Mama was nodding, agreeing with him. “Wallace introduced me to Papa—”
“You hadn’t met before?” The story was getting stranger with every turn.
She shook her head. “But we were fast friends. And in time, we grew to love each other. You know this is true.”
I stared at her, covering my mouth with my hand, unable to keep it closed. Anger boiled just under my skin. Had I seen it? Or had it all been a farce? An elaborate stage play with Wallace Kensington as director?
“Why did Papa go along with it?”
“He’s a good man, as fine as your mother,” Mr. Kensington said. “He found banking wasn’t to his liking. Came to me, confessing his desire to be done with city life and return here, to help his parents on their ailing farm.”
“And so you paid him. Paid him to take my mother and me off your hands. Take us with him. Make us go away.” My mind fought to take it all in.
He stared back at me and paused. “We came to an agreement. Beneficial to all.”
Mama nodded in affirmation.
It was a nightmare. If only I’d wake…
I’d thought I couldn’t bend any further beneath the weight of struggle and grief. I was wrong. Papa is not my papa at all… The pain of it seemed unbearable.
Mr. Kensington swirled his spoon in his cup for a moment, then set it on his saucer. “I grew concerned when I learned of Alan’s stroke. That was when I knew I had to come. But when news reached me he’d had another—”
I stood up abruptly, my hands in fists. “You had us followed? Hired someone to send you reports?” Who had telephoned him? Doc Jameson? Mr. Donnelly?
The necklace… My breath left me in a whoosh.
It’d been from him. As were all the other gifts. The fountain pen, the leather-bound books. There was no other logical explanation.
“My dear girl,” he said, frowning, “you are my blood. My kin. And while I have never been a part of your life, you have been a part of mine since the day you were born.” His face mellowed. “Please accept my sorrow over the pain you have suffered. Clearly, I should have come sooner.”
Come sooner. My eyes met his. “What exactly do you want, Mr. Kensington?”
He laughed under his breath, never dropping his gaze. “Direct, isn’t she?” he asked my mother.
“She’s never been one to hold back her thoughts,” Mama said.
“No, I don’t suppose she would be.” He set down his cup and rose, matching my stubborn gaze. “Cora, I am here to help both you and your, uh, parents. I’ve brought a doctor to town—the finest in Butte—to escort them to Minneapolis and see to Alan’s care. I shall cover any and all expenses.”
I cast an alarmed glance at Mama, but she wouldn’t look at me.
Mr. Kensington studied me. “You, Cora, have your own prospects. The family is about to take a couple of weeks on the lake at our new summer home, before the children are off on their Grand Tour. And I believe, given what has transpired, you’ve long been destined to accompany them.”
CHAPTER 6
Cora
Mama’s mouth dropped open. I gasped. Leave the farm? Go with him? Mama lifted nervous eyes in my direction. They held an odd mixture of horror and…hope.
In contrast, Mr. Kensington’s eyes were steady, watching me as if he were learning all about me, learning how to anticipate my next words. I felt dissected, analyzed.
I didn’t even know where to begin. My knees were shaking, so I abruptly sat down again, as did Mr. Kensington. “So…” I said, “you think you can bring me home with you? That your children will simply accept me as a long-lost sibling and we’ll be one big, content family?”
“I do not. You shall be introduced as my daughter, but none of it will come easily.”
“And…your wife?” I asked. Mama fidgeted with her hands and looked away.
“My wife passed away a year ago.”
Aha. “Did she ever know about me? Did you ever dare to tell her?”
“I did,” he returned steadily. “She knew as soon as we found out that Alma was pregnant. And she knew I was bound and determined to do right by you.”
This surprised me. He’d been honest with them. With them all, in time. And here I was, the last on his list. “I can’t simply leave here. The farm—”
“The farm is dying,” he said. “There won’t be a property in the valley that brings in a profitable crop this autumn. There is no way a woman can keep it running. And there’s no way Alan will be back—” He broke off abruptly, then cast an apologetic look at Mama.
