Natalie twisted free from her husband’s grip and swept her cape from her shoulders in a single elegant movement. She draped the garment over her arm in such a way that Lettie could not help noticing it was new, as was Mrs. Gruber’s gown, her shoes, and her hat. “Good night.” Lifting her skirt ever so slightly, Natalie climbed the steps. “Oh, Lettie?”
“Yes, Mrs. Gruber?”
“Could I entreat you to bring me a cup of tea?”
Lettie opened her mouth to refuse; her mother would not have granted the request of a special pot of tea being made at this hour of the night. But since Natalie would no doubt see the hot milk she brought to the Beasleys, there was no way to refuse without appearing churlish. “Of course. Just this once, Mrs. Gruber.”
Natalie regarded her in evident surprise when her request was accepted. “Well! I’ll be waiting for you, then.”
“Yes, Mrs. Gruber,” Lettie mumbled under her breath, then she pulled a face and turned toward the coat closet as Mr. Gruber followed his wife toward their rooms. Separate rooms.
Since Ned Abernathy would probably be coming in through the kitchen after putting Mr. Goldsmith’s horse and buggy in the barn, Lettie hung up the wraps, bolted the front door, and then rushed into the kitchen. Using some of the hot water on the back of the stove, she mopped up the blood from the floor, muttering to herself when she discovered the stains had soaked into the wooden panels. But soon she had washed them enough so that the darker spots blended into the wood and were hardly noticeable. She was just about to hide the dishcloths with the other dirty linens when the door creaked open behind her.
Lettie whirled, hiding the cloths behind her back as Ned stepped into the room. He regarded her with silver-gray eyes, closing the door behind him and twisting the latch. The click seemed loud in the deserted kitchen, reverberating like the snap of a trigger.
“G-good evening, Ned.”
He merely nodded, his eyes quiet and warm.
“Mr. Goldsmith told me you enjoyed the poetry reading.” Brushing past him, Lettie shoved the towels into one of the drawers in the hutch and turned with a smile. “I was just about to make some tea for Mrs. Gruber and heat some milk for the Misses Beasley. Would you care for anything?”
Ned shook his head. “No. Thank you.” He hesitated for a moment, his fingers curled tightly around the brim of his hat. Finally he stepped toward her, lifting a hand toward a strand of hair that had fallen across her cheek. Long before he actually touched her, his hand dropped and he turned away, moving toward the hall door.
“Miss Lettie?”
She whirled to face him. “Yes?”
“You’ll be careful, won’t you?”
Lettie felt a chill spread through her. How did he know? How had he guessed about the Highwayman?
“With all the trouble, you shouldn’t wander off alone.”
Lettie managed a shaky smile when she realized Ned had been referring to the trouble in town and not the man in her bedroom. Since she’d once confided in Ned about her writing and her habit of dreaming down by the creek, she was touched that he was concerned about her welfare.
“I’ll be careful.”
Ned regarded her a moment longer, his eyes deep pools of gray beneath his brows.
“Good. I wouldn’t want anything to happen to you.” Offering her a slight smile, he backed from the room. “Good night, Miss Lettie.”
“Yes. Good night.”
Ned turned and moved into the hall, intent upon his own room. The moment his footsteps disappeared up the staircase, Lettie sagged in relief. Laws! She had to stop sneaking around like this. Her nerves just weren’t what they used to be.
Chapter 4
It took Lettie a few moments to heat the milk for the Beasleys and the tea for Natalie Gruber, but finally she arranged the respective cups on a tray. Taking a lamp from the kitchen, she hurried up the back staircase.
Moving down the hall, she reached Amelia’s room first. After tapping on the door, she placed her lamp on the floor and entered, only to find Miss Amelia sleeping amid a mound of frothy pillows, her glasses perched on the end of her nose and a playbill from the evening’s performance lying laxly between her fingers.
