Fireblossom (14 page)

Fox wanted to hug her, and he did dare to put one hand on her back in a gesture that was halfway between a pat and a caress. "I'm sure that Miss Cannary hasn't had the benefit of your proper breeding. She treats everyone that way, from what I hear. She's cruder than most men."

"How charming." Maddie felt a shiver run down her back from the touch of his hand. "Aren't you curious to learn what Mr. Hickok is waiting to tell you? Benjamin would be positively agog to hear that you know his hero. He's talked of little else since that wagon train arrived in Deadwood."

"I'll take Ben over to meet Bill as soon as I have a chance, if it would mean that much—"

"Please don't!" she exclaimed. "I am doing everything in my power to
discourage
his new fascination with desperadoes!"

Fox rubbed his jaw and smiled slowly. "I'm afraid that you're living in the wrong town... but then you already know that, don't you." His other hand still rested on her back, and now he drew her closer. A ray of sunlight broke through the trees and illuminated Maddie's exquisite hair. He ached to bury his face in it, then press his mouth to her temple, her creamy throat. Instead, he dared to brush his face against the softness of her hair. "You wish," he whispered, "that someone different lived next door, don't you? A gentleman in every way, who reads the Romantic poets and wears a paper collar as a matter of habit, and always behaves in the best of taste—"

"Don't be silly," Maddie broke in, her voice trembling. "There are no such men in Deadwood."

"And if there were?"

Her heart began to race as Fox drew her closer until her breasts grazed the unyielding surface of his chest. Her cheek touched the starchy fabric of his blue-striped shirt. It smelled fresh and new... and yet like him. "We—we shouldn't be speaking of such matters, Mr. Daniel." She could barely get the words out.

So close! Each time, she came so close to giving way, to yielding to her woman's heart, but always at the brink she recovered. Boldly, Fox kept his fingers on her back, raising them slowly to her shoulder in a tantalizing caress. When he felt her quake, he gathered her near.

"Perhaps," he offered, "we shouldn't speak at all."

Maddie lifted her face to protest, but this time no words would come. She ached for something unknowable. The feeling of his strong arms around her and the sight of his tender blue eyes, gazing down into hers, made her soften against him. When he lifted her off her feet and stepped into the shadow of a pine tree, Maddie didn't struggle.

"Ah." Fox smiled slightly, savoring the moment, before he kissed her. She smelled so lovely and her body was so delicate, yielding to his embrace, that pleasure broke over him in a powerful wave. He reached with one hand to pull off her gardening gloves, holding her fast against him with the other arm, and then he could feel her bare fingers sink into the hair that curled over his collar.

The taste of his mouth intensified the fire that was building inside her. Her breasts tightened and tingled; there was a delicious yearning heat between her legs... and suddenly she heard herself panting as their kiss deepened.

"Oh!" It took all her strength to disengage her lips from his. What in heaven's name had happened to her? "Please... stop!"

Fox drew a heavy sigh. A bright ribbon of her hair had come loose and he raised tanned fingers to smooth it away from her brow. Then, with a rueful smile, he stepped backward.

"It seems I can't be trusted, can I?"

Maddie thought she couldn't stop trembling, but she had to. Straightening, she gave him an even look. "I believe that I can handle you, sir. And now, if you don't mind, I should return to my gardening."

"Of course." He bent to retrieve her gloves from under the pine tree and held them out to her. "You'll need these."

A blush warmed her cheeks. "Thank you." As she accepted the gloves, his fingertips burned her wrist.

"Until we meet again, Miss Avery." Fox gave her an irrepressible smile, then sketched a bow before leaving her to her silent, cooperative seedlings.

* * *

It seemed that the sound of hammering was incessant these days, whether Fox was on his own hillside above Sherman Street or in the midst of Deadwood's badlands. There were still plenty of stores and saloons located in tents with calico inner walls, but more and more of them were being replaced by hastily constructed buildings. Main Street was still a filthy, stinking swamp, but at least it had a more permanent appearance. Dozens of new arrivals poured in each day, prompting Charles H. Wagner to raise his rates at the Grand Central Hotel.

