Chapter 6

 

Dawn turned the sky pink as the long train pulled up to the brick depot in Richey. The uniformed porter helped Edith down the iron steps. Steam puffed around her as she looked at what she could see of the town. It had a respectable, conventional look, with well-kept storefronts and a sprinkling of narrow houses. A few people were astir, and lights in windows told of more citizens awakening with the day.

As the porter pocketed the folded money Jeff held out to him, he said, “Thanks, sir. Maybe I’ll see you on your return trip, Miss Parker. And I’ll be taking your advice.”

“I’m glad, Mr. Vincent. She must be a very nice girl.”

“That she is.” Seeing that their bags had been unloaded from the second to last car, the porter waved his dark hand at the engineer, leaning out of his window. As the whistle shrilled Mr. Vincent swung back aboard.

Edith waved and, as the train rolled past, she gave Jefferson an uncertain smile. He had seen her comfortably bestowed in first class and then had all but disappeared for the remainder of the trip. He still smelted of pipe and cigar smoke.

She’d seen him once, when he’d taken her into the hotel car to share a dinner with her. She couldn’t complain of her treatment—the Pullman Palace car she had slept in had been more like Versailles than a box on wheels—but she wondered at his unexpected reserve. Perhaps he was tired. He hadn’t come into the sleeping car. She’d watched for him until her heavy eyes had defeated her.

“You must be fatigued, Mr. Dane. Is it far to your home?”

“I’m well, thank you, Miss Parker. And no, it’s not far but too far to walk. I’ll get my buggy from the livery stable.”

He took her arm and walked with her into the depot. They were the only passengers stopping in Richey, and the interior was deserted, very different from the bustling noise and confusion of the St. Louis station. Jefferson asked her if she’d like to rest on one of the benches while he went for the buggy.

Edith agreed gratefully. Though the train had been the epitome of comfort, it had still traveled at a speed of close to forty miles per hour while swaying from side to side. Edith could still feel the motion when she closed her eyes.

She opened them when she heard a noise. Glancing around, she saw that the roller shade behind the cashier’s window was flapping slightly, as though in a breeze. Edith rose to study the train schedule posted behind a glass. In the reflecting surface, she saw a pair of spectacled eyes peering at her from beneath the shade the way a lizard peers from beneath its family rock.

Edith felt acutely uncomfortable under this secret stare. Trying to be casual, she picked up her new alligator handbag from the bench and slipped outside to wait for Jeff.

He came back quickly, driving a bay horse between the shafts of a shiny black buggy. As soon as he pulled up, a middle-aged man in a tight blue coat came out of the station, placing his peaked cap on his balding head. Climbing down from the springy seat, Jeff said, “Hey, Arnie. How’s business?”

“Pretty good, pretty good.” Behind rimless glasses, the station master’s slightly protuberant pale blue eyes fixed on Edith. Now she knew who had been so furtively watching her.

Jeff wrapped his hand around her elbow, pulling her closer to his side. “Arnie Sloan, this is my cousin, Miss Parker, from St. Louis.”

“Morning, ma’am,” Mr. Sloan said. His eyes took in her clothes as though he were memorizing them. Edith’s face burned, but she forced a smile.

“Want some coffee before you head on out to Jeff’s place, Miss Parker?”

Jeff answered for her. “Right nice of you, Arnie, but we best be getting along. Dad’s bound to have breakfast going.”

“I’ll give you a hand with the bags,” Mr. Sloan volunteered. Edith saw how he examined the labels of her luggage and ran his hands over the leather as though appraising how new it was.

“I bought them before I left St. Louis,” Edith said to him. “I’ve never traveled anywhere before. Being on the railroad, you must have many chances to travel.”

“No, ma’am. Plenty to see and do here at home. Been station master nigh on ten years, ain’t never been bored yet.”

“I’m sure you haven’t been.” She held out her hand. “Nice to have met you, Mr. Sloan.”

Jeff helped her into the buggy. “See you at the meeting tomorrow, Arnie.”

“I’ll be there. ‘Bye now, Miss Parker,” he called, as Jeff slapped the reins over the bay’s back. They set off down the road, Edith holding her hat against her head.

“He’s the biggest gossip in town,” Jeff grumbled. “Some he knows; a lot he makes up.”

“Then I’m glad I was polite to him. Though I don’t like deceiving anyone about my relationship with you. And your family,” she added. She didn’t want him to think she had begun bracketing the two of them together.

