Читать книгу A Convenient Christmas Wedding - Regina Scott - Страница 12
ОглавлениеWho was this woman he’d married?
Nora had quaked at stern words from Mr. Bagley. She claimed she could not stand up against her brother. Now her face was set, her fists planted on her ample hips. He felt as if a tabby had turned into a mountain lion right before his eyes.
But he’d never run from a mountain lion, and he didn’t intend to now.
“I’ll honor our bargain,” he told her. “You’ll be free to live as you like. All I ask is the right to do the same.”
She relaxed with a brisk nod. “Very well. You can go and wait in the captain’s quarters. I’ll be fine. I’m used to being alone.” She turned her gaze once more to the water.
He could not find his equilibrium with her. Feeling as if he’d been dismissed, he went to join John and Levi farther down the rail.
“I like her,” Levi said. “She seems nice.”
Simon was no longer so sure. Where had that surge of confidence come from? Had she overstated her fears about her brother? Did something more lay behind her proposal to wed?
He kept his distance the rest of the trip.
They arrived in Olympia late in the afternoon. Unlike Seattle, the territorial capital afforded several docks, and more than one ship crowded the harbor at the base of Budd Inlet, the terminus of Puget Sound. The entire town was built on a spit of land, with water on three sides and mountains on two. Simon much preferred the more solid footing of Wallin Landing, with the hill at his back and the lake in front.
But as he walked down the pier toward the town proper, Nora’s case in his hand, he couldn’t help noticing that they were causing a stir. Sailors glanced at Nora as she passed; longshoremen paused in their work to watch. Even here, where the territorial legislature met, women were rare. Though Nora seemed unaware of the interest, Simon put his other hand to her back and stayed close. She favored him with a frown but did not resist him.
“Busy place,” John commented behind them as they made their way south along the boardwalk past all manner of businesses.
“I like it here,” Levi declared, glancing at a hall where banners proclaimed the upcoming performance of a dance troupe. “A fellow could find a lot more to do than farm and log.”
“There’s the land office,” Simon said, nodding to a whitewashed building ahead. He strode to it, shifted Nora’s case under one arm and held the door open for her, then followed her inside with his brothers in his wake.
The long, narrow office was bisected by a counter. Chairs against the white-paneled walls told of lengthy waits, but today the only person in the room was a slender man behind the counter. He was shrugging into a coat as if getting ready to close up for the day.
Handing Nora’s case to John, Simon hurried forward. “I need to file a claim.”
The fellow paused, eyed him and then glanced at Nora, who came to stand beside Simon. The clerk smoothed down his lank brown hair and stepped up to the counter. “Do you have the necessary application and fee?”
Simon drew out the ten-dollar fee, then pulled the papers from his coat and laid them on the counter. The clerk took his time reading them, glancing now and then at Nora, who bowed her head as if looking at the shoes peeping out from under her scalloped hem.
“And this is your wife?” he asked at last.
Simon nodded. “I brought witnesses to the fact, as required.”
John and Levi stepped closer. The clerk’s gaze returned to Nora. “Are you Mrs. Wallin?”
She glanced at Simon as if wondering the same thing, and for a moment he thought they were all doomed. Had she decided he wasn’t the man she’d thought him? Had he married for nothing?
Nora turned and held out her hand to the clerk. “Yes, I’m Mrs. Simon Wallin. No need to wish me happy, for I find I have happiness to spare.”
The clerk’s smile appeared, brightening his lean face. “Mr. Wallin is one fortunate fellow.” He turned to pull a heavy, leather-bound book from his desk, thumped it down on the counter and opened it to a page to begin recording the claim.
Simon knew he ought to feel blessed indeed as he accepted the receipt from the clerk. He had just earned his family the farmland they so badly needed. The acreage would serve the Wallins for years to come and support the town that had been his father’s dream. Yet something nagged at him, warned him that he had miscalculated.
