Delilah's Flame (5 page)

His father had been dead a couple of months when word reached him. Tabor Randall Stanton. The man who’d given him his life, his name. He’d been a strong, vital man once, before the bottle got him. Tabor had been a lad of sixteen when his father packed him and his mother off to a ranch owned by his mother’s sister and her husband. The older Stanton had promised it wouldn’t be long before he joined them. He’d wanted to work a claim a little longer.

His father had never come, not even when Tabor’s mother died. Stan had never gone back to his claim either. He’d wandered around from town to town, doing enough work to buy his whiskey. Later he had gone down to Mexico and stayed a long spell. By that time Tabor no longer wanted to see his father. He’d seen too much hurt in his mother’s eyes all those years of waiting. Eventually Tabor had left the ranch and gone into the navy.

After resigning his naval commission he’d returned to the ranch and his Aunt Sarah had told him his father was ill. She insisted Tabor go and see him. He’d resisted, but given in when Aunt Sarah said it was what his mother would want. He knew that was true. She’d loved his father until the day she died.

Tabor led the stallion behind the shack and tied him in a shady spot. While the horse pawed impatiently, he filled a bucket from the water barrel.

“Easy, Admiral,” he said. “I don’t like it here either. Steady, boy. We won’t stay long.” Placing the wooden bucket within the horse’s reach, he gave the animal a pat beneath the mane. What his father had in that shack could hardly have been worth the ride. A man named Cleve Wilkins had written that his father left some things for his son, with instructions not to give them to anyone else. He’d been tempted not to come, but Aunt Sarah, who was as good as his conscience, had sent him off again. Well, here he was, and anxious to be done with it.

“Howdy.” The greeting came from a face with so many wrinkles it was hard to tell which one was the mouth. “Name’s Wilkins. I buried your pa.”

Tabor extended a hand and shook the weathered one offered by Wilkins. “Thanks,” he said.

“Ain’t no need. Stan weren’t much, but he was my friend. Known him since he came up outta Mexico. Me and him did some prospectin’ together. This here’s my shack,” he said, ambling past Tabor and inside. Tabor followed.

The shack looked the same as before, sparsely furnished with a table, two straight-back chairs, a single bunk, and many empty whiskey bottles. “I didn’t see you when I was here before,” Tabor remarked.

“Naw. I was in the hills. Jest came back here ever’ month or so. Last time I found your pa dyin’. He was down by Fetter’s Creek. Stan never got strong again after that bout of fever last year. Musta fell and broke his neck. Weren’t no time to send fer a doc. Wouldn’ta done no good no way. He only choked out a few words ‘fore he died, bubblin’ blood out with them. Think he wanted to go anyhow.” Wilkins sat in one chair and offered the other to Tabor. With his teeth the prospector pulled the cork from a half-empty bottle. He wiped the neck on his sleeve. “Want a drink?” Tabor declined. Wilkins upended the bottle and guzzled down most of the contents. “Best thing fer cuttin’ dust outta a man’s whistle. You stayin’ the night?”

“No. I’ll be going on into town, heading out tomorrow.” Tabor pulled the leather tobacco pouch from his shirt pocket and started rolling a cigarette. Seeing Wilkins eye him covetously, he offered the pouch to the old man. “Keep it,” he said.

Looking pleased, Wilkins rolled a cigarette for himself and lit it. “Been outta tobaccy awhile,” he said. “Don’t git into town much. That’s what took so long gittin’ a letter off. Had to git somebody to write it fer me.”

Tabor frowned. It was hard to think the man his mother had talked about with such pride had ended up like Wilkins. Why did a man who had a loving family let go of everything to become an aimless prospector and a drunk? His mother had never stopped hoping her husband would come back to her. Over those years she waited, she let herself believe he was trying to save enough money to make a down payment on the ranch bordering Jeb and Sarah Cooke’s property. Even back then Tabor could see his mother held on to an empty dream, one that eventually broke her heart.

Tabor finished his cigarette and, hoping to cut short what was an unpleasant deed, reminded Wilkins of the reason for his trip. “In your letter you said my father left some things.”

