Chapter Twelve

Ever aware that his days were numbered and his fate might be less than pleasant if he didn’t accomplish all the tasks assigned to him, Gabe had, from the start, been keeping a mental checklist. He’d been told to hire a Pinkerton agent. Done. He’d been told to make Nan the sole beneficiary of his will. Done. He’d been told to make her trust him. Almost there. By never touching her intimately in bed without an invitation—which, damn it to hell, he hadn’t yet received—he’d succeeded in convincing her that she needn’t anticipate a physical attack every time the lamp went out. His second great move had been forcing her to be present while he had Hamm draw up his will. Immediately afterward, Gabe had regretted doing that, but in retrospect, he knew that visit to the attorney’s office had erased all fear in Nan’s mind that Gabe was after her money. Also, by signing documents that protected her assets and then transferring ten thousand dollars into her bank account, he’d given her financial independence and the ability to flee if she chose. Those three actions had gone a long way toward convincing Nan that not all men wanted or needed to be in complete control of a woman. Though Gabe couldn’t yet say Nan trusted him completely, he believed she was coming close.

Two things remained on his to-do list: making Nan fall in love with him and then seducing her. Even in the shack, when Gabe had first heard those conditions, he’d had some serious reservations. What kind of man deliberately wooed a woman, tricked her into loving him, and made use of her body when he knew from the start that he couldn’t stay with her? And how was it right to pretend he loved a woman with the sole aim of getting between her legs? The angels had strongly disapproved of Gabe’s former practice of paying women to satisfy his male urges, but to Gabe’s way of thinking, that had been an honest exchange, money in return for service. And he’d always been generous, leaving more than was asked. It had been his way of paying tribute to his mother.

Not that he wasn’t coming to care for Nan. The more relaxed she became around him, the more she tugged on his heartstrings. The fact that she didn’t know she was doing it made it all the more poignant. There was no artifice about her. She was real. If he’d known he could spend a lifetime with her—loving her, protecting her, and providing for her—he would have gladly let go and moved beyond mere affection to a deep and abiding devotion. What man in his right mind wouldn’t? But the remainder of Gabe’s life was numbered in days, not years.

The big question that troubled him was, just how far was he willing to go in order to save his own ass? He’d done plenty in his life that didn’t make him proud, but deliberately setting somebody else up for a world of hurt wasn’t one of them. He yearned to tell Nan that her knitting needle hadn’t killed Barclay, to hell with waiting for the damned Pinkerton report. But if he did that, he would lose the only leverage he had to make her remain in the marriage. He liked to think that she’d come to care enough for him that she wouldn’t kick him out, but what if she hadn’t? The moment he told her she had no murder charge hanging over her head, she might get an annulment and send him packing. He couldn’t take that chance.

Where were the boundaries? Or were there any? Gabe found himself wavering back and forth on that question. So for a few days, he cogitated on it. One minute, he told himself that making love to Nan would be for her own good. Enjoying sex—and Gabe was pretty damned sure he could make her enjoy it—would show her that the physical intimacies between a man and a woman could be not only beautiful but also fabulously pleasurable. Where was the harm in that? After he died again and she got over feeling sad, she’d see men in a whole new light and would no longer cringe at the thought of marriage. That would be good not only for Nan but also for Laney. Gabe sure didn’t want that cute little girl to reach womanhood with a deeply ingrained disgust for the opposite sex.

Oh, how easy it was for Gabe to justify his reasoning and embrace the thought of seducing Nan. She was beautiful. At night, lying beside her in bed, he sometimes wanted her so badly that he ached. He knew she was ready for some gentle persuasion, and physically, he was more than ready. And, he assured himself, it would be for a good cause.

Only, would it really be in Nan’s best interest? Just when Gabe got himself convinced that the answer was an unequivocal yes, a bothersome little voice whispered inside his head that pushing Nan to be physically intimate was wrong. In all his life, Gabe had never worried much about being a gentleman. All those highfalutin manners and social mores were for other fellows, not him. So it was unsettling to discover that he had countless scruples that were now suddenly rearing their ugly heads to torment him with indecision. Right now, it was also a damn nuisance. His conscience may have been late in making an appearance, but it sure was making up for lost time.

