Rose Read online

  Rose could have heard a deep breath, had anyone dared take one, as the men swept the floor and set the tables back in order. They left without saying a word or even once looking at George.

  “You know you made three enemies this morning, don’t you?” Dottie asked.

  George finished his steak and got up. His cold gaze appraised Dottie. “I had several million during the war. Three more aren’t going to make much difference.” He walked over to the wall pegs and settled his battered hat over his eyes. “Good day, ladies,” he said and walked out into the street.

  “That man’s going to get himself killed,” Dottie said.

  “He survived the war,” Rose said. “What’s he got to worry about in Austin?”

  “Men who’ll shoot him in the back and be glad of it,” Dottie stated, disgusted that Rose should ignore the obvious. “And Luke’ll be at the head of the line.”

  “I don’t think he cares about Luke,” Rose said. “He’s a gentleman.”

  Dottie turned on her angrily.

  “He may be a gentleman, though I never knew a man who was out for anybody but himself, but that ain’t going to help you when you’re looking for another job.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can’t keep you on here. The minute you’re done serving, come get your money.”

  The blunt announcement stunned Rose. “You can’t do that. Nobody else will hire me.”

  “That’s not my problem,” Dottie said, not meeting Rose’s eyes. “I can’t afford no more cowboys breaking up the place. There won’t always be someone like him to make sure I get paid. Who was that man anyway?” Dottie demanded, turning to her customers.

  “Never seen him,” one of the men volunteered. “He come into town this morning looking for a woman to do for him and six other men.”

  “There. Go offer for that job if you think he’s so wonderful,” Dottie said.

  She waddled off to the kitchen.

  Through the haze of shock and disbelief, Rose clutched at the only straw she could see. “Do you mean he’s advertising for a housekeeper?”

  “Guess so. He put up a sign outside the sheriff’s office.”

  “Why doesn’t he hire a cook?”

  “Go ask him,” the man said, a mocking smile on his face. “Seems like he’s already got his eye on you.”

  Rose felt the heat rise in her face, but she refused to let Dawson’s gibes get to her. She had to think.

  But for the next two hours she had no thoughts to spare for George Randolph or herself. His turn-up with Luke had made the Bon Ton the most popular eating place in town. Everybody wanted to know where he sat and how many tables Luke broke. Long before the rush ended, she began to wish he had gone to another restaurant to eat.

  But as she walked back to her room, she caught herself daydreaming of George Randolph somehow making her future bright and secure.

  Don’t be stupid, she told herself as she sank down on the hard, narrow bed in the single room she rented. He doesn’t even know your last name. And you can forget all the fairy tales you read about knights rescuing ladies. If your future is ever going to be secure, you’ll have to do it yourself.

  But how?

  She opened her drawer and counted her small hoard of coins. Less than twenty-five dollars. How long would that last? What would she do when it was gone?

  The men had been getting more bold in their advances, more rude in their suggestions, more persistent in their demands. She didn’t know where she could find another job, but she’d starve before she’d let anybody make a whore out of her.

  Rose shuddered at the sound of the word. She’d never said it out loud, never even let herself think it. She could leave Austin, but would it be any different in another town? She would still be a woman alone, without family, without money, support, or protection.

  She thought of her father’s life savings, her only inheritance, lost in a bank failure caused by the Union blockade. She thought of her uncle’s family, cold and distant when her father refused to let her live with them on their New Hampshire farm after her mother’s death; silent and uncaring after she refused to leave Texas at the outbreak of the war; angry and bitter since her uncle’s death at Bull Run.

  She felt more alone and vulnerable than ever.

  Rose went over to a small table and picked up a hand mirror. What did Luke see in her face that made him so sure she would share her body with him?

  It couldn’t be beauty. She was always too tired to look her best. Besides, she did everything she could to make herself look ordinary. Her dresses were dark and loose-fitting. She parted her rich, brown hair in the middle, pulled it back from her face until all traces of natural curl were gone, and captured it in a braid at the base of her head.

