HT02 - Sing: A Novel of Colorado Read online

He paused. “Tonight. But not tomorrow. You must find the strength to do what you do best. To further your goals.”

  “What do you care? You are leaving on the morning train.”

  “But I have not invested in you to see my investment languish.”

  Her eyes narrowed. She remembered signing their agreement. Gavin received fifteen percent of anything she made. “Of course not. You have, what, another year of profits to collect? From afar?”

  “Three years,” he said calmly, as he folded a shirt, “from the time we dissolve our association.” He stared at her. “Which I assume we are doing right now.”

  “Three years?” she sputtered. “I would not have signed such a document.” Unless I fancied myself in love …

  “But you did, Moira. And I would not have agreed to this without it. I was clear with you from the beginning. I wanted to invest in this business, explore it. But I would not have done so without some assurances to compensate me for my time.”

  Slowly, she sat down on the edge of the bed, dimly listening to him pack, her mind racing with words and promises that might entice him to stay. But she swallowed each one like bitter spoonfuls of lemon. Nothing would change his mind. She listened to him wash his face and wet down his hair, lather and shave, familiar morning sounds for her now. Sounds she would not hear again. She listened to him dress, pulling on his trousers and shirt. A belt, a vest, a tie.

  She wished her mother were here. To hold her, keep her upright when she felt as if she were about to disintegrate into a pile of ashes. She imagined her mother in the chair beside the bed again, her face awash with love and concern, reaching out to hold her hand.

  He’s leaving me, Mama. He never intended to stay. I was a fool.

  She wished she could feel the warmth in her mother’s hand, a gentle squeeze. Let him go.

  But I want him to stay.

  I know. Let him go.

  But I can’t do this without him, Mama. I don’t want to do this.

  I know. Let him go.

  And within minutes, she did.

  Chapter 17

  What Moira couldn’t get out of her mind was how easily Gavin walked out the door without a backward glance. Hidden by the curtains, she watched him leave the hotel and walk down the street, a satchel in one hand, a man carrying his trunk behind him. He turned the corner, apparently on his way to the train station. And never once did he look back. It was his way—ever forward-thinking. It was part of what had attracted her to him. But it burned, to know that even she couldn’t make him think twice. Or indeed, even pause.

  She sat down heavily upon the bed. For hours.

  Moira felt dizzy, but not faint. Hungry, but with no desire to eat. Sleepy, but unable to doze. She was lost. Adrift. Spinning. Empty. What to do, what to do … She alternated between fury and indignation and a heartrending agony she’d never before experienced. What have I done? she wondered, running a hand over his side of the bed. How could she have allowed him to so completely own her, envelop her? Was she not Moira St. Clair beneath the Moira Colorado facade? Was she not more than this? A whimpering woman, a mistress tossed aside? She would not allow him to reduce her to such a shell, the mere shadows of a life she desired, no, claimed.

  A knock sounded on her door. “Miss Colorado?” asked a deep voice.

  Moira frowned and pulled her robe tighter. But she walked over to the door without opening it. “Yes?”

  “It’s Daniel, Moira,” he said lowly. “Can you come out for a moment?”

  She frowned, not liking the tone of his voice. Slowly, she unbolted the door and pulled her dressing robe closed at the neck and peered out.

  Daniel looked at her, taking in her stricken appearance, then glanced down the hall, both ways. “Get dressed, Moira. I need to talk to you, but you need to come out here, properly dressed.”

  “What is it?” she said in irritation. “Out with it.” The last thing she needed right now was a lesson on propriety—

  “It’s Gavin,” he said miserably.

  “Gavin?” Slowly, her eyes moved to Daniel’s big hands, hands that held his hat solemnly before him. He didn’t worry the hat, circling it around and around, but there was something—

  “Moira, Gavin’s dead.”

  Her eyes slowly moved up his torso to meet his sad brown eyes. Surely she had misunderstood him. Gavin was liable to be turned around by now, seeing the error of his ways, formulating a proper apology to her—

  She shut the door and dressed, as woodenly as a puppet upon a puppeteer’s strings. Surely she had imagined what Daniel had said.… Surely …

  Moira came out into the hallway, her hair down, her dress haphazardly buttoned, but her eyes were on the tall man before her.

