Her Heart's Desire (9 page)

Chapter Six

Rick waited until Wednesday before
going to Ethel Mae’s house. He didn’t rush to see her for a couple
of reasons. One was simply because he didn’t want to seem too eager
to see her again, but the second reason puzzled him. Ever since
Saturday when he’d spent the evening with Sally and her family, he
ended up thinking of her far more than he should. It bothered him
that he should dwell on her the way he was. She was being nice to
him by helping him attract Ethel Mae. Surely, the pleasant
conversation they shared after supper wasn’t meant to lead to
something more.

With a sigh, he adjusted his tie and
examined his reflection in the mirror at his room in the boarding
house. Taking a deep breath, he decided Ethel Mae was surely done
with supper by now and headed out of the boarding house. The sun
wouldn’t be setting quite yet, but he wondered if he might talk
Ethel Mae into watching it with him tonight. He missed the
opportunity last time.

I also missed the
opportunity with Sally.

Criticizing himself for thinking such
a thing, he focused on the houses in front of him. Sally meant to
discuss her friend. That’s why she offered for him to stay longer,
but at the time, he hadn’t been in the mood to talk about her
friend which was why he declined. He sighed. This was ridiculous.
He couldn’t keep going in circles, thinking of Sally all the time.
He wanted to be with her friend. The first time he saw Ethel Mae in
the mercantile with her mother and little sister, he decided she’d
be his wife one day. The plan was simple really. All he needed to
do was stick with it.

He reached Ethel Mae’s house and
climbed the porch steps. To his surprise, Vivian came running out
the front door and almost ran into him. “Whoa! Watch where you’re
going,” he teased as he stopped her from plowing into
him.

She took a step back and laughed.
“Sorry, Mr. Johnson. I was on my way to give my friend a letter.”
She held the neatly folded piece of paper up. “It’s
important.”

“
Oh, I don’t want to
interfere with something important.” Grinning, he stepped aside,
but to his surprise, she didn’t go down the steps. “Is something
wrong?”

“
Are you here to see my
sister?”

“
As a matter of fact, I
am.”

“
I’ll tell her you’re
here.”

He blinked when she spun on
her heel and bolted back into the house.
What a strange girl.
Slipping his
hands into his pockets, he waited for her to come back out to
invite him inside. However, when she returned, she shut the door
behind her, signaling that such an invite wouldn’t be happening
unless her sister allowed it.

“
Mr. Johnson,” she began in
a hushed tone, “I want you to know that my sister is getting ready.
She had on one of her old shirts but is putting on something
better.” With a wink, she added, “She’s also fixing her hair. She
didn’t do that for the other man interested in her. I suppose what
you and Sally are doing is working.”

“
Oh well, that’s good,” he
replied.

“
Go on and sit on the porch
swing. I have a feeling my sister will want to sit with you
tonight.”

As he was about to sit on the porch
swing, he recalled that it wasn’t just one man interested in Ethel
Mae. “You said two men are interested in your sister.”

“
Oh yes, but she’s only
interested in Samuel. Well, that is until you went out to Sally’s.
Now she’s been talking about you all the time.”

“
Does Samuel know about
me?”

“
No. But then he isn’t as
interested in her as you are, so why would he care?”

Something about this whole thing
wasn’t adding up. Vivian was talking a little too fast, and she was
twirling her hair around her fingers while avoiding eye contact
with him. “What is Samuel’s last name?” he asked.

Her jaw dropped. “What?”

Just as he thought. She was definitely
nervous. He’d been too anxious about seeing her sister last week to
notice, but now that his enthusiasm for coming here had waned a bit
since Saturday, he was beginning to notice details he missed
before. “I’m assuming Samuel has a last name. I mean, everyone has
a last name, unless they don’t exist.”

