“What about you?” she said.
“What about me?”
“What have you done all your life? How old are you, Waco?”
“Twenty-five.”
“So am I. Did you go to school?”
“Oh, for a little while. Never got past the sixth grade. Most of what I know is horses.”
“Yes, everybody says you know horses better than anyone. You ever have a sweetheart?”
Waco stirred and could not seem to find an easy answer. Trouble clouded him, and he cleared his throat then shook his head. “I’ve known a few women, but nothing serious. I guess I know more about horses than I do about women.”
Alice obviously found this amusing. When she smiled, two dimples appeared at the corners of her mouth. “I’m glad to hear a man admit that he doesn’t know everything there is to know about women.”
A silence fell over the two. Finally the meal was finished, and he said, “I’ve been wanting to ask you something, Alice.”
“Well, go ahead.”
“Have you ever thought of me as a man you might marry?” The words were hard for Waco to get out.
Alice stared at Waco for a long moment. “I think a woman wonders that about every man she knows, Waco.”
“I care for you more than I can say. I wish I had the words, but all I can say is I love you and you’ll never know meanness from me. Would you think about marrying me, Alice?”
Alice reached over and covered his broad hands with hers. She rubbed the calluses that were on his palm and said nervously, “How strong these hands are.” She grew silent and seemed to be thinking deeply. Finally she smiled. “I’ll think about it, Waco. I will definitely think about it.”
“Well, I wish I’d been the knight in shining armor to save you, Alice. Waco has all the luck.” Will Barton spoke simply and with obvious sincerity. Alice had just told him that Waco had asked her to marry him.
“Why did you never come courting me?”
“Because I saw Waco was in love with you.” He moved forward then and put his arm around her in a protective fashion. “If he doesn’t treat you right, I’ll shoot him, and we’ll run off to the South Seas and eat coconuts.”
Alice laughed.
She had once told Will that she liked his light sense of humor. He smiled, lost in thought. He suddenly came to himself and said, “But Waco would never mistreat a woman.”
“No, he wouldn’t.”
An hour later, Will encountered Waco. He immediately said, “Alice has told me that you want to marry her.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Well, congratulations.”
Waco ran his hand through his hair with a troubled expression. “It’s not exactly settled yet. She’s got to think about it.”
“I don’t understand having to think about things like that,” Will said, shrugging his shoulders in a gesture of disgust. “If you love someone, that’s all there is to it.”
“No, I don’t think so, Will. A man and a woman have got to have something different, almost like magic. Or else why would they stick together no matter what?” Waco suddenly saw something in Will Barton and asked quickly, “Did you ever feel like marrying a woman, Will?”
Finally Will dropped his head and turned away muttering, “Just once.”
“Why didn’t you do it, then?”
Will’s voice was no more than a whisper. “She favored another man.”
“Come along, Alice. I’ve got something to show you.”
“What is it?” Alice had been standing outside the hardware store when Waco had walked up with a smile on his face. “Come along. I’ll show you.”
Alice looked puzzled but walked along. They cleared Front Street and turned and walked to where a few houses had been built on large lots.
“Come on and look at this.” Waco led the way up on the porch of a painted frame house with gables and two windows covered by curtains.
When Waco reached for the door, Alice exclaimed, “You can’t just walk in there, Waco!”
“Why can’t I?”
“Because we’d be trespassing.”
Waco laughed. “No, we wouldn’t. This is our house.”
Alice stared at him in disbelief. “What do you mean our house?”
“I took what was left of the money from the sale of the horse ranch and put it on this house. It’ll take awhile to pay for it, but it’s for us, Alice. Come on in and let’s see if you like it.”
Alice followed Waco inside. They went through the house room by room, and finally when they got to the spacious living room with the large fireplace, he walked over and put his elbow on the mantel and stared around the room. “I wonder if there was ever a murder in this room.”
“A murder?” Alice stared at him in disbelief. “What are you talking about?”
“Well, lots of things happen in houses, Alice.”
“But not murders.”
“Maybe so. No telling what the history of this place is. Might have been a fellow standing right here where I am. A woman came in the door. He took one look at her and fell in love. They married and had children and grandchildren.”
“That’s much nicer than a murder.”
“I just imagine things like that sometimes. Maybe there was a couple that lived here, and one of them was unfaithful and ran off with the hardware salesman or an insurance salesman.”
“You know, Waco, you’re a much deeper thinker than most people take you for.”
He came to her and brought her to him with a quick sweep of his arm. He’d kissed her before, but lightly. This time he felt not only the desperate hunger of her lips, but running through him was an emotion almost like wildfire. She had this power over him, lifting him to a wild height so that he could know the vague hints of glory a woman and a man might know. When he lifted his lips, he said, “Marry me, Alice. I’ll make you happy.”
Alice put her hands behind his neck, drew him down, and kissed him again. “All right,” she whispered. “I’ll marry you.”
“Alice has agreed to marry me, Will.”
Will was adding up figures in a book. He looked up and said, “Well, that’s fine. Of course that’s no surprise to me. My congratulations. You’re getting a fine girl.”
