Chapter 27
CHAPTER 27
Max strode back along the wood walkway toward the telegraph office on the corner in the next block, his sturdy, good-looking dark-brown cowboy boots thudding on the wood. His cowboy clothes fit in with the people he passed, and he felt again that he was on a Creede TV set.
He felt as if he’d actually stepped into a scene of the show. Except instead of acting like he was in the Old West, he was living it, the sound of wagon wheels and jingling spurs in the air, the hot sun on his hat, the smell of horse and dust and a different world than any he’d ever known in his every breath.
Humming to himself the Creede theme song, he put a little swagger in his stride, pretending to be Creede himself, on the way to put a wrench in an outlaw’s plans.
He finished off the oatmeal cookie he’d brought with him as he crossed the side street to the next block, its plump raisins sweet in his mouth. Pausing beneath the hanging sign that said ‘Telegraph,’ he brushed the cookie crumbs from his fingers and stepped through the open doorway.
He’d received a lot of glances on his short walk, some of them unfriendly, but inside the telegraph office, Cally’s friend Finn, behind the wood counter beside an older man, gave him a big smile that said he’d been let in on the secret that Max, rather than being a butler, was really the Duke of Balmont.
“Howdy, duke,” Finn said. The telegraph office was mostly a bare room, except for the counter that stretched left to right. A vertical half wall stood behind the counter, a curtain beside the half wall leading to the room in back, where presumably the telegraph equipment was located. And everything was immaculate, no dust despite the dusty road outside.
Finn turned to the tall, broad man beside him, the man dressed in brown canvas trousers and a long-sleeved beige cotton shirt, a rough canvas apron over his clothes, his head bald. His expression was wary as he frowned at Max, and Max wondered if he’d encountered Hugo. “Pa,” Finn said, “this is the duke that’s been out at the Sky Top. Looks a mighty lot like that prince, don’t he?”
Finn’s father gave Max an intelligent, scrutinizing look, the wariness fading as he took in the differences between Max and Hugo. “Howdy,” he said, Max getting the impression of a father as honorable as his son. The man put out his hand, and Max took it, regarding it as a gesture of goodwill. “Monahan’s the name. How can I help you?”
“I’d like to send some telegrams,” Max said. “One to New York, another to the country of Zalgravia in Europe. Is that something you can do?” Max wasn’t sure how capable a Wild West telegraph line was when it came to very long distances.
“Yes,” Monahan said and slid a thick pad of off-white paper and a sharp, old-fashioned, plain wood pencil across the wood counter at him.
Max took two folded sheets from his buttoned shirt pocket. “I have them written out already.” He slid the first across to Monahan, trusting that Cally and Bart had told him the truth, that Monahan—and by extension Finn—never divulged who sent or received a telegram, nor what any message had ever said. “This is for King Maximilian VII of Zalgravia, care of Castle Balmont, Zalgravia.”
Finn’s eyebrows rose high on his youthful brow.
Monahan nodded, not blinking an eye at the intended recipient, and Max took the man’s lack of reaction to mean Hugo had already sent and received telegrams to and from that destination. “The sheriff has seen this?” Monahan said as he scanned the message.
“No,” Max said, determined not to lie. “Though I know he shares the same sentiments, and every word of it is true.”
Monahan gave him a long, considering look. “You reckon the prince will pay attention to anything his pa the king might send in reply?”
Max nodded. “I do.” When Monahan made no further objection, he slid the second piece of paper across the counter. “This is for the New York City branch of the Bank of Central Europe.” He slid a small gold coin across after the paper—gold, he’d discovered, was the primary currency here, preferred over silver, with paper bills frowned on and rarely accepted at all. “Is this sufficient?”
“More than enough.” Monahan gave him several smaller coins in change. “I’ll send Finn when you receive a reply.”
“Excellent. I’m staying with the James family.” Max extended his own hand this time. “A pleasure meeting you, Mr. Monahan. You’ll both be at this evening’s entertainment?”
“We’ll be there,” Finn said and grinned, getting a proud glance from his father.
Two hours later, standing outside the James family’s front door, Max skimmed a telegram from the New York City branch of the Bank of Central Europe printed on thin yellow paper, a brief smile crossing his face. “That was fast,” he said to Finn.
