Rexanne Becnel (39 page)

Lacie thought about it a moment, but she still wasn’t sure. “I suppose you have a point. But—”

“It’s just a matter of letting people know what a special place Sparrow Hill is. The right people,” he emphasized.

“Neal has all sorts of ideas,” Ada broke in excitedly. She leaned forward and clutched Lacie’s arm. “He’s going to run advertisements in the newspapers in all the big cities—Denver, St. Louis, Kansas City, Topeka.”

Lacie felt a glimmer of hope as she stared first at Ada’s shining face, then at Neal’s determined one. “But why?” she asked the question wonderingly. “Why should any of this matter to you?”

Neal’s warm gaze turned to Ada, and in that brief moment Lacie had her answer. Neal loved Ada and would do everything in his power to make her happy—even if it meant spending his valuable time on an ailing girls’ school. As she stared at them, she was suddenly struck by the enormous gulf between Neal’s unselfish feelings for Ada, and Dillon’s wholly self-centered response to herself. Neal would give Ada anything she wanted. Dillon took from her more than she had been willing to give.

That was not exactly true, she told herself. She couldn’t blame him entirely for her inability to resist him. She must take part of the blame for herself. But the difference between the two men depressed her anew. Here was Neal, giving her what she really wanted, and still thoughts of Dillon circled in her mind, dragging her down.

“…and so we could live here still. You could manage the school and hire more teachers.”

Lacie came out of her reverie and refocused on Neal. “But if you stay here, what about your job? With Dillon?” she added, his name rolling hesitantly from her mouth.

“Dillon has enough investments to keep me traveling back and forth to St. Louis and Kansas City pretty regularly. There’s no reason why I can’t be based here instead of Denver.”

A small warning sounded in Lacie’s head. “Then—then there’d always be a chance he might come here.”

In the awkward silence, Ada and Neal glanced at each other, then back at Lacie. “You wouldn’t have to see him if you didn’t want to,” Neal said quietly.

Lacie stood up from the wicker rocker and crossed nervously to the porch railing. “You know him better than that.” Then she laughed, a harsh mirthless sound. “Of course, there’s no reason to believe he’d want to see me either.” She took a slow, shaky breath, then another. “But I don’t know if I could face either possibility.”

She turned back and met both of their sympathetic faces. “Your idea is wonderful, Neal. I really believe you can pull it off. And with Ada as headmistress—”

“You
have
to stay,” Ada interrupted. She jumped up and approached Lacie, her fair brow creased earnestly. “I couldn’t begin to manage Sparrow Hill, especially with more students and more teachers. Why, I wouldn’t know what to do at all!” She clasped Lacie’s hands in her own. “You’re the only one who can do it.”

“At least think about it, Lacie,” Neal joined in. “At least consider the possibility.”

Lacie looked from Ada to Neal, then down the wide shady gallery. “I’ll consider it,” she murmured softly. She would consider it, for preserving Sparrow Hill was the one thing she had wanted from the beginning. It was what had driven her to pursue her mad pretense in the first place. Oh yes, she desperately wanted to stay, for just as before, she truly had no place else to go.

But deep in her heart, she knew it was impossible. As much as she wanted Sparrow Hill to survive, as much as Neal’s idea fired her enthusiasm, she knew she could never stay anyplace where she might run into Dillon.

She’d wanted Sparrow Hill to survive, and now it seemed as if it might—only she would not be a part of it.

L
ACIE WIPED A TRICKLE
of perspiration from her brow with the back of her hand. Despite the wide straw hat that shaded her face and the rolled-up sleeves of her loose cotton blouse, she was unbearably hot. Beneath her single petticoat and her skirt, her legs felt as if they were in an oven. In the blazing August heat, the entire world seemed to be wilting, waiting for day to end and evening to fall with its modicum of relief. No one was about, for everyone had sought a shady spot: Leland on the old hammock he’d slung between two magnolias, and Mrs. Gunter to her bed. Ada and Neal had gone to town very early, before the heat had risen so miserably. Even the horses across the field sought the shade of a pecan tree, standing head to tail as they lazily switched away flies with their long tails.

