Emily,
I’ll not waste time with pleasantries as you did in your letter. It seems you have settled in that cozy little farmhouse with a husband and his brat and forgotten why you’re there to start with. You are not there to be a wife or ma. You are there to find the map and gold.
Since you have become so lax in your thinking, I am going to save you from your laziness by setting a deadline. You have until winter’s first frost to find the gold. Anyone with any wits about them could manage that. Unless you want your grandmother to be sent away, you’d best get to work.
Uncle Stewart
Emily’s belly clenched, and her fingers trembled on the page. She sat down on the settee, glad she’d sent Adam out to play. She was beginning to despair of ever finding the map. She’d finished looking in the attic and around the house. It was only spring, but winter would be here before she knew it. What if she couldn’t find the gold by winter? What if the map was not even here? Someone could have found it and thrown it out long ago for all she knew.
She heard Adam squealing outside and peeked out the window. He sat in the dirt watching some bug crawl along the ground. He coaxed it onto a stick and squealed again. Emily smiled. She longed to go outside and play with him, but now she felt compelled to search for the map.
She looked around the room for some area, some piece of furniture she hadn’t searched already. She’d looked everywhere.
Maybe she was going about it all wrong. Maybe Cade knew something that would give her a clue as to the gold’s whereabouts. Maybe he even knew of the map but didn’t know its significance.
That’s it. I’ll see if I can find out something from him.
It sure beat looking for a needle in a haystack. Especially when she didn’t even know if the needle existed.
Emily put another spoonful of potatoes on Adam’s plate and smiled at him.
“Thank you,” he said.
Her eyes met Cade’s, and she read the approval in them. She’d been working with Adam on his manners. He was a fast student, ready to learn and eager to please. Keeping him clean, though, was a task she’d given up on. She’d learned to let him get as dirty as he pleased, then have him get washed up for supper.
She glanced at Cade, who was serving himself another slab of ham. He could put away food, that man, but still stayed slim and solid. Well, it was no wonder with the hard work he did all day. Her gaze fell to his hands, so strong and tanned. His fingers, squared at the tips, were long and so … masculine.
And still.
Her gaze found his, and she saw he was studying her. She’d been staring at his hands, she realized, and knew he must think her odd. She picked up her fork and worked a piece of ham onto it, her face burning.
He’d never said a thing about their embrace in the attic a while back. But she’d thought about it more than she cared to admit. If Cade had thought much of it, she couldn’t tell, for he’d been as distant as he ever had.
Her uncle’s words flashed in her mind. You are there to find the map and gold. The weeks were slipping away, and she had to start questioning Cade, like it or not.
She glanced in his direction and realized Adam was telling him about a game they had played today. How could she steer the conversation toward the map without drawing Cade’s suspicion? Then an idea occurred to her.
“Perhaps tomorrow we could play a different game,” she said to Adam.
His dark eyebrows popped up high. “What game?”
“Well, seeing as how you like dirt so much, perhaps I could bury some treasure. I could make you a map with pictures and see if you can find it.”
“Real gold?”
Emily laughed and hoped it didn’t sound as brittle as she thought. “Well, I don’t have any real treasure, but maybe we could use buttons and just pretend it’s real.”
Emily glanced at Cade, hoping to jog some memory. If he’d seen a map lying around somewhere, maybe he’d think of it now.
“Can we do it now?” Adam asked.
“Finish your supper,” Cade said. “Tomorrow’s soon enough.” He glanced at Emily then back to his son. “You might help Emily with the garden before you think of asking her to play.”
Her cheeks burned. Now he thought she was putting off her chores to play games with Adam. He must think her completely slothful.
She tried to regain her composure. “We’ll do our work first, won’t we, Adam?”
“Aww.”
“None of that,” Cade said. “If we don’t grow a garden, what do you reckon we’ll eat all winter?”
This was getting her nowhere. He’d not taken the hint about the map at all, and now they were on a different topic altogether.
“How about if I draw up the map tonight, Adam?” she asked. “Then as soon as we’re finished with our chores, I can bury the treasure for you.”
“Yippee!”
“Finish your peas,” Cade said.
“Yes, sir.”
Later that night after Adam was in bed, Emily sat with a piece of paper, mapping out the backyard. Her trees looked more like inverted pitchforks, but she supposed Adam would be able to make it out.
She glanced at Cade where he sat reading his Bible. She needed to get him talking about his grandfather or the map. Surely he knew something that would be of help.
