Sioux Slave (31 page)

“Thunder?”

“Well, maybe it wasn't,” she admitted, twisting her lace fan. “It wasn't that loud. When I got up the next morning, Mother and Daddy and my little sister had gone away. They were going to send for me later because I was just beginning school.”

Thunder
, Shelby thought. His brother-in-law was a riverboat gambler. Clint carried a two shot derringer belly gun with ivory inlays.

“Now this chit comes back and claims to be my missing sister, Laurel, and Grandmother accepted her wild story.”

“Just what did Kimi say? Could she remember much?”

“No. You know what I think?” She leaned closer. “I think there was a killing that night and Grandmother helped keep the secret.”

His brother-in-law wouldn't have any qualms about shooting down an irate husband. What Shelby didn't know was whether Clint would care enough about the lady to take her and run away. “Would your Grandmother be a party to something like that? She strikes me as a sweet and very proper lady.”

“For pity's sake don't let that fool you,” Lenore said smugly. “Elizabeth Carstairs has a backbone of steel; she's not some weak old lady. I think she would do anything, I mean,
anything
to protect the Carstairs reputation and name. She's never been what I would call a loving grandmother, and now I'm beginning to think I never really knew her at all.”

Just as you don't know me
. War hero. If only this pretty miss knew how he came by his limp. The medals that so enthralled Lenore, Shelby had taken off a dead man's chest near a battle that Shelby was running from.

“For pity's sake, Shelby, are you listening to me?”

“What? Oh, sure, honey.” He fingered the diamond stickpin in his tie.

“After all, this concerns you, too, because of the money.”

“Money?” Shelby said.
If only you knew how I came by mine.

Lenore nodded. “I overheard Grandmother and the judge talking last night about her will. From what I understand, this Kimi is a bastard by Mother's lover, but Grandmother feels she must include her in the will or people will talk, and she doesn't want them to guess that.”

A kid. Yes, Clint had said the lady had a child by him that her husband thought was his, mentioned the county. A wealthy, beautiful woman with two kids, one of them Clint's. And the lady's name was a flower. That had narrowed it down to two women. All these months, Shelby had thought it might be Rose Erikson.

“I think the Eriksons are going to announce both engagements at the ball,” Lenore said, “you and Vanessa and me and Rand.”

“So the new younger sister doesn't change anything?”

“Not as far as I'm concerned. We can still keep meeting, Shelby. Something's bound to work out.” She went into his arms, and he kissed her hard and ran his hand down the front of her bodice.

Somewhere were the final pieces of the puzzle. Who around here knew more than they were telling? Had Clint really cared so much for the lady that he had killed her husband and run away with her? And if so, would the old lady really help hide her own son's death to protect her family's name and reputation? Now that he had met Elizabeth Carstairs, he wouldn't put anything past her. She might be elderly and frail, but there was steel to that lady. Anyone who underestimated her was a fool.

“Wait a minute,” he thought aloud, “a couple of little sounds that might or might have been thunder–or gunshots. Pretty slim.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, my sweet, you couldn't convince anyone, not even me, that that adds up to a murder, not without a body.” He fiddled with his diamond stickpin, thinking. “In fact, the more I think about it, the sillier it sounds. Anyway, what the hell does it matter? What matters now is who controls the money, and I'm afraid, my sweet, that's Grandma. If she wants to cut that girl into the will, whether this Kimi is really a Carstairs or not, and that's all that counts.”

“But if Grandmother
thought
I knew something, I could blackmail her.”

Shelby threw back his head and laughed. “Sweet Jesus! I'll bet your aristocratic fiancée would be shocked out of his mind if he knew the
real
you.”

“Don't laugh, Shelby, I won't have that bit of poor white trash who is no relation to the Carstairs, getting her hands in the Carstairs money.”

He started to tell her right then—it was such an ironic joke–but he decided against it. “When you find some real evidence, honey, then you can go head to head with Grandma; otherwise, watch out.”

“Oh, you never take me seriously, Shelby.”

“Anyone ever tell you you're pretty when you pout?”

“Am I?”

“You know you are.” He knew what women liked to hear. Clint had taught him that. Shelby had come looking for Clint, hoping maybe he'd ended up with that rich lady he'd been sleeping with, hoping to find Clint living in the lap of luxury, hoping he'd cut Shelby in.

“Prettier than Vanessa or that Kimi?”

“Of course. Neither of them can hold a candle to you, sweet.” Kimi. He'd sure like to get her clothes off. He'd had both the other girls and found them stupid and banal. Kimi was pretty, and seemed smart, too.

“Make love to me, Shelby.” She slipped her tongue between his lips and rubbed her breasts up against him.

