Dorothy Garlock (23 page)

They stood in silence as, far in the southern distance, forks of lightning crisscrossed the darkening sky, lacing the horizon with the fury of nature. It took the thunder a few seconds to reach them, but when it did the bass of the storm’s fury was as deep as a wild dog’s growl.

“Gonna be a storm,” Pearl observed.

Hank nodded. Even in the joy of the moment, he felt a twinge in his gut.

Something bad was coming!

Chapter Twenty-one

T
HE SWEET SMELL
of flapjacks mingled with the strong fragrance of coffee as Hallie filled her plate and cup and sat down at the long table. She’d risen early to cook as the ranch had begun to come to life, the morning sun shining a bright orange through the kitchen windows. The heavy storm that had threatened the night before had passed harmlessly to the south, though the first morning air had been scented with the crisp, freshness of faraway rain. But now, only a scant hour later, the day had begun to turn into a scorcher, the heat dry and stifling. She wiped her brow with the back of her arm and began to eat hungrily.

“It’s the God’s truth, Hallie,” Hank said from his place across from her, his mouth still full of food. “These flapjacks are fit for a king, so it won’t be no surprise to hear that this old cowboy took a hankerin’ to ’em!”

“I’m glad you like them.” She smiled as she spoke.

“Darn right!”

“There’s plenty, so eat up.”

“Don’t need to tell me more than once.” The cowboy rose to fill his plate from the stack keeping warm on the cookstove.

As happy and as proud as she was to see Hank digging in to his breakfast, it was also as clear to Hallie that there was one person who was
not
enamored of her cooking.

Eli
.

He sat quietly beside her at the head of the table, his tanned brow lined with worry, his shoulders slumped as if they were the boughs of an old tree that had spent a night under the pounding rain. His gaze rarely left his plate; the food was scarcely touched. When he had first entered the room, he’d said little, a simple greeting followed by a few grunts and shrugs. Once in a while, his hand would run to his wounded arm, and he winced in pain.

Hallie took a deep breath, trying to draw comfort from all that she had heard from Abe the night before:
He will tell you what is bothering him when he’s ready.
Even as she attempted to be patient in her thoughts, to put what she had learned to good use, she found that giving action to such sentiments was far more difficult than she had bargained for. With every passing moment of silence, her desire to rush to Eli, to put her arms around his waist and hug him, became stronger.

Still, his silence had begun to bother her.
Just because I understand he needs time before he can tell the secrets he is holding doesn’t mean that we aren’t to say a word to each other.
She was just about to break the quiet, to ask him about his arm, the weather or some nonsense, when Pearl came bustling into the room, a plate full of food in one hand, a sloshing cup of coffee in the other.

“I swear,” Pearl spat the words as hard and as fast as if they were bullets. She slammed the plate and cup down on the table. “I swear that if the sun ever rises on a day when that woman is happy about somethin’, I just might fall dead from shock!”

“What was the matter?” Hallie asked, even though she was fairly certain that she already knew the answer.

“The same thing that’s always the damn matter,” Pearl declared, her tone as sharp as a railroad spike. She poured herself a cup of coffee and set the pot back on the stove with a ringing clang. “That old biddy ain’t happy with nothin’ in life, certainly not with this food! She’s got venom runnin’ through her veins!”

“Come on now, she ain’t that bad,” Hank interjected with a wide grin.

“Then next time you can serve her meal! Maybe she’ll take off a chunk of
your
hide!”

“Think she’d treat me different on account of my bein’ her brother?”

“I’d put money on her bitin’ your head off just the same!”

Hank seemed to think about it for a moment, opening his mouth to say something; but looking at Pearl, her hands on her hips and spoiling for a fight, he thought better of the idea. “Naw, you’re probably right,” he agreed with a wide grin. “Even after all these years, I still don’t think that she’s too fond of me either.”

“That’s because you’re a stinky old goat!”

“I may be old, but I ain’t no goat.”

Pearl just grinned.

As she watched Pearl and Hank tease each other, Hallie could see that it wasn’t done with cruel intent. While her mouth said otherwise, it was clear by the twinkle in Pearl’s eyes and the beginnings of a smile that lifted up her mouth that something had come over her. In the presence of the older cowboy, some of the hardness had fallen away. A flood of warm feelings raced through Hallie at the thought of Pearl’s finding companionship and contentment.

