Frail Blood (23 page)

His voice sounded harsh in his own ears, but he could not
help that. Emma had asked for the truth about the kind of man he had been, and
he would give it to her. "My wife was anything but a virgin. In fact,
within months of our marriage, while her belly grew large, I learned that she'd
slept with half the men in San Francisco."

"Oh, Malachi." A world of compassion lay in the
tenderness of her voice as she rose to stand before him.

"The child was not mine, but it still hurt to lose him
– a boy. All along I'd thought of him as mine and the loss was ... palpable, as
if part of my soul had been ripped out. Strange, isn't it? And I was not even
the boy's father."

"And then?"

"I wanted to thrash her, but I was persuaded by my
level-headed and reasonable friends simply to leave her." He smiled to
take the edge from his quip.

"She used you."

"That she did, Emma dear, but as I said, I was young
and foolish."

She touched his forearms lightly. "I'm not like
Constance." The tenor of her voice signaled a slippery purchase.

"You as good as lied about your virginity," he
retorted, regretting the words the moment they slipped from his mouth to muddy
the widening gulf between them.

"Yes," she whispered after a moment, "and I'm
sorry. I – I wanted to experience the ... excitement of being with you and I
went about it the wrong way."

"You guessed I'd refuse if I knew the truth."

"Yes," she admitted, "but I wanted you so
much I risked fooling you. I'm sorry now."

He was touched by the admission and wanted to believe it was
he alone she wanted, not just any man to satisfy her curiosity about sex and
passion.

"No wonder you were so angry with me," she
murmured.

"But look how well that turned out." He laughed,
stepped back lest his feelings for her overwhelm his good judgment. "We
are now colleagues and friends."

"You should not have put me in the same class as that
woman," she warned.

Chapter 24

"More sinn'd against than sinning." –
King
Lear

The crowd of people jockeyed to find a seat on the benches
of Judge Underwood's courtroom. Everyone clamored to witness the last comments
of the two attorneys in the most sensational trial of the county. Emma was
wedged between Stephen on her left and a large, florid man on her right who
reeked of tobacco and manure.

Prosecutor Fulton's remarks were unimaginative, but
thankfully brief. He recounted the murder in lurid detail, re-enacting the
supposed actions of Alma Bentley as she strapped the pistol to her ankle,
traversed the distance to the Machado home, and confronted her lover. Fulton
spat the last word as if it were a vile taste on his tongue.

His entire summation lasted ten minutes. By the smug look on
his face, Emma was certain that he was confident he'd made a cogent argument. She
observed the faces of the twelve men who alternately followed the peacock of
Fulton's posturing and darted glances of something like pity toward Alma
Bentley.

As Malachi began his concluding remarks to the jury, his
words struck her deeply. Alma was a poor, uneducated woman, he said, one who
depended upon the kindness of her employers for her livelihood. And yet, one of
these very bastions of responsibility betrayed her trust and confidence,
seduced her with promises of marriage, and then cast her aside without a qualm.

Malachi recounted the witnesses who'd testified to Alma's
sweet nature, her naiveté, and lack of sophistication. He spoke of her
ignorance. Emma felt a stab to her heart.

Her gullibility. The knife thrust deeper.

Her sorry, weak spirit so easily tempted by a womanizer. Her
final act of shooting Joseph Machado was the last step of her descent into
moral corruption. Without such a man as Joseph, Alma would never have committed
such a heinous sin.

Emma could not breathe. She despised the role Malachi had
thrust on Alma, one of a weak woman, unable to choose right from wrong without
a man's guidance. A woman so frail she was led into the sins of fornication by
a man.

Emma trembled. Did Malachi really believe this? If so, he
must believe that she, too, was as fragile and corrupt a vessel as Alma
Bentley.

He concluded his remarks, after which Fulton rose to add to
the prosecution's summation. Emma could wait no longer. She fled the jammed
courtroom, the sad, dreary form of Alma Bentley, the whole sordid mess of a case
that put a woman on trial for craving passion and sexual pleasure.

It was not right!

#

The jury retired for deliberations after Judge Underwood's
instructions delineating the specific charges and their meanings, as well as
their duties as jurors. Now the long delay began, Malachi thought.

The wait could be hours, days, or weeks. In his experience,
there was no way to predict how long a murder trial would take to come to its
conclusion, but he suspected the shorter the verdict, the less well the outcome
bode for his client.

He spoke words of encouragement to Alma and watched her
being led away to her stone cell. A weariness he'd not felt in a long time
settled in his bones and muscles as he looked about the now-empty courtroom for
Emma. He saw Stephen Knight jotting notes as he sat in the second row behind
the gallery divider.