  Did he think desperation would force her to yield? She tried to smile, but nothing could hide the fear in the back of her eyes, the lines at the corners of her eyes, or the tightness of her mouth.

  Luke wouldn’t be thinking about lust now. He’d be thinking about revenge. And what about Jeb and Charlie? Mr. Randolph would go back to his ranch in the middle of nowhere, and she’d be left here with three men determined to ruin her.

  Unless she answered Mr. Randolph’s ad.

  Rose could hardly credit the thrill that electrified her body. She had never met a man she liked as much or one as kind, but he was a stranger. How could she be thrilled by the idea of keeping house for him?

  She couldn’t deny that her whole body trembled at the thought of being near him, but she didn’t know anything about him. Any woman who rode off with a man gambled with her fate. A woman who rode off with a stranger gambled with her life.

  But it was different with George.

  She remembered how she felt while she sat with him at the table. Safe. She hadn’t felt that way since the Robinsons left for Oregon. If he would protect a woman he didn’t know, wouldn’t he be even more ready to defend someone who worked for him?

  She remembered the Confederate gray of his trousers and felt her body tense, her hopes dim. He had been an officer, too. No such man would hire her, not once he found out her father had fought for the Union.

  But she couldn’t stay in Austin, not without a job. She’d soon be forced to beg.

  Or…

  She was desperate enough to grasp at straws.

  She would write her uncle’s wife again, even though she hadn’t answered any letters in five years, not even when Rose had written them of her father’s death.

  Maybe one of her father’s army friends would help. If she went through his letters again, maybe she would find some names. She only needed one.

  But even if someone decided to help her, she knew it wouldn’t work. It was foolish to expect it—she couldn’t wait two or three months for a reply. She needed help right now. Her twenty-five dollars wouldn’t last long. She had to do something immediately.

  Today.

  “Don’t know what kind of response you’ll get,” Sheriff Blocker was saying to George later that afternoon. “Lots of people come by, but they don’t cotton to the idea of living in the brush. Too much trouble with rustlers and Mexican bandits.”

  “We don’t have much trouble around our place,” George told him. “The boys don’t allow it.”

  “Maybe not, but you ain’t likely to convince people around here of that. Not a month goes by they don’t hear of a raid by Cortina or the men he protects.”

  “I’m not asking anyone to go who’s afraid.”

  The sheriff gave him a good looking over. “I imagine you could do a pretty good job of taking care of your own. What about your boys?”

  “They’re my brothers. We’re all pretty much alike.”

  “That might make it better with the ladies. They attach a lot of importance to family.”

  Several male spectators had gathered outside the sheriff’s office. One of them, an ancient coot with a scraggly growth of beard and a sunken mouth which ejected a stream of tobacco juice every few minut
es, climbed up on the boardwalk next to the sheriff. He looked too old and thin to stand by himself, but George could see plenty of life dancing in his eyes and in the wicked expression on his face.

  The old man laboriously read the sign, looked at George, cackled merrily, then spat a stream of tobacco juice over the head of the nearest spectator.

  “Ain’t going to get nobody worth having,” he said.

  “Go on, Sulphur Tom, clear off,” the sheriff said. “We don’t need you here putting folks’ backs up.”

  “You listen to me,” the old man warned George. “Nothing here you can take to your bed. Not without you’re dead drunk first.”

  “Here,” the sheriff interrupted, “I’ll have none of that talk. This here is a respectable young man with a ranch and I dunno how many head of cattle.”

  “Don’t matter. Won’t get nobody to stay below the Nueces. Sure to get kilt or lose her scalp.”

  “He doesn’t live below the Nueces. Now scram before I put you in jail.”

  “Won’t do no good,” the incorrigible said. “I’d slip between the bars.”

  As the hour drew near, George wondered if Sulphur Tom might not know more about the women of Austin than the sheriff.

