“I’ve been working since I was sixteen,” Tristan said, gaining the road and turning to wait while Shay and the gelding descended after him, “and I’ve had as much good luck as bad. A man who puts his money by and watches out for opportunities can do real well for himself.”
Shay polished his badge. He’d saved most of his salary, too, over the last few years, but it didn’t amount to much. Anyway, he meant to reimburse the town council for what he’d been paid after Grace died. He hadn’t rightfully earned a nickel of it, and he wouldn’t have blamed them if they asked for his resignation. Their respect for Shamus, Sr.,’s memory was probably all that had prevented them from doing just that. “Or,” he said, with some self-recrimination, “he can crawl into a bottle, curl up and wait to die.”
“Takes a while to get over some things,” Tristan remarked. “I explained how I came to be passing through those woods back there, but I can’t rightly guess what you were doing. You have a couple of prisoners to guard, back there at the jail, don’t you?”
Shay bristled a little, because no one had asked him for any kind of accounting in a long while, and he was out of
the habit of giving explanations. “I was just trying to square some things away in my head,” he replied, though grudgingly. He might have said Tristan had no call to worry about how he did his job, but he caught himself in time. The fact was, he couldn’t make a case for himself, because he hadn’t done his job for shit. “And I left a deputy in charge of Billy and O’Sullivan.”
“You have a deputy?” Tristan grinned. “I’m impressed. Half the time, a one-horse town like this doesn’t even have a marshal.”
“If you think Prominence is so backward,” Shay countered, unable to keep a defensive note out of his voice, “why the hell are you planning on settling down around here?”
Tristan pondered the inquiry for a while before giving his answer. They were riding slow and he was still taking in the countryside. “I’ve got family here,” he said, in his own good time.
That comment shut Shay right up, and he spent the rest of the ride chewing on it. Meanwhile, Tristan turned talkative all of the sudden, spilling out plans and schemes to trap the Kyles and all their cohorts. Shay listened with half an ear.
Aislinn supposed it shouldn’t have surprised her that Cornelia took the news of her staying at the house so calmly, given the woman’s conversation with Mr. Kyle that afternoon, in the general store, but surprise her it did. They sat, she and Dorrie and Cornelia, in the fancy front parlor of the McQuillan house, sipping tea from bone china cups. When Dorrie said she’d hired Aislinn to work for them, and given her Shamus’s old room as a part of her wages, Cornelia flushed a little, set her jaw, and smiled with all the welcoming charm of a gaping skull.
Cornelia’s teacup rattled in its translucent saucer as she set it down on the table beside her chair. “Very well,” she said, in shrill tones that had probably been meant to be
melodic. “What’s done is done. Have I mentioned, Theodora, that Shamus is joining us for supper tonight?”
Theodora
? Aislinn took another sip of spicy tea to hide her smile.
Dorrie bent forward from the very edge of her chair, big-eyed and spindly-looking, like a baby bird perched on a branch that might give way at any moment. “You try to poison him, Cornie, and I’m going to know you were the one responsible!”
The elder sister rolled her eyes. She really was quite beautiful, but the coldness that seemed to seep through her very pores spoiled the effect. “I’m not going to do anything of the sort, Dorrie. Don’t be ridiculous. I brought home a nice loin of pork—that’s his favorite if I recall—and it’s roasting in the oven right now.”
Dorrie and Aislinn exchanged glances.
“What brought this on?” Dorrie demanded. She’d wanted Shay to be restored to his rightful place in the family, but naturally she was suspicious of her sister’s motives. Aislinn could have told her that it was part of a scheme to jolly the marshal into letting Billy Kyle out of jail before he could be brought before a proper judge and jury, but she wasn’t going to do that in front of Cornelia. The woman was vicious, like a peregrine trained to tear flesh with talon and beak, but with a difference: the falcon might have felt at least a twinge of remorse.
Cornelia squirmed a little, which indicated that she might have the suggestion of a conscience, if not the substance, locked up tight in some corner of her black soul. “We’ve been at each other’s throats for too long, Shamus and I. I will never—
can
never love him, as one does a
true
brother, but I regret—” She paused, nearly choking. “I regret that I haven’t shown more Christian charity toward him.”
