by Janet Dailey
“I don’t know,” Angie admitted. “But even if it was, I don’t think Ike Wilson would have been able to get it, considering he was locked in a cell when he wrote this.”
“No, no, no,” Griff inserted impatiently. “I’m not talkin’ about invisible ink. I’m talkin’ about the kind of indentations you make on a paper when you write heavily on another sheet that’s on top of it.”
“Hey, that’s an idea.” Tobe jumped on it. “I used to do that when I was a kid. It would look like there was nothing on the paper. Then you’d go over it with the flat of a pencil and you’d see words.” He slapped Fargo on the shoulder. “I’ll bet he drew a map on the paper, then wrote the letter over it.”
Smiling, Angie shook her head in denial. “I’m sorry I don’t have the original here to show you, but—I promise—Ike didn’t do that. I thought of that, too, and checked a long time ago.”
Griff harrumphed, glanced over the letter again, then gave it a little toss onto the table.
“Let me see it.” Tobe reached for it. “I’ll bet I can figure it out.”
“You do that,” Fargo taunted as Dulcie at last succumbed to her curiosity and slid silently off her chair. She sidled close to her brother and peered at the copy of the famous letter.
“More coffee?” Ima Jane suggested when Fargo drained his cup.
He shoved it away in vague disgust. “Naw, I’ve had all the coffee I can take. I think it’s time for a beer.”
When Ima Jane started to rise, Griff waved her back in the chair. “I’ll get it.”
“I’ll drink it there.” Fargo pushed out of his chair and followed Griff to the bar area. Lifting the metal prosthesis, he laid it on the bar top, wincing a little. “I should have taken this dang thing off and left it in the truck. After a while, it gets to feelin’ like it weighs a ton, and the straps get to chafin’. If I wear it too long, I end up with more galls than a horse with a loose saddle.”
Griff offered no sympathy, just shoved a mug of cold beer to him. Fargo downed a third of it in a couple of long gulps, but it didn’t wash away the heavy dejection that had his shoulders sagging. Bits of froth clung to the tips of his stubby mustache. Turning his head, he wiped it off on the shoulder of his shirt.
“I was sure there’d be something in that letter,” he muttered, then glanced at Griff. “Weren’t you?”
“Who’s to say there isn’t?” His eyes held the sly, hard gleam of something more than mere suspicion.
“You read it,” Fargo protested.
“Who’s to say that’s a copy of the real letter?” Griff flicked a glance at the table. “We’ve only got her word for that.”
“That’s true, but she said—”
Griff cut him off. “I know what she said. But, answer me this: if you had the letter, would you show it to anybody?”
“No.”
“Neither would I. So why did she?” he demanded, throwing another look in her direction. “She doesn’t seem stupid to me.”
“So . . . you think that letter isn’t the real one,” Fargo concluded. “It’s just something she made up herself.”
“Can you think of a better way to throw people off track? To convince them that there aren’t any clues in it?”
Needing to give this whole new idea some thought, Fargo studied the beer’s dwindling suds, then took another drink and lowered the mug with a small, disbelieving shake of his head. “I don’t know, Griff. The way it was written, it sounded authentic.”
“She teaches history,” Griff reminded him. “That’s something she could have read up on—and probably did. For all we know, she might have copied parts of the original just to make it look more convincing.”
The more Griff said, the more sense it made to Fargo. He leaned on the countertop and propped a foot on the black-tarnished brass rail. Looking over his shoulder, he stared toward the letter Tobe held. With each passing second, his doubt of its authenticity grew.
“If that letter’s phony, where’s the real one?” he murmured, voicing the thought that crossed his mind.
“She’s got it with her, you can bet on that.” Succumbing to his obsession for cleanliness, Griff got out a spray bottle of bleach solution and began wiping down the under-the-counter area around the bar sink.
“Probably in her purse,” Fargo decided, watching as Tobe heaved a huge sigh and pushed the letter back to the Sommers woman. “She never lets that bag out of her sight. If she ain’t holdin’ it, it’s in her lap, like now,” he observed, then recalled, “She even had it with her when Luke took her out to show her where the skeleton was found. And they went on horseback.”
