Twice a Bride (34 page)

Thirty minutes later, Susanna stepped onto the boardwalk and strolled toward the Butte Opera House. She’d donned her mint-green taffeta dress and obtained a little information from the dowdy Mrs. Michaels, proprietor of the Downtowner Inn. According to her, a Mr. Myron Wilcox managed the Butte Opera House, and Susanna was on her way to meet him.

Clouds hung over the mountains that rimmed the pretty valley. Mrs. Michaels had told Susanna all about the fires of ’96, and the new brick and sandstone buildings had given the city a fresh face. This was, after all, now “the center of commerce in the new state of Colorado.”

She passed Glauber’s Clothing, a millinery, even a fashion design store. She could live here and sing at the Butte until Trenton, or some other influential man, was ready to take her to the stages of New York.

Susanna continued to the opera house. These days, and especially in the West, plenty of women were making their own way. And she would be one of them. Was that what Willow Peterson was doing, or was she banking on Trenton’s help and affections too?

The Butte Opera House wasn’t as big as she’d hoped. It was little more than a storefront wedged in the middle of the block, but it was at least elegant, with gilded filigree and lettering on the glass door and side window. Susanna stepped into a small vestibule. Posters of past performances lined the walls. A rounded woman with a broom looked up from a side hallway.

“Can you tell me where I can find Mr. Myron Wilcox?” Susanna asked.

“He’s in his office.” The cleaning woman pointed to a closed door behind her.

“Thank you.” Susanna tugged her skirt straight and took slow strides to the door. She moistened her lips before knocking.

“Come in.” It seemed ironic that the manager of an opera house would sound like he’d been chewing on gravel.

A man with a hook nose sat behind a desk cluttered with papers and a stained porcelain coffee cup. He peered at her over wire-rimmed spectacles.

“Mr. Wilcox?”

“That’s me.” He studied her from the laced high-top shoes on her feet to the feather on her hat.

“I’m a singer, Mr. Wilcox.”

His laugh stung her ears. “They all are, honey.”

Squaring her shoulders, Susanna ran her finger along her jaw. “I’d like to audition for you.”

He stood. His belly hung over his belt. “That’s not how this works, missy.”

“Susanna. Miss Susanna Woods.” Her indignation was fast becoming fury.

“We bring in top-billed singers. I don’t pull ’em in off the street.” Another coarse laugh. “Where you from?”

“Kansas, but—”

“But nothing. You don’t belong here.” He stepped around the desk and looked her over again. “Leastwise, not as a singer. You might try the other opera house if you’re okay with showin’ your knickers in a vaudeville act.”

Trenton reluctantly walked away from the parsonage. If he hadn’t promised Susanna he’d think about what had happened between them in Kansas and what she’d said yesterday in the studio, a crowbar couldn’t have pried him away from Willow Peterson and her family today. But he’d given Susanna his word, and it was already nearly noon. If he had any hope of seeing her onto a train today, he needed to get to it.

Pulling his coat tight, he turned left onto Bennett Avenue. He’d go to the depot first to see about the schedule. Saturdays seemed to draw even more people into town. Men, women, and children riding in wagons, pulling carts, and walking dogs. But the streets were no more crowded than his mind was with thoughts and images.

The image of Pikes Peak shrouded in clouds mingled with the image of Willow standing with him behind the sofa, her hand in his. The compassion he’d seen in her eyes. He hadn’t told anyone about that pastor’s attempt at exorcism. Not Susanna. Not even Jesse.

The Midland Terminal Railroad depot buzzed with activity. After he’d managed to obtain the train schedule for the day, Trenton walked to the Downtowner Inn, asking God for guidance.

Him … praying. That was definitely something new. And the thanks was due to Reverend Tucker Raines and his sister. Trenton had been right about Willow. She was a woman of confounding faith.
“God was in the fog with me and helped me break through it.”
Her statements still echoed in his mind, challenging his heart.
“Nothing can separate us from the sacrificial love of Jesus the Christ.”

In sharp contrast to Miss Hattie’s Boardinghouse, the Downtowner Inn sat in the middle of a busy city block. No front porch. No flowers. No lace curtains in the windows. If this was all Susanna could afford, perhaps she’d be anxious to accept his offer.

Trenton opened the door, jangling a bell overhead. When he stepped into a cramped entryway, a stick-thin woman appeared from a side doorway and wiped her hands on a soiled apron.

She looked him over and grinned, revealing gaps in her teeth. “You lookin’ for a nice room and got yourself lost, did you?”

“No m-ma’am. I’m Trenton Van Der Veer. I’m here to see—”

“That’s the new photographer’s name.” Her eyes narrowed. “You’re him?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“You here to see Susanna Woods, are you?”

“I am.”

“She left this morning after breakfast.”

Until he heard his deep sigh, Trenton hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath. Dare he entertain the relief easing the tension in his shoulders? Had Susanna really given up and left town on her own?

“No doubt she’ll be back before dinner,” the woman continued.

His shoulders tightened. “Miss Woods didn’t l-leave town?”

