Wild Is the Night (5 page)

“Sure.” Luke nodded, growing justifiably angry. “You know, I don’t expect gratitude or anything. But you’re the damnest woman I’ve ever met. What are you mad at me for?”

“I’m sorry if I ruined your evening,” Amanda said, hiding behind her well-honed defenses. “I suppose most women just fall into your arms.”

“They don’t usually throw up,” Luke agreed, growing more furious by the moment.

“Then it’s just as well we’ll be parting come morning. As Homer says—”

“Amanda.” Luke’s voice was deadly. He reached across the table, picked up the whiskey bottle, then settled himself into a chair while she watched in horrified fascination. He cocked his gun, then placed it within reach. “Don’t you dare.”

Amanda closed her mouth, then drew the linen up more snugly around her shoulders. If there was one thing she didn’t need to learn in school, it was when to back down.

This was obviously the time.

Gunfire woke them just before dawn. Luke was awake in a second, snatching up his gun in one fluid motion, then he posed at the window in shocked disbelief.

“Jesus, what is this?” He fired in return, amazed to discover that the shots were indeed directed at the deserted restaurant. Pausing only to reload, he saw Amanda scramble for her clothes, then for the bird cage. Shaking his head in disbelief, he watched her place the owl safely beneath the table. Only then did she see to her own comfort. Struggling into her dress, she ducked as a window broke and glass danced across the floor in a thousand tiny prisms.

“Get down! This isn’t one of your damned novels, they’re shooting!”

“Who is it?” Amanda peered out from beneath the table where the owl rustled furiously.

“How do I know? I didn’t ask for a calling card. You’re not wanted or anything, are you?”

“No!” Amanda said indignantly. “I—”

The pot crashed to the floor, spinning from the force of a lead bullet. Conversation ceased as Luke struggled desperately to fight off their invisible attackers. Amanda took one stunned look at the pot, then crept across the floor to join him at the window.

“I can help you load.” She withdrew the bullets, placing them in a convenient location near his left hand. He was about to correct her when he saw that it was easier this way, that it eliminated a movement and a fraction of a second that could mean a life. Scooping up the bullets, he then shoved them into the gun, talking almost to himself.

“It’s not Indians. Thank God for that. Though who the hell would be shooting at us now…” Picking off a gunman that appeared into view, Luke’s voice deepened and he whistled. “Damn if that doesn’t look like Butch Winters. Part of the Haskwell gang.”

“Why would they come back?”

“Doesn’t make sense to me. They got the money and the jewelry. It’s damned foolishness on their part.” Squeezing the trigger, he neatly shot another outlaw, this one within twenty feet of the building.

Amanda paled, then rose to her knees and peered out the window. She could barely see the gunmen, but something about them did seem familiar. No sooner did they spot her when the gunfire erupted into a blaze of fury, and Luke flung her to the floor like a sack of oatmeal.

“You trying to get killed?” The gunfire roared, and in desperation, he fired back, wondering what it all meant. Amanda lay on the floor, breathless, more frightened than even the day before. Then there had been a train full of people to help fight the outlaws off. Now, for some ungodly reason, they were back, and she was alone with no one to help her but the southern gunman who had every reason to despise her.

Forcing down her emotions and the renewed queasiness in her stomach, she made herself think. Outlaws. The train. Rising to her knees, she took care to stay well away from the window and she spoke excitedly, her strange eyes gleaming.

“The train! The nine-fifteen should be here shortly.”

“Great.” Luke replied, still firing into the woods. “Maybe we could all take a nice trip to Denver.”

“You don’t understand,” Amanda said in frustration. “The abandoned car is still on the track. When the train collides with it, we’ll have a chance to escape.”

The escape part caught his attention. As Luke reloaded, he had to admit her plan had merit. It seemed even more plausible when the train whistle blew a few minutes later. The iron horse plunged between them and the outlaws, acting as an effective metallic screen from the gunfire. Normally, the delay would have only lasted a few moments, but the loud crash that followed gave them the perfect opportunity, and neither one of them had any desire to waste it.

