Herne held his breath. He took in the youngster’s stance, the badge, shining and new, pinned to his shirt, the hand poised above the bolstered gun. He looked into his eyes and saw them resolute and unmoving. Herne knew that at the first sign of hostility the lawman would go for his gun, no doubt about that from the way he stood there you could tell that he’d made up his mind, decided before ever Herne came back out of the kitchen, first sign of trouble and I’ll gun him down.
Try.
Except the youngster wouldn’t have allowed the word ‘try’ to enter his head; simply the fact of doing it Clearing leather faster, shooting straighter. If a man didn’t think with that kind of confidence he was already half-way to being dead. And this one looked like someone who wanted to stay alive – Herne didn’t want to have to disappoint him.
‘Evenin’, Sheriff.’
Yester nodded, a quick abrupt movement, not about to be thrown off guard.
‘Somethin’ I can do for you?’
‘Ease your hand away from the Colt a little.’
Herne slowly spread his right arm wide, until his hand was a couple of feet clear of the smooth pistol butt. ‘That make you feel better?’
‘I’m feelin’ fine,’ replied Yester, a shade too quickly to be believed.
Herne nodded. ‘That’s good, Sheriff. Now, what’s on your mind? Aside from this gun of mine, that is.’
‘What’s your business here in Cimaron Falls?’
Herne looked blankly at him for a moment and shrugged. ‘Private business, maybe.’
‘And maybe it ain’t,’ snapped the lawman quickly.
Mrs Dawson pushed through from the kitchen, wiping her hands on a soiled piece of cloth. ‘He was asking questions,’ she said, her voice mean and accusing. ‘Plenty of questions.’
‘What about?’ asked Yester.
‘Friend of ...’ Herne began, but the woman’s shrill tones interrupted.
‘Nadine, that’s who.’
‘Nadine?’
‘She used to work here,’ explained the woman.
‘Doing my job,’ pouted the waitress. ‘Till she thought she was too good for it.’
‘She always did reckon she was too good by half,’ said Mrs Dawson, almost to herself.
‘What’s your business with this ... this Nadine?’ asked the sheriff.
Herne gave a short sigh. He was beginning to find it all a mite tiresome. ‘Got a letter for her, that’s all.’
‘Says it’s from her husband,’ the woman butted in.
‘So?’ said Yester.
‘Her,’ the woman went on spitefully, ‘she ain’t got no husband. What kind of man’d marry a woman like that?’
Yester allowed his body to relax, but not much. He was still watching Herne close, despite all the comments and questions that were flying around. Herne knew it and admired him for it.
‘What kind of a woman was she?’ asked Yester.
‘Was she?’ the woman repeated. ‘She ain’t dead, Sheriff, least, not as far as I know she ain’t.’
‘Okay,’ he said irritably, ‘what kind is she?’
The waitress and the proprietress exchanged meaningful glances, but neither of them was prepared to say anything. Herne made a pace down the aisle and the lawman made it clear that another one would be too many.
‘Just hold it there,’ he warned, raising the palm of his left hand.
Herne relaxed; seemed to, at least.
‘Where is this Nadine?’ asked Yester. ‘She still in town?’
‘She is.’
‘Where?’
Mrs Dawson tossed her head. ‘She’ll be at the Imperial Palace,’ she said, pronouncing the name as though the sound fouled her ears.
‘Doing what? She workin’ there?’
The woman’s face jerked upwards and she tilted her nose towards the ceiling. ‘As for what she’s doing there, you’d best ask Mr Bennett. He’s the one as buys her them fancy dresses and puts money into her purse. You ask him.’
Yester ran his tongue over his bottom lip. ‘This Bennett – he own the hotel?’
The woman nodded emphatically.
‘Owns that and a lot of other things in town,’ said the waitress.
‘Him and Albert Cohen, they got most of the place between them!’ Mrs Dawson amplified.
‘Them and the bank.’
The expression on the waitress’s face was one of deep animosity, almost of hatred.
‘Maybe this feller an’ me, we ought to sort out about this letter,’ said the sheriff. ‘You think you could excuse us for a few minutes?’