He began to feel that his brain was a seesaw, up with positive thoughts one second, and down with negative ones the next. In the end, Gabe decided to concede to his scruples, the bothersome little buggers. Let it be Nan’s choice, he decided. If she made a romantic overture, he’d make love to her so fast that her head would swim. But if she didn’t—well, he’d have to live with the consequences, he guessed. When he tried to imagine eternity, he felt overwhelmed—and, okay, a little afraid. A lot afraid, if he was honest with himself. But waiting Nan out was the only decision he could live with.

So instead of trying to woo Nan, Gabe found himself fashioning sturdy rails for the dangerously steep staircase that led upstairs, rebuilding some of her downstairs shelving, which had gone a little rickety with age, and then fixing her shop flooring, the planks of which had worked loose in spots to create trip hazards. On Christmas morning, when he had to take that inevitable predawn walk from the saloon toward her shop, he would take his last breaths knowing that he’d made some improvements, and maybe, if the angels didn’t wipe Nan’s memory clean because he’d failed in his mission, she would think of him with a smile after he was gone.

In the meanwhile, Gabe could congratulate himself on accomplishing a few things that the angels hadn’t specified. He had Nan laughing now. Granted, she was still the most prissy-mannered woman he’d ever run across, but she was developing a sense of humor about that and was even starting to alter her thinking about some things. Laney was now allowed to be in the upstairs living area in her long flannel nightgown, sans wrapper. The girl was covered from head to toe, after all, and Nan had finally accepted that unless Laney needed extra layers to keep warm, it was silly to make her wear them. Nan had also stopped sitting rigidly straight during meals, and sometimes she even let go enough to rest an elbow on the table while she ate. Her appetite had improved by leaps and bounds, and Gabe was more than pleased to note that she no longer avoided sleep by working long into the night. The dreams that had interrupted her rest for so many years seemed to have stopped. She’d also become a participant in the evening games, and slowly but surely, her poker-playing skills had improved. Gabe was pleased when she learned to read his expressions well enough to know when he truly held a winning hand and when he was bluffing. As silly as it sounded spoken aloud, life was one big poker game, at least in Gabe’s estimation, and a woman who knew when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em wasn’t as likely to be bamboozled by shysters.

Gabe even started accompanying his ladies to church on Sunday morning. It made him uneasy, having to hang his guns on a wall hook at the front door, but he did it, not because he was filled with a sudden rush of good feelings or even liked being inside the church, but because his presence there seemed to make Nan and Laney happy.

Gabe tried to find religion in that place; he truly did. Hell, he knew better than anyone that something more waited on the other side of this life. So why was it so difficult to sing the songs and rejoice in the Lord? Gabe worried on it and decided in the end that though he believed in the basic principles of Christianity and that Christ had died for everyone’s sins, he didn’t agree with the way these people were working their way toward salvation. Believing wasn’t some exclusive club, dammit, shutting out others who didn’t think exactly the same way. There were people out there who’d never stepped foot inside a building crowned by a steeple and cross, and though they had faith in other things, or possibly a divinity of another name, that didn’t mean they’d be banned from heaven.

What, exactly, was heaven, anyway? The way Gabe saw it, heaven existed mainly in people’s hearts, not really as a place with streets paved in gold, but a peaceful state of being in the presence of divine goodness, attained by believing in something and living your life on earth by those tenets. Was a Cheyenne Indian less likely to find that because he worshiped Mother Earth, the four directions, the sun, and the moon? The people in this building seemed convinced that they had it right, and everyone else had it wrong.

Gabe didn’t buy that. He’d run into a lot of Indians out on the trail who’d shared their food with him because he had none and had left him with his scalp because he meant them no harm. They had been good men, and back in their villages, they’d had wives and children whom they loved just as much as any white man did his.

Judging by what Gabe had thus far heard, Jesus had been all about love, and that had been at the core of every word he said. Do unto others as you’d have them do unto you. Well, Gabe knew for a fact that none of these men and women in their Sunday best was living by that edict. Not a single one of them had helped that boy under the staircase, and though most of them ate fairly often at Lizzy’s, not a scrap of the food left on their plates had ever found its way to that poor dog in the lean-to.

