DARE THE WILD WIND (53 page)
Read DARE THE WILD WIND Online
Authors: Kaye Wilson Klem
An answer tempted Eden, but she couldn't make it in front of her uncle. To her relief, Duval continued speaking to his host. “Has Isaac Rudd arrived?”
“He won't be here until dinner,” MacFarland said. “He's as anxious to talk to you as you are to meet him, but Isaac isn't known for leaving his desk early, even on a Saturday.”
He gestured toward the open door, but Ross Duval stopped on the steps.
“In that case, I might have time for a quick walk back to Park Street.”
Hollis MacFarland halted in turn. “If you have luggage at the station, I can send for it.”
Duval shook his head.
“I travel light. I left my luggage at my hotel in Hartford, and I came directly to your house on the chance Rudd might be here before me.
“Since he won't arrive until dinner, I won't trouble you to entertain me until then. I saw a tobacconist on Park Street, and I smoke a special blend. I've found it takes some persuasion to get what I want in New England, but I don't like to do without it.”
Eden saw relief in her uncle's eyes, and she was sure he had been caught unprepared by Duval's early arrival.
Ross Duval turned back to Eden. “I'll look forward to seeing you again at dinner, Miss MacFarland.”
There was something oddly conspiratorial in his voice, and his eyes held the same arrogant look she had seen when he had lounged against the gate. She was glad to see him start back down the walk to the street.
Inside the hall, her uncle's shrewd eyes questioned her. “I thought Blake would be staying for dinner.”
Eden looked up in surprise. “I didn't ask him.”
Her uncle's face betrayed his shock. “You let him drive away without an invitation?”
Suddenly Eden understood his question. He had known what Blake planned to ask her that afternoon. He had urged her to go with Blake, and he had expected her to accept. It was like Blake to go to her uncle before he came to her, and Eden felt a flash of indignation.
“Under the circumstances, I didn't think he'd want to stay.”
Her eyes met her uncle's, and his mouth tightened. “Are you saying you turned him down?”
Eden's temper sparked. “What he asked me and what I said are my concern.”
Hollis MacFarland's gray eyes went icy.
“Your welfare is my concern as long as you live in my house.” He turned toward the door to the library. “I think it's time you and I have a talk about your future.”
Chapter Two
“Blake told me he intended to propose to you this, afternoon,” Hollis MacFarland said as he settled into the chair behind his desk.
Eden dropped her gloves on the table just inside the library door.
“He did. I told him no.”
“I find that impossible to accept.”
Eden stared at her uncle. “Why? I barely know Blake. I've only seen him at the bank and a few times here at the house.”
“You've known him more than a year, and he's going to be a rising young man in this town. You'd be wise not to lose him to some other girl in Rockville.”
“How far Blake rises really doesn't matter to me, and I wouldn't marry anyone just to get the best of my friends.”
Hollis looked out the window for a second. Silhouetted in the light, his profile hinted at her father's. But in Hollis, Temple MacFarland's auburn hair had faded to a ginger mixed with gray, and her uncle's features had gone fleshy and puffy from too little exercise and sun. Still, Eden felt a fleeting stab of grief at the reminder.
Now Hollis turned back to her, and there was a new edge in his voice. “Have you forgotten you're already twenty? Thanks to the war in Cuba, half the girls in Rockville are going to end as spinsters.”
“The war in Cuba is over.”
“Not for the men who came back. Blake isn't missing an arm or a leg, and he's more than presentable. And not many ambitious young men are willing to stay in Rockville.”
It was true, marriageable men were far from plentiful in Rockville, and the war had made matters worse. Even though the armistice had been signed only a few months after the explosion of the Maine in the harbor at Havana, too many men had been left at Guantanamo and San Juan Hill. Those who had returned to Rockville in the early months of 1899 had lost limbs, and many had lost their health to malaria.
Few who had a choice returned to Rockville. The town's mills filled stomachs failed by the rocky Connecticut soil, but that grinding drudgery made almost anything else seem better. As soon as they could break from their families, Rockville's young men were gone, to Hartford and beyond. Blake had friends, and he had found opportunity, but not many others could.
Her uncle's eyes challenged Eden to deny it.
“Nature didn't intend you to be a spinster. But you’ll gaze in a mirror too long if you think you can find someone better than Blake Cabot.”
Eden was stung in spite of herself. She was aware she drew men's attention, but she had never been vain. The stares men gave her were as embarrassing as they were flattering, and she knew it was her titian hair and smoke gray eyes that made her different from the other girls in Rockville. They were cat eyes, heavy lashed and tilted at the ends, and as a child Eden had thought they were too large for her face. Now that she was grown, they gave her face an odd touch of mystery.
She had a full, high bosom and long, quick legs hidden by her skirts, but her proud carriage was the gift of youth, and her eyes were the gift of a mother she scarcely remembered. The brothers of her classmates in Boston had called her an enchantress, but Eden was too sensible to believe the nonsense most girls did about their looks.
She hadn't said no to Blake out of vanity. In spite of all her uncle's arguments, she didn't want to marry Blake. His lips had been warm and pleasant, but they had stirred no real feeling in Eden beyond a brief curiosity, and she knew that wasn't enough.
“I don't need to marry Blake or anyone else,” she said. “Even if I never marry, I can live on the stock my father left me in the railroad and the bank.”
Her uncle's face registered shock for a second.
“Do you imagine I'm going to let you spend your father's money when it suits you? Think again, if you have any idea of that.”
“It's my money. I may not be able to spend it now, but when I'm twenty-one it belongs to me.”
“Do you seriously believe I'd consent to turning a sum that large over to a girl of twenty-one?”
Eden stared at him.
“You father left the money to you, but he left managing it to my discretion. Tve put it in a trust, and after you marry, it will be in a new trust for your children.”
Something turned over in Eden's stomach. “You can't have the right to do that.”
“I’m your legal guardian. No woman could hope to manage the money your father left you. Blake agrees with me about the trust, and you should be glad he isn't after your inheritance.”
Eden felt numbed and betrayed. Her father had sent her to the best girls' school in Boston, and he had expected her to learn more than needlework at the Emily Stowe Academy. His intention was for her to be able to manage for herself, and her uncle meant to keep her dependent on someone else as long as she lived.
“It's not as tragic as that.”
Her uncle's voice was suddenly consoling, and Eden looked up at him.
“You need a man like Blake. He’ll know how to take care of things for you when I’m gone, and I intend to name him president of the bank when I retire.”
“He can take care of things at the bank without marrying me.”
“But you can't take care of your inheritance on your own, and I won't let you fall into the hands of some fortune hunter.”
Anger rose in Eden.
“I'm not so foolish I can't manage my own inheritance.”
Hollis MacFarland's face went hard again.
“It's too late to discuss that. The trust is set up, and you'll thank me for it one day. Now I suggest you reconsider Blake's proposal.”
The last of Eden's control shattered.
“You may hiave the right to decide what's best for me for now. But you won't always be able to do that, and I won't let you tell me who to marry.
“I won't see Blake Cabot again, and I'll never marry him.”
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