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night, sometimes with a woman in my bed whose face and name I couldn’t recall.”
    David sank deeper into the embrace of his chair, elbows pressing hard on the arms. “I drank heavy. Gambled heavy, too. It was exciting to me back then. Denver seemed like a big city compared to No Name. Still does, only it’s gotten fancier. Now that I’m older, it just doesn’t hold the same appeal for me.”
    “That isn’t what I asked.” Ace sat forward. “Were you ever so drunk that you could have been intimate with this woman and not remembered it the next day?”
    David puffed air into his cheeks. “Only if she was a sporting woman, and they always take care of things like that with a sponge soaked in vinegar.”
    “They
try
to take care of things like that with a sponge, but it’s about as effective as pulling out before the gun goes off. Sporting women do get pregnant. You know that. Sometimes they get rid of it. Sometimes they don’t. Many a child has grown up sleeping under the staircase of a whorehouse. Now, I asked you the question, square and honest. Were you ever
that
drunk?”
    David could now pinpoint the source of his headache and nausea, and it had a terrible name:
Truth.
He closed his eyes, willing it away because suddenly Hazel Wright seemed mighty appealing. David didn’t want his nice little life messed up by a child he’d sired with a woman he couldn’t remember. “Yes,” he pushed out. “There were times when I got that drunk.”
    Ace made a sound that reminded David of a bellows releasing a blast of air. A creak of wood signaled that he had gone limp and slumped back in his seat.
    Finally David opened his eyes. “I don’t know what to do next,” he confessed. “If this woman used to be a working girl, and I got her pregnant, why didn’t she look me up? And why would she pretend to be married to me?”
    “It’s possible that she didn’t realize she was pregnant for two or three months,” Ace replied, “and maybe she looked for you in Denver and couldn’t find you. As for taking your name and claiming to be your wife, I’ll remind you thatChristian folks don’t look kindly upon an unmarried woman with a bun in her oven. It’s possible that she finally left the area and pretended she had a husband so
decent
folks wouldn’t shun her and the child.”
    Ace didn’t take kindly to holier-than-thou churchgoers. He worshiped weekly with Caitlin, sometimes even taking her to Denver to attend Mass, but he drew the line at acting as if he were sinless. He felt that many people lost their way as Christians, and David agreed with him. That was undoubtedly why he’d been hesitant earlier to embarrass Miss Marcy. Her being an upstairs girl didn’t make her less of a human being.
    “So you think this woman”—David gestured at the mail—“might actually have had my child?”
    “It’s possible. That doesn’t mean I’m saying it’s probable.”
    “Ever since I read some of the letters, I’ve been trying to convince myself of that,” David said. “That it’s improbable, I mean. It’s the
possibility
that has my guts tied in knots.” In a rush, he told Ace about sending Daphne money. “My gut tells me I’ve never clapped eyes on this woman, Ace.” He broke off and swallowed a lump of guilt. “But my conscience won’t let it go. What if I did bed her? She could have been a fancy girl in one of the Denver saloons and mistook me for a gold miner. Back then, before you got the railway connection built, I drove my cattle to market, and I was as dirty as any nugget digger you ever saw when I reached town. How do you tell the difference between a miner and a cowpoke? By the boots they wear? It isn’t like I talk a whole lot about myself when I toss a skirt. Fact is, I don’t talk much at all, except to say nice stuff, leaving off before I tell a woman I love her.” David felt like a ten-year-old again. “Even working girls like to hear nice stuff. Right?”
    Ace nodded. “I raised