This Gun for Hire (10 page)

“He thinks he knows me because he’s heard stories,” she said.

“I imagine that’s true for a lot of people who meet you.”

“Well, they’re mostly wrong. You thought I was—”

“Taller,” he said dryly. “Yes, I remember.”

Her mouth twisted to one side. “At least that was new. Usually it’s some expression of surprise that I am a woman.”

“The trousers, duster, and Stetson might have something to do with that.”

“Hard riding calls for specific clothes.”

“You took the train here.”

“All right. I did. I was feeling contrary.”

That admission made Quill grin.

“Don’t do that,” she said, staring at his mouth.

“Do what?”

“Smile like you swallowed the sun. It’s not natural.”

His grin actually deepened. He echoed her earlier observation, “I’ve never heard that before.”

“Then there is something wrong with people. It’s as if you have a mouthful of high noon. Somebody ought to have brought it to your attention by now.”

A moment of stunned silence was followed by a staccato
burst of laughter, and Quill did not get himself under control easily. The fact that Calico was staring stone-faced at him again struck him as more amusing than not. He could not quite flatten out his crooked smile.

Mildly nettled, Calico merely shook her head.

“Sorry,” he said. When she responded with a derisive snort, it was all he could do not to start grinning all over again. To keep that from happening, he posed a question. “Was there any discussion of Ann’s studies during the interview?”

“Yes. I had to set his mind at ease that I could be at least as good a teacher as Ann needs to avoid making her suspicious. I was convincing.”

“I entertained no doubts that you would be.”

“Well, there is still the matter of carrying it out. I don’t fool myself. I told him I had an unconventional education, but only the broad strokes. Too many details, and he would have shown me the door.”

Intrigued, Quill said, “One detail.”

Calico’s expression turned thoughtful. “All right. I learned my numbers counting cartridges.”

That seemed reasonable enough to Quill. He had it from Joe Pepper that she had grown up at outposts. “I was thinking of a detail from your later education.”

“Well, then, Mrs. Riggenbotham instructed me in matters of carnal knowledge by recounting whore stories.”

Quill was not certain he had heard correctly. “
War
stories?”

“No. Whore stories. Mrs. Riggenbotham was not always the captain’s wife.”

“I see.”

“You asked.”

There was no getting around it. “I did. Please tell me you do not intend to instruct Ann in the way of . . .” His voice trailed off as he tried to collect his scattered thoughts and decide where he could safely turn his eyes.

Now it was Calico’s turn to be amused. “You are
blushing. There is something I don’t see every day, especially from a man who introduced himself to me in a brothel. A cavalry officer to boot.”

“Former,” he said a bit stiffly even if he was grateful to have something else to talk about. “And I never said I was an officer.”

“I know. But you were, weren’t you? First impressions aside—because frankly, you looked vaguely disreputable on the occasion of our introduction—I am noticing more than a little spit and polish about you now. Your suit, for instance, is fine. You are wearing good wool, and the fit tells me there is a tailor somewhere very pleased with himself. Your hair is somewhat overlong, but I think that is because you are particular about who cuts it, and your shoes have a shine I associate with officers turned out for a military ball. You hold yourself easy and you hold yourself straight, and you slip from one stance to the other without conscious thought because you have the knowledge of what is required at your fingertips. That always struck me as the mark of an officer. You can take orders and you can give them, but I’ve noticed that you prefer to give them.”

Quill’s mouth twisted to the side as he rubbed the back of his neck. His hair
was
overlong, and she was right about him being particular.

“Well?” she asked. “Were you?” When he did not answer, she snorted derisively. “You want to lie about it, don’t you? I think you are trying to decide if you can get away with it.”

She had read his mind exactly. His blue-gray eyes speared her knowing green ones. “You think you are clever.”

“No, you think I am clever. I think I am observant . . . and perhaps a little clever.”

He grunted softly. “Yes. I was an officer. Only a lieutenant, and not an ambitious one.”

“Why did you leave?”

Quill shook his head. “Some other time.” He checked his pocket watch. “Dinner is served promptly at seven.”

“I was invited to the table, but I was given allowance to take my meal here. That is what I am going to do.”

“That’s probably wise. Ann will find it difficult to contain her excitement if you’re there.” He stood. “In the morning, then.”

*   *   *

Calico woke up early. She lay still until she had her bearings and then listened for movement in the house. When she heard nothing in the hallway or below stairs, she slid more deeply under the bedcovers and smiled quite happily as she wallowed in the warmth. She wondered if she could accustom herself to the luxury of a thick mattress, blankets that did not itch, a pillow softer than a saddle, and clean cotton sheets. This was not a new imagining. She thought about it every time she was a guest in someone’s home and less often when she was staying in one of the better hotels.

