Mercury's Rise (Silver Rush 04) (13 page)
“I show him your picture every night,” Harmony insisted. “Inez, I’m sorry. I should have warned you that lately, Wilkie, that is, William, has been afraid of strangers.”
“I’m not a stranger!” Inez snapped. “I’m his mother!”
“Of course you are.” She closed her eyes, as if praying for patience, then opened them again, speaking slowly and carefully. “When you gave him into my care, he was eight months old. How much does a child that young remember? I don’t know, but it has been that length of time and half as much again. I show him your photo, talk of you to him every day.”
Harmony approached Lily and William. “Wilkie.” Harmony gently stroked his back. He raised his head at her voice. Harmony guided Lily around, so William was facing Inez again. “This is your mama,” she continued. “Remember the pictures of the pretty lady I show you every night? Mama, Wilkie. Mama.”
For one heart-stopping second, William’s hazel-eyed gaze touched Inez—a brief examination that burned to her soul. His scrutiny returned to Harmony, who was smiling and nodding encouragingly, as if willing him to say the word Inez had been longing to hear.
Lily’s hair still clenched firmly with one hand, William reached for Harmony with the other, saying with triumph:
“Mama!”
Inez turned and blundered away into the crowd, fighting to control her distress.
“Inez!” Harmony hurried after her.
Inez scrubbed at her eyes, denying the tears that threatened to overwhelm, before taking a deep breath and facing her sister. She forced herself to speak calmly. “You were right. I should not have approached him like that. I’m certain he’s tired, probably hungry. I need to be by myself for a while, Harmony. Please. I will join you later.”
Harmony laid a detaining hand on Inez’s sleeve. Inez fought the impulse to shake it off.
“He has never called me mama. That is, he did early on, but I and Lily have corrected him at every turn.”
Inez didn’t want to hear any more. “I need some time to myself. I will see you in a while. I will begin again with William after he is rested.”
She began walking away, blindly, and nearly crashed into one of the small donkey carts.
“Whoa, ma’am!” The donkey wrangler leading the head burro hurried back to her. “Are you all right?”
Steadying herself on the lip of the cart, Inez looked up. The first thing that registered was the red kerchief tied around the wrangler’s neck. Even so, it took a moment for Inez to see, through her misery, that the man in a much worn corduroy jacket and an equally worn short crown derby was Gene Morrow, the driver of the ill-fated stagecoach.
Morrow, who had taken her elbow to steady her, squinted at her, the dust caking up into the wrinkles around his eyes. He stepped closer, a concerned frown barely visible beneath his drooping mustache. “Mrs. Stannert? Are you feeling faint, ma’am?” Alarm was in his tone. He turned away, cupping his mouth, preparing, Inez was certain, to call for reinforcements to help her into the hotel. Seeing Lily mounting the steps, with William still in her arms, Inez knew that was the last place she wanted to be right then.
“Mr. Morrow, no,” she said quickly. “I am fine, just a little overcome by the heat and dust. I was not watching where I was walking.” She swiped at her eyes, grateful to have a reason to wipe the telltale tracks away. “I was just seeking some fresh air. Is there a place to walk, somewhere quiet and cooler?”
Morrow studied her for a moment longer. Apparently satisfied that she wouldn’t keel over if he released her, he pointed around the far side of the house, toward a tangle of darker green. “There be a walking path over yonder, Lovers’ Lane, with plenty of places to sit. It runs from here to the Cliff House, and beyond to the Manitou House.”
With a murmur of thanks, Inez began to move away.
“Ma’am.”
She turned.
He reached into the cart, saying, “Sun is pretty strong here. Addles the brain without a body even realizing.” He pulled out a large-brimmed straw hat, adding, “Mr. Lewis insists I bringst extra headgear for the tykes and ladies who aren’t prepared.” He held the hat out to her.
She hesitated, then realizing that wandering outside without a hat would only serve to draw unwanted attention, accepted it from him. “Thank you.”
