“No, I don’t want to see your sister. Wait! Don’t go. Please, Nellie, would you sit with me a while?”
She glanced up at him when he used her first name. “All right, Mr. Montgomery, I’ll sit with you.” She sat in the swing where they’d sat so companionably earlier in the day, but Nellie didn’t say a word.
“What’s there to do in Chandler?” he asked.
“Church socials, the park, riding, not much. We’re a boring little town. Terel knows everyone, though, and she can introduce you.”
“Will you go with me to the Harvest Ball at the Taggerts’ in two weeks?”
She looked at him sharply. “Which Taggert?” she asked, stalling for time.
“Kane and his wife, Houston,” he said, as though no other Taggerts were in town.
Nellie just sat there blinking. Kane Taggert was one of the richest men in America, and he lived in a magnificent house on a hill overlooking the town. His beautiful wife, Houston, gave elegant parties for their friends, and once a year they gave a magnificent ball. Last year she and Terel had been invited, Terel had gone while Nellie stayed home, but something had happened—she wasn’t sure what—and this year they’d not received an invitation, much to Terel’s horror.
“Terel would love to go,” Nellie said. “She would love to—”
“I’m inviting you, not your sister.”
Nellie had no idea what to say to the man. When she was twenty and much slimmer than she was now she’d had a few invitations from men, but she’d rarely been able to accept. At twenty she had had the responsibility of caring for her father and a twelve-year-old sister—and her father did not like his dinner late.
“Mr. Montgomery, I—”
“Jace.”
“I beg your pardon.”
“My name is Jace.”
“I couldn’t possibly call you by your Christian name, Mr. Montgomery. I have just met you.”
“If you go with me to the ball, you’ll get to know me better.”
“I couldn’t possibly. I must…” She couldn’t think of a single reason why she couldn’t go, but she knew it was an impossibility.
“I’ll take the job your father is offering if you’ll go with me. And if you’ll call me Jace.”
Nellie knew that her father wanted this man to take the job, knew that he needed someone to help run his freight company, but none of this made sense. Why was he trying to persuade her to go somewhere with him? “I…I don’t know, Mr. Montgomery. I don’t know if my father can spare me. And Terel needs—”
“What that young lady needs is…” He didn’t finish his sentence. “I won’t take the job unless you agree to go with me. One evening, that’s all I ask.”
Nellie imagined entering the big white house on the hill on the arm of this extraordinarily handsome man, and she quite suddenly very much wanted to go. Just once she’d like to go out for an evening. “All right,” she whispered.
He smiled at her as he stood, and even in the darkness she could see his dimple. “Good,” he said. “I’m very pleased. I’ll be looking forward to it. Wear something beautiful.”
“I don’t have anything…” She didn’t finish. “I will look forward to the evening also,” she whispered.
He smiled again, put his hands in his pockets, and, whistling, left the garden.
Nellie sat where she was for a moment. What an extraordinary man, she thought. What a very unusual man.
She leaned back in the swing, smelling the sweet fragrance of the flowers. She was going to the ball with a man. And not just any man. Not the butcher’s fat son Terel was always suggesting, or the grocer’s seventeen-year-old son who sometimes looked at Nellie with big eyes, and not the sixty-year-old man her father had once introduced her to. Not the—
“Nellie! Where have you been?” Terel demanded, standing over her in the darkness. “We have been looking all over for you. Anna is destroying the kitchen, and Father wants you to watch her, and I need you to unlace my dress. We’re suffering while you sit here daydreaming. Sometimes, Nellie, I don’t think you care about anyone but yourself.”
“Yes, you’re right. I’m sorry. I’ll straighten out Anna.” Reluctantly she left the swing and the garden and went back to the very real world inside the house.
It was hours later that she got the kitchen straight, had listened to another of her father’s lectures about her eating, and was finally able to get to Terel’s room.
“I got Anna to undo my laces,” Terel said bitterly, sitting in her robe and gown before her mirror and brushing her hair.
Nellie began to pick up Terel’s clothes. She was very tired and longed to take a bath and go to bed.
“Wasn’t he divine?” Terel said.
“Who?”
“Mr. Montgomery, of course. Oh, Nellie, aren’t you ever aware of anything that goes on?”
“He was very nice, yes.”
“Nice? He was much more than nice. I’ve never seen a better-looking man in my life, except maybe Dr. Westfield, but he’s taken. Father says he thinks there’s money in his background.”
“I think Dr. Westfield is quite comfortable,” Nellie said tiredly.
