Horace finally succeeded in freeing the recalcitrant locks of the smoothbore from the tenacious leather straps and, glancing around for support, found that his allies had withdrawn several paces to the rear, leaving him solely in charge of delivering the elements of their complaint to Mr. Wingate. Since everyone seemed to be waiting for him to open the proceedings, he cleared his throat and, in spite of his bruised state, drew himself up to his full height, only to find that he still had to look up to meet Ashton’s gaze. The sun-bronzed features hinted of that one’s amusement, which severely unsettled Horace’s composure. Nervously he cleared his throat again, but strive though he might, he could not lay tongue to a single sensible word with which to begin.

Ashton Wingate saved the day as he squinted at the sun briefly and then greeted his visitors. “Good afternoon, Mr. Titch.” He nodded to the others. “Gentlemen.” He leaned indolently against a pillar, his fingers jammed in the tops of his pockets. “You seem to have picked a fine day for a ride in the country.”

M. Horace Titch tried to hitch himself a notch or two higher, then had to grab for the gun as it began to slip away from him. “I doubt, suh, that you will be able to deal with these good men through the use of inane pleasantries.”

Ashton arched a condescending brow. “I have a feeling that you’re about to correct my error, Mr. Titch. You can start by telling me what the lot of you are doing here on my lawn.”

The fowling piece was growing heavy, and Horace shifted it to a new position before he answered: “That’s just what I’m about to do, suh, and I warn you to be wary. I assure you that we represent the whole of Natchez and Davis County.”

“Indeed?” Ashton let the single word convey his doubt.

“There’s been a grievous wrong perpetrated upon the good people of our area.” Horace was sweating heavily and would have wiped his brow had he found a free hand. “As you are well aware, suh, several of those madfolk escaped from the sanitarium when the place burned down. I have it on very good authority that you have involved yourself in this travesty….” Horace noticed an almost imperceptible hardening of the hazel eyes, but he continued, encouraged by the presence of those behind him. Even Ashton Wingate would not think of standing against such odds. “It seems you have taken one of those crazy people into your home.”

Horace almost held his breath as he awaited the man’s reaction to this bold statement. Other than a slight tensing of the lean jaw, he saw no real sign of change and came to the conclusion that Ashton Wingate had either not heard him or had misunderstood his statement.

“I mean to say, suh, that the…uh…young woman you brought home a couple of weeks ago might just be one of them mad ones.”

A murmur of agreement rose behind Horace, but Ashton only glanced at the sun again, and then consulted his pocket watch.

Seeing no threat forthcoming, Horace warmed to his topic and rushed on: “Really, Mr. Wingate, I can’t understand why you would take such a risk by bringing one of them right into your own home. We must insist that she be delivered into the hands of the authorities.” M. Horace Titch realized he had finally gained Ashton’s full attention when he found himself under the unwavering regard of those penetrating green-brown eyes. He hastened to add, “Just until it can be determined who she is, of course…and only for the safety of the women and children around these parts.”

Now that the demand was out, the rest of the men relaxed a bit. There was a full chorus of assents, with a lot of bobbing heads.

“’At’s right!”

“Way to tell ’im, Titch!”

“We gotta take ’er in!”

Ashton seemed strangely undisturbed by their proposition. “You men have had a long ride out here, and the day has been unseasonably warm.” He called out to include the lot of them: “And you seem mighty uncomfortable on those horses. Why don’t you climb down and rest for a spell?”

A pause followed as they considered this, and a general mumbling rose among them as they agreed that Ashton Wingate wasn’t such an almighty ogre after all. As invited, they dismounted.

M. H. Titch was overjoyed at the prospect of standing on good, solid earth again. A considerable degree of havoc had been wreaked upon his posterior and anterior parts, and he was not at all sure that a walk back to Natchez was not preferable to another ride on this wretched beast. He tried several times to swing his leg over the saddle, as some of the others had so easily done, but the long weapon got in his way. Somehow he ended up sitting on top of the thing, and had the trigger assembly been any less stout, he might have lost his manhood or, at the very least, a part of his leg.

Horace considered his predicament for a moment, giving no heed to the gaping stares he had collected. If he could just hold the gun up high, he thought, then get his right leg free and over the saddle…Amazing! Of a sudden, he found himself standing in the left stirrup with nothing tangled or caught. He was not completely aware of the danger of having his foot deeply wedged in the iron when he began to lower himself from the saddle, but he began to have some inkling of this when he found his other leg too short to reach the ground. He hung there, debating his next maneuver, when the matter resolved itself. The weapon slipped from his grasp, falling between him and the steed, and on the way down, the outsized hammers raked him from breastbone to belly. Forgetting his tenacious grip on the horse’s mane, he snatched for the evil weapon. At the same time his right foot shot underneath the belly of the nag, and with a thud and a loud “whoof,” Horace hit the ground in an absolutely prone position. The weary steed craned its neck to view this latest inanity with a good measure of disdain. The gun teetered precariously on top of the dazed man’s chest, and it was nearly a full minute before Horace came to his senses. Sudden visions of being dragged all the way back to town moved him to immediate action. Dust billowed up around the short, stout man as he struggled frantically to free his foot from the stirrup.

One of his companions had mercy on him and came to his aid. When the boot was untangled, Horace climbed slowly to his feet, using the gun for a crutch, and ruefully dusted off his new suit, causing an epidemic of sneezing fits to strike those nearest him. He slapped the beaver hat against his leg until it regained some semblance of its former hue, then settled it once more upon his head. With the completion of this simple toilet, he lifted his gaze to his host and immediately detected the fact that Ashton Wingate was regarding him with something akin to pity. He could have endured outright hatred far better; at least that emotion would have made him feel less like a bumbling clod.

