Undercover Bride (38 page)

Maggie did as she was told. She glanced at Summerhay, but he hadn’t moved from his spot. A big help he was.

Rikker said something that sounded like, “Hold your horses, big boy.”

The moment he reached his destination, Panhandle pushed Aunt Hetty away and pointed a gun at Rikker’s temple.

Maggie let out a sigh of relief. At least Aunt Hetty was safe. Now if Rikker could distract Panhandle long enough for her to reach her gun… No sooner had the thought crossed her mind than she heard something that shook her to the core. “Maggie!”

At the sound of Garrett’s voice, she gasped. Oh no! What was he doing here?

The porter tried to hold him back, but Garrett raced past him and jumped onto the platform.

Panhandle aimed his gun at Garrett, and Maggie yelled, “Watch out!”

Rikker tried grabbing his wrist, but Panhandle was too quick for him. He hit Rikker on the side of his head with his revolver, and just that quickly Rikker fell to the ground.

“Hold it, all of you,” Panhandle said, his weapon pointed. “Try another trick like that and you’ll all be dead.”

Maggie, Summerhay, and Garrett stood still as statues.

“You.” Panhandle gestured to Maggie with a shake of his head. “You come with me.”

She heard Garrett’s intake of breath. He looked completely baffled. “I don’t know what’s going on. Whatever it is I’m asking you not to do this, Panhandle.”

“Shut your trap!”

“I thought we were friends—”

Panhandle sneered. “Friends? We were never friends. Cotton was so sure you knew where the money was. That’s the only reason I worked for you. I figured eventually you’d get careless and lead me to it. Now you better tell your bride to get over here, or someone’s gonna pay.”

Garrett raised his hands to show he was unarmed. “Take me instead.”

Panhandle shook his head. “We tried that little trick.” He gestured with his gun for Maggie to hurry.

She moved forward, senses alert. When a plan went awry it was necessary to improvise. Rikker looked like he was out cold, but a slight movement of his pinkie told her otherwise.

“Make it quick!” Panhandle’s voice was thick with impatience.

He was so intent on watching the three of them, he seemingly forgot all about Aunt Hetty. That is, until she lifted her cane and clobbered him soundly on the head.

Just as quickly, Rikker grabbed his leg. Diving forward, Maggie knocked the gun from the dazed man’s hand. Before Panhandle could recover, the sheriff had already snapped on the handcuffs.

Maggie rushed to Aunt Hetty’s side, reaching her at the same time as Garrett.

“Are you all right?” they asked in unison.

Looking remarkably well following her ordeal, Aunt Hetty nodded. “Except for my neck and hip and…”

Maggie smiled. Never had Aunt Hetty’s recital of
Gray’s Anatomy
sounded more welcome.

“But not to worry. I’ll live to see another day.” Aunt Hetty leaned on her cane and glared at Panhandle, who was being led away by the sheriff. “No thanks to that awful man.” She regarded Rikker. “What you did was very nice. You could have been hurt.”

Rikker rubbed his chin. “Not me,” he said in his usual rough male voice. Abandoning his old lady walk, he then took off after Summerhay.

Aunt Hetty frowned. “What a strange woman.”

“What are you doing here?” Garrett asked.

“I heard Maggie was leaving today, and I came to say good-bye.” As she spoke Aunt Hetty afforded her nephew a meaningful look. “Why are
you
here?”

Maggie held her breath and waited for his reply.

“I… uh…” He slid a sideways glance at Maggie and quickly changed the subject. “I’m still confused,” he said. “What Panhandle said—”

“I’m afraid it’s true,” Maggie explained. “He was Cotton’s partner and the second Whistle-Stop bandit.”

Garrett shook his head in disbelief. “How did you know?”

“Yes, how
did
you know?” Aunt Hetty asked.

“It was the bishop,” she said. “The day I came to your house I picked up the chessman, and that’s when I knew Panhandle was the boogeyman.”

“And you figured this out because of chess?” Aunt Hetty asked, incredulous.

