by Karen Kirst
She dipped her head in a decisive nod. “I am here to stay.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The hot, sticky days of July melted into August and still Delsie couldn’t find relief from the incessant heat. She often took to spending time beneath the giant shade tree in the yard, hoping for a breeze, as she helped their gardener with weeding and planting.
She longed for the dry warmth of the West and for more to fill her time than gardening and social calls. A feeling of uselessness permeated nearly every hour of her day. The only bright spots since returning home were exchanging letters with Amos and with Lillie. Her father had even penned a postscript in Delsie’s last letter to her sister. A full reconciliation between them not only appeared to be inevitable but likely to happen much sooner than Delsie had thought possible.
Dabbing at her damp forehead with her handkerchief, she stepped into her father’s study, where he sat working at his desk. “Here are the household accounts.” She’d been keeping them since the death of her mother, when her father had discovered her skill for numbers.
She set the ledgers on his desk, then dropped into one of the chairs opposite his. “I’m so ready for this heat to be over.”
He glanced up from writing, his brow furrowed. “You’ve never been bothered by the summers before.”
“No, you’re right. But it somehow feels more humid this year.”
She glanced out the nearest window at the flowers resting against the glass. The blossoms she’d seen heading West weren’t so manicured, but they were no less beautiful. She felt a bit like a wildflower herself these days—transplanted from the open prairie to the confines of a stately garden.
“Is something wrong, Delsie?”
“Hmm?” She turned to look at him.
He sat back in his chair and studied her. “You seem a bit restless, my dear.”
She forced a reassuring smile to her lips. “I’ll be fine. Truly.” Her gaze dropped to the account books. “Though it might be nice to have more to occupy my time than household numbers and gardening and paying visits to our friends.”
To her surprise she heard him chuckle. “I thought as much. You’ve been wandering through the house for weeks like a seaman banished to land.”
“I’m sorry.” She twisted her handkerchief around her finger, afraid to say more.
“Or maybe,” Mr. Radford continued, “like a woman who’s lost her heart?”
Delsie jerked her head up. “Whatever do you mean?”
He gave another chuckle and waved away her shock. “Never mind that now. I have something I’d like you to help me with. A project to occupy your time.”
Interest thrummed through Delsie as she scooted her chair closer to his desk. “What sort of project?”
“I would like to open another bank.” He shifted some papers on his desk, and thankfully, didn’t see the expression of disappointment she felt creep onto her face. “With Flynn doing such an excellent job managing the one here, I’ll admit I, too, have felt a bit like a horse put out to pasture.”
“Where would you open a new one?” she asked, more out of politeness than genuine curiosity now.
He grinned as he placed a map before her. Delsie studied it, surprised to see the town didn’t look exceedingly large. Then she read the name scrawled in the top left corner of the map—Stockton, California. A soft gasp escaped her lips, prompting more laughter from her father.
“You want to build a bank in California? But whatever for?”
“Because I can,” he stated simply. “And because my dear, youngest daughter seems to have left her vitality for life somewhere out West.” He lifted his hands in mock surrender. “I figured it might be worth discovering what some of the appeal is out there.”
Delsie looked at the map again and shook her head in disbelief. “But how would you oversee a bank in California from here?”
Mr. Radford nodded thoughtfully. “An excellent question, one I considered quite a bit when I first conceived the idea. Then I started to think there was nothing still holding you and me here, now that you and Flynn are no longer a possibility.”
Her heart began to race as Delsie anticipated what he meant to say next.
“While we have this lovely home and all its memories of your wonderful mother, it doesn’t seem to make much sense to remain so far from the rest of our family.” He glanced around the study, his expression wistful. “I have carved out a good life here, but perhaps, it’s time for both of us to carve a new life somewhere else.”
“Do you really mean that, Papa?” Hope beat so wildly inside her it almost hurt. The thought of being closer to Lillie and Clay in a new and exciting place, a place that meant being in closer proximity to the memories Delsie had made with Myles, brought a lump to her throat. While she might not be able to be with him, she could bravely take the path her time with him had opened up for her.