“Not Dr. Westfield! Nellie, why don’t you listen sometimes? Father thinks Mr. Montgomery has money. I can’t imagine why he’d consider a job with Father if he has money unless…”
“Unless what?”
“Well…I hate to say it myself, but did you see the way he looked at me during dinner?”
Nellie, behind the wardrobe door, was glad Terel couldn’t see her face. “No, I’m afraid I didn’t see, but Terel, dear, you must be used to men looking at you.”
“Yes,” she said softly, looking at herself in the mirror. Mr. Montgomery had indeed looked at her, but not in the way men often looked at her. In fact, there was something almost chilling about the way he’d looked at her with those almost-black eyes of his.
She put her hand to her throat. He would be a challenge to win, she thought.
“I wonder what his name is,” Terel murmured.
“Jace,” Nellie said before she thought.
Terel looked at her sister in the mirror. Nellie was standing so that just her face was visible above the little screen by the washstand. In the candlelight Nellie was beautiful. Her skin was flawless, her lashes long, her lips full. Glancing back at her own reflection, Terel knew she wasn’t half as pretty as Nellie. Next to Nellie, Terel’s face was too long, her nose too sharp, and her skin wasn’t nearly as smooth.
Terel opened a drawer to her dresser and withdrew a little bag of caramels, then went to Nellie and put her arm around her. “I’m sorry Father was such a beast at dinner. He didn’t have to tell Mr. Montgomery about how you’d eaten all the cake. You weren’t looking, but you should have seen the look on that man’s face.”
Nellie moved away from Terel’s embrace.
“Nellie, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you. I thought you’d be able to see the humor in the situation. It is amusing that a woman could eat an entire cake by herself.”
“It is not amusing to me,” Nellie said stiffly.
“All right, I’ll stop laughing if you can’t. Really, Nellie, if you’d just learn to laugh sometimes you’d have a much easier time in life. Where are you going?”
“To take a bath and go to bed.”
“You’re angry.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Yes, you are, I can tell. You’re angry at
me
because of what Father said. That isn’t fair at all. I’d never tell a guest I had a sister who could eat a whole cake.”
Nellie could feel herself begin to grow hungry.
“I have a present for you,” Terel said, holding out the bag of caramels.
Nellie didn’t want the candy, but every time she thought of that handsome Mr. Montgomery knowing the truth about her she felt a hunger pang. “Thank you,” Nellie murmured, taking the bag, leaving the room, and eating half the candy before she got to the bathroom.
The fog closed over the scene, and Pauline turned to Berni.
“So that’s my assignment?” Berni said thoughtfully. “I think I can handle it. What a hunk that guy Montgomery is. If I were there, I’d want him myself. Does he have money? It would be nice if he had money, because then he could buy Terel some more clothes. She could have—”
“Your assignment is Nellie.”
“He could buy her a mansion or, better yet, build her one. He could—what?”
“Your assignment is to help Nellie.”
Berni was too stunned to speak. “What help does she need? She has everything. She has a family who loves her and—”
“Does
her family love her?”
“They must. They put up with her. You saw her eat that cake. Disgusting. I wouldn’t live with someone like that.”
“Even if that person cooked and cleaned for you and picked up your clothes?”
“I see. This is all meant to make me feel sorry for the fat girl. No one opened her mouth and forced that food inside her.
She
ate that cake. She eats candy all day long. No one makes her.”
“Mmm,” Pauline said.
Berni got off the banquette. She was growing angry now. “You’re just like those bleeding hearts on earth, always talking about eating disorders and how people can’t help themselves. Do you think I stayed slim all my life because I’m naturally thin? I’m thin because I
starved
myself. I got on my scale every day, and if I was so much as a half pound heavy, I fasted that day.
That’s
how a person keeps from getting fat. Discipline!”
“I don’t think Nellie is as strong as you. Some people, like you, can make it through life all by themselves, but people like Nellie need help.”
“She has help. She has a family that puts up with her. There she is, a fat old maid, yet her father’s supporting her.”
“He certainly seems to be getting his money’s worth.”
Berni glared at Pauline. “You think you know this fatty, but you don’t. I know what fatsos like her are
really
like. She looks like she’s the model daughter, taking care of her father and sister, acting reluctant when a gorgeous man asks her out. She may look like the perfect angel, but underneath all the blubber beats a heart full of hatred. I know.”
“You know Nellie that well?” Pauline asked softly.
“I know women just like her. My sister is fat, and she
hated
me. She hated the way the boys asked me out, the way everyone looked at me and no one ever looked at her. I tell you, if you could see the true nature of this Nellie, you wouldn’t see some meek little earth mother, you’d see a demon.”