“You’ve sold me short, Mr. Kensington.”
He considered me for a moment, a small smile at the corners of his mouth. “Forgive me,” he said, one eyebrow raised. “You are clearly most capable. But you’re also bright. Admit it, girl. It’d be a waste. You might make it through this summer, but what becomes of you next year? More work, backbreaking work. For what? If there’s one thing I’ve learned through the years, it’s this—put in the hard work, but only if there’s a chance of a fine profit. If not, look for another opportunity.”
He set aside his teacup and leaned on his elbows, steepling his fingers together. “You have two years of Normal School under your belt. Top of your class. Come fall, you should go back, finish what you started. I can make a way for you to do that. And more.”
How had he—
“You came home for the summer,” he went on, “anticipating helping out your folks, then returning to school, correct?”
“That was my plan, yes. But plans change.”
“Yes, they do,” he said meaningfully. He paused, picked a piece of lint from his trousers, then looked back to me. “I’m giving you an opportunity to seize the finest ‘change of plans’ any girl on the eastern slope has ever been offered. Leave this behind. Accept your place with my family, and I will take care of you and yours.”
We stared at each other for a long moment. I hated him then. For making me face it. Forcing me to turn away from what my papa, my real father, had loved all my growing-up years—this place. To turn away from making his dream work and…do what? Embrace Wallace Kensington’s?
“No,” I said.
And yet…I couldn’t help myself. Had he really said his children were going on the Grand Tour? Did he mean of Europe? And he would actually fund my return to Normal School?
I hated myself then too. For the way my heart leaped inside my chest, pounded with excitement, pleasure, for the first time really, since I’d arrived home.
I glanced at Mama, who continued to stare out toward the fields, eyes wide and vacant. “I can’t leave Mama. Not now. Not with Papa—”
“You are not leaving her. You are merely parting for a time. It will be good for you both. And your papa—Alan would want what is best for you.”
I waited for Mama to move, join in the conversation, but she was mute. I knew she wanted to get Papa to the hospital and to see her parents. They were very old—I hadn’t seen them in fifteen years. They had begged us to come to Minnesota for years. But the train tickets were too expensive. Until now.
I didn’t like it. Wallace Kensington couldn’t come in here, make us all do as he saw fit. Who was he to us? Other than a shadow of our past? He didn’t belong here. We would make it on our own. Find a way to get my folks to Minnesota, find a way to get me back to school…
“I think, Mr. Kensington, that you have overstepped your bounds.” I rose to my feet. “Mama and I can look after ourselves, thank you. I appreciate that you went to such lengths to honor a promise made long ago. But I do not feel a need for any father in my life, other than the one inside this house. And I prefer to make my way with Mama at my side. We are a family. We need not intrude upon yours at this late date.”
His eyes registered surprise. He sat back, took a slow sip of tea, and gave me another small smile as he set it down on the saucer. “My dear Cora, I’m afraid there is no choice in the matter for you. I must insist you return with me. You shall see what it is to be a
part of my family—as well as the one you share with Alma and Alan. It is the wise choice.”
“How dare you—”
“How dare I offer you more than you could’ve ever dreamed?”
“How dare you waltz in here and presume—”
“Presume to prescribe a future with hope and promise?”
I shut my mouth abruptly, glaring at him. Then, “Are you quite finished?”
“Are you?” he asked.
“I am a free woman, Mr. Kensington. Grown. I can do as I wish. I may be blood kin to you, but I am not your employee.” My eyes cut to Mama, but hers remained on the barn.
“Regardless, you shall do as I say.”
I let out a sputtering, exasperated laugh. “And if I do not?”
He traced the edge of his chipped china saucer. “That would be ill advised.” He said it with such confidence that it finally hit me. He could make it impossible for us here. Buy the bank and call our note, if he didn’t own it already. I’d read enough of the man in the papers. There were rumors of him paying off the law. Judges. He was ruthless. Stopping at nothing to get what he wanted.