“I don’t like it myself. I like to be beforehand with the world. Saves trouble. But in this case . . .” He shrugged. “It’s for your own protection.”

They were already out of the small town. The land rose and fell gently beneath the horse’s hooves. Everything was green and pleasant, the crops in the fields high and lush. Early as it was, a certain moisture in the air prophesied a hot and sticky day ahead. Yet the freshness of the air and the lack of crowding buildings made even a muggy day one to look forward to. Edith felt a pain in her breast, as though her heart had expanded for the first time, snapping some confining bond.

“So,” Jeff said, keeping his eyes on the road. “What was all that with the porter?”

“What was what?”

“What advice did you give him? And why were you talking to everybody and his Aunt Lucy aboard that train? You wouldn’t even say ‘boo’ to me when I first met you.”

Edith looked at his frowning profile. “There is a difference between chatting to people while sharing a common experience and speaking to a man and a stranger in the street.”

“A man who has accosted you in the street, you mean.”

“I suppose I do.”

“Very well. And the advice? Something about a woman?”

She hoped he had forgotten. “We were . . . talking about his mother.”

Jeff drew back on the reins. The living silence of the Missouri morning surrounded them. The wind rustled the tops of the trees while the cicadas sang their monotonous song. A few birds looked curiously at the people before returning to their search for breakfast.

“His mother is a ‘very nice girl’?”

Edith stared down into her clasped hands. A hardheaded businessman like Mr. Dane would never believe the truth. Perhaps she could bend her words to fit the listener. Lying, it seemed, was a practice hard to resist.

“We spoke for a moment last night about his lady friend. That’s all. Really.”

He nodded and slapped the reins over the horse’s back. “You’re a lousy liar,” he said evenly. “I’ll remember that.”

Edith felt compelled to explain, stumbling over her hasty words. “I haven’t had much practice. But I thought . . . you did hire me for your problems, Mr. Dane. I thought you wouldn’t like it if I gave advice to someone else, on your time.”

“Do what you please, Miss Parker. I’ve hired you. I have not bought you, body and soul.”

Edith felt a shiver at the base of her spine. What would it be like if he had bought and paid for her? She dragged on the reins of her runaway imagination. “In that case, I will tell you that Mr. Vincent was hesitant about proposing matrimony to a young lady he’d only known for a few weeks.”

“I haven’t known you that long, but I know what you said.”

“Naturally, I told him not to go too fast. He might frighten her if he suddenly laid his heart at her feet. Or what is worse, she might not think him sincere.”

“I lose my bet. I would have guessed you’d tell him not to waste any more time but get on with it.”

“That would have been most imprudent.”

Edith turned her head as though the fence they drove beside was the most interesting thing she’d ever seen. Perhaps lying was a skill that improved with a little practice, for he hadn’t noticed her untruth this time. But how amazing that Jeff Dane should come to understand her so quickly. She had, in fact, given the porter that exact advice. The glow about his frame had been as brilliant as the sun, for the love between Mr. Vincent and his lady was shared fully.

In a little while, Jeff drew up before a two-story white farmhouse. The roof of the porch that ran around the front of the house seemed almost to reach the ground. A walk led up to the front, waist-high masses of rose shrubs bordering the crushed white stone. Their heavenly fragrance rose to meet Edith as she stood to get down from the buggy.

“How beautiful,” she sighed as Jefferson lifted her down.

Looking up into her face, as she gazed at his home, Jeff had to agree. Quickly, he swung her down. “Those are my father’s doing. He loves his roses. I’m not allowed to touch ‘em. Cows I can manage but I just kill plants.”

“I’ve never been lucky that way either.”

He’d walked ahead down the path, carrying Orpheus, leaving her to follow. “I wonder where everyone is,” he said aloud. “Usually, when I come home, they come charging out like . . .”

“Daddy!”

From two directions, little comets hurled themselves toward their father. One caught him about the waist, the other about the knees. As he began to sag, he threw Edith a laughing look, holding out the birdcage. With an answering smile, she took it.

Instantly, Jeff bent and scooped his two daughters up in a giant embrace. The larger girl chattered away, seemingly intent on filling her father’s ear with all the happenings of the week in the shortest possible time. The little one just giggled.

Without putting either girl down, their father juggled them around so that they were each tucked under one of his arms. He carried the laughing girls up the stairs to the deep, cool porch.

Sitting down on a hard chair, Jeff brought the girls upright to sit on his knees. “This is Miss Edith Parker, girls. She’s come to stay with us for a while.”

