The union, p.20
The Union, page 20
Understanding washed over her expression. "When?" She stepped back to the stove, pulling the pans off and turning it off.
"Tomorrow, before daybreak. Keel, they're going to be setting up a blockade this afternoon. We have to go."
She nodded understanding and wordlessly turned toward the hall.
He followed her into the bedroom. Damn, how was he going to stand losing her?
She pulled her satchel from beneath the bed.
"Make sure you have everything—the money, clothes…" His voice cracked.
She faced away from him as she nodded and struggled with a large trunk. As he stepped to her aid, she turned, looked up at him with tears in her eyes, and threw herself into his arms.
"Keely." Damn, why did he have to be so inept?
"McCullough—"
He pressed his fingers to her lips. "I'll take care. I'll be all right—everything will be." He'd never told a bigger lie. Nothing would ever be right again without her.
She pressed her cheek against his chest.
He lost control. He had to have her one last time. He began unbuttoning her blouse.
"McCullough—"
"Don't say anything, Keely. Grunt and scream and moan if you like, but don't call my name." He undressed her urgently, wanting to see her in full one last time. Then he shrugged off his pants and underthings and carried her to the bed. Just this once, he didn't want to hear McCullough's name yelled in passion.
He made love to her urgently, thrusting wildly, both of them bucking until the headboard bounced and pounded the wall. The sounds of men outside in the streets marching and drilling faded away. Until they were both breathless and sparkling with exertion. Until he knew that part of him would die without her. Finally, completion washed over him, cleansing like cool stream water. No matter his duplicity with her, no matter the wrong he had done Keely, he loved her with a part of himself that he hadn't known existed. A part of him pure and unjaded, and vulnerable. She would never know, but he had given her that part of himself—his love, something he had never given before, and doubted he would again.
He rolled from her, the urgent need to get her to safety returning. He kissed her neck and pulled her to her feet.
They dressed silently, hurriedly.
When they finished, he spoke unnecessarily, "To Wallace."
Everything seemed inadequate. There were no words. No words.
Keely stood in the doorway of the Hotel Wallace and watched McCullough walk away, down the street to the train depot, back to Gem. His shoulders set, back straight, he looked proud and determined, confident.
She kept picturing his face, hearing his words as he wished her goodbye. I love you, Keely. I love you.
Why had he looked suddenly haggard? He seemed desperate for her to understand, and yet, his fears had never been founded. She knew he loved her. She had always known, from the first moment she laid eyes on him.
Was there something more he wasn't telling her? Blast him! He was half Irish. With their little people and pots of gold, Irish folk looked notoriously superstitious. But McCullough had never seemed so. She attributed it to his pragmatic Scots half. But now, she more than sensed, she knew he had told her goodbye, not for now, forever. She shivered in the heat. Had he a premonition of his own death? She believed in intuition. She'd felt it when Michael died. She felt a dread now, a sense of something amiss or about to go afoul.
She tried to force aside her own superstitious nature, and willed him to turn back and give her one last look before he departed from sight. But her thoughts brought no action. Determination drove him. He didn't mean to look back, but what did he see ahead?
A voice shook her from her thoughts. "That your man walking away?"
She hadn't noticed the stranger approach. She nodded mutely.
"I saw you two at the train station."
McCullough disappeared around a corner. She turned her gaze to the stranger, trying to place him, remember him. But truth be told, she couldn't remember anything past McCullough. The man next to her wore a sympathetic expression and looked kindly enough, non-threatening.
"Thoughtful man," the stranger said. "He tried to get you out of the Valley to safety, didn't he?"
Keely's hollow laugh came out more of a snort. "Is there such a thing as safety? Does a safe place exist?" She turned and walked into the hotel lobby.
The man followed her. "There's safer places right now than the Valley, miss."
"Judging from the crowd at the station, and the unavailability of trains, it would appear most people think so. I couldn't get a train out until tomorrow morning."
