House of Mirrors (8 page)

This wagon was even more crowded than Grimstone’s and had no sitting area. There was a small bed built into one wall and an extralong bed across from it. Clothing and possessions filled the remaining space, hanging on hooks, trailing out of dresser drawers, lying in heaps on the floor. A single kerosene lamp turned low illuminated the room.

Jonah stepped around the mess to approach Sam, who lay with his feet sticking out from beneath a rumpled blanket and his head and shoulders supported by a pillow. His bangs stuck to his sweating forehead, and his face was wan with tight lines cutting the corners of his mouth. He was shirtless, and for a moment Jonah was struck by the enormous bones and long ligaments that held them together under his pale skin.

“How are you feeling? You don’t look too good.”

“Head aches. And my stomach.” One large hand patted the blanket over his abdomen. “I get these meegraines. Nothing to do but wait ’em out.”

“I’m sorry. I’ll go and let you get some more rest.”

“No. It’s lonely here now that Alan’s gone. The little man was full of himself, but he was company. Sit a spell.”

Jonah wondered where exactly he was supposed to sit. He finally squatted on his haunches near the bed.

“Good crowd tonight?” Sam asked.

“I guess so. I don’t know what ‘good’ is. I haven’t been here long enough.”

Sam smiled, and Jonah returned it. There was no way anyone could refuse to smile along with Sam.

“Anyway, I got to do more than shovel shit tonight. I talked for your show. Did a fair job of it too, I think.”

“Well, that’s great. Only here a few days, and you’re already moving up in the world. I had a pretty good night myself—I mean, besides the headache and throwing up.” He lowered his voice confidentially. “Mindy came to check on me. Gave me some broth and put a cloth on my forehead.”

Jonah wasn’t sure what to say. “Congratulations” seemed a little extreme, but clearly Sam was very happy about her attention. “That’s nice. You really like her, don’t you?”

“Can you tell?” His broad brow puckered. “Do you think
she
can tell? Do I act calf-eyed and dopey around her?”

“No,” Jonah lied. “I don’t think she knows.” And then because he couldn’t restrain his curiosity, “What is it about her that you like so much?” He couldn’t think what would attract anyone to the blunt, sour-faced woman.

“Aw, I don’t know. She’s just so… She’s
Mindy
. She don’t take no guff from anybody, and she’d never lie to you, not even to spare your feelings. She might be snappish, but she’s loyal, and I’d trust her with my life.” He shrugged his bony shoulders. “She’s a real great girl.”

“Someone you can trust is a hard thing to find in this world,” Jonah agreed.

“Of course, I wish she could be my girl, but that’s not likely to happen. I know she’s just bein’ nice to me in a friendly way, but still a man has to have hope, right?”

“That’s right. You never know.”

“When a person’s the right one for you, when you know it right here in your gut”—he pressed a hand to his gaunt belly—“there’s nothing’s gonna change that feeling, whether they think of you the same way or not.”

Jonah remembered how he’d thought he felt something for Ezekiel Burns not so long ago, and now he imagined he felt something for Rafe Grimstone. But he was too polite to tell Sam that sometimes your emotions were as false as the attractions in a carnival sideshow, and it was best to let go of them.

Jonah’s calves were cramping, so he rose. “Can I get you anything? Maybe something to drink?”

Sam pointed to the water pitcher, and Jonah poured him a glass. After Sam had drunk it, Jonah bid his new friend good night and headed back outdoors.

He glanced at the light in the windows of Rafe’s wagon as he trudged toward a thin bedroll on the hard ground and thought of warmth and the sweet smell of pipe smoke. For one moment he allowed himself to relive the excitement of standing chest to chest, grasping each other’s cocks, their tongues curling around each other like talented acrobats, then he pushed the thoughts out of his mind and went on his way.

He was a new man, a stronger, less emotional one. He must remember that and not allow those yearning feelings to creep insidiously through him. Otherwise, he’d be as pathetically, hopelessly a romantic as poor Sam.

Chapter Eight

Rafe headed toward his trailer, dead on his feet after another day of travel and setting up in a new location.
Three days since you touched Talbot and he touched you
, his mind helpfully reminded him.
You could have him in your bed tonight if you wanted to. Don’t you want to?

Rafe grunted and shut down the insidious voice.

