The Rustler (30 page)

“No,” Sarah said, drawing herself up. “Thank you.”

Wyatt raised an eyebrow, and a grin twitched at one corner of his mouth. He waited, and it galled Sarah to know he was enjoying her discomfiture. She hadn't a glimmer what she was doing there, and that only made the whole experience more mortifying.

“Sarah—” Rowdy began, but he fell silent at a swift glower from Wyatt.

Sarah drew a deep breath, her face flaming, wishing the floor would open wide, like the maw of some great beast, chew her up and swallow her.

Still, Wyatt didn't speak. Still, he grinned that grin.

Sarah looked around, saw that the three of them were alone in the dining room, which was a miracle given the popularity of the fish special, and then faced Wyatt again.

“I telegraphed Charles,” Sarah heard herself say, with helpless horror at her own audacity, “and I told him that you and I are going to be married and we want to raise Owen from now on. Are you willing to marry me or not, Wyatt Yarbro?”

Rowdy pressed a napkin to his mouth, probably to stifle a guffaw.

“I don't reckon you've left me much choice,” Wyatt said dryly. All that time not speaking, and
that
was what he had to say?

“Fine,” Sarah said. “The wedding is Sunday afternoon.”

“Don't we need a license or something?” Wyatt asked.

“I don't know,” Sarah admitted, losing some of her steam.

“I can arrange for one,” Rowdy put in. By then, he'd sat himself down again, and put the napkin aside, but his eyes were bright with hilarity.

“Well, then,” Wyatt said, “I guess it's settled.”

I don't reckon you've left me much choice.

Sarah seethed, swamped in humiliation. “Good!” she spouted, then she spun around and marched right out of the Phoenix Hotel, down the sidewalk a ways, and across the street to the bank.

She stomped through the small lobby, Thomas staring openmouthed as she passed, and into her father's office, where she slammed the door behind her, dropped into Ephriam's chair, laid her head down on her arms atop the desk, and cried until her eyes hurt.

T
HERE WAS NO SIGN
of Davina when Sarah got home, at five minutes after three that afternoon, and she found Kitty upstairs, sitting with Ephriam, and staring bleakly into space. Except for their respective positions—Kitty in the rocking chair and Ephriam lying on the bed—it would have been difficult for an objective observer to discern between patient and nurse.

“Kitty?” Sarah asked softly, from the doorway. Owen, calmer now, was in the backyard with Lonesome, and the dog's happy yips wafted in through the open window. Lonesome, at least, was on the mend.

Slowly, Kitty turned her head, looked at Sarah without apparent recognition. Said nothing.

“Where is Davina?” Sarah asked carefully, going to her father's bedside to straighten the already-straight sheets and bend to kiss his forehead. His skin felt cool and moist. She didn't look at Kitty at all, during this exchange, giving the woman the privacy to shift from her sad reverie to the everyday world.

“She's gone to the schoolhouse,” Kitty said, her voice toneless and, somehow, raw. “She knows, Sarah. She
knows.
”

There was only one chair in the room, and Kitty occupied it, so Sarah perched on the wide sill of the window. “You told her, Kitty? About the Spit Bucket Saloon and—and everything else?”

Kitty shook her head, her gaze fixed on the wall above the headboard of Ephriam's bed, or something well beyond it. Beyond Stone Creek, even, or the distant horizon itself. Perhaps even beyond the day-cloaked stars. “Someone on the train told her,” Kitty said. “She—Davina, I mean—was chatting with the person in the next seat, the way people do to pass the time on a long trip, and said her mother was Kitty Steel, married to a rancher named John Steel.”

Then, of course, the other passenger had disabused the young schoolmarm of her deception. Sarah closed her eyes for a moment, imagining what a shock that must have been to Davina. At the same time, she had known all along that discovery was inevitable.

“Did you explain?” Sarah asked.

“I tried, but Davina was having none of it. She said if she didn't have a contract to complete a full school term, she'd get right back on the train and head home to Illinois.” Kitty paused, swallowed painfully. “She said I wasn't—I wasn't her mother, Alvira Wynngate was, because she and her husband took her and her sister in when I didn't want them.”

“But you've been corresponding with Davina and Leona for years,” Sarah reasoned gently. “You must have told them you
did
want them, even with all the lies about being married to a rancher.”

“Being wanted by an upstanding mother who once fell on hard times is one thing,” Kitty said. “Being wanted by one who's a whore and has to fight off the bottle every day of her life is another.”