“Let’s go.” Luke grabbed her hand, quelling his frustration when she stopped for the carpetbag and the owl, then scrambled out the door with him. A supply trail led directly behind the restaurant and into the woods. Luke drove her mercilessly down the path, knowing full well that the outlaws would be upon them within a few minutes. Amanda struggled breathlessly, still trying to carry the carpetbag and the cage and run at the same time. Luke saw her effort and snatched up the cage with an oath, then dragged her deeper into the woods. He didn’t stop until they came to a rusted and abandoned train track, and on it was, unbelievably, a deserted handcar.

“Great.” Luke helped Amanda up, onto the rusted cart, then placed Aesop safely in the center. Amanda put her carpetbag aside, then stared at the apparatus.

“Grab the other end.” Luke shook his head in disbelief. The woman was worse than a cloistered nun. Amanda nodded, then awkwardly snatched at the iron railing that rose in front of her face. Pushing downward with all of her one hundred and eighteen pounds behind her, she managed to lower the bar enough to allow him the leverage he needed. Luke thrust forcefully down on the opposing bar. The gears screeched in protest, but the cart creaked along the track and moved a few feet. Encouraged by their success, Amanda pushed again and Luke followed, forcing the ancient car to resume an old journey down the tracks, even as they heard gunfire in the distance.

“Looks like we did it.” He shouted to be heard above the racket of the handcar and the distant gunfire. Amanda nodded, her hands white against the iron bar, her heart pounding in terror and exertion. The car picked up speed, barreling around a curve. The cage slid across the floor of the car and Luke stopped it with his booted leg. Gradually, the din of the gunfire died as the woods and the Harvey house faded behind them. Luke glanced at Amanda. Her face was covered with sweat, her hair straggled, her glasses crooked. She shoved a lock of damp hair out of her eyes and glanced up at him, catching his triumphant smile. She started to return it, when she looked behind him and a scream died in her throat.

The track ended as abruptly as it began.

Butch Winters slowed his horse down to a brisk walk as the woods closed in around them. They were gone. The path from the abandoned Harvey house led straight into the forest, and except for an old supply hut, there was nothing. A pheasant whirred from the brush as another man reined up his mount, then spat at the dusty ground beneath him.

“Damn, Butch. We had her. Christ, I saw that thin-necked spinster at the window, jest as clear as that day in town when Sam shot that fool Haines. Who would have thought she’d have the guts to write about it in that book? Least she had the sense to change her name.”

“She ain’t got that much sense. We tracked her, didn’t we?”

“Yeah. All the way from Boston.” Damien spat once more and glanced at the woods. The silence made him nervous. “Good thing that fancy woman Sam kept knew how to read. Little thing—just about fifteen, I would say. Remember her? How she used to sit in that room, scared to death of Sam, and pass the time reading penny novels? It was her that tipped Sam off, and her that helped him write to that New York publishing house.” Damien chuckled at the thought. “Must’ve thought it was a fan letter. That publisher told Sam everything. Who Fess Tyson was. Where she lived—”

“Shut up, Damien. You talk too much.” Butch wiped the sweat from his face, wrinkling a thin, twisted red scar on his cheek. “She can’t have just disappeared.”

Both men stared into the woods. Trees were stacked like poles in an endless infinity before them, while lime-colored ferns warned of cover—Indian cover.

“I don’t like it,” Damien said. “It’s too damned quiet.”

“For once, you’re right,” Butch agreed, tightening the leather reins in his fist. “I ain’t gonna find her here. Somehow, she must have gotten help. Did you see that gunman with her?”

“A good shot, no matter who he is,” Damien said. “Looks like a hire to me.”

“Huh,” Butch grunted thoughtfully. “I thought he looked familiar, too. Doesn’t matter, though.” Butch cocked the gun, then fired it senselessly into the bush where the pheasant had disappeared. The bird tumbled out, riddled with shot, useless for any purpose other than a killing.

“Amanda Edison is a dead woman. Gun or no gun.”

Amanda fell abruptly onto her bottom, but Luke tumbled out of the car to the hard, rocky ground. He swore, slammed his hat down upon his leg in disgust, then got painfully to his feet and turned back.

“That’s it? A track that goes nowhere? You know something, lady, you’re some kind of a jinx!”

