A Convenient Wife

by Carolyn Davidson

Twilight had fallen, the sun setting behind the far-off mountains in the southwest, and Ellie breathless and confused saw no one in sight to offer her a helping hand. Her father’s wagon was around the side of the house, and he forced her to walk by his side, his fingers digging into her arm as he muttered threats beneath his breath.

  She staggered and would have fallen, but for the wagon before her. Her hand gripped the wooden sideboard and she felt a sliver jab beneath her nail, the pain barely catching her attention, so great was the ache in her heart. She’d thought to leave, but not this way. Not by force, and certainly not in order to give Mrs. Jamison control over her life.

  Win wouldn’t even know where she’d gone, she thought. Then, from the corner of her eye, she caught sight of James walking down the road, heading for home. Her mouth opened and she inhaled, but only a small shriek left her lips before George slapped his hand over her mouth, then cuffed her with his other fist.

  She sagged to the ground, head swimming, and he picked her up like a sack of oats, and rolled her onto the back of the wagon. His kerchief was called into service as he bent over her, jamming it between her teeth and tying it at the back of her head.

  Pieces of her long hair caught in the knot and she winced, tears rushing to her eyes as he tugged roughly, jerking her head back. It was no use fighting, she decided, her body going limp as he knotted a rope around her wrists and tugged them to her back. The wagon bed smelled sour, but she could not hold her head erect, and waves of darkness overcame her feeble protests, as she was wedged between long pieces of lumber and a bale of straw.

  Lionel Briggs was a most accommodating man, having slept at the livery stable in order to greet Win’s return. “Knew you’d be back sometime tonight, Doc,” the man had said in the midst of a yawn. “You’d better get on home. Your missus will be wondering what happened to you.”

  Win had nodded, and obeyed.

  The house was dark. Ellie was in bed, he decided, opening the front gate and approaching the house. A piece of paper hung from the screen door, held in place by a straight pin, and he removed it. She must have written a note to let his patients know he was away. Stuffing it in his pocket, he tried the knob, and it turned in his hand.

  The door wasn’t locked, though that wasn’t unusual. He frequently forgot to latch the doors at night. One advantage to having the sheriff living next door, he thought with a wry grin.

  The floor creaked beneath his feet as he traveled the length of the hall, with only a short detour to his office, where he deposited his black leather bag. No light shone beneath the kitchen door either, and he frowned. It wasn’t like Ellie not to leave him a meal on the back of the stove. He’d thought the lamp over the kitchen table might be burning with a low flame on his behalf. But no scent of cooking met his nostrils, and he shrugged.

  It was too late, and he was too tired to eat anyway. With five patients in various stages of whooping cough, he’d spent a long, wearisome day. The arrival of a maiden aunt had relieved him of their care, and with instructions he doubted the woman was in need of, from the way she’d taken charge, he’d left and headed for home.

  Now Win sought out his bedroom, opening the door quietly, so as not to disturb Ellie’s sleep. He stood just inside the room, blinking as his eyes adjusted to the dark, and listened for the soft sounds she was wont to make as she slept.

  Silence greeted him, and he made his way to the bed, frowning as he discovered the quilt still in place, pillows unused, and no trace of his wife. “Ellie?” He spoke her name in the stillness, even as he recognized her absence. The room was empty.

  “Ellie?” The bedroom door slammed against the wall as he threw it open, and his feet pounded through the parlor, then across the dining room, skirting the table as he raced to the kitchen. Moonlight traced a path across the floor, shining through the window, and the faint scent of food caught his attention. He moved to the stove where a pot stood on the back burner, almost cool to the touch. Probably the remains from supper, yet she hadn’t banked the fire, and that was not like Ellie.

  Opening the back door, he stepped out onto the porch, glancing toward the house next door. Perhaps she’d been called over to help Kate, and at that thought he shook his head. Ellie wouldn’t walk out the door without leaving him a note. Unless there was an emergency.

