Rose(75)
George pulled the wagon to a halt in front of Bullock’s Hotel. Situated on the corner of Pecan and Congress Avenue, it was the biggest and finest hotel in town.
“What are you going to do?” George asked Rose. He couldn’t just let her down and forget about her. He had to know she would be safe.
“I thought I’d see if Dottie would give me my old job back. Maybe things will be different now.”
“Where are you going to stay?”
“There’s my old room.”
That’s what he’d thought. She didn’t have a job or a place to stay.
“You’ll stay at the hotel until you have a job and somewhere to live.”
“That might take days.”
“I’ll be in town for a while hiring hands.” It wouldn’t take more than half a morning, but he’d stay a week if necessary.
Rose hesitated.
“I’ll pay for the room. It’s our fault you had to come back so soon.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“Let him,” Salty advised. “I always say there’s no point in using your own money when you can spend someone else’s.”
“I’d rather pay my own way,” Rose said.
“I’d rather have a farm of my own than work for George,” Salty responded, “but there’s nothing I can do about that either.”
George took some gold coins from his pocket and handed them to Rose. “Three months. That’s the minimum we agreed on.”
Rose looked at the gold coins winking in her hand. Then she looked at George.
“Is this all your gold?”
“No. I’ve got plenty more.”
He could tell she didn’t believe him.
“As soon as I get a job, I’m going to pay you for the hotel.”
“I won’t let you do that.”
“Then I won’t stay in the hotel.”
She had made up her mind, and George could tell she wouldn’t change it.
“I wish my mother had had some of your stubbornness. She’d have been a much happier woman.”
“I doubt your father would have been pleased.”
“Pa could go to hell. I’m sure he’s there already.”
George reined in his anger. This wasn’t about his father. It was about him and Jeff and circumstances; it was about Rose’s leaving.
“Will you be sure to tell me if you need anything?”
“Yes.”
“Promise?”
She nodded.
He took her hand. He shook it. Only iron restraint kept him from taking her in his arms and kissing her right there.
Then, without a word, he turned and walked away.
But it was impossible to just turn his back and forget Rose. It wasn’t fair to ask him to try. Every fiber of his being screamed in protest. It seemed wickedly cruel that, after being forced to make a vow to remain unwed, he should have been fated to meet the one woman who could make him want to break his promise.
He turned back toward the hotel. But no sooner did he prepare to take the first step to follow her, start to open his mouth to call her back, than nightmarish visions of his own life filled his mind. If he followed her, if he called her back, was he fated to play those same scenes over again with himself in the lead?
He couldn’t take that step.
She deserved to find a man who could love her and give her the family she so desperately wanted. She deserved a husband who could come to her with an unfettered spirit, not a man handicapped and shortchanged by his heritage.
George had thought he would never again feel as heartsick as he had the day Lee surrendered to Grant.
Today he felt worse.
George was at the livery stable when Salty found him. “Have you seen Rose?” Salty asked.
“No. Is anything wrong?”
“You’re not going to like this.”
“Spit it out. Bad news never improves with keeping.”
“Dottie won’t give her back her job.”
“I was afraid she wouldn’t.”
“And nobody will rent her a place to stay.”
“Why?”
“This is the part you’re not going to like. It seems some woman named Peaches is spreading it around that Rose wouldn’t be back here so fast if she hadn’t done something she shouldn’t. She’s insinuating it couldn’t have been anything nice or she wouldn’t have been paid off in gold.”
Rage so overwhelmed George he hardly knew what he did. He headed straight to the hotel. He had no idea what he intended to do, but he had no intention of allowing anyone to mistreat Rose. Especially anyone in this town.
It infuriated him even more that Jeff’s blind hatred and his own selfishness should have made her situation worse than it had been two months ago. He thought of Rose’s kindness, her sweetness, her outpouring of affection when anyone treated her kindly. There must have been dozens of times when she had tried to bridge the gap of hatred and misunderstanding in this town and had been repulsed. Just thinking about it made him furious. By the time he neared the hotel, he was in a lethal mood.