The fresh-faced young man gave him a cheerful grin. “Folks respond real quick when royalty are involved.”
Max laughed. “Well, at least the title is good for something. Will you be offended if I tip you?”
“I reckon not,” Finn said.
Max handed him a gold coin, his earnings from his days as a butler dwindling fast, and based on what he’d been able to purchase so far, he had a feeling Bart—or perhaps it had been Livia or June—had overpaid him. “Can you point me to the Mule Stop Community Bank?”
“I can show you,” Finn said, “if you don’t mind walking back toward the telegraph office.”
“Lead the way.”
The bank, a small second-floor office space in the business district above a ladies’ hat store, smelled of leather furniture and gold, or at least the wealth that gold had brought to the area.
The bank manager, a Mr. Newton, who was dressed in a workaday brown suit and had a square face and an honest manner, was expecting Max. It seemed he’d received a telegram from the Bank of Central Europe as well.
“Welcome, duke,” Mr. Newton said in the informal manner of the townsfolk, though for a moment he seemed taken aback at his first sight of Max, from which Max inferred Mr. Newton had had dealings with Hugo. He led Max from the reception area, where two tellers were assisting customers, into an office with his name stenciled in gold on the door. A second door led out of the back of the room, and Max wondered if that was where the vault was, for surely a bank must have a vault.
‘We had a proper bank,’ Finn had told him on their way back to the business district, ‘but it burned down, and no one’s been interested in building a new one.’
Mr. Newton gestured Max toward a high-backed leather chair in front of an impressive oak desk that looked as dependable and sturdy as Mr. Newton. “How may I help you?”
“I’d like to draw on the Zalgravian line of credit with the Bank of Central Europe,” Max said, sitting on the cool leather.
“Yes, indeed.” Mr. Newton crossed to the other side of the desk and sat down in a chair like Max’s, except Mr. Newton’s chair was on wheels. “I believe you have a telegram to identify yourself?” he said, but from his expression, Max’s resemblance to Hugo had already convinced him of Max’s identity.
Max held out the telegram he’d received from the New York branch of the Bank of Central Europe. He knew the bank had responded to him with alacrity because his request for a credit line had been accompanied by the secret code the King of Zalgravia’s extended family of this time used to access an account set aside for their convenience wherever they went in the world. The special code was a segment of the inscription inside the signet ring of His Majesty the King of Zalgravia, which Max happened to have brought with him from the future.
Mr. Newton read the telegram, compared it to a second one he brought forth from a desk drawer, and smiled. “In what amount, Your Grace?”
The Bank of Central Europe had offered a credit line of ten thousand American dollars, an immense fortune in this time, but Max would only need a few hundred. Enough to bribe Hugo’s local employees to stop working for him. Enough to hire armed guards for Hugo’s neighbors.
Enough to increase Max’s wardrobe, as befitting a royal duke. The last thing he needed was anyone questioning who he really was, just because he didn’t look the part.
“Start with two thousand,” Max said, just to be on the safe side. He felt a prick of guilt at taking the funds under false pretenses, but his family’s honor was at stake, and two thousand dollars was a pittance compared to the family’s nineteenth-century fortune overall.
The most important consideration was that Cally’s life was at stake, and he didn’t want anything to go wrong from lack of money.
Giving thanks to the private book of family history compiled by a great-great-aunt in the nineteen-sixties, who had included, for posterity’s sake, the family’s nineteenth-century—and out of date—banking secrets, and sending gratitude to his grandmother in Zalgravia, who’d insisted Max read that family history, Max settled back in his chair. “I’d like to open an account, Mr. Newton.”
Early that evening, back at home, Cally’s family prepared to welcome her suitors and their families for the evening entertainment her ma had planned. A soirée, Ma had called the party, with nonalcoholic drinks and light hors d’oeuvres. ‘For folks to come and eat and talk,’ Cally had told Max, ‘and generally to socialize.’
And to impress. A cellist from Denver had been imported for the evening—Ma didn’t skimp when it came to Cally’s future—and was warming up in the big drawing room. The hour of the party was early evening, given that several of the suitors—and Cally—were entered in the next morning’s early horse race, the same reason Ma hadn’t arranged for a full sit-down dinner that night.
