Read Treasure Mountain (1972) for Free Online

had yours yet?"
    "I was waiting for you," she said, and dropped her eyes. "I am afraid you'll think me very bold, but I..."
    "No such thing," I said. I drew back a chair for her.
    "I surely dread eatin' supper alone. Seems to me I'm the only one alone, most of the time."
    "Have you been alone a lot, Mr. Sackett?" She looked up at me out of those big, soft eyes and I couldn't swallow. Not hardly.
    "Yes, ma'am. I've traveled wild country a sight, and away out in the mountains and upon the far plains a body sets alone ... although there's camp-robber jays or sometimes coyotes around."
    "You must be awfully brave."
    "No, ma'am. I just don't know no better. It comes natural when you've growed--grown-up with it."
    My collar felt tight, but then I never did like them stiff collars. They chafed my neck. My gun had twisted over on my belly and was gouging me. I could feel the sweat on my forehead and I desperately wanted to wipe it away.
    "Your face looks so--so hard! I mean the skin! Like mahogany."
    "It ain't much," I said, "although it cuts less than most. Why, I mind the time--"
    Well, I caught myself in time. That there was no story for a genteel girl like this here. She suddenly put her hand up to my face.
    "Do you mind? I just have to see if it's as hard as it looks!" Her hand was soft, like the feathers on a dove. I could feel my heart pounding, and I was afraid she'd hear it. It had been a long time since any woman made up to me like that.
    Suddenly somebody was beside the table. "Mr. Sackett, suh? A message for you, suh." And then in a slightly different tone, he said, and it was Judas talkin', "How do you do, Miss Baston?"

    Chapter V
    That name did just what Judas figured it would do and brought me right down out of the clouds. He shot down my balloon with one word, and it was well he did so, because it was only filled with hot air, anyway. No girl like this one would set her cap for a man like me unless there was double-dealing in it.
    She smiled just as brightly, but it seemed to me there was a mean kind of anger in her eyes. Right then she could have shot Judas Priest.
    For a moment there I forgot the message I had in my hand, but it was Fanny Baston who brought my attention back to it.
    Judas had disappeared without even getting a reply from her, but I reckon he wasn't expecting one. Miss Baston glanced at the note in my hand. "Something always interrupts whenever I start talkin' to a good-looking man, Mr. Sackett.
    You can attend to that later, if you don't mind."
    I just smiled at her. I had my good sense back now, or part of it. "It might be important."
    Unfolding the note, I read: Absinthe House. 11 o'clock tonight. And it was signed with a profile of the Tinker. One quick, but amazingly lifelike line.
    I folded the note and put it in my shirt pocket and buttoned down the flap. I had a feeling she was itching to put her dainty white hands on it. She'd get it only over my dead body. I had a feeling she'd thought of that, too.
    "I was lookin' forward to meetin' you, ma'am," I said, and then I lied to her.
    "Orrin, he said he'd met you and was plannin' to see you soon."
    Her eyelids flickered with annoyance. She had not expected that, but folks who deal in crime should recall that folks like to talk, and will tell most everything, given a chance. She had no way of knowing that I hadn't seen or heard from Orrin.
    "I am afraid you have gathered the wrong impression," she said. "I only met your brother briefly, but I found him most attractive. As a matter of fact, that was why I came here tonight. He was to have called on us and did not, and then they told me you were here. Where is your brother?"
    "I was just goin' to ask you that question, ma'am. He's a man never fails to keep an appointment, so something serious must have happened. We had some business here in town."
    "If we could help, Mr. Sackett, you have only to ask. We have many friends here.
    Our people have lived in New Orleans since shortly after it was