A Bride for Frank, page 7
“I’m sure he would have if the map had been on Donald’s body. It was in the bottom of a drawer. It was all that Donald left me when he died. He didn’t leave me a dime, but he’d hidden this map, and I’m the only one who could have found it since it was at the house. What should I do if I see Slade?”
“You’ll take a lantern and come to me. You’ll have to count the tunnels so you can find me when you come back. Whereas, it will take him a while to find us because he’ll have to check every tunnel since he obviously doesn’t remember the location of the gold. Or perhaps he never knew it.”
“That would explain why Donald made a map. It can’t be easy to find. But why would Slade meet us here to get his money? Surely, he doesn’t know if Donald found gold, which, for the record, I doubt he did.”
Frank nodded. “My thoughts exactly. So, why? I believe he plans on killing us and taking all your money. Then there won’t ever be any witnesses and you’ll never decide to go to the sheriff with this information, which, by-the-way, you should do. The sheriff saw your husband and knows what happened. You should never have agreed to the location or to pay him.”
She straightened. “I was scared. I didn’t know what else to do.”
He hugged her. “I know, and you were right to be scared. And that’s what I’ll explain to Slade. He has no hold on you, and he knows it. That’s why he wants to eliminate you…and me, too. In this mine. I’m sure he figures no one will ever look here.”
“You’re probably right. I certainly wouldn’t have, if he hadn’t sent me here. Map or no map.”
After they ate breakfast, Maisie strapped on the gun belt Frank bought and put the pistol he gave her in one of the two holsters.
“Why two holsters?”
“It was the only gun belt small enough for you.”
“Oh, that explains it.” She holstered the gun he’d bought her, then picked up a lantern in one hand and a bucket in the other. She also had the map in the hand with the bucket.
“Are you ready?” He picked up a shovel and a pick, along with his lantern. “Shall we see just what Donald found in these tunnels? And maybe another answer as to why Slade wanted to meet here.”
She nodded. “I am. Let’s go.” Maisie looked at the map. “We pass the first two tunnels on the right and take the third one on the left.”
“I’m following you, sweetheart.”
She smiled at the casually said endearment. Was she his sweetheart? She put that thought out of her mind and concentrated on the map. She led the way into the tunnel. It was pitch black, and if not for the lanterns, they wouldn’t have even been able to see each other by the time they were twenty feet inside the mine.
She passed the first two tunnels on the right and noticed there were more tunnels on the left after the one they went down. Donald had done a lot of digging before he found gold…if he really did find gold. Donald had never spent money like he was rolling in gold, so she wondered if the map was really worth anything at all. But she had to know. She had to see if she could follow her dream, though the more she was around Frank, she wondered if her dream hadn’t changed.
Maisie thought more and more about Frank and staying with him to have her own house and children of her own. She’d always have nieces and nephews, Lottie would see to that, but she was thinking often of having kids. Her and Frank’s kids.
They kept walking, her reading the map by the light of the lanterns and him following. Finally, after they’d been going for a good twenty minutes, she saw something about ten feet up ahead that made her blood run cold. She came to an abrupt stop.
“Maisie? What’s wrong?”
Her stomach churned and she thought she might vomit. “Look in front of us. Do you see what I see?”
Frank came up beside her and dropped his tools. “You stay here.” He pulled his gun from its holster and walked the remaining distance.
Maisie came up beside him.
In a hushed voice, Frank admonished her. “I told you to stay back. What if he’d been alive and just waiting for us or Slade?”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t want to stay back there alone.” She pointed at the skeleton. That could be Joe Small, Donald’s partner, but I didn’t know they had a mine. Joe disappeared just before I was arrested three years ago.”
“Ex-partner. He’s got a bullet wound in the middle of his forehead.”
“And according to the map, this is the spot where the gold was found. That would mean Donald more than likely killed him.”
