She laid down her wooden spoon and reached up to the bow as she turned to face him. “Where was it?”
Her tone was hushed like the evening, warm like the kitchen, and full of wonder.
His hands found his pockets on their own, a good thing. “At the edge of the corral where you took Blanca and her foal.”
Her look struck fire in his veins and he stepped back again, bumping into a chair at the small kitchen table. “I, uh, need to go wash up.” He caught his boot in the chair leg as he turned, nearly breaking his neck trying to get away. But the sound of his name as he reached the door stopped him cold, and he braced himself for a cutting remark about his clumsiness.
“Thank you.”
Not until cooler air hit his face did he remember that he didn’t have to go outside to wash up. Maggie’s indoor plumbing warred with his sense of habit. But what was done was done, and he trudged out to the trough beyond the ash heap that had been the buggy shed.
Emptiness met him across the pasture fence, the absence of animals an uneasy void. And in the stillness he stood listening, waiting for a sense of direction, a course to follow. A clue about the fires and life itself.
What was he going to do if there was an arsonist in town?
And what was he going to do about beautiful, unmarried Betsy Beaumont?
CHAPTER 18
What was she going to do about Garrett Wilson, and why did she think she needed to do anything?
Elizabeth set the skillet on the back of the stove, pulled the coffee pot to the front, and went to the parlor to check on Maggie. The poor woman was sound asleep, curled up on the settee like a kitten. Elizabeth found a shawl on the back of a chintz chair and draped it over her, then lit the wood already laid in the fireplace and set the screen in place.
She and Garrett would eat at the small table in the kitchen.
The suggestion of such intimacy fluttered through her insides, and she reached up to touch the ribbon. Again, he’d shown himself a kind and thoughtful man. If she wasn’t careful, she’d stumble and fall once more.
As she set the table, the differences between Garrett and Edward paraded through her mind. She’d noted only their similarity of broad shoulders and gallant gestures. But they differed on many levels, and if she were honest with herself, they were nothing alike at all. Further honesty demanded she admit she was attracted to Garrett Wilson. Not on a shallow, social level, but deeply in her innermost being.
Frustration added weight to her placement of the silverware, and she pushed honesty aside. She’d come home to start fresh, not have her head turned by another man.
She thought of the Eisners, displaced from their hotel room so soon after their arrival. How they worked together to establish their business and life. How a sense of oneness emanated from them. She had never felt she was one with Edward, though they’d shared a sometime bed and a piece of paper that said they were married. Regret boiled over again, and she shoved it aside with the honesty, clamping a lid on the both of them.
Garrett returned, looking sheepish, probably over his forgetfulness of Maggie’s running water in the kitchen or the washstand in his room. Yet he’d fairly run out the back door. Wet spots showed on his trousers where he’d dried his hands after washing at the trough pump. Without soap.
She resisted the urge to remind him, choosing instead to return kindness for his kindness. Again she touched the ribbon.
Keeping with the informal setting, she served their plates from the stove top and set them on the table along with the coffee pot. She then took her seat, carefully tucking her feet beneath her chair. They would share the small floor space with Garrett’s boots.
He ate heartily, apparently satisfied with her meager cooking skills. But little could go wrong with a skillet of potatoes, onions, and shredded beef.
“Biscuits would have been nice.” She hadn’t intended to voice the thought. It simply fell out of her mouth when she opened it for a bite.
Garrett nodded, full of food rather than complaint. His gray glance didn’t fail to make her heart skitter. “True, but this is good. Maggie’s missing out.”
Unaccustomed to compliments, Elizabeth hardly knew what to say. She deferred to their landlady. “She’s sleeping in the parlor, but I’ll save a plate for her in the warming oven.”
“The fire took the starch out of her.”
Observant.
“I think her loss was more than just the carriage house. The fire encroached upon memories that she holds dear. Memories of her life with Daniel.” Elizabeth paused to sooth her ire with a sip of hot coffee. “That someone would do such a thing, and without cause, is simply malicious.”