He watched as she tied the ribbons under her chin before touching his hat brim and saying, “Anything else you need, just ask.”
He stopped, as if contemplating saying something further, but in the end, simply touched his hat brim again and returned his attention to the lead donkey.
Inez headed around the far side of the house, toward the shadowed break in the wall of trees and bushes. She entered the cool dimness, and a sigh escaped. The light was softer, tinged with green, and the air carried a hint of moisture. Wild clematis and trees with peeling, scrubby bark hugged the path, shadowing it with their leaves and branches. Birds twittered and there was the muted plashing of a small creek or waterway, hidden beyond the green curtain.
It had been a long time since she was surrounded by so much green. In Leadville, trees were sparse, having been cut down early and reborn as buildings and boardwalks for the rapidly growing boomtown. Outside of town, evergreens of various types and size still existed, but nowhere was the growth as dense as what surrounded her at that moment.
Inez walked, eyes downcast, letting the sounds fill her and guide her thoughts.
I should not have assumed he would remember me. I was foolish to swoop down upon him like that.
Getting to know her son again was probably more than she could hope to accomplish in two weeks. Inez stopped in the path, realizing that she wouldn’t even have William to herself for that long. Mark would arrive within the week and everything would change yet again. She had no doubt that she would then have an additional rival for William’s limited attentions and affection: William’s father, Mark.
As it is, we may both lose out to Lily.
A wave of jealousy, more intense than any she’d ever experienced, swept her from head to toe, leaving her shaking and shaken. She stood still, in the center of the path, until the wave subsided. With a clearer head, she decided that whatever was done would be done for William’s sake.
Her attention returned to the world around her, and she became aware of another sound, weaving through that of birds and water. Somewhere, nearby, a woman was sobbing.
Inez followed the sound around a bend in the path. The path opened to allow room for a rustic bench with an intimate view of the previously unseen creek. The bench was occupied by Mrs. Pace in her somber, travel-worn black ensemble. An abandoned black travel hat with a puddle of net lay on the bench next to her. Head bowed, she gripped a pair of dark gloves in one bare hand, tight to her lap. With the other hand, she wiped her eyes with a lace handkerchief, then crunched the delicate cloth savagely into a wad.
Inez paused, uncertain whether to melt back around the corner without saying anything or to venture forward and disturb Mrs. Pace’s solitude.
The decision was made for her when Mrs. Pace swung around, red-rimmed eyes wide, and said, “Oh, Mrs. Stannert, it’s you.” Her shoulders sagged.
“I’m, I’m so sorry for your loss,” stammered Inez, falling back on courtesy. “I apologize for intruding. Excuse me.” She started to back away.
“No, please, after that ghastly interview with the marshal and the doctor, I thought of trying to see you this afternoon.” Kirsten Pace moved the hat to her lap. “If you would, just a moment of your time.”
She looked down at the hat and bit her lip. As Inez approached, she burst out, “I don’t even have proper mourning clothes. The children and I, our travel clothes are the closest things we have, to show our respect.” Fresh tears glimmered in her eyes and spilled out over her cheeks.
Inez leaned forward. “Mrs. Pace, truly, none will fault you. Such an unexpected tragedy, and so far from home.”
“And here we stay,” she said through gritted teeth. “No sooner had I arranged for a telegram to be sent to Edward’s brother, asking him to come to Colorado right away, than I was required to go talk to the doctor and the marshal. The marshal apologized for the intrusion, but Dr. Prochazka…he may be a brilliant physician, although I sometimes wonder, but the man has no human feelings.”
She brought the damp linen back up to her eyes. “Excuse me, Mrs. Stannert, for this display of emotion.”
“Please, call me Inez. It is I who should ask your forgiveness for disturbing you.” Inez resisted the urge to put an arm around the sorrowing woman’s shoulders. “So, is your brother-in-law coming to take you and your children home? Is that why you remain?”
