Arizona Gold (10 page)

Taking a deep breath, she kicked off from the side of the shanty with her feet. Propelling her body backward and up, she then swung forward and through the window to land on her feet with a thud directly in front of the woman.

“Pleased to meet you, Miss Grimes. The name’s Kitty Parrish.”

Opal dropped the glass, whiskey spilling across the table and on her robe. Her face went white, and she tried to get up out of the chair but stumbled and fell, sprawling to the floor.

Kitty reached down and grabbed her arm and yanked her up, then roughly slung her into another chair.

“Now we’re going to talk,” she said, feeling angry blood rush to her face as she righted the fallen chair and sat down across from Opal.

“You…you’re Kitty?” Opal clutched her throat with one hand, willing the words to squeak past the constriction of terror as she wilted before the blazing eyes. “But…but I thought…”

“You thought the Indians killed me like you paid them to do?” Kitty’s laugh was harsh. Well, you wasted your money, lady, because I’m free, and I’m here, and I want to know why in the hell you wanted to get rid of me.”

“But…but I didn’t…”

“It’s my uncle’s—my stepfather’s gold mine, isn’t it? With me out of the way, it’s all yours. So when you heard I was coming, you got the Indians to attack the stagecoach.”

Opal shook her head slowly from side to side. “No. No, I would never do that. And why would I have sent you his part of the map…his money…if I wanted it all for myself?”

“I wondered about that at first,” Kitty said, “because it didn’t make sense. But the Indians were definitely looking for Kitty Parrish, and the only way they could have known I was on that stage was for you to have told them. You were the only person who knew. Besides that, I heard them mention your name.”

“My name?” Opal gasped, both hands slamming the table as she went rigid in the chair. “How could they know me?”

Kitty sneered. “They knew you, all right. Now enough of your lies. I want to know…” Her voice trailed off, seeing the expression on Opal’s face. Opal looked deep in thought, forgetting Kitty was there.

And then she slapped her hands together and exclaimed, “Of course. That’s it. That’s why he was here—the Indian. He knew about the map to Wade’s gold mine, and he wanted it. I told him I didn’t have it, that I’d sent it to his niece—to you. He went away, but when I came home from work that night, I had a strange feeling he had come back.

“Your telegram and letter”—she pointed at the stove—“are hidden behind there. He must have found them, and evidently he could read, so he knew when you were expected. It all adds up.”

“Not to me. How would he have known about the map in the first place?”

“I’ve no idea. But you have to believe me,” Opal gestured helplessly, eyes imploring. “I would never do such a thing, Kitty. I wouldn’t want you harmed for anything in the world. You…you’re a part of Wade, and”—she swallowed and blinked back tears—“I loved him, you see. I could never hurt anything that was his.”

Kitty was starting to believe her, because, after all was said and done, it just wasn’t plausible that she would have gone to the trouble of even telling her about Daddy Wade’s death if she wanted everything for herself. “But the Indian—Whitebear, he was called—I heard him say your name to his mother. And I know it was me he was looking for, because he asked me if I had met a passenger named Kitty Parrish.”

Opal poured herself another drink with shaking hands. She offered one to Kitty, but she declined. “I don’t know,” she said. “Unless…” Her voice trailed off once more.

Kitty prodded, “Go on.”

“Wade used to talk to me about his partner, Dan McCloud, and how he was a strange old codger. He had a little farm somewhere, and he’d disappear for days at a time, and that’s where Wade figured he went. There was a woman somewhere, too, but he never talked about her except when he was drunk, and then Wade couldn’t make out what he was saying. He had a son, and the reason Wade knew about that was on account of Dan saying if anything happened to him he wanted him to have his share of their strike.

“Wade figured the woman was Indian,” Opal went on to say, “because he always wore an Indian amulet around his neck, and when he was drunk and mumbling about loving somebody, he would stroke it and cry. Wade suspected Dan had a son by her, and that he was a half-breed, and that’s why he never came around.”

Kitty paled.

“Kitty, what’s wrong?” Opal got up and rushed to her side. She pressed a hand to her forehead. “You can’t be well, not after being with those savages. Let me fetch the doc to give you a going-over, and I’ll fix you some soup and tea. We can talk about all this later. I just want you to believe me when I say I had nothing to do with you being abducted. I swear it, and you’ve got to believe me…

“I do,” Kitty cried. “And I think I know what’s going on here.”

