Karen Mercury (6 page)

Foster shrugged. “In the Black Hills, where I just came from. Soldiers planted them there to form a pathway for others to follow.” As if on a whim, he removed one from under the saddle and handed it to Tabitha. He was plainly not terribly accustomed to being romantic, for he shoved it at her without finesse. “Here. Mayhap you want to plant some of the seeds in your garden.”

They walked across First Street toward the Cactus Club. Tabitha even had the grit to take the dashing scout’s arm, feeling entirely feminine to be seen walking with such a man. To be sure, some acquaintances gave her odd looks, but she hadn’t been in society enough to make any friends, and her family were all upstanding citizens, for the most part.

“I’m sorry for the loss of your husband,” said Foster. Apparently, he wanted to know more about her, too.

“That’s very kind of you. I’m finally coming out of my mourning and trying to figure out what to do with my life.”

Foster said, “You’re such a fetching miss. I don’t see you having any problem figuring that out.”

Tabitha hugged his forearm closer underneath her bosom. “I can’t imagine being a wife again with no career. After lunch I am going to the
Frontier Index
offices to offer my journalist services.”

“Oh. Henry Zuckerkorn?”

“You know him?”

“I should say I do. An amusing fellow, although the prairie flowers charge him double. He’s a very good journalist, but I caught him wearing a dress in a sporting house once.”

“Really? What were
you
doing there?”

Foster smiled down mysteriously at her, and Tabitha was happy that they shared a secret. It was no terrible crime that a man went to a sporting house. Most men did. “So what did you do that was so notorious? You lived here in Laramie before?”

Foster held open the swinging door of the Cactus Club and let her enter first. Tabitha paused purposefully, so that when Foster entered he’d have to stand so close to her she could breathe in his cowhide scent again. It probably wasn’t so wise to fall for an army scout, because he would be gone again soon. But a girl couldn’t help who she fell for.

He didn’t shy away from standing so close to her, either. When he removed his hat he revealed a nice full head of spiky, gingery hair that stuck up every which way, and she longed to touch its softness with her palm. She bet it was just as soft as the rabbit feeling of her new dog’s head. “You’ve heard of the Mirror Murderer?”

The entire bustling restaurant fell away beyond the fringes of Tabitha’s awareness. She stared like a stunned deer into Foster’s pine green eyes.
Is he the Mirror Murderer?
But wasn’t that fellow thrown a necktie party after he had terrorized Tabitha’s brother—or
had
they hung him? Was she standing right next to him?

Perhaps discerning what she was thinking by her frozen round-eyed stare, Foster placed reassuring hands on Tabitha’s shoulder. “No, that’s not what I meant at all! I meant—”

“Why, Foster Richmond!” cried Harland Park. He owned the Cactus Club but wasn’t usually here. As the town’s chief engineer, he had plenty of other places to be. He came forward jovially, arms out as though about to wrap them around Foster. “Haven’t seen you since you left town!”

Harley steered them to a recently vacated table that hadn’t been cleaned yet. Both men sat, but Tabitha stood woodenly by, waiting for Harley to clear up the confusion.

“Captain Park!” cried Foster, just as jovial. “Custer sent me into town to relay a telegram.”

“Tabitha! How do you know this fine fellow?”

Tabitha held herself rigid, looking down her nose at the scout, who looked even more handsome, if such a thing was possible, laughing freely like that. “I don’t know him very well, apparently. What does he have to do with the Mirror Murderer?”

Harley clapped Foster on the shoulder. “Oh, only the finest attorney Laramie has ever seen! He’s helped me out on some railroad business, to my advantage, too, I might add. But of course old Richmond here wasn’t even fine enough to prevent them from stringing up that loco fellow.”

“You
defended
the Mirror Murderer?” Tabitha asked, although she did relax enough to take a seat.

“Yes,” said Foster, happy as a clam at high water. “Mostly for the entertainment of it all.”