“Ain’t much. But it was real important to Stan. His dyin words was ‘Give them letters to my son.’ Made me promise I wouldn’t give ‘em to nobody else, then shut his eyes and died. Reckon he had a notion he might go. Musta got everything ready a while back.” Still talking, Wilkins rose from his chair, shuffled across the room to the bunk, and dragged it aside. With a knife blade he lifted up a loose floorboard. Underneath rested a rusted tin box. Wilkins lifted the box out. When it was open, he tossed two sealed letters and a tarnished metal disk on the table in front of Tabor. “That there’s silver,” he drawled. “Needs cleanin’ up.”

While Tabor examined the envelopes, Wilkins poured whiskey on the blackened metal and used his bandanna to polish it.

Tabor picked up the shined disk and looked at the finely etched symbol. “The flying S,” he said. He’d helped his father decide on that symbol for the Stanton brand. There had been a pair of those silver medallions, one on each stirrup of his father’s saddle.

“Your pa was hard put for money sometimes—most times. He never would part with that piece. Some nights he’d sit here drinkin’ and twirlin’ that medallion in his hands. Said it was all he had left of what he started out to be. He didn’t have nothin’ else to leave you but that. He wanted you to have it.”

Tabor closed the medallion in his hand. His throat tightened up, surprising him that he had any emotion left for his father. He’d tossed his hat on the table when he’d come in. Now he retrieved it and fastened the medallion on the band. He cleared his throat and glanced down at the letters Wilkins had given him. One was addressed to him; the other, with a request that he deliver it, was addressed to a name he didn’t recognize. Tabor tore open his letter and read it.

Tabor shrugged and put the note back in the envelope. A few words that had taken less than five minutes to write. That was all his father had left to explain the lost thirteen years. He guessed he’d never know the answers to all the questions he had about his father. Whatever had brought him to ruin was a secret buried in that grave out back. Stan had wandered up to Yuba City only about a year ago. Most of the townspeople didn’t even know he was around. Wilkins didn’t know much about his past either. He said Stan didn’t talk much. That was one of the reasons they got along well.

“Anything else I need to take care of?”

Wilkins didn’t seem to hear the question. His weathered face crinkled up and he rambled on with talk about Stan. “Was another fella named Chapman your pa did some prospectin’ with down south of here ‘fore they had a fallin’ out. He come up to see Stan once. Ain’t seen him since before Stan died, though. Reckon he left these parts. Anyhow, Stan said they was square.”

Tabor reached into his pocket. “I owe you for the burying.”

“Naw,” Wilkins insisted. “Stan was my friend. We was even. I reckon all his business is done now.” He scratched his brow beneath the grease-stained hat he’d never taken off. “‘Cept one thing. Stan had claim to that piece of ground he’d been working down south. Never yielded up more’n a few small nuggets in two years. Jest kept him in whiskey and tobaccy.” Again Wilkins scratched beneath his hat. “Stan left thinkin’ he’d never make a good strike there. Don’t know what become of that claim. Reckon it’ll show up around here and I’ll send it to you.”

“You do that, Wilkins.” Tabor got to his feet, ready to leave the stale air and dingy interior of Wilkins’ shack, more anxious to leave the rush of memories trying to jell in his mind. He shook his head, wanting to break the image of him and his mother and father together years ago, happy, hopeful, seeing the future his father talked about. He remembered life fading out of his mother afterward when the letters stopped and the years passed without word from her husband. He remembered the broken man he’d seen in this shack, a man reeking of whiskey and half out of his head from years of its poison. “Thanks for taking care of...my father.”

Wilkins finished off the whiskey. “Weren’t nothin’,” he said.

*     *     *

Wearing a pink lace dress and ostrich feathers in her hat, Delilah sat in the small dining room of the Murray Hotel in Yuba City. The burly marshal, Walsh Peregrine, sat across from her, a teacup lost in a meaty hand more accustomed to a beer mug.

“Yes, ma’am,” Peregrine said. “Sure is a pleasure having tea with Miss Delilah.”

“It’s a pleasure for me, Marshal.” Delilah fixed her sparkling eyes on Peregrine and briefly placed a delicate hand over his. A flush sped to Peregrine’s face.

“I’ve heard what a strong and upstanding man you are. I’ve been real anxious to meet Marshal Peregrine since.”

