Blood on the Gallows

Chapter 26

McBride slammed back in his chair. He didn’t want to say ‘‘I don’t understand’’ again, but, unable to come up with anything else, he did.

Julieta was patient. ‘‘Simon is not a child of love. He is a child of rape.’’

‘‘But who—’’

‘‘His mother is Clare O’Neil, Mr. McBride.’’

‘‘I don’t—I mean, how did it happen?’’

‘‘How do such things happen? Jared saw her, wanted her and forced himself on her. It only happened once, but Clare got pregnant. The baby is the result.’’

The woman read McBride’s eyes, his struggle to come to terms with what she was telling him.

‘‘Jared had seen Clare in town. Then, about a year ago, he took a suite at Dora Ryan’s hotel and invited Clare to join him there for dinner. The day before, he sent a carriage for Clare to her father’s ranch. When she arrived at the hotel she found a room had been reserved for her and a dressmaker was in attendance with a trunk full of expensive silk gowns and jewelry. That would be enough to turn any girl’s head, especially someone like Clare, who had been raised in poverty on a two-by-twice ranch that barely broke even. On that day at least, she felt like a princess in a fairy tale.’’

McBride heard an unexpected note of sadness in Julieta’s voice as she said, ‘‘The beautiful princess went to the ball the following evening where Jared Josephine plied her with champagne and then raped her. He does nothing gently.’’

‘‘Why do you have the child?’’ McBride asked.

A raking rain rattled against the windows and thunder made its presence known to the Capitan peaks. The cabin was warm and smelled of coffee, of Julieta’s perfumed hair and the faint, vanilla odor of the sleeping baby.

‘‘Clare and I have been friends for years,’’ Julieta answered. ‘‘My brother built this cabin, planning to start a horse ranch. But he was a drunk and it never happened. Every penny he had, he spent in town. Then, one night about six months ago, he drank too much and smashed up a saloon. Thad Harlan told him to pay the damages and leave, but when Basilio refused, the marshal shot him.

‘‘Clare knew I was here alone, and when Simon was born she brought him to me and asked if I’d take care of him. She told me she didn’t want Jared Josephine to know that he’d fathered her child. Simon was conceived in lust and violence, but Clare loves him. Can you understand?’’

‘‘A baby is born with a need to be loved,’’ McBride said. ‘‘It’s hard to turn your back on that.’’

Julieta poured more coffee for them both, then took her cup and stepped to the window where she looked out at the rain.

‘‘Clare told me something else. She said that one day Simon would be rich and have all the things that Clare never had.’’

‘‘She was talking about a silver mine. Did you know about that?’’

Without turning her head, Julieta nodded. The fingers of rain running down the window reflected on her face like tears. ‘‘Yes, Clare told me about the mine. Her father discovered it around the time her baby was born. He’d been hunting antelope on his ranch and stumbled upon the mine in an arroyo. He had done a little prospecting at one time and realized the value of the silver.’’

‘‘I wonder that the old man never got his gun and went after Josephine.’’

‘‘That’s why Clare would never name the father. She knew if Hemp braced Jared Josephine he’d be killed.’’

McBride sipped his coffee and tried to put it together. Clare O’Neil had title to the mine and she wanted to keep it, not only for herself but for her son. That’s why she tried to kill me, McBride thought. That night she’d been a tigress protecting what rightfully belonged to her cub. She wasn’t about to take the risk of anyone taking the mine away from her.

After being brutally raped by Jared Josephine, was it possible that Clare was no longer completely sane? Had she turned to Dora Ryan for the comfort, understanding and love that she believed only another woman could give her? And had Dora been murdered because she stood in someone’s way?

McBride’s eyes lifted to Julieta. ‘‘How did Jared Josephine learn about the mine?’’

‘‘Thad Harlan told him. The marshal visited Hemp about six weeks ago when Clare was in town with Dora Ryan. It was in Harlan’s mind to ask the old man if he could start courting Clare and he brought a jug with him. Hemp got drunk and boasted that his daughter would soon become a rich young woman. For some reason he trusted Harlan and told him about the old Spanish silver mine hidden in an arroyo on his ranch. When Hemp came here to visit the baby, he told me that his loose talk was something he regretted. But by then the damage was done and it was too late.’’

