Power in the Blood (95 page)

“Who are you to talk?” Winnie said. “You didn’t work for a living till you came here.”

“I told you, I was an artist.…”

“That ain’t work,” said Smith, “not real work anyway.”

“It certainly is! Do you imagine Rembrandt painted his portraits without monetary compensation? Are you truly so ignorant? Art is the most honorable work known to man, with the possible exception of doctoring the poor and needy!”

“Then go back to it, why don’t you!”

“Winnie, please … This bad news has upset us all.…”

“She’s right,” Smith declared. “I don’t often say so, but she’s right. If you had’ve belonged here, you never would’ve been this way about Brannan, not caring what he’s gonna do to us. For you, it ain’t really real, is what I’m saying, even after I brung you in and set you down and give you a drink and a job and a woman besides.”

“You never gave me to him,” Winnie protested. “I made up my own mind about that.” Turning to Nevis, she said. “And I regret it now, if that’s the way you feel.”

“Stop it! Stop it, both of you! What have I done …?”

“It’s that Injun,” stated Smith. “I never wanted to mess with it, but you had to go and dig it out and bring it down here, and now look what happened because of it. It’s a bad-luck dead-man Injun, is what it is, and if you had’ve done like I wanted and left it where it was, we never would’ve been in the trouble we’re in, and that’s a fact.”

“No, no … Smith, the news would have reached us sooner or later anyway. You’re not being logical, not sensible about this. The Indian has nothing to do with Brannan’s plans, in fact it may be the very thing that allows us to weather the approaching storm. The thing is worth money, as I explained before. If we act quickly to preserve it, the Indian will serve us well. Finding him was not bad luck, but the very best of, good luck, don’t you see?”

He had their grudging attention, and continued with a passion. “People are interested in the unusual, the bizarre, the ugly and the horrific, and will pay to experience these things at second hand. Look at this, for example.” He snatched up the news sheet again and pointed to the leading article:
SLADE STRIKES AGAIN! FIEND STILL AT LARGE!
“The whole southwestern region is petrified by the presence of this cannibal, but the rest of the country spends money reading about their terror. Man is a creature fascinated by the awful, the ghastly, the lurking horrors of the world. We have such a horror, and it cost us the sweat of one working day. Must I make my point all over again? Must I?”

Smith and Winnie exchanged sullen looks. Smith’s expression relented first, and he held out his hand for the bottle Nevis held. “You sure about this Injun?”

“As sure as any man in this vale of tears can be of anything.”

“Well, all right, then.” Smith drank deeply by way of acceptance.

Nevis looked at Winnie. “Will you believe I’ve done no wrong, and want only to help us all?”

Winnie said, “I suppose,” and reached for the bottle.

“Thing is,” said Smith, surrendering it, “we don’t have us a glass case that’s airtight. I never even heard of such a thing. That Injun, he’s already ripe, I say.”

“Then we’ll pickle him until the case is made.”

“Pickle?”

“Exactly. Preservation is not in itself a difficult task. The problem is to preserve the object one is desirous of preserving without hiding it away from view inside a pickling barrel, and that is where the airtight case comes into its own. Until we have it, though, we must resort to dunking our frigid friend in vinegar brine, like so much herring. It should only be a temporary measure, until the case is built. Do we have the financial wherewithal to order such a specialized piece of work, Smith?”

“I reckon.”

Nevis smote his forehead. “And we shall enlist the aid of Mr. Leo Brannan in making our find known to the scientific community and the world at large!”

“I don’t want him having nothing to do with it,” said Smith, and Winnie agreed.

“But the man is perfectly suited to our ends,” Nevis enthused. “What was Slade before Leo Brannan placed a reward upon his head? An unspeakable wretch who ate of his fellow man’s flesh in a collapsed mine, a disgusting specimen of humanity to be sure, but of little note in the sweep of history. However, once our illustrious magnate made known to the public his personal desire that Slade be found and punished, the talk has been of nothing else. The man-eater has become a walking plague, a shadow over the land, the subject on every lip, and Leo Brannan could do the same with our Indian, I don’t doubt.”

“But why would he want to?” asked Winnie.

