The Gifted (23 page)

That would not be such a trial. Laura was lovely. When his sons arrived and grew into little men, he could plan adventures with them just as his father had planned adventures for Tristan. He wouldn’t plan sending his sons to war. He hoped never again to hear the bugle call to war. But there would be mountains to climb. Wilderness places to explore. Perhaps in time, they could even go west and see the wonders there.

Marrying Laura would not be hardship. Rather a beginning. His mother had assured him of that last evening after her long tirade taking him to task for not sending word of his whereabouts. He claimed the loss of memory, but she was not as believing as the Shakers. She knew him too well. When at long last her anger had vented, she once again slipped on her comfortable Southern lady charm that pretended helplessness while hiding an iron will that made sure things happened as she wanted.

It had worked well on Tristan’s father. And he supposed it was working on him. Wasn’t he here walking with Laura Cleveland? Hadn’t he promised his mother the night before to be so charming that Laura’s gray eyes would begin to warm when she gazed at him instead of reminding him of the cold wall of a cave? Not the blue of a warm summer sky.

He shut his eye, disgusted with himself for allowing Jessamine to sneak back into his thoughts again. Charming. That was what he had promised to be. And if that didn’t work, then direct. He’d just go down on a knee and ask Laura to marry him. She’d say yes. It didn’t matter that she seemed to be having as much problem exercising her charms on him as he was on her. She had to answer to her father the same as he did his mother. The two of them had plotted and decided what was to happen. Now they were impatiently waiting for their children to dance to the music they’d written.

Dancing. Would every thought he had bring forth the Shakers? And Jessamine. Dancing and whirling. Smiling at him.

He looked toward Laura at his side, but her parasol hid her face. “Why don’t we go sit in the shade, Laura?” He pushed the sound of a smile into his voice as he put his hand under her elbow and guided her off the path to one of the benches placed strategically to rest the walkers. “I’m anxious to hear what happened while I was gone last week.”

And I will laugh and smile at all your little anecdotes.
He spoke that promise silently, but he intended to keep it.

Laura looked at the bench and hesitated. Tristan whipped out his handkerchief with his good hand and managed to spread it on the bench to protect her pristine white skirt.

“Thank you,” she murmured as she perched on the bench without leaning against the back. She folded the parasol and placed it beside the bench before carefully arranging her skirts to hide any hint of ankle.

Being a lady had its definite disadvantages, Tristan decided. Jessamine would have surely taken a seat on the bench without the first worry of her dress the same as she’d straddled his horse with no visible concern over her exposed shoes and stockings. He tried to recall the turn of her ankle, but all that happened in the woods was little more than a blur. He remembered nothing at all before he awoke to the sound of the two sisters wondering what to do with him. That time was erased as if it had never happened, but the still angry-looking wound on his head and his encased arm were proof enough it had.

Tristan sat down next to Laura. The white froth of her skirts spilled over against his legs. “You look lovely,” Tristan said. And she did.

Her eyes widened a bit as though the last thing she expected to hear from him was a compliment. But she must have heard the same from many admirers. She had been surrounded by several eager men when he’d come down to the hotel lobby to meet her. As his mother reminded him at least ten times a day, he was not the only man at White Oak Springs hoping to find favor in Laura Cleveland’s eyes.

She looked demurely down at her hands, ungloved as a concession to the heat and the casual setting. “It’s so kind of you to notice.”

An uncomfortable tick of silence fell over them then before Tristan reminded her to tell him all the events he had missed in the past week.

“Let’s see.” She looked up and away for a moment before she went on. “We had the midweek ball. Quite the event. And the men had a shooting tournament on Thursday. A few of the ladies played lawn bowls and the men got out their bats and balls and horseshoes. Dr. Hargrove even suggested some of us ladies might enjoy trying to pitch the horseshoes. A few accepted his challenge and tossed a few. The men had great fun over that.”

“Did you give the horseshoes a try?”

“Oh no.” Laura let out a trill of laughter. “I was quite content to watch and save my energy for the evening dances. And my nails.” She held her hands out toward him as though to prove her good sense. “I rather fear Sally Jenkins will be unable to go without her gloves for weeks.”

It would have been the perfect opportunity to take one of her hands. She was practically offering them to him, but the realization came to him too late. “It sounds like a fun week,” he said lamely as she dropped her hands back into her lap. The knock on his head must have made him forget how to be charming.

“Yes, the people here at the Springs intend for their patrons to have plenty to do.” She stared down at her hands, once more folded demurely on the frothy white material of her skirt. Perhaps realizing she might sound uncaring, she hurried on. “It goes without saying that everyone was quite concerned about you all through the week. Your poor mother was beside herself with worry.” Again she rushed on to claim worry of her own. “As we all were.”

“What did everyone think?”

She didn’t quite meet his eyes. “We didn’t know what to think since we had only so recently made your acquaintance. Your mother said it was quite unlike you to simply disappear without a word to her and from what she had told us about you when she was here last season, that did seem true.” She glanced up at him. “You did know she brought your father here to take the waters in hopes of restoring his health after he returned from the fighting in Mexico, didn’t you?”

“Yes, she wrote me about how Father was feeling better at the time. Then the next news I got was of his death after they returned to Georgia.”

“Such a trial for you both.” She looked genuinely sad. “So when you didn’t return last week, we were very concerned for her and hoping she would not have to face more sorrow.”

“How kind of you.” Tristan’s words came out drier than he intended, and her eyes flew up to his face to see if he was mocking her. He pushed a smile across his face in an attempt to assure her of his sincerity.

