The Hired Man

by Lynna Banning

  She nodded, keeping her eyes on his.

  “But there’s two things you don’t know.” He stopped and swallowed hard. “The first thing is that I’ve wanted you from the minute I laid eyes on you. And I want you right now so bad I can hardly breathe.”

  “Oh, Cord,” she whispered.

  “Don’t talk,” he ordered. He swallowed again and went on. “The second thing you don’t know is that I am not going to make love to another man’s wife, even a man who’s a drunk and a bully. But, dammit, I’m having a devil of a time remembering that.”

  “Oh,” she said, her voice quiet. “I see.”

  He groaned. “Hell, no, you don’t see. You have no idea what it’s like to lie awake half the night aching because you’re only a dozen steps away and I can’t...won’t...”

  “Is this like being hot and bothered, as you explained to Danny?”

  The question was so matter of fact he wasn’t sure he’d heard her right. “‘Hot and bothered,’” he repeated. “‘Hot and bothered’ isn’t near strong enough. Try ‘half-crazy.’ Out of my head half the time because I can’t think straight watching you. Wanting you.”

  “I see,” she said again. “Well, there is something that I want you to know, Cord.”

  His breath stopped. “Yeah? What’s that?”

  “I do not ever intend to betray my marriage vows, no matter how drunk or how...whatever my husband is.”

  Cord stared at her. “Guess that solves our problem, then, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes,” she said, her voice quiet, “I believe it does. Since you won’t have another man’s wife and I will not break my marriage vows, it seems clear that we are perfectly safe from each other tonight.”

  He barked out a laugh. “Yeah, I guess so. God help us.”

  “And,” she continued calmly, “if you will stop looking at me like that, I will stop brushing my hair.”

  He couldn’t make his hands release her, so he drew her into his arms and tucked her head under his chin. “Eleanor, you know something? If I live through tonight, maybe I’ll start going to church.”

  “No, you won’t, Cord,” she whispered. “You will go to California.” She pulled his head down to hers and brushed her lips over his cheek.

  “And I will miss you every single day for the rest of my life.”

  * * *

  A more sleepless night Cord could not remember. Not even in prison had his thoughts bumbled about in his brain like drunken cats. He couldn’t go on like this much longer, but...

  Well, there it was, the big but. He couldn’t leave Eleanor in danger, and if he’d learned anything in his thirty-two years, it was that Tom Malloy spelled danger. But neither could he stay around watching Eleanor fry bacon and hang out the laundry and smile at her children, listening to her breathing at night, aching for her. He wondered how long he could continue like this without going stark raving mad.

  And as much as he wanted to, he knew he couldn’t kill Tom Malloy. They’d slam him back in prison so fast his head would spin.

  But you’re caught in a prison anyway, one you can’t escape from.

  He tried not to think about it. He stared up at the darkened ceiling, moved his gaze to the single window through which a faint light shone and counted the number of holes in the lace curtains. He almost missed Mama Cat and her kittens snuggled up next to his body. After a while he noticed that he couldn’t hear any breathing sounds coming from Eleanor.

  Her bed was maybe three feet from his, pushed up against the wall under the window. He’d heard the bedsprings give when she lay down, but she hadn’t said anything, not good night or sleep well or see you in the morning. Nothing. In the dark, which she insisted on while she took off whatever it was she took off, he couldn’t see her face, just the glimmer of her bare arms.

  But he knew she was awake. She was lying still and real quiet, just like he was. So maybe she was trying to figure things out, just like he was.

  And then he heard her draw in an uneven breath, and he knew she was crying. Dammit anyway. He couldn’t stand it when she was unhappy. He lay motionless for a long time, listening, and finally he’d had enough. A man could take only so much of a woman’s pain.

  He rolled off the bed, made his way across the darkened room to where she lay, and without a word stretched out beside her and gathered her into his arms. Her face was wet and her body shook with sobs, but she didn’t make a sound. He pressed her head into the hollow of his shoulder.

