Amelia (12 page)

Her face reflected her terror.

"Oh, my dear," Enid said gently. "Is it so bad at home?"

Amelia, shocked, had to fight down tears and panic. She forced a smile to her face. "It is only that I have enjoyed staying here so much," she lied. "I have missed my father, of course."

"Of course." Enid nodded, but she hadn't missed that look on Amelia's face. Something was wrong. If only the girl had talked to her! Surely she could have helped. But now it would be too late, and King's behavior hadn't made it easier for Amelia. He was openly hostile again, just when Enid had thought he was becoming interested in their pretty guest.

The men dismounted at the steps. Two of the cowboys came along to stable the horses, while a beaming Brant unloaded the game and carried it into the kitchen, where the women would deal with it.

"We had some good luck," Brant told his wife, kissing her cheek warmly. "I cured out the skin for King."

He indicated a yellow fur hide, and Amelia knew without asking that it was the mountain lion Brant had been after.

"You look very fit, so you must have found plenty to eat," Enid teased.

Hartwell looked tired and half out of sorts. He put a hand to his head and winced. "I missed my shots," he muttered angrily. "All I have to show for the expedition is saddle sores and a headache."

Brant and Alan exchanged quiet glances. Hartwell's headaches, and the powders he took for them, had been quite noticeable on the trip, along with his vicious humor. "We saw your brother up in the Guadalupes," Brant mentioned to Amelia. "He was trailing a Mexican outlaw. He looks good. I think the life of a Ranger suits him."

"It certainly seems to," Amelia replied. "Hello, Father."

"I hope you've been pulling your weight here," he said to her, austere and very pale. He removed his saddlebags to the porch. "I wouldn't want Enid to think I raised a lazy girl."

"She has been a great help to me," Enid said rather stiffly. "You are fortunate, Hartwell, to have such a compassionate daughter."

He gave Enid a sharp look, but he didn't reply. "We shall be leaving for home this evening," he announced. "I must be back at my job tomorrow."

"Couldn't you stay, since it is the end of the week?" Enid asked.

"I think not," Hartwell replied. "I will need to see to my correspondence and such. I have a very responsible position at the bank, you know. It is fortunate for my daughter that I do, as she spends money unwisely and
frivolously when I do not contain her impulses."

Amelia's hands clenched. It was untrue, as most of the criticisms her father made about her to other people were. His eyes were glassy, his face pale. She knew these moods and how dangerous it could be to speak to him until they passed. She kept her silence, swallowing the insult.

Enid looked at Amelia and felt sick for her. The girl had already assumed the personality forced on her by her father: quiet, unresponsive, and painfully obedient. What did the man do to cause such a reaction in his child? she wondered. All her gentle probing hadn't elicited one single enlightening comment from Amelia.

 

Hartwell dominated the conversation for the rest of the afternoon, muttering about all the discomfort and hardships he'd had to endure and cursing the impudence of an Indian who'd stopped by the camp fire for coffee one night. The Culhanes listened politely, but they weren't sympathetic. Amelia wanted to tell her father to shut up; she wanted to apologize for him. Of course, she could do neither.

"Ted took quite a shine to Amelia," Enid announced after the women had dealt with the meat and provided lunch. They were sitting in the parlor with the men to have cake and coffee.

"Ted?" Hartwell asked suspiciously.

Enid explained, while Amelia sat rigidly in her chair with her hands folded in her lap.

"I don't approve of him," Hartwell said stiffly. "His family is at the low end of the social scale, and, I suspect, also at the low end of the evolutionary scale. " He found his own sally amusing and laughed heartily. It didn't seem to occur to him that the others didn't join in.

"Ted is a man of bad reputation," Alan had to admit. "I should prefer that you have no social contact with him, Amelia," he said gently. "You are too tender a flower to entrust to such rough hands."

She smiled at him warmly. Alan was so likeable. So… unlike his brother. "You flatter me," she said demurely.

"Indeed he does, and you be properly appreciative," Hartwell told her firmly. "Alan is more your sort. He's the kind of young man I like to see you associating with."

Amelia flushed at the impropriety of the remark, but Alan only grinned.

