Brides of Prairie Gold (16 page)

"Release me, you savage!"

Perrin shouted, "She started this! She"

"Shut up, both of you!" Cody roared, his face as dark as Webb's. He gave Perrin a hard shake. "What in the name of God is going on here?"

"She attacked me!" Perrin cried, twisting to look up at him.

"She was my father's whore! It's her fault that"

"One at a time!"

But they couldn't. Screaming, they shouted accusations and explanations, red-faced and struggling to free themselves until Cody gave Perrin another bone-rattling shake and Webb followed suit. Augusta felt her brains knock against the inside of her skull, felt her bones grind together.

"Quiet! Both of you!" Cody scanned the crowd of appalled onlookers. He glared at Sarah Jennings, who looked utterly thunderstruck. "Did you see what happened here?"

Sarah's head swiveled back and forth between Augusta and Perrin, scanning their muddy hair and clothing, the bloodied lips and scratches. A steady stream of bacon grease flowed into the ground from the pan forgotten in her hand.

Cody barked the same question at Hilda, shaking Perrin into silence when she tried to speak. "You?"

Hilda shook her head. " Nein ."

"The whore came to my wagon and she" But Webb's hand covered her mouth, and Augusta's words were smothered. Frustration choked her.

Ona Norris stepped forward. "Mrs. Waverly provoked Miss Boyd," she stated firmly.

"That isn't what I saw," Jane Munger disagreed. Frowning, she too stepped forward. "Miss Boyd slapped Mrs. Waverly's hand, then threw a chair at her."

Everyone present peered at the broken chair, then examined Augusta's flying muddy hair and torn bodice. Silently, they inspected Perrin's ripped skirt and the new scratches bleeding on her mud-caked cheek. Every face reflected a horrified mixture of shock and disbelief.

Cody exchanged a long glance with Webb. "All right. Each of you return to your wagons." The brides studied his scowl, then hastily dispersed, whispering among themselves. "You too," he growled at Perrin and Augusta. "I'll talk to each of you later."

Gingerly, he released Perrin's shoulders, his body tensed to catch her if she flew at Augusta. But she whirled and ran pell-mell toward her wagon, tripping over her torn hem, breaking into sobs of anger and embarrassment.

The iron fingers opened and Augusta felt Webb step away from her. A button on his fringed jacket caught in her loos-ened hair and she cried out at the tug against her tender scalp, then she jerked free of him. Knowing they stared at her, she flung an arm over her face and ran toward the back of the wagon, desperate to escape Webb Coate's silent judgment.

Once inside the canvas covering, she stuffed a fist in her mouth until she heard Cody and Webb murmur something to each other, then walk away. Only then did she surrender to the hot tears that flooded her cheeks.

Strangled by humiliation, she fought to make sense of what had happened. The events of the past twenty minutes utterly horrified, mortified, and appalled her. She, Augusta Josepha Boyd, had physically attacked someone. She had rolled in the mud like a fighting sow, like a dockyard harpy. She had done this in full view of Cora Thorp, Ona Norris, Bootie, and the other brides who had come running at the sound of screaming. She had done this in front of the wagon-master and his Indian.

Shock blinded her. Bitter tears of shame cast her to her knees. She had disgraced a dozen generations of Boyds. And she would rather have died a hundred deaths than face anyone on the train ever again.

Cody waited until the camp settled down for the night, and the women, who had been scurrying from cook fire to cook fire, crawled into their tents. He checked on the animals, shared a smoke with Heck Kelsey and John Voss on the night watch, then he walked along the perimeters of the squared wagons until he reached Perrin's tent. He scratched lightly at the flap.

"Are you asleep?"

"No."

A quiet rustling sounded inside, then she crawled out. He extended a hand and helped her to her feet, noticing that she had changed out of the torn clothing he had last seen her wearing and had done what she could to comb the mud out of her hair. She wore a plain wool gown, buttoned to the throat. A mud-dull, dark braid fell across her shoulder and curved over her breast.

"It'll still be warm by Smokey Joe's fire," Cody said, noticing that her fingers trembled around the edges of her shawl.