She turned it over in her mind, weighing what she would be surrendering for what she stood to gain. The argument she had with herself was more nuanced than deciding between two competing ideas. If it were only about sacrificing the outdoors and an itinerant life for comfort and confinement, she would take the life she knew, but there were other considerations, many of them complicated, at least in her mind.

Could she have a more permanent residence, for instance, and not be tethered to it? Would it limit her choices? She shied away from calling the residence a home as that word suggested a certain amount of domesticity, and that brought visions of aprons, feather dusters, and stove cooking. It also brought visions of a husband, children, and serving on a committee to raise money for new school primers or church hymnals. But if she settled into a hotel or boardinghouse, returning to it regularly when she was between assignments, she would have to advance money to keep the room available and there were no assurances that strangers would not use it while she was gone. She could not warm to that idea.

Calico pulled the pillow out from under her head and placed it squarely over her face. It muffled her rather loud groan of frustration. She remained like that for a few
moments, considering whether or not she had stumbled upon an elegant compromise of her own by coming to Stonechurch, but before she was able to think it through, personal needs distracted her. Throwing off the pillow, then the bedcovers, Calico rolled out of bed and hurried barefooted to the bathing room.

She was still in there, completing her ablutions, wondering if Quill McKenna intended to return her derringer or if she would have to steal it back, when she heard someone enter her bedroom. She tensed, waited, and relaxed only when the maid announced that she had come to tend to the fire. She would have to get used to Ramsey’s hired help coming and going without much in the way of forewarning. It was outside of the ordinary, and she was not sure she liked it. Her mouth twisted wryly and was reflected in the mirror above the washstand. The same could be said about Quill McKenna’s coming and goings, she thought. The very same.

Calico dressed in the same clothes she had the evening before and added a black woolen shawl. The frost flowers on her windows were a sign the temperature had dipped several more degrees overnight, and she did not want to shiver uncontrollably in front of Ramsey Stonechurch or any of the rest of the family at the breakfast table.

Calico met Ann Stonechurch in the hallway as Ann was coming out of her room. While it appeared to be coincidence that they left their rooms at the same time, Calico had the impression that Ann had been listening for her and timed her departure to make this meeting happen. The girl’s fine features were flushed with what Calico imagined was suppressed excitement and her greeting came a bit too loudly. The surprise the girl affected was forced to the degree that it was no longer natural.

Calico pretended to notice none of it and greeted Ann warmly. “I am happy to know that I am not alone in being awake. Will you show me where I might find breakfast?”

“Of course, but you are very much mistaken if you think you and I are the only ones up.” They started down the stairs.
“Father rises earlier than anyone, and he will already have been in his study for hours. If he is not there, it is because he has gone to one of the mines—probably Number 1—and in that case, Mr. McKenna will be with him.”

“Why Number 1?”

“Oh, I imagine it is because there has been some trouble there. I don’t know much about it. Father does not entertain those discussions when I am around. He says that is what Mr. McKenna’s ears are for.”

“But you know more than your father suspects.” Calico said it as a matter of fact, and then she waited. Ann did not disappoint. First there was the sideways look that Calico caught out of the corner of her eye, and it was punctuated by a slender, secretive smile.

“The miners object to their wages. It had been thought for some time that the Number 1 mine would be played out, but a new vein was discovered. That is good news for the men as they continue to have work, but they also want a share of the profits. My father is adamantly opposed to what he calls a daft socialist experiment.” She hesitated and then added in confidential tones, “He does not always say daft.”

“I imagine not. So there is tension.”

“Yes. Certainly.”

“Violence?”

Ann shook her head vehemently. She stopped Calico at the entrance to the dining room by putting one hand on her forearm and spoke earnestly. “You must not repeat what I’ve told you. It will ruin everything, all of my plans. And you mustn’t worry that if there is violence, it will touch us here. It won’t.”

“How can you be so certain?”

“Because my father will not allow it.”

Calico’s smile was gentle and her response meant to reassure. It did not matter what she believed; it only mattered what Ann believed. “Having met your father, I have every confidence that you are right.”

“And you won’t say anything?”

“No. Not a word to your father.” It was a promise she could keep.

Ann and Calico were discussing Henry James’s
Washington Square
when Quill entered the room. They nodded politely and then ignored him as he served himself from the sideboard. He sat beside Ann, spread his napkin in his lap, and tucked into his scrambled eggs. Although he did not show it, he was mildly amused by Ann’s solemn recitation of what she considered the finer points of the novel. He wondered how they had come to be discussing this particular book. On the surface at least, the conflict between the heroine and her bullying father had a parallel in the skirmishes between Ann and Ramsey, but as Quill heard Ann go on, it seemed she had not made the connection.

