Trail of Passion (Hot on the Trail Book 7)

by Merry Farmer

  Gideon paused for a moment to consider, then said, “I don’t see why not.” Before Dr. Pyle could open his mouth to say more, Gideon went on with, “But it would have to be done carefully. The fumes….” He swallowed hard. “Caution is needed.” His throat closed up, and he couldn’t say more. Anything more that he said would only lead to questions, stories, and confessions.

  “Sounds like a plan to me.” Pete broke the uncomfortable silence with a smile. “We’re only a couple days out from Ft. Laramie. Once we get there, we should have the time and the space to move the sick people out of their wagons. Then you could clean them.”

  “I’d be willing to help,” Dr. Pyle said.

  Gideon nodded.

  Another short pause passed, and Pete said, “We’ll be taking on a few more folks in Ft. Laramie. I had a telegram back at North Platte from some gentleman named Chet Devlin, saying he’d like to join up. There’s usually a few other people who end up at Laramie by stage and need to join a wagon train for one reason or another.”

  “Let’s hope that we’ve cleared up the problem with dysentery by then and that it doesn’t spread,” Dr. Pyle said.

  The conversation was over. Dr. Pyle left to check on the families that needed help. Gideon figured he should get up and go back to work too.

  “So about Miss Lucy,” Pete stopped him.

  Gideon had made it halfway up off the bench, but plopped back down again. “I know, I know. We should be more discreet in the way we conduct our… friendship.”

  Pete hummed. He didn’t bother to stop the grin that spread across his face. “I only have two things to say.”

  “Two?” Gideon eyed him warily.

  “One.” Pete held up a finger, then pointed it at Gideon’s chest. “I told you so.”

  Gideon let out a breath that could have been a chuckle and nodded. “Two, Rev. Kilpatrick is leaving the train at Ft. Laramie. Seems he’s got family on a stretch of land up north of there, and he’s hoping to do some missionary work with the Cheyenne.”

  It took a few seconds for the implication of that to sink in.

  “So if you’re planning on making Miss Lucy an honest woman, you’ll need to get a move on,” Pete echoed Gideon’s thoughts aloud.

  “Thanks,” Gideon said, standing at last. He glanced to the jar he still held in his hands. “Let me know when you need me to act with the wagons. I still think there could be a way to treat the water, though.”

  “Duly noted.” Pete nodded.

  Gideon headed back to his wagon to store the chlorine. His thoughts were as far away from chemicals as could be, though. If they were only a few days out from Ft. Laramie, and if Rev. Kilpatrick was about to leave them, that meant he would either have to marry Lucy right away—which meant asking her, hoping she said yes, and then making plans—or wait until some indeterminate time in the future. Asking her right away meant he’d have to tell her everything about him that she needed to make her decision. Soon. Now.

  He let out a breath, his hands already beginning to shake at the prospect. How many times had he tried to have this conversation and how many times had he backed down, letting fear take over from sense? He tried to thrust aside the thought that he was a fool and a coward in favor of telling himself a topic this delicate needed perfect timing, privacy, and room for all the questions Lucy would surely ask.

  Truth be told, he was so afraid of losing Lucy that he could hardly breathe.

  “That’s the look of a man who needs a night of cards.” Charlie snuck up on Gideon as he stood at the back of his wagon, putting away the chlorine and contemplating the mountain of troubles in front of him. When Charlie slapped a hand on Gideon’s shoulder, he jumped.

  “Charlie,” he greeted the man with a strangled gasp.

  Charlie frowned at him. “Something bothering you?”

  Gideon turned to look at him. He’d come to rely on Graham as a friend, but Charlie wasn’t that far behind. Even if he was a card player. That wasn’t quite enough to make him pour out his troubles. Instead, he screwed his face up to a curious look and asked, “Do you still have that ring that you won off of Poole?”

  “The gold one with the ruby?” A grin spread across Charlie’s lips, making him look like the kind of rogue that mothers warned their daughters to stay away from. “Yeah, I got it. Why?”

  A few pieces fit together in Gideon’s mind. Confessing all wasn’t the only thing he needed to do to ask Lucy to marry him. He needed a ring too, a ring she liked.

