She was wearing a hat. Perhaps, in the shade and the shadow, he had simply missed…
All sorts of excuses popped into her head. As did the sharp stab that crossed her middle and clung on without ceasing.
One split second of yearning, enough for her to glimpse the overlong thick black hair, half-hidden by a dirty bandage, eyes ringed by lines as dark as the scruffy beard, clothing that was filthy, torn, and tattered. One split second, while her heart wrenched painfully in her breast and her middle began to quake.
Then, still oblivious to her presence, he stepped down and disappeared into the crowd.
Valentine’s glance returned from all the street activity to the girl beside him. “Huh. Looks better’n I thought he might. Gonna go say hello?”
She quailed. “No. Not right now.”
“After you’ve been waitin’ all this time? Well, then, when?”
“Uh—tomorrow. I’ll ride over to the Marsden place, sometime tomorrow. I’ll see him then, where it’s more private, and not so—”
“Hectic?” He raised a brow. “Yeah, maybe you’re right. Lissen, you okay headin’ out on your own? Or do you want some company?”
Vickie managed a small broken laugh. “I know you’re chompin’ at the bit to go get your interviews, Val. Yes, I’ll be okay, thanks. Maybe I’ll see you before the paper comes out, and you can tell me what you’ve been able to find out about these poor men, and how they survived.”
* * * * *
Aunt Sophie, already in the kitchen beginning to prepare a light supper, was understandably slightly peeved by the lateness of her niece’s return. “Did you not tell me you’d be gone only a little while?” she wanted to know.
“Uh-huh. But I got waylaid by Val.”
“Valentine DeMarco? Hmmph.” The sniff indicated her opinion of that young man, and his calling.
“And I needed to take care of Petunia, once I got home. You know I couldn’t turn her loose without some care.” Vickie, having also been sidetracked to check on Daisy and her kittens, a mangy old tom who could probably claim fatherhood, and the collie mix named Shep who usually gamboled about underfoot, decided it would be expedient to wash well with the ranch’s handmade soap.
“No, of course not.” Was that a tinge of sarcasm in her aunt’s voice?
“And then,” pausing to avail herself of a fresh towel, she spoke slowly and deliberately, “Sam Marsden came home.”
“Vic!” Her sister, Jessie, stopped short in the task of putting plates and silverware atop the table’s cotton cloth. “Sam? Really? But everyone thought he had gotten killed in the War.”
The girl sighed and drew in a ragged breath but refused to give way to tears. “Yes. As did I.”
“Oh, Vickie, you don’t mean it!” Taken completely aback by the news, Sophie sank onto a chair as if her limbs could no longer give support. “That poor family. With two brothers for sure dead and gone, it seemed a certainty that Sam had met the same fate. Why, no one has heard a word from him since—well, how long has it been?”
“A year.”
“A whole year.” Jessie’s fingers fumbled with the sugar bowl, clinking top to base before the whole thing spilled. “I remember Sam—a big, good-looking fellow, with lots for a girl to like. I declare, what a homecoming this will be. Was Old Man Marsden there to greet his son at long last?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t see him. But I did hear Matthew call out, so at least he had some family present.”
Sophie studied her niece for a moment. “Did he see you, child? Say hello to you?”
Folding her towel into a neat square, Vickie described the moment of arrival. The dust. The noise. Sam’s three companions, staying for a while before any, or all, continued their journey. The immense crowd overflowing the streets to hail one of their own. Val’s intention to talk to the heroes, that he might fill his newspaper with their interviews.
“You had a busy afternoon,” observed Jessie, with a touch of envy. A pretty girl, her three years of seniority had given her a poise and strength that the younger, more timid Victoria lacked. “I wish now I’d gone into town with you. Getting a chance to roll out the red carpet for Sam, and all that excitement…”
“Happy excitement, I’m sure,” affirmed Sophie. “Well. You just never know, do you? Vic, will you please fetch a bowl of potatoes? I’m in the mood for something heavy and fried crisp.”
She didn’t elaborate on what one might never know. Probably the vagaries of fate. Because who could see into the future, understand what lay on the road ahead, plan for the unexpected even just a few hours upon the horizon?
“Is Papa awake?”
“Awake and feeling better. In fact, he’s been doing some bookwork at his desk. I do believe he plans on joining us for supper. Jessie, would you wash and snap up those green beans? Those will taste so good with chopped onion and some bacon grease.”
And so the earthshaking event, that had rolled over Vickie and swept her up in its maelstrom, broke in gentle waves upon the Clark household. The family could rejoice that one thought lost in the bloodshed of conflict was returning to his own, but no personal angle was involved; no member had been directly touched by the tragedy that had affected so many. Or so it was thought.
