The Ballad of Emma O'Toole (19 page)

Turning the ledger over, he started from the back. A few pages in, he found a separate account listing cash paid out. The substantial sums amounted to approximately half the money Armitage had collected. In every case, the recipient of these payouts was listed simply as “A. C.”

Logan mouthed a string of curses. Why
hadn’t he thought of this sooner? Who else besides Phineas Barton’s lawyer would know that the banker had fathered a Chinese child? Most of the other listed names were probably clients, as well. After they’d exposed their secrets under the guise of lawyer-client privilege, Armitage would have shown up with his demand for hush money, implying that he’d discovered the scandals on his own—as in some cases, like Logan’s, he probably had.

Logan had assumed the ledger was about power. In reality, it was a practical accounting of income and division between two partners in blackmail—Hector Armitage and Andrew Clegg.

He had to get the hell out of this place.

With the ledger tucked in his inner vest pocket, Logan cracked open the door and scanned the hall. All clear, but there was no rear exit from the upper floor. The only way out was the way he’d come in, by the front staircase.

Moving cautiously toward the stairs, he’d nearly reached the top landing when he heard the front door open below. Brisk footsteps clicked across the tiles. Logan forced himself to keep a casual pace, as if he’d been here on ordinary business. With luck, the newcomer’s arrival would have nothing to do with him.

But his luck, it seemed, had taken flight. The wavy blond hair and hawkish features of the man coming up the stairs matched those in the photograph on Andrew Clegg’s wall.

Logan continued down the stairs, his eyes on the door. His nerves clenched like coiled springs as he and Clegg passed each other. They had never met face-to-face, and so far the man didn’t seem to recognize him. His luck could be holding after all.

“Mr. Devereaux.” Clegg’s nasal voice was like the crack of a whip.

Logan kept walking as if he hadn’t heard. By now he’d reached the bottom of the stairs. The door was just a few paces ahead.

“Mr. Devereaux, I suggest you turn around.” The snarling tone could no longer be ignored. With slow deliberation, Logan turned.

“I’m sorry, do I know you?” he demanded.

“Let’s say we have a mutual acquaintance.” Clegg was standing partway up the steps, glowering down at Logan. “He told me you had something of his. Give it to me and I’ll see that it’s returned to its proper owner.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Logan could be a convincing liar, but something told him he’d missed the mark. “Why
don’t you tell me what it is I’m supposed to have? Maybe that will refresh my memory.”

“Maybe
this
will refresh your memory.” Clegg’s manicured hand reached into his vest. Logan found himself staring into the stubby barrel of a Smith & Wesson Pocket .38.

Thoughts flash-fired through Logan’s mind like bullets from a Gatling gun. Why not just give Clegg the damned ledger? What did he care about Phineas Barton or any of the other poor sons of bitches who were getting squeezed for their sins? This wasn’t his town and these weren’t his people. He could pack his bags, take Emma and be out of here by nightfall.

But things wouldn’t be that easy, Logan knew. He’d seen too much. He knew too much. Even if he returned the ledger there was no way Clegg and Armitage would let him live. And if they suspected Emma of knowing their secret…

A bead of sweat trickled down Logan’s cheek. Emma was completely innocent. But those two bastards wouldn’t give her the benefit of the doubt. He had to get to her before they did.

He could wheel and bolt in the hope that Clegg wouldn’t pull the trigger. Or he could try to jump the man, hit him low and knock
his legs out from under him. Either way was liable to get him shot, leaving Emma alone and helpless.

The ledger was his only bargaining chip. With it, he had a measure of control. Without it he would have nothing. Given that reality, Logan had just one card left to play.

He met the lawyer’s frigid blue eyes. “You won’t shoot me, Clegg,” he said. “For one thing, a gunshot would bring people running out of every office in this building. People in the street would hear it, too.” As he spoke, Logan edged backward toward the door. “I doubt that even a slippery fellow like you would be able to talk his way out of a noose.”

At that moment, the door inched open behind him. Logan’s furtive side-glance revealed a well-dressed elderly woman with a cane, pushing at the heavy door with one lace-mitted hand.

