Wicked Temptations (21 page)

"That's exactly why I'm writing the editorial," Priscilla said, with resolve. "It's time people stop being intimidated by the man and take action against him and the others. You're running for mayor. Why don't you tell them to stop bullying people. They're running thousands of head of cattle on thousands of acres of land. The homesteaders are only trying to farm one-hundred-and-sixty acres each. They need to be left in peace."

Realizing he was fighting a losing battle, Adam decided on another approach. Pulling her to him, he kissed her soundly, and at first she all but swooned in his arms while kissing him back. Then abruptly, she pressed her palms against his chest and said, "You can no longer manipulate me with kisses, Adam. The lines between right and wrong when it comes to our physical relation may be blurry at times, but the lines between right and wrong when it comes to what the cattlemen are doing to the homesteaders are distinct. Now if you'll excuse me, I want to finish typesetting so I'll be ready to start printing as soon as my order of Readyprint arrives, which will be on the stage due here from Denver tomorrow."

"Then there's nothing more I can say or do to stop you from cutting your own throat?" Adam asked.

Priscilla shook her head. "Nothing at all," she replied, then turned her back to him and started placing another row of ems in the composing stick.

Adam mumbled a string of expletives under his breath, then stalked out of the building, frustrated and worried that Priscilla was so damn stubborn, but filled with admiration for a woman who stood on her principles and refused to back down, even in the face of adversity. If there was anything to what Ralph Cole said about A.J Bothwell and the others involved in a land claim scheme with moveable cabins, or in fabricating stories about Ella Watson to demonize her in the eyes of the townsfolk, he intended to look into that now.

Heading down the boardwalk in long, determined strides, he went to join what remained of the stockmen's meeting, which was underway at the Cheyenne Club. After the meeting had adjoined, and while the men were sitting around the conference table puffing on cigars and discussing what to do about the homesteaders continuing to come in droves, Adam looked around at the men, and said, "What's the story on Ella Watson?"

A.J. Bothwell was quick to reply, "Cattle Kate? She's nothing but a cattle-rustling whore living up the Sweetwater. She's been branding my mavericks and I aim to stop her."

"What makes you think she's a whore?" Adam asked.

Bothwell mouthed his cigar, while replying, "
Averell's
her pimp. He runs a roadhouse and she services all the cowboys in the area, swaps her favors for cattle. It's common knowledge the woman's a prostitute."

"I was out at her place earlier today and talked to her son and
Averell's
nephew and they claim she's being confused with Kate Maxwell, a woman living in
Bossomer
, who's a known prostitute around the army base there."

Bothwell glared at Adam, eyes hard as stone, and said, "They're lying. Read the papers, Whittington. It's all there. We'll be riding out there tomorrow to give her something to think about, along with an alternative. Either sell out or get out. She's robbing us blind, building up her herd from our stock, and
Averell's
running a brothel and she's his whore. So you're either with us, or against us, and we're giving you the chance to ride out there with us and show us which side you're on. So what's it going to be?"

Adam slowly scanned the faces of the men around the table, then settled his gaze on A.J. Bothwell, and said, "I'm not riding anywhere with a gang of vigilantes."

He turned and started for the door.

Bothwell called after him. "Your problem is you've got a red-headed spinster in your bed who's also bedding down with the homesteaders, figuratively speaking, and we've got our sights on the woman. She's been nothing but trouble since she arrived in
Cheyenne
and we'll shut her down if we have to, one way of another."

"Anyone of you goes near her and you'll be hearing from me directly," Adam said. He walked out of the room. He had no idea what the men had planned for Ella Watson, but he'd shoot at close range anyone who threatened Priscilla. But Bothwell had sent a clear message, and the fact was, if Priscilla printed the editorial, she'd be just as much a target as Ella Watson. Holding that thought, he knew he'd have to stop Priscilla, no matter what it took. And he thought he knew exactly the way to do it.

Climbing into the buggy, he gave the command and headed for the ranch to get his horse. If he hurried, he could bed down on the road from
Denver
for the night and intercept the northbound stage before it reached
Cheyenne
tomorrow.

