The Gamble (I) (48 page)

Then she went home with scraps for Moose and watched him eat, then wash himself, then curl into a contented ball and go to sleep. At bedtime she donned the nightgown she’d worn the night she slept in Scott’s bed, then brushed her hair down, pulled the weights on the clock and, when she could avoid it no longer, climbed into bed—an old maid, getting older, sleeping with a spotted cat, while a pendulum ticked in the dark.

Most nights she lay awake listening for the tinkle of the piano and the ringing of the banjo, but the revelry was forever gone from below. She closed her eyes and saw long legs kicking toward the ceiling and red ruffles framing black fishnet stockings and a man with a cheroot between his teeth and a low-crowned black Stetson, and a little boy peeking under a swinging door.

One night when her restless recollections refused to desist, she rose from bed and crept downstairs with the key Scott had left her. She entered the back door of the saloon and stood motionless, holding the lantern aloft, watching light play along the short passage to the room where Willy had slept. Inside that room the cot was gone. The cradles that
had held the kegs remained, along with the yeasty smell of old beer. But the boy was gone, and so were all reminders of his presence. She remembered the last night when she and Scott had tucked Willy into bed and he had kissed her. But the memory clawed at her heart and she left the storeroom.

In the main room of the saloon the chairs were upturned on the tables and the bar. But the piano was gone, and Dierdre, too, along with her Garden of Delights. The light from the single lantern created eerie shadows that crept along the walls and fell between the tables as Agatha moved among them. Here the scent of whiskey lingered, and perhaps the ineffable reminder of cigar smoke.

Something rustled and Agatha stopped, lifting the lantern high to peer into the murky corners. As if through a long tunnel came the distant tinkle of music, a lively song that wafted through the night with the tiny resonance of a harpsichord. Agatha cocked her head and listened. Now she recognized it—a piano and banjo together, and in the background the faint echo of laughter and feet tapping on a wooden floor.

Buffalo gals, won’t you come out tonight,

Come out tonight, come out tonight...

She smiled and turned toward the spot where the piano was, where Jube and Pearl and Ruby were swishing their taffeta ruffles and lifting their heels in wondrous synchronization.

The sound stilled. The images vanished. It was only Agatha’s imagination, the daft maundering of a melancholy and wishful woman standing alone in an abandoned saloon, shivering in a nightgown upon which a man had once pressed his body and a little boy had laid his head.

Go to bed, Agatha. There’s nothing for you here, only heartache and the road to further unhappiness.

She never went into the saloon again after that, except once during daylight hours when she showed it to a party interested in renting it as a dry goods store. But when the man’s wife lifted her nose and sniffed, she declared they
would never get the whiskey smell out of the place. So they left without even checking out the back storeroom.

She wondered if others would come, new renters who’d spark her life with new friendships, new distractions. But who would come to this desolate little cow town anymore? Not even the cowboys now that the saloons were closed to them. Spring would arrive and the liveliness brought by the longhorns and their drivers would be absent. No noise, no commotion, no hubbub. How she would miss it, no matter what she’d said in the past. The cowboys and their disorderliness were as much a part of her life as the millinery shop. But without them and the prosperity they brought, the seasons would change and the town would wither, just as she and her business would, with nobody to care about either.

Christmas was an occasion to be suffered. Agatha’s only delight—and it was a mediocre one at that—was making a stuffed goose for Willy and sending it along with her first letter to him. She filled the missive with idle chitchat about how big Moose was getting and how he had snagged the hem of her garnet dress with his claws, and what she was giving Violet for Christmas, and how beautiful the roof of Christ Presbyterian looked with its mantle of snow. She included no clue of her overwhelming loneliness and was careful to refrain from asking how Scott was or sending him too personal a message.

Whenever she paid the rent, she made out the check and addressed the envelope with more care than she used on anything else these days, forming each flowing letter in intricate copperplate that looked as if it should be embroidered upon a pillowcase. But the enclosed letter stated only that she was sending the month’s rent in the amount of twenty-five dollars, followed by a report on whether any prospective buyers had looked at the building. Except for the month of January, when the sniffing woman and her husband came, that portion of the letter was negligible.

There were outpourings she longed to express. But for fear of sounding like a desperate, love-starved spinster—which was exactly what she was—she bridled the urge.