  “I think I will take you up on that offer of cards,” he said, feeling relieved about something for the first time in ages. “As long as you play with that ring at some point.”

  Charlie’s lips twitched into a grin that was borderline condescending. “Uh, Gideon, I don’t know if you want to go risking the kind of money that that ring is worth.”

  “You know what it’s worth?”

  Charlie shrugged. “I’ve got a good eye for jewelry along with a good head for cards. It’s a ruby and high-quality gold. Worth at least three hundred dollars.”

  Gideon burst into a smile. At last, a win-win situation. Either he won the ring or he lost more of the money he never wanted in the first place.

  “I’m willing to take the risk,” he said.

  “All right.” Charlie rubbed the back of his neck, as if his conscience bothered him. “But if I think it’s getting out of hand for you, I reserve the right to stop the game. I like you, and I don’t want to see you lose your shirt. Not with Miss Lucy in the picture.”

  Well, at least it would come as no surprise to everyone in the wagon train if he and Lucy married suddenly.

  It didn’t take long for Charlie to wrangle a few others to play cards. Graham was busy helping Estelle with the sick people, and no one really wanted to play with Isaiah after the accusations he’d made against Estelle for attempting to pass as a white woman. But there were others in the train—a farmer named Joe, a Swede who was heading to Oregon to take up a job at a general store, and an investor in the logging business named Clifford—who had money to risk. They set up in Charlie’s camp, Olivia making coffee for them and looking on with wary eyes.

  “Let’s keep the stakes reasonable tonight, gents,” Charlie said as he dealt the first hand. “We’ll go easy on Gideon since he, uh, hasn’t played for a few weeks.”

  The others grumbled.

  “It’s all right,” Gideon said. “I brought plenty of money with me.” Not the sort of thing he would usually advertise at a card game, but he had a specific goal in mind.

  The first few hands were uneventful. Gideon didn’t have much to work with one way or another, but because he needed to earn enough to bet for the ring with, he played honestly instead of trying to lose.

  “Not too bad,” Charlie commented as the night wore on. “I may have underestimated you.”

  Gideon replied with a simple smile.

  The evening heated up once the Swede was out, leaving just four of them left playing. The bets were going up, and as Gideon’s pile of money grew, he started paying attention and marking the cards in his mind.

  It wasn’t until after the sun went down and Clifford was out that he set things up so that he could win the ring. Charlie helped him along by dealing three queens right into his hand. Gideon had been paying attention long enough to know that there weren’t enough kings or aces around to give the other two three of a kind, and the odds of a straight or flush were low.

  “How much did you say that ring was worth again?” he asked, keeping as straight a face as possible.

  Charlie—whose expression had gone from patronizing to amused to curious to serious—said, “Three hundred.”

  Gideon nodded, counted out his bills, and put three hundred dollars in the middle of the barrel that served as their table.

  Joe whistled and put his cards down. “No way. I’m not losing the farm before I buy it.”

  Gideon glanced to Charlie with as innocent a look as he could fake.

  Charlie
narrowed his eyes. He reached into his pocket and took out the ring, laying it on the table. “This I’ve got to see.”

  “You’re not going to raise at all?” Gideon asked.

  Charlie’s brow flew up. “Okay, now I really need to see this.”

  Gideon broke into a sheepish smile and showed his three queens. Joe snorted in relief at getting out while he did. Charlie only stared at the cards on the table. After a long pause, he set down a hand that consisted of two aces and two tens.

  “Well I’ll be,” he said.

  Without a hint of surprised, Gideon scooped up the money from the center of the table. He picked up the ring as well, smiling at it, a wave of heat for all that it meant striking him. Then he tucked it in his pocket.

  “Do you want to keep on playing?” he asked Charlie and Joe.

  “Not me.” Joe stood and backed away from the table. “I’ve just seen something here tonight that’s taught me not to judge a book by its cover. Maude would kill me if she knew what I was risking by playing with you.” He wasn’t talking about Charlie.

