Seven Brides - Fern Part 9

Mrs. Abbott was standing outside the door when Madison stepped into the hall.

"She's all yours. Her temper is a little frayed and her integrity is stretched to the limit, but her virtue is unsullied."

Mrs. Abbott's gasp, a sure sign of her badly violated sense of propriety, made Madison feel better. Now he only needed to beat Hen senseless, and he might even feel cheerful.

George looked fed up when Madison reached the porch. "I hope she came out of the interview in better shape than you. If Rose finds her with an elevated temperature, there's going to be h.e.l.l to pay."

"That's the most obstinate, irritating female I've ever met," Madison said, pointing toward Fern's room.

"That's how Rose described your brothers when she first came to the ranch. Are you sure those words aren't more applicable to you than Miss Sproull?"

"If you had any idea what that girl said"

"I know exactly what she said," George interrupted.

Madison looked blank.

"It's July. The window is open. Half of Abilene knows what you said. I don't know what happened to you in the last ten years, but you weren't brought up to treat women like that, even when they irritate you. How many more times are you going to cause me to be ashamed of you?"

Madison thought he would explode. Why in G.o.d's name had he ever left Boston? He might as well have been facing his father all over again, his needling, his snide remarks about Madison's cleverness, making light of his interest in books, of his friendship with Freddy, making him feel small and unimportant.

He never expected it of George. George had been the one who tried to protect him, to explain him to his father, the one who tried to make him feel better when his father had left him shattered and shaking after one of his blistering tirades. Madison had thought he could depend on George at least, but it was obvious he couldn't.

"I don't give a d.a.m.n whether you're embarra.s.sed or not," Madison said, so angry he had trouble keeping his voice steady, "I mean to prove that Hen didn't kill Troy Sproull. Then I'm going back to Boston, and you'll never hear from me again."

He turned and stalked off the porch, down the walk, and into the street. He wanted a stiff drink, and he was going to the noisiest, roughest, most dangerous saloon in town to get it. If Abilene lived up to its reputation as the wildest town in the West, maybe he could spend his time dodging bullets rather than hiding from his thoughts.

Fern wished she could have bitten her tongue off. She hadn't intended to drive Madison away in a rage. This whole mess was more her fault than his. Yet the minute he stepped into the room, she had felt violated. That had put her on the defensive. And when she felt defensive, she became belligerent. That was how she reacted to all men.

She wondered why somebody hadn't pointed it out.

They have. They just stopped a long time ago because it didn't do any good.

"I tried to stop him," Mrs. Abbott announced as she burst into the room. "It's not proper for a man to visit a woman in her bedroom."

"He just came by to see how I was." p.i.s.s and vinegar! Now she was defending him to Mrs. Abbott!

"It is not okay," Mrs. Abbott declared, her sensibilities injured. "He may have meant to be thoughtful, but he was quite rude. Some people think just because they went to a fancy school and wear fancy clothes they can act like a king or something."

Fern didn't have fancy clothes and she hadn't even finished grade school, but she had been acting like bad-tempered royalty for years. She couldn't blame Madison for doing the same thing.

"He'll probably behave better when he's not upset."

"If he comes around again treating me worse than a black slave, he'll have plenty of reason to be upset," Mrs. Abbott declared. She gave the bedspread such a vigorous straightening that Fern feared for the seams.

"Has Mrs. Randolph returned?" Mrs. Abbott's countenance cleared as if by magic. ''I don't think so. It's quiet on the porch. She's never around but what that little boy is calling her name every half minute. Mr. Randolph positively dotes on her. You'd think it would ruin her the way he spoils her, but she's just as bad about him. It's hard to believe a man could be so besotted with a woman as big as a cow about to drop her calf."

Fern didn't want to hear how George spoiled Rose or adored her despite her present condition. She felt sadly neglected and unwanted, and hearing how George worshiped his wife didn't do a thing to lift her spirits. On the contrary, it showed her one more thing that would never happen to her.

Mrs. Abbott seemed to have decided that the entire room needed rearranging after Madison's disturbing visit, even Fern's clothes, which caused the woman to grimace in disapproval when she touched them.

"And she's such a little thing," Mrs. Abbott continued. "So graceful despite being big enough to have two babies. It's no wonder every man in town treats her like a queen. I never saw a more gracious lady."

You might as well say I have all the charm of an outlaw steer, Fern thought to herself.

Mrs. Abbott began rearranging everything on the table next to Fern's bed.

"But she doesn't sit around preening herself in the mirror. No indeed. If I didn't stop her, she'd do half my work. And her paying me to take care of her. Do what I will, I can't stop her taking care of my Ed. You won't find that kind of consideration every day. No, you certainly won't."