He never miscalculated.
“What now?” Nora asked him as they left the land office.
“The tide’s against us,” Simon told her, pushing away his troublesome emotions. “We won’t be able to return north until early tomorrow morning.”
“I expected as much,” she replied, taking her case from John. “Where should we wait?”
John cleared his throat. “I’m sure you and your bride would like some privacy. Levi and I can make our own way.”
Nora glanced between him and Simon. “There’s no need.”
“None at all,” Simon agreed.
John and Levi exchanged glances. “But you just married,” John pointed out.
“I know this is you, Simon,” Levi added, “but Drew and Catherine and James and Rina were pretty lovey-dovey when they married.”
Nora flamed. “I never intended— That is I never supposed— I mean, really, I—” She appeared to run out of steam like a poorly tended engine.
Simon pulled a coin from his pocket and tossed it to John. “McClendon’s, on Main. Request three rooms. We’ll join you shortly.”
With a nod toward Nora, his brothers took off up the street.
Nora had her feet planted so firmly on the boardwalk she might have been part of its construction. “I can see we should have discussed the details of our convenient wedding more fully.”
He might on occasion have a difficult time following other people’s logic, but he thought he knew what was troubling Nora. “Then let’s discuss them now.” He started up the boardwalk, careful to slow his stride to allow her to keep up. She paced him, head down and case close. The feather in her hat bobbed with her movements.
“We’re not really married, you know,” she said.
Simon raised a brow. “I distinctly remember a ceremony just a few hours ago.”
She nodded. “Yes, yes. But that’s the extent of it. Nothing need change. We are agreed on that.”
She didn’t sound convinced of the fact. “I’ll do my duty,” Simon told her.
She stopped on the boardwalk. “Please don’t use that word with me. I am not a duty, Mr. Wallin. I am your partner in this bargain.” She glanced at him under her lashes. “And partners do not share sleeping accommodations.”
He couldn’t help chuckling. “I thought that might be your concern. I have no intentions of claiming my husbandly rights.”
She clutched her case closer. “You requested three rooms. There are four of us.”
“One room is for me, one is for you,” Simon replied. “The last is for John and Levi. I saw no reason they couldn’t share.”
She took a deep breath, setting her green overskirt to fluttering under the edge of her cloak. “I see. Forgive me. I suppose that’s settled, then.”
She had a way of overlooking things. Was it inexperience or blind trust? Neither boded well for the future.
“That’s not the only detail we should discuss,” Simon told her, starting forward again and allowing her to fall into step beside him. “There will be no mingling of finances. What you earn from your sewing is yours. What I earn from my logging is mine.”
“Agreed,” she said. “And very wise of you.”
For some reason, that made his head come up a little higher. Silly reaction. He didn’t need her praise. “You will call me Simon, and I will call you Nora,” he continued. “People will expect that.”
“My father always called my mother Mrs. Underhill,” she said. “But very well. What else?”
This was the toughest part. “We will tell our families that we entered into this arrangement for stability. I will not lie and claim it a love match.”
He thought she might take umbrage. Beth was forever prosing on about romance, for all she claimed she would never want a husband hanging about.
Instead, Nora shrugged. “My family will never believe it’s a love match. I intend to tell them we decided we’d suit well enough, and you are too busy with the farm to come into town on a regular basis but were willing to allow me to continue to ply my trade. I don’t intend to inflict them on you any more than absolutely necessary.”
He still struggled to imagine any family that cruel. “Are they truly so bad?” he asked.
“That,” Nora replied, “you’ll soon see for yourself.”
* * *
Charles and Meredith arrived on a rainy day exactly a week after Nora and Simon returned from Olympia. The harbormaster had sent word to Nora at the Kellogg brothers’ store, where her sewing customers met her, so she was standing on the pier, umbrella over her head, when the longboat bumped the pilings. She smiled as the sailors helped Charles and Meredith to the wide wood planks of the pier and hoped they would attribute her shiver to the cool weather. She was only glad she’d had an opportunity to send a note to Simon through a miner headed north. Her husband should be able to reach her by dinnertime. She only had to survive until then.