  He hastened across the yard, almost stepping on a toad that leaped from his path, startling him into a nervous chuckle. And then he stood on James’s back stoop, feeling foolish as he rapped on the door. There had to be an explanation for Ellie’s absence, but he’d be doggoned if he could come up with one. And waking James was the least of his worries. He’d rather be thought impetuous and a worrywart, than to sit alone and ponder her whereabouts.

  A candle glowed beyond the kitchen, and a tall figure stumbled across the kitchen floor, heading in his direction. James swung the door open and peered through the screen door. “What the hell’s goin’ on?” he asked, reaching to scratch his head. “Something wrong, Win?”

  “Ellie’s not here, is she?” It lacked the note of inquiry to be posed as a question, and before James responded, Win knew his words were in vain.

  “Ellie? Isn’t she home?” James shoved the screen door open. “Come on in. Kate said she was here till the sun went down, doing up the laundry and cooking supper for us.” He deposited the candle on the table and in its flickering light, his face took on a look of concern. His jaw clenched as he turned to Win.

  “Let me get some clothes on and I’ll help you look for her.” Trousers half-buttoned, and shirtless, he left the kitchen, and Win sank into a chair at the table.

  His mind spun in relentless circles, and there was no rhyme or reason to his thoughts. Behind him, fabric rustled and soft footsteps brushed the bare wooden floor.

  “Win?” It was Kate, dark hair caught up in a long braid, her spectacles perched on the end of her nose. “James said Ellie’s not in the house.” She approached him, placing a hand on his shoulder. “She was here with me, most of the day in fact. She did up the wash and cleaned the kitchen for me. Gave me a whole day to myself. Even cooked supper. But she sure didn’t give me any reason to think she was going anywhere else when she left here.”

  Win reached to cover her hand with his, squeezing gently. “I don’t know where to look first,” he admitted. “I’d hoped she might…” His shrug spoke of defeat. “Did she say anything at all to you? About…anything?”

  Kate’s hand clenched into a fist beneath Win’s palm and his gaze shot up to her face. “What? What is it?”

  “She told me about Marie Jamison and Tommy coming to see you, Win.” Her eyes closed, as if she sought to recall the details. “She said something about not causing you trouble. She thought if she wasn’t there, they wouldn’t bother you anymore.”

  “Bother me?” He shoved the chair back as he rose, and it fell to the floor. “She left me because she thought she was too much trouble?” He felt anger surge in a wave of fury. “Where the hell would she go?”

  Kate shook her head. “I can’t imagine. Maybe to Tess? She’d know this would be the first place you’d look.” Her arms hugged across her waist as Kate shivered. “I didn’t think she’d leave without any word, Win. She was just upset because Tommy and his mother were making threats.”

  “Did they come back to the house? Were they bothering her?” And if they had, he’d see to it they were on the next stagecoach to Butte. His jaw was clenched, and his pulse pounded in his throat.

  “She went to the hotel to see them,” Kate told him. “Marie is talking about getting an annulment of your marriage. And Tommy was insisting on Ellie going back to Philadelphia with them.”

  Win gripped the back of the chair. “Does Ellie want to do that? Does she care for the boy?” And if she did, how could he let her go? “Damn, they can’t get an annulment anyway, Kate. The marriage has been well consummated.” That he would blurt out such a statement was a measure of his anger, he thought, but Kate took it without blinking.


  “I’d figured as much,” she said quietly. “Ellie didn’t say, but I haven’t seen a light on in her bedroom upstairs almost since you were married.”

  “She’s my wife,” Win said, each word forced between his teeth as if he would do battle to prove it. And he would, he realized. Ellie was his responsibility. More than that, she was the best thing that had ever happened to him. He cared for her, deeply…almost beyond measure.

  James stalked through the doorway, bending to touch his lips to Kate’s forehead. “I’ll be back, honey,” he said. “I don’t know what we can do in the middle of the night, but we’ll take a stab at it anyway.”

  “All right,” Kate answered. “Win?”

  He turned back, hopeful that she’d thought of something else that might lend a clue in his search.

  It was not to be. Kate’s eyes glittered with unshed tears, and she shook her head mutely. In two strides he was in front of her, and he hugged her, lending his strength and accepting the embrace she offered.

