To Have and to Hold (Cactus Creek Cowboys) (16 page)

“Norman thinks some recognition should be made of Toby’s sacrifice. Once you have found a place to start a new town, he wants everybody to decide on a fitting memorial. You’re not to consider costs. He’ll pay for everything.”

Colby didn’t know whether Norman had given up resisting or if he didn’t object to a memorial for Toby, but he repeated those words with more energy than any of the others.

“One more thing. Norman realizes everyone is of equal importance to this community, that the differences in wealth or social standing don’t change that. As of now, he’s giving up his position of leadership. From now on, decisions will be made by a committee of three chosen by everyone present.”

Every eye became riveted on Norman. They had to be wondering if he would say those words…and if he would mean them.

“You have to speak a little louder,” his wife prompted him. “They can’t hear you.”

Everyone knew Norman hadn’t said a word.

Norman began, “I realize everyone is of equal importance in the community,” but appeared unable, or unwilling, to go on.

Colby prompted, “And that the differences in wealth or social standing don’t change that.”

“Speak up,” his wife said.

The words burst from Norman’s mouth in an angry torrent.

“Go ahead and finish,” Colby said. “You’re almost done.”

Norman repeated the last sentences in a nearly normal voice, but it was clear the words would never have passed his lips if he’d had any way of preventing it.

Colby decided to take advantage of the gathered crowd. “Since everybody’s here, it’s a good time to choose your committee. A couple of rules. Every wife is to have a vote equal to that of her husband, and all unmarried children above fifteen should have half a vote.”

Tom Hale protested. “We’ve never done anything like that. Back in Kentucky—”

Colby interrupted him. “You’re not in Kentucky. Out here women are required to make an equal contribution to survival. For that they deserve an equal voice in what happens to them. If Toby was old enough to die for you, he was old enough to have a say in the decisions that would affect his life. The same goes for Polly, Naomi, Virgil’s boys, and all the others who work as hard as any adult. Anybody else got a problem with that?”

Morley Sumner spoke up. “No, they don’t. We think it’s a good notion.”

Colby knew his novel arrangements wouldn’t go down well with everyone, but he didn’t care. “Dr. Kessling would be a good choice to run the meeting.” Murmuring and head nodding indicated general agreement. “I’ll leave you to your deliberations.”

With ground devouring strides, he left the circled wagons and went to where Ted Drummond was posted to watch the grazing livestock. “They’re meeting to choose a leadership committee,” he told the boy. “Join them. I’ll watch the animals.”

“There’s no point,” Ted grumbled. “I can’t vote.”

“Women and all unmarried children above fifteen can vote. Hurry. You don’t want to be left out.”

Ted’s disbelief didn’t stop him from heading toward the wagons at a run. Colby laughed. It would probably be the first time the boy had been asked to give his opinion rather than being told what to think.

He’d chosen the age of fifteen because that’s when he ran away from home. If he could survive on his own and be treated as an adult in a world of adults, then others could, too. He would have liked to stay behind to see what effect the women and older children would have on the discussion, but he wasn’t part of their community. He was hired just to get them safely to La Junta.

He needed to be thinking about what he would do when he left. It wouldn’t be as easy as he’d thought. Despite the inner conflicts that kept them divided into separate camps, he’d become attached to them. He had a special liking for the kids. For them the West would be more of an exciting change than a difficult challenge. It would ask more of them, but it would offer greater rewards. He just hoped they would be able to see that and not become discouraged because their new lives were so different from the old ones.

The night was calm with a cool breeze that ruffled the grass and dissipated the heat of the day. The ground was still soft, but it would dry enough by tomorrow to make traveling easier. With a day’s rest, he doubted Norman would have any trouble with only six oxen. Considering the weight of his wagons, he wondered why he hadn’t bought mules.

He didn’t want to think about Norman, but he was impressed by his quiet and dignified wife. He knew she’d been forced into an unhappy marriage. That was one thing that never seemed to change. Elizabeth had been forced to marry a man she didn’t love.

