Chapter Two

David Connors was the first student to arrive at school on Monday morning. He rode in on a big bay gelding, looking proud and tall and demonstrating that his concern for artistic impression extended beyond the pictures he drew. Catherine could barely suppress a smile when she saw the cut on his chin that proved he had shaved the down from his cheeks this morning.

His face was alight with the same suppressed excitement she felt at the prospect of not only starting her new job but of having her first session with her new art student.

Soon more children began to arrive. The next group came on foot and consisted not of four but of five Nylans. Lulie had told her the eldest, Jessica, would not be attending, but there she was, herding her younger siblings into the yard.

“Jessica, what a nice surprise,” Catherine greeted her. “I thought you’d be staying home to help your mother.”

“I was going to, but then I heard Davy was coming, and I figured if he wasn’t too old, then I wasn’t, either, since we’re the same age.”

From the look Jessica shot David, Catherine decided the girl was older than her fifteen years and that she had her rapidly maturing eye on the Connors boy. Jessica wasn’t particularly pretty. Her face was plain and her hair was a nondescript brown and worn in an unflattering braid, but her fully mature body strained provocatively against the buttons of her bodice. The smile she gave David was equally provocative, and although he frowned and turned away, his gaze slid to her breasts before he did so.

Catherine sighed, thinking she would have her hands full keeping David’s attention in class and knowing she would have none of Jessica’s.

The other children began to arrive, some on horseback and some walking, and soon the schoolyard was filled with youthful shrieks and laughter. Catherine almost hated to ring the bell and end their fun. Some of the younger children had never been to school and did not know the significance of the clanging bell. Thinking she had found a use for Jessica, she asked the girl to help round them up and get them in line.

Only too happy to take on a position of leadership, Jessica masterfully got all the children organized and marched them inside. She even helped seat them, informing Catherine of each one’s age and abilities. Catherine spent the morning calling each age group up and testing them on their progress. By lunchtime she had begun to realize what a formidable task it would be to teach twenty-two children ranging from five-year- old Tommy Nylan, who did not recognize a single letter, to fifteen-year-old Jessica Nylan, who knew lots of things she shouldn’t.

Catherine had made herself a cheese sandwich from the stores in her room behind the school, and she went out to join the children eating their lunches in the shade of the willows by the river. As they finished eating, they got up and began to run off their excess energy, leaving Catherine, David, and Jessica alone.

“I appreciate the help you gave me this morning,” Catherine told the girl.

“I’m used to helping,” she demurred. “I’ve been taking care of kids my whole life. Ma thinks I’m too old to be coming to school, but that’s just because she got married when she was my age.”

“What!” Catherine could hardly credit it.

“Yeah, and she was just turned sixteen when I was born,” Jessica continued matter-of-factly.

Catherine didn’t know which was more surprising, hearing of such a youthful bride or learning that Lulie Nylan, who looked old enough to be Catherine’s mother, was only eight years her senior.

“I reckon she thinks I’ll be married soon, too,” Jessica was saying, “but I figure I’ll wait another year or two. I want to have some fun before I settle down.” She flashed David a meaningful smile, which made him squirm.

“Davy! Davy! Draw us a picture!” Several of the older boys raced up and fell on David en masse. “Draw us a picture! Please!”

Obviously pleased by the request, David made only a halfhearted protest before going for the paper and pencils he had brought for his afternoon class.

When Catherine and Jessica were alone, the girl turned to her curiously. “How come you’re not married yet, Miss Eaton? I mean, you must be at least twenty.”

“I’m twenty-three,” Catherine said, shocking the daylights out of poor Jessica.

“Oh dear, did your sweetheart die or something?” she asked in dismay.

“I’ve never had a sweetheart.” Catherine tried not to sound defensive. Having never been courted was certainly no disgrace, but from the expression on Jessica’s face, it was the greatest tragedy imaginable.

Then her expression suddenly lightened. “So that’s why you came here! You want to find a husband.” Before Catherine could protest such an outrageous assumption, Jessica scrambled up and said, “I’ll check on the kids.” In an instant, she had made her way over to where David was sketching something for a group of fascinated onlookers.

Catherine watched in amused admiration as the girl expertly diverted David’s attention to herself time and again. While she watched, she also brooded over Jessica’s remarks. Did everyone think Catherine had come to Texas to find a husband? How annoying. Well, they’d soon find out that a husband was the very last thing she wanted, especially now that she knew from her run-in with Sam Connors what overbearing creatures Texas men could be.

When Catherine dismissed her class later in the day, Jessica Nylan lingered at the door, watching David and apparently waiting for him to leave, too. When he made no move to do so, she said, “Why don’t you walk with us, Davy? It’s on your way.”

“I’m not leaving yet,” he told her, obviously uncomfortable with her attention. “Miss Eaton is going to help me with my drawing.”

Jessica digested this information and frowned thoughtfully. “Oh,” she said in disappointment. The look she flashed the schoolmistress as she left was far from friendly, and Catherine hoped she had not made an enemy.

“Jessica seems like a nice girl,” Catherine remarked, trying to judge David’s opinion.

