Nobody's Angel (24 page)

"I have no objection, though 'tis Susannah you must ask," the Reverend Redmon said hastily. "She knows more about these things than I do."

As Mandy had been accustomed for most of her life to turning to Susannah for permission to do everything from wading in the creek to putting up her hair, Susannah could not help but feel that this sudden appeal to their father was directly attributable to her sister's jealousy over their bound man. Susannah suspected that it was Mandy's way of demonstrating that she no longer considered her eldest sister as her mentor, but rather as a rival for a man she wished to attract. Her acceptance of Greer's invitation was likely intended to impress Ian with how attractive other men found her. Susannah loved Mandy dearly, but she had no illusions about her character. Where men were concerned, she expected to reign supreme. If any man gave any indication of preferring another to her lovely self, then Mandy declared war. Even if that other was the sister who had stood in place of a mother to her for the last twelve years.

And to think she had bought a bound man in the hope of making her life easier!

"You may go if Sarah Jane or Em goes with you," Susannah said, though Mandy had not asked her. "There are some things you may pick up for me in town as well. It is very kind of you to invite Mandy, Mr. Greer. It will save Ben from having to make the trip."

Susannah, with Sarah Jane's help, began clearing the table as she spoke, but she did not miss Mandy's glance of dislike.

" Tis Miss Mandy who is kind to consent to accompany me."

"I'll just go get my bonnet," Mandy said. "Em, Sarah Jane, which one of you wants to come with me?"

"I will!" Em said at once. Susannah had to smile. She guessed that Emily feared that, if she didn't go, she might be conscripted to finish planting sweet potatoes. The threatened storm still had not struck, though the heat was even more oppressive than it had been the day before. Perhaps there would be time to finish plowing the field before the rain hit.

Sarah Jane did not object, and so Em ran upstairs with Mandy to fetch a bonnet. Susannah stopped clearing the table to write out a list of the supplies she needed from town. Greer stepped over to her father's side and put a hand on his shoulder. The Reverend Redmon, who'd clearly been preoccupied with otherworldly thoughts, turned vague hazel eyes on his visitor, as if he couldn't quite, for just a moment, place him.

"You've had no trouble out of him?" Greer asked in a confidential tone, jerking his head to indicate Ian, who had shouldered a heavy carton of books that the Reverend Redmon meant to take up to the church. As Greer spoke, Ian was in the act of carrying the box out the door. The Reverend Redmon turned his silvery-white head to look after the bound man with a puzzled frown.

"Who? Connelly?" the Reverend Redmon asked, sounding surprised. "Why, no. In fact, he's been a considerable help to me. I consider that Susannah did a fine day's work when she brought him home to us. He's a very well-educated man."

Greer's mouth tightened, and his hand fell away from the reverend's shoulder. "He's a very violent man. I'm surprised you're willing to trust him around your daughters. There's no telling what he might be capable of."

Ian, coming back through the door, obviously heard that. His stride checked for the barest instant, and his eyes, focusing on Greer, hardened. For a moment, as his lip curled, Susannah was vividly reminded of the ferocious-looking creature she'd first seen on the block. How much had changed in the short time since some twisted combination of pity and temper had compelled her to buy him! Then Susannah realized something that had eluded her: the last fortnight, for all the pain it was going to bring her, had been worth the cost. Had she not gone to the auction that day, her life would have been immeasurably poorer.

Clearly Greer did not recognize, or did not properly appreciate, the threat implicit in Ian's expression. There was going to be trouble, Susannah saw, unless she acted quickly to head it off. Glancing around for inspiration, she seized on the first chore that struck her mind.

"If you would slop the hogs for me before you go, I would appreciate it," she said to Ian in a low voice, hoping both to distract him from Greer's insults and to remove him from the other man's vicinity. With an unreadable glance at her face, Ian accepted the malodorous bucket she pressed on him and turned toward the door.

"That's fitting work for him, all right, slopping the hogs!" Greer chortled. Susannah, pushed beyond bearing, rounded on him before either Ian, who turned menacingly, or her father, who looked surprised, could say a word.

"Slopping hogs is good honest work, and no decent man or woman should be ashamed of doing it! I am surprised at you, Mr. Greer, for making sport of something that I and my sisters do every day!"

