Dorothy Garlock - [Tucker Family]

by Keep a Little Secret

  Without another word, Hale walked over and took down the oil lamp, using it to light his way to the barn doors and out into the night, leaving Owen to be swallowed by the darkness.

  Alone, Owen found himself laughing. Everyone on the ranch knew that Hale was in love with Hannah. To insinuate that he was attracted to Charlotte was ridiculous, a charge Owen knew was not true.

  As for his own feelings for her, that was another matter.

  * * *

  Carter Herrick stood on the small landing that jutted out from his second story office, the cigar in his hand slowly sending smoke drifting up into the sky. Before him was the land that had been passed to him by his father, had given him his immense wealth, and had caused his to be a name feared. Besides the opulent house, buildings of all shapes and sizes dotted the gently rolling hillsides, standing watch over pens of cattle. Men worked hard at their tasks, employees all, every one of them mindful enough not to be caught looking in his direction.

  None of this matters… not a damn bit now that I cannot pass it on to my son…

  Ever since he had decided to destroy John Grant, to make him pay for what he had denied him, what he had stolen and taken away, Carter had still not managed to find relief for the ache that filled him. It burned his gut day and night, a constant gnawing.

  But it was not for lack of trying.

  There had been hopes for the fire; imagining the Grant Ranch utterly engulfed in flames, becoming a towering funeral pyre for that rotten son of a bitch, was a comforting possibility. Carter had wanted to be able to watch from his landing, whiskey in hand, as everything John Grant had amassed was taken from him, burned to the ground, nothing left but ash. It had seemed the most pleasant of dreams, but had proven as difficult to grasp.

  But it could have been, if not for my man’s failure…

  Months ago, it had come to Herrick’s attention that one of Grant’s men had acquired a gambling debt he could not hope to pay. A string of bad luck had created an unshakeable belief that the next hand of cards would surely offer salvation for his troubles, but believing in that lie had only sunken him deeper. One night, when the man had been leaving Sawyer’s lone tavern, he’d been jumped by a couple of rowdies and been beaten up a bit, a warning to pay up.

  And that was when Carter Herrick had stepped in…

  The offer he had made to Grant’s man, to cancel all of his debts outright, had proven far too tempting to turn down. Accepting had put the man in Herrick’s pocket, a tool to be used however he saw fit. In the beginning, he’d asked the man to do little, a petty theft here, a harmless lie there, just enough to get him used to doing as he had been told. Setting the fire had been his first real test, and the results had been significantly less than Herrick had hoped.

  Herrick had believed the man to be capable of executing such a simple task, but his incompetence had proven too much to overcome. He’d lit the fire, but somehow his conscience had gotten the better of him. Another of Herrick’s spies on the ranch had reported that the man had even gone so far as to battle feverishly against the blaze he had created. The damn fool was only making matters worse for himself.

  Another gamble like that would cost the man his life.

  Since the fire had failed, another act against Grant would need to be planned, something that would sow seeds of distrust among the bastard’s ranch hands. Whatever was settled upon, Herrick was sure his new hireling would argue against it, fearful that it would draw attention to his own involvement, but the man’s protests would be ignored. Why should I give a damn about his reputation? He should have thought of what the consequences might have been before running up such a gambling debt! He will do as I tell him!

  All that mattered was ruining Grant.

  Carter Herrick had been a much younger man when his dream had been stolen from him, but the pain lingered through the years, as fresh as if it had only happened yesterday. When Caroline Wallace had left Sawyer, rejected him, a piece of his heart had gone with her. Though he had spent a small fortune desperately trying to find her, it had been to no avail. When he had finally, reluctantly agreed to take a wife, as his overbearing father had demanded, little pleasure had come from it. Not until the arrival of Carter’s son had the ice in his chest thawed, but with the boy’s death, winter had returned, a blizzard from the midst of which he had no hopes that spring would ever come again.

