My wife tell you anything?
Calhoun and Nichols had been around Laramie enough to know who was a stranger in these parts. And…I hadn’t been around long enough! Now things begin to click.
My wife tell you anything?
If Girard wasn’t a stranger in these parts, I needed to figure out his connection to the Bar X Bar.
My wife tell you anything?
It hit me then. Not Lesley Girard.
Wife? Which wife.
That’s why I had my gun out when I stepped into the barn at the Bar X Bar ranch. That’s why it didn’t surprise me when, at the sound of my voice, David Girard turned from the horse he was saddling.
Chapter 39
On my horse, in the shadows of the barn, I extended my Colt at face level and looked down my barrel at him. “David Girard,” I said. “Or, since this is the Bar X Bar, would you prefer I call you Cyrus Ford?”
“No,” he said. “Not possible. You’re dead.”
“You lie down,” I said. “Right there. Right now. And clasp your hands back of your neck.”
It was the best way I knew to stop a man from pulling fast.
He looked at the ground. It needed shoveling.
“I shot a man once,” I said. “Unlike you, I hated doing it. Unlike you, it took only one bullet. And there was no amount of water that could splash him back to life to feel the next bullet.”
He lowered himself.
I kept my gun carefully trained on him as I walked a wide circle to get behind him. There’s a move called a road agent spin, where you hand the gun across, barrel mouth toward yourself, then suddenly flip it so the handle slaps your palm, leaving the gun upside down and barrel now pointing opposite, giving you the chance to fire safely, all within the space of a heartbeat. I know, because I’ve practiced it lots. I wasn’t going to ask him for his gun and take the chance of finding out whether he’d practiced it too.
“Nope,” I said as he turned his head and body to keep his eyes on me, “just keep looking toward the door.”
When I got around him, I stepped up close to his back and plucked the gun loose from his holster and threw it aside. Much safer.
I pressed my revolver against the small of his back. Firm, to pin him to the ground. It was another method to discourage a hero attempt. With my other hand, I patted the sides of his legs and boots. He had a derringer in his left boot.
“Work that boot loose with your right foot,” I said as I stepped away. “Then kick the pocket revolver away.”
He struggled.
I didn’t watch his feet—but his hands. That was the only place I could expect trouble. There was none.
“Sit up,” I said when he was finished. “Keep your hands clasped behind your neck.”
Straw and clumped balls of horse droppings clung to the front of his shirt. He stared at me with cold rage, his saddled horse standing patiently beside him.
“Let’s talk,” I said. “A friendly talk.”
Silence.
“David Girard?” I asked. Silence. “Cyrus Ford?”
“I’ll see you dead,” he spat.
“You tried that once,” I said. “Back in Denver where you called yourself David Girard. Course, this was after you shot me in the leg here at the Bar X Bar where you call yourself Cyrus Ford.”
“Prove it.”
“The names? Or the murder attempts?”
“The murder attempts. It’s your word against mine.”
I nodded. “Maybe.”
Girard snorted. “Maybe? You name the time. Eleanor Ford will testify I was with her. In Denver? Name the time again. Lesley Girard will swear I was beside her.”
I studied him.
He laughed. “Nobody’s been hanged for being married to two women. And don’t expect either to send me before a judge anyway.”
His face, even with that hateful laugh, was a model of perfection. And he carried himself like a god. In the face of betrayal, Lesley Girard had still asked me to get her money, but leave him alone. I didn’t doubt Eleanor Ford felt the same.
“I’ll tell you the way I read it,” I said, “You had the perfect life. Whenever you needed to leave the Bar X Bar to be in Denver, you told Eleanor Ford you had ranching business in Cheyenne, because, of course, Cheyenne was the stopover and your train ticket would indeed show Cheyenne. Once in Cheyenne, you would purchase another ticket to Denver. Same thing, but reversed, with Lesley Girard whenever you needed to leave Denver.”
He gave no reaction, but I knew I was right.