  Several women had mixed with the crowd, but none had come forward. Much to George’s chagrin, he found himself searching for Rose. Even more disturbing, he was disappointed when he couldn’t find her. It’s just as well. She’s not the kind of housekeeper you need.

  George knew it was true, but the knowledge did nothing to erase his disappointment.

  On the dot of five o’clock, the sheriff addressed the crowd. “Anybody here meaning to answer this ad?”

  Three women stepped forward.

  Only George’s military training prevented him from turning tail on the spot.

  “This is Mrs. Mary Hanks,” the sheriff said of the first, a tiny woman who looked old enough to be George’s mother. “She lost her husband during the war.”

  “I got seven kids of my own,” Mrs. Hanks announced. “Don’t reckon I’d know the difference if I was to find myself doing for seven more.” But Mrs. Hanks’s appearance, as well as that of two urchins George guessed were part of her brood, told him her idea of “doing” for a family probably didn’t come close to matching his.

  Sheriff Blocker turned to the next woman, a strapping blonde of indeterminate age, decidedly unattractive features, and an intimidating ear-to-ear grin. “This is Berthilda Huber. She’s German. Her family died on her this winter.”

  “Ya,” Berthilda commented.

  “Doesn’t she speak English?” George asked, his calm shaken.

  “Nothing you could say in mixed company,” the sheriff explained.

  “Ya,” repeated Berthilda.

  George turned to the third candidate.

  “Peaches McCloud is my name,” the imposing woman announced, stepping forward to speak for herself in a manner George associated more nearly with his commanding officer than a housekeeper. “I’m strong and willing. I’ll cook and clean for as many men as you like, but you come messing with me in the middle of the night, and I’ll put a knife in you.”

  The crowd laughed. Some men nudged each other. Several of the women nodded their approval.

  George knew he had found exactly what he needed in Peaches—a big, strong woman who would work like a horse and expect nothing in return but a roof over her head.

  He didn’t doubt that meals would be ready on time, the house neat as a pin, and the linens freshly laundered every week. Yet the moment he knew he had found what he had come for, he didn’t want her. A woman of Peaches’s insensi-tivity could easily destroy the fragile ties that held his family together.

  But where was he to look for someone else? Would things be any better in San Antonio or Victoria or Brownsville?

  No. None of those towns had Rose.

  George cursed. However much he might be unable to forget her big, brown eyes, he didn’t need Rose. Besides, she wasn’t here. What he needed and wanted had nothing to do with her.

  “Said you wouldn’t get nothing but scrubs,” Sulphur Tom cackled from the fringe of the crowd. “Peaches is the best of the lot, but she’ll wear you down to a nubbin inside six months.”

  “Shut up, old man, or I’ll wring your neck,” Peaches threatened.

  Sulphur Tom deposited a stream of tobacco juice at Peaches’s feet to show what he thought of her threats. When she charged after him, the crowd fell back, most of them laughing. Sulphur Tom danced beyond her reach.

  “Take the foreign one,” Sulphur Tom advised. “At least she won’t talk back to you.”

  “I don’t think any of you ladies would be happy with us,” George began. He couldn’t go back without someone to keep house for them, but he couldn’t hire any of these women.

  “I’ll be content anywhere I make up my mind to be content,” Peaches declared, her expression belligerent.

  “Ya,” echoed the Fräulein Huber.

  George started over. “I’m sorry if I’ve inconvenienced you…”

  “We’ll have none of your inconveniencing,” Peaches stated. “You advertised for a housekeeper, and we showed up. Now you’ve got to choose one of us.”

  “We may not be what you was looking for,” the Widow Hanks added, “but we’re the only choices you’ve got.”

  “He’s got one more.”

  Chapter Two

  “Clear off,” Peaches ordered. “He wants nothing to do with the likes of you.”

  “You’re too late,” the Widow Hanks informed her.

  “Ya,” added Berthilda Huber.

  “Now, ladies,” Sheriff Blocker said rather nervously, “anybody who wants can talk to Mr. Randolph. This is a free country.”

