Claire turned from one to the other, confusion lining her face. “What outlets? Does Stanley Fischer hold sway over you, too? He warned me that I’d not find haven with you, but I thought he was just blowing wind.” She bit her lip and let go of the hands she held. She bowed her head and buried her hands in her lap.
“Ease yourself, Claire.” Emma smiled, patting the young woman’s knee. “No man holds sway in Harper’s Station. We are independent women here. Hardworking women. Women who aid one another when a sister is in need. Mr. Fischer buys some of the goods we produce, but we are not fully dependent upon his business. There are other avenues we can explore.” She pushed to her feet and tugged on the hem of her jacket. “Now, if I am to give you a loan to repay the fare Mr. Fischer purchased on your behalf, and if we accept you into our community, there are some stipulations you must agree to.”
Claire jumped to her feet like a soldier reporting for duty. “Anything, Miss Chandler.”
Emma schooled her features into her serious, banker mien. “You must work among us in a capacity that suits your skills, thereby allowing you to make reasonable payments on your loan at the end of each month, and you must abide by the rules of the colony.”
“What rules are those, ma’am?” A cautionary crease lined Claire’s forehead.
Good. It meant she was weighing the ramifications.
Emma listed the basic tenets of their society, ticking them off on her fingers. “You must attend church services every Sunday; you must not speak disparagingly about any lady among us; and if you see a sister in need, you must lend your aid.”
Claire tipped her chin up as if waiting for more. When none came, she raised a brow. “Is that all of it, then?”
Emma nodded. “It is.”
“Then I agree, ma’am.” A smile beamed across Claire’s face, making her appear even younger and prettier than before.
“Normally, this is where I would invite you to walk with me down to the bank,” Emma stated, “but I’m afraid there is one other vital piece of information you need to know.”
“What’s that, ma’am?”
Emma met Claire’s eyes. “Harper’s Station is under attack.”
6
After two and a half days of nonstop travel, Malachi stepped off the train in Seymour, Texas, bleary-eyed, unshaven, and weary to the bone. There’d been no sleeper berths available when he’d booked passage at the last minute in Sheridan, so he’d been forced to ride on a hard wooden bench in the second-class cabin for the duration of the journey. Though, truth to tell, it’d been worry, not the bench that had kept him awake. Anyone who worked in a railroad camp knew how to shut his ears as well as his eyes when his head hit the cot. Had to. Would never get any sleep otherwise. Yet every time he closed his eyes while aboard the train, all Mal could see was a young Emma staring up at him, pleading with him to help her.
Help her with what?
Wrestling that question had stolen his sleep. What kind of trouble was she in? What if he didn’t have the skills necessary to help her? But she’d asked for him. She knew what kind of life he led. Shoot. Maybe she needed him to blow something up. Malachi grinned as he stepped from the train to the platform. If only it could be so simple. But Emma wasn’t the simple type. No, her problems ran from complicated to hopelessly snarled. She was too tenderhearted and too stubborn to leave any thread loose to flap alone in the wind. She always held fast to them all. It was her most endearing quality.
And the most frustrating.
Rubbing a hand over the dark stubble sprouting out of his cheeks and chin, Malachi strode away from the depot in search of two things—food and a horse. He could use a bath and a shave as well, but he didn’t want to linger in Seymour any longer than necessary. His supervisor had only given him a week’s leave, and he’d already used over a third of it getting here. Despite the sun hanging low in the western sky, he needed to press on to Harper’s Station. If he hurried, he might manage to get there before full dark.
He followed the flow of passengers to the Washington Hotel dining room, but the man in the suit at the restaurant’s reception podium took one look at Mal’s rumpled clothing, still coated in dust from Wednesday’s blast at the rail camp, and sniffed in displeasure.
“Table for one, sir?” he asked with eyebrow raised and nose slanted downward, his hoity-toity voice making it clear that the correct answer to the question was no.
Not in the mood to play the game of social niceties, Mal reached into his pocket and pulled out a five-dollar bank note. He slapped it down on the podium the fella stood behind with enough force to make Prissy Pants jump.
“I’m gonna save us both the discomfort of taking you up on that completely ingenuous invitation.”