Widow Woman

by Patricia McLinn

  And then the signature.

  Alba smoothed her palm over the pages. She would like a friend. Someone to talk to. Not of her secrets, because they were best left in the depths of her soul. But to talk with quietly of her life now. Of the dazzle of the sun on the snow. Of the way the air could bite. Of the strange fruits and plants she had seen in those early days and now eagerly awaited along with spring.

  The things she once said to Davis because she knew he would listen with kindness and interest.

  Yes, Rachel Wood, I do long for a friend .

  * * * *

  A racking cough stopped Rachel outside Gordon’s room. After Rachel spent all day in the sickroom, Esther had ordered her to take a brisk walk, eat supper, then rest. She followed each command. And now, with the sun set and the moon risen, she would spend the night at her husband’s bedside.

  He had not been out of his bed in the nearly six weeks since Nick brought him home to Natchez.

  Some days the foreman, Jim Henderson, gave him reports. But Rachel and Esther rationed those days because the news was bad.

  Rachel had ridden out when the warmth of spring and an obvious greening had come to the range, and had fought against being sick at the sight and smell of decaying carcasses.

  Henderson didn’t tell her much, but from Bob Chapman she heard that they hoped half the herd had survived, but feared it was more like a third. Bob once dropped a comment that made her guess that land she’d thought Gordon owned was really open range he’d taken the use of. Most outfits staked claim to a lot of open range. But Pa and Shag had always held with the security of a deed.

  After that, she spent several hours each day studying papers in Gordon’s desk, acquainting herself with the Natchez operation. She was appalled at what he’d spent on her, on furnishing Natchez, on entertainment. The more she learned, the more she suspected Gordon’s refusal to talk to her hadn’t so much been a matter of shielding her from the vulgarity of business as shielding his ego from acknowledging his finances’ sorry state.

  She hadn’t let him know these past weeks that she had any idea of the problems, because the priority had been to get Gordon well.

  Only in the past three days had she acknowledged to herself that that wasn’t going to happen.

  The door of his room opened, and Esther came out. Rachel, wondering how long she had stood there, realized the cough had quieted.

  “How is he?”

  “He is calm. He is ready.”

  Rachel’s gaze jerked to the steady brown eyes regarding her. “You don’t think . . .”

  “He wants to see you,” was all Esther said.

  Rachel steeled herself. But when she entered the dim room she found Gordon, though pale and almost shrunken inside his slack skin, didn’t have the feverish glaze of the worst days and nights.

  She sat on the edge of the bed and took his hand between hers.

  Gordon gave her a faint smile, then turned his head on the pillows that propped him to the near sitting position that eased his breathing. Rachel followed his gaze.

  “I should close that curtain.” She started to rise.

  “No. I asked Esther to leave it, and keep the lamp low. I want to see the moon.”

  He didn’t take his eyes from the window as he asked in a dreamy voice, “Have you ever seen moonlight on a magnolia, Rachel?”

  “No, I never have, Gordon.”

  “That silver light on those glossy leaves is something to behold on a soft spring night.” His voice carried more of the South than usual. “The breeze is like a lover’s breath and the leaves seem to ripple like a dark waterfall tipped with silver.”

  “It sounds lovely.”

  “I wish I could see it once more.”

  “You will, Gordon. Next year—”

  “No.” The soft word stopped her. “I left that long ago and made my life here.”

  She latched onto that. “That’s right. And spring’s coming here. You can feel it in the air, Gordon. In a couple days, we can open the window and you can feel it, too. It’s not Mississippi,” she gently teased, “but it’s getting to be fine weather. Why, before much longer, we’ll be going to roundup. Jim’s hired on hands and they’re repairing wagons and bridles and . . .”

  Her voice trailed off as he faced her, and she knew he hadn’t heard a word. His grip tightened on her hand.

  “I’m sorry, Rachel.”

  “Hush now, Gordon. You rest.”

  “I’ll have time enough to rest soon, girl. An eternity of rest.” A ghost of his old chuckle slid into coughing.