Two pairs of eyes, matching hazel, looked up at her. Except for their eye color, the little girls were as different as could be. The little one’s hair curled riotously above her baby-plump face. Her nose was tiny and her mouth a tight rosebud of light pink. It was impossible to say how she would look when older.

Louise’s face was more defined with a short snub for a nose and a chin astonishingly determined in one so young. She seemed all too intelligent. Her bright eyes flashed on Edith and in an instant, Edith felt as though she’d been examined to her boot soles and backbone.

“Hello,” she said timidly.

It was Maribel who spoke first. “What’s that?” She pointed to the cloaked cage.

“This is Orpheus.” Edith pulled off the covering. The little yellow bird gave her a reproachful look, his head tipped to one side. Then, as though testing his voice, he chirped once or twice. Maribel squealed in delight and squirmed off her father’s lap. Kneeling, she peered into the cage.

“Does he sing?” Louise stood by her sister.

“When he wants to,” Edith said.

She slipped a glance toward Jeff. He leaned forward in his chair, his powerful hands spread wide on his knees. As if feeling her look, he met her eyes. Boldly, he winked. Edith jerked her attention back to the children.

Maribel poked a chubby finger between the bars. “Here, birdie.”

Orpheus tipped his head back and sent a shower of golden notes into the air. Then he flipped his wings as though waiting for applause. Maribel clapped twice. “Sing!” she commanded.

Orpheus obliged.

“You’re a dreadful show-off,” Edith said indulgently.

Jeff stood up. “Let’s put him up here.” He lifted the cage to a hook in the crossbeam of the porch. The early morning sunlight did not reach directly in but the beams were bright enough to turn the canary’s feathers to gold.

Orpheus began to sing what was obviously an ode in honor of the morning. The sudden crowing of a rooster didn’t make him break off. Rather he seemed to take it as a challenge and increased the beauty of his aria.

“He’ll need water,” Edith said. “And I have his seeds in my luggage, if you girls would like to help me feed him.”

She’d prepared on the train to meet tears or shyness. After all, the girls wouldn’t know who she was and she’d been bashful with strangers all her life. Now she had only to meet Jeff’s father. If she could survive that ordeal . . . but no, Jeff had said it had been his father’s idea that she should come.

She heard the tap-drag of the elder Mr. Dane’s footsteps before she saw him. The girls spun around from contemplating the bird and danced to the door. “Gran’pa, Daddy’s home!”

One attached to each of his hands, they dragged him onto the porch. “Howdy, son. Didja . . . ‘?”

“Yeah, Dad. This is Cousin Edith, from St. Louis.”

“‘Course it is. I’d know you anywhere, cousin. And you’ll have to call me Uncle Sam. Well, maybe not. Sounds a little too Yankee for me. Just call me Sam.”

His grin was the same as his son’s, only not quite as broad or infectious. The big shoulders were like Jeff’s too, only weighted by an extra twenty years. It was his left leg that dragged. His eyes were deep-set and his blond hair showed touches of frost. Despite that, the two men looked more like brothers than father and son.

When Edith shook hands with him, she felt no electric tingle as she had with Jeff. However, she was aware of the faintest glimmer about him, almost imperceptible even to her sharp sense.

“Don’t leave our cousin standing, son,” the older Mr. Dane said. “Breakfast’ll be ready in two shakes.” He glanced at his granddaughters. “Get washed up, my beauties.”

“Yes, Gran’pa,” the two girls piped and ran off.

Jeff said, “I’ll get your luggage, Miss Parker.”

“Perhaps . . . if I could go to my room first. I’d like to take my hat off.”

“That’s right, son. First things first. Speaking of which, my pie’s about ready to come out. ‘Scuse me, miss. I mean, Cousin Edith.” He grinned.

Jeff and Edith followed Mr. Dane into the house. “Dad’s one of the best cooks around. We used to have a bunch of ladies coming around after Mother died, bringing all sorts of food. Maybe he should have married one of ‘em but he said he’d rather learn to cook than replace Mother.”

“When did she pass away?”

“Two years ago. Here you are.”

The rooms they’d passed through had been neat without being finicky. She noticed the mantels and tables were bare of knick-knacks, not even pictures. However, there were a great many books, both on shelves and scattered freely around.

At the end of the upstairs hall, Jeff swung open a door and stood aside to let her enter a good-sized white room. Instead of the heavy curtains, beaded, hobbled, and fringed, that her aunt had always hung, thin muslin covered the windows, draped back to let the full sunshine in. The brass bed was neatly made, the candlewick spread flat and nearly smooth. A mirror above a plain pine dressing table showed Edith her own tired face.

