Twice a Bride (9 page)

Willow shook her head. Perhaps there was no matchmaking to be done here. Those two were already a pair.

S
inging the last bars of “The Sidewalks of New York,” Susanna set the stack of extra dressing gowns and petticoats into the trunk at the foot of her bed. She lowered the front of the writing desk and stared at the wooden box at the back. Her grandmother had carved the image of a phoenix on the lid. She was that bird, and she would rise from her ashes in Scandia, Kansas, and make her perch in Colorado. In Cripple Creek, to be precise. Until Trenton was ready to marry her and take her to New York.

She carried the box to the bed and sifted through the stack of photographs inside it, all of them images of her. Just days after Trenton had arrived in town with his photographic van, he’d followed her around with his camera. Pictures of her at the confectionary shop wearing her father’s crisp white candy-maker’s hat. Standing in front of a flowering crab-apple tree. Dressed for dinner, seated on the settee in her parents’ parlor.

If she hadn’t been so shortsighted, she’d already be singing for the upper tens in New York’s high society. Feeling the sting of his rejection again, she returned the photographs to their nest and latched the lid.

She was adding the box to the trunk when her mother stormed into the room and stood over her, boiling like a swollen rain cloud.

“I’ve just spoken to your father.” Lightning flashed in Mother’s brown eyes. “Of all the foolish things you’ve ever done, daughter, this move would top them all.”

Susanna added her silk beret to the trunk.

Mother slammed the lid shut and pinned her with a stormy gaze. “You can’t go.”

Susanna swallowed hard. She had to maintain a sunny disposition so as not to intensify Mother’s storm. “Why not?” She’d managed to keep her voice just above a whisper.

“It’s not prudent for a young woman—a single woman—to travel west without her family.”

Her mother did enjoy rubbing in the fact that Susanna was yet unmarried. “I asked Father about making the trip, and he agreed.”

“That man is clay in your hands, and you know it. You could plead a case for letting you ride a bucking horse in a sticker patch, and your father would relent.” The vein in her mother’s neck pulsed. “Just because you get your way doesn’t make it a good decision.”

“I’m not getting on a bucking horse. I’m boarding a train with a respectable family who will accompany me to Denver.”

“And what will you—a single woman with no significant means—do in Denver?”

“Helen’s brother lives there.”

“And how do you expect that fact to be of help to you?”

“Mr. and Mrs. Granstadt will look after me, and I’ll have Helen to keep me company.” Susanna opened the trunk lid and met her mother’s steely gaze. “I’m sure Denver’s seams are bursting with confectionaries. I’ll have no trouble finding a job as soon as my feet hit the depot platform.”

“A respectable job?” Her mother ran her hand along the ruffle on the bedcover. “I’ve heard stories about the women out there.”

“I’m not one of
those women
.”

“Perhaps not, but neither are you the most discreet of young women.”

A shiver ran up Susanna’s spine. “What happened with Trenton … Mr. Van Der Veer was a simple misunderstanding.” One she could readily resolve, given the chance.

Her arms crossed, Mother raised an arched eyebrow.

“He got cold feet. It happens.” And all Susanna needed to do was warm them up.

Mother dipped her chin. “So, did Mr. Van Der Veer run on cold feet to New York, or is he in Denver?” Her eyes narrowed. “Is that why you’re so set on going there?”

“Why must you be so hurtful, Mother? You know I haven’t heard from Mr. Van Der Veer, and I don’t expect to.” Susanna quivered her lip as though she might cry. “I’m set on going because my best friend is moving to Denver, and I could use a change of scenery.”

And the prestigious photographer was working just behind Pikes Peak. A much shorter trip from Denver.

T
renton chased the broom through the house, still swept up in the memories of Friday’s events. In record speed, he’d gone from reviewing applications for a portrait painter to being caught in a tongue-twisting misunderstanding. And the woman was now his employee.

He scooped a pile of dirt into a dustpan and carried it back outside where it belonged. Even if Jesse had been right about Trenton needing a change of scenery and a change of pace, things were happening too swiftly here for his comfort. The fast and furious way of the West wasn’t his way. Driving his wagon of supplies across New York City from one opera house to another and one political campaign office to another would feel like a summer picnic right now.

A small studio, open four or five days a week. Being his own boss. That was all he’d wanted when he rented the shop on First Street. He hadn’t considered employing anyone else.

He marched through the two-bedroom house, collecting the throw rugs as he went. He set the armful of rugs on the edge of the porch. He shook out a striped rag rug, laid it over the porch rail, and reached for another one.

He should send Mrs. Peterson a letter by courier this very day and tell her there had been a mistake. His mistake, thinking he was ready to expand the business after only two months in town. Why couldn’t he be content with the progress he’d made and with business as it was? One or two sittings a day
wasn’t bad business, and it had been enough until he talked to the spitfire mine owner, Mollie Kathleen Gortner.

It wasn’t his idea to draw attention to himself in political circles or in newspapers. If he’d still wanted that life, he would’ve gone to New York without Susanna. But it felt good to have his feet on the ground. A place to call home.