“Then one day,” I said, “out of the blue, Bob Nichols walks into the Denver First and sees you as David Girad. You see him. Maybe he’s too surprised to say anything because he knows you as his neighbor, Cyrus Ford.”
I drew a breath. “Bad luck for you. Who would guess someone like that would see you in Denver? You know when as soon as Bob Nichols gets to Laramie, he’ll say or ask something that puts your double marriage and the good life that comes with it to an end. So he’s got to go.”
“Do-gooder wanted to talk to me in private first,” Girard said. “To give me a chance to right my wrongs. Wasn’t hard to right that wrong with a bullet.”
“Of course,” I said, “it’d be the last thing he expected. He rides up to you on his horse, you shoot him from where you’re waiting on foot.”
“You think this will accomplish anything…Marshal?” He said marshal with a sneer. “There’s no proof.”
“Humor me,” I said. “About this same time, you’re feeling more heat in Denver because another Laramie man by the name of Lorne Calhoun is doing his best to set up an appointment with you, Mr. David Girard. You’ve managed to avoid it a couple times, but eventually he’ll be there. In your office. And you’ll be facing the same problem all over again. Someone who knows you as Cyrus Ford, and finds it quite a surprise to meet you as someone else in Denver. Someone who can ruin your good life the minute he gets back to Laramie. You might even suspect Calhoun is nosing around at your wife’s request. But with Calhoun, you’ll nip it before it becomes a problem.”
“An ounce of prevention, Marshal…”
“And two birds with one stone. Bob Nichols is already dead. Why not get rid of Calhoun and lay the blame on Nichols? Drag Nichols into the bank vault. No problem. After all, he’s too dead to fight back. And it’s your wife’s bank. One of your wifes’ bank. You know how to get into the vault.” I took a breath. “Stop me if this gets boring.”
“People like you are always boring,” Girard said. “It comes from a misguided belief that good must prevail over evil.”
“You force Calhoun inside the bank vault. Nice accident that the landlady later identifies you as Nichols. You shoot Calhoun. Put a slug mark in the opposite wall so it looked like Calhoun shot Nichols. To make it look more authentic, you pour chicken blood over Nichols. Then while you’re there, you find a way to steal ten thousand or so from your wife’s bank. Which means later you’ll have to kill Clayton Barnes, because when the marshal starts to ask him questions, good ol’ Clay might spill something about how his boss told him to expect to find a horse about where he did when he did. Good ol’ Clay might tell that marshal how you instructed him to bring the horse to the nearest livery after turning in the money he saw. Good ol’ Clay. Not very sharp, I’ve heard, but hard-working and honest. Just a kid with peach fuzz, probably worshiped the ground his boss walked on. Do anything for his boss. Include taking a bullet in the chest.”
Girard shrugged, not an easy thing to do with hands clasped behind his neck. “Dog-eat-dog world, Marshal.”
“I do have some questions.”
“Marshal,” he mocked. “You don’t know everything?”
“Crawford had to know you could get into the bank vault. But I can’t see him in on this.”
“I went to Cheyenne with Crawford once. He loved it when I took him to visit some fine ladies in one of their less respectable establishments. He didn’t like it when I showed him the photographs of him with t
hose fine ladies. What the fool didn’t know was that nothing happened. He was too drunk. Them ladies could barely get him down to his undergarments, he was so heavy. Fact is, they dropped him once and he never even woke.”
“Sure,” I said. “And a bank is built on trust. If folks in Laramie ever saw those photograghs, where’s the trust Crawford can’t live without?”
“There’s more.” Girard smiled, and I saw the traces again of a boy pulling at the wings of flies. He must have enjoyed the pressure he put on Crawford. “I was bleeding Crawford through blackmail. That’s why Calhoun found something wrong in the books. That’s why Crawford couldn’t lend money to Nichols. There wasn’t much around. Especially after I forced Crawford to get all that Union Pacific payroll cash on hand for me to steal.”
“I appreciate that,” I said. “Emma Springer?”
“She asked me a question too many. Turned out she’d seen me follow you from here when you went looking for Clayton Barnes. All that took was a pillow across her face while she was sleeping.”