Peregrine straightened his shoulders and smiled. “Well,” he drawled, “I reckon I’ve got a little reputation as a lawman.”

“You are too modest, Marshal.” Delilah sipped her tea and offered Peregrine another cookie. “Of course, a lady likes that in a man.”

“And you are some lady, Miss Delilah. Talk about how purty you are don’t tell half the truth.”

“Thank you, Marshal. That’s a lovely compliment. I’ll bet an important man like you hears all the talk around here. I’ll bet you know about everything.”

“Sure. I know most everything. Wouldn’t be much of a marshal if I didn’t.”

Delilah fluttered her lashes. “An acquaintance told me she had an old friend here, a fellow named Stanton. She asked me to give him a message. Do you know the man?”

“Stanton.” Peregrine rubbed his chin. “Don’t think I do. ‘Course, he could be one of the prospectors near here. Don’t know all their names. Some of them don’t remember themselves.”

“Maybe so,” Delilah said, disappointed. She’d hoped to at least get a line on Stanton while in Yuba City and, if it proved feasible, to stay long enough to deal with him. Now it looked as if this stop was in vain. She wished she’d canceled out and closed the tour early. Already she was having second thoughts about letting Dinah perform alone.

The marshal stiffened in his chair. That busybody Abigail Fisk had just entered the dining room and was asking for a table all by herself. That could only mean she’d spotted him through the windows from the sidewalk and had come in to collect some new gossip. How was he going to explain to his wife why he had time to take tea with an entertainer? He reached for his watch chain and pulled a gold-plated timepiece from a vest pocket and made a show of flipping open the cover.

“I sure hate to leave, Miss Delilah, but I got to be relieving my deputy. If I hear anything about that Stanton fellow, I’ll let you know.”

“Thank you, Marshal. I appreciate that,” she said softly, happy to be rid of him since he had no useful information for her.

“It’s time for me to leave too. I always try to have a little nap before a performance, but I just couldn’t stop in Yuba City without meeting Marshal Walsh Peregrine.”

Peregrine blushed again. A detail not missed by Abigail Fisk, he noted. Damned nosy spinster. He tipped his hat and smiled as he passed her table on the way out.

*     *     *

The Nugget Saloon filled early. Word had gotten around that this was Delilah’s last performance until next year. Men rode in all afternoon, started drinking early, some occupying themselves with poker playing until the show started. Nobody was happier about the turnout than Fat Jack, the saloon owner. At ten bucks a head for a seat, he counted money all afternoon.

Dinah, alone in her room, practiced the steps to her solo number. When satisfied, she got out her costume and a pair of scissors and made a few alterations to the buckskin garment. She would have to wear the wig with the braids. A redheaded Indian would be laughed right off the stage. Costume on, wig in place, Dinah looked herself over in the mirror. She didn’t look sixteen. Anybody in the audience would think she was eighteen or older, especially if she didn’t wear that sack of a dress onstage.

Turning to check the fit of her costume from every angle, Dinah thought about what her sister had said. Delilah had suggested she was jealous. Well, why shouldn’t she be? Her older sister had everything, including the face and voice of an angel. She didn’t have freckles either. Every man in California desired Delilah. No one even noticed another woman when Delilah was around. Well, only one man did, the only man in the world who made Dinah’s heart leap with happiness. Barrett Fenton was the man she loved, the only man she’d ever love. The painful thing about it was, he would soon be Delilah’s fiancé.

Dinah sniffed. Delilah got everything first. How could Dinah be expected to be satisfied always being a shadow of her sister? Still sniffing, Dinah went to work with her scissors again. Tonight they’d see which one of them everyone was talking about after the performance.

“Dinah, are you dressed?” Loo called from the hallway.

“Almost.” Dinah hastily got out of the buckskin dress and folded it into a bag. She slipped on a wrapper. “Come in,” she said, smiling innocently as she opened her door to Loo.

“I’ve come to take you over to the saloon.” Loo helped Dinah out of the wrapper and into a street dress. The only part of the costume Dinah wore was her wig. While Dinah adjusted the fit of it, Loo picked up her bag from the bed. “I’ll take this,” she said.