***

Priscilla stomped into
The Town Tattler
building, slammed the door with force, and let out a very unladylike expletive. Hearing the commotion, Abigail dashed in from the backroom about the same time Libby came bounding down the stairs. "What's wrong?" asked Libby.

Priscilla crossed her arms and paced the floor. "The Readyprint wasn't on the stage," she said, agitated. "The driver claimed that when he stopped to change horses, someone must have taken the shipment off the stage. He didn't know it was missing until this morning when he started unloading."

"Why would someone take a shipment of Readyprint?" Abigail asked.

"To stop me from printing the editorial about Ella Watson," Priscilla said, feeling her fury rise as she considered how completely trusting she'd been in urging Jeanette Jamison to divulge her information to Adam.

"But, who would want to do that?" Libby asked. "None of us have said anything to anyone about the editorial, not even to our beaus."

"It's clear who did it," Priscilla said. "And I think I'll pay Adam Whittington a visit right now." Snatching up her reticule, she stormed out of the building, got on her rover, and pedaled the few blocks to Adam's house. When the butler opened the door, she marched into the house, turned to face the man, and said, "I've come to see Lord Whittington, Winslow. Is he in?"

The butler looked beyond her toward the closed door to the library, and before he could answer, Priscilla headed across the entry and swept open the door. Adam, who was sitting at his desk bent over some paperwork, looked at her with a start. "Is there a problem?" he asked, when she stood at his desk, drumming her fingers against her folded arms.

"You know there is," she snapped. "Where is it?"

"Where is what?" he asked.

"My Readyprint!"

Adam stood and came around the desk. "I have no idea what you're talking about," he said. He walked past her and shut the door to the room.

"Why did you do that?" Priscilla asked.

"So I could do this." He took her by the shoulders and kissed her. Pressing her lips together firmly, she refused to kiss him back. When he could not get a response from her, he said, "We'll talk about this later."

"No, Adam, we won't because we have nothing more to talk about. We are miles apart on two different sides of a very important issue, and there will be absolutely no coming together about this. Now, I want my Readyprint."

"I told you, I don't have it. But even if I did, I wouldn't give it to you because you're playing with fire and you're going to get burned."

"I'm not a little girl with matches, Adam. I know exactly what I'm doing," Priscilla said, glaring at him. "I'm getting ready to expose Albert Bothwell for what he is, and send a warning to the others to leave the homesteaders alone. There are enough together on this issue to start a lot of trouble if we want."

"Us? You're not a homesteader, sweetheart," Adam said, peering down at her. "You're a newspaper woman who refuses to listen to more than one side of the issue."

Priscilla hardened herself to Adam's endearment. "As far as I'm concerned there is only one side of the issue," she said. "I believe everything Ella Watson's son and Jim
Averell's
nephew told us. The skull and bones are evidence that they were not lying about any of it, and I intend for them to be heard. I also plan to have Ella Watson come talk at the next Town Tattler meeting, and I'll be riding out there tomorrow to tell her. And you don't have to worry about me riding out alone because I'll have my pressman with me."

"Don't do this, honey." Adam reached for her and she backed away.

"You can stop the sweet talk, Adam. I am neither your honey nor your sweetheart," she said, struggling to ignore his troubled eyes and the look of concern on his face, and her desire to kiss him and feel his arms around her. But whatever there had been between them was over. She could not align herself with a man who could stand by and let hardworking people be bullied by men he consorted with almost daily. "I should never have trusted you with Jeanette Jamison's story, and I should never have let you come with me to Ella Watson's place. The only reason you did was to find out what I was up to so you could report back to your associates and stop me."

"I went out there to protect you from whatever trouble you might stir up. It's a very heated issue, and you're not going to resolve it with an editorial in your ..." he paused.

"Silly little scandal sheet?" she offered.

His eyes darkened. "An editorial will only inflame both sides."

"I don't imagine Nellie Bly gave much thought to worrying about inflaming both sides of the issue when she went undercover in an insane asylum for women and learned that they were forced to eat gruel and spoiled beef and drink dirty water, and were tied together and made to sit on hard benches for hours, and bathed in frigid water, and were beaten if they complained that rats crawled all around the hospital. But because she did, she changed the way mental
assylums
are now treating their patients."

