Naughty Marietta. Nan Ryan

clothes looking sorely out of place in this palatial amphitheater.

      Cole wondered briefly if it was the opera’s celebrated star, Marietta, who had attracted such an unlikely mix.

      Impatient for the curtain to go up, Cole again glanced at the private box high up on the wall near the stage.

      It was no longer empty. A silver-haired, impeccably dressed gentleman sat in the plush box, a look of eager anticipation on his face. Something moved behind the gentleman. Cole’s attention was drawn to the back of the box.

      Beneath a sway of lace curtains, half hidden in shadow, stood a tall, spare man with shifty eyes and a nasty-looking scar on his cheek.

      The conductor rapped his baton.

      The noisy crowd quieted.

      Cole quickly turned his attention to the stage. The scarlet curtain rose. The opera began. Act 1 opened on the richly furnished drawing room of Violetta Valéry in Paris. A party was under way. Several bit players sang their parts.

      Cole quickly grew restless.

      He had no interest in the supporting cast. He had come to see Marietta.

      At last the star appeared onstage amidst deafening cheers from the appreciative patrons. Cole blinked, then stared, feeling as if he’d just been struck in the solar plexus.

      Marietta was so incredibly beautiful he couldn’t believe his eyes. Cole drew a quick intake of air and felt his heart lurch in his chest.

      Flaming red-gold hair framed a perfect face with flawless apricot skin, large, dazzling eyes, a small upturned nose and a ripe, red mouth fashioned for kissing. Tall and slender with soft feminine curves, she wore a luxurious ball gown of shimmering turquoise silk adorned with thousands of tiny semiprecious stones.

      Marietta’s character, Violetta Valéry, was determined to ignore the precarious state of her health in a ceaseless round of enjoyment. Marietta looked anything but sick. She was young and healthy. Fantastically vital, alive and vivacious. And she was so breathtakingly lovely, so ethereally beautiful, she might well have been an angel come down to earth. Cole gazed at the vision in turquoise, totally mesmerized.

      The flame-haired beauty took a step forward, smiled and bowed to her admirers, giving the adoring throng a fleeting glimpse of her soft, pale bosom. Amidst whistles, catcalls and cheers, she straightened, pressed her lips to her fingertips and tossed a kiss to the audience.

      At once she had them all—including Cole—in the palm of her hand.

      But then she began to sing.

      Cole’s jaw dropped.

      He frowned.

      He stared in stunned disbelief at the gorgeous Marietta, wondering if the discordant sounds he was hearing were actually coming from her.

      They were.

      Marietta’s mouth was open wide and she was singing at the top of her lungs. She did not have a beautiful voice. Far from it. It was a slightly shrill singing voice that went displeasingly flat when she reached for the high notes.

      Bless her heart, she had everything else. She was young, beautiful, a good actress, had great stage presence and wore the elegant costume as no one else could. She was captivating to watch. Graceful. Commanding. Sure of herself.

      Still, Cole shook his head with incredulity, wondering how on earth such an untalented singer was allowed to grace the stage of this or any other opera house. The woman simply could not sing.

      Puzzled, Cole glanced around. He caught the expressions on some of the weathered faces of the men in the audience. They were smiling, yet looked as if they were in a small degree of pain. Apparently he was not the only one who found Marietta’s singing voice somewhat jarring.

      But if that were so, why had they come to hear her? Why the full house? Why would anyone come to hear a singer with a decidedly displeasing voice? How could this untalented woman, lovely though she was, be an opera star?

      Cole’s gaze returned to the well-dressed, silver-haired gentleman seated alone in the box. The man was beaming down at Marietta as if he had never heard a sweeter voice.

      “Oh, holy Christ,” Cole muttered under his breath, knowing instinctively that the gentleman was no doubt the starry-eyed suitor of the tone-deaf singer.

      Cole sat there and endured the cacophony for several long minutes, then finally could stand it no longer. Opera was tough enough to take when the performers had beautiful voices.

      “Excuse me,” he whispered, rose, and made his way out to the wide, carpeted aisle, bumping knees as he went.

      Resisting the temptation to put his hands over his ears, he eagerly exited the theater. But he didn’t leave the building. He went down the grand staircase to the first floor and into the gaming room. Tables of green baize rested beneath crystal chandeliers. The shuffle of cards, the click of the dice, the spin of the roulette wheel were seductive. Cole, his heartbeat quickening, loosened his black silk cravat. But he did not succumb to his strong desire to gamble.

      A long polished bar stretched the length of the back wall. He headed directly for that bar and for a stiff drink.

      A bald, rotund man stood behind the bar, wiping glasses on a clean white cloth. He looked up, smiled and asked, “What’ll it be, sir?”

      “Bourbon,” said Cole. “And hopefully a bit of information.”

      The fat man smiled and said, “Try me. I know just about everything that goes on in Central City.”

      “Then you’re my man,” Cole said with a smile before he downed his bourbon in one long swallow and shoved his glass across the polished bar. The barkeep poured him another. Cole said, “And your name?”

      “Harry,” he said with a grin, rubbed his gleaming bald pate and added, “Not that kind of hairy.”

      Cole smiled, reached a hand across the bar. “Cole Heflin, Harry. I was just upstairs at the opera.”

      “I figured,” said Harry, firmly shaking Cole’s hand.

      “The star of the opera can’t sing, Harry.”

      The barkeep laughed heartily, jowls and belly shaking. “You noticed, did you?”

      “I noticed. I also noticed a prosperous, silver-haired gentleman seated in a private box who appeared to be taken with the opera’s lovely young star, Marietta.”

      Nodding, the barkeep looked around, then leaned across the bar. “He’s absolutely mad about that red-haired singer.”

      “I assumed as much. Who is he?”

      “Taylor Maltese,” said Harry as if Cole should recognize the name.

      “I’m a Texan,” Cole explained.

      “Then you don’t know who he is?”

      Cole shook his head.

      Harry said, “He’s Taylor Maltese, owner of the Maltese Mining empire. Rich as old Jay Gould. Owns silver mines all over these mountains as well as many other lucrative enterprises.”

      “And this Marietta, she’s his…?”

      “Yes, she sure is.” The barkeep laughed and confided, “I’ve never seen a man as smitten with a woman as Taylor Maltese is with that gorgeous redhead. He’s like a puppy dog, always following her around, nipping at her heels, begging her to toss him a bone.”

      “And does she?” Harry just grinned and gave no reply. Cole pressed on. “I noticed a rather evil-looking character standing at the back of Maltese’s private box. Scar face and all. Bodyguard?”

      “He’s called Lightnin’,” the barkeep said, nodding.

      “Lightnin’,” Cole repeated.

      “That’s how fast he is on the draw.”

      “I