'Oh, Auntie!' Hesitantly Elizabeth-Anne took off her hat and held it in both hands.
Elender wagged a finger at her. 'Don't you 'Oh, Auntie' me,' she warned. 'It's a little too late for that. You're not a silly tongue-tied schoolgirl any longer. You're a young lady, and you must act like one.' She tucked a stray hair back into Elizabeth-Anne's coiffure. 'There, you look perfect.' On an impulse, she kissed Elizabeth-Anne's cheek; then she took her firmly by the arm.
Reluctantly Elizabeth-Anne allowed herself to be led out into the dim hall.
'Don't be so stiff!' Elender hissed over her shoulder. 'Relax!' Then she smiled with amusement. 'I do declare. You're as nervous as he is!'
'He's nervous too?' Elizabeth-Anne looked surprised.
'He is. Now, in you float. Like a princess!' Elender stepped aside, placed both hands in the small of
Elizabeth-Anne's back, and gave her a little push. Elizabeth-Anne stumbled into the little parlor.
The scene that greeted her would be forever ingrained in her mind. In the time it had taken her to get dressed, Elender had transformed the parlor. A white lace tablecloth covered the dining-room table, and she noticed that Elender had even run across the street to the rooming house to pluck flowers: they were arranged in cut-glass vases and seemed to be everywhere. The entire room was a riot of fragrant colors. On the sideboard stood the cut-glass punch bowl and a chocolate cake.
And there was Zaccheus.
The instant Elizabeth-Anne came into the room, he hopped to his feet, a bouquet of daisies in his hand. His Adam's apple seemed to bob nervously, and somehow that, more than anything else, made her feel instantly at ease. She put down her hat, gracefully crossed the carpet, and held out one gloved hand. 'Mr. Hale,' she said formally. 'I'm . . . I'm honored by your visit.'
'I thank you for allowing me to come.' He took her hand formally and held it. They both seemed startled by the invisible spark that ricocheted back and forth between them. After a moment Elizabeth-Anne withdrew her hand. 'Please, won't you take a seat?' she offered.
He held out the bouquet. 'These are for you.'
'Thank you,' she said softly, her cheeks flushing pink. 'They're lovely.' For a moment she gazed down at the flowers. Then she gazed back up at him. 'Would you please excuse me while I put these in water? Please . . . do sit.'
He sat down and she hurried out into the hall, nearly colliding with Elender, who winked conspiratorially— she already had a vase filled with water in her hand. Elizabeth-Anne quickly arranged the daisies, took the vase, and hurried back into the parlor. She placed the vase on top of the spinet piano and stepped back to study the effect.
'I'm afraid bringing you flowers is like bringing coals to Newcastle,' Zaccheus said, looking around.
Elizabeth-Anne laughed. 'Not at all. One can never have enough flowers. And I treasure these the most.'
As she took a seat opposite him, he started to rise politely.
'If I might be so bold,' he said softly, 'you look very lovely.'
'Thank you,' she murmured graciously. 'Would you like some punch?'
He gestured to the marble-topped mahogany end table beside him. 'Miss Clowney already served me some.'
'So I see.' She smiled and clasped her hands. 'A slice of cake, then?'
'Perhaps a little later.'
Out in the hall Elender permitted herself a small smile. It was going even better than she had hoped. She smoothed her long gray skirt with the flat of her hands and went into the parlor. 'Elizabeth-Anne can play the piano,' she said as she took a seat, 'and she plays beautifully. Since the show at the nickelodeon doesn't start for another hour, perhaps you would like her to play a few selections for us?' She gazed inquiringly at Zaccheus.
'I'm sure Mr. Hale doesn't want to hear me play,' Elizabeth-Anne begged off demurely.
'But I do!' Zaccheus protested enthusiastically. 'Please! I'd be honored!'
'Well, if you insist,' Elizabeth-Anne murmured.
'I do,' he said quickly.
Elizabeth-Anne rose and slowly went behind the piano. Scraping the stool forward, she sat down and began playing a Chopin sonata.
The afternoon fled by so quickly that it seemed it was over before it had even begun. The hour in the parlor seemed mere minutes. After the Chopin, Zaccheus begged her to play more, and she played the piano with a surety she had never known before. Then she and Zaccheus went to the nickelodeon and saw the fifth installment of a continuing serial—one reel a week was shown. Afterward they walked up Main Street, and he bought them both an ice-cream cone at the general store.