Greer looked taken aback. As he had hopes of one day wedding Mandy, he took pains to win over the approbation of Mandy's family, especially Susannah and her father. He wet his lips, and an unbecoming flush rose to mottle his cheekbones. "Miss Susannah, I assure you I did not mean . . ."

"We're ready!" Mandy popped her head through the door and beckoned to Greer, cutting short the awkward moment.

"Don't forget my supplies," Susannah said, brushing past Greer as if he were invisible and handing her list to Mandy.

Greer, following her over to the doorway, made one more attempt to right himself in her eyes. "Miss Susannah, I never meant to give you offense, and if I did so unintentionally I apologize."

"That's quite all right, Mr. Greer. I understand that you cannot help it," Susannah said coolly, and showed him her back as she returned to the table and her work. Her spine was ramrod stiff, and he looked at it with a helpless expression for a moment before Mandy dragged him from the room.

"Mr. Greer is not the most sensitive of souls, perhaps." Her father sighed as he put his hat on his head and headed out the back door.

"No, he is not," Susannah said, her nose in the air.

"Susannah."

Ian, bucket still in hand, turned toward her. His voice was barely above a whisper. Sarah Jane had moved into the hall to see her sisters off, so for a moment the two of them were alone. His familiarity would have to come to an end, but this was neither the time nor the place to go into the explanation she envisioned, so she contented herself with raising her eyebrows at him.

"Are you sure you weren't born a duchess and somehow got misplaced?"

"What?" The question made no sense to her. She frowned, puzzling at it, and as she puzzled at it he grinned and turned to follow her father outside.

Susannah, staring after him, felt the impact of that grin like a dagger to her heart.

23

Summer lightning was snaking through the dark clouds that sat on the horizon as Susannah hurried toward the west field. With the breakfast things cleared away, she had hoped to harness Old Cobb and, with Ben's help, finish putting in the sweet potato crop. But Old Cobb had been missing from his stall, and when she checked she had discovered that his harness and the plow were gone from the barn as well. Had Ben decided to undertake the plowing on his own? It was not like the boy to display so much initiative.

Now, topping the small rise that separated the west field from the barn, Susannah stopped in surprise as the mystery was resolved. The west field, with considerably more than three-quarters of its rich, black dirt freshly turned over, lay before her. There was no mistaking the identity of the tall, black-haired man who strode along behind Old Cobb, face taut with concentration and muscles straining as he gouged the plow deep into the small section of heat-dried earth that remained. Ian was plowing, unbelievable as it seemed. Ben came behind him, planting tubers in the newly dug rows.

Susannah pushed her bonnet brim up out of her eyes and stood, fists on hips, watching. The rows Ian made were not as straight as the ones she had put in, but they were acceptable.

He looked up then and saw her. He was nearly a quarter of a mile away, but she could feel his eyes on her. Susannah lifted a hand in salutation, then slowly turned and retraced her steps to the house. It was clear that she was not needed in the field.

Ian Connelly never ceased to surprise her. As a gift to her, plowing that field ranked way ahead of candy or flowers. Her back still ached from the day before. She would have been wrestling that plow again this morning, while Ben took over Em's job of planting. Old Cobb had taken a dislike to Ben, and if Old Cobb disliked the person working him he refused to budge so much as an inch.

In the kitchen, Sarah Jane had her head bent over some mending. The pungent scent of the okra soup bubbling over the fire lay heavy on the air.

"I thought you were going to finish putting in the sweet potato crop." Sarah Jane looked up in surprise as Susannah entered.

"Ian and Ben are doing it."

Sarah Jane's expression became quizzical. "Ian?"

Suddenly conscious of what she had said, Susannah flushed. She glanced at her sister and sighed. Keeping secrets had never been something she excelled at. Lying and dissembling did not come easily to her.

"You were right, Sarah Jane. I fancy him." The relief of confessing even such a small portion of the truth was like lancing a boil.

"Oh, Susannah! I knew you did. Tis as plain as the nose on your face." Sarah Jane's hands, which had been busily weaving a needle and thread through a hole in a petticoat, came to rest in her lap.

"He's not your—typical—bound man." Susannah, for want of something to do, walked over to stir the soup.