“Because …” Nevis faltered. He could think of no compelling reason. The fact that the Indian had been discovered above Glory Hole might pique Brannan’s interest, and any man committed to modern plumbing and ice production would surely be willing to invest in a scientific curiosity such as theirs, even if this meant nothing more than informing the world of its existence. Nevis doubted that remorse over throwing two men out of work would play any role in Brannan’s thinking.

“Who knows why a man such as he might or might not help us, but my friends, he won’t accept or reject our proposal until we ask.”

“That’ll be your job, then,” said Smith. “You got the words that’ll make him sit up and listen, I guess.”

“Thank you, Smith. I am in complete agreement. I will, however, require a new suit of clothing, plus extensive bathhouse time. You, as custodian of the purse strings, will have to supply the cash for these necessary items.”

“Me?”

“I can’t appear before the wealthiest man in the west as I am. I must appear urbane, confident and sweet-smelling before I enter the sanctum of the great man.”

“Why don’t you pay for that stuff? I pay you wages, don’t I? Use ’em for the stuff, why can’t you?”

“Smith, you don’t pay me anywhere near as much as you pay yourself. If this plan is to stand any chance for success, you must part with fifty dollars for my own requirements, and considerably more, I should think, for the glass case. Nothing spent, nothing won, I fear.”

Smith took back the bottle and drained it.

Seeking out the personal interest of Leo Brannan, and receiving it, were two different matters. Freshly scrubbed, shaved, coiffed and attired, Nevis presented himself first at the offices of Brannan Mining, but was shown the door when he explained his business. He then walked all the way up the valley to Elk House in an attempt to confront the owner there, but could get no further than the front doors, having been issued no personal invitation to visit.

Undeterred, Nevis strode back to town in the gathering gloom of evening, his new shoes pinching quite painfully by that time, and concocted on the downward journey yet another gambit, his most audacious. If Leo Brannan would not see him, prevented as he was from knowing Nevis’s need because of the intervening employees at his doorways and portals, then Nevis would have to approach the man by way of someone even closer than his servants. He would take the risky step of consulting with the man’s mistress. He knew her house on Bowman Street as did most of the town, and had heard the rumors that placed her in a less salubrious location at an earlier moment in her life at Glory Hole—a common boardinghouse close to the railroad tracks. It was the humble origins of the mistress that inspired Nevis with faith in his plan; such a female would not be arrogant or dismissive of his entreaties. He was filled with self-assurance as he lifted the lion-headed knocker on Imogen Starr’s door.

It had been a dreadful day. Her breakfast had been unacceptably burned, and her green parrot, a recent gift from Leo, had somehow slipped free of its perch chain and flown through the nearest open window. Leo would be furious when he found out. Lovey Doll had not liked the bird, not trusting its beady little eyes and wickedly curved beak, and it had revealed previous tuition in its filthy vocabulary, something she was sure Leo had been unaware of when he purchased it for her. Anyway, it was gone, and after its abrupt leavetaking, Lovey Doll had shouted at the maid who left the window open, and at the maid whose responsibility it was to take care of the parrot’s needs; the lazy girl had not even noticed the parrot’s leg ring was not secure, and so was responsible for its loss. Lovey Doll doubted that a Brazilian parrot would last long in the rarer atmosphere of Colorado. Perhaps she should order another from whichever exotic store in Denver had provided the first, and hope that Leo did not notice the difference.

Leo had of late been quite testy in his dealings with her. The one-armed wife had packed her bags and left, dragging her odious daughter with her, but this had not improved Leo’s temper at all; he was brusque, demanding, not at all his usual self. The parrot had been a gift by way of apologizing for certain intemperate remarks he had passed recently, remarks concerning the flatness of Lovey Doll’s belly. She had taken to gorging on food since that day, in hopes of plumping herself out to an agreeable width and depth, but still Leo grumbled about his need for a son “or else.” Surprisingly, he had not forced her to visit a doctor for official confirmation of the lie, an oversight for which Lovey Doll was grateful. She could not hope to fool him forever, though, and since conception seemed beyond her body’s abilities, she was fearful for the future, when Leo found out he had been deceived. Any man who sent away his wife because she was barren and his mistress was not would surely be very angry to learn his mistress was a liar. It was the daily postponement of his learning the truth that gave Lovey Doll headaches of terrible proportion, and prevented her from gaining the flesh she required to further the deception for a month or two more. She was in such a state of nerves she could not keep food inside herself, but vomited it up within a half hour of eating, or else lost precious weight through the embarrassing affliction of running bowels.

