He let her go and bent down to pick up his bedroll. She put a hand on his arm. “You’re right, my father and mother made sure I could take care of myself, protect myself from unwanted advances. I could protect myself from you….if I really wanted to, but…I trust you, Ryder.”
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“I know.” A giggle escaped her lips. She put her arms around him and pressed her cheek to his chest to hear his heart thudding, pounding. “It’s the silliest thing, I know, and I don’t care. Stay here. Stay with me.”
He pulled his shoulders back, body stiff, arms straight down at his side.
On her toes, she pressed her lips to the nape of his neck, coaxing him to surrender.
“Ah, Jo, don’t do this,” he said, his voice a harsh whisper.
“Sit with me, talk to me. Tell me how you became a Pinkerton man. You said I don’t know you. Tell me, Ryder. I want to know you.”
“You’re lonely for your family, that’s all this is. Go to sleep.”
Tugging on his arm, she turned him around and pulled him down on the cot beside her. “I’m wide awake. This is your fault, you know. Calling me ‘your Jo,' what did you think would happen?”
»»•««
Sitting next to her, elbows gouging his knees, holding his head in his hands, Ryder asked himself the same question. Fussing with the quilt, she arranged it over them both and snuggled into his shoulder. His arm went around her, and he closed his eyes. This, this is what he’d wanted. What he hoped would happen. And he knew himself for a fool to wish for the impossible.
His cheek pressed to the top of her head, he mindlessly stroked her upper arm. He closed his eyes and surrendered to the moment, admitting to himself he was lonely too. The time had come to let someone in, open up, take a risk.
“The railroad goes straight through Laura Creek. At fourteen, I started as a guard, overseeing payroll shipments. At eighteen, I aided in the capture of an OR&N company embezzler which brought my…ah…talents to the attention of a Pinkerton agent.
“Even though Pinkerton said flat out he didn’t have any use for an Indian, he liked the way I worked and took me on as an apprentice for a year. Funny thing, most folks, when they look at me, they know they don’t trust me, and they sure as hell wouldn’t take me for a lawman. Crooks don’t mind me at all. They don’t trust me, but they don’t mind keeping me around.”
He shook his head and took a deep breath. “I’m a half-breed. Tribe members look at me and see a traitor because I’ve taken on the white man’s clothes and his manners. The white man looks at me and thinks stinking Indian. The forts are being dismantled. Pinkerton took me on as a full-fledged agent to work here in this part of the state. Mostly I investigate the Indian Missions and reservations. He sent me back east to his school for Pinkerton Agents, even paid my way. I like what I do.”
With her hand warm on his neck, she asked, “You travel a lot, I guess?”
He didn’t answer immediately. The wood in the stove popped, and a spark lit up the circumference of the top plate. She jerked, her fingers clutching the collar of his coat. He kissed her forehead and held her tight.
With heart beating loud and fast, thudding against his ribcage, he knew the moment had arrived. Time to face the truth. “I have, until now. You gotta’ understand Jo, Indians aren’t allowed to own property. I’m an Indian in this white man’s world. So making a home, getting a place of my own, is out unless my father gifts me some property. But honestly, I think I’d make a damn poor rancher or farmer. I’d go crazy.”
She tipped her head up, her breath warm on the nape of his neck. “You could never give up doing what you do? You love it.”
“Sometimes. Right now, I hate it. I want to be with you, and I want you to be with me, but I can’t stop asking questions and investigating. I won’t, not until I have all the pieces of the puzzle. I lose track of time. I don’t want to eat or sleep.”
Her fingers had started to make a circle over his chest. If she didn’t stop, he’d have to take her down and love the life out of her.
“You’d need a life mate, not a wife.”
Her insight took his breath away, and his heart beat a drum roll.
“You’d need someone who would understand your commitment to your profession, I guess.”
She grew silent, and in a very sad voice she said, “You know teachers, female teachers, aren’t allowed to marry, or even have suitors. We’re not even allowed to be seen in public places holding conversations with men who aren’t family. I really want to be a teacher. I love teaching, but…but not having someone…a home of my own…someone to love, I think I’d eventually perish.”