"Stephen," he called as he strode toward the older
man and extended his hand in greeting. "How are you?"

"Just finishing the notes for the weekend edition."

"Perhaps you should wait. The jury may return a verdict
before then." Malachi smiled because both men knew a conclusion that soon
was highly unlikely.

"I'm preparing three versions of this edition."

"Three?"

Stephen laughed at the perplexed look on Malachi's face. "One
delineating the summations, another for an acquittal – "

"And a third for a guilty verdict," Malachi
concluded, finally understanding. He patted the older man's shoulder. "You
are a wise man, Stephen. I'm pleased Fulton's attempt to smear your name had
the reverse effect."

"Don't worry about me. I am a survivor of many inequalities."

Malachi looked around the room. "Have you seen where
Emma's got to? I expected her to wait for me."

"She rushed out before Charlie spun out his second line
of manure," Stephen said frankly. "She seemed upset, but I thought it
better to leave her be."

Malachi didn't have to ask why. He knew that his line of
argument for Alma's defense offended Emma. He wished he'd had another option,
but unfortunately, that one was his client's only hope for an acquittal.

He hadn't been able to read the jurors' faces, but he
believed she might have a chance. God, he hoped so. Alma Bentley did not
deserve to face a hangman's noose.

"No mention of where she was going?" he asked
Stephen.

Stephen shook his head, a sad look pulling his eyes down
into a sad, puppy-like expression. "No, but she was more than a little
disturbed. Perhaps
you
should find her."

But everywhere Malachi looked for Emma over the next several
hours, yielded nothing. She was not at
The Gazette
office, nor her home.
He even risked the wrath of her parents and rode the distance to their palatial
home in Sacramento for nothing but a chilly reception.

Where had Emma gone? What mischief was she likely to get
herself into? Malachi remembered the last time she'd run off in search of her
own investigation and a lump of ice settled in his chest at the thought of what
might happen to her if she again behaved so foolishly.

#

The train ride from Sacramento to Bakersfield took Emma less
time than she had supposed. When she stepped down from the car onto the
surprisingly sturdy platform of the train station, she looked about for a
conveyance to take her to the home of Aaron Machado.

Undoubtedly Malachi would consider her actions foolish –
unplanned and impetuous
. Once again.
And perhaps he was correct, but
when she'd watched him present his concluding remarks to the jury, she felt an
overwhelming urgency to ascertain the truth about the murder of Joseph Machado.

She could do nothing for Alma in court – her fate was now in
the hands of the jury – but Aaron Machado, the older brother, seemed like a
good starting place to unravel the mystery. Abhorrent as it was she had more
than a niggling suspicion that the man might've fathered the slain Joseph, Jr.

The very notion of such a liaison sent prickles of revulsion
and disgust over her skin, but she was not so naïve as to believe such conduct
was impossible. Particularly in a household fraught with such dark secrets and
careless adults as in the Machado residence.

The elder Machado son resided in a small bungalow at the
edge of Bakersfield surrounded by more dust than Emma had ever seen in her life.
Raised in the lush San Joaquin Valley amid the long growing seasons and
plenteous fruits and vegetables throughout the year, she'd hardly considered
how barren the area looked this time of year.

But today she was grateful for both the lack of heat and
lack of rainfall.

A long span of dirt and whirling eddies of dust gathered
around the house and its outbuildings. Today an aura of desertion lay around
the place although she glimpsed a chicken coop at the side of the house and a
horse corralled nearby.

While not exactly prosperous, Aaron Machado seemed to have
made something of himself in this thriving railroad town. Perhaps he didn't
need or covet his father's money after all.

Taking her courage in hand, Emma rapped sharply on the door.
After a moment of silence, she knocked again, this time more loudly.

At last, she heard a shuffling of feet and the door swung
open. A large, beefy man with features eerily similar to Joseph Machado, Sr.,
stood in the door frame, silhouetted against the dark interior.

"Yes?" he growled, standing in shirt sleeves and
trousers, his suspenders dangling from his waist. Obviously she'd interrupted
his evening meal because a large cloth was tucked into his shirt neck and his
jaw was smeared with grease.

"Mr. Machado?"

"Yeah?"

"Mr. Aaron Machado?"

The man raked his eyes over her apparel, taking in the
finery of her suit, her broad-rimmed hat, gloves, and jewelry, nodded his head and
softened his tone. "How may I help you?"

"I'm Emma Knight from Sacramento. May I have a moment? I
– I've come to speak to you about your brother Joseph." Emma hesitated and
looked back at the horse and cart which had driven her to the outskirts of town.