“You mentioned you loved a woman once, but you didn’t explain what happened.”
Will shook his head, his lips clamped together. “No sense talking about things like that. When is the date of the wedding?”
“As soon as we get the house ready.”
Will closed the book. “All right,” he said. “Are you sure you love her?”
“I am.”
“And are you sure she loves you?”
Waco did not speak for a moment, and Will saw uncertainty in his face. Finally Waco said, “She doesn’t care for me like I do for her, but I can make her love me, Will. You just wait and see!”
CHAPTER 3
A violent rain had swept through Little Rock earlier, leaving the pungent odors of spring that followed a downpour. It was late in the afternoon, and there was a small light in the sky. Already some businesses were lighting lamps, but Front Street had become a muddy yellow street through which wagons, weary riders, and small groups made a river of mud illuminated by the street’s gas lamps.
Alice had left the house and held an umbrella over her head to catch the few remaining remnants of the rainstorm. She moved along past Jackson’s Confectionaries and next door smelled the dry, faint fragrance of cotton goods at John Maddox’s shop. There was a jam of wagons locked hub to hub, and she heard the curses of the teamsters. She made her way to the shop that had become very familiar to her and arrived at the hardware store barely touched by the earlier rain.
As she collapsed the umbrella and shook it dry, a group of young men passed by and called out to her. Their raw comments brought only a look of disdain from her, and she did not bother to answer them.
Folding the umbrella, she entered the store and was greeted by Will, who put down a b
ox that he was lifting up on the counter. He turned to face her. “Surprised you come out in all this rain,” he said, smiling at her.
“Oh, the worst of it was over. Is Waco here?”
“No. I sent him out with a load of equipment to Walnut City. Should be back fairly soon. What are you doing out in this weather?”
“I was going to get him to go with me and pick out a wedding dress.”
Will came over and leaned against the counter and studied her thoughtfully, a slight smile on his face. “You excited about getting married, Alice?”
“Why, of course.” Her remark was perfunctory, and she had a calm look about her.
“You don’t look excited.”
“Well, do you want me to jump up on the counter and do a dance?”
Will laughed. “That would liven things up. Customers would like it, I’m sure.”
Alice turned to smile, then said, “Well, I guess I’ll have to go alone.”
“James is here. He can handle the place for a while. I’d like to go with you.”
“Shopping?” Alice looked surprised. “Not many men would want to help a woman go look for a dress. Most men, I understand, hate shopping.”
“Oh, not me,” Will said cheerfully. “I like shopping with pretty women. Why, I shopped with my mother all the time.”
“Will, why is it I have trouble believing you when you make statements like that?”
“Because I’m such a nice fellow. Let me get my coat, and we’ll go find you the prettiest wedding dress in Little Rock. Money is no object.”
“Oh, it is, too.”
“Nope. This will be on the store.” He slipped into a lightweight coat, picked up her umbrella, and said, “We might need this before we get back.”
They left the store and walked down the rain-soaked street.
“I love the smell that comes after a rain,” Will said. “It’s even better when you’re out in the country somewhere.”
“You aren’t a country boy, Will.”
“No, I wasn’t. I have at least been there after a rain. Which store we going to?”
“We’ll go to Maddox’s. He has some nice things.”
The two made their way down the main street of Little Rock, which was less crowded than usual, for the rain had kept people in.
When they passed by one of the saloons, Alice glanced in and saw the men playing poker around a table. “You never seem to have any fun,” Alice said. “Don’t you ever go out and play cards or something?”
“I’m a terrible poker player. Terrible gambler for that matter. I always lose more than I win. Cheaper to stay out of it.”
“I’m a pretty good poker player.”
Will glanced at her with surprise. He turned his head to one side and asked, “Where in the world did you learn to play poker?”
“I had an uncle who was an inveterate gambler. I must not have been over twelve years old, and he taught me how to play.” She laughed. “He was surprised when I beat him. We were just playing for matches, and he told me I was a bad girl to beat her old uncle.”
“He sounds like a pretty nice uncle.”
“He was the only one I had. He used to take me places. His name was Luke Carmody.” She did not speak for a while, and then she said, “When he died, I cried for a week it seemed like. I was closer to him than anybody.”
“What about your folks?”
“Oh, I had my mother. My father left sometime when I was very young, so it was just Mother and me and Uncle Luke. He was her only brother, or at least the only one she knew about.”
They reached Maddox’s store, turned, and went inside.
Alice at once went to the section set apart for women’s dresses and began pulling them off of a table and holding them up. She held one up that was obviously too large. It had large figures on it and was fairly hideous.
“Oh, that’ll be the one.” Will grinned. “You’ll get fat enough to fit into it one of these days. You won’t have to buy any more dresses.”
“It’s awful!” Alice put it back and began going through other dresses. She was amused by Will, who did not seem at all embarrassed by the looks he got.
The owner, Mr. Maddox, came over and said, “Well, good afternoon, folks. Some storm we had.”
“We needed the rain. We got plenty of it,” Will said.