Mrs Dawson didn’t take to the idea. ‘There’s my business to consider, I don’t rightly see why you can’t talk to this person down at your office.’
Yester looked at Herne. ‘How d’you feel ’bout that?’
‘You arrestin’ me?’ Herne asked him.
‘Not yet, I ain’t’
‘Then I’d as soon stay where I am.’
Yester saw his point – and right then he didn’t want to push the man too far over something that wasn’t important. He looked past Herne at the proprietress. ‘Five minutes, ma’am, likely less. I’d be obliged.’
After a few moments Mrs Dawson beckoned the waitress and the two of them retreated towards the kitchen. ‘Five minutes,’ she said as the door swung back.
There was a brief silence, the men relieved that they were alone, yet immediately starting to size one another up afresh. ‘This letter,’ the sheriff began.
‘What about it?’
‘That’s what I was askin’ you.’
Herne shrugged. ‘Met a man back along the trail. Gave me fifty dollars to deliver it. Claimed she was his wife.’
Yester thought for a while. ‘Seems like she ain’t.’
‘I’ll give it to her anyway.’
Yester nodded, but something about it nagged at him. ‘If the letter was so all-fired important, how come he didn’t deliver it hisself?’
A trace of a smile crossed Herne’s face. ‘He was busy at the time.’
‘Doin’ what?’
‘Dyin’.’
The sheriff’s eyes narrowed and the knuckles of his right hand almost grazed the top of his gun butt.
‘You kill him?’
‘Would I tell you if I had?’
‘Did you?’
‘No.’
Yester released his breath. ‘Like you said, if you had, you wouldn’t stand there an’ tell me.’
‘That’s right.’
‘But he didn’t die natural?’ the sheriff persisted.
‘Not unless you call three slugs in the chest natural.’
Yester nodded, almost pleased that he had been right. ‘You know who did do it, or is that too much to ask?’
‘He said a bunch of men he’d never seen before. Got no reason to disbelieve that.’
‘Uh-huh. And d’you know what’s in the letter?’
‘No,’ Herne replied straight off.
Yester stared at him, not certain whether he believed his answer or not; unsure if it mattered either way.
‘What you intendin’ on doin’ when you given the letter over?’
Herne took his time before replying. ‘I’ll be riding on. You don’t have to worry about that.’
Yester bristled a little. ‘Who said I was worried?’
‘Why else would you come in here, tryin’ me out?’
‘That wasn’t on account of me bein’ worried.’
Herne nodded. ‘You mean the feller as hired you was?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘Didn’t need to. You’d feel obliged enough to him to come runnin’ when he shouted.’
Anger showed at the back of Yester’s eyes. ‘No one tells me to do this job any way but how I want.’
‘Sure,’ said Herne, smiling. ‘Sure. I’m just glad you got that star to wear on your chest instead of me.’
‘How come?’
‘You’re obviously better at dealin’ with that Cohen than I was. I mean, the fact he went runnin’ to you after he saw me and you came right along here, smart, that don’t mean a thing.’
Yester rocked forward a little on his feet and his body dropped a fraction more into a crouch and Herne wondered if he’d pushed the youngster too far.
‘Easy,’ he said, ‘I don’t mean nothin’ by it.’
‘Then you’d best bite back on that tongue of yours before it gets you into trouble.’
Herne nodded, still faintly smiling. ‘Sure thing, Sheriff.’ He tried his best not to sound too sarcastic.
Yester waited a moment or two and then straightened up. He stood away from the door, making it clear that he wanted Herne to step through first. When
Herne was almost there, he stopped him with another question.
‘Cohen, he didn’t say your name.’
Herne looked at him.
‘Herne,’ he said. ‘Jed Herne.’
‘All right, Herne. Tend to your business and ride on. I ain’t got nothing against you, but I reckon it’ll be healthier that way.’
Herne was of a mind to ask him who for, but he thought better of it. Instead he gave the sheriff a curt nod and let himself out of the dining rooms and onto the street. There were lights here and there and more folk around, horses tethered to the hitching rails up and down. The sound of music, indistinct, was coming from the Imperial Palace. Herne touched the letter in his pants pocket and began to walk along the boardwalk. Once, when he glanced back, the sheriff was watching his progress through the glass.
