No Place for a Lady

by Vivian Vaughan

“Not until I get my horse back!” Morley stormed.

  “Not until you agree to pasture my cattle!” Tyler returned.

  “We ain’t got no middle ground, Maddie. Go ahead, reunite the damned town, but leave me out of it.”

  “Me, too.”

  “Morley,” Madolyn chastised. “Not over an hour ago you told me what a fine husband Tyler would make. Are you refusing to shake hands with the man you tried so hard to convince your sister to marry?”

  “He said…” Tyler’s words sputtered to a stop. He looked to Morley then back to Madolyn. “He said what?”

  “That I shouldn’t run away from life, that I needed to take chances, one chance—on you.”

  Tyler scrutinized his former partner, as though uncertain what he was seeing. “You said all that?”

  “Damn right. It’s true, ain’t it?”

  “Of course, it’s true, but…” Tyler squared his shoulders, winked at Madolyn, and stepped across the tracks, his hand outstretched to his future brother-in-law.

  “What about ’Pache Prancer?” Morley demanded.

  “You’ll get her back. And I’ll get my pasturage.” He crooked his arm for Madolyn. “You don’t think this is the end of her meddlin’, do you, Morley?”

  Madolyn went to him and Carlita followed. They stood in the middle of the tracks, the four of them, looking at each other and grinning. Tyler drew Madolyn to his side and she slipped an arm around his waist, there in the middle of town with citizens from both sides gathered around them.

  When a cheer went up, Madolyn thought at first it was for them, for their reunion, then she heard the words.

  “Lookit Bob! Take it down, son. Take it down.”

  And while the two ornery cowmen and the women who tamed them looked on, boys from both sides of the tracks shinned up the posts and tore down the divided station signs.

  “Hip, Hip, Hooray!” came the shout. Madolyn and Tyler joined in; Carlita and Morley joined, too.

  Suddenly Goldie’s voice rose above the confusion. “Listen up, folks. Listen up.” When she had their attention, she continued. “This is a mighty proud day for folks on both sides of these tracks. Independence Day will mean something personal to us from now on. And I know and you know that it wouldn’t have happened without the fearless leadership of one person. Maddie, step up here and take your bows.”

  “Oh, no. We did it together.”

  But the women insisted loudly and Tyler pushed her forward. Holding his hand, she pulled him along, her mind reeling with the speech she was being called upon to give. What would she say? How could she thank them? She squeezed Tyler’s hand.

  Goldie and Morley most of all. How could she thank them for prodding her until she lost, not her fear, but her need to run away from it? And Tyler, how could she thank him for sticking by her, for not giving up on her?

  Suddenly the crowd roared, as though she had just accomplished all the above and more. Tyler nudged her forward.

  “Look up, Maddie.”

  The sight left her breathless. In place of the two divided signs a new one hung from the depot: MADOLYN, TEXAS.

  “No,” she breathed. “They can’t.”

  “We can and we did,” Goldie responded. “You gave us the courage to stand up for ourselves and our town. And those are lessons we don’t ever want to forget.”

  Frances Arndt stepped up beside the madam. “So Goldie and I gathered the women and put it to them.” She smiled at the new sign. “That sign will be there to remind us of the lessons we learned from you, Maddie. Day after day we can look at it and remember that you taught us how to stand on our own two feet.”

  Tyler pulled her close. Just before his lips captured hers, he murmured, “And I’ll have you, Maddie Sinclair, to look at every single day for the rest of my life. And to love.”

  “Tía y tío, tío y tía, tía y tío…” Holding hands, the children skipped in a wide circle around the inside walls of the schoolhouse. The adults attending the dual wedding reception stayed out of their way, best they could.

  All except one of the brides and one of the grooms. Madolyn and Tyler held hands with Little Jeff and their two little nieces and let the children of Buckhorn drag them laughing and skipping around the room. Madolyn felt a little self-conscious, true, but it was her wedding day. Couldn’t she let her hair down a bit?

  And after the gifts the children had brought—her eyes teared seeing them stacked on Loretta’s desk along with the mound of gifts she had received from the women of Buckhorn, including the wedding-ring quilt.

