Kenan shook his head. “No, you won’t.”
“Whadda ya mean?” Joshua could not bear the thought of staying at his father’s ranch and pretending that he’d never known Rosie, that he wasn’t desperate to know that she was safe and well. Anything could happen to a woman out there, alone. Anything. He shuddered at the thought of it. The country was so dangerous and Rosie was so good and innocent—used to being protected. She’d never survive without her family.
“What I mean…brother”—Kenan reached out and took hold of Joshua’s shoulder—“is that we will find her. Together.”
Joshua swallowed hard. He didn’t deserve this kindness from Kenan. But then he didn’t deserve Rosie’s love. Never had done. But he’d do everything he could to bring her home safely. Then he’d do the right thing and make sure that she knew how much he loved her. Even if she didn’t want him, he’d make sure that she never wanted for anything ever again.
And his mother and father could go to hell.
Chapter Eight
Rosie perched on the edge of the bed in the small room at Mrs. Appleby’s boarding house. The late afternoon sunlight shone across the wooden floor and made the dust in the air sparkle. Rosie’s small patchwork bag containing the few possessions she’d packed lay at her feet, a poignant reminder that it was all she possessed in the world and of the family she had left behind.
Mrs. Appleby fussed around, showing Rosie where to find extra blankets and explaining how she ran the house. It seemed that she had three young ladies currently boarding with her and that they all paid her a small cash fee as well as helping out around the house. Rosie was confused by the reference to gentlemen callers who apparently arrived at all times of the day and night. Why on earth would a respectable woman allow her boarders to indulge in such inappropriate behavior? At the edges of Rosie’s mind, the truth lurked dark and intriguing, yet she had far more important concerns to deal with, so she pushed her questions away.
“Will you come downstairs with me and help to prepare dinner, dear?” Mrs. Appleby offered her broad and cheery smile. Rosie noted for the first time that the woman’s dress was rather low-cut and slightly grubby around the hem where her petticoats were exposed in what appeared to be a deliberate fashion. Was this how women dressed in Nevada City then? Was it a new fashion that had made its way from New York? It reminded her of the whores she’d seen in Virginia City as they paraded up and down the porches of the establishments where they resided. Yet they wore far less than Mrs. Appleby and she had no reason to suspect that this woman was a whore. Tiredness and the heat must be affecting her judgment.
“Rosie, dear? Are you coming?”
Rosie wanted to decline, to tell the older woman that she had a headache and needed to rest, but she didn’t want to cause offense. Her temples throbbed and her thoughts seemed to be running into one another so quickly that she felt she would faint. She needed some time, even just ten minutes, to clear her mind. She was overcome by a sudden longing for the wide open space of the Montana sky and the endless horizon that stretched out around the Duggan homestead. The town of Nevada City felt small, dirty and claustrophobic and she tried to stifle a sense of rising panic.
“Yes, Mrs. Appleby. I will come down. But would you mind if I just freshen up? The stagecoach was crowded and I’m a trifle warm.” She longed to retrieve Kenan’s money from beneath her corset and to be alone with her thoughts. Her stays seemed even more restricting than usual and her ribs felt sore and bruised, as if damaged by her broken heart.
Where was Joshua now? Would he even care that she had gone?
“Of course, Rosie, but don’t be long!” Mrs. Appleby wagged a fat finger at her then exited the room, leaving the mixed aroma of sweat and rosewater in her wake.
Rosie quickly removed Kenan’s cash from its hiding place then tucked it under her mattress. It should be safe there. As long as no one came snooping around. But what reason would they have to look under her mattress?
She crossed the small space to the dresser and filled the pewter bowl with water from the pitcher then washed her face. Her cheeks burned and she wondered if she had some sort of fever. Imagine that—leaving home and hiding out in a strange town only to develop smallpox or some other awful infection—then dying alone, away from those she loved. What if she never saw them all again? They would wonder what had happened to her as they did when Catherine had disappeared. They would never give up hope. The Duggans never did. The thought choked her and she leaned forward, bile rising suddenly. Perhaps the nausea she’d been experiencing was a warning of some other horrid disease. Perhaps her time in this world was limited.
