Gunman and the Angel Read online

  Mandy had her head on Dan’s chest. She looked up to his eyes. ‘Why a room for me?’

  ‘I definitely didn’t want you to have one with him.’

  ‘Don’t you have intentions for me?’

  ‘Yes’m, I sure do.’

  ‘I think they flow along with the ideas I have for you. It’s been long enough, Dan.’

  ‘Yes’m, it has.’

  ‘There’s the buggy,’ Roger Farnsworth said. He appeared to be off in his world of plans. ‘Mandy, shall we get the luggage?’ As he was about to head out, he turned to Dan. ‘I need to talk to you.’

  ‘It all flows in good time,’ Dan said. He took Mandy’s elbow. ‘You get the luggage, Roger, while I introduce Mandy to Jenny Troup.’

  ‘Wait,’ Farnsworth said.

  But Dan and Mandy had already started across the road to the hotel.

  After dinner, they went to Jenny and Sleepy Sue’s room for Riesling wine and talk. Dan brought Roger and Mandy up to date on current events. Jenny took a liking to the wine and wondered if any might be available in Sacramento. Her animated gestures made her seem to come alive. Talking with Mandy about subjects other than the trade left Dan with no doubt Jenny would do well in Sacramento. Santa Fe, first.

  But before that came Darion.

  Enough chairs had been brought in for everyone. Roger arranged it. Sleepy Sue preferred to sit on the edge of the bed. She gazed from one to another, her lumpy face passive. Roger sat next to Mandy so he could hold her hand. Dan sat across from her so he got a full view of her, silly hat to cute shoes.

  Roger said, ‘Are you all right, sweetheart.’

  ‘Better than all right, Roger.’

  ‘It’s just that – now and then you shiver. Are you cold?’

  ‘I’ll get over it. I’m sure I’ll get over it.’

  Roger patted her hand. ‘I know it’s a different climate. Shall I get you a wrap? A coat?’

  ‘Maybe it’s anticipation. I know a cure will come.’

  Roger nodded. ‘Yes, the excitement.’ He sighed deeply. ‘Now that we’re out here and have seen Dan again, I think it is time for you and I to talk about our future.’

  Mandy looked at him with a frown. She glanced across at Dan then continued her frown for Roger.

  Dan said, ‘About Monte Steep, I already know what’s gonna happen.’

  Roger stood. ‘Quint, that’s just the one thing that can’t happen. He must be—’

  Sleepy Sue said, ‘Like hell, it won’t. I ain’t havin’ my Jenny hurt no more. Nobody is huntin’ her down.’

  Farnsworth pointed a bony finger at her. ‘You stay out of this. It has nothing to do with you.’ He frowned. ‘Who are you, anyway?’

  Jenny’s little face scrunched up in agony. She wrung her hands. ‘Dan?’

  ‘Don’t concern yourself, girl,’ Dan said.

  She leaned forward. ‘Straighten this out, Dan. Fix it.’

  Dan turned to Farnsworth. ‘Monte Steep is dead. Ain’t no part of your plan affects that.’

  Still standing in the middle of the room, Farnsworth said, ‘Listen to me, Quint. I’m not having my girl dragged into some Wild West gunfight.’

  ‘It ain’t up to you, lawyer-boy, and you better make sure she’s your girl, first.’

  Farnsworth spun toward Mandy, ‘Tell him, my love.’

  Mandy sighed. ‘Roger, I never hid my feelings from you.’

  ‘But, that was before. My God, look at him. He can’t even move right.’

  Sleepy Sue said, ‘That’s ’cause he got shot up some in a gunfight. He’s healing.’

  Mandy was on her feet. ‘Dan?’

  Sleepy Sue glared at Roger. ‘Who the hell is you, boy?’

  Mandy knelt in front of Dan, her lovely face full of concern. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘I was gettin’ to it.’ He looked up at Roger. ‘There ain’t nothin’ wrong with your plan, Roger, it’s jest I already got it worked out. That duplicate receipt I told you about oughta be here any day, mebbe tomorrow. That shot-dead lawyer has got books in his office we got to bust in and get, and jiggle some entries around. There’s army troops outside Darion ’cause they expecting an Apache attack.’ He cupped Mandy’s chin at his knees. ‘No, me and this little girl here got a score to settle from a past you may know about but don’t really understand. That ain’t changin’. We got to escort these two ladies to Santa Fe to get Jenny’s daughter so she can head on out to Sacramento.’ He turned to Sleepy Sue. ‘I reckon Jenny will have help raisin’ the girl.’

