Linda Castle (28 page)

“Dear God, Chase. Are you telling me that you did not kill him?”

“Of course I didn’t kill him. I saw you riding off…” Chase felt his blood congeal in his veins. “Ira,
didn’t
you kill him with that pigsticker of yours?”

“No. I saw the body lying there… I thought you killed him. All I did was see that the horses got back to Cordel-lane.”

Chase sagged against the wall. “God in heaven. I was prepared to go like a lamb to slaughter because I thought I was protecting you from the Confederates.”

Ira groaned. “I thought you had killed him to save the Railroad and your grandfather.”

“This is too fantastic to believe. First my grandfather was accused—now me. I thought you did it, Ira, but if you didn’t, and I didn’t, then who did kill Alfred Homstock?”

“I don’t know, Chase, but we don’t have long to find out.” Ira’s voice was a flinty whisper. “The rumor is all over town. Your trial begins the day after tomorrow.”

M
elissa walked into the library and found Linese silently weeping. She watched for a moment, embarrassed to intrude but unable to turn away and leave Linese to her sorrow.

While the tears slid down Linese’s cheeks, she fingered her wedding ring.

“Oh, honey, don’t cry.” Melissa stepped forward.

Linese whirled around in surprise, obviously embarrassed to be caught unaware in a weak moment. “I wasn’t really,” Linese protested.

“Why were you looking at your wedding ring like that?” Melissa asked.

Linese dragged her fingers over her damp cheeks and blinked rapidly. She tried to smile but her lips quivered. “I gave my cameo to the soldier, so he would let me see Chase. I have to see him once more. This is the only thing I have left to give him.” A strangled sob escaped her lips.

Melissa smoothed Linese’s hair away from her face. “I’ll watch the twins. And don’t give up hope. Things are always blackest before the dawn. I just know it’s going to be all right.”

“Do you really think so?” Linese wanted to believe the words of optimism.

“Yes, I do. My gram said I have the gift, that I could tell certain things.” Melissa smiled. “I have a real strong feeling this is all going to work out.”

“I hope you are right, Melissa. I have to believe you are right or I would go insane.”

Captain Cordell stood behind the ash tree outside the library and listened to the women talking. He wanted to comfort Linese, but he could not allow her to learn the truth, especially now, with the Southern troops in Main-field. Linese and the twins were in jeopardy just being under the same roof with him. He could not put them in greater danger by letting her know he was not crazy.

He silently cursed himself for ever putting his family through the lie, but at the time, it had seemed the only way to help all those who were leaving the South. He had mobilized every resource he possessed to save Chase, but so far there had been little news. He had been able to learn only that Alfred Homstock, the murdered man, had been sent to stop the Railroad. That precious bit of information had finally pointed away from Chase. The problem was, only those who were deeply involved with the Railroad, like himself, knew it.

Captain Cordell could not even consider the possibility Chase might hang. He would step forward and confess before he would allow that to happen. He would see the Railroad exposed, and damn all of the people involved to perdition, to save his grandson. He would stand in front of a Confederate firing squad before he would see Chase convicted. In fact, he would go do it now, if it weren’t for all the other men his words would sentence to death. But that was the last resort. He had to try everything else first.

If only the damned Southern troops were not occupying Mainfield, then it would all be so simple to sort out. If the Union were occupying Mainfield, then it would only be a matter of revealing himself as a member of the Underground Railroad and claiming that he had done the killing,
a lie, of course, but one he would gladly tell to save Chase. He sighed with frustration and glanced at Linese.

He had wondered how the brave little thing gained entrance into the jail, when he had failed. Now he knew. She had traded away her cameo. Now she was planning to barter her wedding ring. Knowing her plan brought a hard lump to his tight throat.

“I’ll have to get them back for her,” he whispered. As long as he was forced to remain crazy in the eyes of Main-field and the Confederate soldiers, he might as well make the best of it. He turned and strode toward the stable, all the while trying to think of a way to save Chase, and praying the Northern army would enter Mainfield soon.

Colonel Homstock stood at the window of the sheriff’s office and watched the mayor walk down Mainfield’s nearly deserted street. He flinched at the constant barrage of cannon fire beyond the woods surrounding the town.

He refused to believe the South would not win. It had to win. Too much blood had been spent to consider failure after all this time. Too much Homstock blood had been spilled.