I’d mourn her later. Maybe with Doc. I hadn’t known her too well, but what I did know told me the world had been diminished with her passing.
“And Dehlia?”
His face began to twist in purple hatred.
“Blackmail?” I asked. “The blackmailer gets blackmailed in return? That’s why you finally took all you could in Denver and ran?”
He spit.
There is a certain satisfaction when hunches pay off. That had been the only explanation I could think of for both her presence in Laramie — guarded by her brothers — and her late night visit to me. She knew what was happening, of course; she’d been making money from it. Only when people started to die, she had second thoughts.
“Dehlia promised me all the answers in one week,” I said. “That’s all you had anyway. One week. With me dead or not.”
“You do think you know everything, don’t you.” Even his sneer was handsome. “Dehlia left Denver the day before I did. She had no way of knowing that I’d cashed in my chips there. She had no more hold over me.”
“How about here?”
“She made a visit expecting more money. She didn’t expect me to pull a gun and throw her in a dry well. So she’s dead if I don’t return. But a good bargaining point if her brothers show up at an inconvenient time.”
“I’d say this is inconvenient.”
He shook his head. “All you have is speculation. Or your word against mine.”
I shook my head. “’Fraid not. You’re forgetting two things.”
He snorted disdain.
“One,” I said. “The chicken blood.”
Try convincing a judge of that.”
“Shouldn’t be difficult,” I said. I tried to remember completely how Doc had explained it to me. “See, there’s this gadget called a microscope. Like a telescope, but instead it magnifies things real close to you. In a clear drop of water, you can see creatures wriggling like bugs.”
“So…” It was a wary statement.
“So what it can do is give a good look at blood.” I was bluffing now, but what was going through my mind seemed logical. And it was my bet he‘d buy it. “Under that microscope, the difference between chicken’s blood and human blood is night and day.”
Girard spit again.
I didn’t exactly know where I was going with this. I just wanted him off balance. And I wanted that sneer of total confidence off his face.
“Two,” I said. “There’s the letter you missed when you searched Calhoun’s room.”
I was bluffing on the blood. I figured I might as well continue. If I had to, I’d write the note myself and fake Calhoun’s handwriting and signature. “He explained lots in that letter. Enough that ties in with what I can prove now.”
I paused. “When we get back to Laramie, I suggest you make a clean breast of things. Judge will go easier on you that way.”
He stared at me, as if giving it serious thought. Then he smiled.
A heartbeat later, I understood why.
“Drop the gun, Marshal.”
His smiled widened. The voice behind me came from Eleanor Ford. And it didn’t sound like she was bluffing.
I dropped my gun.
Chapter 40
“Move beside Cyrus,” she said.
I lowered myself onto the dirty straw litter, clasped my hands behind my neck, and waited.
She stood where I’d been standing, a derringer fitted into her right hand. Twice in one day, a woman with the drop on me. Only this one wouldn’t smile and serve up lunch like Helen had, barely an hour earlier.
“My darling,” Girard said. “Thank you.”
He started to struggle to his feet.
“Stay,” she said.
“What?”
“You heard me.” She waved the derringer for emphasis. Anything past ten feet, it was a useless pistol. She was close enough. The up-and-down double barrel of the derringer held sufficient promise of death that Girard remained beside me.
“When a marshal comes to call and asks for a woman’s husband,” she said, “it does raise questions. Especially if she’s had a few of her own in the last while. When I saw the marshal ride up today, I followed here to the barn, stood outside and heard everything.” Her voice lost its braveness.
“Everything,” she whispered. “Another wife? Why?”
“Love,” he replied softly. “Love for you.”
Her derringer dropped slightly.
“Remember when we met,” he said. “How it was between us?”
She nodded. “It’s still that way. For me.”
“And me. I loved you so much I couldn’t bear to tell you about the horrid woman who kept me in Denver. And when I saw you returned my love, I decided I could use her money to help both of us.”
“But I have enough.”