The muscle in Garrett’s jaw flexed, and he threw her another look. “So you don’t think it was an accident.”
No, she did not think it was an accident. “If you ask me, I find it highly unlikely that the building would just ignite, especially considering Maggie’s comment about Pearl and that bit of torn cloth she found.”
“All right, I’ll ask you.” His penetrating look set her back. “Any ideas on who that malicious someone might be?”
Trying to write off his demeanor as the suspicious nature of a lawman, she squirmed in her chair. He was making her uncomfortable. Completely unlike what she’d felt only moments before.
“I hardly know everyone in town. What makes you think I could point a finger?”
He frowned, laid his fork on his plate, and seemed to be gathering his thoughts before speaking. A wise move on his part.
She held in her agitation, waiting quietly for once.
When he raised his head, his eyes were dark.
“Call it gut. Call it intuition. Sometimes a person just knows.”
In spite of her innate tendency to not back down, she knew she never wanted to be on the suspect side of his questioning.
“Does Maggie have fire insurance through Rochester?” he asked.
So that was why he’d pinned her. Relief eased the tension building in her shoulders, and she relaxed her clenched hands. “I suspect she does not, but she hasn’t said one way or the other. And since it’s really none of my business, I never asked her.”
Garrett pushed his plate back, picked up his coffee, and planted his elbows on the table. Maggie would have been horrified.
“If I asked for your help, would you give it?”
The man was completely capable of stealing her breath with his outlandish remarks.
She took a moment, reminding her lungs to admit enough air so she didn’t tumble to the floor.
He considered her over the brim of his cup. She wouldn’t be surprised if he knew absolutely every pathetic detail of her life, though she’d told him very little.
“That depends.”
An inquisitor of the highest degree, he didn’t flinch or reveal his thoughts in any way. What happened to the man who’d tied a ribbon in her hair and stumbled over a chair on his dash out the door?
His gaze held steady. “How much do you trust me?”
Again, her lungs locked in place. At this rate, she’d be out cold in a matter of minutes. But before she could find an answer for herself as well as for him, he asked another question.
“How much do you trust your employer?”
The content of two letters in particular sharpened into focus, a letter she wouldn’t mind discussing with someone else. However… “What exactly are you asking me?”
“I’m asking you if you trust me more than him, and if you’ll tell me—provided you know—what he’s up to.”
Garrett Wilson didn’t beat around the bush.
~
Betsy’s wide-eyed stare betrayed her surprise, but Garrett couldn’t be sure what surprised her—his suspicion of Rochester or his request for her help. Unethical though it was.
He was asking her to divulge confidential information, an act—if she agreed to it—that would speak to her character. Just as Clay Ferguson was being measured by his actions, Betsy’s character would be r
evealed by hers. Trouble was, he wanted her help. At the same time, he didn’t want her to be the sort of person who would willingly cross ethical and possibly legal boundaries.
He should have kept his mouth shut.
“You’re asking me to spy.”
“Some people might look at it like that.”
“To betray my employer’s trust.”
Her character was rising to the surface, contributing to his internal battle.
Her jaw tightened and she looked down her nose at her plate, still full of a meal she’d hardly touched. “I’ll give it some thought.”
A non-answer either way. She was stalling, measuring her options. Exactly what a co-conspirator would do.
Or in spite of her reluctance to reveal personal background, she could be an honest woman with scruples.
He wished he knew which.
A mournful howl seeped through the door and windows, and he scooted his chair back. “Thanks for supper. I need to see to my dog.”
“Wait.”
Again, a single word from her made him stop.
“Maggie said she had something for Pearl, and I’m guessing it was this.” She handed him a small dish of bony raw meat. “I hope so. I’m not particularly fond of oxtail.”
He took the dish, but she didn’t let go.