  Rachel held him upright so he could sip water.

  “Remember that day I rode into your branding camp? I told you to marry me so I could buy you pretty dresses. I did that, didn’t I, Rachel? Buy you pretty dresses.”

  “Yes, you did, Gordon. Beautiful dresses.”

  “You look beautiful in them. Like an angel. Like something a painter’d be proud to put on canvas and sign his name to.”

  She thought he might sleep now, but his voice came again. “I told you that day to marry me so you wouldn’t have to worry about running a ranch. I told you I’d take care of you, for always. I’ve let you down, Rachel. You lived up to your part. You always made me proud to have you be Mrs. Gordon Wood. But I’m leaving you with a sorry state, Rachel, and that’s the truth of it. I’ve never owned much land, never saw the need, but now . . . I don’t know, maybe that Nick Dusaq has the right of it, buying a small place and starting that way. But it wasn’t the way I’d run cattle, it wasn’t the way I knew.”

  “I know, Gordon. It’s all right.”

  “No, it’s not. It’s not all right at all,” he said with something close to his old vigor. “That’s what I’m telling you. What land there is is mostly mortgaged deep. And there’re other debts. I thought if we could ride through this winter . . . this damn winter.”

  The surge of energy ebbed, and Gordon was left an old and heartsore man.

  “I’m leaving you debts and a dying herd, Rachel. But I’m asking you to keep Natchez alive. Don’t let it die.”

  “Natchez won’t die, Gordon. I’ll see to it. You rest now.”

  “Yes, I’ll rest now. I’ll rest easier.”

  * * * *

  Gordon Wood died early the next morning. Just after sunup. The time of day he’d loved to ride out to watch the spring sun begin to light the earth of his beloved Natchez with a new day and a new season.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The same wind that had brought spring in full force whipped at Rachel’s hair, pulling a stand free. She shifted Johnny more firmly into one arm so she could tuck the strand beneath her good black bonnet. The hilltop she’d selected for Gordon’s grave was open to a wind that tugged at men’s coats and swirled ladies’ skirts. But it provided a view he’d loved—looking down on the house and buildings of Natchez and beyond to open range with a ridge of mountains in the distance.

  The preacher droned on. He’d come from Chelico and clearly intended to make his trip worthwhile.

  Clearing weather had brought a good number to Gordon’s funeral. That and a measure of respect for the man, mixed, she suspected, with a powerful dose of curiosity about how the new widow was taking her reduced circumstances.

  If they expected a melodrama, they’d come a long way over hard country for a disappointment.

  But how would she provide for her child and all the people of Natchez and the Circle T with a dying herd and crippling debts?

  Another tendril of hair tickled her temple. Once more she shifted her son and reached to capture the escaped hair. The movement brought her head up, and she nearly gasped at the intensity of a pair of black eyes boring into her.

  Nick stood at the foot of the open grave, opposite where she stood by the preacher. Alba was next to him and Davis just behind, yet Nick seemed to her eyes to be totally separate from every other person in the gathering.

  The stern lines of his face revealed little, even as his eyes shifted from her
face to the baby she held in her arms.

  You carry my child, don’t you?

  Yes, I carried your child, Nick. And now I hold your son.

  She turned John slightly, easing away the blanket so that while it curtained him from the wind, it didn’t cover his dark-haired head and honey-skinned face.

  Your son, Nick. Do you feel nothing ?

  The man across from them showed no reaction.

  How much could she fault him? She had told him to leave them alone. She had given his son another man’s name.

  I’ll leave you alone. I’ll leave you and the babe alone. The way a stallion leaves the mare and the foal alone, once he’s served his damned purpose.

  “Mrs. Wood?”

  She blinked hard against the scalding in her eyes. The preacher smiled benignly at her, taking the tears as tribute to his eloquence. Rachel stumbled out words of thanks, then took the first of a stream of condolences.

  Alba Martin took form before her, dark eyes warm and understanding. One slim hand covered Rachel’s where it cradled the baby against her.

