Yankee Wife (8 page)

 

There was a feast of fish that night, even though Jake Feeny had fixed a pork roast, and everyone ate their share—except for Polly, who was pale and distracted. Lydia saw Devon toss a worried glance in his mate's direction every so often, and she hurt for them both. Mrs. Chilcote remained in her room, claiming a case of the vapors, and Millie chattered incessantly. Charlotte was pining over something, but she seemed to have a good appetite, and there was a quietness about Brigham, an ease she hadn't seen in him before.

He was wearing a shirt now, of course, but in her mind's eye Lydia still saw him half naked in the dooryard, splashing his powerfully muscled torso with water. She had seen plenty of bare, hairy male chests in her time, of course, but the sight had never quite affected her in the same way. She'd wanted to lay her hands to those graceful, corded muscles, to feel them move beneath her palms and fingers.…

A surge of embarrassment struck Lydia then, and she closed her eyes against the onslaught, feeling color pound in her cheeks. When she looked again, she found Brigham watching her, his mouth solemn, his eyes full of humor.

It was almost as though he knew what she'd been thinking, Lydia reflected harriedly, but that was impossible, of course. No one could truly know the mind of another.

She reached for a bowl of sliced beets and took a second helping. The serving spoon clattered against the dish as she replaced it, and Brigham's gaze lingered, seemingly on the hollow at the base of her throat. Which, of course, was hidden by the fabric of her dress.

Because it was Lydia's habit to charge when retreat seemed to be the only safe course, she spoke up in a clear voice. “I would like to speak with you privately after dinner, Mr. Quade,” she said to Brigham.

He smiled, still amused, and Lydia wondered what it was about her that aroused such merriment. “As you wish, Miss McQuire,” he answered.

Lydia quite literally felt Polly's gaze careen across the table to catch hers. Polly's lovely face was white with fear; she obviously thought Lydia was about to betray her confidence. An almost imperceptible shake of Lydia's head had to serve as reassurance.

When the meal was over, Lydia rose and cleared her place at the table. The doors of the study stood open to the rest of the house when she reached them, and Brigham was at the hearth, one booted foot braced against the brass fireguard. He watched the flames solemnly, as though they were telling some fascinating story.

Lydia folded her arms and set her feet a little apart, for there was something about this man that made her flood with weakness just when she most needed her strength.

“I will require six dollars salary per month, instead of the four you offered me through Mr. Harrington,” she announced, “and you must build a schoolhouse. There is no reason, of course, why the structure couldn't serve as a church and a community meeting hall as well.”

Brigham slowly turned his head to look at her, and she was at a disadvantage because of the way the shadows played over his face, cloaking his expression. “You want a whole building for two children?”

Lydia tried to stand a little taller. “Yes, Mr. Quade,” she said with patience, only too aware that her voice was shaking slightly. “It's rather the same principle as hanging a birdhouse in one's garden. At first the entire enterprise might seem futile, but in time one bird appears, and then another. Soon, there are swallows or finches or robins everywhere.” She paused, spread her hands as she summed up her point. “If you make a place for children, Mr. Quade, you will make a place for
families
.”

He folded his arms and turned toward her, one thick shoulder resting against the mantelpiece. “I built six fine houses, facing the harbor,” he pointed out, arching one eyebrow, “and they stand empty. Do you have another theory to explain that?”

Lydia sighed. “You'll need those and more as soon as there's a heart to the town. A meetinghouse would provide that.”

Brigham was silent for a long time, thoughtful. Once or twice he rubbed his chin with the fingers of his right hand. “Six dollars a month is too much,” he said after a long while. “How do I know you're worthy of such a salary?”

She stood her ground. “You probably pay that much, or more, to the men who tend oxen and mules in your lumber camps. Is the care of your daughters less important?”

He stared at her for a long moment, as if amazed at her audacity, then gave a low burst of laughter. “Five dollars and fifty cents,” he countered. “My daughters are certainly more important than the livestock, but they're also easier to handle. Most of the time.”

The bargain sounded good to Lydia. After all, she'd been offered four dollars salary in the first place, and now she was getting five and a half. “And the building?” she pressed.

“You'll have your meetinghouse by autumn,” Brigham conceded.

Lydia smiled. “Good. That's exactly when we'll need it. In the meantime, Charlotte and Millie and I will explore the woods and shore and make a study of science.”

Brigham shifted his foot from the fireguard. “Science,” he repeated, somewhat derisively. “Teach my daughters to sew a neat stitch, Miss McQuire. Teach them to cook. Those are the things they'll need to know.”