“Agreed. Let me remove his body. We can’t do anything for him now.” Frank reached under Joe’s arms and dragged him farther down the tunnel. Then he returned to Maisie. He looked at her and picked up her free hand. “Are you okay?”
She pulled out of his grasp and nodded. “I’m fine. Just don’t touch me. You handled his body.” She shivered and had goose bumps. “I just hadn’t expected it. Donald said Joe was with Slade."
"Sorry. But now, we know the truth. Let’s get started so we can get out of here.” He went back to where he dropped the tools and picked them up. Then he held the lantern aloft with one hand and examined the walls of the tunnel. “I see a small vein of what might be gold or could be fool’s gold.” He turned back toward her. “I did a bit of mining years ago, before I decided ranching was what made me happy. I like working with the horses.”
She held her lantern aloft, too. “That’s good but what is fool’s gold?”
“It’s iron pyrite, but it sparkles and has a similar color to gold. I’ll have to see more to know for sure.” He started breaking rocks out of the wall of the tunnel with the pick. When he’d gotten some good-sized chunks, he squatted and examined them. "In this light, I can’t tell. I’ll have to wait until we get some of this out in the daylight.” He dropped what he’d dislodged into the bucket and went back to using the pick on the wall.
When the bucket was full, he put down the pick and retrieved the bucket. “This is full. Time to go see just what we got.” He carried the bucket and followed Maisie out of the mine. It was around lunch time when they emerged.
She walked toward the fire. “I’m anxious to see what you think we have.”
Frank followed her and set the bucket down by where they’d sat to eat breakfast. “Me, too.”
He grabbed one of the smaller rocks and held it up in the sunlight. The gold color in the stone glinted in the sun.
“Well?” Maisie was beside herself with anticipation. She shook her hands at her sides, her eyes wide. “What is it?”
“Mostly iron pyrite, but I do see some gold here, not a lot, so the vein isn’t very big.”
Her shoulders slumped. “Not enough to get rich off of?”
Frank looked up at her and cocked his head, his mouth turned down. “I’m sorry, Maisie. I know you wanted to leave.”
She shrugged. “It’s all right. Maybe if we go a little deeper, the vein will get bigger.”
Frank slowly nodded. “It’s possible. We’ll go in again after lunch. What do we have to eat?”
“Cold canned beans and jerky. I’ll open the beans, if you want them. I think I’ll just stick to the jerky. I’m not that hungry. I’ll make biscuits to go with the beans tonight for dinner. That will fill us up, I’m sure.”
“That’s fine with me. I’m not that hungry, either, so jerky will do.”
“You’re working hard. You should at least have some hard tack with the jerky.”
“Okay, you’re probably right.” He grinned. “I don’t want to pass out from lack of a meal.”
She laughed. “No, you certainly don’t. We’ll get one more bucket and call it good. After you examine the next bucket of rocks, then we’ll make a decision as to whether to carry on or go home or wait for Slade.”
He raised his head. “Home? Did you say home?”
“Yes, I assume I still have a home there with you.”
“You’ll always have a home with me. That will never change.”
Tears filled her eyes. “I…I don’t know what to say. I’ve been trying to leave, and now you’re telling me I’ll always have a home. It’s a lot to take in.”
He took her in his arms. “You’re my wife. Of course, you’ll always have a home, even if you do decide to leave. I’m hoping that, if things don’t work out, or even if they do, that you’ll decide to come home to me.”
“Why are you being so nice?” Her chest was tight and she had a lump in her throat. “I don’t know how to handle that.”
“It’s not that I’m being nice, I’m just treating you like my wife, which you are.”
She stared into his blue eyes. “You know I didn’t want to be anyone’s wife again. I only did this for Lottie’s sake. If I was given the choice without thinking about Lottie, I never would have agreed to the bargain.”
“I know, but I’m glad you did.” He continued to hold her loosely.
She thought he was afraid she would bolt, but she wanted to find out about the second bucket before she decided what to do. “I’m here for a while anyway. Shall you get the second bucket?”