For all that it was low to the ground, the Palace made up for lack of stature in other ways. The furnishings had been shipped and freighted from Chicago and St. Louis – certain items, such as the mirror behind the bar and the chaise longue in the lobby had come up the Mississippi from New Orleans. The lamps were all cut glass, shaped and tinted pink and green. The walls had been hung with the finest reproduction paintings and the reception desk at the far side of the foyer was fashioned from paneled oak. Plants sat on dark green pots like city women’s hats. There was even carpet on the floor inside the entrance.
Howard Bennett was a man of taste and vision – or so he would tell his closest friends after several glasses of brandy. He was preparing for the day when Cimaron Falls would expand, ready to expand along with it. No, ahead of it. The next stage of Bennett’s plan was to build a second floor with a wide balcony overhanging the boardwalk. The first two story building in town! After that there would be private baths, a resident barber and manicurist, a small dining suite which would be available for hire by the community’s businessmen to entertain their colleagues and friends. New brass cuspidors, armchairs, feather mattresses, linen sheets: Howard Bennett spent too much time reading catalogues and dreaming. That was what his friends would say to one another when Howard had left the room to fetch another bottle of his best brandy. Lacks a sense of proportion. And as for this latest fancy of his.
Nadine O’Reilly sat on her high stool behind the reception desk in the hotel foyer, her neck arched slightly back, her head high. Her blonde hair was arranged in a pattern of waves and cascades which gave the appearance of having been poured from an elaborate jelly mould. One quick shake of the head and it would all come tumbling messily down over her face and shoulders. That face was set into an icy stare, blue eyed and smooth skinned, her lips painted a deep shade of red. The sheen at the top of her shoulders was that of warm marble, ivory-colored above the blue of her dress.
She stared at each person who entered with an expression which conveyed her state of superiority; guests – and there were not many – had the impression that she, and the hotel, were being especially gracious in allowing them to stay. Customers anxious only to avail themselves of the facilities of the bar and the roulette wheel, ducked their heads sideways as soon as they entered and so avoided her gaze.
Herne was making his first visit to the Imperial Palace, so he didn’t know the procedure for getting through the lobby without one of Nadine’s withering looks. But then, even if he had, it would have served no purpose. It was the lady that he wished to see.
He let the door close quietly enough behind him and stepped a couple of easy paces into the entrance. His shirt was a faded red, beginning to fray a good deal about the collar mid both cuffs; the pants he wore were a nondescript brown, creased in downward rolls, strands of loose material hanging over the scuffed and worn boots. He wore a wool coat that had seen better days, but so long ago it must have forgotten. Almost the only thing about him which seemed to have had much attention paid to it was the gun belt strapped round his hips – that and the Colt .45 sitting snug in its holster.
Nadine couldn’t see the gun. Well, no more than the barrel end fattening out the holster. She could see a section of the belt, smooth leather and a thick metal buckle. She looked the rest of the man up and down and decided he was on his way into the bar and the sooner the better. Men like that hanging around the lobby would give the hotel a bad name. She averted her eyes and went back to reading the dime romance she had received in the last consignment of goods from the east. After half a page she became aware that the stranger standing opposite her desk had not moved on into the bar; he hadn’t moved at all. He was stubbornly standing there, dirtying the carpet with his boots and even staring openly. At her!
Nadine folded over her book and raised her head so that she seemed to be peering along either side of her nose.
Herne was torn between thinking she looked a stuck up fool and how pretty she looked despite it. Damned pretty! And, Lord, didn’t she know it. He guessed she’d been told so many times since whoever her ma was bounced her up and down in the crib, that she’d long since come to regard compliments as her right. Anyone who wasn’t impressed by her beauty, she likely thought of as half-blind. That or stupid.
Herne wasn’t either: he could tell well enough why she’d figured herself to be a cut above waiting on tables for cowhands and drifters and the like. One other thing seemed certain – Edwards’ story about the two of them being married was as like to be true as the tale he’d heard one time about a grizzly that smoked cigars and sat down to table with a knife and fork.