'It's good.' Elizabeth-Anne licked her strawberry ice cream carefully so it wouldn't drip down and soil her gloves.
He smiled.
'Auntie doesn't allow us to have ice cream often. She says it's so we won't get too spoiled.'
'She's very wise, I'm sure.'
'Probably.' Elizabeth-Anne frowned. 'But sometimes we wish we were more spoiled. Especially Jenny.' She looked sideways at him. 'She doesn't like me at all, you know.'
'Oh?' He kept his face impassive.
Elizabeth-Anne shook her head. 'It goes way back to when we were children and Auntie took me in. Jenny thought I was trying to usurp her place.'
'She still holds that against you?' he asked in surprise.
'I'm afraid so.' Elizabeth-Anne sighed and frowned. 'What she doesn't seem to realize is that I'm not a threat to her, not in any way. But it's difficult for her to accept that.'
They walked in silence for a while. After they'd gone a block, he spoke hesitantly. 'You know, it's curious.'
'What is?'
'Somehow, although I've just met you, it's as if I've known you for a long time.'
She smiled slightly.
'I mean . . . I'm not trying to embarrass you, but I feel . . . what I mean to say is, you make me feel . . . comfortable. I think you're very nice.'
She tightened her lips bitterly. 'So does everyone else. Nice. ' She scowled. 'Everyone always thinks I'm so 'nice.' 'Nice' describes any number of things. It's a greedy word, a safe word. The plainest thing in the world can be 'nice.' '
'That's not how I meant it,' he said quickly, nonplussed by her sudden vehemence. 'What I meant to say was that. . . you're special. That's what I meant.'
'Thank you,' she said stiffly.
There was another prolonged silence, during which he searched his mind for something to say. 'Do you like it here in Quebeck?' he asked finally.
She frowned. 'Well enough, I suppose. But sometimes . . .' She stopped walking and turned to him swiftly, a flush coloring her face. 'I know this sounds silly, but eventually, what I'd really like to do is move to a big city.'
'Any in particular?'
'No, not really. But I'll never forget Auntie telling me about this hotel she once stayed at in Brownsville.
I made her tell me that story over and over. Other children like fairy tales, I suppose, but somehow, that hotel was my castle.' She gave a little laugh.
'Maybe you'll get a chance to see it someday.'
'Oh, no! I wouldn't want to ever see it.'
'But why not?'
'Because I've built it up so much in my mind that I know it doesn't at all resemble what Auntie described. I've let it grow completely out of proportion. The real hotel would be a vast disappointment to me.' Elizabeth-Anne's eyes focused on something invisible in the distance. 'The Hotel Garber,' she said slowly. 'That was the name of it.' She shook her head as if to clear it, and gazed up at him. 'Have you ever stayed there?'
He shook his head. 'Can't say I have.'
'Well, anyway, Auntie and Jenny stayed there right before I met them. And ever since, it's been Auntie's dream to own a grand hotel. But it'll never happen, and she knows it. Still, she insists that having a dream is very healthy.'
'I couldn't agree more. And you . . . you'd like to own a grand hotel?'
'Oh, yes!' Elizabeth-Anne's eyes sparkled with excitement and her words came in such a quick rush that they tripped ove
r one another. 'I really like the rooming house and the Good Eats Café, you know. I like meeting people and making them feel at home. But from what Auntie's told me about the Hotel Garber . . . well, that's what I'd really like.' She smiled and added soberly, 'Of course, it'll never happen.'
'Don't ever say that!' he said sharply.
She glanced at him queerly. 'Why?'
'Because,' he said earnestly, 'nothing in the world is impossible. Dreams are . . . well, doorways to reality, actually. I've had dreams before, and . . . and they started to become reality, but . . His voice trailed off.
'But what?' She gazed at him intently.
He looked away. 'I messed them up. I didn't keep them in focus. I let other influences veer me off-course and change them.' He sighed deeply for a moment. Then he brightened. 'I've stayed at lots of hotels, you know.'
'Really!' Her face lit up.
He nodded.
'Tell me about them!' she said urgently. 'Please, everything you can remember!'
