Stealing Home Page 3

  Satisfied, he dropped his mirror, comb, dentifrice, and shaving lotion back into the kit. But not the hair tonic. Duke touched the tip of it to his nose and inhaled. Sweet…pungent. He met more than one fellow at the hospital who would drink this down when it got too bad.

  He lowered the bottle and opened his other hand wide. Studied the palm still glistening with oil. He brought his hand closer and closer, until his fingers doubled and blurred before his eyes. Soon his own skin was warm against his lips, and he snaked his tongue between his teeth. Just a taste.

  Once again three sharp raps sounded on the door, and his hand shook violently as he attempted to replace the cap.

  “Mr. Dennison? Are you ready to come down? I am about to put breakfast on—”

  Duke took one more glance in the mirror before grabbing the porcelain knob and pulling the door open.

  “Good morning, Miss Voyant.” He flashed a broad grin and ran his tongue across his teeth. “Didn't want you to see me before I was ready to face the day.”

  “And you consider yourself ready now? We are not accustomed to taking breakfast in a state of undress.”

  “And I do not get dressed until after breakfast.”

  “Then it seems we find ourselves at an impasse.”

  He waited for her to fidget, to blush at the sight of him, or titter behind her hand. Instead, she looked straight into his eyes, her head cocked to one side.

  “As we were each unaware of the other's proclivities, today you may come down in your robe.”

  Duke braced one arm against the doorframe and leaned into the hall. “And tomorrow you may serve me in my room.”

  Miss Voyant merely cocked one eyebrow and turned on her heel. Duke smiled with every following step.

  The big man at the kitchen table must be the father. He looked up from his newspaper as Duke walked in, and in one motion folded the paper, stood, and extended a hand.

  “Mr. Dennison?”

  Duke stared at the man's hand. It was as wide as a catcher's mitt, and probably as tough. He willed his own to equal its steadiness as he reached out. “Call me Duke. And you're the sheriff ?”

  “Call me Floyd.”

  The two men took measure of each other, and Duke knew he came up short. A good four inches. And weak, based on the crumpling sensation in his hand. Floyd Voyant obviously didn't know what that hand was worth.

  Duke's gaze traveled up the older man's strong arm, the broad shoulder, and finally met a pair of pale blue eyes sunk into a ruddy face. So this is where Miss Ellie Jane got her freckles—her father's bald pate, surrounded by a fringe of pale, rust-colored hair, was covered with them.

  “Sorry I didn't get a chance to meet you last night.” Floyd seemed to assess Duke's character with his grip.

  “Yes, well,” Duke said, unwilling to be the first to release, “you would think I'd be accustomed to travel, but I guess the trip down wore me out.”

  “Guess so.”

  Duke held himself steady under Floyd's scrutiny and counted it as triumph when the older man released his grip, sat down, and resumed his reading.

  Meanwhile, Miss Ellie Jane rattled around the kitchen, then set a cup of steaming hot coffee on the table in front of her father. At least he thought it was coffee. Duke sat down to his own cup. With new steadiness, he brought the cup to his lips. The drink was thick, sweet, and faintly malty. If it came in a bottle, he might have kept it down. But this just wouldn't go.

  “No offense, Miss Voyant, but that has to be the worst coffee I've ever tasted.”

  “None taken.” Ellie Jane didn't turn around from the large pot on the stove. “And it isn't coffee. It's Postum.”

  “I can think of something else to call it.”

  Floyd chuckled behind his paper and looked up long enough to give Duke a commiserating glance.

  “Do you have any idea of the dangers that lurk in a single cup of coffee?”

  “Enlighten me,” Duke said.

  Floyd brought the newspaper closer to his face as his daughter walked over to the table, gesturing broadly with her long wooden spoon.

  “It destroys your stomach, agitates your nerves, and—something you should be particularly interested in—hampers one's physical prowess.”

  Had the woman's father not been sitting at the table, Duke would have told her that his physical prowess was quite healthy, indeed. Instead, he curled his lip in a suggestive leer and pushed the cup away from him.