  “He didn’t make it as far as the next town on the train,” Daniel said miserably. “He stood up, complained of a headache, then crumpled to the aisle. Passengers said he was dead before he hit the floor. Doctor said it must’ve been an aneurism.”

  “Aneurism,” she repeated dully. The headaches, the constant headaches, ever since he was struck on the boat in that storm, when Daniel had come to their aid and—

  “No one could have known, Moira. Even Gavin—he never sought a doctor out, right?”

  “No,” she said, shaking her head, her mind cascading through every town they had traveled through. “Maybe that was part of why he was going though, part of his need to return to New York. Maybe he wanted to see a proper physician.…” She lifted a hand to her head, feeling dizzy again. “I should have seen it, Daniel. Noticed. But all I could see was my—”

  Her knees gave way then, but he caught her, easily lifting her into his arms. Dimly, she recognized that he carried her to the bed and gently laid her atop it. He was backing away, moving toward the corner chair when she recovered from her faint. She stared at the wall, afraid if she looked into Daniel’s compassionate eyes she’d begin weeping again. “He never loved me. I trusted him, gave him everything, and he still didn’t love me.”

  Daniel hesitated, then, “Did you love him?”

  “I … I think so. Yes.” She lifted a hand to her head. “But I do not know if I know what love is.”

  “You will know what it is, in time. At the right time, Moira. You’ll know.”

  She shifted her eyes slowly to him. “Have you ever been in love?”

  “Once,” he said. He rose, rubbing his palm on his denim pants as if it was sweaty. “A long time ago. A lifetime ago.”

  “You are not that old, Daniel. Just a few years older than I.”

  “Old enough to have lived through much.” He looked to the ceiling and then back to her. “Moira, I’m sorry for your loss. You need to know that before he left, Gavin hired me to escort you anywhere you want to go. Said he wouldn’t trust anyone but me to watch over you, which I’d take to mean he cared, even if he didn’t love.”

  “Gavin,” she whispered.

  There was a pause before he returned, “And he left something else for you.” He pulled a thick leather wallet from an inside pocket of his jacket.

  With trembling hands, she reached for it.

  “I’ll be downstairs if you need me—” He moved as if to leave.

  “Thank you,” she said, seeing nothing but the leather wallet he had handed her. It filled both her hands. She sat up and flipped it open, gasping at the stack of bills on either side. In the back of her mind, she heard the door close behind him.

  There was a brief note with the bills.

  Moira,

  Thank you for sharing your life with me for a time. Regardless of what you think of me, I have enjoyed being with you and seeing you flourish. Please know that I am not to be compared to your ex-manager in Paris, about to rob you blind. In here you will find more than enough cash to see you through Leadville and beyond, if you keep to the schedule. Also enclosed, please find your account information on the two bank accounts we opened while in California. By contract, I will look for your account information each month. Please send it by the fi
fth day. If you can see fit to look beyond your fury, I would appreciate a brief word on your itinerary and how you are faring. Even though I could not profess the love you seek, I do care, Moira, and always will.

  Gavin

  She set it aside and glanced in at the coin and bills that covered the depth of the chest. She’d been bought off like a high-class whore. She let out a humorless laugh. She deserved it, she supposed. Act like less than who you are or who you want to be, her father always said, and that’s how others will treat you.

  10 May 1887

  Bryce, Dietrich, and Tabito are off to Avilla Canyon again today in search of something recognizable in Sam’s clues. They go under the guise of seeking new summer feeding grounds, but I wonder if the men suspect Bryce’s true motive. Meanwhile, I am home with Samuel, and I find that I am making myself scarce, dodging any further intimate conversations with Robert. Was it all in my imagination, his longing glance? Hope in his eyes? That would make a fine mess of things, considering all that is a mess already. Perhaps I am simply discombobulated, confused, unable to think straight with all that is transpiring around me.

