Chance's Bluff

by Catherine McGreevy

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Willy

  Western Idaho

  Summer, 1866

  Willy Ratzel was tired of played-out mines, losing hard-won money in rundown saloons, and bad liquor that made his head hurt in the morning. He wanted to live in a decent city, not another boom town that sprang up overnight and died just as quickly. The West was changing these days, too, filling up. It wasn’t like it used to be, when people could disappear and no one would ask questions.

  He turned his horse’s nose westward toward Oregon again.

  Willy was surprised by how much the state had changed in the past few years. Why, its towns looked civilized, with paved roads and real houses not too different from those he remembered from back east.

  Seeing people stare at his filthy clothes, he found a pump in someone’s yard and washed off the worst of it. As an afterthought, he pulled out his long-unused razor and spent several minutes hacking off his beard. A man starting a new life ought to change his appearance. Willy Ratzel was going to be a townsman now.

  He patted his stinging cheeks, surprised at how squishy his flesh felt without the wiry beard. He hacked a few inches off his hair, wetted it, and combed it down with his fingers.

  A stranger stared back from the looking glass, with a prominent bulldog-like jaw jutting out from under an almost feminine mouth. The skin on the lower half of his face was white and smooth compared to the rest of his deeply sunburned face. His formerly red hair had turned as grizzled as the beard he’d just shaved off. Willy thought that if he didn’t know who he was, he’d never have recognized himself.

  Feeling a new man, he rode into Salem on the appaloosa he’d stolen from the Indian youth and tied the horse to a post in front of a prosperous-looking store. Just outside, an old man was struggling to lift a heavy box.

  Willy flexed his muscles thoughtfully. Years of prospecting had made him strong, if not rich, and he didn’t doubt the old fellow would be glad of help, maybe glad enough to toss him a coin or two. He was getting thirsty, and he’d passed a saloon nearby that looked like it served better than rotgut.

  “Hello there,” he said walking over. “Don’t bother yourself, gramps. I’ll lift that.” He raised the box easily. “Where to, mister?”

  Gratefully, the old man straightened, rubbing his back. “Right through the door there, son, and set it on the shelf.” He eyed Willy up and down, assessing his broad back and strong arms. “Your timing’s lucky if you want a job,” he commented. “Just received a shipment from back east, and our stock boy gave notice last week. I don’t suppose you’d be willing to carry a few more boxes, would you?”

  Willy looked out at the store’s green-and-white striped awning and noted the mahogany door and window frames. This was no ordinary dry goods store, but a place for rich people to shop. He saw neatly folded clothes, fine china in a display case, and a marble counter polished so a customer could see his face in it. A store like this would pay a good salary, and there might be other opportunities as well for a man who could bide his time. Willy was used to following his instincts, and his instincts told him this was the best proposition he’d seen in a long time.

  He grinned. “Yes, sir. You won’t find a better worker than—” Willy caught himself just in time and pulled out the name of an old friend, a gambler who’d died of typhoid a year or so back, “—than Zeke Hart, at your service.”

  “When can you start?”

  Willy patted his empty pockets. “Right now, mister, if you can use me.”

  The old shopkeeper looked relieved. “Follow me. There’s a wagon in the side alley that needs to be unloaded.”

  Willy hung his hat in the stockroom and followed, pleased at his turn in luck. This job would be a sight easier than standing over a cradle all day in a freezing mountain stream. He eyed the shiny brass till on the counter, no doubt full of cash from wealthy local matrons. Yes, sir, things were bound to go better in Salem.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Ben

  Cascade Mountains, Oregon

  Summer, 1866

  Ben lay staring up at the sloped ceiling of the lean-to shed, wondering if his offer to escort Annabelle out of the mountains was a mistake. These days he seemed to stumble into one foolish decision after another, although he didn’t see how he could have avoided this one.

  He’d intended to stay and help the struggling youngsters for a day or two and somehow ended up spending most of the summer. Richard and Annabelle tried to keep secret that they were orphans, but the Indians had told him the truth. The Nez Perce added they would have offered the children help had the white youngsters not hidden every time they rode through, and so they courteously left them alone.