Sarah bit her lower lip. “At least she's staying in Stone Creek until the school term is over,” she said. “You have until next summer to establish some kind of understanding.”

“That's going to be hard to do,” Kitty replied, “given that Davina never wants to see me again, let alone listen to me.”

“With time—”

But Kitty shook her head, cut Sarah off with, “No. You didn't see how angry she was, Sarah. You didn't hear the things she said. I've met up with lots of women who wanted to spit in my face, even some who did, but none of them were my own daughter, my own sweet baby.”

Sarah stood on shifting sands herself, given that she'd wired Charles of her impending marriage to Wyatt Yarbro, and then corralled Wyatt into agreeing to participate in the ceremony. Her father was desperately ill, and she was almost certain to lose the child she loved more than anything, or anyone, in the world, for a
second
time. And on top of all that, the bank.

Despite it all, her heart went out to Kitty, and to Davina, too. By now, the girl had probably written to her sister, as well as her adoptive parents, and any illusions remaining to Leona would be shattered. Sarah could only hope that Helga and the delegation had kept the young woman too busy celebrating her installation at Stone Creek School to fall into despondency.

She made up her mind to go and talk to Davina at the first opportunity. Perhaps, as a person one step removed from the situation, she could help establish some kind of truce between the two women.

“Why don't you go across the hall and rest for a while, Kitty?” she asked quietly. “I'll sit with Papa.”

Kitty hesitated, then nodded, rose from the rocking chair. Moving like a sleepwalker or someone mesmerized, she left the room. Sarah heard the door across the hall open and close.

She sank into the rocking chair.

Ephriam opened his eyes.

“I'm going to marry Wyatt, Papa,” Sarah said. “I'm going to be a ranch foreman's wife.” The tears that stung her eyes should have been ones of happiness—she was about to be a bride at last—but instead, they were ones of frustrated humiliation.

Ephriam didn't respond, except to gaze at her, his own eyes suspiciously moist. He didn't need to tell Sarah what he was thinking; she knew.
What will become of my girl?

Presently, he slept. Sarah sat and rocked.

And then Owen appeared in the doorway, red-eyed himself, and pale. He was a boy in summer, wondrously dirty, his hair a-tousle, his clothes speckled with mud and caked with dust.

Sarah's heart wrenched just to look at him.

“There's a lady here to see you,” he told Sarah. “She's sitting in the parlor.”

Sarah nodded, got out of the chair and adjusted Ephriam's covers again.

Owen took her place in the rocker, bare feet dangling high off the floor.

Hoping to find Davina waiting downstairs, having had a change of heart, Sarah was mildly disappointed, but also encouraged, to see that her caller was Fiona. She was dressed for travel, no doubt planning to board the six-o'clock train to Flagstaff, which stopped in Stone Creek only on Fridays, weekly in spring and summer, every other week in fall, and once a month in winter.

Sarah paused in the doorway of the parlor, at a loss for words; odd, when she and Fiona had exchanged so many confidences over the length of their acquaintance.

Fiona flushed. “I couldn't leave without saying goodbye, Sarah,” she said, fiddling awkwardly with her practical handbag. “I—I hope you won't mind if I write.”

“I won't mind,” Sarah said, but it was more a concession to manners and traditions of hospitality than truth. She remained in the doorway.

“I shouldn't have told Mr. Yarbro what I did,” Fiona said.

“No,” Sarah agreed. “You shouldn't have. It might be easier to forgive you if you'd spoken to me first. We were friends, Fiona. I trusted you.”

Fiona flushed. “No, you didn't,” she said, suddenly recovering some of her spirit. “You could have told me about Owen, and your affair with Mr. Langstreet.”

“Obviously,” Sarah retorted, “I couldn't have. Instead of coming to me when you heard the rumors, you went directly to Mr. Yarbro and tried to undermine his good opinion.”

Fiona seemed to shrink a little, though she kept her head high. “You would have lied to me,” she insisted. “You know you would have said Owen wasn't your child, that it was just nasty gossip.”

Sarah couldn't deny that. So she didn't speak.

“None of that matters now, anyway,” Fiona said. “I took one look at Wyatt Yarbro, that first day at Brother Hickey's revival, and I felt as though I'd stepped in front of a speeding train. I never wanted a man like I wanted him. But he was only interested in you.”

Sarah said nothing. It had not occurred to her, in her self-absorption, that someone else might have been affected by Wyatt's charms the same way she had.

