One of the councilmen leaned forward and propped his elbows on the table. “There’s been some talk, Sam. I guess you know about it.”
A flush of dark anger stained Sam’s throat. “I didn’t have anything to do with those fires.”
“Nobody’s saying you did. So far, all anyone’s saying is that it’s a strange coincidence that your last two projects burned to the ground.”
“You’re damned right it’s a coincidence,” Sam said in a low, hard voice. “What else could it be?”
“Well, no one’s making any accusations, mind, but the only things those two fires have in common is that they were set deliberately, they were set before the building was completed, and you were the foreman on both jobs.”
Striving to remain calm, Sam stared at the men around the table. “The first project was the union hall.” He leaned forward, angry that he felt a need to defend himself. “There’s no lack of anti-union sentiment around here.” Last year had seen deadly riots between union and non-union supporters. “Maybe someone wanted to send an anti-union message.”
“Wouldn’t surprise anybody. There’s still a lot of friction and hard feelings.”
“The second project was the Whittier house. Eighty percent of the people in this county hate Homer Whittier, including several seated at this table.” Homer Whittier had made a fortune cheating careless men out of their share of producing mines. Whittier operated within the gray areas of the law and boasted that he’d never done anything illegal. The loopholes he found allowed him to steal with the weight of the law behind him. “I’d say there are a couple hundred people who hate Whittier enough to burn down his new house.”
“What you’re suggesting is possible. I’m not arguing, Sam. I’ll even go you one better by saying that no one believes you started the fires. Why would you? So don’t go thinking that folks blame you.”
Sam swore. “Then what’s the problem here?”
“The problem is you being the foreman on both jobs. Now me and the police chief and everybody else thinks this is just coincidence.” The mayor gave Sam a thoughtful look. “But if another of your projects burns, it’s no longer coincidence. You follow?”
Sam dropped back in his chair. “So you don’t believe I started the fires, but I might have, and you’re waiting to see if I’m stupid enough to burn down another project. Is that what you’re saying?”
“I’m saying if another of your projects burns, then we need to look harder at you. Maybe someone is sending you a message, Sam. On the face of it that sounds ridiculous, but who knows?”
Sam’s eyes narrowed. “We’ve covered this subject. The fires don’t have anything to do with a new school. The question here is, will you give me the land to build a school or won’t you?”
By some silent process that Sam didn’t see even though he was watching, the men at the table reached a consensus without speaking a word. Glances were exchanged, throats were cleared, cigars lit or extinguished.
At the end of the fidgeting the mayor said, “For the time being, let’s leave the question open. We’ll talk again after you finish building Reverend Dryfus’s house.”
Sam stared in anger and disbelief. “You’ll wait and see if someone torches the reverend’s house?”
Clem waved a fat cigar. “You got to admit, Sam. Nobody’s mad at the reverend. There’s no reason in the world to burn down his new house.”
“So if the place goes up, then you figure the culprit is me.” Stiff with insult, he flattened his hands on the table and started to rise.
“Don’t be an ass, Sam. Sit down. How many times do you have to hear this? Nobody believes you’re burning down your buildings. All’s we’re saying is you might be the target. That’s one reason on a long list of possible causes.”
“We’re drying-in the Dryfus place today,” Sam snapped. “The day the reverend and his wife move into the house, I’m coming back to the council and I expect you to give me the land for a new school.”
“Would you be willing to let someone else be the builder if it meant the school could get started sooner?” The mayor watched Sam’s reaction with a raised eyebrow.
The new school was Sam’s idea; he wanted to build it for his daughters, and he said so. “There’s no rush. School’s almost over for this session. We have until fall to build the new one.” He was going to build it, no one else. The mayor nodded.
Throughout the remainder of the day, Sam considered what materials he’d need for the school and how much of everything and what kind of roofing he wanted and where he might buy a potbellied stove cheap. They’d need desks and a chalkboard.