His cheeks colored slightly, and he refused to meet her eye. “She’s all right, I guess, but she can be a pest.”

“I think she likes you.”

His color deepened, and he glanced up in alarm. “Who told you?”

“Nobody,” she assured him. “I figured it out for myself.”

“Well, I don’t like her. Jessie Nylan’s only interested in getting a man with some money, and Sam says—” He caught himself and turned away.

Catherine was dying to know what Sam said, but she decided not to press the point. Instead, she invited David to go for a walk with her until they found something interesting to sketch. They selected the Shallcrosses’ house and found some shade a comfortable distance away from which to observe it.

David positioned his sketchbook and gave Catherine a questioning glance.

“Go ahead and start. I want to see how much you already know. I’ll watch and give you some pointers as you go along.”

He hesitated a moment and then began lightly sketching in the basic outlines of the building. Catherine had brought her own book, and she began a drawing of her own, glancing up at her companion’s striking profile from time to time to make sure she was getting it right.

“You don’t look much like your brother,” she observed after a few moments.

“Everybody says that,” David said with a grin that belied her statement. “He looks like our pa, and I look like my mother. We’ve got a picture of her, and she sure was pretty.”

“You don’t remember her?”

“No, she died when I was three, but Sam says she was even prettier than the picture. She was young, too, not much older than Sam. She was only twenty-four when she died.”

“How tragic,” Catherine said, thinking how sad it was David’s mother had not lived to see what a fine young man he had become. “Do you know how she died?”

“Sam said she was always sickly. She just got weaker and weaker until she died.” He paused, deep in thought. “I never could figure out why she—”

“Why she what?” Catherine prompted.

“Why she left home and married my pa. I mean, she was from a rich family in New Orleans, and he was a lot older and—” He shrugged.

“Perhaps she loved him,” Catherine suggested.

“That’s what Sam always says, too.” David returned to his drawing.

“This line is too straight,” Catherine pointed out. “See the way it seems to slant away from us?”

David studied the house and then nodded. “Yeah, I see.” He made the correction and concentrated on the picture for a few minutes.

Catherine debated whether to broach the subject of Sam with David, but she knew if she ever wanted to understand the boy, she needed to understand his relationship with his brother.

“You and Sam are very close, aren’t you?”

David’s expression showed he had never given the matter much thought. “I guess so.”

“I suppose your father died when you were very young, also.”

“I was eight, but even when he was alive, Pa never had much time for me. He was pretty busy running the ranch and everything, but Sam played with me. It always seemed like he was my father even before Pa died, and after—” David shrugged again, as if Sam’s devotion to him were the most natural thing in the world.

She smiled. “You were right to warn me about how stubborn he can be.”

David’s quick frown showed his concern. “Sam means well, but there’s some things he just doesn’t understand, like about my drawing. He says I get that from her, too—from my mother, I mean.”

“Was she an artist?”

“She made a lot of pictures. I have them all at the house. They’re mostly of flowers, but they’re not like any flowers I’ve ever seen. Sam says they grow back in New Orleans, where she came from.”

Sam says. Catherine had been right to suspect Sam Connors was the moving force in David’s life. She supposed David’s willingness to defy his sainted brother on the matter of art classes proved the boy’s driving need to express himself. She also knew Connors’s permission could be withdrawn at any time, and if she wanted to ensure his continued cooperation, she would be wise to come to terms with the man. She would never like him, of course, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t learn to be civil to him. At least she hoped she could.

When David had finished his sketch of the house, Catherine critiqued it for him. Then he gave her his familiar grin and said, “Now, let me see the one you did so I’ll know how bad I really am.”

“Oh, I didn’t draw the house,” she explained, handing him her book. “I drew something else.”

“Wow! It’s me!” he exclaimed in amazement. “How did you do that? Every time I try to draw a picture of a person, it never looks anything like them.”

“There’s a secret to it. I’ll show it to you, and then you’ll be able to capture a likeness, too.”

“ ‘Capture a likeness,’ ” he quoted in wonder, as if the words were some mystical chant. “Do you really think I can?”

“If I can, anyone can,” Catherine assured him.

He frowned his confusion. “Why do you keep telling me you aren’t much of an artist? You draw a lot better than I do.”

“I’m technically better because I’ve had more training, but I don’t have the genius it takes to rise above the ordinary,” she said, once again amazed to find she did not mind admitting her deficiencies to David.

“How do you know?”

“I—I just do,” she hedged, thinking about all the futile hours she had spent trying unsuccessfully to recreate on paper the magnificent pictures she saw in her mind.

“What about me? Do you think I’m ’above the ordinary’?”

“Yes, I do, or I wouldn’t waste time with you. Now, it’s getting late. I’d better send you home or your brother will never let you stay for another lesson.” Walking slowly and stopping occasionally to discuss a potential site for future sketching, they made their way back to the school. Catherine had just noticed the strange horse in the yard when David yelled, “Sam!” and waved a greeting.