“What a pleasant room,” she said, reaching up to take out the hatpins that seemed to have dug through to her skull.

“Thanks, it’s mine.”

Edith’s hands stilled. “I beg your pardon.”

“This is my room. I’ll be bunking in with Dad while you’re with us. Don’t worry,” he said in response to her startled look. “It’s no trouble.”

“But I can’t . . .” He was gone.

Edith looked at the big, deep bed. It seemed to grow larger as she stood there. She’d never slept in a bed that belonged to someone else nor ever even shared a mattress with a friend. Her aunt had been horrified by the thought of such moral decay.

Searching her spirit for some hint of true distaste, Edith was startled to find none. She reminded herself that this was a man’s bed, a very attractive man’s bed. This is where he laid his head every night. Possibly he’d shared it with his wife— Gwen. Edith knew that married people usually slept in a common bed though she didn’t imagine it could be very comfortable.

Laying her hat down on the pine bench at the foot of the bed, Edith smoothed a single wrinkle out of the white spread. She followed the crease up to the pillows, the minute dots of the pattern tickling her palm. The pillows were down, deep and soft. Edith fought the urge to put her cheek tenderly against one.

After all, it couldn’t hurt to sleep in a man’s bed as long as the man were sleeping somewhere else. Jeff wasn’t likely to lose his way in his own house, or to absentmindedly return to his former room by mistake. Such a thing would be absurd.

The darkened room showed only a glimmer of moonlight through the translucent curtains. Long ago the house had quieted and now the few sounds that reached her wakeful ear were of the house settling. Then, faintly, she heard a footstep in the hall outside her door. Propping herself up, she looked toward the sound and saw the white china knob of the door turn. A slice of darkness grew as the door opened. Soft as a whisper, Jeff called her name. “Are you awake, my dear?”

Frozen, she didn’t answer. She heard him sigh and the creak as the door began to close. “Yes, I’m awake.” He came back into the room, closer and closer. . . .

Edith sat up, pressing her hands to her cheeks. Her heart beat very fast and her lips were strangely dry. Perhaps she’d fallen asleep and dreamed. . . . No. That fantasy had been produced by her waking mind.

Swinging her feet off the bed—another sin to be counted against her, shoes on a clean counterpane—Edith vowed to take this fantasy as a warning. She would lock her door. Not so much to safeguard against Jefferson, but as a defense against her own worst nature.

A few minutes later, she stepped into the wide hall. Following her hunger, she found her way to the kitchen by the smell of warm biscuits. Both girls were there, their hair wet from splashing their faces. Mr. Dane, a red gingham apron contrasting with his blue jeans, worked at the big black stove.

“There you are. Just in time.” He placed a towering stack of pancakes on a plate and put it down at an empty chair. “Now don’t say you can’t eat all of these. They’ll just go cold if you don’t pitch in.”

“Oh, I should be happy to eat whatever you set before me, Mr. Dane.” She sat down and poured pure amber honey over the stack. The pancakes looked wonderful, high and moist. “Your son said you were a fine cook.”

“He did? Shucks.”

Though his expression changed little, he flipped a pancake high in the air, catching it in the pan. Maribel laughed. “Do it again, Gran’pa.”

He obliged and then said, “That’s enough. I want to eat ‘em, not play with ‘em.”

Every moment, Edith expected Jeff to walk into the bright kitchen and seal himself at the round oak table that gleamed golden in the sunlight. She found herself eating more and more slowly, to give him time. The little girls had no such restraint. They ate with relish, sometimes seeming to put more in their mouths than they could hold.

Mr. Dane said, around a mouthful, “Won’t be much left for your dad, Louise, the way you go on.”

“Um, where . . . ?” Edith began.

“You can’t expect that son of mine to sit down to eat before he’s checked the stock. Not after being away for a week. But then, he does the same thing every morning the Lord sends.”

“Commendable,” Edith replied. All at once, she began to eat more quickly, certain she was merely trying to get ahead of the children. After all, she had a lot of meals to catch up on, and at their rate of speed, there’d be no second helping if she didn’t hurry.

She looked up to find Louise gazing at her. Edith became a little nervous. The child’s look seemed to be largely composed of speculation and surprise, as though she were wondering what strange kind of insect she found in the yard. Sternly. Edith told herself that she was far older than Louise and should easily be able to manage the child. Yet when she tried to meet her steady gaze, it was Edith’s eyes that fell.