Colonel Homstock hadn’t slept a peaceful night since Alfred’s body had been found—minus the gold—and the news of his death had reached Virginia. He knew in his heart Alfred’s death had been the reason for their mother’s stroke.

He was bending all the rules of war and martial law, by pushing this trial forward, but he didn’t care anymore. Each dispatch received at the telegraph office told the sad truth about the South’s lost cause. Realistically, he realized it was only a matter of time before the Confederacy surrendered, but he refused to let the war end with Alfred’s death unavenged.

It was a bitter fact that the South had been kept from this remote corner of Texas for two years. Otherwise he would have long ago seen justice done one way or the other.

Major Chase Cordell was guilty. He was sure of it, well, almost sure of it. Everything fit. The gold, Cordell’s loyalty to the Union, the anonymous information that a horse bearing the Cordell brand had been at the Presbyterian church that night. The final piece of the puzzle had been the fact that Chase had used his crazy grandfather to give himself an alibi, even though the sheriff had tried to make him believe it was the other way around.

What kind of a man would use a feeble relative to save himself? Homstock wondered. Major Cordell didn’t seem like the cowardly kind, but then what did he care, as long as Alfred was avenged.

He watched Kerney pause on the street and glance toward the jail, before he turned and entered the bank. He didn’t like the mayor. The colonel narrowed his eyes and wondered what it was about the mayor that bothered him so much.

“Is there something wrong, sir?” The soldier’s voice snapped Homstock’s head around.

“I’m not sure, Leland.” He folded his hands behind his back and paced the length of the sheriff’s office. “I must be tired. Lately I seem less and less confident about…things.”

Rancy Thompson had been spending most of his time trying to find some way of saving Major Cordell. Colonel Homstock didn’t blame the sheriff. He’d probably be doing the same thing in his position. He might even wonder about the evidence now, if the victim were anybody but his youngest brother, Alfred. When his brother had been murdered, he had promised their dying mother he would see the killer brought to justice.

Homstock understood death during war, but his younger brother had been a civilian, forced to stay behind because of their mother’s insistence. It was a sorrowful irony that someone had managed to recruit Alfred as a spy, after all that had been done to keep him safe. That was what haunted him nightly: his brother had died in spite of his efforts to keep him out of the war.

Still, there was something else nagging at him, as well. He strode to the window and stared outside.

He knew he should ride out to the woods, to help in the struggle that was going on, but Alfred’s spirit would not allow him. Besides, it didn’t really matter anymore. The Confederacy would not stand another day.

That was why he was pushing through Major Cordell’s trial. Time was running out for him and the Confederacy.

Kerney stepped out of the bank and Colonel Homstock found himself unable to stop watching the mayor. Sunlight winked off something shiny on the man’s chest, forcing Homstock to squint against the painful brilliance. What was it about the mayor? He dressed well, looked downright prosperous.

“Leland?” Homstock turned toward the soldier who stood up from behind the desk and snapped smartly to attention.

“Yes, sir.”

“Take some time tomorrow morning, nose around town a bit. I want you to find out everything you can about Mayor Kerney.”

“Yes, sir,” Leland said. “Are you looking for anything in particular, sir?”

“I don’t know,” Homstock admitted. “I can respect a man for being my enemy, but I am mightily suspicious of a man who has no conviction or loyalty of any kind. That popinjay Kerney bends whichever way the wind is blowing hardest.” Homstock’s words trailed off while he thought about it. “And he doesn’t have the look of a man who has suffered much through this war.” The politician was anxious to be Chase Cordell’s judge, anxious to see the trial begin tomorrow. Why? Why was a man who had no personal interest in Alfred’s death be so eager? It didn’t add up.

“I’ll do my best for you, sir,” Leland said.

“I know you will, Leland.” The colonel pulled on his gloves and his hat before he stepped outside. While he continued to wear the Confederate uniform, he was determined
to wear it proudly. He unwittingly matched his footfalls to the sound of nearing cannon fire. He wondered if the South would survive long enough for him to complete Major Chase Cordell’s trial and avenge his brother’s death, and he wondered how long it would be before the Northern troops spilled into Mainfield, Texas.

Linese waited until she saw the Confederate officer leave the jail. She doubted the soldier would be so easily bribed if the colonel was in the office.