Her eyes narrowed in warning.
“Not that I’m a fan, mind you. But the dog did alert Maggie. Just don’t tell it I had anything to do with this.”
“I’ll be sure to put in a good word for you.”
He closed the door on her fuming, enjoying their banter. It almost squashed the impulse to kiss her.
Cooler air cleared his mental muddle for the second time that evening, and he set the dish in front of Pearl and untied her. She wolfed a few meaty pieces, then bounded into the dark pasture, hopefully running off energy and tiring herself.
He needed to sleep.
Not that he would with a personal tug-o-war pulling him between desire and professional duty. His insides churned. Not a good sign for things to come.
As he sat on the bench to rehash the day, a faint glow fanned out low in the east. Apprehension peppered the pot that was his gut, and he whistled for Pearl. By the time she returned and plopped down near the bone dish, the upper lip of a full moon had risen off the horizon, silhouetting the pasture fence and a distant windmill. He let out a heavy sigh.
He’d deliberately mentioned intuition to Betsy, hoping to bait her with the word. His grandmother had insisted that a woman’s intuition was never wrong, and he was hard pressed to recall a single time when hers had been.
Something told him Betsy’s intuition was keenly developed. But until she gave him an answer about sharing information, he needed to look at the situation from the male perspective: logic.
Mom logic, George Booth called it, based a three-legged-stool approach. A deliberate breech of the law required motive, opportunity, and means—mom.
The hotel fire could have been an accident. Though Garrett doubted it, he couldn’t prove it wasn’t, so for now he’d allow the possibility. But a similar situation so soon after the first one, on the opposite end of town in a rarely used private building? That lessened the chances of a second accidental fire.
And what about the melted wax he’d found?
Who would profit from the two fires? Not Thatcher, unless he had a large insurance policy he was sure Rochester was good for. Means and opportunity the man certainly had. But his labor and concern over getting the place up and running again made Garrett doubt he had motive.
Who would profit from burning Maggie’s carriage house? Or was malice the motive, as Betsy suggested? Did Maggie have enemies?
For the second leg, opportunities abounded for both fires. The hotel housed people, and people were always up to something, whether being malicious or just plain stupid. Knocking over oil lamps. Falling asleep with a lit cigar.
The carriage house, on the other hand, was tucked away behind Maggie’s oversized house, out of sight and off the beaten path, yet easily accessed from any side without alerting the owner.
The third leg was the easiest to find. In both fires, fire itself was likely the means. An oil lamp and a candle. Both carried a flame. Both could be left behind with time to spare for escape.
Another phrase from his church-house upbringing chimed in: See how great a matter a little fire kindleth. For sure, it didn’t take much.
He picked up the bone dish and went back inside, leading Pearl through the kitchen and into the porch. “You’ll sleep in here tonight because Maggie likes you.”
The dog looked up at him with her possum grin and banged her tail against the bed frame.
“And you’ll sleep over there without making any noise. Clear?” He pointed to a braided rug in front of the door.
Dutifully, Pearl plopped down on it, eyeing his bedroll-covered tick.
“Don’t even think about it.”
She dropped her head to her paws and shot him a soulful look.
He stripped off his boots, trousers, and shirt and crawled between his soogans—minus the tarp and wishing he had it. He’d need it before winter.
In the light of day, he’d comb through the remains of the carriage house again and check with Thatcher about insurance on the hotel. If Rochester was trying to drum up business for fire insurance, Garrett intended to find out and find out fast.
And if Betsy Beaumont was part of Rochester’s operation, the quicker Garrett found that out, the better. Because from where things stood now, buildings weren’t all that was burning.
CHAPTER 19
Building up her courage for the new work week, Elizabeth walked into the dining room the next morning only to find the table bare. Concerned, she turned immediately down the hall to Maggie’s room on the ground floor and knocked gently.
No answer.
Knocking harder, she gripped the knob and put her ear against the door. Nothing. She edged it open and peeked inside.
