It took her a surprisingly short time to pack. She found Charm’s violet chemise and pants atop the mound of clothes in the tub room. She picked up Reed’s shirt, held it close, and closed her eyes, inhaling his scent. Pulling herself together, she carefully folded his things and set them on the stool.
Towels lay around in dead wet heaps on the floor, so Kate picked them all up and hung them over the edge of the tub. If Reed did not find another housekeeper soon, there was no hope for the place.
Surprisingly calm, she finished packing up her life. Everything she owned still fit in one carpetbag. There was nothing new to take with her but the two dresses Charm had made, far too many memories, and a battered heart.
But she did have all the wisdom she had gained. She kept Reed Senior’s letters to remind her that things are never as they seem. She packed the photograph of Reed. She would never, ever part with it. Then she slipped the silver-framed photograph of Becky and Daniel in Reed’s desk drawer.
Slowly she carried her bag downstairs. The house was as silent as Daniel.
She walked outside and found Scrappy waiting beside the buckboard. Handing him the carpetbag, she walked over to Daniel, now seated on the ground in the shadow of the horse barn. Unmindful of her calico dress, she sat beside him and took his little hand in hers.
“You’ll never know how this hurts me to have to leave you, but I’m doing this for you and for Reed.” She pressed his hand between her palms, promised to remember him always. “I’m going to miss you terribly, just the way you miss your mama, but I know that I’ll see you again someday. When you’re old enough, if you still remember the time we spent together and ask me why, I’ll be able to explain.”
She kissed the top of his head and prayed that his heart would soon heal. Then she cupped his chin, forcing him to look at her. “Good-bye, Daniel.” She kissed his forehead and then let him go. He turned his face away.
Scrappy was waiting, so Kate climbed to her feet and brushed the dust off her skirt and then walked over to the buckboard. As if he had been waiting until the very last minute, the back door slammed and Reed came walking out to join them.
He went straight to Daniel, took the boy by the hand and pulled him gently to his feet; then he led him to the wagon. Kate was biting her lips so hard she was afraid they would bleed.
Reed stood behind Daniel with his hands on his shoulders as Scrappy helped her aboard. The old wrangler took his sweet time checking the lines before he finally climbed up on the seat. He let the brake go, stalled some more, and then turned to Kate. “You sure about this?”
“Yes. Please go.”
Scrappy flicked the reins. As they slowly pulled out of the stable yard, she smiled down at Daniel and then looked at Reed.
“Good-bye, Kate,” he said.
Afraid her trembling lips would give her away, she merely nodded in farewell.
Spewing dust in its wake, the buckboard bounced and rattled down the long, rutted road.
She didn’t cry until the house was out of sight.
45
Kate found a room at the boarding house before she went to see Preston. He did not try to hide his joy, nor did he question her when she told him that she had moved to town. Instead, he immediately walked her down to Lone Star Mercantile to help her secure a position as a clerk.
After she had settled into her light and airy room, complete with a pretty indigo-and-yellow quilt on the bed, she ate dinner downstairs with four other boarders and then waited until just before sunset to walk to the end of town, knock at the back door of Dolly B. Goode’s Social Club and Entertainment Emporium, and ask for Charm.
Dolly, a boisterous, robust woman in her fifties with jarring, carrot-colored hair and carmine lips, welcomed Kate with a startling bear hug, commended her for what she had done for Charm, and ushered her into the suite she had donated to Jonah and Charm until he recovered.
As soon as Dolly opened the door and Charm saw Kate, she left Jonah’s bedside and raced across the room.
“Kate! What are you doing here?” Like Dolly, she hugged Kate hard and long before she stepped back. “Don’t ever, ever come here again, do you hear me? Think what this might do to your reputation.”
Kate had more to worry about than her reputation. Jonah, lying propped up against Dolly’s satin pillowcases, surrounded by a barrage of fancy ruffled pillows, tried to smile. He was as gray as an overcast sky, but not feverish.
“How are you, Captain?” she asked.
