Nan Ryan
Authors: Silken Bondage
Silken Bondage
Nan Ryan
To all my readers
Contents
Part One
1
“Johnny Roulette’s back in town!”
“Johnny’s here in Memphis? Lilly, are you sure?” asked the excited Julia LaBlanc, clutching the lapels of her blue dressing gown together over her ample bosom.
“Do you suppose he’ll come to see the show tonight?” said red-haired, brown-eyed Belle Roberts, a heated curling iron poised in her right hand, a gleaming lock of copper hair in the other.
“My lord, you know he will! If Johnny’s in town, he’ll be aboard the
Moonlight Gambler
as soon as the sun sets,” Betsy Clark Stevens assured with a smile as she reached for a pot of coral lip rouge, then she added, “Julia, can I please borrow your green satin gown … the one that matches my eyes? You know you can’t get into it since you gained those five pounds.”
“Damn you, Betsy,” Julia snapped. “You and Lilly monopolized Johnny last time he was aboard the
Gambler
. It’s my turn!”
“And mine.” Belle’s hands went to her hips and her usually soft voice lifted loudly.
“Who is Johnny Roulette?”
For a second there was near total silence in the cluttered below-decks dressing quarters of the floating gaming palace,
Moonlight Gambler
. Only the gentle slap of calm waters against the
Gambler’s
gleaming black hull and the shouts of men loading cargo on the many vessels lining the bustling Memphis levee could be heard.
The four seasoned showgirls—Lilly St. Clair, Julia LaBlanc, Belle Roberts, and Betsy Clark Stevens—stared in disbelief, then exclaimed in unison, “Who is Johnny Roulette!”
Nevada Marie Hamilton swallowed nervously and looked up at the women crowding around her, shaking their heads piteously as though she had just confessed she didn’t know who was President of the United States of America. “Should I know this Johnny Roulette?”
The women went into peals of laughter at such a question. Platinum-haired Lilly St. Clair, the tallest and oldest of the group, finally wiped the tears from her eyes, stuck a satin-slippered toe around the leg of a straight-back chair, drew it up beside Nevada, and sat down. “Honey, you’ve got to be joking.”
Not particularly pleased with being an object of ridicule among these women whom she had met only hours earlier, Nevada proudly lifted her chin, turned from the mirror, and met Lilly’s eyes squarely. “No, Miss St. Clair. I am not joking. I have no idea who Johnny Roulette is. Is there some reason I should?”
Lilly, crossing her long legs and signaling the others to stop laughing, reached for Nevada’s hand. Holding it in her own, Lilly said, “Don’t mind us none, Nevada. You just came aboard the
Gambler
today; no reason you’d know Johnny. You’re just a kid and you’ve spent all your life on your daddy’s flatboat. Forgive our manners. We’ve all known Johnny so long, we forget there could be anybody up and down the Mississippi who hasn’t met him.” She smiled kindly at Nevada.
“Well, what’s so special about Johnny Roulette?” Nevada asked.
Lilly squeezed Nevada’s small hand, released it, and leaned back in her chair. A wistful expression came into her violet eyes and she repeated Nevada’s words. “What’s so special about Johnny Roulette?” Lilly sighed. “Honey, just wait until you meet him.”
And Nevada listened, as did the others, while the sophisticated Lilly St. Clair spoke of the elusive man they all adored, the half French, devil-may-care, darkly handsome gambler, Johnny Roulette.
“There’s a cloud of mystery that surrounds Johnny Roulette,” said Lilly. “Nobody seems to know exactly where he’s from or if he has any family or if he ever had a profession, other than gambling. Johnny never talks about himself or his past. And anybody that’s ever asked got no answer other than a shrug of his shoulders and a shake of his head.” She smiled then and added, “But nobody really cares, least not here on the Mississippi. He’s so damned good-looking, he hurts your eyes. Johnny’s one of the biggest men I’ve ever met—stands well over six foot three—and not one ounce of fat on him. His hair is dark and wavy, his eyes are black as midnight, and he has a smile that can melt the coldest of hearts.”
Nodding, Nevada listened with interest as Lilly continued to describe the imposing gentleman she obviously thought was a man among men. The others joined in, speaking dreamily of Johnny Roulette’s muscular physique and his sleek mustache and his quick wit and his deft gambler’s hands. They told how it felt to be chosen, after the show, to stand at Johnny’s side while he gambled—to blow on the dice, to bring him luck, to be the envy, however briefly, of every other female on board. Johnny was more fun than anybody, they said; he made them laugh and he himself always wore an irresistible smile.
