by Delynn Royer
Emily was surprised by the undercurrent of jealousy in her sister’s words. “I never said that. I never said that at all.”
Karen closed her eyes and struggled to rein in her emotions. “I’m sorry. But the paper folded. There was no way to avoid the inevitable.”
“Inevitable? I refuse to believe that.”
Karen opened her eyes, all signs of impending tears now vanished. “The paper was losing money. Very soon, we would have been penniless. If it weren’t for Henry’s job at the mill—”
“That’s preposterous. How could he have gone bankrupt? The paper was gaining more support all the time. By the time war broke out, people were eager for the Republican viewpoint. Subscriptions were up. Especially outside the city.”
Karen stuffed her handkerchief back into her handbag. “It wasn’t that. It was the advertising.”
“Advertising!” Emily pointed a triumphant finger at her sister. “You mean the ads were being dropped?”
“Yes.”
“And who do you think was behind that?”
Karen pointed a finger back at her. “Oh, no, you don’t. We already went through this with Papa. Him and his crazy conspiracy theories. To hear him tell it, Malcolm Davenport was solely responsible for everything from the breakup of the Union to last year’s bad tobacco crop.”
“Who else would benefit from pulling advertising from the Gazette?”
“No one, but that doesn’t make it so, Em.”
“Fiddlesticks. Davenport’s got his fingers stuck into dozens of pies. Don’t you think that just a word from him would—”
“But he wasn’t worried about the Gazette,” Karen argued. “It was just a little paper, certainly no competition for the Herald.”
“Not yet, maybe, but down the road it would have been.”
Karen tossed both hands up. “I surrender. Think what you want. You’re impossible to reason with.”
Emily wrinkled her nose and turned her back to run a finger over the empty bed of a job press. “What is Mama planning to do with the equipment?”
“Sell it, of course.”
“Sell it? But—”
“We need the money. Papa didn’t leave her a rich widow.”
Emily hadn’t thought about the financial straits her mother might be in now that her father was gone. “Are there any savings?”
“Some, but not a lot. Especially once the debts are paid. He wasn’t much of a businessman, Em.”
That was true. Nathaniel had always cared more about his principles than his profits. It was one of the traits Emily had always admired most. It was what had set him apart from men like Malcolm Davenport. Now, though, it seemed that Nathaniel’s dedication to principle over the almighty dollar had left his widow with money problems. “I didn’t consider that,” Emily admitted. “How will she get by after the savings are gone?”
“She has the house, and now that Papa’s gone, it probably makes sense for Henry and me to stay on instead of finding a home of our own like we planned. His job at the mill should be enough to support all of us, but the lease on this shop expires at the end of next month. We’ve either got to move the stock and equipment out of here or sell it. There’s no place to store it and no reason to try. What else do you propose we do?”
“Oh, drat.” Emily moved to one of the desks and sank into a chair. “Things are a lot worse than I realized.”
“We’ll get by.”
Emily sat forlornly for a moment before brightening. “Wait a minute.”
No doubt Karen recognized her sister’s tone from past experience. “Oh, no. Don’t even start with one of your—”
Emily jumped to her feet. “What if we pick up where Papa left off? Why, we have everything we need and—”
“No, no, no, no.” Karen shook her head vehemently.
“What’s the matter?”
“What makes you think we could make a profit?”
“Papa always made a profit in the jobbing department. Is Jason Willoughby still around? And Billy O’Leary?”
Before Karen could reply, Emily plowed ahead. “You give me two good men like Jason and Billy, and I guarantee I could get this place up and running again. We’d be making a profit in no time.”
“Oh, Em, it’ll never work.”
“Why?” Emily challenged her, confounded and annoyed that all the rest of the world seemed to see were storm clouds when it was so obvious to her that the sun was close behind.
“For one thing, who’s going to bring their business to a print shop run by a woman?” Karen posed practically.
“But I just know I could run this place!”
“I don’t doubt it, but how would you convince the rest of the business community of that?”
