by Sierra Rose
Although he noticed—she had no doubt he would have noticed—he made no mention of the blush but merely commented again on the air of utter peace and harmony that Miss Hannah had managed to create.
“It wasn’t just my work,” she said, to be fair. The compliment, while appreciated, was deftly turned aside in the way only Hannah had. “Amazin’ has helped me a lot, not only physically with the digging and planting, but with explaining about the various vegetation and shrubs we’ve put in.”
“You should be out here in the evening,” Molly added. “The lightning bugs are flashin’ to beat the band, and the little frogs are chirpin’, and the fragrance that wafts up here would just set you back on your heels.”
“She’s been studying up on herbs, too.” Letitia reached forward to pour more tea, crumbling in a tiny sugar loaf for flavor. “Doctor Havers is quite happy about that; he’s already been here a number of times, consulting on what plant would work for what illness, and putting some of Hannah’s specialties into his own medicine bag.”
Reese, beginning to work on his third cookie, looked contemplative. “Sounds like you might have a right lucrative little business there, Miss Burton, should you decide to pursue it.”
Surprised by the turn this conversation had taken, Hannah sat back and briefly considered the possibility. In her mind’s eye, she could actually see the sign of ownership: Hannah’s Herbs. Or Herbals by Hannah. The prospect brought an infrequent smile to her lips and a rare sparkle to her dark blue eyes.
“You plannin’ to be the one settin’ her up in that business, Mr. Barclay?” said the doctor in a cool tone, as he rounded the corner of the house to join them.
Immediately Reese hauled himself upright to his considerable height and reached out for a handshake. “H’lo, Doc. Takin’ some time off, are you?”
“Hard to take care of sick people when there ain’t no sick people about,” he grumped. “Is this a private party, or can anybody pull up a chair?”
“We have no extra chair, I’m afraid,” Molly explained prettily, “but there is a bench you may use. And, yes, by all means, pull it up.”
“Whatdya got here, cookies?” Gabriel, taking Molly at her word, asked with interest as he looked over the table. “Oh, my, I am a fan of cookies. Uh—anything more substantial lurkin’ about?”
Letitia, for the whom the sun had begun to shine brightly once again, and all was fair and right in the world with Reese’s return, laughed. “Has anyone ever called you incorrigible, Doctor?”
“Why, yes, they have, on a number of occasions. And not in a very flatterin’ way, neither. More shame on ’em.” His heavy brows lowered, he aimed the words directly at his assistant, who merely smiled and lifted one shoulder in surrender. “So, are you?”
“Is who, what?”
“Does Mr. Barclay here plan on settin’ Miss Burton up in business?”
Caught unaware, Reese spread both hands wide in a “Huh?” gesture. “Dunno what my plans are, goin’ forward.” Then, carrying the skirmish into what seemed an unfriendly camp, he suggested that the doctor himself might be willing to talk feasibility and practicality when it came to helping an enterprising entrepreneur get started.
“Huh.” He took a cookie while, carefully avoiding Hannah’s disdainful glance, he considered the proposition. “Maybe.”
“At any rate, it’s barely noon,” she pointed out. “We hadn’t even begun to consider preparing dinner yet. Besides, you surely are aware that Ben and Camellia are still away. Are we supposed to make free of their kitchen and supplies during their absence?”
Gabriel leaned forward to tick off an answer on each finger. “One: the time of day doesn’t have a blessed thing to do with the state of your stomach, if you haven’t eaten since last night.”
“If you have no sick people to care for, why haven’t you—”
“Two:” he swept on past her objection, a trifle testy, “of course I’m aware that Ben and Camellia are away; you figure me to be some lickspittle moron?”
“Truthfully, I didn’t figure you to be an average kind of moron, let alone a—”
“And, three: I assumed you’d prob’ly been makin’ free of their kitchen and supplies all along, since you’re watchin’ the place for ’em while they’re gone.”