"Good for you, sir," Alan replied. "In that case, may I call for Amelia on Saturday evening and take her to the concert at Chopin Hall? I promise to treat her with utmost courtesy and return her to your residence at a respectable hour."

"Certainly, you may escort her," Hartwell said, ignoring Amelia entirely.

It would have been nice if someone had asked her if she wanted to go, Amelia thought. But one look at her father told her not to ask the question.

"And now, we really must go," Hartwell said, rising. "Thank you all for your hospitality. Amelia, do likewise."

"Yes, Papa," she agreed, and quietly added her thanks to his.

"Do come back and see us, my dear," Enid said worriedly, trying not to let her sympathy show too much.

"I should like to," Amelia said in a subdued tone.

"Come along, come along, we don't have all day, girl!" her father snapped on his way out.

Amelia cringed, and inwardly so did Enid and the others. It was terrible to hear the way Hartwell talked to the girl. No wonder she was so withdrawn and fearful around him. What a different person she'd been while he was away, Enid thought curiously. Hartwell was an unpleasant man at best. How much worse must it be when he and Amelia were alone…

She forced a smile to her face and saw them off, hoping that Amelia would feel close enough to her to ask for help if ever she needed it.

King still hadn't come in from the range when Amelia and Hartwell left. She tied her bonnet around her head to keep it from blowing off in the buggy and waved good-bye to the Culhanes as her father snapped the buggy whip against the horse's flank. The animal jumped violently, and Amelia's teeth clenched. It was a hired carriage and horse, paid for by the Culhanes, to her father's delight.

He was in a better humor as they headed back toward El Paso.

"Young Alan does seem to have a case on you," he said. "You encourage him, young woman. I have some far-reaching business plans that involve the Culhanes. Having a son-in-law among them could hardly hurt my chances. You're old enough to marry, and I'm of the opinion that Alan is by far the best you're likely to be able to catch."

Amelia's hands clenched in her lap as the buggy lurched along the road.

"Yes, Father," she said demurely.

He grimaced suddenly, with a hand to his temple. Suddenly, he gave her an angry glance. "I gave you no permission to attend a fiesta!"

The sudden mood swing was familiar, frightening. She swallowed. "Papa, everyone else went. I had to."

He wasn't convinced. "How did you come to be hounded by this man Ted?"

"He only danced with me," she said softly. "He is a very nice man. Not as nice as Alan, of course. I like Alan."

He moved his piercing gaze back to the dirt road. "King accompanied you and Enid?"

"Yes. He is all but engaged to Miss Valverde," she added quickly.

"Just as well. I find him offensively arrogant. You would never suit such a man. I am certain that spineless women have no appeal for that sort."

"Yes, Papa," she said obediently.

"Brant has told me of a house going cheap," he added suddenly. "I plan to look at it tomorrow and if it suits, buy it on the spot. You may begin to pack tonight."

Amelia felt a wave of nausea wash over her. "But the boardinghouse is very convenient," she began hesitantly.

"So, you dislike the idea of having to work at cooking meals and cleaning, is that it?" he demanded harshly. "You have grown lazy living a leisurely life at the Culhane place?"

"That is not true! I did my share of work… Oh!"

His hand had left a faint mark on her cheek, bringing stinging pain and tears to her eyes. "Do not talk back to me," he said with cold contempt. "No child of mine is going to be allowed to do that!"

She glared at him through a mist of tears, fearing him and hating him all at once. No more, for God's sake, no more! she thought. It was unjust to have to live like this for fear of endangering his life!

Her chest rose and fell heavily with the force of her inner turmoil, but she didn't raise her voice. "If you strike me again, I shall have nothing to do with Alan," she said deliberately, knowing his one weakness. Her voice shook, but there was sudden resolve in it. Adrenaline poured into her veins, making her oblivious to the danger of his reply.

Her father was surprised. He hesitated, frowned as if searching for words, thoughts. "Well, then, you… you keep a civil tongue in your mouth when you speak to me!"

She didn't reply. Brushing her hurt cheek, she kept her eyes to the road ahead. She didn't know how she was going to bear this for much longer.