“That’s difficult to believe.”
“I know what I’m talking about. Every fat girl who ever saw me wanted to look like me. They all hated me because they were jealous—just as Nellie is jealous of that lovely Terel.”
“You’re sure Nellie actually hates her sister?”
“Positive. If Nellie were given what she
really
wants, Terel’s arms would probably drop off. She would…” Berni stopped. “What do I have to do to help this Nellie?”
“It’s up to you. I told you, we supply the magic, and you supply the wisdom.”
“Wisdom,” Berni said, smiling. “I don’t know who chooses these assignments, but they goofed this time. Nellie doesn’t need help, it’s Terel who needs the help. I could prove it if I could give Nellie what she really, truly wants.”
“You can.”
Berni thought about that. “All right, I’ll give her three wishes. Not dumb wishes like ‘I wish the dishes were washed’ but wishes for what Nellie genuinely wants. She doesn’t have to voice her wish, just want it, you know what I mean?”
“I believe so. You think that what Nellie seems to want and what she really wants are at odds?”
“Odds? Are you kidding? Little Miss Goody Two Shoes will wish that hunk belonged to her, and she’ll wish Terel into an early grave. You mark my words. I’ll return, and Terel will be scrubbing floors. She’ll probably wish her father into the poorhouse.”
“Return?” Pauline asked. “You mean to give her three wishes and walk away? You don’t plan to stay and see what happens?”
“I like that Terel; she reminds me of myself, and I can’t bear to stay and watch what her fat sister is going to do to her.”
“You’re sure Nellie’s heart is full of hatred?”
“Very
sure. I know my fatties. Now, what do I have to do to give her her three wishes?”
Pauline sighed. “Declare it, nothing more.”
“Okay, fatso, you get three wishes for what you
really
want. Sorry, Terel.” Berni waved her hand in the direction of the screen. “Now,” she said to Pauline, “what other rooms are in this burg? How about the Luxury room?”
Pauline gave a backward glance at the screen, sighed, then led Berni through the archway toward the hall.
J
ace Montgomery dismounted his horse, threw the reins to the boy waiting outside the Taggert mansion, and went inside. The butler didn’t even rise from his chair but kept reading his paper, only glancing up to nod in Jace’s direction.
“In his office?” Jace asked.
The butler nodded again and kept reading.
Jace knew the man didn’t consider him a guest. In the butler’s opinion there were guests and there were relatives, and Jace was a mere relative. As Jace walked through the big, mostly marble house the place rang with the sound of people, and the noise made him smile. The house sounded so much like his home in Maine.
His father’s big, very old, sprawling house, set but feet from the ocean in Warbrooke, Maine, always echoed with the noise of his Montgomery and Taggert relatives, and in the background was the constant music made by his mother and her friends.
After his wife died Jace couldn’t bear the happiness around him. He couldn’t stand to hear children laughing or see couples looking at each other with love. A month after he buried Julie and his three-day-old son he’d stepped on a train, and for four years he’d been traveling, just traveling, doing nothing else. He had met few people, not wanting ever again to care for another human being, and he’d kept to himself.
But about six months ago he’d started to recover, started to be able to think of something besides his own grief. He went to California and visited his mother’s parents and spent some time with the old mountain men who lived on his grandfather’s ranch.
It was while he was visiting Grandpa Jeff that his Aunt Ardis started writing him and nagging him to visit his Taggert cousins in Colorado. He gave in when he found out his cousin, Kane Taggert, and his wife were going to be in San Francisco. Jace took a train south and introduced himself. He found Kane to be as gruff-voiced and as generous-hearted as the Taggerts in Maine, and they became quick friends. Jace also fell half in love with Kane’s beautiful wife, Houston.
The Taggerts had returned to Colorado, Jace had gone back north to spend a few more weeks with his grandparents, then he’d started the journey to Colorado.
He’d taken his time traveling, and it was at one remote stop that he’d met Charles Grayson. During a sleepless night Jace had looked out the window to see a couple of thugs trying to rob a man. Jace was off the train in seconds, and a couple of well-placed fists easily dispersed the thieves.
Charles had been very grateful, and once on the train he’d started saying he needed a man like Jace to work for him. Jace didn’t bother saying he didn’t need a job or want one; he just listened to Charles talk about himself and his beautiful daughter. When Jace found out Charles lived in Chandler, he decided to visit the Grayson family and so accepted a dinner invitation.