Mercifully, before Mrs. Abbott's veneration for Rose could drive Fern to the screaming point, the object of her adoration returned. "You're looking a little drawn about the eyes," Rose said, giving Fern a rather searching look. "I gather your interview didn't go well."

I should think not," Mrs. Abbott declared, fire once more in her glance. "How could any decent female feel comfortable with a strange man in her bedroom? And shouting at her all the time."

Rose looked inquiringly at Fern.

"He was put out about something I said," Fern told her, unhappy at having to confess her folly.

"Him put out!" Mrs. Abbott exclaimed. "Humph! You wait until I see him again. I'll put him out a bit more."

"I don't think that's such a good idea," Rose said. "We want him to concentrate on clearing Hen of those murder charges. Making him furious isn't likely to help."

"I'm sorry, but I can't have him violating my house."

Rose tried to repress a smile but wasn't entirely successful. "I don't think he meant to do that. Could you warm some milk? I think Miss Sproull should go to sleep."

"Coming right up," Mrs. Abbott said. She straightened a dresser scarf she had straightened twice already and gave the room one more glance before finally departing.

"I trust he didn't upset you too much," Rose said.

"It was more a case of me upsetting him," Fern admitted, so glad to be relieved of Mrs. Abbott's censorious presence she was willing to tell Rose practically anything she wanted to know.

Rose gave her a long, penetrating look. Fern felt as though the protective layers surrounding her soul were being peeled away one by one.

"Do you have to hate him so much?" "I don't hate him," Fern exclaimed, shocked to realize she didn't hate him. She'd thought she did. She had intended to. "I just don't want him getting his brother off." She couldn't explain about being undressed or about the chemise. Not even to Rose. "But I don't hate him. I don't think anybody could."

"Yes, they can."

"Why? He's thoughtless and positive he's the only one who has any brains, but he's not really mean. He just doesn't stop to realize how what he says affects people. And he hates being here. Everything about Kansas irritates him. Especially me."

"He probably finds it even more difficult to be with his family," Rose said, her gaze still rather clouded. Now she was the one straightening dresser scarfs. "In fact, I would like you to do me a favor."

"Of course," Fern said. After what Rose had done for her, it would be churlish to refuse any request.

"This may seem a strange thing to ask, but could you try to be nice to him?"

Fern opened her mouth to speak.

"I won't expect it of you if you can't, but could you?"

"Why?"

"I don't feel I can explain that just now, but things are much more difficult for him than you know. I have a feeling your being nice would mean a great deal."

"But surely you, his brothers . . ."

"There are times when family can be more of a problem than a solution."

Fern swallowed. "I'll try," she said, wondering how to go about being nice to a man whose instinctive reaction on seeing her was to growl and start tearing up the ground, "but I can't guarantee he won't close his eyes and groan the next time he sees me." Rose's solemnity vanished. A suspicion of a smile appeared at the corner of her mouth. "No doubt you made him furious, but he's a man, and men are flattered by the attention of an attractive woman."

"I'm not attractive," Fern said. No matter how kind Rose's intentions, it made her angry that Rose would try to make her feel better by telling her she was pretty.

"Who told you that?"

"Everybody I've ever known. My cows usually come out on top in a direct comparison."

"Then you've got to get some new friends."

"I know what I look like," Fern said, tears rising in the back of her eyes. "It doesn't help to have you tell me otherwise."

"Okay, I won't, but Mrs. Abbott said she never would have guessed you could look so fetching once you were out of that hat and vest. George has remarked on it, too. He thinks you're rather statuesque. From a man like him, a single word is a tribute. If you ever get a whole sentence, you'll know you're beautiful."

Fern picked at the sheet clutched in her hand. If Rose had any idea how much she longed to feel just the tiniest bit attractive, she wouldn't torture her this way. "It's nice of you to say those things, but it doesn't matter. Madison doesn't think so."

"You'll never know if you don't give him a chance to tell you. And he won't tell you if you're at each other's throats all day."

Madison would never tell her she was pretty. He probably didn't even think of her as a female, just one of the peculiar species of fauna found on the Kansas prairie.

"I'll try to be nice to him, but I don't expect him to tell me I'm pretty. I give him credit for honesty."

"So do I. Now I think I hear Mrs. Abbott coming with your milk. It'll probably taste awful, but drink it up. It'll help you sleep. We'll talk some more in the morning."

But it was a long time before Fern could get to sleep.

Rose's comments had cracked the seal on a part of her soul she hadn't dared look into for a long time. It was almost as though she had lifted the lid to Pandora's box. A whole flock of demons swirled about her. Hopes and longings she had thought abandoned long ago, open wounds she had thought long healed, slights and hurts she had thought long forgotten, filled her head until she felt dizzy with confusion.

