Chapter 46
An Unexpected Reunion

We didn’t get back to Sonora till pretty late in the evening.

We parted at the edge of town. “See you around, Cornelia,” Derrick Gregory said, then took off toward the middle of town and the Lucky Sluice. I rode back to Nason’s boardinghouse, hoping I wasn’t too late to get my room back—payment in advance!—for the night.

Mrs. Nason almost seemed glad to see me, in her grumpy sort of way. She even heated up some of the supper things for me to eat and said that because they had already gotten cold she wouldn’t charge me for the meal.

As I lay in my room that night, I couldn’t get to sleep. All I could think of was the day I’d spent and Mr. Kemble, and the election, and what I ought to do with everything I’d learned. Finally I got up, lit a lamp, and for the next couple of hours went over my notes and tried to remember everything I’d seen and heard that day. I wrote it down in as much detail as I could. Whatever came of it all, at least I had to be sure of the truth of my facts. I had to be accurate about Derrick’s falsehoods if I was going to tell them to Mr. Kemble in a way that would help Mr. Fremont. My notes weren’t very neat, but I managed to get down most of the names of people Derrick said he’d talked to and quoted from, as well as what he’d told me about making things up and bribing people to say things. And I tried to reconstruct as much of his conversation with Jack Savage as I could so that I’d be positively accurate in my own quotes when it came to disproving the lies that were being told against Mr. Fremont.

When I finally got to sleep, it was after midnight and I slept late the next morning. But when I woke up my thoughts were less confused and my head was gradually coming clear about what I ought to do. I didn’t really stop to consider that the plan was probably foolhardy and dangerous.

First, I’d have to find out what room Derrick was in. After that I’d have to watch him and try to figure out his writing habits. If they were anything like mine, every once in a while his hand would cramp up and his brain would get dizzy and he’d have to take a break and go for a walk or something. And after that . . . well, then I’d just have to hope for the best!

A little after noon I decided to walk up to the saloon just to see if I could run into Mr. Gregory. I didn’t really know what I’d do or say, but whatever happened I had to keep him in my sights. If he left town without my knowing it and got back to San Francisco ahead of me, everything was lost.

There weren’t many men in the Lucky Sluice at that hour, but a couple of tables were occupied. Almost before I was fully inside I heard Derrick Gregory’s voice raised in laughter and talk. He had just won a hand and was celebrating at the expense of his companions. As I walked toward him, I noticed something awfully familiar about the tall thin form sitting beside him with his back to me. Across the table facing me as I approached sat two mean-looking men—one with a beard who looked like a miner, the other clean and well dressed in an expensive suit. If they were together, they sure made an odd-looking pair!

Derrick half turned and spotted me out of the corner of his eye.

“I should have known you were somewhere close by, Cornelia!” he exclaimed. “Gentlemen,” he said to the rest of the men sitting at the table, “this is my good luck companion, Cornelia Hollister. Whenever she’s around, I win!” Then glancing back at me, he added, “Cornelia, these two fellas are the men I was telling you about that work for the senator and are supposed to keep me in line.” He threw me a quick wink, as much as to say that in spite of their rough appearance, he wasn’t worried about them. “And this young buck just got in from the big city,” he said, indicating the young man sitting next to him.

“Meet Rob Flaridy.”

It was all I could manage to keep from stumbling over my feet and gasping in amazement! I’m sure the shock must have shown on my face. I must say, if he was as surprised to see me as I was him, Robin hid his reaction better than I did mine.

“Charmed,” he said, half rising from his chair and tipping his familiar cap with a smile. I knew he enjoyed my discomfort.

“Sit down . . . sit down, Cornelia!” said Derrick. “Bring me some more good luck!”

“I . . . I really can’t stay,” I fumbled. “I was just . . . I thought I’d find out how your article was going. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“No interruption at all!” he said boisterously. Now that I was close to him I could tell he’d been drinking, although he wasn’t really drunk. “I’m half done, Hollister . . . the election’s practically in the bag! I’m just having a little break with my friends here! By tomorrow at this time I’ll be on my way to San Francisco, and the boys here will be on their way overland with a copy of everything I’ve found for the senator’s use in the East.”

“You have a loose tongue,” growled the man with the beard.

“Relax. Miss Hollister’s on our side!”

In spite of his expensive suit, the expression on the other man’s face was anything but friendly. “You just keep your mouth shut and your hand busy, and get those papers copied out for us! We’re a day behind schedule as it is.”

I couldn’t help but notice that both the strangers had rifles leaning against their chairs. The man with the beard also wore a gun belt. The other eyed me with a questioning look.

I turned to leave.

“You come back around tonight, Cornelia,” said Derrick. “I’ll be right here at this table, and I’ll be ready for another dose of your good luck.”