“I’ll live.” Looking adoringly at Charm he added, “Now.”
Charm adjusted his pillow and then offered Kate a chair. After they sat down, Charm took Jonah’s hand.
“I want to thank you, Kate, for sending Charm to me,” the captain said. “And we’d like you to be the first to know, outside of Dolly that is, that as soon as I’m up and around, Miss Riley is going to be my wife.”
“We’re getting married just outside of town at sundown,” Charm added. “And I want you to stand up for me, Kate.”
“We hope you’ll consider it,” Jonah added.
“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
Charm brushed his hair back off his forehead as the man’s eyes drifted closed. “Thanks for coming to see him,” she whispered. “Where’s Reed?”
Kate noted Jonah’s breath was coming deep and easy now, so she quietly confided in Charm. “I quit my job and signed the papers to undo the proxy marriage. I’ve moved to town and am staying at the boarding house.”
“Oh, Kate.” Charm’s shoulders sagged. “What happened?”
Kate looked down at her hands. She had been unconsciously wadding her skirt. She smoothed out the wrinkles and tried to explain. “I didn’t want Daniel to come to depend on me more than he does Reed. They need to learn to trust and love each other and I ... I didn’t want to be in the way—”
Charm reached over and laid her hand on Kate’s arm. “What really happened?”
Before she knew it, Kate had told her everything that she wasn’t ashamed to tell. Charm clucked and tsked and shook her head, and when Kate was through, she said how truly sorry she was that things had not worked out.
Kate collected herself. It was growing dark out, well past time to leave. Charm stood up to walk her to the door.
“Oh, Kate, I know Jonah plans to ask Reed to stand up for him. Can you still do the same for me if it means seeing Reed again?”
There could be worse fates, Kate was sure of it, but at the moment, none came to mind. But no matter what, she could never let Charm down.
“Of course I will,” she assured her.
They reached the door to Dolly’s suite. Charm insisted on walking her through the hall to the back door. Together they stepped out into the close August night. Piano music drifted out of the Social Club along with the sound of laughter, the murmur of hushed conversation, and an occasional squeal of delight.
Kate looked down the street toward the respectable end of town, where lights were shining inside the neat rows of houses. From here she could even see the two-story boarding house roof.
“I’ll come visit you again tomorrow night and tell you all about my first day on the job at Lone Star Mercantile.”
Charm shook her head vehemently. “No, you won’t, Kate. As much as I would love to see you, I won’t have you ruining your reputation. You have a chance to make something of yourself here. Besides, Reverend Marshall is smitten with you. You can’t risk being seen coming in and out of this place.”
“Don’t be silly.” Even though Kate knew it was true, loyalty compelled her to protest.
“Do you really want people talking about you now that you are starting over?”
“Your friendship means more to me than anything that people might say. Preston knows that.” For the first time in her life, she had a friendship that meant much more to her than her name.
But Charm remained vehement. “I don’t care. I mean it, Kate. Stay away from here until the wedding.” A huge smiled bloomed acro
ss her pretty features, and she sagged. “After that, Jonah and I are going to move someplace where I can be respectable, too.”
Kate had been gone a month before Reed stopped watching the road and came to the conclusion that she wasn’t ever coming back.
Every now and again he expected to hear her voice, see her seated at the table in the kitchen or reading by an open window in the parlor. Once he thought he heard the heels of her sturdy brown shoes tapping sharply on the stairs.
Sleep tended to evade him these days, so he spent late evening hours in the office accompanied by Daniel. He had been with the boy day and night since he brought him home again. He bathed and dressed him, made him eat, carried on a running, one-way conversation just as Kate had done.
Slowly but surely, Daniel had come out of the spell of deep sorrow that ensnared him. In Kate’s absence, the boy had begun following him around like a little lost lamb.
Daniel had taken to lugging around a box that contained his toys, a wagon, and odd-shaped animals that Scrappy had made from wood scraps.