  Behind him in his office, a pistol lay on the ink blotter of his oak desk. Carter didn’t need to look at it to know it was there. He had received it years ago as a gift and had come to enjoy keeping it well cleaned and polished enough to see his reflection in its ivory grip. Now he saw it for what it was: an instrument to be used for his deliverance, its iron as hard and cold as his son in the Oklahoma earth. Most nights, whiskey in hand, Carter contemplated using it, thought about ending all of his misery and heartache.

  What a relief to be rid of this world…

  Where once he had been a broad, robust man who thrived on his conviction and personal strength, he had been transformed against his will; heavy, dark circles hung beneath his green eyes, his once-broad shoulders slumped under a weight he could not possibly carry, and even his clothing was shabbier than he would once have ever considered wearing. He was a shell of the man he had been. He was nearing the end. There was no use in denying that he’d soon join his wife and son in death, though his would be because of his own choice and at his own hand. Carter Herrick vowed but one thing.

  Before I go, I’m going to make sure I’m not alone…

  Chapter Twelve

  CHARLOTTE STOOD IN HER CLASSROOM on the school’s second floor and looked out the window as the sun cleared the trees on the eastern horizon. It was a beautiful day, a majestic August morning without a cloud in the sky but with a breeze that she hoped would keep the heat at bay. Throwing open the windows, she breathed deeply of the fresh prairie air and tried in vain to settle her nerves.

  To say that Charlotte was anxious would have been a tremendous understatement. She should have been tired, could not have had more than an hour of sleep the night before because she couldn’t stop wondering what this day would be like, but she was so full of nervous energy that she swore she could have run from the ranch to Sawyer.

  Everything that she had done in her life had been in preparation for this moment: all of the time spent at her teaching college in Minnesota, all of the encouragement she had gotten from Rachel and her father, Christina and her grandmother, and also all of her hopes and dreams. Today was why she had come to Oklahoma. Today was the day in which it would all come together, when she would begin her life as a teacher.

  So why can’t I stop thinking about Owen?

  It had been almost a week since the fire and in that time she had only ever seen him from a distance, walking from the corrals to a horse barn or slowly sauntering back to his cabin. Not once had he come to dinner at the main house, and Charlotte suspected that Mrs. Grant was fixing him a plate to take to the cabin. He had also stopped driving Charlotte into town. Hannah took her brother’s eccentricities in stride, saying that Owen was just being Owen, but there was no doubt in Charlotte’s mind that he was avoiding her. She wasn’t, however, about to swallow her pride and seek him out.

  The truth was that she was still mad at him. There was no excuse for his treating her as he had during the fire. Whenever Charlotte thought of the words he had spoken in anger, it made her heart race in an unsettling way. Still, she couldn’t completely suppress her excitement, particularly when she remembered his lips so close to her own, but all that did was thoroughly confuse her more.

  Tenaciously, she clung to what Del had told her on the steps: that when things didn’t go your way, you had to pick up the pieces and start at the beginning. She wasn’t sure exactly what it was she had with Owen, only that they needed a fresh start.

  But how do I do that? Should I just confront him or will that only embarrass us both?

  Behind her, Charlotte heard the sound of a throat clearing. Sh
e turned quickly, a bright smile on her face as a welcome greeting to her first arriving student, but was surprised to find an older woman standing in her doorway, her arms folded across her chest and her face stern.

  “I suppose that you are Miss Tucker,” the woman declared.

  “I am,” Charlotte replied. “And… you are…?”

  “My name is Paige Spratt, but you will call me Mrs. Spratt,” she answered, apparently offended that Charlotte had presumed to ask.

  “I’m the new teacher.” She smiled uneasily.

  That smile was not returned.

  The first thought Charlotte had when looking at Paige Spratt was an unpleasant one: she resembled a buzzard. Thin to the point of looking sickly, even emaciated, she seemed to be all sharp angles and bones, swimming in a black, unfashionable dress. Her brownish hair, pulled back into the tightest bun Charlotte had ever seen, was touched by grey at the temples. A long neck, bulbous nose, protruding lips, and too prominent teeth completed the picture. Other than a slight hunching of her shoulders, she stood ramrod straight, prim and proper in her carriage as well as dress. Even her black shoes were matronly, one of them tapping a cadence out on the floor just outside the door, as if the threshold of Charlotte’s classroom were a line Mrs. Spratt wasn’t particularly interested in crossing.

