A Lady in Defiance (19 page)

Before Ian could reply, gunfire erupted again, but much
closer this time. The boom was thunderous and came from a definite location.
The two men froze. “That sounded like a sho’gun−” Ian noted with concern.
Before he could finish, McIntyre had tossed aside his cheroot and was running
like a man on fire toward the other end of town, leaving his hat in the dust.

Chapter
15

McIntyre ran as if he was racing the devil. He bounded down
the boardwalks then on to the hotel’s porch. The front door was open and he
could hear a commotion of some kind upstairs. Drawing his gun, he bolted up the
stairs.

“Mrs. Miller, ladies, are you all right?”

He turned the corner and paused to get his bearings. The
second floor was no longer one, large open space. Fifteen rooms had been
roughed in and he now found himself staring down a darkened hall. Light was
coming from the last doorway on the right and he could hear several frantic
voices, yelling and screaming all at once.

“Mrs. Miller,” he yelled again, bolting down the hallway. He
leaped into the room, gun pointed at−

Hank Barrows
?

The young man was kneeling on the floor, hands laced behind
his head, and he was peppered with bloody wounds down a good portion of the
left side of his body. His shirt hung from him in shreds. Still wearing her
faded, blue day dress, Naomi was holding a shotgun on him, smoke whisping from
its barrel. Rebecca and Hannah, in their nightclothes, were cowering behind
her. When they saw McIntyre, all of them started talking at once to him, but
Naomi kept the gun trained on Hank.

“He broke in here−”

“I only meant to scare’em!”

“Started yelling crazy stuff−”

“Said he was going to rip off our clothes−”

“I wasn’t gonna hurt anybody!”

“QUIET!” McIntyre yelled. The room fell silent. “Put that gun
away, Mrs. Miller, before you shoot me. I can see the barrel shaking from
here.” Slowly, Naomi lowered the gun. Hank started to lower his hands, but
McIntyre waved his gun at him. “Keep them up until you tell me what happened…or
you bleed to death.”

The boy started shaking his head back and forth as if he
couldn’t stand his pain. “I swear I wasn’t gonna hurt’em! Rose said she’d let
me have a poke for free if I’d just scare these girls. That’s all. I wasn’t
even gonna touch’em!”

“Then what were you doing leaning over the bed?” Rebecca’s
voice and eyes were wild with fear.

The sound of boots tromping up the stairs stopped her
hysterics and, a moment later, Ian appeared. He assessed the situation quickly.
“Are you all right, ladies?” When they nodded, he went to Hank. Helping him to
his feet, he looked him over. “Ye’re fortunate her aim was off. Ye’re peppered
up good, but you willna die. A wee touch more to the right and ye’d be without
your worthless head, though.”

Naomi raised her gun again. “I was trying to miss. I only
wanted to scare
him
.”

The marshal entered at that moment, gun drawn, and, after
taking in the scene, looked to McIntyre for instruction. “Take him to the jail,
Wade.” Disgusted with all this unnecessary high drama, McIntyre grabbed Hank’s
shoulder and shoved him towards the marshal. “I’ll be by shortly to have a talk
with him. Get one of the Flowers to come over and clean him up.”

Without hesitating, the marshal grabbed the whimpering sot by
the arm and led him out of the room as McIntyre dropped the hammer on his gun.
Clear out to the street they could hear Hank bewailing the misunderstanding. “I
was only gonna scare’em. I wouldn’t have hurt’em. Just scare’em; that’s all. Am
I dying…?”

As his voice faded, Naomi let the hammer down on her shotgun
and breathed. McIntyre dropped his gun back into its holster and took a step
toward her. “Tell me what happened.” The gentleness with which he’d asked the
question surprised even him.

“Here, ladies...” Ian went to Rebecca and Hannah. “Why don’t
ye come with me? We’ll have a spo’ of warm tea to calm our nerves.” With his
hand on their backs, he gently led them out of the room.

Naomi leaned the gun in the corner and sat down on the bed.
“Our rooms are almost finished. One more night and Hannah would have been in
here alone.” McIntyre found her dull stare disconcerting and her deadpan voice
even more so. He approached the bed and leaned on a post. She looked weary both
in body and spirit. He thought again of that night he had caught her praying
and wondered if she was praying right now. He saw her eyes begin to glisten and
she wiped the unwanted tears away angrily. He had the sudden urge to hold her,
to comfort her, to feel the warmth of her head on his shoulder. The desire
startled him to the point that he actually backed away a step.