Mrs. Pace shook her head. “Eric is, was, Edward’s business partner. The hotelier, Mr. Lewis, actually had the gall to ask me this morning what would happen to the business negotiations my husband had initiated.” She looked up, anger slicing through the tears. “I urged Edward not to get involved in something like this. We came for my health, but he was seduced by the visions Mr. Lewis and his cohorts painted of Manitou’s future. What does, did, Edward know of health spas and such? Nothing!”
Inez held up a hand to stop her. “Your husband was forging a business agreement with Mr. Lewis?” Warning bells clanged loud in her mind. “You were against this?”
Mrs. Pace plucked at the net attached to her hat, then focused her eyes skyward, on the green canopy overhead. “I told Edward that the air and the exercise seemed to help. I don’t believe in tonics. My father was a physician, and he claimed nostrums and such were nothing more than snake oil. But, Edward was so happy with the improvements in my health while we stayed here, and I thought, well, the tonic may not help, but it cannot hurt.” She stopped. “Maybe,” she said in a small voice, “I was wrong.”
Inez leaned forward, intent, waiting for her to continue. When she didn’t, Inez asked, “What do you mean?”
Mrs. Pace pressed her lips together until they whitened. Then, she burst out, “My husband did not have a weak heart! I refuse to believe the lies they told me about him.”
“Who? What lies?”
“Dr. Prochazka insists that Edward died from some effect of the altitude that compromised his health drastically. He even suggested that being exposed to air of Leadville could have killed him.”
“If that were the case,” said Inez, “why didn’t he improve when we came down from the mountains?”
“My question exactly,” said the widow, twisting, and then smoothing the kid glove which now rested atop the hat. “Dr. Prochazka pooh-poohed my questions and said Edward was not a young man and that such things happen.”
“Such
things?
” Inez was appalled at the physician’s apparent insensitivity to the young widow’s distress.
She nodded, then continued, “I don’t believe for a moment that Edward died in such a way. I wondered about the tonic, although I have been taking it without side effects. Still, Edward was planning on signing the business agreement when he returned. Now, it’s all quite a mess.” She looked at Inez. “I know we have just met, but my hope is that you might help me. You were there when Edward died. You saw how he took the nostrum, and how it precipitated his collapse.”
“Do you think your medicine killed your husband?” The small brown bottles for Harmony and William flashed through her mind’s eye. “But, Mrs. Pace, that tonic was meant for you.”
The women stared at each other.
“Are you still taking that elixir?” Inez asked.
Mrs. Pace’s mouth set in a stubborn line. “This morning, I poured the day’s dose into the potted plant in our room.”
Inez sank back into the bench seat, thinking.
Neither woman said anything for a moment. Then, Mrs. Pace sighed, a sound pulled from her soul. She said abruptly, “I know your sister.”
Inez blinked. “Ah! I heard. The DuChamps had thought to accompany you to Leadville, but changed their minds.”
Mrs. Pace slipped on one glove, flexed her fingers into the slim pockets. “Edward was not the only one looking at investing in the hotel and the medical clinic.”
Then, unexpectedly, she laid her hand atop Inez’s.
Inez looked up to find the widow’s piercing blue eyes boring into her. “My husband and Mr. DuChamps talked frequently late into the nights about how and where to invest in this area,” she said. “Edward confided in me about some of their discussions, about how they dissected the pros and cons of one venture against the other, about what businesses they thought were poised to flourish and what ones seemed destined to fail. I know they were talking with General Palmer in Colorado Springs, Dr. Bell here in Manitou, Mr. Lewis here at the hotel, and with some of the physicians, including Dr. Prochazka and Dr. Zuckerman.”
Surely, surely, this shadow does not fall on my sister and my son.
Inez’s insides curled in fear.
Mrs. Pace continued, “I must concentrate on the children and on what I’m going to tell my brother-in-law, and what I will do once he arrives. Would you, could you, please, just watch and inquire.”
“Why do you think I could help?” Inez asked. “Truly, I’m here to spend time with family. I know nothing, or at least, very little, about this area, its businesses and its residents.”