The Devil You Know (41 page)

“Where the hell is he going?” asked Malcolm.

Israel shrugged. “The cards must be in the bunkhouse.”

Malcolm swore under his breath, more in disbelief than frustration. “You had a document all prepared in spite of the fact that you say you weren't expecting us today, but you didn't think to keep the cards here? Seems a bit shortsighted of you.” He thought about it a moment, and before Willa responded, he was chuckling. “Right. You put Happy in charge of making sure the cards were around.”

“Why do you think that's funny, Father?” asked Eli.
“You've been laughing at Happy Pancake for years without any good reason that I could ever figure. He bested you at cards once, and you still laugh at him as if he's no account. He bested
you
, yet you always puff up like you got the better of him.” He turned sharply to Willa. “And you, arranging all this so you could rub my nose in it in front of
him
.” He jerked his head sideways to indicate Malcolm. “You didn't have to bring him. We could have come to terms without him.”

Willa remained calm; she spoke quietly. Eli's agitation was palpable and it scraped against her composure like sandpaper. “You were not in a position to play for money once we realized it was always your father's, and frankly, we didn't know the extent of Malcolm's involvement in what happened afterward.”

Eli sharpened his look on Israel. “You know damn well he wasn't there.”

Israel was tempted to say that he was only one hundred percent sure of it now that Eli had given it away. “True, but that doesn't mean you were not acting at his direction.”

Eli came halfway out of his chair at that. “What? You don't believe I can think for myself?”

“Shut up, Eli,” said Malcolm. “And sit back down. Even I am wondering if you can think.”

Those words did not push Eli back. They brought him to his feet, and rather than turning his malevolent stare on his father, he impaled Willa with it. “This is your fault. You want to shame me. You have for years, always with your high and mighty airs, looking down on me, looking down, in fact, on every man who asked after you. I don't know what I did to deserve your enmity, but I can return the shame you visited on me tenfold, Willa.”

Willa realized she was no longer in control of any part of these proceedings and that she wouldn't be as long as Eli was talking out of his head.

“You probably need to stop talking now,” said Israel. “Seems as if it would be good for everyone if you did.”

But Eli was not finished. “You'll want to hear what I have to say since you took on this family when you wedded and bedded Willa.”

“Oh, I know I don't want to hear it,” said Israel. He took a half step forward, not to menace Eli, but to protectively shelter Willa with his shoulder.

“Eli,” said Malcolm. He tapped the poker against the floor. “Stop.”

Eli shook his head. “You'll want to hear this, too. You really will.” He raised his hands helplessly as he turned back to Willa. “Not every hour that I spent in Saint Louis was devoted to Big Bar business. I had time to look into something that has always tickled my curiosity. Don't bother pretending you don't know what I'm talking about. That's beneath you. Let me tell you right off that the doors of the Margaret Lowe School are still open, and I guess you know firsthand what kind of schooling goes on there since it was where your parents boarded you. From what I could see, there is still a great need for their charity.” He shook his head in a parody of pity. “So many girls, and so many of them hardly more than children themselves. It broke my heart, but then I saw the necessity of a place like that. It struck me as a kind of sanctuary for young women who got themselves in trouble. At the very least, it removed them from their own society for a while.”

Willa's stomach curdled and she tasted acid at the back of her throat. Her fingers curled surreptitiously in the sleeve of Israel's shirt. She thought she might throw up.

“That's enough, Eli,” said Israel.

Willa tugged on his sleeve and shook her head. “Please, Eli, you have no idea where this is going.”

“Don't I? Still believe I can't think a thing through? It's like this, Willa. I
know
I never bedded you. Christ, we hardly knew how to kiss.” Without looking at his father, he said, “You hear that, Malcolm? I never bedded her.”

“You told me—”

Eli snarled at him. “You beat that confession out of me. I never touched her like that. Never. Tell him, Willa. Tell him!”