“Wretched trip,” Charles greeted her as if it were somehow her fault. No one who did not know them well would ever have taken Charles for her brother. Though he wasn’t a tall man, he was certainly taller and thinner than she was. His hair was lighter than hers, a fine chestnut, and it was pomaded back from his square-jawed face. His well-tailored coats were always crisp and clean, and his trousers always held a crease.
“Do tell me you brought the carriage,” Meredith said, her feathered hat taking a beating from the rain. She plucked the umbrella from Nora’s grip and huddled under it. Meredith was the very epitome of a grand lady, her gown with its top cape festooned with lace and ribbons and tucks that had fairly worn out Nora’s fingers and patience to arrange to her sister-in-law’s liking. Everyone in Lowell had talked about how the fair-haired, blue-eyed beauty had married above herself when she’d snagged noted accountant Charles Underhill, but Meredith always acted as if she were the one born to privilege.
“There isn’t a single carriage in the city and precious few horses,” Nora told her sister-in-law. “Most people either travel by wagon or walk.”
Meredith gasped. “Walk! I cannot be expected to walk all the way into town from the harbor.”
“It isn’t so far,” Nora assured her. She waved toward the hillside rising above them. “That’s all there is.”
Charles and Meredith exchanged looks of dismay. Perhaps they would be concerned enough to turn tail and leave on the first ship out. Hiding the hope that thought engendered, Nora motioned to the waiting teamster to come take her family’s belongings.
“Mr. Mercer will carry your things up to the house,” she explained as the fellow pushed past them with a nod. “He’s the older brother of the Mr. Mercer who escorted us here. You remember him.”
“Indeed,” Charles assured her, giving Asa’s brother a sharp look. “He was quite persuasive about the opportunities to be found in Seattle.” He returned his gaze to the hillside, clearly dubious.
Nora managed to lead them up the hill to Third Avenue, where most of the finer houses had been built. She’d found one owner ready to leave the area and willing to lease his framed home to her family. Now she climbed up to the wide front porch and let Charles and Meredith into the house. She thought it might suit them. The walls were papered and hung with pictures, the heavy wood furniture covered in floral. She fancied she could already smell the perfumed powder, essence of roses, that Meredith favored.
But of course, nothing was good enough. Charles did not appreciate the view down to Puget Sound. “If I wanted to look at water, I would have moved to Boston.”
Meredith was certain the house was too small for her purposes. “How am I to entertain with a single parlor? And I don’t know where you think you will sleep, Nora, with only one bedchamber.”
“I suppose we could put a pallet on the floor of the attic,” Charles mused.
“No need,” Nora said. “I have my own room at the ladies’ boardinghouse.”
“And do you expect us to wait for you to arrive each morning?” Meredith exclaimed. “Honestly, you are so impractical.”
By the time a knock sounded on the door that afternoon, Nora was worn-out from placating them. She couldn’t help beaming at the sight of Simon on the porch. He was dressed for work, bulky brown coat open at the throat to reveal a red-and-blue-plaid wool shirt over red flannels. His thick wool pants were tucked into heavy boots. At least he took the trouble to knock the worst of the mud off his feet before following her into the house.
“You are a sight for sore eyes,” she told him. “Please, come meet my brother and sister-in-law.”
Meredith and Charles were seated on the overstuffed chairs at opposite ends of the parlor, her brother by the multipaned window, his wife nearest the stone hearth. Charles had the Puget Sound Weekly Nora had left him open before him, his brows drawn down as he studied the news. Meredith had already instructed Nora in the unpacking of her things and was taking dainty stitches in the pillow cover she had been embroidering for as long as Nora could remember. Like everything else she did, Meredith put on a good show while managing to accomplish very little.