Only she was foolish enough to venture out in this unforgiving heat.

With a grimace, Lacie pushed away a damp tendril that clung to her neck, but she did not turn back. Doggedly she made her way across the road, then carefully clambered over the wood-plank fence. She held her long skirt up as she picked her way across the uncut field, clutching a split-oak basket in her free hand. It was only a little farther until she reached the shade of the trees, she told herself. Then she would stop and catch her breath.

At the treeline she stopped, put down the basket, and turned back to look across the field toward the big white house in the distance. How beautiful it was! she thought, caressing the scene with her eyes. The wide green fields, the two ancient oak trees. It was at once both grand and homey, impressive and familiar. How hard it would be to leave!

But no matter how hard it might be, the time had come. It was time to leave, and the sooner the better. Ada would object, of course, as would Neal. Mrs. Gunter would fuss and dab at her eyes. But it couldn’t be helped. She had deluded herself for the past three days, but she could do so no longer. For today her trunk had arrived quite unexpectedly from Denver, and like a harbinger of trouble to come, it had given her a warning.

The trunk had been delivered earlier in the morning, after Ada and Neal had left. As she had stared at it, sitting so square and solid in the wide hall, she’d been acutely aware of Dillon’s part in its arrival. He had sent it on behind her, and it was as if he were telling her to pack and be gone. As much as she hated to accede to even one more of his arrogant demands, as much as she resented his continued interference in her life, she knew she could not oppose him on this. He didn’t want to see her, and she most certainly did not want to see him.

She had decided to leave the next morning, but there were still a few things she needed to do before she went. Now, as she contemplated the task she had set for herself, she could not help but wonder at the vagaries of her own emotions. That little cabin was nothing to her—it truly wasn’t. But it mattered to Dillon, and somehow that changed things. Out of all the elegant and expensive things his money could buy—the hotel she had stayed in, his office building—it was that humble little cottage that affected him the most. He had been vulnerable when he’d taken her there. It had only been for a moment, and he’d hidden it behind a sarcastic comment. But she’d seen it, and it had touched her.

Was that when she had started to fall in love with him? Lacie shook her head and picked up the basket. It was hard to tell now when it had begun, for she could hardly recall her life before Dillon. It seemed she had loved him forever, and as for the years before he strode so imperiously into her life, well, during those years she’d just been waiting to love him.

She moved deeper into the woods, following an overgrown trail that led toward the bayou. When Ada and Neal came home, she would announce her decision. Leland could take her to the station in the morning, and by evening she would be in Natchez. She would send a message to her mother’s second cousin’s daughter. Perhaps she could visit with her for a while as she searched for a teaching position. Or if that wasn’t possible, she could go on to New Orleans, or perhaps Atlanta.

She stepped over a fallen log and continued on, lost in thought. With a little persuasion Ada would write her a letter of recommendation, signing it as Headmistress of Sparrow Hill School for Young Ladies. After all, that’s who Ada soon would be. Surely that letter would stand her in good stead. It might take her a little time, but eventually she would find a position in a school and she could go on with her life.

If only she could find some enthusiasm for the idea.

When the path broadened to an open grassy bank, Lacie halted. Before her, Brush Bayou lay still, barely moving in the thick afternoon heat. The sun struck yellow sparks across its golden green surface, sending shimmering waves of heat dancing before her eyes. Across the water, in a shaded pool, three white herons stood, awkward and elegant on their long stick legs. They stalked the shallow water searching for food, dipping low to feed, then raising their heads up to peer around for more.

She moved quietly to a shady hummock, then put the basket down, and the three birds all looked over at her. When she pulled her old shoes off and flung her hat down, they crooked their necks, following her every movement curiously. It was only when she tucked the hem of her skirt and petticoat into her waistband, then moved barefoot toward the beckoning water, however, that they evidenced any alarm. For a moment they tensed, crouching down a little, prepared to spring skyward at the least sign of threat. Then, as Lacie moved ankle deep into the cool water and bent down to refresh herself by trickling water onto her arms, the birds relaxed. She moved slowly along one bank, feeling the sand and gravel give way to soft, squishy clay beneath her toes while the birds resumed their peaceful search for prey.

