Stone Dreaming Woman (2 page)

“Phillip Hildebrand, right?”

“Yes. Phillip makes my skin crawl. His father operates his investment company just a hair this side of the law, and Phillip wants to go into politics. That’s the dirtiest business on the face of this earth. I’ve had all I can take of men who think they can push me around and patronize me just because I’m a woman. Truth be known, I’m probably smarter than ninety-nine percent of them.”

“You get no argument from me on that score, Jen.”

“I know.” She heaved a sigh. “You were always on my side in all this mess. I don’t think I’d have been able to stand up to Father and go away to school if you hadn’t backed me.” She looked up at her gentle uncle. Rimless bifocals fenced in his mild blue eyes and only the lightest dusting of grey touched his thinning, sandy hair. But he had yet to see his fortieth birthday; he was a full twelve years younger than his brother John.

Jenny and her uncle carried obvious family connections. Both were petite. Jenny, perhaps five feet three, at the outside weighed a hundred ten pounds. They had the same oval face and tawny Weston hair, but she tamed her heavy, curling leonine mane only by braiding it or winding it into a knot. Her mother, a Virginia Brisbane related to the historical Custis family, had given her melting, dark eyes. The rest of her was delicately pretty. A big, horsy, pushy woman might have fared better in a male-dominated field like medicine, but a mind as keen as her father’s lay concealed under femininity reinforced by years of training in genteel New York manners. When her Weston intellect emerged, it often shocked people.

Richard reached out and took her hand. “Sweetheart, while you’re here I don’t want you to worry about anything. Write all the letters you want and see if you can’t find a position acceptable to you. I’ll help in any way I can.”

She gave him a wistful smile. “Thank you, from the bottom of my heart. I know you’re risking your relationship with Father…”

“No, I’m not. You forget I’m the Old General’s son too. I know how to handle John’s bluff and bluster.” Jenny found herself agreeing with her uncle’s assessment. Under Richard’s quiet exterior, the proverbial velvet glove concealed the iron hand. She’d realized early on that he had developed a deceptively unassuming demeanor as his defense against a father who raged and cursed and intimidated in order to get his way.

Maddie arrived with their meal. It looked wonderful, and when Jenny cut into her steak she found it perfectly done. The cornstarch gravy with chopped wild mushrooms and onions gave the meal a surprisingly sophisticated touch. She cleaned her plate with gusto.

“Didn’t you have anything to eat on the train?” Richard asked.

“Mrs. Dean sent me off with a hamper, but that didn’t last forever. My breakfast this morning was an apple and a glass of milk between trains.”

“No wonder you’re hungry. Now about dessert…”

“I smelled pie when we came in.”

“I think I did too. Mrs. Hammill’s deep-dish apple pie is the stuff of legends. She serves it hot with cream.”

“You know, I think I still have a few cracks to fill, and apple pie is my favorite dessert.”

“Apple pie it is.” At that moment the front door opened and a tall young man in the uniform of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police came in. He paused at the doorway to remove his hat and parka. His fair complexion looked pale despite the cold outside. He put his hat aside, rubbed at his very black, wavy hair with a gloved hand, and started toward the stairway.

“Shane,” Richard called. The young man paused.

“
Bonjour
, Richard.” Even Richard’s broad smile did not alleviate the seriousness of the officer’s face.

“Jenny, may I present my friend, Staff Sergeant Shane Adair, Royal Northwest Mounted Police. Shane, my niece, Miss Jennifer Weston.”

“
Mam’selle
Weston.
C’est mon plaisir. Pardonnez moi…
Ah, excuse me. I mean, my pleasure, Miss Weston.” He nodded politely to her, but his face looked anything but pleased. His tone seemed as stiffly formal as his appearance, and for no good reason Jenny felt her hackles raise.

“
Je suis enchantée,
Sergeant.”
There. That’ll show you I’m no ignoramus
, she thought smugly. In spite of her feelings, she favored him with her best Southern Belle smile. Not even the merest flicker across his granite face acknowledged her perfectly precise French. She took in his regular features, strongly square chin, lips rounded in a typically French way, and surprising agate-grey eyes. Heavy cheekbones gave his face a masculine angularity.
He’s not unpleasant looking, if he would only smile
.

“How are you now, Shane?” Richard asked. From the stress her uncle laid on the question, she felt it was much more than social politeness.