Tonight Reed was up late, hunched over his desk while Daniel played on the floor in the corner. He was busy lining up horses and cows, then shoving the wagon into them and knocking them over. Reed tried to concentrate despite the racket, reminding himself that it wasn’t that long ago he worried Daniel was never going to come out of his silence.
Shaking his head at the pile of paper on the desk, Reed decided he was too tired to concentrate. It hadn’t taken him long to realize that even though his father always made the effort of running the ranch seem minimal, Reed Senior had kept his hand in everything.
The four ranch foremen were veterans and competent, but someone had to coordinate the quarters of the ranch, and each one had its own particular problems. The sections that bordered the frontier had been hard hit by Comanche stealing stock. The eastern sectors had problems of their own with encroaching settlers making roads across the ranch. In the far southwest corner, drought threatened.
He stacked up bills and statements, ready to turn in for the night when Daniel threw his wagon into the wooden box with a clatter, stood up, and wandered over to the desk where he leaned against the arm of Reed’s chair. He wore the beaded Comanche choker all the time, but the necklace was too big and was always coming loose. When Reed saw that it was about to fall off, he tightened the thongs at the nape of the boy’s neck.
“There you go, son.”
Daniel opened and closed all the desk drawers, a trick he had learned a few nights ago. Reed was reaching for the lamp when he realized Daniel had stopped dead still and was staring down into one of the open drawers. Inside, face up, lay the broken case with the photograph of Becky and Daniel.
Remembering the boy’s first explosive reaction to it, Reed’s first instinct was to quickly shut the drawer, but Daniel was studying it without any repercussion, so Reed slowly reached in and pulled out the broken silver case.
Daniel frowned, yet appeared to be waiting for Reed to say something.
Reed touched Becky’s likeness. “That was your mama. Mama. Can you say it?”
Slowly Daniel reached out with his forefinger, extending his hand toward the picture. His finger hovered above the likeness before he touched the image of himself.
“That’s you when you were almost three. That’s Daniel.”
The boy continued to point at his own likeness. Reed said again, “Daniel.”
Certain the boy would soon tire of the game, Reed patted him on the head and started to put the photograph back in the drawer. Instead, Daniel pointed to his picture once more and then, in a barely audible voice, he said one word.
“Daniel.”
Reed was too stunned to move. He looked around the room, but there was only emptiness to share the moment. With a lump in his throat the size of Texas, he wished like hell that Kate were there.
Finally, as calmly as he could, he said, “That’s good, son. That’s real good.” He touched Daniel’s chest and said again, “Daniel.”
Daniel touched the image. “Daniel.”
Then, much to Reed’s amazement, the boy pointed to Becky and said, “Mama.”
Daniel kept sliding his finger from Becky’s image to his own, repeating the names over and over again.
To some, a nine-year-old repeating two simple words might not have seemed like much of an achievement. Reed knew that Kate would have rejoiced. To him, it was a start. A damn good start.
Fast Pony knew Tall Ranger, Reed, was proud of him when he spoke the white names—the way Many Horses had always been proud whenever he caught a rabbit or killed a badger. Even though Tall Ranger did not show it, Fast Pony could tell. The man was sitting very still, watching him closely, and when Fast Pony looked up, Tall Ranger was smiling.
At first he had been scared when he pulled the sliding wood box open and saw the ghostly faces staring up at him, but he refused to be afraid anymore, so he convinced himself they were flat and very, very small. They could do little harm.
Tall Ranger was warm and alive right there beside him, so there was no sense in fearing the ghosts on the paper. Tall Ranger would not let anyone hurt him. He was sure of that now.
At first, after his mother was killed, a strange, dense smoke had filled his head, and he wanted to die, too, like Painted White Feather. He had even decided to starve himself this time, but after a few days he was so hungry he ate.
As the mind-smoke began to clear, he remembered how Painted White Feather had told him that Tall Ranger might be his white father. Fast Pony watched and waited, and then he tried to learn some of the white ways.