“What…”

“Whitebear is a half-breed. His father was white, and I think”—she drew an excited breath—“I think Dan McCloud was his father. That would explain why he wanted the other half of the map…and why he wanted me.”

Opal whispered raggedly, “Oh, dear Lord…” and collapsed to her knees.

Ryder stared down at his mother, chest heaving with fury.

“I know you are angry,” Pale Sky calmly said. “As I knew you would be. But I had no choice. Coyotay found the
tiswin
and became crazy. I knew if I did not take Billy Mingo from the camp and set him free, Coyotay would take the revenge he had been thirsting for. You were not here to stop it. I did what I thought was right.

“We have no business with slaves, anyway,” she went on as she returned to her stove. “We have enough to worry about taking care of ourselves.”

He had returned to the camp only moments before, moving his horse as fast as he dared up the last inclines after hearing from a sentry about the captive’s escape. Everyone was sure Pale Sky was responsible, the sentry had confided.

He had burst into her wickiup and did not even have to ask, for she had faced him squarely from the onset to admit everything.

She began to stir the pot of chokeberries she was making into a kind of jam.

The only sound was Ryder’s heavy, angry breathing. “It is nothing to be upset about, my son. Now rest yourself, and I will make food for you. I know you are hungry after such a long ride.

“And tell me,” she cast a smile in his direction and changed the subject in hopes he would calm down, “did you learn when the woman, Kitty Parrish, will arrive?”

“No. She’s already arrived, Mother.”

Pale Sky’s head jerked up.

“She is probably in Tombstone by now.”

“Are you sure? There must have been a stage you did not know about.”

“No. I had the right stage. As a matter of fact, I had Kitty Parrish.”

Pale Sky looked at him as though he were daft. “What nonsense is this?”

“Billy Mingo was not a boy. Billy Mingo was Kitty Parrish pretending to
be
a boy, and you,” he said with cold finality, “let her go.”
Chapter Ten

“I called him Daddy Wade and I couldn’t have loved him more if he had been my real father.”

Opal nodded with understanding. “And I know he loved you like the daughter he never had. That was why I wrote and did what he asked me to—sent you the map and the money. He talked about you a lot, Kitty. He was hoping one day you’d come out here. I’m just sorry things didn’t work out.”

She bit her lip, and Kitty patted her hand. Once she had been convinced Opal had nothing to do with Whitebear looking for her, Kitty had immediately taken a liking to her. True, she had a hardness about her, probably because her job required her to deal with men who sometimes drank heavily, but also Opal had a gentle, caring side. Kitty thought she had probably once been very pretty, too, but now her face was lined, her eyes lackluster.

“I know you must have cared about him, too,” Kitty said. “The two of you had been friends for quite a while, because I could tell you had been writing his letters for him the past few years.”

“I loved him,” Opal was quick to admit. “He was the finest man I ever knew. I would’ve married him any time he wanted me to, but he was hell-bent to get the money to get us out of here first.”

Hesitantly, Kitty asked, “Do you feel like telling me how it happened…how he died?”

It was the morning after Kitty’s arrival. The previous evening Opal had not had much time before having to go to work, and they had talked mostly about Whitebear. Now they were both sure he was Dan McCloud’s son and the Indian who had terrorized Opal.

When Opal had returned in the wee hours, Kitty had been dead to the world, and Opal did not want to wake her. They were now having breakfast—eggs, salt pork, griddle cakes, and coffee. Opal had insisted on cooking a hearty meal over Kitty’s protest that she should not go to the trouble.

“Yeah, I can talk about it,” Opal said as she absently made circles on the table with her coffee mug. “But it still hurts. I think it always will.” She glanced up suddenly. “Did you find everything you needed last night? I meant to tell you to take the bed. I would’ve been glad to make a pallet on the floor like you did.”