  Jenny and Sleepy Sue exchanged looks. Jenny nodded vigorously.

  ‘Mandy,’ Roger said. ‘Do you go along with this?’

  Mandy slowly turned away from Dan and gave Roger a steady stare. ‘Dan pretty much talks for me, Roger.’

  ‘Me too,’ Jenny said.

  ‘And me,’ Sleepy Sue said.

  Roger Farnsworth sank into his chair. He put his elbows on his knees and his chin on his hands. ‘What about you and me, Mandy? I have that buggy to take us to Darion.’

  ‘I can’t tell you anything about you and me.’

  ‘We’ll talk tonight. I’ll come to your room.’

  Mandy put her hand on Dan’s knee. ‘I have a feeling I’ll be busy tonight. In the morning, I’ll tell you everything you need to know.’

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Past midnight she opened her door for him. She wore only a thin nightgown and her brown-copper hair was down. She didn’t stand in the doorway. Leaving the door ajar she walked to the center of the room and stood waiting.

  She shivered as he closed the door and crossed to her.

  Her hands slid up his arms and around his neck. ‘I’ve waited too long.’

  ‘Just long enough,’ he said. ‘Almost too long.’

  ‘I was so afraid coming here.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Rejection – I thought you might leave me empty again.’

  ‘Would that have sent you to Roger?’

  ‘I’m not sure. He’s been so good to me – as a friend. I know he expected that eventually he’d—’

  ‘He worships you, girl.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘He thinks you belong to him.’

  ‘You know who I belong to, who I’ve always belonged to. You were just too dumb to see it.’

  ‘Mebbe, but I ain’t too dumb to show it.’

  He gathered her body close and kissed her the way she needed to be kissed. He swept her off her feet and carried her to the bed. He held no hesitation, no doubt, none at all.

  ‘At last,’ she whispered.

  The pain in his rib woke him. Her face snuggled against his throat. Long, copper hair sprayed across his face. He wanted to be sure that she really was stretched beside him with her long, slim, naked leg over his stomach. He explored her with his palms, every inch of her sleek curves. She had brought her natural beauty to him with passionate abandon.

  When he moved slightly toward the edge of the bed, she grumbled.

  She said, ‘Don’t you dare leave my bed before I’m done with you.’

  ‘What can you want me for now?’

  ‘More, Deadly Dan Quint. You don’t just boil up this hidden passion then push on out of bed.’

  He turned back to her with his hands on her shoulders. He pushed her down under him. ‘All right then.’

  ‘That’s better,’ she said with a grin.

  She lay without clothes beside him with her knees drawn up. ‘It’s almost noon. Don’t you get hungry for something besides me?’

  ‘I might, eventually.’

  ‘God, Dan. Why did you make me wait so long? I know you’ve been with many women. You’re very experienced.’

  ‘How would you know that?’

  ‘Are you disappointed I have none?’

  ‘Not at all. You have a natural passion.’

  ‘Have all your other women been experienced?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’ll have to teach me.�
� She turned against him making him grimace with a stab of rib pain. She jerked up. ‘I didn’t even think – I’m so sorry, Dan. And with all the things we did – Oh Dan, it must have been awful for you, the pain.’

  ‘It sure wasn’t awful, it was delicious.’

  Her cheeks flushed. She put her index finger on his lips. ‘Hush.’ Her cheek went to his chest. ‘I’ve never felt so – so explosive. It was wonderful. Are you going to marry me? In Santa Fe?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ll have Jenny to stand up with me.’ She frowned. ‘You won’t have a Best Man.’

  ‘Sleepy Sue can be my Best Man.’

  That made her chuckle. ‘You’re right. The marriage is more important than the ceremony. Do you want to come back here to live?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Will we go with Jenny and Sleepy Sue to Sacramento?’

  Dan kissed her forehead. Now he regretted the lost time, all those years. He still thought she had been too young, yet he regretted the years they weren’t together. ‘Washington Territory,’ he said.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘We don’t need to be rich.’