  “Rachel,” was all she said, but Rachel heard an acceptance. Her eyes filled anew.

  “I . . . I would be pleased if you would stay on with me a few days, Alba. Please.”

  “Yes.”

  That simply, the other woman gave her friendship.

  The knowledge of it helped buoy Rachel through the exchanges with the rest of the mourners. And through the knowledge that one who had stood by the grave had left without approaching her.

  * * * *

  “Rachel has asked me to stay with her.” Alba didn’t seek permission, but she hoped for Nick’s understanding. What she got was a raised, skeptical eyebrow and, “Didn’t know you two were such friends.”

  “We are friends.”

  “If you say so.”

  “Nick.” He moved free of the hand she laid on his arm, continuing down the hillside, putting more distance between him and Rachel, still surrounded by a knot of people.

  “You know I planned on sending Davis to Cheyenne with the wagon when we got back to the cabin.”

  Yes, Alba knew Davis was going for supplies, and that Nick had suggested she might want to go along to shop. She had no intention of taking such a trip. But she had not thought of a way to say that until Rachel’s offer.

  “If you’d rather stay here,” Nick went on in clipped indifference, “he’ll leave from here and collect you on his way back.”

  “Thank you. But what of you, hermano?”

  He shrugged. “I’ll start home now.”

  That was not what she meant. She had seen him watching Rachel and the child. She had been close enough to sense tension humming through him beneath the blank mask.

  “Will you not pay your respects?”

  “I paid them. I watched them bury Gordon Wood.”

  “And what of his widow?”

  He flinched, then hid his reaction so quickly she would have missed it if she hadn’t watched so closely. “She doesn’t need my condolences.”

  “Doesn’t she?”

  He stared out to the horizon, saying abruptly, “I’ll tell Davis the change.”

  He moved past her, and headed toward a row of horses hitched outside the stable.

  Alba watched him, thinking that perhaps she had been the luckier of them to bear her crippling on the outside. Then she turned and limped into the house.

  * * * *

  Nearly half the guests had departed and much of the food had been consumed, before Alba approached Rachel.

  “I would be honored to stay with you, Rachel. It is arranged that Mr. Andresson will continue to Cheyenne, and stop for me here on his return, if that should not be too long a visit?”

  Catching movement over Alba’s shoulder, Rachel saw Davis standing near a massive hickory breakfront Gordon had had freighted here, at a cost equal to three good horses. Davis was certainly near enough to hear what they said.

  “Not too long at all. But if you want to go to Cheyenne with Davis, I can’t deprive you of that pleasure.”

  “Not so much pleasure,” the other woman said dryly.

  Davis’ shoulders tightened under his too-small coat. Rachel looked from that expressive back to the woman before her.

  “The journey can surely be tiring,” Rachel offered.

  “Yes, especially when you do not look forward to journey’s end.”

  In the rushed words, Rachel recognized a deep discomfort with the gawking of strangers, though Alba’s grave dignity hid it well. So Alba’s reluctance to go to Cheyenne stemmed not from dislike of her companion, but self-consciousness, Rachel decided.

  Unaware of her additional listener, Alba went on, “I will stay here with you, quietly, with much more happiness. It is Nick and Da—Mr. Andresson who insist I must go to Cheyenne for new dresses. New dresses? What use do I have for them? I am most happy to stay here with you.”

  “Thank you, Alba. But perhaps we can ask Davis to serve as your agent and you can yet have a new dress or two. Davis, may we speak to you, please?” She raised her voice as if he were halfway across the room.

  He started, then quickly circled the far side of a small sofa so when Alba turned it looked, indeed, as if he had been halfway across the room.

  “Ma’am?”

  “Davis, Alba has been kind enough to agree to remain with me at Natchez rather than accompany you to Cheyenne. I am sorry to deprive you of her company—” a new surge of color topped his collar “—yet I’m going to impose on your good nature more by asking you to purchase dress goods. We’ll give you a list and I can recommend a friend who will know which shops are the most likely. All right?”