The others had sat quietly in place, watching with some amusement this volley back and forth between the two combatants, as if it were a tennis match. Finally, since a ball had finally been lobbed into the far court, and left there, it seemed that hostilities had settled for the moment.
“Heard anything about anyone lookin’ to hire, roundabouts?” Reese put in, for a change of subject.
“Not much. We seem to have almost a full work force in town.” The doctor chewed contemplatively on another cookie and washed it down with lukewarm tea. “But I’ll keep an ear out.”
For a few minutes they discussed Turnabout’s mild sense of economic prosperity, and the types of businesses currently flourishing. Bath house, bakery, and hotel doing well; a newly opened insurance office, not so much. Likewise Norton’s Livery continued on its upward path, as did the gunsmith shop, several saloons, and the laundry, set up by a stout, staunch enterprising lady who had emigrated from some European country. But a flower shop, aptly named “Blooms” showed signs of malaise, and was, unfortunately, expected to go belly-up soon.
At this point, Gabriel had had enough. Grandly pulling out a pocket watch to consult, he showed the current hour to everyone around the table. “All right, lookahere. Past noon, and I’m plainly starvin’ to death, and no one seems to care. Ain’t one of you fine ladies gonna take pity on a dyin’ man?”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” sniffed Hannah, pushing back her chair into the green sod before either male could make a move to assist. “Some men are worse than toddlers, I do declare. Come along, then, through the back door, and we’ll see what we can scrape together in Camellia’s kitchen.”
“Now that is right Christian of you, Miss Burton. I surely do appreciate your—”
“And kindly stop dawdling,” Hannah, already swishing her skirts upon the porch steps, adjured irritably.
“Yes, ma’am. Yes, indeed, ma’am.” Gabe stood, looked around at the others once more mere spectators to a scene from which they had been excluded, and struck a pose. “Ours is not to reason why,” he declaimed resplendently. “Ours is but to do and die.”
“Gabriel!”
“Ahuh. Comin’!” He paused long enough for a wink. “Just think how badly I’d be treated if the lady didn’t at least tolerate me!” And hastened away, leaving behind him a spurt of laughter.
Once inside the cool, muted room, where Hannah, apron in place, was already bustling from pantry to cupboard and back again, the doctor stopped in the doorway. “And just why in tarnation am I here?”
“Because,” she told him succinctly, “for once in your life you can help prepare a meal you always manage to cadge from us.”
“Me?” He pretended astonishment. “Why, bless my soul, Miss Burton, I ain’t never done much more than brew a pot of coffee for myself. And those never turn out very good.”
“Imagine that. Here, take this butcher knife.”
“I’d rather have a scalpel.”
“Not to slice a rump of ham, you wouldn’t. There’s the cutting board; here’s a platter. Start working.”
Apparently cowed (or at least allowing her the illusion of his being cowed), Gabe looked her up and down for a minute. “And just what will you be doin’, Missy, while I’ve been set to this manly task?”
“Making cornbread and frying potatoes.” Lard was already beginning to melt and sputter in the iron skillet, since the Burton girls, having planned to enjoy their noontime meal here, had started a fire in the cook stove not long ago. She returned his look with an unexpected spark of humor. “And I might serve the blackberry pie that Molly picked up from the bakery this morning.”
“Oh, woman, the key to my heart. There’s nothin’ I like
better than blackberry pie.”
“Of course. Unless it’s peach cobbler, or raisin cake. I do believe I hear that from you about every morsel of food you gobble up in this household.”
“I do not,” intoned Gabe, with mock hurt, “gobble. I merely consume with vigor, that’s all. It’s what a doctor does. Because he’s usually rushin’ around from house to house, tendin’ patients.”
“M’h’m. Business must be picking up again. How are you doing with that ham?”
For a few minutes they worked together in (almost) companionable silence. The clink of knife and fork onto the platter; the sizzle of cooked potatoes being fried to succulent crispiness; the clank of the oven door being opened and closed for the pan of cornbread. Small background sounds, accompanied by mouth-watering scents that would likely draw those at the back yard table inside like iron filings to a magnet.