  That had been but one surprise among many.

  “When did you finish it?” Her eyes widened when she tore away the wrapping tissue. “How did you know?”

  “It was Goldie’s idea,” Frances Arndt explained. “She said there’d either be one wedding or a couple of funerals.”

  “So we decided to hope for the best and finish the quilt,” Hattie Jasper put in.

  Madolyn fingered the delicate stitches, the colorful interlocked rings in the design. “Unity,” she whispered. “That’s what the rings stand for. Unity means more than man and wife.” She scanned the group of women, sisters at heart, all of them. “It will always remind me of us, and how we worked together for the good of all.”

  “And had a good time doin’ it,” Constance Allen added.

  Loretta James hugged her. “I’ll have to wish you luck, even if you did steal the best catch in town.”

  Madolyn was beside herself. From the moment they left the depot where Pastor Arndt performed the double ceremony, her head had been spinning. She hadn’t known what to concentrate on first—the animated chatter of the reunited townsfolk; the way her nieces and nephews played with their new town friends, as if they had always known how to play; the stack cake that had grown out of all proportion, since every woman in town insisted on making a layer to bring to the reception; or the way her new husband—the word took her breath away, she thought possibly it always would—stood to the side in conversation with her brother, once and always his best friend.

  When she saw Morley hand Tyler the book on mail-order houses, she joined them. Tyler drew her hand into the crook of his elbow and squeezed, increasing the giddiness that had been growing inside her for the last few days.

  “Figured you need it worse’n I do right now,” Morley was saying. “I want the damned thing back, though.” He scowled at his sister but wasn’t quite able to keep a smile from his lips. “Since I just found out I paid for it. And a whole lot more besides.”

  When Madolyn blanched, wondering what to expect from Morley now, he laughed and drew her into a rough bear hug. “You beat the clock, little girl.”

  “The clock?”

  “The year’s not up, and look what you got.”

  She laughed. “A husband. Isn’t that grand?”

  “When things quiet down some, we’ll see about gettin’ that inheritance. Don’t reckon we should let it go to some ol’ men’s club, not with the kinda ideas in your head.”

  She kissed him on the cheek. “Thank you, Morley. Isn’t our life going to be wonderful?”

  He cocked his head. “Don’t know about wonderful, but with a suffragette for a sister, it’s likely to be interestin’.” But his voice was so loving she knew he was still proud of her.

  Carlita summoned the children, then. They lined up before Madolyn, beginning with Little Clara, the youngest, who held her sister Betsy’s hand.

  “Para ti,” Betsy said, holding out a small package wrapped in tissue paper.

  “For me?”

  “Y tío,” Clara added.

  Beckoning Tyler to join her, Madolyn knelt in a puddle of ivory lawn skirts and accepted the gift. “Gracias.” She could hardly tear herself away from the girls’ eyes to open the gift. Inside the tissue lay a doll made of sotol sticks, with yarn hair and black shoe-button eyes. It was dressed in red calico.

  “Betsy made the dress,” Carlita explained.

  “Oh, my!” Madolyn hugged the d
oll, then impulsively opened her arms and gathered the girls to her bosom. “Oh, my, how could any one person be so lucky?”

  Tyler had hunkered down beside her. When she released the girls, Clara threw her arms around his neck.

  “Won’t be a coon’s age between visits anymore, little one.” He winked over her black curls to Madolyn. “Think we could have us one like her?”

  “Oh!” Madolyn felt her heart thrash with ecstasy and her face flush with embarrassment.

  “You will make a wonderful mother,” Carlita assured her.

  “Oh, my.” For a time she couldn’t say more. “I’ll need your help, Carlita. I won’t know the first thing about taking care of children.”

  “They’ll teach you,” Carlita vowed. “But we will help.”

  The boys were next. Little Jeff and Abe had made her a vase from a dried gourd and received sound hugs in return. She rose to receive Tomás’s gift, a little basket he had woven from dried grass. He even stood still for his hug, though she knew it embarrassed the ten-year-old. He’ll get used to it, she thought. Now that she could hug her nieces and nephews, she intended to do it on a regular basis.