“It’s not in the camper.” He spritzed some solution over the ice cooler’s metal lid.
Fargo shot him a narrowed look. “You sound awful sure about that.”
“You were there,” Griff countered. “Did she look the least bit worried about anything being missing to you?”
He thought back, trying to remember. “She looked kinda dazed, upset, in a way.”
“But there sure wasn’t anything frantic about the way she looked to see what was taken. I know because I watched. I’d bet money she didn’t hide it in the camper.” Griff nodded with emphatic certainty.
“You’re probably right about that. I know if I were her, I’d keep it in sight all the time,” Fargo declared, then clammed up when Tobe walked up to the bar and hitched a hip onto the stool next to him.
“Draw me a beer, Griff.” He slumped against the counter, his expression all glum and downcast. “You know, she said that her grandfather complained about being confused by the things in that letter. I can sure see why. You could study on that thing for a week and not know any more than you did when you started. Man, I was so sure I could figure out where that gold was if I ever got my hands on that letter Wilson wrote. Now . . .”
Fargo snorted an amused breath. “Kid, you are not only green, you’re gullible,” he declared and downed another swig of beer.
“Gullible.” Tobe’s head came up, quick to take umbrage.
“That’s what I said.” Fargo exchanged a faint, smug smile with Griff.
“What makes you think I’m gullible?” Tobe challenged, getting angry.
Fargo grinned. “What makes you think that’s the real letter?”
Tobe’s mouth came open as the full inference of the question hit him. A split second later, a spark of hope lit his eyes. Before he regained the power of speech, chair legs scraped and bounced across the floor, drawing the attention of all three men to the table. Griff and Fargo took special note of the way the Sommers woman gripped her purse while sliding its long strap onto her shoulder as she stood.
“I’ll see you in a bit,” she told Ima Jane and started toward the front door.
“No hurry.” Ima Jane smiled with assurance and busied herself with gathering the dirty coffee cups off the table.
“Where’s she goin’?” Griff asked when Ima Jane deposited the cups in the dish cart.
“Who? Oh, you mean Angie.” She glanced at the door now closing behind the redhead. “She’s just going to her camper. She wanted to shower and change before supper, and I convinced her to use the bathroom upstairs.” Ima Jane paused, the line of her mouth tightening in faint disapproval. “I tried to talk her into sleeping in our spare bedroom tonight, but she insists on staying in the camper. Maybe if you said something to her, Griff. I just don’t think it’s safe for her to be alone in that camper, not after the break-in.”
“She’s not goin’ to listen to me,” Griff replied.
“She might. We have to try,” she insisted.
“I’ll try, but she’s goin’ to be just as safe one place as another.”
Ima Jane stared at him in disbelief. “How can you say that after what happened this afternoon?”
“Look.” He leveled his gaze at her, forcing Ima Jane to meet it. “Nobody is goin’ to bother breakin’ into that camper again—not once the word gets out that there’s nothin’ in Wilson’s let
ter but the ramblings of a condemned man.”
“But I thought—” Tobe began, thoroughly confused.
“I suggest you do some more thinkin’ and less talkin’,” Fargo told him, with a warning glance.
Tobe still didn’t understand, but he fell silent just the same and took a drink of the beer Griff set in front of him, irritated at the way people always treated him like a dumb kid.
Chapter Twelve
The setting sun’s golden rays fanned over the western sky, tinting the edges of the scattered clouds. Black smoke poured from the semi’s diesel stack as it roared along the highway, chased by its own giant shadow.
When the town of Glory hove into view, the trucker geared down and glanced at the old geezer slouched against the passenger door. He’d picked the guy up about ten miles back, hoping for some conversation, but beyond stating his destination, the old man hadn’t said two words, just sat there staring out the window, clicking his false teeth together.
“That’s Glory up ahead,” the trucker said loudly, just in case the guy was deaf. He received a nod for an answer and tried again. “Want me to drop you off at the Rimrock?”