Harley said, “We didn’t hold it against him. A man’s got to make a living. And it certainly got his name in the papers! We knew each other in Pittsburgh before we both wound up in Laramie.”

Tabitha desperately wanted to know what would possess a man to cease being an attorney and become an army scout instead, but Harley was now demanding to know, “What are your dinner plans? I’m sure Ivy would love to have you as a guest.”

“Yes, I just saw her in the telegraph office. What I’d like to do first is get my dog back from Sherman Bullard. Orianna left her in his care two years ago when she…departed.”

There seemed to be some hidden meaning to “departed,” the way Foster said it.

Harley was now telling Foster, “Really? Because I saw Orianna the day they left on the train for California, and I asked her if the dog would be going with her. She told me… Well, she said the dog had passed away. That was a wonderful dog—the breed that went with Lewis and Clark and their Corps of Discovery expedition, if I’m not mistaken.”

Passed away?
Tabitha couldn’t think of anything more sad or horrifying. She had only known Foster Richmond a fraction of an hour, but she did not think he deserved this pain, especially when it was obvious he cared enough about the dog to take it back into the wilds with him. You could tell a lot about a man by how he treated pets.

But more than just sorrow washed over Foster’s face. His face hardened into an absolute statue—of rage, so it seemed to Tabitha. His pupils became little pinpoints as he stared at some faraway wall—a wall clear over in Cheyenne judging from the distant, cold look in his eyes. It sounded as though he muttered, “That bitch.”

“Maybe I’m mistaken,” Harley said hopefully. “Or maybe Orianna was mistaken. Go check with Sherman Bullard. Isn’t he staying in your old house?”

“Yes, I’ll do that as soon as I’m served a whiskey.” Foster seemed to be a different person altogether now. Tabitha could see him struggling to maintain civility when he appeared to actually want to shoot someone.

Harley ordered a passing fellow to grab Foster a whiskey, and Tabitha said, “Foster, I found a dog recently that didn’t seem to have any owner. A very fine female dog, big, black, and fluffy. I believe she is a Newfoundland. Is that the sort you mean?”

Tabitha was flooded with happiness when Foster exploded, “
Yes!
” He even took ahold of her hands and squeezed them. “That must be her! You just found her wandering around?”

“Why, yes. She was sitting placidly in my garden, and she’s been following me around ever since. Why, there she is right now!”

Foster nearly knocked his chair over in his haste to turn around and look at the window. Sure enough, there sat the fluffy black dog, pink tongue-tip sticking out of her mouth, square ears set up high, listening.
Woof
, she said, to get their attention.

“Phineas!” shouted Foster and shoved several people aside as he raced to the front door. Tabitha followed without another word to her brother-in-law.

Phineas?
Where had Tabitha heard that name bef—
Oh, by Jove.
That was the name the talking board had spelled out. So it
was
the dog’s name after all!

Tabitha had not been this happy in a very, very long time. Just watching Foster fling himself onto his knees on the wooden sidewalk and clutch the giant dog to his chest made her so joyful tears stung her eyes. Foster buried his face in Phineas’s ruff, and she licked his ear, her haunches squirming and tail swishing, dusting the sidewalk for ten feet around them.

Tabitha didn’t even recall later that she flung herself down next to them. Perhaps she just wanted to partake in their happiness. Perhaps it was a natural reaction for anyone with a depth of emotion to want to be physically close to such a fluffy and attractive tornado of joy.

Tabitha squeezed the dog to her and finally dared to lift her hand to Foster’s spiky hair. She reveled in the soft, furry feel of it, even threading her fingers to feel his damp scalp. “I’m so glad I was able to find her for you.”

Then, to Tabitha’s surprise, Foster lifted his face from Phineas’s mane and allowed her to see his bleary eyes swimming with overwhelming joy. He whispered, “Where have you been?”

As though he’d been waiting for her his entire life!

Tabitha was pondering his question when he released the dog and snaked his hand around the back of Tabitha’s neck. “Don’t go away,” he whispered now and kissed her.