Lydia's patience was sorely tried, and only moments before she'd been riding the swell of triumph! “It seems to me, Mr. Quade,” she said evenly, “that there are a number of things
you
need to know. The world is changing. Women want a new place in that world, and they'll have it.”

He bent his head so close to hers that their foreheads were nearly touching, and she felt that strange, primitive need rush through her again, making her head spin and turning her knees to marmalade. “Are you so certain you know what women want?” he challenged in a low drawl; and then, suddenly, with no warning whatsoever, he kissed her.

More than once before, a soldier, grateful and fancying himself in love with her, had pressed an awkward farewell kiss on Lydia, but there had never been one like this. The contact itself was hard and forceful, yet Brigham's mouth felt soft as velvet against hers, and persuasive as the scent of lilacs on a summer evening.

With gentle, skilled motions of his lips, his hand splayed at the back of her head, he made her mouth open. The invasion of his tongue was both sweet and violent, and her own rose to greet his, to do battle, to welcome, to surrender. Her breasts were pressed flush to the hardness of his chest, her breath ached in her throat, and still he kissed her. Still he conquered.

She might have sagged against him when he finally drew back, she was so dazed and boneless, but he gripped her shoulders and held her upright. For a long, humiliating moment, she could only stare up at him in drunken confusion.

He touched her trembling lips with an index finger, then broke the spell with a chuckle. “Good night, Miss Lydia McQuire,” he said. “Sleep well.”

There was a quiet arrogance in his words, too subtle to challenge, but Lydia was unsettled nonetheless. She hoped she hadn't set an unseemly precedent, letting Mr. Quade kiss her that way.

Letting? she thought as she turned, nearly stumbling, to make her way out of the room, out of Brigham's sphere of influence. She hadn't only
let
Mr. Quade take an improper liberty, God help her, she'd wanted more. The thrumming heat he'd stirred in her still hadn't subsided.

Since Lydia was so preoccupied, she got a fright when she entered her bedroom a few minutes later and found Polly standing at the hearth.

“Did you tell Brigham about me?” the other woman asked, sounding desperate and a little angry.

“No,” Lydia sighed. “And I don't intend to. But you can't keep a thing like this a secret, Polly. You must go to Devon and tell him the truth—now.”

“He'll be furious.”

“I have no doubt of that. But Devon's not an unreasonable man. Once he's had time to think things through, he'll probably understand.”

“Probably.” The word sounded miserable, hopeless. Polly sagged into a chair next to the fireplace. “Pa always said my sins would catch up to me, and I guess he was right. He preached the Gospel, and he claimed to know God's opinions on everything from the stars and planets to Mr. Lincoln's necktie.”

Lydia sat on the trunk at the foot of the bed, still a little confounded by the kiss she and Brigham had just shared, and tried to focus her thoughts on the present moment.

“I loved my Pa,” Polly reflected, gazing into the low flames burning in the grate of Lydia's fireplace. “Oh, he was meaner than a Pawnee with a toothache, Pa was, but I would have done most anything to get one fond look from him.”

Lydia waited.

“I was raised in Kansas, in Indian country,” Polly went on. “We had a sod house and a few cattle, and when Pa rode out to make the preaching circuit, I had to stay there alone. I told Pa I was scared the Pawnee would come, or maybe a band of outlaws, but he just said the Lord would look after me.” She paused. “Instead, the Lord sent Nat Malachi.”

Lydia was drawn into the story, picturing the lonely sod hut, the wandering cattle, feeling the especially imaginative fears of a young girl. “The man who helped you deceive Devon,” she said, without rancor.

“Yes,” Polly replied, with a nod. She seemed barely aware of Lydia as she went on with her story. “I told Nat he couldn't stay, since my Pa wasn't around and it wouldn't be proper, but Nat said he'd seen a half-dozen Pawnee just over the next rise and I'd be needing somebody to watch over me.

“Nat has one of those wicked smiles that tempt a woman to sinful thoughts, even if he isn't handsome the way my Devon is. By the time a week had passed, he'd made me believe I loved him, and that I wouldn't be able to make my way in life without him.

“He made love to me in the prairie grass, with just the sky for a blanket, and after the first time, I started to like the things he did to me, the way he touched me. I started to need it.

“Then Pa came riding home from his preaching, on that old mule that was as mean and stubborn as he was, and he caught me with Nat. He called me a Jezebel and said he never wanted to look on the likes of me again.

