by Linda Ford
The preacher entered and everyone greeted him. He bent to kiss his wife then looked at Reese. “See you came back.” He studied Reese a moment. “Got your eye on one of the girls?”
“Hush, now,” Mrs. Kinsley said. “He brought Victoria home. She was in quite a state.”
The preacher went to Victoria. “What happened?”
Victoria brushed aside her parents’ concerns. “It was all so foolish. I assure you it won’t happen again.”
Her parents exchanged a look that Reese wished he understood. He hated to think ill of these good people, but were they hiding Victoria? And for what reason?
Nothing about this situation made any sense. Besides writing to his mother, he meant to spend time with the family and especially with Victoria until he learned the truth. The truth would set them all free.
Or would it rob them of the joy and peace they had at the moment?
Victoria did her best to avoid looking at Reese over supper, but it was difficult with him sitting directly across from her. It didn’t help that Donny asked a hundred questions about cows and horses and Reese answered kindly.
“I want to be a rancher,” Donny said, his voice firm, as if the matter was settled.
“If your mother approves, I’ll take you to see my ranch.”
“Ma, Ma. Can I?”
Victoria chuckled at Donny’s eagerness, and she met Reese’s eyes across the table. Such dark eyes that offered a world of—
Victoria, don’t be foolish. Just because he brought you home. And he’s kind to a little boy.
But something about having him bring her home struck a deeply buried chord. She knew instantly what it was. The idea of returning home. She thought she’d laid all those hopes and disappointments to rest. She did not wish to have them resurrected. Home was here. As Victoria Kinsley.
“I think you may,” Stella said.
“When? When?” Donny bounced up and down on his chair.
“I can’t say for sure but soon. I promise, and I won’t forget.”
Those words echoed in Victoria’s head and stayed there. I promise, and I won’t forget.
Forgetting was far too easy. Easier than remembering.
Again, she tried to ignore him, but his biscuits were light as a cloud, and she had to add her praise to that of the others. “You certainly know how to make good biscuits.”
“Thank you. It’s one of my many talents.”
“Good to know. Which makes me think of the talent show on Friday. Perhaps you have a talent you can share with us. A quarter for the entry fee and it’s all for a good cause.”
He studied her perhaps not more than a fraction of a second, and yet she felt as if time had ceased to exist. “I’ll give it some thought.”
Josie sat beside him and nudged his elbow. “I can’t wait to see what you come up with.”
“Nor can I,” he said with such dryness that everyone laughed.
He hung around after the meal ended, insisting he’d help with the dishes. “Another of my talents,” he said. “Do you suppose I could do that for the talent show?”
“I might pay an extra quarter to watch that,” Victoria said, and the girls laughed.
It was her turn to wash and Reese grabbed a towel, prepared to dry.
“You’re so handy in the kitchen you won’t need a wife,” she said. Where had those words come from? It sounded like she regretted the fact that he had said he didn’t plan to marry. Hopefully he wouldn’t notice, though she couldn’t begin to hope Josie and Eve hadn’t. She knew she was correct when they looked at each other and grinned.
“A wife is a handy thing to have. Saves a man much time in the kitchen. Why, I’ve heard it said, a good wife can turn a house into a home.” He spoke solemnly as if talking about a new kitchen gadget and earned himself hoots of laughter and derision from the others.
Victoria kept her attention on scrubbing the potato pot. For the first time in her memory, she allowed herself to think what it would be like to be a wife. She had Lisa to thank for her wayward thoughts and she would scold her friend the next time they were together.
The kitchen was clean. Ma and Pa had gone to the parlor. Stella had taken her children to bed. Victoria knew she wouldn’t come back out. The poor woman was still as weak as a newborn kitten.
Reese reached for his hat.
Josie caught his elbow. “Don’t be in a hurry to go. Come with us to the church. We like to play the piano and sing.”
He tucked his hat under his arm. “Sounds good.”
Josie and Eve rushed out the door, leaving Victoria to escort Reese next door.
“I thank you again for bringing me home safely this afternoon.” Again, the words—home and safety—tugged at her insides. She pushed them away. She had a home right here where she was loved and cared for.
“Was it talking about not having any memory that upset you?”
“I guess. You have no idea how unsettling it is to wonder who you are. To see strangers and fear they will know you, but you won’t know them.”
“I don’t know, of course, but I expect it can be quite frightening.”
“I’ve had amnesia so long I am now afraid of getting my memory back. The chances are if I do, I will forget all this.” Her insides began to quiver. “The doctor warned me that regaining my long-term memory made it entirely possible I might forget the memories I’ve made during the duration of my amnesia. I don’t want to lose what I have. And yet I wish I knew who I really am.”
Reese touched her arm. “Don’t upset yourself about it. Remember the verse you told me. ‘As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about his people from henceforth even for ever.’ Think of God surrounding you with His arms and His love. I have another verse for you. I read it just last night. It’s Isaiah 41, verse ten. I won’t quote the whole of it. You can look it up if you want to know what else it says. ‘Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed. I will help thee. I will uphold thee.’”
