Chapter Nineteen
Nineteen
Gabe forgot Finn existed when he saw Lizbet grip the back of one of the kitchen chairs, shut her eyes and turn deathly pale.
Immediately, he rounded the corner of the table and gripped her firmly by her upper arms, then lowered her gently onto the chair she’d been grasping so tightly that her knuckles were bone white.
She was trembling.
“Lizbet!” Gabe gasped. And from then on, although neither of them would ever be able to pinpoint the moment things changed, she was no longer Miss Fontaine to him, and he was no longer Mr. Whitfield to her. “Lizbet, what’s wrong? Are you ill?”
She shook her head, her eyes still clenched shut, and her lowered lashes were suddenly wet with tears.
Finn, for once making himself useful, pumped cold water into a cup and brought it to the table.
Gabe carefully pried Lizbet’s fingers loose from each other and eased the cup into her hands, keeping it steady until she finally took hold herself.
She opened her eyes, took a sip, looked up into Gabe’s face and whispered, “It’s William that Henry Middlebrook is expecting,” she said, in a near whisper. “It’s William.”
Gabe crouched in front of her. “Your stepfather?”
She managed a nod and, yet again, Gabe ached to take her into his arms and hold her.
“Henry did mention the name William,” Finn admitted awkwardly, standing somewhere at the periphery of Gabe’s vision. “I didn’t think—”
“You never do,” Gabe answered, his voice clipped. But all his concern was focused on Lizbet.
“Take more water,” he urged her, still crouching in front of her chair.
After two or three cautious sips, she set the cup on the table, but she was still trembling. “Dear God,” she murmured, as one in a daze. “He’s going to take Frankie and Jubal away.” Her green eyes were wild now, frantic. “What am I going to do, Gabe? What am I going to do? ”
Gabe took her cold hands in his and held them firmly, though he was careful not to squeeze too hard.
“Don’t you think you might be getting a little ahead of yourself, here?
” he asked quietly. Then, after a glance toward the door to the parlor to assure himself that Frankie and Jubal weren’t standing there, listening in, he went on to say, “William isn’t going to take the children, Lizbet.
He abandoned them, remember? He’s coming to Silver Hills for another reason entirely—because he thinks he can throw in with Henry and get rich mining this farm.
” Here, he paused, shot an angry glance in Finn’s direction.
“And that, I assure you, isn’t going to happen, either. ”
Finn wilted a little, but he didn’t have an answer ready.
Lizbet shook her head again, despairing.
She was so white with distress that Gabe let go of her hands and held her face instead, feeling the softness of her skin against his work-roughened paws.
“No,” she said brokenly, “William doesn’t want the children—and that’s the worst part, don’t you see?
He’ll take them to punish me , not because he’s turned into a devoted father.
He’ll do it because I thwarted his plan to marry me off to that awful man! ”
“Shhh,” Gabe said, and, without thinking, he kissed her forehead.
“Don’t borrow trouble. I’ll ride over to Painted Pony Creek first thing in the morning and have a word with Judge Bates.
He’s a good man, Lizbet, and the fact that Keller left his children the way he did, while you continued to care for them will carry weight with him. ”
“Maybe you ought to stay here, Gabe,” Finn interceded, his tone speculative now.
“I’m not really interested in your opinion just now,” Gabe informed him, rising to his feet to face his brother.
Finn spread his hands out from his sides and looked truly contrite. “Middlebrook made me an offer, that’s all. I didn’t agree to go after the mineral rights to this land—you didn’t give me a chance to explain that when I got here.”
Gabe was at once relieved that his kid brother was alive and well and ready to throttle him for throwing in with a pair like Middlebrook and Keller. “Make up your mind, Finn. Are you still a Whitfield, or are you just a lackey, pandering to those two in hopes of filling your own pockets?”
Tears glistened in Finn’s eyes. “I admit I considered their offer, but I knew right away that I wasn’t going to accept it.
I know how you feel about this land, how Dad and Granddad and Great-Grandad felt about it.
I came back because this is home, and because you’re my brother.
” He paused, swallowed visibly, then went on.