“It sounds crazy, I know, but Toby and Elise described his hair as similar to yours.” She pointed to Aunt Hetty’s topknot. “I just happened to notice that the bishop’s ceremonial hat comes to a point just like Panhandle’s cap. The problem was, we had no proof. And we’d already made one mistake.” A mistake that could have been disastrous. She moistened her lips and continued.

“One of the thieves backed the train away from the station. Few people know how to operate a locomotive, so Rikker came up with a plan to see if Panhandle could do it.”

Garrett rubbed his forehead. “That still doesn’t explain why the witness described one of the thieves as having a scar.”

“That puzzled me, too.” The scar is what made Garrett their prime suspect. “Then I realized what the witness had seen was the rawhide straps from Panhandle’s hat. The robbery occurred as the sun was going down. I suspect the leather bands cast shadows on the side of his face that the witness mistook as a scar.”

“Well, I’ll be,” Garrett said, shaking his head. “And to think he’s been working with me all this time.”

“Like he said, he was keeping an eye on you.” It was easier to talk about the case than to give in to the confusing emotions whirling inside. “When those large bills showed up at the school fund-raiser, Panhandle contacted Cotton.”

“But how did he know about that?” Garrett asked. “I attended the fund-raiser and even I didn’t know.”

Maggie glanced at Aunt Hetty. “As you know, Panhandle and your gentleman friend played faro together. What I didn’t know until this morning is that Dinwiddie handled the school fund-raiser, and Panhandle helped him count the donations.” He must have suspected the hundred-dollar bills came from Garrett and notified Cotton. None of the other parents could afford such a large donation. She shuddered to think what might have happened had the men known the money came from Elise and Toby.

Aunt Hetty’s eyes widened in alarm. “You’re not saying that Oswald—”

“No,” Maggie assured her. “Oswald was visiting his ailing mother in Denver during the robbery.”

Aunt Hetty shuddered. “And here I thought all that talk about the boogeyman was only the children’s imagination.”

Garrett rubbed the back of his neck. “And to think we blamed Whitewash for all the holes.”

Rikker joined them, grinning from ear to ear. He was still dressed in his old lady outfit, but his wig was crooked and one bosom had fallen to his waist. “It’s over,” he announced. “Panhandle confessed to everything.”

Maggie grinned back at him. Neither one of them had been happy at the prospect of leaving town with so many unanswered questions.

Aunt Hetty stared at him. “Is that you, Mr. Greenwood?”

Rikker pulled off his gray wig. “It’s me, all right.”

“I should have known,” Aunt Hetty said and laughed. She suddenly looked tired, and Garrett slipped his arm around her waist.

“Come on, I’ll take you home.”

This time she didn’t push him away. Instead, she leaned on him, and relief crossed her face.

“When are you leaving town, Maggie?”

“Not till tomorrow,” Maggie said. Sensing Garrett’s gaze, her voice deserted her along with her smile. “I just have to tie up some loose ends.” She would have to write a full report to headquarters and convince her boss that the end justified both the means and added expense.

Aunt Hetty reached out to squeeze her hand. “Stop by and say good-bye to the children.”

Maggie glanced at Garrett, but the eyes boring into hers let nothing in and even less out. “I—I don’t know that I’ll have time,” she stammered. She was always happy to leave town once a job was complete. But not this time; this time she didn’t want to go.

“Let’s get you home,” Garrett said to his aunt.

Aunt Hetty stubbornly held her ground. “What did you want with Maggie?”

Garrett frowned. “What?”

“You came running up here like the cavalry calling her name. It must have been important.”

“I…” He hesitated. “Just wanted to say good-bye.”

Maggie started to say something, but already he had turned away.

“We did it, Duffy,” Rikker said cheerfully, slapping her on the back.

She watched Garrett escort his aunt to his wagon through a veil of tears. “Yes, we did.”

W
here was he?
Maggie paced the station platform with increasing impatience. Rikker should have been here by now.