  Ben assumed the parents had decided to try a shortcut through the mountains, a mistake for which they paid with their lives. With his help over these past weeks, the farm would now provide the youngsters more than a bare subsistence. Still he wondered if his presence had in some ways made things more difficult. Richard, proudly independent, resented the older man’s presence, which had in turn caused conflict between the two siblings.

  It was clear the boy was intellectually brilliant. There was, however, something different about him, Ben thought. He rarely looked him or Annabelle in the eye and spoke in an oddly adult way. Ben had tried to ask Annabelle about it, but each time the girl hotly denied there was anything amiss except that her brother had been away from society too long.

  Ben felt that now he had fouled things up even worse.

  Starlight pierced through where dried mud had fallen from the chinks in the logs walls, and Ben once again wondered how Richard and Annabelle had built this cabin and cleared a farm. It was an impressive feat for two orphaned children.

  No. No longer children. He could not forget bursting in to see Annabelle’s hair coiled like tempered bronze atop her head, the ruffled dress clinging to her slim curves. She was not a young girl, as he’d tried to convince himself from the beginning, but a full-grown woman. There was no use pretending otherwise.

  With a surge of self-disgust, he rolled over and pounded the straw pallet. If only the plow hadn’t broken. If only Annabelle hadn’t tried on that accursed ball gown. What on earth had put it in her mind to do so? Even more puzzling, why did the sight affect him so strongly? He’d seen hundreds of debutantes in such gowns. Thank goodness Richard had interrupted them before he’d made a fool of himself. Because, of course, there was no future for him and Annabelle. When he’d left Shining Water’s tribe, Ben had realized that love and marriage were not for him.

  Why had he lingered in this valley so long? Ben asked himself again. Now his departure would just be more difficult, even more difficult than leaving Shining Water, because this girl seemed to need him more than the Indian girl had. As for his feelings for Annabelle—well, they were better left unexamined.

  Ben thought of the other reason he was reluctant to take the girl to Salem. Before the war ended, the last letter from his mother had ordered him to journey to Oregon to run his father’s store. He’d burned that letter, but he hadn’t forgotten it, or his vow never to set foot in Salem.

  Well, now he had no choice. Once in Salem, he’d escort Annabelle to the land office, buy her a pair of horses and a wagon loaded with supplies as a parting gift, and set off for San Francisco and the Orient. Annabelle would be sure to meet plenty of far more suitable young men, and soon she’d forget him. He might even forget her.

  Pulling the Indian blanket over himself, Ben tried to fall asleep.

  The next day, he went looking for Annabelle and found her kneeling by a giant boulder at the far end of the meadow. When he called her name, her head lifted from where it had been resting against the stone. Drawing closer, Ben saw wet tracks on her cheeks. Seeing the fresh wildflowers she’d laid on the ground, he understood.

  “Was it an accident?” he asked softly. “Or did they fall sick?”

  “Neither. It was murder.”

  His mind flashed on the Ne
z Perce village. No, but it could have been Blackfeet or another tribe trespassing on Nez Perce lands. “Indians?”

  She shook her head. “A prospector told my parents this route was a shortcut, and they believed him. He was waiting for us with a couple of friends.”

  Ben visualized the outlaws, the rifles, the emotions that lay behind the words. “How did you and Richard escape?”

  “We hid behind the wagon. The outlaws never knew we were there.” She didn’t have to tell him about the hardships that followed. Ben could imagine.

  “Where do you plan to go after taking me to Salem?” She stood, brushing off her skirt.

  The query caught him caught off guard. “San Francisco, I suppose. Then I’ll catch a steamer across the Pacific.

  “That means you’ll be gone a year or two at least. Won’t you miss your family? Or …” Annabelle paused, and her eyes grew distressed. “Maybe you don’t have loved ones? I never asked.”