“May I have your attention?” Nora asked.
Neither looked up. “Not now, Nora,” Charles said. “Shouldn’t you be seeing to dinner?”
“She has no concept of time,” Meredith complained. “I suppose it is too much that you would consider our needs after we took the trouble of traveling thousands of miles to care for you in this wretched wilderness, with no friends and a thorough lack of opportunity for your talented brother.”
Each word felt like a nail pounding into her heart, but Nora held her ground. “I’m sorry to inconvenience you, Meredith. But you see, I got married.”
She knew she should not take such delight in the way Meredith’s head snapped up and her pretty pink lips gaped.
Charles lowered his paper at last, blinking at Nora and Simon as if bewildered that they’d appeared in his parlor. “Married, you say? What nonsense is this?”
“It’s hardly nonsense. You can’t miss him standing here beside me.” Nora looked pointedly to Simon, who seemed a bit bewildered himself. She supposed Charles and Meredith might have that effect on people. Still, he stepped forward and nodded to her brother and sister-in-law.
“Mr. Underhill, ma’am. I’m Simon Wallin, and I had the honor of marrying your sister last week.”
Now Charles stared, his face washing white and his hands shaking so hard the paper rattled. Whatever reaction Nora had been expecting, it was hardly that.
Meredith recovered first, rising from her chair. “I know you are given to odd fancies, Nora, but this is too much. How could you leave your brother out of what must surely be the most important day of your life?”
Her guilt rose like the tide on Puget Sound. She would not allow it to swamp her this time. “It was expedient.”
“Expedient?” Meredith clutched her beribboned chest. “To ignore your family, run off with some stranger? Expedient?”
This was not going as she’d hoped. Again she glanced at Simon for help.
“We are properly wed,” he assured them both. “You can ask Mr. Bagley at the Brown Church. He performed the ceremony.”
Charles climbed to his feet, shoving the paper away. “You can be sure I shall, sir. No clergyman has the right to perform a marriage ceremony for an impressionable young woman without consulting her family. And I hold you responsible as well, turning her head with your promises, your flowery phrases.”
The picture of the practical, stern-faced Simon Wallin swaying her with flowery words brought a giggle to her lips. She hastily clamped them together to keep it from coming out.
“Your sister is a grown woman, of age under Washington territorial law,” Simon informed Charles. “She can marry whom she likes.”
“Of age?” Meredith sputtered. She pointed a finger at Simon. “Oh, I see your game, sir. You think because she comes from a good family she must have a considerable dowry. Well, let me tell you—”
“Meredith.” Charles’s tone cut off the rest of her bile. “Please, allow me to handle this.”
Meredith shut her mouth and threw herself back into her seat, sending her embroidery tumbling to the carpet. She looked daggers at Nora, as if this was all her fault.
For once, she was right.
Her brother came forward to meet Simon, raising his head in the process, which only brought him to the tip of Simon’s firm chin. “You can see the trouble you’ve caused, sir. I demand that you annul this sham of a marriage immediately.”
Fear leaped up. Could they do that? Simon had claimed that only the territorial legislature could issue a divorce. She hadn’t considered what would happen if her brother pushed for an annulment. Would Simon be able to keep his claim if she was no longer his wife?
Simon, however, did not back down. He took Nora’s hand, his grip sure, strong. “I will do no such thing,” he told Charles. “Nora knows her mind, and so do I. I called on you as a courtesy. Whether she wishes to continue to associate with you is up to her.”
Oh, but he was masterful! She’d chosen well when she’d asked him to marry her. She glanced at her brother, to find his brows once more furrowed, as if he hadn’t expected an argument and wasn’t sure how to deal with it.
Meredith brought both hands to her face and bowed her head. “Oh,” she moaned, her voice coming out muffled. “That you would take our dear Nora away. I do not know whether I can bear it.” Her shoulders shook with her sobs.
