The Ballad of Hattie Taylor Read online

  The day Doc informed Hattie and Jake of Jane-Ellen’s condition, they sent a telegram to Augusta. One couldn’t, however, simply fly like a bird between San Francisco and Mattawa. Augusta had wired back to inform them that she and Mirabel had missed last week’s sailing but were booked on a steamer ship scheduled to leave tomorrow for Seattle and from there they would catch a train home. With a little luck and reasonable weather on the Pacific Ocean, they would arrive Sunday evening around five fifteen. Jake had talked to the pastor and scheduled the funeral for late Monday afternoon.

  He gathered a couple more ranch hands to help him return the piano to the parlor. The day after Doc gave them the news, Hattie insisted they bring it upstairs to the room next to Jane-Ellen’s. Between bouts of nursing her, Hattie had played tirelessly. It was the only thing that helped alleviate Jane-Ellen’s pain—and then, only temporarily.

  Doc materialized at his shoulder, haggard and thin, looking five years older than last week. “I’m going now, son,” he said wearily. “I’ve been ignoring my practice since Jane-Ellen fell sick. More ’n likely, there’s a load of patients after me like hounds after a bitch in heat.”

  Jake shook his father-in-law’s hand, reaching out to squeeze Doc’s forearm with his free hand. “I’m sorry, Doc.”

  “I know you are, son.” Doc’s eyes filled with tears, but he blinked them back. “I am, too.”

  “Where’s Hattie?”

  “I sent her to bed. She’s worn herself to the bone, but I couldn’t get her to sleep for more ’n two, three hours at a stretch before now.” Raising his eyes to meet Jake’s, he sighed. “Don’t be a stranger, now, boy. No matter what the future brings, I will always think of you as a son.” He walked away, loneliness stark in the slump of his shoulders. He had just lost his last blood kin.

  * * *

  —

  Hattie emerged slowly from a deep, dreamless sleep. Finding it dark outside, she peered at the clock on her bureau to check the time. Her brow pleated. That couldn’t be correct. It was much too dark for seven a.m. Sitting up and reaching for her wrapper, she stared at the clock as though it might suddenly reveal the correct time. Then she realized the pendulum was still.

  Of course. She hadn’t wound it during the not quite two weeks since hearing Jane-Ellen’s diagnosis.

  Hattie used the necessary and brushed her teeth. Barefoot, she groped her way down the stairs. Using the moonlight through the kitchen windows to find her way around, she stirred the embers in the stove, added a couple of sticks of wood, and put on the kettle. While she waited for it to heat, she prepared the teapot and cut herself a wedge of cake.

  A short while later, feeling stronger for her sleep and the snack, she opened the back door and stepped out into the cool early morning air. It was the first time she’d been outside since Doc said Jane-Ellen’s illness was fatal, and Hattie drew a deep breath. The boards of the porch were damp with dew against her bare feet.

  Beneath the normal nocturnal noises, a harsh sound whispered on the wind. Hattie stepped off the back porch, trying to pinpoint the source. It sounded like it originated in the front yard, and she picked her way carefully over the damp lawn. Stopping at the corner of the house, she strained to see into the front porch shadows. The sound she’d heard was that of a man crying—harsh, deep, gut-wrenching crying.

  Her eyes adjusted to the nighttime gloom and she stood at the edge of the flowerbed, distressed, uncertain. Rubbing one bare foot atop the other, she pondered how to help Jake, who sat on the porch floor, hunched over his pulled-up knees, head pressed against his kneecaps and shoulders jerking beneath the force of violent sobs.

  Hattie had never seen a man cry like this before and she didn’t know what to do. Should she slip away and allow him to grieve in private? Should she offer comfort? Oh God, which was the least destructive option? In the end, she simply couldn’t walk away while he tore himself apart. Not trying to help was unthinkable. She climbed the stairs and crossed to squat next to him. Reaching out, she touched his shoulder. “Jake?”

  He raised his head, and his eyelids were swollen and rimmed with red. The sound he made deep in his throat when he swallowed mid-sob made Hattie’s throat ache in sympathy. Then he reached out for her, pulling her into his arms with a force that knocked her off her feet.