  Her arm crept across his bare chest and she clung to him until her breathing gradually slowed and evened out and her arm went slack.

  He smiled into her rose-scented hair. He wasn’t making love to another man’s wife, and she wasn’t breaking any marriage vows, but right now none of that mattered. What did matter was that they were together. And no matter what happened in Smoke River tomorrow or next week or next year, Eleanor Malloy would know that he cared about her.

  * * *

  Ever since that night in Gillette Springs, Eleanor had been acutely aware that she and Cord were closer in some undefined way. They were more careful of each other, more protective. They no longer teased each other. They didn’t argue. They looked at each other across the supper table with understanding and acceptance, even when Tom was present. Which wasn’t often.

  But there would come a breaking point, and they both knew it.

  Late summer melted into fall so seamlessly that Eleanor scarcely noticed. Afternoons were still scorching, especially when she worked outside in the hot sun scrubbing shirts and jeans on the wooden washboard or picking bush beans and pulling up carrots for chicken stew. The balmy evenings settled over the farm like a benediction, and darkness spread over the apple trees and the front porch like black velvet.

  Danny started school again, riding Cord’s bay mare, which he saddled for him each morning, and returning with homework to struggle over each evening. Molly was learning to churn butter and try her hand at hemming handkerchiefs and the doll clothes Eleanor stitched up on her treadle sewing machine. She was also helping Molly with her reading and teaching her to knit tiny blankets for the doll cradle Cord had made for her.

  And Tom was spending more and more time away from the farm.

  As the long, hot days passed, Cord said less and less. Tonight she sat on the porch swing, sorting through the pocketful of flower seeds she’d gleaned from her garden, asters and black-eyed Susans and sweet alyssum. Next summer she would put bouquets everywhere, even in the barn, in the cow’s stall and the tack room Cord had reorganized. Next month she would do more sewing, she decided. Make a pretty pink dress with ruffles for Molly to start school in and a new gored calico skirt for herself.

  She dreaded the coming of winter. The weather would turn cold, too cold for Tom to ride back and forth from the farm to wherever he went every day, and that meant he would spend more nights on the farm. She and the children would see more of him, and she couldn’t bring herself to think about what that would mean.

  As the weeks went on, the leaves on the maple trees turned gold and orange and began to drift onto the ground, and Tom grew more and more short-tempered. Tonight at supper he had been so unpleasant Cord had finally picked up his plate of beans and corn bread and finished eating on the porch. Later, Tom stormed out the front door and with a vicious jab of his fist purposely knocked Cord’s plate upside down into his lap.

  But what upset Eleanor most was what her husband said.

  “You’re still here, huh, hired man? Guess I gotta do something to get you off my farm.” He said other things, too. Terrible things about drifters and men with no right to decent treatment.

  Cord waited until Tom had ridden off, then he stood up and walked off into the dark. She tried to put the ugly words out of her mind, sent Molly and Danny up to bed and sat rocking on the porch swing.

 
She couldn’t help wondering why Cord seemed so distant lately. She had thought and thought about that night they spent together in Gillette Springs, wondering what she might have done differently, wondering if that was what was bothering him.

  Cord walked his nightly route through the apple orchard and around the perimeter of the farm, then checked out the barn. He didn’t know exactly what he was looking for, but tonight he had an uneasy, crawly feeling that nibbled at the base of his spine. Finally he tramped back through the gate to find Eleanor sitting in the swing, sorting seeds into the cups of a battered muffin tin.

  She looked up as he drew near the porch steps. “Is everything all right?”

  “Far as I can tell. Tom’s gone. Kids go to bed?”

  “Yes. Danny has school tomorrow.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’ll go up in a minute. I thought I’d sit here a while and cool off. It’s awfully hot in the kitchen.”

  He came up the steps but made no move to sit down beside her. “Guess I’ll turn in.” Then he hesitated. “Don’t sit out here too late, Eleanor. Tom was in a funny mood when he rode off.”

