Taming Eliza Jane

by Shannon Stacey

  She was mucking out a stall when he arrived, and she grimaced when she saw him standing there watching. Not exactly the reception he’d been hoping for.

  “I brought you flowers,” he said, holding the handful of colorful blossoms out to her.

  Eliza Jane laughed, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “Here I am ankle-deep in horse sh…manure, and you brought me flowers?”

  “Eliza Jane Carter, you almost said horse shit!”

  “I did not,” she snapped primly, but her lips were twitching. He only folded his arms—careful not to crush the bouquet—and waited. “Fine, I almost did. I think that just proves what a bad influence this town is on me.”

  Will grinned and started toward her. “The town or the doctor?”

  “Both. You’re all incorrigible.”

  “Guilty. But we’re growing on you, admit it. You like it here.”

  “Well, I have realized my girlhood dream of shoveling out horse stalls.”

  He reached out and drew her into his arms, not giving a fiddler’s damn who was watching. “I came here to thank you, darlin’.”

  “For what?”

  He kissed her soundly before answering. “For…hell, woman, I can’t even list it all. For feeding me beans in the middle of the night when you’d been expecting lovemaking. For comforting me when Miss Adele died even though I acted like a fool and went for the bottle instead of you. For facing down Lucy Barnes on behalf of an old whore you barely knew just because I loved her. For standing by me and the chickens at her funeral. For…that might be it for right now, but I’m sure there will be more.”

  “That is quite a list.” She tipped her head up to smile at him. “But I didn’t mind a bit of it.”

  Will pulled her down beside him on a hay bale. “How is that, Eliza Jane? I’ve been doing a whole lot more taking than giving the past few days.”

  “I don’t mind it because I know you’d do the same for me. And because nobody’s ever brought me handpicked flowers before.”

  He held the bouquet out to her. “I reckon I should have brought some water for them.”

  “I have a tin cup over by the pump I can put them in. And I’ll look at them while I work.”

  Work. He knew it was a bad idea, but he couldn’t help himself. “When are you going to stop this, darlin’? This is no kind of work for a woman.”

  She gave him a glaring look. “Don’t you start with me, Will Martinson. Neither Mr. Digger nor Johnny have any complaints with my work, I’ll have you know. And it sets a fine example for other women to see me holding my own.”

  “I just don’t like seeing you wear yourself out.”

  She laughed and slapped his knee. “If I were to quit, what would keep you and Sheriff Caldwell amused while you stand around eating penny candy?”

  Will leaned over to nip at her earlobe. “That’s the highlight of my day, darlin’.”

  “Keep that up and I won’t bathe before I come in for my next examination, Doctor.”

  He wrinkled his nose. “Barn smell doesn’t really put me in the mood, but it ain’t enough to keep me from touching you.”

  They were silent for a moment, and Will knew it was time for him to go. Eliza Jane had work to do, and he was keeping her from it. “How about you and I have dinner at the restaurant this evening?”

  She arched an eyebrow at him, then looked down at the flowers. “Aren’t you worried about being seen keeping time with the women’s libber?”

  “Not more than I’m worrying about not getting enough time to keep with you.”

  “And I suppose I’m not really a women’s libber anymore, am I?” She laughed, but to Will’s ear it wasn’t a particularly happy sound. “I’m a stable girl, which is entirely more respectable.”

  “You’re still a damn women’s libber,” he growled. “And you’re still no end of trouble. But there ain’t no reason I can’t sit at a restaurant and share a meal with you. Of course, we might want to be a little more discreet about what I plan to have for dessert.”

  “Hush! What if Johnny hears you?” The harshness of her tone was set off by the curve of her lips. “I’ll have dinner with you, but you have to go now so I can earn my pay.”

  And as simple as that, the light moment dimmed for Will. The reminder she was earning money so she could hightail it out of Gardiner hit him in the gut and it took all he had not to let it show.

  “I’ll be there at six,” he said, and then he kissed her goodbye.

  The thought of Eliza Jane leaving town stayed with him through the rest of the day. He thought about it while he walked to the restaurant. He even thought about it while he sat at the table, waiting for her to arrive.