Wearing her new pale-rose evening dress and white, soft-leather evening slippers, her hair up in the back in an elegant chignon, Cally had just stopped beside the tall crystal vase near the front door, to get a sniff of its fragrant mix of white roses and pink-centered lilies, when Prince Max appeared at the head of the front staircase.
Cally’s breath caught. Not aloud, she was glad to say, but still, her body went still for a moment at the handsome sight of him before her heart sped up, pounding in her chest.
He wore a black suit that fit his broad shoulders as if it had been made for him. His firm jaw was clean shaven, his dark hair cut by the local barber that afternoon.
He started down the stairs, his long legs strong, his masculine mouth turning up in a charming smile. She hadn’t seen him in evening clothes before tonight, except in his butlering suit, but that didn’t count, seeing as how he had disguised his hair and face and acted subservient when he wore it.
This man coming nearer would never, she suspected, be subservient. “You look lovely, Miss Calico,” he said in his rich voice when he reached the bottom.
She grinned. He was supposed to call her Miss Calliope among the suitors and their families, and she knew he would when they arrived, but the nickname made her heart light up with a joy that still surprised her. And she realized it wasn’t the name so much, but the person who was saying it. “You’re mighty fine yourself, Max.”
He preened in his elegant suit. It had been the one he’d been butlering in, but he’d had the style of it altered that afternoon in town, the fit of it measured exactly to his own body. “Thanks to the tailor your brother recommended and an army of seamstresses to alter everything ASAP.”
“ASAP?”
His blue eyes twinkled. “As soon as possible.”
And she realized she was starting to see the side of him that didn’t hanker after catching outlaws with Sheriff Sam. This was more like the man Livie had read about in her time, without the bad stories. “You must have wangled a mighty lot of money from that bank in New York,” she said.
“Only enough for our purposes.”
“I like my flowers.” She touched her fingertips to the deep-pink roses pinned to her dress, their scent sweet and heady. “Did Ma tell you what color to get?”
He gazed at her for a long moment with that special expression he seemed to only have for her, then grinned. “I might have had some inside information.”
She grinned back, then jumped as a loud knock came at the front door behind her. A too-early knock. The soiree didn’t start for another half hour.
Nick, dressed a lot like Max had been when he was a butler, hurried along the hallway from the back of the house, assigned to answer the door to their expected guests.
But Bart, wearing his own handsome dark suit, waved Nick aside as he stepped from the front parlor. Waiting until Nick had disappeared back down the hallway, he opened the front door.
Sheriff Sam, wearin’ a fancy blue Western shirt, dark-brown trousers, and a pair of brown fancy-stitched boots, stepped inside, his jaw shaved, his blond hair slicked back beneath his cowboy hat. Hot air from the day came inside, too, mingling with the scent of Cally’s roses.
Mingling with Max’s scent of oranges and cloves.
“You’re early,” Bart said, closing the door, and frowned. “Does that mean…?”
Sheriff Sam nodded. “Prince Hugo, just coming into town now. With most of the staff from his house at the Crown.”
“Excellent,” Max said at Cally’s side, straightening his white cuffs.
Sheriff Sam gave him a suspicious frown. “Why?”
Max’s eyes got that steely look they got each time he was plottin’ against his ancestor. “It makes my plans for tomorrow easier.”
“Which plans are those?” Sheriff Sam said, even more suspicious.
“You’ll see,” Max said.
“I’d rather hear.” Sheriff Sam’s eyes narrowed. “Right now.”
Another knock came at the door.
Bart opened it again.
Roy stood on the front step, a bunch of the white gladioli flowers the town florist grew in his personal garden in one hand, their stems tied with a blue satin ribbon. A small piece of paper with penciled words was in the other. Dressed as fancy as Sheriff Sam, he wore his habitual all black, only his boots were polished to a high shine, not dusty from the trail. The silver band on his hat—a band she’d never seen before—was engraved with swirls and twirls.
“You got it?” Bart said.
Stepping inside, Roy handed the flowers to Cally and tipped his hat to her, and she grinned at his formal manners. “For your ma,” he told her, then turned to Bart and gave him the piece of paper, which turned out to be a list of the entries for the big horse race in the morning. “No Prince Hugo on the list,” he told them all.
