Gold (32 page)

“
I trust she’s no longer involved with this
Wordsworth Rhynne.”

“
With W.W.? Why do you say that?”

“
I understand he’s considered a rogue and a
villain.”

She laughed.
“W.W. a villain? Oh, he’d love
that word. I must tell him what you said.” She
tapped her parasol on the floor. “You look so
somber, Captain Fitzpatrick.” She stopped smil
ing and stared at him. “You are serious, aren’t
you?”

“
Yes, I’m serious. I came here to caution your
mother about associating with Rhynne.”

“
Well, you must stop being serious this very
instant. I become impatient with serious men.”
She took his hand and pulled him after her across
the room to the foot of the stairs. “You must see the upstairs, Barry. I have the most wonderful
bedroom you’ve ever set eyes on.”

He followed her, smiling and shaking his head.
When Selena reached the top of the stairs, two
workmen stood and doffed their caps.

“
Horace, Manuel,” Selena said, smiling dazzling
ly at them. “The house looks just magnificent.”

They mumbled their thanks. Barry didn
’t think
the two men had even seen him, so taken were
they with Selena.

“
You’ve changed,” he told her when he finally
caught up to her in the upper hallway.

“
Isn’t that what growing up is for? To become
different? Wouldn’t life be boring if we were
always the same, day after day?” Selena stepped over a two-by-four. “This is my room,” she said.
“I intend to put the bed over there. You don’t know about my bed, do you? It’s a Louis XIV,
all curtains and cords and tassels.”

Barry stopped in the doorway.

“
Don’t be shy,” she told hun. “Surely there’s
nothing improper about entering a lady’s bed-
chamber when all of San Francisco can see us.”
She swung her parasol toward the city below
them.

“
I don’t know that I’m shy,” he told her, smil
ing. “It was something altogether different. As I looked at you, I realized I’d never seen a lovelier woman. Never.”

“
Why, good heavens, Captain Fitzpatrick. And
you a well-traveled man, too.”

“
Wait.” He made no move to approach her.
“I had a feeling, a premonition if you will. A
warning. It told me to go back to my room at the
Oriental, pack up, and leave.”

She poked the point of her parasol at a curled
shaving on the floor at her feet. “Why, captain,”
she said. “I think you’re being most ungallant. Threatening to run off no more than ten minutes
after meeting me again.” She speared the shaving
and flicked it aside, and leaned the parasol against the wall.

“
Selena!”

She looked up. The shout had come from
below. Selena walked past Barry, smiling up at
him, and crossed the hall to one of the front rooms. She waved down to someone Barry
couldn’t see.

“
It’s Leland,” she said when she came back.
“Leland’s one of our leading merchants, you
know. I promised to go riding with him today.
And just when we were having such a fascinating
conversation.”

He bowed.
“Miss Selena.”

When she was halfway down the stairs he
called after her. “You’ve forgotten your parasol.”
He stood at the top of the steps holding it toward
her.

They heard footsteps below them.
“Selena,
where are you?” a man’s voice asked.

When she realized Barry had no intention of
coming to her, but was simply going to stand
there smiling at her, Selena ran up the stairs,
grasped the parasol and ran down again. “I’m
here, Lee,” she said gaily. She glanced up the
stairwell. “I thought you’d never come. I’ve been
so bored waiting.”

Later that day, Captain Barry Fitzpatrick
pushed his way to the bar of the Golden Empire,
surprised at the spaciousness and ornate furnishings of the gambling hall. The light of many
chandeliers glowed through the smoke-filled air;
croupiers called monotonously from behind card
tables. A dark-haired girl in a low-cut bodice
spun a ball on a whirling roulette wheel, the ball circling and circling before clicking into the zero
slot.

“
Your pleasure, sir?” the barman asked.

“
I’m looking for Wordsworth Rhynne.”

“
Mr. Rhynne? Just a second.” He signaled to
a big man lounging beneath a painting of a
diaphanously draped woman testing the water of
her bath. “Mr. McSweeney,” the barman said,
“this gentleman here’s inquiring for Mr. Rhynne.”

McSweeney towered over Barry. He seemed as
large as a grizzly and moved as quickly. Barry
had a fleeting memory of an English big game
hunter he’d met in Oregon telling him, “Your
bloody grizzly is more dangerous than the most
ferocious tiger.” Best not to underestimate Mc
Sweeney.

“
I’m Captain Fitzpatrick,” Barry said. “Tell
Rhynne I’d like to have a word with him.”

“
It’s
Mr.
Rhynne,” McSweeney said.

Barry shrugged.
“Tell Mr. Rhynne.”

McSweeney walked away but when Barry
started to follow him the big man stopped and
turned, thrusting his finger to within an inch of
Barry’s chest.

“
You’d best be waiting here, I think,” he said.

Barry felt the excitement of the challenge
course through him. McSweeney eyed him ap
praisingly but made no move to back down.

