Redeeming Lies Read online

  Resting her forehead against the cool glass, she closed her eyes. Would she ever escape this web of lies and live an honest life? Was it too much to ask? In time, she let the rhythm of the train, the percussion of the wheels, and the gentle rocking of the car lull her into a restless sleep.

  David woke with a start as the train jolted to a stop. He rubbed sleep from his eyes and squinted out the window at a rather unremarkable terrain. Except for the new station and a few ramshackle buildings scattered down what he assumed to be the main street of Shoshone, little more recommended the town for other than it was, a junction for the rail service. What he hoped to find would be a cafe where he’d buy a modest dinner, or at the least, a strong cup of coffee while he waited to board the next train north to Ketchum. He found little encouragement after his first glimpse out of the window.

  Spectral-like shadows cast by late afternoon sun did little to improve the appearance of the town, nor did it help to lighten his somber mood. He pulled out a watch from his coat pocket, satisfied by what he read. If the train kept to schedule, he might make Ketchum by early evening. Even if he didn't find an eating establishment, the boarding house he'd contacted should have something to serve him.

  A half dozen other passengers disembarked the train. Like David, some seemed disoriented while two men strode with purpose across the dirt street toward a two-story building a block west of the station. He acted on a hunch and followed them.

  The small hotel appeared as new as the train station, bearing evidence that the rail was bringing some measure of prosperity to a few folks. The berry pie made the day-old coffee palatable. From the window over his table, he watched as the train pulled out, eastbound. Somehow, seeing it recede into the distance in a column of smoke gave his decision to leave Snowberry a sad finality.

  He checked his watch again and pulled the book from his pocket. Poe was proving a suitable companion for the trip. The man was a bit melancholy but otherwise engaging, and the mood was appropriate for his current state of mind.

  Maddie’s train stopped at yet another station, one looking even more desolate than the last. Although the station appeared recently painted, the few buildings within sight of her window scarcely designated the settlement as a town. Even vegetation seemed unwilling to claim it. Perplexed, she wondered what brought people to this uncivilized wilderness. It was a desolate land not even deemed worthy of statehood, instead a territory. She wasn’t even certain what that designation implied. Did clear borders exist? Was it simply an uncharted wilderness?

  She felt certain her father could lose himself in such a place, then she recalled what she'd read of the Pinkertons and shuddered. No, they knew how to track a man as any predator sniffs out its prey. They were the wolves, and she and her father, the rabbits. She scowled at the image her imagination conjured a few minutes earlier. The Pinkertons were the heroes of her stories, not the antagonists. It was for their effectiveness that she admired them. Now, her previous admiration turned to fear.

  She eased her sleeping father back into the seat cushion and pulled her shoulder from beneath his, her arm tingling as circulation returned. Train travel brought unpleasant memories—hunger, this familiar fatigue from sleeping on straight-back chairs, and hunger, yet again. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her too many hours had passed since they’d eaten last.

  Across the aisle, a child of perhaps three or four years of age fussed while her mother made distracted attempts to comfort her with a cloth doll. Petulantly, the child pushed it away, balling her hand into a fist and pounding at her mother's shoulder. Maddie turned away, disgusted by the child's whining. She detested spoiled children almost as much as she detested needlework or oatmeal. Oatmeal. Her empty stomach gave a gurgle of protest.

  From her valise beneath the seat, she pulled a leather-bound notebook. She touched the pencil point to the tip of her nose, tapping it for a full minute before scribbling her thoughts. The Snake River plain stretched away, only breaking the monotony where it rolled up against distant snowcapped mountains. With her head bent to her writing, she missed the beauty of the rolling river. However, she'd probably have failed to appreciate it even if she had looked from the window. Accustomed as she was to green, groomed parks and towering city skylines, she would not have seen it as anything other than a winding course of muddy water.

  "You seem intent on your writing. What is it? A journal?" her father asked, then without waiting for her to answer, he said, "You must miss your classmates. Miss Willard’s school was good for you, wasn't it? You seem more confident since you started attending. I’m sorry I had to bring you with me." He opened his hands in a gesture of helplessness. "I didn’t know what else to do."

  How was she to answer without sounding cruel? Of course, she missed her school, her teachers, her friends, and the opportunities they all made for her—to live a normal life. He'd taken her away from all that, dragging her once again into his world of half-truths and false hopes. However much she wanted to give vent to her true feelings, she saw him for the first time for what he’d become—a broken man.

  The answer never came because at that moment the ticket master strolled through the car announcing the next station stop. Shoshone. The name sounded as foreign as the landscape.

  Her stomach rumbled loud enough for her father to take notice. He chuckled. "Maddie, girl, it's been awhile since we had a decent meal, hasn't it? We aren't so poor that I can't buy us a meal at this next stop. We were once, but not now." He patted her hand much as she remembered him doing when she was a child. Back then, his attempt at comfort often fell flat, the promises he made more often broken than kept.

  "That would be nice, Father."

  "I'll ask the conductor if he knows of any eating establishments here." He rose stiffly, grabbing for the seat back as the track made a turn. He grinned down at her and asked, "Roast beef or duck?"