“The next day, I rode out with Nat.” Polly's eyes glistened with tears, and she was silent for a long time. Finally she finished the story. “Nat isn't a good man, but he can love a woman until she's in a fever, and make her do just about anything he wants. He got us passage to San Francisco when it looked like he'd be conscripted to fight for the Union army, and for a while he worked on the docks, but he soon grew weary of that. It seemed like a lark—just an easy, harmless way to make money—when we started duping miners and sailors and others into thinking they'd married me. Now I'd give anything to go back and change it all.”

Lydia swallowed. “Are you and Mr. Malachi married?” she asked, fearing the worst. Devon might be able to deal with finding out that he was still a bachelor, and not a bridegroom, but bigamy could be more than he could come to terms with.

Polly gave a soft, bitter laugh. “No, thank God. When I think of how I begged that man for a wedding band…”

Lydia closed her eyes for a moment, only to feel her relief give way to grim logic. “Will Nat come here, looking for you?”

“He was drunk when I went to tell him about Devon,” she said. “I'm not sure he heard a word I said.”

“Suppose he did hear?” Lydia pressed. “Suppose he comes to Quade's Harbor to find you. Imagine what that would do to Devon.”

Polly covered her face with both hands.

“There might even be violence,” Lydia went on. “Think how you'd feel, Polly, if something happened to Devon. Think how you would regret not warning him about Nat.”

Slowly, Polly lowered her hands to her lap. She nodded. “You're right. I'd rather have Devon turn his back on me in contempt than see him hurt. And Nat can be as mean as Pa ever was, if he has a mind to be.” She rose stiffly from her chair. “I'm not a bad person, Lydia,” she said plaintively. “We might have been good friends, you and I.”

Lydia touched Polly's arm. “We can still be friends,” she said. “You'll see.”

Polly nodded again and left the room. Lydia undressed to her camisole and drawers and sat by the fire, a kerosene lamp burning at her side, to read. Occasionally she heard voices tumbling down the hallway, male and female and tangled together, but there was no shouting. She was just beginning to hope Devon had heard Polly's story and understood when a nearby door slammed with an explosive crack.

When Lydia peered into the hallway, unable to resist investigating, she saw the broad expanse of Devon's back as he stormed toward the main staircase. Just the set of his shoulders gave eloquent testimony that the soul of this quiet man brimmed with a rage he could barely contain.

S
OME INNER ALARM MADE
B
RIGHAM LOOK UP FROM THE
paperwork spread over his desk when Devon came down the stairs and passed the study doorway. Even in the shadow-smudged light of the kerosene lamps, Brig could see that his brother's stiff composure was only a brittle shell covering some grievous injury of the spirit. He pushed back his chair and stepped into the entry hall.

Devon. His only brother, his best friend, his partner. Although the two men never spoke of their affection for each other, Brigham would have suffered almost any sort of pain or privation if it meant sparing Devon.

“Wait,” Brigham said, reaching the front door just as Devon descended the steps.

The other man stopped, his backbone stiff, his head tilted slightly backward, as if to look up at the stars. Devon's voice was raw when he spoke, and broken. “I can't talk now, Brig,” he said, without turning around. And then he strode off down the walk, disappearing into the noisy darkness of a summer night.

It would be no favor to pursue Devon, so Brigham turned to go back into the house.

Lydia stood in the doorway, a prim corduroy wrapper clutched around her enticing figure, her hair braided into a single thick plait resting against her right shoulder. The light behind her made an aura of flyaway strands, and her blue eyes were wide and worried.

“Aren't you going after him?”

Brigham muttered an exclamation better suited to the lumber camps than his front porch, and thrust one hand through his hair. He had the distinct impression Lydia knew something about Devon's trouble that he didn't, and the idea irritated him.

“No,” he snapped, running his eyes over the length of her sumptuous person with deliberate insolence. “Are you?”

Even in the thin light making its way through the front windows, he could see her color change. “Why, no—of course not. I was simply concerned.”

“What's going on here?” Brigham demanded, without trying to couch the words in the slightest courtesy. “Devon is not a temperamental man, and I've never seen him the way he was just now.”

She lifted her obstinate little chin. “I would be betraying a confidence if I answered that question. You'll have to ask your brother, or Polly.”

Brigham felt wholly distracted in those moments, and wildly frustrated. All of a sudden his very being seemed to be pulled east from west, one part wanting to go after Devon, another to stay near this woman, always. Along with her fresh-faced good looks and saucy pragmatism, she presented a multitude of intangible mysteries Brig wanted desperately to solve.

