The delegation came to a halt before Zac. Two women he didn't know flanked Sarah Thoragood. Bella stood in the back, so she wouldn't have to look him in the eye Zac guessed.
"Are you Mr. Zachary Taylor Randolph?" Mrs. Thoragood asked.
Zac winced at the name. Thankfully Dodie kept a straight face.
"I'm Zac Randolph. Did you ladies lose your way? Or did you forget to check your watches? We don't open for another two hours. But if you don't want people to know you're taking a flyer, Dodie can open a table early for you. Only you've got to promise you won't use any money you borrowed from the offering plate."
Zac thought Sarah Thoragood was going to explode.
"I'm not going to dignify those remarks by a reply," she said, even more pompously than Zac expected. "I've come on a matter utmost urgency. I only heard about it this morning, but it has upset me so I couldn't put it off a single day. All of us feel the same way."
The flanking ladies nodded their agreement. Bella remained in the back.
"What's so urgent?" Zac asked. "Has the Devil come to town? I would have thought he'd have stopped in here before going to the church."
"Mr. Randolph!" Mrs. Thoragood thundered in a style she must have copied from her husband. "Do you dare make light of this serious issue?"
"I don't know what the issue is. I'm just making light for the fun of it."
He could tell Dodie was trying not to laugh, but she was also shaking her head. He'd gone far enough. It would only be harder on Lily if he kept this up.
"It has come to my attention that Lily Sterling is at present living in your saloon."
"True," Zac said moving to the side until he could catch Bella's eye. "She was living in a rooming house, but the landlady evicted her."
"I've also been told she's singing and dancing on your stage."
"After everybody fired her, it was the only way she could earn a living," Zac said. "You seem to have dragged most of the guilty parties along with you. Are you going to hang them or crucify them? I vote for the latter, but I don't know where you can find three crosses."
"Mr. Randolph, if you are going to persist in uttering blasphemy, I will be unable to continue this conversation."
"You promise? I've got lots more."
"You'll have to excuse Zac," Dodie said, unable to remain quiet any longer. "A bad dream woke him early, and he's not himself yet."
"A dream of your own descent into Hell, no doubt," Mrs. Thoragood said.
"No, Lily's," Zac said, suddenly tired of baiting this foolish woman.
"Then you agree we must do everything we can to keep her from that terrible fate."
He didn't know what the harridan had in mind, but he did agree with that much. He nodded.
"Then you will also agree the very best thing would be for her to return to her parents' home in Virginia."
"I told her that the evening she arrived."
"Then I'm compelled to ask you to attempt to persuade her again. I've tried, but she seems to think she would be deserting you. I hesitate to tell you this -- you may put the wrong interpretation on my words -- but I think she believes she's been sent to save your soul."
Zac's bark of laughter caused all four ladies to jump. "Not even Lily could believe that's possible."
"Anything is possible; however . . . "
"However, you don't believe so in this case. Don't bother to answer. I'll talk with Lily, but I doubt she'll go back to Virginia."
"I know she won't," Dodie said. "It's a waste of time to ask her."
"Nevertheless, you will try?" Mrs. Thoragood asked Zac.
"Yes. What's your back-up plan if she refuses?"
"In that eventuality," Mrs. Thoragood said, clearly displeased with Zac's use of slang, "you will agree we must find her a suitable place to live and a position of employment that is above reproach."
"I agree," Zac said, just wanting to get the visit over. If he had to have much more to do with this woman, he might have to resort to brandy to preserve his sanity. He didn't know why Mr. Thoragood wasn't a habitual drunk.
"These ladies have accompanied me because they have reconsidered their positions," Mrs. Thoragood said.
From the expressions on their faces, Zac decided Mrs. Thoragood had done most of the reconsidering.
"Miss Sterling can return to her room at Bella's," Mrs. Thoragood said. "Mrs. Wellborn and Mrs. Chickalee will each hire her for half a day. Perhaps that will prevent so many young men from gathering at either shop."
