The Blacksmith’s Bravery (47 page)

Griffin shook his head. Vashti lifted a shoulder and scrubbed away the errant tear with the shoulder of her vest.

“She got me out of there. She gave me five dollars and said, ‘I've got a place in Idaho Territory. I'm headed back there tomorrow. If you can get out of that filthy place in the morning without anyone seeing you, come to the depot, and I'll take you with me.' I told her I thought I could, but I might not be able to get out with my things, or Ike would catch me. Or one of the other girls would see me, and they'd tell him. She said not to worry about my clothes. She'd outfit me—and I wouldn't have to… to… to entertain men.” She flushed scarlet. “Anyway, that's all I needed to hear.”

“Good old Bitsy.” Griffin smiled, pleased that the brusque saloon keeper had come through for the desperate girl.

“She's the best. I've been here with her four years now, and she's kept her word. Augie, too. They've protected me and let me earn an honest living.”

“The Spur & Saddle has always been a high-class place, even when it was a saloon.”

Vashti nodded. “It's home now. And Bitsy and me, we both found God here. I'll always believe He put me in her path that day at the dry goods. Ever since I learned to pray, I've been thanking Him.” She smiled at him, though tears still glittered in her eyes.

Griffin returned her smile. Somehow they'd crossed a line—dismantled a barrier between them. He glanced ahead, down the slope to the bridge. Trees overhung the road before the short span, and he looked into the shadow beneath the branches of the pines. They were nearly halfway from Democrat's to Nampa. Laughter issued from the coach behind them—Bitsy's loud guffaw. He glanced at Vashti, and she grinned with him.

Beyond Vashti's hat brim, Griffin caught a glimpse of movement in the trees. Automatically he swung his gun barrel toward it. Vashti's eyes flared and she turned, snapping the reins and clucking to the team.

The leaders were only five yards from the bridge when two men jumped from beneath the pines, one on either side of the road.

“Ye-ha!” Vashti slapped the reins on the wheelers' sides as the outlaws
took aim. The horses lurched forward then stalled for a second as the leaders saw the men and the bridge.

“Up!” Vashti yelled, and the lead team plunged toward the span. If they would just charge onward, maybe they could cross the bridge and leave the outlaws behind.

Griffin fired toward the robber on his side of the road, and she knew it might be the only shot he got off. Another gun went off somewhere behind her. Wood splintered between her and Griffin. A horse screamed. On the far side of the bridge, another man stood squarely in their path.

One of the two men she'd seen first ran toward her side of the coach. Vashti unfurled her whip, jerking the tip off to the side. Beside her, Griffin half stood, bracing his feet, as she cracked her whip at the outlaw on the ground. The masked man leaped back from the stinging lash. His gun fired, but the bullet went wide.

The horses thundered toward the bridge. The outlaw on the far side of the span drew a bead and fired. The off lead horse veered left and crashed into his harness mate, throwing the near leader off balance only a few feet short of the bridge. The two horses went down in a tangle, pawing and whinnying shrilly, while the two wheelers plowed into them. The stage swayed. Griffin and Vashti flew forward.

Vashti grabbed wildly as she landed on the off wheeler's rump. Somehow she managed to keep hold of the reins and clutch the backstrap of the harness. A moment later she felt Griffin's huge hand as he clenched a fistful of her vest and yanked her up beside him. She sprawled between the seat and the footrest.

“You hurt?” he asked.

She stared up at him, gasping. “I don't think so.” She still held the reins in her hands.

“Stay down.” He shoved her head lower.

“They shot one of the horses.”

“I know.”

The horses plunged and clattered, trying to get their footing—all but the wounded one, who neighed piteously and thrashed about on the ground. Two more men had appeared out of the brush and
leveled pistols at Griffin. Someone was keeping up fire from within the coach.

“Throw down your weapons,” the man at the far end of the bridge yelled over the noise.

“Griffin!”

He looked down at her, and she reached a hand toward him. “Don't give them the mail.”

“We've got no choice, Georgie. There's five of them at least.”

Griffin laid his gun down in the driver's boot. They'd take it, just like they had his other gun. Scowling ahead at the outlaw across the bridge, Griffin slowly raised his hands.

“Put 'em up!”

Vashti realized he meant her, and she straightened enough so that she could obey. Raising her hands over her head was the hardest thing she'd ever done. A lull in the shooting brought a stillness broken only by the horses' breathing and struggling.

“All right, you two. Throw down the box.”

Vashti caught her breath and stared toward the man on the bridge. He seemed to be the leader. She rose on her knees and wrapped the reins around the brake handle, staring all the while toward the outlaw. She squinted, eyeing his tall, lanky form closely. It couldn't be—

“Hurry up!” His boots thudded on the bridge as he walked toward them. “Get that box down here.” He stepped carefully around the fallen horse and off the bridge.

