M. Donice Byrd - The Warner Saga (19 page)

From
the hallway, Meredith heard Rebecca speaking. She pulled back her shoulders and entered the parlor. The woman stood up with the guilty start. She wore a skirt of tartan plaid, belled out with hoops and worn with a matching short jacket. The woman was as tall as many men with rich brown hair she wore elegantly coiffed in sausage curls. Chocolate brown eyes smiled at her.

“You must be Meredith. I’m Rebecca.”

Acutely aware of her homespun skirt and juvenile hairstyle, she felt awkward and embarrassed to be standing in front of a woman whose appearance screamed of sophistication and wealth. This beautiful woman might have someday been Blake’s wife or still could be. If not her, someone quite comparable to her.

Meredith just wanted to hide under the rug until the woman departed.
As Meredith wondered if Blake had told Rebecca about the forced wedding, her cheek began to glow.

Before Meredith could respond
, Rebecca began chuckling. She tried to suppress it but it just made her laugh harder.

“I’m sorry. How rude of me. I didn’t mean to…” Then she laughed again fanning her face as it became flushed.

Meredith’s expression said it all. She didn’t understand why this woman was laughing at her but it hurt her feelings nevertheless.

Donna, sensing Meredith’s distress, scolded Rebecca. “I fail to see anything remotely amusing, Becca. Meredith is a guest in my home and I’m…”

Rebecca cut her off. “No, it’s not her I’m laughing at. It’s the situation. I’m laughing because every debutante and her mother tried to get Blake to the altar and this sweet-faced, guileless girl has done what all the conniving women of Chicago could not. She is certainly not his usual taste.”

Despite her not unkind words, Meredith felt like she had been attacked and lashed out. “And what kind of women are those; women like you, world-weary and past your prime?”

“Ouch. Not that I didn’t deserve that but the little kitten has claws.” Rebecca said. “I like her. Can we keep her?”

“Apparently not,” Donna answered. “He’s already asking me for the names of lawyers and judges to take care of the matter.”

Rebecca looked Meredith directly in the eye. “Yes, he went to a lawyer this morning. And how do you feel about that?” Rebecca Grant asked her.

Meredith could only shrug.

The tall woman tilted her head to one side, a sympathetic smile on her face. “Whatever you do, don’t fall in love with him.”

Meredith stared silently at the woman. She was too embarrassed to admit she already had. Fisting her hands behind her back, she lifted her chin.

“Oh, you poor thing, don’t feel bad. Blake’s left a very long line of broken hearts behind him.”

“Including yours?” she asked Rebecca.

“No, not mine. Blake and I have no say in each other’s relationships. People make assumptions about us but they are always wrong. I have my own life and so does he.”

Meredith was less than convinced that she should not be jealous. She heard Blake and Donna’s conversation the night before and nearly the first words out of her mouth after learning about their marriage were,
What about Rebecca?
Was Rebecca not upset because she knew Meredith would not come between them or was it because there was nothing to come between? What difference did it make? Blake was divorcing her regardless.

Rebecca turned to Donna. “I think you need to take Mrs. Warner shopping. She deserves to take something away from her marriage.”

Donna smiled widely. “I couldn’t agree more. And Blake can have a big fat bill to remind him of what he gave up.”

“Oh no,” Meredith protested, feeling more than a little uncomfortable with the turn of the conversation. “As soon as we are divorced, I’m going to live with my aunt and uncle. I’m sure the clothing I have will be sufficient.”

“Nonsense,” Donna said turning to Rebecca. “Did you say he already went to the lawyer?”

“I went with Blake this morning to see a Mr. Lowell.” Rebecca’s dark chocolate eyes glanced at the rug in obvious discomfort. “He asked me to tell you, so it won’t come as quite a shock, that he’s divorcing you on the grounds of adultery.”

“That’s ridiculous. Blake hasn’t been unfaithful. There hasn’t been time. Has he?” Meredith looked pointedly at Rebecca.