“If you’re done eating,” Louise said, “I’ll be glad to show you ‘round, Cousin Edith.”

Mr. Dane frowned. “That’s right nice of you, honey. But I bet she’s worn out from traveling, aren’t you, uh, Edith?”

“Actually, I slept very well on the train. Thank you, Louise. I’d appreciate a tour.”

“Okay.” The girl took her plate to the sink. “You ready?”

“Me too,” Maribel cried, climbing down from her chair.

Like Louise, the younger daughter of the house carried her plate to the sink, although she demonstrated greater care, holding the rim tight in her fists. Edith felt it wise to follow the little girls’ example and also put her sticky plate into the cast-iron sink.

“Why, thanks, cousin,” Mr. Dane said. “Girls, you run on out in the yard. I want to talk to Miss Edith a minute.”

With some alarm, Edith resumed her seat. She folded her hands primly in her lap and looked up at the older gentleman, trying to disguise her apprehension. He leaned back in his chair to glance out the back door. Edith peered past him and saw that both girls were running around the yard, aimlessly.

Mr. Dane brought all four feet of his chair back to the ground. With a mysterious air, he drew a small clipping out of his apron pocket and unfolded it. His deep-set brown eyes looked at the neatly torn piece and then locked on hers.

“You don’t resemble your picture much. You sure that son of mine brought home the right party?”

He handed the paper across. It was her own advertisement from the Bulletin, from the last time it ran. Edith had never noticed before how sharp and narrow her aunt’s gaze was behind her black pince-nez. Perhaps it was her own guilty conscience that made it seem her aunt was giving her a most criticizing look.

At the same time, however, Edith recalled that Jeff had mistaken her for her aunt when first they’d met. She cringed at the thought. Surely, she could not look so stern ... so ... incurably virtuous.

“That’s my late aunt. I’m running the service now.”

“You must be pretty busy. Jeff must have been kind of pushy to get you to come all the way out here.”

“I didn’t have very much choice, I’m afraid.”

“You mean he made you throw everything else up? That doesn’t sound like Jeff.”

“Oh, no,” Edith said, hurrying to adjust Mr. Dane’s wrong idea. “He was courtesy itself. It was just that . . . well . . .”

Without knowing quite how, Edith began telling the older man all about her troubles with her empty post box and her demanding landlord. “Really, I was at my wit’s end.”

“So when my son offered you a job, you jumped at it?”

“No, she didn’t. That’s the last thing she did.”

Edith turned around in her seat. Jeff Dane leaned against the kitchen door frame, his arms folded across his chest. She had no idea how long he’d been standing there, but he surely must have heard every word, even when she described him as “a gallant knight riding to her rescue.”

He pushed lazily away from the upright post and entered the room. A long brown dog followed him in. The animal stopped and raised its head. Edith found herself looking into the sad face of what was probably the ugliest dog she’d ever seen in her life. His face was all wrinkles and his ears were long lappets.

“Down, Grouchy,” Jeff said, shaking the coffee pot.

The hound slumped against the ground, gazing up at her out of pouchy red-rimmed eyes. Cautiously, Edith extended her hand. The whip-like tail thumped against the boards of the kitchen floor as he lifted his pointed face to sniff. He whimpered as his wet nose nuzzled her hand.

“What kind of a dog is it?”

“A hound dog. Got a first-class smeller there. Track anything over any kind of ground, won’t you, boy?”

The small eyes rolled ecstatically at his master’s voice.

Sam said, “Would you believe that dog slept outside your door at night, Jeff? Wouldn’t budge much in the daytime either. I think he was worried. Since one master left him, I mean.”

“Left him?”

“His owner died last year,” Jeff said. “He left Grouchy to me in his will.”

“I see.” Moved, Edith took a piece of bacon off her plate and offered it to the dog under the table. As nonchalantly as a baby, Grouchy stood up, stretched and yawned, showing a dark tongue. Then, as if he were thinking of something else, he filched the tidbit and gave her hand a quick swipe in thanks before lying down again. Edith met Jeff’s eyes and had to smile when she realized he’d seen the whole thing.

“Did you ever have a dog?” he asked.

“No, I wanted one but I had enough trouble convincing Mr. Maginn that I should be allowed to keep Orpheus.”

“You’ve missed a lot.”

“Perhaps.”

He sipped his coffee. “Remind me to pay a call on the landlord of yours next time I’m in St. Louis.”

Sam said, “Maybe I’ll go along next time. Sounds to me like the fellow needs a little lesson in how to treat a lady.”