Stop it right now, Rosie Duggan! You are a sensible and mature woman and you need to pull yourself together. You will see your family again—when things have settled down.
She dried her face on the clean cloth provided and tidied her hair using the small oval looking glass that hung on a nail above the dresser. Even though the surface of the mirror was misty, it was like staring at a stranger. Apart from the dark red blotches on her cheeks, which hinted at a fever, she was so ashen-faced that she could have been a ghost, and the dark hollows beneath her eyes did little to help that. Yet her face still seemed fuller than usual and her gaze emitted a glow, as if releasing a luminescence from within. The infection must be clouding her brain.
As must her heartbreak. This would not do. She had made her decision and for all the right reasons. She had to learn to accept and move on. She had done the decent thing.
So why was it so difficult?
* * * *
Downstairs, Rosie sat at the worn wooden kitchen table and peeled potatoes. Their starch turned her hands white but she found the everyday activity comforting. Wherever she was, whoever she was with, folks still needed potatoes peeling.
Mrs. Appleby hummed as she fried chunks of meat and slices of onion over the large open fire, and two other young women clattered about, trying to make themselves useful but invariably getting in each other’s way. In spite of her emotional turmoil, Rosie couldn’t help smiling. It was like being at a show, watching these heavily made-up women in their garish dresses—for the other women’s garments were far more daring than Mrs. Appleby’s—as they attempted to complete everyday household tasks. She was so used to preparing meals alone, or with Catherine helping quietly, that the noise and bustle of the Appleby kitchen was quite overwhelming.
“So…Rosie, ya said ya name is?” The tiny brunette known as Fennella leaned over the table and stared hard. Rosie tried to avert her eyes from the woman’s exposed cleavage but it was difficult to avoid it when her bosoms were almost resting on the tabletop.
My, they do wear their dresses low-cut here.
“That’s right. My name actually is Rosie.” She held Fennella’s gaze. Why did they all seem to think it was a fake name?
“Yeah and my real name is Fennella.” The girl cackled and slapped her hand on her thigh. “Okay then…Rosie…so what are ya doing in Nevada City?”
“I needed a…change of scenery to deal with my…my loss.” Rosie felt her cheeks flame at the misinformation. Sure she was grieving, but not for a dead husband—for one who had never been.
“You a widow?” Fennella studied her nails as if disinterested now.
Rosie nodded.
“Likely story.” The girl, that was what she must have been for she appeared no older than seventeen, raised an eyebrow as she looked Rosie over. “No wedding ring, see?”
Rosie pulled her left hand into her lap and rubbed at her naked ring finger. No. The girl was right. No wedding ring. Fool!
“So you gonna explain what you’re doing in Nevada City or not?”
Rosie blinked rapidly, trying to hold the ready tears at bay. Fennella was so harsh, so direct. Rosie was not used to dealing with such people and she wished that she could go home. Immediately. But that couldn’t happen. As she breathed deeply, trying to regain her composure, black spots swam before her and she closed them for a moment.
When Rosie opened her eyes again, she saw that she had a captive audience of three. They stared down at her like a trio of hungry wolves, their mouths gaping and their teeth exposed. She shuddered.
Fennella was the first to pounce. “How far along are ya?”
“What?” Rosie dropped the knife she’d been peeling potatoes with and straightened her back. She rubbed her sticky hands together, uncomfortably aware now of the starch drying on her skin. “I don’t understand what you mean.”
Did the girl know that she had left home? Was she asking how long Rosie had been running? She didn’t want anyone to know. Her story was that she was recently widowed and taking some time away from home to deal with her grief. That was the façade she wanted to maintain, even if some folks doubted its sincerity. The last thing she wanted was a barrage of questions from virtual strangers.
“I mean, how long since your last bleed?”
Rosie gasped and covered her chest with her hands. How could the girl be so coarse?