A maid appeared bringing fresh coffee and Quill thanked her quietly. He used the cup to hide his smile as he watched Calico. He could not fault her for lack of interest in Ann’s monologue. She appeared to be listening deeply, as if there were meaning beneath the spoken words and the most important thing she could do right now was to hear what was not being said.

He started, splashing his fingers with coffee when Calico suddenly shifted her attention to him.

“What do you think, Mr. McKenna? Was Catherine Sloper’s loyalty to her father misplaced as Ann suggests?”

“I would have had to read the book to have an opinion.”

Ann said, “Oh, but I thought—”

“Never finished it.” He set his cup down and spread honey on a second piece of toast. “
Treasure Island
. Now there is a book.” He nudged Ann with his elbow. “Isn’t that right? I know you liked it.”

Ann blushed, but she spoke as though butter would not melt in her mouth. “It is a fine adventure, but I prefer the drama of relationships.”

“The melodrama, you mean.”

Calico said, “Do not respond to that, Miss Stonechurch. It is evident that Mr. McKenna is a philistine.” Deep rolling laughter at her back startled her. She turned her head sharply
even though she knew it was Ramsey Stonechurch who had come up behind her. He was smiling broadly as he rested his hands on the back of her chair.

“I think it is safe to say, Miss Nash, that Mr. McKenna has been called much worse than a philistine. Lawyer comes immediately to
mind.”

Calico wondered if she looked as uncomfortable as she felt with Ramsey Stonechurch directly at her back. It disturbed her that she had not heard him enter or suspected that he was behind her until he spoke, and she had to ask herself if perhaps a single night spent in a comfortable bed was enough to dull her senses.

Ramsey addressed Ann. “Where is your aunt?”

Ann frowned and her eyes shifted guiltily to the end of the table, where Beatrice usually sat. It was abundantly clear to everyone that she had not noticed her aunt’s absence until her father inquired. “I don’t know.” She pushed back from the table and began to rise. “But I will find out. Her nerves . . .” It was not necessary to finish the thought, as it seemed there was universal understanding. She smiled apologetically and excused herself. She paused only to kiss her father’s cheek on the way out.

Calico had hardly been aware of holding her breath until Ramsey stepped away from her chair to go to the sideboard. She exhaled softly but not as discreetly as she would have wished. She caught Quill’s inquiring expression in the slight lift of his eyebrows. The table was too wide for her to kick
him under it, although it was a temptation to try. It did not improve her mood that he seemed to have read her thoughts. He was practically beaming at her in that wholly unnatural way of his just before he bit down on his toast.

Ramsey was not privy to any of this as he helped himself to steak and eggs and a generous stack of silver dollar pancakes, and by the time he seated himself at the head of the table, Calico and Quill had stopped trading glances and were giving him their attention.

“We have a few minutes before Ann returns,” he said. “I did not tell her yet that I have agreed to hire you, Miss Nash. She badgered me at dinner, and Mr. McKenna also, and she would have been at your door immediately if she had gotten her answer. I decided a lesson in patience was in order, and you deserved a peaceful evening after your journey.”

Calico was grateful and she told him so, although she felt a twinge of sympathy for Ann, who was clearly anxious for an answer. Now she understood why. She looked at Ramsey, but her words were meant for Quill. “A peaceful evening was exactly what I needed.”

*   *   *

“I do not understand why Father has not yet made his decision,” Ann confided to Calico as they began a tour of the house. “He is being purposely disagreeable in the hope that I will change my mind.”

“At the end of the day, he wants what he believes is best for you. It will help if you keep that in mind.” Calico could see that Ann was hardly placated. Ramsey still had not told his daughter that he was in favor of the hiring. It seemed a tad cruel to Calico, but she allowed that Ramsey had his reasons. It did not set well that Quill McKenna appeared to be in lockstep with their employer—the toady. “I’m sorry. I should not have said that. You know it already. It must have sounded patronizing, and that was not my intention. I feel certain there will be a decision this afternoon.” There had better be, she thought. This lesson in patience was becoming heavy-handed.

“You want the position, don’t you?” Ann asked suddenly.

“Yes, I do. I do not like to turn my back on an opportunity.” Calico looked around the parlor as Ann ushered her inside. It was a warm, inviting room with dark walnut wainscoting, gold velvet drapes, and a large mantelpiece that displayed silver candlesticks and a collection of enameled boxes in a variety of sizes. There was enough seating for as many as a dozen guests, and the arrangement of furniture was such that it encouraged conversation in small groups. “This is quite a lovely room,” she said. “Do you spend much time here?” Ann shook her head, and Calico thought she looked suspiciously close to tears.

