Sunset Assignment In San Piccolo

Act Two

I managed to keep the distance between my horse and hers all the way back to San Piccolo. I can't say that I've known a tougher fifty minutes in all my life. I couldn't trust myself not to spill out everything I should have told her before I left. Just one look in her eyes would send me back in her arms. It had taken me so long to get her out of my mind, the thought of letting her in again was killing me.

Every time she cantered up beside me, I would hunker down and spur my steed on. I couldn't afford to give her time to observe me closer. Once we reached the Saloon, Mayor Samuels would be taking her off my hands and out of my heart.

Again.

She'd taken it away from me that day she'd slammed her bedroom door in my face. For all she'd pretended to love me, I'd finally been shown the depth of her attachment. About three dollars. That was enough to buy her the next vial of her poison. And that had been all I'd come to mean to her in the end.

We trotted along the trail around the curve of the hill which shielded the little prospectors' settlement from the wider valley. However, to call the ramshackled collection of low buildings a town did stretch the imagination.

Riding into San Piccolo, I picked up the echoes of music rippling from the Valentine's Dance.

"Is this it?"

Mary's disappointment did not surprise me in the least. Derby was a much larger town and San Piccolo only boasted a high street of ten wooden structures, ranging from a butcher's to an undertaker.

I led her up to the Saloon which stood proudly opposite the Chapel. Both buildings forever trapped in a monumental checkmate of biblical proportions. Alighting from my horse, I yanked down my hat and hitched up to the post alongside the boardwalk.

The light from the windows flickered with shadows of passing dancers. Laughter and fiddles, drums, piano and footsteps bounced through the woodwork and out into the empty, dry street.

She slid from her horse beside me in a ruffle of skirts and moved closer.

Her perfume had hardly changed. A little sweeter maybe, more floral. Her breath swept across the back of my neck, prickling my skin with goosebumps.

I knew she was watching me. Way too close.

The doors banged open as the Mayor burst them apart, throwing blazing light and raucous noise upon us.

"Ah! At last, our honorable guest has arrived. About time, Sheriff."

Mayor Samuels blustered his way past me, his belly protruding from his ill-fitting dress coat. The suit obviously kept on standby for just such an event. His rosy cheeks and beacon of a nose betrayed his love of liquor. Once he'd got a good look at my companion his ample face lit up with delight.
"Why, Mrs Drake, how wonderful it is to finally welcome you into our humble backwater of a town. Why, I do so hope that you will find everything to your liking. The new school building is a real delight, if I say so myself."

Grabbing hold of my Mary's wrists he gave her no choice but to allow herself to be dragged into the hurling bustle of the Valentine's Day dance. All the while shouting in her beautifully formed ear.
"So, now that you've met our Sheriff Rucker, you are free to meet the rest of the town's finest."

Mary stopped. Frozen to the spot. She wrestled herself free from the Mayor's grasp. I watched as she turned back to face me. I had no time to avoid her gaze. Her eyes sprang wide open then misted over. She gasped out my name in a broken voice.
"Rucker, Dan Rucker?"

I did the only thing I knew how. Got away. Blustering past her, I tipped the brim of my hat and yelled out.
"Hell, no, ma'am. You got me confused with someone else."

On jellied legs threatening to give way, I forced my traitorous feet to take me to the other side of the room. My strength caved in and I tripped and stumbled. I would have crashed head first under the incoming tide of dancers had it not been for her hand.

The fiddles and drums faded out of existence. The laughter wafted away like a dream. All I could see was her.

Mary.

Beautiful dark eyes brimming with tears, her warm touch burning through my sleeve, her luscious red lips parting, her...

"Dan. I knew it was you!"

She stood so close that her words breathed out across my face. Giving life to hope. If she remembered me didn't it stand to reason that I had been worth remembering?

Hardly trusting my voice to work, I cleared my throat, and hopefully my head, to ask her what I'd been meaning to say that morning in Derby. Before she'd shut the door forever.

"Why wasn't I enough for you Mary?" My voice took on a life of its own, the connection between brain and mouth completely severed as my heart spoke directly to her.
"You should have let me help you. I love you."

Taking hold of her hands I straightened up and leaned in, our lips barely a hair's breadth apart. The thumping in my chest pounded to the steady thud of the vibrations through the wooden dance floor.

Mary smiled, the rhythm of my pulse sped up. She tipped her head to the side and studied me for a second. Then she took her hands back and delicately placed them either side of my face.

"How could I?" She sighed. "When I had to help myself first?"

I wrapped my arms around her. Bringing her right where she belonged. Next to me. Losing myself in her eyes, I asked;
"Will you let me make you happy, Mary Leighton?"

And then, right there and then, amongst the swirling gowns, smoke and music, she kissed me.

I burned from the inside out, sinking deeper, becoming stronger. The man in me had found the reason to be, the joy of living had finally returned. All in the shape of Mary Leighton.

THE END