"Mr. Logan, come and give us your opinion," Mrs. Hankins called from the back of the store.
Hankins laughed outright at Josh's startled expression. "She doesn't really want your opinion, you know," Hankins confided. "She just wants to get a feel for how much you want to spend. Now's the time to put your foot down and show your bride who's boss." He sent Josh on his way with an encouraging pat on the back.
More than a little puzzled, because he could not picture Felicity choosing something so expensive it would cause Mrs. Hankins concern, Josh strolled down the aisle to the rear of the building. His confusion grew when he saw the stubborn set of Felicity's jaw, but Mrs. Hankins's complaint put everything back into focus.
"Miss Storm doesn't seem to like the taffeta," she said.
"Oh, I like it fine," Felicity contradicted. "It's just so expensive."
Josh glanced at the counter where Mrs. Hankins had unfurled a length of the golden material. It was the same sort of stuff Blanche's dress had been made of, except it was a color that didn't knock your eyeballs loose. He noticed Felicity's small hand fingering the edge of the cloth covetously, but she said, "It costs a dollar a yard, and I'd need more than eighteen yards of it to make that pattern…"
"I have this lovely pattern," Mrs. Hankins explained, showing it to Josh. "You see, she could use it for her wedding gown, but she could also make it up in calico without the fancy trim for everyday. It's very versatile."
"But eighteen yards…" Felicity protested, eyeing the fabric with longing. She had never seen anything so beautiful, but she couldn't expect Mr. Logan to spend that much money on her. How wasteful for a dress she would hardly ever wear! If she could not please him by wearing a white dress, at least she could please him by saving him some money.
"I'd suggest that you get at least twenty yards," Mrs. Hankins said cheerfully. "You'll want to make a bonnet to match."
Felicity drew her hand away as if the fabric had burned her. "Twenty yards! Absolutely not! What else have you got?"
Josh stared at Felicity. Even he could plainly see she wanted that material. Was she still trying to do penance for what had happened by denying herself something she really wanted? The thought sliced into him, lacerating his already sensitive conscience. He simply could not allow her to make any more sacrifices. "Cut her twenty yards of that yellow stuff and then show us what else you've got," he ordered, contradicting Felicity's instructions.
Smiling victoriously, Mrs. Hankins began to measure out the material.
Felicity stared at him in utter amazement. He actually seemed annoyed that she didn't want to squander his money. "I don't need a dress that expensive," she whispered to him.
No, perhaps she didn't, Josh thought, but he needed to give it to her. "Yes, you do," he said with finality.
"I have some brown velvet that will trim this beautifully," Mrs. Hankins reported, still smiling happily.
"Fine, measure it out," Josh said, pleased to be able to do something special for Felicity to prove how much he thought of her.
Felicity continued to stare at him. His gray eyes seemed to challenge her to argue with him. Fortunately, she was too flabbergasted to do any such thing. After the way they had argued earlier, she would not have been surprised if he had refused to buy her anything at all. Instead he was…
"And I want you to pick out enough material to make yourself three… no, four more dresses. Then you'll have one for every day of the week," Josh continued, determined that she would endure no more self-inflicted deprivations.
Felicity gasped. A dress for every day of the week! Nobody needed that many dresses! He was being outrageous. The spark of acquisitiveness she had felt upon entering the store was smothered under this avalanche of extravagance. "Mr. Logan, I don't want-"
"Get her everything she needs, and put it on my account," Josh told Mrs. Hankins, annoyed over the way Felicity had addressed him. She knew he did not want her to call him "Mr. Logan," especially in front of other people. What would Mrs. Hankins think?
Mrs. Hankins thought the whole thing was rather amusing, he noticed, glancing over in her direction. Well, he had provided.her with enough entertainment for one day. "I'll be back later," he said, and strolled purposefully out of the store.