She made it through the days by wearing a false cheerfulness that vanished the moment Violet’s back was turned. But when she was in the shop alone she often found her hands idle while she stared at Willy’s little stool and wondered if he’d grown tall enough that he wouldn’t need it now; and wondered what it was like at Waverley, where he and Scott lived; and wondered if they missed her, too, sometimes; and wondered if she’d ever see either of them again. Then Moose would come and preen himself against her ankles and say, “Mrrr...”—the only sound in the otherwise silent shop—and Agatha would have to force herself out of a deep lassitude that seemed to pervade her more and more often as winter slogged along.

December, with its unendurable Christmas.

January, with its biting cold that made her hip ache worse.

February, with blizzards that blew down out of Nebraska and coated the snow with topsoil, making it as brown and forlorn as Agatha’s life.

It was Violet who brought the telegram. Violet, with her blue eyes lit like a pair of gas jets and her blue-veined hands fluttering in the air and her blue hair trembling. And her titter was back.

“Agatha! Oh, my! Agatha, where are you?
Tt-tt.”

“I’m here. At the desk.”

“Oh, Agatha!” Violet slammed the front door. The shade snapped up and whirled on its roller but she took no notice. “You have a telegram! From
him! Tt-tt.”

“A telegram? From whom?” Agatha’s breath seemed to catch in her throat.

“Tt-tt.
I was coming to work just as I usually do when somebody called from behind me and I turned around and there was that young man, Mr. Looby, the one from up at the depot, and he—”

“From whom, Violet?”

“—said, ‘Miss Parsons, are you on your way to the millinery shop?’ And I said, ‘Yes, of course. Don’t I go to the millinery shop every morning at eleven o’clock?’ And Mr. Looby said—”

“From whom, Violet!”
By this time Agatha’s hands were trembling and her heart was making mincemeat of her chest.

“Well, you don’t have to shout, Agatha. It isn’t every day we get a telegram, you know. From Mr. Gandy, of course.”

“Mist——” Agatha’s voice refused to cooperate. “Mr. Gandy?” she managed on the second try.

“Tt-tt.
Isn’t it wonderful?”

Agatha stared at the piece of yellow paper in Violet’s hand. “But how do you know?”

“Why, it says right here, plain as a barn fire on a dark night—L. Scott Gandy.
Tt-tt.
That’s his name, isn’t it? And he’s asking if you’ll—”

“Violet!” Agatha leaped to her feet and held out a palm. “Whose telegram is it?” Surprising, how calm that hand was when her body felt as if it contained a fault line that was separating.

Violet had the good grace to look contrite as she handed over the telegram. “Well, it was only folded in two. And, anyway, Mr. Looby told me what it said. Then he grinned and handed me this ticket made out for White Springs, Florida.
Tt-tt.”

“A ticket—” Agatha’s eyes dropped to the ticket and excitement made her body wilt into a chair as she began reading.

HAVE PROPOSITION FOR YOU STOP WILL DISCUSS ON NEUTRAL TERRITORY STOP MEET ME TELFORD HOTEL, WHITE SPRINGS, FLORIDA, MARCH 10 STOP TICKET INCLUDED STOP JUBE AND MARCUS ENGAGED STOP REGARDS STOP L SCOTT GANDY STOP

Each time Agatha read the word
stop,
her heart seemed to do just that. At the word
hotel,
her fingers covered her lips and she sucked in a quick breath. She was still staring, dumbfounded, when Violet tittered again.

“Tt-tt.
That naughty Mr. Gandy.
Tt-tt.
He’s sent a oneway ticket.”

Agatha could scarcely breathe, much less speak. But she reached up woodenly and Violet placed the ticket into her
trembling fingers—a stiff piece of white cardboard with black ink that seemed to dance before Agatha’s confused eyes as she scanned the words
Proffitt
and
White Springs.

“White Springs?” Shaken, she lifted her eyes to Violet. “But why White Springs?”

“Why, you just read it, didn’t you? Neutral territory.”

“But... but I’ve never even heard of White Springs, much less the Telford Hotel. Why would he ask me to go there?”

It was Violet’s turn to cover her lips. Her blue eyes twinkled with illicit speculation. “Why, my stars,
tt-tt,
he’s said it as clear as the Morse code can make it—to proposition you, my dear.”