“It has to go parallel to the main run.” Amanda reasoned. “This was obviously a supply car for the restaurant. If we keep walking, we’re bound to come to the town, and help.”

Luke stared at her, even as she reached for her bag and the owl. Damned if she wasn’t right. It was unnerving and annoying at the same time, but he couldn’t help admiring her a little. Even now, as she trudged along the cut trail, looking more like a school marm than a writer of penny dreadfuls, she didn’t complain. Instead, he could almost hear her thinking, calculating their next move, and assessing their chances for success. She glanced back, gave him an impervious look that would have frozen the heart of a meeker man, then looked directly ahead.

Silently cursing, Luke joined her. If she was right, they could be in town within the hour. It definitely wouldn’t be soon enough for him.

Abilene was everything Amanda had ever heard about it, and then some. Short, squat buildings sprang up from the ground as if rooted, while the dusty roads were well-packed from the herds of Longhorn cattle that had been driven over them. Amanda followed Luke down Texas Street, blinking steadily at the influx of sight, sound and textures. Cowboys brawled outside the Applejack saloon, oblivious to the passersby who ignored the scene and went about their daily business. Women carried baskets beneath their arms and hurried about their shopping, pausing only to brush the dust from their hot, high-necked Victorian gowns. Businessmen speculated on everything from cattle to gold, rushing from the McCoy Hotel to the bar, where the real deals were consummated. Whores stood boldly on the steps outside the saloon, their white-tasseled boots a startling contrast to the dismal brown dirt that covered everything.

Amanda choked, then rubbed at her glasses with her sleeve. She felt like a newborn baby just entering the world and absorbing everything that she could in the short time she’d been there. Breathing deeply of the acrid stench of the cow town, she reminded herself to put that in her journal; that peculiar aroma that was reminiscent of Aesop’s cage when she’d forgotten to clean it. And the sounds! She’d never written of the noise that nearly drowned her senses. The shouts of the cowboys. The lewd whistles of the street women. The soft clatter of the horses. And the enthusiastic screech of the train as it pulled into the station, followed by the harsh scrape of the gears against the track. “You coming?”

Amanda glanced up, coloring when she realized Luke had been talking to her. She felt drunk on sensation and she quickly nodded, uncertain of what she was agreeing to.

“There’s a ticket station across the street. You can book passage without any trouble if you still have your old stub. There’s a good restaurant if you’re hungry, and a bath house if you want to get cleaned up.” Luke gestured to an old frame building nestled beside a boardinghouse. “Well, I guess this is it.”

She stood in the street, looking at him with that strange, intense stare that made him even more uneasy than it did earlier. He wondered if she realized how exotically pretty she was, even with her disheveled hair that she made no attempt to straighten, or her frumpy dress. Something about her aroused pity in him, an emotion that was foreign and not altogether welcome. He shrugged, and extended a hand to take her carpetbag.

“Won’t hurt to have a bite to eat. Why don’t you straighten out your ticket and I’ll go get us some seats,” he said.

Amanda exhaled in relief. She smiled and nodded shakily, unable to explain her own reaction. It really made no sense. She should be glad to be rid of him, to be back to civilization and away from outlaws and deserted restaurants. But she was grateful for the reprieve, for however long it lasted.

The ticketman scrutinized her ink-splotched ticket, scraped away the bird droppings, then reluctantly stamped the wrinkled receipt and handed it back to Amanda with a curious glance. Giving the man an absent smile, she tucked the ticket back inside Aesop’s cage, and ignored the owl’s rustling. Returning to the restaurant across the street, she entered the establishment, completely unaware of the ticketman’s gaping stare.

She saw Luke immediately and joined him at a sturdy wooden table. A surly waitress sauntered toward them, her gaze taking in the dangerous looking southerner and his odd companion. Amanda took a seat across from Luke, acutely aware of him as a man in this civilized setting. The night before came vividly back to her in detail. This man had touched her where no man had before, had undressed her, attempted to make love to her…and she had thrown up. Once again mortified by the memory, Amanda immediately delved into her carpetbag. Anything to take her mind off last night. She retrieved a pencil and a notebook, and began to furiously record her observations of Abilene.