How could she be so distressed? She scarcely abided Nora. She’d been positively eager to send her off to Seattle. This had to be an act. But why?
Charles evidently thought it sincere. “See what you’ve done?” he said with an audible sigh. “Calm yourself, Meredith, dear. I will have words with Mr. Wallin. Kindly take Nora to the door and make your farewells.”
Her farewells? He was going to let her go! Nora wanted to grab both of Simon’s hands and dance around the room in pure joy, but she knew that would only give away the game. Instead, she squeezed his hand for encouragement, trusting him to withstand any of her brother’s blandishments, and turned for the entryway.
The sound of a sniff behind her told her Meredith was following.
“Oh, take heart, Meredith,” she said as they entered the shadowy space at the front of the house. “Think how much happier you’ll be without the burden of caring for me.”
Meredith sniffed again as she took down Nora’s cloak from the brass hook at the side of the door. “It was a burden I gladly bore, I assure you. Right now, I can only pity you, Nora.”
Nora frowned, accepting her gray cloak from Meredith’s elegant fingers. “Why would you pity me? I married a good man.”
“I can certainly see that you believe so,” Meredith said, her hands fluttering. “I can imagine how exciting it must have been to have such a commanding fellow propose, but you must have known that it wasn’t love motivating him.”
Of course it wasn’t love, but she wasn’t about to hammer the point home. “I am satisfied with Mr. Wallin’s intentions,” she replied.
“How nice that you are now a better judge of character,” Meredith said, her voice verging on a sneer. “I remember another young man you thought was serious, but alas he never came up to scratch.”
She would bring up Mr. Winnower. Nora shook out her cloak and slipped it over her dress even as she pushed away the memory. “I will always be grateful you and Charles took me in, Meredith. But I’ve made my own way here, and I no longer need your help.”
Meredith reached out a hand to smooth back a tendril of Nora’s hair. The touch would have been tender if not for the hard look in Meredith’s eyes. “You have no understanding of the world, Nora. A man says he’ll marry you, take care of you, and off you go, with no thought of the consequences, no idea of the damage he could do.”
Damage? Despite her hopes, a shiver went through her. She’d thought Simon Wallin a good man, had believed in him because Catherine and Rina had married his brothers and Maddie had spoken highly of him. But what did she actually know about Simon? Would he hurt her? Treat her unkindly?
“I cannot sit idly by when your very life is in danger,” Meredith continued as if determined to press her case. “Did you not see the squint in his cold eyes, those brutish hands?” She lowered her voice as if suspecting Simon might be hiding just around the corner even now, waiting to pounce. “Nora, I fear for you if you go with him.”
Nora squared her shoulders. “I’m not going with him. I shall live in town. He will live on his claim.”
“Indeed.” The sweetness of Meredith’s tone warned Nora she had made a mistake, but she wasn’t sure how. “What a quaint arrangement. However did you convince him to agree?”
By giving him one hundred and sixty acres.
Now she just needed to know that he would keep his part of the bargain and stop her brother from ruining her life.
* * *
“What do you want from me?” Charles asked Simon the moment the ladies left the room. “I warn you, I do not take well to blackmail.”
The man was insufferable. Did he really think that Simon and Nora’s marriage had anything to do with harming him?
“I want nothing from you,” Simon told him. “Your sister is of age, as am I. We married. She is mine now to protect.” He met Charles’s gaze head-on. The man had gray eyes, like Nora, but they were not nearly as warm and welcoming as his sister’s. In fact, right now, they swam with tears.
Tears?
“Do you have a sister, Mr. Wallin?” he asked. “Would you want to learn of her marriage in this cold manner?”
Not at all. He couldn’t imagine how he’d feel if Beth had walked into Wallin Landing with a stranger on her arm claiming him as her husband. But Nora wasn’t Beth.
“Perhaps you should ask yourself why your sister chose to marry without informing you,” he countered.