“What do you need today, Miss Alice?”
“Going to buy a new dress. A wedding dress.”
“Oh, that’ll be back here if we have any that’ll fit you. If we don’t, Minnie Stover could make you one. She’s right good with a needle.”
They moved back to where Maddox had indicated the dresses might be, and for the next half hour they looked at different dresses. Finally they got one that Alice remarked about slowly, “I rather like this one.”
“Well, go try it on. Let’s see what it looks like.”
“You don’t have to wait around, Will.”
“I wouldn’t miss it. Go on now. Let’s see what you’re going to look like on your wedding day.”
Alice moved into the room that was set apart for women to try on clothes and wondered where the men tried theirs on. For the most part, the men of Little Rock wore rough clothes. It was still a frontier town, more or less. She slipped out of her dress, into the new one, fastened it, and then stepped outside. There was a full-length mirror. She came in front of it and examined herself critically. “What do you think?”
“It doesn’t do you justice. It’s not gaudy enough. You need to get something that will knock everybody’s eyes out when you walk down the aisle of that church. I wonder if they have any bright red dresses.”
Alice laughed. “You fool! Brides don’t wear red dresses.”
“Well, you can set it in motion.”
He kept teasing her, and finally she gave up and said, “I guess it will have to be Minnie Stover.”
“Well, let’s go down and tell her we’ve got to have it in a hurry.”
They left Maddox’s and walked down Third Street, where they turned left and found Minnie Stover’s shop.
There was a dress in the window that caught Alice’s eye. “Now that’s the dress I like.”
“Not bad. About your size, too.”
“I wonder how much it is.”
“Don’t worry about it. You only get married once. The store has made a better profit than usual this month. We’ll get the dress if it fits.”
The dress did fit except for a few minor alterations. Minnie Stover, a short, round woman with bright, merry blue eyes said cheerfully, “Might have been made for you, Miss Alice. I’ll have it ready for you tomorrow.”
“Oh, the wedding won’t be for a week.”
“Well, you can pick it up tomorrow anyway.”
The two left the store, and Alice noticed that Will had fallen silent. “What’s the matter? Cat got your tongue?”
“No, I was just thinking. You ever heard that old saying about brides? You need something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue?”
“Yes, I’ve heard that.”
“Well, I want you to have this to wear.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a box. “I’ve been carrying it with me since yesterday. I found it in my things.”
She opened the box and saw a beautiful pearl necklace. “Why, this is wonderful, Will!”
“It belongs to my grandmother. Very old.”
Alice looked up and saw that there was a sadness in his face that he could not hide. “You should keep this for the woman you marry.”
Will Barton seldom showed his emotions, but there was some sort of grief in him. “I doubt if that will ever happen.”
They continued on their way, and Alice glanced at Will several times. When they reached the store and went inside, she said, “Tell me what’s the matter.”
“I can’t hide my feelings very well. I guess that’s the reason I’m not a good poker player.”
“What’s wrong, Will?”
“I guess I feel le
ft out somehow.”
“Left out of what?”
“I don’t know. I had a partner. Now I don’t.”
“Why, you’ll still have Waco.”
“No, I won’t. You’ll have him, Alice.” Will turned, picked up her hand, held it, and looked at it for a moment. “You have beautiful hands.” Then he said with a note of gloom, “The way marriage is, at least as I understand it, one man, one woman. They make some sort of group.”
“Don’t feel that way.” Her hand tightened on his. When he looked at her, she reached up and put her hand on his cheek. “Don’t be sad, Will. You know we both love you.”
Will Barton stiffened and seemed to find something in her words that he needed to hear. “That’s good to know,” he said softly. “Now we’ll have to find you something blue and something new.”
Waco sat in the parlor of Reverend James Stoneman’s house next door to the framed Methodist church. Stoneman was a middle-aged man with iron-gray hair and smooth cheeks. He wore a black suit, the typical uniform for a Methodist pastor of the day, and he had been speaking for some time about the general arrangements for the wedding. Finally he said, “I wish Alice were here.”
“Why is that, Pastor?”
“Well, I like to have meetings with the bride and groom together before the wedding.”
“Meeting for what?”
Stoneman leaned back and ran his hand over his gray hair. “I want to warn ’em that things won’t be easy. Usually when a couple come in and want to get married, they have stars in their eyes. They see nothing but a long road filled with only good things and joyous days passing as they grow older.”
His words troubled Waco, who leaned forward in his chair and asked, “Isn’t it like that?”
“Well, no. There are difficulties.”
“I don’t think Alice and I will ever have any.”
Stoneman suddenly laughed. He had perfect teeth, and they showed against his tanned complexion. “Even Adam and Eve had problems. Every couple I know has some.”
“You and your wife, you have problems?”
The question seemed to disturb James Stoneman. He half turned away and looked out the window. “The birds have been building a nest out there,” he commented. “You see it? I’ve told my wife to leave it there. The mother bird comes every day and sits on those eggs. I’m looking forward to the time when she brings their supper to them.”
The Western Justice Trilogy Page 27