“Of course I mean to go through with this—and quite soon. I’d like the bank built and functional by October. And that’s where I need your help, dear daughter.” He picked up another large paper. This one appeared to be a drawing of a building instead of a map. “I would like you to oversee the expenditures and plans…of our new home in California.”
*
Twilight filled the sky as Myles dismounted near the stables at Guittard’s Station. After passing off the mail to the next rider, he entered the familiar kitchen, but his appetite hadn’t been the same since Amos had taken sick. “Evening, Mrs. Guittard,” he said to the woman working at the stove.
She turned and smiled at him. “Bonjour, Myles. Supper is almost ready.”
“How is he?”
Her face immediately changed from welcome to worry. “He is worse since last week.” She stepped closer as she added in a hushed tone, “I don’t know that you would have seen him, to say goodbye, if you had come even a day later.”
Though he’d suspected as much, the news still hit Myles hard like a punch to the gut. He’d hated seeing Amos waste away these past few weeks. The alert guide who’d traveled with him and Delsie months ago had been reduced to a shell of a man, confined solely to bed.
“Can I see him, before supper?”
“Of course, of course.”
Myles nodded his appreciation and slipped back out the door. Elijah had been waiting for him and dropped to his shoulder as Myles walked past the stable to a lone, small cabin. Knocking softly, he didn’t wait for Amos’s reply but simply entered. A good fire burned in the fireplace, blocking out the October chill that sharpened the air outside.
Myles placed the single chair next to the bed where Amos slept. Elijah alighted on a peg near the door. The similarities between this moment and Myles’s time in the desert after being shot with the arrow struck him sharply with its irony. Only this time it was him keeping a vigil at Amos’s bedside, instead of the other way around.
Raspy breathing filled the quiet cabin. Myles studied his friend’s face. Gray whiskers covered the thinning lines. “Amos?” he called softly.
Amos slowly opened his eyes and blinked. “Myles,” he said in a hoarse voice. “You’re here. I was just thinking about you.”
“You were?” Tears burned his eyelids. He wasn’t ready to say goodbye to someone else he cared about.
“Lots to tell you.” Amos lifted a trembling hand and pointed at the table behind Myles.
He turned to see the supper tray there. “Are you hungry?”
Amos gave a slight shake of his head. “No, the letter.”
An envelope sat near the tray. Myles picked it up and handed it to Amos.
“No,” Amos rasped out. “Look who it’s from and where.”
Myles glanced at the name and address and felt his heart stop for a brief moment. The letter was from Delsie, which wasn’t surprising. He’d known she and Amos were corresponding. But the address penned beneath her name wasn’t from Pennsylvania. It was from California.
A scraping noise came from Amos. It took Myles a second to realize i
t was a laugh. “She and her father moved…to California.”
“When?”
“End of last month.”
Questions fired through Myles’s mind, too many to burden Amos with. “Whatever for?” he managed to get out.
“Her father opened a bank there. Wanted to be closer to Delsie’s sister in Oregon.”
Delsie was no longer in Pennsylvania? She was living out West—where Myles had longed to live for months now. Was it possible this renewed his chances to be with her? He mentally shook his head—he was still a lowly Express rider with limited means to provide for a wife.
“Well, good for her.” Myles set the letter back on the table. While shocking, the news still didn’t change their impossible situation.
Amos studied him, his gaze more alert than Myles had seen it in weeks. “You need to go there, too, and start your ranch.” He started to cough, but he shook off Myles’s offer of a drink from the cup on the tray. When he’d finished, he continued, “You go find her and marry her. She loves you still, Myles. And I know you love her.”
He ran a hand over his jaw. If only things could be that easy. “That’s all well and good, Amos, but I don’t have the kind of money I need to build a ranch right now.” Boarding Moses at the livery stable all summer and into autumn had eaten into his savings.
