A Grave for Lassiter (17 page)

At first he was happy to note that Vanderson slept with the men instead of his wife. Serves him right, he thought. But even so, Melody seemed thinned down and the circles under the gray eyes more pronounced. If she would only complain, he'd throw Vanderson out. But she never discussed her marital problems.

Many short hauls kept Lassiter busy. At least that part of the operation was smoothing out. It did nothing to cheer up Melody. Her temper grew short.

One morning she said in a voice a little too shrill, “Well, I've made my peace with Vance. I suppose it's better this way.”

Lassiter didn't get a chance to ask her to elaborate because she kept to her bedroom for the rest of the day.

But that night Vanderson failed to join the crew at the big lean-to.

Uncertainty as to Farrell's next move was putting a strain on them all, Lassiter well knew.

One day he took a wagon to Bluegate for supplies. While there, it came to him strongly to seek out Farrell, challenge him and get the dirty business ended. But unfortunately the man happened to be out of town that day.

On the twentieth of the month Lassiter returned from a haul into the mountains. At least Vanderson was doing the job Melody had given him, scheduling the hauls. It kept him out of mischief. Even so, Lassiter knew Melody was not getting along with her husband, although she pretended to be cheerful.

On the day of Lassiter's return, Bert Oliver and three men had gone to town for supplies needed to feed the men and to keep things going. The long Reb face was grave as Oliver squatted beside Lassiter, who had removed a freighter wheel and was applying axle grease with a rag.

“Strange feelin' in town I had,” Oliver said, giving Lassiter a steady look.

“Bert, we're s'posed to be friends. You can tell it plainer than that.”

“The whole town is buzzin' like ten thousand bees.”

“How do you mean?”

“There's somethin' gonna happen, but damned if I could find out what. Every time I asked somebody, they claimed I was just imaginin' things an' they'd walk away.”

“And you figure all this concerns us in some way?”

“A bad feelin' I got.”

“I get hunches myself,” Lassiter said, wiping his hands on a grease rag. “Sometimes they're right. Other times they don't mean a damned thing.”

“Last year I drifted through Mexico. A coupla days before a big bullfight, when a real famous torero was comin' to town, I'd git that same feelin' deep in my gut.” Lassiter gave a tight smile. “A bullfight in Bluegate, you mean?”

“It's the same as one, damn if it ain't.”

“Hmmmmm.” Lassiter was thoughtful.

“Tried to git Shanagan to talk but he jist looked me in the eye an' claimed he didn't know what I was talkin' about. But in his saloon I seen fellas starin' at me, then when I'd look back they'd pretend they was lookin' somewhere else.”

“You sure about all this, Bert?”

‘An' along the bar, I'd see fellas nudgin' each other an' grinnin', like they was about to bust. They'd look slantwise where I was standin'. Give me a funny feelin'. Like they knowed somethin'was gonna happen that was secret.”

Lassiter reached for the wheel he had leaned against the wagon. A stack of bricks supported the front axle he had been greasing. Hunched down, he was staring at the headquarters building across the wagon yard. He'd gotten back nearly an hour ago. And after pulling the front wheel that had screeched all the way up the mountain and back, he'd pushed everything else from his mind but getting to the root of the screech. What bothered him was that he had had time to do all that and yet Melody hadn't appeared. Usually when one of the wagons pulled in she'd be down asking how the trip had gone. She seemed interested in everything that pertained to the freight business.

Very strange that Melody hadn't come down from the office to welcome him home.

“I'm going to see the boss,” Lassiter announced. “Will you put that wheel back on?”

Oliver nodded.

There was a strange silence in the office with its desk and safe and benches. He called her name, but there was no reply. He rapped on the bedroom door and called her name again. Still no answer. He rattled the knob. It turned. The door was unlocked.

He stepped inside. The air smelled faintly of her perfume. A light green coverlet was on the bed. Two pillows reminded him of heads side by side. Hers and her husband's. A shiver ran down his spine. If ever she told him she could no longer stand Vanderson then he'd take steps to keep the man away from her. But she suffered in silence and whenever he tried to get her to talk abut it, she'd just shake her head and walk away.