“I can’t think ahead right now, not this minute.” He clasped the hand on his chest to keep it still and brought it to his lips. “You’re mine, Jo. This I know. I don’t know what to do about it.”
“You could make love to me. I would like that.”
In the dark, his lips found hers. Her hand moved to the inside of his coat. Attempting to be the voice of reason, he said, “This is a really bad idea.”
“I know,” she said, with her lips pressed to his ear.
“We shouldn’t.”
“Hmmm, very bad. Naughty,” she said, placing little kisses across his cheek and down his neck.
He laid her down and moved one of her legs to his side the better to put himself between her legs, his hand easily going beneath her nightgown. His fingers found her center and slipped inside the folds. He pressed his lips to her nipple, his tongue and teeth teasing the flesh through the fabric of her nightgown. She bucked beneath him, pressing her hips into his hand. Ruthlessly, his fingers circled, slipping in and out, circling, in and out. Her cry of ecstasy flew into his mouth. Weeping softly, she clung to him.
Chapter Fifteen
Untangling himself from her legs and arms and leaving Jo sound asleep, Ryder rose from the cot and pulled the blanket and then her quilt up to her ears. She sighed and snuggled down, muttering an unintelligible protest. He slipped from the tent with his bedroll under his arm. The temptation to stay, wake her and make love to her thoroughly, not halfway, but all the way, had his body throbbing with an aching need for release.
Sleep out of the question, he stealthily made his way to the administration office and slipped into Ira Jones’s office.
The desktop was neat, the blotter clear of papers and the pens in their holders. A sepia-tinted daguerreotype of a man and a woman caught Ryder’s eye in a brief flicker of his lit candle. The man and woman were performers, dressed in leotards and sequin-covered costumes. Behind them, a cage hinted there might be a wild animal inside. Holding the candle up, he couldn’t find a name or a title to go with the photo, the faces of the couple dim, faded with age.
The door to the hall stood ajar. He slipped through, guarding his candle, and entered Mrs. Jones’s office. Papers, letters, and forms littered her desktop, and one large colorful flyer piqued his curiosity. Unable to read the flyer upside down, he went around the desk and leaned down over it. Holding the candle up, he caught the hot, dripping wax in the palm of his hand. Around the edge of the flyer were depictions of tight-rope walkers, roaring lions, sword swallowers, jugglers in ornate and exotic costumes, and white-faced, red-nosed, floppy-footed clowns in voluminous, colorful clothes.
The headline read. Circus International on tour throughout the west featuring lions from Africa, sword swallowers from Persia, jugglers from Spain.
In large print at the bottom of the flyer, the headline jumped out at him and nearly cost him his candle. From Argentina, Payasos Georgio Jaynes and his charming wife, Rosa, amaze and delight children of all ages with their magic.
And beneath that, in small type. Circus International brought to your town by the Jaynes Brothers.
Blood surging, pulse pounding in his ears, Ryder searched the flyer for a date but couldn’t find it. His prisoners, namely, Jacob Jaynes and his cohorts, were lodged safely, for the time being, in the Cherry G
rove jail. Pinkerton had sent a wire saying they’d be transported soon, but nothing definite. Transported where? Ryder had not a clue. Could be Portland or San Francisco or Denver. Could it all be connected? The clowns, the robbers, the abductions? Maybe the Payasos gang weren’t headed for Canada at all. Maybe they’d been heading for the Oracle in Portland.
Thoughts, plans, ideas mixed with panic stacked up in his brain in a big messy pile. A wire, he’d send a wire, but where and to whom? And from where? He didn’t want to send it from town, Gerald or someone else might find out he knew something. Gerald didn’t know him from dog doo. He wasn’t making any sense. He had to think. Think straight for Jo’s sake, for Dodie’s sake. At this point, he didn’t know anything. But he had the usual gut feeling. He had to go, leave now, tonight. Leave Jo.
Laura Creek, he could ride to Laura Creek, send a wire from there to Pinkerton, warn them. He could be there by this time tomorrow if he left immediately.