Smiling to herself, Lettie placed the tray on the bedside table, then leaned over to lift Amelia’s glasses from her nose, stowing them within arm’s reach. Then she slid the playbill free, pulled the covers up to Miss Amelia’s chin, and blew out the lamp, leaving the playbill beside her glasses.
Tiptoeing from the room, Lettie repeated the same procedure when she found Miss Alma dozing in bed with a tattered copy of Poe’s poems resting against her chest.
Finally, she moved to Natalie’s room. She had already knocked on the door before she realized that Silas Gruber was in his wife’s room, and the two were arguing.
“…Is he, Natalie?”
“Go to bed, Silas. Your bed.”
The voices stopped and there was a long silence before the door opened. Though his cheeks flooded with a ruddy glow, Silas Gruber nodded politely at Lettie, then brushed past her, intent upon his own room down the hall.
Lettie stood for a moment in awkward silence before stepping into the doorway. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know…”
Natalie merely waved her apology aside as if the interruption had been of no importance. “If you’d be so kind as to place my tea on the bureau there,” she instructed from where she sat at her dressing table. One by one, she removed the elaborate switches from her coiffure and lay the swathes of hair in front of her so that they resembled a bizarre collection of horsetails. “I hope I didn’t cause you too much trouble.”
Lettie didn’t answer. She merely hoped her mother wouldn’t find out about this and scold her for waiting on the boarders. “You’re not a servant, Letitia Mae. You provide the boarders with a room, hot meals, and clean laundry. The rest is their own responsibility.”
Lettie set the pot of tea on the bureau beside a crisp linen napkin and delicate cup that Natalie herself had provided. Her lips tilted in wry amusement. Natalie Gruber always drank her tea from a “dressy” cup, always sat in a “delicate” chair, always walked on the “feminine” side of the boardwalk, far from the mud and manure. And that was why Lettie often found herself envying the other woman with an intensity that bordered on dislike. Natalie was always so… perfect. She ate right, she dressed right, she talked right. She even looked right, for heaven’s sake, with dark eyes and black hair that curled into natural ringlets.
Frankly, Lettie had never developed a taste for tea, she sat in whatever chair was available, and usually found herself charging down any old side of the boardwalk she pleased in a most unladylike gait. And her hair and eyes were brown. Just brown—not chestnut, not walnut, not mahogany. They were just plain brown.
“You should have come tonight, Lettie.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“It was wonderful. Very stimulating.”
“I’m sure it was.”
“I never tire of hearing a reading of poetry, do you?”
Once again, Lettie felt a stab of frustration and anger. She’d never been to a poetry reading. But since she couldn’t tell Natalie that fact, she merely smiled in a vague way.
“It’s too bad about the trouble in Carlton.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I don’t suppose the thief would ever come here, to Madison.”
Lettie’s gaze locked briefly with Natalie’s in the mirror, then bounced away again. “I would hope not,” she answered carefully, fighting the urge to peer up at the ceiling. Since Lettie’s room was in the garret, her bed would be situated just about…
Right over Natalie’s head.
“So would I.”
“Mmm?” Lettie jerked her attention back with some difficulty.
“I said, I would hope that a thief like that wouldn’t come to Madison,” Natalie repeated. She stood up, and the delicate lawn and lace wrapper she wore swirled about tiny feet encased in down-edged slippers. “
With my husband serving as director of the new bank here in Madison and all, I would hope the thief would never come to rob him.”
Lettie gazed at Natalie with wide eyes, suddenly feeling cold all over. She wasn’t sure if Natalie was warning her, or simply talking off the top of her head.
“Good night, Lettie. And thank you for the tea.”
Once again, Lettie jerked her attention back to the older woman—though Natalie could not have been more than five or six years her elder. She offered her a quick smile that felt shaky on her own lips, then hurried toward the door. “You’re welcome, Mrs. Gruber. Sleep well.”
She was nearly out the door when Natalie called to her again. “Oh, Lettie?”
Lettie hesitated, then slowly turned to face the other woman. “Yes?”