  She fell half across his lap, her knees striking the floor of the porch. She gasped for air as he clutched her with a strength that made her ribs creak. Carefully, she adjusted herself to a semicomfortable position. One of her feet struck a nearby bottle, sending it rolling, and she smelled whiskey as it splashed across the floorboards. Hattie wrapped her arms around Jake’s neck, tunneling her fingers into the soft layers of his hair as she pressed his face into the contour of her neck. Tremors wracked his body with each muffled cry.

  “God, Hattie, I loved her so much when we got married.”

  “I know.”

  “It could have been so good,” he mumbled into her neck. “Dammit, it could have been perfect. Except she couldn’t stand me touching her. I loved her so much—and it repulsed her when I touched her.” His chest heaved with the force of his grief.

  “Shh.” Hattie managed not to freeze in shock at the unexpected revelation. But she simply held Jake, rocking him and whispering mindless platitudes that hopefully soothed.

  Jake gradually found comfort in Hattie’s embrace. She was soft and resilient, her arms holding him securely in an ultimately calming way. When the force of his crying gradually diminished and he finally pulled away, they were both overheated and damp from the combination of warm evening air, body heat, and tears.

  “When you first announced your plans to marry Jane-Ellen,” Hattie said softly, “I was prepared to hate her.” She watched Jake wipe his nose on his shirtsleeve like a little boy before he recollected himself and pulled a clean handkerchief from his pocket. “I wanted you to wait for me to grow up, you see, so I could marry you myself.” She smiled softly when his startled gaze flew to hers. “You ruined my plans, Jake. I wasn’t about to like your fiancée.”

  Jake reached for the whiskey bottle, contemplating it for an instant before setting it aside. He looked at Hattie crouched a few feet away, her hair a wild tangle leached of color in the darkness, her white nightgown billowing around her. Rising to his feet, he dragged over a wicker chair. “Here, sit.” When she did, he sat at her feet cross-legged. “I never knew that. About you planning to marry me.”

  “Well, of course not. I had my pride. But the point is, I was prepared not to like Jane-Ellen.” Tears rose in her eyes. “Only, I discovered it was impossible. She was always so nice to me. We were so different and she could really irritate me sometimes. The way she constantly worried about everyone’s opinion.”

  He nodded. Jane-Ellen had definitely done that.

  “But she was sweet and good to me,” Hattie went on. “Even when she acted as if her corsets were laced too tight.”

  A snort of laughter escaped Jake, taking him by surprise. For a second he was appalled he found the least bit of humor in this situation. But, tears standing in her eyes, Hattie’s mouth cocked up on one side in a self-deprecatory grin, and he knew it was okay. They weren’t being disrespectful. And it wouldn’t do to idealize Jane-Ellen just because she was gone.

  Gone. How euphemistic. Still, it sounded less final, somehow, than “dead.”

  “She did do that, didn’t she? It was as though she needed to be absolutely perfect at all times.” Jake was silent for a moment. Then, suddenly, his fist smashed down on the floor of the porch. “Dammit, Hattie, she shouldn’t’ve had to die that way!”

  “I know. It was so unfair.”

  “Hell, yes, it’s unfair. And my baby—” His voice suddenly cracked in the middle of the word and he looked up into Hattie’s stricken eyes with angry, helpless grief. “I will never know, now, whether I would have had a son or a daughter.”

 
Dawn was just beginning to replace the darkness with a less impenetrable gray as once again they cried.

  16

  THURSDAY, AUGUST 9, 1906

  The barbershop was more crowded than usual, the simultaneous conversations louder, when Moses came in that afternoon. He wondered what hot gossip had triggered this.

  Then he shrugged and strode past the men in the front room. Hell if it had anything to do with him. So, when his father walked into the back room seconds after Moses went to grab the broom, he looked up in surprise. “You left your customer?” His dad never did that. Never.

  Gerald Marks rubbed the back of his neck. “I wanted you to hear this from me, son. Jane-Ellen Murdock died yesterday.”

