They had reached the general store. Three women stood on the plank walk, their gingham bonnets tilted toward one another conspiratorially. Amy assumed they must be gossiping. Gossiping was sinful but it sure could be fun.
She raised her dark eyes to his and said, “I love Ned. He’s a good man. My children love him. They already treat him like a father. Nothing’s going to change that, Tom. Nothing. I appreciate your apologies but nothing’s going to change that.”
“Well, unaccustomed as I am to losing the lady I’ve pursued, I have to say that I’ve been wrong about you and Lenihan. I can see that you’re going to have a good marriage.”
She would have been more inclined to believe him if he hadn’t worn that sharklike grin. The grin that said he was superior to all he surveyed. “Good-bye, Tom.”
She stood there watching him go. For all his kind words, he’d managed to remind her of Ned’s financial difficulties—another way of saying that Ned had a good reason to get his hands on some of that robbery money.
But as she entered the general store with her wicker basket, she wondered. Why had his words troubled her so much?
“Won’t give you no more credit, O’Malley. You want a drink, I want to see some money.”
O’Malley called it his shoe money. Aptly named. Tucked under the insole of his boot was enough money to get him drunk for a night. Whatever else his expenses might be, he always took care to replenish his shoe money so that in an emergency the money would always be there. And this he considered an emergency—an emergency of the soul. Parrish took pleasure in humiliating O’Malley as often as possible, knowing that the reporter couldn’t quit. He survived on the pittance Parrish paid him. But never before had he been humiliated in front of the likes of the Trailsman. The legendary figure so many other journalists had written about.
He had gone back to his shabby hotel room and tried to sleep. The ultimate escape. But sleep hadn’t come because he ran out of whiskey. Only large amounts of whiskey could put him into the blissful darkness of slumber. Otherwise all he did was lie there and relive his wasted and terrible life. All the things he could have been—but ended up here in Cawthorne.
Finally he’d gotten up, put on his clothes and come here to the Gilded Cage, the only saloon that had ever consented to give him credit. He figured that if he was going to spend money he owed it to this saloon to spend it here.
At this time of day the place was only half full. The men ran to old-timers who played cards and gossiped and talked politics. One other reason he came here is that he’d never been made fun of. At least not that he could remember. The crowd here didn’t seem to have any interest in him at all. He’d stand at the far end of the bar where Aaron, the owner, usually took care of business, and nobody bothered him.
“You don’t have to worry about me, Aaron,” O’Malley said. “I’ve got plenty of money.” He’d taken his money from the shoe before coming here. He’d give people a nasty laugh for sure if he took it out here. He laid some greenbacks on the bar and said, “That should take care of what I owe you and buy me some whiskey and a schooner of beer.”
Aaron Cade, a golden bear of a man with broad shoulders and hair so blond it was almost white, smiled and said, “You come into some money, did you, O’Malley?”
“Not yet. But soon.”
“Oh? You got an inheritance or something?”
O’Malley knew he probably shouldn’t say anything but after suffering Parrish’s mocking words, he wanted to feel important again. “No, no inheritance. A story I’m working on. When this one comes out that Denver paper’ll be wiring me to come back.”
“You sure of that?” Aaron’s tone wasn’t unkind, just gently doubtful.
“Money in the bank,” O’Malley laughed. “And I mean that both ways. Money in the bank that the story’s going to be that great. And money in the bank that that’s what I’ll have—money in the bank and plenty of it.”
“For your sake, I hope you’re right, O’Malley.”
Aaron went to take care of one of the oldsters at a card table. The man’s back had been seriously damaged in a mining accident about ten years ago. He needed help getting up out of his chair and aimed in the general direction of the outhouse in back of the saloon.
O’Malley watched Aaron guide the old man. That was a warning sign to him. He didn’t want to wake up one day and find himself in the same situation this older man did. O’Malley’s dream was of the life he’d led in the big cities before the bottle had taken over his life so completely. There had been fresh young women and expensive meals in fashionable restaurants and spring days when he felt confident that someday he’d not only be working for a newspaper, he’d be running one.
When Aaron returned, O’Malley ordered another round for himself. He ordered a shot for Aaron, too. The bartender smiled. “You down to your shoe money?”
“My shoe money? How’d you know about that?”
“You told me one night.”
God. So hard to remember what he said and did. Had to be careful with his secret. Had to be very careful. “Well, do me a favor and keep it to yourself.”
“Won’t do any good, O’Malley.”
“And why’s that?”
“Same night you told me you told about half the people in here the same thing. I was surprised somebody didn’t wait for you outside and take your shoe off. I hate to admit it but some of my customers ain’t exactly saints. They hear of a drunk with a shoe full of money—”
O’Malley laughed but it was forced. “Me and my big mouth, huh?”
“You got to be careful. I don’t know what kind of thing you’re talking about—something big obviously—but you better watch yourself when you’re drinking. Don’t want to give it away.”
Aaron moved down the bar to grab a couple of empty schooners and clean up.
O’Malley’s heady dreams had been dashed for the moment. Aaron was right. O’Malley always ran his mouth when he was drunk. Had he already told somebody what he had figured out?
But then his hand dipped into the pocket of his soiled suit coat. Merely touching it filled him with hope once again. He took it out and laid it on the bar momentarily, far from the eyes of Aaron. He just looked at it. To the uneducated eye this wouldn’t look like much at all. In fact, the uneducated eye would pass right by it. But to O’Malley this was Chicago and St. Lou all over again. Those fancy meals and those fan cier girls.
He sat there staring at it, the silver button that was a match to the one Fargo had found near the body of Clete Byrnes.
7
Sam Raines was the first one down from the second floor of Rose Fitzhugh’s Parlor of Pleasure. Early in the day for sex but then it was also early for drinking four shots of whiskey back to back.
He had just enjoyed the pleasures of a buxom redhead who had tasted of the perfume she had put on the hottest part of her body and who had enjoyed—or who had faked enjoying—the mating as much as he had. She had worn a sheer black slip under which her full breasts had shifted with mesmerizing grace. Her nipples were enormous and red-tipped like spring flowers.
He had been rough with her at first, pushing her back on the bed and trying to jam himself inside her before she was properly damp. But she had quickly educated, easing him out and gently putting him on his back where she’d begun to stroke his manhood with educated and nimble fingers. He had been ready to explode then but those educated fingers had dissuaded him from ending their session so abruptly. And somehow he found himself pleasuring her, his mouth on her womanliness, and enjoying the joy he was giving her. But once again she stopped when she sensed that he was ready to end things. She got up on her haunches so he could take her from the rear—as he’d whispered his wishes earlier—and in that position gave him the kind of sexing he’d rarely enjoyed. He’d certainly gotten his money’s worth.