They watched until the maid was gone. The woman did not glance back or in any way betray that she knew they were there.
“Thank goodness!” Priscilla said. “Now where were we?”
Fargo eased the door shut and braced both legs. He gripped her hips, tucked at the knees, and thrust, the first of many. He did not count them, so he could not say if it was the fortieth or the sixty-first when Priscilla bucked in a wanton frenzy of release. His own explosion was not long after.
Breathless, they sagged against one another. Eventually Fargo stirred and began to peel himself from her.
“What do you think you’re doing, handsome?” Priscilla asked, wearing an impish expression. “That was only the main course. I haven’t had dessert yet. Are you up for it?”
Was he ever.
9
Much to Fargo’s annoyance, they did not leave the Mayfair farm until ten the next morning. He was up before daybreak, as was his habit, and ready to head out as a golden crown blazed the eastern sky. But Arthur Draypool wanted to have breakfast with their hosts, and breakfast for the Mayfairs was an affair almost as elaborate as supper. The family gathered around the big table and were waited on by the servants. The fare was worthy of a restaurant: coffee, tea, milk, or juice; ham, bacon, beef, or venison; eggs, flapjacks, johnnycakes, and cracklin’ bread.
Fargo had no intention of eating a big meal, but once he sipped some orange juice and nibbled at a johnnycake, his stomach imitated an earthquake, prompting him to heap food high on his plate. He blamed Priscilla. She had been insatiable. They had stayed in the sewing room until nearly two in the morning.
Now she sat across from him, as demure and prim and proper as a true lady was expected to be. She would glance at him every now and then, when she thought no one else was looking, and smile a quick secret smile that only the two of them understood.
Toward the end of the feast, after Fargo had pushed his plate back and patted his overfull stomach, Clyde Mayfair tapped a glass with a spoon to get everyone’s attention and declared, “We wish you all the best in your hunt for the Sangamon River Monster, Mr. Fargo. It is a dangerous enterprise, and I trust you will not take it lightly.”
“I never take killers lightly,” Fargo said.
“You must be diligent in the hunt, merciless when you catch him,” Mayfair went on. “If you find your resolve waning, just think of all the poor people that fiend has murdered.”
The man had gall, lecturing him, Fargo reflected. He nodded and responded, “I know my job.”
Mayfair glanced at Draypool, then said, “I am certain you do. Yet Arthur tells me that you refuse to shoot the Monster on sight.”
“I made it plain I don’t kill for money. If that’s what he wants done, he should have hired someone else.”
“Please don’t be offended,” Clyde said. “Trackers of your caliber are as rare as hen’s teeth.”
“What about that Hiram Trask your son told me about?” Fargo asked.
It was Draypool who answered. “Trask never leaves the South, where he grew up. He is active mainly in Georgia, Alabama, and Florida.”
“A true son of the South,” Jace Mayfair remarked.
Both Draypool and Jace’s father looked at him sharply, and Clyde Mayfair said, “In these trying times, one should not make such distinctions. They might be misunderstood.”
“What does he care?” Jace said testily, and bobbed his chin at Fargo. “How do you feel, exactly, about the coming conflict?”
“I haven’t thought about it much,” Fargo admitted. He tended to fight shy of politics. “But I don’t like the notion of one man owning another.”
“Slavery has been around for thousands of years,” Jace said. “It’s not as if the South invented it. Hell, there are Yankees who own slaves.”
Clyde Mayfair smacked the table hard. “I will thank you not to use such language in the presence of your mother and sister. As for slavery, it is hardly a fit topic for our morning meal.”
“I just wanted to know where he stood.” Jace was in a contrary mood. “Before long, Father, everyone will have to decide where they stand, whether they want to or not.”
Clyde smiled at Fargo. “You must excuse him. He’s young, and the young are always too headstrong for their own good.”
Priscilla set down her orange juice. “Why pick on Jace?” she said, coming to her brother’s defense.
“You’ve said the same things he just did many a time.”
“I repeat,” Clyde Mayfair sternly declared. “Slavery is not a fit topic for polite conversation.”
Fargo thought Mayfair was making a fuss over nothing, but he did not say anything, and the family finished the meal in strained silence. Draypool sent Avril and Zeck to bring the horses around, and refilled his teacup one last time.
“It will be a while before we eat this grand again,” Draypool said. “Please indulge me, Mr. Fargo, for a few minutes more.”
Fargo shrugged.
Clyde leaned his elbows on the table, then took them off at a disapproving stare from his wife. “Tell me about the Indians out your way. I am most curious. From all we hear, they are veritable savages, are they not?”
“Indians are people like us,” Fargo said, and added, without consciously meaning to, “The same as blacks or any others.”
Clyde reddened. “I beg to differ, sir. Indians are not just like us. They wear animal hides and live in squalor.”
“I wear animal hides,” Fargo said, touching his buckskin shirt, “and most nights I sleep on the ground wrapped in a blanket.”
“You didn’t sleep on the ground last night. Look around you, sir. You are seated in a sterling example of why we are superior in every way to every other race.”
Fargo decided he disliked Clyde Mayfair. He disliked him a lot. “Indians couldn’t pack up and move a house like this, and they move often, to be near buffalo and for other reasons.”
“You equivocate, sir. I am not an imbecile. Not all Indians follow the herds. Some live in villages year-round. Villages, need I remind you, ridden with filth and lice and barely fit for human habitation.”
“That’s enough,” Draypool said.
“I am only trying to make a point,” Clyde said to justify himself. “We are not like the Indians and never will be.”
Fargo had listened to enough. He pushed his chair back and stood. “I’ll wait with the horses.” As he crossed the room to where he had deposited his saddlebags and rifle, Draypool gave an angry hiss.
“That was a mistake, Clyde. You should know better. Need I remind you of the trouble we have gone to, or what’s at stake?”
“Don’t lecture me.”
Fargo was spared the rest of their petty bickering. He strode down the front hall and out into the morning sun and blinked in the bright glare. Another muggy day was in store.
The Ovaro was saddled and waiting. Fargo slid the Henry into the scabbard and secured the saddlebags. The saddle creaked as he forked leather. An urge came over him to say to hell with the whole thing and head for the Rockies, but he stayed where he was, and shortly Draypool and the Mayfairs trickled out, the two men still squabbling.
“. . . is that we have to stand up for our own kind,” Clyde was saying. “It is our obligation, if you will.”
“There is a time and a place for everything,” Arthur said, “and this was neither.”
A servant held out the reins to his mount and Arthur took them and climbed stiffly on without so much as a thank-you.
Margaret came down the steps and smiled up at Fargo. “Men and their silly spats. Yet they constantly poke fun at us women.”
Priscilla sashayed to her mother’s side. “If you are ever back this way, be sure to stop by. You are always welcome to our hospitality.”