Feeling her soft, strong body buck beneath his in the fevered abandon of pleasure was only the beginning of the things he wanted from her. Beyond that primordial yearning were other needs, for solace, for challenge, for laughter and fury. He should have been thinking about his brother, and instead he was feeling things, things he'd never imagined, let alone experienced.

The sudden awareness of the track his thoughts were following wrenched Brigham, slammed him hard against a wall of reason. He didn't know this woman. He didn't even particularly
like
this woman. His brother was wandering in the darkness, bleeding from some wound of the soul. And with all of that, here he stood, his brain full of images too lurid for a dime novel.

Crickets and frogs sang in the darkness, and he caught the scents of saltwater and pine sap on the night breeze. As always, those things were a comfort to Brig, because his soul had rooted itself in this land crowded with trees and shining with bright waters. He had long since given his heart to the place, in the same way a husband pledged himself to his wife. “Damn it, Lydia,” he said presently, in an effort to redeem himself to his own standards, “if you're keeping back something I need to know to help my brother, I'll never forgive you.”

She touched her wild, beautiful hair self-consciously. “Good night, Mr. Quade,” she said in stiff tones. Then she turned and marched herself into the house without another word.

“Good night,” he said tersely, long after Lydia had disappeared and he was alone with the frogs and the crickets.

 

The light of the rising sun was dazzling on the water when Polly approached the framework of Devon's building the next morning. He hadn't returned to their f room in the big house the night before, after she'd told him of her deception, and she'd known he would be here.

Sure enough, Devon had built a small campfire in the clearing beside the beginnings of his mercantile, and he was sitting next to it with his back to a large, porous rock. He sensed her approach, looked at her. The expression in his ink-blue eyes, so full of laughter and love before her confession, was flat, defiant, cold.

“You're going,” he said, in a voice that had no inflection at all, the words comprising both a statement and a query.

Polly's throat tightened. She heard her father's voice, in the forefront of her mind, quoting his beloved Bible.
Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free
. In this case, the truth had set only Devon free, but she might well remain its prisoner forever.

“Do you want me to go?” she managed, after a long interval of painful, throbbing silence.

Devon was watching the sunlight dance upon the water, and though his voice was low, and directed elsewhere, Polly heard his response clearly. “I'll pay your passage back to San Francisco.”

First her father had made all the decisions about her life, then Nat Malachi, and now Devon. Polly was weary of compliance, but she didn't know exactly what to say. She pretended, just for a moment, that she was Lydia McQuire, who struck her as bold, brave, and decisive.

“I won't be going to San Francisco,” she said firmly, surprising herself as much as Devon. “Since it's plain that I'm not wanted here, I'll be traveling to Seattle on the next mail boat. Surely I'll be able to find myself a good husband there, since there is such a dire shortage of women.”

She saw Devon's fists clench at his sides, and knew a moment of sweeping satisfaction. When he shot to his feet, she was both frightened and exulted.

But Devon did not come to her, take her by the shoulders, shout that he wouldn't allow her to leave him. He restrained himself, visibly, and set his jaw in a callous, almost cruel fashion. “Go, then,” he said hoarsely. “And good riddance.”

“Devon…”

He turned away, his broad shoulders rigid beneath the smudged, wrinkled fabric of his shirt.

Polly's very soul shriveled within her; she started toward him, stopped herself. Devon was her mate, despite the fraud of their marriage; with him she had discovered what it meant to love and be loved. Now, too soon, it was over, and she was waking from the dream.

She'd wanted to have children by this man, to massage his back and rub his feet when he was weary, to laugh when he made a jest and cry when he felt pain. She would be denied those things, those sweetest of pleasures, because of her own foolishness and deceit.

“I'm sorry,” she said, so softly that she couldn't be sure he'd heard her.

Polly went back to the big house on the hill, encountering no one on the way, back to the room where she'd lain with Devon, transported by the fierce ecstasies she'd known with him. She pulled her gold wedding band from her finger, laid it on the bureau beside Devon's brush, and then turned to packing the few things she'd owned before meeting the man she would always think of as her husband.

Standing before the bureau mirror, Polly did not see her own reflection, but that of the bed behind her. Never, no matter what she had to do to sustain herself, would she ever lie with another man. She wouldn't take a husband, or a lover, or sell her body for money, because she knew the touch of anyone besides Devon would drive her to screaming madness.

The mail boat arrived at midafternoon, and Polly was waiting on the wharf when it chugged into the harbor. She had hoped, at first, that Devon would appear and ask her to stay, but there was no sign of him. In fact, in the intervals when the steam-powered saws in Brigham's mill weren't shrieking, she heard the rhythmic pounding of Devon's hammer. Unlike her, he still had a dream to pursue.

