Shadow of Legends

by Stephen A. Bly

  “Why on earth do they do that?”

  “Because most of the time we only see you when you sit up here in Forest Hill. And when you walk downtown, you carry yourself like royalty, at least the way I imagine royalty would walk.”

  “I was unaware I walked differently.”

  “It’s a compliment. Really.”

  Rebekah took a sip of very sweet, lukewarm lemonade. “I’m ashamed to admit I don’t even know your name. Here you know all about me.”

  “I go by Abby O’Neill.”

  “I’ve seen the handbills! You’re the star of the current show, aren’t you?”

  “At least one of them. Have you seen any of our productions?”

  “Oh, no. I’m afraid I don’t often go into the badlands. But I read a quite splendid review of it in the Courier.”

  “Yes, well, I am a professional actress and singer. But that’s all. The Gem has a reputation I’m not always proud of. I didn’t know that when I contracted to perform here until September. I have nothing to do with what happens in the private boxes. Do you believe me?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  Abby continued to rock and stare at the roofs along Main Street below them. “You have an incredible view up here. No wonder you like this house. You can see all of Deadwood from your porch, can’t you?”

  Rebekah stood up and gazed around. “Yes, but my one regret is that I can’t see the front of our hardware store from here.”

  Miss Abby O’Neill took a sip of lemonade. “I suppose you’d like to sit up and keep an eye on your husband.”

  “That’s not what I said,” Rebekah stiffened, then shrugged. “But I guess that’s what I meant.”

  “Don’t worry about your Todd . . .”

  My Todd . . . is that how he’s known in the badlands?

  “. . . he’s a treasure. All the girls think so.”

  “I trust they aren’t prospecting.”

  “No, ma’am. Not for your Todd, anyway. He’s the strong, serious type. Does he ever laugh and have a good time?”

  Rebekah stared at the woman.

  “Forgive me,” the actress blurted out. “That was personal and uncalled for. I retract the question.”

  “Well, Miss Abby O’Neill, what can I do for you?”

  “I have a desperate kind of favor to ask. Let me air it out before you turn me down. It’s kind of complicated.”

  “I hope you don’t need me to do something illegal or unbiblical,” Rebekah said, a bit startled at the slight tease in her own voice.

  Miss O’Neill’s eyes tightened, then relaxed. “Oh, no . . . well, not illegal, anyway. I’m not a very good judge on what might be biblical. Here’s the predicament. I have a daughter who’s five years old . . .”

  “Does she live here in town with you?”

  Abby’s eyes dropped to her lap. “Oh, no. At the moment, she lives with my mother in Omaha.”

  The well-dressed woman in the rocker no longer looked like an actress, but more like a worried mother. “I imagine you miss her,” Rebekah probed.

  “Yes, I do. I only contracted for the summer. It didn’t seem right to move her out to the frontier. This is not exactly the kind of place to raise children, if you know what I mean.”

  Rebekah rested her hands on the wooden bench beside her. “I couldn’t agree with you more.”

  “Oh, I don’t mean up here on Forest Hill, Mrs. Fortune. This is a picturesque place to raise a family, I would imagine. You’re up here away from the dust of the street, the shouts of drunks, and the unsavory elements.”

  “It can be a little cramped and confining,” Rebekah added. I suppose it all depends upon what you compare it to. She reached over and patted Abby on the shoulder, “Now, what is this favor you need from me?” Why did I do that? I don’t even know this woman. This is the most relaxed conversation I’ve had with a stranger since moving to Dakota.

  “My mother and my daughter are coming out to visit me. They’ll be here Thursday.”

  Rebekah leaned against the railing of the porch. “I imagine you’re looking forward to that.”

  “Yes and no. I want to see my mother, and I certainly want to be with my little girl . . . but . . .”

  “Do they know you work at the Gem?”

  “They know I act and sing at a theater called the Gem. But they don’t have any idea what goes on inside a theater like that. A theater in the East is not nearly as rough and . . .”