Riley Clark did, indeed, seem to be feeling better.
With slow, halting steps, and the aid of a cane, he had come downstairs earlier and finished a week’s work of paying bills, listing entries into his ledgers and so on, at his rolltop desk in the study.
Now, he sat in his accustomed place at the head of the table, smiling at the family that surrounded him, and offering a blessing upon the meal as it was served.
He was a man whose frame and posture had certainly seen better days. His thick brown hair had been silvered by pain during the past decade, and his once-tanned face was lined. Still, he had been forced to learn patience and tolerance, with the effect that his personality held a particular sweetness.
“Vickie was in town today when Sam Marsden got home,” his sister announced.
“Pass me that platter of fried potatoes, will you, Jess? Sam Marsden? You don’t say.” Scooping off a heap onto his own plate, Riley considered. “Been gone a long time, hasn’t he? Everybody thought he’d been killed on the battlefield somewhere.”
Slants of mellow early evening light filled the kitchen—colored with that almost golden radiance particular to certain times of the day, in certain places—making the use of the two burning lamps unnecessary. When supper was ready, Sophie had propped open the back door, allowing fresh air to blow through and disperse heavy cooking odors. Along with light and air came barnyard sounds: hired men calling across, horses nickering, the dog letting out an occasional happy bark.
“Well, I reckon Buckley will be pleased to have another servant on his rundown farm,” Riley continued. “Losin’ two outa four sons must’ve been hard to deal with, and Marsden never did do much of anything with anything.”
“Is that why you don’t like him, Papa?” Vickie, lost in her own world of dreams and reverie, spoke for the first time.
“Oh, shoot, honey, most of the town doesn’t like him. Always treated his wife and boys like dogs, and always treated his dogs like—well, you don’t need to know about that. The man was either gettin’ drunk or recoverin’ from drunk, and in either case not fit to shoot unless you wanted to unload your gun. No gumption at’ all, just put those kids out to work and sopped up any extra cash.”
“Not much of a life for anyone in that household,” murmured Sophie sympathetically. “Here, Jess, more sliced tomatoes? Especially poor Mariah. She’s suffered more than usual through this terrible war.”
Pausing, with knife and fork in hand, Riley glanced at his younger daughter from beneath heavy gray brows. “What kinda condition did Sam come home in, Vic?”
“I don’t know, Papa. There were too many people in the way to even say hello. And three other fellows with him. All liberated prisoners, Val told me. From some place called Ro
ck Island.”
“Huh.” Riley took a sip of coffee. “Bad stuff to go through, then. He may need a while to get back to normal. In fact,” another slow sip, “he may never get back to normal.”
Vickie’s eyes widened with shock, and she let out a little squeak of dismay. “What does that mean?”
“It means,” her sister responded quietly, “that he might be a real handful for any woman to deal with. But I’m up to the challenge.”
Their aunt snorted. “Don’t be ridiculous, Jess. You wouldn’t want to consider such a thing, when you don’t even know how much he’s been changed. He may be mad as a March hare, with what he’s suffered. Or turned wanton. Or even be downright dangerous.”
Undaunted, Jessie let a slow, speculative smile bloom. “Oh, pooh. Sam was decent enough before he left that I had my eye on him. Besides, haven’t you heard of the healing power of the Lord?”
Rising to begin clearing away the supper residue, Sophie clucked her tongue with disapproval. “Let’s not be poking fun at what we know nothing of. All right girls; which of you will wash, and which will dry?”
Vickie collared her sister upstairs, for privacy, once their chores were finished; the hot clean dishes put back into their cupboard, the food scraps distributed to hungry creatures outside, and the kitchen tidied up. Aunt Sophie was hunting up the needlework she enjoyed working on so much, and Riley had laboriously limped into the parlor with another cup of coffee and a good book.
“We’re betrothed!” she announced in a whisper, entering Jessie’s room only to immediately close the door.
Several lamps were lighted, and the windows were open. Jessie was already seated before her elaborate mirrored bureau, with its tortoiseshell dresser set and various bits of frippery dear to the feminine heart. Having removed the pins from her hair, she was proceeding to apply the brush with long, sensuous strokes. Her face, so similar to her sister’s but with a slightly harder cast, wore a dreamy expression.
Fair brows arched, she turned. “What?”
“I said we’re betrothed. Secretly.”
Jessica could be forgiven for her confusion. “What are you talking about? Who?”
“Sam!” Vickie burst out. “Sam. He asked me to marry him, before he and his brothers enlisted in the army, and I accepted.”
A moment passed during which the older girl took in this news, chewed it up, and attempted to digest it. “And you’ve kept it secret all this time? Why on earth?”
