She held up six fingers.
“Six. That’s a good age.”
Leia smiled and nodded, causing her dark curls to bounce against her face and shoulders. Such a pretty little girl. Her mother must have been beautiful. Well, her dad wasn’t exactly a hobgoblin, but they’d said Leia looked like her mother.
Seeing that they had finished their coffee, Rose made a suggestion. “Mak, Jane might enjoy seeing the horses, since she’s an expert horsewoman.”
“I’m not expert,” Jane rebutted, feeing the twinge of being second best.
“Oh, Matilda says you are.”
“Matilda embellishes.”
They all laughed, including Matilda, as if they agreed.
The idea of seeing the horses excited Jane. “I would love to see them. And I need to find out if there’s a place where I could rent a horse for my own transportation. Matilda, would you like to see the horses?”
Matilda waved a hand. “Oh, honey, I’ve seen enough back ends of horses to last me a lifetime. Rose has offered to show me the upstairs and some of those comfortable-looking dresses so many women wear for everyday.”
Rose smiled at her. “Yes, and I want to hear more about your travels. And Texas.”
“Jane and Pilar heard my stories over and over on the voyage. I think they’d get seasick hearing them again.”
“Miss Jane,” Mak said, seeming sincere instead of sullen, “I’d be happy to show you the horses. Some of them, anyway.”
“Well, this being a ranch, I wouldn’t expect to see them all. So I accept, if you don’t mind leaving your company.”
“You are my company. And there’s something I’d like to ask you.” He congenially looked at her uncle. “Russ, I know you’ve seen them before, but would you like to join us at the stables?”
“What I’d like to do,” her uncle said, “is talk Coco out of another piece of bread smeared with mountain apple jam and a cup of coffee, sit on the front porch in that rocking chair, and just eat, drink, and. . .sit.” He chuckled. “Maybe prepare a sermon on gluttony.”
“Leia,” Rose said, “why don’t you show Pilar your rooms and collections? She might like to see your schoolroom. If Miss Jane doesn’t teach, Reverend Russell has said Miss Matilda has some good things she could teach us all.”
“Oh,” Leia said, “I would like Miss Jane to be my teacher.” She pointed to Matilda. “And you, if you can sit still long enough.”
Matilda smiled. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Leia reached for Pilar’s hand. “Do you have Little People and Night Marchers in Texas?”
Pilar shrugged a shoulder. “No.”
Leia led Pilar away. “I can tell you about them. You need to know, to be safe.”
Just as Jane was about to ask, Rose sighed. “Children and their imaginations. Okay, you two, go on,” she said to Jane and Mak. “Matilda and I have fashion and travel to discuss.”
If she didn’t know better, and if they all didn’t know she was engaged to be married, Jane might think somebody was trying to set her up with Mak MacCauley.
“Mak,” Jane said as they walked across the velvety green lawn. “What, or who, are the Little People Leia mentioned?”
He looked down at her and exclaimed, “Amazing.” Then he laughed. “I mean your eyes. They’ve become as green as a Ti leaf.”
Her chin lifted. “You mean like cooked and stuffed with rice?”
“Hardly.”
She liked his laugh. She thought it was amazing how cordial he could be as long as she wasn’t asking to ride his horse. “My eyes do that,” she said. “They’ll turn dull again in another setting.”
He seemed about to say something but closed his mouth. He opened it again and said, “Mine are always a dull brown.”
She might have said she thought his eyes quite dark and mysterious and she’d like to know what he seemed to carefully conceal behind them, but he quickly said, “This way.”
They’d come to the lush foliage at the end of the lawn, and he led her down a shaded path bordered by Ti and other bushes and trees she didn’t know the names of.
“About the Little People,” he said. “I think most cultures have their fairy tales. Or tall tales. Like most legends, stories are based on fact. It’s believed the Menehunes were a race of people living here long ago. People of other places came in and conquered them. The conquered people were considered inferior, and the word
Menehune
came to mean
commoner
.”
“Like the Romans and Jews,” Jane said. “The conquerors always think the conquered are inferior.” At his quick glance, her thoughts came closer to the present. “Or like Indians, Mexicans and. . .slavery.” She drew in a breath. “Are the natural Hawaiians looked upon that way?”
