by Rachel Bird
Faith peered further into the room. At the far end of a large worktable, Big Mama Deckom had her rifle aimed at Jane Stedman.
Faith lowered her six-gun and stepped into the room.
“What’s going on here?” She spoke reasonably, trying to act as Fontana would. Cool. Calm. It felt like the locusts had returned and were stomping a reel inside her chest. It wasn’t so long ago she’d watched this woman murder her own son in cold blood.
“Tell that little girl to get back in here,” Big Mama growled.
The name wasn’t ironic. She was… big. Six feet tall or close to it, with the kind of bodily thickness that had once been solid but had gone soft from age. She’d cleaned herself up since Faith saw her last. Her dress was out of date by half a decade, but it was clean and in good repair. Her hair was pulled back severely, hidden under an Italian straw bonnet that would have been stylish had she not covered it with quite so many dyed ostrich feathers.
Jane Stedman, on the other hand, was a studied contrast to the woman holding the rifle. Every stitch Jane wore whispered of elegance, confidence, and understated charm. For the first time since Faith had started wearing trousers, she felt shabby.
It hit her then that, like her own attire, Jane’s outfit was a costume, no less than if she belonged to a troupe of traveling actors. Jane Stedman in the role of the modiste! Of the finest Parisian house of fashion, to be sure. If the Deckom matriarch had intended to engage Jane Stedman on fashion’s battlefield, she never stood a chance.
But then, that’s probably why Big Mama brought a rifle to this party.
Hannah quietly returned to the storeroom and crept up behind Faith.
“Who else is out there? Don’t lie to me.”
“It’s only Mrs. Gensch,” Hannah said softly over Faith’s shoulder.
Red John’s firearm was holstered and, judging by past performance, not likely to be loaded. Faith couldn’t count on the same with his aunt. Big Mama’s rifle was cocked and aimed; there’d be no outdrawing her. Best to defuse the situation.
Faith put away her Colt entirely. “Why don’t we all go out front where there’s room to breathe? Hannah, go draw the curtains so no one can see inside from the street. Looks like Mrs. Deckom here wants some privacy.”
There would be room to maneuver in the larger area, if only Faith could get Big Mama to move into it.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Good girl. Here was a situation that required obedience! Hannah would never behave so at home, but she kept cool and followed Faith’s lead. Without a by-your-leave from Big Mama, she ducked back out to the showroom and could be heard pulling the window curtains together.
Suddenly noticing everyone was looking for her lead, Big Mama barked at Red John, “What are you waiting for, boy? Get on out there.”
Jane turned to go, and Big Mama butted the end of her long gun against the seamstress’s back.
“Now, Big Mama, you agreed things were settled,” Faith said when everyone was in the front room. She had Big Mama on her right and Jane on her left. The others were spread in a half circle between where Faith stood and the door.
Charity had moved closer to Mae, putting herself between her employer and what could well have been the line of fire. Such a selfless act from Faith’s most self-centered sister! Break Heart was changing them all.
“Settled? Between me and the sheriff’s pretty new bride, maybe. Not between me and this Salem witch who butchered my boy.”
“I doubt Jane Stedman—”
“What do you doubt, Deputy Steele?” Jane stood defiant, a glint of fed-up fury in her eyes. “Aren’t you convinced, with all these others, that I must be the devil’s handmaiden?”
“You’re not the devil’s handmaiden!” Hannah cried out. “Even if you like to make people believe it.”
“People believe what they need to believe, little one.” Jane softened slightly at Hannah’s fierce defense, but her gaze stayed firmly fixed on the woman with the rifle. “And then they look for any little thing to use for proof.”
“I want the truth,” Big Mama said. “The true truth. I need to know why my boy, my Bobby, ended up dead and his skin stretched across the head of that toy drum you gave Fontana.”
Faith caught her breath along with everybody else. Then came a bewildered silence. All turned to Jane—even Hannah blinked.
“You want to know why?” She scoffed. “You’ll have to look elsewhere for enlightenment. I can’t tell you why men turn thief or why they molest and murder in frenzied abandon. All I can tell you is that they do.”
