Bandit's Embrace (The Durango Family)
Page 46
For a while after his younger brother’s death, Enrique was inconsolable. He thought he would lose his sanity. Night after night he paced the library, staring into the darkness, bitter regret in his heart. He tried to find his brother’s sweetheart, but Texas was a big place. He knew that she was a mixture of Czech and Apache, and that her name was Lidah, but that was not enough to track her down. Enrique had fully intended to make the girl a member of his family, but he could not find her.
Then a miracle had happened. The señora, who was well into middle age and had given up hope of ever having a child, presented him with a son, an heir. In his mid-forties he was to be a father. The Falcons named their son Tony in memory of Enrique’s beloved younger brother. But again tragedy struck. When the boy was eight years old, he was kidnapped. The ransom attempt was bungled, and the boy was never seen again.
Don Enrique stared into the fire, looked again at the letter he’d just received. Sixteen long years and now he knew. He reread the newspaper item, then the letter from his old friend, Swen Swenson, the Texas Ranger. He had met Swen and had forged a friendship with him years ago as he’d searched for his brother’s sweetheart.
Dear Enrique:
I write this letter with great regret and sadness. All these years, as you requested, I have watched for a big blond man with blue eyes, and a small birthmark like a flying bird on the back of hs left hand.
The writing seemed to waver on the paper held in his shaking fingers. Don Enrique had never quite given up hope that whoever had kidnapped his son might have let the boy live, might even have adopted him. Tony would be twenty-four now if he were alive, and the frail hope of finding him was what had made life worth living for the old man. Then several weeks ago, a miracle had occurred. A big blond man claiming to be Tony had come home.
Don Enrique had been only too eager to believe this stranger. After all, he did bear an amazing resemblance to the Falcons. He smiled bitterly. He had been so eager to believe, perhaps he had seen a resemblance that didn’t really exist. But of course the real Tony was dead. The article about the tattoo artist and the letter he’d just received wrapped up the last of the puzzle.
He reread the letter, anger and pain in his heart.
I regret to inform you that I have buried a man matching that description. A little more than three weeks ago in the town of Bandera, there was a shootout over a card game between a light-haired outlaw known as the Oklahoma Kid and a blond pistolero called the Bandit from Bandera. According to witnesses, the Bandit outdrew the outlaw when he caught the Oklahoma Kid cheating at cards. I regret to inform you that the dead man had blue eyes and, more importantly, that small birthmark on the back of his left hand. Señor, your search has ended in death. I have buried this man, arranged for prayers and flowers. To protect your family honor, be assured I will take the secret to my grave. I am sorry to be the bearer of this news.
Respectfully yours,
S.V. Swenson
Tony—his son—was dead and buried in Bandera, Texas, no doubt killed by the very man who had shown up to assume his place, tattooed with a fake birthmark.
Falcon’s wrinkled hand shook with fury and pain as he crumpled both the letter and the news item, tossed them into the fire, watched them burn. What was he to do, now that he knew the truth?
He had come to love the impostor as if the Texan were of his very own blood, and the ailing señora doted on him. If he were to tell her the terrible truth, it would no doubt kill her.
The don went to the gun cabinet, got out the case of dueling pistols, carried it over to his desk, opened it, and checked them. He would challenge this Texan to a duel and spill his blood for his duplicity.
No, he shook his head. He could not do that. The old señora was in frail health. He dare not let her know what he had discovered. It might mean her death from shock. As far as she was concerned, the impostor was the son she had lost. The don hefted the pistol, considered what to do. Honor meant as much to him as his bloodlines. The impostor had acted with dishonor, and yet Don Enrique loved him as much as if he had been the real Tony. The man killed at the gambling table in Bandera had been a stranger in every way but blood. And that man had been an outlaw. He had dishonored the family and, worse yet, had been caught cheating at cards. What a humiliating thing for a proud gentleman like Enrique.
Yet he must not allow the Texan to get away with what he had done. For a long moment, he thought about the situation. Someone had plotted with the Texan. Who was it? Amethyst Durango. The don shook his head. Of course that was unthinkable! Her bloodlines were as noble as the Falcons’. She would not knowingly mix them with a common cowboy’s. She, too, had been duped. No, it was more likely someone in his own household, someone who knew much about the Falcons and their personal lives.
Romeros. When his fine pinto had disappeared a few months ago, he’d had reason to think that someone from his own ranch had stolen the horse, sold it. Who else knew the stallion well enough to handle it, knew where its stall was and how to sneak it out in the middle of the night? And somehow he had always suspected Romeros of being involved in the disappearance of his young son. The foreman had been so jealous of the boy. Don Enrique was not such a fool that he didn’t recognize Romeros’s ambitions.
But he had never dared voice his suspicions about his foreman to anyone; it was too terrible a mistake to make if he were wrong. On the other hand, he’d watched the man, hoping that if Romeros had been involved, he would someday relent and lead him to the child. If his only link to his son was his foreman, he dare not break that connection.
But now he could voice his suspicions aloud, fire Romeros or challenge him. He would get to the bottom of this.