  Shock reverberated through Moses like a struck gong. “That can’t be right! Hell, you know how the men can be. They’re worse gossips than women.” It couldn’t possibly be true; it—

  “Jake told me himself,” Gerald interrupted gently. “When he was in town arranging for a coffin.”

  And suddenly Jane-Ellen’s death was a cold, hard fact wishful thinking couldn’t alter. Moses’ shock morphed to guilt. Hattie must have called him the minute she heard Doc Fielding’s diagnosis. But had he been there for her? Hell, no.

  Bitter self-blame hammered him, and he refused the luxury of clutching his own out-of-control emotions as a mitigating factor. Situations were either honorable or dishonorable. Black or white—no shades of gray. Hattie had called and he’d avoided her with an excuse lamer than Henderson’s old mare. This wasn’t the first time he had let her down. But it was sure as hell the worst.

  Moses viewed his failure as his worst betrayal yet, and figured Hattie did too. It mentally berated him in an endless loop as he rented a bicycle and haunted the road between town and the Murdock Ranch. Twice, he got as far as the gate to Jake’s ranch, determined to offer Hattie his sincerest apologies and what solace he could. Both times he lost his nerve.

  He turned away the second time, and his shoulders slumped in defeat as he dispiritedly pedaled back to town. He knew he wouldn’t ride this way again. It was too damn late. He had callously turned her down when she’d called specifically asking for his help. His face was the last one Hattie would want to see now.

  * * *

  —

  “I apologize for intruding on your privacy, Jake, but I wanted to offer my condolences.”

  Jake’s head snapped around in surprise. Roger Lord was the last person he’d expect to defy Mattawa’s convention of leaving families to their bereavement until the funeral. Only very close friends were allowed to ignore the custom.

  Jake finished fishing a stone from Thunder’s shoe, then unclamped his knees to let the stallion’s hoof drop. After swatting the horse’s rump, he swept up the hobbling reins and led Thunder to a clean stall. Reemerging moments later, he wiped his hands on his worn, clean dungarees and extended his right to Roger. “Thank you, Roger. It was right neighborly of you to make a special trip.” Sure as hell wish you hadn’t, though. He kept that thought to himself.

  Roger exchanged meaningless platitudes with Jake for several moments before working the conversation around to his true reason for going out of his way to make this trip to the Murdock Ranch. During the past months, he’d become obsessed with the idea of forcefully relieving Hattie Taylor of her virginity. The idea had consumed him since the afternoon he’d overheard her conversation with the Marks boy outside Armstrong’s Livery. Knowing the perpetration of such an act against Hattie Taylor could carry serious repercussions for him rarely entered his consideration. And when it did, it was brief blips he found easy to brush aside. Hell, he was an elite personage in this town, above the laws governing lesser mortals. Besides, who would believe the slut’s word over his? Everyone whispered that she was a girl of loose character.

  His paramount concern was the need to strike soon. Not only was she leaving town in a few weeks, but given her outspoken, free-spirited nature, he doubted she’d long remain a virgin to despoil. It would be just like the lush little baggage to freely bestow her virginity on the first smooth talker to come her way. And that wouldn’t do. Roger was determined the mouthy bitch forever remember her deflowering as the most degrading moment of her life.

  It was such a pleasurable way to teach a woman her rightful place in this man’s world.

  He’d heard people say the grief accompanying the loss of a loved one was mind-numbing. It was a sentiment he didn’t understand, for a person of superior intellect didn’t allow extraneous nothings to interfere with his thought process. Still, the minute he heard about Jane-Ellen’s death, he realized the confusion of such a time was a golden opportunity for him.

  He never doubted he would achieve his objective. He was accustomed to getting his way—it was the only just outcome. Of course preeminent men such as himself were rewarded.

  “It must be difficult to keep everything running smoothly at a time like this,” he murmured in the sympathetic tones he’d heard others use. “Handling your ranch. Taking care of your ward.”

  “I’m getting by.”

  “When is Augusta due back in town?”

  “Sunday, if all her means of transport run on schedule.”

  “If it would help,” Roger offered, concealing his excitement, “Hattie is welcome to stay with Gertrude and me until Augusta’s arrival. It would give you one less thing to worry about, and it might be easier for Hattie to be in town.”