“She doesn’t know.” Mrs. Appleby gestured at Rosie with her knife. “She has no idea what you’re talking about.”
Rosie looked from one face to another. The other young woman, Helen, placed her work reddened hands on the tabletop. Helen might be lodging with Mrs. Appleby now but it was clear that she had worked hard in the past, maybe not even that long ago. Had it been her parents who had set her toiling at their farm or had she been taken in by a rancher as a low-paid picker? “Rosie, what Fennella meant was, when did you see your last course? Was it this month?”
Rosie tore her eyes from Helen’s hands. Shame washed over her. Then realization dawned. She struggled to swallow. “No…” She shook her head. “No. No. No.”
“Denying it won’t do any good, sweetheart.” Mrs. Appleby walked around the table and squeezed Rosie’s shoulder. “You’re expecting or I’m a virgin.” She snorted at that and the other two joined her.
Rosie stood and backed away from the table. She wrung her hands together and sucked in her cheeks. Expecting? A child? Her?
“But… How is it possible?”
“I’ve been around a while, Rosie, dear and seen a lot. Seen many a young woman carrying a child she didn’t want and running away to avoid the scandal. That’s what it is with you, right? You fall for a married man and let him get his greasy mitts on yer? Or did ya let a handsome young stallion take yer over his saddle?”
Rosie shook her head and ran a hand over her stomach. It was flat beneath her corset. Almost.
“Have you been feeling queasy lately, honey?” Fennella asked, suddenly kind.
Rosie chewed her lip.
“Have your breasts ached more than usual when you remove your corset?” Mrs. Appleby resumed squeezing Rosie’s shoulder.
Rosie nodded. “But only the past few weeks…maybe two or three.” They had been heavy and she had been aware of a dull ache that afflicted them when she first sat up in the mornings and when she removed her corset in the evenings.
“So you’re a few months in is all.” Mrs. Appleby adjusted her huge bosom. “I know someone who can help you with that—if you don’t want to keep the child, that is.”
Rosie looked at the three women in turn, registering the understanding on their faces. They weren’t judging her as she had first thought, but they were so matter of fact about it too. As if this happened all the time.
But it probably does. To them.
“Help me with it?”
“Yes, ya know. Help you to get rid of it. I mean, you can’t possibly be thinking of keeping it, dear.” Mrs. Appleby spoke as calmly, as if she was talking about throwing away an old shawl or a stained rag.
Get rid of it?
“Have you…?” Rosie couldn’t finish her question. It was inappropriate. Horror washed over her.
“Have I ever had to get rid of a child?” Rosie’s landlady raised her fair eyebrows. “More than I care to count, dear.”
So these poor women conceived babies that they didn’t want then had them removed from their bodies as casually as performing any other ablution. How could this be right? Or was Rosie just too sheltered to know what really went on in the world?
“But what about your husbands?” Rosie had to ask, though she had an inkling that she already knew the answer.
The three women cackled until they were red-faced and sweaty.
“Husbands?” Mrs. Appleby rubbed her greasy forehead. “We have no men to keep us, sweeting. Men pay us for our time but we have no husbands. Thank the Lord! Oh, you’re an innocent one, ya are! I’m thinking that old Danny read you wrongly when he brought ya here. What do ya think, girls?”
Fennella and Helen grinned their agreement.
“You have been misled, my dear, and some nasty man took advantage, didn’t he?” Mrs. Appleby shook her head and her jowls wobbled. “Don’t you worry, Rosie. Mrs. Appleby will take care of ya now.”
As her landlady returned to frying steak and Fennella and Helen took over the potato peeling, Rosie quietly left the heat of the kitchen. Her hands trembled uncontrollably and her legs shook beneath her skirts.