“It might take some time to build the business back up to what it used to be, but…” Despite herself, Emily began to see the logic in Karen’s argument.
“And how would you pay Jason and Billy in the meantime? They have families to support.”
“Well, I’m not sure just yet, but—”
Karen drove home her final point in a gentler tone of voice. “And what happens to the business if you get married and have children?”
Emily turned away and folded her arms tight. That question, although tactfully posed, was like a stake to the heart. “Not much chance of that. Not around here. Who would have me?”
Karen’s reply was soft but firm. “Any man would be lucky to have you.”
“Spoken like the truly good-hearted sister of a fallen woman.”
“Don’t say things like that.”
“People are talking again. I can see it in their faces.”
“I doubt that, and even if they are, it’ll pass.”
“I’m sure it will. As soon as I go back to Baltimore.”
Karen approached from behind and rested a hand on her shoulder. “I know Mama would love for you to stay, and so would I. Dorcas deserves to know her aunt Emily, but…”
“But?”
“If you decide to stay, you know it won’t be easy. Given a choice, people will always believe the worst. It’s human nature.”
“Now you sound like Papa.”
“Thank you.”
Emily forced a deep breath, deliberately composing herself before she turned back to face her sister. She tried to smile. “You’re welcome.”
Karen didn’t smile back. “And then there’s the other thing.”
“What other thing?”
“He’s engaged to her, you know.”
Another stake to the heart. Emily knew, of course, to whom her sister was referring.
At the funeral, as she had sat so stoically in that front pew, she’d wanted, more than anything, to be able to turn to the man she knew sat six pews behind her. She wanted to lose herself in Ross Gallagher’s strong, competent arms. She wanted to cry on his shoulder, but that was impossible.
Ross was present in the church, barely ten feet from where she sat, but the emotional distance between them could never be forded. They weren’t children anymore, or even tentative adolescents, and their friendship was a thing of the past. He was a man, and he was sitting next to the woman who would soon be his wife. Johanna.
When Emily finally brought herself to reply to her sister’s statement, she feigned casual disinterest. “Who is engaged to whom?”
Karen gave her a stern look. “Ross is engaged to Johanna Davenport.”
“Johanna Butler, you mean,” Emily corrected. Karen raised a skeptical eyebrow, but Emily turned her back to stroll around the shop. “Anyway, I’m happy for him.”
“Oh, Emily.” Karen’s tone was reproachful.
Emily made a face as she ran a finger over the dusty surface of a worktable. “Well, he always wanted to marry into that stinking rich family of hers. I’m happy he’s finally going to get his wish.”
“What’s that I hear? Jealousy?”
“Certainly not. It’s just that I never quite understood how easy it was for him to trade loyalties.�
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“Loyalties? You can’t mean when he left his old job here to go work for the Herald? That was years ago.”
“Now that he’s finally gotten himself engaged to Lady Johanna, I suppose he’s right in line to become editor of the Herald.”
“I don’t doubt it. After those articles he wrote, he probably deserves it.”
Emily looked around at Karen. “What articles?”
“He wrote a series on his experiences as a prisoner of war. He spent some time at Andersonville.”
“Andersonville?” Emily repeated softly. “I didn’t know. Everything I’ve heard about that place—”
“Yes. It must have been horrible. After he came back and wrote the articles, he showed them to Papa. The Gazette was no longer in business, but Papa wrote a letter to Mr. Greeley in New York and urged Ross to submit them. Mr. Greeley was impressed enough to run the whole series in the Tribune. After that, Malcolm snapped Ross up and put him on staff.”
Emily frowned. “You mean, it’s true that Ross didn’t go to Davenport for the job? Davenport went to him?”
“That’s the way I heard it. Now I understand he’s working on a novel.”
“A novel?” Emily flashed a smile despite herself. “That’s wonderful. I always knew he could do it.”
Karen gave her a sardonic look. “I’ll just bet you did.”