Struggle as she might, she couldn't get the lid on again. She was going to have to confront everything she had tried to avoid all these years.

And all because of Madison Randolph.

She wished Hen had shot someone in Ellsworth or Newton instead of Abilene. Then Madison wouldn't have come here. She wouldn't care whether he was unhappy, and she wouldn't have to be nice to him.

It would be a lot better if she could just go back to the farm and forget she had ever met him. Then she wouldn't have to wonder whether he really might like her, whether that moment when he held her in his arms, that thrill of excitement before he kissed her, was real or just her imagination.

It was important that she know. She hated herself for being so weakshe had a terrible premonition it would lead to all kinds of troublebut she had to know. And as long as Rose thought there was the slightest possibility he could like her more than a one-eyed saloon girl with a squint, she would hang around.

Besides, she had two things to prove to him: that she wanted justice as much as he did and that Hen had killed Troy.

Light spilled from more than a dozen Abilene saloons, gambling establishments, and hotels. Cowhands trying in just two or three wild, uninhibited nights to forget the loneliness of two months on the trail, laughed, drank, and played with desperate haste. The noise of dancing, singing, occasional shouts, and the clang of the ubiquitous piano poured into the street.

During the day, merchants tried to empty the cowboys'pockets by hawking hot baths, haircuts, and a shave, the finest in new clothes and custom-made boots, as well as the chance to sleep in a warm, dry bed. By night the saloons, gambling halls, and an a.s.sortment of soiled doves tried to relieve them of any money they might have left.

As long as their sixty or ninety dollars lasted, they lived like princes. When it was gone, they quietly left for Texas, tired and broke, but determined to do it all over again next summer.

Madison didn't enter the first saloon he reached. He kept walking until he reached the loudest and noisiest, the Bull's Head. It pleased his sense of the ironic that he should have had to pa.s.s the schoolhouse and the Baptist church to get there. It was rather symbolic of leaving civilization behind and entering an area of Texas Street where the savage pa.s.sions of men were freed from their chains.

He felt a lot like a wild beast straining against the manacles of expectation. Expectation based on who he was, who he had been, and who he intended to become. All three decreed that he should return to his hotel, have a quiet drink in his room, and go to bed in the hope that tomorrow would be a better day. But Madison had a strong streak of his father in him.

He didn't feel like a quiet evening, He wanted to do something loud and physical; he wanted to do anything that would strike at the heart of the anger and resentment that choked him. He wanted to hurl firebrands at his brothers' cold-hearted refusal to extend to him the same forgiveness they allowed everyone else.

No, he wanted to say to h.e.l.l with all of it. He wanted to show them that their approval or disapproval didn't mean a thing to him.

"Give me a bottle of your best brandy," Madison said to the seamy-looking character behind the bar.

The Bull's Head Saloon was not a pretty building. It had been built of raw lumber, likely shipped in from wooded hills farther east. George said it had been put up in less than a week, clearly with more attention to haste than detail. The only attempts at decoration consisted of several posters tacked to the walls and a mirror behind the bar.

A few women sashayed among the customers, encouraging them to drink and accepting invitations to visit the rooms upstairs. Other customers sat around tables engaged in various games of chance. One man stood at the bar. He looked up when Madison ordered his drink.

The bartender placed a bottle and a gla.s.s on the counter. Madison eyed the gla.s.s with distaste. He held it up to the light. "Is there a certain number of fly specks required before people are allowed to use your gla.s.ses?" he asked, handing the gla.s.s back.

"n.o.body else complains."

"Maybe Abilene should advertise for an eye doctor."

The bartender chose a new gla.s.s and wiped it carefully before he snapped it down before Madison. The force shattered the gla.s.s.

"Probably the only clean one in the place," Madison murmured.

The now surly bartender produced another gla.s.s, which he set down with more care. Madison poured out a finger of brandy. He didn't like the color of the liquid. He didn't care for the bouquet. He hated the taste.

"Do you have any real brandy," he asked, "the kind you keep for the owner?"

"This is real brandy," the bartender insisted.

"Only in Kansas. Bring me something decent or find someone who can."

The bartender stepped through a door at the back and returned a moment later with a second bottle.

"See if this pleases your highness," he said.

Madison recognized the brand. "It will if you haven't tampered with the contents."

The bartender moved away to tend to another customer and Madison tasted the brandy. It was good. Some of the tension left his body. He could stay here as long as he wanted, knowing that the brandy at least would fulfill his expectations.

"You must be George Randolph's brother." His neighbor at the bar had moved closer.

"So?"

"You here to see about getting Hen out of jail?"