Dispirited, Vickie plopped down on the settee, which was upholstered in lavender to match all the similar colors of violet and purple and orchid in this room. “Oh, you know what things have been like between our families. You heard Papa at the supper table. Sam and I thought it would be best to keep it just between ourselves for a while.”
“Oh, Vic.” Putting aside her hairbrush, Jessie folded both hands together in her lap, while she considered all the ramifications of the ordeal her sister had been enduring. “The whole time he was gone away…the whole time he’s been missing and presumed dead…how awful, to go through so much. And no one even knew, to help you.”
“Once we’d started it,” the girl admitted miserably, “we hardly knew how to fix the mistake we’d made. I couldn’t very well make an announcement, with him missing for so long and presumed dead. I wrote letter after letter to him and hadn’t heard a word for ages. Then, with the war finally over, and still no sign…”
“So you’ve had to just drag along somehow. I’m so sorry, Vic. I can’t imagine what you must have been feeling. But, then—” she tilted her head slightly, curious, “why didn’t you talk to Sam today? He must have been just about out of his mind with joy, to be back with you again.”
“Noooo…not so much.”
A puzzled frown. “What?”
“He saw me, Jess,” said Vickie in a low voice. Her fragile appearance seemed to have communicated itself to her voice. “But he didn’t see me. I couldn’t understand. He looked through me—and past me—as if I were someone he’d never met before. It sent a chill up my spine.”
“Well, of course, no wonder. Still…I think if I had been in that situation, I would have confronted him, to find out what was going on. No point in letting a perfectly good reunion go to waste.”
Color suffused the younger girl’s cheeks. “I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. Not with everyone watching, and wondering…”
Jessica’s expression, as she studied her sister, was unreadable. “So you plan on getting married.”
“Well, I—I hope so. It’s just that—oh, Jess, I love him so much! He’s all I’ve ever wanted. And I’m sorry for not telling you all this earlier, when it happened. But somehow it didn’t seem real. And then, with Sam gone—” Sighing, she rubbed the heel of one palm over a grease stain on her skirt.
“Obviously, Papa doesn’t know about this arrangement? Nor Aunt Sophie?”
Vickie was shocked. “If I wouldn’t tell you, Jess, I certainly wouldn’t have told either of them.”
“Hmmm.” Jessica returned to the leisurely brushing of her silky gold hair. Watching her sister in the mirror, she casually suggested, “Maybe the love of your life has changed his mind.”
“Oh, no. I can’t believe that. I won’t believe it. There’s simply something strange happening. We’ll work it out. I’m sure we can work out whatever the problem is, once I’m able to see him face to face, alone.”
A shrug, as if the matter were of little importance. “Well, after all, Vic, he’s been gone for what—two and a half, three years? He’s seen a lot of the world. And probably a lot of other females, here and there. It wouldn’t be surprising if—”
“No!” Temper roused, the girl jumped to her feet. “Don’t even try telling me that. Oh, I’m sorry I even hoped you might be understanding!” On the verge of tears, she flung open the bedroom door and pelted out into the hall. Farther on, her own door slammed shut.
* * * * *
Secretly betrothed! What kind of poppycock story was that anyway? Why would this revelation suddenly come out, only in private, just when Jessie herself had expressed an interest in that attractive Sam Marsden whom she remembered—with pleasure—from his presence roundabout, several years ago?
Rising, thoughtful, she carefully closed her door.
Her sister had a nerve! Obviously she was trying to claim the returned hero for her own uses, instead of allowing another girl—namely Jessie—to show some interest.
Oh, true, a very few single men had remained in town and country during the call-up to war. Old men, either unable to fight or unwilling to, and one or two wealthy enough to pay some poor young fool to take his place in the conscription line. Or men so physically or mentally disabled that no military, no matter how desperate, would ever seek their services. Even when hostilities ended at last, the list of choices had not vastly improved.
Because so many had been slaughtered, because such a lack of males prevailed in every province, a whole generation of young women would be left spinsters to the end of their days. No husbands. No children. No families. All due to this damnable war!
Jessica was determined that she would not be among that number.
Resuming her seat, she surveyed her image in the mirror. Lovely enough, both face and figure; substantial income enough; determination and strength enough to intrigue any man. Were any still available.
The Yellowstar had staunchly survived those terrible years that had so devastated many parts of the country. The army had demanded good beef, and the ranch had been able to supply it. The demand was urgent enough, in fact, that a small troop of men from their Texas post had been delegated to help with the stock. Otherwise, her father had once mentioned, the Clarks would have been in a financial pickle, with plenty of cattle but no one to run the herd.
An Endless Love to Remember: A Historical Western Romance Book Page 3