Betsy’s eyelashes lowered. Joel took one look at her worn dress and overlarge coat and couldn’t help himself. “There’s no reason to talk like that about Miss Huckabee,” he said. After all, who was this postmaster to ridicule her? “I’m certain that, given the opportunity, Miss Huckabee would have improved herself considerably.”
The wounded look on her face transformed so swiftly that Joel felt like he’d lost track of time and reawakened in the middle of a completely different conversation. Now her eyes were sharp and her grin, although bemused, had an edge to it. “What about Deputy Puckett’s letter? Where’s it?” she asked the postmaster.
Joel’s neck tightened as the letter came into view. The handwriting curled in loops that no self-respecting man could form with a pen. It wasn’t his mother’s handwriting. Who else—
Betsy ripped the envelope out of his hand. “It’s definitely from a lady. But look! The address is scratched out and over it is written: Redirect to Pine Gap, Missouri. Whoever is writing Deputy Puckett didn’t even know he’d left Texas.”
Joel grabbed her right arm. Quick as a wink she had the letter in her left hand, a whole body length away from him.
“What lady shares a familiarity with you enough to write but doesn’t realize you’ve left town?” she asked.
“Give me the letter.” He wrapped an arm around her body and was pulling her against himself before he thought better of it. That wouldn’t work. The old postmaster laughed as she twisted away from him, but it wasn’t a clean getaway. Joel grabbed her cap and yanked it off, telegram and all.
“Owww!” Betsy swung for her hat but missed.
Joel lifted it above his head, the crinkling sound telling him that he’d captured her secret as well. She pushed her hair out of her eyes and then made a wild swipe, but Joel held it high.
“Negotiations are on,” he said. “My letter for yours.”
If she knew how potentially dangerous the contents of that letter were for him, she’d give anything to read it. The contents of her message couldn’t be in any way as embarrassing as his. But he had to bluff.
She twisted her mouth, hating to be bested at anything. Her eyes narrowed at her hat, and he held it higher to protect it from a desperate attempt.
“I’m sure it’s fascinating reading,” he said. He fished his hand into the sock cap until his fingers touched paper. “There it is.”
“Fine!” She shoved his letter into his hand and snatched the cap away. “I was just fooling around.”
“Glad to hear it,” Finley said. “You don’t want the Bald Knobbers after you for disturbing the peace.”
Postmaster Finley turned away grimly, and Joel didn’t find the statement funny, either. If Fowler and Sheriff Taney knew what was in that letter—or at least what he suspected it contained—they’d already be celebrating that they’d rid themselves of their inconvenient deputy.
Thank goodness Betsy had a secret, too.
Chapter 16
Betsy ran home with her skirt tangled around her legs and her cap in her fist. She had to open this telegram.
The door slammed against the wall when she burst in. Sissy startled and lowered her sewing. “You’re back already? Did you get Mayor Walters’s storeroom organized?”
The world was filled with interesting adventures, and Sissy wanted her stuck in a storeroom. Oh, what Betsy wouldn’t do for a place of her own! Perhaps the news held in this envelope could be the first step to achieving that goal.
“Is Uncle Fred in the office?” Betsy headed to the office door. “I’ll see if he needs me.”
“What about Mayor Walters?” Sometimes, either through distraction or plain exhaustion, Sissy let Betsy slip through without answering her questions. Today wasn’t one of those days.
Betsy sighed. “I’m to help him tomorrow. He isn’t feeling up to it today.”
“Tomorrow? Are you sure?”
For crying aloud! Betsy was twenty-four years old, but as long as she lived under another’s roof, those years didn’t earn her a day of autonomy.
Betsy cracked the door open. “Tomorrow I’ll work at the dry goods store. Today I’ll see what Uncle Fred needs.” Then, just as insurance, she called, “Uncle Fred? I’m coming.”
“Come on in,” he answered. “Did you get the market numbers from the sale barn?”
Betsy smiled apologetically at Sissy and then darted into the office. Uncle Fred’s sleeves were rolled up to his elbows and held in place by arm garters. Today wasn’t a printing day, but he claimed he wrote faster with his cuffs up. His pen flew across the pad, scratching his notes. He paused, licked his finger to rub out a word, then kept going, never lifting his eyes as Betsy answered.
“I didn’t get a chance, there was so much going on.” She pulled her hat off. “You won’t believe what happened.”
He looked up through his smudged spectacles at the envelope she produced from the cap. “What do you have there?”
“It’s always been a letter before, but this is the first telegram I’ve received. They wouldn’t do that just to tell me I’d been rejected, would they?” She probably couldn’t even open it now, as clumsy as her hands felt.