  Will was starting to think about marriage, and she was still thinking about leaving. And he didn’t have a damn clue what to do about it.

  Eliza Jane was surprised by the number of people in Marguerite’s when she arrived. She usually ate her dinner an hour earlier than Will had specified, and must be gone before the dinner rush, she supposed. The crowd of cowboys, businessmen and others was predominantly male, with a few families mixed in, but she spotted Will right away. He was talking to a rough-looking, barrel-chested man.

  The man was standing, as if he’d been walking past when he saw Will, so she made her way toward the table. It didn’t seem likely they’d be discussing personal medical issues in a busy restaurant. The man departed just before she reached them, however, so Will was free to stand and give her one of those smiles that made her toes curl.

  “Good evening, Mrs. Carter. I’m glad you could join me.”

  The words, and the formal tone he used, caused Eliza Jane to once again become aware of her surroundings. People were a little more still and a lot more quiet than when she’d just entered. Obviously their fellow diners were a little curious as to why the damn women’s libber was sitting down to a meal with their doctor.

  “Thank you for making the time to see me,” she said a little too loudly. “I hope a discussion of recent medical advancements in the field of feminine reproductive disorders won’t affect your appetite.”

  While men around them cleared their throats, shifted in their chairs and returned to their suitably manly conversations, Eliza Jane took her own seat and glanced at the slate where the daily specials were written. They had beef stew listed and, after the day’s work, her mouth watered just thinking about it. If not for Will’s presence, she’d order a big bowl for herself.

  Will sat as well, his grin letting her know he was rather amused by her audacity. She was about to say something when Marguerite bustled up to their table.

  “Look, it is my favorite customer,” she said in her effusive, slightly-accented way. “You are so good for my business, Mrs. Carter! The wives, they make such a fuss about cooking that the men, they pay me to do it instead.”

  Eliza Jane smiled as Will rolled his eyes. She ate all of her evening meals at the restaurant, and the owner always made a fuss over her. “You’re certainly busy tonight, Marguerite.”

  “Yes, it is wonderful, no? Now what will I bring for your supper?”

  Eliza Jane looked to Will, and after a moment he raised his gaze from the menu. “It’s customary in these parts for ladies to go first, darlin’.”

  Flustered, Eliza Jane felt the heat rise in her face. “Oh, I…where I come from it’s customary for a man to order for the women in his party.”

  “Is it customary for the man to read a lady’s thoughts to know what it is she’s of a mind to eat?”

  “She’s of a mind to eat what he orders for her.” Aware of Marguerite waiting patiently, Eliza Jane handed back the menu she hadn’t bothered to read. “I would love a bowl of that beef stew, please.”

  Will ordered a steak and potatoes, and after Marguerite left he propped his elbows on the table and shook his head. “I reckon I’d be a women’s libber, too, if I had to stand for somebody telling me what I was of a mind to eat.”

  Eliza Jane laughed, then tried to change
the subject. She didn’t want to think about Augustus Carter or her father tonight. “Who was that man you were speaking to when I arrived? I don’t think I’ve seen him before.”

  “That’s Roland Thayer.” Will paused to take a sip of his water, and she used that moment to conceal her reaction to the name. “He’s on the road a lot, driving his freight wagon, and I asked him to look in on a family that lives about fifteen miles north of here. They’re doing fine, which is good to hear.”

  She nodded, but couldn’t think of a single thing to say. She knew Roland Thayer was out of town for several days each week because those were the days she visited with his wife, Dandy.

  Eliza Jane had finally run into her at the Mercantile, and Dandy had invited her to stop by the house, but it could only be on the days her husband was away. The woman still refused to admit Roland had ever laid his hands on her in anger, but Eliza Jane knew fear when she saw it. And Dandy Thayer was very, very afraid of her husband.

  “That’s…kind of him.”

  Will nodded, seemingly unaware of the awkward silence. “He seems a decent sort. The Thayers live on the outskirts of town. The house ain’t much and Dandy hardly ever ventures out, but he’ll do me the occasional favor.”