He’d promised himself he wouldn’t think about Elizabeth. He just got angry about something he couldn’t change.

He whistled to Shadow. The Appaloosa lifted his head out of the grass and started toward him. His attention was so focused on the stallion he failed to hear Naomi’s approach.

“Seeing how well you’ve trained Shadow, I shouldn’t be surprised that you were able to get Norman to make that apology. Still, I’m wondering how you did it. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t heard it.”

“Why aren’t you at the meeting? You get a vote in what they decide.”

“You certainly stirred things up. Vernon Edwards and Tom Hale tried to change the rules after you left, but Morley Sumner told them to sit down and be quiet or he’d set them down.” She laughed again. “I’ve never seen Tom Hale look so astonished.”

“You’ll lose your vote by not staying.”

“My half vote, you mean. I gave it to Ethan.”

“So why are you here? You’ve avoided me since last night.”

“I wanted to thank you for what you did. Forcing Norman to apologize was an important step. However, it was the words you forced him to say that were more important. Norman will do his best to weasel out of them, but nobody’s going to let him forget he said them.”

“He can only weasel out if all of you allow it.”

“That’s hard to do when we know he takes it out on Sibyl, but that’s not your problem. What made you force the men to let the women and older children have a vote? The men have been adamant that only they would make decisions, and that they would be made in secret.”

“I know what it’s like to be ignored when you make more of a contribution than a lot of adults.”

“Do you intend to let your wife and children help you make decisions?”

“I won’t have a wife or children.” He stumbled over the last word. He could see that she was about to question that statement so he headed her off. “Why are you talking to me? You haven’t even looked at me since yesterday.”

Her gaze faltered, but she looked him in the eye. “Because I’m grateful for what you did and admire you for having the courage to do it.”

“But you still don’t want to look at me.”

She did look away. “That’s all I had to say.”

He reached for her arm when she started to turn away. “What happened after we got back yesterday? You can’t be angry I kissed you. You kissed me back the second time.”

Naomi jerked her arms out of his grip and turned to face Colby. “I don’t know why I did that. I’m sorry.”

“You weren’t sorry then. Why are you now?”

“I wasn’t thinking.”

“You were thinking plenty before that. You weren’t at a loss for words. Don’t try to tell me that my kiss paralyzed your mind.”

“That’s just what it did,” Naomi said.

“I don’t believe you.”

She reacted like she’d been slapped. “It’s not very gallant to call a lady a liar.”

“What choice do I have when you won’t tell the truth?”

“It’s not very gallant to press for the truth when a lady doesn’t want to give it.”

“A
lady
would have enough courage and class to spit it out. She wouldn’t try to hide behind her gender.”

“Okay, but don’t say you didn’t ask for it. A
gentleman
wouldn’t kiss one lady when he’d already promised to take care of another one. A
gentleman
wouldn’t lie to the first lady because he’d changed his mind because of a second lady.”

“What are you talking about?” Colby asked. “That’s complete gibberish.”

“I’m talking about you swearing you wouldn’t take us to Santa Fe, but telling Cassie you would take care of her when she gets to Santa Fe until she finds a husband.”

“Where did you hear that?”

“From Cassie herself. Can you deny it?”

Colby could feel some of the tension leave. After a moment, he smiled. Naomi was not merely influenced by their kisses. She was so jealous she’d pounced on every word Cassie uttered. He was a fool to think she didn’t care for him as much as he cared for her.

“How dare you laugh at me?” Naomi was enraged.

“I’m not laughing at you.”

“I can see your face despite the setting sun, and I know a smile when I see it.”

“Do you recall Cassie’s exact words?”

“She said you were going to
take
care
of
her
.”

“Did she tell you how?” She couldn’t have because he hadn’t told her.

“No, but she said you had changed your mind about going to Santa Fe because she asked you.”

“Cassie is a beautiful young woman who’s always had everything she wanted because of her beauty. She assumes if she wants it, it will happen.”

“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard,” Naomi said. “She’s silly but not an idiot.”