‘Can I help you?’ Nadine asked. She made it sound most unlikely.
‘If you’re who I think you are you can.’
‘I am the manageress here and if—’
‘Your name Nadine?’
She flushed slightly, affronted. ‘And if it is?’
‘You know a man name of Edwards? Jamie Edwards. Some kind of prospector.’
The red leapt to her cheeks then, her hands fluttered above the desk; she touched the hem of her dress, curl of her hair beside her ear, her dress again.
‘I don’t ...’ she began but already it was no good. ‘What about him?’
Herne’s eyes narrowed. ‘What was he to you?’
Nadine linked her fingers and struggled to regain the ascendancy she felt she’d lost. ‘He was ... he was nothing. I know him, knew him, that’s all.’
‘Uh-huh, no more than that?’
‘Of course not.’
Herne shook his head. ‘The way he tells it, it’s a different story.’
‘He always was full of big ideas.’ She snapped it out before she could stop herself and her face showed how much she regretted it.
‘Didn’t think you knew him that well,’ said Herne, the beginnings of a grin on his lips and in the corners of his eyes.
‘I didn’t!’ Her voice was too loud and sharp and before it faded a man in a three-piece suit that spread less than elegantly over his stomach walked through the side door from one of the other rooms. He was close to fifty and his hair was brushed flat and thinning, almost black. His face was florid and his eyes were too small for his face. There were two gold rings on the fingers of his left hand, a gold tiepin stuck through his cravat
‘Something wrong, Nadine?’ He spoke in an aggressive purr, glancing hastily at Herne and lingering over the woman behind the desk.
‘No, no, nothing, this man—’
‘He’s making a nuisance of himself?’
‘Yes, well, not exactly. It’s all mixed up.’
‘So it seems.’
Bennett went towards Herne and introduced himself. He asked if there was anything he could do to help. Herne shook his head and said it was between the lady and himself, a private matter. There were unmistakable signs of jealousy in the hotel owner’s face, in the opening and closing of his fingers, the way he struck a match at the third attempt and lit a small cigar.
‘In that case, you’d best make use of my office.’ He pointed towards the door he’d come through moments earlier. ‘I’ll take over duties behind the desk for five minutes.’
He gave Nadine a look, fast and severe, that made it plain he would expect an explanation from her afterwards. Then he glowered at Herne and held open the office door. Nadine got down from her high stool, her cheeks still flushed, and moved towards the office with a stiff swish of petticoats from beneath her long blue dress. The bottom of it swept the carpet as she walked. Herne waited until she was at the door, nodded at Bennett, and followed her through.
He shut the door firmly behind them.
For several long moments they looked at one another. Herne watched the woman’s eyes, waiting for the first signs of real disturbance, of weakening. After a while he decided that they weren’t going to come. He leaned back against the wall close by the door and she sat on the edge of Bennett’s desk, her hands set against the turn of the wood, but not gripping it as though she were suffering from any tension. Now that the initial shock, the surprise had worn off, she was in control again.
She even smiled: quickly, then it was gone.
‘So what’s happening to old Jamie?’ She looked away from Herne, at a painting of trees and a river on the wall; she gave her head a little shake and said: ‘He always was a poor fool.’
‘But you married him.’
She didn’t answer straight off, then: ‘That was a long time ago and I was a different woman.’ She looked directly at Herne then, expecting him to understand. ‘I wasn’t even a woman. I was stranded in the middle of some God forsaken hole and I couldn’t see any way out.’
‘And he offered you one – that the way it was?’
‘I didn’t think I could make it on my own. I know there are women who do, but back then I didn’t think I had that kind of strength.’
‘And now you do.’
‘Yes. Now I do.’
‘So you didn’t have any use for Jamie anymore?’
She stood down off the desk, her hands small fists in front of her. ‘What are you, some kind of preacher? You sure don’t look like one, I’ll say that for you.’
Herne shook his head. ‘I ain’t no preacher.’
‘Why the lecture, then?’
