“I didn’t know you were expecting a caller, Pauline.”
“Good evening, ma’am.” Ethan got to his feet. “Ethan Bredlow from the Gazette. I met you the other night when I came to interview the doctor.”
“I read the article. It would seem to me that you could have given the doctor more credit. He’s the only one in town and he works from daylight to dark.” She lifted her brows and looked at Pauline. “Is Susan home?”
“She’s at Mary Sue’s. Mary Sue and Jeff will walk her home.”
“She didn’t ask permission to stay out until after dark.”
“She asked her father,” Pauline replied drily.
“Oh, well, in that case—I’ll go in and have a glass of lemonade with Jesse.”
“Jesse isn’t here either.”
“Oh, dear. I hope she isn’t traipsing around after dark by herself.”
“No. She has an escort.”
“Who, for goodness sake? Edsel came to fetch his mother. He and Roberta gave me a ride home.”
“Ask Jesse. She’s coming up the walk now.”
Louella turned to peer into the near darkness. “Well, my heavens! Has she lost her wits? What in the world is she doing with him?”
“I don’t think that’s any business of yours, ma’am.” Pauline said testily.
“I wonder if the doctor knows. My, my! I can’t believe he’d approve of his daughter consorting with hill trash.” Louella turned and went into the house.
“Old busybody,” Pauline murmured.
Jesse and Wade came up the steps, Jesse holding tightly to Wade’s arm.
“Hello, Ethan. It’s nice to see you. Have you met Wade Simmer?”
“Well… no. Howdy, Wade.” Ethan held out his hand.
“Ethan Bredlow works for the paper,” Jesse explained as the two men shook hands.
“Howdy,” Wade said, then, “Howdy, Miss Pauline.”
“Mr. Simmer.” Pauline’s nod and smile did not go unobserved by Ethan.
“I dropped by to ask Pauline to go to the ball game on Sunday.” Ethan sat back down in the swing.
“You did not,” Pauline declared and stood. “You asked me to go to the Chautauqua, and I said I was going to the ball game.”
“Honey, you’re just being picky.” He gave her a cocky grin.
“Don’t honey me, you… masher. And get yourself out of the swing so Wade and Jesse can have it.”
“No, don’t bother,” Wade said. “I’ve got to go to Ike’s and get my horse. It’s not wise to be wandering around Harpersville at night. I might be mistaken for The Looker.”
“I’ll go with you, Simmer, unless Pauline begs me to stay.” Ethan cocked a brow at the teacher, who tilted her chin with indignation.
“Don’t hold your breath,” she said tartly, then scowled.
“I think I may have cracked the ice around her heart, Miss Jesse,” Ethan said good-naturedly. “At least she’s talking to me.”
“I’ll be glad for your company, Bredlow.” Wade drew Jesse toward the corner of the wraparound porch. “Give me a minute with my lady.”
My lady. Jesse loved to hear him say that.
“You’ll come Sunday?” she asked as soon as they were alone.
“A team of mules couldn’t keep me away.”
“Saturday Papa and I will be at the school giving the smallpox vaccinations. The next Saturday we’ll be at Fronys’ store. I hope the hill people will turn out.”
“You may be surprised. They’re not all like Otis Merfeld. They love their children. But enough about that. I need a kiss to last me until I see you again.”
The tenderness of his lips on hers bespoke a new priority, putting love ahead of all other desires. They kissed as if they had not kissed before—soft kisses, loving kisses. He cradled her face in his hands.
“I love you.” His voice was quiet. They stood pressed together, heart to heart, thigh to thigh, toe to toe.
“I love you too,” Jesse said and meant it with all her heart. “I’ll look forward to Sunday.”
“Be careful. I’ll worry about you until that man is caught.”
“I’ll worry about you. I’m glad Ethan will go with you to Ike’s.”
“Bye, sweetheart.”
“Bye, till Sunday.”
Jesse watched him and Ethan until they rounded the corner of the porch and walked down the drive toward the alley where they would take a shortcut across the field to Ike’s garage.
“Well?” Pauline said when Jesse came to sink down beside her in the swing.