When had she first done this? Lacie wondered as she meandered through the shallows of the lazy bayou. That first spring at Sparrow Hill, when she had been so lonely, so lost? Or later, after the war had ended, and there wasn’t so much fear of encountering Yankees in the woods? She wasn’t sure, and anyway, it didn’t really matter. She had done it for years, whenever she could—only this would be the last time.

With a heavy sigh she moved into deeper water, relieved as the cool liquid lapped up to her knees. She hiked her skirt a little higher with one hand, while with the other she loosened the pin that held her hair in a wilting coil at the nape of her neck. Down came the thick gleaming mass of hair. Up came the skirt a little higher. The sun beat furiously upon her and reflected up from the amber surface of the deeper water. It was so hot. So hot, she thought.

When she made the decision to take a swim she turned abruptly for shore. The three herons paused again as she unbuttoned her skirt and removed her slip. They stared as she shed her blouse, then turned back toward the water. But as she stepped into the bayou, clad only in chemisette and pantalets, and propelled herself forward in a shallow dive, they decided it was all too much. As if of one mind, they all rose in unison, flapping for a moment in alarm as they lifted high above the water. Then they glided across the clearing and disappeared into the trees like three society matrons, aghast at her unseemly behavior.

Lacie watched them flee her presence as she floated on her back. She let her head slip beneath the water, then turned and kicked forward, swimming through the murky bayou until her lungs ached for want of air and she had to surface with a sudden splash.

Although the water felt heavenly on her heated skin, Lacie was hardly comforted by her swim. In the past she had enjoyed her solitude in this place. Today, however, it only made her feel more alone.

Would it always be like this? she brooded. Would she always feel so completely empty, so horribly desolate?

She struggled against the sorrow that seemed to overwhelm her. She would simply have to keep busy, she told herself sternly, and find new things to occupy her days.

But what about her nights? a wayward thought rose in her mind.

Frowning, Lacie swam back to the shore. Finding her footing, she climbed up the shallow bank. She would not think like this, she decided angrily. If she went on this way, daydreaming about him, burying all the hurtful things he’d done and remembering only those few good times—those wonderful times—she would drive herself mad.

With a vengeance she pulled her slip and skirt up over her sopping wet pantalets, then buttoned her blouse over her clinging-wet chemisette. She snatched up her hat and shoes in one hand and grabbed the basket with the other. With new and inexplicable haste, she hurried down the overgrown trail that paralleled Brush Bayou.

Lacie wasn’t sure precisely where the little cabin was. She only knew it was beyond the area where she normally wandered. But as she proceeded along through the thick woods at a brisk walk, she became more and more confident of her destination. Up this rise, circling the bayou, then down and across a sandy shaded branch that was little more than a trickle.

When she finally reached the tangled, overgrown clearing, she found it even more neglected than she had remembered. Blackberry vines scrambled across the path, catching at her skirt as she passed. Morning glories, with their blue trumpet flowers already beginning to close in the afternoon, climbed up the porch in profusion and dangled from the rotting eaves. For a moment she was taken aback, dismayed by the task she’d set herself and daunted by the absolute futility of it. What did it really matter? she asked herself. Who would know or even care about a few pitiful rose bushes struggling in a long-forgotten and abandoned garden?

No one would, she acknowledged. No one would know or care—but then, that did not matter. She had come to tend the rose bushes because she wanted to. There was no other reason.

With a sense of purpose she approached the house and set the basket down. She frowned at the tangle of rose bushes, thickly grown and coiled about themselves at the edge of the porch. With the help of one of the school’s library books, she had identified the plants as Apothecary Roses. The famous Rose of Lancaster, she thought with a faint smile. But she grew more serious as she contemplated her task. The suckers must go first, she decided, and the faded blooms and hips. Then she would tie them up so they wouldn’t shade themselves and perhaps learn to grow along the porch rail, as they had so many years ago. After that, she would work the bag of rotted stable sweepings she’d brought into the soil, then mulch the roots with leaves.