Vivian let out an uneasy laugh. “He’s
real. My sister doesn’t make people up. Samuel is real, and he has
a last name. It’s…um…” She tapped her lips with her finger. “Let me
see…”

Furrowing his eyebrows, he waited for
her to think of a suitable last name to a man he was beginning to
believe really didn’t exist after all.

“
Dixon! That’s a good one.
His name is Samuel Dixon.”

That confirmed his
suspicions.

Giving another nervous giggle, Vivian
said, “I have to go.”

He watched her as she bounded down the
steps, with her letter still in hand, and wondered why Ethel Mae,
Vivian and Sally would make up a man named Samuel. And if Samuel
was made up, it was safe to guess that they made up Larry, too. But
the question was why. Why would they go to such lengths to make up
different men who wanted to court Ethel Mae? What could they
possibly have to gain by such a ploy?

He sat down on the swing and debated
his options. He could pretend that he hadn’t figured out what they
were doing. Drumming his fingers on the arm of the swing, he stared
off into the evening sky, not particularly seeing the pinks and
yellows forming on the horizon. What was his best course of action?
Did he tell Ethel Mae he caught onto what she was doing? Did he
play along? What, exactly, did this mean?

The front door opened, and his gaze
went to Ethel Mae who stepped out onto the porch, her hair and
dress much nicer than it’d been the last time he’d seen her. That
was suspicious, too, wasn’t it?

“
Good evening, Rick,” she
said, a wide smile on her face. “I’m so glad you came
over.”

“
Are you?” he asked
uncertainly.

“
Well, sure I am.” She
crossed the porch and sat next to him, this time looking
attentive.

If he remembered right, last time she
was yawning when they were sitting together like this.

“
I missed you since I last
saw you,” she continued, adjusting the cameo around her neck. “Did
you have a good weekend?”

Yes, she was definitely more
interested in him this time. Uncertain about what to say, he
shrugged. “Yes.”

“
Really? Did you go to
Sally’s for supper?”

“
As a matter of fact, I
did.”

“
And?”

What did she want him to say? It was
quickly occurring to him that she expected him to reply in a
certain way. Could it be that the supper at Sally’s had something
to do with this? Trying to figure out what she wanted him to say in
light of what he learned about Samuel and Larry, he said, “I had a
good time at Sally’s.”

“
Did you?” Ethel Mae
studied her hands which were in her lap for a moment before she
turned her attention back to him. “I hope you’ll consider having
supper over here, too.”

He furrowed his eyebrows. “Supper over
here?”

“
Why yes. It’d be wonderful
to talk to you. You could learn more about me, and I could learn
more about you. Like now. Here we are with that glorious sunset.”
She motioned to it and then tapped his arm affectionately. “Isn’t
it lovely? And isn’t it good we’re sharing this moment
together?”

“
Uh, yes.”
Not quite as lovely as it would be to share it
with Sally.
The thought surprised him, but
perhaps it shouldn’t have since he’d been thinking of Sally all
week.

“
You know, I think the
sunset is like looking at a painting. The way the colors blend
together is beautiful. What do you think of when you look at the
sunset?”

He glanced at the sky. He figured he
should have something romantic to say about it, but his mind was
blank. When he thought of watching a sunset with a woman, he
thought it’d be nice to wrap his arm around her shoulders and maybe
kiss her. The sunset was a way to spark a romantic atmosphere. But
it didn’t seem right with Ethel Mae. Perhaps last week, it did, but
for some reason, it didn’t anymore.

Shifting so he wasn’t so close to her,
he said, “Vivian tells me that you know someone by the name of
Samuel.”

Her eyes grew wide as she pressed her
hand to her heart. “Samuel?”

“
Yes. I hear he’s rather
charming.”

She giggled and waved her hand at him.
“Oh, that Vivian. You know how she is. She exaggerates. Remember
the way she was going on and on about Hugh? She claims to hate him,
but honestly, I think she fancies him deep down.”

“
I don’t know. Vivian was
quite adamant that you were fond of Samuel.”