Resisting with difficulty the urge to call him back and demand he countermand his orders, Felicity tried to remember to remain calm and unruffled in front of the storekeeper's wife. She didn't want to cause talk, and after all, she would get to choose fabric for four more new dresses. Since she had never owned more than two dresses at any one time in her entire life, such an opportunity should have thrilled her. It would have, too, if she had thought for one minute Mr. Logan's generosity was prompted by his affection for her. Instead he was buying the clothes just to be ornery, just because she had objected. And maybe just to prove his dominance over her. Sighing with resignation, she focused her attention on the violet-sprigged calico Mrs. Hankins was showing her.
Josh leaned against the barn wall and watched Felicity's bedroom window fade from light to dark. He tried not to think about the fact that she would, at that very moment, be climbing into bed clad in nothing but a thin nightdress. Sighing wearily, he reached into his vest pocket for the makings to roll himself a smoke.
"You sure did fix that girl up good and proper with clothes," Candace said from beside him.
He whirled, surprised to find she had come so close without his realizing it and annoyed that she had seen him staring at Felicity's window like some love-struck swain. "Not that she appreciates it," he replied, unable to keep the edge from his voice.
"You mean she didn't thank you for all those things you bought her?" Candace said in disbelief.
"Oh, she thanked me, all right. You would've thought somebody was holding a gun to her head to make her do it, though." The memory of her stilted "Thank you, Mr. Logan" still rankled. He had bought her the clothes to overcome the feelings of shame he knew still tormented her. He wanted to prove to her that he did not believe she had done anything to be ashamed of. He had even been stupid enough to expect her to be pleased. If he had remembered her reaction to the first clothes he had given her, he could have spared himself the disappointment. The girl simply did not know how to accept a gift.
"She's gonna look mighty pretty on her wedding day," Candace said, hoping to tease him out of his dark mood.
But Josh did not want to discuss his wedding day, certainly not with Candace. Casting about for a change of topic, he remembered that he had something important to discuss with her. "There was a man in town looking for you the other day."
Candace's dark eyes glittered in the moonlight as she pretended to simper. "Was there now?" she asked playfully.
"A colored man, and Hankins said he looked like you," Josh said, watching her reaction carefully.
"Looked like me?" Candace echoed, puzzled.
"Yeah, I figured he might be some kin of yours. Hankins said he was asking if you still worked for me and where my place was located."
Candace frowned thoughtfully. "Might be. I got lots of kinfolk, brothers and cousins and…" She paused. "How old a man was he?" she asked sharply.
"Hankins wasn't sure," Josh said, catching the change in Candace's tone but uncertain as to what it meant.
"Was he around my age or older or… younger?" Candace asked, her voice strange in the darkness.
"I really don't know. Is anything wrong?" he asked with growing concern.
"Wrong?" she said distractedly. "No, nothing's wrong." Then she smiled, her teeth a white slash in her dark face, but Josh knew the smile was forced. "Well, if he's kin of mine, I reckon he'll show up here sooner or later. Good night, Mr. Josh."
Josh frowned as he watched her hurry away. When Hankins first told him about the stranger, Josh had been certain the man could not possibly mean Candace any harm. He knew Candace could not have an enemy in the world. But for the first time in his life Josh considered the fact that he knew very little about Candace's past, a past that m
ight possibly include someone of whom she would be afraid. But Candace was not afraid, not exactly. Her emotion had been something different, something he could not quite identify. He stood there in the dark, puzzling over it for a long time and trying not to look up at Felicity's darkened window.
"How long will you be gone?"
Asa Gordon looked up to where his landlady stood in the open doorway, and smiled. "Don't know exactly. This is a tough case and I might be gone several months," he reported, and returned to his packing. The task would not take long. His few changes of clothing would fit easily into the carpetbag sitting on his bed.
"Should I hold the room for you?" Mrs. Cruthers asked.
She was being professionally polite, in case someone happened to overhear, but Asa heard the petulant undertone in her voice. For the past several months, the buxom widow had been much more than his landlady. Sacrificing the cozy comfort of her bed was his only regret at leaving Philadelphia. But it was a tiny regret. He suspected that Mrs. Cruthers was beginning to imagine wedding bells in their future. Better to make the break a clean one.