Emily almost retorted, then stopped herself. What was the point in trying to pretend with Karen? “All I meant was, he’s a good writer.”
“Mmm.” Karen also looked as if she were about to say something more, but then changed her mind. She broached a new subject. “What do you say we get going to market?”
Emily turned away. “Do you think you could wait for me? I’ll be out in a minute.”
“You have a lot of memories to sift through, don’t you?”
“Something like that.”
“Fine. I need to get something at the dry goods store. I’ll meet you there, but don’t be long.”
After the door closed behind her sister, Emily released a long sigh. It was much too warm and stuffy in here from being closed up for the past few weeks, but she could still detect a trace of those wonderful old smells underneath. Ink, turpentine, pipe tobacco. Memories. Of this place, Papa, and of so many other things.
*
August 1855
“It’s beautiful, Em. Exactly how I imagined that scene when I wrote it.”
Emily beamed, pleased at Ross’s compliment.
He hunkered down next to her on their picnic blanket by the creek, examining her sketch with an appreciative eye. “The bear looks so big next to poor little Matthew. And so ferocious. He doesn’t know if he can really shoot that old grizzly.” Ross looked up with a grin. “It’s perfect.”
Emily gave him a sly smile. “Flawless.”
Ross raised an eyebrow, taking up her challenge. “Peerless, in fact.”
“Impeccable.”
“Supreme.”
Emily’s brain reached and stumbled. Best? No, any two-year-old knew that. “Uh, unequaled.”
Ross’s grin widened. He was sensing victory. “Consummate.”
Good one, Emily thought grudgingly. “Matchless.”
“Superlative.”
Superlative? Jiminy pats. She’d have to look that one up when she got to the print shop. “Um ...”
“Sublime,” he said when she paused too long.
Emily wrinkled her nose. Who could beat a word like that? Mr. Ralph Waldo Emerson, maybe. She let out a bothered little sigh—her way of conceding defeat—before taking the sketchbook from him. “So, now that I’ve done such sublime work, does that mean you’re finally going to let me read the end of the story? Does Matthew shoot the bear or not?”
Ross ran a hand through his tawny brown hair, clearing a stray lock from his forehead. It had lightened considerably over the summer. Streaks of gold ran wild all through it. “Next Saturday,” he said, rising to his feet. “I’ll let you read the end next Saturday.”
Emily tore her gaze from his handsome face to look down at the sketchbook on her lap. Next Saturday. It would be their last Saturday before school started again. The summer was rapidly coming to an end.
“I don’t know if I can wait that long,” she said. “What if it rains and we can’t meet, and...”
It wasn’t really the possibility of waiting two weeks to find out the end of the story that bothered her, it was the approaching end of summer. She had never had a summer as wonderful as this one, and that was because she had never had a friend as wonderful as Ross.
He was two years older, and he was a boy, but somehow that didn’t matter. They thought the same thoughts, they shared the same dreams. Emily had other friends, friends that were girls, friends that she went to school with and played hopscotch with, but none of her other friendships had ever been like this. Secret and exciting.
She heard a sound—dip-dop-dop-dop!—and looked up to see Ross skipping rocks across the sparkling surface of the summer-shallow creek. He was tall and solid for a boy of thirteen and growing taller with each passing month. The sleeves of his homespun shirt—a shirt that had fit him perfectly in June—now barely reached his wrists. His denims were rolled up to his shins, disguising the fact that he was growing out of them, too.
As he stood before her, with the late morning sun behind him, Emily evaluated his barefooted, broad-shouldered frame with the keen eye of a budding young artist. Her fingers itched to capture him on paper. Just like he was now. She wanted to trap this moment forever.
Tired of skipping rocks, Ross returned to her side and dropped to his haunches. “School starts soon,” he said, catching her gaze and holding it. “We’ll be in the same schoolroom this year.”
Emily didn’t reply. Neither did she look away. What he said was true. Emily was moving to the upper level classroom. Ross was in his last year there before moving on to the boys’ high school. For one year, they would share a teacher and a classroom.