McBride nodded. ‘‘Harlan must have figured that the mine was more important than courting and told Jared. That’s why Josephine ordered his son to marry Clare. He wanted to get his hands on the silver.’’

The woman turned and looked at McBride. ‘‘By then Jared considered Clare soiled goods. He had gotten what he wanted from her and once he had a fortune in silver in his pocket he could make a better marriage for himself. Clare told me that Jared had ambitions to get out of Rest and Be Thankful and wed into high society back East. He saw himself in politics, maybe even president if only he dared to aim that high.’’

‘‘And once the mine was Jared’s, his son, Lance, could get a divorce.’’

Julieta laughed. ‘‘Mr. McBride, a bullet is a lot cheaper than a divorce.’’

‘‘Talking about a bullet, who do you think murdered old Hemp?’’

‘‘Thad Harlan, Lance Josephine, a hired killer, take your pick. Like Dora Ryan, Hemp was in the way of Jared’s plans. Who knows, maybe it was Jared himself who killed him.’’

McBride rose to his feet and picked up his hat. ‘‘Thanks for the coffee and the information, Julieta,’’ he said. All of a sudden the woman, standing beside the weeping window, looked impossibly young and vulnerable. ‘‘Is there anything I can do for you? Money—’’

‘‘No, I’m fine. There was a little money left after my brother died and my needs are few. And Clare helps when she can.’’

‘‘Where is Clare, Julieta?’’

‘‘In town, with Dora, I imagine.’’

McBride shook his head. ‘‘Dora is dead, murdered in her hotel suite. I found her body yesterday morning.’’

Alarm flared in the girl’s eyes and the hand holding her cup trembled. ‘‘And Clare?’’

‘‘I don’t know.’’

A silence stretched between them; then McBride said, ‘‘Julieta, there’s something I need to tell you. Clare O’Neil tried to kill me. If I find her, that’s not something I intend to forgive and forget.’’

He saw the girl struggle for words, and when she spoke she was hesitant, almost apologetic, echoing something McBride had already considered. ‘‘Mentally, Clare has not been herself since that night in Jared Josephine’s room and I think she knows that. Now she wants only what’s best for her baby. She gave Simon to me because she has a premonition that she won’t be around to mother him. Clare told me that, and my heart is breaking for her.’’

‘‘Julieta,’’ McBride said, ‘‘I believe you are in great danger. If Josephine finds out about the child, you and Simon will become two more obstacles in his way. And you know how he deals with those.’’

The girl smiled. ‘‘I have my brother’s rifle. I’ll be all right.’’

‘‘Not if Josephine sends Thad Harlan.’’

A moment of fear flickered in Julieta’s eyes and McBride said, ‘‘Come with me. I will protect you and the baby.’’

It looked to McBride that the woman considered his suggestion for all of a second. Then she said, ‘‘Jared Josephine has no idea where I am. Thank you for your concern, Mr. McBride, but I’ll be all right.’’

The stubborn tilt of Julieta’s chin told McBride that he would not be able to convince her to leave, not that day at least.

‘‘What I said still goes,’’ he said finally as he rose to leave. ‘‘I’ll do all I can to keep you and Simon safe from harm.’’

Julieta’s only comment was a wan smile and the soft closing of her door.

Because of the dreariness of the day and McBride’s confused mental state, it was not a good time for the mustang to act up. But it did. The big man’s growing anger at Jared Josephine, at Harlan and the rest, was like the cocked hammer of a hair-trigger revolver. Now, when the mustang locked its forelegs and refused to go back into the wind and rain, the hammer dropped.

McBride swore and waved his fist. ‘‘Remember this? You mend your ways, horse, or you’ll get it right between the eyes.’’

As was usual with the mustang, its protest made, it allowed itself to be led outside the lean-to where McBride mounted.

He gloomily sat his saddle, looking at the cabin, thinking. Detective Sergeant John McBride, NYPD, abuser of horses and protector of babies, realized that he’d just completely lost any notion he’d harbored of riding away from the dangerous mess that surrounded him.

He knew he would never be able to live with himself or hold up his head in the company of belted men if he left Julieta and an innocent child to their fate.

But as he rode away from the cabin he felt a growing sense of unease, the feeling that his life was rapidly falling apart and the one who’d be left to kick aside the pieces would be a grinning, triumphant Jared Josephine.