Wild Dream

by Duncan, Alice

  “Thank you, Mr. Wilde. Oh, thank you!”

  It looked as though Mrs. Paul was going to succumb to another water storm, but fortunately for Charley she managed to pull her ragged emotions together. After a very few snuffles, several pats at her eyes with her soggy hankie, and a look of adoration that made Charley blush, she turned to rejoin her fellow Literary Ladies.

  After a moment’s hesitation—Charley didn’t want to be close to Mrs. Paul in case she suffered a relapse and stumbled into his arms or something—Charley followed.

  Chapter 11

  The Rothwell literary ladies began making their way back home around three in the afternoon, after having spent a good two hours longer in the pursuit of literacy than was usual for them. Most of the time had been spent in extolling the virtues of music and its relationship with great works of fiction.

  Eustacia Topping, the minister’s wife, had even gone so far as to suggest the infamous Madame Lafarge would not have been so bloody-minded had she been exposed to the edifying effects of the America City Brass Band on a daily or weekly basis. Addie didn’t know but that she agreed with her. She did, however, feel it incumbent upon herself to point out that Mr. Dickens’ Tale of Two Cities would have been sadly flat with the mad knitter missing. Mrs. Topping said she’d have to think about it.

  None of the gentlemen, except Charley Wilde, ventured an opinion on the various merits of combining the arts of music and literature, even when asked. Charley offered it as his belief that Mozart had united the two very well several times, although his personal favorite was Beethoven’s “Fidelio, oder Die eheliche Liebe.” The ladies stared at him, awe-stricken. His band members nodded wisely. Addie shook her head, absolutely thrilled that her Charley should be such a musical genius.

  Charley only looked embarrassed and kept his mouth shut after that.

  Now Addie stood on the porch, watching as the last of the ladies departed in Mrs. Topping’s wagon. Ivy stood at the gate, waving them away with her best hankie, a white linen one Addie had given her last Christmas. She’d embroidered the Blewitt family crest on it, and Ivy only used it on special occasions. The band members were each taking one last glass of dandelion wine in the parlor.

  Addie was in raptures. Charley’s brass band had been the highlight not merely of the Literary League meeting, but of the entire year hereabouts. Perhaps the decade. The Rothwell vicinity, unfortunately, was not for the most part fraught with excitement of a cultural nature.

  The band, though, had been wonderful. More than wonderful. Addie couldn’t even think of a word good enough to describe them. Her heart sang. Her senses soared. Every time she looked at Charley, her very soul lifted to touch the realm of splendor.

  He was her prince. Her very own prince. Prince Charley. She loved the name. She loved the sound. She loved him. He embodied everything she’d ever craved, everything she’d dreamed about on those never-ending evenings she’d spent staring out her window at the mystical heavens.

  “Addie!”

  Ivy’s joyful shriek jolted Addie out of her happy thoughts. Tearing down the porch steps, Addie met her aunt with a hug Ivy returned with vigor.

  “Oh, Aunt Ivy! Nobody’s ever, ever held a more successful Ladies’ Literary League meeting! Never, not once!”

  “I know it, Addie! I know it!”

  The two ladies exchanged another bear hug and turned to walk, arms around each other, to the porch. They saw Charley watching them, his band flanking him, an odd, tender smile on his face.

  Giving him her most refined, ladylike smile, Addie said, “Mr. Wilde, I can’t tell you how much your band enlivened the League meeting today. Your performance was simply superb.”

  “Superb? It beat the living tar out of anything any of these ladies has seen in a month of Sundays, Charley Wilde!”

  Addie allowed herself a tiny frown in reaction to her aunt’s enthusiastic comment. It was, after all, Ivy who had taught Addie everything she knew about being a lady. With a larger frown, she wondered if her aunt’s teachings had been as thorough as they might have been. She quickly dismissed the thought.

  Charley downed the last of his wine. “Thank you very much, ma’am. We all appreciated the opportunity to play for your group. The only thing most of us ever really wanted to do in this life was play our music for folks who appreciate it.”

  His men all nodded. To Addie, they looked more somber than the occasion called for. She couldn’t account for it.