Dorrie got to her feet and smoothed the skirts of her greenish gown, which was only slightly more attractive than the brown calico she had given Aislinn. Her smile
was dazzling, like sunshine on a Mexican silver hatband. “I’ll get out Mama’s good china,” she said, with touching eagerness.
A protest took shape in Cornelia’s mouth, but she swallowed it, with obvious difficulty, and rendered another parody of a smile. “Of course,” she said. “Perhaps Aislinn wouldn’t mind fetching a bouquet of flowers from the garden. Roses will do nicely, I think.”
“A grand idea,” Dorrie cried. Aislinn saw the corner of the letter she’d apparently gotten from Eugenie that morning peeping from Dorrie’s pocket, and wondered if it contained tidings of Leander’s triumphant return. Since it was plain that Shay was about as welcome in that house as a long-horned steer would have been, from Cornelia’s standpoint anyway, there had to be another reason for Dorrie’s exuberance.
Aislinn was in the garden, cutting prickly red roses with a scent that could make you drunk, when she sensed that someone was nearby and looked up to see Liza Sue watching her over the back fence. The maid’s uniform, added to her scrubbed face and tidy hair, changed her appearance so much that Aislinn took an extra moment recognizing her.
“You landed on your feet, I see,” said Liza Sue, without rancor.
Aislinn approached the fence, her arms full of fragrant, prickly-stemmed roses. “I have your dress upstairs,” she said. “I’ll fetch it for you.”
Liza Sue shook her head. “Just burn it, or tear it up for rags. I won’t have no use for it after this.”
“How’s Eugenie?”
“Mean as a bear. She misses you somethin’ powerful, and she’d take you back if you asked her.”
“I know,” Aislinn said, and sniffled. She missed her friend, her space in the dormitory, the satisfying work that made the days pass quickly, but it was best to move on if she could.
“She sent me down here, Eugenie did, to watch for you and pass on a message. She’d like a visit, now and again, if you’ve a mind to be social.”
Aislinn laughed, but the sound was part sob. Her relief was enormous; she might have lost her position at the hotel, but her friendship with Eugenie, which she valued a great deal more, was still intact. “I would enjoy that very much.”
Liza Sue leaned over the fence a little way, and lowered her voice. “Is it true that Billy Kyle is in jail, and the marshal don’t plan to let him out again?” Her eyes were wide, and shadows of fear flickered in their depths like specters.
“It’s true,” Aislinn confirmed. “You don’t need to be afraid of Billy.”
“You wouldn’t say that, if you knew him the way I do. I’ll be scared until I hear he’s dead and see him in the coffin—him and his daddy, too.”
The mention of the rancher made Aislinn take a step nearer the fence. She heard the threatening echo of Mr. Kyle’s voice in the back of her mind, and knew that whatever Cornelia McQuillan’s romantic hopes might be, she was as terrified of him as Liza Sue was. “Tell me about Billy’s father,” she urged, in a quiet voice. It was clear by the other woman’s shudder that she’d touched a nerve, but that same sense of urgency she’d felt earlier was back again. “Please.”
Liza Sue blinked rapidly, shaking her head. “He’s bad,” she said.
Aislinn reached out and grasped her newfound friend by the wrist, to prevent her from running away; she was strong from three years of hard work, but she took care that her hold on Liza Sue should not be hurtful. “Tell me,” she repeated.
Tears brimmed in Liza Sue’s eyes, and her nose reddened. “I can’t,” she said. Then, again, and more frantically, “I can’t!” Fear gave her the strength to pull away,
and she turned and hurried back toward the hotel, wiping her cheek with the back of one hand as she went.
Aislinn watched her until she vanished, then turned, with her fragrant burden of roses, and walked back inside the house. She wished she’d told Shay about the conversation between Cornelia and Mr. KyIe when she’d encountered him earlier, outside the store, but all was not lost. She’d make a point of speaking to him alone that evening, when he came to supper.
When the dinner guest arrived, his fair hair was shining and neatly combed and he was wearing a suit and a string tie. Even if he hadn’t looked utterly accustomed to such fancy garb, Aislinn would have known the visitor wasn’t Shay at all, but Tristan. The differences were subjective ones and as impossible to pinpoint as before, because on the surface the fine features, the breathtaking blue eyes, strong jaw and sensuous mouth, the physical grace and innate prowess, even the scent of the skin, were precisely the same.
