Part 28 (1/2)

”Nothing. Nothing that makes an} sense. When your father died, the police picked this room clean. There would be noth- 306.

ing left for anyone to look for now. But whoever came in last night must have thought there might be.”

”And whoever came in had that deringer in his possession,” I said. ”But who could it have been?”

Jon shook his head and went to the box on the small table. I had closed it last night after I found what was in it, and he raised the lid. The two blunt-nosed little guns were there. The twin pistols that had been reunited.

”I wonder what time Caleb left Jasper last night,” I said. ”I wonder if he could have come into this room before he went off.”

Jon was silent, and another question rose in my mind. What if it had been Persis herself who had kept the second pistol? What if she had asked Caleb to replace it last night?

”You'll have to tell your grandmother,” Jon said.

”No-not now! It's better not to!”

My vehemence alerted him, and he must have guessed what I was thinking, for he let the matter go.

Further speculation was futile, and we returned to stand for a few moments longer on the porch.

”How are you?” I asked, not wanting to let him go.

”Never felt better.” But if there might have been a moment of intimacy between us he turned it aside. ”Hillary may have a ( good idea about attending Ingram's ball and calling his bluff. Maybe we can show a united front if we go.”

”In costume?”

Jon's mood had lightened. ”It's not hard to look like a fortyniner. Save me a dance, Laurie. Or don't you dance with cowboys?”

”I dance with cowboys every chance I get,” I told him.

But already he was looking away from me, off up the valley toward Old Desolate.

”I'm itching to get started out there,” he said. ”We need to be ready for next year.”

37.

”Can you really graze cattle in the valley?”

”Sure. It's big enough, and there's plenty of gra.s.s. In the summertime, anyway. We'll need to do some planting, and we'll need more land down on the flats during the winter, and that can be managed. The cows that are held back for breeding and not sent to market can be fed with our own hay. We can swing it if your grandmother holds onto her courage. Are ou going to be a partner in this, Laurie?”

”I am if you'll have me.”

I couldn't hold back what I felt any longer. It was there in my eyes, on my lips, whether I wanted it to be or not. He couldn't help seeing it. He pulled me into his arms, kissed me almost roughly, and then set me away from him.

”The heiress and the cowboy!” he said. ”That's not what I'm after, Laurie.”

I watched him move away with that easy lope that covered ground so quickly. My heart was thudding, and my thoughts were angry. Now I knew what stubborn pride I would ha” e to confront. Somehow I would have to manage that. How er few times in my life had I ever been determined about anything. But I was determined now. I had my directions finallv, and I knew where I was going. No more fantasy and makebelieve and escape, but only the reality of Jon Maddocks and the life I wanted to spend with him.

When I whistled for Red, he came bounding around a corner of the house, and I took him for a run that we both needed. More than ever I knew that Mark Ingram had to be defeated. Really stopped. Sent away, once and for all. Jon had to have his chance at the valley, and Persis and I had to have our chances too.

But as I returned to the house, I found myself wis.h.i.+ng that there weren't times when I still felt afraid. Something faceless always seemed to be working against us, and I would hae to 308.

look past Mark Ingram to find it. He was involved, but there was something more.

Two days later this feeling in me was reinforced when an attempt was made upon Ingram's life. The whole thing was cornmon knowledge in Jasper within an hour of when it happened. Belle learned about it and brought the news to us.

One of the few sports Ingram could enjoy was riding, and he was often out on the mettlesome gray that was his favorite mount. On this morning he was riding over to Domino when he was fired upon from behind a clump of rocks. The first two shots missed, but the third cut through his jacket and resulted in a slight flesh wound in his upper arm. He had the good sense to get out of there as fast as he could, and he rode Juniper back to town at a gallop. While his arm was being bandaged, he ordered his men out to search the area from which the shots had come. A rifle was missing-the hunting rifle that had always stood behind the bar at the Timberline, and anyone could have picked it up.

At Morgan House we talked over the shooting, and Belle showed how much it had upset her. If it hadn't been for Persis' need, I think she might have returned to him then. But not even Belle, who knew Ingram so well, could guess what had happened. Caleb was home by that time, and he had no suggestions to offer either.

”Sure, Mark has enemies,” Belle said. ”He's always made plenty of them along the way. He can be dangerous, and dangerous men draw lightning. But who knows which enemy has turned up again to try to get rid of him now?”

Whatever his private suspicions might have been, Mark Ingram shrugged off the incident. The wound was slight and to be ignored. Though it was noted that he never rode out alone after that. Always two or three of his men rode with him wherever he went, and they looked a grim lot when they followed 39.

the trails around Jasper together. Like something out of the old West.

The remaining days before the Forty-niners' Ball went by without any further event. And that was just as well. Even the mysterious attack upon Mark Ingram, which seemed to indicate that someone was on our side, had been disturbing. We needed a spell of calm to rest us and to give us a chance to be braced for whatever was to come.

Persis ate her meals with a new appet.i.te, and she even exercised a little, and slept better at night. She began to come downstairs more often, and even walked about outside. Pretty soon, she said, she would be up on a horse again. Belle was delighted with her improvement, but afraid she would overdo.

Caleb had returned from Denver looking subdued, but with the new will in hand, and it had now been properly executed. I was Persis Morgan's main heir. If that fact served only to increase my uneasiness and my sense that I might be in even greater danger than before, I told no one how I felt.

There was one uncomfortable moment when I met Caleb alone in the hall near my room and told him about the deringer that had appeared with its twin in the mahogany box in the back parlor. I watched for his reaction, and even in the hall light that was always so dim, I could see how shaken he was. He took me by the arm and led me quickly back to his room.

”Who knows about this?” he asked.

”Only Jon. No one else.”

”Sit down for a minute,” he directed, and I sat in a worn leather chair and looked about a room that had been kept almost bare of decoration. This was the room he must stay in whenever he stopped in this house, and right now he was living here. Yet apparently he had never set any stamp of his own personality upon it, and it was as coldly austere as I had once thought him to be. I wondered what Caleb would be like if he ever really let himself go to the point of explosion.

While I sat waiting for him to speak, he stood at a window and stared unseeingly out at Jasper.

”Who do you think placed the gun in that box?” I asked him finally.

”I think I know,” he said. ”But I'm not going to talk about it. I'm not going to guess. I just want to suggest that you should not mention this to your grandmother. Can I ask for your word on that?”

I wondered if he suspected what I suspected.

”I won't promise anything unless I understand why.”

”I think you've come to love her. That's why. You won't want to damage her in any way.”

”But she has only to walk into that room to see for herself that two guns are there.”

”I don't think she'll do that. But it's a good thing you told me about this.”

”I thought you might have put it there.”

Dislike for me showed in his eyes, and our interview was over. Whatever he could have told me, he had no intention of putting it into words. I left him feeling more frustrated than ever and defeated by the secrets that were still being held all around me.

During those days before the ball I saw nothing of Hillary, since he had gone to Denver. He phoned before he left to tell me that he wanted to buy materials in order to decorate the Opera House for Ingram's party. I was just as relieved not to see him for a little while.