The Fire of Greed (20 page)

Chapter 36

“MR. WALDRON,” JOSEPH AMES SAID STERNLY, RISING TO
greet his colleague as Waldron returned to the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe office.

“I have just received this telegram from the home office.”

Waldron took the yellow Western Union flimsy in his hand. The message was addressed to Ames and it read:

FOR YOUR PROMPT ATTENTION STOP E WALDRON TO BE RELIEVED OF DUTY AND ORDERED REPORT HOME OFFICE IMMEDIATELY STOP

“Good day, sir,” Ames said, picking his hat up from his desk. “Good day . . . and good riddance. Let the home office sort out the bitter fruit of your incompetence.”

With that, Ames stormed out of the office, slamming the door behind him. Ezra Waldron stared at the telegram, devastated but not defeated. He
would
leave Santa Fe. What Ames did not know was that he had already planned his exit. Tomorrow, he would ride to Lamy for the last time. Tomorrow, he would climb aboard the afternoon train for Kansas City for the last time.

There was much about New Mexico Territory that he would not miss, but there were still things that he
would
miss. Among them, the smell of sweet perfume and the sight of lips the color of chilies.

In the scenario proscribed by his employers in their telegram, Ezra Waldron was to travel to the home office like a whelp with his quivering tail tucked between his quivering legs. He would then ascend the steps of the home office to be called upon the carpet, violently berated, then fired and banished forever from a job that had been the reason for his existence for the eighteen years that seemed to have lasted a century. Losing his job was a terrible blow, but it was not the end of the world. Indeed, he would not be going back to that world—nor would he be going to Kansas City.

Waldron had already made plans that were
not
those proscribed and imagined by the home office. Waldron's plans included climbing no steps, nor standing nervously upon any home office carpet. In
his
scenario, he would detrain at La Junta, Colorado, and simply disappear. He'd try Denver for a while, because that was where his bank accounts were, but deep down inside his soul, he knew that he would eventually wind up in San Francisco. Still fueled by the glittering fortunes of the Gold Rush and Comstock years, it offered all the opportunities of a financial hub—
and
it was the city of fresh starts.

He hung up his coat and hat and sat down at his desk.

“
Who's been disturbing things at my desk?
” Waldron asked in a deafening roar.

“I just took the account ledger,” the clerk replied meekly from across the room. “You told me to use it to do those sums from last month.”

“So I did,” Waldron said, glowering at the man.

“Has anyone
else
been at my desk?”

The clerk thought for a minute and replied, “Miss de la Gravière was here to see you. She said that you said that she could sit in the chair next to your desk.”

“That I did,” Waldron said, retreating into his spinning head.

As his head spun, his eyes stared straight down at the letter that lay on top of the pile of paperwork on his desk for all the world to see.

The letterhead was that of the Denver & Rio Grande Western, and the contents, when viewed privately, had been a promise of wealth that had been the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the pot at the end of eighteen long years.

The contents, when viewed through the eyes of anyone else, such as the dark eyes of Nicolette de la Gravière, were, alas, an indictment of one Ezra Waldron for stock manipulation, conspiracy, and being an accessory to murder.

When he had left his desk in a hurry to rush over to the Plaza, he had tossed the ledger and a random stack of papers on top of these critical documents, assuming that the ledger, stack of papers, and critical documents would remain in exactly that same unrifled order until he returned.

Now there was no doubt in his mind that the gorgeous young woman with the beautiful smile, with whom he was on the verge of falling in love, had seen the letter and the brokerage statement.

There was no doubt in his mind that the bright and intuitive young woman whose insights he found marvelous, had
read
the letter and had seen the brokerage statement and had understood how and why it constituted an indictment of one Ezra Waldron for stock manipulation, conspiracy, and being an accessory to murder.

He looked at the last sentence of the letter and reread the part about the elimination of the “two loose ends.” He almost cried when he realized that now, there was a
third
loose end.

He looked up. While he had been absorbed in his predicament, Nathaniel Siward had returned to the office and gone to the desk that he used when he was not at Lamy.

“Don't take off your coat, Siward,” Waldron said. “We have an errand to run.”

* * *

“WE'VE GOT A PROBLEM,” WALDRON SAID QUIETLY AS THEY
walked down the street. “Or I should say I've got a problem, which means the same thing . . . that being that
we
have got a problem.”

“What's that?”

“Another loose end.”

“What? Who?”

“I think that this is the most difficult thing I have
ever
had to do,” Waldron said, looking at Siward with genuine, gut-wrenching anguish in his eyes.

“What's that?”

