"A word in the right ear? A promise to the right person. A favor extended?" Mary saw immediately that she had him. For the senator to deny it would be admitting that his leverage and authority was not as extensive as he wanted others to believe. If he admitted that he had the power and prestige to accomplish such a task, then he was also saying that someone like Hamilton could do the thing as well. Stillwell regarded Mary consideringly.

"You're a very clever young woman," he said at last.

"Perhaps too clever for your own good." Out of the corner of his eye he saw Ryder shift slightly and recognized that he needed to tread carefully.

"But, yes, you're correct. I could arrange it if that were my desire.

It's not easy to admit that Hamilton carries as much in the way of clout as I do, but it's true nonetheless. There are ways it could be accomplished."

Satisfied, Mary returned to the settee.

"Then a reasonable conclusion is that Senator Hamilton helped arrange the assignments of a group of men who had no real purpose at Fort Union except to steal the gold shipment." Ryder's long fingers intertwined and became a single fist.

"In carrying out their mission, they murdered an equal number of men assigned to escort the wagons, planted evidence to make it seem as though it were a Chiricahua raid, stole the gold, and arranged very neatly for me to assume the blame."

"Miss Hamilton," the senator said softly. Ryder nodded.

"Mary suspected her part in this long before I did. The senator's daughter was instrumental in making certain I was unavailable at the time of the massacre." Stillwell's lips compressed. He sighed heavily.

"Why weren't you killed?"

"I might have been if it weren't for Miss Hamilton's successful playacting and her sordid account. I think it was decided it was better to have someone to accuse for the mission's failure than to leave an open-ended investigation into the matter."

"Ryder was the perfect choice to take the blame," Mary said.

"He certainly was," Stillwell agreed.

"My God, he certainly was."

"The hangman was supposed to silence me." Wilson Stillwell's mouth curled upward in a humorless smile, but his eyes alighted appreciatively on Mary.

"And he would have if it hadn't been for Mary here."

"More or less," Ryder said enigmatically, refusing to explain her real role in his escape or that of Florence Gardner. His quick glance at Mary cautioned her as well. The senator raised his wine glass again and sipped.

"Obviously there's something you don't wish to tell me," he said.

"I have no problem with that, but do you know where the gold is?"

Ryder shook his head.

"We don't think it's in Arizona any longer.

It was Mary's idea to follow Miss Hamilton in the hope she would lead us to it."

"Well, she led you to Lieutenant Rivers and to her father. I'd say Mary's instincts are good ones. Who can say where the gold might turn up?" He leaned back in his large armchair.

"I've heard quite enough to make my decision." He sipped his wine again, then regarded them both over the rim of his glass.

"How is it that I can assist you in bringing Hamilton and his slut of a daughter to justice?" Mary blinked, taken aback by an underlying viciousness in the senator's almost genial tone.

"Do I shock you, Mary?" he asked matter-of-factly.

"Did you think I wouldn't take this information so personally? I don't know what my nephew's told you about our relationship, but I can assure you I take this all very, very personally. Not only was Ryder cruelly maligned, but I was unwittingly duped into offering myself up for public ridicule." Mary suspected it was the latter situation that Wilson Stillwell found most difficult to accept. Still, it no longer mattered why he wanted to help, only that he did.

"I do not suffer fools," he said lowly.

"And neither will I be made one.

No one does that to Wilson Stillwell. No one." Mary had an urge to look at Ryder, but she resisted. There was a fierceness about the senator's announcement that she found unsettling, even dangerous.

"It's good of you to offer your help," she said evenly.

"Ryder and I both appreciate it." Mrs. Shanahan parted the pocket doors to the parlor and announced that dinner was ready. The senator rose, took Mary's arm, and escorted her to the dining room.

Ryder followed with interest, watching Mary's reaction to his uncle.

There were small signs, imperceptible to someone who didn't know Mary as well as he did, that she was not eager to be in Wilson Stillwell's company, that she didn't like linking arms with him or matching her step to his. The senator seated her at the long walnut dining table, then took his place at the head. Ryder sat on his uncle's right. Each time Mary turned to him, a question in her forest green eyes, his own expression was carefully guarded.

Clams were served first, then cream of potato soup. More Montrachet filled their glasses, but before a servant carried in the tender bass fillets, Stillwell ordered Amontillado and Rauenthaler be brought up from the wine cellar. The fish course was followed by cucumbers and thin slices of rare roast beef and more wine.

"Ryder tells me you have a fine collection of wines in your cellar,"

Mary said. Dinner did not lend itself to important conversation.

Although she wanted to do nothing more than finish the discussion that had begun in the parlor, she held back, following Ryder's lead.

"What I've tasted thus far is certainly proof of that."

"I imagine your father has a similar cellar," Stillwell said modestly.

Mary shook her head.

"Nothing like yours, I'm sure. He appreciates a good wine, but admits he has no real taste for the distinction between them."

"It can be learned," Stillwell said. He savored the Rauenthaler.

"I'd be proud to show you the cellar."

"And I would be honored to see it." The conversation proceeded in just that fashion, simple exchanges with no consequence or purpose except to fill the silence between the sorbet and the salad. This situation lasted until coffee was served. Stillwell drew another cigar from the lacquered box that was presented to him and lighted it with relish.

Ryder declined a second time.

"You haven't explained," Stillwell said, "what it is I can do for you.

You understand that simply going to the papers with what we have won't be enough. The fact that you're my nephew, Ryder, means that whatever I say in support of you will be critically examined. I feel certain that Hamilton will be able to provide explanations for the assignments and transfers, and it will become my word against his. That won't do at all. The papers will also be very cautious in regard to Miss Hamilton. You can't level accusations at her pretty head without proof."

"We know," Ryder said.

"That's why we think nothing less than Senator Hamilton's confession will serve." Stillwell hadn't expected that.

"His confession? You think that cagey old bird is going to give it to you?"

"No," Mary said.