  “I'll pick up some coffee at Jonas's this afternoon,” Floyd said from behind his paper. “We'll have it for you tomorrow morning.”

  “Pop!” Ellie Jane used her spoon to force her father's arm to lower the paper. “We'll do no such thing.”

  “He's a guest in our home, Elijah Jane—”

  “Elijah Jane?” Duke made no attempt to hide his amusement.

  “I was named after my mother's favorite prophet.”

  “How unusual.”

  “I suppose you have a more noble origin for Duke?”

  “Nope.” He stroked the corner of his moustache. “I just made it up myself.”

  “How unusual.” She turned her back on the men, muttering and banging the contents of the pot into three white crockery bowls.

  “Don't be so rude, sweetie. Remember he's a—”

  “Please, Pop, not another word about Mr. Dennison being a guest.” She slammed a bowl of steaming, brownish stuff in front of both of them.

  “She's right.” Duke ignored the food in front of him. “The thing is, I'm a drunk.”

  Floyd set down the newspaper and picked up his spoon. “Now Dennison, there's no need—”

  “There might be a more polite term for more polite society, but it boils down to the same thing. I'm a drunk, and the men who own me don't like that. They worry that I'll drink too much and lose a game. They don't trust a drunkard to get a hit. If my judgment's off by this much,” Duke held up his hand and closed one eye, pinching Miss Elijah Jane Voyant's head between his thumb and forefinger, “I won't be able to pull a double play.”

  He picked up his own spoon and set it on top of the lump of food in front of him. It didn't sink in. “See, if we lose a game, they lose money, and they paid too high a price for me to take that kind of chance.”

  Now this was a quiet room. Ellie Jane stood, frozen to the floor. Her thumb hooked over the edge of a bowl. Like she was deciding whether to sit down and eat, or throw it to the floor.

  She sat. Her little hands rested on the table. Then she reached one out. Not to the point of touching him. But just a little. Toward him.

  “I am so sorry,” she said, patting her fingertips on the table. “I had no idea.”

  “I spent the last three months in a Chicago hospital getting sober.” Duke looked from Ellie Jane to her father. “I guess I'm here to be sure the cure sticks.”

  “Where you are most welcome,” Floyd said.

  For a few minutes, the only sound was the clicking of spoons against bowls. Ellie Jane taking dainty bites. Floyd digging up heaping mouthfuls. Duke trying to figure out exactly what had been served out of that pot. He looked up and saw the yellow box on the counter. Grape-Nuts. He took a bite and managed a polite smile as he worked his mouth around the warm, nutty, sticky mass. Nothing to wash it down with except the cooling cup of Postum.

  “Why here?” Ellie Jane held her spoon aloft, looking at her father. When Floyd Voyant didn't respond, she turned her attention to Duke, who swallowed the lump of cereal before responding.

  “Well, that's a good question, Miss Voyant. As far as I can tell, the only people who know I'm here are the team owners and that hack brother of yours.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “David is a fine, trusted journalist.”

  “Who sold me out. Week after week, writing about how Dennison's losing his edge. Headlines like: ‘Duke Dennison: Dumb Decision.’ My game wasn't slipping, but he just wouldn't leave it alone. Got the whole town talking about Duke's problem.”

  “I'm sure he just wanted what was best for you.”

  “And I'm sure he wanted to sell newspapers.”

  “That still doesn't explain why he suggested you come here.”

  “That's easy,” Floyd said, chewing thoughtfully. “Town's dry. Not a drop of liquor for sale within the city limits. Not legal, anyway. And I think folks'll worry about selling to the man taking board with the sheriff.”

  “You've got a smart boy there, Mr. Voyant.”

  “My brother's a very kind man, Mr. Dennison.” Ellie Jane stood and took her father's empty bowl to the sink. “He must think very highly of you.”

  “He must indeed.” Duke made one more attempt to penetrate the lump in his bowl.

  “Forget about that.” Floyd scooted his chair away from the table and swatted Duke on the shoulder with his newspaper. “You go upstairs and get some clothes on. I'll take you to Marlene's Diner for a real breakfast.”