“There’s something else.” Amos coughed again, his face contorting with the pain. Myles looked away. He hated the feeling of helplessness stirring within him. “I know I’m not your pa.” The words brought Myles’s head back around and renewed the watering in his eyes. “But you, and Delsie, have been the closest thing to a family for me.”
Myles reached out and clasped Amos’s pale hand. “You’ve been like a father to me.” It was the first time he’d admitted out loud how much Amos’s friendship had meant in his life. Myles was better because of knowing this honest, hardworking man of faith for the past seven years.
Amos’s mouth curved up into a slight smile. “That’s good. ’Cause I got something to give you.”
“What is it?” Probably his gun. The older man had already given Delsie his prized pocket watch.
“It’s under the floorboards, beneath the bed.”
Myles bent and peered under the bed. The space looked rather small. “All right.” Lowering himself onto his stomach, he felt around until his fingers touched a hole in the wood. Myles pulled up on the board and it lifted.
“Inside is a knapsack,” Amos said.
Moving more by feel than sight, Myles managed to wrestle the sack from the space beneath the floor. He crawled back out from under the bed, brushing dust from his hair and shirt.
Amos caught his eye and nodded. “Open it.”
He sat back down and lifted the flap of the sack. Bundles of cash filled the entire satchel. He released a startled laugh. “You rob a bank or something, Amos?”
Another raspy chuckle came from the ailing man. “No. That was earned, from honest work, over the last twenty-something years.”
“I don’t understand.” Myles had assumed Amos was paid as much as the rest of the Pony Express workers, but there had to be at least five or six hundred dollars sitting inside this bag.
“Me and the missus lived simply and we saved.” Amos gestured to the bag. “I want you to have it, Myles. All one thousand and ten dollars of it.”
Myles gaped at the money, hardly daring to believe. “But…”
Amos shook his head. “It’s for your ranch. Yours and Delsie’s.”
The words sunk deep into Myles’s heart, setting hope to burn anew inside him. “Is this what you meant back in that burned-down cabin in the desert? About the Lord working in mysterious ways?”
Some of the old spark returned to Amos’s gaunt countenance. “Maybe it was. Can’t think of much more mysterious ways than the Lord blessing you through the riches from one old station worker.”
The tears were getting harder and harder to resist. “I can’t thank you enough, Amos. But why now?”
“It’s time,” Amos murmured, his look full of double meaning.
Myles set down the bag and reached for his friend’s hand again. “What do you mean, old man? You’re tough and stubborn. You’ll weather this.”
“Not this time.” Amos patted Myles’s hand in a gesture to comfort him. “You are a credit to your father, Myles. And I’m proud to call you my friend.”
Amos’s words sounded similar to the ones Delsie had told him four months earlier. Did she really still love him? Could he win her hand once he had his horse ranch running? Everything about his future was changing—again—and it both thrilled and terrified him.
“If you hurry back to Saint Joe,” Amos continued in a voice growing weaker by the minute, “you can get Moses and head West in time to avoid most of the snow.”
“I will, but not tonight.” He wouldn’t leave Amos yet.
Amos closed his eyes. “You don’t have to stay.”
Myles squeezed the man’s hand once, then released it. “Yes, I do.”
He let Amos sleep, his mind awhirl with plans and thoughts for how quickly he could find land and horses and start building stables, corrals and a house. When Amos woke again, he asked for a little water, but nothing more, insisting Myles eat the food. Myles obliged, though he couldn’t stomach much. What he didn’t eat, he shared with Elijah.
Sometime later, he jerked away, aware of the sudden silence and cold. He jumped up and stoked the fire, then moved back to his chair. “Amos?” he said, leaning forward.
The older man’s rattling breaths had ceased. His chest no longer rose and fell, and his face appeared relaxed as if in peaceful slumber.