“I did tell her I’d make sure she had a place to stay in Santa Fe, but it’ll be in a convent.”

Naomi stared at him in disbelief. “You plan to put her in a convent?”

Colby laughed. “She won’t be
joining
a convent, just
staying
there. “There’s a group of nuns who take in women with children and no husbands. They will let her stay there as long as she needs.”

He waited several moments for what he’d said to sink in, for Naomi to decide if she believed him.

“She didn’t actually say you’d agreed to go to Santa Fe,” Naomi admitted. “She assumed you had because she asked you.”

“Did she tell you she’d asked me to marry her?”

Naomi was aghast. “She
couldn’t
do that, not with Abe barely cold in his grave.”

“Cassie will be faithful and loving to the man she marries, but she’s incapable of the kind of commitment you would give a husband. When one man disappears, she’ll have no trouble transferring her affections to another. I don’t say that to be judgmental. It’s just the way she is. That’s why I was drawn to you. When you tell a man you love him, it will never change.”

“What about you?” Her voice was so soft it was almost drowned out by the rustle of the grass.

“I believe in commitment but not love. That’s why I’ll never get married or have children.” This time he managed to say the word without stumbling.

“But there’s love all around. You can see it even here.”

“I see commitment but not love.”

“What do you think love is?”

“I don’t know. I loved my parents, but they didn’t love me because I couldn’t be what they wanted. I loved Elizabeth”—he hadn’t meant to let her name slip out—“but she didn’t love me because I wasn’t rich.”

“If you knew that in the beginning—”

“She said I was the only man she’d ever loved, the only man she ever
could
love, until”—he did manage to stop this time—“until her father told her I was too poor, so she married a rich man of his choice.”

“What do you think love should be?”

He wasn’t sure. Maybe he’d just
thought
he loved his parents because that’s how children were supposed to feel. Maybe he didn’t truly love Elizabeth. If he had, would he have allowed her to turn her back on him? He thought he’d fought for her, but wouldn’t he have fought even harder if he’d loved her as truly and deeply as he thought?

“I thought I knew, but now I’m not sure. What do you think it should be?”

“I can’t speak from experience, but I think love requires a deep trust that’s not based on facts so much as it is what you know of a person’s character. I think it requires commitment that doesn’t falter during hard times. It requires respect, honesty, a sense of fair play, an ability to compromise, to put yourself second.”

“That could describe a business relationship. I want to know what would make you marry a man against your father’s wishes, against your friends’ advice, maybe even despite common sense.”

Naomi favored him with a half smile and a shake of her head. “I hope I never do anything like that.”

He was insistent. “But if you did, what would it take?”

Naomi sobered, regarded him thoughtfully for a moment before speaking.

“I’d have to believe I saw something in him that was hidden from everyone else, something that maybe only I could see because of the special relationship between us. There’d have to be trust and all the other things I mentioned, but there’d have to be something special that drew me to him, that kept us together in the face of so many obstacles.”

“What would that be?”

“Love.”

“But what is love? People are always talking about it, but they never say what it is.”

How could she answer that? She was certain her father had loved her mother, but men didn’t talk about their feelings, especially to their children. Her mother had always said her husband was a wonderful man, but she had been one of the beautiful Brown sisters. She could have married anyone she wanted. Why had she chosen their father?

Maybe it didn’t matter what her parents’ feelings for each other were. Colby has asked what
she
thought, but despite having reached the age of nineteen, she hadn’t given it much thought. She’d been too busy taking care of her family after her mother’s death, she hadn’t met any man who appealed to her, and she’d seen her cousins make unhappy marriages. With the war swirling around them and then the nightmares, love wasn’t something she had time to think about.

So what did she think? Didn’t she have some idea about what she wanted? To her surprise, she knew exactly what she wanted.