I nodded sort of noncommittally.

“And maybe by then I’ll be rid of these two brutes,” he added, gesturing across the table, “and we can have some fun!”

I left the saloon without looking at Robin again.

I walked straight across the street into the dry goods store and pretended to look around. I kept close to the window with one eye on the swinging doors of the Lucky Sluice. In about twenty minutes the two men came out and walked up the sidewalk toward the north end of town. Five minutes later Robin emerged. He stopped, looked up and down, then started in the opposite direction, crossed the dirt street to the side I was on, and continued on toward the first hotel I had gone into when I’d got into Sonora.

I watched for another minute or two to make sure Derrick wasn’t coming out. I didn’t want him to see me chasing down the street after Robin. But finally I figured he’d gone back upstairs to his room. I left the store and walked southward as quickly as I could without attracting attention. I saw Robin up ahead of me, sauntering along slowly. I went out into the street so my boots wouldn’t make a pounding noise on the wood walkway, and started running after him. I caught up with him just as he was passing a narrow alleyway that ran along the near side of the hotel.

Before he saw me coming, I ran alongside him and gave him a hard shove sideways into the alley and behind the building. He lost his balance and let out an exclamation, while he struggled to get back his footing. I jumped behind the edge of the wall after him, and grabbed him before he could yell.

“What are you doing here?” I exclaimed as loudly as I dared without attracting attention.

“I could ask you the same thing,” he retorted. “And get your hands off me!” I hardly realized that I had hold of his coat and had pushed him up against the building.

I relaxed and took a step back.

“I am here because Mr. Kemble sent me,” I said.

“As am I.”

“He sent you?”

“How can I put this delicately, Corrie?” he said, finally cracking a meaningful grin. “He wasn’t sure a girl of your tender years could—shall we say—handle such an important assignment. So he sent me along to make sure you didn’t foul it up.”

“Foul it up?” I cried, getting angry. “You’re the one who’s going to foul it up. I’ve practically got Gregory’s whole story!”

“Ah, but I know that he’s in room fourteen, and I know where those other two men are staying, and I know their whole scheme.”

“How long have you been tracking him?” I asked.

“Couple weeks.”

“Kemble told me he had someone on this but that it dried up and they lost Gregory’s trail.”

“Well, that was unfortunate. He eluded me for a while, but then Kemble told me to follow you up here and see what you turned up, and to move back in if I could. Experience, you know,” he said with a superior smile. “He felt even if you did track down Gregory, I’d be better able to get what we need in the end.”

“Why, that conniving rascal!” I said. “He gave me all that runaround about me being the perfect one for the story and about the election and truth all hanging in the balance, and all the time he was just using me! And you’re trying to tell me that I was just a decoy so that you could get the story in the end?”

“The truth is sometimes painful, Corrie,” said Robin, still smiling with that look of superiority.

I turned away and strode off a few steps deeper into the alley. I felt like crying and screaming all at once!

But if I was going to prove that I could compete with men like Mr. Kemble and Mister Robin T. O’Flaridy, I couldn’t do either. I couldn’t give in to all the female emotionalism flooding through me right then. I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t go over and punch Robin in the nose. Somehow I had to see this thing through, and prove that I was made of stronger stuff than either of them might think.

I took a deep breath, then turned back around.

“So it has been you following Derrick recently,” I said calmly. “And you were on our trail down to Big Oak Flat yesterday.”

“And you’ve got to admit I did a pretty good job too,” said Robin. “Neither of you saw me, did you?”

I shook my head. “But Derrick knew somebody was back there.”

“Nah, he knew nothing. He was guessing.”

“Don’t be too cocky, Robin,” I said. “If you’re not careful you could put your foot right in the middle of it and get us both killed.”

“What could go wrong?”

“Plenty. You just watch your step. We’re too close. I don’t even want to think what those two men might do if they catch us or if they find out we know each other.”

“They’ll never find out a thing!”

“Just watch your step. Both of our names have been in print recently. It wouldn’t take much and we’d be in way over our heads.”

“I tell you, you worry too much, Hollister.”

“And maybe it’ll be my worrying that’ll get you through this,” I replied. “Where you staying?”

“Right here,” he said, indicating the hotel.

“Well, I’m in the boardinghouse down the street. Which is where I’m going now—I’ve got to do some thinking. You stay out of trouble!”

In reply, he only flashed another smile of unconcerned indifference.

As I left the alley and walked off alone down the street, it hardly occurred to me how much everything had changed. I wasn’t afraid of Robin anymore, as I had been in San Francisco. In fact, I’d acted as if I were the older and more experienced one of the team.

And for better or worse, I suppose that’s what we were now, at least for a couple more days—a team. Something inside me told me it was up to me if we were going to get out of this in one piece. Robin was too cocky for his own good.