She pinched her cheeks to give them some color and wished her eyes were not red rimmed from crying. She hated Chase to see her like this, but she had to speak with him today. Maybe she could say or do something that would spark a recollection. The Confederate soldier looked up and smiled when she stepped inside the sheriff’s office.

“I—I’ve come to see my husband,” Linese said.

His smile broadened in anticipation. “You know the rules, ma’am.”

Linese pulled the ring off her finger. “Yes, I know the rules.” She placed it on the desk and pushed it toward the man.

He stared at the plain gold band as if assessing its value in cold cash. She tried to ignore the catch in her heart. It was, after all, only a ring, and well spent in order to see Chase.

When he scooped up the ring, he nodded toward the door to the cell. “Go ahead.”

Linese lifted her chin a notch and forced herself to smile. She was determined to be strong for Chase.

Chase looked up when he heard the door open. He jumped from the narrow cot and nearly tripped over the damnable shackle chain on his ankle in his haste to get closer to Linese.

“Dearest.” He stretched his fingers through the bars and caressed the side of her face as soon as she was near enough. Her eyes were swollen and red. There were gaunt hollows under her cheeks.

“Oh, Chase.” She closed her eyes and leaned into his hand. Just to be near him made her feel less helpless.

He touched her lips with the pad of his thumb and wished he could hold her. She hadn’t been sleeping much, he could tell. She looked too thin, her fragile bone structure was made even more prominent by the paleness of her skin. Being locked away and unable to protect her ate at him.

“Honey, you’ve been crying,” he accused gently.

“I have not.”

“You have become a strong woman while I’ve been away, not at all like the timid, blushing girl I first met, but you are still a terrible liar, Linese Cordell.”

She smiled at his left-handed compliment and savored the feeling of his hand against her face. His fingers were warm and rough. His touch sent an arrow of longing through her. If only the cold bars didn’t separate them. She yearned to feel the strength of his arms around her, to taste his lips and give herself to him.

“Chase, I’ve been so worried about you.”

“I’m fine, honey. Tell me about you and the girls. I hear the cannons day and night. Has there been fighting near Cordellane?”

“Not yet. The twins are fine, growing like weeds.” She looked up at him. Tears pooled in her eyes. “Oh, how I wish you could see them.” She blinked furiously in an attempt to keep the tears at bay.

It ripped a part of his soul away to see her in such pain, to be unable to protect her from it and to know it was going to get worse. “I’ll see them, honey.” He tried to bolster her spirits with a lie.

“If only you could remember something, Chase. Any small detail about your past might help.”

Chase looked at her sweet face and felt the floor fall from beneath his feet. He had to tell her. There had been too many secrets between them for too long. He could not keep this from her. “Linese, there’s something I have to tell you.”

“What, Chase? Have you remembered something?”

“I remember. I remember it all.”

Hope filled her eyes, then it traveled down to her lips. The smile and relief on her face was like summer rain on parched earth. It sent a ripple of love and desire flowing through Chase to see how it transformed her.

“Thank, God,” she said, and sighed. “Have you talked to Rancy yet? Or the Confederate officer?” Her questions spilled out eagerly. “When will they let you come home?”

“It isn’t as easy as that, darling.” It cleaved him in half to know he was going to crush the life out of her with his next words. “I can’t say anything to Rancy or anyone else. I remember, but it doesn’t make any difference.”

“What? You can’t mean what you are saying. Of course, it makes a difference.”

“I do mean it. There are people that would be imprisoned or killed by the Confederates as spies, if I tell what I know. There is one good thing about it.” He smiled and stroked her temple. “I remember the day I met you—clearly.”

Linese felt a chill climb her back. He had made that remark a moment ago, about her no longer being timid and blushing, and she hadn’t even noticed its significance. She hadn’t even realized what it all meant.

“Chase, if you remember, then you must defend yourself. Unless…” She narrowed her gaze on him. “Surely you are not telling me that you are guilty.”

“No. You were right. I’ve done a lot of horrible things in war, but I didn’t kill Alfred Homstock in cold blood.”

“Then you must talk, you must tell the Confederate officer. You have to tell them who did it.”

“Honey, I can’t. Besides, I don’t know who killed Alfred Homstock, I only know who didn’t kill him.” He could not tell her about Ira and certainly not about his grandfather. She and the twins would need the old fox to keep them safe.

“I can’t bear it, Chase.” Unchecked tears spilled over her eyelids and down onto his fingers. “I can’t live without you.”