Cloaked (Once Upon a Western Book 1)

by Rachel Kovaciny

  Mr. Linden sat there for half a minute or more. Then he chuckled. “Suit yourself.” When he rose from his chair, his knee brushed against hers.

  Mary Rose made no sign that she had noticed. She did not lower her book even a smidgeon until he was gone and the door closed behind him. Then she dropped the book on her lap and let out a sigh of frustration. The nerve of the man! Impugning her grandmother’s taste in books and friends, and as much as accusing Hauer of... of what? When she stopped to think over his words, she saw Mr. Linden had not said anything libelous. His vague and generalized comments had made her feel uneasy, but not for any definite reasons.

  Try as she might, Mary Rose could not regain her interest in Pride and Prejudice. She set it aside and stared out the window at the outbuildings, wishing for the lunch bell to ring.

  Instead, the door opened again. Mary Rose picked up her book hastily, then sighed with relief when Jubilee entered. “Oh,” she said before she thought about her words, “I’m so glad it’s you!”

  “You are?”

  “Yes. That is, of course I’m happy to see you, Grandmother.”

  “Did you expect someone else?”

  “No. That is, I thought it might be Mr. Linden again, but...” Mary Rose wasn’t sure how to finish that sentence, so she didn’t.

  “Mr. Linden?” Jubilee came closer. “So that’s where he went. I wondered. What was he doing in here?”

  “Oh... talking nonsense, you might say,” Mary Rose said uncertainly. Should she tell her grandmother what Mr. Linden had implied? Would her grandmother laugh it off or take it seriously? Mr. Linden had made Mary Rose uncomfortable several times in the past few days, but Jubilee obviously viewed him quite favorably. Would she even believe him capable of unsettling someone?

  “What nonsense?” Jubilee looked stern.

  “Well, we... we talked about Jane Austen a bit.” Mary Rose held up the book as proof.

  “Pride and Prejudice! I haven’t read that in so many years.” Jubilee’s expression softened. “Your grandfather and I read that whole book out loud the winter that...” She shook her head a bit, as though tossing away a memory. “Never mind. I’m glad you dug that out. It should be read more often, not left to molder. Are you enjoying it?”

  “Oh, yes, I am.” Or, she had been until Mr. Linden arrived, anyway.

  “Wonderful.” Jubilee turned to go, then paused. “I came to tell you I’ve laid my green riding skirt on your bed. Have you a belt?”

  “Yes.”

  “Let me know if it doesn’t suit you. When we ride into town Saturday, we’ll visit my dressmaker. I’m sure she can make you a skirt or two in no time.”

  “Thank you,” Mary Rose said.

  “You’re quite welcome.” Jubilee gestured to the book. “I’ll leave you with Lizzy and Mr. Darcy until lunch time.” And she was gone.

  Mary Rose was more confused than ever. Jubilee was kind, but so distant still. Would Mary Rose ever feel less stiff in her presence? Would she ever belong here on this ranch, among these people? She feared she would not be spending a happy, carefree summer out West the way she had fancied for so long. Why couldn’t she somehow make reality match her imaginings?

  Chapter Six

  The next two days repeated the previous two. On Thursday, Mary Rose spent all morning riding Patience. Old Joe told her that until she could handle the old mare’s trotting without looking like an addled sailor, he would not trust her on a faster horse. But he did allow her to ride in the bigger pasture behind the house instead of in the little corral. Patience seemed to enjoy this, and at the end of their lesson Old Joe taught Mary Rose how to urge Patience into a faster gait, which he called a lope.

  Unlike trotting, which Mary Rose considered some sort of odd punishment horses inflicted on their riders, loping was a joy. Patience moved smoothly beneath Mary Rose, and though no one would call her a racehorse, she still had some speed left to her. Mary Rose threw back her head and gloried in the sensation of air rushing past while land disappeared beneath the horse’s hooves. This was how she had dreamed riding a horse would be! Why, it was like running, but better!

  If Patience had been willing and able, Mary Rose would have ridden her at a lope from one end of that pasture to the other and back again all afternoon.

