The Raging Hearts: The Coltrane Saga, Book 2 (31 page)

The sergeant’s Adam’s apple bobbed nervously as he swallowed and nodded. “Yes, sir. Yes, sir, I understand. And you don’t have to worry about me. I swear it on my mother’s grave. Once you walk out that door, I’ll find it hard to even remember who you are. Don’t ever worry about me, Mr. McRae.”

Corey’s smile was tight, and he nodded ever so slightly as he said, “Good-bye, Sergeant.”

McRae opened the door and stepped outside, closing it tightly behind him.

Sergeant Jesse Brandon watched his departure, much relieved. All he wanted was to get out of Wayne County and out of North Carolina. Forget the whole thing.

Corey started down the street, bowing his head against the brisk wind. He did not see the tall, medium-built man step out of a doorway to block his path. He saw the booted feet planted squarely in front of him just in time to come to an abrupt halt and not slam into him. Looking up, he saw the eyes of Jerome Danton blazing at him.

“McRae.” His voice was tense. “I hear you’ve got Kitty Wright at your place again. What the hell are you trying to prove? Everybody in town knows she hates your guts.”

“Does she now? And what would give you that idea? I saved her life, and her baby’s, the night you and your hooded cowards burned her out of her home. Now she is ill and I have come to her aid once again. But what does all this have to do with you?”

Danton’s fists clenched and unclenched at his sides as he tried to control his rising temper. “You can’t prove I had a damn thing to do with those night riders burning her out, and if I was you, I’d watch making accusations.”

Corey raised an eyebrow in amusement. “Well, now, who are you to be warning me, Danton? Everyone in town knows you are the leader of the Ku Klux Klan, or whatever you call yourselves. And what business is it of yours if I choose to help a neighbor in distress?”

“Distress? Hell, man, you’ve caused her as much distress as anybody. I know you bought her tax certificate. Does she know it yet? I’ll just bet she does, and I’ll bet you’re holding her at your place against her will.”

“Miss Wright is quite ill.” Corey spoke as though conversing with a simpleton. “She is still delirious with fever.”

“And how about the taxes? How, is she going to feel when she finds out you now own her place? I know how she feels about that land, McRae. I did the gentlemanly thing. I rode out to see her awhile back and offered to buy her land. I knew she was having money problems. You went behind her back and bought that delinquent tax certificate.”

Corey spread his legs and began slapping the riding crop against his open palm once again. If this were to lead to an open confrontation, then he would face it as he did all opposition. “I still do not see that any of this concerns you, Danton. Now, I have other matters to tend to, if you have nothing more to say.”

“I’ve got a lot more to say, McRae. A hell of a lot. I happen to take a fancy to that filly, too, and I’m not about to sit back and watch you maneuver her into doing what you want.”

McRae tried to step around him, but Danton moved to block his path. When he moved, Corey saw the slight limp. He smiled. “She isn’t a very good shot in the dark, but if I were you, I would be careful in the daylight.”

Danton’s face colored. He would always have that limp from the ball Kitty Wright put in his leg, but she would make it all up to him one day—in his bed. He pointed a finger at Corey and snapped, “You hear me out, you pompous bastard, you’re not going to get away with what you’re doing.”

Rance Kincaid seemed to appear from nowhere. He had been standing in a doorway just behind Jerome Danton. The sound of a gun hammer cocking made Danton’s head whip around quickly, and his eyes widened at the sight of the man standing behind him, pointing the weapon straight at him.

“I reckon the name-calling about ends the conversation, don’t it, boss?” Rance said evenly.

“Yes, Rance, it does. I certainly don’t intend to stand out here in the cold and banter with a fool.” He tipped his hat with an insolent grin and walked on.

Walking beside him, Rance shivered against the chill of the day, and Corey moved in the direction of the saloon. “I think we can both use a drink. By the way, I want you to alert Martin and the rest of the men to keep an eye on Danton. Double our night guards for a while. He might be fool enough to bring his hooded night riders to shoot up the place and burn one of their crosses and try to scare us. If he does, I want as many of those bastards killed as possible. Is that clear?”