Fox checked Nuttall & Mann's Number 10 Saloon, the Betwix-Stops Saloon, the Senate, and the Green Front and finally found Wild Bill sitting at a card table in the Gem. He was flanked by Bessie and Victoria but appeared disinterested. There were two other men at the table, one of whom was Captain Jack Crawford, who styled himself a "poet-scout." Fox found the man annoying and conceited but decided to endure his company in exchange for Bill's.

Fox took a seat and smiled. "I'm not interrupting a game, I hope?"

Hickok shook his head. "No. I feel like hell today, Captain Jack's writing a new poem, and Charley here's about to go to the bathhouse." He shook Fox's hand and then slumped back in his chair. He was paler than the last time they had met. "Have you met my pard, Colorado Charley Utter? Charley, this is Fox. I knew him in the war. A good man."

The third fellow, who wore buckskins and sported a long mustache and shoulder-length hair like Hickok, smiled at Fox. "It's good to know you. Me and Seymour are starting a Pony Express here in town. If you need a job, we need riders."

Fox smiled back, liking Colorado Charley immediately. "I'll keep that in mind, and I appreciate the offer."

"Where you been, darlin'?" Victoria whispered. When she leaned over his shoulder, the smell of her cheap perfume was overpowering.

"Leave Fox alone, Victoria," Wild Bill said as he poured himself another drink with his left hand. Fox remembered that this was one of his cautious habits, leaving his right hand free. He also endeavored always to sit with his back to the wall and never to the door of a saloon when he played cards. Some laughed at Hickok's vigilance, but he contended that it had kept him alive when many of his contemporaries had been less fortunate. "Why don't you girls leave us for a few minutes. I'd like to speak to Fox without an audience."

Victoria and Bessie flounced away, curves jiggling. Something in Wild Bill's solemn gaze prompted Fox to accept the offer of a drink. "Is this serious?" he said, and as soon as the words were out, he sensed what the subject was. Oddly enough, Fox hadn't thought of Custer once in the past few hours.

"It's about Custer and the Seventh," Hickok said in husky tones. "You asked about them the other night, and I thought you might know someone who was with Custer."

"I did," Fox whispered. Instinct told him to gulp the drink.

"There's been terrible news!" Captain Jack Crawford exclaimed, unable to restrain himself.

"What do you mean?"

Bill shot Crawford a warning look. "Well, we just got word that last month Custer's men went up against a whole mess of Sioux—up near the Little Bighorn in Montana. June twenty-fifth, I b'lieve it was."

"And?" Fox heard his own voice from a distance.

"Well, it seems Custer bit off more than he could chew. He was massacred, him and the couple hundred men who rode with him that day."

"They're dead?" Fox was certain he must have misunderstood. "All of them?"

Hickok nodded, stroking his mustache, then reached out with his left hand to refill Fox's glass. "Story is that they didn't have a chance; there must've been two
thousand
Indians. Either Custer was one of the greatest heroes who ever lived... or the biggest fool."

As the truth sank in, Fox felt as if his heart would explode.

Chapter 8

July 20-24, 1876

"I heard that the only survivor was a horse name of Comanche," Charley Utter remarked. "Too bad he can't talk."

Fox's mind was whirling as he thought of Captain Myles Keogh, Comanche's rider, and then all the other men he had come to know in the days before the battle. Stabbing guilt brought beads of sweat to his forehead. He tried to concentrate. Surely the entire Seventh Cavalry hadn't been killed that day—it had numbered more than six hundred men! Besides, just before Fox had made his exit, Custer had divided the regiment into three battalions, to be commanded by Reno, Benteen, and himself. It sounded as if only Custer's battalion had been wiped out. Perhaps the others, circling the Indians from different directions, had managed to escape.