  As Joe left, Charlie fixed Gideon with a sly grin. “You’re a player after all.”

  “I play the same way you do.” Gideon shrugged. “I keep track of the cards, calculate the odds, play smart.”

  “You were playing me for a fool in all those other games.” Charlie’s smile grew with admiration.

  Gideon shook his head. “I wasn’t interested in winning then.”

  The idea seemed to strike Charlie as unbelievable. “What kind of fool plays cards to lose?”

  He owed him at least a hint of an explanation. Whether they were close or not, Gideon had a feeling he’d just earned a lifelong friend as well as an engagement ring.

  “A fool who has blood money to lose,” he answered.

  Charlie’s grin dropped. A new look of comprehension passed through his eyes. He nodded. “Understood.”

  Gideon was grateful that was all he said.

  Charlie went on, nodding to the ring in Gideon’s hand. “Now go off and use that for what it’s for. I can’t be the only newlywed on this trail.”

  Chapter Ten

  Things in the wagon train grew more and more hectic as they drove on toward Ft. Laramie. Gideon and Lucy watched over Tim for a night so that Estelle and Graham could get a break. Tim was a quiet, easy-going child, but having him around meant Gideon couldn’t take Lucy aside to tell her about his past or to propose. Then Tim went missing, and Gideon and Lucy were busy helping to search for him. Both vital conversations would have to wait.

  At least that’s what Gideon kept insisting to that part of his conscience that begged him to just go on and get things out in the open.

  “Tim?” He marched through the lines of wagons parked outside of Ft. Laramie as the late afternoon sun streamed down. “Tim, where are you?”

  He spotted Lucy across the field. Even though it buzzed with activity, with dozens of pioneers rushing to take care of their livestock or heading to the fort to buy more supplies, she saw him and asked with her expression and a gesture if he was having any luck searching. Gideon shrugged and shook his head. Lucy lowered her shoulders and indicated that they should continue to search. Gideon nodded and walked on.

  He headed toward the fort. “Tim?” No answer came, but as he crossed through the palisade gate and into the fort itself, he figured he should take the opportunity to see what supplies Ft. Laramie had for sale. After more than a month on the trail, he was running low on essentials.

  “…and I don’t know where the woman gets off, thinking she can waltz about like normal people.”

  Gideon almost turned on his heel and walked right out of the supply depot at the shrill sound of Ruth Nelson’s voice. Her friend, Viola, was with her, which didn’t make him any more inclined to stick around.

  “Miss Estelle has done a fine job of healing those families sick with dysentery, right Dr. Faraday?” Gideon’s retreat was thwarted by Dr. Pyle’s wife, Eleanor, dragging him into the conversation. “Norbert says that aside from Dr. Faraday’s use of chlorine to treat the water, Miss Estelle is the one who we should all be thanking for keeping the disease from spreading.”

  “Well,” Ruth huffed.

  At the same time, Gideon backed straight into a man who was watching the conversation from the counter where a militiaman was collecting payment for supplies. He jumped on the chance to get out of the women’s conversation by turning to the man he’d stepped on.

  “I’m so sorry, sir.” He whipped his hat off and checked to make sure the man was in one piece.

  “I’m quite all right,” the man mumbled in reply. He seemed startled, splotches of red on his face. He was older—maybe in his fifties—with gray hair, sideburns, and a coat that was cleaner and better made than most of the coats Gideon had seen this side of the prairie. Gideon prayed he hadn’t stepped on the man’s toes too hard.

  His prayers took a different turn when the man frowned and said, “Dr. Faraday?”

  Hearing his own name from a stranger’s lips had never made his heart sink so low. The way the man said it, clearly he’d heard the name before.

  “Yes,” Gideon replied cautiously. “Faraday. Gideon Faraday.”

  A beat too late, he extended his hand to the man. The man stared at it for a moment, then took it, his expression grave.

  “Diver,” the man said. “Leopold Diver.”

  Gideon wracked his brain to see if he knew the name. Was the man affiliated with Princeton? The army? Was he one of the investors from New York who had financed the experiment? Perhaps a general who had advised them?

