Silver Lining (16 page)

"This is your family, too. And that means you have as much right to an opinion as anyone else." Irritation infused Livvy's voice and expression, and she released a long breath. "Nothing is working out the way I thought it would. Suddenly I'm going to have two new daughters-in-law. One's pregnant and wishes she wasn't. The other probably isn't and wishes she was."

"Mama," Gilly said, tapping Livvy on the shoulder. "Little pitchers have big ears."

"Sunshine isn't a fool. She knows things aren't working out the way anyone wanted them to."

The McCords were the only family Louise was likely ever to have. But that didn't mean they accepted her. Accepting the fact of Max's marriage was not the same thing as accepting the woman he'd married.

She'd do well to keep that truth in mind.

Turning to glance at Gilly's softly rounded profile, she cleared her throat and remarked, "How long have you been married?"

"Mr. Weaver and I have been married for six years."

" Gilly , for heaven's sake. I think you can call him Dave in front of your sister-in-law."

"Six years," Louise repeated. But Gilly had only one child. That was discouraging. On the other hand, as nearly as she could piece together, Max had been with Philadelphia once and that had been enough. The whole business of sex and pregnancy was mysterious and frustrating.

"Well, here we are. Your new place."

As recently as this morning she had reread her copy of Max's letter describing the house, so she had some idea of what to expect. Nevertheless, the house surprised her. To her relief, it wasn't as large as she'd imagined or as she would have thought it was if she hadn't seen the main house first.

Max's house sat on a rise, and seemed tall and narrow with no landscaping in place to soften the angles.

What Max had referred to in his letter as simple translated to clean lines and no wasted space.

"It's rather spare," Gilly murmured. "It will help if you plant some lilacs come spring and put in trees to break the wind."

"I like it," Louise said softly. The house didn't pretend to be grand or impressive. But it might become so in the future if wings were added to accommodate a growing family. But the future didn't concern her.

For the moment, she was awed to think that she would be living in this house.

"Since you didn't come with a trousseau, I've brought extra linens and dishes and the clothing I mentioned earlier. Also, more food staples to get you started," Livvy said, walking around to the wagon bed and letting down the gate. She lifted Sunshine to the ground. "Don't anyone go inside empty-handed."

Carrying a box filled with pots and baking utensils, Louise climbed the porch steps of the house where she and Max would live for the duration of their marriage.

The foyer was large enough that she could have pitched her Piney Creek tent on the polished wood floor. A quick peek to the left revealed a parlor with a bay window. To the right was a dining room with a matching window. A staircase led upstairs; a paneled hallway ran back to a kitchen, pantry, and what Livvy called the mudroom.

"The kitchen is large and sunny," Gilly commented, placing a box of tablecloths and dish towels on a long wooden table.

"Uncle Max sent to Denver for the best appliances."

That he had. Louise had never seen anything like the gleaming six-hole, nickel-plated stove and oven.

"And look at this," she said in a whispery voice. A pump handle overhung the sink. "Water in the kitchen.

Can you imagine? You don't even have to go outside."

"We'll put everything away, and you can sort it out later. Right now, I imagine you want to have a look around."

"If you don't mind."

She was careful not to touch anything as she passed from room to room examining the furnishings and wallpaper and carpets. Since she'd seen Livvy's house and knew how things ought to look, she spotted blank areas, like the mantelpiece in the parlor. As everything else seemed complete, the blank spots puzzled her until the answer popped to mind. Probably it had been Livvy who furnished the house while Max was gone, and she had left space for Philadelphia 's display items.

This was Philadelphia 's house.

The rose-colored bedroom had been furnished with Philadelphia in mind. The paisley wallpaper and flowered carpets had been selected to please Philadelphia 's taste and preference. The kitchen had waited for Philadelphia 's dishes and pans and napkins and tablecloths. It should have been Philadelphia touring the house, marveling at all she saw.

Sobered and feeling a bit low in her mind, Louise returned to the kitchen. Livvy and Gilly had donned aprons and were putting together a stew for supper. While Gilly peeled potatoes and Sunshine stood on a stool beside her, Livvy kneaded bread dough on the end of the long kitchen table.