“I'm sorry,” Fiona told her. “Not for loving Wyatt, because I can't help it, and I think I'll always care for him. But you were my friend, and I shouldn't have tried to turn him against you. I just thought that—well—when Aunt Lavinia passes, God keep her, I'll be a wealthy woman. I was going to use that to win him over, but he didn't give me a chance. As soon as I said what I did, he turned his back for good.”

“Are you sorry you betrayed me, Fiona, or sorry Wyatt didn't take the bait?”

Fiona gave a wobbly, faltering and wholly tragic smile. “I don't know,” she said. “If you won't accept my apology, then there's nothing more I can do. But I had to try, Sarah. And I
do
wish you well.”

Sarah nodded. “And I you,” she said.

“Can you forgive me?”

“Probably,” Sarah said. “But it will be a while.”

“May I write to you?”

“Yes,” Sarah answered, feeling even more bereft than she had earlier, because she
had
liked Fiona, and confided in her as much as she'd been able.

With that, Fiona gave a little nod, crossed the parlor, brushed Sarah's arm as she passed, and left the house.

 

C
HARLES'S TERSE BUT SCATHING
answer to Sarah's telegram came the next morning, a Saturday, while she was opening the bank for the customary half day. Thomas was off, and her father was sick, and so she was alone.

She gave Elliott a nickel for delivering the wire and stoutly refrained from opening it until he left. He'd lingered a few moments, waiting to see her reaction to what he knew was inside, but she wouldn't give him that satisfaction. He'd have enough to report to his mother as it was.

Am detained here for foreseeable future. Send the boy immediately or prepare to deal with consequences. C.L.

Sarah crumpled the telegram into a ball, fetched five nickels from the till, and hurried out onto the sidewalk to call Elliott back to dictate her one-word answer.

No.

She'd barely stopped hyperventilating when Davina Wynngate swept in, looking schoolmarm-proper in a modest brown dress, her spun-honey hair modestly but attractively coiffed.

“I've come to open an account,” she said, none too cordial now that she knew Sarah and Kitty were friends. “I would have patronized the other bank, but it's closed.”

Sarah rustled up a smile. “I'll be glad to help you,” she said.

Davina looked around as she crossed the small lobby and stood, straight backed, at the counter, opposite Sarah. “I must say,” the girl announced loftily, lifting her chin, “that I had forgotten how rustic the West really is.”

Amused, Sarah hid a smile. “We try to behave in a civilized manner,” she replied lightly, “but it's a never-ending challenge.”

Davina flushed a little.

Sarah gave her a printed form to fill out.

“How safe is this bank?” Miss Wynngate inquired.

“About as safe as any,” Sarah said.

Davina ponied up her cash on hand. Fifty dollars, an impressive sum for a girl who hadn't undertaken her first position yet. Undoubtedly, the school board had paid her train fare to Stone Creek. They provided housing, and the teacher could either cook for herself or dine in a rotating series of homes, of which Sarah's was one. This was probably graduation money, or a leaving-home gift from her adoptive parents.

“I suppose ‘Mrs. Steel' told you about our—discussion,” Davina said.

So, the girl wanted to talk. Sarah was both surprised and mildly gratified. Perhaps all wasn't lost, as Kitty seemed to think.

“Some of it,” Sarah said, proceeding cautiously. The ice was thin on this particular conversational pond.

Angry tears welled in Davina's beautiful eyes. “How can you befriend her?”

“Because I like her?” Sarah ventured.

“Why?”

Clearly raised by strict Victorian standards, which were more stringent in the East than the West, Davina seemed honestly baffled.

“Kitty has her faults,” Sarah said, “like all the rest of us. But she's a good person, totally devoted to caring for my invalid father. Any lies she told you were intended to
protect
you and your sister, rather than deceive you.”

“But she's not—
respectable!
”

“I don't suppose I am, either,” Sarah allowed. By Eastern social standards, she was little better than Kitty, having borne a married man's child out of wedlock. Davina probably hadn't been apprised of this, having arrived so recently, but it was only a matter of time, of course. And not
very much
time, either.

“The day my contract is fulfilled,” Davina said, stiffening up again, “I'm leaving Stone Creek for good.”

Sarah permitted herself a smile. Before Christmas, some lonely rancher would have wooed and won Davina Wynngate. She might not teach beyond the agreed term, but she wasn't going anywhere.