by Linda Bridey
******
Violet couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Iris and Rose weren’t conspiring to get rid of Cornell, were they? They couldn’t! They wouldn’t! They daren’t! Or was it only Violet who daren’t make a move against Cornell?
And what would their new husbands say about Cornell? They certainly wouldn’t want Cornell around, not after they got their hands on the fabulous Kilburn family fortune. How much did the three men know about their future wives’ wealth? Violet dared not ask her sisters how much they revealed to their fiancés in their letters. Nor did she tell them what she wrote to Chuck Ahern about their family fortunes.
One thing was sure, once the three men married the sisters, they couldn’t control the estate as completely as Cornell did. A single man could do as he pleased with the funds and property at his disposal, and his wards could do nothing to stop him. Three men, joined for life to the three heiresses, would at least have to work together to make the ranch into a thriving, profitable enterprise again. None of them would possess a controlling share over any of the others.
Violet put the idea of Cornell’s future as far out of her mind as she could. Was that the reason Cornell protested so loudly against these mail-order marriages? Then again, he suggested other potential grooms for the sisters all the time. He wanted them to get married—only to men of his own choosing. Their fortunes would pass out of his hands, regardless of who they married.
Maybe Cornell just tried to hide his uncertainty under a bluster of wounded propriety. Maybe he used his position as their guardian to protest their marriages to hide the fact that he didn’t want to be turned out of house and home. No one would want that.
Violet rode the rest of the journey to Butte in silence, and her sisters obliged her. The last thing in the world she wanted to hear was her sisters plotting to dump Cornell. Anyway, she had other things to think about to take her mind off it.
The wedding celebration on Friday, for instance. Violet told Rita, the ranch cook, what foods to prepare and what cake to bake for the luncheon to follow the wedding service. She went to great pains to match her sisters’ wedding dresses with the decorations she planned for the house. She would talk to Iris about giving Pete and Wade the day off work.
Before she knew it, Violet saw the town of Butte in the distance. It wasn’t much to look at. Most Montana towns barely distinguished themselves from the scrubby rangeland from whence they sprang. You could barely see them until you practically ran into the wall of the first building. The weathered boards took on the same desolate grayish-tan color as everything else in this territory.
Only the mountains struck a breath-taking contrast. You couldn’t turn around without catching your breath at their imposing grandeur. They thrust their magnetic presence into your awareness at every hour of the day. You couldn’t get away from them. You kept seeing them even when you closed your eyes.
If Butte wasn’t much to look at, it was even less to experience. As much as Violet looked forward to getting off the ranch and into town, Butte disappointed. The haberdashers’ shop carried barely enough thread and other sewing notions to make a complete dress, and the dry goods store often ran out of essential staples like flour and salt.
No amount of complaints to any shopkeeper in town improved the service. They just didn’t care. They knew very well they provided the only service of their kind anywhere in the territory. You could shop with them or go without, and they knew it.
The only businesses in town with enough competition to provide decent variety were the saloons. Butte had four—one in the hotel, one in the whorehouse, one at the billiard hall, and one at the distillery on the road out of town. All four stayed busy day and night, what with cowboys and railroad men and drifters and rich cattlemen coming into town for a bit of diversion. The saloons did a roaring trade in mayhem, gun fights, broken glass, and replacement tables and chairs from the local carpenters.
Violet knew all about the saloons from driving past them on trips to town. You couldn’t set foot in Butte without seeing or hearing some brawl or drunken sing-a-long coming from one of them. The Kilburn sisters drove past them without looking right or left.
This time, Iris had a different idea. Because they were going to the train station and not into the town itself, Iris turned off around the barn and stables behind the hotel. She circumvented the town completely and drove right up to the station without passing a single saloon. Iris reined the horses in front of the station, but the train wasn’t there anymore.
Violet patted Iris on the arm. “Well done. We’ll have to remember that when we come into town next time.” She glanced at the station. “It looks like we missed the train.”
The three sisters alighted from the buggy. A few stray passengers milled around the station porch. “The three of them must have gotten off here. Didn’t we all tell them we’d be here to pick them up? Let’s ask around. Maybe someone knows where they are.”
“But,” Violet pointed out. “They aren’t likely to know each other. They aren’t likely to be together, wherever they are.”
“We can only ask,” Iris replied. “I’m sure we’ll find them somewhere.” She turned to the nearest man, who leaned against the station door, watching the three women and listening to their conversation. “Excuse me. We’re looking for some people who got off the train from Salt Lake City.”
The man cocked his head. “Well, that’s just about all the people you see here. Every one of us got off the train an hour and a half ago. Don’t you see the people you’re looking for?”
Iris flushed, and Violet stepped in. “The men we’re meeting are strangers to us. I mean, we don’t exactly know what they look like. One of them is named Chuck Ahern, and one of them is named Mick McAllister, and the other is Jacob Hamilton.”
“Well, then, you’re in luck,” the man returned. “I’m Chuck Ahern.”
Chapter 7