“You’ve got to believe me, Gabe. I’m on your side. ”
Gabe felt a strong stir of hope for this prodigal brother of his, and he relaxed his guard a little. He knew Finn well, despite their long separation, and he was telling the truth.
“Half this farm is still yours,” he said. “And I guess I couldn’t stop you if you decided to dig for silver on land you own. Just know that if you do that, Finn, you’ll be dead to me.”
Finn looked pained. “Gabe, we could be rich.”
“I don’t give a damn about being rich. I care about this land, and everything the family went through to hold on to it through hard times.”
“Fair enough,” Finn said, with a sigh and a slight lift of one corner of his mouth, an attempt, Gabe supposed, at a grin. “I give you my word, Gabe. There will be no mining on Whitfield property unless you agree.”
“I won’t,” Gabe said flatly.
“I’ll get my satchel,” he told Gabe, his tone lighter than before. “I left it on the step in case you flung me back out into the storm.”
Gabe gave a sigh of his own and rose to his feet. “Get your stuff,” he told his brother. “After I’m sure Lizbet is all right, I’ll rustle up some dry clothes for you. With luck, you won’t come down with pneumonia before morning.”
“I’ll put it off as long as I can,” Finn replied, with pert amusement. “The pneumonia, I mean. Wouldn’t want to be any trouble to you, Big Brother. After all, you’ve got this sacred farm to maintain, and you don’t need any distractions.”
“Just go,” Gabe said, weary but reassured. “And if you want food, help yourself. The pantry is full.”
Finn slid a sympathetic, respectful glance Lizbet’s way. “Look after the lady,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”
Lizbet was slowly regaining her composure, and when Gabe had reheated the coffee and poured her a cup to steady her nerves, she made an attempt at a joke. “It looks as though John was right,” she said, after a sip and a quick pulling in of her cheeks. “Your coffee has to be chewed.”
After that, she seemed to regain her strength, moment by moment.
“And I’m not afraid of William Keller or Henry Middlebrook,” she said, straightening her spine as she spoke. By then, Finn had retrieved his bag from the back step and retreated to the parlor.
“I think I’d better look in on Frankie and Jubal,” Lizbet went on, when Gabe didn’t speak, pushing back her chair to rise, though he promptly prevented that by resting on hand lightly on her shoulder.
“Sit awhile,” he said. “I’ve got to go upstairs to get some bedding and the like for Finn anyhow. I’ll see how the kids are doing and report back to you—how’s that?”
Lizbet favored him with a rather flimsy smile that, nonetheless, made him feel as if he might drift upward, untethered by gravity, and bang his head on the ceiling.
“They can be a handful,” she warned, but she looked relieved to stay behind. Probably wanted more time to collect herself.
Finn was in the parlor, seated in one of the armchairs and pulling off his boots. As a boy, his demeanor had usually been one of impish good humor, and it heartened Gabe to see the brother he recognized.
“You can’t go off and leave that woman alone, Gabe,” he said. “Not to ride over to Painted Pony Creek for a lawyer or anything else. She needs protection, and you know it.”
“From you?” Gabe retorted lightly, without slowing his pace. He’d reached the foot of the staircase when he heard Finn’s answer.
“Henry Middlebrook is a dangerous man,” he said. “I remember that from the old days. When somebody gets in his way, he’s likely to do just about anything. Knows he’s already hell bound, so why not get his revenge any way he can?”
Gabe paused, gripping the newel post with one hand. “If you haven’t told me everything you know about what he and Keller are planning, you’d better say so right now.”
“He didn’t tell me anything. It was his housekeeper, Ruth, who filled me in—I got to town yesterday, and Middlebrook invited me to stay the night at his place.
I was almost broke, so I agreed, rather than spend my last dollar on a hotel room or ride out here so you could raise hell with me for mentioning silver mines first thing.