“I’m quite well. And you?” The reply was brief to the point of terseness.

“Couldn’t be better, now that my favorite niece is here for a visit.”

Almost reluctantly his gaze went from Richard to Jenny. “Well, Miss Weston, I hope you enjoy your stay in Elk Gap. If I may be of any service to you, you’ve only to let me know.” He turned slightly as though he were going to take his leave, and when Jenny took a second, careful look at him, he seemed pale and tired.

“Won’t you join us for dessert? Apple pie will be my treat,” Richard offered.

“Thank you, no. Perhaps another time? I’ve been up to North Village. I had to investigate a shooting, and I need to write my report and get it countersigned in time to post it on the evening train to River Bend. With all my other paperwork, that may be a tight squeeze.”

“Definitely another time. You know you’re welcome at my house, day or night.”

“Thank you. But I really must be on my way. It was nice to make your acquaintance, Miss Weston. Good day.” He nodded toward Jenny by way of acknowledgment but did not wait for a reply.

“Good day, Sergeant,” she said to his retreating back. She watched briefly as he climbed the stairs. It was instant distaste on Jenny’s part. He seemed like the kind of sourpuss who did not even like himself. But she decided not to voice her opinions to her uncle, who obviously thought a great deal of the dour young man.

“Have you known Sergeant Adair long?” It was a purely polite inquiry, and she could not have cared less about the answer.

“Ever since my first day here. He’s been an incredibly good friend to me. When I came here I had no idea under the sun where I was. He helped me find my house and also my housekeeper. He’s actually a barrister. He could practice law anywhere in Canada, but he’d rather do police work. He single-handedly settled all the fuss the Indians, the loggers, the farmers, the trappers, and the railroad men had for years. There’s not a man jack hereabouts who doesn’t think the world of him.”

“You included, it seems.”

“Of course. He’s gone far out of his way to help me.” It was on the tip of her tongue to say that boorish behavior was no recommendation of a man’s character, but in deference to her uncle, she held her peace.

Less than half an hour later they were on their way home. Richard’s ancient team, which he fatuously called “The Girls,” were hard-pressed to achieve a wheezy trot. It took them nearly an hour to arrive at Richard’s small ranch. Knowing the proximity of their barn, with its feed and comfortable, warm stalls, they turned a fraction before he drew up the left rein and commanded them
haw
. Jenny looked about with awe. They moved down a lane curving around an orchard, toward a snug two-story log house that looked to have been reinvented and added to over generations. One single chimney, flanked by two dormer windows, rose from the center of the roof, and a capacious farmer’s porch ran the entire length of the front.

“Well, this is home,” Richard announced. “It’s probably going to seem plain to you. I don’t have electricity. There are, however, running water, indoor plumbing, and a telephone. I added the telephone and the plumbing. I can stand kerosene lamps, but a backhouse and a pump were just too primitive.”

Just then a man in work overalls and a black-and-green chopper jacket came from the barn. Richard beckoned to him. “That’s my hired man, Toby. He’s slow and he’s deaf, but he’s a top stockman and he keeps a good garden.” Richard pointed to Jenny’s trunks and pantomimed taking them inside. Toby nodded. But to Jenny’s clinical eye he did not look mentally impaired
. I’ll bet money he’s only deaf.
If he could be taught to read and write he’s probably as smart as the rest of us. If I’m here long enough, I might try
.

Richard and Toby took a handle each on the first trunk and Richard pushed the front door back, pausing politely to let Jenny enter first. The door opened into an old-fashioned assembly room, with a scrubbed heart-pine floor covered with a bright, braided rug.

A relic of the house’s earlier days, a huge natural stone fireplace with an ancient “reckon” to hold cooking pots formed a large part of the center wall. A relatively new wood-burning cook stove stood at right angles to it, and an odd set of bunks ran along the front wall between the window and the outside corner, obviously a holdover from the early days when the farmhouse had its origins as a one-room cabin. A pleasantly solid woman with silvering dark hair and huge dimples stood before the stove, stirring a pot.

“Well, Mr. Weston, I think you’ve just made it home in time. It’s going to rain any minute.”

“Jenny, Mavis Conner, my housekeeper. Mavis, this is the favorite niece you’ve heard so much about.”

“Mrs. Conner,” Jenny said with a polite nod.

