by Pamela Morsi
Tom glanced at him in interest. "She's got a rig named after her."
The cowboy nodded. "It's one of those they're drilling out on the hill. The P. Calhoun Number One, the latest exploration well of King Calhoun's Royal Oil."
"A working oil well is one dang purty sight," he continued. "And Princess Calhoun ain't no dog."
"Oh no?"
"To an old ranch hand like myself, I'd describe her more as a little brown heifer."
"A heifer?"
"She's a heifer all right," the mustached man said. "Guess her name ought not to be Princess but Bossy!"
"She sure knows how to tell a man what to do," another fellow agreed. "I worked for her on this house, she about wore my ears out with her ideas and orders."
"Bossy, that's a good name for a heifer."
“But what a heifer,” the cowboy declared. "Worth one million dollars on the hoof."
Beside him a man whistled in awe.
"A million dollars?"
Tom's throat went dry at the thought.
"The man who marries Princess Calhoun won't be breaking his back on a damned old oil rig," the lanky cowboy said with certainty. "And he won't be having to dress up in his old army uniform to earn an extra ten dollars on his day off, neither."
"You know, that gal ain't half so ugly as I was thinking!" the burly fellow with the mustache exclaimed.
The rest of the men laughed with him.
"Not so plain, maybe," the mustached man agreed. "But what kind of man would be wantin' to be told 'come here and sic 'em' for the rest of his life."
Tom shook his head. A million dollars. A woman worth a million dollars. It was almost more than a man could get his thoughts around.
Ambrose Dexter was probably worth a million dollars, he thought. But then, Ambrose's family owned a steel factory, a linen mill, and their own bank.
Rich people. He knew them, understood them, and sometimes despised them. And more than anything else, he was determined to become one of them.
The recruits were admonished once more. "Don't get drunk. Stay clean. And show up on the podium when Mr. Calhoun begins the festivities."
Tom barely listened. He had no intention of doing anything to muddy his uniform or risk losing the money he was to be paid. Ten dollars was a month's wages in most places he'd been. Here in the oil fields, it was about the cost of a fine steak dinner. But then, crackling meat was more what fellows like him were eating.
The men began to move away from the barn. Tom wandered off by himself, content to go it alone. The area behind the mansion was barren and rough. There were no formal gardens with stone paths between an abundance of flowers and shrubs. There was merely a wide expanse of half-hewn prairie grass and a few hardy wildflowers, resistant to the midsummer heat. In the center stood a raised wooden platform, shaded rather ineffectively with a tarpaulin roof, grandly referred to as "the gazebo."
"Pitiful," Tom whispered aloud and shook his head.
He reached the far end of the open area and leaned against the sturdy trunk of an aged cottonwood. He surveyed the area as a whole. The gardenless garden, the raw, unattractive barn and the rather small, ill-conceived house. With a million dollars, this was the best King Calhoun could do?
Tom shook his head derisively. It was all very raw, very new. Nothing looked like it really belonged there. Tom had seen the graceful gardens of the rich. He had seen the casual elegance that came with old money and the tasteful taming of nature by the finest families in the country. He had seen Ambrose Dex-ter's country house. In his mind he pictured the place—lush magnificence, understated elegance.
Poor King Calhoun, he thought to himself, like a scrub brush set among the ornamental ferns. No matter how long he grew there, he'd never cease to draw attention to himself.
Calhoun, like Tom himself, was up from nothing, and everybody knew it. The difference was that Calhoun could now buy off his detractors, but apparently the fellow didn't know how. Tom knew exactly what to do, but didn't have a nickel to his name.
His year in the Rough Riders had taught him much about life and the world. More than he could have ever learned in the Methodist Indian Home. Much of that knowledge, however, was about inequity and injustice. Life was a stacked deck, loaded dice, an unleveled wheel. A man born with name and fortune could find success at every turn. A man born with neither soon learned that even the mildest triumph would continually elude him. Some days Tom wished he didn't understand so much. Sometimes he wished he was still the silent, mixed-breed stable hand Reverend McAfee had intended him to be. But he had been Gerald Tarkington Crane. It was an experience a man didn't forget.