“I do not wish to deal with you harshly in order for you to accept my gift, Cora. But you shall accept it. One way or another.”
Mama finally broke out of her daze and leaned forward. She tried to touch my hand, but I pulled away. “Cora, maybe this is best.” She sighed and glanced back toward the window. “Papa’s not improving… Who knows how long we’ll need to remain in Minnesota. You’d be free of this place, free to pursue your own dreams. See some of the world. Finish your education. And your papa can get the care he needs.” She turned back to me. “Perhaps this is God’s doing, a way out for us. Not a trap, but rather a bridge to what He has for us next.”
She was agreeing with Wallace Kensington? Or simply giving in to him? How could she? I stared at her, my heart heavy. What would Papa say if he could be a part of this?
I searched her eyes, and in them I saw grief and weariness, but also a trace of hope. For me. But for herself and Papa, too. Ever since Papa’s last stroke five days ago, I’d seen none of that. And it pushed back at my rage and indignation, forcing me to reconsider.
I rose and paced a moment, thinking it through. All my life I’d envied those who didn’t have to work all day to get more than a little meat and potatoes to the table. Envied those who could attend any class they wished, purchase any book they wanted, board steamships and travel. And now it was here. An option. A whole new world of options.
And Papa… I glanced toward his bedroom window. His best chance would be in Mr. Kensington’s doctor’s hands, getting him to a hospital. Perhaps with good care, he’d find renewed health again. But what then? I shook my head.
“If Papa survives the trip and regains his health,” I said lowly, “the loss of this place will break his heart.”
“Now it is you who are selling Alan short,” Mr. Kensington said. “He is a man who understands himself and his limitations. I have other investments about Dunnigan. And I am prepared to expand them. I’ll purchase this property for three times what it is worth. Enough to pay off the debts, as well as give your folks a little nest egg to begin again, wherever they wish.”
I stared at him and then looked again to Mama. Her eyes were pleading now, begging me to accept. As well as rife with regret and remorse.
Why would he offer three times the value? To make it impossible for Mama to say no? My eyes narrowed in his direction. There was something more—
“Come now, Cora.” He interrupted my thought. “Use that keen mind of yours. There is really only gain in this deal for you and Alma and Alan.”
I shook my head, wondering over his audacity. I wanted to scream at him. I wanted to kick him off our porch. I wanted to run.
But there was little choice, much as I hated it. He’d offered us everything we needed and more. To turn away was to be a stubborn fool. And Alan Diehl had not raised a fool.
“I…I need some time to think about it,” I said.
“Of course. Although as I understand it, every day Alan is not in a city hospital—”
“I understand,” I bit out.
He gave me a hard look, mouth open. Clearly, he was unused to interruptions.
“I’ll give you the night,” Mr. Kensington said, rising and reaching for his hat as his doctor came through our front door, closing it quietly behind him. “I’ll return in the morning for your answer.”
He turned to my mother. “Alma, you and Alan will travel in one of my private train cars to Minneapolis. We’ll do everything we can to make you both as comfortable as possible.”
“I haven’t agreed to go.”
He ignored me and looked only to my mother. “There will be enough in your account to more than see to your needs, as well as the proceeds from the farm’s sale. Is there anything else you need done before you go?”
“Our—our things,” she said dimly, looking toward the house.
I thought about what it contained. A dirty, threadbare imitation Oriental rug? A settee, sagging in the middle? The chipped china? The small clock on the wall that hadn’t kept good time for years? Was any of it worth keeping?
“I’ll have some people come out tomorrow to collect anything you’d like to store,” he said. “It will be waiting for you, or you can send for it when you have need of it.”
I had to admit it. He said it with utmost respect; when surely he must have understood that we had very little of worth.