“Between school and the shop, we’ll be seeing a lot more of each other.” He narrowed his eyes, trying to ascertain if she followed his line of reasoning.
Emily nodded. “I know what you’re trying to say.”
“You do?”
“We can’t let anyone know.”
Ross smiled and let out a heavy sigh of relief. “You do know what I’m talking about.”
“No one would understand. They’d think—”
“Precisely. That’s why we have to act as if—”
“We barely know each other.”
“Or even as if we can barely stand each other, because—”
“The kids would never leave us alone about it,” Emily finished.
“That’s right.” Ross cleared a stray lock from his forehead and gazed absently at the slow-moving creek. For a few minutes there was no sound, no sound but the trickle of creek water passing over rocks and the soft flutter of summer breezes stirring the oak branches overhead. When Ross looked back at her, his expression was sober. “We’ve got a secret to keep, and there’s only one way I know to seal it forever.”
Emily’s eyes widened at the grim look on his face. “What?”
“We’ve got to seal it in blood.”
“B-blood? How do we do that?”
“It has to do with an old Indian ritual of becoming blood brothers. One blood brother can never betray the other.”
“Indian ritual?” Emily was doubtful. Was Ross pulling her leg? “Can’t we just swear on a Bible?”
“Not good enough.”
“What’s this old Indian ritual about?”
Ross didn’t answer right away. Emily watched curiously as he rose to his feet and moved to the edge of the creek. Soon, he bent and pulled something from the mud. After swishing it around in the creek water, he held it up like a prize. “This will do.”
As he approached, Emily squinted at the sliver of glass that glinted in the sun. Probably a shard from an old whiskey bottle. It looked wickedly sharp.
“What are you going to do?” she asked, trying to keep the apprehension out of her voice.
Ross sank to his haunches again, his dark eyes searching her face for fear. Emily scowled, knowing that if he detected any misgivings, he would think her a weak-kneed female.
Ross waved the sliver of glass under her nose. “We’ve got to cut our palms. Just enough to make them bleed. Then we’ve got to mingle our blood.” Emily’s nose wrinkled before she had a chance to stop herself.
“Well, if you’re scared—”
“I’m not!” Emily denied quickly. “You go first.”
Ross opened his left palm and examined it. “Since you’re a girl, maybe we can just nick our fingers. How about that?”
“Fine. Just let me see you do it first.”
He gave her a wily smile, and Emily got the feeling that he was teasing her just because she was a girl, but before she could say anything, he had the sharp edge of the glass shard pressed against the fleshy pad of his forefinger. She let out a gasp when he slashed it, drawing a swell of bright red blood.
“Oh!” Her eyes crossed as he offered his wound directly in front of her nose for inspection.
“Quick. Give me your finger.”
Emily felt queasy. What was the matter with her? How many times had she tripped and fallen while running, skinning her knees or gashing her elbows? Plenty of times she’d bled. Plenty of times. Why did the prospect of it now suddenly seem so...ghastly?
“You aren’t going to turn all yellow on me, are you?”
Emily forced herself to meet his expectant gaze. There was no sound but the call of a wood thrush and a barely discernible plop from the creek, a small fish or frog. She thrust out her hand, forefinger extended. It trembled some, but there wasn’t much she could do to control that.
Ross took her hand in his. “This is it.”
Emily closed her eyes and held her breath. She felt pressure, then a sting. When she opened her eyes, she stared as one drop of blood billowed like a soap bubble on the tip of her finger.
Ross let go of her and threw down the glass shard. He held up his bloody finger. “Now, touch.”
Feeling almost hypnotized by the sight of her own blood, Emily touched the tip of her forefinger to his. It was wet and slippery, but Ross grasped her wrist, holding her steady. A thin stream of blood ran down both their fingers, but by then she didn’t mind so much anymore. She’d done it! And she hadn’t even flinched!