  Charley sounded uncommonly philosophical to Addie—even emotional—and she peered at him closely. His smile seemed very warm. It heated Addie, anyway. She felt quite shy all of a sudden.

  “You were just wonderful,” she repeated softly. “Just wonderful.”

  “Thank you kindly, ma’am. I reckon this is the most fun any of us have had since we left Georgia.” Peachy Gilbert sniffed loudly after his little speech. The rest of the band members courteously looked away when he whipped out his bandanna and wiped his nose.

  “Peachy’s right, ma’am,” said George Alden after a discreet pause.

  “We all like our horns better’n about anything,” Francis Whatley admitted with a bashful smile.

  “And this wine’s about the best I ever drunk, Miz Blewitt,” Harlan Lewis said. He lifted his empty glass as if to prove his words.

  Lester, of course, said nothing, although he looked at Ivy as though he’d gladly follow her to the ends of the earth.

  “Oh, my land. I declare, you fellows don’t need to thank us. Why, you provided the most stunnin’ music I ever heard. I do declare!” Ivy pressed a hand to her bosom and beamed at the band members.

  “And, Mr. Wilde, it was so sweet of you to agree to give Homer Paul cornet lessons.” Addie had to wipe a tear away and felt silly. “He needs the guidance of a good man. He surely does. Why, that was about the kindest thing I ever heard of.”

  When he got embarrassed and couldn’t hold her gaze, Addie thought it was just like him to be so modest.

  “You’re gonna teach cornet, Charley?” Harlan looked at Charley as though he’d just offered Harlan a two-foot brick of solid gold.

  “I reckon,” Charley mumbled.

  “By gol,” murmured Harlan, “I wonder if anybody in town wants to learn how to play the bass horn. It’d be kinder fun to teach a body my horn.”

  “Reckon I could learn somebody the tenor horn,” Peachy offered. A slight flush stained his cheeks, and an expression of fervor lit his eyes.

  “We used to give lessons to the boys at the academy back to home,” said Francis. “Remember, George?”

  “I remember, all right.” George nodded. “Best time o’ my life was when we had the band playin’ on weekends and we taught them boys after school.”

  “Weren’t it, though?” Francis’s voice sounded dreamy.

  Lester nodded.

  “Well, you know, gentlemen, I reckon the teacher could put a question to the children at the schoolhouse. Miss Pinkley could ask the boys if anybody’d like to take lessons.” Addie smiled at the band.

  The men turned several interesting shades of red, and Harlan murmured, “That’d be right nice, ma’am. That’d be real grand.”

  The rest of them nodded.

  They left shortly thereafter, most of the men having to return to jobs in town. Addie gave them each a kiss on the cheek, thus assuring each man’s intense embarrassment. She sighed heartily as the last one straggled off down the beaten path toward Rothwell.

  “What a marvelous day.”

  Lester had disappeared somewhere. Addie figured he’d headed out to the west pasture where he’d been helping their hired man mend the fence. Lester didn’t say much, but he worked hard around the place.

  “Well,” said Ivy, “I think I’ll run on inside and write to Pansy. I can’t wait to tell her about the Literary League and the band playing today. We can wash up the glasses and plates later.”

  “Oh, Aunt Ivy, you’re just goin’ to gloat like anything to Aunt Pansy, aren’t you?”r />
  With a wicked chuckle, Ivy said, “I surely am, Addie. I surely am.”

  Charley watched Addie shake her head as Ivy ran off, limber as a school girl. What a pair these two Blewitt ladies were. They were really something; both of them. It was difficult for Charley to remember what life had been like before he met them.

  He stood on the porch, knowing he should get back to work. After all, he still had shelves to build in the barn and a hayloft to secure. But Addie Blewitt captivated him. He couldn’t seem to tear himself away from her today. She smiled as she trod up the steps to join him.

  “Did you like ‘Wood Up Quick Step,’ Miss Adelaide?” It was a stupid question, he guessed, but he wanted to hear her say it. He’d played it for her.

  “Oh, Charley—I mean, Mr. Wilde, I’ve never heard anything like it. I swan, I don’t know how you can blow and move your fingers so fast at the same time.”

  “It’s breath control, Miss Adelaide. Breath control and finger dexterity.”

