.45-Caliber Desperado (26 page)

To satisfy his curiosity, he pounded on the heavy door twice with his rifle butt, then looked in the window left of the door.

Abandoned all right. There were three cells comprised of banded steel cages at the back of the place. There were cots in only two of the cells. Aside from a few curled, yellowed wanted posters on one wall, where a desk had apparently once sat, the place was empty of all furnishings.

Spurr wasn't surprised. He hadn't figured on finding a lawman here in Diamondback. Most towns this far off the beaten track couldn't afford lawmen. They usually relied on the irregular services of a county sheriff or a sheriff's deputy from the county seat. If the county in which Diamondback lay even had a seat. The courthouse might only be a saloon somewhere, the law enforcement being handled by remote cavalry outposts or by passing deputy U.S. marshals like Spurr himself.

No, Spurr hadn't figured on finding any help here, but now that it indeed appeared that Diamondback was without a marshal or even a constable, he felt a twinge of apprehension.

He stepped down off the boardwalk and into the street, casting his squint-eyed gaze eastward toward the Diamondback Hotel. He'd be alone against the gang—if the de Cava bunch was indeed who the newcomers were. He could no longer rely on the backing of Sheriff Mason. The only help he was likely to get was from Captain Wilson and his troopers at the outpost, but he'd seen no sign as yet of the captain, who might have gotten held up in any number of ways. Spurr knew from past experience that army outposts were not only often small and remote but unreliable. He'd known many that had been wiped out by the desertions of their garrisons.

Wilson might be waiting for a summons from Spurr. The old marshal knew that Diamondback was equipped with a telegraph, though he'd not yet seen any lines. He'd find the office soon, after he'd checked on Mason, and see about sending a telegram to Wilson. He'd have the man make his way to Diamondback pronto with as many troopers as he had in his arsenal.

Back in his prime, he might have taken on seven or eight men alone. He wasn't that stupid anymore. Nor capable, he mused dryly, nibbling his mustache as he swung away from the hotel and tramped eastward up First Street, resting his old Winchester on his sagging shoulder and keeping his gloved index finger curled through the triggerguard.

The Dickinson house came into view behind wavering curtains of tan dust above which he could see the washed-out blue of the sky.

Hard to tell what time it was, but it was likely getting on in the afternoon. Night soon. Even if the wind lightened, the de Cava bunch would stay here in Diamondback until tomorrow morning. No point riding after dark, though that they were making hard for the border was obvious. If they headed out before help arrived for Spurr, the old lawman would continue to dog their trail and wait for help. Maybe he'd even figure a way to take them down one by one or two by two, until he had the entire gang six feet under.

Noting a chill adding to the wind's bite, Spurr walked up to the house's front door and knocked twice. Since Mrs. Dickinson and the birdlike Mrs. Winters were likely still with Mason, he went ahead and stepped inside.

“Ah, there you are, Mr. Spurr.” Mrs. Dickinson stood in the open doorway just beyond the foyer, on the left side of the short hall. There was a range and an eating table behind her, and a teakettle was starting to whistle.

Spurr moved inside and closed the door. “Howdy, ma'am.” Quickly, awkwardly—the neat, little house made him feel big and unwieldy, for some reason—he doffed his hat and looked at the woman regarding him expectantly, long-fingered hands intertwined in front of her slender waist, beneath the high, proud bosom. “I figured you'd be with Mason.”

“He's fine. Resting now due to the chloroform.”

“You work fast.”

“I have a lot of experience as of a couple years ago. When there were more miners and cowpunchers around, we had a booming business, my husband and me.” She hiked a shoulder. “Besides, the bullet wasn't deep. It must have been a ricochet, and when it struck the sheriff, it bounced off the side of a rib. Came right out.”

“What's the prognosis?”

“Oh, I imagine he'll be up and around by tomorrow. I don't recommend that he stray too far from bed, though, for several days. A week would be best.” She hooked a thumb to indicate behind her, where the steam kettle was whistling in earnest. “Would you care for some tea, Mr. Spurr?”