  Dan said, ‘You’ll have the mining claim to start with.’

  ‘I’ll sell that. We’ll find something up in the Northwest, up in Washington Territory where we can live a happy life together.’

  ‘You’ll be in charge of that.’

  ‘Of certain parts, yes.’

  ‘You know we got something to do first.’

  ‘Monte Steep. He’s the last one left. On the train coming out here, he was all I thought of – well, when I wasn’t aching for you. What did you say he calls himself now?’

  ‘Zack Deller.’

  ‘And his family left him?’

  ‘Went back home to Kansas, wife and two girls.’

  ‘Then there’s just him.’

  ‘And his marshal.’

  ‘Enough for the two of us. I’ve been practising again, Dan. Roger was upset but I want to be as fast as you, like before.’

  ‘That won’t be hard these days.’

  She sat with her knees under her. ‘We best get started. I’m ready. I’m ready to tell Roger we want him with us for the paperwork in Darion and the duplicate receipt and for him to get with a judge so it’s all legal. And I’m ready to tell him, he can forget about any kind of romance with me. I’ve been taken well and I’m spoken for.’

  ‘Maybe he’ll buy the silver claim.’

  Her eyebrows went up. ‘You know, I’ll offer it to him. But after the paper is legal.’ She kissed him well on the lips. ‘I’m eager to get started, love.’

  ‘Why so eager?’

  ‘Haven’t you heard, Mr Quint? I’m a satisfied woman now. If I were to die tomorrow it would be as a real woman, not an innocent girl.’

  Roger Farnsworth did not take the news well. What surprised Dan was why Farnsworth took it at all. He had to have known. The boy was highly educated but with minimal real-life experience – book smart, life dumb. Likely, the lad knew little, if any, woman experience. Dan had known Mandy since she was twelve. He knew her spirit and temper and capacity for life. He’d always figured her with a real man, certainly – and with eventual heart-wrenching regret – not a man as age advanced and battered as himself, but never with a boy like Roger Farnsworth. Despite Dan’s handicaps, the beautiful, angelic, young woman had chosen and given herself to him.

  That was the end of it. She was his now and deadly, bad news to anyone who tried to change that. He loved a grand woman who loved him back, not for what he represented, but for him, including the shot-to-pieces carcass and cranky disposition. She owned every part of him; he had nothing left for anybody else.

  Any thought of rolling to Darion on Monday ended when Roger and Mandy had lunch alone together. Without believing her, Roger went from the lunch table, out of the hotel to the downtown saloon bar.

  Dan was in the stable about to hitch the buckboard when Mandy ran to him and threw her arms around his neck.

  ‘Roger is in the saloon. I’m afraid he’ll find trouble. I tried to stop him.’

  Dan dropped the harness over a wood peg and patted her back. ‘Does he carry a gun?’

  Mandy pushed away. ‘Yes, a small revolver in a belly holster.’

  Dan unhooked the thong off the Peacemaker hammer. ‘I’ll look into it.’

  As he started for the stable door headed toward the saloon, Mandy grabbed his arm.

  ‘Dan, you won’t hurt him. You can’t hurt him. Please.’

  ‘That’s up to Farnsworth,’ Dan said, pulling away.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Roger Farnsworth tossed down a glass of cheap bar whiskey like a lad without experience tossing down cheap bar whiskey. It wasn’t his first. When Dan walked in, Roger stood at the bar, his polished east coast boot planted on the brass rail but slipping off on occasion. A cowboy stood to his left, Stetson brim pulled low in front of his eyes – he stared at his whiskey glass like a man agonizing over a broken heart. To Roger’s right, two business types in suits without hats, bent together as if in conspiracy. Upstairs, girls still slept off Sunday night.

  Monday afternoon brought little downtown saloon action.

  Dan stepped to the bar and nodded to the bar keep. ‘Another for my friend.’

  Roger bobbed and turned to Dan. ‘You’re not my friend, Dan Quint.’

  Dan said, ‘We were headed for Darion today.’

  ‘To hell with Darion. To hell with you.’ He turned to his full glass and bent his head. ‘To hell with Mandy Lee.’