  “Well, it surpasses me, Mr. Wilde. It just simply surpasses me.”

  “I played it for you, Addie,” he confessed softly. He hadn’t meant to; the words slipped out past his guard.

  “You did?”

  Addie looked up at him with such a sweet smile, Charley was reduced to jelly on the spot. His vocal chords suddenly froze up on him.

  “Oh, Charley,” Addie whispered. “Oh, Charley.”

  Her eyes alight with love, Addie glided to him and put her hands on his shoulders. She lifted herself up on her toes, and planted a little kiss on his cheek. Then she kissed his other cheek. Then she looked into his eyes, her lips slightly parted, and sighed.

  He couldn’t take it any longer. As if compelled by forces beyond his control, Charley found his arms circling Addie’s small body and he discovered his head lowering until his lips grazed hers. She tasted like sunshine; she smelled of roses; she felt like heaven.

  “Oh, Charley,” she breathed again, her voice soft as a dandelion puff in the wind.

  He kissed her gently, brushing his lips against hers, until her response drove him to tighten his arms and groan, “Oh, Addie.” He crushed his lips against hers then, and thrust his tongue into her mouth to taste her sweetness. He moved his hands over her back and felt her melt against him. She was so small, his hand nearly spanned her waist. It rested in the delightful indentation between her ribs and her hips until he couldn’t stand it any longer, and he closed his hand over the delicious swell of her bottom.

  She whimpered and pressed herself closer. Her breasts flattened against his chest and he ached to hold them, to tease her nipples into tingling awareness. He wanted to taste them, to taste her, to know her essence as no man ever had. Although he closed his eyes, Charley saw a flash of blinding light as desire consumed him. His control suddenly became so shaky it was all he could do to keep from sweeping her off to the barn and ravishing her.

  A semblance of his former honor remained, though, and Charley wrenched his lips from hers with a moan of loss. Reluctantly releasing her glorious rump, he cupped her head with his hand and held it to his shoulder and clasped her tightly to his chest.

  Gasping for breath, he squeezed his eyes shut and wondered what was wrong with him. He had no future here. He had to right to lead any woman on. Especially this woman: as silly and romantic as any he’d ever met in his life. As foolish and absurd. As delightful and sweet. Oh, Lord.

  He rasped, “I’m sorry, Addie.”

  “S-s-sorry?”

  He felt her heart hammering against him and fought the urge to drop to his knees, press his head against her belly, and beg her to let him stay with her. Charley realized with an aching deep in his soul that this is the first place he’d felt at home since before the blasted war ripped his life to tatters. And the feeling had nothing to do with the place itself, either. It had to do with Addie. His little Addie. She felt like home to him.

  What a selfish son of a bitch he was.

  “Ch-Charley?”

  “Yes, Addie,” pushed out through Charley’s painfully tight throat.

  “Please don’t be sorry.”

  Charley inhaled deeply. He knew how innocent Addie was of the world. She fancied herself a model of southern propriety, but she didn’t know the half of what the world expected of women. He knew, though, and he was a monster to take advantage of her.

  From somewhere deep within, Charley found the strength to say, “It’s not gentlemanly for me to kiss you this way, Miss Adelaide.”

  He felt her swallow. Her heart still hammered against him like the wings of a frantic hummingbird. “It-it’s not?”

  Charley shook his head. Then, knowing a shake to be far short of what the circumstances required, he said, “No. Kissing you was a dastardly thing to do, Miss Adelaide?”

  “Dastardly? It was?” She sounded terribly disappointed.

  “Yes. I’m afraid it was. A gentleman should never kiss a lady the way I just kissed you.”

  Addie pulled away from him and he felt as though he’d lost his way; that the only thing anchoring him to goodness and right had just abandoned him. It was a miserable feeling. He looked down to discover her peering at him intently, her expression a cross between bewilderment and frustration.

  “But it felt good, Charley.”

  “It felt real good.”

  Her bewilderment grew and he moaned again. “You see, that’s one of the rules, Miss Adelaide,” he explained patiently, believing he owed her this, although he was also afraid it might just kill him. His body screamed for her.