  She gave him a wan smile. "Ham and eggs, if you please."

  He winked at her before turning away. With that new faltering gait, he made his way to the front of the car.

  Her hunger stirred a memory of an article she’d read in last month’s Harper’s Magazine. Mr. Fred Harvey had opened a series of restaurants along the route of the Santa Fe Railway. The article proclaimed the wonders of civilized dining service in an otherwise untamed country. The rail lines they'd been traveling could certainly benefit from Mr. Harvey's establishments. She tried to remember the details of the advertisement below the article. Wasn’t Mr. Harvey looking for respectable young women to serve in his restaurants?

  Picking up her pencil again, she scribbled in her notebook recollections from what she’d read. Perhaps the information might come in handy one day. Maybe that would be the very thing to support herself in a vocation that would take her away from her father's schemes.

  She was still writing when her father returned. Alarm bells rang in her head as she looked up into his face, his gray-skinned complexion. She reached for his hand, helping him to the seat. "Father, you look terrible."

  His words came out in a staccato cadence between great gulps for air. "I don't feel all that well, little girl. Guess I'm getting a little old for this kind of life." He met her eyes, a wry grin, then, "Just need a rest, that's all, a nice feather bed, a warm bath. I'd be right as rain." He made a feeble attempt to laugh, choking instead. "Think that's the common expression, isn't it?"

  "Here, let me loosen your collar a little." She helped him untie the cravat. His heart pounded against her palm, the vein in his neck throbbing. "Maybe I can find some water for you." She rose to her feet, but his hand clutched at her arm, pulling her back onto the seat.

  "No, I'll be fine." Beads of sweat dotted his forehead. "Maddie, I need to tell you the rest of the story." His hand continued gripping her arm, fingernails biting into her wrist.

  Her alarm increased at his growing agitation. "We can talk later, Father, perhaps when we arrive in Nampa." She wasn't sure she wanted to hear what he had to say. The fear in his eyes, his strange
behavior, were enough to tell her that this time, whatever the scam, it was remarkably different. He had done something his usual charm and glib tongue couldn’t fix.

  "No! Now is the time." He lurched forward, reaching for his leather bag.

  Seeing him struggle, she pulled it out for him, balancing it on the seat between them.

  "I told you I made enemies in New York."

  She nodded once, cold sweat trickled down her spine.

  "Our...enterprise was in trouble. We needed more funding to continue. I contacted a family that is quite able to provide cash for what they deem a good investment." He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his brow, folding the cloth with studied care before returning it to his pocket.

  Watching him, Maddie chafed with impatience. She wanted to rant at him, wanted to scream, Just tell me! But she held her tongue, biting her cheek instead.

  "The good news is that I convinced them. . ." He made another sound deep in his throat that sounded like it might have been a swallowed laugh or cry or both. "I suppose the bad news is the same. . .I convinced them."

  "Did they hire the Pinks?"

  He gave her a quizzical look. "Pinks? When did you become so acquainted with the Pinkerton Agency that you'd use that term?"

  She shrugged, unwilling to explain herself.

  "Never mind. I wish they had. At least the consequence they administer would simply be jail time." He slowly shook his head. Unable to meet her eyes, he stared down at her hands instead. "No, the Sicilians take care of their own reckoning."

  Maddie's breath caught. "Father, why? You told me you'd have no dealings with them." Stories she’d heard of those who’d received the consequences for a family’s failure to make payment on a debt owed filled her with new fear.

  He took both her hands in his, like a drowning man grabbing onto someone who might save him, as though she could somehow absolve him of his crimes. "Maddie, I'm so sorry."

  She pulled her hands from his, refusing to be his rescuer or his priest. Sliding away from him to the far side of the bench, she hugged her arms to her sides. Tears welled in her eyes as though she were drowning in a personal sea of anger. "When will you stop?" She asked it softly, without looking at him, knowing the answer.

  "Now, Maddie, now! I will go straight. I promise!" He lay a trembling hand on the leather satchel. "This is our ticket to an honest life." He turned his gaze upon the satchel, an expression of near reverence.

  The whoosh of steam and squealing brakes announced their arrival at the train depot.

  Alex leaned across the bag and whispered, "Maddie, if anything happens to me, promise me you'll use this to make a fresh start. It will allow you to disappear."

  Her anger had constructed a solid wall about her—truth, lies, all woven into a tightly plaited fence erected in a moment between them, a wall that could not be deconstructed by any number of apologies. She didn't answer him, neither did she look at him when he staggered down the aisle telling her he'd return with dinner. She couldn't tolerate one more lie.

  Chapter 3

  David considered his options and ordered a sandwich to take along on the next leg of the journey. He could see no use in taking chances on finding the boarding house manager surly and unwilling to dirty her kitchen for a late arriving guest. The young woman who returned from the kitchen had taken the effort to wrap the snack in a cloth napkin. Although she blushed scarlet when he thanked her, she met his eyes with a boldness that David found somewhat unsettling and surprising. He hardly considered himself meriting such a flirtatious invitation.

