Chapter
35
“What in the world!”
The startled shout came from somewhere
nearby and caused Selena to gasp and jump away from Conrad. Kingman
strode to the bottom of the porch steps and stared at them. The
light coming from inside the cabin revealed his face was twisted in
lines of surprise, confusion, and anger.
“Dan, please,” Selena began. “I
wasn’t—”
“I saw what you were doing,” Kingman
cut in. “It seems pretty obvious.” He swung his gaze toward Conrad.
Anger dominated his expression. “And you, Browning, I reckon you
lied to my face earlier. I wouldn’t have known if I hadn’t come
back to get some extra ammo before I started out to the
pass.”
“You’re wrong, Kingman,” Conrad said
flatly. “Nothing happened here except Selena was thanking me for my
help. That’s all it was.”
A disgusted snort came from Kingman.
“Thanking you?” he repeated. “Is that what you call it? Looked to
me like she was about to thank you right into bed! Was that story you
told me about being a grieving widower a lie, or do you just not
give a damn about your wife’s memory?”
Hot rage bubbled up inside Conrad, but
he tamped it down and kept his voice calm and steady. “You’re not
thinking straight. If I was going to make a play for your woman, I
wouldn’t do it right out here in the open where anybody could see
us, like you just did, now would I?”
“You thought I’d already ridden out to
the pass,” Kingman shot back. “You thought nobody else was
around.”
“Dan, that’s not true,” Selena
insisted. “You’ve got the wrong idea. Maybe I was too impulsive,
but I was just talking to Mr. Browning, and I felt so grateful to
him for everything he’s done. I . . . I didn’t think, I just . . .
I’m sorry. It didn’t mean anything. I swear.” She glanced at
Conrad. “No offense.”
“None taken, I promise
you.”
“Well, this is sweet as all get-out,
but I don’t believe you,” Kingman said bitterly. “Either of you.
There’s nothing I can do about it now because we need everybody to
help us beat Hissop and Leatherwood, but I promise you, Browning,
when this is over, you and I will settle this.”
“If you’re bound and determined to
make a fool of yourself, I suppose I can’t stop you,” Conrad said
coldly. He stood and watched as Kingman turned and stalked off into
the darkness.
“What have I done?” Selena murmured in
a voice taut with pain. “I never meant for this to happen. I never
meant to hurt either of you.”
Conrad could have told her if she
didn’t mean to hurt anybody, she ought to have better control of
her emotions and impulses, but he didn’t see how that would help
anything. “Maybe he’ll cool off by morning.”
“No. You don’t know Dan as well as I
do. Once he gets his mind set on something, he won’t change
it.”
“He decided he was wrong to try to
kill me and Arturo,” Conrad pointed out.
“Yes, but you forced him to change his
mind by saving his life, and mine.”
“Who knows what tomorrow will bring?”
Conrad asked.
While he couldn’t answer that question
fully, he had a pretty good idea of some of the things the new day
would bring with it . . .
Blood, and destruction, and
death.
Conrad was up before dawn the next
morning. When he left Arturo sleeping in the other bunk and went
outside, he didn’t see Kingman anywhere, but he didn’t look for the
man, either. There was no point in going out of his way for a
confrontation.
He saddled a horse and rode up to the
pass. A man holding a rifle stepped out from behind a boulder to
challenge him, then lowered the weapon as he recognized
Conrad.
“Oh, it’s you, Mr. Browning,” the
sentry said. He was one of the men who had stayed behind in the
valley when Conrad and the others went to Juniper Canyon to rescue
Selena and the other women.
“Any sign of Hissop and Leatherwood?”
Conrad asked.
“No, it’s been mighty quiet all
night,” the man reported. “I reckon they’ll be here before the
day’s over, though.”
Conrad nodded. “I think you’re right.”
He looked at the fuses hanging down the walls of the pass.
Everything appeared to be just like he’d left it the day before.
The red cylinders of dynamite were hidden in the cracks where he
had placed them, and the fuses themselves were almost the same
color as the rock walls, so they weren’t very noticeable. Of
course, once the fuses started burning, the sputtering sparks they
gave off would be visible, but Conrad hoped the avenging angels
would be charging into the pass in such heat of battle they
wouldn’t see the fuses until it was too late.