“Oh, yeah, boss. We’ll pick ’em off like hogs in a pen at slaughtering time.” He spoke casually. Killing came easily to Rance and the others who worked as hired guns for McRae.

After a drink, Corey left the saloon and walked alone down the street to his office. Unlocking the door, he stepped inside and moved quickly to get a fire burning in the stove. There was not a lot he planned to take care of during this brief visit, but while there, he could use some warmth.

The kindling quickly ignited, and he removed his heavy sheepskin coat and stood in front of the stove, rubbing his hands together briskly. Eyeing the papers stacked on his desk, he frowned, wondering where to begin. There were several tax certificates he meant to call in. He had no intention of giving the landowners time to come up with money. He wanted their hand. He would have to go over those so he could send Rance and some of the men out to deliver the news to the farmers. They either came up with the money at once, or they left their property. If they did not leave peacefully, Rance and the others knew how to take care of them.

Sergeant Brandon had told him about the federal marshals who would be coming in, and he wondered how much inconvenience this was going to cause. Some of the marshals might not take too kindly to his method of evicting farmers.

Everyone thought old Micah Pursall had just wandered away with a broken heart when McRae foreclosed on his tax certificate. No one knew that old fool had dared to stand up to Rance and his men, meeting them with an Enfield. Micah and his wife and three children would never be found. Let everyone believe they had left. Their bodies were rotting at the bottom of the Neuse River, weighed down with enough stones to keep them under till the fish and turtles got through picking their bones.

Corey had neither time nor patience to go through the tedious process of eviction through the courts. True, the Northern judges were quite sympathetic to the Northern certificate holders, but now and then one came along who wanted to give the Rebels extra time to come up with the tax money. Corey found it expedient to handle things his way.

One parcel of land belonged to old Zeb Mooney. Only fifty or so acres were involved, but the land was very flat and the drainage good. A perfect tract for tobacco. It was already cleared of trees and stumps, which would save his field hands time. They could get right to plowing as soon as the ground thawed and be ready for spring planting as soon as the weather was right.

Corey had offered to buy the old man’s land, just as he always offered to purchase everyone’s before buying their tax certificates. He preferred that business be pleasant, if possible. Unfortunately, most of the Southerners he dealt with were most indignant, and some of them, like Mooney, were downright rude. He made Mooney a fair offer, and when the old man started yelling and screaming about how his boys died defending his land, and how he would live there till he died and then be buried right alongside of them, Corey made another offer—the same amount of money for the property, but with a special stipulation drawn up in the deed. The Mooney family cemetery would remain untouched, and it would be fenced off and never desecrated. Mooney told him he was crazy and gave him five minutes to get off his property.

Well, Mooney was going to be buried a lot sooner than he had thought, but not in his family cemetery. It looked as though he would have to end up at the bottom of the Neuse River with old Micah Pursall and his family.

The other piece of land Corey wanted right away adjoined Mooney’s and belonged to a feisty little widow named Mattie Glass. A deep, rolling stream from an underground spring on Mattie’s land cut through the property, and Corey needed that water for his cattle. The plot was only ten acres, hardly enough to quibble over, but the water was important. He made her an offer higher than anyone else would have made, but Mattie turned him down flat, saying she did not even want to dicker with him. Her husband had deeded the property solely to her before he went off and got himself killed by the Yanks at Shiloh. She had two boys, twelve and thirteen, and she was going to raise them right there on her land. Corey had tried to explain to her that ten acres was hardly enough land to worry about, that the generous sum he was offering was more than enough to purchase a small house in town. Her argument was that the land was all her husband had to leave them, and she could never sell it. “Thurman would turn over in his grave if’n I did,” she had said, looking at Corey as though he had to be out of his mind even to suggest such a thing.