“
I might have talked to him
on occasion, much like I’ve talked to you, but I assure you, it’s
of little consequence. Isn’t the sunset lovely?”

Hesitant, he glanced at the sky. He
couldn’t believe Ethel Mae and Vivian were lying to him. Even
worse, Sally was behind it! Bolting out of the swing, he said, “I
have to go.”

Ethel Mae gasped and stood up. “But
why? We were having a wonderful time.”

When he realized she followed him to
the porch steps, he spun around and faced her. He was ready to tell
her exactly why. She was making a fool out of him. Lying to him
about some man who didn’t even exist! If only he knew why. He knew
she’d never tell him the truth. If he confronted her, she’d make up
some excuse in an effort to shift the blame to someone
else.

With a frustrated sigh, he said, “I
forgot to do something. I can’t tell you what.”

“
Oh, it sounds serious.
Does it involve your job?”

“
It’s something I must tend
to,” he replied, hedging around the truth.

“
Then I won’t keep you, but
I hope you’ll come by again.”

Somehow he doubted that. To remain
polite, he nodded and headed down the steps. He needed time to
think about what he should do, but for the time being, he thought
it would be best to avoid women altogether.

***

“
He couldn’t get away from
me quick enough,” Ethel Mae told Sally the next day.

Sally looked up from the tea punch she
was making in her kitchen. “Really? What else did Rick
say?”

“
Not much. He asked about
Samuel and then said he had to go.”

Sally’s eyebrows furrowed. “Maybe he’s
trying to make you think he’s not interested in you so you’ll want
him.” And if so, then that meant yesterday evening when he came to
have supper at her house, it didn’t change anything. He still
wanted Ethel Mae.

“
I don’t think so. He
didn’t seem remotely interested in me. He even said he had a good
time when he was here.”

“
Which only proves my
point. He’s a good actor.”

“
He can’t be that
good.”

“
Sure he can.” Sally sighed
as she stirred the tea punch. “We might have underestimated him.
The man can hold his own very well, and I’m afraid he’s devoted to
you.”

Ethel Mae grimaced. “But I pretended I
wanted him to be there. I flirted with him and
everything.”

“
You flirted with him? Why
did you do that? Now he’ll believe all of this is
working.”

“
He’s supposed to think
that. Next time, I’ll have Vivian tell him that Samuel paid me a
visit, left flowers, and that I had such a good time that I might
let him court me. Then Rick will want to see you again to make me
jealous.”

Sally shook her head. “It won’t work.
He wants to be with you. When he was here, he didn’t so much as
want to sit on the porch swing with me.”

“
You need to give it more
time. Believe me, it’s working. I saw how restless he was
yesterday. He didn’t want to be with me.”

She poured the tea punch into two
glasses. “So why did he go see you?”

Ethel Mae blinked in surprise. “Well,
he did promise he’d stop by to see me. Perhaps he meant to keep his
word.”

Not convinced, Sally set the pitcher
in the center of the work table and took off her apron. “If he
didn’t want to see you, he wouldn’t have gone. I think he
remembered something he really did have to do and that’s why he
left in a hurry.”

“
It can’t be
that.”

She set the apron on the hook by the
door and turned to her friend. “Of course, it can. He’s a judge. He
probably had something to research or something. We don’t know
everything judges do.”

“
Oh, Sally. It can’t be.
I’m telling you, he didn’t look as excited to see me as he used
to.”

Somehow, Sally doubted that. He might
have pretended he wasn’t excited, but she was sure he
was.

“
Have faith,” her friend
said encouragingly. “I really think he’s not as interested in me as
he used to be. I believe you’re starting to win him
over.”

Sally forced a smile as she handed
Ethel Mae her glass of tea punch. Taking hers, she decided to agree
with her friend because, soon enough, they’d both know what Rick
wanted. “Want to go sit on the porch swing and talk?”