Israel answered for her. “It's true. She told me.”

“But did she tell you the rest?” Eli asked. “When you realized your bride was no virgin, did she tell you the rest? Did she tell you how her daddy poked her, put his baby
inside her, and then sent her away to a home for unwed mothers just like it was a school for fine ladies. Willa had no one sniffing after her skirts back then. It could only have been Happy or one of his ranch hands who stuck her, and my money's on her father.”

Willa moaned. It was a pitiful, keening cry of grief for that thing that was dying inside her. She wondered if it were her soul. Her knees buckled. Israel caught her before she dropped to the floor and gently lowered her to the piano bench. He put his hand on her shoulder and held her steady.

Malcolm stared at Willa. His mouth hung open as he sucked in a breath. He shook his head as though to clear it, and then he took a single step toward her. “Is he right about the child? Is Annalea mine?”

Eli's head snapped up and then twisted around. “What?”

But Malcolm was paying no attention to his son. “Is it true, Wilhelmina? Is Annalea my daughter?”

Willa didn't speak, didn't say the words that she wanted him to hear, namely that Annalea would never be his daughter. Her silence, though, was not predicated on the fact that she couldn't find her voice. It was because Eli drew his gun and fired at Malcolm, and the sound of it was deafening.

She would have jumped to her feet then, but Israel was still holding her down with one hand and drawing on Eli with the other. Malcolm was on his knees, blood blossoming high on his chest, wounded but not, it seemed, gravely, while Eli stood with his arm extended, finger on the trigger, and every grim line on his face an indication that he meant to rectify that.

Malcolm put out his hands as though he could ward off the bullet. He had no experience appealing to his son, and his attempt to do so now came to nothing. Eli's finger tightened on the trigger.

Israel shot him.

Eli staggered backward and his shot went over Malcolm's head. He fired again and this bullet lodged in the ceiling. Israel dropped him where he stood.

Willa had no time to make sense of the tableau in front of her. Eli was sprawled on his back on the floor, blood pooling under his thigh and seeping through his jacket at the shoulder.
Was he dead? And then there was Malcolm, still on his knees, clutching his chest and howling, although it was impossible for her to determine what part of his wail was provoked by physical pain and what part was emotional anguish. Finally, there was Israel standing at her side, one hand holstering the Colt, the other still on her shoulder, though whether he was steadying her or himself was no longer clear.

The commotion at the back door effectively closed her mind to every other thing. She heard Happy coming at a run, throwing down curses like they were lighted sticks of dynamite. Zach followed, his heavy tread recognizable for its staccato step. Behind him were two more people whose footfalls were unfamiliar, but one of them spoke, and Willa could have sworn it was a woman's voice that she heard.

Happy barreled into the front room and stopped short of banging into the sofa. Zach held his ground better and moved in far enough to make room for the pair behind him. That couple halted in the archway and stood side by side, taking in the same scene that Willa had moments earlier.

Calico had no difficulty identifying her brother-in-law. The similarity in the brothers' features was remarkable, and only Israel's dark hair immediately distinguished him from Quill. “Is any of this your work?” she asked just as if she had known him for years.

And Israel, with no indication that he was at all surprised to see them, nodded and pointed to Eli.

Calico gently nudged her husband with an elbow. “Damn, Quill. I thought you said your brother couldn't shoot.”

Eli Barber did not die. His father did.

When Willa realized there was a chance to save them, she sent Zach for the doctor while she and Israel worked together to stop Eli's bleeding. Happy gathered bandages, tweezers, needles, and thread, and every other item he thought they would need, including the whiskey. The bullet in Eli's thigh had missed the artery and passed through the meat of his leg. The shoulder wound was initially more concerning, but when they were able to examine it closely, they located the bullet and Israel was able to extract it. Eli's bleeding was profuse but not, as it turned out, deadly. No one present thought that Eli would be grateful for it.

