Why hadn’t she ever been told about love between a man and a woman? Shock had caused her to withdraw from him; that and pure terror. She still trembled so it was hard to think. To be loved and admired, to be wanted and pursued, was enough to learn in one day. To discover that Cord intended to claim her body, as well as her soul, was too much.
But what was she afraid of? Certainly not Cord. Even now she would have given anything to be at his side, to know she would never have to leave him again. She trusted him as she had never trusted anyone since her Aunt Sarah died. A shocking idea occurred to her. She trusted him more than she ever trusted her aunt! That shouldn’t be possible, yet somehow it was. She had trusted him after the first few minutes and had yielded up her mind and soul to him long before she realized it. He had never violated this trust and had continued to build on it without any promise of reward.
And now he had asked her to marry him; he was offering himself and everything he had worked so hard to acquire to her. Wasn’t she ready to offer him her all?
And that’s what it was, Eliza realized with sudden clarity; it was a commitment to Cord that would neither waver nor alter throughout the span of her life. Yielding up her soul was different from yielding up her body, but weren’t they part of the same? Was it possible to do one without the other? Could she say she truly loved him and continue to withhold part of herself from him? Still, it was one thing to admit to being in love, even desperately, hopelessly, wildly in love, and quite another to confirm it by yielding up the most private parts of her body. It was a commitment Eliza knew she wanted to make, but it was one she wasn’t sure she was ready to make now.
What if her uncle found out? He might not throw her out, but he would subject her to abuse worse than abandonment! Yet somehow that didn’t frighten her anymore. Whether or not she lived with him would affect her comfort, but only Cord had the power to affect her inner being, and Eliza felt certain he would never abandon her. Noticing the sun had begun to set, Eliza pushed her thoughts aside and hurried toward the cabin.
“Where have you been?” Ira demanded when the door opened to admit his niece. “Don’t you realize it’s nearly dark and you haven’t even started dinner?”
“It won’t take long.” Eliza moved quickly past her uncle to take a leftover stew from the larder. He had been drinking, and that always made him cross.
“Forget the food,” Ira ordered illogically. “Tell me where you’ve been all afternoon?”
“I was restless, so I went for a walk,” Eliza stated, keeping her back to him. “I guess I stayed longer than I realized.” Ira regarded her suspiciously.
“But what have you been doing this whole time? I couldn’t find you anywhere.”
Eliza’s brain whirled, frantically trying to guess where her uncle would have searched for her. “I’m sorry if you had to saddle up the horse just to look for me.”
“That’s no answer. Where did you go?”
“I went over the ridge, past the Hodgess’ place, and along the creek.”
“I didn’t see you.”
“I must have been in the grove.”
“Why didn’t you answer me? I nearly yelled my head off.”
“I guess I didn’t hear you. I wasn’t paying much attention.”
“If you were in those trees, you’d have heard me.”
“I don’t know why I didn’t hear you,” Eliza said desperately. “I just didn’t.” She hoped the smell of the warming stew would make her uncle forget his curiosity, but Ira was like a dog with a bone.
“I don’t supposed you cared that I might want to know where you’d gone?”
“You were asleep.”
“You could have left a note.”
“I didn’t mean to be gone so long.” He continued to watch her, suspicions forming in his mind. Eliza dared not raise her eyes; she was no good at dissembling.
“I need some eggs for the cornbread,” she said.
“I’ll get them. You keep on with dinner”
Eliza hoped he would have grown tired of the subject by the time he returned, but he was more agitated than ever.
“You weren’t at the creek,” Ira announced, setting the eggs down so hard Eliza wasn’t surprised to find two were cracked. “And you weren’t in those trees either.” Eliza broke the eggs into the bowl. “Where were you?”
“I told you, I didn’t pay much attention to where I went.”
“I think you paid extra special attention to where you went and who you saw.”
“It’s Sunday. Nobody’s about.”
“You went to meet someone, didn’t you?”
