect a man to write his wife and son when he knows he’s about to die,” she replied, attempting a shrug of indifference.
Ima Jane wasn’t about to be put off by that uninformative answer. “Such as?” She leaned closer, inviting Angie to confide.
She shrugged again and kept her eyes on the plate of food. “How sorry he was. That sort of thing.”
Frowning, Ima Jane said with insistence, “Surely he told her about the gold that was stolen?”
“I suppose you could say he did indirectly when he referred to being convicted of robbing a train.”
Ima Jane sank back in her chair, crestfallen at the news. “You mean, he didn’t tell her where the money was hidden?”
Her wits sharpened after a night’s sleep, Angie smoothly dodged a direct answer. “Did you really think he would? Don’t you know the authorities were anxious to recover that money? They were bound to read the letter before they sent it on. I’m sure Ike Wilson knew that.”
“I hadn’t considered that,” Ima Jane admitted and sighed in regret. “Everybody’s going to be so disappointed, though. They were certain he’d told his wife where the money could be found. After all, your grandfather was convinced he knew where it was when he came here. It seemed logical to believe the letter had indicated where to look. Now . . .” She let the thought trail off, unfinished, her expression turning glum.
Silence reigned for several seconds, broken only by the muted clink and scrape of silverware on plates. Then, Griff picked up the subject with a thought of his own.
“Just because he didn’t spell out the location of the stolen loot in so many words, that doesn’t mean he didn’t leave some clues to its whereabouts,” he suggested a bit gruffly. “Something, maybe, that would only mean something to his wife.”
“Of course. That has to be the answer,” Ima Jane declared, all enthused again. “Why didn’t I think of that?”
A grunt of amusement came from Griff. “Knowing you, you would have come up with it sooner or later.”
“Probably.” The airy agreement was barely out of her mouth before she once again directed her attention at Angie. “You didn’t, by any chance, bring that letter with you, did you?”
Never in her whole life had Angie been able to lie convincingly. Knowing that, she chose her words carefully. “I did bring the family scrapbook with me. I remember my grandma always kept the letter in it.”
Both statements were facts that led to a fallacy. The letter wasn’t in the scrapbook; Angie had tucked it into a zippered pocket inside her purse.
“I would love to read it,” Ima Jane admitted with unabashed candor. “After breakfast, why don’t we go through the scrapbook and see if it’s there?”
Having anticipated the request, Angie had already decided it would be harmless. “I’ll be happy to show it to you,” she agreed and stabbed a bite of syrup-drenched bread with her fork. “Don’t let me forget, though, to get directions to Luke McCallister’s ranch. I promised I’d be there by one o’clock.”
“You won’t have any trouble finding the Ten Bar. It can’t be much more than forty-five minutes from here,” Ima Jane told her. “Even if you left a little after twelve, you’d still arrive with time to spare—” The telephone on the back bar rang, interrupting her and startling Angie with its harshness. Ima Jane sighed in mild disgust and arched a knowing glance at her husband. “What do you want to bet that’s Joanie Michels calling to say she’ll be late?”
“It wouldn’t be the first time,” Griff replied with marked indifference.
“Isn’t that the truth,” Ima Jane agreed, but there was a good-natured smile on her lips when she pushed back from the table and went to answer the phone.
It rang once more, loud and long, assaulting Angie’s ears again. Thankfully Ima Jane picked up the receiver before it could ring a third time. After an initial exchange of hellos, she sent a little “I told you so” look at her husband and said into the phone, “Yes, Joanie. What can I do for you?”
Griff didn’t acknowledge the glance and made no attempt to keep a conversation going now that his wife was absent from the table. Which left Angie free to concentrate on the rest of her breakfast while Ima Jane chattered away in the background. She was still on the phone when Angie cleaned up the last of her French toast.
Sighing in contentment, she sat back from the table. “That was a fabulous meal, Mr. Evans. I’ve been in five-star restaurants where the food didn’t taste half as good as this.”
“Thanks.” Despite the compliment, his expression never lost its sour quality.
It pushed Angie to convince him of her sincerity. “I’m serious. If you were in a large city, people would be standing in line to eat here.”
His glance ran over the tavern’s rustic interior with its planked floor, scarred tables, and mismatched chairs. Something wistful crept into
his eyes. “I used to think about movin’ to Cheyenne—or maybe Denver—and openin’ up a restaurant there. A steak house, maybe, with a limited menu, but everything on it fresh and the best quality—like here.”
“I’m surprised you haven’t.”
“How could I?” The vinegar of defeat was in the look he sent her. “In order to get the money to start somewhere else, I’d have to sell this place—and who’d buy it? No one in his right mind, that’s for sure.”
As much as she wanted to encourage him, Angie recognized the truth of his statement. She asked instead, “Have you tried to sell it?”
He answered with a slow nod. “I’ve got a FOR SALE sign I stick outside every now and then. It’s gotten plenty of laughs but no buyers. When the real estate agents find out it’s in Glory, they don’t even want to talk to me. I can’t say I blame them either.” Rising to his feet, he gathered up their dirty plates and silverware, stacking them atop each other. “Want more coffee?”
After a second’s hesitation, she nodded. “I would, thanks.”
“Be right back with the pot.” He loaded the dishes on the serving tray and headed for the kitchen with it.
Talking about the restaurant had resurrected all of Griff’s old feelings, both the sweet yearning and the utter futility of it. He was trapped in this place, as surely as if it were a prison with bars at the windows and shackles around his legs. Resentment boiled up in him, rising like a black and bitter gall in his throat. There was no hope that he’d ever be free of this place. No hope at all, short of winning a lottery.
Or finding that outlaw gold.
The thought brought him up short. For a moment Griff almost laughed at the sheer improbability of it. Then he started wondering. Wondering about things—like the tales of the rock pillar that was supposed to point to it. That girl’s grandfather had been so sure he could find the cache of stolen money. And there was that letter Angie Sommers had—the one written by the outlaw Ike Wilson.
Wouldn’t it be something if that letter really held clues? He pushed through the swinging doors to the kitchen. And wouldn’t it be something if he could find it?