Blackstone's Bride. Bronwyn Williams

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СКАЧАТЬ had occurred to him later that he might have done even better if he’d held out longer, but time was too short. So he’d named a price that was enough to cover the amount of his half brother’s loan with any interest Stanfield might tack on, then added enough to cover his own traveling expenses.

      When George had first written to him about the drought that had nearly wiped him out, Jed had offered to go back to Foggy Valley and help out on the farm. He’d been flat broke at the time, but he figured another strong back and a pair of willing hands wouldn’t come amiss. George had assured him he didn’t need help, and that he’d be able to pay off the loan once he got to market with his beef and tobacco.

      So Jed had moved on, heading gradually eastward, and continued doing the things he’d enjoyed most: gambling, womanizing and reading encyclopedias. He’d always liked women, ever since he’d discovered them. For reasons that passed all understanding, they seemed to like him, too—a big, rough, uneducated guy who was better known for his skill at cards than any skill on a dance floor.

      Before he’d heard from George, he’d been enjoying life, taking it as it came, getting ready to move on to fresh hunting grounds. His half brother had sold his cattle to a drover and come out slightly ahead, but three weeks before the tobacco market opened, his tobacco barn had burned to the ground with the year’s crop of burley inside, forcing him to borrow money from the only man in Foggy Valley in a position to help him.

      Sam Stanfield. Moneylender, rancher, politician—the man who now owned all the land between Dark Ridge and Notch Ridge. In other words, the entire valley except for the farm that had been in the Dulah family for three generations. According to George, Stanfield was ready to take possession of the Dulah farm, too, unless George could come up with the money to repay the loan, including the wicked rate of interest the old pirate charged.

      “Not this time,” Jed muttered, dragging his saddlebags out from under the bed. He took off the coat he’d bought especially for the closing in an attempt to look more like a gentleman than a rambling, gambling half-breed bastard with a brand on his behind.

      Dressed in Levi’s, his old buckskin jacket and his favorite boots, Jed crammed everything else into his saddlebags. As he’d already settled up with the slick-haired kid at the front desk, all that was left was to retrieve his horse from the livery and he’d be on his way.

      He would have headed directly for the train station but for one thing. Sam Stanfield’s name was not entirely unknown even as far east as Raleigh. Even in the state capitol, Stanfield had friends that kept him informed and Jed wanted his visit to be a surprise. Stanfield had to have known in advance that the railroad was getting ready to make another move, which was why he’d set out several years ago to gain control of as much property in Foggy Valley as he could by driving honest farmers off their land.

      George had held out for as long as possible, but when he’d gone hat-in-hand to the bank in Asheville and been turned away, he’d had no recourse but to turn to the man he knew damned well would pull the rug out from under his feet at the first opportunity. The Dulahs might have settled the valley a hundred years before the Stanfields had come carpet-bagging down to the Carolinas, but tradition meant nothing to a man like Sam Stanfield.

      Looking back, Jed could see the pattern all too clearly. Like looking at a hand of cards and foreseeing the way it would play out, he’d taken the news about the railroad’s westward push through the mountains and added to that the way Stanfield had started finding ways to lay claim to the entire valley.

      So far the rails didn’t go anywhere near Foggy Valley, but Jed wasn’t going to take a chance that he’d be spotted and word would get back to Stanfield that help was on the way. By now he probably knew about the account Jed had opened in the Asheville bank, knew to the penny how much was in it. The fact that Jed’s last name was Blackstone, not Dulah like his half brother’s, might buy him some time, but not much.

      Jed had a mind to travel the back roads. After eight years of wandering, seeking out card games to support himself, professional ladies for entertainment and public libraries where he could further his education, he was well acquainted with the back roads. In the central part of the state the old wagon trails were slowly being replaced by more modern road, but not back in the hills. There were places there where a man could drop out of sight and not be found for a hundred years.

      Eleanor sat on her front porch and watched the sky grow light to the eastward. The only way she knew east from west was that the sun rose in one direction and set in the other. She didn’t know what day of the week it was—wasn’t even certain it was still April, for that matter. Her calendar was three years old, and daily, or even weekly, newspapers were only a distant dream.

      Cradling a bone china cup in her callused hands, she tried to push away the remnants of the nightmare. She knew it by heart now. It never varied. She was trapped like a bird in a cage, being fed morsels of dried corn by people who spoke a foreign language. She would beg to be released—“Open the cage door, please!” she would cry. Might even yell it aloud, there was no one to hear. Sometimes she woke up with a sore throat, as if she’d been shouting for hours.

      “Probably snoring,” she said. She had to stop talking to herself. It was no wonder her throat was often sore, the way she rambled on about everything and nothing at all.

      The other day she had stood on the back porch and recited the multiplication tables all the way up to the eighttimeses, which was all she could remember. Except for the tens, of course, but that was no challenge.

      Her coffee was cold. She hated it black, but they never brought her any cream, rarely even any tinned milk. Only buttermilk, and that was awful in coffee. She set the cup aside, oblivious to the contrast between the fine bone china with its pattern of violets, and the worn hickory boards.

      “Three times three is nine, three times four is…”

      She thought of the time one of her third grade students had stood before the class and gravely recited, “’Leven times one is ’leven, ’leven times two is toody-two, ’leven times three is threedy-three,” and on until Eleanor was red in the face from trying to stifle her laughter.

      The entire class was in an uproar. She had barely been able to get herself under control, much less control twenty-three unruly youngsters between the ages of six and nine.

      Dear Lord, what she wouldn’t give to be back there on the worst day of her brief teaching career, instead of stranded here in the back of beyond, in a cabin on top of a gold mine, a widow, an heiress—and a prisoner.

      “I’ll have to try again, of course,” she whispered to herself, her two laying hens and the big, black-winged birds circling overhead. “Next time they won’t be able to stop me.”

      Shouldering his saddlebags, Jed took one last look around the plush hotel room to make sure he hadn’t left anything behind, and then he opened the door. The livery stable was no more than eight blocks away, an easy walk if they hadn’t gone and made cement paths all over the damned town. Feet weren’t meant to walk on cement, but try telling that to one of these slick, gold-toothpick types that ran the place.

      Halfway to the livery, he shed his coat and crammed it into his saddlebag. Hot as blazes, and here it was only April. Too much cement held the heat so that even after dark things didn’t cool off enough for a good night’s sleep. Time to get back to the mountains. Long past time, Jed told himself half guiltily.

      McGee greeted him in his usual manner, by trying to take a chunk out of his shoulder.

      “Meanest horse I ever seed,” said the boy who had the care and feeding of some dozen animals.

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