“Yes, well.” She managed a practiced smile in return of his. “We did our best since we had no way to guess at what might have befallen you. We even had prayer with your mother. One of my dear friends here, Flodella, she’s the granddaughter of a preacher. I think you met her at the ball last week. Anyway, at first your mother was sure you would be back any minute but after two days passed and then three, we—my friends and I—surrounded your mother in a prayerful circle and Flodella spoke the most devout prayer for your safety and return.”

“I’ll have to thank her.” From the Shaker prayers to Laura’s and her friends’ prayers, he seemed to have been surrounded by prayers. “Thank all of you.”

“That’s hardly necessary.” She waved a hand in dismissal. “We’re just overjoyed our prayers were answered.”

Somehow he wasn’t feeling that joy radiating from her. A moment of silence fell over them before he asked, “So, was the consensus of the ladies that I had ridden away with no regard to my dear mother or that I had perhaps come to a bad end with my body floating in the river?” He was sorry for the words as soon as they came out of his mouth. A lady’s sensibilities were to be respected and talking of bodies floating in the river could easily spin a gently bred lady into the vapors. He had no wish to deal with a fainting woman.

He was getting ready to offer a profuse apology for his callousness or be ready to fetch smelling salts when he heard what sounded like a giggle. Maybe he was hearing wrong and it was a sob. But no, she pushed her hand over her mouth and faked a cough. He didn’t know whether to pretend he was offended or make a pretense of not being aware of her amusement. What would a charming man do? Perhaps the thought of his body floating in the river was not so distressing to her sensibilities as he’d imagined. A smile worked its way out on his lips.

She peeked up at him, her hand still over her mouth but with the smile evident in her eyes. “I do apologize, Tristan. It is quite unseemly for me to smile at your question when in fact you were obviously set upon by unsavory characters and in some danger of your life. Might have possibly even come to the end you indicated.”

“Smile? I think laugh is a more accurate word.” He leaned back on the bench, not upset at all. He looked at her with new eyes. “So I’m guessing there was some conjecture about what might have happened to me. Wagering even, perhaps?”

“I heard a bit about that possibility among the gentlemen. Certainly not among us ladies.” She fanned her blushing cheeks with her handkerchief.

“But you did talk about it?” Tristan said.

“Oh indeed. Talk is, after all, our main pastime.”

“And what were the winning suppositions?”

“A few had you going back to Texas. Julia did so want you to have a pining heart for a señorita there. But most were of the mind that you had escaped to the goldfields.”

“Escaped?” Tristan raised his eyebrows at her. “Escaped what?”

“Me, of course.” Laura laughed again. This time she didn’t bother trying to hide her merriment.

“A man would be extremely foolish to attempt to escape a lady as lovely as you.” It appeared he hadn’t forgotten all his charm while with the simple Shakers.

“So some might think.” Laura’s smile faded as she looked directly at him.

He met her gaze and thought he should just go down on one knee right there in front of the bench and offer his devotion and his name. Get it over with. But though their shared laughter had helped him see her as a real person rather than an obligation, he still felt no desire at all to reach out to touch her cheek or feel her lips under the tips of his fingers as he had with the beautiful Jessamine. Nor did she appear to be entertaining the thought of him stealing a kiss. At least with any kind of pleasure. Instead the laughter had given way to a certain grimness, a look that made him wonder if she had even more desire to escape him than he did her. For a moment, he almost considered asking her that.

But what if he was wrong? What if she was waiting for words of love? Then again, perhaps she’d rather hear he was floating in the river. He had the strange urge to reach up and touch the wound on his head.

The moment of truth passed as she looked away from him with a reminder of the time. They stood and walked back toward the hotel to prepare for the evening festivities.

He told himself it was good he hadn’t offered her words of love with no truth in them. Not while the beautiful Jessamine continued to haunt his thoughts. Another few days here with Laura, more strolls around the lake, more smiles, more dances in the moonlight, and perhaps an attraction would flicker to life between them. His memories of Jessamine would fade. Then everything would be fine. His mother would be happy. Laura’s father would be happy. He looked over at Laura. Perhaps even Laura would be happy. Happiness would abound.

15

Jessamine did not have a good Monday. Normally she embraced the duty of working in the gardens because it seemed good to be part of the miracle of seeds bursting and pushing tendrils up toward the sun. God’s gift to his children, her granny used to tell her when they planted their garden plot. At least those children willing to put their hands to the plow.

Her granny was akin to the Shakers in that way. She believed the Lord intended a person to work, but not every minute of the day. “The good Lord gave us hands to work, but he also gave us eyes to behold his wonders. I’m thinking he expects us to take the time to ponder on those wonders.”

Jessamine had always thought Sister Sophrena might lean toward her granny’s way of thinking even if she never came out and said she admired the scent of roses in the air or the busy buzz of bees working through the apple blossoms brightening the orchards. But Jessamine had seen her pause on the paths. She’d seen the look on her face sometimes when she was writing in her journal. Jessamine had peeked at a few lines from that journal from time to time and recognized the thread of joy in the words. Not that the sister would ever speak against the Believers’ way of simple plainness and only seeing beauty in the usefulness of the roses for rosewater or the dance of the bees amid the blossoms because it resulted in honey and apples for the Believers’ tables. She would not. The Believers’ way was her way.

It was Jessamine’s way too. The village was home. Her roots had grown down into the Shaker soil as surely as the beans she was dropping into the rows would germinate and reach down into the garden soil. She had nowhere else to go. She didn’t even know the name of the prince who had loved her mother and been her natural father. She knew Sister Sophrena’s name. She knew her love.