  “Be careful,” she said softly, and her gaze swept to her husband. “Check with Tess first.”

  Tess, wrapped in a dressing gown, answered the door in moments. “I just woke up out of a sound sleep,” she said, “and then I heard you rappin’ on the door and calling. What’s wrong? My heart’s goin’ a mile a minute. There’s something gone awry. I can tell.”

  “Ellie’s not here, is she?” Win heard the hope that laced his words, and watched in despair as Tess shook her head.

  “Heavens, no,” she said quickly. “Haven’t seen her since yesterday morning when she came by the store for a piece of side pork and some beans for your dinner, Win. What’s happened?”

  “She’s gone,” James said bluntly. “Win came home to an empty house, and there’s no way of knowing where Ellie is. We just took a chance that she might have come here.”

  “Wish she had,” Tess told them. “I know she was upset about Marie Jamison making such a fuss. And madder than a wet hen that Tommy was being led around by the nose.”

  “Kate said Ellie went to the hotel to see them.” Win tamped down his banked anger, and forced himself to consider his next move. “Maybe that’s the place for us to go, James. Do you suppose they had anything to do with this?”

  “I doubt Amos will let us go stompin’ around, waking his guests up in the middle of the night,” James said with a frown. “I could do it as a lawman, but I’m thinking we’d might as well wait till morning. If she’s there, she’ll still be on the premises at daybreak.”

  “It’s almost five o’clock now,” Tess said. She pushed open the screen door. “Why don’t the two of you come on in, and I’ll fix you some coffee and make some breakfast. By the time you finish eating, it’ll be time enough to shake Amos out of bed.”

  She lifted a hand as Win opened his mouth. “Don’t give me an argument, Doc. You probably didn’t eat all day yesterday, and if you’re plannin’ on scourin’ the countryside for Ellie, you need something in your belly.”

  “She’s right,” James said, and placed a hand on Win’s shoulder. “Let’s go on in and make some plans.”

  The rooster crowed twice, paused a moment, then sounded his arrogant message again. Ellie rolled over in the narrow bed and sat up, pushing her hair from her face, her aching arms protesting the movement. She’d spent a couple of hours with her hands tied behind her back, and bouncing around on the flat bed of her father’s wagon hadn’t helped any. She felt bruised from one end to the other, and as she got clumsily to her feet, she found her legs hurting in numerous places.

  Her index finger throbbed unmercifully and she peered down at it in the dim light from the window. A splinter was pressed into the quick, just a bit of it protruding beyond the edge of her nail, and she gripped the bit of wood with her front teeth, easing it from the tender flesh. She was clad in the wash dress she’d worn to scrub out Kate’s laundry, and it sagged like a shapeless, dark shroud around her weary body.

  Win would be frantic. The thought battered her mind, and she snatched on her coat from the floor, then hastened to the window, thinking to slide it open and climb through to the yard. Too late, she recalled her father with hammer and nails, pounding long spikes to secure it against just such an event. For a moment she was tempted to smash the glass and take her chances with the jagged edges, and then thought better of it. Getting all cut up would be a foolish move, and Win would scold her roundly for such a choice.

  Win. She closed her eyes, visualizing him as he must have looked, coming home late last night and searching for her. He would think she’d left him, and the words she’d spoken to Kate rushed to her mind. I think I need to leave for a while. She’d said it aloud, and Kate had discouraged her from the idea.

  Leaning her head against the cool windowpane, she closed her eyes. He wouldn’t know where to look, and if he thought she’d left on her own, he’d be hurt. And hurting Win was the last thing on earth she ever wanted to do. Her love for the man welled up within her and she hugged it to herself, a keening whisper escaping her lips as she thought of his pain.

  “Win…” His name was a soft murmur and she pressed her fingers against her lips. “I love you.” She hadn’t told him, had been afraid of forcing her affection on his already burdened shoulders. He’d taken on so much, marrying her, accepting her child. She couldn’t bear to make him feel obliged to return a declaration of love, when his feelings ran more to pity and heartfelt concern.

