"Did you hear? There was a lynch mob in the square last night! They caught one of the men who attacked Miss Taylor. They would have hung him too if Sheriff Barron hadn't been there to stop them. Even then the crowd looked like they might try to string that man up but then Mr. D'aray opened the saloon up and they forgot all the hanging."
"Isn't it strange? Mr. D'aray closing up his saloon like that? You would think a man like that wouldn't give two figs about someone like Miss Taylor. Especially after she attacked his saloon and tried to make him move it. Yet there he went, turning away business on her behalf."
"Oh, I know! Did you know the two of them went out riding the other day? Alone. I understand they spent quite a bit of time down by the river."
"You don't mean..."
"No," disappointment registering that something isn't quite the juicy bit of gossip it sounds like. "My Wilbur had to go down to the sawmill on business and he saw them. He said it looked like Mr. D'aray was teaching Miss Taylor how to shoot a gun. I suppose he was showing her how to protect herself in case those men came back."
"Well, I declare. You don't suppose he's...sweet...on her do you?"
"Wouldn't that be just terrible! After what she's already been through, to have a man like that following her around. You just know he'd never marry her. Why, when he got tired of her he'd probably expect her to work in his saloon as a...saloon girl." Something about the tone of voice suggests that as repellent as the thought is, it also intrigues her. Wilbur's special night just might come early this month.
Return to the Archive