Jesus would have given his whole supper to the boy, and then he would have pitched a holy fit inside the café, berating everyone there for ignoring the plight of a helpless critter outside.

That was it for Gabe in a nutshell: He couldn’t believe that it was the holy songs people sang or the devout prayers they could recite by memory that earned them a ticket to their idea of heaven. It was one’s actions toward others, human or animal, that saved one’s soul. I’m here every week, these people seemed to be saying. I’m holier than others who don’t come. Yet some of the men snored through the preacher’s long sermons, and a lot of the women seemed more concerned with how they looked than with why they were there.

All his life, Gabe had felt set apart from religious people, never quite understanding what they found so special about the inside of a building, and more than once as a kid, he’d envied other children who regularly attended church with their parents. Now he no longer felt left out or even slightly jealous. If he wanted to feel close to his Creator, he’d go outside, away from all this sanctimony, and appreciate creation—the power of a high wind, the miraculous formation of an icicle, the incredible blue of a summer sky, or the beauty of a dog that never lost faith and continued to wait for a handout that none of these people was ever likely to offer him.

Nan seemed to sense that Gabe didn’t like going to church, but when she asked him about it, he skirted the question. It wasn’t right to make light of another person’s beliefs or to criticize the rituals she held dear. Nan was sincere in her worship. She hung on every word the preacher uttered and said every prayer with reverence. Her face fairly glowed as she sang the hymns. For Nan, going to church meant everything, and Gabe respected that. It truly was Nan’s way, and Gabe had no doubt that God looked into her heart and saw that.

It just wasn’t for Gabe.

He did like the Lord’s Prayer, which he’d never before heard in its entirety. He sorely wished he could memorize the words without studying on them, because, in his opinion, Jesus had laid out a set of rules in that prayer for every decent human being to follow, regardless of what name they gave their god.

When Gabe had completed all the needed repairs in the shop, he tried to make himself scarce during the day so Nan could do business. Most of the ladies had overcome their fear of him after seeing him in the shop a few times, but it didn’t escape him that there were some purchasing needs that they would never mention to Nan when a man was present. Mrs. Tandy, a stout matron with black hair, entered the shop one afternoon, glanced from the corset case to Gabe, and then turned as red as a ripe tomato. She left without buying anything. Mrs. Hamm, who walked a lot like her chickens, bobbing her head with every step, whispered behind a cupped hand of her more personal needs and then went into the work area, where Nan could show her merchandise behind the curtain. Patience Cole, a hunched and frail widow woman with bad hearing, stopped in every day to browse and visit, and announced each time she left that men had no business in a ladies’ apparel shop. Each day, a number of ladies came into the shop, but few of them bought anything. Gabe couldn’t help but wonder if he was causing a drop in sales.

Staying upstairs too long made Gabe feel caged. Of a morning, he’d go across the street to get a newspaper or periodical, which entertained him for a couple of hours while he finished off the morning pot of coffee. Then he cleaned the apartment, a task he considered to be obligatory, since he lived in the place and helped create the messes.

By noon, though, he ran out of things to do. He spent the lunch hour with Nan, sharing a meal with her that he usually prepared, mostly sandwiches, since he wasn’t an accomplished cook, and then helping her in the shop with little chores she couldn’t do while waiting on customers.

When one o’clock rolled around, Gabe developed the habit of hitting the boardwalks to get some fresh air and exercise. He always went to the livery first to visit Brownie. Giving the horse a good rubdown and some treats took only a few minutes, but Gabe stretched his time there into an hour by exercising the gelding in the corral out back. Once he’d left the stable, Gabe walked the streets of Random. He strolled up one and down another; then he retraced his steps, not caring if anyone noticed that he passed the same buildings again and again. If they thought he was casing a joint, so be it.

Going inside any of the businesses was out unless he actually wanted to buy something, a task he tried to do early in the morning, far earlier than he’d been out and about the first time he’d lived through this month. Otherwise he ran the risk of stumbling into reenactments. Knowing exactly what would happen next and what people were going to say before they said it . . . well, it gave him the fidgets. He didn’t find it entertaining, as the angel Gabriel had feared he might. Instead he was filled with an urgent need to escape.