He understood that the woman ghost on the paper was his white mother. Mama. But he had never seen her around here, just the image on paper. He decided she must be gone forever.
And what of Soft Grass Hands? For a time he wondered if she was his white mother, but she was gone now, too. Tall Ranger lived alone, with only him.
He often wondered when Soft Grass Hands was coming back. She had gone away once before, but had come before the sun had gone down on the day. And what of Yellow Hair? He missed her, too. There had been few sweets since she left them.
When his mind cleared he remembered the way Tall Ranger had buried Painted White Feather on the prairie and had given him the precious shell necklace she always wore. Every day now, he wore it. Every night he slept with it beneath his pillow. Before he fell asleep, he made a vow never, ever to forget his mother’s last words to him.
“I want you to live, Fast Pony. I want you to grow up safe, away from death and sickness. With a full belly. You have always been the best son.
“Make me proud of your bravery.”
He had begun to follow Tall Ranger and to learn his ways, to make Painted White Feather’s spirit proud. He wanted to do what she asked of him before she died.
“You are a white man’s son by blood.”
Maybe Tall Ranger was his white father. Someday, when he learned the white tongue, he would ask.
One thing Fast Pony knew was that he would always be one of The People in his heart. For now, to please Painted White Feather, to honor her memory, he would be Daniel.
“Will that be all today, Mrs. Peabody?” Kate tucked a half dozen eggs in a small bucket of oatmeal to keep them from breaking. Annabelle Peabody’s husband, Charlie, was one of the Lone Star ranch hands who also played trumpet in the town band.
Annabelle was much younger than Kate but already the mother of three boys under six. Each time she came into the store the poor woman looked more exhausted than the last.
She had opened her purse but was forced to corral the boys before she could count out her coins.
“That’s enough for now, you hear me? Stop hitting Lawrence, Charlie Junior, or I’ll tell your pa. An’ I mean it this time.” She looked back at Kate and sighed in frustration. “Lord, sometimes I don’t know if it’s worth it.”
Kate’s heart ached with envy as she watched the three towheads scrambling about below the counter
tops and playing hide and seek in the aisles. Melancholy, she shook her head and smiled. “Believe me, it is.”
Annabelle paid Kate and gathered her purchases. Then she paused and reached over to give Kate’s hand a sympathetic pat.
“Don’t you never mind, Kate. You’re pretty enough to find a man out here. Pretty soon you’ll have a few youngsters of your own.”
Embarrassed, Kate thanked Annabelle and then came out from behind the long wooden counter piled with goods to help her gather up the boys. Taking three-year-old Timmy’s hand, she walked the Peabodys to the door.
The other boys raced ahead, careening down the sidewalk. Annabelle hollered for them not to step into the road, grabbed Timmy’s hand from Kate, and hurried after them at a brisk trot with her poke hat dangling down her back and her arms full of supplies.
Kate watched Annabelle and the boys until they disappeared around the corner. After a heavy sigh, she was in the act of rubbing fingerprints off the front window with her sleeve when she heard a familiar voice behind her.
“Hello, Kate.”
She turned around and saw Preston near the door and smiled. Her concerns when she first moved into town were that he might begin to pressure her into marriage and that he would want to spend all his free time with her—but neither proved true. He had been thoughtful enough to give her time alone to settle in and had kept his visits to a minimum.
If anything, he was determined to let her adjust to her new life.
“Come in and talk to me while I dust the shelves,” she invited, happy to have him there. Aside from Annabelle Peabody and the boys it had been a slow morning. Empty hours seemed to drag of late.
“I don’t want to get you in trouble with Harrison.”
Kate laughed, knowing Preston was teasing. Harrison Barker, a recent transplant from Pennsylvania, owned the Lone Star Mercantile. Somewhere around forty, Harrison Barker was married and the father of one daughter. He was ambitious and highly motivated, busy putting together a proposition to expand the store, although for the life of her, Kate couldn’t imagine why. The place was already stocked with more goods than the few inhabitants of Lone Star could purchase in five years.
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