He was shaking out the last rug when a man rode up on a sorrel and leaned forward in the saddle. “Mister, you need yourself a woman.”

Some folks would agree, say finding a wife was his next step. Trenton had a stable business and a home. But finding a wife wasn’t a smart choice or a realistic conclusion for him. Not after his stretch in Kansas. Trying to be neighborly, he nodded anyway.

The wiry fellow dismounted. He wrapped the reins around the hitching rail and walked bowlegged into Trenton’s yard. “You the new camera man, are you?”

“Yes, I opened the Photography S-Studio in town. Trenton Van Der Veer.” He glanced at the rug hanging in front of him like a curtain.

“Joseph Weatherly.” Joseph slapped his dusty cap on his leg, an apparent substitute for a handshake. “My place is up on the next road. Practically neighbors, you and me.” He spit a stream of brown into Trenton’s lawn. “Got me a sister in Manitou Springs. She done lost her husband in a lumber accident.”

“I’m sorry.” Trenton meant it. Sorry for Joseph’s widowed sister, and sorry Joseph was trying to sell her to him like a swayback mare.

“Real good cook, Millie is.” Joseph pressed his hat onto his head. “You can bet she would’ve had them rugs shook out and laid back down yesterday.”

“About done. Thank you.” Trenton waved, then pulled the rugs from the porch and went inside. There was a good chance Joseph wouldn’t be the last neighbor to want to marry him off. Next time he’d shake out the rugs after sundown.

He laid the striped rag rug in the kitchen in front of the sink and carried
the others to their respective places of service. When he set the last rug on the pine flooring in front of the bookcase, his writing box caught his eye.

He’d started over here in Cripple Creek but with little chance he’d forget what he’d left behind. Maybe it was time he wrote to her. He probably needed to reconcile his past if he had any hope of a future here. What if he’d simply imagined or misconstrued her words and acted on a misinformed impulse?

He carried the writing box to the kitchen. After spreading a piece of stationery on the table, he dipped the fountain pen into the ink.

Dear Susanna
,

He set the pen down and leaned back in his chair. He should have considered what he’d say to her, if he had anything to say, before going to the trouble of starting a letter. He capped the ink and returned the box to the bookcase.

A walk to town seemed a more reasonable exercise.

Saturday morning Willow positioned a floppy hat on her head, pulled her reticule from the wardrobe, and strolled down the stairs. She didn’t know what she would say to Ida, but Miss Hattie was right. Ida would want to know about her artistic opportunity at the Photography Studio, and she’d be excited for her. But was Ida ready to return to work, to let Willow go? Only Ida could answer those questions, and it was time Willow asked them.

Willow walked outside under a cloudy sky and pulled her shawl tight. Although it was only the middle of September, autumn seemed anxious to push summer out of the picture. Rain had pelted her bedroom window for the better part of the night. And from the look of the gray wall shrouding Pikes Peak and the Sangre de Cristos, the surrounding mountains were still getting pounded.

Dodging a mud puddle at the end of the walkway, Willow started up the hill toward the First Congregational Church, where her brother served as
pastor. The steeple towered above rooftops, a beacon of faith and hope, and the white-trimmed parsonage, including a picket fence, stood behind the brick church building. The rosebushes lining the graveled walkway to the parsonage had recently been pruned.

Willow wiped the bottoms of her shoes on the rag rug. Before she could knock on the door, a lace curtain fluttered at the window, and Ida peered out at her. Soon Ida stood in the doorway, tears running down her face.

After closing the door behind them, Willow took Ida’s hand and led her into the parlor. “Tucker isn’t home?”

Ida wiped her tears. “He went to the hospital to visit one of our parishioners.”

Help me, Lord. Give me the words You would speak to her
.

Willow refused to ask her sister-in-law if she was all right. The answer was obvious. So obvious she couldn’t fathom asking Ida to return to work on a regular basis. Swallowing her regret, Willow looked up at the first painting she’d done upon her arrival in Cripple Creek. A bank of fog obscured the top of Pikes Peak. The fog was beginning to clear for her, but not yet for Ida.

As soon as possible she’d send Mr. Van Der Veer a note by courier to let him know she couldn’t accept the job as portrait painter. Her sister-in-law needed her still.

Ida wiped more tears from her face and seated herself on the sofa. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me.”

“Grief has gotten into you.” Willow sat in the rocker across from her. “You are the wife and the big sister trying to be strong for everyone else’s sake.”

“Vivian was here yesterday. She might be having her baby soon.” Red rimmed Ida’s blue eyes. “I should be feeling better by now.”

“When Sam died, my grief took me down an unforeseeable path. For a long time.”

“But I didn’t lose my husband.” Ida wiped her eyes. “I hadn’t even felt my
baby kick or roll as Kat has. I hadn’t held my baby. I don’t even know if it was a boy or a girl.”

“But he or she was already a part of you. A life you and Tucker had created and anticipated.”