  Ben thought of Chance McInnes, who could never understand why Ben didn’t want to settle down near his parents and sisters. “Yes, I have a family,” he told her.

  “Parents? Brothers and sisters?”

  “A mother, a father, and three older sisters.” He smiled at Annabelle’s straightforward questions.

  “You’re lucky that your parents are both alive. You will visit them before sailing to the Sandwich Islands, won’t you? They must miss you very much.”

  Ben’s smile faded, and without realizing it, his voice took on an edge. “Actually, I won’t be seeing them.”

  She nodded. “I forgot. They live back east, don’t they? You once told me you grew up in New York City.”

  He kicked himself for giving away so much, but he couldn’t bring himself to lie. “My sisters stayed in New York with their husbands,” Ben corrected her, “but my parents live in Oregon now.”

  Gasping, Annabelle stared at him. “They do? Where?”

  He didn’t like the turn the conversation had taken. “As a matter of fact, they happen to live in Salem.”

  “Salem! So close! And yet you don’t plan to see them before you leave?”

  “No.” His tone was intended to head off any further questions, but Annabelle ignored the warning.

  “Your mother and father live only a few days’ journey away, and you’re not even going to visit?” Her voice rose with disbelief. “When did you last see them?”

  “Before the war, when they still lived in New York.”

  “That means it’s been almost six years!” she breathed. “I’d give anything to see my parents again, anything! How could you be so heartless?”

  He felt the need to redeem himself. “Your parents were different from mine, Annabelle. My family was never close.”

  “How do you know my parents were different from yours?”

  “Because I know you.” He gestured at the boulder that served as a tombstone, at the scattering of flowers at its base.

  Annabelle seemed unaware he’d complimented her. “Every child should love his or her parents. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

  “I do love them.” He searched for words to make her understand. “It’s just impossible to be around them. I never could please my father, while my mother was only interested in me as a way to enhance her prestige. Finally, I realized the only way to live my own life was to leave.”

  “If your parents were to die before you made peace with them you’d never forgive yourself. You must see them again, Ben.”

  “You are being presumptuous.” Ben wished he hadn’t confided his personal affairs to her. “Forgive me for intruding, Annabelle.”

  He stalked away, worried the trip to the Salem registry office would prove even more troublesome than he’d feared.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chance

  Western Idaho

  Summer, 1866

  Pulling his horse to a stop, Chance gazed at the town in the distance, a scowl contorting his mouth. Beside him, Vern and Abner sat on restive horses, their long sallow faces glowing with excitement.

  “Remember,” Vern said. “You said we could pull this one alone, Chance, just Abner and me together.”

  Chance nodded reluctantly, although he’d agreed only because he had no choice. The cousins showed signs of rebelling against the tight leash on which he’d kept them for so long. If he said “no” one more time, Vern and Abner might go ahead and rob the bank on their own anyway. Then any control he pretended to have over the men would vanish completely.

  He finally had enough cash to pay for a new farm, but now Chance felt trapped in a life he’d never wanted. If he left the gang, these unruly men would pillage and rob innocent settlers. It was all he could do to hold them back, force them to adhere to his rules against rape and murder. The men needed leadership. A brake. Unfortunately, that was him.

  “All right,” he said grudgingly. “Just remember, no shooting. Get in and out as quick as you can. We don’t want to push our luck.” Vern’s eyes glowed in a way that made Chance nervous. Taking a deep breath, Chance clicked to his horse and led the tall cousins on the descent into town.

  Outside the bank, he pulled his hat low and waited with the horses while Vern and Abner pulled their bandanas over their nose and chin and burst inside.

  Chance craned his ears to make out what was going on. Through the open doorway, he heard his companions’ nasal drawls and the squeak of the cashier’s frightened voice.

  The ashen-faced cashier stood with hands in the air, staring at Vern and Abner, who by now were both brandishing their pistols. Before Chance could say anything, Vern’s gun went off with a flash and a boom. The cashier slid to the ground, and a trickle of blood appeared at the corner of his mouth.

  “What the—?” Chance shouted, rushing into the room. “Those guns are loaded?”