The figure sitting on the front steps rose and waved back. Sam Connors was larger than she remembered and twice as forbidding, even in ordinary range clothes. He took a final drag on his cigarette and dropped it, grinding it out with the heel of his boot before moving to meet them halfway.

“I was wondering where you two got off to. I was in town and thought I’d ride home with Davy.” His mouth was smiling politely, but his black eyes were wary and guarded, as if he expected a fight. Determined not to start one, Catherine smiled politely back.

“I took David over to town to do some sketching,” she said.

“See if you can tell what this is,” David said, producing his drawing.

Connors examined it closely. “The saloon?” he guessed, with what Catherine could only have described as a twinkle.

“Sam!” David protested, punching his brother in the arm.

“It’s the Shallcrosses’ house,” Connors admitted with a chuckle that startled Catherine with its warmth. “And it’s damn good.”

“Sam, you shouldn’t swear in front of a lady,” David said, but neither Catherine nor Sam heard his chastisement.

Connor’s gaze had settled on her in silent challenge, and she could not look away. “See how good he draws?” Connors said. “I told you he doesn’t need any lessons.”

“Oh, but I do, Sam,” David insisted. “Miss Eaton, show him what you drew.”

Catherine reached into her sketchbook, pulled out the drawing of David, and handed it to his brother.

“See, Sam, it’s me. Isn’t it good? Miss Eaton said she can teach me how to draw people, too. Hey, maybe I’ll do a picture of you.”

Connors stared at the paper for a long time, so long that Catherine began to wonder if he saw something there she had not. His dark eyes were bleak when they lifted to her again, and then she understood. Even in his ignorance, Connors had recognized the superiority of her work over David’s.

The grin he gave David was slightly sad. “Don’t waste your time on me, Davy. If you ever learn to draw this good, you’ll want a pretty model. Maybe Miss Eaton’ll let you do her picture.”

A compliment? Catherine decided not to analyze it too closely. “You underestimate your brother, Mr. Connors. David will be doing much better than that in no time at all.” This time her smile was genuine, but he didn’t look at her. Instead, he glanced back down at the drawing he still held. Now she was sure. He did see something there, something no one else saw. After another long moment, he seemed to recall himself and reluctantly handed the paper back to her.

“Oh, keep it if you like,” she said, wishing she dared ask why he found the portrait so fascinating. Of course, he doted on the boy. Perhaps he’d never seen a picture of him before. It might be nothing more than that, but Catherine didn’t think so.

“Thank you,” he said, his voice a little husky. His eyes were wary again, although why he still found her threatening she could not guess.

“Gee, thanks, Miss Eaton,” David said, taking the paper from Sam and slipping it safely into his own sketchbook. “Can you show me how to do this tomorrow?”

Catherine watched Connors for a reaction, but she saw none. He seemed to be waiting for what she would say. “I think your brother only gave you permission to come two days a week. Don’t you want to space them a bit?”

David’s face fell, and he turned beseechingly to Sam. “You can’t take up all Miss Eaton’s time, boy. She’s got other things to do besides teaching you.”

“No, I don’t,” Catherine contradicted, knowing she would gladly spend all her free time instructing David. “I don’t mind teaching him as many days as you can spare him.”

“Sam, please,” David pleaded.

Connors wasn’t happy, but for some mysterious reason he seemed unable to deny David’s request. He sighed in defeat. “You can have him as many days as you can stand him, but only if you let me pay you for your time.”

She was going to protest that she didn’t want any money, but she knew he needed to salvage his pride in some small way. She’d beaten him in everything but this, and she did want to make peace. “All right. How about a dollar a week?”

“How about a dollar a day?” Connors countered. “Or don’t you think your time is worth that much?”

Again she met his silent challenge. “Whatever you think is fair,” she conceded. She would spend the money on art supplies for David, anyway.

He nodded his agreement. “Just don’t let him wear you out. He’ll do that if you let him.” Connors’s tone was grim, but his eyes held a teasing glint when they shifted to David.

“I’ve never been able to wear you out,” David protested.

Connors lifted his eyebrows in amazement. “You’re getting art lessons, aren’t you?” Without giving the boy a chance to respond, he added, “Come along now. You’ve taken up enough of Miss Eaton’s time.” He touched his hat brim and gave Catherine a little nod. “ ’Afternoon, miss.”

“Goodbye,” she murmured to his back as he strode off to his horse.

“Thanks for everything, Miss Eaton,” David said, beaming his triumph. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Yes, tomorrow.” Catherine waved as they rode off, and she stood in the yard watching for a long time, until they disappeared from sight. She should have felt pleased. She and Sam Connors had made a peace of sorts. At least they had conversed civilly, and both had made concessions. Still, there was something about Connors that disturbed her.

Perhaps it was his overwhelming physical presence that made her ill at ease. When he was near, she felt the unevenness of the match between them. His size and obvious strength made her feel weak and helpless. She knew she was being ridiculous, especially considering she had been victorious in their confrontations. Her feelings of weakness were only an illusion.

But she wasn’t foolish enough to imagine he couldn’t be invincible if he set his mind to it. She would simply have to make certain he never set his mind against her.

