CHAPTER

10

Rosemond looked up from the telegram she was writing, smiled, and handed it to me to read.

Hannah Pryor, Bond St. St. Louis. Send word of Capt. WKs trial ASAP. RB

“We don’t have the money to be verbose,” Rosemond said.

I handed it back with a nod. While Rosemond took the paper to the man behind the counter and paid, I scanned the bulletin board for my Wanted poster. Advertisements for goods and services, some handwritten, some professionally printed, ranging from blacksmithing to hotels to restaurants to tent sales to freight hauling to the Sweetwater gold mines.

“Anything interesting?” Rosemond said.

I yawned. “No painter.”

“A good sign.”

We stepped out of the telegraph office.

A line of five wagons loaded with supplies and men drove slowly past us. A man sitting on top of one of the wagons raised his hat and called, “Good-bye, beautiful! Next time you see me, I’ll be a rich man!”

“Not fookin’ likely with your claim,” an older man said, amid laughter from the others.

Undaunted, the young man said, “Wait for me!”

We watched as the supply train pulled out of town and onto the plains. “Which of us do you think he was talking to?” I said.

“Whichever one of us would take him.”

For as much as the towns in the West were a dirty mess and full of shysters and crooks, there was an underlying energy and optimism that appealed to me. The push west was based entirely on hope: for a new life, the opportunity to shake off the chains of the East, to take control of one’s own destiny without interference from the government. Everyone west of the Mississippi had bought into the idea that energy, hard work, and tenacity was the recipe for success, and a single-minded selfishness had grown up around it. When a Western settler looked at you, they didn’t see a customer, but another rung on the ladder to their own success. The successful men masked this selfishness with obsequiousness; the failures believed them.

And Rosemond fit right in.

Despite myself, I admired her desire to start a new life. I’d known enough whores to have long since lost my moral superiority on the subject; women had no rights and few options. I would never judge a woman who used the one advantage she owned outright, her body, to feed herself and her family. But whoring couldn’t last forever. There was a physical toll on the body that caught up with everyone eventually, and add to that the opiate addiction afflicting so many and the diseases they were inevitably riddled with, and there came a time in every prostitute’s life when her means of survival would be taken from her. Rosemond was smart enough to quit before her profession ravaged her. Knowing her even for a short time, I had no doubt she would be successful. With or without my help.

Rosemond walked away from the telegraph office and in the opposite direction of the hotel.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“To see Dunk.”

I put my hand out to stop her. “Oh, Rosemond, don’t.”

She stared at my hand on her arm until I removed it, then lifted her steely eyes to mine. “What kind of coward would I be if I didn’t look upon what I wrought?”

“You didn’t bring that on Duncan, I did, and the knowledge of it will haunt me all of my days.” I swallowed the sob that threatened to escape me as his final expression filled my mind. “I don’t think it wise for you to see him like that, but I cannot stop you, nor will I go with you. I refuse to let you guilt me into seeing him hanging on the gallows, again. I will make restitution by finding a game and earning enough to bury him properly.”

I hurried away, my stomach twisting at her words. What kind of coward would I be if I didn’t look upon what I wrought? I thought I’d become hardened to death after my flight across Indian Territory, but now I knew I was not. A small part of me was relieved I’d retained my humanity, but the rest of me grieved for the wanton loss of life caused by my decision to leave New York City. Kindle had convinced me the deaths in Indian country were no loss to the world, and I’d comforted myself with the thought. The deaths of Cora Bayle and Duncan March offered no such solace.

I stopped on the wooden sidewalk in front of the Union Pacific Hotel and looked back down the street the way I came. Cheyenne’s business day was in full swing. Teamsters drove wagons in and around one another on the wide main street, with only few arguments and shouts breaking through the din of jingling tack, snorting horses, and general indistinct cacophony common to all busy towns. Stray dogs skulked around on the edge of the streets and in the alleys, searching for scraps. A young boy sold newspapers on the corner. Two other boys hid in an alley and peeked around the corner. When the newspaper boy turned toward them, they stepped out into the street and threw a chunk of horse manure at him, hitting him squarely in the eye. The two urchins ran off, laughing. The newspaper boy wiped the manure from his face and continued on with his job.

I looked to see if Rosemond had taken my advice. Of all the activity in my sight, there were only two women walking down the street. Neither was Rosemond.

I slid into the line for the front desk behind a hirsute man with the look and smell of a miner long used to being alone. Or was the smell coming from me? A discreet sniff near my shoulder confirmed that the opiate withdrawal was overcoming my recent bath. A glance in the mirror on the wall opposite the front desk told me I would need to use Rosemond’s paint tonight to protect against my wildly fluctuating complexion.

The clerk finished his business with the miner in front of me and smiled as I stepped to the counter. I looked around, leaned forward, and lowered my voice. “I was wondering …?”

“Charlie.”

“Charlie.” I smiled again, hoping I didn’t look like a dope fiend searching for a fix. “Would you happen to know of a game where a woman would be welcome?”

The desk clerk studied me with a knowing air. “I might.” Charlie placed his hand palm up on the counter.