The proprietor shook her head in short wobbles. “Didn’t take her bags with her, if she did. Besides, she’s paid up for another week.”

If Susanna was still in town, he obviously hadn’t gotten through to her. “Did Miss Woods mention where she was going?”

“Not a word about it.”

Well, there was nothing he could do for Susanna if he couldn’t find her. And he refused to hunt her down. He didn’t want to take any chance at encouraging her childish notion that the two of them could become a couple again. He’d much rather purchase a box of pecan fudge for a certain portrait painter.

Hattie pulled another of her shirtwaists from the line and dropped the clothespins in her apron pocket. She added the shirtwaist to the basket on the ground, also adding to the list of reasons she missed having Mr. Sinclair and Cherise around the boardinghouse. She liked having men’s shirts and little girls’ dresses hanging on her line. She added more pins to the apron and a dressing gown to the basket.

Having Harlan and Cherise in the house had stirred something inside her. They’d felt like family. Now Kat was preparing Harlan and Cherise’s meals and laundering their clothes, and she already had more than her share to do. A doctor’s wife. A mother with a little one and another baby on the way. A monthly column to write for
Harper’s Bazar
. And now she was an experienced midwife. Kat didn’t have any time to spare.

Hattie pinched the last pin and released her navy-blue walking skirt. She was considering paying Kat a visit this afternoon to offer her help when a stylish young woman stepped around the corner of the house. Hattie added the folded skirt to the stack of clothes in the basket and smiled at her guest. “Good day.”

“Mrs. Peterson?” As the young woman drew closer, her brow crinkled and a slow smile lit her blue eyes. A beaded reticule hung from one arm. “You’re Willow Peterson?”

“No, dear.” Hattie felt a peculiar satisfaction in upsetting the young woman’s expectations. “Willow is much younger than I am.”

“Oh.” The young woman’s mouth lingered in the shape of an
O
.

“Willow is one of my boarders. I’m Hattie Adams, the owner.” Hattie untied her apron and dropped it into the basket, then picked up the bundle and, balancing it on a hip, walked toward her guest. “You are?”

“Yes, of course, pardon my poor manners, ma’am.” Her guest straightened and tugged at the scalloped hem of her paisley jacket. “I’m Miss Susanna Woods.”

“Miss Woods.” The niggle in Hattie’s stomach kept her from saying it was a pleasure to meet her. It may have just been the two extra pieces of sausage she’d eaten at the breakfast table, but something didn’t feel quite right.

Miss Woods’s eyes narrowed, and she cocked her head. “Mrs. Peterson didn’t mention me?”

“No.” Hattie shifted the basket to her other hip. “But we’ve both been busy chasing our tails to get where we’re going.”

Miss Woods quirked a thin eyebrow. “Might you know when you expect her?”

“Well, it’s hard to say. Fact is I’ve lost track of time.”

“Last I checked, it was half past eleven.”

“My, oh my, but time is flying.” Hattie tucked a pesky strand of hair into the bun at the back of her head. “I would’ve thought they’d have returned by now.”

Miss Woods moistened her lips. “They?”

“Yes. Willow and her employer left here well over an hour ago.”

Her visitor’s shoulders drooped. Did this have more to do with Mr. Van Der Veer than Willow?

“Would you like to come in and have a cup of tea while you wait?” Hattie asked.

Miss Woods pressed her reticule to her midsection. “No. Thank you.”

That settled it. A young woman who refused tea with her was clearly up to no good. “May I give Willow a message? Does she know where to find you?”

“No thank you.” Miss Woods drew in a deep breath. “I’d rather surprise her. Good day, Mrs. Adams.”

Hattie nodded. “Miss Woods.”

She didn’t like to make a habit of judging strangers, but if she was pressed to offer her opinion, she’d pronounce that one a tower of trouble.

W
e’ve both been chasing our tails to get where we’re going.”

What kind of gibberish was that?

Susanna marched down the hill toward Bennett Avenue. Trenton—
her
Trenton—was with Willow Peterson. And that woman at the clothesline likely knew where he’d taken her, but wouldn’t say. Susanna wouldn’t have lasted a full day living in that house, no matter how comfortable the amenities or delectable the food. Hattie Adams was a mother hen, and Willow was obviously in her brood. Was Hattie Adams that way with all her boarders, or just the ones trying to steal another woman’s man?

Susanna had hoped to at least meet Willow. How else was she to determine the best approach to the situation?

At the corner, she glanced both ways on Bennett. It wasn’t a bad looking town, with shiny new brick buildings lining its main street and plenty of people coming and going for commerce and culture. But Cripple Creek wasn’t New York, and she hated roadblocks and detours. Willow Peterson, Myron Wilcox, and Hattie Adams among them. She’d experienced more than her fair share of diversions and frustrations since her arrival in town, and she’d had enough.

She slid her hand into the empty seam pocket on her skirt. Her father had given her enough money for the train to Denver and to tide her over until she’d found a job, but it was more costly to lodge here than she had anticipated. It
was time she came up with a new plan. She seated herself on the empty bench in front of the post office and tucked her reticule, with the small amount of cash that remained to her, under her skirt.