He laughed. 'That would take days. Weeks, probably.'
'In that case,' she said softly, 'I suppose I'll have to listen to you for weeks.'
'I'm afraid you'd get bored.'
'Oh, no!' she vowed. 'Never! And you?' she asked. 'All you've done so far is ask me questions and make me talk about myself. What about you? What do you want to do?'
'I'm not sure. I think . . . I think I'd like to stay on here. If I can find a job.'
She looked at him soberly. 'I'm afraid there aren't many jobs available around here.'
'I know that. But I'll try to find one.'
'I heard you sell Bibles.'
He grinned. 'Word sure gets around fast.'
'It's a small town . . . and everyone already has Bibles.'
'I know that. So I'll have to find something else.
Something where I don't have to travel. So I can stay put for a while.'
She looked surprised. 'You don't like to travel?'
'I do, but I've been on the road for too long now. It's time I settled down.'
'I'll ask Auntie about any available jobs,' she promised. 'If anyone knows of any, it's her. The Good Eats Café is the best grapevine in town. You wouldn't believe how people talk while they eat. I'll keep my ears open too.'
'I'd be grateful.'
They walked in silence for a while, and when they reached the end of Main Street, they turned around and slowly retraced their way in the direction from which they had come.
Zaccheus' heart was light. It was just as he had thought. Elizabeth-Anne was not at all like Phoebe or Jenny. She was shy but warm, and underneath all the benign surface traits she was brimming with dreams and ambitions. He barely knew her, but he felt extremely lucky. Somehow he knew she was just right for him. Maybe he hadn't lost his own dreams entirely . . . perhaps together they could forge them into reality.
On sudden impulse he reached out and boldly took her hand in his. As his fingers closed over her gloved hand, she tensed, and when she looked up at him, her eyes held a peculiarly pale, faraway look. Then she seemed to relax, and she smiled shyly.
But there was nothing shy about the emotions the touch of his hand aroused within her. She felt in the midst of an upheaval. Her stomach was trembling, aflutter with a thousand invisible butterfly wings, yet she felt an intense physical awakening, a soaring such as she had never before experienced.
But she kept these powerful emotions well in check. She hoped that to the casual observer she seemed as quietly withdrawn as ever.
'Seems like you lost the new roomer,' Laurenda Pitcock said in a dry voice. She nodded with her chin.
She and Jenny were standing in the purple shadows of the alley beside the Good Eats Café. It was break time for Jenny, the halfway point between serving lunch and dinner, and Laurenda had dropped by for a visit.
Jenny watched through narrowed eyes as Zaccheus and Elizabeth-Anne walked slowly toward them, holding hands while engrossed in conversation.
They 're sure being friendly, she thought bitterly. And that expression on Elizabeth-Anne's face . . . it's one I've never seen before. There's a glow, a vitality about her . . .
Laurenda grinned. 'Looks like you played your cards all wrong, Jen. He seems to like the quiet type.'
Jenny whirled around. 'Shut up, pie face!' she hissed fiercely. 'I didn't want him anyway! I sent him packing!'
'Sure you did. First you fell all over him, and now you suddenly can't stand him.' There was a note of mocking laughter in Laurenda's voice. 'Face it, Jen. You lost him.'
'So?' Jenny clenched her fists and stood there stiffly. 'Who said I ever wanted him?'
'It's okay, Jenny. There'll be other men. Rich men, not just some two-bit Bible salesman. He'll be here awhile and then he'll be gone. You mark my words. You'll forget all about him.'
'Sure,' Jenny said absently.
'Besides,' Laurenda said cagily, 'look at it this way. If you can't have him, why should anybody else?'
Jenny stared at her. 'What do you mean?' she asked slowly.
'Oh, just give me some time to think about it,' Laurenda said loftily. 'With our brains, we'll be able to cook up something to break up those two. Right?'
Jenny looked at her for a long moment. Then her lips spread into a wide, devious grin. 'Yeah. We'll be able to cook up something good.'
5
Jenny scowled as the four of them came out of the drugstore. 'What do we do now?' she grumbled in a bored voice.