“I came in from the backyard and the hotel was so quiet, but
then I heard the stairs creak. They hadn’t done that before, not that I’d
noticed.” She turned her head to look at the wall behind him. He followed her
gaze to the paneling, ripped and splintered from buckshot. “I just knew
something was wrong and we keep the gun behind the door. I heard a voice
whispering but it wasn’t Rebecca or Hannah.” She shook her and frowned. “I
tried to be so quiet...When I crept into the room, I saw him standing at the
end of the bed…just staring at them.”

Naomi looked at him then and the depth of pain and confusion
he saw drew him back to the end of the bed, but no closer. “I warned him. I
tried to get him to leave.” She swallowed. “What if I’d killed him? I nearly
did.” She wasn’t asking about the legal ramifications, he knew, but the deeper
meaning of taking a life. “A kind of blind fear came over me, but I was blind
with rage at the same time. How can that be?”

He didn’t know the answer to that, but he did know her
experience wasn’t unique.  He had been introduced to that strange mix of
fear and fury during the war. He had watched a dear friend’s head explode when
hit with a cannon ball; yet, he had kept firing at a sea of Yankees spilling
over the ridge. Turning from the bloody memories, he offered encouragement.
“You didn’t kill him…and I dare say once word of your shotgun gets out, you
won’t have any more unwanted visitors.”

“He said Rose put him up to it. Why does she hate us so?”
Naomi’s chin quivered and he heard tears in her voice. He knew, though, that
she wouldn’t cry in front of him. No matter what it took, she wouldn’t do that.
He understood the need to hide weakness and vulnerability.

“I suspect she wants you to leave. You needn’t concern
yourself with her now. Rose will not plague you again. I’ll see to it
personally.”

“I appreciate you coming by. Please let us know if we can
press charges...if it even goes that far.”

He detected cynicism in the comment. She didn’t trust that
anything would happen to the boy. “I’ll stop by the jail and tell Wade to start
the proceedings. He’ll be punished.” He hoped the promise would reassure her.

She offered nothing more and stared down at her hands in her
lap. He realized he was dismissed. Wishing for something more to say, he
motioned as if tipping his hat “Until tomorrow then, Mrs. Miller.”

Defiant against any emotions that might make her tolerate the
man, much less like him, Naomi stood, straight and tall as she could manage, to
watch Mr. McIntyre leave. She hoped she looked regal and collected. She wanted
him to know she was strong and didn’t need him to lean on…unlike Daisy or any
of those other women in his employ.

Yet, in spite of herself, Naomi felt a slight kindness
towards Mr. McIntyre. She assumed his gentle voice and attempted heroism were
lulling her into a false sense of trust. He was a cad, a man who led women into
prostitution; a dishonest, disreputable business man not worth her time. He was
here now out of a need to protect his investment and nothing else. But she was
so tired of fighting this town, the men, these evil women and their plots−

