The woman stood motionless on the wooden boardwalk, staring into the milliner’s window at a quilted sugar-scoop bonnet. She thought it was, quite possibly, the ugliest hat she’d ever seen in her life. But sugar-scoop bonnets were made to be functional, not pretty, and this one would serve very well for the coming winter.

“Excuse me, madam.”

Two businessmen skirted around her, lifting their hats as they passed, the scent of cigar smoke and hair oil wafting after them. She stepped closer to the window with a wan, polite smile at the men but kept her face mostly averted, hoping the dim silvery light from the early mountain sunset would mask her features. Her basket thumped against the window.

Her gaze roamed up and down the street, which was filling up with people closing shop for the day and returning home to a roaring hearth and warm meal, a smoke for the men, sewing for the women, children playing quietly on rag rugs. They would talk about the light snow that had started as the sun dipped below the mountains and was dusting the woman’s shoulders as she stared into the reflection of the milliner’s windows. A man left the building behind her. Her breath fogged the air. Her frigid gloveless fingers clutched her heavy basket. A train whistle blew in the distance.

A bell jingled and the milliner stepped out of his store. “Can I help you, madam?”

“How much for the bonnet?”

The man glanced at the item, the price clear from where he stood, and back at the woman. She knew what he saw, and was humiliated. “Five dollars.”

The woman pretended to consider buying the bonnet and the man, kinder than he needed to be, went along with the ruse. “Thank you, but I’m afraid it’s too dear. Good evening.”

She felt his eyes on her back as she walked down the main street and turned the first corner. Mud, thick and cold, oozed through the hole in her shoe. A wagon loaded with logs lumbered down the street. Tack jingled and wheels creaked as horses strained against the load and the foot-deep mud. The teamster urged them on with gentle but firm words, and slapped their backs with the reins. The teamster caught the woman’s eye and nodded an acknowledgment.

She leaned back against the wooden building and tried, for the thousandth time, to think of another option. But the hole in her stomach and the cold wind seeping through her threadbare dress and the snow melting on her bare head and dripping down her neck distracted her. She thought of her family, huddled around a cold hearth with only one Army blanket to cover three bodies, Joan whimpering with hunger, Stella impatiently shushing her, Hattie comforting them both and chafing at being left at home. All waiting for the woman to return.

A man walking down the main street saw her, looked around, and slinked into the alley. Her eyes followed him, but her head remained tilted back against the wall. He made no secret of looking up and down the length of her body. She could see his imagination blooming behind his eyes. “You lost?”

“No.”

He moved close to her. He smelled of whisky, and his fingers were stained with ink. A newspaperman. She straightened, moved away, and averted her face.

“Meeting someone?”

“No. On my way to catch the train. Excuse me.”

He grabbed her upper arm. “The train doesn’t leave for ten minutes. Plenty of time for us to get to know each other.”

“Please release me, sir. My husband is expecting me.”

The man laughed. Bits of tobacco were caught in the spaces between his teeth. “Not much of a husband, letting his wife out in this weather without a coat.”

She shivered, as much from the cold as from his statement. It was more true than he knew. Her eyes were drawn to the coat the newspaperman wore. Though it was fraying at the cuffs, it was obviously well made: gunmetal gray wool with a red-silk lining peeking out when the wind caught his coattail. It looked warm.

This is what she’d been reduced to: coveting the coat on a man who saw her as something to use and discard. Anger flowed through her like lava down a mountain, slowly spreading from the center of her chest out to her bloodless fingers, infusing her with a hatred she had never before known.

“What time is it?”

The man took his gold watch out of his waistcoat pocket. “Ten ’til.”

She lifted her face to his, and he smiled in pleasure in what he saw there. She smiled wider. Almost laughed. “Plenty of time.”

The woman turned and walked deeper into the dark alley, knowing the man would follow. The low snow clouds and the sunset threw the narrow back alley into a helpful gloom. Someone tossed water through a door a few stores down. A stray tabby cat sat on top of a stack of crates outside the milliner’s back door. The cat hissed and jumped down, almost tripping the john. She set her basket on the ground.

He unbuckled his belt. “How much.”

“Your coat.”

He paused. Laughed. “My wife would wonder where it was.”

She nodded toward his hands. “You’re a newspaperman. You’ll think of a story.”

He held out his stained hand. “Gives me away every time.” His eyes were hungry now that the meal was at hand. “My coat.”

He’d moved to his pants buttons.

“Before.”

The newspaperman shook his head but shrugged out of his coat, eager to get on with it. The woman donned the coat, looked up and down the alley, bent down, and opened her basket. In a fluid, silent motion, she placed the gun underneath the man’s chin.

“What in tarnation …”

She pulled back the hammer. “It’s a Walker. My dead husband’s. All I have left of him. I’m going to use it to rob the bank across the street.”

The newspaperman’s eyes widened with the first trace of fear.

“But, you’ve ruined my plan, and why? Because you saw a vulnerable woman standing alone, minding her own business.”

“I didn’t mean anything by it.”

The woman’s expression twisted into disbelief. “Your pecker tells another story.”

“Please.”

“Your poor wife. She’s waiting at home for you, probably has a nice supper ready. Worked hard on it, too, and how do you repay her? Trying for a poke with a stranger on the way home.”

The man’s voice shook. “Keep the coat.”