“There’s a parallel,” he said. “As you mentioned, it’s in all cultures. Sometimes it’s called class distinction, society, caste system. But before we get too morbid, let me add that through the centuries, the Menehunes have become legend as Little People, no more than three feet high. They do good deeds. If sharks are about to attack you, the Little People can come in their little tiny canoes and beat them away with their paddles. You never see them. They do their good deeds at night and are responsible for many blessings.”
“I can see that children might enjoy the stories,” Jane said. “But Christians wouldn’t believe the stories, would they?”
“I don’t know,” he said as they walked from the foliage into what seemed to be an entirely different world. Stretched out before her was an elaborate stable bordered by a corral.
As they neared the stables, Jane stopped in her tracks, forgetting anything but what came into view ahead of her.
“How magnificent.” She hurried to the fence, heading for the huge black stallion glistening like velvet in the soft evening sun. A rider dismounted and held the reins.
“Careful,” Mak said. “That’s Panai, my racehorse.”
Jane saw the big black eyes sizing her up. He snorted, as if trying to scare her away. Jane laughed but kept her distance. “Why, you big pretender. You don’t scare me at all. You’re all huffs and snorts.”
Like your owner
, crossed her mind.
“Don’t be too sure,” Mak said. “Miss Jane, meet my jockey, Chico Garcia.”
Chico was a small, middle-aged man who looked as dark as some of the Mexicans in Texas. His intelligent eyes were as black as Panai’s.
Chico held the reins. “Stay there,” Chico said to Panai and stood between Jane and the horse.
“Aloha, Miss,” Chico said. Creases formed in his weathered face when he smiled.
Jane kept pretending she was paying no attention to Panai, but she knew he was watching. A proud horse, waiting for her praise of him.
“This is Panai. Panai, Miss Jane.”
Jane started to take a step but Mak said, “No, don’t approach him. Chico, take him inside.”
“See you later, Panai,” Jane said.
She smelled the welcome aroma of horseflesh and hay. The horse had a large stall, more like an apartment.
In the stall, Panai turned and stood at the half door. Jane saw other horses with their heads sticking over their half-doors, turned their way. “I think the other horses are in awe of Panai,” she said, noting that Panai looked at her when she said his name.
“No,” Mak said. “They’ve seen him for many years. They must be in awe of you.”
“I—” She started to deny that but became still. Panai moved forward and stood as if not seeing her.
Jane stepped closer.
“Careful,” Mak warned. “He has teeth.”
Jane studied that huge, magnificent, black velvet head with the white mark of a champion blatantly displayed down the front of his face.
She brought her hand up to stroke his head. His big black eyes held what? Curiosity? She spoke softly to him and patted his neck. His head moved up and down.
“You have a way, Miss,” Chico said. “He never lets anybody do that but me and Mister Mak.”
“He knows I love him,” Jane said, “not just appreciate his beauty and strength. I love him because he’s. . .a horse. A wonderful animal.”
Chico stayed near and held the reins. “He tolerates males but shies away from females.”
“Well,” she said. “Maybe he’s decided it’s time for a little female companionship, a female friend.”
Jane dared not look at Mak. She sensed the silence. The horse and his owner were somewhat alike. No females—threatening ones, that is.
As if in answer, Mak said, “We don’t want him going soft. He has a goal. The three of us have a goal.”
Jane looked at him. “To stay away from females?”
Even Mak laughed good-naturedly along with Chico. “Seems I’ve been talked about behind my back. I mean, our goal is to win a race. And Chico needs to take care of the horse.”
Chico said, “He likes you.”
For a moment their eyes met. For an instant she thought,
Who? Panai or Mak?
Then Chico said, “Almost as much as he likes an apple or carrot treat.”
Well, that settled that—she hoped.
After a final pat to Panai’s neck, Jane walked down the passageways to the other stalls, adequate but smaller than Panai’s.
“These are for the carriages and daily riding,” Mak explained. She spoke to a couple of stable boys grooming the horses, probably having recently been brought in from the range. Each of the horses was eager for a pat or a rub.
“Which do you like best?” Mak asked.
“I like them all, but—”
“Other than Panai,” Mak said. “He’s not in the same category.”