“Wrapped up in the ranch and in the bank. Not money we could take when we needed it. I used her in Denver. Don’t you see? I used her because I loved you so much.”
He was able to get a sad, choked hitch in his voice. “In fact, darling, I left her this week. You can ask Keaton here. That bridge has been burned. All for you.”
She sighed. But did not completely lower the derringer. Kept it waist high, aimed somewhere between the Girard and me.
“Darling,” he said with the same reasonable tone. “All you need to do is shoot Keaton. Our problems will be solved. He’s the only link to Denver.”
She continued to stare at him. When I’d first visited the Bar X Bar, her petite figure had been strong and alluring. Now it sagged with weariness. The remarkable face so clear of wrinkles now looked ten years older. “I…I… don’t know what to think.”
“Think of love. Our love,” he soothed.
If ever I wanted to hit a man’s face without warning and unfairly, it was now. I felt dirty at the oiliness of his words. Yet each time he spoke seemed to soften her more. What kind of hold was this?
“We’re two of the same breed,” he soothed. “Remember. Our love was so strong you helped me get rid of your husband. I got rid of my wife, but later, when it best suited the both of us. After I’d taken her money. I saw no need to worry you with things you might not understand until they were finished.”
“What he’s saying,” I finally interrupted. “Was that her cash was tied up in Denver, and he couldn’t leave. What I’d understand if I were you is that he’s still here with you for the same reason.”
“No,” she said.
“Haven’t you been trying to sell the First National? And the ranch? Ask yourself if you believe he’d still be here once he got his hands on that?”
Girard rocked me with a punch.
She didn’t shoot him. Nor me.
I spit blood. “Eleanor, you had your will changed. To take this man out should you die an accidental death?”
She flinched.
Girard raised his fist again. I was ready, and smashed an elbow into his face.
“You cha
nged your will,” I repeated. “In your heart you know you can’t believe whatever he says now.”
“Eleanor,“ he warned, “if I go to jail, so do you. We both know how your husband died.”
“He was old,” she said to me, helpess. “So old. And Cyrus loved me. The money would have set us free if it hadn’t been in the ranch and the bank shares.”
“We are free,” Cyrus urged. “Just shoot Keaton. Or give me the gun. I’ll shoot him. We’ll have forever together. I promise.”
She swung the derringer so that it pointed directly at my chest. Her knuckle whitened. My head, I’d have a chance of ducking. That gun carried only two bullets. But she was pointing at my chest.
“Freedom?” I asked. My mouth was dry. It was tough to speak clearly. “What about Dehlia’s brothers? You heard him say she was taken care of. He’d only risk her death if he knew he’d be riding away from those gunmen. And away from you.”
“Cyrus?”
“Not so,” he said. Untroubled. “I’m only holding her as hostage to show them they can’t push me around.”
Weak reply. We all knew it. Her derringer was back to a point between us.
A sudden thought. And I was speaking almost before finished thinking it. “Dehlia,” I blurted to Eleanor. “Ask yourself about Dehlia. How’d she know he lived two lives? Was she married to him before? Tracked him down?”
“Cyrus?”
“No so,” he said. But had nothing to add to it.
“Why,” she said. “Why?”
With no indication it would happen, she moved her hand and pulled the trigger. It was only a small pop, but the impact of the bullet into his chest threw Girard onto his back, almost beneath the hooves of his saddled horse.
I froze. For I knew she’d helped murder her first husband. And she knew I knew.
“I did it for love,” she said. Strangled voice. “I murdered my first husband because I loved Cyrus. But all those nights alone, it haunted me. When Cyrus was with me, I knew what’d I done was alright. But when he was away…”
She drew a breath to steady herself. “And now I killed my second husband for love.”
When I saw what was about to happen next, I began to scream. But it wouldn’t come out. Like a bad dream, I saw the derringer swing slow, as if we were swimming in time. Yet despite the horror of the slowness, I could not move fast enough. Frozen, unable to even lift a hand, let alone rise and dive.
Silver Moon Page 24
