Yesterday's Magic (7 page)

Aunt Freida took a step away. “I’ve got to
get this coffee going. I’ll be right back,” she said. “You’ve got
time to join us for a cup, don’t you, Elizabeth?”

“I’d love that. It surely is cold. But you’ve
probably got ice on your well.”

“I imagine.” Aunt Freida said. “Lucky for me,
I filled up my water barrel just yesterday. It’s colder earlier
this year than it has been in a long time.”

Aunt Freida walked into the back room and
Bella knew that if she’d had her magic still, the first thing she’d
have done is whipped up a Starbucks.

Elizabeth continued to stand in the middle of
the room. “Can I help you find something,” Bella asked, feeling as
awkward as the tallest girl at a junior high school dance.

The woman sighed. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“I’ve never been a very good liar. I know you met my brother
yesterday. He came to see me last night after he’d left your Aunt’s
house.”

“Oh.”

“He seemed nervous,” Elizabeth said. “Talking
more than usual, about nothing really, while he paced around my
front room. It took him twenty minutes to finally tell me that he’d
had supper with the two of you.”

Bella remembered the strangled
I’ll be
there
. “I’m not sure he was crazy about eating with us,” she
said.

Elizabeth smiled. “He’s let work become too
important and sometimes he forgets the need to be social with
others.”

Warmth spread from Bella’s stomach and
settled in her chest. This morning she’d been thinking about
getting very social with the good sheriff.

“I said something that bothered him,” Bella
admitted.

“What was that?”

“I mentioned that the people in the stage had
been talking about him. He didn’t like that.”

“Oh.” Elizabeth’s cheeks turned pink and she
looked five years younger. “He didn’t mention that. He’s a very
private person. I guess that’s what surprised me when he seemed to
want to talk about having supper with you and Freida.”

“So you decided to check me out?”

“
Check. You. Out
?
”
Elizabeth
smiled and this time it reached her eyes. “Yes, I suppose I
did.”

The door chimed, opened, and Jedidiah McNeil
filled the doorway. He stared at his sister, his face full of
concern. “I thought that was your rig. Is something wrong?”

She shrugged, looking rather amused. “No. I
just thought a trip to town would do me good.”

“You haven’t been to town in over a year,” he
said, his tone wary.

Elizabeth looked at Bella, her face very
serious. “My husband died thirteen months ago. It was in the middle
of the fall harvest.”

Bella’s heart broke for the woman. “That must
have been horrible for you.”

She nodded. “Jedidiah told me last night that
you were a widow, too. I guess you would understand better than
most.”

She hated this. She really, really hated
this. “Yes, that’s right.”

“I think it’s wonderful that you came to stay
with Freida. Family is important at a time of loss.” Elizabeth
looked at her brother. “If I hadn’t had Jedidiah, I’m not sure I’d
have made it.”

Jedidiah McNeil looked like he wished for a
hole to swallow him up. “I’ve got to get to the office,” he said,
his voice gruff with emotion. “You want me to see you home
first?”

Elizabeth shook her head. “No. Now that I’m
here, I think I’ll pick out some material. It’s been a long time
since I’ve thought about a new dress.”

Bella heard a noise behind her and Aunt
Freida came out of the back room. “Morning, Jedidiah,” she said.
She walked over to the stove and sat the coffee pot on top of it.
“If you’re interested in a dress, Elizabeth, I’ve got a few
ready-made ones on the rack in the corner. They been going fast,
you know, with tomorrow night being the big dance and all. I’m glad
I picked one out for myself before I…uh…put them out for sale.”

Elizabeth cocked her head. “You got yourself
a dress for the dance?”

“Yes.” It appeared as if the word had been
pried out of her aunt’s mouth.

“I didn’t know you knew how to dance,” Jed
said. He looked genuinely puzzled.

Aunt Freida straightened up, adding another
inch to her already tall frame. “I’ll have you know, Jedidiah
McNeil, that my Herbert and I were very good dancers. And just
maybe I’ve missed having music in my life?”

It was a question but she said it like it was
a challenge. “Christ, Freida,” Jed said, irritation now showing in
his gray eyes. “You can’t blame me for asking the question. I meant
no harm.”

“You’re just damn surprised this old woman
got asked by a man to go to the dance on Saturday night.”

Jed frowned. “What man?”

