Free Devil's Creek Massacre by Len Levinson Page B

ladies’ dresses. May I?” He reached behind her neck and fastened her garment with deft manipulations of his fingers. “What a lovely neck you have, Mrs. Dawes. Like a swan. Do you think you might like to get married again someday, after official mourning has ended, of course?”
    â€œNot very likely,” she replied, “and thank you for buttoning my dress, but if you ever touch me like that again, without my expressed permission, I'll slap your face. Do I make myself clear?”
    He gazed into her unforgiving green orbs, then took a step backward. “Absolutely, and I apologize if I've been too forward. I guess it's the trial lawyer in me, but I know character when I see it, and you've got it aplenty. Poetry isn't my game, and I don't mince words like some you'll meet here tonight. I can't help thinking that you and I would make quite a team. Look at it objectively. We're both shrewd people who've been around the corral a few times.”
    â€œI'm not that ambitious,” she replied, “and unlike you, I adore poetry. It makes life worthwhile, regardless of how many times you've been around the corral.”
    â€œWomen like you get men killed, because you're too beautiful for your own good. But you're a very fine example of your type, which you should take as a sincere compliment.”
    Vanessa struggled to prevent herself from smashinghim in the face. “The death of my husband was a terrible tragedy, regardless of what you think of me. But your death would be quite another matter.”
    He smiled falsely, bowed, and strolled away nonchalantly, because he was rich and didn't give a damn. There was no shortage of beauties anxious to throw themselves at a rich lawyer, but Vanessa was rich herself, fortunately. Never, during six years of singing in saloons, had she met such a calculating and insulting individual. He'd be the ideal husband for me, she reflected cynically, except I can't stand the son of a bitch.
    She felt like a foreigner in the dancing parlor. Four blazing chandeliers beamed bright golden haze, and young gentlemen danced with their hands behind their backs, while ladies in hoop skirts twirled around them. The former belle of the ball guessed that some unmarried girls probably were pregnant, and a few gentlemen preferred to sleep with other gentlemen. Maturity enabled her to probe beneath the surface, an ongoing disillusioning process. Nothing was sacred anymore, and if a woman didn't have an income, she could end up giving herself to men like Howard Sutcliffe.
    A glass of champagne was suspended in her slender graceful fingers as she recalled her recently departed husband. Lieutenant Clayton Dawes had saved her from Duane Braddock, but what was so wrong with Duane Braddock? She'd left him, not the other way around, and broken his innocent heart.
    Lieutenant Dawes had seemed reliable, compared with Duane's immaturity and naivete. Vanessa had planned to spend the rest of her life on army posts with Lieutenant Dawes, attending tea parties and socials with the other officers’ wives, but then he'd been killed on a scout, and another dream vanished.

    She hadn't known, when she'd first tied the wedding knot with Lieutenant Dawes, that he'd harbored ill will toward Duane, and vice versa. Then the insanely jealous Dawes charged Duane with murder following a shoot-out where Duane had merely defended himself. Duane broke out of the army camp and had been on the dodge ever since.
    Duane needed me, but I let him down. Now circumstances have changed, and I can do any damned thing I want, such as buying a ticket on the next stagecoach west and searching for Duane Braddock.
    She stiffened in the corner, shocked by what she'd just thought. Search for Duane Braddock! Are you crazy? Indians attack stagecoaches regularly, and stage-coach stops have the worst accommodations imaginable. Don't you think it's time to wake up, after all you've been through, you idiotic Miss Vanessa