“Allow me, ma’am.” Silently blessing the lady, he stepped to one side and swung the door wide-open. Clegg blanched and fumbled with his gun, shoving it back into his vest. The lawyer stood fuming on the stairs while the dowager tottered over the threshold. By the time she was midway across the tiled entry Logan had
exited the building and vanished around the corner into the crowded milieu of Main Street.

Emma stood on the front porch, one hand shading her eyes against the sun. Logan had ordered her to stay in the house and keep the door locked until he came home. Despite the stifling indoor heat, she’d done as he wished. But as the afternoon crawled on with no word from him, worry had deepened to gnawing fear. Every beat of her heart told her something was wrong.

Below the hill, the town drowsed in the broiling summer sun. Even the Chinese vegetable seller, toiling up the road with his baskets, dragged his sandaled feet in the dust. He glanced up at her as he passed. When she didn’t wave him down, he moved on.

Where her hip pressed the railing, Emma could feel the slight bulk of Logan’s derringer beneath her apron. She hadn’t wanted to leave him weaponless, but he’d insisted she take it. Only as she’d ridden away from the mine with the tiny gun in her pocket had she remembered.

The weapon she carried was the one that had killed Billy John.

Now she slipped it out of her pocket. Small and deadly, it lay like a child’s toy in the palm of her hand. A gun was only a machine—an
assembly of metal parts with no mind, no soul and no conscience. Even so, the feel of its cold weight against her skin made Emma shudder.

Was Billy John’s ghost still haunting her, or had the nightmares sprung from her own guilt? Emma slid the gun back into her pocket. What was the use of brooding over questions that had no answers? She loved Logan and had long since forgiven him. If heaven saw fit to give them a life together she would spend every day counting her blessings.

Last night’s lovemaking had been slow, sweet and tender, as if every caress might be their last. They’d said little, but Emma had felt the weight of impending danger. Logan, she sensed, had felt it, too. That was why he’d forced her to take the derringer that morning—and perhaps why, for the first time, he’d finally said he loved her.

Dropping her gaze to her hands she whispered a brief prayer. She wanted to believe Logan was safe. But if he was all right why wasn’t he here? How much longer could she wait without rushing out to look for him?

As She gazed down the road Emma saw a figure—too small to be Logan—crossing the Chinese bridge. She recognized one of the ragged boys who hung around Main Street, hoping to
earn a few coppers by tending a horse, carrying bundles or running a quick errand.

Seeing her on the porch, the boy raised his arm and waved a folded piece of brown paper. Emma’s pulse skittered. Without taking time to get her bonnet or fling off her apron, she plunged off the porch and raced down the hill to meet him partway.

Groping in her pocket for a few pennies, she thrust them at the lad and seized the note. As she unfolded the paper, her shaking hands blurred the crudely penciled letters.

Fear gripped Emma, making her dizzy. She willed herself to take gulps of air until her head cleared. Whatever had happened, she had to be strong. She had to get to Logan.

With a groan, Emma pushed past the boy and sprinted down the hill toward the bridge. Ghosts of the past howled in her memory—that freezing April night, her frantic race down the street to the Crystal Queen to find the boy she’d loved, his blood soaking into the floor, the light
fading from his eyes and Logan standing over him. Had she and Logan come full circle?

Emma willed herself not to remember. This was a different time, a different man. But the ghosts would not be silent. Every step she took was a silent prayer for Logan’s life.

The livery stable wasn’t far beyond the bridge; but by the time she reached it, Emma was sweat-soaked and out of breath. She was well-acquainted with the stable where Logan kept the horse he rode to the mine. But she’d never been in the alley out back.

Odd, how quiet the place was. Through the open doorway of the barn, Emma could see the youth who mucked out the stalls, hard at his task. No one else was in sight. One would think that an injured man would draw a crowd. Had someone taken Logan to the doctor?

Heart slamming, she rounded the corner of the building. She found herself looking down a narrow alleyway, walled on one side by the back of The barn and on the other by a high wooden fence. Beyond the fence she could hear a dog barking. The only other sign of life was a drowsing horse hitched to an empty buggy, standing in the shadow at the alley’s far end.

“Logan?” Emma’s voice quivered in the stillness.
What if he was in the back of the buggy, lying wounded on the floor?

“Is anybody here?” Emma’s flesh crawled as she neared the buggy. The dun horse twitched an ear as she approached, then settled back into a doze, flies buzzing around its face.