The French doors at the west end of the house were flung open and a steady stream of servants bustled in and out. The air seemed almost charged with the abundance of hectic activity. Everywhere he looked, tables were being set, flowers being arranged.
Servants. The word was a bitter taste in his mouth. Servants, those who serve. At least they knew who they were. They understood what they did. Most people were not so lucky. Tom had discovered that in the great America where all men were created equal, there existed only those who are served and the people who served them.
An argument broke out concerning spoons. Tom almost smiled at the resulting pandemonium. It might be a picnic, but it was obviously not an occasion for hiding the good silver. King Calhoun might be the unwashed, but he was definitely the wealthy. King Calhoun and the men like him were the examples to emulate, Tom thought. He was a servant who was now being served. That's what Tom wanted for himself.
A movement at the doors caught his eye. Talking a mile a minute, a young woman stepped from the doorway into the yard. She was regally gowned in a mustard silk trimmed with Irish lace, her waist was cinched fashionably narrow. Her hair was coiffed in the prevailing style made popular by the Gibson Girl, but the effect was spoiled by the bottle-thick lens of her spectacles. Tom looked her over head to foot and gave his personal nod of approval.
So this was King Calhoun's Princess. Tom eyed her assessingly. Neither dog nor heifer, this one million dollars on the hoof would win no blue ribbon at any county fair. Yet it was not that she had anything desperately wrong with her, Tom thought. She was burdened with no tragic limp, no frightening scars, no horrible disfigurement. She was tall, actually quite tall for a woman, although she was not particularly slim and lithe. Her hips were wide and Tom had always preferred dainty, delicate females. But he'd been around enough to appreciate a full-bodied voluptuous woman. She had a round, provocative backside. Unfortunately her bosom, though generously decorated with ruffles and lace, was decidedly boyish.
But it was not the physical appearance of Princess Calhoun that made a strong impression. It was the sound of her voice. It had a deep, almost masculine pitch, and the tone was brisk and strident.
As Tom watched her he was reminded of cavalry drill. The snapping of orders that men and animals obeyed without question. It was almost as if he could hear her calling cadence.
Fold those napkins, find those spoons
Serve the stuffed goose with the prunes
The imagined scene brought a grin to his face. Princess Calhoun, Tom decided, would have made an admirable drill sergeant. That was not a virtue generally found attractive to gentlemen.
Poor Princess, Tom thought to himself and then hastily discarded his sympathy. She was not poor. She was an heiress. She was the wealthy and undoubtedly spoiled daughter of a millionaire. She probably gave orders because she believed herself intrinsically superior to those around her. If she had a strident voice and a less than cuddly corset shape, well a man could suffer deafness by choice and any deficiency in bust measurement could more than be compensated for by the size of the young lady's pocketbook. A clever determined man could devote himself to following her orders and making her feel beautiful the rest of her life.
Chapter 2
Tom watched the festivities with a skeptical eye. The great King Calhoun had not deigned to show
up until things were well under way. Arrogance. Tom was certain that was it. Pure arrogance. He could admire that. He certainly had his own share of it.
"Who exactly do you mink you are?" Cyril Up-church had asked him angrily one evening in San Antonio.
"Whoever I damn well choose to be," Tom had answered.
In some ways that was true. In others it was the biggest lie of all. Tom had been pretending most of his life. He'd come into the world with no name at all. He therefore felt that whatever name he gave himself was just as valid as the one that Reverend McAfee had given him.
One summer he'd called himself John L. Sullivan and routinely bloodied the nose of any boy who dared refer to him as Tom. By the following winter he was Billy Sunday, holding tabernacle revival meetings every afternoon.
Tonight, he was completely anonymous. People moved around him, but they knew neither his face nor his name. He was nobody. He could be anybody.