  “I would have thought that you would have sought me out by now,” Mrs. Spratt continued, her face as sour as if she had bit into a lemon. “After all, I’ve been teaching here for over twenty years and might have been able to give you a bit of advice about what you should expect. I would have thought you eager for knowledge from my years of experience.”

  “I’m sorry if I’ve offended you in any way,” Charlotte explained, “but when I was hired, I wasn’t given much information about whom I should contact once I arrived in town. I was told that someone would contact me.”

  “Well, we all know what happens when assumptions are made,” Mrs. Spratt cut her off dismissively.

  Charlotte couldn’t stop her temper from boiling at the audacity of the woman’s words. The truth was that, ever since Charlotte could remember, she’d had a short fuse, eager to jump into a confrontation and defend herself. At that particular moment, she wanted nothing more than to correct Paige Spratt’s misconceptions, to give every bit as good as she got, but decorum or politeness held her back. After all, letting her oversize temper run wild was what had landed her in trouble with Owen, and maybe she should try a different tack.

  “Again, I’m sorry if I’ve offended you,” she offered neutrally.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t worry about offending me, my dear,” Mrs. Spratt replied in obvious insincerity. “I’ve seen many a young girl like yourself come and go through these parts in my time. Little Miss Know-It-Alls thinking that they have all the answers when the truth is they have a brain the size of an egg. Few of them make it more than a school year or two, rushing back to wherever it was they came from or scurrying off to marry the first foolish man who gave them any attention. Truthfully, I usually don’t even bother to remember their names.”

  “It’s my intention to be here for a considerable time,” Charlotte answered defensively, giving voice to feelings she was not even sure she’d had before she spoke of them.

  “I’m sure that right now, standing here talking to me, you honestly believe that to be true, which is wonderful, my dear, just wonderful,” Mrs. Spratt said with a sweetness that was as false as it was sickening. “But if you really want it to be true, you have an awful lot of things to learn about… your clothes, for instance.”

  “What about them?” she asked, suddenly self-conscious.

  “Just look at you!”

  Charlotte did just that, looking down at the outfit she had carefully picked out for such a very special day. Rachel had bought it for her as a graduation gift in St. Paul, at a marvelous little shop whose owner was an older man with a handlebar mustache. One of her most prized possessions, it was delicately wrapped and put in the bottom of her steamer trunk, only worn when needed. The blouse was white, embroidered at the cuff with a delicate blue frill that ran an inch up the wrist. Pleated along the front, it had ivory buttons that shone in the sunlight. A dark blue skirt fell to mid-calf. She couldn’t imagine what could be wrong about her clothes.

  “I… I don’t understand…”

  “No proper young woman goes about with the top button of her collar undone unless she’s advertising what’s to be found beneath the fabric!”

  “How dare you say that…” Charlotte began, her hand involuntarily flying up to her open collar, a fashion trend that all of the girls she knew followed.

  “And the color doesn’t do a thing but distract the children from the important lessons,” Mrs. Spratt continued, her list of complaints not in the least bit out of steam. “That sort of meandering pattern is too noticeable, too vulgar. You truthfully should be no more noticeable than the blackboard! Their time here with us should be as fundamentally sound as their days in church. A proper school instruction shouldn’t be about having fun, being entertained, laughing and whatnot, but filling their empty little heads with knowledge. Anything else is simply a waste of time.”

  The sudden realization dawned on Charlotte that had Paige Spratt been her teacher when she was in school, they wouldn’t have gotten along at all. What happened to make her this way? If Mrs. Spratt wanted to be as plain and boring as the blackboard, she’d certainly succeeded, but that wasn’t the path Charlotte had chosen.

  “A waste of time?” Charlotte echoed.