  “Pleased to be of service,” he muttered gallantly.

  “Thank you, Mr. Andresson.” Alba appeared to focus her sweet smile on his shirt’s top button.

  “My pleasure, ma’am.”

  Neither looked at the other, Rachel realized, as she promised Davis to have the list ready in the morning. Maybe she was reading more into this than was there. Heaven knew she hadn’t much experience in that line.

  But she found a spark of interest in the next half hour in noticing that Alba and Davis did look at each other, but only when the other’s attention was diverted.

  * * * *

  Davis stood patiently on the front porch, casting surreptitious looks at Alba. Rachel felt a guilty pang that her guest looked so tired this morning.

  The need to be occupied had overwhelmed her last night, and Alba seemed to understand. It was impossible to delve into ranch finances on the night of Gordon’s funeral, and the delay in facing what she knew she must do had made Rachel edgy and restless. Alba had suggested they survey Rachel’s wardrobe for suitable mourning.

  Gordon had lavished clothes on Rachel, many considerably more elaborate and beribboned than she cared for. But Alba had a good eye for what the removal of a flounce here, a row of bows there could accomplish. For several hours, they sorted out what Rachel cared to save, what she would rework and what she would give away. She pressed a pair of pale, creamy dresses on Alba, insisting they washed out her own fair coloring.

  They also developed the short list of material Alba would allow, mostly for work clothes. Until, finally, exhaustion caught Rachel and she stumbled into bed, barely aware when Alba trimmed the lamp and retired to her room.

  “I do think we should add a length of wool serge to the list. Alba,” Rachel said now, refreshed enough to renew an argument lost the night before.

  Alba shook her head. “That would make a wonderful riding suit, but what use have I for a riding suit?”

  “I’m sure we could rig something with a sidesaddle.”

  “Thank you, but it was tried, before I left Texas.”

  “I’ll make you a saddle.” Both women looked up in surprise at Davis’ decisive words.

  “Thank you, but as I said—”

  “It’s been tried. But not by me. I’ll do it. Now—” he turned to Rachel, who stared, be
mused by this side of the young cowhand “—wool serge? What color?”

  “Davis—Mr. Andresson, I can’t—”

  Rachel regained her wits and ruthlessly interrupted Alba. “A deep red. Something rich. Garnet or claret.”

  He nodded and climbed into the wagon, with a tip of the hat in farewell before clucking up the horses.

  “Well.” Rachel divided attention between the woman by her side and the figure in the wagon. “Davis has developed a real decisive streak. He’s become the kind of man,” she added with a returning spark of dormant mischief, “who won’t take no for an answer.”

  * * * *

  Alba’s visit was a respite. An all-too-short period of quiet and calm, while Rachel gathered her resources.

  Alba would sit across the room, efficiently opening seams, removing fabric flourishes and remaking Rachel’s wardrobe.

  Rachel wished she possessed as much skill in reordering the workings of Natchez and the Circle T. She devoted hours to learning details of the financial trouble she had only glimpsed before, and in trying to formulate a plan to deal with them.

  God, she couldn’t even do right for her baby, she thought in moments of despair. Her milk, plentiful earlier, had rapidly dried up these past weeks. Instead of the warmth and satisfaction of having her child at her breast, feedings became episodes of frustration—hers and his.

  Esther and Myrna said, one in few words, the other in many, that it wasn’t unnatural. Then they set to mashing food and straining milk for Johnny.

  Alone in bed, sometimes tears slipped loose, and Rachel allowed herself to wish for Shag. But only in sleep did dreams of Nick have their say. She never spoke to Alba of Nick, nor of details of the financial burden Gordon had left. Just as Alba never spoke of Davis, nor of the shadows that sometimes dimmed her eyes.

  When it came time for Alba to leave, they stood once more on the porch with the wagon and Davis waiting.

  “Thank you for staying with me, Alba. Please, come again.”

  “I will, Rachel.”