Two Brides Too Many (29 page)

Morgan pulled out a chair for her and then sat across the table, his hands clasped in front of him. “I should’ve told you Friday before I invited you for the carriage ride today.” He looked down at his hands. “You’d been hurt so badly, and so recently, that I didn’t feel it was wise to share such information yet.”

“And yet you chose to tell Darla Taggart about your wife?”

“I didn’t…” His voice faltered. “She was prying…and it just came out.”

“So is that how it works?”

He stared at her, a vein on his forehead jumping. “She asked if the piano was mine, and I told her it had belonged to my wife. When she kept questioning me, I blurted out that I couldn’t fathom ever being married again. My involvement with her is—”

“I know, professional and humanitarian.” She met his gaze. “This isn’t about Darla. After church this morning, she asked me if you’d told me about your wife.” The last word came out louder than she’d intended. When Rosita stirred and turned over, Kat continued in a whisper. “This is about your not telling me you’d been married.”

“And, naturally, you thought…”

“What was I supposed to think? I don’t know you very well.” She tugged the gingham cloth in the center of the table straight, her thoughts bubbling right along with the coffeepot.

“Perhaps that I was a man who knows what it’s like to lose someone you love. Who knows what it’s like to move across the country in a new beginning and have it turn out far differently than you’d expected.”

That’s what she wished she’d thought, but he was right. She’d thought the worst of him.

“I didn’t love him,” she said quietly.

Morgan nodded. “Opal died in childbirth nearly three years ago now. So did our son, William Morgan.”

Tears stung Kat’s eyes and she pressed her fingers against her welling eyelids. “I’m so sorry,” she said, and gazed up at him. This man who sat across from her, blinking back his own tears, truly knew what it meant to love and lose. In her haste to protect herself from more pain, she never even considered the possibility that Morgan might have suffered losses of his own. Kat’s tears began to spill over her face. “I’m so sorry about Opal and William.”

Morgan pushed the empty lantern and gingham cloth from between them, and held his handkerchief out to her. When she reached for his handkerchief, the backs of their hands touched and his lingered, and she looked up into moist green eyes brimming with understanding and compassion.

“You’re not like Patrick Maloney.”

“No ma’am.” He dipped his chin. “I’m surely not.”

“I shouldn’t have doubted you. I’m sorry.”

“Apology accepted. Am I forgiven for not telling you myself…sooner?”

“You’re forgiven.” Kat felt the corners of her lips turn up a little. “But you have to promise me that you’ll tear up the ugly note waiting for you in the basement. Before you read it.”

“You’ve got a deal.” He released the handkerchief and stood. “I brought a picnic supper, but the wind is picking up a bit and the shadows are lengthening. The spot I had in mind will soon be shaded and, thus, too chilly. How do you ladies feel about a picnic supper inside tonight?” He looked from Kat to Nell and back to Kat.

“That sounds wonderful,” Kat said.

As he took long strides out the door, Nell sniffled and Kat stood up from the table and went to the window. Dabbing at her tears, she watched Morgan reach into the back of his buggy and pull out a picnic basket. He was a good man. A man she could trust.

A man who couldn’t fathom ever being married again.

T
HIRTY
-S
EVEN

M
onday morning, Kat could hardly keep up with Rosita and HopHop.

“Choo-choo! I see Abuela today!” The little girl sang as she skipped ahead of Kat and Nell on the way down the hill. Last evening they’d been setting out Morgan’s picnic supper when Rosita woke up. After they’d all eaten their fill, she and Nell crafted a makeshift checkerboard complete with beans for checkers. It wasn’t the same without Ida and Vivian, but they’d still laughed a lot. It was a different family she had here in Cripple Creek, but it was a kind of family nonetheless, and Kat was dreading saying good-bye to its smallest member.

They turned onto Bennett Avenue. They’d only been here two weeks, but Cripple Creek wasn’t the same town she and Nell had seen when they stepped off the train. When the false-fronted wood buildings had been reduced to ashes, the whole community had pitched in to haul off the rubble and rebuild the town. Men were hard at work with hammers and trowels, raising fire-resistant brick and sandstone
buildings in their stead. With the new buildings came a new direction, and a new sense of purpose.

