Satisfied, he segmented the glass and made his way back to where he had left the claybank. He retraced his route to the ravine and through to the wagon road on the west side of the mine, so that it was as fixed in his mind as the layout of the compound. He would have no trouble leading the raiding party here when the time came.
It was after five when he arrived back in Silver City. In his room at the hotel, where he went directly after returning the claybank to Tully’s Livery, he shucked out of his dusty clothes and lay down on the bed to rest. Fatigue was heavy in him; his side ached and there was a dull throbbing in his head. Too much whiskey this morning, too much exertion this afternoon. And too much manhandling last night.
But his need for rest was exceeded by his desire to see Sabina again. He roused himself after half an hour, washed, combed his hair, and put on fresh clothing from his warbag. His stemwinder gave the time as five past six when he left the hotel. The thought of a drink was in his mind as he walked toward Avalanche Avenue, but he did not want to see her tonight with whiskey on his breath. And he still didn’t seem to need it or its numbing effect. Later, no doubt, but not just now.
When he reached the millinery shop he saw that no lamp burned behind its window. The sun was gone and twilight was beginning to settle; if she was here waiting for him she should have lighted the lamp by now.
But she wasn’t here: the door was locked.
Had she changed her mind about having dinner with him? Or left when he failed to arrive promptly at six? He didn’t believe either possibility. She was not the type of woman who made petty decisions based on emotional whim; she was a Pink Rose. She had said she would wait here for him. She should be here waiting.
An uneasiness moved through him. He turned toward the lighted barbershop and hurried inside. The barber, a tall man with muttonchop whiskers, was just taking off his apron, getting ready to close for the day. Quincannon asked him if he had seen Sabina Carpenter leave her shop upstairs.
“Yes, sir, so happens I did,” the barber said. “I was shaving a customer at the time and I noticed her through the window.”
“What time was that?”
“Oh, half an hour, forty-five minutes ago.”
“Was she alone?”
“No, sir. She was with Oliver Truax’s wife. Two of them rode off in Mrs. Truax’s buggy.”
Helen Truax. Sabina and Helen Truax.
And then he understood; the knowledge came to him with a suddenness that was jarring, followed by a wave of anxiety and self-hatred. He should have understood long before this. If he had, this wouldn’t have happened at all. His fault. It was his fault if any harm came to her.
What he had overheard Bogardus and Helen Truax plotting this morning, what he had stupidly failed to grasp at the time, was Sabina’s abduction and eventual murder.
Chapter 17
He ran out of the barbershop, across the rutted avenue toward Jordan Street. A keg-laden wagon from the local brewery almost ran him down; the driver reined his team aside just in time, hurled a string of curses at Quincannon’s back. He barely noticed. His head was full of the words Bogardus and Helen Truax had spoken this morning, words that fairly screamed their significance to him now.
I don’t like it, Jack. Hasn’t there been enough of that already?
Yes. Too much. But it can’t be helped.
Why do I have to be the one?
We’ve already discussed that.
It has to be tonight?
The sooner the better.
I don’t have to stay at the mine, do I?
Why not You might enjoy the game…
Another disappearance, Jack?
Never mind that. One matter at a time. But we can’t afford to let anyone stand in our way now, this close to the finish. Not anyone, you understand?
They hadn’t been discussing him; it had to be Sabina. His fault. He’d told Helen Truax about Sabina finding the stock certificate and then hiding the fact; he’d made her realize Sabina knew about her connection with Jason Elder, made her suspicious of Sabina’s motives. Naturally they wanted to know what her game was. And when they found out — or even if they didn’t — Sabina would die. His fault. If he’d kept his Goddamned mouth shut, if the whiskey he’d consumed that night hadn’t loosened his tongue, her life would not be in danger now.
The whiskey. It was the whiskey, too, that had kept him from realizing the sense of what he’d overheard at the Truax house. Damn the stuff, befuddling his mind and his judgment…
A steady consumption of liquor distorts a man’s judgment, slows his reflexes, makes him prone to mistakes.
I won’t make any mistakes.
Different voices echoing in his memory, Boggs and his own in San Francisco last week.
I won’t make any mistakes…
The irony of it was bitter, appalling. He had taken to drink to drown the horror of what he had done to Katherine Bennett, an innocent woman; and now the drink in turn had caused him to place the life of another innocent woman in jeopardy. He couldn’t allow it to happen again, he could not bear the awful burden of responsibility for a second woman’s death — a woman, in spite of her resemblance to Katherine Bennett, he found himself caring more about than any he had known except his mother. He would rather die himself, here tonight. If anything happened to Sabina he would die tonight — at the hands of Bogardus and his men, or if he survived them, by his own hand later on.
He crossed Jordan Street, cut through an alley to Washington. There was little doubt where Sabina had been taken: the Rattling Jack. Once Helen Truax, the Judas, had driven her out of town, Bogardus or some of his men would have been waiting to accompany them to the mine; there would be no escape for Sabina either from them or from the compound. A half hour to forty-five minutes ago. They would just about be arriving now. And it would not take long for one man, or several, to torture a defenseless woman, to do even worse to her.
I don’t have to stay at the mine, do I?
Why not? You might enjoy the game…
Quincannon’s emotions urged him to run straight to the nearest livery for a horse and then to ride hell-bent for the Rattling Jack. But his intellect demanded otherwise. The chances were good that he could get inside the compound without being seen, down the bluff at the rear; but what then? How could he free Sabina and then get both of them safely out and back to town? One man pitted against a dozen or so was suicidal. No, he had to have men to back him up, men to tilt the odds in his and Sabina’s favor. He couldn’t wait for federal officers and the proper legal papers to arrive; he had to have a raiding party now, tonight, within two hours.
Prepared for it or not, he had to put his faith in Marshal Wendell McClew.
Darkness was fast approaching; he could see the lighted basement window of the marshal’s office half a block away. Pain from his battered ribs had him gasping for breath when he finally reached the door. He threw it open, half-stumbled down the stairs.
McClew had been tacking a wanted dodger onto a wall filled with them, using the butt of his Colt sixgun for a hammer. He swung around and said in surprise, “What the bloody be-damned! You look all het up, Mr. Lyons.”
“My name isn’t Lyons.” The words came out in sharp little exhalations, like puffs of steam from an overworked engine. “It’s Quincannon — John Quincannon. I’m an operative for the United States Secret Service.”
“The United… what?”
“Secret Service. Listen to me, now, don’t interrupt.”
Quickly, trying to catch his breath between sentences, Quincannon explained what he was doing in Silver City and what he had learned; who Sabina Carpenter was and what she was doing here; the urgency of matters as they now stood. McClew’s eyes grew wider and wider; his amazement seemed genuine. So did his skepticism.