“There would have to be a strong physical attraction. I know some people would say that’s shallow, but I think a woman needs to think her husband is the most attractive man in the world, even if only to her. She needs to want to be near him, to feel his presence, to enjoy the intimacy of touching him. She has to enjoy his kisses, his embrace.” She could feel herself blush. “Being with him, becoming part of him, has to be more rewarding to her than parental approval or the acceptance of friends. She will place his interests above her own even if she couldn’t be sure he’ll do the same for her.” She stopped, at a loss for what to say next.

“Do you think it’s possible for a woman to feel all that?”

“Only if a man is worthy of it.”

“You can’t find one man in a hundred that close to perfect. What about everybody else? Don’t they deserve love, too?”

She noticed he had said
they
, not
we.
She didn’t understand why he valued himself so little. “The man doesn’t have to be perfect any more than the woman. That’s how a woman would have to feel to marry a man in the face of so much opposition. She’d want to feel that way even if everybody was enthusiastic about her choice.” Colby didn’t look as though she’d answered his question. “What did you want me to say?”

“It’s not that.”

He didn’t get to say what it was because Ben came running up.

“They’ve got a committee and Norman isn’t on it,” he announced. “They want to talk to you right now.”

“I’ll go in just a minute.”

“Papa said I was to get you. You gotta come now.”

“Go,” Naomi said. “We can finish talking later.”

Colby hesitated before following an impatient Ben. He looked over his shoulder at Naomi just before they disappeared around the corner of a wagon.

Naomi wondered what had raised the questions in Colby’s mind. Had she given him the right answers, or was she as confused as he seemed to be?

She wasn’t wrong about trust, honesty, or any of the other things. Anybody would list those. It was the attraction element that was hard to understand, impossible to pin down. Exactly what made him so attractive to her? He wasn’t the most handsome man she’d ever met. He was taller than anybody in the wagon train and more muscular than anybody except Morley Sumner, but she’d never been overawed by physical size and prowess. He said he didn’t have enough money to replace his worn uniform with decent clothes, but that didn’t appear to bother him. He didn’t try to ingratiate himself with people, yet everybody liked and trusted him. He was kind, thoughtful, and willing to help anyone if he could.

That couldn’t be the whole answer. She was attracted to him before she knew that.

It had to be more than mere physical attraction. She had known almost immediately he was a man who would stand by his word, who could do whatever he put his mind to, who a woman could depend on. What other kind of man would jeopardize his life to save a bunch of strangers? She thought of many more traits and characteristics, but none of them held the answer. Yet something had to be there because she thought about him constantly. The desire to be with him, to know everything about him, was impossible to stem. Why?

Maybe love was something that couldn’t be described in words. Maybe it was something that had to be experienced to be understood. It was an indefinable melding of the physical, emotional, and intellectual—a combination a rational person might tell you couldn’t possibly exist.

Yet she was certain it did. Otherwise, how could she explain her deepening attraction to Colby, and the feeling that it had already grown to more than that?

***

The next day Naomi and her father were eating their midday meal when a frightened Paul Hill came running up to their wagon.

“Wilma’s labor pains have started. You gotta come.”

“It’ll take several hours,” the doctor said. “I’ll come as soon as I finish eating.”

“You gotta come now,” Hill insisted. “She said she’s been having pains since sometime during the night. She didn’t want to say anything because everybody was so upset.”

“Naomi will go with you. I’ll come as soon as I get my bag.”

“I told her to tell me as soon as anything happened,” Hill said to Naomi as they hurried to his wagon, “but she said she didn’t because it was going to take a long time.”

“Are the pains sharp yet?”

“Yeah. That’s why I noticed. She went white and couldn’t hide her groans.”

Naomi had helped her father with several deliveries. Groans didn’t necessarily mean the baby was ready to make its appearance. She’d known labors to last most of a day. She wondered what Colby would decide when he found out. Surely he wouldn’t leave them behind to catch up later.

When they reached the Hill’s wagon, Wilma’s sister-in-law, Flora Hill, was with her. Several women had gathered around to keep the curious at bay. In a way that was characteristic of all small villages, everyone knew everything without having to be told.

“One contraction is hardly over before the next one starts,” Wilma told Naomi. “Where is your father?”