"Well, you're not Nellie Bly and this is not a
New York
asylum for the insane," Adam said.

"No, but one woman is being treated as badly as the women in the asylum, and I can make a difference. And I want my Readyprint. Either you took it off that stage or you had someone else take it to stop me from printing the editorial in order to protect the interest of the cattlemen."

When Adam refused to admit he'd taken her shipment, she said, "I guess we have nothing more to say to each other." She swept out of the room as fast as she'd entered, and was out of the front door before Adam could stop her. While pedaling back to
The Town Tattler
building, she felt a new determination to get out the editorial the next day as scheduled, even if she had to post a handwritten copy of it on the town bulletin board.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

''She is only a woman, and yet she makes herself

feared by
Spain
, by
France
, by the Empire, by all...'

— Pope
Sixtus
V describes
Elizabeth
, c1588

The news was all over town, but Priscilla couldn't believe it until she'd read about it in the
Cheyenne Daily Leader
, and then in the
Cheyenne Daily Sun
. Still she stared in stunned disbelief at the headline that read:
DOUBLE LYNCHING: Notorious Characters Hanged For Cattle Stealing Jim
Averell
and His Partner Ella Watson Meet their Fate at the Hands of Outraged Stock Growers... "Hanging from the limb of a stunted pine growing on a cliff fronting the
Sweetwater
River
were the bodies of James
Averell
and Ella Watson. Side by side they swing, arms touching each other, their tongues protruding and their faces swollen and discolored almost beyond recognition."

In both articles, the newspapers, which were owned and operated by the Stock Grower's Association, portrayed Ella Watson and Jim
Averell
in the most despicable of terms, calling Ella a prostitute and a virago who cursed everything and everybody, and Jim a cur and a murderous coward, handy with a six-shooter. The article also stated that when the posse of stockmen burst into the cabin with an arrest warrant, they found the
thieving pair
playing cards and drinking whiskey. The article went on to say that the six members of the Stock Grower's Association involved had been arrested for the hanging—Albert Bothwell among them, Priscilla noted with dark delight—but that the men had been given a chance to post bail, which they'd done for each other, so all six were at present walking the streets, while justifying why the deed had to be done. The article ended with the words:
An inquest may be held but it is doubtful if any attempt will be made to punish the lynchers, who acted in self protection, feeling that the time to resort to violent measures had finally arrived....

Priscilla was still staring in disbelief at the headline when a man she'd never seen before, who was dressed in the work clothes of a farmer, came into the building, and said in an anxious voice, "Miss Phipps, I'm Frank Buchanan, and I need to get the facts of what happened out before I leave here. The newspapers will never print the truth since they're owned and run by the Stock Growers Association."

"Come on into the back room where we can talk, undisturbed," Priscilla said, motioning for the man to follow. After she'd shut the door behind them, Frank Buchanan introduced himself as a friend and neighbor of Jim
Averell
and Ella Watson, and started telling Priscilla his story...

"What's written in the papers is made-up," Buchanan said. "I was in the back room at Jim
Averell's
store when the men came in. Albert Bothwell claimed they had a warrant for Jim's arrest, and when Jim demanded to see the document, Bothwell and John Durbin pulled their guns and forced Jim into the buggy with Ella, who they'd already taken from her place. I followed them up the river, staying a good long distance behind so they wouldn't know I was following, and when I finally caught up with them and got close enough to see what they were up to, Jim and Ella were standing on a couple of large rocks under the pine tree and the men had put ropes around their necks. Jim and Ella's feet were tied, but not their hands, and both were trying to get the ropes off. At first I thought the men were just trying to scare them, but when I realized they intended to hang them outright, I opened fire and kept it up until I ran out of bullets. The men started firing back, so I left then and raced to Dan
Figer's
place for help, but by the time I found him and we returned, it was too late. Jim and Ella were dead, and the men had left."

"Did anyone else see what happened?" Priscilla asked.