"I reckon you can let the room go to someone else, since I don't know when I'll get back," he said, allowing just the proper note of apology to tinge his voice.
He had not expected a tearful scene, but he was equally surprised by her cold hauteur. "I should have figured as much from the likes of you," she sniffed, turning on her heel and stalking angrily away.
Asa paused in his packing, marveling over her reaction. Women, God love them, never ceased to amaze him. With a philosophical shrug, he resumed his chore. There would be other buxom widows. There were plenty of them in Texas.
Chapter Six
Felicity's wedding day dawned bright and clear. She happened to notice this because she was wide awake long before the sun had even peeked over the horizon. Sitting up against the headboard of her bed, she drew her knees up to her chest and clutched them tightly. In the feeble morning light she could see the golden dress hanging on a peg across the room and looking like just one more elegant accessory to this golden room.
Shivering slightly, she pulled the quilt up over her shoulders, even though she knew her chills were not caused by the temperature. She shivered because she was afraid, more mortally afraid than she had ever been in her entire life. In a few hours scores of total strangers would descend on the ranch to witness her marriage to a man she hardly knew. Tonight she would no longer sleep in this golden room, alone. Tonight she would sleep with Mr. Logan in his bedroom next door. And tonight he would do that awful thing to her again.
But it wasn't awful if you were married, she reminded herself sternly. And, she admitted reluctantly, it wasn't even awful if you weren't. Every night since it had happened she had awakened from tormented dreams, her body damp and aching, longing for something she could not even name. She did not dare to let him know her longing, though. Instead, whenever he came close, whenever he tried to take her in his arms, she resisted. She could not allow him one single kiss because even one kiss was more temptation than she could bear. If she gave him her mouth, she would give him everything, and that would be wrong. She simply could not allow it, not again, not until they were married.
Tonight they would be married. Felicity shivered again. Maybe now the quarrels would end, the quarrels that frightened her almost as much as thoughts of the wedding. Mr. Logan's angry voice insisting, "We'll be married in a few days! What will it hurt?" and then, "We'll be married tomorrow, for God's sake!" and her insisting right back, "But we aren't married yet!" Then the fear would come, the fear that he would call the whole thing off. Sometimes he was so angry that she wondered why he didn't, why he didn't just send her away and be done with her.
She supposed he would be embarrassed to call off the wedding after everyone already knew about it. That was the only explanation that made any sense to her. The idea that he might want her, specifically, as his wife was too preposterous even to consider. As exciting as making love with him had been for her, she knew he could easily find a much more exciting woman to take her place. Hadn't Mrs. Delano already indicated her willingness? There surely must be many others whom Felicity had not met. She found the thought extremely depressing.
But in spite of everything, he was still going to marry her today. She had to keep reminding herself of that. As Joshua Logan's wife, she need fear nothing ever again. She would never be alone or poor or hungry or lost. And he would protect her. She would never again have to look over her shoulder to see if someone was following her. She would have a home, and she would have Mr. Logan to take care of her. That was more than she had ever hoped for. She should have been grateful.
But if only she could have his love, too. She understood only too well that the ache she felt for his physical body was just a symptom of her craving for his affection. Unless he cared for her, unless he loved her the way a man loves a woman, she would always be alone and poor and hungry and lost, no matter what luxuries surrounded her.
"Please, God," she whispered into the morning stillness.
Blanche Delano was as good as her word. She arrived soon after the breakfast tray that Candace had delivered to Felicity's room.
"Good Lord, girl, you're as white as a sheet!" Blanche exclaimed the instant she entered Felicity's room. "Lucky thing I brought along some rouge. We'll have you fixed up in no time."
"Rouge!" Felicity said, shocked to her core. "I couldn't paint my face!"
"Of course you could. Everyone does it," Blanche informed her blandly. "Is this your dress?" She paused a moment to examine the garment. Blanche herself was clothed in a stately gown of deepest burgundy crepon, a heavy, crinkled crepe fabric, and a matching velvet hat that tied primly beneath her chin.