  However, Patience was not willing. And when the lunch bell clanged, Mary Rose discovered that she had worked up a powerful hunger. But she couldn’t go to lunch until she had ridden Patience back to the stable, watered her, taken off the bridle and saddle, rubbed her down, and put everything away where it belonged. Old Joe insisted that Mary Rose learn to care for horses too, not merely how to stay on them and look pretty.

  When Mary Rose finished tending Patience, she felt like she hadn’t eaten for at least two days. She stepped out of the stable and nearly collided with Mr. Linden. Of course. He somehow always knew where to find her.

  “Miss Mary,” he greeted her. “We were wondering if you had missed hearing the dinner bell. Your grandmother was quite concerned.” Once again he offered her his arm while they walked up the drive to the big house.

  To avoided taking his arm, Mary Rose used both hands to pick up the front of her skirts and keep them out of the dirt. She was wearing the green riding skirt Jubilee had loaned her, and of course she would not want to get it dirty, would she? “I had to tend Patience after my ride,” she explained.

  “You shouldn’t have to do that.” Mr. Linden sounded disgusted. “What is Jubilee paying that old man for, if he can’t even take a saddle off a horse once in a while?”

  Mary Rose looked at him. “What business is it of yours who my grandmother pays, and for what?”

  “She’s made it my business. Surely you know why I’m here—her finances are in a terrible state. I’m straightening them up the best I can, but I’m afraid she’s paid no attention to expenditures and income since your grandfather died. I’ve been studying them for days now, and I’m still not sure if she’s in debt or not.” He shook his head. “I’ve unsnarled a good many such messes, but never one this bad.”

  “I see.” Mary Rose wondered if this was why Jubilee’s ranch had been short-handed that spring. Had she been unable to hire as many cowhands as she needed? She imagined what her parents would say if they knew her grandmother might not be so well-off as they had assumed. Would they want her to stay? Tell her to come home?

  She knew right then that she wanted to stay the rest of the summer. Old Joe had promised that she would be ready for a better mount with another lesson or two. He had one all picked out, though he refused to tell her which of the half-dozen he kept near the stables was the one he meant. And Hauer had promised to tell her more about life growing up with the Cheyenne. And she was starting to find things to talk about with Jubilee in the evenings.

  Back home, she was of little use now that she had finished school. To stay at home, embroidering pillowcases for her hope chest, enduring the pestering of her little brothers and sister, and attending the same parties with the same people—it was so dull when compared with life on the ranch. Her siblings didn’t need much looking after anymore, and how many pillowcases was she going to need as a married woman someday anyway?

  No, it was better that her parents knew nothing whatever about Mr. Linden’s dim views of her grandmother’s finances. After all, he might be wrong. He’d said himself that he didn’t know yet what the true state of them was.

  Mary Rose tried to dismiss these thoughts during lunch but ended up with a headache. Jubilee blamed the hours spent in the bright sun, and Mary Rose did not argue. She went to her room and took a long nap, not waking until golden light slanted through her curtains. From her window she saw Hauer walking down the road that wound down to the house around the far side of the pasture. It must be nearly supper time. Riding a horse for several hours certainly had tired her out. She didn’t see how cowboys could spend all day in the saddle—and sometimes all night too. They must get used to it somehow, but Mary Rose was glad she didn’
t need to.

  Saturday morning found Mary Rose riding Patience once again, but not inside a pasture or corral this time. She rode beside her grandmother’s stylish buggy, with Mr. Linden on her other side mounted on a sleek black gelding borrowed from Jubilee. Hauer drove the buggy, and Jubilee sat next to him, wrapped in the beautiful red cloak she had worn the evening Mary Rose arrived. The sun had barely risen, and the Wyoming morning air nipped at her, making Mary Rose grateful for the old coat Mrs. Mills had loaned her.

  Jubilee wanted to leave as early as possible, chill or no chill in the air, so she would not have to contend with such a large crowd in town. The night before, she had explained to Mary Rose that most people on the surrounding ranches came to town on Saturday to shop or trade or gossip. Jubilee would rather do her own business before the stores became too crowded.

  When they reached town, Mary Rose had warmed up enough to remove the borrowed coat and leave it in the buggy. She’d been happy to have it on the ride to town but did not want to wear it any longer than necessary. Like many another sixteen-year-old girl, she had vanity enough not to want to be seen wearing a dingy black coat so old it looked green in certain lights.