"That so. Smart men are seeing the wives and children out of the Valley." The man paused. "You look like you could use a friendly ear and a little something to perk you up. Could I buy you a cup of coffee, Miss—"
He waited for her to give her name. His tone held no flirtation, and there seemed to be nothing untoward, nothing other than kindness behind his words, but she felt no need for companionship just now.
"Mrs. McCullough. Thank you for your offer, but no thank you."
The man's expression lit up. He smiled in apparent recognition. "Would your man happen to be Ian McCullough?"
"Yes. Do you know him?"
"Not well, but I thought your husband looked familiar. Just couldn't place him without a name. I'm a member of the Butte City Miners' Union. They sent me over to help out the boys here.
"I met McCullough when he came through Montana. Your husband's reputation preceded him. Will he be involved in the big doings expected?"
The man's tone remained friendly and pleasant, but something about him made her wary. "My husband doesn't share his business with me, sir."
The man cleared his throat; embarrassment crept into his expression. "I didn't mean to be prying, ma'am. But I can see you're worried, and I just thought to set your mind at ease. I'm heading up to Gem, and I just thought that I might be able to look out for him for you. You don't happen to know where he'll be, do you, so that I can look him up?"
"No." Something about the man's persistence worried her. She walked away abruptly. Fortunately, he didn't follow.
Dietz didn't sleep at all that night, didn't even try. He had sneaked up to warn Monihan about the coming attack and then returned to Gem where he hung out at Daxon's saloon drinking with his union buddies, pressing for more information, for anything that would be useful later in convicting these thugs.
He couldn't see any way to avert the coming violence. Monihan, with fewer than one hundred men, couldn't stop the hordes of angry union men bent on revenge. Throughout the night the town had swelled with over a thousand of them. Dietz had run into Patterson up at the Gem Mine where Patterson stayed, helping keep watch, while Dietz went back to town to glean what news he could.
Dietz's head pounded. Too damned much alcohol. He needed something to eat. He excused himself. Facing the empty boardinghouse would mean facing life without Keely. He couldn't do it. He went to the Nelson Hotel. The French chef there knew how to cook a good breakfast. He had just settled into a booth when Tom Whalen shouted from outside. "Watch me shoot that damned nose off!"
A shot rang out. One of the waitresses screamed. The French chef came out of the kitchen, still holding a stack of wood, as if he'd just come from the woodpile. "Jim over at White & Bender's store poked his head out to see what was what and those fools shot at him!"
Dietz was McCullough now. He smiled warmly, amused. "Did they hit him?"
"Just missed." The chef retreated to the kitchen, shaking his head.
The shot's a blasted signal, a call to action, Dietz thought. Just as the waitress took his order, Patterson crawled in the side window, looking like a man on the run.
Dietz flashed him a calm, cocky smile. "If you're thinking of running, Mr. Allison, you had better think again. We've got guards everywhere. Why don't you just head on back home and wait until we're ready to deal with you?"
"To hell with you, McCullough." Patterson headed for the kitchen and the back door.
Dietz followed.
The French chef stopped Patterson short. "They've got fifty guards posted out there waiting to ambush you, Mr. Allison."
"I just came through there ten minutes ago. There weren't more than three." Patterson poked his head out and ducked back in.
Dietz casually drew his Colt and pointed it at Patterson. "I told you to get on home."
Before Patterson could move a lone man came up the boardwalk from the swamp out back, in shirtsleeves and unarmed.
"Ivory Bean," the French chef said.
Dietz cursed inwardly. Bean was a Thiel guard from up at the Gem Mine. What fool's errand brought him to town?
"I come in peace. The scab who got himself beat up the other day is dying. He needs medicine—"
The reverberation of a shot cracked the air. From out back, in the shade of the overhanging trees in the swamp, Dietz spotted a quick glimpse of Lunn Gaffney holding a gun aimed at Bean's back.
Bean fell face forward onto the boardwalk. A solemn red stain soaked his shirt. Shots whizzed through the air. No one moved to help Bean. There wasn't any point—he was dead.
