“Sioux again?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure anything’s been stolen,” he told her. “Just found a cut fence out in the south fields.”
“You should probably talk to Sheriff Waits,” she replied. “He’s a good man.”
“I’d rather not. At least, not yet,” Harvey responded. “Not until we know something for sure.”
“Better to get the word out early, isn’t it?”
“Normally, yeah. But I’d rather not raise an alarm without cause. Besides, you know how people in town are,” he said. “I’d rather not give them an excuse to hate the tribes even more than they already do.”
Chenoa gave him a small smile. He knew she appreciated that his attitude toward the tribes was a lot more progressive than that of some of the people in Stephill. He knew she’d faced plenty of racism in town, but she never complained about it. She never used it as an excuse to turn angry or bitter. She never let it get to her. Harvey admired the way she was able to brush it off and move forward.
“I saw the woman at Mark’s place.”
“That’s his sister, Isabelle.”
“She nice?”
Harvey nodded. “She is. She’s a lot different than her brother. She seems a bit more − whimsical. Mark is more grounded in reality than she seems to be.”
Chenoa smirked. “That’s not a bad thing,” she went on. “She’s pretty.”
“If you say so,” he replied. “Hadn’t really noticed.”
Chenoa gave him a knowing smile. Harvey cleared his throat and counted the stack of seed bags in front of him, taking a moment to compose himself. The truth was, he did think Isabelle was pretty, but he couldn’t afford to let himself think that way. The last thing he needed was to think about any woman in a romantic sense, let alone Mark’s sister.
Despite the passage of time, he still had feelings for his dead wife. He still loved her. And right now, he needed to focus on his son. He’d had his chance at love, she was gone, and his little boy needed all of his attention now. His son deserved to be the center of his world.
“Too much loneliness isn’t good, Harvey. It is unhealthy for the body and the soul.”
He flashed her a grin. “I ain’t lonely. I’ve got you and Charley.”
She gave him a pointed look then rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean.”
He did know what she meant, but he pushed those thoughts aside.
“Harvey, you have not been with a woman in −”
“I know how long it’s been,” he responded. “I don’t need the reminder.”
She laughed. “I wish I didn’t have to continue to give you the reminder. But I will.”
“I could always fire you.”
“You could,” she grinned. “But you won’t.”
Harvey knew she was right, he wouldn’t. Never in a million years. But he did want to end the conversation.
“How about this − you go take stock of what’s in the cold room,” he said, “while I finish up out here.”
She eyed him for a long minute, knowing exactly what he was doing. Chenoa pursed her lips and shook her head, her disapproval more than evident.
“Unhealthy. For body and soul,” she said. “Remember that.”
“I’ll do that.”
Chenoa turned and left the barn, heading for the rear door of the cold room to do as he asked. Harvey mopped his brow with his sleeve then settled his hat back atop his head before getting back to counting everything out in the barn.
As he worked, he became more and more convinced that nothing was missing. Which set his mind spinning with questions about who had cut his fence and why. The more he thought about the fence, the more it bothered him. Not just the questions, but knowing there was still a hole in it.
Convinced he was not going to find anything amiss with his inventory, Harvey opted to pause the counting for now. He grabbed his toolbag, slung it over his shoulder, and headed out to the south field, his mind working the entire time, turning the questions over and over, trying to figure out the mystery.
As he walked along the fence line, he spotted Isabelle on the porch of Mark’s house. She was sitting in one of the big rockers and looked like she was reading a book. He liked that. He didn’t have a whole lot of time to spend reading, but he did enjoy a book now and then. Exercising his mind, that was what Amy used to call it. And he supposed that was true. But he thought having a sharp mind was essential to make it in the world and it was something he planned to instill in his son when he was old enough to read.
As Harvey knelt down and started to mend the fence, his thoughts turned from the mystery of who cut it to thoughts of Isabelle. He tried to push them away, not wanting thoughts of her to intrude in his mind at all. But no matter how hard he tried, they seemed to stick that much more firmly.
What Chenoa said was true − Isabelle was a very beautiful woman. She intrigued him in ways nobody had since Amy died − and some of the folks in town had certainly tried their best to pair him with another woman. But there was a sweetness, or perhaps an innocence about her that appealed to him. She had a sort of freshness and naïveté that he found refreshing.
To Harvey, the women he had been introduced to seemed to have an agenda. He thought they seemed to want something from him and had shown an interest in what he had and could do for them rather than in him as a person. The greed he saw in the eyes of some of them had been an absolute turn off and had only served to fuel his retreat from anything approaching romance. It had showed him he was right to shun it and focus on his son.