Rebecca’s hand flew to her throat at the implication. She stammered a moment before gaining control. “I’m sure I wouldn’t know. Lordy, I think this is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I’m never going to forgive Blake for making me do this,” she said. “You’ve misunderstood. The solicitor said his infidelity was not enough to end the marriage in the court’s eyes. Yours, however, is.”

“Mine!”

“He lied. He had to. Divorces are nearly impossible to get. He told him you weren’t a virgin when you were married.”

Meredith gasped.

“It was the only way. He could hardly claim abandonment or cruelty. As it is, Blake is paying a fortune in bribes to get this over with as quickly and as quietly as possible.”

“Of course,” Meredith murmured, bleakly.

Donna took Meredith by the arm and led her to the sofa. They sat down together and Rebecca squeezed in next to Donna, sitting at the sofa’s edge.

“You know you can fight this,” Donna said.

“He already hates me. If we can’t get divorced….”

“He doesn’t hate you.” Donna said kindly. “I actually suspect he may find he has feelings for you.”

Meredith couldn’t tell her the only
feelings he had for her involved his enjoyment of what they shared between the sheets. He would never forgive her for allowing him to think she was married and no longer a virgin. She looked up at the woman with all seriousness and announced in whispered tones, “He didn’t propose to me.”

“We know,” Donna said patting her arm. “Blake never wanted to marry anyone. He’s a rake and a philanderer, if ever there was one. It was bound to catch up with him sooner or later.”

“Poetic justice,” Rebecca said with a snicker. “Oh, good heavens. Don’t get me started again.” Rebecca covered her mouth and looked away trying to keep from laughing. “Tell me honestly was he falling down drunk or was your father holding a shotgun on him?”

Donna elbowed Rebecca.

“My parents died recently.”

Rebecca’s expression grew serious. Her eyes widened with understanding. “You’re one of his orphans? I suppose that shouldn’t surprise me but it does.”

Meredith had overheard Donna the night before referring to her as a stray but she didn’t understand what that meant and now with Rebecca referring to his orphans, Meredith was even more confused.

“I don’t understand what you mean.”

“Blake can’t walk past a child on the street without making sure that there is someone taking care of them.”

Meredith felt guilty knowing Blake was seeking out the offspring of the couple he had found so he could help and she had repaid his kindness with a lie of omission. It was no wonder he wished he’d never met her.

“Oh my, is that the time?” Rebecca asked spying the clock on the mantle. “I’m going to miss the stage if I don’t hurry. I wish they’d get that trestle repaired. I swear I’m black and blue for a week just riding the stage from here to Macon.

“Do I need to have
Fulton take you to the station?” Donna asked.

“No, I’ve rented a little surrey and livery boy is going to pick it up at the station this morning.”

She gave Donna a polite hug then turned to Meredith. “Don’t let him divorce you. If you want to stay married to him, fight for him. You may be his only hope for love because he just won’t allow himself to get close to women.”

Donna looped her arm through Rebecca’s arm and gently guided her to the door.

“You shouldn’t build up her hope like that,” Donna said in soft tones hoping Meredith didn’t hear her. “You aren’t going to tell anyone that he’s gotten married, are you?”

“No, of course….” A look of mischief came over Rebecca. “Yes, I am. You tell him I’m going to tell everyone who will listen and let’s see if he still goes through with divorcing her.”

“You aren’t really going to do that, are you?”

Rebecca thought about it for a moment before answering. “Probably not, but tell him I am.”

“Maybe you can tell people he’s met someone special that way if he does show up with a wife, it won’t seem so scandalous. And if he doesn’t, everyone will assume he’s just up to his old patterns.”

Rebecca hesitated. She looked at Donna, then over Donna’s shoulder at Meredith. “For you and for Meredith, I’ll do it. Not for Blake,” Rebecca answered as
she opened her ridicule and fished out a folded paper. “He’s been called away. I have no idea where but he said he’ll be back in a week or two. Here.”

She handed the paper to Meredith. “It was nice meeting you,” Rebecca said and made a swift departure. 

