The Diamond of the Rockies [03] The Tender Vine (23 page)

Bittering turned back to Quillan. “Mr. Shepard, how did you know this . . . What did you say your friend’s name was?”

Quillan’s jaw tensed. The detective was baiting him. “I didn’t say.” He didn’t argue the term
friend
again. He wouldn’t dignify the tactic. But he added, “His name is Shane Dennison. I knew him when I was a boy in Laramie.”

“A boy of eight, nine?”

“Fourteen.”

“Almost a man.”

“Almost.” Quillan’s hands tightened on the edge of his chair.

“Was this Shane Dennison your companion?”

Quillan thought back to those days when Dennison had taken a liking to Quillan, taken him under his wing and championed him to the other difficult boys. He nodded. “For several months.”

“Why did you part company?”

“I left town.”

“Your family moved?”

Quillan pictured himself walking out of Laramie without even a horse. He’d hitched a ride on one wagon or another until the dust of Laramie was covered by so many other layers it was no longer recognizable. “No. I did.”

“Mind telling me why?”

Yes, he minded. But he knew from that first clash with the law that it mattered little what he minded or didn’t. “Personal reasons.”

“Unhappy at home?”

“Sure.”

Bittering gave him a quick stare. “And you never saw Dennison since.”

“That’s what I said.” Quillan glanced at the agent. Why didn’t he speak up, tell the detective how it had been? Without Quillan’s interference both the Express box and the man’s life would have been lost.

Bittering laughed lightly. “Yet your keen memory recognized him at once.”

“That’s right.” They had covered this already. The detective was crossing back, trying to confuse him.

“Are you wondering why a detective is here in a small whistle-stop like Granger to take your report?”

Quillan hadn’t, but now he did.

“I’ll tell you. This is the third time in four weeks the train’s been hit in almost that same spot. We believe this gang could have an inside man, someone aboard who signals when there’s a ripe payload on the Express, relays any delays, that sort of thing.”

Quillan took that in without showing any emotion. Didn’t they realize a man like Dennison could stake out a track and learn its patterns as easily as he studied the flow of a bank? Then another thought occurred. They thought he was the inside man. “Then why would I rouse the others to fight off the outlaws?” His frank assessment startled the detective, but he recovered quickly.

“Jealousy? Struggle for command? Any number of reasons. I have many accounts from fellow passengers of your aloofness, unwillingness to mingle.” He raised his brows at Pierce, who nodded heartily.

“I don’t mingle by nature.” Quillan’s voice sounded tight to his own ears.

“Don’t you. Well. You seem to have mingled with Shane Dennison. You knew him, and from what I surmise, he knew you, too. Seemed surprised you’d stand against him.” This time he glanced at the agent.

“He was surprised I was there at all. It’s been so many years.”

The detective turned. “That’s right. Fifteen years, yet you knew Dennison by his eyes alone.”

Quillan didn’t repeat the other details that had clued him in. He looked at a short stack of books atop the oak file cabinet. “Will you hand me a book?”

Again raising his brows, which gave his wide forehead a singularly unpleasant appearance, Bittering reached for the top book and handed it over. It was a survey written longhand by a man named Eustace Washington. Quillan opened randomly and silently read the first two paragraphs of the page. He turned the book around and held it out to Bittering. Pierce leaned closer, pencil poised. Quillan recited word for word what he had just read.

Bittering followed the page, then looked up.

Quillan met his eyes. “I recall things well.”

Bittering stood a long moment. He’d felt certain he had it all figured out. Now Quillan saw disappointment take shape and soften the hard line of his mouth, the wide gaze of his eyes. Quillan stood up. “I’m not your man. Now if you’ll excuse me—”

“Mr. Shepard!” Pierce fairly leaped from his corner. “May we try another example, for the sake of authentication?”

Quillan looked at him. “Authentication?”

Pierce whisked a paper from the desk. It held a diagram of the spurs and lines running to and around Ogden, the next major hub. Quillan studied the diagram. “So what?”

Pierce tore a paper from his pad. “Can you reproduce it?” He held out the pencil.

Quillan stared from it to him, then took the pencil and scribbled what he recalled from the diagram. Pierce laid the two papers on the desk. Except for slight differences in length and direction, his drawing was very near the other. The other men stepped close to see.