“He loves me and wants to marry me.” Jesse hugged herself with her arms and leaned her head against the high-backed swing.
“You’ve just discovered that he’s crazy about you?” Pauline sighed. “Anyone with half an eye could see that when we were at his place. He couldn’t keep his eyes off you.”
“I’m not going to tell Papa yet. I’ll not leave Susan and Todd here with Lou… el… la.” She drew the housekeeper’s name out the way Susan sometimes did. “Wade will understand when I tell him.”
“I keep wondering how she got in so tightly with the Harpers in such a short time.”
“She’s probably convinced them that she’s a quality lady who has fallen on hard times. But I can’t see Roberta Harper hobnobbing with a housekeeper.” With a toe on the floor, Jesse started the swing moving gently.
“I bet she’s told them that she’s a friend of the family and come to take care of her dear friend’s children.”
“How did you and Ethan get along?”
“Like a cat and a dog.”
“Which was the cat?” Jesse laughed. “He’s quite a charmer.”
“That’s the trouble. He could charm the bark off a tree.”
“Are you still worried about… The Looker?
“’Course I am. I don’t think I’ll ever feel safe again.”
“It wasn’t Ethan. He hasn’t been here long enough.”
“I realize now that it couldn’t have been him. Besides, he’d not do anything incognito. He’s too much of an exhibitionist.”
“I kind of like him. I hope he and Wade can be friends. Wade needs friends here in Harpersville.”
The familar squeak of the swing chains filled the silence. The thoughts of the two women were of the men who had just left them.
Jesse felt as if she were riding on a cloud. Wade loved her! All the time she was worrying that he had changed his mind about her, he was worrying about calling on her. He had actually come and left when he had seen Ethan on the porch.
Darling Wade, you are my heart.
Pauline’s thoughts were on Ethan. In another time before the attack she might have been flattered by his attention. He was good-looking, fun, and charming. That was it, she thought as her mind mulled over the things he had said; he was too charming. It was as if he were using his charm to hide something. What could it be?
CHAPTER
* 16 *
Ethan walked alongside Wade. With an experienced eye he sized up the man. Although Ethan could match Wade stride for stride, Wade was taller and more heavily built. Obviously, he was a hard, tough, powerful man who was well able to take care of himself. He radiated energy and strength. Ethan had met others like him who seemed to be both the hunter and the hunted. Their senses were alert to a thousand possible dangers.
As they rounded the barn behind the doctor’s house, Wade paused and looked in every direction before he started walking again. He was a careful man.
“I’ve been wanting to meet you, Simmer.”
“Yeah? Why?”
“To see if you were the hellion everyone says you are.”
“Yeah,” Wade said again, his eyes scanning the landscape from side to side.
“You expecting someone to jump you?”
“Maybe. Can’t tell about these yahoos. They’d not do it in daylight.”
“Ralph said he warned you about Secory.”
“He left word with Ike.”
“Most folks think you’re the fellow who’s looking at the women.”
“Yeah? They can think what they want.”
“Who do you think it is?”
“How the hell would I know? I just know it isn’t me.”
“It isn’t me either. I hit town only a few weeks ago.”
“Rules you out, doesn’t it?”
Suddenly Wade threw his arm out in front of Ethan to stop him. He tilted his head to listen. His keen ears had picked up a sound. An instant later he knew what it was. A horse was snorting and fighting. His horse. He began to run. Ethan kept pace with him.
“What is it?”
“Be quiet. Somebody messing with my horse.”
When they reached Ike’s garage, Wade sped around to the back and jumped over a rail fence. In seconds he was on the man who, with a cruel thin rope on the nose of the horse, was trying to pull him to the gate. Wade’s fists lashed out with lightning speed and knocked the man to the ground. The frightened horse reared when the man lost his grip on the rope, his hooves coming down within inches of his tormenter. Wade grabbed the horse’s mane, held his hand in front of his nose so he could smell him, and began to talk soothingly. Recognizing his master, the horse quieted.
“God-a-mighty, that bastard almost killed me!” The man swore and scrambled to his feet. He reeled toward the fence and ran headlong into another fist. Ethan’s.