»»•««
A hawk feather lay on the top of her travel trunk. Jo blinked, groaned, and shook her head. He’d disappeared into the night again. Rolling onto her back, she folded her arm over her eyes and relived the night in Ryder McAdam’s arms. The fact of her nudity shamed her. She’d asked to be conquered, seduced. But being nearly seduced, almost conquered by a ghost, a phantom, left her wanting whatever it was they hadn’t done. And she knew they hadn’t consummated. He’d never even slipped out of his trousers. He’d played her like a fiddle, making her sing and beg for more. She lay for a few moments lecturing herself. She was a fool, a fool headed for ruin.
Her stomach rumbled, grinding on empty. Saturday, no school, but if she wanted breakfast, she needed to hurry. Time for self-recrimination would have to keep until later.
The girls were up, the privy door opening and closing. Jo washed her face, braided her hair, dressed, and prayed no one could see into her sinful soul.
Dodie waited for her outside her tent and pounced on her, asking, “You saw him?”
“He’s fine. We have to hurry. I have to set the tables.”
“He left you something? What? What did he leave this time?”
Jo stopped. Irritated, she closed her eyes to calm herself and inhaled, letting her breath out slowly. She answered Dodie’s question, “Another feather.” Taking long strides, she took off for the great hall.
Dodie, leaping sideways, asked, “What kind of feather?”
“I don’t know, hawk, I guess, brown, black, reddish.”
“Hawk? That’s a hawk feather. Hawks hunt prey. He’s hunting.”
Jo stopped short and Dodie nearly fell into her arms. Blinking, head shaking, Jo sputtered and asked, “Hunting? What? Hunting? Now? Why?”
“Hawks fly and hunt their prey.”
“Oh, well,” Jo said with a toss of her head, marching across the green, muttering to herself. “Wonderful. He’s gone hunting. I don’t believe this.”
Dodie, giggling, skipping to keep up with her, said, “I thought I heard coyotes last night.”
Jo rushed forward, trotting up the steps of the great hall, refusing to take the bait.
“Sounded close,” Dodie said right behind her, on her heels. “They usually hunt in the orchard.”
“Do you know if it’s sausage or ham this morning?” Jo asked, concentrating on maintaining an indifferent façade.
Dodie giggled and tossed an apron at her. “Fatback, oatmeal, and biscuits. The usual. Twyla-Rose is in the kitchen making biscuits. Heavy as lead and dry as sand. I recommend lots of butter and honey to help them slide down the gullet.”
Cheeks burning, certain Dodie knew the truth, yes, she’d spent the night with her brother, naked and in heaven. She’d begged Ryder to seduce her, and he had, most thoroughly. She tied her apron around her waist and then loaded up the serving trolley with the dinnerware and escaped into the dining room away from Dodie’s all-seeing eyes. Perspiring, she set the tables. Her nerves in shreds, she prayed for composure. All thumbs, she dropped silverware, tipped over two water glasses, and tripped on the leg of a chair on her way around to the last table.
During the meal, Jo sat at her table, unable to eat more than a few bites of her runny oatmeal. She eyed the biscuit dripping with butter and honey, but it held absolutely no appeal. The greasy, undercooked fatback smelled rancid, giving her stomach flip-flops. She wrapped four strips of the limp fatback and two biscuits in her napkin and put the pouch in the pocket of her apron. Thinking to add to her cache, she snatched one of the forbidden oranges from the bowl in the middle of the table. The rule—oranges, any fresh fruit offered, must be shared with at least two other diners.
Mrs. Jones rose to her feet and tapped on her water glass, startling Jo to attention. She slipped the orange to her lap, squared her shoulders, chin to her chest and eyes downcast. Her guilt had expanded into ridiculous proportions. She held her breath, anticipating her public humiliation. Somehow Gerald…Gerald, the spy, had discovered her late night romp, her wild night of uninhibited self-gratification with the heathen mesmerizer, Ryder McAdam.
“Next Saturday, as is the custom, students are allowed off campus to replenish necessities and notions from the merchants in town,” Mrs. Jones said in her usual nasally drone
Jo slumped forward and released her breath, grateful Mrs. Jones’s topic did not include her, so far.
“However,” Mrs. Jones said, her beady, all-seeing eyes scanning her subjects and landing on Jo.
