Silken Dreams

by Bingham, Lisa

  Dropping the papers, he jammed the lid over the box. Then he grasped his hat, rifle, and a box of shells, and he strode out into the black of the night.

  Ethan crouched low in the shadows around the bank, listening for the slightest noise that might be out of place in the darkness. When only the lazy chirp of the crickets punctuated the silence, he moved around the back of the bank to the side alley. Taking a long metal file from his pocket, he inserted it into the keyhole, nudging slightly until he managed to twist the lock and open the door.

  Glancing over his shoulder, Ethan slipped inside and closed the door behind him, then stood to full height. For a moment he paused, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the blackness of the interior. His heart raced in a heady combination of exhilaration and dread as he was rushed by the familiar scents and shadows of a night-cloaked bank office. Not for the first time, he found himself grateful that he’d given up this kind of a life. And if his hunches were correct and the man imitating him appeared tonight, he could give up this kind of life for good.

  Slipping his revolver from its holster, Ethan crept into the bank, looking for a place to hide until the thief made his own appearance. He was nearly halfway through the front lobby when he halted and became still. He thought he’d heard something: a mere whisper of a sound that was out of place.

  Changing directions, Ethan crept toward the door of the office, crouching low so that his shadow would not be seen from the windows surrounding the cubicle. Slowly, cautiously, his hand closed around the doorknob and he opened the door a crack, wincing at the slight creaking noise.

  A split second later, Ethan realized that the thief had already been there. The doors to the safe hung open, the shelves lay bare, and the overpowering stench of kerosene cloaked the tiny office and rose to assault Ethan’s lungs.

  Standing up, Ethan took only a moment to gaze into the office. Through eyes that watered and stung, he glanced down, seeing the shape of Silas Gruber’s blood-soaked body. A searing curse rose in Ethan’s mind, but he bit it back, realizing he’d just walked into a trap.

  A burst of panic shot through his body and he whirled to race from the room, but before he could take three steps, something heavy crashed over the top of his head and he felt himself crumpling to the ground.

  For a moment, the bank was silent.

  Then a figure in black stepped forward and gazed down at Ethan’s body. “Krupp said you would come,” the thief murmured, then dropped an iron bar to the ground and grasped Ethan McGuire by the heels. “I guess you weren’t as smart as everyone thought.”

  Once Ethan’s body had been positioned by the front door, the thief grunted in relief, then stepped outside to retrieve another container of kerosene and a white vellum calling card.

  The thief smiled in secret pleasure. Tonight, Ethan McGuire and the Gentleman Bandit would die forever in the blaze of the Madison City Thrift and Loan.

  The stench of kerosene clawed at the back of Silas Gruber’s throat, causing him to struggle to consciousness. Blackness surrounded him. A grasping, heavy blackness filled with the stark odors of sweat and fear.

  He gasped and coughed. Biting back the whimper that rose in his throat, Silas reared his cheek away from the splintered wood of the floor. A searing pain shot from a point behind his ear to the center of his skull, threatening to plunge him once again into unconsciousness. If only he had waited for the Gentleman outside. But no, like a fool, he’d waited in his own office, thinking the darkness would conceal him.

  Clenching his jaw to still the unmanly sobs that seemed to tumble loose from his throat, Silas squeezed his eyes shut, trying to focus his mind on something other than the pain: the accolade he would receive for apprehending the Gentleman and his wife.

  Natalie.

  After tonight, she’d never let him live down the debacles of his career. She’d never believe that he had done it all for her. For Natalie…

  With her name filling his head like a tangled litany, Silas’s eyes opened and he reached out, sliding his left hand across the rough floorboards. Even in the pitch black of the night, he could see the oily sheen of his own blood, could sense the rasping grate of the crushed ribs in his chest. But he was a desperate man. Desperate and frightened.

  Clawing at the floor, he slid his body forward, inch by agonizing inch, praying all the while that the black-garbed figure would not return. An almost hysterical bark of laughter burst from between his clenched teeth. How many times had he assured himself that he would know just what to do if the Gentleman returned? How many times had he contemplated the beating he’d give the thief responsible for his loss of position and wealth and his wife’s disfavor? Yet when the moment had come, Silas had seen nothing, heard nothing, done nothing.