So Gabe walked—something he had rarely done the last time. No more bellying up to a poker table in the saloon of an afternoon, where he might be tempted to fleece another player simply because he knew what cards would be dealt and to whom. No more lingering in the hotel restaurant, hearing the same conversations take place again. Out on the boardwalks, Gabe occasionally encountered someone that he’d bumped into before, but mostly he experienced no repeat performances.

During his outings, Gabe always stepped behind Lizzy’s Café at least once to check on the starving dog. Not dead yet. Gabe wasn’t sure why he went, because it made him feel bad when he walked away. He was drawn there, nevertheless. He didn’t allow himself to scratch the poor critter behind its ears. He said no kind words. Going there was pointless, and the animal’s begging eyes always made him feel guilty. But he went anyway.

And then there was the boy, who huddled under the staircase when he wasn’t skulking around town in search of nourishment. That really broke Gabe’s heart. He yearned to toss the kid money. Barring that, why couldn’t he at least give him some food? But he’d been given his instructions, and if he meant to get this right, he couldn’t disregard them.

One afternoon while walking, Gabe was passing Doc Peterson’s for the third time when the sight of a little girl and her mother stepping into the office waiting room stopped him dead in his tracks. Next week, on Tuesday the twenty-first, four days prior to Christmas, that young mother was going to take her little girl back into the doctor’s waiting room, where the child, who had a weak heart, would be exposed to a very nasty chest ailment that would take her life on Christmas Eve.

Gabe’s knees went suddenly weak, and he had to lean against the damn building to stay erect. His entire body broke out into a cold sweat. He knew that precious child was going to die, and he had it within his power to stop it from happening. Except that he could do nothing, absolutely nothing. Last week, Gabe had been able to reason his way past a deaf and frail old lady stepping off the boardwalk and dying under the wheels of a wagon. Not my place to intervene. Okay, yes, he could accept that. Everyone had to die at some point, and that old lady’s time had come. But the child? She was only about three, barely out of diapers. Maybe the weak heart would take her later in childhood anyway, but what if it didn’t? What if, by stepping in, Gabe could give her a chance to live a happy and fruitful life well into old age?

Walking back toward Nan’s shop, Gabe felt physically sick. It’s not my place to mess with stuff like that. I’m not supposed to alter events while I’m here. But the words pinged inside his head like shotgun pellets rattling around in a tin can.

By the time he reached home—or what he’d come to think of as home, anyhow—Nan had flipped her door sign over to read CLOSED. Gabe was relieved that he’d be able to cross the store and escape upstairs without having to exchange pleasantries with Geneva White or some other female customer. He stepped inside and pushed the door shut behind him, feeling as exhausted as if he’d just outrun a pack of flesh-devouring hounds.

“Gabriel?” Interrupted from tidying her cashbox counter, Nan fixed a worried gaze on him. “Are you all right?”

“Fine, I’m fine,” Gabe told her, but he couldn’t say it with any conviction.

Nan circled out from behind the partition and moved toward him. “Oh, dear, are you coming down sick? Geneva says there’s a nasty illness going around. Simon caught it and took to his bed for nearly a week. He’s all right now, but Geneva says he grew so congested that she had to send for Doc. Now, apparently, it’s sweeping through town like wildfire.”

Pushing up on her tiptoes, she reached to check Gabe’s forehead for fever. He caught her slender wrist before her fingers connected. He didn’t want her to feel how clammy his skin was. “I’m fine, Nan, only a little tired for some reason.”

“Tired? You look gray. Get yourself upstairs. I’ll hurry along as quickly as I can, and I’ll dose you with some of Mr. Redmond’s tonic. He swears by the stuff, so I always keep a bottle on hand.”

“I don’t need any tonic,” Gabe protested. “Maybe just a fresh cup of hot coffee to perk me up. I got chilled during my walk.”

She frowned up at him. “Well, silly you. That’s to be expected when you haven’t the good sense to wear a coat.”

“I can’t wear a coat when I’m walking fast for exercise. I get too hot.”

She gave that derisive little snort that he’d come to expect whenever she disagreed with him. “You didn’t get too hot today. Upstairs with you. I’ll build up both fires, and you’ll be toasty in no time.”