“Gabe.”
“Ahuh. These slices aren’t too thick, are they? A man likes to be able to see what he’s eatin’, y’ know, not have the food transparent. But I could—”
“Gabriel, listen to me a minute.”
He nearly dropped his weapon in surprise. Hannah, wanting to talk seriously with him? Goldarnit, couldn’t she have chosen a better time than here and now, when they were busy getting ready to fill his stomach and someone might walk in at any second?
“Yes, Miss Burton. I’m listenin’.”
She was standing near the sink, backlit by a shaft of mid-day sunlight that colored her hair with a rich blue-bronze, both hands knotted together at the waist of her white apron.
“This Reese Barclay of Letty’s, that she’s picked up.”
“I know the man.” As if he were a bit of crumpled newspaper that had been discarded in the streets, and Letty were removing him for disposal. “What about him?”
“Does he remind you of anyone?”
“H’mmm...can’t say as he does. Maybe similar to a thousand other cowpokes that’ve crossed my path over the years. Never really thought about it.”
Hannah wanted to stamp her foot in frustration. “Well, then, do. Do think about it!”
Baffled, Gabriel put down his knife, leaned against the counter, and considered her, this waspish-tempered but gloriously beautiful woman who had decided to make her own way in life. “All right. I’m thinkin’. And, no, there’s nobody that might—huh. Well, now, I dunno. Seems like there’s a spark of somethin’...”
“Exactly. I feel the same. There’s something—some mannerism, or way of speaking—but I can’t quite put my finger on it.”
“Well, Miss Burton,” considering the matter settled (or unimportant, which would be worse, in her eyes), he had turned back to his slicing and dicing, “when you figure it out, lemme know, will ya?”
Giving up on the chance to have someone else in her corner, whatever her opinion, Hannah sniffed and took up her wooden stirring spoon. “By all means,” she assured him, with acid on her tongue and iron in her soul. “I shall be happy to.”
Just then came the anticipated, familiar creak of the screened door being opened. “Oh, Hannah, honey, I’m sorry for being such a derelict,” caroled Molly, entering with the tray of teapot and cups. “I meant to come in earlier and help you. But we just got to talkin’, and—”
“It’s all right.” Hannah, pink-cheeked and tight-lipped with irritation (although not directed at Molly, as she guiltily supposed), turned from the skillet of potatoes. “As you see, we have things well in hand. But, if you could get some coffee going, that would be a help. And Letty can set the table. That is—where is Letty?”
Molly put down her burden to begin unpinning her hat. “Oh, I thought I ought to give the courting couple some privacy. They’ll be along directly.”
Tactful, thought the doctor.
Waste of time, thought their sister.
It might be that both were correct in their estimation.
Chapter Ten
“TISH,” HE SAID.
“Tish?”
“Ahuh. Just wonderin’ if anyone had ever called you that, ’steada Letty.”
Sisters and guests had consumed the noon meal (Reese with unabashed gusto; Letitia, watching curiously, supposed she’d better learn how to cook) amid a pleasant air of conversation and congeniality. And, since the doctor and Hannah were seated side by side, a good deal of teasing and a small bit of sniping.
Afterward, the girls had cleaned up in the kitchen (and Hannah, grudgingly but voluntarily, slapped several big chunks of ham between two fat slices of sourdough bread to send along with the doctor). Meanwhile, Reese and Gabriel wandered outside into the sweet October sunshine to smoke a couple of cheroots and talk about whatever it is that men talk about when their womenfolk aren’t around.
Some time had passed before Gabe decided he ought to return to the office, just in case some desperately ill patient came crawling in to seek his services. Then Molly, hat firmly on head and impish grin firmly in place, betook herself off to jail. It was time, she told her sisters, as a farewell, that the man she loved paid her some attention. After all, she would soon be his wife, and she intended not to be a neglected one! Third to leave was Hannah, who had decided her boarding room bedroom would serve as retreat to read and take a nice long nap.