God had been doing the same for Kat. She now had a home and a focus for her writing. She had new friends, including her gentleman friend. He brought her unexpected joy, even if she still had questions about what was to come. Kat couldn’t help but wonder if Morgan would ever change his mind about marrying again, and Nell was concerned about seeing Judson when he came to call, wondering what direction their relationship would go.

“Now I see Abuela?
Tio
Ray?” Rosita tugged on Kat’s skirt. Her small knapsack of belongings hung over her shoulder.

“First, we have to go to the post office so I can mail my story.” Kat patted Rosita’s silky black hair. “Then we’ll go to the depot. We’ll find Mr. Boney and wait for the train.” Thankfully, the miner would be there to translate. Saturday night after Boney’s shotgun lesson, he’d given Kat the telegram from the sheriff in New Mexico. Rositas grandfather was gravely ill, so the little one’s grandmother and her uncle would need to get right back on the train with her to return to Santa Fe. She and Nell had hoped to be able to spend some time with Rosita’s family, partly to extend the time with her, and partly so they would know that Rosita would have a good life with them in Santa Fe. However, judging by the child’s excitement this morning, Kat doubted she and Nell had reason to worry.

At the sound of the faint whistle when the train came out of the mountain pass, Rosita’s eyes widened. “Choo-choo,” she whispered. “Choo-choo. I go on the train.”

“Yes. Very soon,” Kat said, shaking her head as the three of them crossed the boardwalk and made their way into the post office.

Kat recognized the couple at the counter immediately. They were unmistakable. A familiar shock of red curls spilled down the woman’s back—clothed this time—and a baby fussed, his head sticking out from the cradle of her arms. The man at her side wore black breeches and a top hat, and the room smelled like cheap toilet water.

Kat grabbed Nell’s arm to turn them all around, but it was too late. The couple turned to leave, and the woman grinned in recognition.

“I was wonderin’ if I’d see you around here sometime. Thought maybe I’d scared you off with that mess.” The woman beamed at Kat. “Didn’t even get your name. Mine’s Iris.” She turned toward the man who escorted her, dragging her red curls across the baby’s face. “This is the woman I was tellin’ you about. The one the new doc thought was a midwife.”

Kat squared her shoulders and offered him a half nod. “Mr. Whibley.”

“You know him?”

“Mrs. Maloney.” Removing his hat, the slick gambler tightened his jaw in a frown.

“You know her?” Iris jerked back toward Kat, her eyes wide. “You were married to Paddy?”

“No, we were never married.”

“You aren’t Paddy’s widow?” Whibley shoved his hat back on his head.

“I didn’t say I was married to Mr. Maloney, sir. You did.”

“But you pointed a shotgun at me like you were his widow.”

“I pointed a shotgun at you because you wouldn’t leave my property.”

“You want to tell me why this woman had to pull a shotgun on
you?” Iris glared at him, a hand on one hip and a baby on the other.

“A misunderstanding is all the lovely lady and I have between us,” Lewis said, holding up his hands. “Paddy’s cabin was mine.”

“Was
. Before you lost it to him, Mr. Whibley.”

“Yes.” Whibley nodded. “And I woulda won it back from him fair and square, but since he’s dead—”

“You thought you could move into Paddy’s cabin and call it your own?” Iris shifted the baby to her shoulder.

“I didn’t know there was a woman living there.”

Iris shook her head and looked at Kat, her brows arched. “Sounds like my Lewis, all right.”

“Your Lewis?” That question came from Nell, and earned a slanted stare from Iris.

Kat saw green in the woman’s brown eyes and cleared her throat. “This is my sister, Nell.”

Lewis nodded.

“Yes, my Lewis.” Iris stepped closer to the gambler. “We got close the last time he was in town.” She grinned at the newborn in her arms. “Real close.”