And the Texan. What was he to do about the Texan without upsetting his frail wife? Barring a miracle, the señora hadn’t long to live, the doctors had told him so. He mustn’t hasten her death by telling her the son she loved was an impostor; that her boy was actually buried in Bandera.
He ground his teeth in rage, powerless because of his love for his wife. What he would have to do was hold his silence, pretend to accept the Texan as his son, lull the young man into the security of being the Falcon heir. But the day the old señora died, he would take revenge against the impostor, and what a vengeance it would be!
Sí. He nodded. He could patiently await his revenge. Don Enrique Falcon was one of the richest, most powerful men in all Mexico. Fifty good vaqueros followed his orders without question. His word was law in the state of Coahuila. The day the señora died, he would kill the impostor. The only decision to be made now was whether to invite him onto the dueling field or to have his vaqueros whip the Texan to death and bury him in an unmarked grave somewhere on his vast ranch. Such an end was all a man without honor deserved, and yet he had grown to love the boy so. Bitter tears came to his eyes as he thought of the deception.
He heard a sound in the hallway, turned toward the door. “Who is it?”
Bandit paused with his hand on the doorknob, took a deep breath. What he was about to do would be the hardest thing he had ever done in his life, but he must do it. His conscience would not let him do otherwise.
Slowly he opened the door, favoring the right arm that throbbed from the pitchfork wound. The old don stood behind his desk, holding a dueling pistol. “Señor?” Bandit said, “we must speak.”
The old man gave him a piercing look. “You’re hurt!”
Bandit glanced down at the dried blood on his sleeve. “It’s nothing,” he lied, even though his arm ached. “Just a flesh wound.”
“You are all right? What about Amethyst Durango?”
“There’s a lot to tell,” Bandit said, entering and closing the door behind him. “Right now, I’ll just say that Amethyst is fine, but Romeros and Mona—Monique—are dead.”
“What? What happened?”
Bandit approached the desk, stopped, chewed his lip. “I don’t know how to tell you this about a trusted employee, sir, but Romeros really was a villain. He had ga
mbling debts to pay, so he stole the pinto stud and sold it to the Comancheros, who sold it farther north to an outlaw who needed a fast horse for his robberies.”
The old man blinked, but he didn’t look as shocked and surprised as Bandit had expected. “And Señorita Monique?”
Bandit shrugged, trying to remember the story he had made up to protect the dead woman. “When Amethyst and I returned to the Durango ranch, we caught Romeros in the barn attempting to rape the lady. In the struggle, he knifed her and then, as he was running away from me, he got into the old fighting bull’s pen and the bull got him.”
“My friend Gomez will be so upset—”
“He’s already returned with his vaqueros. Amethyst is with him. It’s a shock, of course, but your friend is a brave man.”
“I must go to him, comfort him. He stood by me when my son was kidnapped, and I by him when he lost his wife, then when Miss Callie died. He was going to marry her, but she died suddenly.”
Bandit thought about it, decided to keep his silence about Miss Callie forever. Revealing the truth about her death would open a Pandora’s box, and the murderer had been executed. Justice had been done. Now he must admit why he had come here, even though the old man would hate him, would want to kill him. Bandit paused, studying the old don in the lamplight. He had come to love the Falcons as if they were his own blood. Strange how he felt so at home on this ranch, as if somewhere in his blood, his very being, he recognized and remembered this place.
The don looked from the pistol, back up at him. “Was there something else, my son?”
My son. Bandit wished it were true. At this moment, he would rather have been a relative of this fine old man than anything else in the world. He reached automatically for his lucky coin, didn’t find it. Then he remembered Amethyst had it. He must get it back from her before he left Mexico. For he was going to leave. He had made his decision.
Bandit cleared his throat. He was sorely tempted to do what Amethyst had begged him to do, keep his mouth shut, pretend to be Tony Falcon. After all, who knew but them? They could hold the secret forever, and no one would be the wiser. That way, he would have the girl he loved, and finally he would have money, social position, and two of the biggest ranches in Mexico to pass on to his own sons.
Oh, it was so tempting. He half turned. “It was nothing, Papa.”
He started toward the door. If he told, he would lose the girl he wanted. Gomez Durango would not let his daughter marry a nameless Texas saddle bum. Bandit reached for the doorknob, hesitated, then turned around and came back to face the old man across the desk. “Yes, there is something else, señor. Something I must tell you.”
“I am waiting, Tony.” As the old man stood there holding that pistol, it almost seemed he was deciding whether or not to kill the younger man.
Bandit shook his head. Of course he was mistaken. Old Señor Falcon didn’t yet know what he was about to reveal. “Sir, I have something very terrible I must tell you. When I am finished, you will hate me very much. But I must tell you first how much I love and respect you and your señora. What I am about to reveal, I would give my life to change, but the past cannot be changed.”
The old man looked away as if he were remembering. “I have thought the exact thing a million times since my brother died because of my snobbish foolishness.”
Bandit took a deep breath, plunged in. “Señor Falcon, I am not your son.”
“What? How—”
“Let me finish.” He held up his left hand. “This mark is a tattoo, a fake. Romeros took me into this plot, which, I confess, I was only too eager to get involved in because I was in love with Amethyst Durango and knew I could have her no other way.”