"There's a rhubarb pie in the oven, and fresh coffee on the stove," Livvy mentioned, pushing the heels of her hands into the dough.

"I didn't realize I was gone so long."

"We planned to get supper started. You shouldn't have to cook the first night in your new home. You'll want to put away your things."

"That won't take long," Louise said, pouring herself a cup of coffee. She pressed the back of her hand to her forehead, then watched them working in her kitchen and taking time from their own homes to do it.

"Why are you doing this?"

"Beg your pardon?" Livvy looked up from the lump of dough.

"You don't want me here. All I've done is cause the McCord family a lot of trouble. So why did you put together all these things?" She waved a hand at the now empty boxes. "Why are you cooking supper and planning to sew me some dresses? Why are you trying to help me?"

"Because you married Uncle Max and you're part of our family," Sunshine said, smiling the smile of youth and innocence. "We do too want you."

Livvy studied her for a moment. "Why did you stay in Piney Creek and nurse those men?"

"I honestly don't know. It just felt like the right thing to do."

After a shrug, Livvy slapped the dough down on the table and continued kneading.

Smiling, Gilly paused with a potato in one hand and a paring knife in the other. "If the McCords had a motto, it would be 'Do the right thing.'"

That could have been her motto, too. She understood the importance of doing the right thing. However, she noticed that only Sunshine had disputed her remark that she wasn't wanted here. No matter how Livvy and Gilly tried not to blame her for the scandal and misfortune pouring down on the family, on some level they did. Helping her originated in a sense of duty and an obligation to do the right thing for Max's wife.

After Livvy. Gilly, and Sunshine departed, she put away her few belongings, then fetched her everyday shawl and stepped outside the mudroom door. She sat on the top step of the kitchen stoop in a wash of afternoon sunshine, leaving the door open so she could smell the savory scent of stew simmering on the stove, and the yeasty fragrance of bread loaves cooling on the table beside the rhubarb pie.

There was space between the stoop and the clothesline for a kitchen garden, she noted. If she was still here come spring. And she identified a spot where the ground began to slope that would be convenient for pouring out sudsy laundry water.

To the west the land dipped and rolled like waves swelling toward the distant mountains. To the east the ground appeared flatter, bushier, but with fewer trees. She couldn't see the main house from here, didn't spot another rooftop or any signs of a nearby neighbor. If it hadn't been for voices calling back and forth down by the barn and storage sheds, Louise would have felt as if the world had dropped away, leaving only this house and this patch of ground.

A week ago she would have followed the voices and introduced herself and spent the rest of the afternoon getting acquainted with the hands. But everything was different now. Instinct warned that the boss's wife didn't lollygag around the barn with the hired men.

A deep sigh caused the shawl to slip off her shoulders. Well, she was accustomed to solitude. She had her songbook stories to think about, and after today she would be too busy to worry about being alone.

Tomorrow she'd have chores—cooking and dusting and sweeping. And Livvy had mentioned that the hands had been feeding the chickens and milking the dairy cow, suggesting these were tasks Louise was expected to handle.

When the shadows lengthened and the air felt cool against her cheeks, she stood to return inside, pausing as she noticed a horseman trotting across the prairie range. Even from a distance she recognized Max by the way he sat Marva Lee and from the distinctively jaunty angle of his hat. She watched him lean forward in the saddle as Marva Lee sailed over a stone fence, then man and horse veered toward the barn.

Never had Louise expected to feel her heart constrict in a spasm of strange wild joy simply because a man rode toward her. But this wasn't just any man. Her husband was coming home for supper. And suddenly that seemed like a mighty fine thing.

She couldn't decide whether to curse Preacher Jellison for turning her life upside down or to bless him for giving her a taste of a life she would never have experienced otherwise.

She'd decide later. Right now she needed to give the stew a stir and set the table. Son of a… gun. She flat couldn't get over it. She had a husband, and he was coming home for supper.