When the noon whistle blew, he remained up on the Dryfus roof to eat his lunch. Angie had packed him a glass jar filled with the beef stew and noodles and gravy that he’d missed last night. The meal wouldn’t be hot now, but he anticipated it would be delicious. He also had bread and a generous pat of butter wrapped in a scrap of oilcloth. The apple must have come from the root cellar and then from the bottom of the basket. But the skin wasn’t wrinkled too badly, and it still tasted sweet when he bit into it.
While he sat in the sunlight on Reverend Dryfus’s half-shingled roof eating his lunch, Sam gazed out at the low hills rolling down the valley. Willow Creek was growing by leaps and bounds, spreading down and out over ground that cattle had recently grazed.
His gaze settled on two blackened ruins, not far from each other. The burned-out Union Hall, and down three blocks and over two blocks, the charred remains of the Whittier house.
There was no doubt about the destruction being deliberate. The arsonist hadn’t bothered to make the fires appear accidental or a result of natural causes.
As Sam had told the mayor and the councilmen, there were reasons why the new Union Hall and the Whittier mansion might have been torched. His guesses could be correct. Certainly it was possible.
But Sam’s gut said otherwise. Frowning, he sent his apple core sailing off the roof toward the scrap heap.
Following the noon break he assembled his crew. “From now until the reverend and his missus move in, I want a watchman on duty every night. I’ll pay time and half.” The extra pay would come out of his pocket. “Any volunteers?” The added expense made him inwardly cringe. But another fire could destroy his livelihood.
If the mayor and the sheriff were correct that Sam might be the reason for the fires and if the Dryfus place burned, then he’d be in real trouble, because he agreed that three fires exceeded coincidence.
Worse, if the fires were not coincidence then he had a gut feeling that he might know who was behind them and why. If he was right, then he also understood the message.
Chapter 5
By Saturday Angie was grateful that Sam’s house wasn’t any larger, and she had developed a new appreciation for Mrs. Dom, who had cleaned the Bertoli residence for so many years. After Sam and the girls left in the morning, she allowed herself another cup of coffee, often with Molly Johnson, then she launched herself into an exhausting day of dusting, polishing, washing, sweeping, scrubbing, shopping for provisions, and cooking.
Everything revolved around cooking. When Angie wasn’t actually cooking, she was preparing to cook, cleaning up after cooking, or thinking about what to cook next. All her other tasks were sandwiched between the unrelenting demands of cooking.
This morning, while her bread loaves were rising, she had rushed up to the grocer on Bennet Street and bought carrots and potatoes since there weren’t any more vegetables in the root cellar. The items cost the Earth, which irritated her since she used her own money to buy them.
From there, she hurried to the butcher shop, where she purchased two chickens, one for tonight and one for Sunday dinner. Which she also paid for with her own money.
When she arrived back at the house, the iceman was at the door with the weekly block of ice and demanding payment on delivery. There went another fifty cents.
After she put away her hat and gloves, she punched down the dough for rolls an
d let the dough rest while she shook out the floor rugs. Then she shaped the dough and covered the balls with a towel for the second rise.
Next she sat outside on the kitchen stoop and plucked the feathers off the chickens, saving the feathers in an old pillowcase. She hated plucking feathers, but it was pleasant to sit in the thin mountain sunshine, listening to the traffic spinning along Bennet Street and the dynamite blasts in the hills, which had taken a little getting used to.
Many of the mines had coal-fueled pumps to keep water out of the shafts. Plumes of smoke curled from the stacks, sulfurous and dark, drifting south along the mountain ridges. The ore trains also added smoke to the valley haze, as well as contributing the noise of whistles and squealing wheels. Dust hung above the streets dividing rows of houses and shacks and tents.