Earlier, as they’d left the hotel together, he said he had something to do and would catch up with her at the station. It wasn’t like him to be that mysterious, but she was too wrapped up in her misery to give the matter much thought until now. What was so important?

Whatever it was, he better hurry. The train was due to arrive in less than ten minutes.

She shaded her eyes against the sun and stared down the tracks. Sun glinted off the rails and the air shimmered with heat, but so far no sign of the train. Maybe it would be late.

People milled around her with an air of expectancy. Mindless chatter filled the air. A baby cried.

Then all at once she saw something that stopped her in her tracks. Crankshaw, the pickpocket, was at it again. As usual he made no effort to hide his dastardly deeds. If she didn’t know better, she would think he was purposely trying to get her attention.

She tried to ignore him, but when he stole a doll from a young child, her mouth dropped open. What was the matter with the man? The little girl screamed, and her mother tried calming her to no avail.

“I’ll get her doll back,” Maggie shouted and took off running.

Gawking over his shoulder Crankshaw jumped off the platform and ran along the tracks, dragging his foot. Maggie chased after him and quickly gained ground. This time she was careful not to trip on the rails.

“Come back, you scoundrel—”

Suddenly, Crankshaw did something totally unexpected. Tossing the doll on the ground, he mounted a handy horse and galloped away.

Maggie stopped running and stared after him. Maybe she was seeing things, but that sure did look like Garrett’s horse. It wasn’t bad enough that she imagined seeing Garrett in the moon and the stars and everywhere else. Now she even imagined seeing his horse.

She picked up the doll and shook off the dust. She turned and walked back to the station. Something caught her eye. Someone was sitting in the shade of the water tank.

“Garrett?” she whispered. Either her eyes were playing tricks on her again or she was losing her mind. But it sure did look like Garrett sitting in front of a chessboard.

Garrett watched her advance as he arranged the chess pieces on the board, and something stirred inside.

A jaunty feathered hat sat on her head, and she was dressed in the same blue suit she wore the first day he’d set eyes on her. She looked every bit as beautiful today as she had back then. Every bit as intriguing as she’d looked the night they danced. Maybe even more so, now that he’d read the letters—not the mail-order-bride letters but the real ones sprinkled with tears and what had seemed like pieces of her heart.

The letters convinced him that Aunt Hetty was right. It wasn’t Maggie the detective he’d fallen for. It was Maggie the woman.

Years of playing chess had taught him that the start of a game makes all the difference in how it ends. The same was often true of life. Thanks to Rikker for hiring the pickpocket, his plan was to go back to the beginning. Go back to when they first met. This time he hoped for a better ending.

He waited until her shadow fell across the chessboard before standing.

“You must be Miss Cartwright.” Her true name came easy to him. It was as if part of him always knew the real woman behind the disguise.

The look of disbelief gradually faded from her face. “Yes,” she whispered.

“What are you doing here on the railroad tracks?” he asked.

Regarding him with misty eyes, she hesitated for a moment then visibly relaxed. “I was hoping to… convince a thief to return a little girl’s doll.”

He smiled. She caught on fast. He took his seat again and stood the last of the chessmen on the board. “And how, exactly, did you intend to do that?” He raised an eyebrow. “Convince him, I mean?”

“With a strategically pointed gun.”

“You might try a little charm and goodwill,” he said.

“Do you think such a thing would work?” she asked. “After… everything that’s happened?” They were no longer talking about dolls and pickpockets, and the air between them sizzled with meaningful glances and unspoken words.

“There’s only one way to find out.” He waved his hand over the chessboard. Wars had been raged and won over a chessboard. But today, much more than kings were at stake.

He gestured toward the empty chair. “Sit.” Before this day was over, he intended to know everything there was to know about Miss Maggie Cartwright, one square at a time.

Much to his disappointment, she hesitated. “I should return the little girl’s doll.”

“Not to worry,” he said. “The little girl will soon be clutching a brand-new one.”