Nora (25 page)

“Yes, it is,” King agreed. He pulled his hat back over his eyes and stuck his hands in his pockets. “I'll, uh, tell Dad you'll be along. Meanwhile, I think the three of us will wander down to your drilling site with your foreman and take a look at the operation. If you think we have time,” he added, tongue in cheek.

Cal could be just as deadpan as his brother when he wished. He nodded solemnly. “We'll wait for you in the restaurant, if you're not back,” he said. King nodded.

“Mr. Culhane,” Nora called worriedly when he started to leave.

He turned. “King,” he corrected with a smile.

“His real name is Jeremiah Pearson Culhane,” Cal offered. “But only Amelia gets to call him that. I heard she usually does it when he's made her mad. She throws things, so don't ever get between them when they fight.”

King looked indignant. “I'll do you an equal favor one day.”

“I expect you will,” Cal said irrepressibly.

“King, then,” Nora continued. “Do you think Pike will really leave, that he won't try to blow up the well or set it ablaze or anything?”

“Mr. Pike has boarded the train for Kansas City,” King informed her pleasantly. “In fact, he boarded it just minutes ago with several escorts, one of whom
was wearing a badge. It seems that Mr. Pike has a case pending against him in Texas that he neglected to mention. Something involving an assault charge in a dispute over a silver mine along the border. The sheriff kindly agreed to look the other way as long as Pike removed himself from Texas immediately.”

“Why, how fortuitous!” Nora exclaimed. “And this charge simply walked up and presented itself?”

“Not exactly. Mr. Dunn cabled a gentleman he knows. Only minutes later, the sheriff received the wire about Pike.” He pursed his lips. “Oddly, Pike seemed to know nothing of the incident in question.”

“Oh, my goodness!” Nora burst out.

“Mr. Dunn makes a particularly bad enemy,” King replied, turning. “I'll, uh, see you both for dinner in the hotel restaurant.”

Cal lowered her so that she could close the door and lock it. She looked up at him curiously.

“Your family has some of the oddest sorts of acquaintances….”

“Wait until you meet your in-laws,” Cal said, his hands going to the buttons on her suit. “I have a brother-in-law who was a Texas Ranger. He is now a deputy sheriff in El Paso. Amelia's sister-in-law is the daughter of one of the most notorious bandits ever to come out of Mexico. I could go on,” he added with a grin. “One of our wranglers used to rob banks….”

Her hands lifted to guide his to the next button while her eyes gleamed with excitement. “You can tell me
later,” she whispered. “Right now I have expectations of something far more exciting than tall tales.”

 

T
ALL TALES INDEED
, he thought several hours later, sitting with her in the restaurant while she charmed his father and brothers and they discussed going to El Paso a day or so later. First Cal had put Mick in charge of the well and told him, and the other men, about the share he was giving them in the venture. They were ecstatic, and Cal knew that he had no more worries about the safety of his operation. He had also been contacted by the Rockefeller representative, with whom he was to meet the next morning.

“Cal has been telling me lies,” she mentioned suddenly. “About bank robbers and desperadoes and Texas Rangers, all in your family.”

The men looked at one another, and Brant smiled warmly. “Well, Nora, I guess you'll just have to come out to West Texas with us and see for yourself what's true and what's not.”

“Why, that is exactly what I had in mind,” she replied with a smile.

T
HE TRIP TO
E
L
P
ASO WAS
long, but Nora hadn't a single complaint. She'd never been so happy, upset stomach and all, and Cal was beaming at the prospect of fatherhood.

Amelia and Enid were waiting for them at the depot, and after the introductions and the ride to the ranch, Nora found herself firm friends with the women long before the men came back in from their wanderings around the ranch to eat the evening meal.

“You'll meet Maria tomorrow,” Enid assured her. “She and Quinn have been in Mexico, where their daughter was baptized by a priest in the village where she used to live. We wanted to go, but we felt it would be an intrusion. They keep to themselves. Maria isn't really Mexican, but she was raised to be, and she's still a little shy with us because her adoptive father was an
outlaw.” She grinned. “She's coming around, day by day.”

Nora had learned that Cal's tall tales weren't so tall. It was fascinating meeting so many people whose real lives were more interesting than her dime novels. She'd learned things about her husband and his childhood that still made her feel faint. It was a miracle, in fact, that he'd lived to reach his present age! Nora felt like the tenderfoot he'd once called her, but as she learned more about the ranch and his people, the more secure she felt.

She liked these people. Enid did her own cooking and cleaning, although she had plenty of help from the cowboys' wives on offer. The ranch was huge, much bigger and more efficient than her uncle's, and it took no time at all to see, from the contents of the house and the way Enid and Amelia dressed, that money was no rare commodity here. The warm reception she was given made her feel right at home, and the last of her doubts vanished.

She adored Amelia's baby boy. She spent long hours holding him and dreaming of the birth of her own child. Her one sorrow was that her father and mother would probably never see it. They had not tried to contact her again, nor had she appealed a third time to them. It was just as well, she thought, that she and Cal would be living away from Uncle Chester and Aunt Helen. It was unavoidable that Helen would correspond with her only sister, Nora's mother. The wound would never heal if it was constantly reopened.

Cal noticed her preoccupation and asked her about it that evening when they were alone in their room. She confessed reluctantly that she was still sad about the rift between her parents and herself.

“Your people will come around,” he promised her. He grinned. “Meanwhile, I expect your uncle and aunt are on the verge of paying them a visit to do a little chafing.”

She asked what he meant, but he waved her away with a laugh and refused to talk about it.

A letter came for her two weeks later, from her aunt Helen. “We have been east to see your mother and father,” she wrote. “They are much changed, Nora, and I think you will find them chastened and eager for you to visit. Do think about it.” There was a postscript to the effect that no apologies would be expected, either. “And Chester said to tell your husband that he said nothing to your father about who your husband was.”