Bittering said, “Will you give us a description of your . . . of Dennison?”

“Don’t you have him on a poster? His career has spanned fifteen years.” Quillan met Bittering’s eyes. Let him realize the nature of that first relationship. Quillan no longer cared.

“He’s never been pictured without the mask.”

Quillan hesitated, then took the pencil again from Pierce. He was not an artist. Recalling words or a diagram was one thing. He thought of Wolf ’s cave. Unlike his father, he’d never spent much energy on pictures. But he stared at the paper and recalled Shane Dennison’s face. It wasn’t artistic ability that mattered, but attention to detail, the shape and placement of the mouth, the roman nose, the way the chin caved in toward the neck. He turned over the page and drew Shane Dennison as he remembered him. “He’s no doubt filled out some. Has a mole here at the edge of his lip.” Quillan swallowed, pushed the paper across to Detective Bittering. “I hope you find him.”

Bittering held out his hand, but Quillan turned and left the room. Once again, every man had assumed the worst of him. Even the agent whose life he’d saved.

Carina watched them carry Miss Preston from the train on a litter not unlike the one Quillan had made for her ride up the mountain. Priscilla Preston would be kept in town to heal from her injuries. The doctor strode purposefully beside his patient. He must be staying, too, as the town could hardly support a physician of its own. Miss Preston’s aunt walked alongside the litter like a lost soul, but Carina was not sorry to see them go. Shaking her head, she recalled the younger woman’s foolishness. If the bullet had been six inches lower, she would never have opened her eyes again.

She looked again down the hall toward the room where Quillan was being questioned. How long could it take to get his statement? Then she saw him coming toward her, his stride long and forced. Angry? No, it wasn’t anger so much as defiance. Why was he defiant, defensive, on guard? He took her arm without a word and led her back aboard their coach and to their seats.

She turned. “Are you finished? They took your statement?”

With a half laugh, he smirked. “Sure.”

She caught his hand. “What is it, Quillan? What happened?”

“They made assumptions. I proved them wrong.”

She pressed his hand to her cheek. “What assumptions? Tell me!”

He turned and jerked the curtains closed around them. She was not surprised to then be jerked tightly to his chest. His mouth on hers told her he’d been hurt and was seeking solace, as always, in her physical love. She kissed him deeply. “Don’t let it bother you,
caro mio
.” She stroked his face. “What do they know?”

“Am I so wretched, Carina? Do I . . . do I look evil?”

“No, my darling.”

His fingers dug into her back. “I must.”

“No. Not evil, just different. People distrust what they can’t understand.” He grabbed her arms and held her out. “Do you trust me?”

The violence of his question frightened her. “Yes. Of course I do.”

“Why?”

“Because I love you.”

He dropped his forehead to the crown of her head. “How can you?”

“I just do.” She smoothed his thick, wonderful hair and felt the violence leave him. “Don’t let them hurt you.”

“I don’t know what God’s doing. Cain said He had plans for me, but I don’t see it. I don’t understand.”

“Don’t try to. Just wait.”

He sagged. “For what?”

“God will show you.
Gesù Cristo
. He will.”

Quillan’s breath came easily now as he enveloped her gently into his arms. “Don’t ever leave me, Carina.”

“No. I promise.”

He sighed. “They thought I was one of the gang.”

“What? How could they? You
stopped
the outlaws—you didn’t help them!”

He rubbed his hand over his jaw. She heard the sandpaper scrape of his whiskers. He did look rather wild.

She touched his face with her fingertips. “You could shave.”

“I don’t want people to judge me by how I look.”

She sighed. “But they do.”

His jaw grew tight. “Then let them. I am what I am.”

She smiled. “Oh, Quillan.”

He tipped her chin up and stared into her eyes. “You don’t want a pirate husband?”

“I want you any way at all.” She heard other passengers coming aboard. The whistle blew, and more voices sounded outside their curtain.

He looked at the flimsy barrier and whispered, “You know what I wish? That you and I could have this train all to ourselves, with no one else.”

She pressed her hands to his chest. “Others would love and trust you if you gave them the chance.”

He shrugged one shoulder. “I don’t seem to know how.”

She stepped back from him as the train made a small lurch forward. “You’ll learn.”

“You’re supremely confident of that.”