They had stopped walking and faced each other. She looked into his steady, dark gaze, and found strength and encouragement. As much from him as from the words he spoke. “Thank you. I will remember those words every time I get worried and fearful.”
“Are you two coming?” Josie called from the church.
With a little self-conscious laugh, Victoria hurried on, Reese at her side.
By the time they stepped into the interior, Eve was playing the piano and Josie standing at the pulpit singing. She beckoned them forward.
Not knowing if Reese would be familiar with the words of the hymns that all the Kinsleys knew by heart, Victoria took a hymnal from a pew as she marched up the aisle.
She and Reese stood beside Eve and sang hymn after hymn. Reese joined in on the songs he was familiar with. He had a deep bass voice that added to the different parts they sang.
After a bit, Josie left the piano and Eve took her place. “We all play the piano,” Victoria explained to Reese. “Ma made sure of that, though she didn’t have to teach me. I already knew how to play.”
Josie stood beside Victoria. “She plays better than any of us. Funny how she remembers that and not who she is.”
Strange indeed, Victoria thought. They sang some more, and she gave herself over to enjoying the music and Reese’s voice blending with hers and her sisters’.
Eve stopped playing and came to the pulpit. “It’s your turn.”
Victoria sat at the piano. As soon as she began to play, everything else faded away as she lost herself in the music. At the end of the piece, she glanced up to see Reese watching her, his eyes dark with an emotion she couldn’t identify.
Josie and Eve nudged each other as they watched him.
She wanted to tell them it wasn’t that. In fact, if she had to guess, she’d say he was measuring her, assessing her. Was he seeing her as someone without a past?
“Come and join me, Eve,” Victoria said, and her sister sat beside her on the piano bench. They played a duet. They played faste
r and faster, the goal to see who would stumble first. They both lifted their hands at the same time and laughed.
“I have an idea for the talent show,” Josie said.
Eve and Victoria grinned at each other. “See how fast we can play that piece?”
“That might be fun too. But what about a quartet? Us and Reese.”
Reese blinked. Opened his mouth and closed it without saying anything.
Eve pressed the matter. “You did say you wanted to do something for the talent show.”
He studied each of them a moment and a slow, heart-stopping smile came to his face. “Okay, let’s do it.” He and Josie moved to stand behind Eve and Victoria at the piano bench. They flipped through the hymnal looking for something that suited them all.
Finally, they settled on one, and Victoria was chosen to be the accompanist. The others crowded to her back as they practiced.
“We do sound good together,” she said when they were reasonably satisfied with their progress.
“Let’s get together tomorrow evening and go over it again,” Eve said.
Everyone agreed. Victoria wanted to refuse. There was something about Reese that unsettled her. It could be his dark good looks, or the memory of having turned into a quivering mess in his presence, or simply that she didn’t feel free to embrace a future of any shape. This had all started with agreeing to let him walk her home. She would make sure Lisa realized what she’d gotten Victoria into with that promise to say yes to an invitation from Reese.
They parted ways at the manse, Reese to the livery barn where he said he had picked up a few days’ work. “Need some cash to buy supplies,” he explained.
The girls went inside. Ma and Pa were sitting at the table drinking tea and discussing Pa’s sermon notes for the following Sunday. It was a time when the parents liked to be alone, so the girls said good night and went upstairs to prepare for bed.
As usual, Victoria sat at the writing table by the window, opened her latest journal, and began to write in it. Her sisters knew the reason for her meticulous detailing of her day.
She’d explained it many times. “I don’t know my past, don’t know what the future holds, but I don’t want to forget one moment of right now. No matter what happens, I’ll be able to read about it and remember.” Her throat tightened now as she considered the possibility.
“Vicki.” Eve caught her attention. “What happened to bring you home in such a state this afternoon?”
“Yeah, you scared us,” Josie added.
“It was so strange. I was telling Reese about the family. How all the girls are adopted. Then I told him about me losing my memory. I don’t know what came over me but when I told about how no one came looking for me, I got cold and started to shake.”
“Oh Vick, you poor thing.” Both girls came to her side and hugged her. “You are one of us now, and I hope you always will be,” Eve said.
Victoria bent her cheek to first one sister then the other. “You know, this is all Lisa’s fault.”
The girls sat back on their heels to stare at Victoria.
“Yes. She said I needed to forget my lost past and go boldly into the future. Well, those weren’t her exact words, but that’s what she meant. Then she made me promise to say yes if Reese asked to accompany me on a walk. I promised, so when he asked me, I was honor bound to agree.”
Eve and Josie grinned at each other.
“I’m sure it was a terrible hardship,” Eve said.
“I don’t know how you endured it.” Josie could barely get the words out before she laughed.
“I quite enjoyed myself,” Victoria said, doing her best to sound superior.
The three of them laughed and Victoria picked up her pen to write.
Eve and Josie hung over her shoulders.
Victoria pulled her journal away. “This is private.”
The pair nudged each other and winked as they made their way to their respective beds.
“It’s private,” Josie whispered loudly.
“Private,” Eve echoed, and they laughed.