The white silk robe Lilly had loaned her falling off her slender shoulders and her long raven hair spilling down her back, Nevada Marie Hamilton listened attentively, her blue eyes wide with interest, her soft red lips pursed. Still, she was skeptical.
Surely no man could be quite so handsome and charming as this tall, dark, always smiling Johnny Roulette.
Johnny Roulette had a toothache. A mean, nasty toothache. Scowling, Johnny followed a uniformed steward into a huge, richly carpeted suite of the elegant Plantation House, the finest hotel in Memphis, Tennessee. Clutching his throbbing right jaw with a big hand, Johnny jerked at his tight, choking tie while the steward rushed forth to throw the tall French doors open to the balcony.
Turning then, the slender little man said, “Our most luxurious suite, as always, Mr. Roulette. You’ll get the nice breeze off the river and I’ll bring up ice water immediately. Will there be anything else, sir?”
“Yes,” said the suffering Johnny Roulette. “Whiskey.”
“Whiskey, Mr. Roulette?” The steward’s pale eyebrows lifted. He’d never known Johnny Roulette to drink hard liquor, not in all the years he’d been staying at the Plantation House. Nor anything stronger than an occasional after-dinner brandy. Thinking he had surely misunderstood, he repeated questioningly, “Whiskey?”
“The best Kentucky bourbon you’ve got,” Johnny Roulette answered, shrugging impatiently out of his custom gray linen suit jacket He smiled weakly then and added, “I do so enjoy a glass of good bourbon in the afternoon.”
“Y-yes, sir, right away,” murmured the dumbfounded steward, bowing and backing away.
In minutes the little man returned with a tray bearing a large silver pitcher of ice water, a tall cut-crystal tumbler, a heavy lead shot glass, and a bottle of fine Kentucky bourbon.
Johnny, barechested now, nodded his thanks and immediately uncorked the whiskey. Ignoring the glasses, he turned the bottle up to his lips and took a long pull.
“God Almighty, that tastes awful,” he said, making a face and gratefully accepting the glass of ice water the steward hastily poured and handed to him. “Thanks,” he managed, still feeling the fire from the bourbon burn its way down into his chest and race into his long muscular arms.
“Mr. Roulette, I do not mean to intrude, but my employer and your good friend Mr. Robin mentioned while I was downstairs that you are suffering from a toothache. I happen to know a skilled dentist whose office is not two blocks from the Plantation House. He would be—”
“No dentists,” said Johnny, shaking his dark head decisively. “Ben Robin should mind his own affairs. Tell him I said so. I don’t need a dentist.”
“But if you’ve a toothache, I’m sure—”
“Just a slight one,” said Johnny. “Nothing that bothers me that much. All I need is a little nap.” He grinned then to show he was really feeling fit.
“Very well,” said the mannerly steward, smiling back at the big towering man. “I’ve turned down your bed. You’ll be wanting your evening clothes pressed, I assume.” Johnny nodded. “Mr. Robin says the dice have been rolling hot on the
Gambler
, of late.” The steward reached the door. “Get some rest, sir.”
“That I’ll do,” promised Johnny Roulette, smiling easily but frowning again as soon as the door closed.
“Owwww!” Johnny groaned as he headed for the whiskey bottle. And Johnny Roulette—a big strapping man who had looked down the barrel of a gun on more than one occasion and who had fought in the War between the States when he was still in his teens—hoped no one would suspect that he was so deathly afraid of the dentist, he couldn’t have been dragged there by a team of wild horses.
And so it was that Johnny Roulette, in agony, terrified of dentists, sat alone in his river-view hotel suite on that humid June afternoon in the summer of 1876 and got pleasantly and profoundly drunk.
Soon he was so delightfully tipsy that his throbbing tooth stopped throbbing, his aching jaw stopped aching, and his pain-dimmed black eyes began to sparkle with their usual devilish light. By the time the sun was westering across the placid river, Johnny Roulette, grinning between pulls on along thin cigar, thought to himself that he had been such a fool. All these years he had eschewed the delicious taste of good Kentucky bourbon. What a mistake!
He held a half-full tumbler of the whiskey up before his face and admired its pale amber hue, deeply inhaling its unique bouquet. Crushing out his cigar, he took a drink of the smooth, warm bourbon and, sighing with contentment, decided he would skip dinner.
At dusk Johnny Roulette, loudly singing a bawdy song he’d learned years before from a bearded riverboat pilot, splashed about in his bath, cigar in one hand, bourbon in the other, while in the outer room the hotel steward hud out a suit of freshly pressed black evening clothes along with a starched white shirt, gleaming gold studs, and polished black leather shoes.
