CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Blake released a long sigh, mostly to make her smile. She did.
“If I must.”
“You must.”
Belle looked feminine in a pretty yellow dress; he was glad it wasn’t black. “Fine, but can we at least walk?”
“That would be lovely. I’d like to go to the mill. My sisters will be there soon, or they might already be there now. Is the lumberyard close enough that we can get there on foot?”
“Sure.” He patted Banjo’s hip as they left his gelding tied in front of the leather shop. “Just down the road and over the bridge.” The breeze was brisk, but the sun helped to keep away a chill. “I see you’re out of mourning?”
Her lips wobbled. “I’ll never be finished mourning, but choosing our businesses last night felt like a new beginning. We took a vote and decided the time had come.”
“I’m glad.”
She pointed another finger. “And you’re changing the subject.”
He smiled and shrugged. “What do you want to know?”
“How you got your scar. I know Moses figures into the story somewhere. About your family too.”
Kicking up a little dirt with his boot toe, he looked at her from a tipped-down head. Not fond of sharing his story, he’d known this day would eventually arrive. “I’d just turned ten years old when my brother set out for his first battle in the Civil War. He was fighting for the Union and was older than I was by seven years. We’d been on our own for a long time, but had been taken in by a kind, childless couple some six months before. Barton and me helped with the chores around the farm. They fed us and gave us a nice room with two beds. But Missouri was overrun with fighting. Barton felt strongly about signing up. I didn’t want him to go, but he did anyway. Said a man wasn’t much of a man if he didn’t stand for the things he believed in. He’d been gone for three months’ training and came back on leave to visit before his unit was sent into battle. When he left, I snuck away and followed.” He glanced across the street for a moment, remembering. “I still feel bad about leaving that farm the way I did.”
“What about your parents?”
“They’d been dead for years.”
She reached over and touched his sleeve.
“I was small and fast. I didn’t want to be left behind. Heard there was going to be fighting past Missouri’s southern border, in Arkansas, which wasn’t that many miles away. Barton would be furious if he knew I’d followed, so I stayed hidden, which wasn’t that difficult in the sea of soldiers. Confederates were comin’, and not a small number. Men were scared.”
Blake felt his scar pulse. Belle was walking on his left side, so she was getting a vivid show of the mutilation, he was sure. Nothing I can do about that now. Talking about Barton made his heart trip in his chest.
“I surprised a young man with a bayonet as I tried to find Barton. We fought and he wounded me. When the shooting starts, you can hardly think with all the screaming and crying, smoke, and gun blasts. Men running here and there, dirt marring their uniforms. Blood everywhere.” Remembering, he had to stop, collect his thoughts.
She reached over and grasped his arm. “Wait! You mean one of our own Union soldiers tried to kill you?”
“He was little more than a boy himself.”
“Oh, Blake! That’s terrible! I’m so sorry.” Tears glistened in her eyes.
He gave a curt nod and began walking slowly. “After seeing so many dead soldiers, all I could think about was my brother. I needed to find him. Protect him if I could. In shock, and covered in my own blood, I struggled through a hedge of brambles and arrived just as he took a bullet in the chest. I would’ve died there by his side, but Moses came upon me. I was as still as a corpse. The battle had been over for hours, and everyone was gone. Moses had been thrown into a gully by an explosion and knocked out. He was eighteen, wore a ragged, blood-splattered uniform like my brother’s, and was missing a boot. Disoriented and in pain from a gunshot wound in his arm, he plucked me off Barton’s cold body and carried me like a baby until he found a deserted barn. Somehow, he cleaned me up, stitched my wound with a small sewing kit he carried, and cared for me for several days, maybe a week. He was sick with fever himself. Those days are difficult for me to remember. He told me later that he went looking for Barton’s body, but by then it was gone, and most of the other dead soldiers’ bodies had been collected too.”
Belle had her handkerchief out and was wiping her tears. Blake had no more tears to shed. They passed Mrs. Gonzales, the Mexican woman who’d told him about the peddler’s wagon, hard at work at her fire. She watched them with curiosity.
“What happened then?” Belle struggled to say.