  “It ought not be. Not for the likes of her,” Peaches stated, dislike, or an even stronger emotion, flaming in her eyes. “If there was any law around here, she’d a been run out of town long ago.”

  “I’m not afraid of you, Peaches McCloud, or of anything you have to say,” Rose said.

  She looked so tiny standing between Peaches and Berthilde, her clothes shabby, her appearance tattered. She neither shrank from them nor seemed conscious of her lack of size, but faced George with a China-doll gaze that met his own without wavering.

  George felt himself being drawn to Rose, and he instinctively cut his emotions off as clean as a sharp knife slicing through sausage. He had inherited that skill from his father. Though he tried to be like his sire as little as possible, right now he needed all his resources to withstand the almost irresistible lure of this woman.

  “I hear you’re looking for a housekeeper,” Rose said. “I wish to be considered for the position.”

  After having decided that Peaches would be the perfect choice, George told himself it made no sense to consider Rose. She appeared fragile next to the other woman, even frail. She couldn’t have grown more than three or four inches over five feet. Yet a trace of elegance hovered about her, which the other women lacked.

  He had to turn her down. To be this captivated by his housekeeper was to invite disaster.

  “I don’t expect you’d be any happier with the position than these ladies,” he began.

  “But you can’t refuse me without even considering me,” she pleaded.

  “Of course he can,” the Widow Hanks assured her.

  “Are you certain you understand what’s required?” George asked, trying to give himself time to think. “It’s not much of a house, a dog trot I believe you call it, and there are seven of us.”

  “I understand. It would be a contractual agreement. I would perform certain services in exchange for money.”

  “Hussy!” the Widow Hanks exclaimed. “You make a perfectly respectable arrangement sound disgusting.”

  “How’s her kind to know what goes on between honorable men and women?” Peaches asked.

  “Ya,” added Berthilda.

  Rose looked about her, frustration, impatience, and desperation taki
ng their turn in molding her expression.

  “Could we talk alone for a few minutes?” she asked George. “I have some questions of a private nature about which I need assurance.”

  “I have no such questions,” Peaches announced.

  “I won’t wait forever,” stated the Widow Hanks.

  “Ya,” added Berthilda.

  George told himself he had no reason to see Rose alone, that it would be best to put an end to things right now. But try as he might, he couldn’t bring himself to refuse her in front of this hostile crowd.

  Besides, he couldn’t ignore the appeal in her big, brown eyes.

  Yet it was something else that caused him to agree to her request. She had faced them all courageously, but fear hid in her eyes. It peeped out when something caught her off guard; it skittered across her face when one of the women tried to prejudice him against her; it danced wildly when he seemed to be about to refuse her request.

  Every instinct George had developed during four years of fighting warned him of danger, and he came instantly alert, ready to do battle.

  For Rose.

  At the same time, he felt disgusted with his weakness. He’d never make a good army officer if he couldn’t make decisions without letting sentiment affect his thinking.

  “Would the Bon Ton be suitable?”

  Rose nodded.

  “Don’t have nothing to do with her,” Sulphur Tom called out just as George stepped toward the edge of the boardwalk. “She’s Yankee spawn.”

  Yankee! For the briefest instant George froze in his tracks. An impulse made him turn to Sulphur Tom. “Most of us came to Texas from somewhere else. Where were you born?”

  For an answer the old man directed a stream of tobacco at George’s feet.

  George chuckled easily. “Above the Mason-Dixon line, I gather.”

  The crowd parted to let him pass.

  The walk to the Bon Ton seemed endless to Rose. She turned her words over and over in her mind, trying to decide how best to arrange them. Her future rested on the decision of this now cold and formal man.

  Had she made a mistake? He didn’t seem anything like the wonderfully strong, cheerfully chivalrous man who knocked Luke Kearney down, or the gentle man who had coaxed her to sit at his table and ordered her to eat while she restored her shattered composure.