  Silas’s laughter became a jagged sob. His head sank to rest on the floor, and he panted for breath. The fingers of Silas’s left hand once again moved to claw a path forward, while those of his right clenched miserably around his prize: the black neckerchief of the figure who had caught him unawares. He had no doubts that the thief had been the Gentleman, and he had to get outside… had to warn Krupp… had to…

  Silas’s hand reached out again, then froze. His fingers had not encountered the rough boards of the floor, but a smoothly polished boot. He fearfully raised his head. In the darkness, he saw nothing but a solid ebony shape within the blackness of the bank office. Then the figure took a step back, opening the door that led to the side alley bordering the bank and the Mercury Saloon. A weak, blue-gray wash of starlight slipped over the figure’s unguarded features.

  “Goodbye, Gruber,” the shadow whispered.

  Silas’s eyes squinted in the darkness. That voice. That—

  The shadow moved again. A match rasped against the doorframe and flared to life. Silas’s head reared, and he tried to push himself upright. Recognition and panic shuddered through him, along with the pain.

  Then the figure flicked the match from gloved fingers.

  Silas watched in horror as the tiny whisper of light arced through the blackened building toward the puddle of kerosene in the corner by the safe. The door closed. The match fell.

  “Nooo!”

  The night filled with the whooshing breath of fire.

  At the rush of heat and smoke, Ethan coughed and struggled to consciousness. “Lettie?” he rasped, then winced at the pain thundering at the back of his head. Opening his eyes, he came face-to-face with a licking trail of flame eating its way toward him.

  Ignoring the searing pain of his own body, Ethan lifted himself, intent upon reaching the door. But when he saw the dark shape of another body, he crawled toward the man, reaching out to turn him onto his back.

  A shudder of recognition raced through Ethan’s body when he found himself staring into Silas Gruber’s wild eyes. Memories came pounding to the fore, and with them a shimmering realization. Five years before, Ethan’s last heist had been in Chicago, where Gruber had served as director to the Chicago Mortgage and Thrift. And although Ethan had never personally seen the man, he’d followed the publicity, heard about the scandal that had ensued. Because of his lackadaisical security, Gruber had been demoted and sent to another bank in…

  Madison.

  Silas Gruber’s eyes widened in mutual recognition. His face suddenly became fierce, and he reached out to grasp Ethan’s shirt with a bloody hand. “Damn you,” he growled. “You did this to me. You—” His words suddenly stopped and his brow creased in confusion. “You aren’t… the one…” he muttered, almost to himself.

  Ethan grew still at the man’s words. “Who did this, Gruber?” he demanded. “Who’s responsible?”

  But the man didn’t seem to hear him. Instead, his eyes grew dull, seeming to look in upon himself. “I paid Krupp to kill you… hated you.” His fingers tightened, pulling Ethan toward him. “After what you did to me … I would have done anything. Anything!” He gasped and squeezed his eyes shut against the pain. The fire roared closer and hotter, but Ethan found himself unab
le to move until he knew the truth. “Krupp… Star. For a price, he will arrange… murder.”

  Ethan glanced beyond Gruber at the licking flames. From the moment he’d seen Silas’s face, he’d guessed that Gruber was the man he’d overheard talking to Krupp weeks before. Now he had his proof. But that didn’t explain who had been impersonating the Gentleman Bandit. It was obvious that Gruber had thought it was Ethan McGuire.

  Gruber cried out, and his fingers grew lax. Bending toward him, Ethan demanded over the hiss and crack of the fire, “Who did this? You realize they meant to kill us both tonight. Who?”

  Gruber’s eyes flicked open, but Ethan knew his mind was in the past. “I killed … Jeb … for Krupp.” A gurgling chuckle bubbled from his throat. “Discovered I didn’t have the… nerve to kill a man… I meant to wound him…” His fingers clenched. “Just… wound him…” His lips twitched. “But the blast … set it wrong … it finished the job…”

  “Damn you, who—” Ethan’s words died and he straightened, realizing he was talking to a dead man.