But there was something about Isabelle that broke through those barriers in his mind. Or had at least, put a few cracks in them. He had not spoken to her much, but just watching the interaction between she and her brother was enough to show him that she was a genuinely good person with a good heart. She genuinely loved her brother and it was clear that she did not come to Stephill just to benefit from his hard work. She was not looking for profit. She came looking for her family.
To Harvey, that commitment to her family was as refreshing as her apparent love of books and exercising her mind.
He was not looking to get involved with anybody emotionally but if he were, he would want it to be with somebody who had those kinds of qualities.
Chapter Fourteen
“So tell me more about Harvey,” Isabelle said. “He seems − nice.”
She worked the handle of the pump up and down and when the water came rushing out, spilling into the large basin in the kitchen, she grabbed a sponge and started to wash the dishes. Mark leaned against the counter and watched, seemingly still amused by her.
“Harv is one of the best men I’ve ever known,” he said firmly. “I owe him a lot. Actually, I owe him everything I have here.”
“Everything you have here is due to your hard work,” she corrected him.
“True,” he said as he picked one of the pastries left behind on a plate. “But without his guidance and help, I would still be flailing around in the dirt.”
Wolf padded into the kitchen and sat down beside Mark, looking up at him with wide, hopeful eyes. He chuckled and tore a piece of the pastry off, dropping it to the big dog. Wolf snapped it out of mid-air and chewed it down quickly, turning his head back up, hoping for another treat.
Mark tore a piece of the pastry off and popped it into his mouth, chewing on it thoughtfully as Isabelle started to set the clean dishes in a rack her brother had built next to the basin. He pulled off another piece of the pastry and dropped it for the dog to enjoy.
“He took me under his wing from the start. Let me work and learn from him,” Mark went on, his voice thoughtful and earnest. “Taught me everything he knows, and when it was time for me to go off on my own, he was the one who helped me get established. I really do owe him everything.”
“I would say that makes him a good man.”
“I’d say it does.”
Isabelle dried her hands on the small cloth on the counter then draped it over the
drying dishes. She turned to her brother and pursed her lips.
“What is it?” he asked as he dropped the last of the pastry to Wolf.
“He doesn’t seem to speak much,” she replied. “And he also seems − sad.”
“He is,” Mark sighed. “He’s had a hard life. Suffered some unthinkable losses. Losses that would have broken a lesser man.”
“What happened?”
Mark frowned, seemingly unsure whether to tell her or not. Knowing her brother as she did, she knew he would say it was not his place to tell her. That it was not his story to tell. But he surprised her when he started to speak.
“His son was born a couple of years ago,” he said softly. “His wife didn’t survive the birth.”
Isabelle frowned, a wave of pity suddenly washing through her. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, doing her best to stifle the swell of emotion rising within her. It was silly, she knew. She did not know him to feel impacted by the loss of his wife or how hurt he must be feeling. But she still hurt for him all the same.
“Whatever you do, don’t pity him, Isabelle,” Mark cautioned. “He hates it when anybody feels pity for him. He’s a proud man. Strong. Doesn’t like to be coddled.”
“You can still be a strong, proud man and accept somebody’s sympathy,” Isabelle replied, indignant. “That does not make you weak or somehow unmanly.”
“Try convincing him of that,” he grinned. “He’s a tough, independent man who plays his feelings close to the vest. Always.”
“It is sad that he thinks he cannot grieve for fear of looking weak,” she noted.
“Well, that’s how some men think,” Mark said. “You have to be tough and hard if you want to make it out here.”
“Is that what has happened to you, brother?”
“What do you mean?”
Isabelle gave him a soft smile. “You have a bit of a harder edge to you here than you did back in Grimepass,” she told him. “You seem to carry this darkness with you.”
He sighed. “Maybe. I cannot deny that ever since that − incident − with the Sioux thieves, I have felt differently,” he replied, and Isabelle could not help but hear the sadness and pain in his voice. “It changed me, Izzy.”
She pursed her lips. “I imagine it had to,” she said softly. “I imagine it strips you of your innocence.”
He nodded. “I can’t disagree with that,” he said. “No matter what I do, I see things differently now. And the most damnable thing about that whole situation was that it didn’t have to happen the way it did.”
Isabelle cocked her head and looked at him. “What do you mean?”
Mark walked over to the larder and retrieved a bottle with a light amber fluid in it. He took a glass down from a shelf then poured himself a stiff drink. He offered her one but Isabelle shook her head − she was not much for drinking. Mark tipped his glass back and took a long swallow, grimacing as he gently set the glass back down.