Now she could see into the buggy. It was empty except for a stained and rumpled canvas tarpaulin, flung over the backseat. Almost forgetting to breathe, she reached for the tarpaulin and lifted the edge.

Rough arms seized her from behind. A hand shoved a smelly rag over her face, pressing hard. Emma’s legs sagged beneath her as the daylight went black.

T
he rattle of wheels over a washboard road jarred Emma awake. Dazed, she lay still for a moment. Her mouth tasted of bile. Her head felt as if it had been slammed by a meat ax.

As the fog cleared her mind, she opened her eyes. She lay sideways on the floor of a buggy, her head and body covered by a rough canvas that smelled like stale manure. The heat underneath was nauseating.

Only when she tried to push away the canvas did she realize her wrists were bound behind her back. Her ankles were lashed as well, with rough hemp rope that gnawed into her skin.

Panic stampeded through her body. Her shoulders bucked. Her bound feet kicked and thrashed.
“Let…me…up!”
she gasped.

The buggy swayed to a halt. Sunlight blinded her as the canvas was yanked away. When her vision cleared, she saw Hector Armitage’s freckled face leering down at her.

“So you’re awake at last, my dear,” he chortled. “I was beginning to fear I’d put you to sleep for good.”

Rage burned away fear as she glared up at him. “How dare you? Where’s my husband?” she demanded.

“I was hoping you’d know the answer to that question.”

“I haven’t seen Logan all day. A boy brought me a note…” Emma groaned silently as she realized how she’d been taken in. “The joke’s over, Armitage. Untie me and let me go.”

“Sorry, my dear, I can’t do that.” Wry amusement glittered behind his spectacles. “This is no joking matter. Your husband stole something from me. I want it back. You’re my insurance that he’ll deliver.”

Emma twisted her body to a sitting position on the floor of the buggy. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she snapped. “Logan isn’t a thief.”

“Such a little innocent. Butter wouldn’t melt in your pretty mouth, would it?”

His gaze narrowed and darkened. The man
was capable of anything, Emma reminded herself. He’d already proven that by kidnapping her. She’d be foolish to underestimate him.

Turning away, he slapped the reins on the horse’s back. The buggy jerked into motion, wheels creaking through the ruts. There was no need for Armitage to watch her. With her hands and feet bound there was no way she could attack him from behind or leap out of the buggy and escape. Likewise, the road was an isolated stretch. There was little chance they’d meet anyone she could call to for help.

Aspen trees lined the roadsides, their pale jade leaves coated with dust. Emma didn’t have to ask where the buggy was headed. The way was all too familiar. A chill of foreboding crawled up her backbone.

Armitage was taking her to the Constellation Mine.

Logan zigzagged through the Chinese settlement, sprinting his way among clapboard huts, vegetable patches and clotheslines where laundry dangled limp in the heat. He cast occasional glances over his shoulder, but he was no longer concerned about having been followed. It was Emma who was in danger now.

Logan had left Andrew Clegg sputtering on
the stairs. For the sake of appearances, the lawyer wasn’t likely to chase him. But the whereabouts of Hector Armitage remained a worry. It made sense that the two cohorts had met when Clegg returned from Coalville, and Armitage had told the lawyer about the theft of the ledger. At the time, neither of them would have known that Logan was waiting in Clegg’s office.

The reporter would have taken the next logical step to try to track down Logan—he would have gone after Emma.

Logan could only pray that she’d had the sense to lock herself in the house and keep the derringer close at hand.

He’d headed home by way of the Chinese gulch in part to avoid being seen. But there was another reason, as well. He’d heard of an old man there, a skilled gunsmith, who repaired broken and abandoned pistols and sold them under the table. Logan had stopped by his shed long enough to buy a short-barreled Colt .45 Peacemaker and enough ammunition to load it. “This gun very hard to fix,” the old Chinaman had warned. “Hard to find good parts. You test it. It doesn’t shoot, you bring it back and I fix again.”

Logan had flung down his cash, taken the gun and hurried away. There’d be no time to
test the weapon. The important thing now was getting to Emma.

Passing under the Chinese bridge, he took a road that wound across the hillside to bring him up behind his house. From a distance the place appeared quiet. Too quiet.