Because of her own newfound happiness she had kept silent when Pearl had returned to the barn the night before, deciding not to tell her what had happened in the mercantile, how the strange man had threatened them all. She had also held her tongue about Eli and her worries about his visit to the cemetery. It would have been nice to have had another opinion, someone to share her concerns, but she wouldn’t have marred her friend’s happiness for all of the stars that dotted the sky.

“Maybe you should take in her noon meal,” Pearl kept right on prodding Hank.

“I wouldn’t mind savin’ you the hassle”—he grinned, the laughter bright in his eyes—“but me and Eli got plenty of work to do on the fence line to the east. We’re bound to be there till nightfall.”

“It’ll wait,” Eli said suddenly. After his voicing little more than a grunt or two the whole morning, the sound of his voice was so startling to Hallie’s ears that she nearly jumped from her seat.

“What’ll wait?” Hank asked, confused. “That fence?”

“We can send a couple of the hands to take care of it,” Eli explained, his eyes never leaving his plate. “We’re not straying from the ranch today.”

“Why’s that?”

“We’re staying here!” Eli suddenly barked, his gaze shooting up and holding his uncle fast. Hallie stole only a quick glance in his direction; his hooded eyes were watery and red, bloodshot in a way that told her he had not managed to get much sleep. More than ever before, she wanted to know what had happened in town, to know what secrets he kept from her.

The heated air of the kitchen captured the silence that followed Eli’s outburst. Hallie had begun to wonder if it would ever be broken when Abe surprisingly stepped into the room, his face no less sleep deprived than that of his brother, his hair and beard slightly unkempt.

“Good morning,” he said solemnly.

“To you as well,” Hank responded warmly, happy for a change in the tone of the room. “I hope you were able to get a little sleep last night.”

“I am afraid that it would have been little more than a wink or two,” the man who believed himself to be the late president answered. “Watching over my beloved Mary requires a vigilance that leaves little time for my own comfort. I dare not allow myself to waver. One never knows when there will be an improvement.”

“Has there been any change?” Hallie asked hopefully.

“Unfortunately not,” Abe answered as he helped himself to a steaming mug of coffee and a couple of flapjacks, obviously not as averse to Hallie’s cooking as his mother was. “I had hopes that Mary’s convalescence would be brief, but she still must rest a while longer as she recovers the strength she needs to rejoin us.”

“It won’t be much longer, I reckon,” Pearl ventured.

“Let us hope not, my dear.”

As this casual talk began to replace the harshness of Eli’s words, Hallie couldn’t help trying to gather their meaning.
Why doesn’t Eli want Hank and himself to be far from the ranch? Does it have something to do with what occurred in Bison City?
As hard as it was for her to accept, she knew that the only answers to these difficult questions would come when, or more important
if
, Eli decided to tell her.

“Keep eating. You need to keep your own strength up,” Hank told Abe.

“I need little to keep going, but even I require a bit of nourishment from time to time.” With a nod to Hallie, he added, “A task much easier on account of our fine new White House cook.”

She was about to answer, to thank Abe for his kind words, when there was a knock on the door, followed by the screech of hinges and the sound of booted feet on the wooden floor. All heads turned in surprise at the sight that greeted them.

There, in a bright blue dress, her golden hair pulled up beneath an equally bright bonnet, was Fawn.

For a moment, the air in Hallie’s lungs vanished. Sweat beaded her brow and the hairs on her arms and the back of her neck stood on end. It was as if she’d suddenly found herself in a dream, as if she had blinked her eyes and where there had been nothing at all, a second later there was Fawn.

“I’m terribly sorry to be barging in like this,” she began, her voice dripping with honey, her smile as bright as the sun rising steadily in the sky. “After all that’s happened here, I couldn’t seem to keep myself away.”

“What on earth are you talkin’ about?” Hank asked, puzzled.

“Why, Mrs. Morgan’s fall, of course,” Fawn explained, her green eyes darting to Hallie’s and holding them just long enough for a sickening feeling to begin to spread across her gut.