Calico and Quill worked feverishly over Malcolm. While Eli's wounds were not catastrophic, the same was not true of his father. Although it was not immediately apparent, Malcolm was dying even as he was in the throes of pain for himself and his son. The angle of the bullet's entry put it on a course grazing Malcolm's shoulder and burying itself beside his heart. His cries stopped when one of his lungs collapsed. His heart kept pumping blood into his chest cavity, and the bruise appearing under his skin was a warning of inevitable death.

They made him as comfortable as possible and then got out of his way so he would have a clear line of sight to his son lying just beyond an arm's length reach. It was Calico, standing off to the side, who had the clearest view of Malcolm in his final moments, and she would tell Quill later that it was not the vision of Eli that Malcolm carried to his grave. It was the image of Willa.

Israel and Quill wrapped Malcolm's body in a sheet and carried him outside at Happy's request. Happy fired his shotgun in the air twice and hollered for Buster Rawlins, who he figured was somewhere around, waiting for Malcolm's direction. Quill was not so sure there would be a response to Happy's overture, but then someone appeared out of a cluster of pines a hundred yards beyond the barn and Quill became a believer.

“It's Malcolm,” Happy told Buster, pointing to the shrouded corpse. “His horse is in the barn. You can get it, and one of us will help you with the body. Take him home.”

“What about Eli?”

“In the house. We sent for the doc. We'll get him to the bunkhouse later, and he can stay there until he's fit enough to move. Just so you know, there's probably no chance of him going back to Big Bar. His daddy here, well, that's Eli's doing.”

Buster nodded, regret etched deeply in his broad features.

Happy set his eyes on the rifle in Buster's scabbard. “Malcolm order you to snipe at Willa's husband? That'd be like him, but it doesn't mean I think it would be like you. So . . . would you have done it, Buster? Would you have made my little girl a widow?”

“Guess we'll never have to find out,” said Buster. “I'll get Mr. Barber's horse now.”

*   *   *

Inside the house, both women startled at the twin shotgun blasts. Calico was halfway to her feet to investigate the source when Willa shook her head and told her not to bother.

“That's Happy.” A moment later they heard him shouting for Buster. Willa explained to her who Buster was and why Happy thought he was around.

Calico eyed Eli. “He's still breathing,” she said, and then added in practical tones, “And since we've done all we can for now, come with me into the kitchen and I'll make you a cup of tea if you have any, or coffee if you don't.” When Willa didn't move, Calico placed a hand over hers. “Come on. Your hands are shaking. Chamomile will calm that.”

Hardly aware that Calico's hand had moved to her elbow
and was gently nudging her, Willa accompanied her sister-in-law into the kitchen. Her contribution to making the tea was to point out the pantry. She sat in a chair that Calico pulled out for her. “I am not usually so discomposed,” she said quietly. “You are not meeting me at my best.”

Calico's response was to chuckle. “Oh, Willa, it's in the nature of what I do that I rarely meet anyone at their best. True, I mostly tangle with varmints like the one in your front room, and they are a pitiful lot, but I think I can confide in you that my hands shake when I am confronting a quilting circle.”

Willa regarded her suspiciously. “I don't believe that, but you're kind to say so.” When Calico merely shrugged and began to add kindling to fire up the stove, Willa asked, “Are you really Calico Nash?”

“Calico McKenna now,” she said. “I guess Israel didn't tell you.”

“No, he didn't. Your name came up once. I don't quite remember the circumstance now, but he could have told me then, and he didn't.”

“Your husband and I don't really know each other except through Quill. I never put eyes on him until today. Quill visited him in prison—” She stopped and looked back over her shoulder at Willa, her green eyes as wide as an owl's. “Lord, you know about that, don't you?”

“I know.”

Calico blew out a relieved breath. “I couldn't tell from the disjointed explanation your father gave us when we intercepted him in the yard. Of necessity, introductions were brief, but he accepted that Quill was Israel's brother without question.”

