The Last Renegade (16 page)

He raised a single eyebrow.

“Of course you are. It was a ridiculous question.”

“I’m heartily glad to learn you know it.”

She gave him a narrow look, darts at the ready. “What I meant,” she said, carefully enunciating each word, “is that you were not here when I came in and elicited the help of two of the Davis brothers.”

“Perhaps it’s only that you didn’t see me.”

“You weren’t here.”

“Well, I won’t flatter myself that you noticed my absence.”

“Good for you.”

His slim smile was like a warning shot. “I went back to my room for a few minutes. There was a commotion in the hallway. When I heard Rabbit and Finn, I decided to stay where I was until it passed.”

“Probably wise.”

“I thought so.” He leaned an elbow against the bar. “Could I get a beer?”

She nodded and poured him one. Jessop Davis appeared at the bar, and she gave him a beer and two more for his brothers. “Compliments of the house,” she told him.

“Thank you, Mrs. Berry, but Jake didn’t do anything.”

“He waited for you and Jem. That certainly was a hardship for him.”

Jessop grinned, swept three beers off the bar, and went back to the table where his brothers were waiting.

“They were part of the commotion?” asked Kellen when Jessop was gone.

“Since you have to ask, I imagine they were the quiet part.”

“What happened?”

Raine shook her head. Charlie was coming toward her from behind the bar, and Dick Faber was approaching the front of it. “Can we speak later?” she asked under her breath.

He nodded. “Just so you know, Eli and Clay left when Mr. Collins brought the crate. Apparently Uriah’s been talking about it. They decided he would want to have it right away.”

“All right.”

Kellen thought she looked relieved. Satisfied with that, he took his beer and left.

Kellen expected to hear about the previous night’s commotion at breakfast. When a shadow crossed Kellen’s newspaper, he looked up in anticipation of seeing Raine. He masked his annoyance when he saw it was one of the Pennyroyal’s new guests.

“Mr. Coltrane, is it?” Mr. Jones asked.

“Yes. You’re Jones?”

“John Paul Jones.”

“I saw you at dinner yesterday.”

“My first evening here. May I join you?”

Kellen wondered why Jones did not respond to any of the things that he was doing that kept others away. The paper was not a deterrent. Neither was the fact that Kellen avoided the pleasantries that everyone else offered when Mr. Jones entered the room. Kellen had actually shifted in his chair to give the newcomer a better view of his shoulder than his profile. Most telling, he had deliberately shown no curiosity when others remarked on Mr. Jones’s limp.

Yet here the man was, standing at his table, holding on to the edge for balance and support with the tips of his precisely clipped fingernails.

“Please,” said Kellen. He folded the paper and laid it beside his plate. “Sit. Do you need help?”

“No. I can manage.” He pulled out a chair and eased himself into it. “A minor inconvenience.”

Kellen did not inquire. He raised his hand and got Emily Ransom’s attention. She came close to scalding Howard Wheeler when she missed his cup as she hurried over. “Not an emergency, Miss Ransom,” said Kellen. “I want the hotcakes and more coffee.”

“No eggs for you?” she asked, carefully filling his cup. “Mrs. Sterling will make them any way you like.”

“Just the hotcakes.”

“Bacon?”

“The hotcakes.”

“Fried potatoes?”

“Hotcakes.”

Emily sighed. She could not hope to extend their exchange by suggesting toast and jam. “You, Mr. Jones?”

“All of that,” he said. “Scramble the eggs, and ask the cook to keep them on the wet side. I do not care for dry eggs. Also, I would like toast. Two slices. And blackberry preserves, if you have them.”

“Certainly, Mr. Jones.” Emily poured a cup of coffee for him, and then hovered just long enough that Kellen gave her a nudge in the direction of the kitchen.

“What a silly girl,” Mr. Jones said, watching her go. “I don’t suppose she can help it.”

“She enjoys herself. There’s no harm.”

Mr. Jones added cream to his coffee. “You don’t find all that fluttering wearing on the nerves?”

Kellen did, but he was also feeling perverse. “No. It’s easy enough to overlook.” He picked up his coffee and sipped. “What brings you to the Pennyroyal, Mr. Jones?”

“John Paul,” he said. “Please.”

“Kellen.”