The old man said nothing for some moments. “You did it for love of the girl? What of the dead tattooist?”
How in blue blazes did he know that? “Romeros killed him to stop his blackmail, only I didn’t know that until tonight.”
The old man’s eyes did not blink as he stared back, the pistol still in his hand. “You were not after the Falcon money?”
Bandit shrugged. “If I were, would I tell you I’m a fake? No, Romeros was after the inheritance. I thought only of marrying the girl. I love her so.”
The old man winced. “My brother said that same thing,” he murmured, “about another girl as he died in my arms at the Battle of Chapultepec.”
“The brother your son was named for?”
The old man nodded, swallowed hard. “If Antonio had lived, he might have had his own namesake, but I tried to keep his memory alive by passing his name on to my son.”
This was going to be the hardest thing he had ever had to do in his life. He could only wonder that the old man hadn’t already crumpled in shock at his confession. But old Falcon was made of strong stuff, Bandit thought admiringly. Still, the worst news was yet to come.
“Señor, I wanted very much to be a part of this family, for, you see, I’m a nameless bastard. My mother waited in vain for her lover to return to marry her as he’d promised.”
“He was without honor if he left the girl with child and did not come for her.”
Bandit sighed. “I always hoped that perhaps there was a good reason he did not return, like maybe he took sick and died. My mother lived a very sad existence, always hoping. But in the end, she despaired and killed herself.”
“No one can change the past,” the old man said softly, looking as if in his thoughts he was faraway. “My brother left a sweetheart somewhere. I promised I would find her, but I never did. If she had had a child by my brother, it would have been a cousin to my own son.”
The door burst open then and Amethyst rushed in. “Santa María!” She ran to Bandit, tried to take him in her arms, “I was so afraid you would leave before I got here!”
He must be strong, must not weaken because he loved her so. Very carefully, he reached up, unclasped her small hands from around his neck, moved her to one side. “I have already told him part of it, Aimée, that I am not his son, that Romeros is dead and Monique was killed protecting her honor.”
Her face twisted in anguish. “Oh, why did you tell him? We could have married, lived a lifetime together without anyone ever knowing!”
Old Don Enrique looked long at her, his features drawn. “You knew of this deception, yet you, the daughter of my dearest friend, conspired to keep the truth from me? Why?”
Amethyst flushed, and then she looked the old man in the eye proudly. “Because I love him. If he’s leaving, I’m going with him! I’d give up everything, do you hear me? Everything to be his wife!”
“And you.” Falcon turned to look at Bandit. “You obviously love this girl, yet you now throw it all away, why?”
Bandit paced the floor, ran his hand through his hair. “I don’t know. Maybe deep in my heart, while I have no bloodlines to boast of, I can still behave honorably.”
He hesitated. Now he must tell the worst of it. The old man held a dueling pistol. Would he kill Bandit when it was told? Would Amethyst hate him forever? He glanced down. He wore his own gun tied low, and certainly there was not a gunfighter in all Texas who could outdraw him, much less an elderly man with hands that shook. “Señor,” he said softly, “I am leaving Mexico forever, going back to Texas. But there is one thing I must say before I go.”
“Yes?”
“It hurts me to think you and the señora will keep waiting, hoping, looking for a kidnapped son who will never come again to this ranch.”
The pistol trembled in the old man’s hands. “And what of the old señora? What am I to tell her?”
Bandit shrugged. “I have no good answer. I wish I did. I love her very much. Perhaps you need tell her none of this. Perhaps she need know only that I left on business for Texas and that someday I might return. She hasn’t much time left.”
The old man’s mouth was a grim line. “Barring a miracle, that’s true. All the decisions I make about this, have already made, center on my concern for my dear wife.”
Amethyst stared at him in disbelief, horror sweeping over her. She looked over at the old don.
He leaned for support on his desk, the pistol still clutched in his hand. “Why—why do you tell me this?”
If there was ever a need for a miracle, this was the time. Amethyst’s small hand went to the medallion in her pocket, Bandit’s medal. She clenched it in her fist and prayed frantically as she watched the drama unfold before her.
Bandit paused, shook his head. “He was cheating at cards, señor, something a man of honor—a Falcon—would never do. But then, I suppose being raised by a renegade, he had an outlaw’s morals. If I hadn’t been fascinated by the birthmark on his left hand, I wouldn’t have been studying his hands so closely, might not have seen him cheat.”
“And then you have the dishonor to come take his place?” The old man brought the pistol up suddenly, aiming it at Bandit.
“No! No!” Amethyst threw herself between them, clinging to the Texan. She didn’t think of anything except how much she loved him. “No, Señor Falcon, don’t you see how much bravery, how much honor it takes to confess this to you when he need not ever have told?”
“He killed my son!” The pistol was still aimed at Bandit, but the hand that held it shook. “You are armed, Texan, draw!”
Bandit set Amethyst away from him, out of the line of fire. “Señor Falcon, I will not draw on you.”
“Draw or I will shoot you down where you stand!”
Helplessly, Amethyst looked from one man to the other, clutching the medal, praying feverishly. Holy Mary, Mother of God . . .