“That woman is bitter as hell, for reasons of her own, which I am too much the gentleman to reveal. What I can tell you is that Henry and William met years ago, back in St. Louis. Henry loaned William a boatload of money a while back, and William promised him a young, pretty wife in return, in addition to repayment. Now, having failed to meet the conditions of their original agreement, William’s gone and reneged on the rest of the deal, too, because the lovely Lady Lizbet wouldn’t cooperate, and now poor old Henry is mad enough to pull up railroad spikes with his teeth. ”
“What made Middlebrook agree to a plan like that in the first place?” Gabe asked.
“He’s not the type to buy a pig in a poke, so to speak.
And there’s no call to point out the awkward inference, because we both know Lizbet is a beautiful woman.
What I’m saying is, Henry never laid eyes on her until last fall, when she stepped down from the jitney. ”
“Indeed, Lizbet is beautiful,” Finn replied, spreading his hands for emphasis.
“And it just so happens that you’re wrong, for once in your life.
The old man knew that firsthand, because he saw her at a big party of some sort back in St. Louis, according to Ruth.
He’s been obsessed with her ever since.”
“Does Lizbet know that?” Gabe was actually thinking aloud, not querying his brother. “That Henry set his sights on her way back then? Because it seemed to me, he was a stranger to her when she arrived last September.”
“I have no idea,” Finn admitted, rising from his chair and moving to the sofa, where he began pushing at the cushions with both hands, probably to determine if they would be comfortable to sleep on. “Why don’t you ask her?”
Gabe said no more but simply went on upstairs.
The first thing he did was check on the children, as he’d promised Lizbet he would.
Jubal and Hector were sprawled on the bed in Finn’s old room, side by side. Hector was awake, but the boy lay spread-eagle on top of the covers, face down and still wearing his shoes.
“Hey, buddy,” Gabe said, in a near whisper, his heart swelling a little. “Let’s get you tucked in for the night.”
Jubal stirred slightly as Gabe removed his shoes and maneuvered him under the covers, but he didn’t wake up.
Frankie, it turned out, was better situated.
She lay in the bed Gabe had moved into the space that had once been Bonnie’s sewing room, a lantern burning on the bedside table, a book propped up on her little chest.
Again, Gabe’s heart was affected.
“Is everything all right?” she asked tentatively, when she saw Gabe in the doorway.
By everything , Gabe knew, she meant Lizbet. And to this child, Lizbet probably was everything—or very nearly so.
Was William Keller greedy enough, coldhearted enough, to separate Frankie and her brother from the person they loved most?
Possibly, he was, and that raised Gabe’s hackles again, tired though he was. His argument with his brother—which had begun maybe five seconds after Finn stepped over the threshold and immediately lobbied him to sell the mineral rights, if not the farm itself—had taken a lot out of him.
“Things have calmed down considerably,” he answered mildly, chagrined that he and Finn had frightened this child and probably her brother, too, by shouting at each other the way they had. “Your big sister is fine, but I reckon it’s safe to say she thinks you ought to be sound asleep by now.”
“You won’t tell her I lit the lamp, will you?” Frankie asked, worried. “She’d be mad, because we’re supposed to let her do that, always. Because there could be a fire.”
Gabe was making no promises. “Just don’t do it again, Missy,” he said. “Fire is nothing to play around with.” It wasn’t very dark upstairs, because the moon was almost full and the curtains were open. She’d lit the lamp because she wanted to read, and the moonlight, bright as it was, wasn’t enough.
He hesitated on the threshold, unsure whether he ought to walk over and put out the thing himself or keep a proper distance. He wanted Frankie and her brother to feel safe in this house.
Frankie solved the problem by stretching out one arm and turning the key at the base of the glowing lamp, thus quenching the flame.
“Good night, Mr. Whitfield,” she said.
“Good night, Frankie.”
He was turning to leave when she spoke again, her voice soft and tentative and heartbreakingly young. “Mr. Whitfield?”
“What is it?”
“Please don’t let my father make Lizbet get married to that awful Mr. Middlebrook,” she said. “She might do it, if it means keeping me and Jubal.”
Gabe hesitated, still on the threshold, his back to Lizbet’s innocent little sister, searching both his mind and his soul for the right response.
Finally, he said, “I mean to make sure that doesn’t happen, Frankie. No matter what it takes.”