  “Risqué?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’d like for them to never find out?”

  “Exactly.”

  “That does present a problem.”

  “I’ve rented myself a nice room at the Merchant’s Hotel. They’ll stay with me there. We’ll have a good time. They’re only going to be here a few days.”

  “Well, it sounds like you have everything nicely arranged.”

  “All but one thing.”

  “Oh?” Rebekah questioned.

  Abby stood and strolled to the edge of the porch, her back toward the house. Rebekah noticed they were both about the same height. “One thing I wanted to do was to rent a carriage and drive up to that French restaurant in Central City.”

  Rebekah nodded. “It’s a very nice place to eat if you have several hours to finish a meal.”

  “Yes, but here’s the real problem. Amber is only five, and it wouldn’t be good to take her along. The only people I really know in Deadwood live and work at the theater, but that’s not the type of place . . .”

  A wide smile broke across Rebekah’s face. “And you want me to recommend a baby-sitter?”

  Abby swung around, her fingers laced together and pressed to her raspberry-colored lips. “It’s even more impertinent than that. I ­wanted to ask you, personally, to baby-sit.”

  “Me?”

  “I told you it was rather brazen. Could you, please? I’d pay you.” Abby held her breath and pleaded with her eyes.

  “Nonsense. I will not take pay. Yes, I’ll baby-sit one evening for you.”

  A flood of relief broke across the woman’s firm face, and she threw her arms around a reluctant Rebekah and hugged her. “I somehow knew I could count on a Fortune. Your whole family treats people square.”

  Abby stepped back and dropped her embrace. “Sorry about the hug. I’m kind of a demonstrative person.”

  “That’s alright,” Rebekah said. “Now, which night do I need to keep your daughter?”

  “Friday.”

  “Oh, dear . . .”

  “Is there something wrong?”

  “Well, that’s the night of the church Raspberry Festival and Auction.”

  Miss O’Neill bit her lip and clenched her fists. “Perhaps I could change and . . .”

  “No . . . no . . .” Rebekah insisted, “that’s quite alright. You don’t mind if I take your daughter with us to the church social, do you?”

  “Oh, heavens no! That would be wonderful. You really don’t mind?”

  “Of course not. Just let me know what time you need to drop her off.”

  “I’ll leave word with Dacee June at the store,” Miss O’Neill suggested.

  “You know Dacee June?”

  “I don’t think there’s a man, woman, or coyote in the Black Hills that doesn’t know Miss Dacee June Fortune. And she certainly knows everyone. She knows when they arrive, when they depart, and who they saw while in town.”

  “I didn’t realize she was that notorious.”

  “Most of the girls at the theater agree that if we could live our teenage years over, we’d all like to be Dacee June.”

  “She does seem to enjoy life . . .”

  “Without sinning.” Abby turned back to gaze across the gulch. “Having fun without sinni
ng. That’s not an easy combination to sustain, especially in Deadwood.”

  Rebekah fidgeted with her fingers. “I believe that’s our challenge wherever we live. Some have trouble with one element more than the other, I believe.”

  “And that’s where we’re different, aren’t we?” Abby laughed. “I have trouble not sinning . . . and you have trouble having fun.”

  Rebekah bit her lip. I hardly know this woman and she’s judging my life? I certainly know how to have fun! She felt her shoulders slump. At least, I think I remember.

  “I talk too much. It’s the actress in me. I’m always trying to get in another line. I’m a little nervous and I ramble on when I’m nervous.”

  “You’re nervous about your mother and daughter coming to visit you.”

  “Yes, and I’ve got one more favor to ask you. I write to my mother twice a week and tell her about things in Deadwood. Well, sometimes there isn’t much I want to report on in my world, so I take some item out of the newspaper and tell her those things as if I had overheard it at the café. She has this idea that I know most of the folks up here on Forest Hill.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with reporting the news.”