  Duke looked at Ellie Jane.

  “Oh, go on.” She snatched his bowl away.

  Duke went up to his room and examined the white suit he'd hung on the back of the closet door the night before. Not too wrinkled. Still, when he slipped his arms into the jacket, it hung on him much the same way. And it didn't seem as if Miss Voyant's cooking would beef him up anytime soon.

  He grabbed his straw boater from its perch on the bedpost, put it on his head, and took one last look in the mirror. Finally, seeing himself with clear eyes, he tried to see what everybody else did. Fine clothes. Flashy jewelry. Every inch of him from his hair to his shoes a studied replica of high society.

  But none of that fooled Duke. He was still Donny Dennison, stray son of a stinking drunk from a Wyoming sheep ranch. He was still just running away from home.

  Floyd was talking on the telephone when Duke walked out of his room. Frantic, squawking noises spilled through the earpiece, and every now and then Floyd interrupted them to say something soothing. He motioned for Duke to wait downstairs.

  With the parlor full of morning light, he saw the details of the room more clearly. In particular he was drawn to an ornate silver frame on the mantelpiece, and the picture within it. A woman. A beautiful one, with a shining mass of jet-black hair pinned up in some complicated style. Her face was turned away, showing a delicate jaw as she looked down at delicate hands resting on an open book.

  Farther on was a picture of this same woman, holding a chubby, solemn child on her lap. Still another of her standing next to a much younger —but just as bald—Floyd Voyant. She had both hands lightly gripping the top of his head, and her face opened up in a knowing smile.

  “That's my mother.” Ellie Jane's voice surprised him.

  “And is that you?” He pointed to the scowling baby.

  “No.” She reached out and ran a finger gently across the glass. “That's Dave. Mother died shortly after I was born.”

  “She was beautiful.”

  Duke had met Dave Voyant on three occasions. Once for an interview after Duke broke a league record in stealing bases. Once at a birthday party for the team's owner. And once at the asylum where he showed up to offer Duke a place to stay for a few weeks before he went back to the game. Dave looked like his mother. Slim and dark and elegant.

  Ellie Jane studied the picture of her mother. He knew they were thinking the same thing, but Ellie Jane just nodded. “She was, wasn't she?”

  “What was her name?”

  “Claire.”

  “Now this is an interesting picture.” He pointed to the one of Claire and Floyd.

  “Oh, that's just a little joke. Mother used to go around with a traveling phrenologist.”

  Every now and then a word came along to remind him that he never stepped a single foot inside a school. Usually he'd just smile. Gloss it over. Change the subject to one of his three favorite topics: baseball, booze, and women. But not this time. He could tell by the way Ellie Jane touched the photograph that she wanted to tell him. So he asked.

  “Some people say it's a true science.” She put the picture back on the mantle shelf. “And maybe it is for some. But for Mother, it was a pure sideshow.”

  “But what exactly is phorn—”

  “Phrenology? It's a way of deciphering somebody's health and well-being by reading the bumps on their head.”

  Duke couldn't help it. He laughed.

  “I know it seems silly, but remember. This was long before some of the scientific advances we enjoy today.”

  “Ah yes. Medicine. Pure gold.” He didn't mention the literal gold—the painful daily injections that trademarked the Keeley Cure for inebriants.

  “Well, Mother traveled around with an uncle of hers, somebody just a generation away from being a gypsy. He was more of a mentalist, really, but he swore he could tell a person's future health by feeling his or her scalp. He brought Mother along because he soon learned that he'd get a lot more men to pay for a session if they could put their heads in the hands of a beautiful woman.”

  Duke looked at the photograph again. Claire Voyant's broad smile; Floyd Voyant's humorous, skeptical sneer.

  “And your father was one of those willing customers?”

  Ellie Jane laughed. “Hardly. He was the sheriff charged with running them out of town.”

  “She didn't run far.”

  “No. See, when my father put them in jail, Mother's uncle paid his own bail, then skipped town. At first Pop felt sorry for her, and then, eventually, he fell in love with her.”