  Then Jorge was standing before her, looking for all the world like Morley had looked so long ago. So long ago. And there in the green eyes of her nephew she read the meaning of this day. The true meaning, for it stood before her in the recreation of her brother. The past was dead and gone. They had been given a clean slate, she and Morley, a new life. What they made of it was up to them. The past no longer had a purchase on their future.

  Jorge’s gift wasn’t quite a surprise, yet it was. He had whittled her an object, a miniature—

  “I’ll be damned,” Tyler laughed beside her.

  She took the little wooden parasol in both hands and examined it from all sides. “Perfecto,” she whispered. After a moment of hesitation, she added, “sobrino.” And he came into her arms. She hugged him hard. Nothing timid about her now.

  “Tía,” he mumbled when she released him. Then, as grown-up as a boy of fourteen could be, he extended a hand to Tyler. “Tío.”

  Tyler shook the boy’s hand while sliding his other arm around Madolyn. Her heart was so full she feared it might burst. Never had she dreamed her life could hold so much love. Never had she dared hope her life would include such a warm and wonderful family. And this was only the beginning.

  While Maddie and Carlita opened the rest of the gifts, Tyler drew Goldie aside. “Haven’t had a chance to thank you for your part in all this.”

  “My part? Reckon I did meddle some. Don’t know why. You know my views on true and lastin’ love.”

  “You’re wrong this time, Goldie.”

  “I hope to the Lord above I am.”

  “Don’t worry, I’m not about to hurt her.”

  “For both your sakes,” Goldie added. “We’d have a hell’ve a time puttin’ Humpty Dumpty back together if that pretty little suffragette knocked you off the wall.”

  “There’ll be a few rocky roads,” Tyler conceded, “but we’ll make it. Don’t ever doubt that.”

  “I’ll just have to hide and watch.” She sobered. “Don’t reckon we’ll be seein’ much of you anymore after tonight. Or of her. But I’ll keep up.”

  “Hell, Goldie, I still have my room up at the house. Besides, we live in the same town—the one you were so dead-set on reunitin’.”

  “I know. But…well, me an’ mine, we’ll be confined to certain areas again, once the new wears off.”

  “No way. You’ll be welcome…”

  “Where? In church? At the garden socials? Truth known, I don’t want to be. Socializin’ with the wives would be downright bad for business.”

  Tyler laughed. “You have a point.” Madolyn glanced around, beckoning him with a smile that showered him with sweet sensual yearnings. “Thanks again, Goldie. I owe you.”

  “What were you and Goldie hatching up?” Madolyn accused.

  “Nothin’. I just thanked her for holdin’ onto you until I managed to catch you.”

  Madolyn laughed. “Men! I should have known you would take credit for all this.”

  He leaned forward, whispered in her ear. “I’m gettin’ danged anxious to take credit for a whole lot more. How much longer before we can go to the hotel?”

  “The hotel?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Our weddin’ night, case you overlooked the most important part of this day.”

  “I didn’t overlook it.” She felt her cheeks flush. “But we can’t spend it at the hotel. We have to go back to Goldie’s.”

  “To Goldie’s? You moved out.”

  “You still have your room,” she reminded him. “The girls are counting on it, Tyler. They’ve gone to a lot of trouble to prepare us a honeymoon suite.”

  “I knew bein’ married to a suffragette was goin’ to be interestin’. Never figured on spendin’ my weddin’ night in a whorehouse, though.”

  “Tyler Grant, I’ll thank you not to talk about Goldie that way. She’s the best friend I’ve ever had. The most sensible one, too.”

  “You don’t mean to say she’s displaced Miss Abigail?”

  Madolyn laughed, and once started, she couldn’t stop. She laughed from the belly, from deep inside her, from her heart. She threw her arms around her new bridegroom and knew she was happier than she had ever dreamed possible.

  Later when he lifted her into the wagon the women had decorated with paper flowers and streamers, Madolyn admonished him. “We have to go through the front door, Tyler. And up the central staircase.”