  Samuel coughed from the nursery, and Odessa looked up with a frown. He had been uncommonly fussy today, unhappy in her arms or in his crib. She had attributed it to him waking early from his nap. She listened closely as he coughed again, but then was quiet. He hadn’t nursed well before he went down, constantly pulling off the breast as if he was as agitated as his mother. Odessa paused for a moment, holding her breath in order to better hear, and then he coughed again and began to cry, a sleepy, frustrated sound.

  She rose, unlocked her door and went across the hall, pausing to see if he would settle without her picking him up, but instead he found steam to fuel his little engine. “Oh, Samuel, Samuel,” she said soothingly, moving over to touch his back. She pulled her hand quickly away, trying to make sense of the heat. It was early May, and the house was chilly at night. But then she knew. She picked him up and cuddled him close, his smooth skin as soft as a peach against her jaw, but as hot as a boiled potato.

  Odessa paced back and forth across the nursery floor, patting his bottom, talking to him in a low, soothing voice, trying to ease his agitation. All the while, she was thinking through what she remembered of babies, of her mother caring for her younger siblings. “Are you teething, sweet pea?” she asked Samuel, holding him out in her arms. He squinched up his face and cried harder, as if frustrated that she wasn’t figuring out what he wanted to tell her. She sat down in the rocker and tried to put him to her breast, but that made him so angry that he began to cough again.

  “Oh, sweetheart, Samuel, Samuel, where did you pick up a fever? She held her breath when he cried so hard he couldn’t seem to gather a breath, scaring her to pieces. What if … what if it was … no. She refused to even entertain the thought. It was the teething. Or some other illness. Not the consumption.

  Odessa buttoned her nightshirt and tied her robe as best she could. His diaper was dry. He wasn’t hungry. She cast back through the week, of people who had come through the house, none of them sick. But three days ago, a neighbor had come by with a basket of biscuits and mentioned her youngest had the fever. He’d recovered, but he was an older child, not a baby.

  The fever. Please God …

  She turned to the door, longing for Bryce to come through it, and at the same time remembering he wouldn’t be coming home for a couple of days.

  “Bryce. I need you,” she whispered. She walked to the top of the stairs and looked down, wondering if she should trouble Robert. She gasped when she saw he was sitting on the bottom step, head in his hands as if praying. “Robert?”

  “Dess,” he said, looking up the stairs at her and the baby. “Is he all right?”

  Holt, the hired man assigned to guard the door, rocked forward from his position—leaning against the wall on a chair—down to four legs. Together, he and Robert stared upward.

  “I-I don’t know. I’m afraid he has the fever. Mrs. Teller was here a few days ago. Her son had the fever and she held him. Do you think—”

  Holt rose and put his hat on his head. “I’ll go for the doctor, ma’am. We don’t wanna take no chances.”

  Odessa breathed a sigh of hope. “Thank you, Holt.”

  “Ma’am,” he said with a nod. In a blink, he was gone.

  Robert climbed the stairs and looked down at Samuel, whimpering in her arms. “Think a cool cloth might help?”

  “Of course.” Why hadn’t she thought of the same? A cool cloth, a doctor … a surge of gratitude and hope went through her. “I’m … I’m glad you’re here.”

  He gave her a slow smile. “Glad I can be. I’ll go out to the icehouse. Meet you in the kitchen?”

  Odessa returned to her room and hurriedly pulled on a day dress, ignoring her cold, bare feet. On the bed, Samuel was crying so hard he was turning purple. She lifted him in her arms, cooing, bouncing him, trying to soothe him any which way she could. She heard the front door open and close.

  “Ma’am? Mrs. McAllan?”

  She moved to the landing. “Trace,” she greeted the tall, thin man.

  He pulled his hat from his head and rested it on his chest, watching as they came down the stairs. “Holt said he was goin’ for the doctor in town. Asked me to take up his post on guard.”

  “Fine, fine,” Odessa said distractedly. She moved past him, her eyes focused on Robert as he came in the door, a kerchief filled with ice in his hands. She went to a cupboard and pulled a towel from it.

  “Here, let me do it,” Robert said. He was just over her shoulder, peering down at the babe in her arms. Odessa shivered at his proximity and hurriedly handed him the towel. She moved to the other side of the table, hoping it wasn’t obvious that she suddenly needed some sort of barrier between them.