By the time the first week of school had ended, Catherine and the children had settled into a routine, and the school was running smoothly. David proved himself as able as he was enthusiastic in improving his technique, and Catherine had to watch herself so she wouldn’t be tempted to keep him far too late each day.

When Friday came, she had to tell him with regret that they could not have a lesson at all.

“I’m supposed to stay with the Nylans this weekend, so I’ll be walking home with the Nylan children,” she explained as the students filed out at the end of the day.

“You can walk with us, Davy,” Jessica offered, having at last found a way to entice David into going with them. Apparently, she had come to school with the idea of having David Connors walk her home each day, and she had let Catherine know her displeasure at the situation. Now it seemed all was forgiven, and she included Catherine in her gracious smile.

“All right,” David agreed, although he still seemed wary of Jessica’s attention. Whatever Sam Connors had told David about the girl had been enough to counter the obvious attraction he felt for her feminine charms.

As they walked, Jessica asserted her powers of conversation, but David resisted, showing a strength of will Catherine thought must be another trait he shared with this brother. When he turned off toward his own ranch, Jessica fell silent, no longer feeling obligated to be charming.

Catherine knew a sense of foreboding the instant she caught sight of the Nylan ranch house. Knowing the building housed eight children and two adults, she wondered first how so many bodies could be accommodated in such a small space. Then she wondered where on earth she would be expected to sleep. Why hadn’t she been firmer in her refusal to board with the families on the weekends?

Lulie Nylan’s enthusiastic greeting made Catherine regret her negative thoughts. The woman was obviously delighted to have an adult woman visitor, and Catherine guessed she must be starved for female company.

“I’m sorry we ain’t got a room you can have all to yourself,” Lulie said as she escorted Catherine inside, “but the two younger girls’ll sleep on the floor in our room while you’re here, so you and Jessie can have the girls’ room all to yourself.”

“I’m sure that will be fine,” Catherine said, relieved to see the Nylan home was spotlessly clean in spite of its small size and numerous occupants. The house consisted of one main room that served as kitchen, dining room, and parlor, and three smaller rooms that had been added as the family grew. Lulie and her husband Augustus shared one and the boys another, while the girls occupied the third.

Catherine was instructed to put her carpetbag in the smallest bedroom, which held only one bed. She had to assume all three girls normally shared it. The prospect of sharing it with Jessica was far from inviting.

Putting on a brave face, Catherine returned to the main room to help Lulie with supper, but all the children had fallen to the task, each performing a separate duty with the competence of long practice.

“Let’s sit outside a spell so we don’t get in the younguns’ way,” Lulie suggested, shifting the ubiquitous baby on her hip and leading Catherine onto the porch, where several weathered ladder-back chairs stood.

“Jessie just loves school, and so do the rest. They can’t wait to get there every morning,” Lulie remarked as she sat down and settled her baby on her lap.

“I’m glad. I’m enjoying it, too.” Catherine took the chair beside her, smiled at the baby, and received a gurgle in response.

“Jessie says you’re teaching the Connors boy to draw.”

“Yes, that’s right. He’s very good.”

“Always did like to draw, that one. I’m a little surprised Sam’s letting him do it, though. He’s never cared much about Davy’s pictures. What’d you say to him to change his mind?”

“I... nothing really,” Catherine hedged, unwilling to recall the argument she and Connors had had at the dance. “David must have done the persuading.”

“Looked to me like you and Sam weren’t getting along at all last Saturday night. You never did say what you thought of him.”

Catherine remembered Lulie had expressed her dislike of Sam Connors. What had she accused him of? Oh, yes, of fencing in his water. “I barely know him. I haven’t really formed an opinion.”

Lulie snorted. “You don’t need more’n a minute to get an opinion about Sam Connors. Are you one of them ladies who don’t like to gossip?” she asked archly.

Catherine could make no such claim, although she still wasn’t ready to confide in Lulie. “What do you think of him?” she asked with a conspiratorial smile.

Satisfied, Lulie leaned back and returned the smile. “I think he’s a no-good son of a bitch. Now, don’t look so shocked. When I tell you some of the things he’s done, you’ll think so, too.”

“I’d be fascinated to hear all about him,” Catherine replied, leaning back in her own chair.

“Well, like I told you, he was one of the first around here to put up fences. Cheap as barbwire is, it still costs a pretty penny to run it all the way around a ranch, so only the bigger ranchers can afford it.”

“Surely no one can fault him for fencing his own property,” Catherine argued, wondering what all the fuss was about.

“He didn’t only fence his own property. He fenced public land, too.”

“Public land?”

“Yeah, land owned by the state that everybody’d always used for free,” she said bitterly.

“Isn’t that illegal?”

“Oh, he leased it. Paid all of fourteen cents an acre for it, but that’s not the worst. He closed in his water, too. Everybody’d always shared their water before. Lots of water holes dry up come summer, and those folks lucky enough to have reliable water always let the rest use it. But no more. Now them with the money to do it have put up fences, and our cattle dies of thirst, bawling for water outside the wire.”