Loud and boisterous and energetic, Willow Creek was nothing like Angie’s old neighborhood in Chicago. She could remember summer days so quiet and still that she would believe she was alone in the world. That could never happen here. The mines operated twenty-four hours a day and so did the town. A miner coming off shift at midnight could buy a meal at a chophouse or a restaurant or, if he stopped by the bathhouse first, he could dine at one of the hotels. He could drop by a saloon for a drink and a game of poker, or he could find a polka at the dance halls. Whatever a man’s vice, he could find it in Willow Creek at any hour of the day or night.
This thought made her wonder where Sam went and what he did every evening. Usually he didn’t come home until well after dark. Last night the girls had been in bed asleep by the time he quietly sneaked into the kitchen to see if Angie had left him any supper on the stove. She hadn’t.
Tonight, however, she planned to wait up for him. They needed to talk, and she doubted the encounter would be pleasant for either of them.
While she baked bread, she cut up the chicken and reviewed the items she needed to discuss with Sam. And it occurred to her that she had thought more about Sam in the last five days than she’d thought about him in ten years.
Being aware of him began even before breakfast when Sam came into the kitchen to wash up and shave. From the first day, the routine of shaving had fascinated Angie. First he put a pot of water on the stove. Then he took the mirror off the wall and propped it over the sink. Next he washed his face and groped for the towel he had forgotten to lay out.
After Angie had observed the procedure a couple of times, she started heating the water and laying out a towel as soon as she was up and dressed. It was a mistake, of course. Once a woman did a chore, the chore became hers forever after. Now Sam expected hot water and a towel. He did thank her, but even so.
After washing, he stropped his razor. Years of habit made his movements so easy and efficient that he hardly paid attention to what he was doing. Finally he soaped his face and leaned to the mirror, pulling his skin tight before he drew the razor across his jaw. When he finished shaving, he combed his hair and tied it at his neck where it fell naturally into a long curl.
Watching Sam perform his morning toilette almost seemed an invasion of privacy. Maybe that’s why observing gave Angie a delicious forbidden thrill. She had never before watched a man shave or comb his hair. Hadn’t considered that such a simple everyday act might create an odd sense of intimacy.
She wondered if Sam had felt something similar that first morning when she’d rushed into the kitchen dressed in her wrapper with her night braid hanging down her back. For her the incident had been embarrassing and excruciatingly uncomfortable. But what had it been for him? A moment of intimacy? A reminder of Laura?
She didn’t like thinking about Laura, but it was hard not to. This was Laura’s house. Laura’s curtains hung at the windows. Her tablecloth covered the table. Laura had either purchased or made the braided rugs; she’d chosen the chairs and side table in the parlor half of the big room. The dishes and utensils were Laura’s. Angie slept in Laura’s bed, cooked on Laura’s stove, fed Laura’s children, and spent many hours every day being angry at the man Laura had loved.
And being intrigued by him as well. Sam Holland was a handsome man whom Angie had once dreamed about and longed for. When she looked at his mouth, she remembered all the girlhood hours she had spent, dreamily speculating about kissing him. To her shock, she’d wondered about that recently as well.
Irritated by this unwanted line of thought, Angie put the pieces of chicken into a hot skillet, then went into the bedroom and brushed the spring suit she planned to wear to church tomorrow. She had time to change the ribbon on her hat before the chicken finished cooking. Before she peeled potatoes, she finished unpacking the last of her trunks.
Inside, carefully wrapped and padded, she found her mother’s favorite teacup. For a moment Angie sat on the side of the bed, holding the cup and saucer and remembering her mother. In the afternoons, her mother had composed letters at her writing desk with this cup and a teapot beside her. One of Angie’s last memories was of her mother sitting in bed, gazing into the teacup as if she glimpsed eternity there.
Angie turned the teacup between her fingers, examining the tiny rosebuds painted on the china. The roses were as delicate and serene as her mother had been. Angie hadn’t understood her mother’s serenity, and she supposed her mother hadn’t understood the emotional outbursts of her husband and daughter. Angie hadn’t thought like her mother or looked like her. She didn’t have her mother’s stillness or grace, and she wasn’t delicate. She must have disappointed her mother in many ways.