  “So you don’t know his wife well?” She realized belatedly the question might seem odd. “I mean, it seems everybody knows everybody else’s business in Gardiner.”

  “That’s true, for the most part. But the Thayers have always been quiet folk who prefer to be left alone, and we respect that.”

  Eliza Jane was watching him closely, and he didn’t seem to be harboring any troubled thoughts regarding Roland Thayer. And she knew if Will had evidence Dandy was being mistreated, he wouldn’t stand for it.

  And yet, she couldn’t quite bring herself to press him on the matter of the Thayers. She couldn’t prove Dandy was being mistreated when she denied it herself, and it was too risky to involve the law with no evidence. While it was easy to forget at times, Will was Gardiner’s deputy sheriff and the sheriff was his best friend.

  No matter how fair they seemed in their dealings with the townspeople—Sheriff Caldwell’s penchant for shooting people aside—it was too great a risk to confide in them yet. The last time she’d asked the law for help had cast a shadow she couldn’t outrun.

  “It’s good the other family’s faring well,” she said awkwardly, trying to close the door on that particular conversation.

  By the time their food came, the uncomfortable moment had passed and she ate with relish. Perhaps it wasn’t ladylike to mop up the dish with a second slab of buttered bread, but the appetite she worked up at the livery each day wasn’t exactly ladylike, either.

  In between bites of his steak, Will amused her with stories from his own day, launching into one about the sheriff after they’d pushed their empty dishes off to the side.

  It seemed Adam decided to pay a visit to Mrs. Digger, the wife of the man who owned the livery stable. He claimed he was just feeling sociable, but every person who walked by the house could smell the rich, sweet aroma of fresh cookies in the oven. Unfortunately, Lucy Barnes was also of a mind to visit Mrs. Digger, so the sheriff claimed an urgent need to visit the water closet.

  “Now, Mrs. Digger knew he was hiding from Lucy,” Will said, “so she didn’t say a word. That poor son of a gun spent almost an hour hiding in Mrs. Digger’s water closet.”

  Eliza Jane’s stomach ached from laughing so hard after a full meal, and she had to use her napkin to dab at her eyes. “He must have been mad as a hornet when he got out of there.”

  “Oh, he was. He told me if he’d known Lucy was going to talk Mrs. Digger’s ear clean off, he’d have taken the cookies in there with him.”

  “Why doesn’t he just surrender and marry the girl? He might have Lucy Barnes as a mother-in-law, but at least he wouldn’t be hiding in water closets in this kind of heat.”

  “He’s a stubborn cuss and he don’t aim to ever marry. Besides, not many know this, but Beth Ann’s set her sights on a cowboy her ma don’t approve of.”

  Eliza Jane thought back to her brief conversation with the girl. “Joey, right?”

  Will looked surprised, and then his eyes narrowed. “Yeah, Joey Keezer. You aren’t encouraging that girl to do something stupid, are you?”

  The cheerful atmosphere of the dinner faded away and she sighed in disappointment. “Do you really think I would tell Beth Ann to run away from her family?”

  “I’d like to believe you wouldn’t, but it wouldn’t be the first time you’ve taken me by surprise, darlin’.”

  “Don’t you darlin’ me, Will Martinson. When Beth Ann Barnes confided her troubles in me, I told her eloping wouldn’t make her happy and she’d best talk to her mother about her feelings, and keep on talking about them until the woman saw reason.” She heard the snappish tone of her own voice and she regretted the conversation had circled around to unpleasantness again.

  “Don’t be upset with me, Eliza Jane,” Will said, but when he stretched out his foot to touch hers, she jerked hers back, tucking both feet safely under her chair.

  He frowned and leaned forward. “When you go around encouraging women to know their minds and act on it, don’t be surprised by somebody thinking you might have encouraged a young woman to know her own mind and act on it.”

  “There’s a big difference between teaching a woman to care for her own health and finances, and encouraging a young woman to ruin her future.” She couldn’t decide if she was more angry or more sad he’d thought her capable of such a thing. “And furthermore, despite what everybody seems to think, I do not go around lecturing to cause discontent and get everybody riled up. I do it so that maybe in the future girls like Beth Ann won’t ever have to feel the way I felt.”