That tickled Nora, who had sweet dreams imagining a meeting between her husband and her parents now, with Cal's revealed social status. “Imagine Aunt Helen going to visit Mother,” Nora mused curiously. “Why, after her last trip to Virginia, she told me that she would never have the nerve to go back. They were, uh, rather haughty toward her and Uncle Chester,” she added sheepishly.

“That will no longer be the case, of course,” Cal returned.

“I don't understand.”

He put a loving arm around her. “I gave him two percent of the well,” he told her. He grinned wickedly. “I expect your father got both barrels, including the news that you've married a millionaire.”

Her eyes widened. “A millionaire?”

“You knew I was rich, didn't you?” he asked easily. “Well, I'm richer now. Your father was never in our league, sweetheart, even when I was working as a poor, itinerante cowboy. It was one of the reasons I hated having you look down your nose at me. You see,” he added gently, “from my point of view, you were the one staring poverty in the face.”

She blushed. “I was silly.”

“Oh, no,” he said at once. “After all, you had the good sense to fall in love with me!”

She picked up a broom, and King happened to walk into the room just as she raised it. He turned right on his heel and went out again. Later he told Amelia that she'd better start writing her name on things she intended to throw at him, because Nora was starting her own collection.

 

T
WO MONTHS LATER
, settled in Beaumont in a beautiful home with maids to look after the housework, Cal announced that they were going to visit her people.

She argued, but it did no good. He was adamant. So she put on her fashionable new suit, one that helped to disguise her blossoming body, and they took the long trip back East.

Her parents were both at home when they arrived,
having been cabled by Cal before he and Nora left Texas. She glanced up at him with quiet pride. He was wearing a three-piece pin-striped suit, with an expensive wide-brimmed Stetson and handmade leather boots. He looked as prosperous as she did.

Her father opened the door. He was hesitant and a little uncomfortable. He shook hands with Cal and nodded at Nora, although his eyes were apologetic and he looked very different from the blustering man she'd walked away from so many months before.

Cynthia was less reserved. She cuddled her only child close, with tears in her eyes, and rocked her gently.

“I have missed you so much,” she said.

Nora knew that she had, but that she would always defer to Nora's father, regardless of his right or wrong. She understood that tendency a little better now, knowing that she would stand by Cal if he did murder.

She drew back, and Cynthia dabbed at her wet eyes, carefully studying her daughter. When she saw the faint bulge at Nora's waist, she smiled.

“I am glad,” she said gently. “Very glad. It hurt me deeply that I could not come to you when you were so ill.”

“Aunt Helen took very good care of me,” Nora said. She knew that she sounded a little stilted, but she couldn't help it. They had not parted as good friends.

“You both look well,” her father said. “Well, and prosperous. Chester told us of your good fortune in the oil fields, my boy,” he added to Cal. “I expect you
feel different, now that you have some money of your own.”

Cal lifted an expressive eyebrow. “I have never been without it,” he replied with faint hauteur. “My people own a considerable amount of land in West Texas,” he said, adding deliberately, “including the ranch your brother-in-law manages for us.”

The looks on her parents' faces were just short of comical.

“You are part of the Culhane family?” Mr. Marlowe asked.

Cal nodded. “The middle son. I used my grandmother's maiden name while I worked for Chester. We wanted to make sure that he implemented our changes,” he added by way of explanation. “My father liked him enough to ensure that he succeeded by sending me along to help.”

“I…see,” Mr. Marlowe faltered. “But the clothes, and the gun, and living like a cowboy…”

“Part of the facade,” Cal explained.

“Nora, you never told us!” her mother chided gently, flushing.

“Nora didn't know,” Cal replied tightly. “Not until our well came in, at least.” He held out his arm and Nora slid under it, smiling at her father from its protection. “We can't stay,” he said, surprising Nora. “I'm taking her to New York for a brief honeymoon before we go home to Beaumont. We expect to make you grandparents in a few months. By Christmas, perhaps.”

Cynthia smiled. “I hope it's a happier Christmas for you this year,” she said sincerely.

“It will be,” Nora said dreamily.

Cal continued to stare at Mr. Marlowe, who found those silver eyes dangerously insistent. He cleared his throat. “Eleanor, I am sorry for what happened at our last unfortunate meeting. I want you to know that you are welcome here whenever you, and your husband, like to visit. And I hope that you will feel comfortable enough to bring our grandchild to see us when it is convenient.”

Nora smiled at him, old wounds healing in the passing of time. “I think we might manage that,” she said.

“You are sure that you will not stay?” Mr. Marlowe asked. “We have a spare room. A nice one.”

“Another time, perhaps, thank you,” Cal replied. “We must go.”

They walked the younger people to the door. As Nora bade them goodbye, she hoped that her relationship with her own children would be warmer and less constrained.

She mentioned it to Cal when they were back at the depot, waiting for the train that would take them north.

He held her hand tightly in his. “Nora,” he said softly, “can you imagine our children shaking hands when we tell them goodbye?”

She thought back to the reception Cal himself had gotten not only from his two brothers, and his mother,
but from his father. She thought of the open affection between all of them, and the last doubt left her eyes.

“I think that we will share enough love with our children that there will be no secrets and no distance between us,” she told him. Her fingers tangled in his. “I am very lucky.”

He shook his head. “
We
are very lucky,” he corrected gently.

It was a statement with which she had no argument whatsoever. Her hand lay gently on the warm mound of their firstborn, and her eyes were bright with excitement as the train pulled noisily into the station, puffing steam around like fluffy clouds in the faint chill of the early autumn air.