Chapter 9 - THE WOMAN WITH THE SKILLET
Clara hit Wyatt once.
She wanted to hit him twice.
Margaret stopped her.
“Not because he doesn’t deserve it.”
“Then why?”
“Because the first one was excellent.”
Wyatt lay unconscious in the mud.
Bell arrested him.
Clara forgot him immediately.
Jeb was dying.
The bullet had entered high in his chest.
Margaret knelt.
“Jacob.”
Blood bubbled at his lips.
Clara went cold.
“No.”
Margaret tore open his shirt.
“Collapsed lung.”
“You’re a nurse.”
“Was.”
“You are today.”
They carried him into the boarding house.
Clara boiled instruments.
Margaret worked.
No anesthetic beyond whiskey.
Jeb regained consciousness halfway through.
He saw Clara.
“Train?”
“Ours.”
“Children?”
“Safe.”
“Wyatt?”
“Skillet.”
Jeb’s mouth moved.
“You really are a good cook.”
“Shut up.”
He did.
Mostly because he fainted.
He lived.
Barely.
For three days Clara sat beside him.
On the fourth, he opened his eyes.
“You look terrible,” she said.
“So do you.”
She kissed him.
“Don’t make me laugh.”
“Then stop getting shot.”
“Reasonable.”
His fingers found hers.
“Margaret?”
“Alive.”
“Vale?”
“Federal custody.”
“Train?”
Clara smiled.
“Complicated.”
That was an understatement.
Her fraudulent transfer had created a legal catastrophe.
Newspapers loved it.
ABANDONED BRIDE STEALS RAILROAD.
Another preferred:
COOK DEFEATS INDUSTRIALIST WITH COFFEE POT.
Clara hated that one least.
More importantly, Bell had delivered the archives to a federal judge outside Black Vein’s influence.
Investigations began.
Camps were raided.
Workers freed.
Names returned to the dead.
Eight hundred and twelve.
Not a statistic anymore.
People.
Jeb recovered slowly.
Margaret stayed.
This created an unusual domestic arrangement.
Clara had kissed Margaret’s husband.
Margaret knew.
Jeb knew Margaret knew.
Nobody knew what normal etiquette required.
Finally Clara asked.
“Do you want him back?”
Margaret choked on coffee.
Jeb nearly dropped his spoon.
“Clara.”
“What?”
Margaret stared at Jeb.
Then laughed.
“No.”
Jeb looked offended.
“You could hesitate.”
“I love you.”
Margaret reached across the table and squeezed his hand.
“But I stopped being your wife fifteen years ago.”
“You were legally—”
“I don’t care about legally.”
She looked at Clara.
“I survived because I became someone else.”
Then back to Jeb.
“So did you.”
There was grief in that.
But also freedom.
Jeb nodded.
Margaret kissed his cheek.
“Besides, you snore.”
Clara looked at Jeb.
“You snore?”
“No.”
Margaret laughed.
“Like an injured buffalo.”
Clara reconsidered the romance.
Spring came.
The mountain changed.
Snow became water.
Water became flowers.
Clara’s contract ended.
Fifty dollars.
Jeb placed the money on the table.
She stared at it.
“What?”
“Our agreement.”
She looked at him.
“You are paying me?”
“Yes.”
“After everything?”
“You worked.”
“I stole a train.”
“Not in the original duties.”
“Should’ve negotiated better.”
He smiled.
Clara took the money.
That surprised him.
“Good,” she said.
“What?”
“I wanted to see whether you’d actually pay.”
“You doubted me?”
“Never hurts to audit.”
She pocketed it.
Then Jeb’s face became serious.
“Where will you go?”
There it was.
The question they had avoided.
“San Francisco.”
He nodded.
“When?”
“Tomorrow.”
Another nod.
Nothing else.
Clara became furious.
“That’s all?”
“What should I say?”
“I don’t know.”
“You want me to ask you to stay?”
“No.”
He looked confused.
“Yes.”
More confused.
“I want you to want me to stay without believing wanting gives you the right to ask me to abandon everything else.”
Jeb stared.
“That is extremely complicated.”
“I’m a woman. We contain several sentences.”
He thought.
Then stood.
“I want you to stay.”
Her heart moved.
“But?”
“But I think you should go.”
Her heart dropped.
Jeb came closer.
“You arrived here because men kept choosing your road.”
Silas.
Wyatt.
Vale.
Even Jeb, sometimes.
“If you stay now because you’re afraid leaving means losing me, then I become another road someone else chose.”
Clara’s eyes filled.
“I hate when you become intelligent.”
“I read.”
“I remember.”
He touched her cheek.
“Go to San Francisco.”
“And us?”
“If there is an us when you’ve had every choice in the world…”
He swallowed.
“…come back.”
Clara kissed him.
Long.
Painful.
Beautiful.
Then whispered:
“Do not grow another ridiculous beard.”
“No promises.”
The next morning Clara left Bitter Creek.
Not as a rejected bride.
Not as anyone’s woman.
She bought her own railway ticket.
First class.
With fifty dollars earned from winter work and another five hundred awarded by the government for helping recover the children.
Jeb stood on the platform.
He did not ask her to stay.
That was why leaving hurt so much.
The train moved.
Clara watched him shrink behind her.
She cried.
She did not turn back.
Three months later, Jeb received a letter.
Dear Mountain,
San Francisco is loud, expensive, foggy, and full of men who believe women cannot understand contracts.
I am having a wonderful time.
He smiled.
Then read the next line.
I bought a restaurant.
He sat down.
The next:
Actually, I bought three.
Jeb whispered, “Jesus.”
And then:
Also, I may have accidentally purchased part of a railroad.
Jeb began laughing.
The final line said:
Do not wait for me.
His smile disappeared.
Underneath, in smaller writing:
But perhaps leave the porch light burning.
May you like
Jeb looked toward the empty road.
Then he lit the lamp.