“How awful! Hasn’t anyone protested? Surely, if you went to Mr. Connors and explained—”

“You think he don’t know what he’s doing to us? He knows, all right. He wants to drive us out, all us little ranchers and the farmers, too. Then he’d take our land and be even richer than ever.”

So Catherine had been right to mistrust Sam Connors. He was even more cruel and ruthless than she had feared. Some men covered such things with a veneer of charm, but Connors apparently felt no need to conceal his true character. Everyone who knew him must surely know what kind of man he was, so why should he bother with the customs of polite society?

The only thing she could not figure out was how sweet, sensitive David could be the man’s brother.

Lulie continued her tirade against Connors, listing his many sins and shortcomings, but Catherine barely heard. She was too busy thinking how closely she had courted disaster. She had been a fool to challenge Connors so directly on their first meeting. Now she remembered the worried looks from the other women when she’d told them she was going to meet him. Her only salvation had been his soft spot for David. She would have to be very careful in the future not to upset the delicate balance she had established with Connors.

A little while later, Augustus Nylan came ambling over, wondering aloud when his supper would be ready. He was, Catherine realized, probably not much older than his wife, but he was already bent from poverty and hard work, his skin tanned and toughened like leather from the relentless Texas sun, his pale blond hair thinning. How different he seemed from Sam Connors, who was about the same age and who certainly must work every bit as hard. She had never given much thought to the factors that aged people, but now she determined poverty and disappointment must somehow accelerate the process. Connors’s success seemed to have sealed him against the forces of time that had ravaged his neighbors.

“Is Lulie telling you all about Sam Connors?” Augustus asked, his eyes bright with a bitterness she could easily understand. “He’s a bad one, all right, though he ain’t the worst of ’em, not by a long shot.”

“Are you gonna defend him?” Lulie demanded.

“Not hardly, but at least he only fenced his own land. Amos Pettigrew didn’t even bother to lease the land he fenced. He just took what he wanted and shut the rest of us out. Even closed off the road so his neighbors couldn’t get to town.”

“Why don’t they take him to court?” Catherine asked. She couldn’t believe such corruption could go unpunished.

Augustus chuckled at her naivete. “When you got money, you got nothing to fear from the law, either. We complain, and the judge says he don’t see anything wrong.”

“That’s outrageous!”

Lulie nodded sagely. “Now you see the way things is around here.”

“And since she does,” Augustus said, “let’s talk about something else. I don’t want my digestion ruined. Come on, woman, and get my supper on the table.”

Huffing indignantly, Lulie stalked into the house, her baby squirming on her hip. Catherine followed, hoping to be of some help.

Obediently, Lulie did not mention Sam Connors again, but that night when Catherine and Jessica had settled into bed, the younger girl brought up the other Connors brother.

“Davy really likes you, Miss Eaton.”

“I like him, too. He’s a very sweet boy.”

“He’s rich, you know. He owns half the Spur. Old man Connors left it to both boys equal.”

“So I’ve heard,” Catherine murmured.

“Davy ain’t much more’n a boy, and you’re a woman grown.”

Catherine rolled over and tried to make out the girl’s face in the dark. “What are you getting at, Jessica?”

She sighed gustily. “I’m getting at you and Davy. Do you have your eye on him or not?”

“What?” Catherine sat up in outrage.

“You’re making an awful big fuss over him, and any fool can see he’s crazy for you,” she accused, sitting up, too.

“David and I are friends, nothing more,” Catherine insisted.

“Friends?” she mocked. “Is that why he follows you around like a lovesick puppy?”

“He loves what I’m teaching him,” Catherine tried, wondering how on earth she could explain David’s obsession to this ignorant girl.

“And what exactly are you teaching him?” she asked snidely.

“To draw,” Catherine replied, hating the defensive tone in her voice.

“And what have you been telling him about me? He used to like me before you came along.”

“I haven’t said a thing about you. If his attitude has changed, it’s none of my doing.” She wondered whether she should warn Jessica she had a much more formidable adversary than Catherine Eaton, one whose opinion David trusted far more and whose influence was much stronger. But Jessica gave her no chance.

“Well, his attitude is going to change right back again, and pretty soon, too. Davy Connors is mine, and I’m going to be living on the Spur before the year is out.”

With that, she flopped back down, giving Catherine her back. Catherine thought someone should probably point out to Jessica that while fifteen-year-old girls might marry, they seldom married fifteen-year-old boys. Certainly Sam Connors would have something to say about the match, and Catherine didn’t think it would be anything good. Poor Jessica was overmatched, but Catherine didn’t think she would appreciate any advice from the person she considered her rival for David’s affections. With a resigned sigh, she lay back down and closed her eyes.

The next day Jessica gave no sign they had ever had their bedtime conversation. She was perfectly pleasant to Catherine, at least in front of other people, and in private she simply ignored her. Catherine passed the day playing games with the children and listening to Lulie’s well-formed opinions on every subject. That night Jessica feigned sleep when Catherine came to bed, and the next morning the whole family piled into the wagon to go to church.

By rights, Catherine should have been the Nylans’ guest for Sunday dinner, too, but she persuaded them it would be much more convenient to simply drop her off at the school after church rather than to make another trip to town with her after dinner.