“Nope. Let me out on the other side a town.” His mouth barely opened when he talked. As loose as those dentures sounded, the trucker figured they’d fall out if the old man opened his mouth any wider. Maybe in his shoes he wouldn’t be so talkative either, he decided.
The highway went straight through the center of town. The mostly abandoned buildings in the block-and-a-half-long business district blanketed the thoroughfare in shadow. The semi rumbled through it at a slower speed than usual, then rolled to a jerky stop at the corner of the last cross street, brakes squealing and grabbing.
“Here you are.” The cab vibrated with the suppressed power of the idling engine.
Without so much as a “thanks for the ride,” the old man climbed down from the truck, exhibiting surprising spryness for his advanced years. Curious as to his destination, the trucker watched the reflection in the side mirror. But the old man disappeared from sight almost instantly.
Air brakes whooshed and hissed an accompaniment to the grinding of gears as Saddlebags ducked into an alleyway nearly overgrown with weeds. He scurried down it, keeping to the deep shadows. “Fool’s errand, that’s what this is,” he grumbled to himself. “It’s a long walk back if’ n you can’t bum a ride off someone. An’ what for? Nothing, that’s what for.”
The aroma of fried chicken drifted to him before he reached the rear of the Rimrock. He grinned when he saw the back door to the kitchen standing open. He stole close to it, ignoring the flies that swarmed against its screen door, tormented by all the food on the other side of the wire mesh.
Inside the kitchen, an aproned Griff stepped to the charcoal grill and Saddlebags heard the hiss and sizzle of a steak being turned. He tried to remember the last time he’d chewed a piece of meat, but his memory wasn’t that good, and the day was too long ago to recall.
Heat wafted through the screen door, stirred by the oscillating fan whirring at high speed near the grill. Shifting to scan every corner of the kitchen, Saddlebags saw that Griff was its only occupant. He settled back to wait, confident that his vigil would be rewarded.
Sure enough, not five minutes later, Ima Jane pushed through the swinging door and entered the kitchen. Immediately Saddlebags stepped closer to the screen door and tapped on its wooden frame.
Startled, Ima Jane turned and stared in openmouthed surprise when she recognized him. Recovering, she said quickly, “Griff, it’s Saddlebags.”
She hurried to the screen door and pushed it open, her smile bright with a welcome that failed to disguise her curiosity.
“I didn’t expect to see you. Come on in. I’ll bet you’re hungry.” Then she called over her shoulder, “Griff, fix Saddlebags a plate of your beef and noodles.”
His hesitation was slight. It was information Saddlebags wanted, not food, but he wasn’t fool enough to pass up a free meal. He followed her inside and let himself be led to the break table in the corner. By the time he sat down, Griff arrived with a plate mounded with homemade egg noodles in a rich brown gravy dotted with small chunks of tender beef.
Ima Jane produced a set of silverware and a glass of milk, then sank into the chair on his left. “When did you get into town?”
“Just now.” He shoveled some noodles into his mouth. They almost dissolved on contact. “Who was that redhead with McCallister today?”
He felt, rather than saw, her eyes sharpen on him. “That was Angie Sommers. Luke mentioned they had seen you.”
“Sommers.” He rolled the name through his mind and came up empty. “Never heard it.”
“I don’t imagine you have. She only arrived yesterday from Iowa.”
“Iowa.” He shoveled in another mouthful of food, confident that the single-word response would be enough to prime Ima Jane’s pump. Whatever information she had about the redhead, Saddlebags knew she would spill it.
“Yes, it turns out that it was her grandfather’s body they found on the Ten Bar. His name was Henry Wilson. I’m sure you’ve heard of him. He was the grandson of Ike Wilson, the outlaw—the one who came here years ago to search for the gold.”
“Heard of him.” Saddlebags tore off a chunk of bread and sopped it in the noodle gravy. “Before my time, though.”
“We’ve been trying to remember if you came one year later or two.”