Using his key, Logan let himself in through the back door and moved into the kitchen. The room was in perfect order, the floor freshly mopped, the table and counters polished and every dish put away. The bedroom and parlor were likewise immaculate, as if Emma had spent the day in a nervous frenzy of cleaning. There was no sign of a struggle. But Logan’s wife was nowhere to be found.

Had she gone to meet with Armitage after all? Sick with dread, Logan searched the empty house for some sign of what had happened. By the time he’d found her pocketbook and straw bonnet on their customary hooks inside the wardrobe, he knew his worst fears had come to pass.

Emma wouldn’t have set out for town without her purse. And especially, on this blistering day, she wouldn’t have ventured out bareheaded. She’d been taken.

Logan yanked open the front door. As he’d feared, it was unlocked. A folded paper lay with
one end anchored under the doormat. Snatching it up, he opened it to the message.

The surge of murderous fury almost blinded him. He’d felt something near to it seven years ago when he’d gone after Henri Leclerc, the man who’d destroyed his sister. But Logan was wiser now. He knew that Emma’s survival, and his own, depended on his keeping a cool head.

It made sense that Armitage would choose the mine for their meeting. It was isolated, with a deep, flooded shaft where anything he wanted to be rid of could be lost without a trace. The shaft would be vital to his plan. Only a fool would believe that Armitage meant to release Emma in exchange for the ledger.

The only way to cover his crimes would be to murder the two people who could send him to prison. After shoving their bodies down the shaft and removing some personal things from the house, he could publish what he’d learned about Logan’s past. Anyone reading it would
assume the couple had simply left town ahead of the law.

Even if the bodies were found, there’d be no evidence to tie Armitage to Logan’s mine. The deaths would mostly likely be dismissed as a double suicide.

Clever little bastard. In his evil mind, he probably thought he’d pulled off the perfect crime.

Logan strapped on his shoulder holster and covered the gun with his vest. The ledger was still in his pocket. It wouldn’t be enough to save Emma. But at least it might buy them some time.

At the livery stable, he flung a saddle on the sturdy buckskin gelding and headed up the canyon road at a gallop. He’d thought about alerting the town marshal. But that would have taken time; and after his experience with Andrew Clegg, Logan wasn’t ready to trust anyone, not even the local law.

Where the road wound up to the mine, he could see fresh buggy tracks in the dust. He forced himself to stay calm and think clearly. Armitage wasn’t stupid. Until the reporter got his hands on the ledger, he would need to keep Emma alive. After that, he’d have nothing to lose.

Through the aspens, Logan could see the
shaft house with its weathered board siding. He’d left the place padlocked, but breaking in would be easy enough with the right tool. Armitage would likely be waiting inside, with Emma at his mercy.

Logan would have to be ready for anything.

Above the road was the open shed where Armitage had left the horse and buggy. Dismounting, he led the buckskin under the slanting roof and looped the rains over a rail. Taking a moment, he glanced into the buggy. He found a dirty canvas, but when he lifted it aside, there was nothing underneath.

Cat-footed, he made his way through the trees toward the shaft house. The structure had windows but they were small and high. Armitage wouldn’t be able to look out and see him coming, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t heard the horse or that he wasn’t watching from somewhere else. He could easily be waiting in ambush to shoot Logan down and take the ledger.

That last thought gave Logan pause. Going back to the shed where his horse was tethered, he slipped the ledger out of his vest and buried it in a bin of oats. Then he went back to the road and circled the shaft house, coming around from behind.

Heat blanketed the afternoon in a torpid silence.
Even the chickadees that flitted among the aspens had fallen quiet. A lone raven perched on the peak of the shaft house roof. An omen, Logan’s grandmother would have called it. But an omen for whom?

Logan mouthed a curse as he edged around the corner of the building and saw the broken padlock dangling from its hasp. Drawing the short-barreled Colt from its holster, he mounted the stoop, thumbed back the hammer and shoved open the door.

His eyes searched for Emma but she was nowhere to be seen. Hector Armitage stood next to the shaft. His grin broadened as Logan stepped over the threshold.

“Mr. Devereaux!” His unctuous voice dripped sarcasm. “How kind of you to accept my invitation.”

Logan bit back an acid retort. He’d resolved not to speak until he’d sized up the situation. What his gaze took in made his gut clench.