Kat remembered him saying he’d been here in Cripple Creek about eight or nine months ago gambling with Patrick and no doubt behaving in the same indecent manner. Was this scoundrel the baby’s father? Kat needed to remember to pray for the little one who wiggled and whimpered in his mother’s arms.

“We’ve had us some real good work last night and Lewis is takin’ us to California. Sending a letter right now to warn my brother that we’re coming. That is, if Lewis can behave himself long enough.” Iris
laughed and elbowed the man. Lewis continued to glare at Kat. “Thank you again for helping me and my son.” She stroked her son’s cheek.

“I wish I could have done more.”

She nodded. “God bless you all.”

“And you.” The couple turned to go, and Kat tried not to look at the man wearing the top hat and carrying his gambling table. When they walked out, Kat turned her envelope over to the postmaster. Then she led Nell and Rosita down the new boardwalk and over to the Midland Terminal Railroad depot where Boney Hughes stood beside his mule that was tied to the hitching rail. True to form, the man spit a stream of brown into the dirt as they approached.

“Ladies.” He removed his hat and bent to the little girl’s level. “Rosita,” he said, his open arms accepting the little girl’s hug.

“I see Abuela and Tio Ray today.”

Boney nodded and looked up at the sisters. Kat was sure she saw tears pool the man’s eyes before he turned away.

Rosita pulled Boney toward the platform, and the sisters followed. Kat reached for Nell’s hand and squeezed it as the train puffed into the station. Rosita squealed with excitement, singing a new song about her grandmother.

Nell’s hand started to quiver, signaling tears coming on, and Kat squeezed a little tighter. “I know, Kat. I just…” Nell’s voice cracked as tears spilled down her face.

As the train came to a stop, a stream of people disembarked and milled around on the platform. Finally, an older Mexican woman wearing a long dress made of cotton, with bright flowers stitched into the yoke and the hem, stepped out of the car with a younger man.
The man, Kat guessed, was Rosita’s Tio Ray, and he stayed by the door of the Pullman.

“Abuela!” HopHop dangled from Rosita’s open arms as she ran toward the stocky woman. Even from here, Kat could see how much the woman’s face mirrored Rosita’s.

“Mija
!” She rushed toward her granddaughter, her long, full dress swooshing with every step. Rosita all but leaped into her arms. Rosita’s legs wrapped around her grandmother’s middle and their foreheads touched.

Both Rosita and her grandmother looked at Kat and Nell, their dark eyes shimmering with joyful tears. They chattered in a language Kat might not understand, but she knew enough to know it translated into love.

The grandmother’s gray hair hung in two braids, interwoven with bright strips of cloth, and suddenly Kat saw why Rosita always insisted on having her hair plaited with cloth ribbons.

She said something in Spanish and looked at Boney.

“She thanks God for you,” Boney said. “You have cared for Rosita, and she will be grateful for as long as God gives her breath.”

The woman stroked Rosita’s hair. She was taking Rosita with her. It was an answer to Kat’s prayers. So why did it hurt so much?

Nell seemed unable to move or speak. Drawing in a deep breath, Kat held tight to her sister.

The woman set Rosita on the ground, and she ran back to Kat and Nell.

“I go home with Abuela.”

Kat nodded, unable to get any words out. Nell embraced Rosita. “I will miss you, little one,” Nell said, tears brimming in her eyes.

Kat knelt down on the platform and hugged Rosita good-bye. When Kat stood, Rosita held HopHop out to her, her bottom lip extended. “He’s yours now,” Kat whispered. “HopHop will go wherever you go.”

Rosita’s smile lit her eyes as she squeezed the bunny tight.

The grandmother spoke again, raising her hands and placing them on her chest.
“Salud, pesetas, y amor. Y tiempo para gustar.”

Kat smiled at the woman and then looked to Boney for the translation.

“She wishes you health, wealth, and love, and time to enjoy them all.”

Kat watched Rosita tug on her grandmother’s colorful skirt as she spoke. “Please tell her thank you. That we pray for God to bless her, Rosita, and their family.”