She was in no mood, therefore, to answer her own doorbell when it became obvious the maids she had shouted at earlier had gone into hiding somewhere inside the house, and could not hear the visitor announcing himself on her step. Lovey Doll’s face, as she opened the oak door, was not conducive to unwarranted conversation.

The fellow there had a vaguely familiar air about him that confused her momentarily. It was intolerable that she should be expected to answer her own door, without knowing who her visitor was in advance. “Yes?” she snapped. The man was staring with an impudence she considered worth reporting to Leo, so he could have the fellow run out of town for his lack of manners. “What is it?” she asked in exasperation.

“Lovey Doll?”

The words transfixed her with fear. How did he know? Who was he, this red-nosed stranger?

“No,” she said. “You’re mistaken.”

“Lovey Doll … It’s you, it’s really you.”

“Please depart this instant.”

“It’s me, Nevis!”

“Nevis?”

“Nevis Dunnigan! I painted your picture, Lovey Doll. You don’t mean to say you’ve forgotten posing for
Venus Revealed.
Lovey Doll, I never thought … oh my goodness … to see you again.”

“Nevis Dunnigan …”

“Yes! Yes! May I come in?”

“Nevis … Yes, you may.”

She stepped aside and let him pass into her life again.

“Do you work here?” he asked, looking around at the richly appointed hallway.

“I … no, this is my house.”

“Yours? But … how fortuitous, Lovey Doll! How wonderful you look!”

“We’ll sit in the parlor.”

She led him to a comfortable settee, her mind whirling. If Nevis Dunnigan breathed a word about her former identity, all her plans would be washed away in an instant. Leo Brannan would never marry a woman who had posed in the nude for a painter, and deceived him over her very name. Nevis’s reappearance in her life had come at the very worst moment she could conceive of. He looked awful, despite his new suit of cheap material and his overscented pomade, like a tramp made over by good works and a few dollars, yet still a tramp beneath it all. His nose was a large strawberry, his cheeks heavily veined by the unmistakable drinker’s web. She had not known him for long, back in Kansas City, but even if she had, his appearance had changed so very greatly over the years, she would never have recognized him without his own introduction.

“So, Nevis, how have things been with you?”

“Oh, excellent. You find me in the pink, as they say.”

“You are still a painter?”

“No, not anymore. They stole my work, the picture of you, and never compensated me with a single cent.”

“Compensated?”

“Imitations of my work became commonplace. Surely you knew your picture, or at least a copy of it, was in every saloon in the country.”

“No, I did not,” said Lovey Doll, appalled.

“And on cigar boxes too, and a host of other commercial canvases, so to speak. But you look utterly unchanged, Lovey Doll, from the days when I made that first immortal study.”

“Please, don’t call me by that name, I beg you. My real name is … Imogen Starr, and I have reverted to its use. Lovey Doll is so … theatrical, don’t you think?”

“I confess I always thought it suited you to perfection, but if you insist … Imogen.” He glanced around himself at the polished parquet flooring and ornate wallpaper. “So you are … Leo Brannan’s special friend?”

“I am.”

“I thought I had the right house, then when you appeared in the doorway I felt I must surely have made a mistake, but no, it was truly you, and you’re the very one I came to see, in your capacity as Mr. Brannan’s … confidante. Such an amazing coincidence. This is the work of invisible hands, to be sure. Are you a believer in fate, Lovey Doll … I mean, Imogen?”

“I scarce know what I believe anymore. What is it you want, Nevis?”

“Oh, yes, I had quite forgotten. Put simply, I have a business proposal for Mr. Brannan to … shall we say, endorse? He does not have to contribute money toward the venture, merely discuss it at length in his newspaper, and make sure other newspapers become interested.”

“Interested in what?”

Nevis told her, in considerable detail.

“You pickled the thing …?” asked Lovey Doll, aghast.