  After sliding the sandwich into a jacket pocket and his book into the other, he left the café and ambled down the dirt street back to the train station.

  The late April afternoon blew a chilling wind against his neck. As he pulled his coat collar close to his face, he gazed north to the foothills and wondered if snow was falling at Ketchum's higher elevation. He hoped this was not the case because he was quite finished with winter. Idaho had a way of hanging onto the season as if it were a dear friend, but David felt a closer kinship to the warmth afforded by spring and summer. For his way of thinking, they could arrive none too soon.

  A scattering of passengers lounged or stood upon the train platform, most in rough clothing, reflecting lives acquainted with the harsh frontier. Two black-haired children hung close to their mother's skirts. David surmised them to be of the Nez Percé tribe. A somber-faced man, whose features were hidden behind a bush-like beard, stood close by, a rifle cradled in the crook of his arm. He acknowledged David with a curt nod. David replied in kind.

  Emerging from the ticket office, a distinguished, middle-aged man stood out from the rest of the travelers. Although he wore a common bowler and a rather ill-fitting jacket, he carried himself more like a gentleman of means. David watched him for a second, curious. What might have brought the man to a place such as this?

  The gentleman glanced back at the waiting westbound train, which sat puffing steam like a restless dragon. He took a single step; a strange amalgam of expressions washed over his face, urgency, pain, and something else—fear. One hand reached out as though to catch something, the other clutched at his chest. It was an all-too-familiar scene for a man of David's training. Before the man had fallen to the platform, David was running.

  Maddie wiped at her eyes with the back of her glove, her handkerchief already drenched with tears. She took in a gulp of air to steady her shuddering breath. Through a film of tears, she saw the older woman in the seat before her exclaim and lean close to the window. Maddie followed the woman's gaze. A crowd of passengers gathered around the still figure of a man lying crumpled on the platform.

  "Poor man!" the woman said with a sob. "Poor, poor unfortunate man! He collapsed right there on the platform. Just clutched his chest and fell down like a rock. I fear he may be dead!"

  In moments, played before her eye as though through a stereograph, she saw at once every person on the platform, their positions, their reactions telling the story. Without words, each one told her what they'd witnessed. To the right of the fallen man, a woman clutched her husband's arm, her other hand holding a handkerchief pressed to her face—shock. Another woman, middle-aged, turned her face away, her hands covering her face—horror. Then there were the curious bystanders. To the left, a man knelt, a stethoscope in his hand, an open bag at his side. Each character brought the event into three-dimensional focus.

  A bowler hat lay a few feet beyond the onlookers, looking lost and obscenely out of place. A train conductor became a blur, running, in contrast to the small, still crowd. Horror, sadness, urgency. Deductions from observations. The man who had the tools of a physician rose to his feet, placed his stethoscope back in his bag, and walked away from the man, his head down. An unfortunate accident—a death. Her father was gone.

  Maddie stood a few feet back from the window, tears dried on her cheeks, mouth dry. It was as though all moisture had been wicked from her body as the shock wave hit her. All that there is time for is action and it will allow you to disappear. That was all she needed to remember. She glowered at the bag, touching it with her fingertip, then recoiling as though burned. She blinked and her world changed again.

  In the next moment, her instincts took control, forcing any emotional response to her father's death into a small corner of her heart. With the leather satchel in hand, she swept down the aisle toward the door. Along the way, she picked up a pair of wire-rimmed reading glasses from atop a newspaper beside a sleeping passenger. Before stepping out of the train car, she reached overhead for a woman's straw hat perched on an overhead shelf. In a heartbeat, she’d replaced it with her expensive one.

  The woman who stepped from the car onto the platform was no longer the ingénue fresh from Miss Emma Willard's elite boarding school for young women of means. In her place stood a woman with a short history, a school teacher, as her glasses and less polished appearance bespoke. With an illusion of confidence, she strode across the wood platform to t
he train's ticket office. A quick glance at the blackboard with its posting of train arrivals and departures determined where fate would write the next chapter of her life. It would need to be a good place to disappear. Ketchum.

  Chapter 4

  David stood apart from the onlookers, feeling the same wretched sense of failure that always came upon him as the result of a patient's death. It didn't matter that he was not the man's physician for more than the few seconds before he stopped breathing. It was that persistent sense that he could have done something more—faster or sooner. After previous years of discussions with his closest colleagues, David concluded such feelings were professional hazards. Guilt was as easy to stuff into a medical bag as a stethoscope.

  The station master caught up to David even as the curious pressed in for a view of the corpse. The doctor spoke with the railroad representative to explain what had occurred. The account of the man's heart attack would not be pointing fingers of culpability at the Oregon Short Line. With that report concluded, David's involvement came to an end. The undertaker or the livery owner would assume responsibility from this point, and David was freed to continue the journey north. That was good because the train departed in ten minutes.

  He slouched onto a bench, mentally exhausted. People-watching helped distract him from gloomy thoughts. A dozen passengers milled about, awaiting the boarding announcement. None stimulated his imagination.

  Only a few minutes passed before the crowd gathered into a ragged line as the conductor called out, "All aboard for Hailey and Ketchum!"