“Or Kuthbert or any of Hugo’s other henchman?” Max asked, taking the penciled list from Bart and perusing it.
“Nope,” Roy said. “Entries closed at five, just as the mayor promised.”
Max glanced at the grandfather clock standing against the far wall of the front hall. “It’s six-thirty now.” He gave a small, triumphant laugh. “Hugo is too late.”
“He did get a telegram,” Roy said, taking off his hat, Sheriff Sam doing the same. “Monahan brought it out as Prince Hugo rode into town. The prince frowned like the devil when he read it, then crumpled it in his fist before shoving it into his coat pocket.”
“I wish to blazes I knew what was in that telegram,” Sheriff Sam said.
“I can guess,” Max told him, “if it’s from who I think it’s from.”
Bart narrowed his eyes. “Who?” he said.
“The King of Zalgravia.” Max handed the penciled list of race entrants back to Cally’s brother. “I may have sent him a telegram from the legendary Sheriff Sam Creede.”
“ Me ?” Sheriff Sam looked like thunder, clearly not liking being impersonated. “Why the blazes would he pay attention to a telegram from an American sheriff?”
“Not any sheriff,” Max said. “The legendary Sheriff Sam Creede.”
Sheriff Sam’s thunderous expression deepened. “Now you’re making fun of me.”
“I assure you,” Max said, “I am not. But you are world famous, Creede. Now. Here in this century. Those dime novels you talk about are shelved in the castle library back home, purchased for the pleasure of Hugo’s father the king— first editions , contemporaneous to now. The king will most assuredly pay attention to a telegram from you, especially one detailing Hugo’s misdeeds.”
Bart’s face was grim. “And what do you reckon the telegram Prince Hugo got said?”
“Well,” Max said, “if it is from the king…”
Cally grinned. She liked Max’s sneaky ways, when he did it for the greater good. “ What did it say, prince ?”
“That Hugo’s financial funds are impounded. His ability to draw on the king’s accounts has been terminated.”
Roy gave a low whistle.
“Damn it,” Sheriff Sam said, slapping his leg with his cowboy hat, and looking like he might brawl with Max, “ I told you not to mess with the future .”
“I haven’t,” Max said. “It’s all true. I’m quite sure I remember the timeline. Sometime around now, the king withdraws his financial support from his heir, Hugo. In another month or two, the king will threaten Hugo’s right to succession.” He glanced around the group, his gaze ending—lingering—on Cally. “As I’ve said, there’s no love lost between the Evil Prince and the rest of my family, even among his own parents and siblings. I might have hurried the process up by a few days by sending the telegram to the king, but truly, the sooner he learned of Hugo’s depredations against his neighbors, the better for us. There was no mention of his dealings with Cally, of course.”
Cally nodded. Of course. Max was a gentleman.
“He’ll be mad as fire,” Roy said.
“I’m mad as fire,” Sheriff Sam said.
Bart exhaled, that concerned expression he got when he worried about their family’s safety furrowed again in his brow. “Prince Hugo will be wondering who the hell told the king, unless the king mentions in the telegram his informant was Sam.”
“I can handle him,” Sheriff Sam said.
Max shook his head at Bart. “The king is too smart to reveal his sources. It’s the only reason I was willing to use your name, Creede. He would want to keep Hugo on his toes by keeping him guessing who is sending news of him back to Zalgravia. If Hugo suspects anyone, it will be the newly arrived Duke of Balmont.”
“You, in other words,” Bart said.
And Cally’s heart clenched. What would the Evil Prince do in revenge to the ‘cousin’ who kept thwarting his plans?
An hour later, in the large, elegant drawing room at the front of the house—which was filled with wood-trimmed furniture, mahogany occasional tables, and blue-and-cream floral silk fabrics—the party was in full swing. In addition to the five remaining suitors and their parents, Doc Jannings and his lovely wife Grace were there. The legendary Sam Creede and his deputy Roy Venture. The local reverend, a rugged-looking man about Bart’s age, wearing a fine suit with a clerical collar, and with a hardness about him, as if he’d seen a lot of life in his relatively short lifetime. Until he smiled, and then he looked younger. Happier. More like a man who could shepherd his flock with compassion, or so Max thought.