Jones nodded. “I am working for the U.S. Geological Survey. I have been assigned the eastern half of the Wyoming Territory and the southwestern portion of the Dakota Territory.”

“Isn’t that a lot of ground for one man to cover?”

“I’m here in advance of the team that will follow. I can hire locals to help with some preliminary work. The government’s interest is water and mineral resources.”

“This would be the Department of the Interior.”

“Correct.” He nursed his coffee. “What about you, Kellen?”

“Working on a story.”

“Is that right?”

Kellen nodded. “About the ranches. Ranchers. There is still a lot of interest about that life in the East.”

“There is certainly a lot of interest in it in Washington.”

Kellen merely arched a brow.

“Well,” Jones said, lowering his cup. “You know, of course, that the drought of eighty-six put considerable stress on the water sources all over the West, and then winter arrived with one blizzard after another. Add the ranchers and the farmers fighting over water rights and the land that’s fit for irrigation, if we don’t get a good survey of the region and identify sites for reservoirs and hydraulic works, there will be blood on the prairie.”

“You think the cattlemen and the farmers will do to each other what the Cheyenne and the Sioux couldn’t?”

“I think that is precisely what they will do. So does Washington. Congress just authorized this survey. Here I am.”

“Are you staying here long?”

“A month at least. This will be my base for a while.”

Kellen sat back when Emily appeared with a plate of hotcakes in one hand and a platter of everything else in the other. She dipped in front of Mr. Jones and slid the platter into place in front of him, then laid the hotcakes at Kellen’s setting. She pointed to the white pitcher that held the syrup. “Do you want more coffee?” When they both said yes, she went to get it.

Raine caught Emily with the coffeepot before the girl left the kitchen. “I’ll take it in,” she said.

“But—”

“I’ll take it in,” Raine said again, brooking no argument. “Help Mrs. Sterling with the turnovers.”

“I need her help with the dishes,” Mrs. Sterling said.

“Do whatever she wants,” Raine told her. “No fighting.” She took the coffeepot and ducked out of the kitchen before there was an exchange of words. She visited all of the tables, purposely leaving Kellen and Mr. Jones for last. All the while she was pouring and chatting, she had an ear trained to the conversation at their table. Most of what she overhead she believed she was hearing incorrectly. They could not be discussing reservoirs and dams.

“Coffee, gentlemen?” she asked.

Mr. Jones held up his cup. “Please. Thank you for sending the bath salts up to my room. Your man told me it was your idea.”

“Were they helpful, Mr. Jones?”

“Very much so.”

“Good.” She raised the pot for Kellen. “Mr. Coltrane?”

“I didn’t get any bath salts.”

Raine’s mouth flattened. “Coffee?”

“Yes.” He did not lift his cup, nor did he say please. He thought she might pour coffee in his lap, but if the thought was there, she restrained herself. He thanked her.

“Won’t you sit with us a spell, Mrs. Berry?” Jones asked.

“It’s a kind and tempting offer,” she said, smiling. “I don’t know if I—” Raine looked around the dining room. Everyone was settled and entertained. She set the coffeepot on the table. “Do you know? I think I will. Thank you.”

Mr. Jones got up and held out the chair on his left for her. It put her directly across from Kellen. He had politely risen halfway as she was seated. Now he dropped back in his seat and gave all of his attention to his hotcakes.

“You are doing well today, Mr. Jones?” she asked.

“Tolerably well. I believe I will soak my foot again after breakfast.”

“That’s probably wise. I suppose you will not be taking your regular walk this evening.”

“No, and I will miss it.”

Raine directed her next comment at Kellen in spite of the fact that he only had eyes for his plate. “Mr. Jones takes a daily constitutional,” she told him. “He is completely dedicated to it.”

Kellen’s fork was heavy with three triangles of hotcakes wet with molasses. He used it to make a gesture of salute in Mr. Jones’s direction and then managed to get it all in his mouth without spilling a crumb or a drop.

“That’s commendable,” he said around a mouthful of food.

Raine was tempted to kick him under the table, but she doubted he would let it pass. She decided to ignore him instead. “Please, Mr. Jones, you must eat. Your food will grow cold.” When he made some vague noises that were a polite protest, she insisted. “I will leave if you don’t eat.”

“Very well.” He smoothed the napkin in his lap before he picked up his knife and fork. “Did those young ruffians get home safely?”