The steam engine that ran the steel-cabled drum hoist had been shut down and drained after the flood. But Armitage had hooked the old rope hoist, with its windlass and system of pulleys, to the top of the cage. Logan could see where the rope ran down past the lip of the
shaft. Somewhere below would be the cage—and Emma.

“So, are you ready to return my property?” Armitage asked.

“Not until I’ve seen my wife.”

“I’m afraid you won’t be able to see her.” Armitage glanced down to where his hand rested on the brake that held the windlass—and the cage—in one position. “But you can certainly hear her.”

His hand released the brake, allowing the windlass to drop the cage about eight feet. Emma’s terrified scream echoed up from the depths of the shaft. The sound tore through Logan like a blast of shrapnel.

Armitage engaged the brake again. He was still smiling. “Now, Devereaux, I’ll take that gun. Lay it on the floor and kick it toward me. No tricks or the little lady goes for a ride, all the way to the bottom.”

Emma huddled on the floor of the cage, her wrists and ankles scraped raw by the knotted hemp. Her heart was still hammering after the sudden drop. For that instant she’d believed she was going to die. Then the cage had jerked to a halt, leaving her suspended, as before.

She knew what was going on. Hector Armitage
had just given Logan a demonstration of who was in charge. All the vile little man had to do was release the brake on the windlass and the cage would fall. Release it long enough, and she would plummet to her death in the water below. If Logan wanted her to survive, he would have to do exactly as he was told.

Not that Armitage meant either of them to live out the day. Emma had no doubt that he planned to kill them both.

The shaft was pitch-black, filled with subtle sounds—the creak of the rope hoist, the squeal of a rat, the ever-present drip of water and the rush of Emma’s own ragged breathing. In the humid heat, her clothes stuck to her body as if they’d been glued. Her hair hung down in wet strings around her face. But no discomfort could compare to the fear that she would never get out of this place. She steeled herself to remain calm and quiet. No more screaming. That would only distract Logan and make things harder for him.

Emma calculated she was about a hundred feet down—high enough, still, to see the square of light overhead and hear what was happening above her. Sound seemed to carry down the shaft. When Logan laid the gun on the floor
and kicked it toward Armitage, she heard it clearly, as she did the exchange that followed.

“If you’ve hurt her, you little pipsqueak, I’ll tear you apart with my bare hands,” Logan growled.

“Hurt her?” Armitage chuckled. “Please, I’m a gentleman. Aside from her rather precarious location, your wife is perfectly fine. So let me ask you again, did you bring my property?”

“I brought it, but I’m not fool enough to have it on me. Let Emma go and I’ll tell you where I hid it. She’s innocent. She doesn’t know anything about this.”

“Tut-tut, my friend. You’re in no position to call the shots. Get me the ledger. Turn it over now, or your wife will take a sudden bath. And since her hands and feet are tied, she won’t last long in the water.”

“If anything happens to her, there’ll be no reason for me to give you anything—and nothing to stop me from killing you.”

“With your own gun, which you just gave me? Don’t you think that sounds a little farfetched? I could shoot you from here. Besides, with both of you dead, why should I even need the ledger? Stop trying my patience, Devereaux. Let’s get this over with.”

There was a long pause. Emma sensed that
Logan was weighing his reply. Gritting her teeth against the pain, she twisted and strained at the rope that had already worn the skin off her wrists. Her hands were slimed with blood.

“Hear me out,” Logan said. “I don’t give a damn about the ledger. I don’t give a damn about your blackmail scheme or any of the poor devils you’ve been squeezing for cash. All I want is Emma, safe and free. Let her go and you can have anything you want—including me.”

Tears flowed from Emma’s eyes. The ropes tore into her flesh as she struggled harder.

“She’s not part of this,” Logan continued. “She hasn’t a shred of evidence against you. This is between the two of us.”

“I’ve heard enough.” As the brake loosened, the cage plummeted like a boulder. This time Emma managed to gasp instead of scream. But the terror was just as gripping as before. She felt an instant’s lightness before the momentum halted. The rope snapped tight slamming her against the floor. As her body struck, she felt the bruising impact of something small and hard against her hip.

Logan’s derringer. It was still in her pocket
.