“You need to go find your friend Ben Muriday. Get him before he takes another drink, or get him dried out. You need to tell him that we have five hundred dollars for him. Tell him that we need him tonight. We have another job for him and
his gun
.”

* * *

“YOU DON'T SEEM YOURSELF, MA CHÈRE FILLE,” THERESE DE
la Gravière said to her daughter. “It is your night off, and you're going to the theater with a gentleman . . . but you look like you've just lost your best friend.”

“Oh, Mama,” Nicolette sighed. “I don't know . . .”

“What don't you know?”

“
Macbeth
is such a gloomy production,” Nicolette complained, having decided not to tell her mother about her discovery on Waldron's desk.

“You're not going to the theater to see a play,” her mother corrected her. “You're going to the theater to
be with a gentleman . . .
a gentleman who is courting you.”

“I have not yet decided that we are in a courtship.”

“By the time that a gentleman takes a lady to the theater
twice
, it's courtship,” Therese explained. “By the time that a young woman brings lunch to a man at his workplace, it's courtship.”

“Oh, Mama,” Nicolette said, rolling her eyes.

“I have to get ready to run a restaurant tonight, and my daughter, who is going to the theater tonight, complains that she isn't sure that she's being courted. I wish a man would ask
me
to the theater.”

“
Mama
, what man?”

“Any man. It's a figure of speech. Or
no
man, because that's the way it is.”

“Mama, I didn't realize that you wanted . . .”

“That's because you're a young woman . . . and I am an old woman who should have forgotten such things long ago.”

“Mama, you're still beautiful.”

“Not that anyone notices . . .”

“
Ha!
You've seen the way Dr. Richardson looks at you,” Nicolette said. “Do you think he comes to Refugio del Viajero twice a week only for the
carne asada
?”

“Yes. He is a very loyal customer.”

“Oh, Mama, you're impossible.”

“It is
you
who is impossible. Now, quit moping and get ready for Mr. Waldron.”

“Mama, can I ask you a question?”

“Of course,” Therese said. “When do you have to ask to ask me questions?”

“Do you think it was a mistake for Mr. Waldron to tell the world about the robbery? Mr. Ames has been saying that it was a terrible mistake.

“I'm not in the railroad business,” Therese said. “I don't know. What do you think?”

“I'm not sure. As I have read in the newspaper, it has driven down the price of his railroad's shares.”

“Then it was a mistake,” Therese said with a shrug.

“Unless it was on purpose.”

“Why would a man hurt his own company on purpose?”

“To help a competitor?”

“That's ridiculous,” Therese said dismissively. “It would be as though I poisoned my own salsa to send my customers streaming over to Delmonico's.”

“You're right, Mama,” Nicolette said agreeably. “There would be no reason for you to do that.”

It
did
seem improbable.

“Nicolette?”

“Yes, Mama.”

“Why are you putting on a black dress?” Therese asked. “You should be wearing azure or lavender.”

“Because
Macbeth
is
such
a gloomy play, Mama.”

Chapter 37

“MR. COLE, WHAT A PLEASANT SURPRISE,” THE CORONER
shouted cordially from the adjacent room when Domingo had announced the visitor. “Pardon me for not extending a hand in greeting. I'm with a patient.”

The bounty hunter had decided to pay a visit to his fellow Virginian, if for nothing else than for the sake of conversation.

“I'm attending to some friends of yours, Mr. Cole,” Dr. Amos Richardson said in a quieter voice as Cole stepped to the doorway. “If you are not offended by the presence of death, as I presume you are not, I invite you to step in to observe.”

Cole came into the room to see the lifeless bodies of Gabe Stanton and Jasper Gardner. The deep purple of the latter's injured nose stood out in stark contrast to the pasty paleness of the rest of his face. Cole had no emotion upon viewing these faces, now in quiet repose, after what he had seen of them in life. He had harbored no desire to see them dead without their days in court, nor was he sorry to see that their lives' journeys were at an end.

“I assume that you have seen that this man you have been seeking has become a minor celebrity here in town,” the doctor said as he worked.

“That I have, though I 'spect his time in the limelight will be short.”

“I reckon you to be correct on that point.”

“And here are two other of my recent acquaintances in your care,” Cole observed, looking down at the bodies.

“The stories of their demise, which
they
have told me since their arrival on my table, are considerably different than that which Mr. Muriday has been telling around town,” Richardson said.

“That's interesting . . .” Cole said, his tone asking the doctor to please go on. “How so?”

“Mr. Muriday has been telling a story of a gun battle with two armed men.”

“So I've heard,” Cole replied.