Once in Chandler Jace had quite suddenly become very homesick, and, knowing Charles was at his freight office, he’d gone to the Grayson house an hour too early for dinner. He wanted to see this daughter Charles said was such a paragon of grace and beauty.
Within ten minutes of meeting Nellie he agreed with everything Charles had to say about her. She was kind and warm and funny, and for the first time in four years he found himself talking about his wife’s death. It had been so pleasant to sit in the garden with her and break beans. She hadn’t been flirtatious like so many women were. Instead, she’d blushed like a schoolgirl, and that beautiful face of hers had made him feel better than he had in years.
It was with disbelief and no little horror that he’d heard Charles Grayson cursing Nellie when they’d returned to the house. For a moment Jace had been too stunned to react. Charles had talked of nothing else on the train except his lovely daughter, yet here he was acting as though he were ashamed of her.
Still confused, Jace had sat through a long, boring dinner in which Nellie didn’t say a word but her sister never stopped talking. It took Jace some time to realize that when Charles spoke of his daughter, he meant the younger one. As far as Jace could remember, Charles had never even mentioned that he had two daughters.
By the end of the meal, Jace began to understand what was going on. It seemed that both Charles and his younger daughter thought Nellie was
fat.
Jace looked at her, and indeed there was a bit more of her than there was of some women, but she didn’t look like more than he could handle.
He looked at the younger sister, the one who was supposed to be so talented and so beautiful, and all he heard was the word
I
. Terel seemed interested only in herself, and she assumed that others were interested, too.
The meal seemed to go on forever, and he could hardly wait to get away from Charles and his vain daughter. He’d escaped as soon as he could and gone through the back gate. He’d guessed correctly that Nellie would go to her garden. Being alone with her in the garden was as pleasant as he remembered. Before he knew what he was doing, he’d agreed to work for Charles—a man of whom his opinion was now much lower—if Nellie would go to the Harvest Ball with him.
He smiled now as he walked into Kane’s study. He meant to get more out of Nellie than a couple of dances.
Kane was bent over his big desk with his friend and partner, Edan Nylund, a man nearly as big as Kane but as blond as Kane was dark. Playing on the floor, tumbling about like puppies and making as much noise as a couple of steam engines, were three children ranging in age from one to three. Two were dark, one blond, so Jace guessed that two of them belonged to Kane and one to Edan, but he couldn’t tell the sex of the children.
“Hello,” Jace shouted over the noise of the children.
Kane looked up. “What brings you here?”
“I’ve come to run away with your wife.” He nodded a greeting to Edan.
“Good,” Kane said. “Make sure she takes those damned kids with her. Quiet down, all of you!” he yelled, but the kids ignored him.
A moment later all three children hushed, and Jace looked toward the doorway. Houston stood there, as beautiful, as serene as he remembered. “Children,” she said, “leave your fathers alone. Go and find Uncle lan.” Obediently, the children left the room, the oldest holding the youngest’s hand.
“Now,” she said, smiling, “what can we do for you, Jocelyn?”
Jace winced, and behind him Kane snorted. Only his mother called him by his real name, and during his lifetime he’d bloodied several noses when anyone else called him Jocelyn. But Houston had called him Jocelyn since they’d met, and when they were alone he didn’t mind.
“I really just came to visit,” he said, but Houston stood and looked at him. He was years older than she, but she had a way of making him feel like a child. He cleared his throat.
Behind him Kane laughed. “You might as well tell her. If she says you came here for a reason, then you probably did.”
Jace smiled. “All right, I’m caught. Houston, could I see you privately?” He looked at Kane. “I have a proposition to make to you.”
“She gets propositioned often enough by me to keep this house full of kids,” Kane said, more than a little pride in his voice.
Houston acted as though she were ignoring her husband’s words, but there was a faint blush under her skin. “Come with me,” she said, and she led Jace into a small, pretty, quiet sitting room.
“How is your visit to Chandler?” she asked when they were seated. “Meet anyone interesting?”
Jace laughed. “I hope it’s not that apparent to everyone.”
“When we met you in San Francisco you were so miserable there was a gray tinge to your skin. There is a bit of a sparkle in your eyes now, and if I’m not mistaken, you look as though you’re up to something.”
“I am,” he said with a slow, lazy smile. It was a smile not many women had seen, and those who had, had said yes. “I am going courting.”
Houston swallowed. She was happily married, but she wasn’t dead. “I am sure you will win any woman you choose.”
“I mean to, but I may need your help.” Jace stood and walked to the window. “What do you know of the Grayson family?”