His thoughts kept returning to one fact: If he and Custer hadn't quarreled so violently, and if Custer had accepted his offer to join the soldiers, Fox would have gone with them to their deaths. Right and wrong no longer mattered; the point was that he had ridden away and they'd all been killed. Good God, why hadn't he tried harder to change Custer's mind? Were his nightmares real? Was it George Armstrong Custer's
ghost
who taunted him at night?

While Fox was lost in thought, it seemed that everyone in the Gem had begun to talk about "General" Custer and the tragedy at Little Bighorn. Colorado Charley Utter, sensing that the drama was about to get out of hand, departed for the bathhouse. A moment later Captain Jack Crawford stood up, brandishing the paper covered with his fanciful handwriting.

"Who would care to hear the first verse of my newest poem, composed during this past hour since word came of General Custer's demise?" A murmuring hush spread over the crowd, which prompted Captain Jack to step up onto his chair and read:

Did I hear the news from Custer?

Well, I reckon I did, old pard.

It came like a streak o' lightning,

And you bet, it hit me hard.

I ain't no hand to blubber,

And the briny ain't run for years,

But chalk me down for a lubber,

If I didn't shed regular tears.

People made sounds of solemn approval, while some of the upstairs girls began to weep. Captain Jack cautioned them that it was only the first verse, and he couldn't promise that the rest of the missive would be as profound.

Wild Bill gave Fox a glance and a shrug in critique of Crawford's talent, but Fox was in no mood for irony. "I—I'm going to go upstairs for a little peace," he muttered. "Hope you feel better, Bill."

"Can't say as I blame you, pard. Have one for me."

Fox didn't know if his friend meant a drink or a girl, so he merely nodded and rose to find Victoria, stopping for a bottle on the way. Victoria threw a triumphant look back to her friends as Fox took her elbow and guided her toward the stairway.

Climbing the slanting staircase, Fox found that he couldn't shut out the unwelcome thoughts. He'd never experienced such pain before. What did they call it—survivor's guilt? Images burned in his mind of two hundred soldiers lying dead under the Montana sun. He had handled Custer badly, letting his temper override reason. He shouldn't have said the things he had... he shouldn't have left, even if Custer had ordered him to... he should have tried something else...

But what about the Indians? another voice in his head argued. Would it be better if Custer and the Seventh had butchered the Lakota people instead? Would that have been fair?

Pausing on the top step, Fox stared at the bottle for a moment, then lifted it to his mouth and drank deeply.
Please God
, he prayed silently,
make it stop....

* * *

Titus Pym nailed one of the last shingles in place on the cabin roof, then leaned over to look down at little Ben Avery. "Just about finished. Where d'you suppose that bloke Fox has got to?"

He'd asked the same question of Benjamin and Wang Chee at least a dozen times over the past three days, and of course no answer was forthcoming. Now, Ben lifted his hands and shrugged. "Gee, Mr. Pym, I don't know. He'd of told somebody if he was gonna leave town, wouldn't he?" As Titus crept over to the ladder and descended, Ben's brown eyes lit up. "Maybe he's in the badlands! You want me to go down there and ask around?"

"Certainly not, me young lad!" The older man feigned shock. "But I was thinkin' it might not hurt to inquire at your house. Perhaps he said something to your grandmother or your sister and didn't have a chance to speak to any of us."

"Why would he tell Gramma Susan anything? Or Maddie? Gramma's an old lady and Maddie
hates
Fox!"

"Does she? That's a strong word, lad. Let's go along and ask all the same, and if we're lucky, perhaps your lovely grandmother will offer me a piece of cake or pie or whatever's cooling inside the kitchen window today."

Pym put a hand on the boy's shoulder, and they walked across the lot, through the pine trees, and up to the Averys' back door. Titus would have knocked, but Benjamin threw open the door and marched in. Susan O'Hara was drying dishes and putting them away on the shelves. Her face brightened at the sight of the Cornish miner.