“Can’t recall.” He dismissed the subject with a lift of his bony shoulders and never looked up from his plate. “Been too long.”
Disappointed that she hadn’t succeeded in eliciting a more precise answer, Ima Jane sighed. “I suppose it has.”
“Came t’ claim the body, did she?” Gravy dripped on his matted beard when he jammed the sodden bread chunk in his mouth. But he didn’t bother to wipe at it. Whatever table manners he’d learned, he had abandoned them long ago.
Ima Jane nodded. “She’s thinking about taking his remains back to Iowa so he can be buried next to his wife.”
“No point.” His stomach was full, but he continued to stuff the food in his mouth. It was a common practice of primitive man to gorge when there was plenty. It improved the chances of survival during times of want. “They’re dead. They ain’t gonna know it.”
“I swear you men have no romance in your souls,” she declared, with an amused but despairing shake of her head. “I grant you it’s more symbolic than anything else, but it seems fitting that they would be reunited again after all these years.”
He grunted a response and washed down the mouthful of noodles with a swallow of milk, some of it dribbling from his mouth corners.
“I’m glad Luke saw you at the ranch this afternoon.” The statement seemed to come from out of the blue.
But it was the tone of her voice that caught Saddlebags’s ear. It was one that signaled the pump needed a bit more priming for the well to keep flowing.
“Why?” He pushed the word through the fast-dissolving noodles in his mouth.
“Because somebody broke into Angie’s camper while she was at the ranch. Fortunately nothing was taken.” Her gaze was fastened on him in avid anticipation of his reaction. “But we’re all convinced that whoever broke into it was looking for the letter.”
“Letter?” Before he could stop himself, he shot her a quick look.
Her smile was smug with satisfaction. “Yes. The one Ike Wilson wrote to his wife before he was hung. The one everyone thinks might have clues to the gold’s location.”
“She brought it with her?” He scooped up more noodles, using a piece of bread to push them onto the spoon, while he pondered the many implications of that.
“A copy of it. She left the original at home. She says it has historical value completely apart from the missing gold,” Ima Jane explained, much too casually. “Which is just as well because it’s worthless otherwise.”
“You’ve read it?”
“She showed it to all of us earlier. An
d believe me, there’s nothing in it that indicates where the gold is.”
“Why you tellin’ me that? Think I’m gonna knock her over the head and steal it?” He threw her a cold and ugly look.
She recoiled instinctively. “I never said that.”
He cackled at her reaction. “Scared ya, huh?”
“Of course not,” she denied, still a little flustered.
“Not to worry. That letter can’t tell me nothin’ I don’t already know.” He talked through the food in his mouth, his loose dentures clicking and clacking.
He briefly wished he had taken out his teeth before he’d started eating. As soft as these noodles were, he could have easily gummed them.
“How can you be so positive of that when you haven’t seen the letter yourself?” Ima Jane wondered with a mixture of curiosity and vague suspicion.
“Stands t’ reason.” He tipped the milk glass to his mouth and flushed the food into his stomach.
“How?”
“ ’Cause folks claim her grandfather had a copy o’ that letter, an’ he never found the gold.”
“I wonder what happened to his copy,” Ima Jane murmured. “It wasn’t among the things they recovered with the body.”
“That a fact?” There wasn’t much more than two large bites of food left on the plate. As much as he hated to leave it, Saddlebags had the feeling that if he tried to force it down, his stomach would bust open. He pushed the food back and laid a hand across his miserably full belly.
Rising from her chair, Ima Jane reached for his plate. “How about a slice of Griff’s apple pie with some homemade ice cream?”
He shook his head in refusal just as Griff shouted from the grill area, “Your order’s up.”
“Be right there,” she called back, then glanced at Saddlebags. “You sit here and rest. As soon as I get this order delivered, I’ll pack you up some food to take with you.”
He waited until Ima Jane had backed through the swinging door, balancing the serving tray with its food order on one arm. Then he went to work hauling out the kitchen trash. Nobody was ever going to say he took charity. He worked for anything he got.
