Killer Poker

Chapter 4





No one tried to kill them, despite Arturo’s veiled prediction, and they made better time than Pevner had said. It was late in the afternoon of the next day when they reached what folks had started to call the Mile High City.

The Front Range of the Rockies lay ten miles west of Denver, but because of the thin, clear air the mountains appeared to be close enough to reach out and touch.

“It’s a spectacular sight,” Arturo commented from the buckboard seat as he and Conrad entered the city.

“Denver’s a pretty place, all right,” Conrad agreed. He rode the blaze-faced black alongside the vehicle. “I want to go see my lawyers first. Their office is on Colfax Avenue, not far from the capitol.”

“Do you have attorneys on retainer in all the large cities, sir?”

Conrad smiled. “Just about. It takes a lot of paperwork to keep all those business enterprises going, and I sure as hell don’t want to have to do it.”

He wore a black coat to go along with the black trousers and had a string tie cinched around his neck. Silver conchos studded the hatband of his black Stetson. He looked like a successful rancher, or possibly a gambler or gunman.

They passed the federal building, the state capitol, and the U.S. Mint. All of them were impressive structures. So was the six-story brick office building where Conrad’s lawyers were headquartered.

Arturo parked the buckboard on the cobblestone street in front of the building. “I’ll wait out here and keep an eye on our supplies, sir.”

Conrad nodded. “That’s a good idea. Denver’s gotten to be a big enough town that you can’t trust people like you can in a little settlement.”

The building didn’t have a hitch rail for saddle horses in front of it. Most people traveled around town in buggies or carriages these days. Conrad dismounted and looped the black’s reins around the brake lever on the buckboard. That would work well enough.

He went inside, through a lobby with a brilliantly polished granite floor, and up a wide set of stairs with gilded banisters. Quite a few men were walking and talking in the lobby, all the while puffing on expensive cigars. Their footsteps and voices echoed from the high ceiling. The smell of rich tobacco smoke hung in the air.

On the second floor, Conrad came to a heavy wooden door with pebbled glass in its upper half. Painted on the glass in gold letters were the words HUDSON, BURKE, AND HARDY—ATTORNEYS AT LAW. He turned the gold-plated knob and stepped into an expensively appointed outer office with a gleaming wooden floor.

The woman behind the desk was putting a cover over her typewriter. She looked up at him and said, “I’m sorry, sir, but we’re about to close for the day.”

Conrad took his hat off and smiled. “It’s I who should apologize for coming in so late, Miss . . . ?”

He noticed she wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.

She hesitated but then supplied her name. “Sullivan.”

“Miss Sullivan.” Conrad didn’t recognize her from his previous visits and knew she probably had been hired since the last time he was there. She was very attractive, probably about twenty-five, with honey-blond hair pulled up on top of her head.

Conrad went on, “I need to speak to Mr. Hudson if he’s here, please.”

Ellery Hudson was the senior partner in the firm and the one with whom Conrad had dealt most often.

“I’m afraid that’s impossible without an appointment,” Miss Sullivan said without addressing the question of whether or not Hudson was in the office. “If you’d care to make one, Mr. Hudson has some time available at the end of next week . . .”

Her voice trailed off as Conrad shook his head. “This is important,” he said. “I need to speak to him right away. Tell him it’s Conrad Browning.”

Carefully plucked blond eyebrows rose in surprise. Obviously, Miss Sullivan recognized the name. She hesitated and then pressed a button on her desk.

“Yes, Rose?”

The woman’s voice came out of a black box on Miss Sullivan’s desk. Conrad looked at it with interest. He knew it had to be one of the new inter-office speaking devices he had heard about. They were based on the same sort of apparatus as a telephone and were being installed in some of the offices back east. He hadn’t expected to see one in Denver.

But it would be a new century before too much longer, he reminded himself. Things changed. Progress, or what passed for progress, was inevitable.

Rose Sullivan leaned forward and spoke into the box. “There’s a man out here who insists on seeing Mr. Hudson, Mrs. Moorehead. He says his name is Conrad Browning.”

Conrad smiled again. That was a name he knew. Julia Moorehead was Ellery Hudson’s private secretary.

“Ask him to wait right there,” she said.

Miss Sullivan looked up at Conrad. “If you’d care to wait a moment . . .”

“I heard,” he told her, still smiling. He hung his hat on a rack just inside the door but didn’t have a chance to sit down in one of the padded leather chairs before the door to the firm’s inner sanctum opened and Julia Moorehead came out.

She was a handsome, middle-aged woman who had been Hudson’s private secretary for a number of years. A decade earlier, nearly all the secretaries and clerks in law offices and other businesses had been men, but that was something else that was changing with the times.

“Mr. Browning,” Julia said as she held out a hand to Conrad. “It’s so nice to see you again.”

“You, too, Mrs. Moorehead.” He took her hand for a moment. “Is Ellery here?”

“Yes, I told him you were here and he said to bring you right on back.” Julia glanced at Miss Sullivan’s desk and added, “You can go on home, Rose.”

“I don’t mind staying for a while. Someone might need something typed.” Rose was looking at Conrad with frank interest now that she had seen the reaction his name provoked. Clearly, he had to be an important man, and important men often were wealthy.

Conrad recognized the look Rose gave him and didn’t want to encourage it. He had been a widower long enough that he was no longer in mourning—at least not officially—but he had more important things on his mind than romance.

“That won’t be necessary,” Julia said. “I can type anything that needs to be typed.”