He ran his hand up under her dress.

“It's exciting to take chances.” Lenore smiled. “I can see why my mother did it.”

Shelby pulled her off the wicker settee into the soft dirt under the camelia bush and unbuttoned her bodice. “Just a quick one, honey.”

She dug her nails into his shoulders, pulling him down on her. “A quick one is all I need–for now.”

She was a bitch to satisfy, he thought, as Lenore brushed the dirt off her dress and, with her mincing walk, accompanied him out the side door. He grinned as he limped to his horses and swung up.

“For pity's sake, Shelby, what's so funny?”

If you only knew
. No, not funny–ironic. “Nothing. The engagements still going to be announced at the Erikson's ball?”

“Vanessa and I've planned it that way, although I've hardly seen anything of Rand. Instead of the eager lover, he acts as if he's avoiding me.”

If I could get between that Kimi's thighs, I wouldn't want you either
, Shelby thought. But of course, he only smiled, said his good-byes, and rode away.

 

 

Lenore stood there a long moment, watching Shelby ride away, the sunlight reflecting off his slicked down hair. Just when she thought she had everything planned, that Kimi had showed up and threatened to ruin everything. What was she going to do about it?

Lenore turned and went back into the conservatory. The puppy had wandered in through the door she'd left ajar and was digging under the camelia bush. “Stop it, you damned mutt!” She kicked at him. “Grandmother will be mad if you dig up her flowers and wonder how you got in here.”

Tally Ho paid no attention to her and kept on digging.

“For pity's sake!” Lenore grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and pulled him away. He had dug quite a hole already. Lenore dragged him over to the outside door, pushed him out, and shut the door. She surveyed the damage. If that bush died, there was going to be big trouble with her Grandmother.

Maybe if she filled it carefully, Grandmother would never know about it. She dropped to her knees and began to push the dirt back into the shallow hole with her hands. This was nigger work, she thought. She ought to call a servant to do it, but she didn't trust any of them not to tattle to Grandmother; especially that Nero. He had never liked her. Still it galled her. She was a Carstairs and the Carstairs were bluebloods. Lenore was above doing this kind of dirty work.

Sunlight reflected off something in the hole. A button? A coin? No, it was bigger than that. Had Shelby dropped something? Puzzled, she picked the object up, stared at it. Rusty. It had been buried in the dirt a long, long time. Lenore held it up to the light. There was no mistake. It was an ivory-handled derringer.

Lenore hid the little weapon in her bureau, knowing the three would be home soon from the dressmaker's. Now just why would a derringer be buried in her grandmother's conservatory? Still puzzled, Lenore spent the rest of the day deciding what to do about it. Should she tell Shelby? No, he'd only laugh and tell her some soldier had dropped it during the war. But did soldiers carry derringers?

 

 

Two days had passed since the night Elizabeth had found her long-lost granddaughter. These had been both the happiest and the most bittersweet days of the last sixteen years. She had had to face the truth about the wagon train. However, the fact that she had finally found her granddaughter made up for it.

There was something strange going on that Elizabeth couldn't quite figure out. Lenore suddenly looked like a cat who had caught a mouse, smiling secretly to herself. Who knew what the little sneak was up to?

On the other hand, Laurel looked miserable, and young Rand was staying away from the house. When he did come to call on Lenore, he looked ill at ease, as if he were holding back something that he dare not say.

Elizabeth decided to stay out of it, not knowing what she could or should do. She had realized that Rand was in love with Laurel, but Laurel seemed loath to break up her sister's engagement. Well, half-sister ...

 

 

Elizabeth stopped playing the piano and listened. In the dusk darkness, she heard the judge's buggy pull up out front and Nero greeting him. She rose from her piano bench as her old friend entered. “Pierce, so nice of you to escort the girls to the ball tonight! I don't think they're quite ready. You know how women are.”

“Not really,” he reminded her, “I've lived all my life without one because the widow I wanted wouldn't say yes.”

She felt the pain in her chest again, but forced herself to keep smiling. “You're as sweet as ever, Pierce.”

He took both her hands in his. “Great Caesar's ghost, Elizabeth, you are as beautiful as ever! Why don't you change your mind and go with us? Afraid you'll outshine all the silly young things?”

She laughed gently as they went to sit in front of the fire. “You really should go into politics. You're more honest and smarter than most of them, and you're charming besides. When they finally give women the vote, they would all vote for you.”

“Are you all right, my dear?” He peered at her anxiously. “You haven't looked well lately.”

“Don't be such an old fussbudget.” She dismissed him with a frail hand. “But if you're pouring yourself a drink, I'll take a little sherry. I'm just a bit under the weather tonight, that's all.”