  Robert peered at her with compassionate eyes. “Where are your raisins, Dess?”

  “Raisins?” she asked blankly.

  He lifted a small cloth bag in his hand and came around the table toward them. She forced herself to stay put. “I have some dried lime peel,” he said, as if that explained everything. “It’s a remedy our mother used when we were children. Raisin tea. Worth a try?”

  Odessa raised her eyebrows. “Couldn’t hurt, I suppose.”

  Robert did not wait for her response, just turned and walked around the kitchen, assuming she trailed behind. “Where are your raisins?” he repeated.

  Odessa inwardly shrugged. If tea would help little Samuel, she was willing to try. “Lower left shelf in the cupboard,” she said.

  He pumped some fresh water into a bowl with the ice, wrung out the cloth and handed it back to her. She gently dabbed it at Samuel in her arms. Surprisingly, he didn’t wail in protest. Perhaps it felt good to him. “Poor baby,” she cooed. “Poor little baby. It’ll be all right. Mama has you.” Robert pumped more water into a bucket and then poured it into a kettle on the stove.

  She sank into a rocker by the adjacent den’s wood stove and rocked the baby back and forth. Thankfully, Robert stayed over by the stove. “I didn’t know you were a medicine man,” she said to him.

  “Not a medicine man,” he said with a slight smile. “Only a man with some medicines.”

  In a few minutes, the water was boiling and Robert added the raisins and lime peel. It filled the kitchen with a warm smell that reminded Odessa of Christmas. “So how do you propose we get tea down a baby’s mouth?” she asked.

  Another small smile. “I’ll show you.” He used a ladle to put a small portion in a tin mug, then reached for her potato masher and pressed down on the mixture. He glanced over at Samuel now and then when he let out a particularly loud cry. “Do you have cardamom? Sugar?” he asked.

  “Lower right side of the cupboard,” she directed, her eyes on Samuel. He was quieting a little, not because his fever was abating, she knew, but because he was terribly tired. She rose and went to the bucket, wringing out the cloth with one hand to get rid of the access moisture.
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br />   She settled in again, trying to help her baby get comfortable. He shifted repeatedly and then let his arm hang listlessly from the side. She frowned, watching as his little rib cage rose and fell so rapidly, as if trying to wave off the heat roiling inside of him. Robert appeared at her elbow and leaned over them both. “Give him to me a moment, will you?”

  Reluctantly, she let him take the baby from her arms. He moved to the small settee and unwound Samuel’s twisted nightshirt and lifted it away. “Please, the cloth?”

  Obediently, Odessa handed him the ice wrapped in the towel. Samuel, startled by the sudden cool, stretched out his arms and widened his eyes but then settled immediately. Robert spoke quietly to the child, using low tones to sooth him. He looked at Odessa. “Come, sit beside him a minute while I fetch the tea.”

  He padded over to the kitchen and poured a bit of his raisin tea into a heavy cotton bag. Cupping his hand beneath it, he came over to them and asked Odessa to open the baby’s mouth.

  He let a few drips fall in. The baby frowned and then his tongue moved in and out of his lips as if he were tasting it. And liking it. They repeated the action over the next quarter hour, until Samuel had ingested several teaspoons. “Good baby,” Robert soothed, stroking his fuzzy head. “Good, good baby.”

  Robert left to put the cotton bag in the washtub, then returned to sit in the rocker across from them, his eyes never leaving the baby. She watched the baby too, waiting for the miracle that she had been praying for in snatches over the last hours—that the babe’s fever would break, that the doctor’s visit would be for naught.

  Samuel drifted off to sleep and Odessa shifted in her seat. Her shoulder ached from sitting too long in one position.

  “I can hold the baby,” Robert offered. “Why don’t you try and rest a little?”

  “Oh, that’s all right,” she said. “I want to stay with him.” It was sweet of the man to offer, but she couldn’t. The only one she’d leave the child with at such a frightening hour would be Bryce. Oh, Bryce, why’d you have to leave? She knew she was being selfish, that he was out searching, hoping to find a way, a future for them all, but she couldn’t help but feel sorry for herself, for Samuel. They needed him here. Now.