Chapter 17
Women and children packed the Wallace train station. Tired, frightened, frustrated, and hopeful, they sought passage out of the Silver Valley. Eerily, and in sharp contrast to the norm, hardly a man made an appearance. Keely watched the ticket window as she waited on the platform to board her train to Spokane. McCullough had been wise to purchase her ticket the night before. She should be grateful for it, but she wasn't. Instead, she kept moving toward the back of the platform.
A young woman with a baby on her hip begged the cashier at the ticket window for a ticket, any ticket, to anywhere. Keely couldn't drag her gaze away from them, or the harried clerk who kept shaking his head. No. Nothing. No. At last the cashier gave up, stepped back from the window and pulled down his shade. The woman, tears standing in her eyes, stepped away, trying to coo to her baby, but she looked more like she needed comforting herself.
She should be on that train, Keely thought. A mother's life, and that of her child, is worth more than mine.
The train pulled up and braked with a great snort of steam. No incoming passengers departed. No one wanted into the Valley. The conductor set the steps up into the entrance. The crowd Keely stood in rushed forward, propelling her with them.
She shouldn't be here. If she left the Valley she'd never see McCullough again. A small voice seemed to speak in her mind saying, Leave. Go to him. Save him.
Suddenly, she knew her fate was wrapped around his, so intertwined it couldn't be separated. Come what may, she was going to be with him. She turned on her heel and fought her way upstream out of the crowd.
At the edge of the depot lobby, she found the young woman and handed her the ticket. "Go. Take your child to safety."
The woman hesitated only an instant. When the train gave another roar of steam, she murmured her thanks, snatched the ticket from Keely's outstretched hand, and ran for the train, baby and bags bouncing around her.
Two souls saved, Keely thought. Without looking back at the departing train, she ran for the street. She had to find a way to get back to Gem and past the blockade. As if sent by fate, Joe Poynton, recording secretary for the Central Union, rode up the street. She ran out into his path, waving and calling.
"Mrs. McCullough. You're like to get yourself killed jumping out in front of a man like that!"
His reprimand didn't set her back at all. "Are you heading to Gem?"
"I am, and in a hurry." He appeared agitated and put out with her.
"Then you're taking me back with you."
"No, ma'am. It isn't safe."
"I'm going one way or another. I'll be far safer with you than anyone else. The boys will be sure to let you through the blockade. If you don't want my blood on your hands, you'll give me a hand up." She stayed firmly planted in his path.
He motioned for her to come round and extended his hand. "But be quick about it."
###
For an instant Dietz, the French chef, Patterson, and the waitress were all too stunned to react. Shots buzzed through the air like angry bees around a hive. No one dared go out after Bean's body. Patterson got his senses back and sneaked back through the window over to his own building. How the hell Patterson meant to escape now, Dietz couldn't fathom, but he had to get moving himself. McCullough was expected at the bridge to post his men to defend the town from scabs and prevent any reinforcements from reaching the mine.
"Looks like I've been called to action," Dietz said, tipped his head to the waitress, and headed for the bridge.
Lunn headed the men that held the blockade. Keely saw him as they rode up. Lunn kept his gun trained on them. Mr. Poynton rode unflinching into the face of all those gun barrels, keeping Keely shielded and out of sight behind him.
"Halt!" Lunn called out. "Or we fire."
"Drop the guns, Gaffney," Mr. Poynton retorted. "It's Poynton and Mrs. McCullough."
"Keely?" Lunn's gun fell as he called his men off.
Poynton rode through the lines.
Lunn waited to help her off the horse. "Keely," he said again softly. "What are you doing here? I thought you fled to safety."
She didn't feel like explaining. "I had to come back."
Lunn turned to Mr. Poynton, who waved him over and asked for a briefing. The two men walked a short distance away from her, and though she strained to hear, she caught very few words.
Lunn whispered something to Mr. Poynton, who in turn looked shocked and then angry. Lunn said, "I'll tell her. I'll take her home."