"No, he's not that."

" Tis foolish, I know. I'm determined to put it behind me. How ridiculous it must appear, a spinster of my years pining over a handsome face!"

Sarah Jane looked at her pensively. "Not ridiculous, Susannah. You could never be that. You know, it had never occurred to me before Connelly came on the scene that you might wish to have your own life away from us, with a husband and children of your own. Has it been a dreadful sacrifice, dear?"

Susannah looked around at that. "A sacrifice, taking care of you and Mandy and Em and Pa? Don't be silly, Sarah Jane. I love you all more than I can say." Moving over to the flour bin and sliding back the lid, she began to scoop out white flour to make biscuits for the midday meal. Sliding the lid closed again, she added, with an attempt at lightness, "Besides, as Em pointed out not so long ago, no man has ever offered to take me away from all this. Had there been such an offer, and had I wished to accept, I assure you that I would have done so."

Sarah Jane smiled but shook her head as she picked up her needle again and began to ply it. "I think that, had it not been for us, you would have had an offer. Several offers! Since Connelly appeared, you've been, I don't know, different—younger seeming, and—and pretty. Did you let yourself, Susannah, you could be quite lovely, I think."

"Me?" Susannah was glad to be able to laugh a little. "How very sweet of you to say so. But I don't aspire to be lovely, thank you very much. Any more than I aspire to sprout wings and fly."

"There are some bachelors among the congregation."

A genuine, though wry, smile curved Susannah's lips. "Indeed there are. And not one of them would I have if he was offered to me on a platter with an apple stuck in his mouth. Now don't start matchmaking, Sarah jane. I am content as I am, I promise you."

"Are you?" Sarah Jane's eyes flicked up to Susannah's face and held. "Are you really, Susannah?"

Susannah met Sarah Jane's troubled gaze, but, before she could come up with an answer that would satisfy her without being a total lie, the unmistakable sounds of a carriage pulling up and of their younger sisters' voices and footsteps on the front porch distracted both women. Not that Susannah was sorry to have the conversation cut short. Sarah Jane knew her as well as anyone in the world, and Susannah was afraid that, if she said much more, Sarah Jane might be able to read between the lines.

The first fat drops of rain splattered on the window glass not long after Hiram Greer, after much buttering up of Susannah, took himself off. Thunder rolled, lightning flashed, and in moments a soaked-to-the-skin Ben barreled through the back door.

"That's some downpour!" he exclaimed, spluttering and shaking his arms so that water droplets showered the floor like rain.

"Here, Ben, take this," Em said, scooping up the towel that hung from a peg by the dry sink and handing it to him with a shy smile.

"Why, thank you, Miss Em." Ben took the towel, apparently all unconscious that Em's heart was in her eyes as she looked at him. Susannah, watching, felt a sudden pang of sympathy. She knew exactly how Emily felt. Mandy, who must have been watching too, snorted. Mandy had little patience for what she considered Em's childish heartburnings.

"Where's Connelly?" Sarah Jane voiced the question that Susannah had not liked to put into words.

"He went on down to his cabin. He, ah, had an accident."

"An accident?" Susannah spoke more sharply than she intended. She could have bitten her tongue as soon as the words left her mouth, but there was no way to recall them or the tone in which they had been spoken.

"Oh, he's not much hurt. He, uh, told me not to tell y'all about it." Ben, having mopped himself up, bent to dab at the puddle he'd created on the floor. He looked up, met Susannah's eyes, and shrugged. "Guess I don't work for him, though, do I? Old Cobb kicked him."

"Kicked him!"

"You know how the danged old—uh, mule—hates thunder. Connelly was pickin' a stone out of his hoof when it thundered. Next thing I saw, Connelly was flying down the field. I don't think the kick hurt him much, though. Leastways he was able to get back up. He swore a blue streak, let me tell you. It'd been rainin' for a few minutes, and the field had already started turnin' to mud. He was covered with it, and he looked mighty funny, too. Course I didn't laugh. Connelly's not the kind of fellow you'd want to laugh at to his face."

Em giggled. Ben grinned at her. Sarah Jane smiled at Ben's telling of the story, but her eyes were thoughtful as they rested on Susannah's face.