“Oh. All right.” Rose didn’t bother to hide her disappointment, any more than she bothered to hide the invitation in her eyes when she looked at Conrad.

Julia closed the door behind them and led him along a corridor lined with doors. “I apologize for that, Mr. Browning,” she said quietly. “Rose has something of a predatory nature.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

She paused. “I was so sorry to hear about what happened. I don’t believe I ever met your wife, but I’m sure she was a wonderful woman.”

“She was.”

“We were all very upset when we heard that you’d been killed, too. It was such a relief to find out later that that report was incorrect.”

She didn’t know how close he had come to letting Conrad Browning stay dead. But those days were over.

Julia opened a set of double doors at the end of the hall. “Here he is, sir.” She stepped aside to let Conrad enter Ellery Hudson’s private office.

It was the largest office on the floor, with cross ventilation and an excellent view of the snowcapped mountains from one of the windows. Ellery Hudson came out from behind a big desk with his hand extended.

He didn’t look like one of the most prominent attorneys in the country. He was a short, somewhat pudgy man with wispy, fair hair. His eyes behind rimless spectacles were pale blue. His mild appearance concealed a keen legal mind and a nature that could be ruthless when called for.

“It’s good to see you again, Conrad,” he said as the two men shook hands. “I’m terribly, terribly sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you, Ellery.” Conrad sat down in the plush leather chair in front of the desk while Hudson resumed his seat behind it.

“I’ll leave you gentlemen alone,” Julia murmured.

Conrad lifted a hand to stop her. “No, please stay.” He glanced at Hudson. “If that’s all right with you, of course.”

“Whatever you prefer. I certainly have no secrets from Julia. She knows more about what goes on around here than I do.”

“And that’s often a good thing,” she said with a smile.

“Indeed.” Hudson clasped his hands together on the desk in front of him. “What can we do for you, Conrad?”

“First of all”—he took a deep breath—“I have a story to tell you.”

Julia sat in a chair to the side while Hudson leaned forward. The two of them listened intently as Conrad explained everything that had happened during the past two years, starting with Rebel’s kidnapping and murder. Julia put her hand over her mouth to stifle a gasp of horror several times as he filled them in.

When he reached the part about the twins and how Pamela had concealed their very existence from him, both of his listeners looked shocked and then angry. Conrad told them about his search for the children so far.

When he was finished, Julia said, “How could any woman use her own children as pawns in such a warped attempt at vengeance? I can’t believe it!”

“Obviously, Pamela was capable of almost anything,” Conrad said. “Warped though it certainly is, Pamela’s plan has been effective. She intended to torment me . . . and she’s succeeded.”

Hudson said, “And now your search has brought you to Denver. How can we help you, Conrad?”

“My hunch is that Pamela probably stayed either in one of the best hotels in town, or with friends. I need to find someone who remembers when she was here, and whether or not she had the children with her.”

“Because if she didn’t . . . ?”

“Then I’ve come too far and overlooked the place where she left them. But if the twins were still with her, the hiding place is either here in Denver or somewhere farther west. She was booked through all the way to San Francisco on the train.”

Hudson nodded. “Yes, that makes sense. We have operatives who can investigate for us. It shouldn’t take long to blanket all the best hotels in the city and find out what you need to know. A few days, perhaps.”

“That’s what I was hoping you’d say, Ellery.” Conrad smiled. “I knew I could count on you.”

“We’ll do everything we can,” Hudson promised. “Discreetly, of course. That goes without saying.”

“Of course.”

“In the meantime, what are your plans?”

Conrad shrugged. “I don’t have any. Arturo and I have been on the trail for quite a while. I suppose we’ll find a place to stay and rest while your men conduct their investigation.”

“I’ll telephone the Lansing House and have them reserve their best suite for you.”

“That’ll be fine. I’m obliged to you.”

“Conrad . . .” Hudson hesitated. “Have you thought about what you’re going to do when you find the children, as I’m sure you will?”

Conrad frowned. “What do you mean? They’re my children. I’ll take them and make a home for them somewhere. I’ve been drifting for awhile, but then it’ll be time to settle down.”

“What if Miss Tarleton gave them to some family to adopt?”

Conrad’s frown deepened. “You mean . . .”

“I mean those people may have been raising the twins as their own for the past three years. They may not want to give them up.”

Conrad sat forward in the chair. “But they’re my children.”

“You might have to prove that. You might even have to go to court to claim them.”

“How can anybody prove such a thing?” Conrad flung out a hand in irritation. “And who would go to court over it?”

“You never know. I’m just trying to make you aware of the possibilities.”

Conrad sighed as his anger left him. “You’re right. And I appreciate your concern, Ellery. Right now, though, all I can think of is trying to find them.”

“I understand. When the time comes to deal with that, you’ll have plenty of people on your side to help you.”

They stood up, and Conrad shook hands again with Hudson. As he turned to go, Julia Moorehead took his hand as well and said, “I hope you find them, Mr. Browning. I’m sure you will.”

“Thank you.”

Rose Sullivan was gone from the outer office when he went back through it on his way out of the building. Just as well, because his mind was whirling and he didn’t need any added distractions. He had been concentrating so much on locating the children that he hadn’t given much thought to what would happen after he found them. Hudson was right; it might not be as simple as he wished it could be.

But a few more added problems wouldn’t make him give up. Not by a long shot. He would figure out what needed to be done and—

“Mr. Browning.” The voice intruded on his thoughts. “There you are.”

He looked into the smiling, eager face of Rose Sullivan.