  Abby puffed out her cheeks and released her breath slowly. “Would you have lunch with me, my mother, and my daughter at the Grand Central Hotel? I’ll pay of course, and could you, sort of, pretend that we’re friends? I don’t want to have to admit to them how lonely this kind of life really is.”

  “Only if you’ll let me pay for my own meal,” Rebekah insisted. Lonely? This woman and I have a lot more in common than I ever imagined.

  “Why?”

  “Because when friends go out to eat they usually pay for their own meal.”

  “Oh . . . yes! I don’t know which is more audacious . . . my demands . . . or your generosity. You are a very gracious lady.” Abby’s green eyes bounced in such a way that the makeup-covered creases next to them seemed to melt. “When I first came to town, a girl named Sawnah told me that not all the fortunes of Deadwood were hidden in the ground. Now I know what she meant.”

  “This is a very small, isolated town. I believe we should all help each other out if we can.”

  “Yes, I know what you mean, and if there’s anything I can ever do for you . . . ?”

  “I can think of one thing,” Rebekah replied.

  “You can? What is it? I’ll do it.”

  “It’s just as presumptuous as your requests.”

  “Really? How delightful. That way I won’t feel so guilty at my demands.”

  “You haven’t heard the request.”

  “It’s not illegal or unbiblical, is it?” Abby grinned.

  Rebekah joined in the laughter. “We’re beginning to sound like good friends. Abby, do you have a shawl or a wrap that goes with that beautiful dress?”

  “Oh yes, and a hat, too.”

  “May I . . . may I borrow them for the Raspberry Festival at the church?”

  The actress reached over and clutched both of Rebekah’s hands. “Yes, of course! Would you like the golden-heeled slippers, too?”

  “I think the dress, shawl, and hat will be wonderful.”

  “Oh, this is so grand . . . I’ll just say, ‘Mother, my friend, Mrs. Fortune, needs to borrow my dress.’ That sounds like we’re good friends, doesn’t it?”

  “Not if you call me Mrs. Fortune. You’ll have to call me Rebekah. Shall I call you Abby?”

  The actress wrinkled her nose. “Could you call me Abigail? Until I came to Deadwood, I was always called Abigail. My mother is not too fond of Abby. She says it reminds her of a convent.”

  “You’ll be Abigail. I’ll be Rebekah. What’s your daughter’s name?”

  “Amber. She’s a very bright girl. She can read and she’s only five.”

  “Abigail, I think I need to ask you a personal question. If we are to be old friends, I need to know something about Amber’s father.”

  The smile dropped from Abigail’s face. “What do you need to know?”

  “Is he alive? Where does he live? Those kinds of things.”

  “As far as I know, he’s alive. I have no contact with him, but I imagine he still lives in Chattanooga.”

  “Were the two of you . . . ?”

  “Married? Oh, yes. Dr. and Mrs. Philip Gordon Jr.”

  “Doctor?” Rebekah couldn’t keep her hand from flying to cover her mouth. “Your husband was a doctor?”

  “Rebekah Fortune, you do look shocked. He’s a doctor. But he’s not my husband anymore. He divorced me when I ran off with Amber.”

  “You ran off? Did he mistreat you?”

  Abigail looked away. “This is getting personal, isn’t it?”

  “How good a friend do you want me to be?”

  “He didn’t hit me, if that’s what you mean.” This time she stared Rebekah in the eyes. “After the first few months, he just ignored me completely. In a big house full of servants I was consumed with loneliness and boredom. I’m an actress. He knew that when he married me. He wouldn’t even let me go to a theater.”

  “So you just left him?”

  “I cried, begged, pleaded, prayed, and threatened to try to get him to change. He would call me immature, unreasonable. About a year after Amber was born, we left.”

  “There was no way to reconcile?”

  “When he started bringing women into our home for ‘consultations’ and locking the study door behind them, I decided we should leave.”

  “Have you seen him since?”