The food was good, the people welcoming. The uniform had always commanded a great deal of respect, but it had been a long time since Tom had worn it.
He'd tossed a few horseshoes and listened to a few rowdy jokes. Somebody dragged a hundred length of two-inch jute rope across a bar ditch, and a tug of war between the rig builders and the tank builders ensued. The friendly competition between the two groups of workers was made lively by such derisive taunts as "chop down the pond gougers" and "set the flametorch to those sawdust sifters.”
Tom clapped and cheered along with the others until the rig builders finally managed to pull the tank line into the ditch. There was some frustrated cursing from the losers, but the defeat was accepted with fairly good grace.
The gray of the evening was beginning to leaden the sky as the torches around the gazebo were lit. Calhoun stood on the dais joking and laughing with the crowd.
The man who'd hired him caught Tom's eye and motioned him toward the gazebo. The other uniformed Rough Riders were also headed that way.
Here's where I earn my dollar, Tom thought to himself, and made his way through the crowd. He joined the other men on the stage standing behind the host of the festivities.
The audience gazed up at them in undisguised admiration. Tom allowed his eyes to wander among them. Most were poor working folks, like himself. But there was money among this crowd.
The trappings of wealth and privilege, when not anointed by blood, could only be achieved in two ways, either hard work or underhanded means. In this place, in this time, with rich, black crude oil greasing the way, hard work had been the answer for these people. Tom Walker was not so particular about the method, only the outcome.
King Calhoun was energetic and long-winded. If stirring up shouts for the red, white, and blue was good enough for politicians, it was good enough for Royal Oil. He apparently loved hearing the sound of his own voice, and at length the rich oil man talked about another Fourth of July eight years earlier.
"The Rough Riders had taken heavy casualties on the charge up San Juan Hill," Calhoun told the crowd. "They would not march victorious into Santiago for two more weeks."
King, florid-faced and portly, shook his head dramatically. Not a sound was heard from those assembled. "We know that they were tired," he continued. "And we know that they were hurting, many dying on the bloody fields of Cuba."
Tom Walker had seen combat duty. He had killed men he never knew based merely upon the color of his uniform. He had watched young men die for a cause they couldn't quite articulate. And he'd saved Ambrose Dexter's life. He felt no pride or honor or glory for it. It had not been done bravely, but without thought at all. Tom was a man of action. And a man's actions can lie as surely as his words. His life in the Rough Riders had taught him that, too.
King Calhoun stepped back and motioned for a young man in a striped seersucker suit to step forward. Behind them the band began to play. The smiling fellow raised a megaphone to his lips and raised his soothing tenor voice in song.
"While the shot and shell were screaming
Upon the battlefield;
The boys were bravely fighting
Their noble flag to shield;
Came a cry from their brave captain,
'Look boys! our flag is down;
Who'll volunteer to save it from disgrace?'
'I will,' a young voice shouted.
I’ll bring it back or die.'"
Tom had heard the tune a thousand times. It was pure sap and sentiment. Written by a Tin Pan Alley scribbler with less knowledge of life or war than plow horse, the song was closely associated with the Rough Riders. It never failed to bring a tear to the eyes of a crowd.
" ‘Just break the news to mother,
She knows how dear I love her.
And tell her not to wait for me,
For I'm not coming home.'"
Tom observed the expressions on the faces before him. As the last strains of harmony faded, the emotion was almost palpable.
King Calhoun stepped forward once more and gestured to the men in uniform. "I give you, good people of Topknot and Burford Corners . . . true defenders of American freedom!"
A boisterous applause arose from the crowd. Cheers and whistles and long-forgotten calls to "Remember the Maine!" filled the air.
Deliberately Tom kept his face expressionless. The band struck up a faster, happier tune and Calhoun invited the crowd to shake the hands of the heroes. People surged onto the dais.
For twenty minutes, Tom and the others were slapped on the back, congratulated, and generally adored by strangers. It was not an unwelcome form of entertainment. Tom revelled in their attention even as he stoically maintained a demeanor of dignity.