Meredith unfolded the paper and began to read.

Meredith,

My work has called me away and I don’t have time to explain. Wait to tell your relatives about your parents until I return. I don’t want to worry you but it’s a bad sign if I’m not back within a month. I am headed south so it is possible that I could be taken or killed. Show this letter to Donna. I am authorizing you to take an allowance of $30 a month out of my account until I return. I’m sure a lawyer can instruct you on what to do if I don’t return. As my widow, you would be entitled to it all but please, do not be too eager to declare me dead as captured is as real a possibility as death.

Blake Warner.

Meredith stared at the paper for several moments then reread it.

17

Blake Warner sat atop his shiny black mare heading south out of Union territory into an area filled with bushwhackers, Southern loyalist and countless rebel troops. His pockets were filled with penny candy and matchsticks.

He had been more than a little put out to have to leave Meredith right now but he didn’t have a choice. The delays in
Minnesota and Iowa had put him way past due and that was why Rebecca had shown up. His contact near Sedalia had been spooked and wouldn’t meet with anyone but him. Blake on the other hand had nearly been captured the last time he met with the man and had no intention of meeting him again. His information, never more than troop size and movement, could easily be gathered by Blake himself. That’s what the candy and the matches were for. For every twenty-five foot soldiers he’d move a Lucifer from one pocket to another. For every ten cannons he’d move a peppermint and for every ten horse soldiers he’d moved a piece of butterscotch. It was easy to do if they were moving. He would just stand by the side of the road, watching and counting. It was more difficult to do if they were camped. He had no qualms about entering a military camp. What spy would be so brazen? He’d ride in and tell the sentry he needed a pass and minutes later he’d be escorted in. They’d ask where he was from and why he needed to travel through the area. Blake would tell them he was from St. Joseph and he was searching for his sister who had run off with a man. He’d then show the officer a miniature of his mother that his father had given him after they had been reunited and claim she was his missing sister. The only drawback was he had to stop and ask everyone he saw if they had seen her. It was time-consuming but he had to do it or his story wouldn’t ring true.

It took Blake several days to get where he needed to go and a day to gather the information he needed before he began to head back to
St. Joseph. He opted for a different road back for the sole purpose of looking for more troops. When he began having people tell him they knew the woman in the miniature, Blake had no choice but to leave his route to seek out the woman, Anna Morgan.

It was midafternoon when Blake made his way down the narrow forested road to the secluded farm.

“That’s far ‘nough, mister.”

Blake dismounted at the road and had barely set
foot onto the Morgan’s land when the boy stepped out of the house with a shotgun trained on him. He put his hands in front of his chest so the boy could see his hands were empty.

“You just git on back to yer horse and keep a-ridin’.
Yer kind ain’t welcome ‘round here.”

Blake felt momentarily startled wondering if the boy knew he was a spy.

“My kind?”

The boy squinted as he lined up the sights. “Strangers,” he said, the word spat with disgust.

Blake laughed out loud in hopes of disarming the boy’s fear of him but stopped when he saw the boy’s finger tightened slightly on the trigger.

Suddenly, a small girl bounded out of the house giggling, completely unaware of the tableau in the yard. The boy startled and Blake was sure he would
unintentionally pull the trigger.

“I’m gonna tell Pa yer playin’ with his gun, Petey.”

“Shush up, now,” the boy hissed. “Go git Ma.”

The girl blanched at his raised voice. Her bottom lip pouted out, her eyes wide with question as if the boy had never raised his voice before.

“We got company, Lolly. Please, go git Ma.” His voice was calmer but it still came out as an order.

The girl swung around and noticed Blake then. She gasped and ran off around the building as if fire licked at her backside.

“Son, I’d feel a whole lot better if you’d take your finger off the trigger,” Blake said in what he hoped sounded like a friendly tone. “I think we’d both feel bad if an accident happened.”

His eyes steadied on Blake again. “Maybe both of
us would. Maybe just one of us.”