"Did you make this all yourself?" Blanche asked, obviously impressed as she spread the intricate folds of the skirt.
"Candace helped," Felicity said. Candace had to help. Making such a dress in so brief a time was simply too big a job for one person.
"I can't wait to see how it looks on you," Blanche said. "But first we'll concentrate on fixing up that face of yours so folks won't think you're scared to death of poor ol' Joshua."
Felicity winced, but Blanche did not seem to notice. Between Blanche and Candace, they got her bathed and combed and curled and dressed by the time the first wagon-loads of guests began to arrive. Once again Felicity knew frustration as she tried to view herself in the small mirror over the washstand.
"You look like a picture in Godey's Lady's Book," Blanche decreed.
Felicity had never seen Godey's Lady's Book, but she knew she looked like a picture. She could hardly believe the lovely young woman staring back at her from the mirror was Felicity Storm. Blanche had insisted on trimming the hair around her face and crimping it with a curling iron until it formed a burnished halo around her head. The face she was accustomed to seeing looked different, too. Her eyes seemed to be larger and a deeper shade of blue, and her cheeks were unnaturally rosy, although Blanche's rouge could be blamed for that.
The dress itself was nothing short of magnificent. Encased in its crisp folds, Felicity felt like a princess. The bodice hugged her tiny waist and fit tightly over the small breasts that Blanche's skillful lacing of her corset had lifted to prominence. The yards and yards of skirt flared out and down, draped into a tidy bustle in the back. Felicity's collar and cuffs were trimmed in golden brown velvet, as soft as bunny fur, and velvet flounces edged her voluminous skirt.
Felicity touched one of the velvet-covered buttons that ran down the front of her bodice, recalling how she had covered them by lamplight, her head pounding from eyestrain as she and Candace raced the clock to have the dress ready in time. Now the effort seemed worthwhile. Felicity Storm might not deserve to marry a man like Mr. Logan, but at least today she would look as if she did.
Felicity spun happily to face Blanche, who beamed her approval. "Well now, do you need any last-minute wedding-night instructions, or has Joshua already taught you everything you
need to know?" Blanche inquired with her usual frankness.
Felicity gaped at the older woman in horror and guilt, the scarlet in her face no longer the result of cosmetic enhancement. Felicity realized instantly that she had revealed her shame, that she should have pretended innocence instead, but it was too late for such subterfuge. Blanche knew the truth.
"I see," Blanche murmured to herself. "There now, don't look so worried. You won't get any lectures out of me. Here, sit down. I reckon there's still a few things you need to know." Blanche directed her to sit on the edge of the bed, helping her spread her skirts so they would not wrinkle. "And don't look so guilty. I doubt Joshua wasted much time talking you into it, or even getting your consent, for that matter."
"He didn't force me," Felicity said, answering some perverse need to defend her betrothed. "I didn't fight or scream." Felicity watched her hands twisting in her lap so she would not have to see Blanche's reaction to such an infamous confession.
"Of course not," Blanche said softly, gently patting Felicity's shoulder. "You probably wanted it, too."
This brought Felicity's face up, her startled blue eyes meeting Blanche's green ones. Instead of the condemnation she had expected, she saw only kindness.
"Listen, honey, you'll have to do worse than that to shock me. Maybe I should tell you about myself before you start feeling too guilty. I was born in a whorehouse." She did not seem to hear Felicity's gasp of horror. "I grew up there, and when I was fifteen, ray mother turned me out to whore, too. I'd been working in a dance house for a couple months, one of those places where they have cribs in the back. Do you know what a crib is?"
"A baby's bed," Felicity said innocently, her voice a fascinated whisper.
"It's also a small room with just a bed where a man can go with a woman for a quick… roll in the hay." Blanche gave her a self-mocking grin. "One night I was in one of the cribs with a man. He got nasty because I wouldn't… do something special that he wanted. He hit me a few times, and Sam Delano came busting in to see what the ruckus was all about. He'd never set eyes on me before that night, but when he saw how young I was, he took me out of that place."
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