“Suh, I must warn you,” he began angrily, but had to pause to spit dirt out of his mouth. “We will not be put off lightly. We’ve come here to see that our community is made safe again.”

The troop of unworthies began to exchange self-righteous comments as they regrouped behind their leader. They lifted clubs and guns en masse to affirm their agreement with what Horace had stated.

With calm deliberation, Ashton perused the crowd of men, then casually called over his shoulder for a bucket of cool water to be brought up fresh from the well and a jug of rum to accompany it. Unruffled, he waited until both had arrived and made a show of emptying the dark, potent brew into the bucket. He stirred the lot with a long-handled dipper, then raised the cup and took a long, slow sip, following his action with a smile of obvious pleasure.

The mob had grown strangely quiet as envious eyes marked his every movement. Dry tongues licked longingly over parched lips, while nostrils quivered to catch the scent. When he was sure he had gained their rapt attention, Ashton lifted the dripping ladle aloft and dribbled the liquid in a slow, tantalizing stream.

“The road from town is hot and dusty. I’m sure you men could use a bit of cool water.”

Sighs of relief were quickly overwhelmed by shouts of assent, and a mass of burly bodies gathered near the stoop. Nudging elbows prodded slighter forms aside as each sought to receive his ration. Ashton stared down at them and almost smiled as he stepped back.

“Aye, that’s the way, lads. Nothing like a good swig of grog to cut the grime in a man’s throat.”

They nodded eagerly in a rushing tide of agreement. Horace finally yielded to his own thirst and deigned to put the brimming dipper to his lips. He swirled the first draft around in his mouth and then spewed a muddy stream onto the lane before he quenched his thirst. As he passed the dipper on, he got back to the matter at hand. “Mr. Wingate!” He gained that one’s rather skeptical regard almost immediately. “Do you intend to hand the woman over to us so we might deliver her to the sheriff?”

His cohorts suddenly recalled the reason for their visit and, since the bucket was nearly empty, clustered around their selected spokesman. Horace had never been leader of anything before, and he felt a surge of importance as he laid the gun over his arm and turned to survey his fellows. There was a wild dash for cover as the bore of the weapon swung with him.

Had Ashton been in a better mood, he might have found some humor in these antics, but he could manage no more than a coldly tolerant smile when the little man’s round, dirt-streaked face confronted him again. He had not heard the harpsichord for some moments and could only hope that Willabelle had had the foresight to escort Lierin up to her room.

Horace cleared his throat. “You understand clearly why we’ve come, suh. If you would be so kind as to fetch the girl, we’ll take her in to the sheriff and let him decide what to do with her. I’ll see that no action is taken against you.”

Ashton neither spoke nor changed his expression, but Horace’s eyes widened perceptively as the front door swung open and Belle Chêne’s huge black overseer, Judd Barnum, stepped casually out, with a pair of oversize horse pistols tucked in his belt. In the crook of his arm rested an ancient but well-kept, bell-muzzled blunderbuss, and across his chest he wore a wide leather strap from which dangled a dozen or so wooden charges for the awesome weapon. The black held his silence, but braced his feet apart and proceeded to dip into the large pocket of his waistcoat, removing a handful of small, jagged metal pieces, which he ceremoniously dumped into the muzzle of the blunderbuss. Laying the piece again over his massive arm, Judd glanced up to meet the startled and disturbed stare of the short man, then his gaze ranged leisurely over the rest of the gathering.

At least one of the onlookers shuddered as he conjured a mental image of the mayhem such a charge would cause. Bellies tightened and grumbled as they churned in sudden consternation. Somewhere the note of lighthearted fun had vanished from this afternoon’s foray, and they began to have second thoughts about the wisdom of disturbing the occupants of Belle Chêne.

“You gentlemen are under a misconception,” Ashton announced almost pleasantly.

Horace tried to form a question, but he found his mouth gone dry, this time with roweling dismay. He had heard that Ashton Wingate had a penchant for turning the tables on pranksters or anyone else who meant him harm, but he had not expected the man to stand firm against such odds and surely not to take the upper hand. Intensely aware of the threat that faced them, Horace could only stand and gape.

The hazel eyes flicked toward him briefly. “You most of all, Mr. Titch.”

“Why…?” The single word was strangled out.

“The lady whom you have so carelessly slandered is my wife, and you should know me well enough by now at least to guess that I’m not partial to having anything taken from me by force, especially when it is something I treasure.”

“If’n she’s your’n, why ain’t we never seent her befo’?” The question came from a bearded, snaggle-toothed fellow who stood near the rear of the group.

“If Sheriff Dobbs has any questions he wishes to address to me, I will most respectfully respond, but I owe none of you an explanation.”

“Ah…the sheriff’s a friend o’ his. Ol’ Harvey ain’t gonna do nothin’ to upset his lordship here. We’ve gotta take care o’ this matter ourselves if’n we want justice done.”

Once again nodding heads conveyed the general consensus of the group of men.

“Yeah! She might’ve been the one what murdered the attendant, an’ she could kill again! Maybe one o’ ours next!”

“Yeah! If’n he won’t give her to us, we’ll take her!”

There was a sudden surge toward the porch, but Judd stepped forward, snatching one of the pistols from his belt and driving them rapidly back as he swung the wide bore of the blunderbuss to face them.