Natalie turned back to her dresser, retrieved a small book, then moved toward her, the fabric of her wrapper rustling against the floor. “I believe you once expressed an interest in borrowing this.”
Lettie glanced down at the book of poetry in Natalie’s hands. Natalie’s long, slender, perfect hands. Lettie’s hands were small, and calloused from the work at the boardinghouse.
“Well, yes.”
“Go ahead. Take it. Keep it as long as you’d like.”
Lettie looked at Natalie in surprise. “Thank you. I’ll take good care of it.”
“I know you will.” Natalie flashed her a quick smile. “You take care of everything so well. It amazes me how you cook and clean here at the boardinghouse and take care of the boarders as if they were your family instead of… strangers.” Lettie felt herself straighten a little at the compliment, until Natalie continued: “You’re just like a … a mother possum.”
Lettie felt her face grow stiff. “Thank you for the poetry book,” she muttered, then slipped out the door, closing it tightly behind her.
“A mother possum!” she whispered fiercely to herself, stomping down the back stairs. Then, after glancing over her shoulder to make sure no one could hear, she muttered an unkind word that would have made her proper mother faint.
Lettie’s irritation toward Natalie was soon forgotten. Within moments, she had raided the kitchen and gathered a piece of pie, a few slices of cold meat, and a portion of homemade bread, wincing when the actions caused the cut on her finger to throb. She was about to hurry up the back stairs when she came to an abrupt halt.
What if he’d gone?
Her heart began to pound thickly within her chest at the mere thought of such a possibility. It would have been easy for him to slip from the house while she’d been attending to the other boarders. But even if the stranger hadn’t gone, there was nothing to prevent him from disappearing again the moment the house was quiet and she was asleep. And then it would only be a matter of moments before one of Jacob’s men saw him and apprehended him.
Lettie felt a shiver of foreboding at the mere thought of his capture. No. She couldn’t let that happen.
Looking about her for some solution, Lettie’s gaze fell upon the pantry door, and she quickly set the tray on the table and rushed toward the small storage room. Pulling a low stool toward the far side of the pantry, she climbed on top and reached for one of the quart-sized crocks of milk covered in a wet dishcloth. Taking it out into the kitchen, she hesitated only a moment before grasping a vial of her mother’s sleeping powder from the kitchen hutch.
After opening the milk, Lettie hesitated, biting her lip. She had no guarantee that the Highwayman was still in her room. And even if he were, she wasn’t sure that she should keep him there by force.
Shrugging away her own misgivings, Lettie uncapped the vial of sleeping powder and sprinkled a healthy measure of the substance into the milk. Her mother took about a teaspoon in her tea when she had one of her migraines.
But the Highwayman was larger than her mother—Lettie eyed the crock in her hands—and there was a lot of milk.
Taking a deep breath, she dumped half the vial into the milk. Better to be safe than sorry.
After grating nutmeg on top to disguise the taste, she placed it on the tray with the rest of the food and the untouched cups of warm milk left from the Beasleys. Then she covered the tray with a napkin and raced up to the rear wing, which housed the men. At the top of the stairs, she took a sharp turn to the right, where another door opened up to a narrow staircase that climbed to the garret.
Originally, the room had been Jacob’s, but when he’d begun sleeping in the small house behind the jail, which was provided for the town marshal, Lettie had been given the garret as her own. Although the area was large and spacious, its sloping ceilings and seasonal temperatures made it too uncomfortable to use for boarders. But Lettie found herself grateful for the room, since it provided her a sense of privacy she’d never had before.
Slipping through the door, Lettie closed it behind her and hesitated, quickly running a hand over her hair and smoothing the wrinkles from her clothing. Her heart fairly pounded from her chest in excitement. He had to be here!
Assuming her best imitation of Natalie Gruber’s lady-of-the-manor smile, she straightened her spine, pushed her bosom out to its best advantage, and glided up the stairs as elegantly as she could. “I’m sorry it took me so long.”
The room lay silent and dark.
Her bosom fell and her breath left in a whoosh. He’d gone. Somehow, despite the boarders’ presence, he’d managed to slip out of the house.