She marked the spot on the map where she would bury Adam’s treasure and held it up. Would Adam be able to understand the pictures?
“What do you think of it?” She held up the picture for Cade. Across the room, his gaze lifted from the Bible to the picture she held up. He squinted, and she realized he couldn’t see well from across the room.
She got up and walked over to the settee where he sat. Feeling brave, she sank down beside him and handed him the picture.
His lips twitched as he looked at it.
She felt amusement well up in her. So her picture did look like Adam had drawn it. Had she ever claimed to be an artist?
His lips twitched again.
“And what’s so funny, Mr. Manning?” she asked, feeling suddenly playful.
He glanced at her then back to the map. “Why’s there a porcupine in the middle of the yard?”
She swatted his arm and wondered if she’d overstepped her bounds. “That’s a bush.”
His laugh was disguised as a cough.
“And I suppose you could do better?”
He looked at her then, and the amusement on his face made her feel warm and cozy all over. “I’m not the one who offered to draw a treasure map.”
His smile slid away slowly like the ocean’s tide, but his gaze remained locked on hers. She felt her own fade away. The mantel clock ticked off time, and so did her eager heart.
He cleared his throat and looked back at the paper. “It’s fine, really.” He handed it back to her. “You’ve been real good to Adam.”
She accepted the paper and suddenly realized how close they were sitting. Her calico gown draped over his knee, and she realized she liked the intimacy the image invoked.
“I’ve grown fond of him. He’s a good boy.”
Cade settled against the back of the sofa, and she was relieved he didn’t seem to mind her closeness. “He is good. But I’ve been a little neglectful of the manners and such. He’s learning a lot from you.”
His approval brought a wave of pleasure to her belly. “He’s a delight to me, I assure you.” All this talk was wonderful, but she couldn’t help but think of her uncle’s last letter and his deadline. Perhaps now, while they were talking so nicely, was a good time to probe.
“Adam’s been asking about his ancestors lately.” It was true. He’d had a barrelful of questions about who owned the clothes and trinkets in the attic.
“That a fact?”
“Umm.” She worked absently on the map. “I didn’t know what to tell him.”
He closed the Bible on his lap and laced his fingers behind his head. “Not much to tell, really. We’re farmers, going back at least three generations.”
He went on to tell her about his own parents. They’d been hard workers and plain folk who’d done well to raise a family and provide the necessities. When he mentioned his grandparents, Emily’s ears perked up.
“Don’t know much about Grandpa Quincy ’cept he didn’t much like to work. My pa said he was gone a lot and would turn up out of the blue. One day he just disappeared, and they never did know what happened to him. Eventually, they figured he was dead and put a grave marker on the hill out back.”
She’d seen it weeks ago and had wondered about it. “Do you remember him at all?”
He shook his head. “I was young when he disappeared.”
“You must have missed having a grandfather.”
He shrugged. “It was odd. Nobody liked to talk about Grandpa Quincy much. When I’d ask my pa about him, he’d get all snippy. Grandma didn’t cotton to talking about him either. I just figured her feelings had been hurt by his desertion. She had a hard life, trying to keep up the farm without his help.”
“What do you suppose he did all those times he went away?” She glanced at his face.
His eyes squinted as if he could see into the past. “Don’t know. I guess I figured he wandered around, liked his freedom.”
He didn’t know. She could see the honesty on his face.
Unlike me. A wave of shame washed over her. I’m doing this for Nana, though. I have no choice. She shifted in her seat and watched the material of her skirt slide off his leg.
“Have you ever looked through his things? In the attic, I mean?”
His gaze fixed on her, his brows hiked up beneath his dark bangs. “No. Grandma must’ve put some things up there, but I’ve never gone through the stuff.” His eyes narrowed, and their depths were laced with suspicion.
She grew warm under his scrutiny and adjusted her skirts around her legs.
“Why? Did you find something up there?”
“No.” The word, too emphatic, popped out of her mouth before she could stop it. But at least that question she could answer honestly. “No, I just—I just wondered if you’d ever looked through his things and found some kind of explanation of what he’d done while he was away,” she finished lamely.
“Don’t reckon there’s much to find. He was just a wanderer who didn’t much want to be tied down to family and work.”
She nodded, not wanting to agree verbally. It would be too much like a lie, and she’d had her fill of dishonesty. She decided to turn in for the night. As much as she’d enjoyed her talk with Cade tonight, it didn’t take a genius to recognize the suspicion that lingered on his face. And she’d just as soon hit the hay before he started asking questions.