As Gabe climbed the stairs to the apartment, he wasn’t sure if he’d ever feel warm again.

•   •   •

While Nan fussed over him, Gabe’s mind circled the dilemma he found himself facing. If he did anything to alter the course of events that was destined to occur, he would be in trouble up to his eyebrows. But what if he found a way to change some things—only a few—without actually turning a hand to do anything himself? Once the idea took hold in his mind, it wouldn’t leave.

That evening, over another of Nan’s wonderful suppers—beef gravy and mashed potatoes with hot rolls slathered with butter, preserved corn, and green beans as sides—Gabe said casually, “I sure do see some sad things during my walks.”

Both Laney and Nan said, “You do?”

Careful, Gabe. Even though neither angel had made his presence known for quite some time, Gabe figured they had celestial spies keeping a close eye on him. “Oh, yeah. So sad that it makes me question the goodness of humanity sometimes. How can people turn a blind eye to obvious suffering? I just don’t understand it.”

Nan let go of her fork, making a loud clink against her plate. Her eyes filled with concern. She so seldom left her shop to mingle with others that she honestly didn’t know what was happening in the town she now called home. And Laney wasn’t allowed to go near the saloon, and had no reason to venture behind Lizzy’s Café on her way to and from school.

“Suffering?” Nan echoed. “What suffering?”

Gabe shook his head. “Never mind. Let’s enjoy our meal. I don’t want to upset you or Laney.” If he could herd them around to pressing him for the information he wished to impart, maybe the angels would give him a pass. “Some things are just meant to be, I suppose.”

“What things?” Nan glanced at Laney. “Is it too awful for young ears?”

Gabe forced a smile that he knew looked forced, because he honestly didn’t have a real smile in him tonight. “Oh, no, nothing like that.”

He resumed eating, counting off the seconds. Through his lowered lashes, he saw Nan retrieve her fork, but she put nothing in her mouth.

“Well, now that you’ve said something, you can’t leave it at that,” she complained. “What on earth is happening in our town that people are ignoring? Do tell, or my imagination shall bedevil me all night.”

“Mine, too!” Laney cried. “I shan’t turn a blind eye if I see suffering.”

Gabe prayed not. Now that he had his ladies waiting with bated breath for him to enlighten them, he couldn’t decide whom he wanted them to help first, the boy or the dog. Being human, the boy took priority; there wasn’t a question in Gabe’s mind about that. On the other hand, he wasn’t any too sure the dog could last much longer without food.

“I’ve seen two things that really disturb me,” he finally said. “And I’m unable to do anything in both cases.” He made a show of peppering his meat, deliberately taking his time. “There’s a half-grown pup under a lean-to out behind Lizzy’s. Aside from the fact that all he’s got for a bed is a tattered hunk of wet blanket, he’s slowly starving to death. I think he smells the food inside the café and hopes to get handouts, but apparently Lizzy and her customers who pass through the backyard aren’t possessed of generous hearts.”

“He’s starving?” Laney’s eyes bugged. “Truly?”

Gabe nodded. “He’d be a good-size dog if he had any meat on his bones. Longish yellow fur. It’s all matted right now, and his ribs poke out like Conestoga wagon hoops. He’s on his last legs, I’m afraid.”

Laney directed a yearning glance at Nan, to which Nan responded with, “No, little miss, you absolutely cannot bring the poor thing home. We’ve no place here for a dog. No fenced area out back. Animals must have access to the outdoors to tend to . . . Well, that goes without saying.” Nan sighed. “You’re at school all day, except on weekends, and I’m busy in the shop. There’s no one to take him out for walks.”

“Gabe could do it, Mama! He walks all afternoon.” Laney sent Gabe a pleading look. “Right, Gabe?”

Aware that he’d be gone soon, Gabe couldn’t bring himself to saddle Nan with a dog she honestly couldn’t care for. Thinking quickly, he said, “I’m not so sure that would work. The poor fellow is scared to death of me.” That was one of the biggest lies Gabe had ever told. Dogs always took right up with him, and he had no doubt that the starving mutt behind Lizzy’s would as well if Gabe offered so much as a kindly word of encouragement. “That’s why I haven’t taken him any food. He’s so scared of me, I doubt he’d touch it.”

