The Last Hard Men by Brian Garfield Read Free Book Online Page B

I’m going to do? I’m going to put this house up for sale.”
    “What? The house? But—”
    “I know. You were born here. Well, that was a long time ago. The house is too big, we don’t need it. It just keeps you hopping. I’m going to sell it.”
    “And do what?”
    He grinned at her. “Move into a flat in Orndorffs Hotel.”
    She glared at him, but she was amused. “You old stinker.”
    “Yeah. Won’t be room for you there, Susie. I’ll have maids to keep my room clean and a whole hotel kitchen to cook for me. I won’t need the likes of you fussing around after me.”
    “You’re bluffing,” she said, “but I love you.”
    “I am not bluffing. Next week the house goes up for sale.”
    “Do it if you want,” she said, feigning indifference. “But don’t do it on my account. If you really can’t stand having me around, I’ll leave. You don’t have to sell the house.”
    “Is that a promise?”
    “It is if you’re asking for it.”
    Loneliness pressed at him from unseen shadows. But he said, “I’m asking for it.”
    She was studying her hands, turning them over, again and again as if they were unfamiliar objects she’d never seen before. “All right,” she said in the same small voice. “All right, Father. But it doesn’t mean I’m going to marry Hal.”
    The door clapper banged three or four times. Burgade put down his brandy snifter. “That’ll be your young man. Better get your shawl—there’ll be a cool breeze along the river tonight.”
    Her eyes flashed. “What makes you think we’d go walking in that notorious lovers’ lane?”
    He only grinned at her. Color filled her cheeks and she went out of the room in a rush. But he noticed she was moving with a light step. Still smiling, he went to the hall door and greeted Hal Brickman while Susan dashed upstairs to get her wrap. Hal wore the customary jodhpurs and engineers’ boots, a charro jacket and a necktie; he had his snap-brim hat in his hand; his hair was slicked back, parted down the middle. A real dandy—but amused by it, not serious about it. Burgade didn’t understand dudes very well but he liked Hal. They sat in the parlor with brandy and talked weather and crime until Susan came down, her hair freshly brushed and shining, her mother’s lace shawl about her shoulders. She looked a little like her mother—not much, but enough to send Burgade’s memory back twenty years.
    Hal was saying, “I imagine they’ll catch them before the week’s out.”
    Hearing the last of it as she entered, Susan said, “Catch who?”
    “Oh, just some convicts who broke out of the penitentiary,” Hal said.
    “Oh,” she said, not interested. She came into the room and Burgade rose gallantly from his chair; she pecked his cheek and let Hal take her arm and guide her toward the door. Hal said, “Good night, sir.”
    “Always good to see you,” Burgade said.
    Susan hesitated. The pink tip of her tongue quested her mouth corner. “Would you like anything from Porter’s store? It’ll still be open.”
    “No. Nothing, thank you. And if I did I could get it myself.”
    “Don’t be cranky,” she said tartly. “Nothing—that’s your trouble right now, you know. You want nothing.”
    Not altogether true, he thought. Right now he wanted Zach Provo. Or perhaps what he wanted was the excitement of the challenge.
    They stood a moment in uncomfortable silence, Susan reluctant to leave, until Burgade turned and stared rudely at the bookcase as if dismissing them from his mind and looking for something to read.
    “Well,” Susan said uncertainly, “good night, then, Father.”
    “’Night,” he mumbled, and took a step closer to the bookcase.
    His daughter went out with her young man. Through the window he watched them go along the walk under the gaslight poles. In response to something Hal said, Susan laughed with an open throat; she seemed healthy and girlish, she touched the ground with toes like musical notes. Burgade saw Hal