She waited till she heard his boots on the stairs and then
fell backward across the bed. She was too stunned and too tired to cry. She
merely wanted to get away from this abhorrent place, to go somewhere people
weren’t constantly trying to insult, injure, or leer at them. She wanted to lie
down and feel John’s arms around her. Hoping her mind would stay numb, she
rolled over and curled up into a tight little ball, like a child awaiting the
safe haven of sleep.

~~~

Rebecca and Hannah watched silently while Ian bustled
confidently about the kitchen, making tea. “I’m quite pleased,” he muttered as
he ran his hands over the new stove. He looked around at the newly renovated
kitchen. “They’ve done a wonderful job. This is a much more functional kitchen
for a commercial venture.”

Neither of the sisters replied. Suddenly aware that she and
Rebecca were in their night things, Hannah pulled her gown closer and hunched
beneath the table, trying to make herself insignificant.

Rebecca slid her hand over and clutched Hannah’s. “Are you
all right?”

Hannah half-nodded, half shook her head. “I don’t know. I
guess so. I’m not sure really what I think. I don’t know if I’m more shaken by
that man coming in our room or by Naomi trying to shoot him.”

“She tried to miss. A scatter gun has a wide pattern.”

“She pulled the trigger.”

“She had the
guts
to pull the trigger. That’s not an
easy burden to carry. To have a temper like that must be frightening.”

Hannah bit her lip, willing to ponder that point. If not for
what Rebecca had said, Hannah wouldn’t have thought of it in that way. And
maybe because Naomi was willing to use a gun, whether out of courage or anger,
there would be no more trouble. She prayed it was so. She was scared enough as
it was. Glancing down at her ever-growing midsection, she tried not to fear the
future.

Ian set cups on the table then returned with a kettle of hot
water. Rebecca assisted by putting the tea and strainers in each cup. He poured
the water, returned the kettle to the stove then sat down with them. Dunking
the strainer, he studied the girls. “Ye’ve been through a lo’ since ye departed
yer home. I think ye’re holding up remarkably well. I’d be willing to bet that
once words of this gets out, ye’ll have no more trouble.”

Hannah wasn’t so sure. She had a strong suspicion that there
was one woman in town who wasn’t feeling too peaceable. “What about Rose? Is
she going to let this go?”

“I believe Rose’s time at the Iron Horse has come to an end.
She has been a thorn in Mac’s side for some time now. I suspect he’ll be
pruning her from the Garden forthwith.”

Wearing a melancholy smile, Rebecca stirred a little honey
into her tea. “I can’t believe how far we’ve come from Cary and I don’t mean
miles. That life seems a million years in the past.”

“Aye, I know what ye mean. My life as a young man in Sco’land
is a vague memory now. Everywhere I’ve traveled, in fact, seems vague and
shadowy. I regret not having put down roots somewhere but my wanderlust wouldna
let me be.” He sipped his tea and thought for a moment. “I came to Defiance in
March and thought to leave this fall…” The look on his face transformed to
something deeper and softer as he looked at Rebecca. Hannah knew if she could
see the change, surely so could her sister. “I think now I’ll stay a wee bit
longer. I’d like to see the hotel up and runnin’.”

Rebecca paused with her tea almost at her lips. “Do you think
you’ll ever go back to Scotland?”

Ian shook his head. “I knew when I left I wouldna see home
again. I’m more interested in lookin’ forward than back. The past is done and
there’s no changin’ it.” Rebecca nodded, her eyes aglow with what looked like a
new understanding. Ian straightened up in his seat, as if he was intent on
making his next point. “We can best honor our dead by livin’ well. Movin’
forward dusna mean ye love them any less. It just means ye’re still alive.” A
shadow of a memory crossed his face. “I was married for a brief time in
Sco’land. After Annie died, I came close dying as well. I just thank God he
dinna leave me to perish, alone with a bottle in Glasgow.”

Hannah caught the reference and knew Rebecca hadn’t missed it
either, judging by her wide, glimmering eyes. “You’re a Believer,” her sister
asked, sounding stunned.

“I am a man of faith, but admittedly a wayward faith. Though,
somehow I feel the prodigal son is returnin’ home.” Hannah knew there was a
message in that statement and hoped Rebecca didn’t miss it.

Indeed, Rebecca’s reply was so soft her voice was barely
above a whisper. “I’m glad you found your way back.”

Hannah took note of her sister’s sparkling eyes aimed at Ian
and the intent way he studied her. Grinning, she realized she could stand up
and sing Beautiful Dreamer and these two would merely nod politely, if they
paid her any attention at all…and Hannah was just fine with that.

~~~

When McIntyre walked into the jail, Wade looked up from his
dime novel and shrugged apologetically. “I reckon he’ll live, Mr. McIntyre, but
he’s sleeping’ it off now. Squalled like a baby all the way here, then went out
like a lamp when his head hit the pillow.” Displeased that he couldn’t question
Hank, McIntyre strode over to the cell and looked in on the new guest, barely
visible in the low light. His drunken snoring, the wet, sloppy sound of a hog
rooting through thick mud, convinced McIntyre he was indeed alive. “Lily
cleaned him up some,” Wade explained from behind him, “but I told her not to
worry too much about him. He ain’t dyin’.”