“Thanks kindly. I won’t be long.” Then he wondered, worried. The reputation of nearby State Street had already reached his ears. “So you walk back to the boardinghouse all by yourself in the night? After the prayers?”
Her lashes fluttered. “In the summertime, it stays light a very long time. Otherwise, there’s always someone with manners who sees me home. Often, it’s Clemmons, when he’s in health. And Doc Holliday escorts me once in a while.” Then she stared at him full on. “It’s how Emmett wanted things, without him. Me, cozy and safe at night, away from here.”
Emmett, Always Emmett. Bronx, in a snit, rolled his eyes. “Seems unsafe to me, your man wanting you to walk about in the dark, no matter.”
“It’s not such a far walk up Pine Street. And not too fearsome. Homes and families there.” Her lovely mouth opened to catch a glimpse of her sweet pink tongue, and he heated to his feet. Remembered how much she still loved Emmett. But he didn’t apologize for disconcerting her. He spoke the truth. Doc Holliday was gentle but dangerous. And what manners, someone from this part of town? Instead, Bronx nodded a good-bye, hated that he’d miss her. Hated that he’d left his own coat at the boardinghouse and had to shrug into one worn by a dead man. The dead man she still loved.
He headed out, regretted the door slam, but it was heavy and couldn’t be helped. Behind him, the noisy room smelled of hot coffee, and his mouth watered.
Strange. He found himself whistling along to a tune Lila started singing before he walked away. Must have learned it from Miz Edith.
Ah, well, he’d be back soon. Wondered why he looked so much forward to a night of godly hymns, As for praying—well, a man with no soul couldn’t be bothered with such things.
Enough sunset hung in the sky to light his way, but enough dusk hid the grimy street and covered ramshackle buildings. Nothing along Chestnut Street matched the splendor of the wide-open Avenue, its big Assumption Church and fancy brick opera houses.
He kicked at a chunk of rock pocking the walkway. How had Emmett brought such a refined young lady to a neighborhood so tumbledown? So full of folks who decent folks didn’t want to know? Why hadn’t his preachifying been good enough for the well-mannered congregations?
Even more, how was it Lila stayed on, a woman alone? Might not the town’s living preachers lend her a hand?
Oh, well. His whistling stopped before he grew to despise Emmett all the way through. For Lila loved her man. And for all Bronx’s sins, Bronx was a better man than a jealous fool. Oh, too much to think of when, despite his good sense, a lady with long red hair intrigued him once again.
Cold wind from the Sawatches rustled across the collar of the dead man’s coat. Too tight across the shoulders for him, although it kept the chill from his bones. A funny satisfaction brushed over him. Lila had thought of his comfort, not caring if her dead husband had to donate his coat.
Bronx whistled again in time with his footsteps up the Avenue, nodded at his new world. Waved to folks bound for their evening entertainments. Snow cresting mountains on both sides, white so bright the glare might even hurt an eye in the moonrise.
Somehow, stuck between two mountain ranges, Leadville seemed wrapped in broad shoulders that brought a strange comfort. Nighttime lights and lanterns came to life like fallen stars across the town, lit enough for him to read such enterprises as a stationers and piano store, stoves and tinworks. Telephone poles stabbed the sky and drew lines around the road. Folks still bustled about with their tasks at end of day. Nope. Bronx Sanderson wasn’t disappointed at all in the place he’d trudged up a mountain to find. In such a bustle of humanity, he’d no doubt obtain a hardworking job before tomorrow ended.
And there was a lovely red-headed widow in the midst of it… although—his heart fell a tad—such a thing was most unwise to think.
At Miss Frieda’s, he saw nobody else although he heard a ruckus in the kitchen, grabbed from the plateful of chicken legs and beans stuck in the middle of the dining table. Best but to leave a note rather than get lectured by a busy body in the flesh. Scrawled a message he stuck on her register counter. Staying with Lila at her shelter. That’s all any big mouth needed to know.
Walking back to Lila’s, stars flecked the night sky like shining freckles on an angel’s face. Dark clouds swirled through the sky like a kid’s fingers in mud. The beauty struck him, and his steps slowed, letting in more questions. Had he wasted away today, drinking bourbon with a fancy gunfighter?
Or had Doc Holliday presented him with an opportunity he could not ignore? The invitation to Denver niggled like fleas in a wool shirt. How might it be, Bronx Sanderson legally dead?
Him, so lost in thought...the door from Lila’s shelter all but smacked him in the face. She threw it open toward the dirt road to let him in. “Perfect timing. I’m about to lock the door for the night.”
Heat flicked against his face. “But I promised I’d be back. I’d not leave you alone.”