Vows (25 page)

 
Laughter intensified as he touched Emily's cheek—hot, hot, afire with self-conscious-ness—and finally her mouth, which opened, emitting a faint gasp. She jerked back so sharply he imagined her head bowed over the back of the chair. When he'd discomfited her to the degree that he was certain everyone in the room knew he was doing it intentionally, he touched her scabbed nose and forehead.

 
"Is it you, tomboy?" he asked, loud and clear, then bellowed, "Emily Walcott!" leaping from her lap and ripping the blindfold from his eyes.

 
She had ripened like an August tomato and was staring at her skirt as if trying to suppress tears of mortification.

 
Tom swung toward Charles. "No offense intended, Charles."

 
"Of course not, it's all in fun," Charles replied.

 
Emily's expression turned mutinous and Tom knew he must do something to alleviate the tension. So, there before all her friends he bent swiftly and dropped a kiss on her cheek. "You're a good sport, Walcott," he declared.

 
She shot up from her chair and skewered him with a feral glare, planted her hands on her hips and came at him with slow, insidious intent while their ring of friends laughed at their antics. Tom retreated behind Charles's chair, extending his palms as if to stave her off. "Charles, help me! Tell your woman to back off!"

 
Charles joined the parody, pretending to subdue Emily, who strained toward Jeffcoat, warning, "Next time, hostler, I'll dump you on the floor!"

 
Though Emily had drawn upon feigned vitriol to escape having her incipient feelings for Tom detected, the incident had been unnerving. Not nearly so unnerving as one that happened later in the evening, however.

 
It was bound to happen sooner or later: Tarsy insisted on playing French Postman. The rules of the game needed no explanation for Emily to guess that its outcome would be kissing. She herself escaped being sent a "letter," but before the game was over, Tarsy sent one to Tom, and when it was delivered, Emily watched with derelict fascination as the two of them stood in the middle of the room and kissed as she had never observed anyone kissing before, with Tom's hands running freely over Tarsy's back, and their mouths open—wide! For a good half minute! A lump formed in Emily's throat as she watched. Hot tentacles of unwanted jealousy and undeniable prurience painted blotches on her neck. Even before the game ended she vowed she would never attend one of these parties again.

* * *

To Tom, kissing Tarsy had been nothing but a false show, a convenient opportunity to further divert memories from how he'd made free with Emily Walcott.

 
For that was the encounter that had rocked him.

 
Just a game to some, but to him it had been the first feel of her skin, the first scent of her hair, and a telltale gasp that she'd been unable to control when he'd touched her lips. Whatever outward appearance Emily Walcott maintained, she was far from indifferent to him, and the knowledge put a tension around his chest that refused to go away.

 
During the days that followed, while he worked beside Charles, Tom pretended casual disinterest or amusement whenever her name was mentioned. But at bed-time he fell onto his pillow to stare at the ceiling and ponder his dilemma: he was falling in love with Emily Walcott.

 
He dreamed up an excuse to avoid the next party, spending instead a miserable night at the Mint Saloon, listening to veiled slurs from his competitor, Walter Pinnick, who sat with a group of his drunken henchmen and blubbered about his failing business. Next he went to the Silver Spur where he played a few hands of poker with a handful of weatherbeaten ranch hands. But they were a poor substitute for the company of his friends who were gathered across town.

 
The following week he and Charles completed work on his livery barn and Charles suggested, "You should have a party in the loft before McKenzie delivers the hay."

 
"Me?"

 
"Why not you? It's the perfect place. Plenty of room."

 
Tom shook his head. "No, I don't think so."

 
"A dance, maybe, and invite the local merchants and their wives—a grand opening, if you will. It wouldn't be bad for business, you know."

 
Upon further consideration, the idea took on merit. A dance. What trouble could he get into at a dance, especially with the older generation around? Hell, he wouldn't even have to dance with Emily Walcott, and Charles was right—it would be a wonderful goodwill gesture from the newest businessman in town. He'd need a band and refreshments, a few lanterns, little more.

 
He found a fiddler who sometimes played at the Mint, and the fiddler knew a harmonica player, and the harmonica player knew a guitar player, and in no time at all, Tom had his band. They said they'd play for free beer, so on a Saturday night in mid-July the whole town turned out to christen Jeffcoat's Livery Stable.

* * *

Josephine insisted that Edwin take Fannie. "She's been in the house too much. She needs to get out and so do you."

 
"But—"

 
"Edwin, I won't take no for an answer, and you know how she loves dancing."

 
"I can't take her to a—"

 
"You can and you shall," Josephine stated with quiet authority.

 
He did.

 
They walked uptown together: Charles and Emily, Edwin and Fannie, through a molten summer sunset, through a windless violet evening, the older couple without touching, except for Fannie's skirts brushing Edwin's ankle like an intimate whisper. He felt young again, released, strolling along beside the woman who was vital and healthy and whose desirability had in no way diminished over the years. If anything, it had grown. He allowed this admission to surface while keeping his gaze locked on his daughter's back. If things had turned out differently Emily might have been theirs—his and Fannie's.

 
"Oh, Edwin," Fannie declared, when they were halfway to their destination, "I'm so incredibly happy."

