Chapter Seven
THE ARTICLE WOULDN’T write itself.
Delia knew that as she stared at the blank sheet of paper on the table before her.
It was mid-afternoon, a few hours before Max would arrive home from the hotel.
Anna had attempted to run out the door earlier without a word, only to find Delia stopping her and demanding to know her plans.
Faced with an afternoon of scouring the kitchen, Anna had reluctantly told her that she’d befriended a pair of siblings that lived nearby.
After extracting a promise that they would behave and that Anna would return by supper, Delia let her go.
With the house quiet, Delia finally had the time and the energy to think of writing.
Anna was a bigger handful than all of Delia’s younger siblings combined.
She hadn’t realized exactly how much she was taking on when she answered Max’s advertisement.
While Anna didn’t seem to trust her—or even really like her—just yet, she did at least appear to respond to the respect Delia insisted upon.
Maybe it was for the best. After all, she didn’t want the girl to get attached to her. She hadn’t taken on this self-imposed assignment to hurt anyone’s feelings.
Staring at the page again, she decided to start at the beginning.
After all, readers would be curious about the journey to Colorado and her impressions of the town.
She had nothing scandalous to write about, but the town and the train were fascinating enough.
If she made it lively and intriguing enough, readers would clamor to know more.
And that meant Roy would print it, despite his misgivings.
Delia set to work. Two hours later, the inkwell nearly dry and her hand cramping, she had a decent enough draft of an article. Tomorrow, she would read it again and rewrite it. Then she’d send it off to Roy with a note of apology.
For now, she needed to tuck it away and start supper.
Upstairs, she placed the draft beneath the paper lining in her jewelry case, and then she set to work chopping vegetables for a soup.
The cool mountain breeze through the open windows was a welcome respite from the heat of the stove.
Before she knew it, the soup was ready and Max had arrived home.
They waited an hour and a half before Anna deigned to find her way through the front door.
Delia looked to Max. Anna was his daughter, and she expected him to take charge of the situation. But all he did was shake his head and say, “You were to be home in time for supper.”
Anna said nothing. Instead, she sat at the table with unwashed hands and a dirt-streaked pinafore over one of her old dresses. Delia waited another moment, but when Max said nothing, she had to speak up.
“Anna. If you wish to eat, you will need to wash your hands and remove that pinafore. And then you will need to apologize to your father and me for your tardiness.”
Anna eyed her without moving.
Delia recognized a challenge when she saw it.
She tapped the bowls on the countertop. “Supper will be waiting when you do as I’ve asked.
Dessert, however, may not be. And neither will your ability to visit with your friends, as I’ll feel the need to speak to their mother.
” With that, she turned around and began to dish out soup for Max and herself.
After a moment, the legs of Anna’s chair scraped across the floor, and the back door opened.
Delia held her breath, hoping it had worked. Within a moment, Anna returned inside and disappeared into the parlor. When she came back, the dirty pinafore was gone.
Delia looked at Max—a silent warning not to say a word—and proceeded to dish Anna a bowl of soup.
Later that evening, after Anna had fallen asleep early, Delia found Max enjoying the night air on the rear steps of the house.
“May I join you?” she asked. She’d come out here on a mission. It was still early, but it wouldn’t hurt to begin putting her plan to find him someone to fall in love with into motion.
He looked up at her in pleasant surprise. “Of course.”
She sat beside him. The steps were narrow, and the side of her leg pressed against his. Why that made her heart beat faster, Delia didn’t know. She could admit he was attractive, but it wasn’t as if she were in love with him. Or that she hoped he might be in love with her.
That was impossible, considering why she was here.
“How did you do that with Anna?” he asked. “Make her listen to you?”
“Oh,” Delia said in surprise. Her mind was so fixated on asking him about Miss Sullivan, the hotel cook she was able to meet when she brought his lunch earlier in the day, that she hadn’t thought he might bring up something else to converse about.
“I didn’t make her do anything. I simply stated what was expected and what would happen if those expectations weren’t met, in a kind but stern manner. That’s all.”
Max laughed. “You make it sound so easy.”
“It isn’t,” Delia said, tilting her head as she thought about it. “I suppose I figured it out with my siblings. Children try to test you to see what they can get away with doing. But if you stand firm while remaining kind, they’ll come around.”
Max was quiet for a moment. “I suppose I give in to her too much.”
After watching his lack of reaction to some of Anna’s antics, Delia was inclined to agree. “Being stern with her won’t make her love you less. In fact, I suspect she’ll love you more.”
“Do you think she does at all? Love me, I mean?” His question was so earnest that it made Delia’s heart ache for him.
“I think she does. Or she will,” she said softly. “Even if she doesn’t realize it yet.”
Max clasped his hands together and rested his arms on his knees, his elbow bumping into Delia’s leg. “Sometimes I think she blames me for the loss of her mother.”
Delia worried her lip between her teeth, trying to determine how to respond to that. Children weren’t always rational in how they thought. “It’s difficult to say. But maybe it’s because she simply doesn’t know you that well yet?”
He nodded. “Maybe. I also don’t know what to say to her about her mother. What if one day she asks me why I wasn’t there? Why she didn’t know me until now?” He paused. “I’m sorry. I’m asking you questions that you can’t answer.”
She gave him a reassuring smile. “It’s all right. Sometimes it helps simply to speak the words out loud.”
“I’ve also realized that since you’ve been here, I’ve talked an awful lot about my life but haven’t asked you much about yours. I imagine you must miss your family?”
“I do,” Delia said in a low voice. She hadn’t expected the sudden change in conversation, or the emotions his simple question evoked. Most of the time, she tried not to think about Mother or her brothers and sisters. It was easier than missing them.
“Tell me about them,” he said. “Which sibling is your favorite?”
Delia laughed through the lump in her throat. “That isn’t a fair question. I imagine it’s akin to asking a father who his favorite child is.”
“That’s easy enough. I only have one child.” He grinned at her as he shifted his body to see her better.
Delia felt her face go warm at the movement of his leg against hers.
She swallowed and forced her mind back to her family.
“I couldn’t choose between them. They’re all so very different.
” She went on to tell him about the silly jokes that her little brother Michael was so fond of telling, how long it took Tessie to learn to walk, how Mother was an endless fount of fascinating stories, and on and on.
“I’m sorry,” she said after several minutes had passed. “I’ve missed them all quite a lot.”
“I’ve enjoyed listening. I have no siblings, so I find stories of them entertaining.” His face grew serious for a moment. “I hope you don’t regret leaving them to come here.”
“No,” Delia said immediately. “Not at all. You’ve been so kind.”
He smiled again and, before Delia realized what had happened, he’d taken her hand in his. “I’m glad to hear that. I like having you here.”
Her eyes strayed from their hands to his face. He was still smiling, and as his fingers laced through hers, she found herself smiling back at him.
The most contented feeling settled over her as they sat there, the stars twinkling in the sky above. There was something wonderfully comfortable and secure about sitting on the step, next to Max, their hands intertwined and the only witness being the dark mountains far off in the distance.
It was almost as if nothing else in the world mattered except the two of them in that very moment.