Nan frowned. “Can’t you just”—forgetting her table manners, she swung her fork and tossed a bit of gravy onto the front of Laney’s pink dress—“throw the poor thing some food? We have plenty of stuff left over, so much that the icebox won’t hold all of it, and it’s always going bad on me. We could feed two dogs and a small child on a daily basis with what I throw out.”

Laney mopped at her dress. Nan was so upset about the dog that she hadn’t even noticed what she’d done. In that moment, Gabe realized how easily he could completely lose his heart to this woman. If she had a mean bone in her body, he’d never yet seen it.

“He won’t let me get that close.” Another lie, but Gabe, who normally avoided speaking untruths, had decided he wasn’t counting. “Even if I put all my muscle into it, the offering would wind up in the middle of Lizzy’s rear dooryard. Some customer would step in the muck, and then there’d be hell to pay for the dog. Lizzy would immediately put two and two together. She might even ask somebody to shoot it for her.”

“You are rather fearsome, Gabe.” Laney tossed her soiled napkin down beside her plate. “If I were a starving dog, I’d be a mite scared of you, too. But I bet—”

“Young ladies do not bet,” Nan interrupted.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Nan.” Gabe gave her a loaded look. “We bet all the time when we play poker. The sky won’t rain rocks upon the child’s head for saying such an innocent word.”

Nan made a fist over her heart, swept her eyes closed for a moment, and then said, “You are correct. I’m sorry for getting off topic. Old habits die hard.” She offered Laney an apologetic smile. “You may continue, dear heart. I’m sorry for interrupting you.”

Laney, still wide-eyed, revised her approach. “I will venture a guess that the dog won’t be afraid of me, and I could take food right into the lean-to without upsetting him at all.”

Nan nodded. “I think your guess is probably correct. Gabriel does have a—” She broke off and sent Gabe another penitent look. “Well, let me just say that you scared the sand out of me the first time we met.”

“It’s his black attire and those frightful guns that he wears,” Laney observed. “If he’d dress like a normal person, he wouldn’t look quite so intimidating. He’d just look interesting.”

“Laney!” Nan admonished. “It is extremely careless of Gabriel’s feelings to criticize his choice of clothing. He doesn’t dress abnormally.”

“He doesn’t dress like all the other men in town,” the child protested.

Gabe shot up a hand. “Ladies, ladies.” To Nan, he said, “My feelings are not in the least hurt by Laney’s observation. I dress for effect and deliberately try to look mean. I’m a fast draw, remember. Looking mean discourages upstarts who want to take me on. Usually,” he added, remembering Pete Raintree. Then, to Laney, he said, “I’m glad to hear that I look intimidating. That’s my aim. So can we return to discussing a solution for the poor dog?”

“I can get close enough to feed him,” Laney pronounced. “I’m certain I can. I’m only a girl. Nobody, not even a possibly mistreated dog, is afraid of a girl.”

She struck fear into Gabe’s heart every time he looked at her, only not in the way she meant. Pretty soon boys would be lining up at Nan’s door to see Laney. Gabe wouldn’t be around to oversee the situation or step in to teach the unruly young pups proper calling manners.

“It’s settled then.” Nan studied her uneaten meal with a forlorn expression. “I’ve lost my appetite, thinking about the poor thing. He can have what’s left of my supper.”

“Mine, too,” Laney seconded.

Gabe’s usual hunger for Nan’s cooking had vanished that afternoon when he’d seen the little girl. “Mine goes into the pot, for sure. I won’t die sometime during the night if I don’t get something to eat. The poor mutt might.” Before his ladies could leap into action, Gabe forestalled them with, “But the dog is only part of the problem.”

Nan, caught in midmotion as she rose from her chair, sank back onto her seat. “Oh, no! Is there another homeless animal that’s starving?”