That left Reese and Letty to their own devices. Yes, Letty assured everyone, they would lock up the house again. No, they two would not linger too long here, alone. Yes, certainly, she understood about decorum, and all that. For Heaven’s sake, did they believe she was a child?
“Tish,” she repeated again, now, tasting the word.
The back yard, on this perfect autumn afternoon, with its towering trees and leaves tinged with a slight change of color and inviting twig furniture, had called them back. The weather was too gorgeous to stay confined indoors, and enough privacy from any neighbors’ view was guaranteed to be provided by shrubs and bushes galore.
After seating Letitia on the bench, Reese had pulled up a chair opposite and leaned forward into their tête-à-tête, knees spread apart and forearms braced on thighs. He had removed his Stetson once again, so that a sweet soft breeze ruffled his hair and lifted the open collar of his shirt. Turning his head a bit, he sniffed appreciatively like a hunting dog following the quarry’s scent.
A captivated Letty could only sit still, simply drinking him in. She wondered how good fortune had so smiled upon her—guided her, in fact—that she had chosen this particular man, of the dozen or so who had responded to her newspaper advertisement. She wondered if Molly had felt the same.
“Yeah,” said Reese into the quiet, smiling as if he understood her mood and the tenor of her thoughts. “I kinda like Tish. If you do.”
A cardinal suddenly burst out into song almost directly overhead, flashed its brilliant red plumage from one branch to another, then flew off into the misty blue sky. Looking for seeds, no doubt. Or warning off another male from his territory. Several bumblebees, already drunk on nectar, buzzed their way from flower to flower collecting pollen and encouraging the development of
more. In the distance, one of Abel Norton’s livery pups set up a sudden barking, briefly subsided, barked again, stopped.
Letitia felt unexpectedly breathless. And slightly nervous. And fluttery, like someone being propelled slowly and carefully across the planks of some swinging bridge, high above a gorge.
“Yes, Reese. I do like it.”
For a few minutes they basked in the silence around them. No words, no half-parsed sentences, only eloquent shared glances that spoke more than any utterance ever could. Taking measure from substance, and finding satisfaction.
He reached out to clasp her hand, twining her slender fingers loosely through his. “Me, too. You wanna discuss somethin’ serious?”
In her imagination, that pesky swinging bridge began to rock slightly, moving back and forth just enough to jar the nerves. “Serious. You mean sad? Distressing? Disturbing?”
His grin lit up every line of his face, lightening the exp
ression of his eyes, sending the white scar into oblivion. “Kinda depends on how you feel about it.”
“Well, Reese, I won’t know until you tell me.”
Still keeping hold, he stood and breached their few inches of decorous separation to seat himself on the bench beside her. “Thought you might like to talk about the future.”
He was close. So close. Enough that she could feel the warmth and solidity of his thigh pressed against hers, and that alone initiated a slight trembling. But wariness crept in, to settle over her like a chill cloak of uncertainty. “All right...”
His gaze swept down to their linked hands, then up to zero in on her face, to take in every detail of buttermilk complexion and quartz-blue eyes as if he were committing her features to memory.
“I was mighty taken with your ad,” he told her softly, harking back over the past few months. “You wrote just enough to get me interested.”
“And you sent me your first letter.”
“I sure did. Wasn’t sure what was gonna happen—whether you would be considerin’ better offers—but I didn’t wanna take a chance on you gettin’ away.”
Their smiles blossomed forth at the same time: warm, sweet, generous.
“You didn’t, really?”
“No, ma’am. I felt right from the beginnin’ you were a keeper. But—”
“—But—?” Letitia’s heart had begun beating a muffled lub-dub lub-dub, like the slow up-and-down swishing of a butter churn.
“—I have some reservations.”
“Do you, now?” As a defense against implied criticism, she lifted her chin, proudly, and carefully slid her hand free from his. Was their arrangement for this marriage contract to suddenly fall apart, after her slow but apparently inevitable capitulation to his charm during the past few days? “Well, then, perhaps we ought to part ways, here and now, instead of—”