She did not wait for his response but swung around and strode into the kitchen, her muslin skirt swishing about her long legs. Spurr couldn't help taking a quick appraisal of her full, round ass, then found himself blushing when she glanced at him sidelong as she removed the teapot from the stove lid. She kept one eye on him and arched her brow with apparent, albeit subtle, reproof.

Shit, she'd caught him. You'd think he'd learn . . .

“No, ma'am. No, thank you,” he said, feeling the warmth in his sand-blasted cheeks as he let his gaze crawl like a truckling dog across the polished hardwood floor. “I'd best look into a hotel room somewheres . . .”

“No need for that, Mr. Spurr.”

He looked up at her as she poured steaming water into a delicate china teapot adorned with painted daffodils. “Say again, ma'am?”

“You can bed down here, with your friend. At least, I assume you're friends though under the chloroform Sheriff Mason cursed your name several times.” Mrs. Dickinson gave him that penetrating sidelong glance once more, and her lips spread a bemused half smile as she sprinkled dried tea leaves from a tin canister into the teapot.

Spurr brushed a gloved hand across his nose. “He did, did he?”

“Come on in and sit down. There's only one hotel in Diamondback, and it's way on the other side of town.”

Spurr felt like a bull in a china shop, but he couldn't very well head across town and try to secure a room in the same hotel as the de Cava gang—if they were the de Cava gang, which they likely were. But he could bed down in a livery barn, which was what he'd do when he'd had a rest. His feet were sore from all the walking he'd just done, and the wind was hard on a man with a weak pumper.

“I reckon I'd have a sip of tea,” he allowed, lowering his rifle and looking around for a place to put it. The house was so neat and orderly and crisply papered and painted, he was worried about damaging something, even of scuffing the floor with his hide-bottomed moccasins.

“If you'd prefer coffee, it wouldn't take long . . .”

He hesitated, finally leaning his rifle in a corner near the front door, holding both hands out in case it slid down the wall, scratching the mauve wallpaper with gold vases of cattails imprinted on it. “No, no—tea's fine.”

He strode into the kitchen, making sure not to brush his clothes on the walls or door casing.

She'd set the teapot on the table covered by a white tablecloth embroidered with red roses and green leaves. Now she went to an open, white cupboard above a dry sink, and pulled down two china cups and saucers that matched the teapot.

“What brings you to Diamondback, Mr. Spurr?” She looked at him as she carried the cups and saucers to the table and dropped her eyes to the badge on his chest, partly concealed by his vest. “Or is it . . . Marshal Spurr?”

“Just Spurr's fine. Thank you, ma'am.” He closed his hand over a chair back but his moccasins seemed glued to the floor. He was staring at the delicate china, hoping against hope he wouldn't break it. Maybe he should skip the tea, head on over to the livery barn.

“I reckon law business brought me and the sheriff to your fair town.”

“Sit down, sit down.” She was pouring tea into one of the cups, holding the lid on with the third finger of her other hand. “Can I ask you what kind of business?”

“I'd rather not say at the moment.”

He'd known the woman only a few minutes. He thought he could trust her not to spread the word that he was here, after the de Cava gang, but he hadn't nearly outlived his ticker by throwing caution to the wind. He slid the chair at one end of the table out carefully and sagged into it even more carefully.

“I would ask you where you telegraph office is, though, ma'am. I'd like to send a telegram to the soldiers out to Hackberry Creek.”

“Just south of town, on the other side of the creek. Homer Constiner has a little shack out there that was supposed to be a train depot, when a spur line was considering running a track through Diamondback. Those plans, of course, went the way of the gold, the rain, and everything else out here.”

Spurr removed his deerskin gloves, set them down beside his cup and saucer, hoping he wasn't littering the table with too much sand and dust, and wrapped his hand, or as much of it as possible, around the teacup. He lifted it slowly to his lips.

He couldn't remember if he'd ever drunk from any vessel as small and delicate as this. When in hell would he have had the opportunity? He didn't care for it. In fact, as he lifted the steaming brew to his lips, he felt himself growing irritated that anyone would fashion a cup so small and obviously fragile.

Wasn't life, for chrissakes, difficult enough?