He went over, closed the door, then got them each a drink.

“You've learned something?” she guessed, and took the glass, sipped it, waiting for the bracing effect.

He fingered his mustache, sighed heavily. “Yes. Just as we suspected, Shelby Merson has a fake name and he's not a wealthy merchant from Baltimore.”

“I thought not; the accent isn't right. Who is he?”

“Clint Nutter's brother-in-law.”

“Oh Lord!” In her dismay, the sherry sloshed over her shaking hand. “After all these years . . .”

“Are you all right, Elizabeth?” He handed her his handkerchief to wipe her hands.

For a long moment, she didn't answer. Her chest hurt so badly, she wondered if tonight was the night she would die. The clock on the wall ticked loudly. “I suppose it was too much to hope that the secret was forever safe.”

“I told you at the time we should report it. The three of us are accessories for our part in it.”

“I know, I know.” She took a sip of sherry. “All I could think of at the time was the scandal and protecting the Carstairs name. And you, Pierce, you helped me, knowing it would ruin your career if your part in it was ever discovered.”

“I'm not sorry about that, my dear,” he said gently and filled his pipe. “For you, I would do anything.”

She stared into the fire. “What do you think he's after?”

“The truth maybe, but money more likely. I don't think you want to know where he got the money he used to buy that plantation between yours and the Erikson's.”

“Tell me anyway.”

He paused to light his pipe. “It seems Shelby, like his older brother-in-law, preys on wealthy society ladies. He charms or blackmails vulnerable rich women out of their funds. As a matter of fact, he was wounded escaping from a Memphis lady's bedroom when her husband came home unexpectedly.”

She groaned aloud. “Worse than I thought. Where do you suppose he got the medals?”

“Great Caesar's ghost, who knows? One thing for certain, he didn't serve in the war. In fact, he's spent five years in jail.”

“I don't suppose Lenore knows about him?”

He took a puff of his pipe. “Of course not. She's too snooty to bother with poor white trash. She's as foolish and immoral as her mother. She's probably being used.”

“So now he hopes for a permanent income by marrying the Erikson girl. Yet he's dallying on the side with Lenore.”

“Why not?” The judge shrugged and drank his brandy. “He's probably trying to figure out how he can end up with both fortunes.”

“Over my very dead body!” Elizabeth put her glass down abruptly. “The Carstairs holdings are going to a Carstairs!”

 

 

Lenore had heard the judge's buggy arrive outside as she primped. Was this the time to confront the two old people about that derringer to see if they did indeed know something incriminating? She tiptoed out into the hall. There was no one about, although a light shown from under Kimi's door. Her bastard sister was still getting ready for the ball. Kimi had tried to be sisterly, but Lenore would have none of it. She could hardly wait to see Kimi's face when she told her the scandal.

At least she would be the most beautiful one at the ball. Lenore had had the dressmaker secretly copy that elegant emerald silk dress with the big sleeves from Camelia's portrait. She didn't intend to be upstaged by this newly found sister.

The green silk rustled along the hall as Lenore minced her way quietly down the stairs, looking around for the butler. Nero didn't seem to be anywhere around. Her feet were already hurting, and the evening hadn't even started. She put her eye to the keyhole in the music room door. The two old people sat before the fire.

“Does anyone but the two of us know this?” Grandmother asked.

“I doubt it.” The judge puffed his pipe. “The question is, what do we do about it?”

Elizabeth Carstairs looked at him. “How do you suppose he knew?”

Judge Hamilton shrugged. “I suppose there's just the slightest chance that it's mere coincidence.”

“I doubt that. How much do you suppose he knows?”

“Probably not enough or he'd already be either calling the law or blackmailing you.”

Grandmother looked grim. “I thought the secret was safe, but it obviously isn't. I must protect the Carstairs name from scandal at any cost.”

“That's why I told you you needed to rewrite your will, Elizabeth, and let me take care of it immediately. Otherwise, there will be questions and rumors.”

Outside the door, Lenore bit her lip to keep from throwing the doors open and storming in with an angry tirade. She had no intention of sharing the Carstairs fortune with that Kimi.

The elderly lady sipped her sherry, sighed. “Questions and rumors; yes, you're right, Pierce, I'll have to divide the money and property down the middle, treat both girls as beloved grandchildren, even though it galls me to give anything to a bastard child fathered by that tinhorn gambler. It must never get out that one of them is no blood kin of the Carstairs at all.”

Outside the door, Lenore took a deep breath. Now she had the knowledge and the power to get what she wanted. Throwing the door open, she strode into the music room. “For pity's sake, I don't know why you always tell me not to listen at keyholes, Grandmother. One learns so many interesting things that way.”