“Hallie told me about the terrible accident, about how Mrs. Morgan had fallen and was unable to leave her bed,” she explained. “Well, the more I thought about it, the more I was certain that it was my Christian duty to come and see about her.”

“You rode out here to see about that old bat?” Pearl asked.

“Now, Pearl . . . ,” Hank scolded.

“I took my father’s buggy at first light,” Fawn explained proudly, her chest swelling in her bodice. “I am more than capable of driving myself. I’m not the sort of woman who needs to be chauffeured about as if I were the belle of the ball.”

Hallie winced inwardly at the obvious dig at her trip to Bison City. Knowing the truth of the matter, that Eli had asked her to accompany him to town, that she had not needed him to drive her, did little to salve the stinging wound. She gave Eli a furtive glance, but he seemed to be paying Fawn about as much mind as he’d paid his breakfast.

Fawn also seemed to be aware of his lack of interest. Her bright eyes darted from one face to another but always back to Eli, where he sat slumped in his seat, and his back turned to her. Hallie could see the emotions that flitted across Fawn’s face: hope that he would pay her notice and exasperation that he didn’t. His lack of attention got the better of Fawn and she took a few steps toward him.

“I’m so sorry about your mother, Eli,” she offered.

Eli’s response was little more than a grunt. Frustration crossed Fawn’s face like clouds on a brilliant blue sky, a soft red flushing her pale cheeks. No longer content to be ignored, she reached out and placed her hand on his right arm and gave it a gentle squeeze.

“Fawn, don’t—” Hallie began but it was already too late.

“Goddamn it!” Eli roared, the pain in his arm cutting as sharp as a knife blade. He shot up and out of his seat, the blood in his temples pounding, his teeth clenched tight. When his eyes finally turned to Fawn, the emotion written in them was certainly not what she had longed for.

“Eli, I didn’t know you were hurt,” she muttered, flustered and concerned.

“Don’t touch me!” he barked.

“What in hell’s the matter with your arm?” Hank asked with concern in his voice, more than a bit confused by his nephew’s outburst. “You fall off your horse or somethin’?”

“It’s nothing,” Eli answered, but it was clear to all in the room that his words were false.

While she had been startled by Eli’s anger, it didn’t take long for Fawn to recover, the confusion that had been written on her pretty face replaced by a syrupy-sweet mask of helpfulness.

“But what about Mrs. Morgan?” she asked.

“She’s gettin’ the help she needs,” Pearl offered, her tone defensive.

“I have to wonder about that,” Fawn retorted. Hallie saw clearly that Fawn Billings was not the sort to take rejection lightly. Even when faced with an obstacle like Eli’s anger, she was ready to get right back in the fight, no matter who was the opponent. She considered herself to be a woman of means, cultured, far above the type of woman she thought Pearl to be, too far above her in station to be spoken to in such a way.

“Now just you hold on for a minute,” Pearl barked, her dander rising.

But even as she listened to the older woman fighting against her accusations, Fawn’s attention had been pulled elsewhere. Her gaze was fixed upon a spot over Pearl’s shoulder, farther into the room. Questions filled her eyes as a sly smile broke across her face.

“Abe?” she asked, her voice uncertain. “Is that you?”

Hank and Pearl parted to reveal Abe standing near the stove, a cup of coffee held gingerly between thumb and forefinger. He nodded his tousled head solemnly, as if he were greeting the wife of an ambassador. “Miss,” he said.

“Why, I haven’t seen you in years.” Fawn smiled warmly, her eyes surveying his tall frame, taking him all in, surprise in her reaction. “But why on earth are you dressed that way? You look just like President Lincoln’s photo in my father’s old books!”

“How I truly hated posing for those photographs,” Abe said with a chuckle, traveling in his mind back to a distant time that he had never actually experienced. “Having to sit still while the photographer fussed around, changing plates and tossing a black cloth over himself. As bad as it was to pose with my generals, imagine how hard it was with the children!”

Fawn laughed heartily, her tight curls bobbing. “Ever since we were kids, you always were the one that could make us all laugh with your silly stories!” But when she noticed that she was the only person in the room who took his words for a joke, she soon stopped, more confused than ever. Hallie could see the gears of her mind spinning, trying to make sense of the puzzle before her.