Faith shared a look with Charity. It was the longest speech either had ever heard out of Jane.
“You lie!” Big Mama cried. “My Bobby was a good boy. A gentle boy.”
“What I saw told a different tale.”
“He was simple,” Big Mama said. “He didn’t understand things. Whatever you think you saw, he was led on by someone up to no good. Someone craven, someone—”
“Someone named Frank.”
“You’re lying!”
“It’s the true truth and you know it. Why else would you shoot Frank?”
Big Mama hesitated and relaxed her aim.
A blunt force hit the front door, as if someone had stumbled against it. The handle turned and the door pushed open to the chime of the modiste’s dainty bells. Harman Polk swaggered into the shop, an unattractive man in his late thirties with a bald spot not well hidden and the bodily softness that comes not from age but from a lack of industry.
He homed in on Faith, apparently oblivious to anything being amiss.
“There you are, little lady. I wondered where you’d got—”
With all eyes on Polk, Faith made her move. She stepped between Jane and Big Mama, grabbed the rifle barrel with her bare hands, and wrenched it downward.
“What?” Polk drew his weapon and managed to look halfway tough.
Maybe it was sheer luck, and maybe it was innate self-preservation, but Big Mama let go of the rifle and stepped back, hands up. She left Faith standing between her and Harman Polk.
For a terrible two seconds, Faith wasn’t sure Polk would hold his fire, then Charity stepped forward, diverting his attention. “You must be the visiting sheriff.”
“How splendid!” Mrs. V jumped in and took charge of Polk like a regular diplomat.
“Yes, ma’am. That I am.” A silly grin tugged at Polk’s mouth. He took in all the ladies in the room, and when he landed on Lily Rose, his gaze went soft.
“Visiting sheriff?” Red John frowned. “We didn’t hear about no visiting sheriff.”
Criminy! That’s why the Deckoms had been so bold as to come into town. They’d felt no fear, thinking Faith was on her own. She should have shot one of them when she had the chance, just on principle.
“Allow me to introduce myself, Sheriff,” Mrs. V reclaimed Polk’s attention. “I’m Abigail Vanderhouten, the proprietor of this establishment. And here is Charlotte Gensch. She and her husband own the Lilac Hotel…”
Mrs. V had saved the day. The more she chattered on, the more everyone relaxed. Jane slipped away into the back room, and Faith mouthed go with her to Hannah.
“Deckom, eh?” Polk looked at Red John and his aunt dubiously. “Fontana told me you Deckoms ain’t supposed to be within town limits on pain of spending three days in a cell.”
“That’s the punishment?” Red John perked up.
Oh no. To Red John, three days in the Hotel Fontana would be a holiday. That’s all Faith needed, Polk insulting her in the front room and Red John swooning over the lack of fleas back in the cells.
“Red John and Big Mama were just passing through, Sheriff.” Charity linked her arm with Red John’s and gave him a big smile, edging him toward the door. “Don’t you have to be in Rosamund? Why don’t you and your aunt get along about your business?”
“Nobody tells me to get along, missy. You watch your mouth,” Big Mama said. “I don’t care how sweet on you my nephew is.”
“Now, now, Big Mama.” Red John shifted nervously, his gaze traveling from Charity to his aunt. “She didn’t mean nothing by it. And I do have to get along. Mr. Morgan won’t take kindly to my missing our meeting, and I know you want those matched grays for your new rig.”
Mrs. V perked up at the mention of Mr. Morgan. Luckily, she said nothing. Faith just wanted to get the Deckoms out of the shop and out of town.
“Looks like we won’t get what we came for today anyway.” Big Mama relented, but not without having the last word. She narrowed her eyes at the passageway to the back room. “Tell that Jane Stedman she and me ain’t finished,” she said to no one in particular. She held her hand out to Faith. “I’ll have my John Brown, if you don’t mind.”
Before returning the rifle, Faith relieved it of its ammunition.
“Aw, now Big Mama! That ain’t right,” Red John said. “I told you not to load that thing while we were in town.”
“Since when do you tell me what to do?” All the way out the door, Big Mama continued to harangue her nephew, whose face had turned as red as his hair.