Her landlady nestled childlike in the center of a four-poster bed, blankets mounded around her like colorful clouds.
“Maggie?” Elizabeth tip-toed to the bedside and leaned in to hear if the woman was breathing. What would she do if—
“Good morning, dear.”
She startled back at Maggie’s voice, nearly the victim of her own imagination. “Are you all right?”
“Just a bit weak, but I’ll be fine once I’m up and about. I’m afraid I overslept.” Maggie threw off the covers and pushed herself up, but then fell back against her pile of pillows. “Oh, dear.”
Elizabeth laid a hand against her forehead. “You’re feverish. I’m sending for the doctor.” But she had no clue whom to send other than herself.
“Oh, posh. I’m fit as a fiddle. Just a bit over-vexed by the fire, I suppose. I’ll be right as rain in no time.”
“But you’ll be resting in the meantime. I’ll get you some water and a cup of tea, and be right back. Promise me you’ll stay right there.”
Maggie waved a hand. “Don’t make such a fuss, Bets—Elizabeth.”
“You call me whatever you want, but promise me you won’t try to get up by yourself.”
A heavy sigh of resignation settled the little woman even deeper into her nested bedding.
In the kitchen, Elizabeth put on a kettle of water, set out teacups and saucers, and found a serving tray. Then she looked through the door glass into the porch where Garrett slept. He was gone and his bed smoothed over.
Rummaging through Maggie’s stores, she found chamomile tea and some English wafers—biscuits, the tin said—which she arranged on a small plate. The water soon boiled, and she poured two cups, arranged everything on the tray, and carried it to Maggie’s room.
According to the tall case clock in the hallway, she had two hours before Mr. Rochester expected her.
His office was not where she wanted to be this morning, especially now with Maggie ill and Garrett asking her to spy. The idea still rubbed her wro
ng, with the emphasis on wrong. But what if Anthony Rochester was somehow connected to the fires? Garrett seemed to think so.
“Betsy?”
Maggie had pushed herself up against her pillow mountain and was watching Elizabeth with a frown.
“Oh—yes.” She shook off her worry and set the tray on the edge of the bed with plenty of room to spare next to Maggie’s small frame.
“I see you’re ready for a cup of tea and wafers. Or biscuits. I’m not much of a baker, but I found these in your pantry.”
“How sweet of you, dear. But you mustn’t worry about me. I’m fit as a fiddle.”
Fit enough, Elizabeth noted, that her hand trembled as she lifted her tea cup.
“Have a cookie, Maggie. Or whatever they are. I’d be happy to fix something more substantial for you. Eggs perhaps?”
Maggie shook her head. “These ginger thins will do just fine.” She snapped one in half and dunked it in her tea.
Elizabeth giggled.
“This is my bedroom, so I’m permitted to indulge. Join me.”
Encouraged by Maggie’s lightheartedness, Elizabeth did just that and dunked a thin cookie in her tea.
Since manners—and Maggie—were momentarily set aside, she grasped the opportunity. “I’m so sorry about your barn, and terribly grateful that Lolly was in the pasture. You’re fortunate that the flames didn’t spread to the house.”
Maggie spooned a broken cookie out of her teacup. “Fortune had nothing to do with it. The good Lord was watching out for me like He always does. And this time, He used that ugly-as-sin dog of Garrett’s.”
Elizabeth choked back a snicker.
Maggie glanced up. “You don’t believe me, do you?”
“Oh, but I do. That dog is as ugly as you say.”
“Speaking of Pearl, did Garrett eat before he left this morning?” Maggie rubbed her forehead.
“He was gone when I checked. Pearl too. But I’m sure he won’t starve.”
Dunking a second cookie, she added, “I’m also sure that the insurance money should allow you to rebuild the carriage house or a small barn. Would you like me to check on it this morning when I see Mr. Rochester?”
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