“Yes, you shall get the second bucket?” Roy Slade slipped out of the trees; his Colt was leveled at the two of them. “Maisie, you take off that gun belt and come over here.”
Maisie stiffened and turned toward Slade. He’d wrecked her tender moment with her husband and she wanted him to know she wasn’t his to command. “No.”
“If you don’t, that man you’re with, your new husband I suppose, will die.” Slade pointed the gun at Frank.
She looked up at her husband. His mouth was in a firm line and his eyes narrowed as he concentrated on Slade.
“Okay. Just don’t shoot anyone.” She unbuckled the gun belt and let it fall to the ground. Then she walked over to Slade, her head held high. She stopped beside him. “You won’t find any gold here, Slade. Just fool’s gold for fools like you and Donald.”
“Shut up, woman.” He turned a little and backhanded her, but kept his gun aimed at Frank.
Frank stepped forward to help her.
Slade fired his weapon, just to the side of Frank.
“Stay where you are or she’ll die. I have no compunction not to kill you or her, if I need to.”
Maisie suddenly realized Slade had killed Joe Small. Not that Donald wasn’t capable of it, he had been. “You killed Joe. Murdered him. You knew where the gold was, why did you need the map?”
“Because it showed where his body was. I couldn’t have anyone find him now, could I? And after I went to all the trouble to see that Donald was killed in that robbery.” He suddenly grinned. “That was a bit of acting on my part, when I told you he’d been killed in the robbery, since I was the one who killed him. My boss would have killed me if I didn’t. You see Donald owed him a lot of money and the Boss figured you’d either pay him the cash or you and Lottie would earn it in one of his whorehouses.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You did me a favor, so I don’t care that you killed him. But I won’t let you take Lottie. I have your blood money. Let me get my saddle bags, It’s all there.”
“That’s fine. But now you and your husband will mine my gold for me.”
Frank had moved closer while Maisie kept Slade talking.
Slade looked at Frank and leveled his weapon at Maisie. “Don’t take another step or she dies. You might take me down, but she’ll be dead. Is that really what you want?”
Frank stood completely still. “No, don’t hurt her. I’ll do whatever you say.”
“Good, because you’re going into that mine and bringing me out another bucket of rocks. While you do that, our little Maisie, here, will take apart these rocks for the gold.”
“There’s not enough gold here to keep you in bullets for even a day. It’s all fool’s gold.” Frank looked over at Maisie. “Are you okay?”
She nodded and raised her hand to her cheek, while her face throbbed. “Yes. I’m fine. It’s not the first time a man has hit me.”
Slade laughed. “Yeah, Donald used to take his fists to you regular, didn’t he?”
She lifted her chin. “I suppose that makes you happy. You and he probably couldn’t fight a man, but you don’t have any trouble beating up a woman. One of these days, that woman will fight back, and you’ll lose.”
“Maybe, but not today.” He looked at Frank. “You drop that hog leg you’re wearing and get going now. I expect you back here with a bucket-full of golden rocks within the hour.”
Frank’s hands were fisted at his sides. “It takes longer than that to fill the bucket.”
“Then you’d better get started,” Slade sneered. “He waved his gun at Frank. “Go, before I shoot her to make you.”
“If anything happens to Maisie, I’ll make sure you pay ten-fold for what you do.”
Slade narrowed his eyes and shoved his gun in her side. “You don’t do what I say, she’s first and you’re second. Got it?”
Frank nodded.
But she saw the hatred in his eyes. If he could, he’d have killed Slade for the way he was treating her.
Picking up the bucket, tools and lantern, Frank nodded once, then turned and headed down the mine.
“How do you expect me to take these rocks apart until he returns?”
Slade smiled.
It was an evil smile if she ever saw one and it sent a frisson of fear up her spine.