  Tyler grinned. Scanning the crowd, he quipped, “Guess I know who wears the pants in this family. Case I’m ever in doubt, though, I’ll just ride over to the depot and take a gander at the station sign. Madolyn, Texas! Don’t know of another man who lives in a town named after his wife.” Stepping up beside her, he kissed her a long smacking kiss, to applause from the gathered well-wishers. “But then you’re one of a kind, Maddie Grant.”

  Moments later he drew up in front of the house and walked her to the front door. There he stopped, turned her to face him, and kissed her, long and wet and deep and wonderful. She had just sighed for the second time, when the gaudy front screen burst open. Goldie’s girls rushed out, squealing congratulations. Suddenly a voice called them from the yard.

  “Mrs. Grant!”

  Madolyn turned toward the sound with Tyler’s arm firmly around her waist.

  “Hold that pose,” Price Donnell hollered. A second later, a flash blinded them.

  “You set me up again, Mr. Grant,” Madolyn accused, laughing. “I’ll be front-page news, same as before. On the porch of the House of Negotiable Love, surrounded by Goldie’s girls.”

  Tyler kissed her tenderly. “Not the same as before, love. In this picture you’ll be kissin’ your husband.” And with that he scooped her in his arms.

  Penny-Ante rushed to hold the door.

  “Thank you, Annie,” Tyler said, as he carried Madolyn over the threshold of the house.

  “Thank you, Annie.” Madolyn whispered. She watched the soiled doves flock in behind them. Without breaking stride, Tyler took the stairs.

  “Have fun!” Two-Bit called.

  “Take off your spurs, big boy!” Dolly advised.

  Gaining the second floor, Tyler chuckled. “Sorry we didn’t go to the hotel?”

  Madolyn snuggled her lips against his neck. “No.”

  “Don’t break Goldie’s bed down,” Daphne called up.

  “If he gets too rough to handle, Miss Maddie, give me a holler,” offered Annie.

  Tyler stepped onto the third floor. “Sorry we didn’t use the back staircase?”

  She laughed, so happy she couldn’t bear it. “Any way you cut it, it’s two flights of stairs. And, frankly, I wouldn’t have missed this for the world.”

  “Neither would I, love.” When he opened the door to his bedroom, the cloud of scented candles and perfume nearly knocked him off his feet. “Damnation, Maddie, it loo
ks like a first-class whorehouse.”

  “Goldie runs an exemplary establishment,” she admitted, amused at the red satin that draped the bed and the abundance of lighted candles.

  “Wonder how your Miss Abigail would feel about this.”

  Madolyn couldn’t suppress a giggle. “She would be mortified! No doubt about it.”

  In the end, they used her old bedchamber. The room was barren, the air a bit stale, but the bed was made. She opened windows, while Tyler blew out the candles in his room.

  “I’ll take stale air over perfume any day of the week…” Returning, he stopped, still as death, in the doorway. “Damn, Maddie, this isn’t right. You deserve to spend your weddin’ night in the finest hotel.”

  She stood equally still. Absorbing the essence of him. His beloved presence filled her room and her life, now and forever. A shyness that she hadn’t expected crept up her neck. “I wouldn’t trade this room and this town and this day for any other place in the world.”

  When he started to shuck his black jacket, she stopped him. “Wait, let me look at you. I’ve hardly had time.”

  He grinned, self-conscious himself now, she could tell, as she perused him from top to bottom.

  “Do you want to know my first impression of you? The day I arrived in town?”

  “I hope I’ve changed your mind about all that.”

  She smiled, savoring his soft drawl. She could hear his love for her, in his tone, in his words. “I thought you looked like a man who belonged in a real suit.”

  “Time was…” His words drifted off. She sensed melancholy. Moving into his arms, she held him fast.

  “When I moved over to Horn and thought I would never see you again, I realized that I didn’t know anything about you, about your life, your past. It devastated me. Now we have all the time in the world.”

  He kissed the top of her head.

  “But let’s save it for another day.”

  “My thoughts, exactly, Mrs. Grant.” He drew her back, ran a hand down the fine needlework on the yoke of her wedding gown.

  “I should have bought you a new gown.”

  “You don’t like this one?”

  “Hell, Maddie, you’d be beautiful in a flour sack. But Goldie’s weddin’ dress?”