Lacy (42 page)

Lacy caught his hand and held tight when the
doctor came out. But he didn't look solemn. He was smiling wearily.

"She'll be all right. She'll sleep the
clock around, of course. She didn't take enough to kill her. You got her here
in time."

"Oh, thank God," Cole ground out.
"And thank you!"

"It's a pleasure to bring good news to
someone for a change. How's Marion?"

"Bearing up," Cole said heavily.
"She's seeing her doctor, now— for something to calm her down. Turk's with
her."

"We were in school together. She's a fine
woman. Your father was a lucky man. Let Katy stay overnight. You can take her
home in the morning if she's improved. Good night, now."

"Good night."

"Thank God." Lacy sighed, leaning
against his chest. "It was a stroke of genius on your part, making Turk go
with Marion."

"I don't doubt he'll knock my brains out
for it later," he said, "but I couldn't risk Mother as well as
Katy."

"I understand..."

Booted feet echoed down the hall. They turned to
find Turk coming along the narrow corridor with a face like tissue paper.

"Marion's in the car, resting comfortably.
Doc says she'll be okay. How is Katy?" he asked, his eyes desperate.

"She's going to sleep the clock around, then
we can take her home," Cole said quietly. "She'll be all right."

Turk tried to speak and couldn't. He turned
away, not wanting them to see his face. He was shaking so hard with fear that
he could barely stand by himself. He'd never known such terror. He swallowed,
and swallowed again, before he leaned against the wall and began to roll a
cigarette with fingers that spilled half the tobacco in the process.

"What I don't understand is why she did
it," Cole said heavily. "I thought she was getting better."

"It's because of him, that's why she did
it,"Turk said jerkily. "She loves him."

"She hated Danny," Lacy protested.

"Not Danny." He turned, his eyes
blazing out of a white face. "Him! Wardell!"

Lacy stared at him uncomprehendingly. Katy had
told her that she still loved Turk. Why did he have the idea that Wardell was
responsible for her suicide attempt?

"What did she say to you today?" Cole
asked Turk. "She must have said something."

"She said he was kind to her," he
replied wearily. "It brought it all back. I lost my temper. I was so
damned jealous of Wardell I could hardly see straight—thinking about how she'd
known him… how
well
she'd known him. I was rough with her, and she
cringed. Danny beat her often. She was scared to death of me. She actually expected
me to hit her!" He shook his head to clear the glaze in his eyes. "My
God, as if I could ever hurt her!
Her,
of all people!"

"Why do you think she loves Wardell?"
Lacy asked gently.

"She's unhappy. He was good to her when
nobody else gave a damn; of course she loves him." He glared at Cole.
"I know you talk to him now and again. Tell him she needs him. Maybe he
can keep her from doing..
.that..
.again."

He stared toward where the doctor had gone, his
face agonized, before he turned and went back down the corridor.

Lacy turned to Cole. "But she doesn't love
Wardell," she said. "She loves Turk. She said she'd never stopped,
never would. Where did he get the idea that it was Wardell?"

"Maybe she gave it to him," Cole said
thoughtfully. "I can't understand why she took the pills, though. Turk
cares about her. I've never seen him so torn up."

"Perhaps," Lacy began thoughtfully,
"she mistook his jealousy for contempt. She's very sensitive about what
happened. Turk might have inadvertently given her the impression that her
intimacy with Wardell disgusted him."

He sucked in a harsh breath. "Lacy, if
that's true, with her self-image so low already, we might not be able to stop
her next time. We've got to do something."

"Could you ask Mr. Wardell to come and see her?"
Lacy asked. "I don't like hurting Turk or Katy, but he might be the
catalyst to bring both of them out in the open about what they really
feel."

He lifted an eyebrow. "Well, little one..
.as it happens, I think I might just have a way to get Wardell here."

He didn't add how. But as he began to recover
from the trauma of the day, he realized that everything was working to his
advantage right now. Even poor Katy's predicament. With luck, he could solve
her problem and his own at the same time, and perhaps save her life.

Chapter Nineteen

Ben
had produced,
painstakingly, the first chapters of his book. He was amazed at his own skill,
at the way the words danced to life on the thick paper in his typewriter. He
didn't type well, and it was slow going, but he was making progress.

He ran a hand though his hair and felt the beard
on his chin. He'd all but gone without sleep and food during the creative
process. Now, finally, he felt he had something to show a publisher. He knew
one was in town, visiting Gertrude Stein. He wasn't as avant-garde as the other
expatriated American novelists who lived in Paris. In fact, he was rather
shockingly conservative in his outlook. But because of President Coolidge, the
whole country was turning that way after the wild living and excesses of the
postwar years. His book wasn't about breaking the rules. It was about the
nobility of living up to them. He smiled excitedly as he thought about the
trend toward that sort of thinking, and that he might be riding the very crest
of the wave. If he was right, and the pendulum of morality was swinging back
again, he could find himself at the top of the literary heap with a very
old-line point of view.

His journalistic style had been polished during
his brief stint with the Bradleys. He'd suffered—and had also witnessed the
suffering—of others because of himself. All that had gone into the book; all
his heart and soul had gone into it. It was the best thing he'd ever done. Now
all he had to do was convince someone to publish it.