Bella remembered her aunt’s hesitation. “You
don’t have to tell him,” she said quietly.

Evidently not quietly enough because Jed’s
jaw stiffened and he shot Bella a look. The meaning was clear. She
might be family but he’d been Freida’s friend for years. Aunt
Freida saw the look too and stepped forward.

“Not that it’s any of your business Jedidiah
McNeil, but if you must know, it’s Thomas Bean,” she said, her tone
just shy of belligerent.

To his credit, the sheriff didn’t react. He
nodded, like he was considering the information. Then Bella caught
just the hint of a wicked gleam in his eye. “You don’t think he
plans to bring along his mother, do you?” he asked, ever so
innocently.

Elizabeth took four very quick steps toward
her brother and shoved the heel of her hand into his shoulder.
“Shush,” she said, with all the authority of an older sister
warning a younger brother.

He rolled his eyes but he didn’t say
anything. Bella understood. She
had
an
older sister, after all.

“It doesn’t matter now, anyway,” Freida said.
“I’m not going.”

“Why not?” Bella asked.

“I’m just not.” Aunt Freida started to fiddle
with cans of vegetables and fruit and,
oh ick,
meat. She
stacked and rearranged and generally just created more
disorder.

What the heck? How was Freida ever going to
know if she and Thomas had the real
what
? The woman had
surely planned to go. She’d bought a new dress.

Suddenly it dawned on Bella why her aunt was
backing out. ‘You don’t want to leave me alone?” she asked.

Aunt Freida shrugged. “That doesn’t hardly
seem the right way to be treating family.”

This was wonderful. She was a fifth wheel in
a time when people didn’t even have four wheels. It was even worse
than her friend Tara’s last dinner party. It had occurred shortly
after she and Bradley were no longer a thing. There’d been six
darling couples and her. The table would have set twelve
comfortably—thirteen was a squeeze, and just why did every set of
china come with twelve plates?

“Please don’t change your plans because of
me, Aunt Freida,” Bella said. “I’ll be quite happy at your house,
with a good book.”

“No…I really couldn’t—”

“Jed,” Elizabeth said, interrupting Freida.
“Who are you taking to the dance?”

The man turned as red as the handkerchief
wrapped around his neck. “I’m working.”

Elizabeth seemed to consider his response.
“Well, I suppose there’s always Earl Bean?”

Bella tried not to flinch. “Really, I don’t
mind staying home by myself.”

“I won’t hear of it,” Aunt Freida said.
“Thomas will under—”

“Jed.” Elizabeth poked her finger into her
brother’s chest.

The store was so quiet that Bella could hear
her own heart beating. Jed yanked his hat lower onto his forehead.
“Oh, Christ, fine. I’ll take her to the damn dance.” He looked and
sounded miserable.

Elizabeth and Aunt Freida looked
satisfied.

Bella bit the inside of her lip and knew that
when she got the chance, she was stepping on Jedidiah McNeil’s
foot. Hard.

Jed had just finished his monthly accounts
when the door of the sheriff’s office swung open so hard that it
hit the wall behind it. He was half out of his chair, with his hand
on his gun, when he realized it was his deputy and that the man was
grinning like some fool.

“You son-of-a-bitch,” Bart said. His tone was
agreeable, like he was discussing the weather, not like he was
insulting Jed’s person. He stood in the doorway, his arms crossed,
tapping the toe of his right boot.

Jed knew he’d trust the man to ride beside
him on any given day but there were times when Bart Schneider was
simply an idiot. He sat back down in his chair. “It’s cold outside,
Bart. Shut the damn door.”

Bart did so and then plopped down in the
chair next to Jed’s desk. “You’re a sly one, Jedidiah,” he
said.

Jed didn’t bother to answer. Bart clearly had
something to say and Jed knew from past experience, there’d be no
need to encourage him, nor any way to stop him.

Bart leaned forward in his chair. “Not that I
blame you. She’s a pretty thing with curves just where a man likes
them.”

He wanted to play dumb, to ask
who
Bart was talking about? But given that he’d spent
the better part of the morning trying to forget about Bella
Wainwright, he didn’t trust himself to manage his way through that
conversation. “I assume you’re talking about Freida Stroganhaufer’s
niece?”