Zac's respect for Mrs. Thoragood rose considerably. He didn't know the two older women, but he did know it took a powerful lot of persuading to get Bella Holt to change her mind about anything. Clearly Mrs. Thoragood was a woman not to be taken lightly.
"You'll have to talk to Lily about that," Zac said.
"Of course."
"She's not here at the moment."
"When can we have her call on you?" Dodie asked.
"The sooner the better," Mrs. Thoragood said.
"I'll tell her you want to see her the minute she comes in," Dodie promised.
As Mrs. Thoragood turned to go, her gaze fell on the stage. "Is that where she performs?" she asked.
Zac nodded.
Mrs. Thoragood's gaze surveyed the cavernous space of the saloon. "You must have more people in here every night than my husband has in church." It was clear she considered the imbalance unfair and undeserved.
"Ask Lily to do a little song for you," Zac suggested. "I bet it'll do wonders for Sunday attendance."
Mrs. Thoragood swept from the saloon followed closely by her supporters.
"What are you going to do now?" Dodie asked when the doors had closed behind the women.
"I don't know."
"She won't go."
"I know, but you have to admit it would be the best thing for her?"
"Would it be the best thing for you?"
Zac snapped out of his abstraction. "It sure would. It would be a burden off my mind."
He got up and wandered over to the stage. It would be best if she went home. He could stop worrying about her. He could stop hating the men for staring at her. It was getting in the way of his gambling. He'd always gambled for fun and because he was good at it. Now he found himself searching out men who seemed to be overly interested in Lily, drawing them into a game, trying to empty their pockets as fast as possible so they'd leave. It was a compulsion that pushed him relentlessly.
It would be a load off his mind, but he would miss her. She caused more trouble than any female was worth, but somehow he didn't mind as much as he'd expected.
* * * * *
Sarah Thoragood entered her husband's study without knocking. "We've been overwhelmed by donations this past week," she told him. "I would never have believed your appeal from the pulpit could have had such results."
Mr. Thoragood appeared more than normally pleased with himself. "I put a lot into that sermon," he said. "I guess those sinners finally got the message. If they don't shape up while they were down here, they needn't bother when Gabriel blows his trumpet."
"Yes, you made that abundantly clear, my dear. But you've done so before without such spectacular results."
"Spirits shouldn't be the only things that get better with age. Why not preachers?"
"Why not?" said Mrs. Thoragood. "I've had to post the names of half a dozen men as the largest contributors. I can't understand it. It's always been their wives."
* * * * *
That night a fist fight broke out over a card game. That in itself wasn't unusual. The reason for the game, however, was not in the least ordinary. Lily had let it be known she would have dinner with the man who could raise the most money for the church benevolent fund. When Mrs. Thoragood posted six names as the top donors, the six men agreed to a card game to determine the winner.
Several mines, a ranch, two saloons, and a freight company had changed hands before the fight broke out. It turned out one of the losers objected to the winner holding four ace
s when he already held two. Zac told them he would give more money than any of them, so they could all take their property back. He wasn't going to have Lily's name bandied around town because they were such fools.
* * * * *
"I told you Zac wasn't the wicked man you thought," Lily said when Mrs. Thoragood told her about the check. Lily had gone to the Thoragood's home to drop off some more clothes donated by the girls at the saloon.
"But I don't understand why he should give money to us," Mrs. Thoragood said. "He's not a member of the church. He's never even been inside its doors."
"I don't think you can expect him to attend," Lily said.
"I'd be a very odd minister's wife if I wished for gamblers to make up part of a Christian congregation."
"You should count yourself fortunate if you did," Lily shot back. "He does more good for this community without telling anybody about it than anybody else I know."
"Are you comparing his work to my husband's?" Mrs. Thoragood asked, her bosom beginning to swell.