He looked up at her and Isabelle saw that haunted, almost distraught look in his eye and felt herself cringe inwardly. She immediately felt bad for forcing him to live through the memory of such an obviously traumatic event all over again. He drained the rest of his glass and reached for the bottle, pouring out about half the amount of his first drink. He picked the glass up and just held it, looking down into the amber liquid.
“When we ran those Sioux raiders down, they wanted to turn themselves in,” he said slowly. “They were surrendering to us.”
“Then − what happened?”
He pursed his lips and took another sip of his drink. He sighed again and when he looked up, Isabelle thought he had just aged ten years. At least.
“Some of the people around here − they hate the Indians. They hate them for no other reason than they’re Indians,” he told her. “It’s disgusting and it’s decidedly against the teachings in the Bible, as far as I’m concerned.”
“I agree,” she replied. “But what happened?”
“Somebody got an itchy trigger finger,” he said, his voice full of regret. “Our side says it was them who fired first and we just reacted.”
“But that is not the truth, I take it.”
Mark shook his head. “The Indians were unarmed at first. They had their hands up,” he said. “It was Elmer Alford. He yelled that one of ‘em had a gun but that wasn’t true. I saw him pull his pistol and squeeze off a shot first. After that, it was just chaos. There were bullets flyin’ and bodies droppin’ left and right.”
“My God,” Isabelle gasped. “Are you sure?”
“Sure of it as sure as I am of you standin’ here right now.”
Isabelle leaned back against the counter and let out a long breath, folding her arms over her chest almost protectively.
“D - did you tell anybody?” Isabelle asked.
He nodded. “Harv and I tried to get everybody to stop shooting. But we almost got shot ourselves so we had to step into the fight,” he replied softly. “Afterward, I talked to Sheriff Waits about it. Told him what I saw.”
“And what did he say?”
A shadow crossed Mark’s face and Isabelle could see the frustration in his face.
“Said there was nothing he could do,” Mark reported. “He would never get a case to stick. Not with the way people in town feel about Indians, combined with the power and influence Elmer’s got. No judge would touch that case.”
Isabelle shook her head. “That is − awful.”
“Yeah.”
A long, quiet moment passed between them. Mark finally cleared his throat, topped off his drink, and looked up at her again.
“Anyway, I have some paperwork I need to get to,” he said. “So I’ll be in the study if you need me.”
Mark left the kitchen and she listened to the thump of his footsteps on the wooden floor retreating. She returned the bottle he had taken out of the larder and then poured herself another cup of coffee. Walking out of the kitchen, she grabbed her book and headed out to the porch to read for a little while.
She sat in the rocker, the book open in her lap, but found herself reading the same page again and again. She could not focus on the words on the page. Instead, she kept thinking about everything Mark had told her − about Harvey and about the shootout with the Indians. She was awash in emotions and did not know how to even begin sorting them.
She looked up, trying to clear her mind, when she saw Harvey walking along the fence line, heading out into the fields. She had to physically restrain herself from raising her hand to wave at him. Isabelle thought she had already made a big enough fool of herself by rambling on earlier and she had no wish to lay it on thicker.
Her mind turned to thoughts of the man and all he had lost. It certainly made sense that he was so guarded and closed off. But that only made her more determined to crack the hard shell he was wrapped up in − ever more curious to see what lay inside.
Chapter Fifteen
“Pastor Rawlins, this is my sister, Isabelle.”
Isabelle smiled at the kind-looking man standing before her. Pastor Jacob Rawlins was a slight man, standing a couple of inches shorter than Mark. He was thin, with a head full of white hair, a thick white beard that was neatly trimmed, and dark eyes that shone with intelligence. He had deep lines etched into his face and had the look of a scholar about him.
His church was simple. It was a large white clapboard building with a high steeple that housed a bell that was tolling a low, almost mournful sound. Two glass windows were set into each side of the building and a large wooden cross hung on each side of the main doors.
“It’s lovely to meet you, Pastor Rawlins,” Isabelle said.
“It’s wonderful to finally meet Mark’s sister,” he replied as he took her hand and gave it a firm squeeze. “He has talked about you from the first day we met.”
Isabelle’s cheeks flushed but she gave her brother a smile. They stood to the side of the half-dozen stairs that led up to the doors of the small church that sat on the e
dge of Stephill.
“My brother does like to go on,” she said.
“Only when it’s the truth,” Mark said. “If you’ll excuse me for a moment.”
Isabelle watched Mark walk over to a small group of women who were approaching the steps of the church. A small smile touched her lips when she saw Ruby turn around and greet her brother. He pulled her aside and they huddled together, heads bowed close, and talked. Ruby’s smile was beautiful and the color in her face made her even lovelier than normal.
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