Everything was secured for the night, all the crew in their beds—or someone else’s. He’d done his last walk of the perimeter. They always had a night guard keeping watch to make certain no unexpected trouble came from the locals. It seemed unnecessary, but Rafe had been in the business long enough to know that a situation could blow up fast and hard. And when trouble came, it often seemed to be under the cover of night.

Which brought his mind to the stranger who’d been looking for him a few nights ago. That couldn’t be good. Jonah had said the man had a British accent, which suggested someone from back home was looking for him. If the family had bothered to send someone in search of him, it must mean something had happened. Perhaps a death. But he didn’t want to know about it, didn’t want to turn his mind to look back at the world he’d left behind. He’d cut himself off from his family for a reason, and even death wouldn’t change the fact that he wanted nothing to do with them.

Rafe stopped walking. A light shone from inside his wagon. His heart sped up along with his feet as he hurried to it. A part of him was positive he’d find Jonah waiting inside. But when he threw open the door and bounded up the step, he was disappointed to find Henry Fisher sitting with a glass in one hand and a bottle in his other, singing along with the ballad that crackled from the Edison phonograph cylinder.

“She and I will never be one. Alas, for the stormy sea,” he sang.

Rafe sighed. It seemed the Fishers were more on the outs than the ins these days, and he was getting a bit tired of listening to Henry’s litany of woe.

“Ellen threw you out again?”

Without answering, Henry clinked the bottle against the rim of the glass, then pushed the fresh drink across the table toward Rafe.

Rafe picked up the whiskey and downed it in a gulp. He licked his lips and blew a breath. “I needed that. Long day.”

He straddled the other chair and waited for Henry to talk. He didn’t say “tell me about it.” He’d be getting an earful soon enough, more details than he ever wanted to know about the “Amazing Signortoris” life of wedded bliss.

Rafe poured another glass full of the cheap whiskey and wished it was Craggenmore. He studied Henry’s sharp features—the hatchet nose and long chin; beneath a thin mustache, a wide mouth that was quick to smile; heavy brows that were quick to frown. Henry used black hair dye to add to the illusion of being a knife-wielding Italian and always had a dark stain at the edge of his hairline, but Rafe could see mingled white and brown hair creeping in at the roots.

After listening for as long as he could stand to the man’s laundry list of complaints about his wife, Rafe finally interrupted. “Why do you do it? Why do the pair of you continue to claw at each other year after year?”

“What do you mean?” Henry stared at him through bleary eyes.

“Why don’t you give each other some peace and go your separate ways?”

“Are you crazy? We’re
married
,” the other man replied, as if that explained everything.

“People get divorced.” Rafe heard his own voice slurring a little and realized he was pleasantly squiffed. “Or at least live apart. If they don’t, a lot of them should.” He thought of his own parents, who’d battled each other in a much icier fashion than the fiery Fishers.

“Phah,” Henry scoffed. “I couldn’t live without Ellie. What would be the point of anything without her?”

His vision shifted, and perhaps for the first time, Rafe understood the Fishers’ relationship. They were happy causing misery to each other. Henry threw knives at his wife on a daily basis. In return, she threw verbal knives at him. It was their own private juggling act, and they loved it.

“Anyway, making up makes the arguing worthwhile, don’t you think?”

“Mm,” Rafe replied. He’d not had any such experience, because he’d never had that deep of an involvement with anyone. “I suppose.”

Henry chuckled. “I promise you, it does. With Ellen, it’s never sweeter or stronger than after a storm’s blown itself out. That woman can…” And he was off again, sharing intimate sexual details that made Rafe take a pull direct from the bottle.

“Hey,” Rafe finally interrupted the drunken rambling. “Did you see a man around here a few nights ago? A gent with a big white mustache and a cowboy hat? I heard someone like that was looking for me? The rumor is he was hanging about the show a couple of nights ago.” And ducking the stranger had been difficult though not impossible to do. The trouble was, someone had mentioned spotting a man matching his description lurking here too. He’d followed them.

“The one who looks and sounds like he’s been punching cows all over London? Yeah. Looking for you. I said I hadn’t heard of you in my life. He don’t believe me. What did the fake cowboy want?”

Rafe shrugged. “No idea, but it’s best to avoid strangers asking questions.”

“Amen to that.” Henry got up and staggered to his bedroll. “Is your injured Lamb of God coming back here tonight?”