“Not an animal,” Gabe replied. “It’s a cold, hungry boy, about Laney’s age, maybe a little older. He huddles under the—” Catching himself just in time, Gabe refrained from using the word brothel in front of Laney. “Just this side of the saloon, there’s a staircase open to the street. He hides in the far left corner, where the shadows help to conceal him. His mother took off with some cowpoke, promising to return. I have no idea what happened to her, but I don’t believe she’ll come back.” Gabe held up a staying finger. “I know you, Nan. You’ll want to gather him up and bring him home. But this boy has led a hard life. What he really needs is to be taken in by a family—a family with at least a couple of other children and an experienced father to ride herd on him. This boy may be given to violent acts. He may be a thief. His language may be even rougher than mine.”

“Well, we can’t just leave him under that staircase!” Nan cried. “And if he’s hungry, why on earth haven’t you been taking him food, Gabriel? We’ve plenty to share.”

Once again, Gabe had no choice but to lie. “The boy is afraid of me, too, just like the dog. If I went under that staircase, he’d probably drench his drawers.” The kid had been extremely wary of Gabe, but not quite that wary. “And you can’t just throw food at a child as if he’s an animal. That would be horrible.”

“I can hide my cashbox so we can bring him here until—”

“No,” Gabe said softly.

He sincerely did have concerns about the kid’s character, and he could not, in good conscience, put Nan or Laney at risk. As long as Gabe was present, he could deal with the boy, but the clock kept moving forward. If Nan took the child in until more permanent arrangements could be made, Gabe might die before it happened, leaving Nan and Laney alone with a possible miscreant. There was also the inescapable fact that someone up there had to be watching, and Gabe would pay dearly if he encouraged Nan to be the one who took the kid in.

“I think what you should do is see to the boy’s immediate needs—food to fill his belly and blankets to keep him warm. Then, Nan, when you can steal time away from the shop, perhaps you can whisper in the preacher’s ear, making him aware of the child’s plight. The preacher knows all the good families in town, and he is the perfect person to place the boy in a proper home.”

Nan expression went bewildered. “Why haven’t you whispered in the preacher’s ear yourself? You’ve met him twice now on Sunday.”

“Did you notice the way he looks at me?” Gabe challenged. In truth, the minister had been friendly enough and seemed to practice what he preached, accepting even a gunslinger into his church. “He’s wary of me, too. I’m definitely not the best person to speak with him.” Gabe could only hope that Michael and Gabriel were presently preoccupied with other concerns, possibly an old lady whose idea of heaven meant that it had to be brimming with cats. Otherwise, he was going to get caught. “You understand, I hope?”

“I didn’t notice him looking oddly at you, Gabriel, and I know for a fact that he’s a very caring man, but if you say he feels nervous of you, I can only take your word for it.”

Gabe settled back in his chair, hugely relieved. Both the boy and dog would be saved, yet Gabe would be able to look the angels dead in the eye and honestly say he hadn’t lifted a finger to help either one. He’d done some exaggerating—and tossed in a couple of whoppers—but he figured he could get away with that.

The little girl with a weak heart still presented a huge problem, and Gabe had no ideas up his sleeve yet as to how he might prevent her death without actually doing anything himself. But he’d think on it.

Nan pushed up from her chair. “We’ve work to do, little miss. We can clean our garbage pail and toss some food into it for the dog, but feeding the boy will take a bit more preparation.” Moving toward the sink, Nan glanced from the window glass toward Gabe. “It’s dark out. Isn’t that staircase right beside the saloon and in front of . . . uh—” She broke off and lifted her brows at him. “I’m not sure it’s safe for two females to go there at this time of night unescorted.”

Gabe didn’t want Laney or Nan going near the place alone even in broad daylight. They could encounter a drunk at almost any time of day. Most women in town crossed the street and walked on the other boardwalk while passing the brothel and drinking establishment. Maybe that was part of the reason the kid had received no help, because no one had seen him. Yeah, right. The boy left his hidey-hole to forage for food, and unless people were blind, they had seen him. The reason the good ladies of this town ignored the kid was because he was the child of a whore, and going near him might soil their fancy skirts. Or force them to face the unpleasant fact that an “unfortunate” had a booming business going upstairs. Were their husbands contributors to her income?

“I suggest that all three of us go,” Gabe said. “At the staircase, Nan, Laney and I will stand well back so I don’t scare the boy, but I’ll still be close enough to step in if anyone bothers you. As for the dog, you and I can hold back while Laney goes inside the lean-to with food. Again, I’ll be there if needed, but not close enough to alarm the poor mutt.”