“I got better, and Moses had to return to his unit. Since I was an orphan, he did my bidding by putting me on a westbound train, away from the fighting, and wished me luck. I told him I was going to ride until I got to Colorado. Barton always talked about the Rocky Mountains and how one day we would make our way west. Live in Colorado.” He glanced at her and smiled. “I was weak. I stayed huddled in that train car with a handful of other bums until hunger forced me off—but I was in Colorado. Weeks came and went in a haze of hunger and fever. It’s amazing I lived. Everyone I came upon was repulsed by the half-healed wound, still oozing pus in some places. When I could, I hitched rides farther west. I don’t know how long after that I stumbled onto your ranch. The rest you know.”
She cried into her handkerchief, her tears flowing freely. “I’m so, so sorry. To witness what you did, and be injured, and almost die is unthinkable. I can’t even comprehend how much you must have suffered.” She stopped to blow her nose.
People were looking, but he didn’t care.
“I want you to know that the ranch is yours, Blake,” she said, her tone filled with emotion. New tears bathed her face she’d just dried. “It’s your ranch more than it’s ours. Always remember that.” She turned into his chest. He put his arms around her, holding her tight, letting her cry for several minutes. He hadn’t meant to cause her such distress.
Struggling for breath, she looked up into his eyes. “B-but how did Moses find you after the war? It must have been years later.”
“It was.” He slipped the hankie from her quivering fingers and got to dabbing at her tears, which never seemed to stop. “That time in the barn, when I was hanging on to life and he was struggling too, he’d talk to fill the hours. He’d been a slave, but ran away and joined up to fight. He’d mentioned a town where his aunt lived, and where he intended to go after the war, if he survived. It was strange, but about ten years later, in a dream, I remembered the name of the town in South Carolina he’d spoken of. Your father helped me find him. By then, his only living relative had been dead for several years, so he jumped at the chance to start over.”
She took the linen square from his hand and gave him what he was sure she thought was a very serious stare. “S-such a story. I don’t know how you’ve kept that inside.” More tears streamed down. “The Five Sisters is your home, Blake Harding. Don’t ever think different. And don’t you ever leave.”
He was touched by how Belle kept repeating that mantra, so he’d not feel excluded. But will I ever really be part of the family? Belle is going back to Philadelphia to marry Lesley Atkins. Blake didn’t have any hold on her. Maybe Mavis or Lavinia would remain in Eden, he supposed, or perhaps all the rest of them. But Eden wouldn’t be the same without Belle. He knew he’d better get used to that fact. With all the excitement ahead, there was going to be heartache too. And to that he was no stranger.
In the living quarters in the rear of the cantina, Santiago watched his father pull out a chair from the table and slowly lower his body into the seat. He looked old and decrepit, even though he was only forty-seven. His eyes weren’t red from drinking. Today was Demetrio’s birthday. What would turning twenty-seven in prison feel like while still facing ten more years? Santiago couldn’t imagine. No words could cheer his father.
“Can I get you anything, Father? A cup of tea or breakfast from Mrs. Gonzales?”
“Gracias, my son, but no. I just want to be left alone.”
Nodding, Santiago grasped the money pouch with its few coins of change and headed into the cantina, the scents of stale beer and whiskey still strong on the air. Chairs stood on top of tables. Their bartender had taken one chair down and sat at a table, drinking coffee while waiting for the bar to open. Santiago placed the money in a small strongbox, then picked up the broom. Is this all I have to expect from life? This cantina, this town, this emptiness? Feeling caged, he headed for the porch. He understood completely why Demetrio had run off in search of more.
“Santiago, my friend.” Padre Francisco stood at the bottom of the steps.
“Padre,” he replied respectfully, thinking back to the man’s observant gaze the day Santiago had passed the message to the rider.
“A word?”
Santiago leaned the broom against the handrail and took the steps down. Padre Francisco smiled up into his face. The man never seemed to age. He always spoke in the same peaceful tone and never lost his patience—no matter what kind of mischief Santiago found himself in.
“What’s on your mind, Padre?”
“I find myself thinking about you much these days. Whenever that happens, more often than not, something is amiss.”
That was his way of saying, “Give up the goose. I saw you take it, break it, or start it.” He was good at getting a confession without asking any questions at all.
“No, Padre. No trouble. You don’t have to worry about me.”
Padre Francisco studied him for so long that Santiago began to fidget.
“No? Well, good. I’m glad to hear that. How’s your father? Today’s Demetrio’s birthday. I’m sure he’s in need of a cheerful word.”
“True. He’s inside if you want to visit.”
The priest gave a nod and then lifted his gaze one more time to Santiago’s. He’d clearly seen the rider and somehow knew of the interaction. Santiago could fool himself all he wanted, but he knew he was going to spill his guts sooner or later.
