“I consider you my daughter. I know we don’t see eye-to-eye on everything, but that’s how it should be in this world of folks with different sets of mind. None of your barren marriage was your fault, and to the dickens with him for making you think so. And all because of the explosion of the war. It hadn’t just lamed his leg...Holy man, my foot. It’s why I’ve encouraged you. Why I wanted a match with Mr. Sanderson. Asa likes him, and he don’t give his approval lightly.”
“What? Tell me the rest. Tell me everything I need to know.”
She held tight to Bronx’s hand so as to encourage him he was part of the tableau, not just watching something on a stage. But he didn’t say a word, because he couldn’t think of any.
Miss Frieda patted his head, like she reminded him she hadn’t forgotten him, but she paid all her attention to Lila.
“I saw it right off. When I bathed Emmett’s feverish form during his last sickness. His injuries from the war...gave him a limp, true. But much more.” Her big cheeks blazed red like apples. “You see, the war also hurt his manhood. He’d never be able to...perform. As a husband ought.”
“Well, maybe he didn’t know for certain, until...our wedding night. Such a matter is not a topic for proper discussion. And Emmett was a Biblical man, no fornicator. How would he even know, himself?”
Bronx spoke up in a wry tone. He was no fornicator either, truth to tell, but... “A man knows. And he married you, anyway. Had you waste all these years.”
“No, no, Bronx. I can’t regret it. For I’d not have helped so many at Gethsemane. I’ll help Malina, now.”
“But you paid a hefty price. Your family.”
“Yes, but Emmett did teach me of forgiveness. I do have that. And most important, without Emmett, I wouldn’t have come to Leadville. I wouldn’t have found you.” She gazed into his eyes with every word, not blinking one single time.
His fingers wrapped themselves in the wonder of her hair again. No matter Miz Frieda hunkered close by, for at her words, Lila relaxed against him again, and her face all but wore an angel’s halo. Then her mouth tightened.
“But it doesn’t change the fact that a Pinkerton is after you.”
Well, his relaxation ended quick. “I have been thinking about that. According to Doc Holliday whose knowledge I admire, I am a dead man. I might understand should a lawman be after Shandy Brinks, the man I lived as before I found my way, but—”
“Let us hope and pray we solve the mystery. And we might well.” Miss Frieda rose to her full height much like a standing grizzly gear, and a bit more fearsome—Bronx had encountered one in the wild. “I have dispatched my livery boy in finding Mr. Mangold to get the sale of Gethsemane up and running.” Her eyes glittered. “Malina told me all. But beforehand, my boy’ll be consulting with Doc Holliday, who I believe is sure to know how to guide us.” She bestowed a tender smile back and forth between them, so Bronx reckoned Malina had revealed Doc Holliday’s presence in her life.
Bronx preened a bit hearing Miss Frieda saying “us.” Here, finally, somebody cared for him, included him. Somebody decent and law abiding, that was. “But I won’t expect Doc to get here in a huff. He’d likely chained to a bourbon bottle.”
A pounding on the front door matched the throbbing of Bronx’s heart. Might as well been hiking up the waterfall again, so out of breath was he. Lila’s face paled. He recalled how Matthias Scottsdale hadn’t come right in. And even with his fine manners, Doc Holliday knew Leadville better than to knock at an open door.
It was time. His heart all but cracked a rib. “I’ll answer it. I’ve bamboozled y’all enough.”
“Bronx!” Lila beat him to the door, faster than a barn mouse with a tomcat behind.
“Mr. Scottsdale! I’m Lila Brewster. Won’t you come in?”
Her voice was so blessedly normal Bronx started breathing again.
“And I’m Bronx Sanderson.” He held out his hand.
“I’ve been looking three or four states for you, Mr. Sanderson. Matthias Scottsdale. Mind if we sit down?”
Bronx took a deep breath, The man didn’t look threatening at all, but then, he’d been fooled before. Rebekah.
They all took seats around the parlor.
“Should I make tea,” Miss Frieda asked, polite.
“No,” the three of them said together, also polite.
Matthias showed his badge, crossed his legs at the knee, puffed on a handkerchief, and eyed the room with approval, took so long Bronx all but screamed. Lila’s fingers twitched across her skirt, and she stopped long enough to reach for his hand. He exploded deep down even as nerves crawled in an out of each muscle.
“Can we get on with it, sir?” Lila finally spoke up in her Esther voice. Bronx remembered the Bible lady interrupting her royal husband, and he sent Lila a secret smile.
“Indeed.” Scottsdale smiled at each of them, and Bronx had no choice but to relax. Was he to be bound in chains, he reckoned it would have happened first thing. “Some years ago, I was hired by your brother, Tulsa Sanderson, to find you after you broke jail in Prescott. Little did he know you’d been declared dead. And the grief was real.”