“It's unwise to run away,” Lydia said.

Polly was so startled that she nearly fell into the water. She hadn't heard the other woman approaching because of the ordinary noises.

“I'm not as bold as you are,” Polly replied, with dignity. “I'm not as strong.”

“Monkey feathers,” Lydia answered, her eyes solemn, her mouth unsmiling. “Of course you're strong. You have to be; you have no other choice.”

“Devon doesn't want me,” Polly said, lowering her eyes. More than once, since she'd come to the wharf to wait for the mail boat, she'd considered simply jumping off into the water and letting herself drown, but some inner core of strength wouldn't allow her the easy escape. Besides, somewhere deep inside her, flickering like the light of a candle, was the fear that she might miss something tremendous by dying now, even though her life looked hopeless.

Lydia sighed. “Stop thinking with Devon's brain, Polly,” she said. “You have a mind of your own, and it will tell you what to do if you listen.”

Polly stared at this odd, strong, pretty woman standing before her, wondering where she'd gotten all those outlandish ideas that sprang constantly from her mouth. “You could marry him now, if you wanted,” Polly said. “Devon is free, in the eyes of God and man, and I know you find him attractive.”

The memory of Lydia's shock when she'd discovered that Devon already had a bride, on board the ship from San Francisco, was plain between the two women, needing no further mention.

Lydia folded her arms. “Very well,” she said, in a tone of kindly challenge. “If you truly don't want Devon, if you board this boat and sail off to Seattle, I'll make a point of consoling him.”

A venomous pain surged through Polly's system. She loved Devon, and she was fairly certain he felt the same way about her, even though his disenchantment had blinded him to the fact. Still, Lydia was a beautiful woman, and Devon wanted a home and family so much that he had been willing to travel far and wide to bring home a bride. He would undoubtedly hurt for a while, then notice Lydia and begin to court her.

Tears burned in Polly's eyes, blurring the raw splendor of this kingdom nestled in the palm of God's hand. “Devon deserves to be happy, and you could give him what he needs,” she said. The mail boat put into port just then, and a crewman jumped onto the dock to secure the craft with rope. A ramp slammed against the shifting boards of the wharf, and Polly leaned down and picked up her single carpet bag.

Lydia touched her arm. “Will you write, at least?” she asked quietly.

The other woman's concern curled against Polly's bruised heart like a warm kitten. They could have been Such good friends, if only things had worked out differently. “Yes,” Polly said. Then, unable to add a farewell, she boarded the boat and walked to the far side of the small cabin to await departure.

 

Lydia felt bereft as she went back up the driveway toward the house. She knew she could probably have Devon for a husband, if she waited for his inner wounds to heal a little, then offered him gentle, steady condolences. The trouble was, her initial attraction to him had turned to the quiet regard a sister might have for her brother. It was Brigham who made her blood heat until she thought her veins would be seared through, Brigham who had stirred her fighting spirit back to life.

The fact that the imperious Mr. Quade was quite unsuited to her personal tastes didn't seem to matter.

Midway up the drive, she encountered Millie, who leaped out of a lilac bush, her hair full of dingy chicken feathers, her face streaked with berry juice or rouge.

Dutifully, Lydia cried out in mock terror.

“I'm a savage,” the child announced proudly.

Lydia laughed and pulled Millie against her side in a brief embrace. “I think many people would agree,” she said. “But you're a very appealing savage, all things considered. Where did you get those feathers?”

“From the floor of the henhouse,” Millie replied, pleased with herself. “They were lying all over the place, free for the taking.”

Lydia grimaced, thinking of lice and other unsavory things. “I believe a bath would be a good idea,” she said, taking Millie's small, grubby hand, and at the same time, plucking away the feathers and tossing them aside.

“Savages don't bathe,” Millie told her, but she didn't protest being defeathered. “Not in water, anyway.” Her small, dirty face glowed with inspiration. “Blood, maybe,” she speculated, one finger to her lips. “I heard Papa say once that some of the Indian women wash their hair with urine and fish oil.”

Lydia sincerely hoped Brigham hadn't made such a revolting comment in casual conversation. Children were so impressionable, and they had hearing as sharp as a cat's. She didn't comment on Millie's statement because she didn't want to encourage more of the same.

“Where is Charlotte?” she asked instead.

“Who knows?” Millie countered, with a shrug. “Camelot, maybe. Or Sherwood Forest. Or perhaps a castle in Spain.”