“Who would I meet?”
Ira paused a moment, then his face went black with rage. “You met Stedman, didn’t you, even though the bastard tried to kill us?”
“That’s not true.” Eliza was shaking, a strained look in her eyes. “He just ran us off the creek”
“You admit it! You ran off to meet that whore’s son.”
“You’ve no right to call him names,” Eliza declared, roused to wrath by the attack on Cord.
“Now you’re defending him.”
“I am not,” she said, attempting to sound disinterested, “but you’re making a fool of yourself going on about him every time you get a chance. People are beginning to snicker behind your back, even Croley.”
The truth of these accusations only served to fan Ira’s temper. “You needn’t think to hide anything from me, Elizabeth Smallwood. There’s not a person within thirty miles of Buffalo who doesn’t know he’s after you.”
“They’re not as blinded by hate as you,” Eliza said caustically as she placed the plates on the table with a clatter. “But they do know they’ll have to answer to him if they lay a hand on me.” She slammed the stew down in front of her uncle’s plate, but Ira, too angry to notice his dinner, grabbed Eliza’s arm and forced her to look him in the face.
“Do you know what it would do to the saloon if everybody knew you were sneaking off to see Stedman?”
“Don’t I mean more to you than a bunch of cowboys laying down their pay for a drink and a few songs?” she asked miserably.
“That’s no answer. Where did you go this afternoon?” Ira demanded, his wrath unabated.
“I told you I just wandered around,” Eliza repeated, saddened by her uncle’s complete indifference to her question.
“That’s not true,” he raged, shaking her like a sapling in a storm. “Tell me where you went!”
“I’ve told you, but you won’t believe me.”
“You haven’t told me the truth.”
Eliza knew that no matter what she said, he wasn’t going to believe her. “If you can’t believe anything else, maybe you can believe that wherever I went, I’ve done nothing I’m ashamed of.”
“Damned, bloodsucking cowboys!” he roared. “They’re determined to take everything from me.” Striking out blindly in his rage, Ira hit Eliza in the mouth and she slumped into a chair, unable to hold back a whimper of pain. Ira was frightened by what he had done, and he tried to cover his shock by helping Eliza roughly to her feet. “It was an accident,” he mumbled. “I lost my temper”
“If you lose it again I won’t be able to sing for a month.” Eliza knew no matter how furious he might be with her for seeing Cord, Ira hadn’t intended to hit her.
“Get dinner on the table,” Ira directed, still conscience-stricken but turning angry at Eliza for putting him in the wrong.
“I already have,” she said through a rapidly swelling lip. They sat without speaking.
“You’re not eating,” he finally said.
“I’m not hungry”
“You need to keep up your strength.” She didn’t respond. The look of sadness deepened, but gradually a hard look remolded her countenance, a setting of features that had never before appeared on Eliza’s face.
Ira’s disposition gradually recovered its equilibrium, and by the time the meal was over he had forgotten he had ever been repentant. “Hur
ry up with the dishes. You don’t have much time to get dressed.”
Eliza lifted her eyes from her plate and looked squarely at her uncle. “I’m not going to sing tonight,” she said.
Anger and hurt made Eliza say the words; a desire to be treated as something more than a workhorse gave her the courage to stand behind them.
“The swelling is hardly noticeable. It’ll be gone in a couple of hours.”
“I will not be seen with a swollen Up and bruised cheek.” There was a moment of stunned silence, and then Ira’s features settled into a look of angry displeasure.
“Do you want Mr. Stedman to see me and start asking questions?” Eliza paused. “Even if he’s not mere, someone’s bound to tell him.”
“You mean you’d tell him I hit you?”
“I will if I have to, Eliza promised, willing to make use of any leverage she could. “I’ll tell him and Mrs. Baylis and Mr. Burton and everybody else.”
“You’d set all them against me?” Ira asked furiously.
“Only if you force me.” Eliza’s confidence grew with each passing minute.