Red Brearer kicked at a pebble and watched it bounce across Main Street, stirring up little clouds of dust. He was short and stocky, with a perpetually surly expression. His name was derived from his shock of orange-red hair, which stuck out from under his cloth cap. 'I dunno. Wanna go over to the nickelodeon and see the show again?'
Jenny glanced up the street at the pink rooming house and shook her head. 'Auntie doesn't let us see the show more than once, and we've already been this week. Besides, I've already spent my week's allowance. Auntie only gave me the money for the soda if I let Elizabeth-Anne come along.' She jerked her head sideways in Elizabeth-Anne's direction.
Red looked at her out of the corners of his eyes. 'You work in the café. Why don't you keep some of the money? You know, just a little bit here and a little bit there?'
'Are you kidding?' Jenny shook her head. 'Auntie's too sharp. She always knows exactly how much there should be. Even if I come up a nickel short, she knows it. I don't know how she keeps track of it, but she does.'
A look of disappointment came over his face. 'There must be something we can do,' he mumbled.
Laurenda put a hand on Jenny's arm. 'I know what we can do!'
'Whoa!' Jenny cut her off and turned to Elizabeth-Anne, who was standing a few feet away. 'You've had your soda, 'Lizbeth-Anne,' she said succinctly. 'That's all Auntie required of me. Now, scram. We want to be left alone.'
Elizabeth-Anne looked at each of them in turn. Only Red seemed slightly embarrassed. Then she shrugged and slowly walked off, hands in her pockets, chin tucked down onto her chest. Behind her she heard Jenny's stage whispers and then three loud shrieks of laughter.
Her face burned with embarrassment. Then, for some strange reason—an instinct or intuition—she suddenly felt a force drawing her eyes up to the pink rooming house. She could see a shadow in the third- floor window. And that, for some reason, made her shrug off her embarrassment. Lifting her head with pride, she headed for the Good Eats Café, every inch of her suddenly brimming with confidence and dignity.
Zaccheus stood at the oriel window, one hand parting the curtains, the other tucked into the small of his back. Down the street he could see the young man and two young ladies obviously ostracizing Elizabeth-Anne from their activities. The way she walked along so dejectedly, hands in her pockets, tugged at his heartstrings. She seemed so lonely, like a lovely vulnerable flower deprived of water. She positively drooped.
A sympathetic look came into his eyes, turning them startling blue, warm and liquid. He wa
nted nothing more than to rush downstairs, throw the haven of his arms around her, and offer comfort and succor.
Forget about them, he wanted to say to her. You've got me.
But at the moment, time was their enemy. He had things he had to do, and he couldn't procrastinate.
He consulted his pocket watch, then snapped it decisively shut. If he didn't hurry, he would be late. And that was unthinkable, especially after Miss Clowney had gone through such pains to get him this job interview. Besides, he consoled himself, he would see Elizabeth-Anne later, after he got back. They'd agreed to meet at the tiny park, with its bandstand, at the south end of Main Street. Right now, he had time for a quick bath, and that was it. He was expected out at the Sexton ranch, and it wouldn't do to be late. Jobs for a young man, even one who was good at figures and writing, were not easy to come by, especially here in southwest Texas.
Twenty minutes later, as he headed out into the country in the buggy Elender had lent him, he noticed Jenny and her friends heading in the opposite direction on foot, toward a dilapidated shack at the far side of the railroad tracks. A half-hour after that, he arrived at the sprawling Sexton ranch house with five minutes to spare.
He tethered the horse, slapped the dust off his clothes, hopped up on the porch, and knocked confidently on the big double doors. A Mexican maid answered and led him down an endless series of cool corridors to Tex Sexton's office. Opening the carved dark-stained door, she stepped aside to let Zaccheus enter and said: 'Mr. Sexton will be with you shortly. He's out hunting.' Then she closed the heavy door quietly and he was alone.
The first thing that hit Zaccheus was the room's smells. The air was redolent with a mixture of expensive masculine fragrances: leather and wood, Cuban cigars, oils, and saddle wax. He walked over to one of the windows and gazed out at the ranchland at the back of the house. Cattle were grazing peacefully beyond the sheds and barns. He heard the heavy trampling of hooves, and several horses galloped into view and slid to a halt. Their riders, shotguns in hand, hopped limberly down off their saddles. One horse was riderless, but dragged a litter behind it. On it lay a slain deer.
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