She was already eagerly anticipating the hours of solitude ahead of her when they pulled up to the church, but when she saw the hostile crowd gathered in the yard, she forgot everything else.

She spotted Sam and David Connors in the group gathered around another rancher whose name Catherine could not recall. He was red-faced and angry, speaking belligerently to those around him, although Catherine could not make out his words.

“Wonder what’s got old Pettigrew in an uproar?” Augustus muttered as he reined in and got down from his wagon. The children began to pile out of the back, and Nylan helped his wife and Catherine down from the seat.

“Hey, Nylan,” Pettigrew shouted from across the yard. “Somebody cut my fence last night. What do you know about it?”

“What you just told me,” Nylan replied. Lulie laid a restraining hand on his arm, but he shook it off. He strode over to face the furious rancher.

“Everybody knows you’re the head honcho of all the small ranchers and farmers,” Pettigrew said. “Nobody cuts a fence without checking with you first.”

“I don’t tell anybody what to do,” Nylan said, his face growing as red as Pettigrew’s. “If somebody cut your fence, I don’t know nothing about it.”

“You lying little bas—”

“Pettigrew!” Sam Connors’s commanding voice cut him off. “Do you have any proof Nylan was involved?”

Amos Pettigrew was a large barrel-chested man, but he looked small beside Connors. “The bastards who cut my fence didn’t leave a calling card, if that’s what you’re asking, but we all know Nylan’s their leader.”

“You don’t know no such thing!” Lulie Nylan shouted. “Augustus was home all night last night. Miss Eaton was staying with us. Ask her!”

Everyone turned to Catherine, who stood speechless at the edge of the crowd. Although several dozen people were staring at her, she was aware only of Sam Connors’s expectant gaze. For a long moment no one spoke, and then Connors said, “I doubt Miss Eaton can vouch for Gus’s whereabouts all night.”

Someone snickered, and Catherine felt her cheeks burning. “He was at home when I retired around ten o’clock,” she volunteered, knowing such testimony would hardly help but compelled to say something.

Connors’s eyes flickered, perhaps in annoyance, but before he could speak, Augustus said, “I got no reason to cut your fence, Pettigrew. It’s not my land you’ve got blocked off.”

“It’s not anybody else’s land, either. Spencer and Riley don’t have any legal right to live there.”

“But they been living on that land for years,” Augustus said, and a chorus of voices agreed with him.

“Then they should’ve laid claim to it before somebody else did. It’s public land, and I’ve got as much right to it as anyone.”

“Do you think you got a right to their cattle, too?” someone wanted to know. “We hang rustlers around here.”

Pettigrew turned his fury in the direction of the voice, but Connors clamped a hand on his shoulder to restrain him.

“We can’t solve anything this way, Amos. The fact is, you got no idea who cut your fence and you ain’t likely to find out.”

For an instant, Catherine thought Pettigrew would turn on him, too, but the irate rancher managed to regain control of his temper. He shook off Connors’s hand in irritation, but he said, “You’re right, Sam, but I’ll give you all a warning. From now on, my men’ll be patrolling at night, and if they catch any fence cutters, they’ll shoot them where they stand.”

Catherine’s gasp was lost amid the roar of disapproval from the crowd. Pettigrew stomped off toward his horse, and in a few moments he and what Catherine guessed must be his crew rode away. She stood where she was as the crowd coalesced into various groups. One group clustered around Augustus Nylan, who was muttering furiously while Lulie tried unsuccessfully to soothe him. Another group gathered around Sam Connors. She could hear the deep vibration of his voice as he urged them to something, but she could not make out the words.

In a few minutes David broke from the group and made his way over to where she stood. “I’m sorry you had to see this, Miss Eaton. It’s a sad thing when you can’t even go to church in peace.”

“Yes, it is,” she said. “I had no idea how serious the fencing problem was. Would Mr. Pettigrew’s men really shoot someone?”

David glanced uneasily down at his boots. “I—I reckon they would, but they won’t catch anybody,” he hastened to assure her. “I mean, the ones who do the cutting don’t never get caught.”

“I guess that’s some comfort.” She glanced at the men to whom Connors was speaking. She could see some of them were ready to resort to violence, too. Would Connors condone shooting?

David followed the direction of her gaze and said, “Sam didn’t mean to embarrass you by what he said.”

Catherine doubted that, but she decided not to argue the point. “He was only stating a fact!”

David nodded vigorously. “And he was trying to keep you out of it.”

“How very considerate of him,” she said, but David missed the sarcasm in her voice.

“Yeah, Sam’s a little rough, but he’s a good man. Not like Pettigrew and some of the others.”

“Isn’t your ranch fenced, too?” she pointed out. David’s expression told her he did not consider it the same thing at all. “We only fenced our own land, and we put up a gate so folks could use the road.”

“And what about your water?” she challenged. Before David could reply, the church bell began to ring. Catherine thought it had a desperate sound to it, and one look at the Reverend Fletcher’s face as he pulled the rope confirmed her impression. He was obviously trying to break up the conclaves being held in his churchyard, and Catherine hoped his sermon that morning would soften a few of the hearts.