Nan nodded. “That sounds like a champion plan to me.”

“If I were a hungry boy under a staircase, I’d want sandwiches,” Laney announced. “They’re easy to eat. No plate or flatware to bother with.”

“Good idea, sweetness. Sandwiches it shall be. How many do you think he can eat, Gabriel?”

Gabe bit back a smile, wondering why it had taken him so long to come up with this idea. “Three should do it. If they’re wrapped in paper or a towel, he can eat all he likes and save the rest for later. In the morning, I’m sure he’d welcome a couple of bacon-and-egg sandwiches, especially if you could get them to him warm.”

“He’ll need something to drink,” Laney observed.

“Milk,” Nan inserted. “We’ve a quart bottle with a cork that I can fill with a funnel.” She glanced over her shoulder at Gabe. “While we prepare the food, can you get some quilts? You’ll find them on the high right shelf of my workroom at the end of the hall. There’s a worn one I’ve been thinking about tossing. We can use that one as a bed for the dog. The boy should have nicer ones. If they get stained, so be it. I can always make new ones if and when my stacks run low.”

Twenty minutes later, Gabe walked with his ladies, who were bundled up against the cold, to watch while the boy received food and bedding. I’m not lifting a hand, he assured himself, hoping one of the angels was listening. Then he quickly scratched that wish. He’d be better off if Gabriel and Michael were perching cats on clouds and their spies were watching someone else. He wasn’t physically doing anything himself, but he’d sure connived to set things in motion.

Standing back with Laney, Gabe couldn’t clearly see how the boy reacted to Nan, but when she emerged from under the stairwell and reached him, he saw that she was smiling tremulously and had tears in her eyes. For the second time in the space of an evening, Gabe realized how easily he could fall head over boot heels in love with her.

“He’s got plenty of quilts now to keep him warm and comfortable,” she said brightly. “And he’s gobbling sandwiches so fast I’m afraid he’ll make himself sick.”

“Was he scared of you?” Laney asked, saving Gabe the trouble.

“After exhibiting an initial bit of fright, he quickly got over it,” Nan answered. “I think the food distracted him from worrying overmuch about the delivery person’s possible intent.”

Gabe felt as if the weight of the world had been lifted from his chest. “He’ll be starving again come morning,” he observed.

“No, he won’t. This delivery lady has every intention of taking him a huge, hot-from-the-stove breakfast. And I will carve out time tomorrow to pay a call on our minister to let him know there’s a boy who needs placement in a good home.”

“You can sweeten the deal by telling the preacher that the generous family will receive a tidy amount of money each month to offset the cost of feeding and clothing an extra child.”

Nan smiled up at him. “Are you truly willing to do that for him, on a monthly basis without fail?”

“Sure.”

Fortunately Gabe knew that Nan would see to it after he died. She would then have a bank account balance nearly as big as her kind and gentle heart.

He felt at peace as he escorted the two females to Lizzy’s. He handed Laney the quilt he’d been carrying under one arm. Nan, apparently chilled, leaned against Gabe’s side as they watched the girl scurry across the café’s back dooryard to the lean-to. Even through the darkness, Gabe saw the painfully thin yellow dog struggle to his feet, beside himself with happiness to have a visitor. Laney set aside the bucket and went down on her knees to hug the animal’s neck. Not good. Gabe had a bad feeling it might be love at first lick. Soon the dog was devouring the offerings. Laney stayed there until the food was gone to collect the pail.

“I think I need a new trash bucket,” Nan observed. “That one is going to be in constant use.”

Gabe was happy to agree that she was probably right.

During the short walk home, he congratulated himself on outwitting the angels. He’d followed their rules, almost. Surely almost would be counted as good enough, even up there.

Gabe was too happy to worry about it overmuch tonight. He took it as a very good sign that he hadn’t heard the angel Gabriel’s admonishing voice boom in his ear.

Now Gabe had only to dream up some way to prevent that little girl from going to the doctor next week. That was going to be a tough one, he knew.

But, dammit, he had to think of something.