He talked his way into a cocktail party that
night and followed Reb Garnett around like a puppy until the publisher finally
got tired of ducking him and sat down with resigned irritation to listen to
Ben's plot. But the irritation began to mellow into interest, and by the time
Ben finished, the man was actually interested.

"You say you worked as a journalist?"
Garnett asked. "That's right." "You're very young."

"It's a young country right now," Ben
argued. "But don't you see everyone's getting sick of permissive living?
All for me, nothing for the other man, is a philosophy that has seen its peak.
President Coolidge is turning it all around. His fascination with the enduring
values upon which society should and could be based has sparked much interest
at home." He leaned forward intently. "The least you can do is give
me a chance. I'll do anything you ask to help arouse interest in it."

Garnett eyed him for an entire minute while
wheels turned in his mind. Hemmingway was making a name for himself, like
several others, with characters whose decadent behavior heralded the boredom
and alienation of an entire generation. Ben's book was different, dwelling on
what was positive about morality. Five years ago, it would have been laughable.
Now, it was another form of avant-garde literature.

"All right,"he said after a minute.
"Let me read the manuscript. I'll consider it."

Ben let out a whoop that temporarily interrupted
the flow of conversation. "Thank you!"

"Wait until you hear the verdict,"
Garnett said warily. "You may change your mind."

"Not a chance!"

That night, he sat down and wrote a long letter
to Cole, telling about his potential success. He cursed the length of time it
would take to get to the ranch even as he sealed it. He'd asked about the
others, especially about Faye. Lacy had written that the girl was doing well
and that she was in good health. Ben wondered about the child, about how Faye
would manage. If he could get a good price for his novel, he could send her
some money. Lacy would help her, but it wasn't Lacy's responsibility, it was
his. He shouldn't allow a child to suffer for his lapse of control.

He leaned back in his chair, remembering how
tenderly he and Faye had loved that long-ago afternoon. He'd never been with
any woman the way he'd been with her. He missed her. She probably didn't miss
him, he realized. But his life was never going to be complete without her in
it.

Impulsively he pulled another sheet of paper
toward him and began to write to Faye. Perhaps by now she'd have forgiven him
enough to listen to his side of things.

christmas day was only
a few days off when Cole
met a nattily dressed Blake Wardell at the railroad station in San Antonio. He'd told no one where he was going or why; he'd simply taken the old black
runabout and driven to the city.

He'd wondered if he was going to recognize Wardell,
since he'd never seen the man. Lacy had given him Katy's description, which
helped. But the very posture and dress of the man set him apart. He was wearing
a beaver-trimmed overcoat, with an expensive wide-brimmed hat pulled low over
his forehead. Uncannily, for a spilt second he reminded Cole of Turk in his
posture and size and the way he held that cigar. Turk smoked cigarettes now,
but he'd been fond of cigars when they were in France.

Wardell was older than he'd realized, but still
fit-looking, and even out of his element he was vaguely intimidating to
passengers disembarking around him.

Cole had worn his best dark suit to the station,
with matching boots and Stetson. He didn't want to give the impression of
poverty-—even if he
was
facing foreclosure.

He moved closer to the stranger and stopped,
just staring at him.

Wardell turned. He had large, dark brown eyes,
deep set in a face as dark and formidable as Cole's own. He returned the quiet
scrutiny, his wide mouth finally cracking in a faint smile.

"You're Whitehall." He nodded.

"Which makes you Wardell."

The older man chuckled. "Aren't you afraid
to be seen in public with a hood like me?" he asked, his eyes narrow and
challenging. "I'm a bad man."

"That makes two of us," Cole said.
"Coffee or booze?" he offered, because he knew where to get both,
Prohibition or not.

"Coffee, if I get a choice. I've pretty
much given up booze. It's starting to taste of soapsuds."

Cole laughed. "Coffee it is, then."

He led the way to a small cafe nearby and slid
into a booth, waiting to speak until the waitress took their order and went to
fill it.

"How is she?"Wardell asked. He'd taken
off his hat, and he had thick, dark hair sprinkled with gray. He looked more
like a banker than a mobster.

"She's fine..." Cole grimaced and ran
a hand through his own dark hair. "Oh, hell! She's not fine. She took an
overdose of pills earlier in the week and damned near killed herself. All of us
are watching her like hawks."

Wardell went pale. "I was afraid of
that," he said. "A girl like Katy isn't meant for experiences like
the one she had. I'll bet she'd never seen a dead body in her life—and I put
that one in her way. She blames me, doesn't she?"

"She hasn't said one word against you since
she's been home," Cole said firmly. "She said you were the only
person in Chicago who even tried to help her. Katy's like me. She never forgets
a favor."

Wardell took a deep breath. "Marlone was a
dirty little rat," he muttered. "My God, I hated him!" He looked
up as the young waitress brought coffee, and he gave her a smile that made her
flush. He chuckled, watching her walk away. "You don't see many girls who
blush where I come from," he told Cole. "That's what I liked about
Katy. I could make her blush without trying." He fingered his coffee cup.
"What are we going to do about her, Whitehall?"

"Turk isn't lucid," Cole began.
"But, he thinks..."

"He's the ace?"Wardell asked, his
expression as belligerent as Turk's was when Wardell's name was mentioned.