An arm whipped around her neck, and the cool snout of a revolver pressed against her temple.
Lettie opened her mouth to scream, but the hand that held her quickly covered her mouth.
“Where is he?”
She sagged in relief when she recognized the smooth tones of the Highwayman’s voice, but he continued to hold her tightly against him, digging the revolver into her skin.
“Where is he?” he asked more fiercely.
Lettie tried to struggle against him, but since her grasp of the tray made the fight nearly impossible, she finally lifted her foot and brought her heel crashing down over the stranger’s instep.
The man swore and released her, hobbling a few feet away and muttering under his breath.
“Be quiet, man!” she whispered as he groaned. “Do you want to bring the whole house in here to see what’s causing all the commotion?”
The man was immediately silent, but when he glanced up, his eyes fairly seethed with anger and suspicion. As if to underscore his emotions, the man lifted a finger to jab the air in front of her. “You little brat! You set a trap.”
“I did no such thing!”
“Then why did you bring your brother?”
“I did not bring my brother.”
“I heard male voices.”
She huffed in impatience. “This is a boardinghouse.”
The stranger opened his mouth, hesitated, then closed it again. “Where is he?”
“Who?”
“Your brother.”
She sighed in irritation, placing the tray on the bedside table. “I told you. He isn’t here.”
The man grasped her elbow and whirled her around to face him. His eyes were stormy and dark. “You wouldn’t defy your brother by hiding me like this.”
“I’m not defying my brother. I’m simply… avoiding any unpleasantness.”
The man clearly didn’t believe her explanation.
“Look,” she inserted, when he seemed about to argue with her again, “would I be feeding you if my brother were about to come and drag you into jail?” She pulled the napkin aside to reveal the laden tray.
The man continued to eye her in blatant suspicion, but the soft growl of his stomach betrayed him.
“Just as I thought,” Lettie murmured, surprised by the wave of protectiveness that rushed through her. “You probably haven’t had anything to eat all day.”
“I’m not hungry.” The man turned away, and the set of his shoulders became stiff and proud.
“You are hungry, and we both know it. You need to eat something. I
’m not about to poison you, you know.” Lettie clasped her hands behind her back, surreptitiously crossing her fingers and silently assuring herself that she wasn’t really lying. She was only going to drug him, not poison him. There was a difference.
“This is some kind of a trap, isn’t it?”
Lettie froze, wondering how he’d been able to tell she’d been stretching the truth, but before she could speak, the man continued.
“You’ll wait until I’ve got my mouth full of food, then your brother will come charging through the door.”
“That won’t happen.”
“You told him about me, didn’t you? You and he hatched some kind of trap.”
“I did no such thing!”
The air shivered between them. The stranger watched her closely, evidently still hesitant about trusting her.
“Why not?”
Lettie opened her mouth to issue some pat answer, then paused before saying truthfully, “Because I don’t want to see you hurt.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know!” she snapped, but then she quickly lowered her voice. “If you don’t want anything to eat, fine! Just sashay on out of here with an empty stomach and forget I ever tried to help you.”
A heavy silence fell between them until, finally, the man lowered his revolver. His gaze darted toward the tray of food.
“Eat,” she urged again.
Turning, she grasped a slice of bread slathered with sweet butter, then shoved it into his hand. The man stared at it a moment as if it were some foreign object, before he hesitantly lifted it to his mouth and took a bite. Within moments, he was hungrily finishing the last mouthful and reaching for the other items on the tray.
Lettie backed away, watching the stranger with tingling satisfaction as he sank onto the edge of her bed and ate with one hand, his revolver lying laxly in the other. He was a handsome man, she thought, though not for the first time. The lean strength of his features and the crisp waves of his hair were compelling. Alluring. With only a tiny bit of effort, Lettie could imagine this stranger dressed like her Highwayman, in a flowing silk shirt, tight breeches, shining Hessian boots.…
Silken Dreams Page 5