Lee didn’t say a word before he left the room and was soon on the street again. He slammed into three bars before he found LeGault. He didn’t speak to the man but walked straight toward him, grabbed him by the shirt front and hauled him out of the chair.
“You want to come with me peacefully or dripping blood?”
The cards dropped from the gambler’s hands and he moved his feet to regain his balance. He gave Lee a quick nod as Lee began to shove him out the back door. No one followed them into the alley, whether because they didn’t care, or because they didn’t want to anger a doctor, wasn’t clear.
Leander was so angry that he could barely speak. “Where is she?”
“It’s too late for that now. You should have been here a couple of hours ago.”
Lee grabbed the man’s shirt front and slammed him
against the back wall of the saloon. “I’ve never killed a man in my life, and I took an oath to save lives, but so help me, LeGault, if you don’t answer me right now, I’ll break your scrawny little neck.”
“By now, she’s in the hands of the sheriff, no doubt under arrest for stealing a million dollars’ worth of securities.”
Lee was so astonished that he released the man and took a step backward. “Where? How?” he managed to whisper.
“I told you I’d get back at you for all those years I spent in jail. She was easy. She thinks she’s saving your life, but instead, she’s taking stolen goods out of town, and the sheriff has been informed of what she’s doing, and by now she’s in his custody. I hope you like seeing her in jail.”
As Lee raised his hand to strike LeGault, the man began to sneer. “I wouldn’t try it if I were you. I have a pistol aimed at your belly. Now, why don’t you be a good boy and go visit that pretty wife of yours in her cell? I’m sure it’ll be the first of many such visits.”
Lee didn’t want to waste time on the man, and he didn’t think he’d have the courage to shoot nun, so he backed out of the alley—he didn’t want to give LeGault a clear view of his back.
Lee ran down the street to where his buggy waited and, on second thought, he confiscated a big black gelding that stood tied to the hitching post, vaulted into the saddle and took off southeast out of town. The only place that could have a million dollars’ worth of securities was the train station.
He came to a rise and, in the moonlight, he could see a buggy to his right and what could be a posse of men to his left. It looked as if Blair were riding into the men who meant to arrest her—and he was half a mile away.
Chapter 34
Leander kicked the horse, started yelling, fired his pistol, grabbed a rifle from the scabbard on the horse and began firing it, all at the same time. The poor horse, terrified of the strange rider and all the noise and gunpowder, bolted forward, tearing across the moonlit countryside at breakneck speed. Lee wanted to draw attention to himself, to get the posse’s mind off his wife.
He succeeded.
When a few “stray” bullets landed a foot away from the lead horse of the posse, all the men halted, trying to control their horses, and giving Lee the precious minutes he needed to reach Blair before they did.
As it was, they all met at the same time. One glance at the sheriff’s solemn face and Lee knew that what LeGault had said was true—they’d come to see if one of the Chandlers had indeed been involved in a robbery.
“Damn you!” Lee yelled at Blair as he pulled back on the horse’s reins and dismounted, slapping the horse’s rump to head it back toward the lights of town. “I can’t trust you out of my sight for a minute.” He climbed into the buggy, grabbed the reins from her and looked up at the sheriff. “Let a woman have her own carriage, and it’s no telling how much trouble she’ll get into. And this is the worst. Always doing things for other people, never taking into account her own safety.”
The sheriff studied Lee for a long moment, a moment so long that Lee began to sweat.
“Boy, you oughta take care of your wife,” the sheriff said solemnly. “Or somebody else might.”
“Yes, sir,” Lee said. “I’ll have her taken care of by morning.”
“Six hours, Leander. I’ll give you six hours, and then I might be that somebody.”
“Yes, sir,” Lee said, and felt like crying, he was so grateful. “It won’t take me that long, sir.” He snapped the reins and moved the buggy off the road, heading it back toward the freight office.
Once they were on the road, Blair spoke for the first time. “So you did come, after all. How did you find out the delivery was tonight?”
Lee didn’t look at her. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll keep your mouth shut. Your silence may stop me from blistering your rear end and keeping you tied inside the house for the rest of your life.”
“Me? Me!” she gasped, holding onto the side of the carriage. “I was just filling in for you. I hoped that if I took over for you once, you’d see the misery you put me through.”
“Took over for me!” He turned toward her, and his eyes were blazing with rage. “Do you think I was stealing securities? That I was working with LeGault?”
“What else could you be doing? You don’t make any money as a doctor, but you can afford all the medical equipment and the house and the expenses for me, and you come home with bullet wounds and…” She stopped as Lee halted the buggy fairly close to the dark freight office.