I smiled. “Charlie, if I had money enough to bribe you, I wouldn’t need a game, now, would I?”

The clerk shrugged. “I’m sorry. I can’t help you.”

“We know how this works. You get a kickback from the dealer for sending people their way.”

“The last time I sent a woman she broke the bank.”

“I have no intention of breaking the bank.”

Charlie scoffed.

“I’m not a gambler. I need to earn a specific amount, and I’ll stop.”

“How much?”

“Enough to get me back East, and eat along the way.”

“Just you? Not your sister?”

I smiled conspiratorially. “She doesn’t approve of gaming. Moving west was her idea, not mine.” When Charlie looked unmoved, I begged. “Please?”

He sighed. “Rollins House Hotel tonight, eight o’clock. Ask for Lily Diamond.”

“You’re a peach.”

I walked across the crowded lobby, the bed upstairs beckoning my exhausted body and mind. I needed to rest to be mentally agile enough to win at faro, a game I hadn’t played in some years.

“A thousand dollars is a lot of money for a dead body,” a man with a showy set of neck whiskers said.

I stopped at the bottom of the stairs, my hand on the newel post. Perspiration popped out on my upper lip and I swallowed the lump of fear lodged in my throat.

“The Langtons can afford it,” his companion replied. The man puffed on his pipe and continued, “Can you blame them? She’s proved a difficult piece of calico to take alive. I wonder what man she’s seduced to save her this time.”

“I understand she’s lost her looks, after being taken by the Comanche. Who would want to poke her, after those savages had their way?”

“There’s more than one way to fuck a whore.”

The men laughed heartily and I walked up the stairs on unsteady legs. I rushed down the hall to the communal bathroom and just made it to the commode before vomiting bile from my empty stomach. I wiped saliva from my mouth with the back of my hand, ignoring the tears rolling down my cheeks.

Why was I surprised, or upset? I knew how men talked, what they thought of me. But it had been a long time since I’d heard it firsthand. The armor I’d built up over years of fighting against the misogyny had weakened during my time with Kindle. He provided me with protection, and I had gotten soft as a result. I splashed water on my face and stared at myself in the mirror. I didn’t need to worry about people recognizing me from the Wanted poster. I was too different. I suppose I should thank the Comanche for the broken nose and the hardening of my countenance. The only thing that could give me away was myself, my actions.

And Rosemond.

Would she turn me in after I won her money as retribution for Dunk’s death? Would I do the same to her if she’d been responsible for Kindle’s?

Yes.

I went into the bedroom and checked the contents of my medical bag before latching it. I glanced around the room, thinking. Planning. How observant was Rosemond? If I took the bag downstairs and checked it at the desk, would Rosemond notice the bag was gone? Everything else in the trunk was Rosemond’s, and off-limits. Besides, I didn’t want her things. My medical bag and enough money to buy a train ticket back to Saint Louis and to eat along the way. I would have plenty of time on the train to decide what to do next. Cable Sophia, the young woman I mentored at the orphanage, in the code I used in correspondence with my cousin? If the Pinkertons were watching the orphanage for me, they would be focused on correspondence to Kindle’s sister, not a sixteen-year-old mulatto orphan. I had no doubt she would do whatever she could to help me, but was it fair to ask? No. She had her life in front of her. I didn’t need to risk her bright future for my own skin.

I would worry about my destination later. I needed to earn money for Dunk’s funeral, a small stake for Rosemond, and enough to get me away from a woman I couldn’t fully trust to keep my identity secret. Once again, I needed to go where I was unknown to anyone, friend or foe alike. This time, I would go alone.

I was lying on the bed in my shift fighting off a hot flash when Rosemond returned.

“Did you find a game?”

“Yes. And you are the disapproving sister who must be kept in the dark.”

“Good. Resting up for tonight?”

“Yes. This bed is atrocious. I adjusted the slats so if we balance just right, we shouldn’t fall beneath the bed.”

Rosemond removed her hat. “We should have the answer from my friend in the morning.”

“Okay.”

Rosemond paused, the long gold hat pin primed to puncture her head. “Okay? I thought you’d want to know as soon as possible.”

I closed my eyes. “Whether we go this afternoon or in the morning won’t change what the answer is. I need to focus on winning two hundred dollars.”

“Huh.” The bed creaked as Rosemond lay down next to me. “I told the agent to only give the answer to me.”

“Why?”

“I don’t want you sneaking away without fulfilling your promises.”

“Why do you think I’d do that?”

“Because it’s precisely what I would do. Be quiet. I’m starving and the only way to not think about food is to sleep.”

“My eyes are closed. You’re the one who keeps talking.”

The small, windowless space felt like a jail cell. I hadn’t slept since Grand Island, and my sleep there had been laudanum-induced. Any rest it had provided was negated by the shivering craving for more of the opiate the following day, and exacerbated by the uncomfortable train ride. My legs and arms suddenly felt like they weighed a hundred pounds, my brain like a boll of cotton. I crossed my arms over my chest and let the sound of Rosemond’s steady breathing lull me into an uneasy sleep.