  He coughed. The flames licked closer, filling the air with a cloying smoke and the rushing crackle of timber being consumed. Knowing that he, too, would be a dead man if he didn’t get out of the bank immediately, Ethan reached out and belly-crawled toward the front door. He lifted a hand to the doorknob, only then realizing he couldn’t get out without a key. The fire roared behind him, growing hotter and searing his skin. There was no time to pick the lock.

  Swearing to himself, Ethan growled and pushed himself to his feet. Grasping a chair from beside the door, he threw it through the plate-glass window, then, holding a hand over his face, lunged into the night.

  The impetus of his movements threw him forward, and he stumbled and fell to the ground. He moaned when sharp bits of glass dug into his clothes and skin, but the relief from the scalding heat of the flames overshadowed his pain. Trying to gather his strength, Ethan dragged sweet, gulping lungfuls of air into his chest, then straightened, intent upon escaping before the law rode hell-bent toward him.

  The snap of a rifle being cocked split the night and Ethan froze, slowly lifting his head. When he found himself pinned beneath the sights of Jacob Grey’s weapon, he took a deep breath, coughed, then reluctantly lifted his hands in surrender.

  Jacob didn’t speak. He merely walked toward him and clamped a set of irons around his wrists, then gestured for Ethan to follow him in the direction of the jail. Behind him, the bank shrieked in a sudden explosion of fire.

  The figure in black rode toward the outskirts of town. As if already certain of the way, the horse followed the commands of its master and veered away from the road. Slowly, quietly, the animal threaded through the trees before coming to a stop at the end of the weed-infested drive leading up the abandoned Johnston farmhouse.

  After only a moment, the thief was joined by another figure. Moonlight glinted off Judge Krupp’s silver hair, giving him the appearance of a jovial grandfather or an ancient sage.

  “Well?” he asked quietly.

  The thief smiled. “I did everything just as you told me, then emptied the safe, just for the hell of it.”

  “What about—”

  “McGuire? Dead.”

  “And Gruber?”

  “Dead.”

  Krupp lifted a brow in surprise. “I’m impressed.”

  “You should be.”

  His own lips twitched in a suggestion of a smile. “You’d best head back into town.”

  “In a minute.” The thief turned in the saddle and gazed back at the yellow glow beginning to tinge the edge of the horizon. “It’s really too bad, you know—about the bank, I mean.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “They’ll never find my calling card in the rubble.”

  Krupp snorted in ironic humor. “They’ll find two bodies and assume the thief was caught in his own blast. Don’t you think that’s calling card enough?”

  “I suppose it will have to be.”

  The clamor of the town bell rose eerily from the distance, and the judge stiffened. “Damn,” he muttered, almost to himself.

  “It’s just because of the fire.”

  “The bell’s too fast, too regular. Almost as if—” He twisted in his saddle to glare at the thief. “As if a murderer had been caught.” His eyes narrowed. “Or a thief.”

  “No! He was dead. I know he was!”

  “Dammit, you’d better hope so! Otherwise both of us could be in a hell of a lot of trouble.”

  Jacob whirled to face Gerald Stone, slamming his fist onto his desk in emphasis. “The man is within my jurisdiction and he will be held within my jail until he can be brought to speedy trial!”

  “You had your orders, Jacob. If you managed to apprehend Ethan McGuire, you were supposed to take him to the farmhouse.”

  “I caught the man crashing through the plate-glass window of the Madison Thrift and Loan. Since Krupp’s men evidently left before the appointed hour, I was alone and found myself forced to apprehend him without help.”

  “Dammit! You’ve created an awkward situation, Grey. This man was supposed to be turned over to the Star.”

  “The Star, hell! Where was the Star when I needed someone to cover my ass?”

  “Nevertheless—”

  “The Star blew their chance to execute McGuire without drawing suspicion to themselves. Now it’s a matter for the courts.”