Hoping to encourage the others, she took David’s arm and started for the church door. A few of those who had also been mere onlookers in the morning’s drama followed, and soon the larger groups broke up and began to move toward the church.

Inside, Catherine and David took a seat near the back on one side, but she quickly saw the earlier animosity was still holding. Augustus and his people sat on one side, and Connors’s friends sat on the other. Catherine and David were on the side of the big ranchers, and she did not even want to know if the black look Jessica Nylan gave her was because she was on the wrong side or because she sat with David.

The entire service was a disaster. Hardly anyone sang during the hymns, and by the time the Reverend Fletcher got up to preach, he actually trembled with apprehension. Fletcher was a short, stout man with a bald head and a tendency to sweat profusely. To give him credit, he made a valiant effort. He chose the Sermon on the Mount as his text, and he expounded at length on Christ’s promise of blessing to the peacemakers. Unfortunately, Catherine did not think one in ten of those present heard a word he said.

By the time they rose for the closing hymn, the clapboard building was fairly crackling with tension. Grateful she had already begged off having dinner with the Nylans, she excused herself from David the instant the service was over and made her way outside to find Lulie.

The older woman was already surrounded by the wives of the farmers and smaller ranchers. Catherine laid a comforting hand on her arm and said, “I wanted to thank you for your hospitality and tell you how sorry I am for what happened this morn—”

“You see how it is? I told you about Sam Connors, didn’t I?” Lulie said. “He’s their ringleader, too, just like they accuse Augustus of leading our group. It was probably his idea to shoot the fence cutters.”

Although Catherine had no cause to like Sam Connors, she felt Lulie painted him a little too black. “Mr. Connors seemed to be trying to calm Mr. Pettigrew down.”

Lulie’s pale brown eyes flashed. “Whose side are you on, anyways?”

“I’m not on anyone’s side. I simply want to see everyone treated fairly,” Catherine insisted, turning to the other women for their support.

Twila Shallcross jumped to her defense. “Miss Eaton is new here. We can’t expect her to get involved in our battles.”

“She can see who’s right and who’s wrong, can’t she?” Lulie asked. “If it’s fairness she wants, she won’t be on Connor’s side for long.”

Catherine sighed in frustration, but before she could reply, Augustus called. “Lulie, get the kids together. We’re leaving.”

“Come on, Miss Eaton. We’ll drop you at the school,” Lulie said.

“There’s no need to trouble yourself. It’s out of your way, and I’d enjoy the walk,” Catherine said, eager to get away from the Nylans as quickly as possible. “I’ll just get my bag out of the wagon.”

Catherine thanked her again, but Lulie was too distracted to notice as she called to Jessica to help gather the rest of the children. Catherine slipped away without further incident.

The school was on the opposite end of town, but that was not a long distance. Catherine chose the shady side of Main Street, and the sound of her heels on the wooden sidewalk as she walked past the shuttered businesses was loud in the mostly deserted town.

“Miss Eaton!”

She turned to see David riding down the street toward her. Behind him, hanging back, rode Sam Connors, astride the most magnificent horse she had ever seen, a black stallion with a white blaze. Riding this horse, wearing his black suit and with his face shaded by an even blacker Stetson, Connors looked to Catherine’s artist’s eye like the perfect metaphor for evil. She shivered slightly at the thought.

David reined up beside her and jumped down from his horse. “Aren’t you going to the Nylans for dinner?”

“No, I’m going back to the school. I told the Nylans I had some work to do and excused myself from Sunday dinner.”

Sam Connors came up and reined his stallion in. “Didn’t they offer to drive you over to the school on their way home?”

“Yes, but I told them I’d rather walk.”

His dark gaze was faintly disbelieving, and David said, “Sam don’t believe in walking. He’d saddle up to go from the house to the barn if he could.” The boy ignored his brother’s glance of reprimand and added, “Here, I’ll carry your bag for you.”

He snatched the bag from her before she could refuse and started off, leading his horse with his free hand.

Catherine glanced uncertainly at Connors, who muttered an imprecation and then swung resignedly down from his own mount with a creak of saddle leather. Covering a smile, Catherine fell into step beside David. In a moment, Connors came up on her other side, leading his restive stallion.

He wasn’t really a giant, she told herself as she tried to judge his height out of the corner of her eye. He probably only stood a little over six feet without those high-heeled riding boots. Still, he was rather broad. In the shadows stretching out before them, she looked like a little girl next to him. She had always known she was petite, but never before had she felt insignificant. To make matters worse, she was afraid the illusion of evil about him wasn’t just her overactive imagination.

Connors’s dark eyes glittered down at her, and she tried in vain to read the emotion in them. “Davy said I should apologize for what I said this morning.”

She frowned at his ungracious tone. Determined to mind her own manners, she said, “There’s no need.”

“That’s what I told him,” Connors replied with irritating unconcern. “I figured you’d be glad I tried to keep you out of it.”