If there was such a place as hell, then she was surely in it. She was carrying Joshua’s child. She had not thought for a minute that it was possible. She’d known how it could happen but with her age and— Oh, she had been a fool. She had taken her pleasure with the man she loved and now she would have to pay the biggest price of all. For she had refused Joshua’s proposal for sound reasons. She had been thinking of him and his family and what she did not want to put him through. Yet now, here she was, with a babe in her belly and no prospects for the future at all. How could she bring a child into the world to be a shameful bastard?
Yet how could she destroy that precious, tiny life before it had even begun?
Chapter Nine
Joshua sat on the Duggan porch and swirled coffee around his mouth. He tapped his feet in turn, his knees bouncing along with them. Kenan had decided that they would leave at first light, but the thought of waiting tortured him. He was so agitated, he felt as if it would be better to be crushed in a stampede than going through such anxiety about the woman he loved. At least if he could get moving, he’d feel like he was doing something.
He should have protected Rosie and given her love and security before things got this far.
He was responsible for this, and he would never forgive himself if anything happened to her. The thought that someone might take advantage of her turned him cold yet filled him with a white-hot rage. If anyone so much as harmed a hair on her sweet head he’d—
“You all right?”
Joshua glanced behind him to see Catherine. She gestured at the step beside him. “Mind if I sit down?”
“Go ahead.” He shrugged. He didn’t know that he could focus on conversation right now.
“How are you feeling?” Catherine’s big green eyes glowed in the twilight. Joshua found himself suddenly wanting to speak to her, to try to explain himself, to convey just how miserable he was that things had gone so wrong.
“Just awful, ma’am.”
“Oh, Joshua. Please call me Catherine. There’s no need for ‘ma’am’ with me. It’s so formal and it makes me feel so old.”
He smiled. Catherine was a good woman, and it was hard to see how anyone could think badly of her.
“Thank you, Catherine.”
“You’re worried sick right now, aren’t you?”
He nodded. “I can’t believe she’s gone, that she isn’t inside making dinner or fussing around one of you. I’m fair stewing in my own juices ‘cos of how she must’ve been hurting to run off like that. Why didn’t I prevent this? I just can’t accept that she’s not here.”
“Me either. Rosie is a rare breed of woman. She’s so sweet and kind. Even though she’s just a few years older, she’s like a mother to me. It’s strange.” Catherine pushed her red hair over her shoulders. “And she’s been such a help with the little
one.” Catherine bit her lip and Joshua could see that she was holding back her own distress.
“I know that,” Joshua replied. “Rosie adores her niece.” The image of Rosie holding the baby in her arms and gazing at her with that look that was warm, loving and needy all at once made his chest ache. He hoped to see her holding their own child one day, he was more certain of that now than ever before.
“You have to bring her back, Joshua. She loves you. As much as a woman can love a man.”
The pain in Joshua’s throat threatened to cut off his air supply altogether.
“I love her, too.”
“So bring her back and do the right thing by her.” Catherine got up off the step. “You’re the only one with the power to change her mind. So go do it.”
“I will,” Joshua whispered as Catherine disappeared into the house. “I will.”
* * * *
Rosie trembled as Mrs. Appleby led her past buildings, yards and animal pens before arriving at the scruffy shack. Rosie wasn’t sure that she’d be able to find her way out again if her landlady left her there. Evidently, the woman who lodged at the ramshackle hut did not want to be visible from the main thoroughfare, or at all easy to locate. Which was understandable given her line of business.
The killing of innocents.
Now stop it! You have no other choice, Rosie, and neither do the other poor women who come here seeking assistance. A woman’s options are limited.
The breakfast that Mrs. Appleby had insisted she eat now sat heavy in her stomach and threatened to make a reappearance at any moment. She swallowed hard repeatedly, willing it to stay in place.
They entered the small, dark space and Mrs. Appleby pointed at a narrow pine table against the rear wall. “Go lie on that table there and she’ll examine ya.”
Rosie looked from the table to her landlady’s face and back again. “Really?”
“Yes. Now hurry up. We don’t want to be hanging around here any longer than we have ta.” Mrs. Appleby took a seat next to the front door and pulled some sewing from her bag.
A Rancher for Rosie Page 7