“Oh, Mama. I miss you. There are so many things I wish we could have talked about.”
Sighing, Angie turned the cup between her fingers.
When she had packed for this trip, she hadn’t imagined she would stay in Willow Creek longer than overnight. She had pictured herself settled in a small house waiting for the divorce to be final. She had brought the teacup as a piece of home and history to comfort her when the days were lonely and the wait seemed long. She had wanted the teacup as a reminder of family and of her mother.
What on earth would Emily Bertoli have thought if she’d seen where Angie was living now, still waiting for her life to begin?
Deciding she needed something to see and touch that had not belonged to Laura, Angie placed the cup and saucer on the windowsill above the sink where she would see them every time she washed dishes or prepared a meal. The cup and saucer would remind her that this situation was temporary. Eventually she’d go home again, this time as a free woman.
The rest of the day passed in a blur of cooking and chores and cooking and cleaning and cooking and thinking about what she would say to Sam when he finally came home.
But first there was supper with the girls. As usual they rolled their eyes and turned sullen when they ran inside and found her waiting instead of Sam.
Angie had warmed wash water for them and watched diligently as they scrubbed their faces and hands, then brushed dust off their dresses before they sat down to supper.
“What did you do all day?” She hadn’t seen them since lunch and that made her uneasy. “I thought we agreed that you would tell me where you were.”
“We got busy,” Lucy said. Her eyes brightened when she saw the fried chicken, but heaven forbid that she should admit she was pleased.
“You didn’t go to Myers Street, did you?”
“No,” Daisy said solemnly. “Papa told us not to.”
Angie passed the mashed potatoes. “So where were you?”
Closing her eyes, Lucy held the bowl of mashed potatoes under her chin and let the steam bathe her face. Angie had no idea why she would do such a thing. “We played kickball with the Mueller children for a while, then we went to the site and watched Papa work.” She considered Angie through a sweep of pale lashes. “I want to be a carpenter when I grow up.”
Daisy’s mouth rounded in surprise. “I thought you wanted to be like Miss Lily.”
“I want to look like Miss Lily when I’m not being a carpenter.”
“Girls can’t be ca
rpenters.” Daisy looked to Angie for confirmation.
“Well, I’ve never heard of a female building a house,” Angie said slowly, “but there’s no reason why a woman can’t hit a nail with a hammer. I’ve done that myself.”
“Was Papa a builder back when you knew him?” Lucy asked.
Angie touched her napkin to her lips and nodded. “My father hired your papa and his father to build new cabinets for our kitchen. That’s how I met your father.”
The first time she’d seen Sam, she had stopped abruptly as if she’d run into an invisible wall. She’d never seen a man as handsome or as natural. He took her breath away and made her heart race even before he looked at her and before she heard his voice. He stood in the backyard beneath the big elm measuring a length of wood balanced across two sawhorses. His expression was intent and focused, his hands sure and quick with the yardstick.
The young men of Angie’s acquaintance, brothers or cousins of friends, wore stiff-looking suits and polished shoes and slicked their hair with pomade. She knew boys didn’t dress as formally at home, but she didn’t often see them in their private casual mode. It was strange to observe a man without a jacket and with his shirtsleeves rolled up. She could see the hair on Sam’s arms, which seemed shockingly scandalous and made her feel warm and strange inside.
Eventually he’d looked up and smiled, and her heart stopped. Dark hair and dark mustache. Blue eyes. Sun bronzed skin on his hands and face and throat.
At age sixteen, she had believed in heaven and happy endings and love at first sight. And she had seen all three in Sam Holland that first day, that first minute.
“Angie?” Daisy tugged at her sleeve.
“What?”
“You have a funny look on your face.”
“I was just . . .” She looked around, her gaze settled on the three pots of water heating on the stove. “I was wondering where you keep the bathtub. It’s Saturday night. Bath night.”
The Bride of Willow Creek Page 7