“If there’s anything that gets my dander up,” Ethan said calmly, “it’s a son of a bitch who abuses a horse.” He hit him again and blood splattered.
Wade grabbed the man by the shirt at the back of his neck and pushed him toward the gate. “Move,” he snarled, “while you can.”
He hauled him into Ike’s garage with only his toes touching the ground. A lantern hung over the grinder where Ike was working on a piece of metal. Wade’s eyes quickly scanned the room, then turned to the man he held. He seldom forgot a face, and he had seen this man unloading a dray wagon the day he had talked to Marshal Wright.
“In the hills we hang a man for horse-stealing.” His voice was low and sinister.
“I… wasn’t stealing him.”
“It sure as hell looked like it to me.”
“Me too,” Ethan said. “Let’s hang him.”
“I was… only goin’ to turn him loose. I wasn’t stealing. I… wasn’t.”
“You’d better talk fast, mister.” Ethan jerked his head toward Wade. “This man is one mean son of a bitch. I don’t know if Ike and I can keep him from stringing you up.”
“They… told me to turn the horse loose so ya’d have to walk home.” His eyes left Wade and pleaded with Ethan. “That’s all I meant to do, mister. I swear it.”
“Who’s they?” Wade demanded and shook the man like a wet mop.
“I… I… I—The… the bridge crew. Don’t shake me! Ouch! Ah… my neck—”
“Where are they waiting?”
“Bridge, by the creamery.”
Wade opened Ike’s door and shoved the man outside. “Go tell ’em I’ll be along in an hour.” Before he could get the door shut the man was running.
“I never heard a thin’, Wade. I was workin’ on the grinder.” Ike was a small man with a sun-wrinkled face, squinty blue eyes and hair that had receded to the middle of his head. His hands and his clothes were covered with grease.
“That’s all right, Ike. Where’s Jody?”
“In the back room readin’ or sleepin’. He’d not hear nothin’ either with the grinder goin’.”
“It’s a good thing. He’d have run out there and made matters worse.” Both Ike and Wade looked questioningly at Ethan.
Ethan held his hands up palms out. “You’re thinkin’ I’ll turn the boy in for being in Harpersville after dark?”
Ike spoke. “I don’t know ya, mister. I don’t know what ya’ll be doin’.”
“It’s a stupid law that wouldn’t hold up in court. I’m sure Marshal Wright knows it. If he doesn’t, I have contacts that will make sure he knows it damn quick.”
Ethan’s manner had changed so completely that Wade looked at him with a puzzled frown. Gone was the flippant, devil-may-care look. Ethan’s face had sobered and a telling, knowledgeable light had come into his eyes as he weighed his words. He was getting his point across without giving anything away. Wade knew instantly that there was more to this man than the image he presented.
“Then we have your word?”
“You have it.”
“Good enough,” Wade said.
A moment later Ethan’s charming facade emerged once again as he looked over the motor that sat on two blocks.
“What’s it for? A motor car?”
“Might be” Ike said.
“The Literary Digest says motor cars won’t catch on.”
Ike snorted. “They ain’t done too bad in the six years since Ford built the first one.” His laugh was a dry cackle. “I’d a give a penny to a been there when they found out they’d built the thing too wide to get it out the door.” He wiped his greasy hands on a rag and dropped it on the bench beside the motor. “We might put this’n on a carriage and drive ’er up and down in front of Harper’s bank, huh Wade?”
Wade clasped his friend on the shoulder. “Sounds good to me, Ike.” He looked toward a curtain covering a doorway and saw it move. “You can come out, Jody. Ethan knows you’re here.”
“Yeah. He’s the smarty what works at the paper.” Jody emerged and stood with his arms crossed over his chest. “Be big news, NIGGER FOUND IN TOWN AFTER DARK.”
“Yeah?” Ethan looked the boy up and down. “A bigger story would be SMART-MOUTHED NIGGER BEING TUTORED BY MISS PAULINE ANTHONY.”
“How’d ya know that, toad?”
“That’s enough, Jody,” Wade said sharply and turned to Ethan. “How did you find out?”