“You stay where you are or your husband dies as soon as he comes out of the mine.” He walked to his horse and brought back a small pick. “You’re going to get the gold out of those rocks on the ground.” He handed her the pick. “Now get to work. I want it done by the time he brings up another bucket full.”
She looked up at him. “What if nothing’s here?”
His eyes darted from side-to-side and his shoulders hunched a little bit. “There is. There has to be.”
Chapter Eight
Maisie shaded her eyes as she worked in the sun and then swatted at the flies buzzing around her. Some bird cried out as she worked on the rocks, picking at them and separating the granite from the golden color. But the color was fool’s gold. She knew it since Frank had showed her the difference, but she didn’t tell Slade. She just kept working at it and the golden pile got bigger.
Finally, she was on the last rock and she saw some real gold, the bright yellow stood out against the less bright iron pyrite, but there was nothing she could do about it. First, it wasn’t much and second, if she’d kept it separate, Slade would have gotten suspicious. So, she added it to the pile of iron pyrite. It added an air of truth to the pile of dirt she was passing off as gold dust.
Slade gazed down at the collection and grinned. “I knew there was gold here. You tried to keep it for yourself, but I knew.”
“Aren’t you afraid your boss will wonder what you’ve been doing when you should have been on your way back with the money?”
His eyes widened and he looked over his shoulder.
Whoever his boss was, Slade was afraid of him. Maisie lifted a brow. Interesting. Who in the world could he be afraid of? Who could do harm to a deputy sheriff, except maybe the sheriff? But I happen to know that sheriff is an honest man. He did his best to keep Donald away from me, jailing him for vagrancy a couple of times so he wouldn’t come home drunk. So, who is Slade working for?
“You never mind about my boss. He and I have an understanding.”
“Does his understanding include you taking all my money and the gold and killing me? I can’t imagine he’ll be very happy if you do that. You’ll be looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life.”
He stepped toward her, his hand raised. “Shut up! You don’t know anything. Just keep working and getting me that gold.”
Clearly, appealing to his logical side didn’t work. She kept taking the fool’s gold from the rocks.
Frank returned with a fresh bucket.
Slade turned his gun toward Frank.
Frank was faster. He fired his weapon.
Roy Slade fell to the ground clutching his right side. “How? I took your gun.”
“Did you forget about Joe Small’s gun?”
Slade dropped his gun and clutched his side while blood ran through his fingers. “I didn’t kill Small. How would I know if he still had his weapon?”
Frank narrowed his eyes and held his gun on Slade. “But you said the map showed where his body was. If you didn’t kill him how would you know that?”
“Donald told me and since I’m the only one alive, I couldn’t very well have them find the body and pin it on me, just like you’re doing.”
Maisie shook her head. “That’s awfully farfetched, Slade. Why should we believe you?”
“Why else would I want the map?”
She rolled her eyes. “Oh, I don’t know, maybe for the gold. The map also shows where the gold was found. I believe that is what you’re really after.”
Slade shrugged. “Believe what you want.”
Maisie looked down at him. “I intend to.”
Frank looked over at Maisie. “Are you all right?”
She nodded and walked to where Slade set their guns. “He didn’t harm me.” She holstered her Colt and carried Frank’s to him.
He turned back to Slade. “You’re very lucky. If you had hurt her I’d have had to kill you. Now, why don’t you tell us who you work for?”
Blood still seeped through Slade’s fingers. “I need a doctor.”
“You need to tell us who you work for.” Frank raised the Colt again. “Or you can see the undertaker instead of the doctor.”
Slade raised his hand. It was bloody from holding his side. “Okay, okay. I work for Albert Haynes.”
Maisie’s eyes widened. “The bank president?”
Slade nodded. “Yeah, and he has some really bad men working for him. Men who would kill you as soon as look at you.”
“Okay, we’ll get you to the doctor.” Frank took his gun from Maisie and holstered it, then put Joe Small’s gun in his waistband. “We’ll pack our gear and then take him into Flagstaff.”
