Bill stepped out of the room and checked the position of the sun in the sky. He spat an invisible speck of dust onto the ground at his feet and strode across the street. The poor horse still stood tethered to the rail in front of the church.
Bill led the animal with the gig behind it to the door in the side of Mrs. Harrington’s house. When he arrived, the door opened, and Grace emerged in her gingham dress. She wore her hair hanging down her back, the same way she did when he met her under the ranch gate.
“All ready to go?” he asked.
Grace nodded. “I straightened up the bed as best I could. I hope Mrs. Harrington doesn’t notice.”
“She won’t have to notice,” Bill replied. “I’m going around to tell her right now that we used the room.”
“Do you have to?” she asked. “I hate to think of her cleaning up after us.”
“I told you I would pay her,” he replied. “Let her think what she wants. She knows we just got married. What does she expect us to do?”
Grace shrugged. “It just seems so low.”
“Everybody does it, even rich people,” he told her. “Don’t you think Miss Florence Abbot will do it, too, when she gets married?”
Grace’s worried face cracked a smile at that. “I don’t think she’ll ever get married. I don’t think she’ll ever find a man who will put up with her, unless she gets a mail-order husband. And that’s not likely to happen. Her father wouldn’t tolerate it.”
“He might have to,” Bill replied. “That might be the only way to get rid of her. Now grab your dress and get in. I’ll talk to Mrs. Harrington, and we’ll get back—that is, if you still want to go.”
“I’ll go,” she declared.
She went back in and got her dress, and when she came out to put it into the gig, he was gone. She arranged the hanger and canvas cover over the seat and took her place just as Bill reappeared. He dusted his hands off. “Well, that’s that.”
He climbed up next to her and took the reins. “Let’s go home, Mrs. Bailey.”
The horse’s footsteps drowned out Grace’s laugh, and the gig rolled back along the road to the Double A Ranch.
“Just so you know,” she told him, once they’d gone a fair way, “my room isn’t as nice as that one we just left.”
“I’m sure it will be just fine,” he replied. “You haven’t seen some of the rooms I’ve stayed in during my life.”
“I just want to let you know,” she went on, “I didn’t have time to tidy it up before I came to meet you. I had to serve Abigail and Florence in the upstairs conservatory, and the minute Florence let me go, I ran out to meet you. I haven’t had a chance to fix it up for your coming.”
“What does that mean?” he asked. “Is it frightfully dirty, or are you worried about your knickers lying all over the floor?”
“Stop it.” She slapped him on the side of the arm. “I don’t leave my knickers lying all over the floor, and it isn’t frightfully dirty. I just mean I haven’t been able to arrange any wardrobe space for your things.”
“Oh, well,” he replied, “that won’t be a problem. I don’t have much.”
“That,” she went on, “and it’s not a very big room. There’s hardly any room to move around.”
“There’s a bed in it, isn’t there?” he asked.
“Of course,” she replied. “There’s a bed, and a wardrobe, and a washstand. But that’s about it.”
“That’s all you need,” he told her. “I guess you don’t spend a whole lot of time in there, other than sleeping and dressing.”
“That’s all I have time to do,” she replied. “I’m working all the time.”
“I’ll be working all the time, too,” he told her. “I won’t be doing anything in the room except sleeping and dressing, either. Oh, and.....you know, being with you.”
Grace giggled. “All right.”
“What were you worried about?” he asked. “Did you worry I would think less of you because your room is small?”
She waved her hand to one side. “Every time I’ve looked at it in the past few days, I keep thinking what a dreadful place it is for a married couple to live. It’s not like having a place of our own.”
“We could have a place of our own if we left the ranch,” he replied. “We could get a homestead out in Montana, and then you wouldn’t have Florence ordering you around. We could have our own cattle, and our own horses, and our own house.”
Grace gazed at the landscape rolling past. “It does sound nice. Have you ever had that before?”
Bill shook his head. “Not of my own, but I grew up on a homestead in Oklahoma. My father came out with the first wave of settlers and broke the land himself. I grew up in a handmade house, and my mother and father did all the work around the place. There were no maids or cooks or cowboys.”
“It’s a far cry from the Double A Ranch, isn’t it?” she mused. “I could get used to a life like that.”
“So what are we going back to the ranch for?” he asked. “Let’s do it. Let’s keep on going and never look back. We’ll live for ourselves, and rely on ourselves. We can do it. You’re a strong girl, and I can tell you know how to work hard. I know how to herd cattle and break horses. We don’t need Acton Abbot telling us what to do. We can do it all for ourselves. What do you say?”
Grace considered his offer. The road between Borger and the ranch slipped away before her eyes. She knew that road so well, and she knew the ranch well enough to know what waited for her when they got back.
“I’m not ready to leave yet,” she told him. “Florence might be high and mighty, but the ranch is a really nice place with a lot of really nice people. Florence might just get her way and drive us off, and then we can head out West and have our own place. But we agreed to work here, at least for a while. Let’s stick it out a little longer and see how it goes.”
Bill shrugged. “Whatever you want, dear.”
She laughed. “Listen to me. We haven’t got any money to buy the supplies or stock we would need to have our own homestead. We’d never be able to support ourselves if we went now. Let’s agree to work here for a while to save up some money. Then we can move out to our own place with everything we need, and we’ll be in good shape.”
He studied her out of the corner of his eye. “Now you’re talkin’.”
“Just don’t tell anyone about our plan,” she told him. “Let’s keep it between us—just like that part about me being a princess.”
Bill chuckled and patted her knee. “All right.”