Ethan shrugged. “Wasn’t hard. Doctor hired the boy when there were plenty of boys in town who would have been glad to have the job. Teacher stays with the Forbeses and disappears in the barn with an armload of books every morning about ten o’clock. Susan or Todd takes lunch basket to the barn. And you know what? Jody is nowhere in sight. It doesn’t take a ton of brains to figure out what’s going on.”
“You’ve nosed around and found out quite a lot in the short time you’ve been here.”
“My job is hunting the news.”
“So that’s your interest in this, huh, Bredlow? A story for the paper?” The expression on Wade’s face was anything but friendly now.
“My interest in this has nothing to do with the paper. It’s purely personal. Miss Pauline Anthony.” Ethan grinned and to his astonishment he felt a flash of heat cover the skin of his face. “She’s something I’ve been looking for all my life.”
“That’s all?” Wade asked, not quite believing.
“It’s plenty. You of all people should understand that.” Ethan’s eyes caught Wade’s and held them. The unspoken words about him and Jesse sparked between them.
Wade nodded. “You know she’ll lose her job if she’s caught. Harper controls the school board.”
“It won’t be me that tells. If anyone does, it’ll be the housekeeper.”
“Doctor Forbes assured me that she would keep quiet.” “Why would she keep quiet if it’s to her advantage to get in good with the Harpers?”
“Because she doesn’t want to get in bad with the Forbes-es. She works for them after all. If we can rock along here a few more weeks, though, Jody and I will be going down to Tuskegee to see if we can get him into a boarding school. We’ll talk to the track and field coaches. Jody’ll need training if he’s going to try out for the Olympic team a couple years from now.”
“He’s that fast, huh? The 1904 games will be in Saint Louis. I’d like to see him run, but will he be allowed to enter the races?”
“A few good men are working on it.”
Ethan looked at Jody and saw resentment in the eyes that stared back at him.
“You’ve nothing to fear from m
e, boy.”
“I ain’t a feared a you. I ain’t a feared a no man—nigger or white.”
“Good for you. I can’t say that. I’ve been scared out of my wits by colored and white men at some time or other.” He grinned cockily at Wade. “Well, shall we go tackle that bunch down by the creamery?”
Now Wade grinned. “Let ’em wait. I’ll cross the creek a mile back and go home by way of a deer trail up through the woods. There’s a hungry bunch of mosquitoes down by the bridge. After they’ve chewed on those fellows for a while, they should be ready to give it up and clear out.”
Ethan smiled broadly. “Good. I wasn’t in the mood for a fight anyhow. I’ve got on my courtin’ clothes.” He gave them a jaunty salute. “See you at the ball game,” he said before he went out the door.
Beneath the bridge that spanned the creek four men huddled, fighting the swarms of mosquitoes that surrounded them.
“Goddamn. These sons-a-bitches is eatin’ me up. Let’s get outta here. He ain’t comin’.”
“You said he’d be here in an hour.” John Secory, a big, burly redheaded man with a hot temper stood and peered over the bank. “I already got the wire stretched across the bridge.”
“It’s what he told me to say. Lord-a-mercy, I think my nose is busted.”
“It’s what ya get for gettin’ caught.”
“How’d I know that sissy-britches from the newspaper’d be with him?” The man tried to protect his face from the mosquitoes with his shirt collar. “He might be a comin’ with him.”
“Let him come,” Secory growled. “Any one of us can handle that dressed-up dude with one arm tied behind.”
“Horseshit! He didn’t bust yore nose. I’d just as soon been kicked by a mule.”
“It would a been a sight easier if n he’d been walkin’,” Secory grumbled. “But the wire will trip up his horse. Then we’ll be all over him like flies on a pile of fresh cowshit. That bastard’ll pay and pay good for what he done.”
“How’d you know for sure it was him that looked at yore gal?” The question came from one of the two men who stood and came to peer down the road toward town. The man with the broken nose huddled with his head in his arms.
“I jist know, that’s all. He’s been a thumbin’ his nose at this town fer years. He’s as randy as his old pa was. The bastard got hung fer it.”
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