“I will make it happen,” she told Ann.

Ann’s small chin stopped wobbling. “You will? You can?”

“Yes, Ann. I can and I will.”

*   *   *

Calico had a thorough tour of the house through Ann’s expressive, excited eyes and returned to her room well before luncheon. She was there only a short time before she was summoned—there was no other word for it—to Ramsey Stonechurch’s study. It was Beatrice who had been sent to get her, and Calico did her best to set the woman at ease. Ramsey’s sister-in-law was pleasant but not confident, and she chattered as opposed to engaging in conversation. Calico was grateful to leave her behind at the entrance to the study, and more grateful still that Quill McKenna was not waiting with the pharaoh.

“Close the doors,” Ramsey said. He gestured to her to come forward but did not invite her to sit. “This need not take long, Miss Nash. It has come to my attention that perhaps I have been overzealous in my desire to teach my daughter a lesson in delayed gratification.”

“Her aunt said something?”

“Beatrice? No. It was Mr. McKenna.”

“Oh.” Damn, and damn again. Couldn’t he remain a toady? The job would have more to recommend it if he remained a toady.

“Yes, well. There you have it.” His thick mustache lifted at the corners as he smiled broadly. “Do you want to tell Ann, or should I?”

Calico did not hesitate. “You tell her, sir. Every father deserves to be a hero to his daughter.”

*   *   *

Ann practically bowled Quill over in the hallway as she was leaving her father’s study. He made a show of staggering back, but except to give him an over-the-shoulder apology as she fled, he thought she barely noticed his performance. He was still smiling to himself when he walked into Ramsey’s study. Ann had not taken the time to close the pocket doors. It did not matter who was responsible; that oversight always annoyed her father.

“I just saw Ann,” said Quill. “Would I be correct that you finally told her you hired Miss Nash?”

“She brought a gun in here, Quill. Do you believe it? She brought a goddamn gun in here.”

“Ann?”

Ramsey scowled. “No, of course not Ann. Calico Nash. She could have killed me.”

“Huh. She carried in her revolver?”

“Not a revolver. A derringer. I spied the bulge under her sleeve.”

“I’ll be damned.”

“Admiration is not what I am looking for.”

“Well, it’s hard not to be admiring. I took her pistol, so she either had a spare or she stole it back. Did she threaten you with it?”

“No.”

Quill did not know what to say except, “I see.” It was hard to keep amusement out of his tone.

“Oh, for God’s sake, just sit down.”

“She’s not going to use it on you,” said Quill. “It seems to me she is taking her responsibilities seriously. You should be satisfied with your decision.”

“She is. I am.”

“So you merely wanted to vent your spleen on me.”

Ramsey Stonechurch knew nothing about being sheepish, so his expression remained unapologetic; however, his lips twitched and he gave up the scowl. “Your calm is infuriating, you know.”

Quill sat. “I know it infuriates you, but I am not sure why that is. One would think you would want composure in a man charged with your protection.”

“I do, but that doesn’t mean I find it natural.”

Quill thought he should probably begin a list. First it was his smile, and now his calm. He was surely a disappointment. “My father was a minister, Mr. Stonechurch. He knew how to vent his spleen from the pulpit and shower brimstone on the parishioners cowering in the last pew. You are not there yet.”

“Not for lack of trying,” said Ramsey. He opened the ledger on the desk and began to thumb through the pages. “Do you remember Frank Fordham giving this to me yesterday?” When Quill nodded that he did, Ramsey went on. “I did not have an opportunity to examine it until early this morning, but I am discovering again that there is a good reason why I trust Frank with the business accounts. Since the new vein of ore was found in the Number 1 mine, Frank has been monitoring production. He made a comparison of the three mines we are currently operating and what he found is not encouraging.”

Ramsey turned the ledger 180 degrees so that it faced Quill. “Look at it for yourself.”

Quill pulled his chair closer to the desk. “Will I know what I’m seeing? I am not an accountant.”

“This is not a balance sheet. These are production figures.”

“All right.” He examined the columns carefully, one for each mine. On the facing page there was also a month-to-month comparison of the previous year’s production to the current mine yield. He could see the steady decrease in the Number 1 mine’s production, a spike, and then a return to the earlier production numbers. There were fluctuations
in the yields of the other mines, but Quill recognized that if he graphed the results over a year, even two, he would be able to draw a straight line between the points. The average yield remained the same.