“
Sir,” McSweeney added. His tone took away
all the respect the word might otherwise have
held.

Barry turned and went back to the bar. He
wasn’t here to fight anyone. He was downing the
last of his whisky when he sensed someone stand
ing behind him. It was McSweeney.

“
Mr. Rhynne says, ‘Bring the gentleman up,”
he said.

McSweeney
scanned Barry’s buckskins.

“
I’m not armed,” Barry told him.

McSweeney nodded and led him upstairs to a
thickly carpeted hall lit by glowing lamps in
sconces along the walls. He ‘tapped on a door,
opened it, and stepped to one side. Barry walked
into the room.

Rhynne
’s office was spartan, the furnishings
consisting of a pine desk, two chairs, a single
potted fern near the window, bookshelves and a
clock on the wall behind the desk. Only the dark
leather bindings of the many books contradicted
the room’s frugal image.

“
I’m Captain Fitzpatrick,” Barry said.

“
I’ve heard of you. Excuse me, captain.” He
looked at McSweeney who was waiting in the
doorway. “Has there been any word?” he asked.
“There’s been no change.”

“
Let me know the minute you hear.” Mc-
Sweeney nodded and shut the door.

“
Ned Heineman, a friend of mine, was taken
ill last night. He’s the best piano player in all of
San Francisco.” Rhynne put both of his hands palm down on his desk. “Now, how can I help
you, captain?”

“
I’ve been hired by the Committee of Vigi
lance.”

“
So I’ve heard. I’ve been expecting you since
word of your coming circulated. I wondered if you’d turn out to be Wordsworth’s ‘happy war
rior.’”

Barry looked at him questioningly.

“The man ‘that every man in arms would wish
to be.’”

“
Ah,” Barry smiled. “You’ll have to judge that for yourself, Mr. Rhynne. May I speak in con
fidence?”

“
Of course.”

“
I have some advice for you. Leave San Fran
cisco.”

“
I like you, captain. You come directly to the
point.”

“
The Vigilance Committee will see to it that
you leave, one way or the other. Why not steal a
march on them by leaving on your own?”

“
Would you, Captain Fitzpatrick, if you were
in my position?”

“
Probably not. Though I’d realize I might be
making the biggest mistake of my life.”

“
My feelings exactly. Do you want to know why Coleman would like to see the last of me?”

Barry shrugged.
Rhynne smoothed his mustache. “He needs a
piece of property I own to build an auction house on.”

“
I know nothing of that.”

There was a knock. When Rhynne called,
“Come in,” McSweeney opened the door. He
stood shaking his head. It was several seconds
before Barry saw that the big man was crying.

“
Out with it, Mac,” Rhynne said.

“
He’s dead, Mr. Rhynne. Ned died a few
minutes ago.”

“
Damn.” Rhynne struck the desk with his fist.
“Did they decide what it was?”

“
Cholera.”

The word hung in the room like an intimation
of doom.

“
Thank you, Mac,” Rhynne said. “I’ll see to
the arrangements myself.”

After McSweeney shut the door, Rhynne stood
up and extended his hand. “Thank you for the
warning, captain,” he said. Barry hesitated a moment before shaking Rhynne’s hand.

“
Don’t be oversure of yourself,” Rhynne said.
“Little is as simple as it seems.” Barry said noth
ing.

Once the captain had left, Rhynne walked to
the window and looked down into the Square.
He stood to lose more than he cared to think about
in Sutton’s mining scheme. Captain Fitzpatrick
posed a threat--he was a dangerous man. And now
Ned was gone.

Wordsworth Rhynne wondered if his luck had
begun to turn for the worse.

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

“Are you going out again?” Pamela asked

Selena turned from the pier glass.
“Lee’s asked me to dine with him tonight. We were to have lunch but—well, I changed my mind.” She didn’t feel she wanted to talk about her encounter with Barry Fitzpatrick. Not yet.

“
Who else will be with you?” Pamela’s voice was sharp.

“
Oh, mother, will you stop worrying about my reputation. You know Leland’s already asked me to marry him. I’m the one who doesn’t want to get married. All Lee talks about these days is building a railroad over the mountains, I don’t find that especially romantic.” Selena eyed herself appraisingly in the glass.

“
Well, at least you’ve given up the idea of
singing in public places. I never did approve of
that.”

“
You were quite right, mother,” Selena told her. She wondered what Pamela would think if
she knew why she didn’t want ever to sing public
ly again—in the Golden Empire or any other
fancy hotel in town. Selena rearranged a curl
above her forehead and smiled secretly at her
reflection.

She
’d intended to keep up her singing when
they’d returned from Hangtown. When W.W. had
told her positively he wouldn’t have her in the
Golden Empire, she’d put on her very newest
French brocade and bearded him in his office at
the back of the hotel.

“
Why is there any difference between singing in Hangtown and your new hotel here?” Selena
had demanded. “They’d like me just as well in
San Francisco.”