She nodded silently and preceded him, seating herself on a buffalo robe thrown over the log beside the fire. She refused to look at him, fixing her gaze on the low flames in the cook pit. Absurdly, she reminded Cody of a painted squaw. One cheek was striped by the healing scratches Winnie Larson had carved. The other cheek had been freshly marked by Augusta Boyd.

Lowering himself to the end of the log, he tried to decide where and how to begin. That he had to think about it surprised him. Ordinarily, he spoke bluntly, without concern as to how his words might be received. But this small woman possessed a puzzling facility for turning his thoughts inside out.

Initially, he had believed that Perrin Waverly was weak, withdrawn, and raw with vulnerability. In retrospect, he saw that she had been unsure of herself and her reception among the others, and with good cause. But she was not weak. After witnessing her tireless efforts with Winnie Larson, after observing how seriously she assumed her position as the women's representative and how she stood up to him, Cody had concluded her backbone was made of iron.

Throughout the last weeks he had overheard bits and pieces of gossipy talk among the brides; still, it had jolted him to hear it confirmed that Perrin had been Joseph Boyd's mistress. What had happened to that iron backbone when Boyd came knocking at her door? Why hadn't she refused him? What on earth had possessed her to throw away her body and her reputation?

As if sensing his speculation, she leaned forward and wrapped her arms around her knees, gazing into the low flames. "You and I have met before, but I don't think you remember."

Cody blinked at her profile and silently swore. She never did what he expected, seldom said what he anticipated. Until this minute, he would have wagered his saddle that she would immediately inundate him with explanations regarding the fight with Augusta Boyd.

"You're mistaken. I'd remember if you and I had met." Drab clothing and faded hats couldn't disguise a beauty as rare as hers. He wouldn't have forgotten her regardless of the circumstances. Her lush compact figure and those lustrous cinnamon eyes would remain in a man's memory long after she had gone.

"It was a brief meeting. We weren't introduced."

"I think you're mistaking me for someone else."

"About three years ago, my husband took me with him on a business trip to St. Louis. Garin and his brother owned a warehouse in Chastity. Down by the river." She fell silent, looking into the flames as if the past flickered in the dying glow. "Garin was a possessive and jealous man. He used to" She shook her head, unconsciously raising both hands as if to ward off a blow. "We were crossing the street. This was our second day in St Louis. A man bumped into me and I started to fall, but he caught me by the arms. Garin" Closing her eyes, she pressed her fingertips to her bottom lip. "Garin went mad. I guess he thought I don't know. Anyway, he fought with the man. Right there in the middle of the street."

As Cody listened, his memory stirred, bringing forth an event long forgotten. The scene she described formed in his mind and he recalled horses rearing in clouds of dust, drivers and riders struggling not to run down the two brawling men. Now he remembered a woman, dressed in a neat dark cape and gown, frantic and oblivious to the wild-eyed horses and cursing drivers. The sides of her bonnet had concealed her face.

Raising her eyes, Perrin looked into the darkness beyond Smokey Joe's fire, trying to see the prairie wolf who howled near the river. "I didn't see it happen. But the man had a gun; he shot Garin in the stomach. The man kept firing, he must have been crazed, and one of the shots wounded a man on a horse behind me."

She turned her scratched face and gazed into Cody's eyes. "Then you came running out of the smithy. And you shot the man who killed my husband."

Cody remembered. "I found out later that his name was James Amberly. He was a horse trader known for a hair-trigger temper. He'd been in scrapes before."

"I never learned his name. Or yours. I didn't know who you were until you interviewed me for this journey."

The orange shadows cast by the flames made her dark eyes seem too large for her small features and delicate bone structure. To his amazement, he felt an absurd urge to stroke the blue vein that throbbed on the pale skin at her temple.

She turned back toward the fire pit. "Garin's brother sold the warehouse and took his family back east. My portion of the money was enough to care for myself for two years. Then" She lapsed into a long silence. "I had no family to turn to, there was no work to be had. To keep myself alive I would have married any man who asked, but none did. I was desperate. Lucy Hastings's father, the Reverend Mr. Hastings, did what he could to help me. I would have starved if his parishioners hadn't collected food on my behalf. But there were other expenses. A place to live, soap, clothing, shoes" She touched her forehead.

Bending forward, Cody stirred the coals into a small burst of flame. "Enter the sainted Mr. Joseph Boyd," he said bluntly.