“It’s not what you think.”
Padre Francisco pursed his lips. “I hope not. I know how much Demetrio means to you—to all of us. You can do nothing to help him now, except pray. He needs to walk a straight line. He is the only one who can help himself.”
“I sent him a few things to make his life easier. A blanket, chocolate bars, a box of cigars. Things like that.”
“No file, explosives, or weapons?”
Santiago shook his head, though the padre wasn’t far from the truth about where his intentions had started. He’d arranged for a pack of mule freighters passing through to sell him dynamite so Demetrio could blow his way out and ride for California. But his good sense had returned, and he’d left it buried beneath the old barn. Instead, he’d sent a box filled with the exact things he’d just told the padre about.
“I’m happy to hear that. I know how much you desire to have Demetrio home.”
“Not home. Just out of prison. He could never be happy here now.”
A buggy approached. Four of the Brinkman sisters waved as they passed, the driver keeping the horse at a trot. The carriage turned at the rocks by the icehouse and crossed the bridge. They were on their way to the mill.
“A breath of springtime,” the priest mumbled, still watching the buggy. “Let me know how I can be of assistance if you find yourself in need.”
That was his way of saying, “Let me help you stay out of trouble.” With that, the padre climbed the stairs to go in search of Santiago’s father.
“This is quite impressive.” Katie followed the lumberyard manager around the large steam-powered saws and equipment. Belle, with her other sisters and Blake, trailed at a respectable distance to give Katie a chance to affirm her place in the company.
When she and Blake had arrived, all four sisters had gaped at her red eyes and runny nose but kept their questions to themselves.
Katie glanced at them over her shoulder and then looked back at the manager, a twinkle in her eye. “It’s much more advanced than I’d thought. I expected a waterwheel turning slowly down at the river’s edge.”
The river ran fast along an extended beach of white sand. Towering trees gave shade, and yet the sunshine that did get through the seemingly impenetrable leaves sparkled on the blue water like diamonds. A few logs were anchored to the shore by thick ropes.
What a beautiful spot to spend the day, Belle thought. And a dangerous business to be in.
“That’s how we began, Miss Brinkman,” the manager replied. “But your father liked to keep up with the times. He was always around, asking questions about how we could be more efficient and make more money and such.”
“I can see that.”
Blake leaned close and whispered into Belle’s ear, “Katie seems quite interested. I’m surprised.”
Belle couldn’t get Blake’s story out of her mind. Not only had he sustained a life-threatening wound, but he’d lost his only brother. Thinking of losing a single one of her sisters made her lose her breath. How did he survive? And at such a tender age. Her heart shuddered when she thought of him stumbling around each night, looking for food and shelter. She looked up into his eyes, and her heart melted.
“She really does,” she whispered back, trying to hide her sentimentality. “I’m a bit surprised myself. I’m glad, though. She needs something to take her mind off her fears.” She brushed away a layer of fine dust particles that had covered her chin. “The air is gritty, but I like the scent of the plentiful pine shavings. Much nicer than the tannery.”
Blake laughed. Mavis, Lavinia, and Emma, who were admiring some newly milled boards stacked several feet high, turned to see what had transpired. They smiled and then looked away. Katie and the manager moved out of the pole building and headed for a small cabin that displayed a sign designating it as the office. The mountains loomed in the background, bringing a sense of peace to Belle’s soul.
The Rocky Mountains that Blake’s brother, Barton, had wanted to see. Is he up there now, watching over Blake?
“What do you think, Belle? Could you be a lumber baroness?” His eyes were filled with questions that looked to have nothing to do with the conversation at hand.
“Better than I can be a tannery baroness. I don’t know what to do with that place. Was Mr. Little the owner before it passed to Father?”
“Indeed. He had a son who worked with him. He would be there now, but he was killed a few years ago by a band of out—” He snapped his mouth closed.
“You don’t have to mince words with me, Blake. I already know the dangers. Anyplace in the world can be perilous. I could be run over by a wagon in Philadelphia just as easily as I could here. There’re no guarantees in life.”
He regarded her so long she felt her cheeks grow warm.
“True enough. After Mr. Little’s son was gone, business fell off because inventory was so low. Mr. Little was starving, but didn’t say anything to anyone. John went in one day, added two and two together, and made the man a handsome offer—”
KABOOM!