For the first time he noticed an envelope on the floor. Evidently it had once been propped up by a pillow on the bed, but a breeze through an open window had blown it down.

His mouth went dry when he picked it up and saw that it was addressed to him. Personal. He tore the envelope.

Lassiter: Melody Vanderson is my guest at the big house in town. I want you to join us for a business discussion. I can't stress enough the importance of our meeting. She tells me there have been attempts on her life. That is why she sought sanctuary with me.

To lessen any chance of harm coming to her from these enemies, I must insist that you come alone. Any show of force on your part could mean disaster for her.

As an intelligent man, I know you can read between the lines and realize that discretion is vital.

The note was unsigned. Not that a signature was necessary. Who else but Kane Farrell? With no signature and the text in block letters, Farrell was protecting himself. In case something went wrong, he would disclaim all knowledge of the kidnapping. And what else was it but that? Lassiter felt such a rush of anger that had Farrell walked in the door he would have tried to kill him with his bare hands.

At first Lassiter was so enraged that he crumpled the note and threw it into a corner of the room and stormed to the door. Did Farrell for one minute think he could bluff him into not coming to Bluegate with every available man?

Before reaching the door, however, he stopped and turned everything over in his mind. He picked up the crumpled note and reread it. The threat to Melody's safety was spelled out. No, he couldn't risk it. He calmed down sufficiently to maintain a straight face as he hunted up Dad Hornbeck. He found the old man in a small barn where he was mending a mule harness.

Lassiter asked if he had seen Melody. Hornbeck nodded. He had seen her ride out with her husband earlier that day. “On the Bluegate road,” finished the old man.

“How did Melody seem?” Lassiter asked coolly.

Hornbeck rubbed his wrinkled chin, looking puzzled. “Same as usual, near as I could tell. 'Course she was on the road by the time I seen her an' it was a far piece. Somethin' wrong?”

Lassiter almost showed the old man the note, but remembered the veiled threats. Melody would be in danger if he made a wrong move.

“No, nothing's wrong.” Lassiter shook his head. “I'm going to town. See you when I get back.” Would he ever get back?

He almost let go with a blast of bitter laughter. What would he find in town? Melody in a trap, no doubt. Well, he'd get her out of it, one way or another. But at what cost? That was something for the fates to decide. It was out of his hands. All he could do was follow Farrell's directions for the present. And play the rest of the game by the cards he drew. The gall of Farrell, he thought angrily, to make a captive of an innocent young woman such as Melody Vanderson. Even acknowledging her married name put a bitter taste in his mouth. For he felt strongly that somewhere in the woodpile was Vance Vanderson.

The trip to Bluegate seemed endless. Today he had no eye for the sweep of color from wildflowers, the intense green of cottonwoods and aspen in their spring finery, nor even a second glance at a beige-colored bobcat that bounded across the road ahead of him.

The only humans he met were in a large blue wagon with Farrell Freight Lines painted on the side. It was a double outfit, wagon and trailer, pulled by twelve mules, coming from the direction of town.

As the outfit approached, Lassiter pulled off the road and sat in his saddle, one hand clamped to the butt of his holstered .44. Both teamster and swamper were strangers, but apparently knew him by sight.

“You seem mad as hell, Lassiter,” called the bearded and heavyset teamster. “But ain't our fault. We only work for Farrell!”

Lassiter didn't take time to dwell on what the man might have meant by “fault.” It was later that he learned.

Chapter Eighteen

Never had Melody been so upset as she was that day when her husband told her that Lassiter had been injured and was in Bluegate, asking for her. They left in a spring wagon by the rear door of the office.

Only when they were a mile or so down the mountain did she wonder aloud.

“You acted almost as if you didn't want anyone to see us leave. You did tell Dad Hornbeck, didn't you?”

“Sure I did.” He flashed his boyish grin, which he thought would wipe the puzzled look from her face. “Now don't fret. Lassiter will be all right once he sees you.”

She felt it a strange thing for him to say, knowing his intense jealousy of Lassiter.