  “Courts!”

  “No jury in the world would acquit him. It’s simply a matter of linking him to the other crimes. Then Ethan McGuire will be punished through due process.”

  “Due process?” Stone repeated in disbelief. “The man is guilty! You know that, I know that—hell, the whole town knows that. If you weren’t able to take him to the farmhouse, why didn’t you plant a bullet through his head?”

  “If I’d done that, the whole town would have known within an hour that I was a member of the Star.”

  “There are ways to cover up your involvement.”

  “I wasn’t about to undermine my own authority here by exposing myself in that way.”

  “This is the same man who murdered your friend!”

  “Jeb Clark would have backed me in my actions.”

  “Clark was a member of the Star. He would have followed orders.” Stone strode toward the front window and gestured toward the crowd lining the opposite boardwalk. “Do you see them, Grey? Those men have lost everything in that bank—some of which will never be recovered. They aren’t looking for law and order, they’re looking for—”

  “Justice?”

  “Damn right. And the only justice they’ll see will be found in McGuire’s death. Those men are out for blood.”

  Jacob regarded his friend through narrowed eyes. “And so, it seems, is the Star. Why are you so all fired up to see the man shot? He’ll meet his just deserts in time.”

  “The man is guilty. You said that yourself. You’re simply tying up time and money that will end with a bullet in his head anyway. What would it have mattered if you’d shot the man?”

  “I would have been taking the law into my own hands.”

  “You’re a member of the Star.”

  “That doesn’t make it lawful.”

  “We are the law, dammit!”

  “Then why can’t you see that I had to bring him into custody? If I’d shot the man without at least making an effort to bring him to trial, my authority would have been in jeopardy in this town. This time the lawful order of things had to be obeyed.”

  Stone pointed to the crowd. “Those men aren’t going to care whether the court damns him first or if he just ends up dead.”

  “I say it matters. And I’m the one who is responsible and ultimately to blame,” Jacob repeated stubbornly.

  “Don’t be a fool, Jacob. The Star—”

  “The Star is not responsible for upholding the law in this town. I am.”

  “Then turn the man over to me.”

  A heavy beat of silence pounded i
n the crowded office. “What?” Jacob asked in disbelief.

  “Turn the man over to me. Notify the town that McGuire can’t get a fair trial in Madison. Once the man is in my custody, the Star can take care of matters without endangering your position here.”

  Jacob hesitated.

  “It will work,” Stone added smoothly. “And no one will ever know you’re turning the man over to the Star for execution.”

  Jacob stared at the man before him, taking in his earnest expression and the cajoling cast of his features. His stomach churned sickeningly as he studied Stone’s eager expression. “I’ll think about it,” he finally conceded.

  Stone’s features hardened for a moment in displeasure. He threw Jacob a stern glance and swept his hat onto his head. “It’s the only way, Jacob. The Star has already made a decision on McGuire’s guilt. To buck its authority would only prove to be a mistake.”

  “Maybe. But I’m the one who has to decide if it’s a mistake I can live with.”

  “Just don’t take too long in deciding, Grey. An awful lot of things can happen to a man when—”

  “Don’t threaten me, Stone,” Jacob inserted in a low voice. “And don’t you dare threaten my family.” He leaned forward on the desk in emphasis. “I’m not as stupid or trusting as some of your other members—and you should have known that long before now. I’ll act within my own conscience. And if anything should happen to me or my kin, arrangements have already been made that will uncover the entire network of the Star.”

  Stone seemed to pale. “You took a blood oath.”

  “That was before you started making threats.”

  Stone’s face settled into a mask of fury, but he knew he would get no farther with Jacob. “Make your decision, Jacob. I’ll be back at nightfall.” Jamming his hat onto his head, he threw one last hard glance in the other man’s direction, then stormed out of the office.

  Stone wove his way through the crowd of onlookers, then swung across the street and climbed onto the boardwalk just in front of the china shop. Taking a quick glance around him, he joined Judge Krupp.