  Vern turned toward him, finger still on the trigger. “I took care of that last night when I realized what you’ve been doing. Guns ain’t for decoration, Chance McInnes. I ain’t follering your orders any more. It took a while, but I finally figured out we don’t need you, and this is our last job together. You never wanted us with you in the first place, so seems like this is a good time to say goodbye.”

  Chance stared at the teller’s limp body on the floor, the circle of red starting to spread from behind his shoulder blades. All he could think was thank goodness Walter was back at the caves with a mild case of dysentery, along with the other men who had somehow attached themselves to the gang over the last few months, for much the same reasons as Abner and Vern. He had found it easier to let the additional men in than to chase them off, although it was getting harder and harder to enforce his “rules.”

  “Why couldn’t you have told me this last night?” he asked Vern now. “We could have parted ways then, with no hard feelings.”

  “This is a sight more fun. I wanted to see your face when you realized the gun was loaded after all. And this way, I can pin the robbery on you. See? You ain’t the only one with brains around here, after all.” He chuckled. “Say your prayers, Chance, because you’re going where this teller just gone. Everyone’ll think you both shot each other, while Abner and I get a clean getaway. Serve you right for playing us as fools all this time.”

  Vern pointed the gun at Chance, while Abner stood by grinning widely. The cousins had been itching for a gunfight for a long time, and they’d finally got their wish. But Chance had guessed what Vern was up to, and before the other man had finished talking, Chance grabbed Abner and pulled him in front of him as a shield. Abner’s grin faded from his face as Chance snatched his skinny wrist and forced the revolver in his hand toward the shorter bandit.

  “You might want to change your mind about that, Vern,” he snapped.

  “Hey! What do you think you’re doing?” Abner struggled in Chance’s grip, trying to wrestle the six-shooter away, but as his hand slid around the gun, a second boom filled the room. This time, Vern dropped.

  Cursing, Abner whirled on Chance. Abner w
as taller by three inches and mad as a wounded badger, but Chance was twenty pounds heavier, all of it muscle. Chance wrestled the still-smoking pistol out of Abner’s grip, inch by inch. Dimly, he realized that outside the bank women’s voices were screaming.

  “You idiot,” he gritted into Abner’s ear. “You just got your cousin killed, and now we’ll both be arrested. Or more likely, swing from a tree if the mob that’s gathering has its way.”

  Abner grunted something and fell against Chance, knocking him to the ground, but the big Iowan did not let go of his grip. They rolled around on the ground, both of their hands clutching the pistol, which Abner struggled to point at Chance’s chest.

  Entangled in the other man’s spider-like legs, Chance managed to push the weapon away, only to hear another deafening report explode near his eardrum. Abner fell limp on Chance’s chest, and he pushed the lanky body away, feeling sick.

  Scrambling to his feet, Chance stared at the three bodies sprawled motionless on the floor, puddles of blood seeping into the wooden planks as if from a can of spilled varnish. Outside came more screams and the sound of rapidly approaching hoofbeats.

  Chance dove for the door and plowed through the gathering crowd, jumping on his horse. “Git, Sally!” He dug in his heels with a force he’d never used before, and Sally neighed shrilly in surprise before plunging down the center of the street to escape the smell of blood and gun smoke and the reverberations of fired weapons.

  Clutching the reins, he hunkered low against the horse’s withers as another gunshot rang out and something whizzed by his ear. Someone in the gathering crowd must have come to his senses and reached for a weapon while the others were still trying to figure out what had happened.

  Their blundering confusion gave Chance enough time to get out of town, although he knew a posse was likely to form soon. He turned Sally through a mass of brush and down a steep ravine, rocks and pebbles flying as they plunged recklessly along the dry creek bed.

  Too close for comfort. His heart pumped like a steam engine at full throttle. Even if the posse didn’t find him right away, from now on their search would be relentless. Sickened, he urged Sally onward. Three dead men, and he’d be blamed, even though Chance had done everything he could to prevent it.