  No, Leopold Diver looked more like a middle-class businessman than anyone he would need to worry about. Still, there was a spark of familiarity in his eyes.

  “W-what brings you to Ft. Laramie?” Gideon asked, obliged to make conversation.

  “I’m heading west,” Leopold answered. “To… to Oregon. I was told there was a wagon train coming through here with a boss named Pete Evans who would be willing to take me along.”

  At least there was a way Gideon could be helpful in the situation.

  “That’s our wagon train. Have you met Pete yet? I can introduce him to you if you’d like.”

  “Thank you.” Leopold nodded.

  Gideon gestured for him to follow, and the two of them made their way out of the supply depot and into the main yard of the fort. It was just Gideon’s luck that Pete was crossing the yard, an intent look in his eyes as he searched the area. When he spotted Gideon, he changed directions and strode to meet him.

  “You seen any sign of Tim yet?” he asked without preamble.

  “Not yet,” Gideon answered. “But I did run into Mr. Diver here. He’d like to join our wagon train.”

  “Ah.” Pete thrust out a hand to shake Leopold’s. “Pete Evans. You must be the one they told me about when we rolled in.”

  “Leopold Diver.” Leopold took Pete’s hand. “You come highly recommended, Mr. Evans. I need conveyance from here to Oregon City.”

  “I’ll just keep looking for Tim.” Gideon excused himself from the conversation and inched away.

  As he left, he caught Leopold staring at him. The intensity of the man’s eyes struck all the way to Gideon’s marrow. Something was off, wrong. The man knew him, but for the life of him, Gideon couldn’t guess how. Leopold’s eyes practically burned a hole in his back as he walked away. As if the man could see into him. As if he knew. It was unnerving. He made a long circuit of the furthest reaches of the fort in search of Tim just to get away from the man.

  “Did you find anything?” Lucy asked him later as the two of them met up just outside of the fort’s gate.

  “No,” Gideon answered, rubbing the back of his neck. “Wherever he is, he’s well hidden.”

  Lucy hummed in answer. They turned to walk together back to the wagons. They’d parked next to each other, the way they usually did nowadays. Once he worked up the nerve to make things official between them, maybe they could
figure out how to divide their things between two wagons. He would feel much more comfortable if the bromine he’d brought along was in an entirely separate wagon than the chlorine. Of course, if he was going to say something, he would have to say it fast. Rev. Kilpatrick wouldn’t be with them after tomorrow. Even one day—

  He stopped dead, holding Lucy back with him, when they rounded a corner and came within sight of his wagon. Leopold Diver stood at the back, leaning over the tailgate, peering into the crates where all of Gideon’s chemicals were stored.

  A frantic, sick pounding feeling grew in Gideon’s stomach and chest. If the man knew him, it was almost certain he knew about the chemicals, knew what they were for.

  “Excuse me,” Lucy called out to Leopold, indignant as only Lucy could be. “That’s not your wagon.”

  Leopold started and backed away from Gideon’s wagon. His expression was still as hard as stone, but a flush formed on his cheeks. He glanced nervously from side to side before saying, “I’m terribly sorry, madam. I heard there was a small boy missing, and I was trying to help search for him.”

  Lucy marched on ahead of where Gideon was frozen to the spot. “Well, he’s not in Gideon’s wagon, that’s for sure. He knows better than to play where dangerous chemicals are stored.”

  If he wasn’t so startled by the turn of events, Gideon would have winced at Lucy’s pronouncement. He picked up his pace to reach the back of his wagon and Leopold at the same time that she did.

  “Chemicals?” Leopold’s frown deepened. He glanced questioningly to Gideon.

  “For water purification,” Gideon explained.

  Leopold’s expression still didn’t betray much about what he was thinking. “You keep dangerous chemicals where children could climb in and tamper with them?”

  “No, no,” Gideon rushed to correct him. “The crates are all sealed as tightly as can be expected. I generally keep the tailgate closed, and usually I’m within sight of my wagon at all times. It’s been an unusual evening.”

  Leopold only grunted in response. He continued to stare at Gideon with eyes that said he knew so much more than he was letting on.