  ‘Careful, Farnsworth. You can feel sorry for yourself on your own two-bits. Things got to be done.’ He tossed down his whiskey, nodded with two fingers up.

  ‘I had a plan – how to get her set for life.’

  ‘I ain’t got no plan, just stuff got to be done. Mandy is already set for life.’

  Farnsworth snapped to attention. ‘You say her name, like, familiar, like you know her well, too well. How dare you say her name like that. Who do you think you are?’

  ‘The chosen one.’

  ‘She told me she was with you last night.’

  ‘She was.’

  He stood stiff and stared, his stovepipe hat cocked a little to the side, his thin face beet-red with drink and rage. ‘You took her to your bed?’

  ‘No, she took me to her bed.’

  ‘Liar!’

  Dan moved a little away from the bar so his right hand was free of obstacles.

  Roger blinked and looked hard at Dan’s gun hand. ‘Do you intend to shoot me?’

  ‘If I have to. I take into consideration you’re twisted around and upset so I ain’t gonna want to. You keep on the trail you’re driving and you’ll force me. I don’t know you, not close as a friend like Mandy. To me you’re just an arrogant, pompous little ass. I won’t want to but you keep prodding with insults about the lady and me and you can’t accept the way of life or what she really wants, and I’ll drop you where you stand.’

  ‘You mean get me out of your path?’

  ‘You ain’t in my path no more, but that’s one way to remove your presence completely.’

  Roger’s bony shoulders slumped inside the dark coat. He turned back to the bar and sipped whiskey. ‘You aware how many years I’ve known her?’

  ‘Not near as many as me.’

  He nodded. ‘And now you’ve been . . . intimate with her.’

  ‘That I have. It was bound to happen. You shoulda seen it coming. Now I’m gonna marry the woman and impregnate her soon as I can.’

  ‘God! I can’t even think of her with you, some prairie gunfighter, old enough to be her daddy.’

  ‘Start.’

  ‘I . . . just can’t.’

  ‘Then wrap your thinking around this. She ain’t never gonna be with you. Set that heavy in your head.’

  ‘What am I to do?’

  ‘Everything you was gonna do with her only without her. It’s the trail I was gonna take.’

  Roger squ
inted sideways at Dan. ‘You weren’t sure?’

  ‘I ain’t never been sure. She admires you and considers you a good friend. I didn’t know how she really thought or felt. She mighta chose you. She talks high enough about you. But I’m sure now. You can bet your last gold piece how sure I am.’

  ‘But . . . her education – she might have been a fine attorney.’

  ‘She still might.’

  ‘No, you’ll have her campfire-cooking in some tepee, barefoot and pregnant.’

  ‘It’ll be her choice. Wherever she is, she’ll wake mornings with a smile.’

  Roger Farnsworth shook his head. ‘That’s that then.’

  ‘So, do I got to shoot you down or are you walking away or are we gonna get on with the business we got.’

  ‘You mean making Mandy rich.’

  ‘And other stuff.’

  The two men walked together to the Post Office and Dan claimed the duplicate receipt in General Delivery sent from Sarah Deller. Sarah had included a short note.

  Dan. Home safe. Make things right. Luck. Sarah.

  Dan handed the receipt to Roger Farnsworth.

  He read it twice as they walked back to the hotel. ‘This might be enough in itself. What illegal activity do you have in mind when we reach Darion?’

  ‘Do what they did. Break into the lawyer’s office, tear out the old page, replace it with a new entry and a new claim form. Make it all the same only with Jeremiah Dickers and Will Lee as owners. With them deceased, Mandy inherits.’

  ‘Then what? Mandy becomes a silver mine owner? She settles here?’

  They stopped in the hotel lobby. Dan said, ‘We got other ideas. Want to buy it?’

  ‘Buy what, the silver mine?’

  ‘I hear it’s a money maker.’

  Roger was silent for a spell. ‘You think I want to live out here in the Wild West?’

  ‘Some say it’s the future of the country.’

  ‘Me, owning a silver mine.’

  ‘You’re rich enough. You could be one of them absentee owners.’

  But Roger stared at the swirls in the royal blue, hotel lobby carpet. ‘No, I’d want my own hand in running it.’

  ‘You can make some plans about it. Don’t count on support from Darion.’