  Hauer dropped Jubilee and Mary Rose at a small cottage down a side street before he took the buggy horse and Patience to the livery stable for feed and water. Mr. Linden had offered to accompany Jubilee and Mary Rose, but when Jubilee explained they were going to her dressmaker’s, he declared he would meet them later, when he was finished looking over Jubilee’s accounts at the bank. He wanted to see whether they agreed or disagreed with the books she kept at home.

  The dressmaker asked Mary Rose an endless stream of cheery questions about her trip and how she liked Wyoming. While she talked, she measured Mary Rose in every way imaginable, jotting mysterious notes and symbols on a sheet of paper. When she’d finished, she let Mary Rose choose fabric for two riding skirts from a stack of samples. Mary Rose selected a dark brown she thought looked practical and would not show off dirt, and a dusky blue she couldn’t resist because it was so pretty.

  As they left, Jubilee hung back for a moment and whispered something to the dressmaker, who said she would be delighted and should have it finished in plenty of time. Mary Rose longed to ask what would be ready, and in time for what, but since it was obviously a secret, she did not give in to her curiosity. Out loud, at least. Privately she came up with several theories, from a new party dress to an apron for doing all the housework before the dance.

  From the dressmaker’s, Jubilee led Mary Rose down the town’s main street to a large establishment with an elaborate sign that read “Dry Goods.” Mary Rose thought the sign’s words and style amusingly at odds, for if you were going to pay to have a three-foot-high sign painted in red and gold letters with many ornamental flourishes, why not call your store an emporium or other fancified name while you were at it? But when she stepped inside, the sign made more sense. The store was the oddest mixture of elegant and ordinary. Barrels of nails stood next to a dressmaker’s dummy wearing a dress that would have been the height of fashion in Peoria last Christmas. Hats trimmed with feathers, ribbons, and lace hung beside calico bonnets. A glass-fronted counter held pocket watches and penny candy.

  Enthralled, Mary Rose wandered amid haphazardly placed shelves and tables piled with a staggering variety of objects. A copy of Shakespeare’s plays caught her eye, half hidden under a pile of almanacs. She leafed through it, finding a few favorite plays. Her family owned a similar, albeit fancier, volume. Next she gazed at the bolts of fabric crammed onto shelves that stretched from waist height to the ceiling. Most were sturdy cloth that would endure much wearing, but a few bolts of fashionable sateen gleamed on a high shelf.

  Jubilee had instructed her to find a hat she could wear during her riding lessons, and Mary Rose spent a good ten minutes at a mirror deciding which hat suited her hair and face best. She decided on a pale brown hat with leather strings that tied under her chin to keep the hat in place. Jubilee approved the choice and then went on with her own shopping.

  Mary Rose wandered about again, stopping in front of that glass-fronted counter. She crouched before it to examine the sweets. Eight jars of various types of penny candy stood enticingly at the right height to catch a child’s eye. Behind them were bowls holding more expensive treats. She saw golden rectangles she expected would be butterscotch, pink discs that might be rose-flavored lozenges, and green that would doubtless be wintergreen. The dark brown hard candy might be horehound, or maybe anise, which Mary Rose’s mother favored to soothe a cough. But Mary Rose’s gaze lingered on the butterscotch. She remembered so well the way their cook at home would make butterscotch for a special treat when Mary Rose was young. Now that she and her siblings were growing older, childish joys like making candy together were fast disappearing, and she regretted this loss.

  Mary Rose was so focused on the sweets that she did not notice someone walk up to the case and stand next to her until that someone dropped down beside her to see what had captured her attention. It was a young man, perhaps twenty years of age, with thick brown hair and a pleasant profile. He studied the candy, not looking at her at all. Mary Rose realized after a moment that she was staring at him in a most unladylike manner. She returned her attention to the candy, only to meet his gaze in his reflection on the glass.

  “Hello,” the young man said in a voice so rich and sweet it matched the butterscotch Mary Rose had longed for.

  “Hello,” she replied in surprise.

  “Which one?” he asked seriously.