“If it does not offend you, smell this,” the coroner instructed, holding up the right hand of the late Jasper Gardner.

As Cole placed his nose near, his first thought was that this was the hand that had so recently lifted two Mescalero scalps. His second thought was of the aroma of sweat mixed with the pungent and unmistakable stench of burnt gunpowder. He had smelled it so many times on his own hands.

“You would have no doubt that this hand had fired a gun?”

“None,” Cole agreed.

“Now,” Richardson continued, holding up Stanton's right hand. “Smell this hand.”

The stench was that of sweat alone.

“And now this,” the doctor said, holding up Stanton's left.

Again, there was no hint of the acrid spice of gunpowder.

“So you think Stanton never shot a gun?” Cole asked.

“Certainly not in the recent exchange, and probably not for many days prior. Mr. Muriday was in a gunfight with one man, not two.”

“Wouldn't put exaggeration past him,” Cole said.

“Let me direct your attention to another feature,” the coroner said, continuing with his demonstration. “Note the nature of the bullet wound in Mr. Stanton's forehead.”

“Looks to be close-range,” Cole observed.

“Near point-blank,” Richardson confirmed.

“Muriday shot an unarmed man at point-blank range?”

“That's about the size of it.”

“You gonna tell the sheriff?”

“It will be in my report,” Richardson said with a shrug. “Not that he will do anything. A dead fugitive is a dead fugitive. It just confirms the character of the man who you saw shoot your brother.”

“That it does,” Cole agreed.

“What are those?” Cole asked, pointing to a side table.

“Personal effects. I took them from the pockets of these two.”

What had caught Cole's eye were two passes issued by the Denver & Rio Grande.

“I took
these
off the dead bodies of two dead men who pulled a railroad job with Stanton and Gardner,” Cole said, pulling out the two railroad passes that he carried and placing them on the table.

“Four passes from a rival road,” Richardson observed. “Two from Stanton and Gardner . . . two more from the others. All four of the men who robbed the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe carried passes from the rival road . . . These are given only to employees.”

“That's what I thought until this morning,” Cole said. “That was until I saw Ezra Waldron hand one to Muriday as a
reward
for services rendered.”

Richardson stared silently for a minute before he spoke.

“I had a very interesting visit this morning from a friend of yours,” he said.

“A friend of mine?”

“Well, she
did
speak your name.”

“She?” Cole asked, trying to think of any female friend he might have in Santa Fe.

“Nicolette de la Gravière . . . from Refugio del Viajero.”

“What . . . How is
she
my friend? I only saw her once and without a formal introduction,” Cole asked. “This is not to say that I would object in any way to her friendship.”

“She too recalls your visit to the Refugio, and she went on to mention you by reputation.”

“How so?”

“It's a long story,” Richardson cautioned.

“I've got time.”

“She's been seeing Ezra Waldron of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe,” Richardson began, ignoring the slight twitch of Cole's eyelids. “This has naturally involved her calling on him at the railroad's offices. This morning, she was there when he was not, and in the course of her waiting she happened upon some documents which caused her alarm.”

“What kind of documents?” Cole asked, intrigued.

“She said that she found a letter to Mr. Waldron from the Denver & Rio Grande, thanking him for his service and advising him of a ‘quiet' five-thousand-dollar deposit in his account at an unspecified location.”

“Payment for what?”

“As near as I can figure, based on the date of the letter, it was for publicizing your capture of these two gentlemen, and the detrimental effect that this had on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe share prices.”

“How exactly?”

“Investors were panicked by the fact of such a large robbery,” Richardson explained. “Lack of confidence on the part of investors drove capital to the Denver & Rio Grande. According to the documents that Miss de la Gravière saw, Mr. Waldron was heavily invested personally in the rival road and he made a great deal of money.”

“I understand,” Cole said. “Investing in rival roads is pretty lousy, not to mention disloyal, but I don't figure that it's illegal . . . is it?”

“I'm a doctor, not a lawyer,” Richardson replied. “But I don't reckon that it is. Another thing that Miss de la Gravière said she found was a part in the letter about Mr. Waldron getting more money deposited in his account when he took care of ‘two loose ends.'”

“What two loose ends?”

“I believe it meant the two gentlemen who arrived in my care this morning shortly after Miss de la Gravière departed.”

“You think Waldron was behind Muriday killing these two?”

“I don't know,” Richardson replied. “I honestly don't know. I remember being in the room when Mr. Waldron told
you
to bring them back dead rather than alive.”

“I have not forgotten that,” Cole said with a nod.