  Now she wished she’d said the words aloud. During one of the nights when his hands had come to know her body, and his mouth had searched out secret places to give her pleasure untold. He’d held her throughout the long night hours, his embrace giving comfort, his kisses bringing her to a knowledge of passion. Maybe he knew. Perhaps his heart was attuned to hers, in some strange way able to sense the deep emotion she nurtured on his behalf.

  Behind her the door opened, and her father stood on the threshold. “Get yourself out in the kitchen, girl,” he said harshly. “Long as you’re here, you might’s well make yourself useful.”

  “I want to go home, Pa,” she said quietly. “You had no right to treat me so.”

  “I told you last night, I got every right in the world. I gave you life and I can make you do as you ought. That boy wants to marry you, and as soon as his ma gets things in order, you’re going to behave yourself and do what they want you to.”

  There was no use in arguing. She’d wait for a chance to escape and run for it. In the meantime, she needed to eat, and if fixing breakfast for her father would keep him off her back, she’d make enough for both of them.

  And Win would come. As surely as she knew her own name, she knew he’d find her.

  Chapter Nine

  “Come on over to the office and we’ll decide which area to cover first,” James said. They’d eaten, though Win thought it a waste of time. But being rude to Tess Dillard was something he could not bring himself to do, and his good sense told him that she was right on this count.

  “I’m all for calling out a posse,” Win said, watching as a wagon rumbled past. Both men stepped onto the road and crossed quickly.

  “Not enough to go on,” James told him. “There weren’t any signs that Ellie had been taken against her will, were there?” At Win’s quick grunt of denial, James shrugged. “Kate said she talked like she might move out for a while. Maybe she went home last night and decided to stay somewhere else till all this mess gets straightened out. Sometimes women get things into their heads and there’s no arguing them out of it.”

  “She’d have left a note,” Win said stubbornly. “I know Ellie well enough to know that.” He followed James into the sheriff’s office and watched from the doorway as James circled the desk. “If you’re going to sit there and plot out a plan, I’ll start asking around town, see if anybody saw her after she left your place last night.”

  “Don’t leave yet, Doc. I need to see you first.” A voice from behind him took him unawares, and Win looked over his shoulder. Henr
y Morris was out of breath, his face flushed, and he cast a quick look at the hotel before he prodded Win back into the office. “Best no one sees me with you right now,” he said quickly.

  “What’s up?” James asked, leaning forward over his desk. “You look like you’re steamed over something, Henry.”

  “I don’t know if this is against the law or not, and I suspect it could get me into a whole heap of trouble, but I think the two of you ought to know what’s going on.” Henry caught his breath and aimed his attention at Win. “There’s something funny about that woman and that boy.”

  “That woman?” Win’s mind clicked into gear as he heard Henry’s words, and he spun toward James. “Marie Jamison,” he said abruptly.

  James’s chair hit the wall and he let loose with a muffled oath as he rounded the desk. “Marie Jamison. You’re talking about Marie Jamison, aren’t you? And that fancy-pants son of hers.”

  “Yeah, you betcha,” Henry said. “I sure don’t want to get in trouble, Sheriff, but I think that woman’s up to no good. And I’ll warrant the doc don’t know what they’re tryin’ to do.”

  “Have they done something with Ellie? Do you know where she is?” Win asked abruptly. “Do they have her?”

  “Don’t know,” Henry said, “but I don’t think so. They sent a telegram to Philadelphia to some lawyer fella, askin’ about gettin’ an annulment. That was yesterday, and I wasn’t thinkin’ what it was all about, till the answer came this morning first thing.”

  “Annulment.” Win spat the word from his mouth as if it were a vile assortment of syllables. “What lawyer fella in Philadelphia are you talking about? Do you know his name?”

  “I didn’t pay that much attention yesterday, but when the answer came back it was signed by somebody named Guy Wilson, Attorney at Law.”

  “Attorney.” Win swallowed, willing his breakfast to stay where it belonged. “And they asked him about an annulment?”