«^»

T
he original plan had included a wing extending to the south. The additional space would have added a sunroom, a library, and a family sitting room on the ground floor, a nursery and extra bedrooms above.

Before Max had departed for Piney Creek, he'd decided to wait and see how well Philadelphia adjusted to ranch living before adding the expense of the south wing. He had hoped that eventually she would share his love of the land and the pleasure of not dwelling eaves to porch rail with a neighbor. When that time came, if it did, then he'd construct the wing.

Now he studied the tall, narrow core of the house and conceded that Philadelphia would never have adjusted to an isolated location or to living so far from her father and friends and lady's clubs. Moreover, he'd neglected to provide quarters for a cook or maid, an oversight Max only now recognized as significant.

Absorbed in thinking about mistakes that seemed obvious in retrospect, he was almost to the barn before he saw Louise rise from the kitchen stoop and gather the edges of her shawl close to her breast.

She stood straight and tall, not signaling, not seeming to expect anything, simply waiting and watching.

The barn called to him, but duty and guilt called louder. Swearing softly, he paused, then turned Marva Lee toward the house and rode up to the stoop, wondering what he could possibly say to her. To his relief she broke the silence first.

"Supper's ready whenever you are," she said, shading her eyes to look at him. She didn't castigate him for abandoning her as he'd half expected she might.

"I'd like to look at the barn and sheds, and speak to the boys." None of the hands were strangers, since most had worked for the McCords before Livvy parceled the ranch into fourths. They would expect him to say hello after a long absence.

"There's no hurry. Supper will keep." She dropped her hand and smoothed it across the front of an apron he'd seen his mother wear. "There's a basin of water in the mudroom where you can wash up."

Late sunlight slanted across her face, finding gold in her hazel eyes, coaxing auburn highlights from her hair. "Max?" Color rushed into her cheeks and her voice sounded oddly shy. "This is a wonderful house."

From her perspective he supposed it was. Anything with solid walls and a roof would be an enormous step up from pitching a tent on the bare ground. She wouldn't notice the lack of an informal sitting room and servant's quarters.

Putting her out of his mind, he spent the next hour touring the barn, sheds, bunkhouse, corrals, and stock pond, and talking to Shorty, his foreman.

"Everything seems to be according to the plans," he said with satisfaction. He'd never doubted that it would be, not with Shorty Smith overseeing the barn raising and house building. Shorty had been his man on site, the person he'd trusted to make the day-to-day decisions and see that the job got done.

"I appreciate your diligence on my behalf," he said gruffly, shaking Shorty's hand. Spending the summer in the mountains would have been impossible without Shorty. His brother and Gilly's husband had their own operations to run, and he wouldn't have imposed by asking either to oversee an extensive building project.

"My pleasure, boss," Shorty said, puffing out his chest. "It ain't often a man gets to be part of a ranch right from the get go." He leaned on the top rail of the corral and slid Max a curious look. "I wish you and the missus every happiness on your new place."

Shorty wouldn't ask the questions flickering behind his sidelong glance, but it wasn't difficult to guess what they were. Cowboys were worse gossips than old women, and undoubtedly there was a great deal of bunkhouse speculation about Max coming home with one woman days before he was scheduled to marry another. By suppertime tomorrow the cowboy grapevine would be discussing what it meant that Wally had taken the gig to town wearing his Sunday best and toting a large traveling satchel. And before breakfast of the following day, the hands would notice that Wally wasn't participating in the roundup. By then they might have learned that Wally and Philadelphia had run off to Denver together.

Max bit down hard and faced toward a sunset blaze of red and orange. The days were getting shorter and the nights colder. "Tomorrow I'll bring Mrs. McCord down to show her the barn. You might tell the boys to shave and put on clean bandannas."

Having said all he intended to say, he headed toward the back of the house and the mudroom. The first time he entered his house should rightly have been through the front door so he could experience a first impression as others would. But having admitted the flaws, his impression of the house was soured.

"Is there a towel?" he called after washing up.