The sardonic smile on the boy’s face worried him. He hated seeing a look like that in one so young. It was an expression Blake himself had developed and then learned to cover up in his youth. Damning the war, Blake decided the best course of action was to remain quiet and wait for the mother.

Amber-brown eyes that had seen far beyond his years narrowed at Blake with suspicion. The boy was gangly thin with slightly sunken cheeks. His straight brown hair fell limply to his shoulders. His homespun clothing dyed in mismatch browns were well-worn but clean except for the mud on his shoes and hems of his pants, the moisture leaching up the leg several inches from walking on the dewy ground.

Blake’s breath caught in his throat as the woman came around the corner of the house. For a brief moment it was like seeing his mother’s ghost.

Anna Morgan greatly resembled Blake’s miniature of his mother. Her face was oval like his mother’s with high cheeks, wide mouth, and a pert nose. Her hair was the same jet black color but pulled back severely in a tight bun that Elizabeth would have never worn. Her eyes were not almond-shape nor the color of whiskey as the picture depicted. Anna’s eyes appear wider apart and bluish green as the dark turbulent sea.

“How do,” the woman said brusquely.

Blake heard the Southern twang and immediately regretted coming.

“Good morning, ma’am. You must be Anna Morgan.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “Must I?” Anna Morgan placed herself between her son and Blake, staying far enough to the side so Pete still had a clean shot. “Who are you?”

“I’m sorry, I forgot to introduce myself. I’m Blake Warner.” Not that anyone had given him a chance, he added to himself. “I’m sorry to have alarmed you.”

The little girl hugged her mother’s leg and watched the stranger intently from a mostly concealed position behind her mother’s skirt.

“You got business with Mr. Morgan? I don’t think he’s got shine to sell.”

“No, ma’am. I actually came to see you. Some of the men in town sent me out here but I can see I’m just wasting your time.”

Blake turned to leave. Her question stopped him.

“What men?”

Blake shrugged. “I didn’t ask their names. They thought you look like my sister but I can see you’re not her.”

“Your sister is missing?” Her voice softened.

Blake nodded stepping closer. “Would you like to see her picture?” Blake froze when he saw the boy lining up the sights again.

“Pete.”

At the sound of his name, Pete lowered the gun barrel and approached his mother.

Anna gazed at the picture.

“That you, Ma?” the little girl asked as curiosity drew her out of her hiding place to stand directly in front of Pete. “Looks like you.”

“No, baby doll. This man is lookin’ for his sister.”

“What’s her name?” the little girl asked boldly.

“Lolly,” Anna chided the child. “Little girls are to be seen and not heard.”

Blake squatted down on his haunches. “Her name is Lizzy.” He grinned kindly at the child who looked like a porcelain replica of her mother. “It’s been so long since I’ve seen her that she may have a little girl just like you that I don’t even know about.”

“Would you be her pa?” The girl’s face scrunched up in confusion.

Blake chuckled. “No, sweetie, I’d be her uncle and she’d be my niece.”

“I ain’t got no uncles.”

“I don’t have a niece that I know of.”

“I could be your niece.”

“Lolly,” her mother said in an exasperated voice.

Blake didn’t glance up. “Well, I suppose we could pretend – just for today. You have to call me Uncle Blake and I have to give you candy.”

“Candy!”

“Well, of course. That’s an uncle’s job.”

Blake knew what a treat candy was when sugar was almost impossible to come by. Reaching into his pocket, he removed a handful of butterscotch candies wrapped in a square of brown paper. Carefully, he unfolded the paper and held it out to her.

Lolly looked to her mother. At Anna’s nod, Lolly reached out and snatched one up.

When she struggled with the paper her mother helped her. “Thank you, Uncle Blake,” she said remembering her manners after the candy was in her mouth. Her thank you was garbled but Blake’s grin widened as he perused her expression of joy. He patted her soft curls before standing back up and offering a piece to her brother.

“No thanks,
Uncle
,” Pete said in a tone that bordered on insolence. He lifted Lolly onto his hip in a protective gesture despite the fact the girl was nearly too big to be held in that manner.