Buchanan nodded. "Dan
Figer
saw the hanging. He was plowing his hay meadow and could see the lynching party down at the river. But after learning it was Jim and Ella and seeing them hanging, he's too scared to come forward. Ella's boy, Gene Crowder, and Jim's nephew, Ralph Cole, also know what happened. I talked to them yesterday, right after the hanging. I guess when Ella saw the men coming to her place she told Gene to hide in the shed, which he did. Gene said the men didn't break into Ella's cabin with an arrest warrant, like the newspapers are claiming, but instead tore down her fence, letting out her cattle, and threatened to kill her unless she got in the buggy. She told them she had papers for all of her cattle, and they just laughed and told her to get in the buggy, which she did. Gene said they rode off with her then. I went back to Ella's place today to find Gene, but he's gone, probably too afraid to stay. I'm going to try and find him, but then we'll be leaving here because those men will be after both of us."

"What about Ralph Cole?" Priscilla said. "You said he knows something."

"He does. According to Gene, he arrived just as the men were leaving Ella's place. The men didn't see Ralph because he came from the opposite direction, but he saw them riding off with Jim and Ella. I haven't seen him since though, so he must be laying low for now. But that rider who came racing into
Cheyenne
to bring news of the hanging to the
Daily Leader
—Ernie McLean—he's not a witness. He's a friend of Tom Sun, A.J. Bothwell and John Durbin, three of the lynchers. They wanted to make sure the story got out the way they wanted it."

"Which they succeeded in doing. It's nothing less than premeditated murder," Priscilla said in disgust, wishing she could have gotten Ella's story out sooner, knowing it would have already been too late by the time her Readyprint was stolen, presumable by Adam. "Do you plan to come forward?" she asked.

Buchanan shook his head. "I don't want to end up like Ella and Jim, maybe not hanging from a tree, since that would be too obvious, but they'd get me somehow. No, I want to find Ella's boy and leave. There's nothing for me here. My place needs too much work, and I'm tired of fighting the cattlemen. Those men won't be prosecuted, so anyone who knows the truth of what happened and might later come forward, will always be a threat to them and will have to be taken out one way or another. I just wanted to get the facts to you the way they are before I left."

"Are you willing to write it all down in your own words?" Priscilla said. "That way I could print the story exactly as you told it."

Buchanan thought about it for a few moments, then nodded, and said, "I'll do it right now, but then I have to go."

"I understand," Priscilla replied. She went into the main room for paper and an ink pen and ink, then left Frank Buchanan hunched over a small table while tediously documenting the incident in his own words. But while he was doing that, Priscilla went to find Edith and Mary Kate, who were just down the street at
Herman's Dry and Fancy Goods
, so they could come and witness Frank Buchanan's signature on the document.

After Frank Buchanan left, Priscilla drew in a long, wearisome breath, and said to Edith and Mary Kate, "Those six cattlemen have sent a very chilling message to the homesteaders, and Frank Buchanan is doing exactly what they'd hoped he and others would do. But I refuse to turn tail and run, at least not until I get out the truth about what happened. After that, we'll get back to what
The Town Tattler
is all about."

"Well actually, Miss Priscilla, I'm not staying here after what happened," Edith said. "My Frank is real worried about me working here, so he asked me to marry him, and I said I would. He says he'll make good on the money I owe you for the wagon trip here."

"I understand," Priscilla said. She'd been expecting Edith to leave to marry young Frank Gundy, but not so soon. She still needed all four women in order to get the paper out. It seemed everything she'd worked so hard to make happen was coming undone. She'd never wanted to take sides in the issue between the homesteaders and the cattlemen, and until the whole hideous hanging came up, she'd managed to maintain a fairly even distribution of articles and editorials from both sides. But now a principle was involved, and she couldn't just look the other way.

Priscilla eyed Mary Kate. "Will you be staying on?" she asked, preparing for the worse, understanding if Mary Kate was also too afraid to stay.

Mary Kate looked at her with uncertainty, and said, "You know the man I met at church who's been courting me, Roger
Hotchkins
? He's really concerned about my staying here, after overhearing some of those cattlemen, who know your Lord Whittington, talking about shutting down your paper and giving you something to think about other than harassing cattlemen."