  Jake wasn’t prepared for the rush of panic Lord’s suggestion unleashed in him. Hattie leave? She was the only reason he’d remained relatively sane. Face impassively stoic to conceal his thoughts, Jake leveled a look at Roger Lord and tried to keep his voice neutral when he said, “No. I appreciate the offer, but Hattie has been a great comfort to me, and she needs to be where she feels helpful. It was a generous offer, though. I’m much obliged.”

  No? Roger was nonplussed. And furious. Hell, yes, it was a generous offer! Who did Murdock think he was to decline? It had never occurred to him that Jake wouldn’t jump at the prospect.

  Not understanding people’s apparent need to forge bonds with friends and family, Roger was left at a loss over Jake’s refusal. His wishes were supposed to be instantly gratified. It was his right. Enraged, but unable to express it, he made polite conversation for another few minutes before taking his leave. His brain, however, worked at a fever pitch.

  By the time he turned his buggy onto the county road and clicked at the horses to pick up their pace, he was already turning ideas over in his mind, looking for an alternate means to achieve his goal.

  17

  Murdock Ranch

  FRIDAY, AUGUST 10, 1906

  It was growing late and Jake’s still-sweltering office hosted the only light on downstairs. Contemplating the level of whiskey left in his bottle, he sat tilted back in his chair, his damp shirt stuck to his skin and his bare feet propped up on the desk. He knew he’d been knocking back too much liquor the past couple of days. Shrugging, he poured himself another shot.

  He’d already drunk more than he should, but it was the only way to guarantee himself a reasonable night’s sleep. Besides, it wasn’t like anyone was around to see or care if he got a little drunk. Cook always withdrew to her room behind the kitchen shortly after the dinner dishes were washed and put away. And Hattie had already retired.

  At least he assumed she had; she’d disappeared upstairs earlier in the evening and he hadn’t heard a peep from her since. Which was just as well. He was on the verge of losing control and he sure didn’t need her to see him like that. On the other hand, if she’d stayed for their nightly conversation, it might have staved off this god-awful loneliness. He had discovered his best defense against the bleak night hours was a heated debate or quiet conversation with Hattie.

  During the day he handled things reasonably well. Not even death excused ranchers from tending their spreads, and the nonstop demands
of the Murdock spread kept Jake occupied mind and body for ten to twelve hours at a stretch. Not that he didn’t have a perfectly competent foreman willing to take the burden of running the ranch off his shoulders. But Jake needed to work, to burn off the restless energy, the seething emotions.

  In contrast to his rigid daytime control, the early hours after midnight were a nightmare. Sleep was all but impossible unless he drank himself stupid. He tossed and turned until the sheets were a damp jumble more constrictive than a spider’s web with a fresh fly. His mind refused to rest. For the past two nights, his brain had spun with relentless feverishness, battling unrelated emotions. Anger at God for taking his wife and child in such a terrible manner, unbearable grief, unspecified rage at the unfairness of life. And most horrifying of all, now that the first shock of Jane-Ellen’s death had worn off . . . a niggling sense of reprieve.

  Jake’s feet hit the floor with a thump and, swearing roundly, he staggered slightly as he pushed away from his desk. He hated himself for those fleeting moments of a sense of freedom. Swaying slightly and eyeing the whiskey with a caustic look, however, he acknowledged booze wasn’t the answer. It helped dull the edges, but it didn’t begin to address the problem. Thinking it did was a sure road to ruin. He’d wind up like old Doc Baker if he wasn’t careful. Putting the bottle back in the bottom drawer of his desk, he turned off the light and left the office.

  He had nearly reached the top of the stairs after securing the house for the night when the bathroom door down the darkened upstairs hallway suddenly opened and flooded the surrounding area with light. His breath caught in his throat as Hattie stepped out into the hall.

  Clearly, she’d been bathing and washing her hair, for she was briskly rubbing her wet hair with the towel draped around her neck. To Jake’s mind, the activity was too little, too late. She sure as hell hadn’t been quick enough to prevent her hair from dripping onto her thin wrapper. A wrapper that currently clung damply to her skin in several places.