The woman laughed. “I want your hat, too.”

The man lifted his hands partway and the woman pressed the barrel of the gun harder against his neck. He pointed to the hat.

“One hand.”

He removed the hat and placed it on the crate.

“Thank you. This is all going to work out just fine. Much better than my original plan, in fact.”

The man’s brows furrowed.

“You’re gonna help me rob that bank.”

“I couldn’t do that.”

Her expression hardened. “You’d be amazed what you can do when your life depends on it.”

The man swallowed and nodded vigorously. “I’ll help you.”

“Oh, you don’t have no choice in the matter … What’s your name again?”

“Alfie Gernsback.”

Laughter bubbled up and burst forth on a wave of nervous energy. “Your mother hate you or something?”

“Alfred.”

She nodded. “It’s some better, but not much. Okay, here’s the long and short of it, Alfred.” The woman glanced up and down the alley again, and leaned forward. Gernsback leaned down to listen. “Your wife? She’s gonna be much happier without you. Trust me.”

She reveled in his confusion, and his flash of understanding before she pulled the trigger. Alfie Gernsback’s brains hadn’t stopped spraying the milliner’s back wall before she’d picked up her basket and the dead man’s hat and was walking briskly through the alley.

She stopped and looked up and down the street. She ran to the nearest clutch of men. “I think I heard a gunshot.”

“Well, this is Denver.”

“Back that way somewhere.” She motioned in the area of the alley.

The man patted her on the arm. “We’ll look into it.”

She smiled and nodded, her hand over her heart. “Oh, thank you. I would hate for someone to be hurt.”

“I’m sure it’s nothing.”

She crossed the muddy street and arrived at the bank door just as the clerk was locking up.

“Oh, no. Am I too late?”

The clerk was a thin young man with a high forehead and a weak chin he tried to camouflage with a neckbeard that would never equal Lincoln’s. “Just locking up now, ma’am.”

“My husband is going to be so angry. You see, we’re leaving on the five o’clock and he asked me to drop off my jewelry in the safe this morning and I plumb forgot, what with packing and giving the servants instructions for while we’re gone and oh, a dozen other distractions that I have ever day.” The woman inhaled, smiled, and tilted her head to the side. She touched his arm. “Would you mind terribly? It won’t take but a moment, I promise. I have to catch a train, after all.”

The clerk blushed, and nodded. He opened the door as a commotion started down the street. “I wonder what that’s all about?”

The woman entered the bank, pulling the clerk along with her eyes and sultry voice. “Heaven knows. This is Denver, after all.”

The clerk led her to his desk as the woman took everything in. “Must be lonely, being the last one out every night.”

“I like it.” He looked pointedly at her basket. “What did you say your husband’s name was?”

“Is the safe that way?” She pointed down the hall and started walking.

“Yes. Just a moment.” The clerk followed her. “You can’t go down there.”

“I thought it would save us time, since we’re under the gun.” She stepped back against the wall opposite the safe, noting the bank name stenciled across the front. Bank of the Rockies. “Would you like for me to turn around while you open it?”

“I would like for you to go back to the front.”

“Of course. I’ll wait at the nearest desk.”

Alone in the main room, she placed the basket on the desk, lid open, and pulled out a rope. The man returned in less than a minute. “Now, if you’ll just …”

She stood, hands behind her back, smiling. “The jewelry is in the basket.”

The clerk moved forward and bent over to reach in the basket. The woman shoved a chair into the back of his legs, toppling him back into the seat. She looped the rope around his chest and pulled tight. The clerk, stunned, merely looked over his shoulder at the woman, giving her time to place the gun in her other hand on his shoulder. “You will want to sit still for me. I’m not very good with a gun. I’d hate to kill you on accident.”

The front door opened and closed. The clerk and the woman looked up. “Oh, thank God,” the clerk said. He tried to wiggle free but the woman hit him in the back of the head with the butt of her gun. The clerk grunted, and dropped his chin to his chest.

“It took you long enough.”

The teamster crossed the floor in five strides. “Some man was killed back in the alley over there. There’re people everywhere.”

“Tie him up good while I get the money.”

She took the basket to the safe and loaded it with as much cash and gold as would fit. She rifled through the personal papers, pulling out some, tossing others back into the safe. She stared at a deed for a long time before placing it in her basket and returning to the front.

She tossed the personal papers into a metal trash bin, found a match on the nearest desk, and tossed it in the can. The papers were soon engulfed.

The teamster finished tying the clerk to the chair and kicked it over. “Let’s go.” He took the basket from the woman. “Where’d you get the coat?”

“Stole it.”

The clerk moaned around the handkerchief the teamster had stuffed in his mouth. The woman crouched down next to the young man. “I’m sorry I had to hit you. But, it’s either steal from you, or lay on my back for a living. You understand?” The clerk stared at her with glassy eyes. She patted his shoulder. “You’ll be fine in a day or two.”

She stood, pulled the dead man’s hat low over her eyes. The clerk was cognizant enough to look at the gun in her hand with fear. She put the gun in her pocket and grinned, high on the smoke from the burning documents. It wouldn’t ruin him, nothing so petty as a few thousand dollars and lost documents would ruin him. But it would irritate him, and that was good enough. For now. She bent down and whispered in the clerk’s ear.

“Tell Colonel Louis Connolly, Margaret Parker sends her regards.”