"He's not my Lord Whittington," Priscilla said, to set things straight. "And after the next issue of
The Town Tattler
, where I plan to run Frank Buchanan's story, along with an editorial that includes what Jeanette Jamison and Gene Crowder and Ralph Cole told me, we'll go back to issues women want, and stay away from the feud between the cattlemen and homesteaders."

Mary Kate gave her a sheepish look, and said, "Well, you see, Roger also asked me to marry him, but I had been waiting to tell you that after Edith told you about her and young Frank Gundy. Roger wants me to leave too, so I will, since he's to be my husband and I want to do what's right by him."

"And you're both leaving right now, I suppose," Priscilla said, her tone jaded.

"Well, yes, that's what we decided after reading the papers this morning," Mary Kate said. "But Abigail and Libby plan to stay a little longer. At least that's what they said yesterday. But that was before the hanging. After what happened to that poor woman and man, Abigail and Libby may change their minds, since they were with me when Roger told me about the cattlemen talking about giving you something to think about. We're all pretty scared now."

"Yes, I suppose you are," Priscilla said. Everyone, it seemed, was scared but her. Maybe she was just too stubborn and naïve to know when to quit. But she was a newspaperwoman now, just as Nellie Bly was. And she knew with certainty that Nellie Bly would not have quit before she got her story out. She sighed. She only wished she had Adam on her side. For some reason, after news of the hanging reached town, she'd expected him to come by to see how she was doing. Just the night before he'd claimed he was worried about her when he'd all but pleaded with her not to print the editorial. Now, she wondered if the disappearance of her Readyprint was more about stopping the editorial for the cattlemen's sake than about stopping it to keep her from harm.

She also wondered what Adam's position would be now, with two people hanged by a gang of vigilantes, and both newspapers backing the six men who'd done the dastardly deed. But if Adam heard Frank Buchanan's side of the story, he might be ready to concede that she was right about the men he was keeping company with at the Cheyenne Club, and help her expose them and see that justice was carried out.

She also pondered his mother's stance. Lady Whittington had her petty grievances against the nesters, but she was not a woman without principle. Surely she wouldn't condone a vigilante lynching. Maybe it was Lady Whittington and the cattlemen's wives to whom she should turn for support. After all, a woman had been hanged without a trial, and without being heard—a classical style lynching by a murderous gang of wealthy, powerful stockmen who'd taken the law into their own hands—and Lady Whittington was one of the more candid and outspoken among her circle of friends.

Deciding at least to find out what Lady Whittington's position was, Priscilla changed into a tailormade with a divided skirt, got on her rover, and pedaled over to Adam's house. Winslow, the butler, answered the door about the time Lady Whittington was coming down the stairs. Seeing Priscilla, Lady Whittington rushed up to her, and said, "It is absolutely unspeakable what happened, even if the woman was a lady of the night and had been stealing cattle. This is no longer the wild west. We do have laws."

Priscilla quickly relayed everything she'd learned from Frank Buchanan to Lady Whittington, who said, "We shall ride out to the ranch at once and speak to Adam. He said something about rounding up some of the ranchers for a meeting there. I'll order the coach
 
brought around at once and we'll go see what it's all about. I don't know what Adam intends to do, but I plan to speak my mind before he does it. And you will come with me and tell Adam what you've learned from that man."

"Yes," Priscilla said, with certainty. "I'd very much like to do that."

The ranch was several miles from town, and as they rode in the comfortable confines of Lady Whittington's town coach, with its velvet drapes, and plush velvet seats, and door pulls covered with morocco, Lady Whittington wasted no time turning the conversation from the
unspeakable hanging
, to the state of affairs between Priscilla and Adam... "Adam has been a bear to live with ever since you left," Lady Whittington said. "He snaps at the children, he barks at the servants, he paces the floor in his office—I can hear him down there at night—and he was beside himself with worry about you yesterday, when he said you were intent on writing an inflammatory editorial, which you planned to post on the town hall. The man is in love with you and he has no idea what to do about it."