Jo tipped her head and tried not to blink. In her head, her guilty conscience stacked up a colorful list of infractions she had committed of late.
“We are going to make an adjustment in our scheduling.” Groans and grumblings followed Mrs. Jones’s announcement. She tapped her water glass smartly. Her brows drew down over her needle nose, and her thin lips pulled back into a disapproving scowl. “That will be enough of that. If I hear one more, rude outburst, I’ll rescind my offer to give you a day at the circus and send you all to the barns to muck stalls and chicken coops.”
A heavy, tense silence ensued. No one dared breathe. “That’s better,” Mrs. Jones said, bony shoulders thrown back and hands held tightly to her waist. “Now, as I was saying, we have received notice that a circus of some renown is to arrive later next week. We have received a special invitation to attend. We will go as a group and sit as a group. You will be on your best behavior. Miss Ott, Miss Ames, Miss Buxton, I will hold you responsible for maintaining a tight rein on your students. The invitation is for a special, just for the school, Friday afternoon performance.”
Mrs. Jones started to take her seat but paused turned back to the hall to say, “Any misconduct or infraction by any one of you between now and next Friday will prevent the entire student body from attending this event.” Her lips pursed, she gave them all a satisfied nod. “You are excused.”
The girls, demonstrating great restraint, Jo thought, folded their napkins, put them on their plates, and rose from their tables. They slid their chairs back in place, carried their plates to the bin beside the exit door, and filed out of the dining hall in a quiet and orderly fashion.
Once outside, youthful spirits set free, the girls jumped and squealed in excited anticipation, prancing and leaping around on the lawn like young colts.
Chapter Sixteen
The damn rain and wind came straight at him. Worried about Jo wet and cold in her tent, Ryder hunched his shoulders and tucked his chin into the collar of his black canvas long coat. He kicked the flanks of the plodding cob he’d borrowed from the sheriff, urging it down the bank and between the towering yellow larch. He traveled alongside the rivulet of water tumbling down the hill in a small ditch and worked his way up the mountain to home and Laura Creek. Taking mercy on his tired mount, he dismounted and led the horse across the shallow stream. He found the track in the dark and walked the mile or so into town.
Laura Creek, nestled in a meadow between steep and densely forested mountains, offered a bit of shelter from the wind and driving rain.
Not a single light glowed in any of the windows of the houses of the town. Going behind the sheriff’s office, he tied his horse to the hitching ring next to the water trough and removed his bedroll from the front of the saddle.
Hardly anyone in Laura Creek locked their doors, save for Howard Buttrum, owner of the bank and the town’s mayor. He locked the bank doors, of course. The sheriff, Telt Longtree, locked the jail if he had a prisoner. Otherwise, he left it open, declaring to anyone who thought to criticize there wasn’t anything worth stealing in the place. Ryder entered through the back door, tossed his bedroll in the dinky cell, and went out to the front office to see if he could coax the dead coals in the potbellied stove to life.
He lit the lantern and filled the coffee pot with more water and a scoop of ground coffee. In four hours the telegraph office would open. With nothing to do but wait for his coffee, he began rifling through the scattered flyers and pamphlets on Telt’s desk. And there it was, the flyer for Circus International. He found specific dates handwritten along the margins. Weak in the knees, he plopped down in Telt’s rickety old office chair. He would’ve gone over backward if he hadn’t caught himself by grabbing hold of the edge of the sheriff’s heavy oak desk.
First stop, Umatilla, then Pendleton today and next day La Grande,and then on to Cherry Grove. After Cherry Grove, on to Enterprise. Then on to Lewiston, the last town on their Columbia River tour. They were to celebrate with a performance aboard the River Belle, which would take them to the mouth of the Snake River where it joined the Columbia. The performers, deserving a rest, would then journey down the Columbia to Vancouver, where they would board a ship bound for South America.
There it was, all laid out, a neat and tidy little plan. But how did the Payasos gang fit in? And the abductions? How and where to look for the answers? He had four, no, three and a half hours to think about it. His head hurt, and his throat ached. The strong shot of hot coffee warmed him up all the way down to his gut.
Jo and the Pinkerton Man Page 11