  “No.”

  “Has Amber?”

  “No. He doesn’t even write to her or anything.”

  “What do you tell her about her father?”

  “What can I tell her? If she asks, I lie. I say he is a kind man who has many important things to do, but we’re not one of them.”

  “You’ll have to tell her the truth someday.”

  “I know, and God help me when I do.”

  “He’ll help you, Abigail.”

  “I know that. God has never run away from me, no matter how many times I’ve run away from Him.”

  “I do believe you and I can be friends.”

  “When do you want me to send up this dress?”

  “Whenever it’s convenient,” Rebekah said.

  “You might want to stitch it in a place or two,” Abigail offered.

  “Would you mind?”

  “A good friend like you?” the actress grinned. “Of course not.”

  On some days the seventy-two stair steps from the end of Wall Street straight up the gulch to Williams Street seemed hardly a challenge at all to Todd Fortune.

  This was not one of those days.

  A sharp sting blazed up his right leg. It originated at his ankle and concluded with a knotted muscle in the back of his thigh. Each step began the cycle again, and by the time he reached the front door of his Forest Hill home, he was ready to collapse. The sun had long since dropped behind the hill. It was hot, but scattered clouds stacked up in the west and teased of a lightning storm. Kerosene lamps flickered up and down the gulch as he glanced back down the steps and caught his breath.

  Rebekah’s right about one thing. Rapid City is a lot flatter. I’ve almost forgotten what it would be like to walk home on level ground. ’Course, a ranch in Texas would be fairly flat, and I wouldn’t have to do much walking.

  Rebekah swung open the front door. “Are you going to just stand at my door, waiting like a teenage boy who doesn’t have nerve to knock?”

  “Evenin’, Darlin’.” Todd pulled off his hat and ran his fingers through his light-brown hair. “Guess I was catching my breath.”

  “My goodness!” she gasped. “What happened to you? Your coat is torn! You’re covered with d
irt! You didn’t get run over by a stagecoach, did you?”

  He jammed his boot heel into the black iron bootjack shaped like a giant beetle and pulled off one boot, then the other. “I took a tumble when we captured those stagecoach outlaws. Then I strained my leg when we unloaded those freight wagons.”

  Rebekah tried brushing off his coat sleeve with her hand. “Dacee June came up and provided a full report of the arrest. I understand Daddy Brazos shot one of the men.”

  “That he did.” Todd followed his wife into the house.

  “Todd, that’s part of what I tried to explain at lunch. This is a dangerous place to live. You could have been hurt! What if you had been caught in the crossfire?”

  “That was a real possibility,” he recounted.

  She walked into the kitchen. “How did you get so dirty? I’ll try to brush your suit out and mend it, but it will never be the same. Just place it there in the pantry.”

  Todd hung the coat on a peg above a burlap sack of potatoes, pulled off his tie, then unfastened the top button on his soiled white shirt. I don’t think she’d understand that I had to dive off an embankment to avoid getting shot by my father. “Well, we had them penned down, and as I went down to the road, I stumbled off an embankment.”

  “You had no business going out there. They could have taken care of it on their own, I’m sure.”

  Todd sighed. “I keep having people tell me that. They seem to insinuate that I’m not of much value other than running a store. The truth is, those old men would still be chasing the outlaws if I hadn’t cut off their retreat.”

  Rebekah stared into his eyes, then finally spoke, her voice much softer. “I didn’t mean to sound so crabby. I worry, that’s all. An attempted stagecoach robbery is not worth getting yourself killed over.” She hugged his shoulders, then reached up on tiptoes to kiss his cheek. He held her face in his rough hands and pressed his lips to hers.

  “Well,” she laughed after the kiss, “I’m glad to see you are making a speedy recovery. I hope you’re hungry for onion soup.”

  “Sounds fine, as long as I don’t have to hike up a hill to get it.”

  “Do you need some rubbing alcohol on that bum leg?” she asked.