"It's a privilege to meet you," the strangers said over and over. "Thank you." Tom almost had to bite his lip not to add, But who do you think that you've met?
He continued to shake hands, to speak politely, to accept the accolades that came his way. Then, as if he felt the gaze on the back of his neck, he turned to meet a pair of brown, bespectacled eyes staring at him from across the distance of the lawn. Princess Calhoun's expression was so openly adoring, Tom was momentarily taken aback.
He nodded slightly in recognition, only to see her look away hastily, a vivid blush staining her cheek. Poor Princess, he thought to himself. She'd obviously never learned the danger of wearing her heart on her sleeve.
Tom was, he'd been told, just about the most handsome fellow to ever don a pair of trousers. And he'd had sufficient luck with ladies over the years to have developed a confidence in his charm.
Deliberately he perused the young woman from head to toe. Then, keeping his lips perfectly still and noncommittal, he smiled from his eyes alone. It was a technique proven over and over to set the most hardened female heart aflutter. It felt as if he were giving a gift. The bossy drill sergeant in skirts would never be able to actually attract a man's eye in that fashion.
Then he remembered how attractive and desirable a million dollars could be. He began to walk in her direction.
It wasn't as if he'd planned it, he assured himself as he approached her. He'd never intended to approach her. It had been her eyes that had sought him out. And it wasn't as if things were all settled. If she turned out to be too small a catch, he'd ease her off the hook and throw her back.
He kept his eyes upon hers as each step brought them closer and closer. Her expression was awestruck, her hands clutched together over her heart.
Geez, almighty! he mentally exclaimed. She'd already swallowed hook, line, and sinker, and he had yet to even offer the bait.
He stood in front of her now, gazing down into wide brown eyes made inordinately large by thick, round spectacles, and complimented her in a way that he knew would be closest to her heart.
"It's a lovely party," he said.
The words came from his mouth, not in the slow, slightly nasal accent that came natural to him, but in the clipped Yankee tones that he had so carefully perfected.
Her mouth formed a big O of
dumbstruck appreciation. He took her hand in both of his own, merely holding it gently without the merest hint of caress.
He glanced around and sighed with feigned exasperation. "As there is no one in proximity to formally introduce us, may I be so bold as to present myself to you?"
She remained wide-eyed and mute.
"I am Gerald Tarkington Crane," he said. "Late of Bedlington in the New Jersey and Yale University, class of '98."
"I . . . I . . . I . . ."
He squeezed her hand comfortingly. "You needn't speak," he assured her. "Standing within the mere presence of a lady such as yourself is quite enough."
"I . . . I'm Princess Calhoun," she managed finally.
"What a beautiful name," he answered. "And so suited to you."
"Oh no, not at all," she blurted out.
He smiled at her, this time using his whole face, flashing his pearly white grin with devastating effect.
"You don't think yourself a princess, Miss Calhoun?"
She was taking long, nervous breaths that had the effect of causing the abundance of ruffles upon her breast to rise and fall dramatically.
"You must call me Princess," she told him, her face flaming with her own boldness. "All my friends do."
Tom angled his head slightly and lowered his voice to a seductive timbre. "I don't think I care to be lumped in with all your friends. Perhaps I can give you a special name."
She was clutching his hand like a lifeline. He could feel her trembling.
"My best friend, Muna, calls me Prin," she admitted.
"Then I definitely don't want to do that," he said. "It sounds too much like prim, and doesn't suit you at all."
Princess looked momentarily surprised. Clearly she must have thought it a very apt description.
"I shall call you Cessy," he said.
"Cessy?"
"Yes, Cessy. May I?"
"It sounds strange."
He smiled down at her warmly as if she'd made some very clever little joke. "It doesn't sound strange to you and me." He leaned toward her once more. "And no one else need ever know."
"Cessy?" She whispered it as if it were already a secret between them.