  Much to her horror, she couldn’t see Will anymore through the blur of tears. Oh, good Lord, she was crying in the restaurant. As if they hadn’t been enough of a spectacle simply dining together.

  She was aware of Marguerite approaching and Will pressing money for their meals into her hand.

  “But Mrs. Carter? Is she not well?”

  “She’s well enough, except for having a jackass for a dinner companion.”

  “Whatever you did, you had better be sorry, young man, or I’ll give you a whack with my mixing spoon.”

  “I intend to make it better, Marguerite. And I’ll try to do it right since I stitched up the last cowboy you took after with it.”

  Eliza Jane dabbed at her face with her napkin before allowing Will to lead her out of the restaurant. The cooler night air refreshed her a little, so she tucked her arm under his and they walked slowly down the sidewalk, just as they had her first day in Gardiner.

  “I got thrown away, too, you know,” Will told her in a quiet voice. “My family tossed me aside because I stood up for a cause I believed in. I know it’s not quite the same, and that making your way’s easier on a man, but the people who were supposed to love me turned away because of something in me I couldn’t change.”

  She sniffled and edged a little closer to him. “When I heard Augustus’s new bride was expecting, I was devastated. It was the lowest moment of my life, and I’d never felt so worthless or so hopeless. An acquaintance invited me to a suffrage meeting she was hosting, and…oh, Will, the things that speaker had to say.

  “The strength of her convictions shone through with every word she spoke, and the message was so powerful. Can you imagine women being allowed to vote—to have a say in not only our own lives, but in the governing of our country? I wanted to define my own destiny, and I wanted to be strong and unafraid, like she was. It was as though I had a gaping hole in my life and this…this purpose filled it.”

  “I understand that, darlin’.” He stopped in front of the hotel and turned to face her. “But sometimes a hole that seems filled is really only patched over.”

  She really didn’t want to think about that too much right now. “Are you coming up?”

  “Not to
night. You’re about done in, and we haven’t exactly been discreet tonight.”

  “I don’t know how your family could cast aside a man like you.” Damning discretion, Eliza Jane reached up to caress his cheek. “They must be complete and utter fools.”

  “As is Augustus Carter, a fact for which this lucky man is extremely grateful.”

  He turned his face to kiss the palm of her hand, then he tipped his hat and walked away, whistling a jaunty tune that made her smile.

  Chapter Eleven

  Several days later, Eliza Jane left the livery after the morning feeding and walked up the sidewalk. She had no idea what she was supposed to do for the chickens, but since she’d promised Miss Adele she’d tend to them, she made her way to the Coop to see if they needed anything.

  She’d been in town long enough to know ten-thirty in the morning was the ideal time to pay them a visit. They’d be up and about, tending to their chores. But not yet beginning the long process of dressing, curling, painting and powdering themselves for their customers.

  She found the four of them in the kitchen, sitting glum-faced around a table that bore an account book, writing implements, and a carved wooden bowl full of money.

  “Good morning, ladies,” Eliza Jane said, and it seemed as though they all sighed at once.

  “We can’t make no sense of this, Mrs. Carter.” Fiona waved a hand over the table.

  Eliza Jane settled herself in the empty chair. “What are you trying to figure out?”

  “Well, we’ve got all this money here and we don’t know how to split it up.” As was usually the case when they were in a group, Fiona did the talking. She pulled a sheet of paper from the book and slid it across the table to Eliza Jane. “Here’s the list Miss Adele wrote of who gets what, but we can’t figure the percents.”

  “I know she was concerned about how you’d fare. Didn’t she explain all this to you?”

  “Yes, ma’am. We tried to pay attention, but I guess we didn’t listen enough.”

  “Figures make my head ache,” Betty added, and Sadie nodded.

  Eliza Jane looked over the paper. Apparently the women, instead of keeping what they earned, put all of their money in the dish, and then Miss Adele divvied it up. There was a percentage to the house, a percentage to Miss Adele personally and a percentage to each of the chickens.