She nodded, drawing the curtain back behind their seats to reveal the rest of the car. Then they sat down across from each other, eyes held unswerving. His mouth pulled slightly up at one edge. “God’s got his work, taming me.”

Something smoldered inside her. Did she want him tame? Or was it his difference that made him so irresistible?

They were scarcely on their way when one group after another came to shake Quillan’s hand, to comment on his courage. Mr. Pierce appeared, pad and pencil in hand. “If you don’t mind, Mr. Shepard, I’d like to follow up on that demonstration. It’ll make a great angle for the story.”

“What demonstration?” Carina looked from one to the other.

Mr. Pierce described Quillan’s reproduction of text and diagram. She looked at her husband. How had he felt, forced to perform such things to prove his innocence? But then she knew how he’d felt. “Mr. Pierce, my husband—”

“It’s all right, Carina.” Quillan motioned the newsman to sit beside her. “What would you like to know?”

For the next half hour Mr. Pierce questioned and Quillan demonstrated his mental capacities, reciting portions of books he’d committed to memory, explaining that it had been an ability he’d discovered early on, and how he even had infant memories of his mother’s face and hair. Carina was amazed he would share something so intimate. Was he trying to trust? To be trusted?

“It’s amazing, Mr. Shepard.”

“Quillan.”

Pierce nodded. “Quillan, you realize this is a remarkable gift. To what do you attribute it?”

“To God.”

Pierce raised his brows.

“That surprises you?” Quillan half smiled.

“You don’t look the God-fearing sort.” Pierce shifted uneasily. “And the agent said Dennison called you the ‘reverend’s personal demon.’ ”

Quillan sat back and crossed his arms over his chest. “So I was. But every man can be redeemed if he’s willing. Don’t you believe that?”

Carina watched the newsman search for an answer. Mr. Pierce seemed nonplussed, and she was certain Quillan had intended that.

“I . . . well, I suppose. If he’s willing.”

“Are you willing, Mr. Pierce? Do you serve God with your pen?” Quillan made his face innocently curious. Knowing him as she did, Carina recognized his effort.

The newsman flushed. “Well, I certainly don’t thwart him.”

“Fence-sitter, are you?” Quillan seemed to enjoy turning the tables on Mr. Roderick Pierce, even phrasing the question in the tone and manner of the other man’s speech.

“My experience hasn’t led me one way or another. I’m a reporter. I depend on my eyes and ears. So far they’ve not seen or heard God. Which doesn’t mean I discount him completely. Too much starch in my early spine for that. Only I’m lacking sufficient evidence to make a secure declaration.”

Quillan nodded. “Well, my experience is, the longer you resist, the harder it gets. Best make your peace before the going gets rough.”

Pierce eyed him. “And I imagine you’d be one to know.”

Carina glanced at Quillan, who didn’t answer, leaving Pierce to his imaginings.

Pierce said, “Care to illuminate your relationship with Dennison?”

Quillan shook his head. “No.”

“Off the record?”

Quillan smiled, but still said nothing.

“Waltzed a while with the wicked, did you?” Pierce said it conspiratorially. Quillan glanced to the window and back. “Mr. Pierce . . .”

“Oh, I understand the lure, Quillan. I’ve raised some dust myself. Were you one of the gang?”

Quillan narrowed his eyes. Carina saw the hooding that made them flat as pewter plates, revealing nothing. She didn’t know what the newsman was trying to do, but Quillan suspected something. He said, “Bittering put you up to this?”

Mr. Pierce sat back abruptly. “I don’t quite follow.”

“Did he put the bird in your ear to feel me out, make sure he didn’t misfire when he let me walk away?”

Carina felt Quillan’s fury, tightly contained, yet evidenced in the taut tendons of his neck.

Pierce spread his hands. “Bittering?”

“Or are you just a dog on a scent?”

Mr. Pierce frowned. “No need to get testy. Curious, is all.”

“Mr. Pierce, this book is closed. Write your story and color it any way you like. I’ll never read it anyway.”

“I’ll send you a copy. Staying in San Francisco, are you?”

Carina said, “Sonoma. Send it to the DiGratias of Sonoma, California.”

When Quillan said nothing, Mr. Pierce turned to her. “Your family, ma’am?”

“That’s right. I’ll read your story, Mr. Pierce. So tell it right. My husband is a hero.”