  “The rules?” she asked in a tiny voice.

  “Of society. You see, kissing like that and feeling—feeling the desire I feel for you is natural, but it’s not proper of me to demonstrate those feelings.”

  “It’s not?”

  “No. It’s not.”

  “How come?”

  “Because we’re not married, Miss Adelaide. We’re not married, and we’re not promised. And—” He sucked in a deep breath. “—And I can’t offer you those things, because I have to take care of the men in my band before I think about my own wants. A man who stirs those desires in himself and in a lady is not a gentleman, and I beg you to forgive me.”

  Addie’s expression lightened and she grinned at him. “Pshaw.”

  “Pshaw?” Charley stared at her

  “Pshaw,” she repeated. “Why, how you talk, Charley Wilde. As if you were some bounder fellow just triflin’ with my affections. Why, I know you’re a gentleman, Charley.”

  “I didn’t behave like a gentleman just then, Addie.”

  “Piffle, Charley. I kissed you. Remember? I distinctly remember I was the one who kissed you first.”

  Charley felt his control over the situation slipping. Not that he’d had much to begin with. “Miss Adelaide—” he said, but she interrupted him.

  “Now, Charley—I mean, Mr. Wilde, it’s the truth and I know it. So do you. You’re just too much of a gentleman to admit it.”

  Her smile tipped upside down, and she frowned. “I reckon I just proved I’m not much of a lady, though, huh?” She looked down at her shod feet and her frown intensified. “I reckon it takes more than shoes to make a lady.”

  “Miss Adelaide, shoes don’t matter,” Charley said, desperate to turn the conversation back to his own villainy.

  “What do you mean, they don’t matter? They do, too, matter, Mr. Charley Wilde. I’ll be pee-diddled if I’d wear these awful things and give myself blisters if they didn’t matter. Ladies wear shoes.” She spoke as if she were reciting one of the Ten Commandments and he’d just blasphemed by denying this particular one’s validity.

  “Miss Adelaide, it’s not shoes and clothes that make you a lady. You were a lady before you began wearing shoes.”

  “Nonsense!”

  “It’s not nonsense!” Charley was quickly becoming as irritated as Addie. “For the good Lord’s sake, all that stuff doesn’t matter anyway! What good would a simpering, useless Georgia bell
e be out here in the territory, anyway? That’s stupid thinking!”

  Addie stood back, arms akimbo, and glared at Charley. “Well, I like that! First you tell me I’m no lady and need to improve myself, then you tell me I’m stupid to do it!”

  “I didn’t tell you to act like a lady!”

  “You did, too!”

  “Did not!”

  “Did too!”

  “Did not!”

  Recognizing the absurdity of the argument, Charley turned abruptly and dragged a hand through his hair. How had this asinine quarrel begun, anyway?

  Well, he wasn’t going to let her get away with it. He’d been at fault, and he was going make her admit it. He turned again.

  “Listen, Miss Adelaide, I meant what I said. I’m sorry I kissed you. It was contemptible behavior on my part.”

  Addie scowled at him for a couple of seconds. Then a thought struck her. Charley could almost hear it land. At once, her expression eased. She said, “Pshaw!” and sounded happy again.

  Oh, Lord, she was back to “pshawing” him. Charley was sure he didn’t want to hear what she was going to say with the breath she was taking.

  “Why, that just goes to prove what I’ve been tellin’ you all along, Mr. Wilde.”

  Charley shook his head. He couldn’t even ask.

  “You’re too much of a gentleman ever to admit I might have been even a teensy bit at fault for that kiss. Even though I was the one who started it all by kissin’ you.”

  Aw, hell.

  “And I reckon all the kissin’ we’ve been doin’ just proves what I’ve known all along.”

  Although he was pretty sure he didn’t really want to know, Charley managed to ask, “And what’s that, pray tell, Miss Adelaide?”

  “Why, that you’re my Prince Charmin’, Charley!”

  Aw, hell in a hand basket.

  “You’re my Prince Charmin’. And I’m your princess.” She turned to go into the house and peeked coyly over her shoulder when she delivered her parting shot. “And I’m gonna make you admit it, too, Mr. Charley Wilde. Just you wait.”