They remained perfectly still, two people frozen in time, each gauging the other, each realizing they no longer knew the person they faced.
“You know I wouldn’t hit you intentionally,” Ira acknowledged, knowing he had already lost.
“I know, and I’ll continue to sing, but I won’t go back until the bruises are gone.”
“That could take several days,” Ira hollered, flaring up again.
“You should have thought of that before you hit me.”
The decision hung in the balance; Eliza wondered if her courage would hold out, but she remembered Cord’s arms around her, and the flutter in her stomach disappeared. She was fighting for more than just a bruise; she was fighting her own fears and her habit of running away. She was fighting to be worthy of a man who could stand up to a town, an entire county, the whole state without fear.
Ira couldn’t read Eliza’s thoughts, but he knew she meant what she said, and there was nothing he could do about it. If it ever got out he had struck her, even accidentally, Ella Baylis would see to it everybody heard of it in a matter of hours and that could ruin him. Ira ground his teeth in anger, determined not to give in to any further demands, but he remembered what Cord had done in the saloon and was uneasy. Croley wouldn’t protect him, and the customers would enjoy a fight, if you could call murder a fight.
“Be there by Wednesday.”
“If the bruises disappear.”
“I’ll tell everyone you’re sick. Until then, you’re not to leave this cabin.”
“I won’t see Mr. Stedman if that’s what you mean, but I will go to school. And to the store.”
“You can’t be seen looking like this.”
“But I need supplies.”
“I’ll get them. One look at you and Ella will have it all over town.”
“Okay, you go to the store, but I have to go to school. The children won’t care. I can tell them I ran into the bedpost. It’ll be a great joke.”
“You’re not to leave the place for anything or anybody,” Ira exploded.
Eliza’s knees started to knock, but she found her resolution had stiffened. “You can’t keep me locked up like a prisoner and then expect me to sing for you,” she argued. “I’ve got to be able to come and go like any other grown woman”
“Not so you can sneak off with that scum.”
Cord doesn’t need you to defend him, Eliza told herself. Just keep your mind on your own self for now. “I’m not running off to meet anyone.”
“What about this afternoon?”
“I told you, I went walking and lost track of the time.”
Ira didn’t believe her, but she had clung to her story so tenaciously he was beginning to wonder if she might not be telling the truth after all. “Only to school,” he said, giving in reluctantly. “Mind you, I’ll be keeping my eye on you.”
“Of course.” Eliza lowered her eyes, afraid Ira might see her look of triumph. She busied herself with cleaning up.
“Women are ignorant fools,” he muttered as he stalked angrily out into the night, but if he could have seen Eliza after he closed the door he might have had second thoughts.
She stood perfectly still until the sound of his horse’s hooves died away, then she let out a whoop and danced wildly around the room until her head was spinning so madly she couldn’t keep her balance and she collapsed into a chair.
“Life is so beautiful,” she said, laughing with happiness. “I’ll never be afraid of it again.”
Chapter 13
A week later Eliza drew the buckboard the town had provided for her use to a stop before a cabin nearly as rundown as the one she and her uncle occupied. She was about to make her first call on the parents of a student, and she wasn’t at all sure what she was going to Bay, but she had insisted on having this school, and it was up to her to make it work.
Bear Creek ran close by the cabin and the crops near its banks flourished, but the ground that rose from the creek level was very rocky, and the hills behind the cabin looked to be full of blind canyons and hidden draws. Not the sort of land for a homestead.
Susan Haughton was very surprised to open her door and find the new schoolteacher on the steps, but she invited Eliza in, offered her coffee, and made her comfortable.
“Though no lady can be comfortable in a place like this,” she said bitterly, gesturing at the poor but spotlessly maintained cabin. “It’s worse than a cow barn.”
“I wanted to talk with you about Billy,” Eliza began, so disconcerted by Mrs. Haughton’s apologizing for her home she plunged straight to the object of her visit.