Kitty could have told her there really wasn’t much to find in the cramped little two-room shanty. The furniture was sparse, too—table, chairs, and stove in one room; a bed and chifforobe in the other. “I was fine, really. Actually, I’m used to sleeping lately with nothing between me and raw earth but a few animal skins. And, yes, I found everything. I had a nice bath, and your nightgown is a little large, but I’m grateful for the change.” She gestured to herself.

“Well, we’ll get you some decent clothes today. I thought after you eat we’d go shopping. There are a few nice stores in Tombstone where you can find fashions from back East, and—”

Kitty dismissed that suggestion with a quick wave of her hand. “Overalls are all I need. Maybe some new boots. I think I’ve worn mine out from all that walking, and…” She fell silent to see Opal’s disapproving scowl. “What’s wrong?”

“Kitty, you can’t continue to dress like a man.”

“Why not? I always have. It’s comfortable.”

“Folks will think you’re odd.”

“I’ve never cared what people think.”

Opal looked her straight in the eye. “Maybe it’s time you did…like it’s also time you got that chip off your shoulder.”

Kitty stiffened. “What do you mean?”

“Wade told me how it was for you growing up—the way folks shunned you and your ma for her siding with the Yankees during the war.”

“She didn’t exactly
side
with them. She did business with them in order to survive. She believed selling them horses was justified, but other folks didn’t agree, and they wouldn’t forget, and that’s why we had trouble.”

“Well, whatever the reason, Wade said it was tough on you, because you were all the time getting in fights. And lonely for you, too, on account of the kids not being allowed to have anything to do with you.”

Kitty gave a bitter laugh. “It wasn’t a matter of them being
allowed
. The fact is—they hated me, too. And, yes, it was tough, as well as lonely, but it’s all behind me now. I’m going to make a new life for myself.”

“Not as long as you got that chip.” Opal pointed to Kitty’s shoulder as though a block of wood was actually perched there.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I mean that you have to forget the past and start living like normal folk…like a
woman
. Besides, it’s time you had a husband to take care of you.”

Kitty was quick to object. “Getting married just to have a man look after me is the last thing I’ll ever do. I can take care of myself, thank you, and probably better than most men. I can ride and shoot, and—” Again, the look on Opal’s face threw her into silence.

“Maybe you can,” Opal allowed. “But you have to accept the fact that you are a woman, Kitty—and a very pretty one, at that. Look at you. With your hair all washed and shiny and hanging down your back, and your face scrubbed clean, you’re very attractive. Why, the men are going to be beating my door down once we get you really fixed up.”

Kitty sighed. “How many times must I tell you I’m not interested?”

“Well, then, what do you plan to do with yourself now that you’re here? I’ve got a little money—not much on account of my brother managing to beg off of me what he doesn’t steal behind my back—but you’re welcome to it. And you’ve got a home as long as you need one. Heaven knows, the least I can do for Wade is look after you as best I can, but you’ve got to think about the future.”

Kitty began to make circles with her coffee mug, as well, watching the wet swirls as she murmured, “Well, I’d like to look for the gold, but I guess I’d better think about finding a job.”

“Doing what? You want to be a gambling dealer like me? That takes experience, honey. Years of it. And I’d hate to see you work the saloons, plying men to buy drinks, and you sure as hell aren’t gonna be no soiled dove. Wade would turn over in his grave if I let you go bad.”

“I would never do that. But there has to be something I can do. I’m good with horses. I thought maybe I could hire on at a livery stable, since I hear there aren’t many ranches around here.”

Opal sneered. “Who’d want to hire a woman for that? No, honey, we’ve got to find something else you can do. But tell me, what was your thinking in coming out here, anyway, once you knew Wade was dead?”

“I had no place else to go, and I guess I had it in the back of my mind that between the two of us we could find the gold.”

“Believe me, I’d like nothing better, because from the way Wade talked, it was quite a strike. They weren’t bringing any of it out, though, except for a few nuggets now and then when they needed supplies. They were hoarding it, because they didn’t want to file a claim.”

“How come? It seems to me they’d want to protect it by staking it.”

“But if they did, other prospectors would hear and try to dig around it. They were also afraid of claim jumpers, robbers. They were”—she shuddered at the painful memory—“afraid of what eventually happened.”

Kitty hated to have to remind her but wanted to know the whole story. “You said you’d tell me how it happened.”