But she didn't dwell on it. All that mattered now was to reach Lassiter's side to see how badly he had been injured. Vance had said that a wagon tipped over and he had been caught by a wheel.

It seemed hours before she saw the haze of smoke from cook fires and the blacksmith shop. The town seemed busier than usual, she noted as they wound away from the business district. She found herself in front of the house her Uncle Josh had built for that harridan of a wife.

Her jaw dropped. “Lassiter is
here?
”

“Doc Overmeyer thought he should have comfort. And he's got it here.”

He drove around to a side door, hopped out and tied the team to a post. Then he helped her out of the wagon. They went up a short flight of steps to a wide veranda that ran to the front of the house. He opened a door and she hurried inside. He closed the door. She heard a key turn in a lock.

But before she could speak, Kane Farrell appeared, elegantly dressed in a fine black wool suit, his dark red hair neatly combed. He was smiling.

“Well, Vance, I see you didn't let me down.” He sounded pleased.

“Where is Lassiter!” Melody cried, looking down a long hallway to a parlor she knew so well.

“Oh, I have a feeling Lassiter will be along,” Farrell said with a smile. “Come, my dear.” He beckoned.

“Which means Lassiter wasn't injured at all!” she cried. “Vance, you tricked me!”

She tried to run, but they each grabbed her by an arm. Though she kicked and tried to bite, she was helpless. She was literally dragged to a large bedroom that used to be Josh Falconer's. Familiar tall dark chests of drawers, the big bureau, and a canopied bed dominated the room.

There were three women in the room. One of them was buxom with hennaed hair and large brown eyes, in a flowing green dress with lace trim that failed to cover her rather extravagant curves. She was probably in her late thirties. The other two were pretty, younger, with rouged faces and tight-fitting dresses.

“I'm Blanche,” the older woman announced. “And these are two of my girls. We've been hired to keep watch over you for the night. I'm sure we can do it.” She gave a soft laugh.

When Vance and Farrell released her wrists, she tried to run. But Blanche was surprisingly swift. She was dragged back to the bedroom.

Farrell produced a chain. While the three women held a squirming Melody, a hand clapped to her mouth, the chain was padlocked around Melody's waist. The other end was fastened to a leg of the bed.

“I'll scream!” Melody threatened when the hand was removed from her mouth.

Vance leaned close. “You do that and you won't have any teeth.”

“Damn you, Vance,” she said angrily, but he only shrugged and left the room. She was alone with the three women.

“Just calm down, honey,” Blanche said quietly. “It's a job with us, nothing more.”

Melody took a closer look at the woman. Her voice cued her in. One day when she first came to live with Uncle Josh, she had gotten lost downtown. And as she passed a two-story building at a dead-end street, this woman came to a doorway. “I think you're lost, honey. You better get back on Center Street.”

Melody saw the girls in the windows and turned red, realizing that she was in front of a parlor house at the end of a deserted side street.

Farrell and Vance returned to the bedroom. “Lassiter's coming,” Farrell told her coldly. “Keep your mouth shut, hear?”

“Goddamn you both!” she stormed at her husband and Farrell. “When Lassiter gets here he'll . . .”

“Do nothing.” Farrell gave her an angry look. In his earlier struggle with her, his hair had become mussed and his face so slick with sweat that he was now mopping it with a white handkerchief. Subduing her hadn't been easy.

“Lassiter will do
something,
” she said defiantly.

“Lassiter won't be alive to see the sun go down tomorrow,” Farrell said in such a vicious tone that she was stunned. She stared at the green-eyed tense face that held all the fury of an aroused mountain lion.

“What are you going to do to Lassiter?” she asked breathlessly.

“When you hear sustained shouting tomorrow, you'll know he's down for the final count. When this is followed by silence, you'll know he's finished.”

“Finished?” she heard herself say numbly.

“Dead.” Farrell supplied her with a hard smile.

Lassiter came bounding up the veranda steps to face Farrell in the doorway. “Where is she?” he demanded.

“Come in, come in.” Farrell stood aside and Lassiter strode into the parlor. Something hard rammed his backbone.