Jane nodded. Panai was special, set apart. Like some people seemed to be born for a special purpose or with extraordinary abilities.
“Okay, let me see. Oh, this one I know. Hey, I think I’ve ridden on you.” She rubbed his face.
Mak patted his neck. “Big Brown,” he said.
“Sure is. What’s his name?”
“Big Brown.”
Jane laughed lightly. “Oh, he likes me very much. See, he’s trying to nuzzle me.”
Mak allowed it. “Something Panai would never do.”
Jane swept her gaze down to Panai, thinking,
You heard that, didn’t you, Panai?
But we’ll see. We’ll see.
“These two,” Mak said, walking farther past the stalls, “are ready to be ridden by others. Which would you choose for yourself?”
Jane looked them over. One was solid brown and looked to have a good nature. The white one was a wee bit smaller but shook its head, and she suspected it had a frisky nature and thought they’d love to ride over the range together. They seemed equally receptive to her. She felt their necks, their shoulders, gently rubbed their faces.
“I can’t decide,” she said. “Which would you choose for me?”
“I’ll think on it,” he said.
They walked back up the passageway. Chico was brushing Panai’s hips.
“Nice meeting you, Chico. Panai.” She winked.
She could have sworn the horse winked back. At least she knew he blinked, which upon first encounter he had not done. A horse could learn very difficult tricks. Winking was probably the least difficult.
Upon entering the stables, she hadn’t noticed much of anything except the big horse as they turned left. Now, on the right, she saw the carriages, the surreys, a good supply of vehicles.
“These are mighty fine,” she said, touching first one, then another of the handsome vehicles, including a hansom, a landau, and a surrey, in which several people could ride in style.
“Now, what I wanted to ask you.”
Jane faced him with an expectant feeling. Since he considered her no personal threat, would he offer to let her ride with him over the range?
“I was wondering,” Mak said, “Do you think you and Matilda and Pilar would like a ride over the ranch?”
“Oh my, yes.”
“In this?” He tapped the wooden side of a wagon with his forefinger.
He watched her touch the wooden sides that were about two feet high, then look into the wagon in which eight people could be seated comfortably.
“Is this a farm wagon?”
“Yes.” He wondered what kind of vehicles seven people would take for an outing in Texas. Of course, that would depend upon how they were dressed. Jane and their other guests were dressed for a semiformal dinner. “Or we could take a couple of surreys.”
“No, the wagon’s perfect,” she said, and he believed she meant it, until she added, “If it’s not clean, we could sit on a bandana.” A trace of mischief was in her eyes.
At that, a stable boy appeared from the passageway. “I cleaned it, Mr. Mak.”
“I was kidding about the bandana,” she said. “Do I need to return it to you?”
He reared back and stuck out his hands. “Oh, please don’t. I never want to see that again.”
“I can hook up the fillies, Mr. Mak.”
Mak nodded, aware that the stable boy—and Chico, too—probably strained to hear every word they spoke. Other than his mother, Jane was the only woman who had been in this carriage house and stable since Maylea. But they would see her ring, or he could tell them before anyone started rumors about anything possibly being personal.
“I think they’d love riding in this and seeing the ranch. I know I will.”
“It’s not too. . .rustic?”
“It’s perfect.”
Mak smiled and nodded to the stable boy, who struck off down the passageway toward the horses.
Mak asked the reverend to sit up front with him and have the ladies ride in the seats behind them.
Listening to the women talk and his mother describe certain sections, Mak felt he was really seeing his own ranch for the first time in a long time.
He allowed the two dapple grays to trot-walk along acres and acres of green rolling fields, past grazing sheep and cattle. At one point, they stopped to watch a herd of wild mustangs disappear along the slope of a distant mountain.
He heard his mother explaining about the bunkhouses, the many corrals, the small houses where some of the paniolos lived.
Beyond that was endless acres of green merging with white wavy lines of tide rushing in and out from a royal blue sea that melted into a lighter blue sky dotted with a few wispy clouds.
“My property ends here,” Mak explained, pointing to a fence. “That’s the beginning of a sugar plantation. All that is sugar cane. Belongs to friends of mine, the Honeycutts.”
“Honeycutts?” Pilar said. “That must be where Susanne Honeycutt invited me to go on Sunday.”