His kiss poured his jubilation into her. Foster didn’t try to slide his tongue down her throat but just sucked on her mouth slowly, longingly, with a vast outpouring of sorrow intermingled. He had suffered a lot, maybe in the same way she had, losing Parker. So she kissed his soft angelic mouth and tried to give him some reassurance that things might not always be this difficult or this sad.

Foster only gently pulled away when Phineas nudged her big muzzle between them. Foster seemed embarrassed now and laughed nervously, kissing his dog on her snout instead.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Tabitha affirmed, “but you’re going back to Custer’s army.”

Foster laughed and looked only at Phineas. “Maybe not.”

“Who is this Tabitha gal?” Worth asked as they hitched their horses to the post in front of Vancouver House. The owner, Simon Hudson, was Tabitha’s father, apparently a big fish of a railroad magnate. It looked to be the grandest house in town, with a porch wrapping around three sides and a sunroom choked with tropical plants. “You’ve only mentioned your buddy Captain Park. Is she his wife?”

Worth looked forward to associating with genteel, cultured women again. He had been knocking about the Montana and Dakota Territories for years now, in between expeditions working for the Union Pacific making photographs of railroad construction crews. None of these activities involved any beauteous belles. And since he was convinced that consorting with prairie flowers led to the clap or French pox where one’s penis would turn black and atrophy, Worth wasn’t terribly experienced with the fair sex. He was eager and somewhat nervous to meet this cultured lady. He had been batching it far too long and needed to get back into the courting game.

“Not his wife,” Foster grunted. “His sister-in-law, apparently.”

“Is she married?”

Worth could tell from the irate glance Foster flashed at him that Tabitha was not wed. Worth gulped and bent to pet the dog Phineas, who had followed them from the Union Pacific Hotel. Strange thing about that dog. She must’ve been part hound, because one moment she’d be trotting along beside them. And the next she was gone, off on some important coyote errand. But Foster’s eyes always misted over when he gazed at Phineas, and Worth liked seeing this gentler, less gruff aspect of Foster. He didn’t care if Foster didn’t like him. He liked Foster.

“She’s in mourning for a dead husband,” was all Foster would say. “Listen. We’re just here because Harley has an impressive kit of photographic equipment I wanted you to see. He can probably help set you up in your new photography venture here in town.”

The gal who opened the front door of Vancouver House wasn’t dour by any means. She was a compact, shapely yet tough blonde belle with clear sapphire eyes. The most cunning beaver-like front teeth were revealed when she smiled. The only sign of her mourning was a black armband, and oddly enough, she wore a slightly dried-up sunflower blossom pinned over the ample rise of a breast.

And the way she immediately took Foster’s hands was a caution! Worth instantly saw the bond between them as they shone their eyes at each other. Foster had never looked more uncertain, like a stuttering adolescent. The usually gruff and dignified scout turned into a puddle of romantic, adolescent silliness when Tabitha took his hands. Worth knew he would have to keep a respectable distance between himself and the widow, or Foster would whale into him ferociously, as Worth had already seen him capable of.

“Has Phineas eaten anything?” Tabitha asked, leading the men into the cool recesses of a well-appointed parlor.

A sickly, round-headed fellow approached the fluffy dog eagerly. “Oh, there’s my Phineas! See, Tabitha? You thought I was just joking when I said the dog’s name was probably Phineas.”

Foster frowned, perhaps irritated at the round fellow’s presence when it was clear he wanted to be alone with the bountiful belle. “How did you know her name is Phineas? It isn’t the usual girl’s name.”

“Oh,” the fellow said giddily, waving away Foster’s concern. “It was merely the suggestion of a talking board we were playing with right before we found the dog. It spelled out the name ‘Phineas,’ and we wondered what it meant. Odd, isn’t it, to find out the dog’s name really
was
Phineas?”

“Talking board?” Foster snapped suspiciously. But once again, his eyes softened when they landed on Tabitha’s creamy face. “One of those spiritual parlor games?”