“Mavis, please,” she corrected with gentle firmness. “And welcome to Canada. It’s grand to meet you, after everything Mr. Weston has told me.”

“Come up and see your room, Jen. Mavis devoted a lot of time to making it livable. Before, I had just been using it for storage.” With Toby following, he took up the handle of the trunk again and led her to the right, through an archway into the front parlor. The room exuded comfort in the form of a large oriental carpet, two oxblood leather wing chairs flanking the double fireplace, a cameo-backed settee in scarlet velvet, and several occasional tables that held elaborate crystal-bowled lamps. At first she had thought to head through the door at the back of the living room, but a peek inside revealed Mavis’s bedroom on the right, then a hallway through the pantry, leading past the rear kitchen door to the bathroom at the back. Instead she followed the men up the stairs to the traditional children’s dormitories. Richard had long ago claimed the larger room on the left, but when she saw her own bedroom, it reached out and welcomed her. At first glance it appeared simple, a far cry from her chamber in New York with its jacquard satin draperies and marble-topped walnut suite imported from Germany; however, that room had held nothing but turmoil. Though small, this promised peace. The furnishings consisted of a washstand, an armoire, a bonnet box highboy, a cheval glass, a single brass bed, and a delicately carved rosewood lady’s writing desk with cabriole legs that Jenny remembered well. It had belonged to her late Aunt Alix.

“Oh, Uncle Richard! Aunt Alix’s desk!” she exclaimed, her throat tightening with emotion at the memory of her beloved aunt, dead tragically young during her first childbirth.

“It’s yours now. Call it a late Christmas or an early birthday gift. I figured you might need somewhere comfortable to read and write in private.” She came to him and his arms went softly around her. For a moment she was afraid she might cry.

“You’re way too good to me, you know,” she murmured against his shoulder.

“You’re worth it, sweetheart. I want you to be happy while you’re here.”

“I’d be happy in a barn, but this room is lovely. Who made the curtains? Mrs. Conner?” Their glazed chintz, delicately flowered in an abstract swirly blue with mauve roses and green leaves here and there, matched the bedspread, the dust ruffle, and also the skirt around the washstand.

“Of course she made them. She loves to sew. I gave her a sewing machine last Christmas, and she has made herself an entire new wardrobe over the year.”

“Perhaps I could coax her into helping me make a divided riding skirt. I detest riding sidesaddle. You do have a saddle horse, don’t you?”

“As a matter of fact, I haven’t. However, it would be a small matter to get you a good mount. There’s a man around here who trains horses. He’s an absolute genius. An Iroquois Indian named Thomas Wise Hand. Of course I’ll have to ask Shane to be our go-between, because he speaks Iroquois.”

“Well… Let’s just see, shall we?” she demurred. She wanted nothing to do with the sour-faced young police officer.

Less than an hour later she had unpacked her belongings and managed to strew them all over the small room. Her medical textbooks fit nicely into the shelves below the dormer windows, and she had hung her clothes in the armoire and placed her lingerie and nightclothes in the highboy. Mavis had certainly gone the extra mile. All the drawers were freshly lined with butcher paper, and she had put a handmade lavender stick in each one. Jenny picked up one stick and rubbed it gently between her palms, held her hands to her face, and inhaled the newly released fragrance.

Her hands still smelled of the lavender when she lifted a leather box from the bottom of her trunk. She started to put it in the bottom drawer of the highboy, but instead she sat down on the bed and opened the case. It contained her important papers, including diplomas, grade reports, internship and residence evaluations, and a list of all the hospitals she had written to and their answers. They read like a roster of every heartbreak she had ever known. She leafed through the stack of replies until she came to the one that had been more important to her than all the rest of them put together. It bore the return address of Northtown Surgical Clinic, the internationally famous and preeminent experimental and teaching hospital in New York City. Her father had been on the staff there since before her birth, and as soon as she was old enough to decide she wanted to be a doctor, too, her one and only goal had been to join its staff along with him. Every insult and slight she had borne from her male professors and colleagues, every night she had gone without sleep in order to study, every smutty innuendo she had pointedly ignored, every friendship she had passed up, every sacrifice she had made, had been directed toward the one hope that a single-page letter shattered. She knew its contents by heart:
At this time there are no vacancies on our staff; nor, for the foreseeable future, are there any plans to hire women as staff physicians
. She put the envelope back in the stack with a sigh.