While Aislinn hung back, there in the entryway of the McQuillan house, Dorrie and Cornelia greeted their “brother” very cordially, and neither seemed to suspect that they were entertaining an imposter. While the sisters were fussing in the dining room, Tristan paused beside Aislinn and spoke to her in a genial whisper.
“What gave me away?”
She smiled up at him. The deeper reasons were beyond her ability to explain. “The clothes. Shay probably hasn’t owned a suit since he left home.” Her amusement faded. “Where is he? He’s all right, isn’t he?”
Tristan was quick to reassure her. “He’s busy looking after his prisoners. It seems they were a bit too much for the deputy he left in charge—the big one tried to hang the little one with one leg of his own pants. You’re not going to tell them who I am, are you?” He tilted his head to indicate the McQuillan women, who were chattering as they bustled between the dining room and kitchen,
carrying in platters and bowls, rearranging the lush, velvety roses in their mother’s Cut-crystal vase, moving silver candlesticks from the table to the mantel and then back again.
She linked her arm with his. “No,” she said, hiding her disappointment that she would not see Shay that evening after all, unless she sought him out, which might be awkward. “It should be interesting.”
“Which one hates me?” He was frowning at the two women buzzing around the table.
“The beautiful one, giving all the orders. Her name is Cornelia. Didn’t Shay give you any instructions at all?”
“He said they’d probably serve something he hates.”
“Pork roast,” Aislinn confided. They had gained the threshold of the dining room then, and she was extra careful to keep her voice low.
Tristan’s blue eyes sparkled. “Do I like that?”
She laughed, causing both Dorrie and Cornelia to turn and look in their direction. Dorrie’s expression was indulgent, even benevolent, while Cornelia’s smile was fixed and there was a pulse leaping spasmodically at the base of her throat. “It’s your favorite,” Aislinn answered, barely moving her mouth.
He gave a comical sigh of relief. “Thank God it isn’t liver and onions,” he said.
The meal was pleasant, and the food was plentiful. Aislinn had not enjoyed such a repast since before she left Maine, and even though she knew she was no more welcome in that house than the man the sisters called Shamus, in Cornelia’s mind anyway, she ate heartily. The beautiful china, the starched white tablecloth from Ireland, the shining silver and the candlelight, all of it made for a very festive effect. Afterward, there was rich coffee, imported from Arabia, a little pyramid of chocolates served on a plate painted with lilacs, and the conversation, if superficial and somewhat on the brittle side, was lively. Not quite like eating in the hotel kitchen, with
Eugenie and the cook bantering back and forth over her head, but nice nonetheless.
The evening would have been close to perfect if the man with the elegant table manners and sophisticated opinions had really been Shamus McQuillan the younger. It was a testament to how little both Cornelia and Dorrie knew about their brother that they didn’t seem to suspect anything. To Aislinn, who had not known Shay long at all, the contrasts were glaring.
“Perhaps Miss Lethaby wouldn’t object to taking a brief stroll with me,” Tristan said, when the evening began to wear on. Aislinn looked from Cornelia to Dorrie, unable even to imagine Shay speaking so formally, and certain that one sister or the other would take notice of the deception at last.
Neither of the women seemed even mildly suspicious. Cornelia had probably never paid a lot of attention to Shay, even while he was growing up in that house, preferring to pretend he didn’t exist, while Dorrie had lived by means of distraction, keeping the realities of her life at bay by daydreaming of her reunion with Leander.
“Fine, fine,” Cornelia answered, with a dismissive wave in Aislinn’s direction. “Have a nice walk.” The unspoken addition was as plain in its meaning as if she’d breathed sound into it.
Don’t come back, and if you lose her somewhere along the way, that will be fine, too
.
The stars were out, the saloon was spilling noise and yellow light into the street as always, and Shay’s office looked more like an armed camp than a small-town jailhouse. There were guards with rifles out front, and the back entrance was probably covered as well.
Aislinn was alarmed. “Is he expecting trouble?” she asked. She held Tristan’s arm, and he squired her along the shadowy edge of the road with as much style as a gentleman escorting his lady through a park.
Tristan gave a little shrug. “It comes with the territory,”
he said. “He’s a lawman, after all. Are you worried about him?”
She sighed. “Yes,” she admitted. She thought he smiled slightly at that reply, but she couldn’t be certain, since it was quite dark and she only caught a glimpse out of the corner of one eye. “Oh, yes.”