  “Yes,” she agreed quietly.

  He put his hand on the screen door. “I locked the back door. Be sure to lock this one, all right?” Without waiting for an answer, he moved through the doorway, and the screen slapped shut behind him.

  An hour later she still sat rocking back and forth, lost in thought. She shut her eyes tight.

  Dear God, I am so lonely. I ache to talk to Cord. Or not talk. I just want to be near him.

  She must be a disloyal wife for wanting this. But dear heavenly God, she knew she would suffer when Cord was gone.

  With a jerk she stopped the motion of the swing, stood up and marched into the house. She locked the door and went up the stairs to her bedroom. She’d go crazy if she let herself think about it.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Cord jolted awake and lay unmoving for a moment, wondering what had wakened him. The house was quiet. He knew it was buttoned up tight because he’d double-checked the locks on both the front and back doors. Eleanor and the kids slept nearby, and his ears were attuned to any noise from downstairs.

  The house had the middle-of-the-night stillness that was usual between midnight and 4:00 a.m. So what had brought him out of a sound sleep? He started to roll over when he saw an odd flicker of light through the window.

  Fire!

  He scrambled off the narrow bed, pulled on his jeans and jammed his boots on his bare feet.

  “Fire!” he yelled. He raced out of the attic and pounded on Eleanor’s bedroom door. “Eleanor, wake up!” He pushed the door open to see her white-clad figure sitting up in bed.

  “Get dressed!” he ordered. “The barn’s on fire!”

  By the time he reached the front porch, red-orange flames were shooting fifty feet into the sky. The unearthly growl of an unchecked fire shot a chill up his backbone.

  Eleanor banged through the screen door wearing a white nightgown with a baggy plaid shirt over it and her work boots.

  “Fill a bucket!” he shouted. “I’ll check on Tom and get the animals out.”

  He closed his ears against the high-pitched screams of the horses and headed toward the burning building. The wide barn door was hot to the touch. He bunched his shirt around his fist, rammed the wooden latch free and shoved the door open.

  Black, eye-stinging smoke roiled out. He sucked in a lungful of air and plunged inside. “Tom! Tom!”

  No answer. He climbed the ladder into the loft, but Tom was gone.

  He found the milk cow, smacked her on the flank, and she lumbered out into the yard.

  The stalled horses were panic-stricken and refused to budge, so he stripped his shirt off and tied it around the gray gelding’s eyes. Fighting against the heat, he slipped a rope around its neck and dragged it forward into the cool night air. He paused only long enough to yank the covering from its head and plunge it into the bucket of water Eleanor held.

  He sloshed handfuls of the cool water over his face and bare chest, then grabbed his wet shirt and ran back into the barn. His bay mare was squealing in her stall, snorting in fear and rearing up to bang her hooves against the wall. Cord sidled over, stretched his wet shirt over the mare’s rolling black eyes and grabbed a handful of coarse hair.

  “Come on, girl,” he urged. “Move! You can do it. Just come with me.” He tugged hard, but the horse balked again. By now flames were nibbling around the edge of the barn door; if they didn’t get through it in the next few moments they would be trapped.

  At last the quivering animal took a step forward, then two. Cord slapped her rump hard and she bolted through the burning doorway and into the yard, where he hoped Eleanor could catch her mane and bring her to a stop. He heard the splash as Eleanor tossed a bucket of water on the mare’s singed hide and heard her voice.

  “Cord!” she screamed. “The horses are safe.”

  He ducked back into the smoke-filled tack room, grabbed the two saddles and all the harnesses he could and heaved the armload out the barn door.

  Eleanor watched the barn door, now a mass of flames. Why did Cord not follow the animals outside? Oh, dear God in heaven, was he trapped?

  “Cord!” A sickening feeling flooded her stomach. The fire had consumed most of the structure. Nothing was left but two walls and the roof, and flames were now eating their way along the eaves. Dear God, Cord will die in there!