“Amos.” Myles’s voice broke as the tears he’d held back so long broke free of his restraint. “Goodbye, old man.” He gripped Amos’s lined hand one last time. “You will be missed.”
He knew he ought to go tell Mrs. Guittard the news and see what needed to be done to bury Amos properly. But instead of moving he simply sat, staring at the wall for some time, remembering. Memories of Charles, Amos and Delsie filled his thoughts. He’d had to say goodbye to the three people he cared for most in the world. But one of them might still be waiting for him.
Fresh energy coursed through Myles. He shouldered the sack of money Amos had gifted him and climbed to his feet. “Come on, Elijah. We’ve got things to take care of.” The bird flew to his shoulder as he stepped out of the cabin.
The darkness outside had begun to recede, which meant morning was fast approaching. His future, one made possible by God and the generosity of Hank Amos, awaited him. And with a great amount of work, and even greater faith, perhaps a beautiful dark-haired woman waited for him, too.
California, June 1861
“Morning, Miss Radford.” The general-store owner, a Mr. Jasper, smiled at Delsie from behind the long counter. “Here for your weekly letter?”
Delsie nodded. “I have one to post to Lillie, as well.”
True to their word, she and Lillie had faithfully written each other, almost every week, since last year. Delsie expected the news any day now that she was an aunt. Had Lillie given birth to her and Clay’s first child this week?
She paid to mail her letter and accepted the one Mr. Jasper handed her in return. Before she could tear it open, though, the man spoke again. “That hat you ordered last month came in today.” He lifted a hatbox onto the counter and opened the lid.
Peeking inside, Delsie smiled. Her father had insisted she order a new hat from back East for her birthday the month before. Twenty years old now. She could hardly believe it still. While she might have felt ancient at such an age, and unmarried, back in the parlors of Pennsylvania, out West she felt as young as ever. With her whole life ahead of her.
She was content and happy with her life here in California, save for one thing. Her smile faltered a little at the thought. There had been something—or rather someone—she’d really wanted to see for her birthday, silly as it was.
Delsie closed her min
d to the foolish hope of once more seeing a certain dark-eyed, dark-haired horseman. Instead she focused her attention on the blue hat before her.
Lifting the creation out of the box, she admired the stacked folds of velvet and the gorgeous white feathers. It was the loveliest creation she’d seen in ages. Although she’d heard from her father, one of the town’s most successful bankers, they were to get a milliner here soon, so perhaps fashionable hats would be much easier to come by in the future.
“It’s beautiful,” she said with sincerity.
Mr. Jasper beamed as if he himself had fashioned the hat. The idea of the white-haired man with spectacles constructing a delicate lady’s hat made Delsie choke back a laugh.
“Thank you, Mr. Jasper. I’ll see you next week.” Looping the string of the hatbox around her wrist, she let herself out the door. She paused on the wooden walkaway outside to tear open her letter from Lillie. Her eyes quickly took in the first few lines until she found what she’d been hoping to read for days.
“I’m an aunt,” she whispered to herself, “to a healthy baby boy.”
Her earlier bright smile returned to her face. She would hurry to the bank to tell her father that he had a grandson. Delsie kept reading as she walked down the sidewalk, completely absorbed in Lillie’s words.
So intent was her gaze and concentration on the paper in her hand that she didn’t see the person in front of her until she bumped into a solid shoulder. “I’m so sorry,” she murmured, without lifting her eyes. “Please excuse me.” She moved a step or two past the stranger.
“I’m guessing that fancy getup you’re wearing means you can read,” a deep voice intoned.
Delsie froze, her chin snapping up in surprise. That voice; those words. She lowered the letter to her side and pivoted slowly. Her pulse pounded rapidly even before she caught sight of the man’s bearded face beneath the shadow of his hat.
“Myles?” The name sounded more like a breathless squeak than anything else.
He removed his hat and smiled at her. That slow, full smile that had the power to weaken her legs beneath her, even after all this time. “Hello, Delsie.”