Polk followed them out but stopped in the doorway and looked back at Lily Rose. He puffed up his chest and lowered his voice to a manlier level. “I’ll escort those two out of town and see they don’t return.” Fawningly, he touched the brim of his Stetson to Mae Tagget, Mrs. Gensch, and Mrs. V. “Ladies.”
“The Lord shall cut off all flattering lips,” Faith muttered, without believing it much.
What was Polk up to?
Chapter 4
Rosamund, Colorado
Rafe Morgan rode into Rosamund a few minutes before the appointed time. He passed the Dilly-Dally Saloon, noted the Appaloosa at the hitching post out front, and continued on to the livery.
The rhythmic bang, bang, bang of determined hammering echoed through the street. It was the sound of industry. Of progress. Of the United States healing, growing again, now a decade past a terrible war.
Rafe was ardently enthusiastic about the future of his country, and coming to Colorado had done much to affirm his optimism.
A dozen years ago, this town had been no more than a crossroads. But with the peace had come a new wave in the westward migration. Some folks came running toward the future, some came running from the past, and some of both type lingered and then put down roots here at the eastern foothills of the Rocky Mountains.
The locals elected a sheriff, built a real jail next to the saloon, a general store appeared across the street that doubled as a post office, then a boarding house opened just a bit up the way.
Five years ago, the Merchants Association changed the name from Hangtown to Rosamund—a mark of respect, Rafe figured, for his brother Preston. With that change, the place really began to flourish, attracting a more permanent sort of resident than a place called Hangtown ever could.
In the three years since Rafe’s arrival, two more ranches and seven more farms had been established nearby. One day, as if it had all happened in the blink of an eye, Rosamund woke up a real town, boasting a blacksmith, a Western Union office—and the latest project now underway, the building of a decent-sized church.
It was a real shame the railroad had gone through Break Heart, fifty miles to the southeast, instead of Rosamund.
“Hey, Mr. Morgan.” The stablemaster’s twelve-year-old son hurried out of the livery to greet him, as usual, and as usual Rafe asked the boy to water and feed Hecate while he attended to his business.
“I’ll be quick today, Corey,” Rafe said. “I need to get back to the Morning Star.” A feeling of dread gripped him, as if merely saying those words aloud made what he feared more likely to come to pass.
He wished he hadn’t promised to meet a prospective buyer for the grays today. He’d had a bad feeling about leaving Pres. But he had promised, so here he was. There was no planning for unforeseen events, and a man who didn’t keep his word wasn’t worth talking to.
The hammering echoed through the street and accompanied him all the way to the Dilly-Dally. Men were framing the new church at the far end of town, a project meant to encourage respectable ladies to move to Rosamund.
Rosamund’s supply of “respectable ladies” was nowhere near adequate to the demand, but they were sufficient in number to demand a real church be built and a real preacher enticed to grace its pulpit—this time one who didn’t play faro, could hold his liquor, and wasn’t quite so trigger-happy.
With the foundation laid and the framing underway, the search was now on for a proper, ordained—preferably married—man of the cloth.
Rafe was all for the new church, and as soon as the crisis at the ranch passed and the Pres and the cowboys got going on the drive to Cheyenne, he’d be back in town to add his labor to the effort. The prospect of more single women coming to Rosamund was to be wished for, even if Rafe had little hope of being among the beneficiaries.
At twenty-seven, he was acutely conscious of the many ways a good wife could add to his happiness. But he was no fool. Good wives require good husbands, and Rafe wasn’t the likeliest of husband material. He wasn’t worthy of offering himself as a woman’s partner in life and father to her children.
Yet.
For one, he had no settled occupation. Preston was a successful rancher. A cattle baron, folks said, and deservedly. Rafe’s other brother, Schuyler, was a successful lawyer back East and counselor to some of the oldest and wealthiest families in New York.
Currently, Rafe was a ranch hand, one among many who worked for Pres. He didn’t flatter himself that he was the most highly valued among the crew either. Even Pres seemed aware of the fact. The annual cattle drive was about to head out, and Rafe hadn’t been chosen to go.