Glad? She didn’t feel remotely glad about anything that had happened this morning, but she remembered with whom she was dealing and bit back her sharp reply. There was no use in jeopardizing David’s art lessons for the small pleasure of putting this man firmly in his place.

They walked on for a little way while Catherine cast about for a neutral topic of conversation. “That’s a beautiful horse, Mr. Connors.”

His eyebrows rose skeptically. “Are you a judge of horseflesh, Miss Eaton?”

“One needn’t know much to recognize such quality,” she countered. “But I probably know more than you would ever suppose.”

His dark gaze flicked over her disdainfully, making her feel smaller and more insignificant than ever. “If you know anything at all, it would be more than I’d suppose.”

“Sam!” David chastened. “You promised.” Connors’s lips tightened, and Catherine wondered exactly what he’d promised.

“Your brother has a right to be skeptical,” she said generously. “I know I don’t look like an authority, but as an art student, I had quite a bit of experience dissecting horses and other animals, too.”

“Dissecting?” David asked, puzzling over the unfamiliar word.

“Yes. You know, cutting them up.”

“You butchered livestock?” Connors scoffed, plainly amused at such a preposterous idea.

“No, of course I didn’t butcher livestock. I cut them up to examine the muscle and bone structure.”

“What in God’s name for?” Connors demanded incredulously.

“So when I drew or painted pictures of them, I could use my knowledge of anatomy to make the animals look as real as possible.”

“Gosh!” David exclaimed. “Maybe that’s why my animals don’t look any better than my people do.”

“Your people are getting much better, David,” she assured him.

“You better not let Miss Eaton draw your picture again, Davy,” Connors said dryly. “She might want to cut you up to make sure she gets it right.”

David laughed good-naturedly, although his eyes asked her a silent question.

“No, I don’t cut up my models,” Catherine said, giving Connors a disgruntled frown, “but I have studied human anatomy, too. In fact, my father taught anatomy at the Pennsylvania Academy, and he made all his students attend lectures at the Jefferson Medical College.”

“Next, you’ll be telling us you really did cut people up,” Connors said in disgust.

She had, of course. The study of human anatomy included dissecting cadavers, but Catherine would never admit such a thing to Sam Connors. He probably wouldn’t believe her, anyway.

David was shaking his head in wonder. “There’s a lot more to being an artist than I ever thought,” he said.

Now Connors frowned, and his sharp gaze went from David to Catherine and back to David again. “Don’t worry about it, Davy. You’re going to be a rancher, remember?”

Catherine thought his tone held a warning, but if David heard it, he gave no sign it disturbed him. “Oh, sure, I remember,” he said. “I’d just—I’d like to learn as much as I can.”

“Well, you’re lucky you have Miss Eaton, then,” Connors said slyly. “Seems she knows everything there is to know already.”

Catherine scowled at him, but he only grinned that maddening grin of his, the one that made him look like David, which made her even angrier.

Trying to remember she had vowed not to cross Sam Connors again, she managed a semblance of her sweetest smile as they stopped in front of the school.

“Your brother is right. I do know almost everything, and I’ll do my best to pass my knowledge along to you. We’ll even dissect some animals, if you like.” She turned to Connors and looked him up and down with the same disdain he had used on her. “We might even cut up a person if the opportunity presents itself.”

Connors’s dark eyes narrowed, but David hooted with laughter. “Now you’d better watch out, Sam, especially if you see Miss Eaton with a skinning knife.”

The expression in Connor’s eyes was murderous for a moment, but only for a moment. Then the triumphant twinkle she had come to hate returned. His gaze slid over her small figure with insulting thoroughness. “I’m not too scared,” he decided. “She’d have to wrestle me down first, and I think I have the advantage.”

Catherine’s cheeks flamed, but too many other parts of her also burned for her to blame simple embarrassment. She had the uncomfortable feeling he had examined her and found her lacking as a woman in some elemental way. She did not like the feeling at all.

“Come on, Davy. Miss Eaton said she’s got some work to do, and we’re keeping her from it.” He touched his hat brim, then turned the stallion and mounted.

The stallion was restless from being led, and Sam let him dance away a few dozen feet before checking him to wait for Davy. From this safe distance, he let himself look back and watch the boy return her bag and say goodbye to her.

God, she was a pretty little thing, all sunshine and light. Her skin was as white as milk, and her hair gleamed like gold in the morning sun. He could still remember how soft her hand had been the night they’d danced. The rest of her would be soft too, and he knew just what she would look like under those prim clothes. Her small breasts would tilt upward, the tips as pink as her lips and straining to be touched. He would be able to span her tiny waist with his hands, and then he’d trace the flare of her hips and her long, slender legs.

He knew just how she’d be in bed, too—quiet and submissive, absorbing his passion, draining him until he was as weak and as helpless as a babe. Oh, yes, he knew all about women like Catherine Eaton.

Did she think she could cut him up, dissect him, like one of her animals? Well, she had another think coming if she did. Sam Connors had been cut up by an expert, and now he was immune to women like her.

And if he sometimes dreamed about her golden hair drifting across his chest and her white body pressed against his, no one but he would ever know about it.