“Not a great deal. He’s a widower with two daughters. They’ve only lived in Chandler for a few years, and I’m afraid I haven’t had as much time to welcome newcomers as I once did. Two babies in four years has kept me busy.”
“Yes, I can imagine it would.” He looked back at her. “Have you invited them to your Harvest Ball?”
“Kane”—she hesitated—“Kane asked me not to invite them.”
“Don’t tell me
you
don’t like Nellie?”
“Nellie? Nellie is a dear. She is the most generous person in the world, always ready to help anyone who needs her, but last year two young men engaged in fisticuffs in the garden in a battle over the younger daughter’s favor. Kane said—well, he said some unpleasant things about the character of the younger daughter, so an invitation was not sent to the Grayson family this year. I fear that some young man will bring her, though.” She looked up sharply. “You are not one of her suitors, are you?”
Jace smiled. “It’s Nellie who interests me.”
Houston looked at him for a long while. She had not spent much time with Nellie, but she’d always thought men were fools not to see beyond her thick figure. Men fell all over themselves over that vain, frivolous Terel, but not one man so much as asked Nellie to a church social. Yet here was Kane’s cousin, this very good-looking man, saying he was interested in Nellie. Her opinion of Jace, already high, rose several degrees.
“I will issue an invitation to Nellie at once. Is there anything else I can do?”
“I don’t know much about this sort of thing, but I don’t believe Nellie has a dress to wear. Could you…?”
“Of course,” Houston said, her opinion of Jace rising even higher. “Don’t you think Nellie would look splendid in silver? Silver and pearls?”
“I think Nellie would look splendid in anything.” He took Houston’s hand and kissed it. “You’re a real lady, you know that?” He didn’t know why Houston laughed so hard, but he was glad he’d pleased her.
Nellie was feeling frazzled. During the two days since Mr. Montgomery’s visit she had been trying to make up to her family for embarrassing them. She had cooked some magnificent meals—of which she had eaten very little—and she had doubled her energies in cleaning. She and Anna had taken the front parlor’s curtains down, hauled them into the backyard, and spent hours beating the dust out of them. In the evenings she’d been very tired, but she’d still stayed up late embroidering the lapels of a jacket she was making Terel for Christmas.
She hoped that if she was good enough, her family would forgive her for making a fool of herself, and them, in front of a guest. She really did want to make her father and sister proud of her.
Now she was up to her elbows in flour as she rolled out dough for an apple pie for dinner. She had already prepared a standing rib roast, even cutting the little paper frills for the rib tops. Everything was ready to be put in the oven for dinner tonight.
She was so absorbed in the pie that she jumped when someone knocked on the frame of the back door. The door was open, since—with the stove filled with wood and blazing—the kitchen was hot.
“I knocked at the front, but no one answered,” Jace said, smiling at Nellie and clutching a large bouquet of late fall roses.
“I’m so sorry,” Nellie said, putting her rolling pin down and wiping some of the dough off her arms. “Anna is supposed to be dusting, but I guess…” She trailed off, remembering her father’s lectures about telling family business to outsiders. She looked at the flowers and smiled. “I guess you’ve come to see Terel, but I’m afraid you’ve missed her. She—”
“I came to see you.” Without being asked, he stepped inside the overly warm kitchen. “For you,” he said, holding out the roses.
Nellie stopped where she was and blinked at him. She didn’t take the flowers.
Jace walked to the table, took a slice of apple from the bowl, and ate it. “You don’t like roses? I thought you did, but if you don’t I’ll get you something else. What do your other beaux bring you?”
Nellie was tempted to look behind her to see if there was someone else in the kitchen to whom he was talking. “I like roses,” she whispered, “and I have no…male friends.”
“Good,” he said, and he smiled at her warmly.
Nellie couldn’t move but just stood there watching him as he sat on the edge of the table eating apple slices.
“You want to put them in water?”
“What?”
“The roses,” he said, smiling again.
“Oh. Oh, yes.” She recovered a bit as she took the roses from him. The Grayson household owned several vases to accommodate the many bouquets of flowers Terel received, but Nellie had never received so much as a daisy before. She slowly arranged the flowers, taking her time so her head could clear. Calm once again, she turned back to him.
“Thank you for the flowers, Mr. Montgomery, but I’m afraid Terel won’t return for hours yet. She—”
“I want you to take a walk with me.”
“Walk? You mean walk to where Terel is? I’m sure—”
“I do
not
want to see your little sister,” he said sternly. “Nellie, I came to see you and no one else. I want you to walk with me.”