“I shouldn't wonder. The two of them, they're like kings on opposite sides of a chessboard. One white, one black. In every other way virtually identical.”

“Mm.” Calico finished filling the kettle from the pump and set it on the stove. “I was saying earlier that Quill visited Israel in prison, and I knew he didn't want me to go, so I didn't ask. My husband says his brother is a charming rascal who can sell wool to sheep.”

Willa's slim smile appeared. “My husband says his brother is a saint who would shepherd those sheep to safety.”

Calico laughed, shaking her head. “Quill is no saint, but is he right about Israel?”

“Actually, he might have underestimated his brother,” said Willa. “Israel could persuade sheep to buy back the very wool he had just sheared from them.” She waited for Calico's appreciative chuckle to fade away, and then she added with quiet intensity, “He simply chooses not to do it any longer.”

Calico sat down and took one of Willa's hands in both of hers. “I'm glad. Quill will be, too.”

Willa said, “It will take Quill some time to believe it. I know that. So does Israel. He was against involving his brother. He wanted to prove himself first, or at least uncover the truth first.”

“Uncover it?” asked Calico.

“Yes. Oh, I see. You can't possibly know all of it. He doesn't recall anything about his journey here. We had to piece it together from a lot of different sources.”

Willa found that summarizing the chronology of events for Calico helped her as well. As she neared the end, she felt a calm that owed nothing to the chamomile tea that Calico put in front of her and that she sipped from time to time. There was little she left unsaid, and the only detail of importance that she omitted was the exchange of words that goaded Eli to shoot his father. That secret now existed in a closed triangle connecting her and Israel and Eli. She hoped it would remain among them, as Eli would not want to claim Annalea as his sister or reveal to anyone that his father was a rapist.

Willa finished by asking, “How did you find us? Israel wrote to Quill but he did not tell him where he was.”

“He wrote? We never received any correspondence from him. I suppose it will be waiting for us once we return to Eden.” She was on the verge of saying more when the back door opened and Happy, Quill, and Israel walked in.

Willa smiled to herself as Happy strode in without pausing, while Quill and Israel both stomped snow and dried mud off their boots before they crossed the threshold into the kitchen.

“Buster took him away,” said Happy without preamble. “How's Eli, and is there coffee?”

“Still breathing, and you'll have to make it,” said Willa. She welcomed Israel's hands on her shoulders after he circled the table to get to her. He stood behind her and worked the knots in the back of her neck and across her shoulders. She nearly moaned aloud. She wasn't sure that she would have been embarrassed for anyone to hear her if she had. She lowered her head to give him better access to her nape.

To no one in particular, she said, “I should have told Zach to bring the sheriff. I wonder if he'll think of it on his own?”

When this was met by complete silence, she looked up and caught an exchange of glances that she could not interpret. Since all of them eventually ended at her husband, she knew he was part of whatever was going on.

“What?” she asked. “What don't I know that all of you do?”

“I only just now found out,” Happy said, adding water to the coffeepot. “I guess your husband figured he had his reasons.”

Israel's mouth flattened. “Thank you for that spirited defense, Happy.”

Willa tipped her head back to look up at Israel. “You probably should tell me before someone else does.”

“Yes, well, I did have my reasons. I was thinking . . . that is, it occurred to me that, um, I didn't want, or rather, I didn't know—”

Quill leaned a hip against the sink when Happy moved out of the way. He was grinning, and his eyes, so much like Israel's with their unique blue-gray cast, were thoroughly amused.

“Not such a smooth talker now, are you? ‘Tongue-tied' is a word that comes to mind.”

Calico shushed her husband. “Let him say it, Quill.”

Israel started again, but the words did not come any easier the second time. Finally he gave up and looked at his brother. “Ah, hell, Quill. Just show her.”