Agatha blushed and became flustered. “Oh, don’t be silly, Violet. Having a... a proposition for me could mean anything.”

“Then why is the ticket only one-way?”

Agatha’s gaze fell to it. Within her body the fault line widened. “I... I don’t know,” she answered in a small voice. “But, my goodness. Jubilee and Marcus engaged to be married—imagine that.”

“Do you think you’ll see Willy?”

“I don’t know. Scott doesn’t mention him.”

“Well, what are you sitting there for, child? The tenth is the day after tomorrow.”

The realization stunned Agatha. “Oh, gracious, so it is.” Pressing a hand to her hammering heart, she glanced around the shop, as if trying to recall why she was there. “But...”—she raised distracted eyes to Violet—“but how can I get ready to go by then... and how can I leave the shop for an indefinite length of time... and... and there’s that dress I’ve been working on for—”

“Bosh!” Violet spat. “Put that ticket down in a safe place and get upstairs this moment, Agatha Downing. Don’t ask yourself how or why or for how long, not when a man like that is waiting in a hotel room in Florida for you. Just stuff as many gowns as you can into your trunk and be on that train when it pulls out tomorrow!”

“But—”

“One more word and I’ll quit my job, Agatha!”

“But—”

“Agatha!” For an elderly woman, Violet could muster remarkable choler.

“Oh, Violet, can I really do such a thing?”

“Of course you can. Now, up with you.” Violet reached for Agatha’s hands and assisted her from the chair. “Check your gowns and your petticoats and make sure you take plenty of clean underwear, and if anything needs laundering we’d best get it down to the Finn’s immediately. There’s not a moment to waste.”

“Oh, Violet.” Agatha would have been appalled at her lack of coherence had she realized how many times she’d already said “Oh, Violet.” But this time she embraced the birdlike woman and said fondly against her temple, “You have a magnificent rebellious streak in you that I’ve always admired. Thank you, dear heart.”

Violet patted her shoulder, then shoved her away. “Upstairs with you now, and use a little vinegar in your rinse water. It brings out the red highlights in your hair.
Tt-tt.”

He’d booked her a berth in a sleeping car, but sleep was out of the question. During the night she spent in it, her eyes scarcely closed. Such brimming anticipation could not be squandered in sleep. Hours like this were too precious, too rare, to let them slip through unconscious fingers.

She watched the land change from brown to white to green, a green more verdant than any she remembered in her entire life. She recalled the semiarid climate of Colorado with its piñon pines and poplars, but the earth itself was sere. And in Kansas, though a veritable ocean of blue-stemmed bunch grass filled every vista, it was green for only a short time each spring. Beyond the plains, Kansas offered little verdure but for an occasional copse of cottonwoods and hackberries. But the farther south and east Agatha traveled, the greener became the view out the train window.

They crossed the Tennessee River on a majestic trestle so high above a canyon it felt as if she were looking down
on earth from heaven. Near Chattanooga the tracks twisted and turned through verdant ravines and several times she glimpsed waterfalls in the distance. With the foothills of the Appalachians behind, the land began flattening. Then there was Georgia with earth as red as ten-year-old rust, and more pines than she’d ever imagined, straight and thick and secret.

She changed trains in Atlanta and the rumbling wheels bore her ever closer to Scott and an assignation whose outcome she dared not contemplate for fear it might be one she must refuse. She shunted the thought to the recesses of her mind and immersed herself in the childlike joy of discovery. When she saw Spanish moss for the first time, she gasped in delight and looked around for someone to share it with, but everyone was either dozing or disinterested. The pines gave way to water oak and live oak and soon the tracks were bracketed by black water from which cypress knees projected, and the foliage became so thick it seemed no creature could live in it. But she saw a deer on an emerald knoll and before it quite registered upon her brain, it had turned tail and disappeared into the wall of growth behind it. Something flashed past, an impression of candy-pink tufts on a ball of green, too fast to absorb. She watched for another and saw one in time to inquire of the conductor.

“A tulip tree, ma’am. We’re just about to pass over the Florida border. Tulip trees bloom early down here. Watch for white flowers, too, big white flowers on spreading green trees. Those’ll be magnolias.”