“Muriday was on assignment with the railroad when he finished the job
before
either man could stand trial. One might assume that Mr. Waldron had been paid by the Denver & Rio Grande to stage the robbery in the first place, and that he wanted to make sure there were no ‘loose ends' to tell the tale. As I told Miss de la Gravière, without that letter, there is no evidence to support such a theory.”

“Until there were
four
Denver & Rio Grande passes laying on your table,” Cole pointed out. “They could have been hired guns from anywhere, but the fact that
all four
were carrying Rio Grande passes tells me that they had all
probably
worked as hired guns for
that
road.”

“Possibly,” Richardson said thoughtfully, looking at the passes. “The evidence
does
point in that direction. It certainly
looks
like there's a connection. If only the dead could speak.”

“You didn't tell me how
my
name came up in your talk with Miss de la Gravière,” Cole said.

“Oh yes, I meant to tell you,” Richardson began. “She said that she wanted to take money from the family business to
hire
you to find the evidence.”

* * *

BLADEN COLE SAT ON A BENCH BENEATH AN OVERHANGING
arcade on the opposite side of the street from the saloon in which the back bar was presided over by a rookery of kachinas, the saloon where he could glimpse Ben Muriday being treated to drinks and being toasted for a dubious distortion of heroism.

He would wait for the rat-faced man, and for the opportunity to confront him. It might be tonight, and it might be tomorrow. Sooner or later, Muriday would be alone. Sooner or later, the time would be right, and Cole was determined to be there when it was.

As he waited, his eyes wandered up the street in the direction of the Refugio del Viajero, and his mind drifted to Nicolette de la Gravière, and how he wished to see her face once again. He would, he told himself, go back to the Refugio del Viajero when his business with the rat-faced man had been resolved, and he
would
see her smile, and he
would
smile back. Would merely seeing her be enough, or could more come of it?

During the long days on the trail, Cole had allowed his mind to fabricate images of a future in which he became part of her life. He closed his eyes, pictured the smile on those lips the color of chilies, and knew that he could never tire of a face like that. Naturally, such a scenario would require a reciprocal interest on her part, but when a man is imagining during long days on the trail, he's in a playground of the imagination, where everything is possible.

Cole had allowed himself to cavort in the playground of such imaginings many times over the years since Sally Lovelace passed from his reality. It had been Sally who had changed his life by turning a wandering man into a man who indulged the notion of being a settled-down man. Then too it had been Sally who turned him back.

Sally had not so much cursed his life, as she had painfully exposed the curse that had been there all along. Cole was not meant to be long in one place.

Then again, as Doc Richardson had mentioned, Nicolette
was
rendered unavailable by the fact of her “seeing” Ezra Waldron, who
was
by all appearances a settling-down sort of gentleman—or at least he had apparently seemed so until Nicolette saw the strange missive from the Denver & Rio Grande. Perhaps when he saw her again, Cole would mention to her what the coroner had said of her expressed interest in hiring him. Perhaps he would allow himself to be hired, though for her there would be no hiring, but merely his offer to assist her without cost.

That would be a situation that might make for some interesting moments—helping a woman, to whom he was attracted, in the investigation of her gentleman suitor.

Then too Cole's own curiosity had been aroused, both by Nicolette's urgency about the letter and the compounding mystery illustrated by the four Denver & Rio Grande passes.

How long his mind had been drifting and wandering these roads of imagining, Cole did not know, but he was abruptly jerked back to the reality of the moment, and the reality of his single-minded obsession with the rat-faced man.

Muriday was being pushed through the swinging doors of the saloon in the company of a fairly well-dressed fellow Cole recognized as one of the men he'd seen at the Lamy railroad camp when he delivered Stanton and Gardner to Ezra Waldron.

They left the saloon, not meandering as drinking buddies would, but moving with a sense of purpose—
or rather
, the railroad man moved with the momentum of purpose, while Muriday was brought along in tow.

Through the window of a cafe near the Plaza, Cole watched the railroad man buy Muriday a cup of coffee, and then another. It became clear that the purpose of the coffee was medicinal, not social. The rat-faced man, having had some number of drinks of another nature, was being sobered up.

Having hired Ben Muriday to deliver the prisoners dead or alive, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe apparently still employed him as part of its posse, and his work was evidently not yet finished.

Assuming that the “loose ends” hypothesis proposed by Nicolette de la Gravière and restated by Richardson was correct, Cole wondered what
other
loose ends might still be left in this affair.

* * *

FED AND CAFFEINATED, MURIDAY LEFT THE CAFE WITH
the railroad man after more than an hour. It seemed later than it was because the late afternoon cumulus clouds had gathered in the west.