"No, but I venture to suggest if Zac wanted something done, he'd get more people offering to help than Mr. Thoragood."
Mrs. Thoragood couldn't argue with that, though she desperately wanted to. She had often bemoaned the unpleasant reality that evil had more power to move men than good. She had no doubt Zac had a direct access to an unlimited supply.
Mrs. Thoragood was further displeased to learn Zac hadn't yet had his promised talk with Lily. She would have been more than willing to do it herself, but Lily had shown a pronounced aversion to having anyone criticize her behavior or tell her what to do. She absolutely refused to allow anyone to disparage Zac Randolph within her hearing. Mrs. Thoragood was not a coward, but she was a sensible woman. She knew when to trim her sails and wait for more favorable winds.
* * * * *
Two pistol shots in the street broke Zac's concentration like a snapped thread. He slammed his cards face down on the table and sprinted across the saloon. He opened the door and came to an abrupt halt.
Two men were down and bleeding. One lay on the sidewalk, the other sprawled half in the street. A quick inspection showed the wounds to be serious but not fatal.
"What the hell are you bleeding all over my doorstep for?" Zac demanded.
"The damned bastard shot me," the offending bleeder said. "He didn't even bother to give me a warning. He just followed me out the door and shot me."
"What for?"
"I called him a yellow-bellied, low-down skunk of a liar."
"That'll usually get a man's dander up," Zac observed wryly.
"He shouldn't have said anything about Miss Lily."
Zac's body stiffened. "What did he say? And don't shout it all over the street for everybody to hear."
"I wouldn't let them words pass my lips," the man said between labored breaths. "I told him if he repeated them to a soul, I'd kill him."
"Looks like he tried to shoot you in the back."
"What else could you expect of a man who'd defame the reputation of an angel like Miss Lily?"
* * * * *
At first Lily had been furious when Zac told her she couldn't perform that evening. Not even her feeling of guilt when he said it would be nice to pass an evening without near riots, fist fights, or gun battles could make her accept being banned from the stage.
She had finally realized there was a little of the wanton in her. She liked singing, dancing, the glitter of the spotlight, the feeling of power over men, the knowledge that the big, brutal rulers of the world would do virtually anything to please her. She supposed this was the hidden seed of sin her father had seen deep inside her years ago. It must have been the reason he'd watched her so carefully, pledged her to Hezekiah so early.
It had worried her at first, but as the days went by and nothing terrible happened, she had begun to relax and enjoy her success. She'd never experienced anything like it before. It was hard not to want still more.
Which is why she was so angry with Zac.
He said he wanted to talk about her future. That was ominous. He hadn't mentioned her future for days, but she could tell he had been burning to. It was like a huge lake building up behind a high damn. Apparently the dam was going to break tonight. She was determined it wouldn't wash her away.
She didn't plan to spend the rest of her life singing in the Little Corner of Heaven, but neither was she about to give it up until she had something better to do.
On top of everything else, Zac wasn't acting like himself. It was almost like he was trying to placate her, trying to coax her into a good humor. She didn't trust him when he was like that. She knew something serious was in the air when she headed toward his office and called her back.
"We can't talk here," Zac said. "Get something to wrap up in. It's always cold on the water at night."
Dodie handed her a thick shawl.
"On the water?"
"I'm taking you to dinner on a yacht on the bay."
Lily was prey to several emotions. Like all mountain people, she had an innate distrust of large bodies of deep, wave-crested water. Neither was she thrilled with the idea of bobbing around on it in a small boat. That anyone should be able to enjoy eating dinner under those circumstances was beyond her comprehension.
However, she didn't say anything. She would attempt to swim the bay at its widest point before she would let Zac think she was a coward. She didn't know why that mattered so much, but it did.
It wasn't very far to the pier, but Lily was glad Zac had chosen to take her in a cab. It gave her less time to worry about what he was going to say. She became uneasy when the cab hit the boards of the wharf. The horse's hooves rang loud on the planks, but it was the sound of the boards rattling as the cab passed over them that completely unsettled her. The waves of the bay lapped noisily under the wharf at the pilings that held them above water.