“I don’t have to ask,” Charles said, his voice as heavy as his look. “I know. She is simple, unaware of life’s dangers. She trusts too easily. I have done all I can to shelter her.”
Simon frowned. From what he could see, Nora might be a bit whimsical, with unexpected giggles and hearts embroidered on her sleeves, but she did not appear to have a diminished mental capacity. Was that how her family saw her? Was that how they treated her? Small wonder she longed to escape.
“Nora will want for nothing,” Simon promised him. “I earned the patent on my original claim, and I registered another for my wife. I can provide for her, should she need it.”
“Well, certainly she will need it,” Charles insisted. “You didn’t expect me to hand you a dowry, did you?”
Why did they both pluck on that string? Perhaps dowries were important where they came from, but not in frontier Seattle.
“I don’t want your money, or hers,” Simon told him. “All I demand is that you treat her with respect and consideration. Do that, and you will have no trouble with me.”
“Yes, well...” Charles smoothed back his hair with one hand. “I have some demands myself, sir. You will bring her to see us at least once a week, and you will see to it that she accepts our invitations to dinner.”
“Nora can see you if she likes,” Simon returned. “But I won’t have time to come in weekly.”
Charles’s face fell. “Live that far out, do you?” He sighed. “Oh, but I cannot like it. She’s never dealt with farms and animals and that sort of thing. She’ll be completely out of her element, and that is never good, let me tell you. No, you must move into town, for her sake.”
Simon stared at him. Was he truly so selfish he would give no thought to Simon’s plans, his family’s needs or Nora’s hopes? He wasn’t sure how to respond.
Meredith spoke for him as she sailed back into the room with Nora right behind her. He noticed she hadn’t fastened her cloak. Was she uncertain as to whether she was leaving?
“No need for concern, Charles,” Nora’s sister-in-law announced. “Nora tells me she and Mr. Wallin do not intend to live as man and wife. She will be staying in town while he returns to his claim. We can go on as we always have.” She came to her husband’s side and gave his arm a squeeze. “Isn’t that good news?”
Charles seemed to grow a little taller. “Excellent. Nora can stay with us, then. You can visit when you like, Mr. Wallin, but do provide a few days’ notice first. Only practical considering our busy schedules.”
Simon felt as if he’d turned the page in the book he’d been reading only to find his adventure novel had become a farce. “Nora?” he couldn’t help asking. “Is this what you want?”
She opened her mouth, but once again Meredith spoke first. “Of course it’s what she wants. We are her family. We know what she needs. We understand her.”
Nora raised her head, her gray eyes solemn, then crossed to Simon’s side. “No, you have never understood me. I don’t need you to take care of me. I took care of myself all the way to Seattle.”
“Now, now,” Charles said. “I know it must have seemed that way to you, but I paid Mr. Mercer to take care of you while Meredith and I settled our affairs in Massachusetts.”
Nora blanched. “What? He said nothing.”
“As it should be,” Meredith said with a nod. “We wanted you to have a taste of the freedom that has been denied you because of your tragic constraints.”
Nora was curling in on herself again. Simon wasn’t sure whether to intervene or merely pick her up and carry her away from them.
“I, for one, worried about you every moment we were parted,” her brother confessed. “Now that we have been reunited, nothing will stand in the way of me doing my duty.” He clapped his hands together. “There! It’s all settled. Thank you for stopping by, Mr. Wallin. Safe trip home.”
It was like trying to stop a falling fir. The tree was coming down, breaking everything around it as it crashed. He refused to allow Nora to be crushed under the weight of their assumptions. He owed her that at least.
“Nora?” he pressed. “Do you want to stay with them?”
She gazed up at him, her eyes stormy, then glanced at her brother and sister-in-law, standing there with delight stamped on their faces.
“No,” she said. “I want to get as far away from them as I can. I’m coming to live with you, out at Wallin Landing.”