“Who?” Rafe scratched his cheek. He needed a shave.

“The preacher’s son, Ahab. No… Jonah. Knew it had to do with whales.”

“Who told you he was a preacher’s son?” Rafe got up and put their mugs in the dishpan.

“Come on, Grim, you know Treanor knows everything about every town we roll through. He told me his guesses about our little lost lamb.”

Rafe wanted to learn more but didn’t want to express too much interest. “Oh?” he said with an air of supreme indifference as he sat on the bed to pull off his boots.

Luckily Henry was in a chatty mood. And even better, he’d dropped the Italian accent. Now he was nasal New England. “Reverend Talbot’s a big noise in that little berg back where we picked up the boy. Couple of years ago showed up at some council meeting, Treanor said, to tell ’em to drive us outta town. And ’parently he’s a minister who likes his hell. Not as showy as some of those Southern preachers, but as grim and God-fearing as you could ask for.”

“What else did Treanor say?”

Henry yawned and muttered something about needing another drink. He sat up then must have spotted the cups resting in the enamel dishpan, because he lay back on the blankets and sighed.

The subject might be over as far as Henry was concerned, but Rafe was still curious. Far too curious.

“Maybe Talbot has had a falling out with his family for some reason,” Rafe wondered aloud. Not difficult to guess why, of course.

“Even Treanor’s not that good at picking up local gossip. Just that he swears Talbot senior resembles our Jonah. And there’s the name, of course.” He rolled over and squinted at the bottle still sitting on the table. “Maybe we ought to have a drop more.”

“I think not, lad. We’ll have work in the morning. And you’ll have to do some begging and groveling with your missus.”

Henry gave a crooked grin. “I do enjoy that begging and groveling.”

Rafe groaned. “Spare me any further details, I beg of you.”

“Fair enough, since you spare me yours.” Henry gave a jaw-cracking yawn and stretched his thin arms overhead. “Speaking of which, that why you had to leave home?”

The hair on the back of Rafe’s neck rose. He forced a laugh. “You’ve had a fair snoot-full if you think I’m going to talk over my private affairs with you, signor.”

“First I figured it was something like thievery,” Henry said. “But I see how you don’t take any women to bed, so I supposed your inclinations might have led to your putting a sea’s worth of distance between you and your family.”

“Christ Almighty, Henry. Since when did you turn into a gossip?”

Henry went on as if he hadn’t interrupted. “And I saw the way you looked at that preacher’s kid.”

Rafe reminded himself he didn’t want to beat the snot out of Henry, no matter how tempting it might be. Instead he opted for the truth. “My family couldn’t care less if I bedded a man, a woman, or a ruddy pig.” He could do whatever he liked as long as he was discreet. After all, his brother had done much worse. He finished with, “So no, the reason I left home had nothing to do with who I slept with.”

“I was closer with the guess about thieving, then?”

“Shut up or get out,” Rafe said without heat. “And next time your wife kicks you out, go sleep with Lance. The cat’s the only one who’ll put up with you when you’re like this.”

Henry mumbled something about Sir Lancelot and farting, then fell silent.

Rafe had thought he was exhausted, but now he lay wide awake. Perhaps his brother had hired the man who was looking for him. If that was true, he’d have to be careful. Edward would be the last man to want him to return to England, but Rafe had never truly understood what drove his brother. He’d thought he’d known the boy and then the man behind the smile, but he hadn’t known Edward at all.

He rolled onto his side and counted Henry’s snores. God, and now Henry knew about his vice. Another problem he must face. Rafe had been too obvious about his attraction to Talbot. He’d have to do an even better job of ignoring the preacher’s son, but the blasted man bore that ineffable appeal that made Rafe hungry for every brief encounter, from the simple exchange of conversation to what they’d done in this wagon. Even with all the bruises, Talbot was appealing—his voice, the way he held perfectly still when another spoke, listening as if that person were the most fascinating being on earth.

Rafe didn’t trust charm. God knew he could wield it himself. He’d had lessons from the best. He recalled his mother, one dainty hand on the sleeve of a boring politician, leaning forward, her eyes wide as she listened to the man’s dull conversation, and then her contagious laughter as she ruthlessly and accurately imitated the man later. She didn’t have the shadow of a conscience under her layers of charm, even as she’d fought to keep Edward, her older son, from facing the consequences of his actions.