"It is my head, Amelia," he said confusedly, wincing as he looked at her. "I fear that I am going mad, you know, there are such terrible headaches, and I cannot… oh!" He caught his head in his hands and dropped the reins abruptly. "Oh, dear God, it hurts… so!"

"Here. Let me drive." She took the reins from him and urged the horse forward. He was worse, all right. She had to get a doctor to see him. She simply had to!

 

The Howards were long gone when King came wearily in the front door. He scowled as he looked around the parlor and, instead of Amelia, found his father and brother sitting with his mother.

"Welcome us back, boy," Brant said, rising to shake his son's hand. "I brought you a present." He pointed to the lion skin lying over the arm of the chair in which King habitually sat.

"You got him, then," King replied with a smile. "I thought you would."

"Dad got him, all right," Alan murmured sheepishly, "after I missed him twice."

"If you'd wear those spectacles instead of keeping them in your jacket pocket, you might have better luck," King chided, but not without affection. "It's good to have you both home."

"Aren't you going to ask where Amelia is?" Enid asked demurely, with her eyes carefully on her crocheting.

"Obviously she and her father went home," he replied, unperturbed. "I'm famished. Is there anything in the kitchen?"

"I'll dish it up."

"Alan and I will finish our brandy while you eat," Brant said, after a warning look from Enid, who often seemed to read his mind.

"You do that, dear," Enid murmured. She led King into the kitchen with a lighted lamp and then lit another to give her enough light. "I pray for the day when we have gas lights, as they do in El Paso," she muttered while she went about punching up the fire to reheat the meat and potatoes in her stew. "There's coffee on the warmer, dear."

He poured himself a cup, quiet and uncommunicative.

"Amelia is afraid of Hartwell," Enid mentioned quietly.

He glanced at her. "Her problems are no concern of ours."

She stirred the contents of the big iron Dutch oven. "They might become so. Alan is taking her to a concert on Saturday evening."

King went very still. "Her father, of course, countenances such a match," he replied after a minute, his voice dangerously low. "I do not. I would not wish such a woman on my worst enemy, much less on my own brother."

"She is not what she seems," Enid said firmly. "You see only the image she projects for her father! I am certain that she has spirit and intelligence."

"She speaks a little French," he returned. "Barely enough to make herself understood, and probably Marie taught it to her."

"I wish you had been kinder to her," Enid said solemnly. "She has a tragic face."

"Many women are able to cultivate one to catch unsuspecting men in their webs."

"Women like Miss Valverde?" she asked sweetly.

"She is my concern."

"I shall move out of the house if you attempt to install her here as your wife," she informed him tartly, and her dark eyes sparked at him.

After a minute, his expression lightened, and a corner of his disciplined mouth curved up. "I wonder that my father has not taken a tree limb to you in the past."

"Oh, he did, once. I took it away and hit him with it." She chuckled.

King shook his head, amused. "Whomever I marry, it shall have to be someone like you, I think. A quiet, docile woman would be the ruin of me."

"I agree," she replied. "But do be sure before you take that step, my dear. Be very sure."

He didn't reply. He finished his coffee and poured himself another cup, just as she dished up his beef stew and set it on the table.

 

Amelia couldn't go downstairs to have supper at the common table in the boardinghouse. Her cheek showed the blow her father had dealt her, and it was too embarrassing to advertise it to the world.

It was unthinkable for a person with any honor at all to display her family's dirty linen for all to see. A woman, or man, who would betray their own flesh and blood, regardless of the reason, would certainly not hesitate to betray anyone else.

She went to her own room in the suite they occupied and locked herself in. It was as well that she had, when her father staggered up the steps two hours later, having imbibed heavily with some acquaintances. But this time, fortunately, he was too soused to cause any trouble. She heard him fall onto the sofa in their sitting room and closed her eyes gratefully. At least tonight she did not have to fear the violence that strong drink worsened in him.

He had a hangover the next morning and barely spoke to Amelia, even at breakfast. But as he went out, he paused to remind her to pack.

"For by this afternoon, I expect that we shall have a house," he said stiffly, carefully keeping his eyes from her cheek. It wasn't swollen or obviously damaged, but he looked guilty and morose.