Willa dropped her head so she could see Quill. “I guess you better show me then.” The words were barely out of her
mouth when Quill began to unbutton his coat and peel back one side to reveal his jacket and the silver badge pinned to it.

Willa was familiar with Sheriff Brandywine's tin star, but this was different. The five points of this star filled the circumference of a silver circle, and even with the distance separating her from Quill, she could make out the words
U.S. MARSHAL
stamped in the arc above the star.

Willa ducked under Israel's hands and twisted around in her chair to see him better. “This is what you couldn't tell me about him? You didn't want me to know that your brother
is
the law?”

Israel backed up a step and put up his hands in a protective gesture. “It's embarrassing,” he said, his gaze moving to Quill's and then back to Willa. “For both of us. All right. I'll give you that it's more embarrassing for him to be my brother than it is for me to be his, and that's why—”

“Don't say that,” said Quill. “I've never been embarrassed to be your brother. Never. Frustrated. Confused. Annoyed. Those come immediately to mind. Now tell me what the hell you're talking about.”

Israel lowered his hands to his sides. “I didn't want you here, not when I had no memory of what I'd done. The truth is, I'm tired of disappointing you, and if I had done something that was going to put me back in jail, I preferred that you were not the one taking me.”

“Well, you didn't do anything wrong except disappear,” said Quill, “and like it or not, I
am
your brother, and I damn well will be around.”

“Are you two gonna tussle?” asked Happy. “'Cause I got coffee brewing and there's plenty of ways you can hurt yourselves in here. Better take it outside.” He scratched behind his ear. “But wait for me. I'm gonna check on Eli first.”

There was silence on his exit.

“Are we gonna tussle?” asked Quill.

Israel shook his head. “It's never come to that, has it? I don't suppose there's a good enough reason to start now.” When Quill nodded in agreement, Israel's eyes darted to Willa. “Are
we
gonna tussle?”

“Later. And not outside.”

Quill whooped with laughter. “There's no butter melting in that mouth, brother. You are in the kind of trouble that no one can get you out of.”

Calico leaned over and swatted at her husband. “Does he look as if he wants help, Quill? Leave him be or we're gonna tussle, and you know I fight dirty.”

Willa's attention was instantly arrested. Israel was similarly intrigued.

Quill pointed to them for Calico's sake. “Not in front of the newlyweds.”

She chuckled, and then spoke to Israel. “Did Quill tell you how we tracked you down? I've already explained it to Willa.”

“He did. Outside. I don't know why I thought I could hide from the two of you.”

“It was insulting,” said Calico.

“Uh-huh,” said Quill. “And we could have been here yesterday if Calico could let a thing go, but she has an uncanny sense when it comes to names and faces that has a way of diverting us.”

Willa frowned, puzzled. “What do you mean?”

Quill removed his coat and hung it up before he pulled up a chair beside his wife and sat. “We took the train from Lansing to Jupiter, rented horses at the livery, and got directions. We had ridden about two miles from—”

“Two and a quarter,” said Calico.

“As I said,
about
two miles outside of Jupiter when we came across this fellow headed in the direction of town. I noticed Calico slowing her horse as he got closer, so I'm alert to the possibility of trouble. Then she pulls up and asks him for directions to Pancake Valley. Now I already told you that we had those from the livery owner, so there is another reason for me to pay attention. He was pleasant enough, happy to put us on the right path, and about a couple of minutes into the conversation—”

“Three minutes,” said Calico.

Quill gave his wife an aggrieved look. “Oh, we
are
gonna tussle.” When the ribbing that comment caused quieted, he said, “Three minutes into that conversation, she introduces
herself as Calico Nash, which she only does when she forgets her last name is McKenna, or when she's about to take someone into custody. I was fairly sure which instance this was, and when she asked politely if the stranger's name was Jesse Snow and he bolted like his horse had been struck by lightning, I knew I had guessed correctly. Of course, I had to run him to ground because I won't let her ride hell-bent for leather when she's pregnant.”