Lily was almost relieved to reach the yacht.
"I don't see any masts," she said. "Who's going to row us?"
Zac laughed. "You stayed in your mountain valley too long. The yacht is powered by a steam engine. It's noisy, so we'll bank the boiler while we eat."
If it was anything like the train Lily though, it would be deafening. But she didn't have time to worry about the noise. As the yacht began to make its way slowly into the bay, the city took on a whole different appearance. From being surrounded by lights, Lily found herself moving under the cloak of night, staring back at the coast as it moved farther and farther away.
"Everything looks so small," she said to Zac. "The lights look like the fireflies I used to catch when I was a little girl."
It wasn't long before they had moved far enough out into the bay to be hit by the ocean winds that came whistling through the Golden Gate. Lily shivered and reached for the shawl Dodie had given her.
"It's beautiful," she said, thankful for the shawl and the shelter of Zac's body. "But I can see why more people aren't enjoying the view."
"Why?" Zac asked.
"Because they're afraid of freezing, being blown overboard, or getting lost in this endless darkness."
"Do you want to go back?"
"No." She did, but she'd never let him know.
Lily was relieved to discover they were to eat below deck.
"It's not nearly so enjoyable down here," Zac apologized, "but on deck the wind practically blows the food from in front of you."
"It's fine," Lily said, trying not to sound relieved.
Dinner was wonderful. She was used to the delicious things the chef at the saloon created, but tonight she had her first taste of lobster and crab.
Her enjoyment of the evening, however, was blunted by the knowledge that Zac had brought her out here for a purpose. She didn't know what it was, but she didn't think she was going to like it. It didn't look like he was either. He kept up a steady stream of harmless chatter throughout the meal, but without his usual sense of fun. It seemed forced, like he was making himself entertain her.
Regardle
ss, she liked being below deck. They were anchored in a cove. The waves were so gentle she soon forgot about them. She couldn't see the bay if she didn't look out the windows. The food was cooked right in front of them on several braziers. The heat from the coals warmed the cabin until the effect of the food and the heat were so relaxing she could hardly keep her eyes open.
Then Zac asked her the question he'd obviously been meaning to ask from the beginning. "What about your future?"
Lily jerked out of her daze. "What about it?"
"What do you intend to do with yourself? You've seen just about all there is to see in San Francisco. It's about time you start thinking about going back home."
"I'm not going back home," Lily said. "I thought you understood that by now."
"I thought you were running away so you wouldn't have to marry that preacher fella. Surely you've made your point by now."
"You've missed the point. That's not why I really left home," Lily said, irked that men seemed to see a woman's life only in terms of marriage to one man or another. They didn't seem to understand that even if she did want to be a wife and mother, a woman wanted to feel she had an identity of her own.
"Maybe it's not all your fault," she conceded. "I admit when I came out here, all I was thinking about was getting away from Papa and not marrying Hezekiah. But I see things differently now. I realize I could never spend the rest of my life in Salem, especially as Papa's daughter. I have too many ideas that would make people uncomfortable, Papa most of all."
"Such as."
"I like having my own job. I like being free to do what I like with my time. Mama is forty-six years old, and she's never had a minute when some man wasn't telling her what to do. I don't mean I won't want to please my husband, but I also like pleasing myself. I love singing a new song, changing the dance routine, or deciding on a new dress. I know they're tiny things, but I never felt like I accomplished anything before. Everything I did was planed for me by someone else."
"So you do want to get married, have a family, do all those wife and mother things?"
"Not right away, but someday. But I don't want to go into marriage with my husband thinking he owns me and I'll do everything he says without question. I don't want him to think he's the only one with any requirements. I'm not going to marry just any man. If he doesn't come up my standards, he can go peddle himself somewhere else."
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