“All will be in order, so you can take the three o’clock east, and we can take the three-ten west. If, of course, Cora finds herself amenable to our plans.” He gave me a curt nod.
Our plans? This was purely a Kensington plan, from start to finish.
You can keep your money and your promises, Mr. Kensington—we need nothing but the Lord, the land, and each other. We’ll find a way. Somehow. Someway…
But my fierce words remained unspoken, as gagged as my mother’s protests seemed to be.
I was trembling, unable to face Mama, as Mr. Kensington and his doctor drove away.
She joined me at the sink, watching through the kitchen window as his black buggy grew tiny in the distance, a small cloud of dust rising behind his wheels.
“How could you?” I asked softly, not wanting Papa to overhear. “Give yourself to that man?”
She paused. “You just met him. Wallace Kensington does not give up when he wants something. And for a while,” she said, her voice growing so quiet I almost couldn’t hear her, “he wanted me.”
I considered that for a minute. I knew Mama had grown up poor, her father a lumberman, her mother a cook. But she’d had a taste for adventure and had traveled west, eager to find work. I’d always known she had worked for a wealthy family. I’d daydreamed about being there too, peeking in on their well-to-do life. Never knowing I was one of them by blood.
I dug my fingernail into the pad of my thumb, trying to wake from this mad dream. Yet found I was still in the middle of it.
“Did he—did he…force himself upon you, Mama?” I couldn’t imagine my mother, altar guild chairwoman at church, Sunday school administrator, Grange Hall coordinator, ever willingly taking part in extramarital relations. I couldn’t believe I was even asking her this now.
“No,” she said softly. “God help me, I went willingly. We were different people then. Both of us weak and in need.” She turned to me and touched my shoulder. I was two inches taller than her, wider in the shoulder. But at the moment, I felt too small to face her. Too scared. I reached for a teacup, placing it in the sink to wash.
“Cora,” she said.
I pursed my lips and glanced at her from the side.
“Forgive me, Cora,” she said. “It’s not how any child should start out life. But it was your start. Wallace made it as easy as he could on you. Your papa, too. I should have told you earlier. I should have.” She sighed, and a tear traced her cheek. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh, Mama,” I
said, looking back to the window, the valley road still and empty except for Mr. Kensington’s buggy, tiny in the distance. I twirled the rag inside the teacup that was already clean.
“Your papa, he wanted you to think of him as your father, through and through. He didn’t see any need to—”
“No need? To break the news that the most powerful man in the state was my father by blood?”
“Well, I’m not certain he’s the most powerful.”
I lowered my voice for fear Papa would hear me. “Did Papa think I’d never find out?”
She sighed and turned back to the sink. “He hoped not.” Her voice cracked. “We both hoped Wallace would forget. That he’d see it was easier if he just left you, us, to live our lives. Only the yearly birthday presents made us think he had not.”
She looked to me, deep care in her eyes. “Your papa loves you, Cora. You must believe it. And I think Wallace truly believes this is the best thing for you.” She paused and turned toward me, taking my hands. “While it will be undoubtedly difficult, Cora, I believe it’s an answer to our prayers. Don’t you see? How else can we get your papa the care he needs?”
I bit back one angry retort after another. The Lord was answering my prayers by destroying my life, taking me from the people I loved? By striking down my papa so this pretender could come and claim me?
But then I remembered. My prayer for Him to make a way for us. It wasn’t the way I’d imagined, but I couldn’t deny that a way had been made. I sighed and closed my eyes. “I know Papa loves me, Mama. And I love him all the more for loving me as his own.”
She stared out the window. “I’d made a mess of things. Made awful, sinful choices. And God redeemed it all. Redeemed me and my life. I’ve been happy here, with you and your papa. Despite the struggle and disappointments, our love has made it all worthwhile. Our parting will only be for a while. For you to see what’s possible on your own, unhindered by your responsibilities to us and this farm. Your future won’t be as you imagined it, but there are good things ahead for you too, child. I know it.”
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