Victoria laughed too. She didn’t mind being teased. It was part of being loved. She mused over what to write in her journal. She never hid her writings and didn’t mind if others read her description of the day but to her knowledge, no one ever did though sometimes they asked her to read parts aloud. She bent her head and wrote several pages then blotted the ink dry. Just before she closed the book, Eve begged her to read about the day.
She turned to face them and started reading about the chores they had done in the morning.
“Skip to when you were at the store,” Eve said.
She did so, not leaving out anything—not how she’d eavesdropped on Reese and Jimmy, nor how Lisa had said Reese’s interest in her was as a man wanting to court a woman. When she got to the part about sitting on the bench, the other girls sighed.
“It’s so romantic,” Josie said.
“You know the rest. You were there.” Victoria closed the book.
Eve sat up. “You didn’t read how you got home. You can’t skip that.”
So, with a pretend, long-suffering groan, she read those words then slipped into bed where she lay beside Josie, her eyes closed, pretending she had fallen asleep. But sleep eluded her as her thoughts swirled round and round with an unsettling mix of fear and hope.
Hope that she could embrace the future.
Fear that her past would come back and destroy the world she knew and loved.
Chapter 4
Reese fought a battle with himself all the next day. He only wanted to get close to Victoria to discover the truth about her. He didn’t want to care for her. More and more he suspected she was really Constance Hayworth.
Determined to get to the truth of the matter, he wrote a letter to his mother and posted it that morning. Soon he would know if Miss Hayworth had been returned to the bosom of her family.
If not, then there was a good chance Victoria was the missing girl. If so, she was the daughter of a rich man who could appear on the scene any moment and snatch her away. He surely didn’t want any part of that. Not when she appeared so happy and content as Victoria Kinsley.
He should stay away from the Kinsleys until he heard back from his mother.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t deny a strange and powerful urge to protect her from the likes of Smitty and anyone else who might realize who she was. Besides, he’d agreed to sing a song with the three Kinsley sisters so had to meet them at the church later.
He did his best to occupy his day at the livery barn. He cleaned the stalls, swept the floors, and even washed the window in the little office. Then he removed a plank that had been damaged and set about replacing it with a new one.
Jimmy came by in the afternoon. “Miss Victoria is at the store again if you want to go walk her home like ya did yesterday.”
Reese turned from fixing a gate to stare at the boy. “How do you know I walked her home?”
“I saw you. Took her by way of the river, didn’t cha?”
“Jimmy, my friend, you better be careful who you spy on. It could land you in a heap of trouble.”
“Only if I’m caught.”
“You be careful, hear?”
“Always am. You gonna go to the store now?”
“Not this time. Mickey is away on some business and expects me to take care of this place.”
Jimmy slouched and scuffed his toe in the dirt.
“Why does it matter so much to you?”
“She’s nice and pretty and you’re handsome and nice. I just thought…” His voice trailed off.
Reese hooted. “Jimmy, I never thought to see you in the role of matchmaker.”
“Why not? I asked Ma about it and she said Miss Victoria was the perfect age for gettin’ married. How about you? Aren’t you the right age?”
“I’m twenty. Can’t rightly say if that’s the right age or not.”
“Sounds like a good age to me. Miss Victoria is eighteen.”
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br /> Reese knew that though he wondered how the Kinsleys had come to know her correct age. Another fact that made him wonder where the truth lay. “How do you know?”
“I asked her friend, Miss Lisa, at the store. She said Miss Victoria was maybe eighteen, but she wasn’t sure. ‘How can ya not be sure?’ I asked. All she said was sometimes you aren’t. Funny, huh?”
Not so funny as much as sad, confusing, and suspicious, but Reese kept his thoughts to himself.
Jimmy hung around about another hour, entertaining Reese with his view on town life. When he left, suddenly remembering he was running an errand for his mother, Reese chuckled to himself. The scamp knew the comings and goings of most people in town and had an opinion on everything.
Toward supper time, Mickey returned from his business and Reese sauntered over to Sylvie’s Diner. Sylvie, he’d discovered, was a rotund little woman with a thick bun of graying hair and a loud voice.
“You got two options on the menu,” she said the first time he put in an appearance. “I only make one item. Your choice is take it or leave it.”
Reese had chuckled. “I’ll take it. By the way, what is it?”
“Roast beef and everything that goes with it,” Sylvie said, and brought in a plate piled high with food. The aroma brought a flood of saliva to Reese’s mouth.
“And apple pie, if I think you deserve it.”
“Apple pie? What do I have to do to deserve it?” He scooped up a forkful of fluffy mashed potatoes drowned in rich brown gravy.
Sylvie sat across from him. “I heard you been squiring Miss Victoria home from the store. You can tell me what your intentions are toward her.”
He stared at her. “Isn’t that a question her pa should ask?”
“Miss Victoria is a special young lady. I might not be her ma, but I care about her and I don’t want to see her hurt. So, are your intentions honorable?”
Reese bought himself a little time by tackling the plate of food. “Good meal.”
“Uh huh.” She clearly didn’t mean to budge from the spot without getting an answer from him. And Reese guessed it better be an answer that pleased her.
“I was at the store when she left and asked if she wanted me to walk her home.”