He rode back down to the settlement to
get some breakfast and found that Arturo had gotten up while he was
gone and started a pot of coffee boiling on the stove in the cabin
they were using. The coffee came from their supplies that had been
left in the buggy, as did the bacon Arturo was frying to go with
flapjacks.
“How does the situation look this
morning?” Arturo asked from the stove.
“No sign of Hissop and Leatherwood
yet. It’s just a matter of time, though. As soon as I’ve eaten, I’m
riding back up to the pass, and I’ll stay there until they show up.
I’m going to be the one to light those fuses.”
“Is young Mr. Kingman aware of
that?”
“I don’t care what he’s aware of,”
Conrad said. “Some things he thinks he knows, he’s got all
wrong.”
“Ah, yes, the kiss. I’m not absolutely
convinced that he is wrong
about that, although of course it’s not really my place to say
so.”
“Heard about it, did
you?”
“I suspect everyone in the community
has.”
Conrad frowned. “Wait a minute. What
did you mean when you said you aren’t sure Kingman was wrong about
what happened?”
“Well . . . I’m not exactly the most
astute observer of human behavior in the world, but I have been
around a lot of people in my line of work, and from what I’ve seen
I’m convinced Miss Webster does indeed have romantic feelings for
you.”
Conrad shook his head. “That’s crazy.
She’s married to Kingman.”
“Not officially,” Arturo pointed out.
“As Mr. Kingman himself admitted, they simply declared themselves
married. There’s nothing really binding about it, either legally or
religiously. Technically, Miss Webster is still free to be with
whomever she chooses, and at the moment she feels a great deal of
gratitude to you. I suggest that it has influenced her emotions to
the point where she’s mistaking that gratitude for something else.
Add to that a degree of physical attraction, and you have a very
confused young woman who’s thinking with her heart, not her head.”
Arturo held out a cup. “Coffee?”
“Yeah.” Maybe Arturo was right, but
Conrad didn’t like to think so. If Selena actually had fallen for
him, it could only complicate things. Once Paradise Valley, if
that’s what they were going to call the place, was safe from Hissop
and his bloodthirsty avenging angels, it would be a good idea for
him and Arturo to get out of there as quickly as
possible.
If they could get out after the pass was blocked, he
amended. He was convinced there had to be another way in and out of
the valley. There had been no chance to explore it fully. The idea
of being stuck there was unacceptable, and not just because of the
potential awkwardness with Selena and Kingman.
Frank and Vivian were still out there
somewhere. His children, his lost twins, the two youngsters who
were depending on him, waiting for him, whether they knew it or
not. He would never give up looking for them.
By the time he finished eating and
went back outside, more people were moving around. He spotted
Kingman saddling a horse and went over to him.
Kingman glanced at Conrad, then
deliberately looked away. His face was set in cold, stony
lines.
“I’ve already been up to the pass,”
Conrad said. “No sign of Hissop and Leatherwood yet.”
Kingman grunted as he pulled a saddle
cinch tight. “They’ll be here.”
“I know. I’m headed back up there now.
I want to be ready to light those fuses when the time
comes.”
“I’m lighting the fuses,” Kingman
snapped.
“We talked about this,” Conrad said.
“It’s too dangerous, and folks here in the valley need you too
much. Especially Selena.”
He knew it was a mistake as soon as he
said it. Kingman turned sharply toward him. “If I get killed, that
means you and Selena can be together without having to worry about
me. That works out better for both of you.”
“No, it doesn’t,” Conrad said. “I’ve
told you, there’s nothing between us, and I’m not staying here. I’m
heading for San Francisco as soon as I can.”
“Why don’t you take her with you?”
Kingman sneered. “She’ll make a good Gentile slut.”
Conrad’s hands clenched instinctively
into fists. He didn’t want Kingman talking about Selena that way,
even though he had no real feelings for her except some sympathy
and mild affection. Kingman appeared to be on the verge of striking
out as well, and the feeling of imminent violence was thick in the
air.
There was no way of knowing what might
have happened. At that moment, shots rang out up at the pass, their
reports rolling across the valley and echoing from the surrounding
mountains.