When she heard his voice, Vashti was sure. After eight years, she was looking into the eyes of Luke Hatley, the man she'd at one time hoped to marry. The man who'd sold her to settle his two-hundred-dollar poker debt.

CHAPTER 32

P
ain stabbed through Griffin's knee as he tried to straighten it. When he'd catapulted forward, he'd slammed into the metal rail on the footrest. Good thing, or he'd have sprawled on top of the wheel team, the way Vashti had, but he'd smashed his knee in the process.

A quick glance around told him that two outlaws stood on the near side of the stage—his side—and one on Vashti's side. One of their men must have gone down, but whether it was the one he'd shot at first, he had no idea. Maybe one of the passengers had hit a robber.

He focused on the leader, who walked deliberately toward them with his gun pointed squarely at Griffin's chest.

“We can't throw the box down,” he called.

The leader stopped and stared at him through the eyeholes in his rude sack of a mask. “Why not?”

“The box is bolted to the frame of the stagecoach.” Griffin waited, his hands still at shoulder level, half expecting the man to shoot him point-blank. He glanced uneasily at Vashti. She still crouched between the driver's seat and the footrest, staring at the man. “You all right?” he asked, low enough that he hoped no one else heard.

Her lips twitched, but she didn't answer.

“All right, get down,” the outlaw said, gesturing with his rifle. “Nice and easy. Get over the side and stand a couple yards away from the coach. And don't try anything.”

“Come on, Georgie.” Griffin lowered his hands slowly and gripped
her shoulder. “With one horse down, we're not going anywhere, so we may as well do this peacefully.”

“But we can't let them take the mail!”

“Yes, we can,” he said between clenched teeth. “Come on. I'm not letting you get shot because of your stubbornness.” Her eyes snapped. That was good. She was mad at him now, and that anger would get her moving. “Climb down on my side. I don't want the coach between us so I can't see you.”

He turned to get his footing. One of the outlaws, wearing a mask, stood just below him. He jerked his rifle, indicating that Griffin must get down. He looked back at Vashti. “Come this way. Stay close to me.”

She nodded but kept her gaze fastened on the leader, who now stood near the wheelers.

Griffin hopped down. Another outlaw had opened the coach door and was herding the passengers out.

“Leave all weapons and belongings in the coach, folks,” he said, as if this were a sightseeing trip.

Griffin looked up. Vashti was at the edge of the messenger's seat, about to lower one foot over the side.

“Get over there,” the outlaw near Griffin said, nodding toward where Hiram, Libby, Bitsy, and the other three passengers huddled.

Griffin ignored him and stayed close until Vashti hopped down from the steps to the ground. “Come on, Georgie.” He placed himself between her and the outlaw and walked beside her toward the others.

“That one's Benny,” she hissed.

“The one behind us?”

She nodded. So she recognized one of the robbers from the earlier holdup, even though they wore masks this time. If they ever got the chance, she might be able to identify him in court.

“I'm sorry, Griff,” Bitsy said when they reached the knot of passengers.

“Nothing to be sorry for,” he said.

“Hiram got one of them, but—”

“Shut up!” The man guarding them lunged toward Bitsy, pointing his gun at her midsection.

Bitsy clamped her lips together and glared at him. The red feather on her hat quivered.

Griffin noted the checkering on the stock of the gun the outlaw held. That was his shotgun—the one the robbers had stolen weeks ago. He looked away.

“Keep your hands up,” growled Benny.

Griffin turned slowly, his hands in the air. Vashti stood between him and Bitsy, her mouth set in a hard line. He looked down the line at the others. They stood still in the sun with the breeze fluttering the spruce boughs. Leo Rice, whom they'd picked up at the Democrat Station, had blood on his cheek. Not shot, Griffin decided. A splinter must have caught him when the outlaws peppered the coach.

The leader and the fourth outlaw climbed up to the driver's box and rummaged around. One of them lifted Griffin's shotgun and examined it. The other held up the little canvas bag Vashti carried on her trips. He pulled out a skirt and a pair of pantalets and held them up, laughing. “Well, boss, I guess you was right.”

Griffin scowled. He expected them to pull out Vashti's pistol next, but he didn't see them do that. Instead, the leader used his own handgun to shoot the lock off the treasure box. Griffin winced. More repairs to the coach. The two outlaws whooped.

“Well, boys,” the leader called, “we hit pay dirt this time.”

“All right,” said the one who'd threatened Bitsy. “If you folks have anything of interest in your pockets, now's the time to hand it over.”

Griffin sighed and reached into his pocket for Cy Fennel's watch. He handed it to Benny, with a few coins and his case knife. “That's it.”

“And you, young fella?” The outlaw shifted his attention to Vashti.

“I've got nothing of value,” Vashti said, stony faced.

“That right?”

“Yeah, that's right.”

While Benny relieved the cowboy, Hiram, and the third male passenger of their cash, his companion looked Vashti up and down. “I heard they was a girl driving stage out here, but I didn't believe it.”