  “So he bailed her out?”

  “Mmm-hmm.” She wrinkled her nose when she smiled. “And realized he was in love with her. They got married just a few days later, in the same courthouse.”

  “Very romantic.” He just might use this story again someday.

  “Yes, well, the town didn't exactly think so. There was always a kind of cloud over our family because of that. Picksville has a rather long, unforgiving memory.”

  “But she did give up her bump-reading ways?”

  “Completely. She became a devout Christian woman. Pop says sometimes she'd stay up all night reading her Bible.” Ellie Jane moved on and ran her fingers down the spine of a large black book. The Holy Bible. “She was reading about the prophet Elijah the night she gave birth to me and made Pop promise to give me his name.”

  “You ever wish she was reading about someone else? Like…” He tried to think of an example.

  “Mary? Ruth? Esther? Good heavens, no. The world has enough of those, I should think.”

  True. He could think of several and could clearly remember at least three.

  “But enough about me. What of your parents? Are they still living?”

  Thankfully Floyd chose that moment to come down the stairs, hat in hand, ready to leave.

  Duke didn't have the heart to tell her he didn't have a clue about his parents.

  NED

  Marlene's Diner was a long, narrow building on the corner of Spring Street and Green Avenue. During the afternoons and early evenings, she did a brisk business selling wax paper–wrapped sandwiches and bottled ginger ale to the passengers from the train. But in the mornings, Marlene was devoted to the locals who gathered daily for breakfast and gossip.

  Ned always sat at the counter, right on the corner stool where he could have an uninterrupted view of the door. Marlene had a little silver bell hanging above it, and each time the door opened, every head in the place would turn to see who walked inside.

  Before he moved to the corner seat, he'd been startled plenty of times with a hand slapped on his back, causing him to spew his coffee or drop the last corner of his toast into the remaining runny yolk on Marlene's robin's-egg blue plate. But now he could see who was coming into the diner before anybody else had a clue, thanks to the big glass window that looked out into the street.

  Of course, other patrons could look through it too, but those who weren't bent over the morning edition of the daily paper were caught up in heated debates over the latest headline in the paper, and they would read or rant until the signal from Marlene's little silver bell interrupted their pursuits.

  This morning Ned kept his eyes on the window and drummed his fingers on the countertop. He felt a touch on his hand and looked up to see Marlene's quizzical expression. She wore her thin blond hair in two braids wrapped around the top of her head and an apron that—no matter what time of day—was meticulously starched and white.

  Now she brought her hand up to hold an invisible cup. Coffee?

  Ned nodded.

  She mimed cracking an egg into a skillet.

  He nodded again and stirred his finger. Scrambled. He wasn't going to risk dribbling yolk on his shirt.

  Ellie Jane never came in for breakfast, but she walked past the window every day at exactly a quarter 'til eight. Often, she was with her father who would stop in, after suffering what seemed a disapproving look from his daughter. So this morning when Ned saw Floyd's bald head skimming over the top of the enormous Marlene's Diner painted on the plate-glass window, he sat up a little straighter hoping, as he did every day, to catch Ellie Jane's eye. Today, however, she wasn't scowling at all. In fact, she walked arm and arm with Floyd, and even offered a kiss to his bent cheek before he walked inside.

  The swinging of the door triggered the usual disruption of Marlene's clients, but instead of returning immediately to their plates of hotcakes and eggs, they remained a frozen image of twisted necks and suspended forks.

  Floyd looked as intimidating as ever in his black leather vest and sheriff's star. When he lifted his hand in greeting to the patrons, they responded in one movement back to their meals.

  But not Ned.

  The steaming cup of coffee Marlene had set in front of him remained untouched, and though he felt the nudge of the plate as she placed it on the counter, he ignored it.

  Duke Dennison, wearing a white suit and a straw boater, was in Marlene's Diner.

  Floyd and Duke navigated through the narrow passages between tables to where two empty stools were on the end of the counter's long side, just around the corner from him. Ned kept his eyes locked on Floyd, willing him to take these two places, and minutes later, Ned was shaking his hero's hand.