“They did. Mr. Collins escorted them home.”

“Ah, yes. Their pap, I believe they called him. The station agent.”

“That’s right. It was fortunate, really, that they were out last night. I don’t know that I could have managed on my own.”

“You seem very capable, Mrs. Berry. I believe I was in good hands even before there were so many of them.” He speared
some eggs. “The boys? Do they come here often? They seem overly familiar.”

“They are frequent visitors, yes.” She tilted her head to one side and regarded him with interest. “I believe you are not fond of children, Mr. Jones. Is that right?”

“Guilty,” he said without apology. He pressed his napkin to his mouth, and then laid it across his lap again, smoothing it just so. He picked up his coffee cup. “They have so few redeeming qualities, don’t they?”

Raine chuckled. “And yet we all passed that way.”

Kellen glanced at Jones. Every gesture the government man made was precise, perhaps even practiced. He held himself correctly, though not stiffly, and while he had a tendency to mannered behavior, he was not fussy, at least not annoyingly so. The exact part in his hair, the well-groomed mustache and beard, and the way he liked to press the napkin over his lap, all made Kellen wonder how well the Department of the Interior had chosen their leader.

He finally put his finger on what was rubbing him the wrong way. Mr. John Paul Jones had all the markings of an academic.

“Maybe John Paul spent less time as a child than the rest of us,” he said. “Did you?”

Jones laughed politely. “I am quite certain I did not. I had as few redeeming qualities as the ruffians, although I do not think I flatter myself when I say my grammar was better.”

Raine saw Kellen had something to say about that, and she spoke quickly to cut him off. “I promise that Rabbit and Finn will not pester you, Mr. Jones, but I cannot promise that you won’t see them around. They are charged with bringing trunks and bags to the hotel from the station, and I find they are useful here. I will not bar them from coming or toss them out on your account.”

Kellen waited to see what the reaction would be. He observed that Mr. Jones was properly appalled.

“I would be unhappy if you did, Mrs. Berry. It is one thing to operate an establishment with the comfort of your guests in mind, quite another to operate it according to their whims.”

“I’m glad you understand.”

Mr. Jones continued to apply himself to his meal while Kellen pushed his empty plate away and reached for his coffee.

“I was thinking I would go for a ride this morning,” Kellen said. “Can you suggest a direction, Mrs. Berry?”

Raine assumed he meant to do more target shooting. “I believe you will find it pleasant to follow the river south and east.”

“The road that winds past the graveyard looked as if it might be promising,” Jones said.

“Perhaps tomorrow,” said Kellen. “Is that an area of interest that you mean to survey?”

“I mean to survey everything, but yes, that’s an area of particular interest.”

“You will want to speak to the Burdicks,” Raine said. “They own most of the land heading out that way.”

Jones grew thoughtful. He used a thumb and forefinger to smooth his mustache and let his napkin lay where it was. “I don’t need their permission to make a survey for the government.”

“That may be true,” said Raine, “but I do not believe the Burdicks will care.”

Kellen reached for the coffeepot and topped off his cup. “I would give Mrs. Berry’s words some heed, John Paul. I haven’t been here much longer than you, but I’ve already heard the story of how Uriah Burdick’s wife eloped with a railroad surveyor. I don’t get the sense Mr. Burdick will take kindly to you carrying your equipment onto his property.”

Jones blinked as widely and slowly as a barn owl. He turned those eyes on Raine.

She nodded. “There was also a man shot dead because someone thought he was a rustler,” she said. “He happened to be our marshal.”

Kellen spoke before Jones could. “I’ll be damned,” he said. “No one told me that.”

To Raine’s ears, he sounded convincing. It was gratifying to know that being an accomplished liar was one of his talents. “It happened several years ago.”

Jones folded his napkin and laid it over his plate. “Still, I would be foolish to ignore it. How do I arrange to speak to Mr. Burdick if visitors are discouraged?”

“You could speak to one of his sons,” said Raine. “Mr. Coltrane has had drinks with them. They come in the saloon several times a week this time of year.”

Jones turned to Kellen. “You would arrange an introduction?”

“If you like.” Kellen shrugged. “But I have to tell you, there’s no getting around the fact that you’re a surveyor. I have a feeling that won’t set right with them.”