Mr. Poynton replied. "I'm counting on you, Lunn. Take care of things."
Lunn nodded. Mr. Poynton slapped him on the back and went for his horse. Lunn came to her, looking uncertain. Displeasure colored his expression as he took her arm and roughly pulled her away. "You shouldn't have come back."
He seemed more put out than concerned. His whole attitude baffled her. "I'll take you to Lacy's. Her house is on the edge of town. It shouldn't see much action."
Keely shook off his grip. "You'll take me nowhere. I'm going home."
A thunderous roar cut off further words. The sound hurled down the Valley, deafening aftershocks echoing in its wake. The ground shook. Seconds later another blast sounded, silencing her screams. When realization hit her, she kept thinking the same thoughts over and over again. Oh, dear God, they've blown up the mines. Please help us.
There was no return for the boys now, no salvation. They had crossed the line. When the law took over again, they would be punished. Michael, how right you were! How many lives had the men ruined with their rash and inexcusable violence?
Lunn pulled her into a crushing embrace. He was one of them—one who would be destroyed. Him and McCullough.
As silence settled in an irrational wave of apprehension crashed over Keely. "McCullough!"
Lunn shook her. His eyes shone almost wickedly. "You can't save him now. You shouldn't have come, Keely. McCullough is a dead man."
"No! Liar!" She rebelled, though his words made no sense.
Lunn grabbed her in a grip so intense it frightened her, and pulled her face into his. "Listen to me, Keely. I don't know how else to tell you this. McCullough is dead."
"No, how can you know?" Panic coursed through her. Was she too late?
"You don't understand," Lunn said, forcing her to look at him as she struggled to pull away. "McCullough has been dead for months now."
She stared at him, dazed.
"The man you know as McCullough is a fake, a private detective, the man who killed McCullough in Thompson's Falls in May."
She stared at him. How could even Lunn make up such a lie?
The explosion shook the bridge. Timbers creaked and swayed. Horses whinnied and reared. Dietz's men scrambled to get a grip on the rails, or ran to shore, anything for stability. In the distance a tall pillar of smoke eased into the sky over the Frisco Mill, lazily curling heavenward into the blue. As the men realized the big plan had come off curses turned to whoops of excitement.
Damn, they've done it. Dietz stared off into the distance. Just a few more days to hang on and the mission would be over. Then Dietz could ride off to another assignment, one far away from Keely, one where he could forget.
A young man near him seemed unmoved with joy, more contemplative, almost regretful. When Dietz stared at him the fellow grimaced and shrugged. "I wish they hadn't of done it. There had to be another way. We're all in trouble now. You can't just go dynamiting mines and shooting folks up without paying some kind of price." The young man nodded toward his compatriots. "They haven't realized it yet, but we're all going to pay for this."
The boy was right. If the Governor had any sense at all he'd declare a state of civil unrest and call in the state militia. Dietz began making calculations, trying to figure out how to save Patterson and stay under cover long enough to make sure none of the union bosses escaped before they paid the price.
It took nearly half an hour to calm the horses and get his men back in place. By that time kegs of whiskey and beer were being rolled from saloons into the street. The men drank and caroused and abandoned rank, leaving Dietz and a few loyal men to patrol the bridge.
A lone rider emerged from the woods on the far side of the creek and drew to a halt at the end of the bridge. Fear rode down Dietz's spine, raising gooseflesh as it went. Images making rapid connections flashed through his mind—the horseman, a job Dietz had done for the railroad in Wyoming. Dan McBride. How had he gotten out of jail?
"Dietz, or should I say McCullough, nice to see you again," McBride called out. Malice danced in his eyes.
Dietz posed casually as his heart pounded furiously in his ears. The bastard knew who he really was. Who had he told? His cover was blown for sure.
"McBride." Did McBride intend to drop Dietz here on the bridge?
McBride made no move for his firearm.
As Dietz leaned against the bridge rail, he surreptitiously palmed his Derringer. McBride stood in range of the tiny pistol. Dietz refused to go down without a fight.