She belatedly weighed the wisdom of her hasty decision to
approach Aaron Machado alone. She risked far more than her reputation by
entering his house.

Would the driver wait for her to finish her business even
though she'd paid him a considerable amount to remain? Her experience at the river
dock in Sacramento had made her decidedly skittish on the matter.

However, she took a deep breath, girded up her loins, and
ploughed on. "May I come in?"

Machado's stolid face remained blank and his voice silent,
but after a moment he opened the door wider, allowing her entrance into a
small, but tidy sitting room. "Excuse me a moment," he said, waving
towards a large overstuffed chair.

When he returned minutes later, he'd donned a jacket,
although not a neck cloth, and wiped at his face, presenting a much less
threatening appearance. This boded well. Although he did not offer her
refreshment, he began cordially enough by waiting for her to be seated before
plopping himself down on the shabby sofa opposite the chair he'd indicated for
her use.

"Now," he began, threading the fingers of his
beefy hands, "what can I do for you, Miss Knight?"

How to begin such a delicate and potentially dangerous
topic? Emma clutched her handbag tightly, feeling the outline of her father's
purloined Deringer through the soft fabric. "I – I thought perhaps you
could tell me something about your brother's early life."

"He'd dead now," Machado answered bluntly. "Why
do you want to know about his life now he's gone?"

"I'm helping to investigate his murder."

Machado shook his head as if the dreariness of his brother's
death was a mere irritant, but Emma detected the twitching of his hands. "I
hardly knew little Joe," he answered, drawing a blunt finger down the side
of his nose. "I was a grown lad when he was born."

"But you were there the night of his birth?"

He glanced at her suspiciously. "Who told you that?"

"Mrs. Henderson. The midwife. She seemed to think that
you cared very much for your little brother."

"Humph, damned busy body – begging your pardon, miss."
He rose, jammed his large hands into his trouser pockets, and stared out the
front window to the dirt and Joshua trees dotting the surrounding land. "I
left when Joe was a little fellow, two or three, never been back."

Emma twisted in her chair to watch him. "If you don't
mind my asking, why is that, Mr. Machado? Why did you leave?"

The man kept his back to her as he barked out a harsh laugh.
"She wouldn't let up. Kept after me like a mad woman. I – I thought after
the babe was born, she'd let it go, take care of him, leave me alone, but ... "

His voice trailed off and when he turned to face Emma, the
ragged look on his face spoke of grief and agony the likes of which she'd never
seen.

"Why did you not attend Joseph's funeral?" she
asked, her voice a gravelly whisper that hardly reached the distance to where
Machado stood with the pain of his long-kept secret.

"Because
she
would be there and I couldn't face
her again." His face twisted in an ugly grimace. "And my father – the
bastard would be there too!"

He did not apologize for his epithet, and the sudden
blasphemy shocked Emma. Aaron Machado was a man who'd done unspeakable acts
when younger. She was now certain of that fact. Why, then should it shock her
that he murdered his own son? The gap between incest and murder was surely not
so great a chasm on the broad spectrum of evil.

He stared her down with hard, black eyes and Emma felt a
tremor begin in her legs and travel upward to her hands as her grip tightened
on her handbag. Would she have time to remove the pistol and aim before he
reached her?

"There were – are – evil people living in that house,
Miss Knight. You must surely see that now."

"Yes," she murmured, taking in the embodiment of
one of those evil persons standing before her, confessing to the shocking deed.
She hardened her heart and her words came out like stones of indictment. "And
there were victims."

Suddenly his demeanor changed, his voice softened, and his
thick lips trembled as if he were a penitent asking forgiveness. "Victims,
yes, you're right. Dupes. Innocents."

All bluster fell away as the man sank to his knees, burying
his head in his hands. "Poor baby Joe, he was the greatest victim of us
all." Machado's muffled voice shook with remorse and desolation.

"And Phoebe, of course." Emma stood over the man,
feeling revulsion and compassion for the man at the same time. "Do not forget
your sister Phoebe and what you did to her."

The clock ticked loudly in the corner of the room, marking
the passage of long minutes while Emma trembled in righteous anger and Aaron
Machado sobbed into his hands.

Finally, she swept toward the door, turning back to him with
her hand on the knob. "No doubt, the sheriff will be in contact with you
as soon as I inform him of your ... vile and unspeakable relationship with your
sister."

"What?" The bewilderment in Machado's voice was
genuine and unmistakable. "What the devil are you talking about?"

"Phoebe – the mother of your child." The words were
an ugly cancer on her tongue.