  “That’s exactly right!” Mrs. Spratt answered enthusiastically, mistaking the parroting for agreement. “Besides, you’ll have enough other things to worry about around town without being a bad teacher besides.”

  “Worry about? Like what?”

  “Like being a single lady and all of the problems that causes!”

  Now it was Charlotte’s turn to fold her arms over her chest. She didn’t say a word, knowing that Mrs. Spratt couldn’t wait to continue.

  “Everyone knows that a single woman your age, without morals, is usually completely desperate to find a man,” Mrs. Spratt obliged, speaking in a tone much like she were telling a secret. “Tongues around town are already wagging about what kind of standards you must have. Imagine, a strange, single woman who chooses to live out on a horse ranch! My word!”

  Charlotte barely repressed the sudden desire to slap Mrs. Spratt; it came at the exact instant she understood why all of the teachers before her had given up their jobs so quickly.

  “What you need is to find a stable man, a good Christian man with upstanding credentials in the community.” Mrs. Spratt talked on, oblivious to Charlotte’s angry expression. “Lord only knows what kind of sordid men can be found out on a horse ranch! Filthy degenerates, more often than not! A compassionate man is what you need to find, and until you’ve done so, people will whisper and think far less of you.” And here her voice dropped to a low, conspiratorial whisper. “They might even get the idea that you’re nothing but a whore…”

  It was that one word, whore, that broke Charlotte’s control over her temper and loosened her tongue.

  “Now you listen, Mrs. Spratt, and you listen to me closely!” she barked, feeling a faint tremor of thrill for maintaining enough decorum to use the woman’s proper name. “If you think that I’m going to stand here and nod my head while you insult me, well then, you’ve got rocks in yours and should’ve retired years ago!”

  “Why, I’ve never been so insulted in all my life.”

  “And another thing,” Charlotte snapped, taking her turn at cutting her fellow teacher off. “Your way of teaching might work fine for you, it might allow you to bore your poor students to sleep, but my way of teaching will work just fine without any input from you! If I want your advice, I’ll ask for it! Until then, keep away from my classroom and I’ll stay away from yours!”

  And with that, Charlotte stepped back and, since Mrs. Spratt had never even bothered to step over the th
reshold of her classroom, shut the door in her face with a satisfying click. For a moment, Charlotte was proud of herself, but then regret began creeping into her chest.

  On my first day of school, before my first student had arrived, I’ve made my first enemy…

  * * *

  The rest of the day had been relatively uneventful. After the initial excitement of her students’ arrival, fifteen boys and girls who looked at her curiously and expectantly, a few gossipy whispers shared among them, Charlotte had settled into her first day as a teacher.

  Some of it had been strange; hearing herself referred to as “Miss Tucker” was something she doubted she would ever get used to. Writing on the blackboard, occasionally squeaking the chalk, which resulted in a serenade of giggles, was going to need practice. But the nerves that had plagued her when she had first arrived slowly dissipated, and her confidence grew with each passing moment. She was stern when she needed to be, encouraging whenever a child faltered, and capable when asked a question.

  Today, I am a teacher…

  The one moment that stood out in her day, besides her confrontation with Mrs. Spratt, was when she caught Emily Hagemann absently staring out the window instead of concentrating on the lesson being taught. When Charlotte had to ask her to pay attention, Emily had exclaimed, “Oh, fiddle! It’s such a wonderful day, too!” and the whole class had burst into sniggers, and Charlotte had had to suppress her own laughter.

  That would have been me, many years ago…

  When the last student had left and the room had been tidied up for the night, Charlotte shut off the lights and left the school, heading for downtown Sawyer; Hannah would be waiting for her so that they could drive back to the ranch. Suddenly, just before she could even begin to wonder if Owen would be behind the wheel of the truck, a voice called out to her.

  “Well, I reckon you must be the new teacher in town.”

  Charlotte stopped at the sound and looked around, but couldn’t see who had spoken. She was in front of the funeral home beside the school, but there was nobody in sight. Then she noticed a woman standing beside the evergreens that framed the walk in front of the funeral home.