Blake didn’t blame him in the least. The boy was smart to question the motives of a stranger giving away a precious commodity like candy.

He folded the paper around the remaining candy and handed it to Anna. He could see she wanted to object but the woman obviously had a soft spot when it came to her children.

She returned the picture to him. “I can see where people might think I look like her. I hope you find her.”

Blake gave Lolly one last smile before he left. “Don’t bite into the candy. Make it last.”

A faint smile touched Blake’s eyes and lifted one corner of his mouth as he mounted Wunner to go back to the main road. He would have frowned had he realized it.

His thoughts were on the little girl. He wondered if he’d someday have a daughter with his dark hair and the same tendency to curl as it grew. He ran his fingers through his unruly mop thinking he needed to get it cut again before it began to curl in earnest.

No, he’d rather the boys looked like him and the girls looked like Meredith – except for the curls of course.

Had Blake been on foot he would’ve stopped dead in his tracks. He wanted his daughters to look like Meredith. Not any anonymous woman or even a woman with Meredith’s coloring but Meredith herself.

The thought scared the bejesus out of him.

If Blake admitted to himself, he wanted to have children with her,
then he had to admit also to having feelings for her. Scowling in earnest now, Blake refused to entertain the notion he might be in love. He discarded labels of smitten, crush and infatuation as belonging to foppish boys. He was too serious and sensible for those ridiculous sentiments.

Feelings.
He liked the vagueness of the word and tried to turn his thoughts away.

Perhaps since he did have feelings for her, he’d been too hasty in filing for his divorce. He liked children and wanted to be a father someday. And that usually involved a wife. Perhaps they could come to an agreement, after all, they had decided to divorce before they had gotten to know one another. She might be a little rough around the edges but he liked her nevertheless.

Like. He could live with that word, too.

They could remain married but live apart. He could visit, slake his lust – if it could ever be slaked with her – and then returned to his own hotel room.

Lust. He could definitely admit that. He was more than a little attracted to her. Attracted. Add that one.

He would not allow his children to grow up as bastards. They would definitely remain married. Despite living apart, there would be no doubt in anyone’s mind they were indeed married. He would have to take Meredith to the theater or the opera or the ballet at least once a week, holding her hand publicly so everyone could see they were fond of each other.

Fond. Blake wasn’t sure he liked that word much.

He would be forced to take her to most of the society functions keeping her possessively close by and looking tenderly into her eyes. That should lay his claim to her and keep the bucks at bay.

Possessive, tender, claim. He grudgingly added the words to his mental list.

It was only honorable that he should give up all of
his women also. And good riddance to them. He had never been entranced by any of them like he was by her. Never had any of them ever kindled these warm feelings. Oh, some may have claimed they were enamored with him but this was the first time he had, in his heart, felt that way about a woman. She was a woman to cherish.

Honor, entranced, warm, enamored, cherished.
Blake groaned there was only one more word to add to the list. A small four-letter word.

Fool.

Like a switch being thrown, the locomotive that was Blake’s thoughts suddenly change tracks. Or perhaps more accurately, completely derailed into a mass of tangled metal.

Suddenly, an image of his mother, Beth, loomed before his mind’s eye. Blue from being drained out, her soulless body draped over the edge of the large cast-iron
tub. Blake felt his stomach roiling a manner, oh, so, familiar. And Blake knew he could never allow himself to love Meredith. How could he give his heart to a woman when the first and only woman he loved could betray him in the ultimate betrayal as she had?

If she had to kill herself, she did not have to do it in such an obvious manner, leaving him to discover her lifeless corpse. She could have swam out into Lake Michigan until the weight of the water in her skirts pulled her under or poisoned herself or stepped in front of a rushing coach. But the way she did it left no doubt she killed herself and intended for him to find her. How he hated her for that! It had taken him the remainder of his childhood to get past the maudlin and the anger. He had been good at covering it up so no one knew – he could not let it show for if he did, they might ask and his mother’s death was a secret he would take to his grave.