Both of them turned pale. Judge Hamilton reacted first. “How long have you been listening?”

“Long enough.” Actually she hadn't heard much at all, but they didn't know that. “So Camelia had begun sneaking around with a lover? Now that I think back, I remember a handsome man turning up sometimes when Daddy was gone on business.”

Grandmother looked as if she might have a heart attack. “You were so little,” she murmured, “I didn't think you were aware of what was going on.” She looked at the dress, then at the portrait.

“Yes, I look like her, don't I?” Lenore smiled with satisfaction. “And you never liked her.”

“There was a reason,” Grandmother said. “She was just like you are. In fact, if I believed in reincarnation, when I saw you walk in just now–”

“Oh, stop it!” She confronted the old lady. “You would do anything, anything to protect your precious husband's family name. Well, maybe you went too far!”

“Young lady,” the judge bristled, “don't talk to Elizabeth that way!”

“I'll talk any way I want because I seem to have the winning hand,” Lenore gloated. “One thing I won't do is stand by while you change your will. I demand that you leave it alone. Your real granddaughter, not the bastard, should get every last cent! Do you hear me?”

“But Lenore,” Grandmother said, “if I do that, as the judge says, people will wonder—”

“I don't care! Leave the will alone, you hear?”

Elizabeth Carstairs opened her mouth as if to protest, but the old man waved her into silence. “You heard what she said, Elizabeth.” He looked at Lenore, nodded defeat. “All right, as her lawyer, she'll leave the will exactly as it was written many years ago. We'll just have to worry about the gossip later.”

Lenore glowed with triumph. “I don't know why you're both so worried. If you're dead, what do you care what anyone thinks about the family?”

Her grandmother looked up at her with grave dignity. “I know this is hard for you to understand, but I loved James Carstairs enough to do anything to protect the name he gave me and his son.”

Lenore snorted with derision. “I'll just bet you would! I remember the thunder that night, only after all these years, I'm not sure it was thunder at all.”

She saw them exchange glances.

The judge took the pipe from between his teeth. “Explain yourself, young lady!”

“No, it's you two who need to explain. It occurs to me now the thunder might have been gunshots. Did that damned gambler shoot my father, and run away with my whore of a mother and his bastard brat?”

Elizabeth Carstairs looked as if she were on the verge of a heart attack. “What–whatever made you say such a thing?”

“Because I know you would do anything, even hide the death of your own son to protect the Carstairs name. And by the way, I found a certain ivory-handled derringer.”

Grandmother's sherry crashed to the floor with a tinkle of glass. She gasped and tried to get her breath. Immediately, the judge was by her side. “Are you all right, Elizabeth?” He held his brandy to her lips.

Lenore watched without emotion as the color gradually came back to Grandmother's face. If Elizabeth Carstairs dropped dead at this moment, she would be the heir, that was the thought that crossed her mind. That and the satisfying thought that they were both guilty of something terrible. Their faces when she had mentioned the gun told her that.

The color gradually returned to Grandmother's face. “Lenore, I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Don't you?” she asked smugly. “Couldn't tell it by the expressions on both your faces.”

“Young lady,” the judge thundered, “you're making all this up to upset Elizabeth. I don't know where or why you think this supposed weapon has anything to do with Elizabeth, but—”

“It was buried in the conservatory.” Lenore nodded to the puppy snoozing in the corner. “Your damned mutt dug it up under the camelia bush. Now tell me the truth. Did Kimi's father shoot and kill my father?”

“It was all an accident,” Elizabeth blurted. “Jim came home unexpectedly and found them in an embrace in the shadows on the east lawn—”

“Elizabeth!” the judge thundered. “Say no more! You owe her no explanation!”

“And you're in on it, too, aren't you? You supposed paragon of virtue!” Lenore sneered, “and I'll bet even Nero is part of it. He's big enough to carry the body.”

Neither spoke, but she saw the truth of what she had said in their stressed faces. “They killed my father and ran away, taking their bastard brat with them. And you, my dear grandmother, what kind of a woman would do
anything
to protect the family name, even hide a murder?”

The judge glared at her. “The kind you'll never be. You haven't got the guts or the class Elizabeth has.”

Lenore backed toward the door, shaking her head. “Don't you talk about principles and class to me, you pompous old windbag! I don't know much about the law, but I'll wager it's a crime to cover up a murder—”

“It wasn't a murder,” Elizabeth blurted, “it was an accident—”

“Elizabeth,” the judge snapped, “say nothing more.”

Lenore smiled. “Ah, so there was a death! When I find out what Nero did with the body, I could humiliate you, ruin your career.”

“And disgrace an elderly lady?” Pierce Hamilton looked toward Grandmother.