  In the reflection, Mary Rose could see that he had bright blue eyes and an open, friendly face. She wondered what he’d meant. “I beg your pardon?”

  “Which one of those candies made you look so wistful?”

  “Oh!” Mary Rose laughed self-consciously. “The butterscotch. I haven’t had it in such a long time.”

  “Ah.” He smiled so infectiously that she smiled back at his reflection. “It so happens, I’m partial to butterscotch myself.” He stood and offered his hand to help her rise.

  She accepted his help gratefully, her legs cramped from crouching in front of the candy. Once she was on her feet she found, to her great surprise, that this young man could properly be described as a giant. He was the tallest man she had ever met, standing more than a foot taller than she did. When she noticed her hand still rested in his, she withdrew it hastily, but then wondered if doing so might offend him. To cover her confusion, she said the first thing that crossed her mind. “What a coincidence! That we both prefer butterscotch, I mean.”

  “So it is.” The young man continued to smile at her. “If I had to guess, I would say it’s my favorite candy.”

  “Really?” Mary Rose looked away, flustered. She spotted Jubilee approaching and added, “Oh, here comes my grandmother.” She somehow needed to keep talking, even if she said something dull or nonsensical.

  Jubilee reached them, beaming with the most genuine smile Mary Rose had yet seen from her. “Good morning, Christopher. I see you’ve met my granddaughter.”

  “In a way, though I suppose you ought to properly introduce us.”

  “Then may I present my granddaughter, Miss Mary Rose O’Brien. Mary Rose, this is Deputy Christopher Small, my godson.”

  Deputy Small took Mary Rose’s hand and bowed over it, a courtly gesture she had not expected. It made her think of all the men in Pride and Prejudice, the way they treated even women they weren’t fond of with respect. He said, “Enchanted to meet you, Miss O’Brien,” and gently squeezed her fingers in his own before releasing them.

  Mary Rose found she could not speak at all.

  Jubilee asked her, “Have you finished looking around, dear? I’m nearly done with my shopping. Mrs. Mills needs some peppermint candy for a cake, and then I believe we’ll start loading things into the buggy.”

  “I have, yes,” Mary Rose managed to say. She was wondering how someone named Small could be so exceedingly tall. But she had the go
od sense not to say as much. Likely he had endured enough teasing on that point already in his life.

  Deputy Small leaned down and whispered something in Jubilee’s ear. Then he turned to Mary Rose. “I trust I’ll see you again at church tomorrow.”

  “Yes, of course!” Mary Rose smiled. She watched the deputy weave his way between shelves and tables with remarkable grace until he passed through the doors and out of her sight.

  Hauer arrived then to assist with stowing various bundles and boxes in the buggy. When it came time to leave, Mary Rose eyed Patience with far less enthusiasm than she’d had before they set out. Hauer must have noticed her expression, for he offered, “If you’d rather ride with Jubilee and me, I can tie your horse to the buggy.”

  “Oh, yes. Thank you.” Mary Rose climbed gratefully into the back of the buggy, moving several parcels aside to make room for her feet. Hauer helped Jubilee up to the front seat, then secured Patience’s reins to the back of the buggy. Mr. Linden had not yet joined them, but it seemed they were not waiting for him, for Hauer untied the team from the hitching post, climbed in himself, and they set off for the ranch.

  Jubilee turned around in the seat and held out a small bag for Mary Rose. “Something for the trip home.”

  When Mary Rose opened the little bag, she laughed aloud. Inside were a dozen pieces of butterscotch. Now she knew what Deputy Small had whispered to her grandmother.

  Jubilee laughed too. “He’s a kind-hearted boy.” She faced forward again and chatted with Hauer all the way back to the ranch. Mary Rose savored the sticky, chewy candy one bite at a time, saving six pieces for later and making the other six last the whole way home.

  Chapter Seven

  The next morning, Hauer brought the buggy to the door right when Mary Rose finished cramming one of Mrs. Mills’s dazzling rolls into her mouth for a quick breakfast. Jubilee, Mary Rose, and Mr. Linden joined him, Mr. Linden riding beside Hauer, who drove. They rode to town once again, this time to attend church.