“Has he been late to school? I make sure he is dressed and out of here early every morning.”
“He hasn’t come to school at all the last three days.”
“What?” his mother asked, suddenly still and tense.
“Billy is a nice boy, very quiet and obedient, but he got into a fight last week and I haven’t seen him since.”
Susan twisted the corners of her apron, and then abruptly sank into the chair opposite Eliza. “It’s Sam and me.” She encountered Eliza’s blank look. “We fight all the time. Sometimes it goes on for days.”
“Why?” It was impertinent, but she didn’t know what else to say.
“Because I hate Wyoming and I hate cows, but most of all I hate the unending grind to eke out a miserable living here.” In her agitation, Susan started resetting all her hairpins. “I know it’s my fault we’re here without anything to go back to, but I can’t stop blaming Sam. No man could bear it, but he puts up with it as long as he can and then he explodes. Now I’m pregnant again.” Eliza’s rush of joy was rudely dashed down. “I don’t want my baby to be born in this place,” Susan said fiercely.
“We had a small farm in Missouri,” she went on, “not much, but enough to make a living. Sam liked to go to the saloons. He got drunk occasionally, but mainly he told stories and sang songs a female would be ashamed to hear. The men loved it so much the saloon owners started to pay him a little something whenever he would come in, but I was afraid the company would ruin him and I kept after him to stay home. Well, you might as well ask Sam to give up and die as pass a saloon and not go in, so I talked him into coming out here. I made sure we were a long way from town. I also made him promise he wouldn’t go into town without me. He’s stuck to his promise, but it’s taken the life out of him.”
“Maybe you should go back to Missouri.”
“It took most of the money we had to set up here. It took the rest to keep going. Now, with the baby coming, I don’t know what to do.”
“What does Billy think about Wyoming?”
“He really doesn’t care where he is, but he’s a sensitive child, and I hate to see him bullied by other children.”
“Doesn’t he know how to fight?”
“No, but his Pa insists he stand up and defend himself. I supposed he�
�s in the right of it, but I don’t like it. They pick at him because we’re farmers, especially the boys whose pa’s run a few head of cattle or steal even more.”
“You know who rustles cattle?” Eliza asked, astonished.
“Everybody knows. They don’t keep it a secret. The way they see it, if you don’t steal, something must be wrong with you. That’s what the fight was about. Didn’t you know that?”
“No,” Eliza said, faltering, her face drained of color.
The other boys taunted him, said his pa was a fool to starve with Matador steers around for the taking.”
“But the Matador belongs to Mr. Stedman,” Eliza exclaimed involuntarily.
“And he never lets us forget it,” Susan said bitterly. “I suppose the only reason he hasn’t forced us out is because he knows we’ll have to leave on our own before long. Though God knows where we’ll go, or how we’ll find the money to get there.”
“But Mr. Stedman’s not like that.”
“Maybe not, but he’s made it abundantly plain he doesn’t want us here.”
“Won’t he pay you for the land?”
“Yes, but Sam refuses to sell to him. And of course nobody else is fool enough to buy this place, so we’re caught between Sam’s pride and my foolishness.” The cabin door opened and Billy Haughton entered with his father.
“Sam, what happened?” shrieked Susan. Billy was wet and muddy, tears stained his cheeks, and his right hand massaged his tender buttocks.
“Go on,” his father commanded, “tell your mother what you did.”
“I tried to run away from Pa and fell into the creek. He gave me a licking.”
“Sam Haughton, how could you, after all that boy’s been through?”
“Being soft and dreamy is one thing. Running from me is another.”
Eliza’s inclination was to escape as quickly as she could, but she had to stay. It was her duty as a teacher; it was her desire because of Cord.
“He’s no coward,” Susan declared in angry defense of her child. “You know he got into that fight because of you.” It was obvious how much it pained Sam Haughton to know his failure to provide for his family was the reason for his son’s trouble.
Wicked Wyoming Nights Page 13