He tried to close his upper lip over the rim of the cup but his mustache got in the way. He hadn't trimmed it in a month of Sundays so it had become a soup-strainer without his knowing.

“Christ,” he grumbled, glancing over the cup at the woman sitting across from him.

She was watching him, a bemused twinkle in her large, brown eyes.

“Uh . . . sorry.”

“I do apologize for the cup, Spurr.”

“It's no problem.” He applied a little more pressure to push the rim between his lips, and drew about a half-teaspoon of the tea into his mouth, let the sour-tasting brew roll back over his tongue, and swallowed. “Ooh,” he said, smacking his lips. “That's right good.”

“I'd be happy to make you a cup of coffee.”

“No, it's good.”

Spurr took another sip and set the cup back down in the saucer, wincing at the too-loud clink of china on china.

The woman was gazing at him obliquely over the rim of her own cup, which she held in both her fine hands, and he couldn't tell what she was thinking. To break the pause, he looked around the kitchen that appeared bright, clean, and happy despite the dull gray-tan light angling through the room's two windows that the wind rattled in their frames. “You live all alone here, eh? Do all the doctorin' by your lonesome?”

Mrs. Dickinson nodded as she swallowed a sip of her tea and set the cup down in its saucer. “The house isn't worth much here, I'm afraid. I'll hold on to it as long as I can. As long as there is some doctoring to do. I've had to cut my expenses since my husband died, of course, but I'm comfortable here. I do have some family in Ohio, but all those I was close to are now passed.”

She'd said it very matter-of-factly, without a trace of self-pity. Spurr was cheered by the warmth in the woman's pretty eyes. She smoothed out a small wrinkle in the tablecloth with her right hand and gave him something close to a shy smile. “Do you have a woman, Spurr?”

“Me?” Spurr said. “Nah. No woman.” He thought of Abilene, but he didn't consider her his. She belonged to no man, and that's how he liked it. That's probably how he would like it even after they both went to Mexico together, if they ever got that far. “Oh, I been married. Three times, in fact. It wasn't right for me, ma'am.”

“How long have you been marshaling?”

“Longer than I care to remember. Soon done, though. After this here . . . well, after I head back to Denver, I'm gonna turn this hunk of copper in to my boss, Chief Marshal Henry Brackett, collect my time, and head south with a gal I know. If'n she'll ride with me. I think she will, but . . .” He chuckled wryly. “Women are notional.”

“Yes, we are.”

“Well, maybe you aren't,” he said, backing water.

“Oh, no—I am, too.” She sipped her tea once more and favored him with a penetrating stare that fairly seared his own, wind-burned eyes. “And this is my current notion, marshal. Why don't you let me heat water so you can take a bath and get some of that trail dust and grime off of you. And then I'll make you supper, and you can spend the night right here, in my spare bedroom. It's all very neat and clean, and the mattress is stuffed with goose down. It's been slept in maybe a total of three times.”

She let her voice trail off when she saw the curious cast to Spurr's own, lilac-blue gaze. Lowering her own eyes demurely, she ran her hand over the wrinkle in the tablecloth again, and said, “I don't mean to be forward, Marshal. I'll admit it gets lonely here. I do miss the ministrations of a strong man. The touch and the warmth of a strong man. But I am not a charlatan.”

She lifted her eyes to his once more, and there was a boldness and sincerity there, as well as a haunting sort of mad lonesomeness, that was like a razor-edged knife poking the backside of Spurr's heart. He was buoyed, however, by her seeing him as strong.

“Well, I'll be damned,” Spurr said in genuine disbelief, a boyish embarrassment touching his cheeks again with warm irons. “Ma'am, I ain't all that strong. Not anymore I ain't. But I sure never been so charmed, and I sure ain't up to refusin' a beautiful woman's offer of lodging.” He arched a brow. “That said, I am a stranger to you, Mrs. Dickinson. Are you sure . . . ?”

“If a woman can't trust a man with a badge, who can she trust?”

Spurr stared at her fine-boned hands. On her right hand, she still wore a gold wedding band. He lifted his gaze to her full bosom, which heaved against her dress, pulling the material so taut that it puckered along the sides of her breasts, beneath her arms.