 
Who but Fannie would be happy with this impossible situation?

 
"You always are."

 
Their gazes met and hers held a question: Shall I feel guilty because Josephine has shared you with me for the evening, or shall I make the most of it?

 
They made the most of it. They danced the waltz and the varsovienne, the Turkish trot and the reel. Their hands learned the feel of one another—his as it lay on her waist, hers as it rested on his shoulder. They accepted these touches as a gift.

 
They grew warm and drank beer to cool off. They laughed. They talked. They conversed and danced with others, distancing themselves to covertly admire one another from room's width. They learned that they could be happy with this and no more.

* * *

Tom hadn't intended to ask Emily to dance. He'd brought Tarsy, and Tarsy was enough to wear out any man on the dance floor. He danced with others, too, from his new circle of friends—Ardis and Tilda, Mary Ess, Lybee Ryker; the list had grown. And with many of their mothers, and, of course, with Fannie, who was sought as a partner by every man in the place, regardless of his age.

 
Fannie brought it about, what Tom had been determined to avoid. She was waltzing with him, chattering about Frankie's capacity for molasses cookies, when Edwin danced past with his daughter.

 
"Oh, Edwin, could I talk to you?" Fannie heralded, swinging out of Tom's arms. "I wonder if one of us shouldn't go home and check on Joey."

 
While they carried on a brief conversation Emily and Tom stood by, trying not to look at each other. At length, Fannie touched their arms and said, "Excuse me, Tom, you don't mind finishing this one with Emily, do you?"

 
And so it happened. Tom and Emily were left facing each other on a crowded dance floor. She wouldn't look at him. He couldn't help himself from looking at her. He saw the telltale hint of pink creeping up her cheeks and decided it was best to keep the mood convivial.

 
"I guess we're stuck with each other." He grinned and opened his arms "I can bear it if you can."

 
They moved toward each other gingerly and began waltzing, maintaining a careful distance but bound by unmerciful memories of the last evening they'd spent together.

 
His fingertips learning the textures of her face.

 
His hands and tongue on Tarsy.

 
"I wasn't sure you'd come," he said, meeting the eyes of Charles, who watched from the edge of the floor.

 
"Papa and Fannie and Charles wouldn't have missed it."

 
"So you got roped into it."

 
"You might say that."

 
"You're still angry about that silly game." He turned his back to Charles and glanced down at her compressed lips as she stared over his shoulder "I'm sorry if it embarrassed you." His glance slipped lower, to her chest, tinted by a charming if unladylike vee of sunburned skin shaped like the neck opening of her brother's shirt. There, again, he detected a blush behind a peppering of freckles.

 
"Could we talk about something else, please?"

 
"Certainly. Any subject you like."

 
"You have a fine barn," she offered dutifully.

 
"I picked out the rest of my horses last week. I can get them any time."

 
With the subject of horses she was comfortable; she risked meeting his eyes. "From Liberty?"

 
"Yes. One mare is in foal." She relaxed further as Tom continued with her favorite subject. And I went down to Buffalo and ordered carriages and wagons from Munkers and Mathers. I'll get them as soon as my hay is delivered."

 
"Dams?"

 
"Yup."

 
"They're good, sturdy wagons. Good axles. They'll last you. What brand of carriages?"

 
"Studebakers."

 
"Studebakers … good."

 
"I thought I'd need the best, what with these damned washboard roads out here—where there are roads. I ordered my hay from McKenzie, too. As soon as it comes I'll be open for business."

 
They danced on in a more comfortable silence after the interpersonal talk still careful not to stray too close.

 
"So what have you been doing?" he inquired, implying casual disinterest when actually he was avid to know everything that had affected her life since they'd seen each other.

 
"Not much."

 
"Charles tells me you removed a hairball and a rotten tooth. Got paid for it too."

 
"I removed the tooth, not the hairball. That I took care of with epsom salts and a little raw linseed oil. Distasteful but effective."

 
"But you
did
get paid."

 
He watched her face for signs of satisfaction and found them as she answered, "Yes."

 
"I guess that makes you a real doc now, huh?"

 
"Not really. Not until spring."

 
Silence again while they moved to the music, still separated by a body's width, searching for a new distraction. At length she remarked, "Charles says you've picked out blueprints for your house."

 
"I have."

 
"Two stories and an L-shaped porch."

 
"It seems to be the going thing. Tarsy says everybody's got a porch these days."

 
Their gazes collided and they danced in a web of confused feelings.

 
You're building it for her?

 
The tension between them became palpable.

 
Hoping to remind them both of their obligations, Emily commented, "Charles will do a good job for you. He does everything well."

 
"Yes," Tom replied, "I imagine he does."

 
Somewhere a harmonica wailed and a fiddle scraped, but neither of them heard. Their feet continued shuffling while they grew lost in one another's eyes.

 
Stop looking at me like that.

 
You stop looking at me like that.

 
This was impossible, dangerous.

 
The tension built until Emily felt a sharp pain between her shoulder blades and she lost her will to keep the conversation impersonal. "You didn't come to the party last week," she lamented in a breathy voice.