He would have to do some thinking on that one, he decided, staring at the tax certificate in his hand. Zeb Mooney was really no problem. Everyone thought he was crazy anyway, the way he sat in the cemetery all day talking to his dead wife and sons. No one would be surprised if he disappeared. They would think he walked into the woods and never came out.

Mattie Glass, however, was a different situation. If she were to disappear, as well as Zeb Mooney, and Corey wound up with both parcels of land, well, he was asking for trouble.

Federal marshals would not be along for a few days. He needed to move quickly.

The door banged open, and Rance swaggered in. “It took you long enough,” Corey snapped. “Close the damn door. Can’t you see you’re letting all that blasted cold air in?”

The smug look left Rance’s face. “Something happened I don’t know about, boss? You were in a pretty good mood when—”

“I don’t have time for chitchat, Rance.” He thrust the two tax certificates at his foreman. “I want these papers served at once. Tonight. The time limit is up. If Mooney gives you any trouble, take care of him the way you took care of Pursall. As for that widow woman…damn, I don’t know what to do about her. I’m going to make a lot of enemies if I evict a war widow and two children.”

Rance scratched at his crotch thoughtfully, and Corey swore, “Damn it, man, why are you always digging at yourself down there? Do these trollops you cavort with give you lice?”

“Sorry, boss,” Rance mumbled. “Just a habit when I’m thinkin’ on something.”

“Think about Mattie Glass. I want her property because of that underground stream.”

“You know, she ain’t a bad-lookin’ piece of woman-flesh. I’ve noticed her sometimes in town. She’s got a nice body. Why don’t you just marry up with her and then you’ll have her land with no problem at all. When you get tired of her, you can pass her on to me and the boys…” His voice trailed off, and his large frame seemed to wither. “I was only trying to be funny,” he said.

“This is no time to be funny. I can’t do as I please until I have things under control. I want you to take some men and pay Mattie Glass a visit tonight. Put hoods on so you won’t be recognized, should anyone see you. Rough her up a little and put some fear into her. Tell her to sell her land or something terrible will happen to her boys.”

“I get it.” Rance smiled. He enjoyed this sort of thing. “You don’t want everybody saying you evicted a helpless war widow, so me and the boys scare her into selling, and we make sure she knows that if she dares tell anybody she was pressured, she’ll wish she hadn’t.”

“Exactly.”

“And what about old man Mooney?”

“Don’t waste your time talking to him. Just go over to his place and kill him and throw him in the river. Weigh him down good. Then I’ll wait a few weeks and file a claim for his property since I hold the tax certificate. By that time, we’ll have Mattie off her land. I’ll have both tracts, all nice and legal and respectable.”

“You sure got everything figured, boss.”

“Just don’t louse it up, Rance.” Corey eyed him warily. “I’ve got too much at stake.”

Corey straightened a few more papers on his desk, then put on his coat.

“How about Miss Kitty?”

“What about her?”

“I heard one of the niggers say they heard Doc Sims say she was getting better.”

“So?”

Rance looked uncomfortable. “Boss, I know you want to marry that woman, and I don’t blame you. She’s the prettiest filly I ever laid eyes on. I was just wondering how long it would be before you got what you wanted.”

“Not long, Rance.” Corey smiled. “Not long at all. You just take care of your business, and I’ll take care of mine. Everything is going to turn out all right. You’ll see.”

Chapter Twenty

The world had stopped spinning. The fog had finally lifted. Kitty could focus and make out people’s faces. She could lift her head without the racking nausea consuming her.

When the fever finally broke, she was dreaming that she was floundering in a choking sea and thousands of groping, clawing fingertips were clutching at her body, trying to pull her down. She fought against it, trying to rise, struggling against the forces seeking to drown her.

She opened her eyes and heard someone gasp, “Praise God, she’s coming out of it.” There was no sea of clutching fingers. It had been only a nightmare…a horrible nightmare. She wanted to stay awake, but her body was too weak. While she had awakened from a terrible dream, something was nagging in the back of her mind that told her another nightmare was beginning…and that this one was real.