Oh, Pres had let him down easy. Said he was glad Rafe would be there to watch over the ranch and keep the kids safe while he was gone. Maybe it was so. Rafe had no quarrel with the decision. He preferred life on the ranch to life on the trail.
Truth be told, he preferred life in a bustling town to life on the ranch. He was glad he’d come out to Colorado, but he was a gregarious sort and he’d rather spend his day with people than cows.
If it wouldn’t be disloyal to Pres, Rafe would have taken up Sheriff Dawson’s offer to become a deputy in Rosamund. There was talk of Dawson becoming a US Marshal, and when that happened, the sheriff’s job would open up.
Rafe stepped up on the Dilly-Dally’s sidewalk, and the strange Appaloosa nickered. Hopefully, it belonged to the man he’d arranged to meet here. He had no patience today for lateness.
The horse’s saddle caught his eye, a worn and scratched thing that could use an oiling. He looked the horse over. “There, there,” he murmured in response to an untrusting flinch. Gently, he stroked the gelding’s neck. The horse could use a good brushing, but that might just be the effect of a long ride. He was a decent weight, and his eyes were clear enough—though not as bright as Rafe liked to see.
Running his hands down the legs disclosed no sign of injury or neglect, but the brittle, cracked feet stopped Rafe cold. The poor animal was overdue for shoeing. Even a recent ride of fifty miles didn’t justify their condition.
Indeed, after such a long ride, the animal shouldn’t be hitched outside a saloon at all but up at the livery stables, being brushed down, watered, fed, and generally cossetted.
Rafe made up his mind right there. Mr. John Deckom, if he was the owner of this Appaloosa, would not be purchasing horses from Morning Star Ranch.
Inside the Dilly-Dally, two men sat jawboning at the end of the bar, a rather scruffy-looking redheaded stranger and Cephas Jones, Rosamund’s town character.
Rafe shot a daggered look at Seth—supplying Cephas with alcohol was generally frowned on—but the bartender merely shrugged. The stranger must have bought the drinks; Cephas had no surplus resources.
The broken, frail old coot hadn’t survived the war with all his mental parts intact. After the
fighting ended, he’d wandered west until he came to Rosamund—when it was still called Hangtown—fell to his knees at the crossroads, and refused to budge an inch farther. That was over a decade ago, long before Rafe’s time.
These days the town paid Cephas a meager stipend to sweep the sidewalks and chase away mad dogs. He slept in a shed behind the offices of the Rosamund Gazette. Twice Rafe had found him lying in the street, liquored up and asking an unseen person where his head had got to. On both occasions, Rafe escorted the poor wretch to the jail for the sheriff to watch over until he sobered up.
He didn’t have time for that today.
“My gal’s a real corker,” the stranger was saying, loud enough to carry through the entire saloon. Including Rafe, there were only four men in the place. “First time I saw her, she tricked my knife off me and stabbed me.” He cheerfully held up a hand to display a wound not yet healed.
“Sounds like true love.” Cephas stared philosophically at his empty glass. “It was meant to be.”
“Her name’s Charity. Ain’t that a pistol?”
“You Deckom?” Rafe took a seat.
“That I am,” said the redhead. “My friends call me Red John. If you’re Morgan, I’d be obliged if you let me by you a drink.”
Rafe waved off the bottle of Old Crow that Brighton pulled down. He just wanted to give Deckom the bad news, get over to the general store to pick up the Morning Star’s mail, and get back to the ranch.
“Best of all, she’s a real strawberry tart—uh, meaning she has the prettiest red hair you ever saw.” Apparently unoffended by Rafe’s refusal, Deckom continued regaling Cephas with the anecdote of his wondrous ladylove. “Someday we’ll have a passel of cute little carrot-tops running around.”
“Red hair!” Cephas’s eyes went wide and he blew through his missing tooth. “Hoo, there. That ain’t asking for trouble.”
Rafe had some familiarity with the common prejudice against red hair, being afflicted with it himself—though his was of a more subdued and blonder variety than the flaming crown Mr. Deckom boasted. Rafe grew up being teased over it, asked if he had a hot temper, heard whispers behind his back that he must be a child of the devil. Having the father he did, that last always gave him pause.