“There is an upturn here in May when the new vein was found at Number 1, a slight increase the following month as expected, but then . . .” He looked over the figures again.

“But then?” Ramsey prompted.

“Production drops steadily. Slowly, to be sure, but steadily. It never reaches the previous lows, but it also does not reach the levels I would anticipate from a new vein.”

“Look at that. You
do
know what you’re seeing.”

“What accounts for it?”

“You know what accounts for it. The men. They are not digging at the expected rate, not so slow that it would be noticed right way, but over time, and with Frank’s attention to detail and how he set this up, the deceit of it all practically shouts out from the page.”

Quill expected that explanation and was glad to get it out of the way so he could examine other possibilities. It was unlikely that Ramsey would entertain them for long, but Quill believed it was a necessary function of his own job.

“What else accounts for it?” he asked.

“Not a damn thing.” Ramsey snatched the book back and twisted it around again. “This is the miners doing this. My company. My men. It is an act of betrayal. They have no loyalty.”

Quill waited for Ramsey to calm before he asked, “Can one man slow production on his own?”

“One? No. But one man can encourage others. That makes them all responsible.”

“What if the vein is not as wide or as deep as you were led to believe?”

“It is.” Ramsey closed the ledger and turned his head away as if he could no longer tolerate the sight of it. He closed his eyes briefly while he rubbed the bridge of his nose with a thumb and forefinger. “I saw the vein myself. I commissioned the survey. I know how to read a map, and before
that I learned how to read a mountain. That’s how Stonechurch Mining came to be.”

Quill nodded. He knew the story of how Ramsey and Leonard Stonechurch came to make their first strike on Silver Knob following survey maps their grandfather made when he came through with Zebulon Pike in ’06. They were young men when they came across silver, later gold, and still later, silver again. Mines played out because in the early days there was no machinery to uncover the ore or bring it up, and when the machines were invented that could do the job, there were few men with the resources to purchase and operate them. Eastern consortiums owned many of the mines, but Ramsey and his brother poured their profits into their holdings and stayed in Colorado. Ramsey thought people should appreciate that, but as time passed, and he became more distant from the daily operations while living like the lord of the manor at one end of the town, there were grumblings. There were resentments.

From what Quill could tell, the antipathies were isolated, not widespread. In spite of being known as a coldhearted bastard by some, there were plenty of people in Stonechurch who thought the sun rose and set according to their town’s remaining founder. The help that Ramsey employed to run his house as efficiently as he ran his company were chief among them. It was Quill’s opinion that Mrs. Pratt, the housekeeper, and Mrs. Friend, the cook, were more likely to surrender their firstborn than say a bad word about Ramsey Stonechurch.

“The machinery?” asked Quill. “Is it in working order? Have there been breakdowns?”

“Something is always breaking down,” Ramsey replied. “I have no reports to indicate that there has been more maintenance at Number 1.” He leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. He thrust his chin forward. “Go on. Try another one.”

Quill thought if Ramsey had been wearing gloves, he would have thrown one down. “All right. What about a recording error?” He raised both hands before Ramsey could speak. “I am not talking about Frank. You say he is meticulous, and
I believe you, but he does not count the cars as they come up or weigh the ore or oversee the processing.”

“Do you think an error like that would be isolated to one mine?”

Quill admitted it did not seem likely, but it did make him wonder about another possibility. “What if something is being deliberately recorded incorrectly? What if the production is exactly what it should be, but it is being recorded as less?”

“Embezzlement, you mean? Of the ore?”

Quill shrugged. “Is it possible?”

“That would be quite an operation, and it doesn’t really matter to me whether the men are not bringing it up or whether they are bringing it up and hauling it off in secret. Either way, they are stealing from me. I want you to find out who is behind it and how it is being done.”

“That means I would be away from the house, away from you. You can’t decide to go off on your own if I am at the mines. We know what happened the last time.”

“You were gone for weeks then, not hours, and it doesn’t matter. This is important, and I want you to take care of it. Besides, I have Calico Nash here. I am in hands every bit as capable as yours.” He gave Quill a crooked smile. “And prettier ones, too.”

“Hmm.”

“Talk to her,” said Ramsey. “Tell her what I want, and tell her not to ask for more money.”

“I will tell her, but I am not responsible if she brings a bigger weapon to the table.”

*   *   *

“Come in,” called Calico, responding to the knock at her bedroom door. She was fairly certain that it was not Ann because she had left that young woman in the front parlor with a book. “You will have to decide if anything in all of literature has been as influential as this,” she had explained, opening it to the first chapter and setting it in Ann’s lap. “‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.’ I
would be hard pressed to think of a better opening than that, although ‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,’ is very good, too.”