The cellist was a big hit, playing classical music interspersed with tunes that would be considered modern in the late nineteenth century.
Mrs. Zandt had done her magic again with the food, her savory hors d’oeuvres filling the air with the scent of hot pastry, herbs, mushrooms, cheese, and even a hint of bacon.
The suitors flocked around Cally.
Max himself avoided the suitors, not wanting any of them to recognize a gesture, an expression, that might remind them of Bart’s butler. Instead, he charmed the parents, wanting to do his part to make June’s party a success.
Not that his help was needed. All anyone had to do was take one look at Cally—at her charming, vibrant face, her lithe, strong body, all of her clothed and coiffed in the latest, most fashionable styles of 1897—to admire her. Her young suitors certainly did, even Finn.
Too bad every single one of them was wrong for her. Too young. Too unappreciative of who she really was, too oblivious to her amazing vitality.
Or maybe that was his competitive heart speaking, heart and mind conflicted. His mind didn’t want to get in the way of her finding the best match for herself, but damn it, his heart and body kept yelling ‘Pick me!’
“You’re giving yourself away,” Livia whispered, coming up to his side in a floor-length lilac dress, her short sleeves as puffy as the other ladies’, her dark hair in a chignon as elegant as Cally’s and June’s.
Max started. “What? To whom? Did I say something about the future?”
“Not that,” she said, handing him a small crystal glass filled with a nonalcoholic fruit punch. “I was talking about that look of love in your eyes.”
Love? Was that what this ridiculous besottedness was? This seeking Cally out at every turn? His scowling at every young man who showed an interest in her? Love? “Don’t be silly,” he said, his heart starting to pound, tumbling in his chest every bit as much as the Summer River tumbled over the rocks in its path.
“I’m not being silly,” she said. “I’m dead serious.”
“Such nonsense,” he told her, his gaze going back to Cally.
“Right,” she said and strode back to her husband.
An hour later, the four suitors from Cheyenne and Denver were gathered around the large fireplace, loudly discussing politics. Their parents, seated in the center of the room with Bart, Livia, and June, were doing the same, only at a lower volume.
Standing beside the dessert table, Finn and his mother and father were listening to a story being told by Creede, the cellist taking a break.
Max, leaning beside an open window, straightened, wanting to get to know the Monahans better, and started toward Creede. He’d charmed everyone but his Miss Calico, having damped down his competitive spirit, and his uncharitable thoughts toward the young men wooing her. He’d suppressed the frustration that burned in his chest, knowing he could outshine every single suitor, all by turning on the charm and dazzling his Miss Calico with his attention.
But he didn’t want to dazzle or charm her. He wanted her feelings for him to be pure, based on the truth between them, or at least as much of the truth as he could share with her.
If only he weren’t leaving in a week or two or three…
“Are you having a good time, duke?” Cally said when he’d gone a few steps toward Creede, coming silently up behind him and making him jump.
He turned to face her, her pretty rosewater scent filling his senses, the pink roses he’d given her, pinned now to her modest neckline, as fresh as she. “Indeed, I am,” he said for the benefit of the others, if anyone was listening in, and gave her a restrained smile. Offering his arm to her, he steered her toward the one suitor who was anywhere near worthy of her.
“What are you doing, Max?” she whispered, dragging back on his arm in a ladylike way, one that would ensure no one noticed what she was doing, but damn, she was strong, not willing to be led where she didn’t want to go.
Much like her horse.
“Steering you toward the only suitor here who is anywhere near worthy of you,” he whispered back.
“Finn?”
He nodded.
“Not you?”
His heart jerked at her whispered words. His head spun for a moment, that tumbling sensation coming again to his chest. Dropping his gaze to hers, he held it for a long moment. “ Me ?” he whispered back.
“Well,” she said, “ain’t that what we’ve been doing the last few days? Courting each other?”
He waited for her mischievous grin. The little imps that came to her pretty eyes when she was teasing him.
They never came, neither grin nor imps. She was serious.
He caught her gloved hand in his. Holding her gaze, he raised her hand and kissed the back of her warm fingers through the silk. “Yes, Miss Calliope, I reckon we have.”