  Without thinking she dumped the water bucket over herself, grabbed up her nightgown in one hand and started forward. Just as she reached the barn door, Cord stumbled through with Mama Cat under one arm and his hands full of squirming kittens. Smoke rose from his trousers, and the ends of his hair were frizzy.

  She grabbed him around the waist and knocked the kittens away. With a yowl Mama Cat skittered off into the dark, and Eleanor mopped at Cord’s soot-streaked face with the hem of her sopping gown.

  “Are you burned anywhere else?” she demanded.

  Water dribbled down his cheeks and dripped off his chin. “Don’t think so,” he panted. “Water feels good. Thanks.”

  All at once she began to tremble. He could have died! And if it weren’t for him, all her stock, the horses and the milk cow, would have been incinerated.

  Cord touched her shoulder. “You all right?”

  “Y-yes, just shaky. I usually get scared after an emergency,” she wept. “And th-then I have a g-good cry.”

  He propelled her up onto the porch and settled her in the swing, where she curled her legs up under her wet nightgown and bent her head.

  “I smell like smoke,” he rasped. “I’m gonna wash off at the pump.”

  She sat sobbing and trembling while he doused his head under the faucet and dumped a bucket of water over his smoke-singed jeans. When he returned he slid onto the swing next to her and wrapped his arm around her shoulder.

  After long minutes without saying anything, he pulled her to her feet and walked her into the house. At the foot of the staircase he stopped her and touched her shoulder.

  “Eleanor...” He steadied her body against his. “Listen to me.”

  “Yes? Wh-what is it?”

  He waited, feeling her frame shake. “That fire was set on purpose.”

  Her sharp intake of breath made him pause. He didn’t want to frighten her, or the children, but he did want to make sure she understood what had happened.

  “Cord, how could you possibly know that?”

  He started to speak, then bit his tongue and waited a long moment, searching for the right words. “I found a blackened pile of straw inside the tack room. And four burned matches. Someone intended to set your barn on fire.”

  She swayed into him and swiped tears off her glistening cheeks. “Oh, no,” she moane
d. “I don’t believe that. I can’t believe anyone would do such a thing.”

  Tom would. But Cord wouldn’t say it.

  He turned her toward the stairs and started up ahead of her. “Come on. Let’s check the children, be sure they’re all right.”

  He reached one hand back to grasp hers and slowly led her up the steps until they stood together outside Molly and Danny’s bedroom. Eleanor twisted the doorknob, pushed the door inward and quietly stepped inside. After a moment she backed out.

  “They’re both still sound asleep,” she whispered. “You’d think if they heard any of the commotion outside they’d be wide-awake and full of questions.”

  “Give thanks to God your kids are sound sleepers.”

  She closed the door and leaned her head against the painted wood. “I can’t think about it. I can’t...” Her voice choked off.

  Cord guided her across the hallway to her own bedroom. The door stood ajar. He led her over to the bed, sat her down and knelt to pull off her boots. When he looked up she had buried her face in her hands and her shoulders were shaking.

  “Eleanor, it’s all over now. You’re safe. Molly and Danny are safe. And your cow is probably eating your petunias.”

  “N-no, she wouldn’t be,” she said in a hiccuppy voice. “Betsy doesn’t like petunias.”

  She couldn’t seem to stop crying, so he tried to distract her. “Your nightgown is all wet.”

  “I kn-know.”

  She tipped onto her side and curled up in a tight ball.

  “Don’t leave,” she whispered.

  He settled his tired body beside her and smoothed her hair.

  “Cord,” she murmured. “Stay here with me.”

  “My jeans are filthy and I smell like smoke.”

  “Stay anyway.”

  He knew it was fear talking, but he stood up, toed off his boots and peeled off his water-soaked jeans. They dropped onto the rag rug beside the bed with a wet-mud sound, and then before he could stop himself, he threw caution out the window and stripped off his drawers. He wondered if she would even notice, much less care, but right now he didn’t give a damn. She’d asked him to stay and by God he would stay.