“Oh, yes indeed. I fairly had to fight my way
through the crowd at the Mercantile. But once I made it to the
front counter, I introduced myself with pleasure.” Bart patted his
chest. “Nothing prettier than a woman with black eyes that
twinkle.”

“I didn’t notice her eyes,” Jed lied.

Bart raised a pale blonde eyebrow, which
exactly matched the hair on his head. “I suppose you did manage to
notice that when she smiles and you see all them nice, white teeth
and those pretty pink lips, that it makes you feel good to be
alive?”

When she’d smiled at him last night, he’d
almost dropped a load of firewood on his toe. And then this
morning, he’d lost complete control of his senses. Now he was going
to some damn dance. “I don’t have time for things like that.”

“But suddenly you’ve got time to go dancing?”
Bart asked, his tone now taking on a truly perturbed tone. “I
thought you planned to be busy watching over the jail.”

Jed closed the notebook that he’d been
working in. “Do not start with me, Bart Schneider. I was in the
wrong place at the wrong time and I couldn’t say no without getting
both Freida and my sister all riled up. And on any given day, I’d
rather have you pissed at me then either one of them.”

Bart seemed to accept that. He took off his
hat and put it on the corner of Jed’s desk. “Patience was sorely
disappointed when I told her you couldn’t take Madeline. The only
thing that saved me was that Madeline found someone else to take
her to the dance.” He looked over his shoulder, towards the door,
as if he was making sure it was shut. “You know, Jed, I do have one
little problem.”

Bart’s little problems had a way of turning
into big headaches for Jed. “What now?” Jed asked.

“I ain’t much of a dancer.”

“You’ll do fine,” Jed said. He pushed back
his chair. He needed to walk—hard and fast enough that he’d have to
take suck in breaths of the fresh, cold air. Maybe that would
finally clear his head of Bella Wainwright.

Bart put his hand on Jed’s arm. “Jed, I mean
it. I can’t dance. My parents never danced because of my pa’s bad
leg and I didn’t have no sisters. I need you to help me.”

“But—”

“Please. I don’t want to disappoint Patience
again.”

Well it couldn’t get much clearer than that.
Jed had already done more than enough to make sure that Bart had
had to disappoint his girl once. “What is it that you want me to
do?” Jed asked.

“Dance with me, Jed. Let me step all over
your feet so that I don’t do the same with my girl.”

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Jed, no one will know. Fifteen minutes.
That’s all I’m asking.”

Jed rubbed his forehead and wondered what the
good folks of Mantosa would say if the Sheriff were to be seen
having a drink at the saloon shortly after breakfast time. “Ten
minutes,” he said. “Not a minute more. And we never speak of this
again.”

Bart’s pale face split open in a wide grin.
He stood up and held out his arms. “Come here, darling.”

Jed gritted his teeth. “Shut up,” he said,
his lips barely moving. He moved in front of his deputy. “Dumbest
idea, ever,” he mumbled, loud enough for his friend to hear. Then
he pointed to Bart’s left hand. “That goes here,” he said, pointing
to his left side, right above his wide leather holster.

Bart nodded earnestly and did as instructed.
“You gonna put your hand on my shoulder, Jed? That’s what the girl
does, right?”

Resigned to just get it over with, Jed put
his left hand on Bart’s shoulder and held out his right hand. Bart
grabbed it and squeezed, as if he were trying to hang on to a
slippery pig. “Ease up,” Jed ordered. Christ. Bart’s girl was going
to be spending her Saturday night at Doc Winder’s place, getting
her bones set.

“Sorry,” Bart said, his cheeks turning pink.
“I’m no good at any of this. I’m going to make a fool out of
myself, ain’t I?” he asked, sounding truly miserable.

Jed actually felt sorry for the man. “You’ll
do fine. Just make a box with your feet. It’s easy. Look, just
follow me.”

They managed to make boxes all across the
room and back again. Jed could feel some of the tension leave his
friend’s body. “See, you’re doing fine,” Jed said.

“Shouldn’t I be complimenting her or
something?” Bart asked.

In Jed’s opinion, Bart trying to dance and
talk at the same time was a little like a man trying to rub his
stomach and pat his head at the same time. “I suppose you could
try,” Jed said.

They made another series of boxes as they
crossed the width of the room. Bart pretended to study Jed’s face.
“Your eyes look especially lovely tonight, Patience,” he said.