Her head whipped around and she glared at him. "Joseph Boyd was not a saint, but he was kind and generous. He saved my life, Mr, Snow. When I met Joseph, I was at my lowest ebb. I saw no way to survive another winter, and I was considering taking my own life. Of all the people in Chastity, Joseph Boyd was the only one who recognized my desperation and offered meaningful assistance!"

"By making you his mistress?" He didn't know why he felt so angry or why he was prodding her like this. He could not have explained why her story pained him, not if the success of the journey had depended on him doing so. But something about her defense of the man who had ruined her infuriated him.

"No." She came to her feet in an angry swirl of wool and fringe. "Joseph asked nothing but companionship in payment for his kindness. It was me who persuaded him to climb into my bed. Joseph was as lonely as I was, missing his wife as I missed my husband, but with better cause. Yet he never asked me to compromise myself. That was my idea and he resisted it. Make no mistake. Ruining myself was solely my decision. And I threw myself away for the best of reasons. Gratitude and affection."

He stared up at her, astonished by her honesty. And her naïveté. "You only think it was your idea. He manipulated you."

Sudden tears sparkled in her brown eyes. "He said he loved me, and I tried to love him, but" Her hand slashed across her body in a gesture of frustration. "Regardless, I would have married him except neither of us believed Augusta would accept another woman in her home. Then something happened, I don't know what, and Joseph changed. At the end he was anxious, depressed even so it was a terrible shock when I learned that he"

Slowly, Cody stood. "So Augusta hates you because you were her father's mistress."

She cringed from him, pressing both hands to her injured cheeks. She looked sick. "Fighting with Augusta, rolling in the mud it's the most humiliating, most shameful thing that has ever happened to me or that I could possibly imagine."

Her whisper was as husky as her speaking voice. Suddenly Cody pictured her with her rich dark hair spread across a white pillow. A wave of fury rocked him that it had been Boyd who heard her whisper his name in that midnight whisper.

He stood so close that her skirt brushed his legs, and he could smell the cornstarch she had combed through her hair to draw out the mud, sensed the softness of her. His groin tightened and the urge to pull her into his arms nearly overwhelmed him.

He didn't want this. His fists tightened at his sides and he reminded himself that he was finished with women. "I can't have my passengers brawling."

Her body jerked and she squeezed her eyes shut. Thick lashes fringed her cheeks like silky crescents, dark against the paleness of her distress. "I know."

"I don't know how you settle this with Augusta, but either the two of you reach an accommodation or I'll put you both off this train. I've told Augusta the same thing. I won't tolerate fighting among my passengers."

Sudden fear leaped in her eyes. She had no family or she would have appealed to them after the death of her husband. She had no place to go or she wouldn't be here. Her only future waited in Oregon with a man who might be less kind than Joseph Boyd and more abusive than Garin Waverly.

"I'll find a way to appease her," she whispered, stepping back from him. She covered her mouth with a hand and spoke against trembling fingers. "Somehow. I'll try."

"Mem Grant and Hilda Clum approached me on your behalf," he said, annoyed with himself that he was telling her this after he had decided that he wouldn't. "Winnie Larson is recovering, and they credit you for Winnie's returning health. I won't tell you that their support is enthusiastic, but you've made progress."

"Progress? Toward what? Acceptance? These women will never accept me. I represent everything they fear and abhor." She looked away from him. "I haven't had a woman friend in years, Mr. Snow. I no longer even hope for friends."

There was no response he could make.

A rush of color flooded upward from her throat, and sudden tears gathered in her large dark eyes. "But speaking on my behalf was generous of Mem and Hilda. I'm grateful." She bowed her head for a moment, then she surprised him yet again. "I hope someone also spoke for Augusta."

Cody decided he was never going to understand women.

He stared at her, then slowly nodded. "Ona Norris and Bootie Glover."

"Good." She turned into the darkness. "If that's all, then good night." She stumbled over an exposed rock, paused, and stared back at him. "Do you have secrets, Cody Snow? Or are you the only person on this train who doesn't?"

As it didn't seem that she expected a reply, and he wouldn't have answered anyway, he remained silent. He heard her gather her skirts, then stumble through the dark night toward her tent.