He shrugged. ‘Maybe on account of you bein’ so high an’ mighty out there. Maybe because …’ He looked at her and the expression on his face changed.
Nadine relaxed her hands. ‘Because what?’
‘Because I watched him dyin’.’
Her head dipped forward and she clutched at her chest, as though a sharp pain had cut through her. All the color faded from her cheeks and her eyes closed tight. It didn’t last more than a minute. When she had composed herself she looked at him frankly and said, ‘I’m sorry.’
‘What for? Showing a little emotion for your husband?’
She shook her head. ‘He wasn’t that. Not really. Not for a long time. I haven’t even seen him for, what? Two years.’
‘You sure?’
‘I should know.’
Herne nodded. ‘I guess.’
There was a knock at the door and Bennett’s voice called out, asking how much longer they were going to be. Herne said a while. Bennett asked Nadine if she was all right and she shouted back that she was fine. Herne heard the hotel proprietor move away.
‘You a friend of his?’ she asked, her voice softening as she leaned back against the desk. Herne tried to concentrate on the answer to her question and not to think about how attractive he was finding her.
‘Uh-uh. Run into him all shot up an’—’
‘Shot?’
Herne nodded. Three times. Bushwhacked.’
‘Who..?’
‘He said he didn’t know. I sat with him, slept. Woke in the mornin’ and he was dead.’ He looked at her, trying to figure out what she was thinking, feeling. ‘Went peaceful, there’s that to it. Peaceful as a man can with three slugs stuck inside him.’
‘You buried him?’
‘Yeah.’
The silence hung between them again. He watched as with her left hand she twisted at a bracelet on her right wrist. It was gold like the rings on Bennett’s hand and he would have bet that it was Bennett who gave it to her. He caught himself wondering exactly what for and quickly reminded himself that it wasn’t any of his business.
She tried him with a smile. ‘This thing you wanted to see me about – was that a message from Jamie?’
‘Kind of.’
She waited; he saw the tip of her tongue wet her lower lip at the center.
‘Gave me a letter. That an’ fifty dollars. It was all he had an’ I guess he knew he wasn’t about to spend it on anything else.’
She was slightly tense now, despite herself. Herne moved a few paces closer and he was near enough to see a light film of sweat along the upper lip. Outside in the entrance, he thought, that had been an act; then in here when he told her of her husband’s death, was that an act, too? He wondered if she knew herself.
He slid the folded letter from his back pocket. Her eyes caught on it and he read a tremor of excitement behind them.
‘Did he ..?’ she began slowly.
‘Say what was in it?’ Herne lied. ‘Not a word.’
‘You didn’t..?’
He shook his head. ‘It ain’t been opened. You can see that.’
Her hand touched his for an instant as she took the letter and he could sense the excitement running through her. Behind them, Bennett’s fist hammered on the door. His shout spun Herne round. Nadine reached forward and touched his shoulder lightly.
‘It’s all right,’ she said, ‘let him in.’
Herne pulled open the door and Bennett was outside, the lean shape of Sheriff Dan Yester ten feet or so behind him. Herne caught his eye and grinned.
‘Okay,’ Bennett blustered, ‘I’ve work to do, papers to attend to. And if you two have finished your little private conversation, I’d be obliged if I could have my office back to myself.’
Herne shrugged and started walking. Nadine came quickly after him, slipping on her icy mask as she stepped onto the foyer carpet. By the time she was seated behind the desk once more, her hair and her complexion looked as perfect and unruffled as they had when Herne had walked in. She still hadn’t opened the letter and Herne wondered what she’d think when she did, whether she’d take Edwards story of buried silver with any degree of seriousness. He turned his head as he came alongside the sheriff and gave her a last glance; she looked directly at him and gave no indication that anything had passed between them.
‘Evenin’, Sheriff,’ he said before continuing towards the hotel door.
‘I guess you’ll be leaving now,’ said Yester.
‘First thing in the morning, Sheriff.’
The peace officer nodded, his face stone. ‘Be sure you do. I’ll be down at the livery to see you ride out.’
Herne grinned and touched the peak of his hat. Till the mornin’ then, Sheriff. Let’s hope it sets fine.’