the weather seems so much gentler here?”
“Look around you.” He pointed to several ranch houses in the distance. “That’s the way most folks think. They want to settle where it’s easy. Where they’ll have friends and neighbors. And pretty soon someone else will be making the rules for them. They won’t be able to move without stepping on someone else’s property. Then they’ll find themselves fighting someone else’s battles and even breathing someone else’s air.”
Izzy breathed deeply, hoping to diffuse the anger simmering in his tone. “It smells fresh and clean to me.”
“Give it time, Miss McCree. With enough people, they’ll find a way to foul even the air.”
She shot him a quick, sideways glance. “I take it you don’t have much use for people.”
“I can take them or leave them. Long as they don’t cross me or mine.”
He flicked the reins and the team moved smartly. After crossing another meadow, they looked down on a pretty valley. Clustered in the middle were several houses, as well as a saloon and a general store.
“That’s Sutton’s Station. Old man Sutton was the first to settle here. He runs the boardinghouse and stagecoach stop.”
As they drew closer, Izzy saw hat one of the houses was a dispensary, and another bore a wooden sign proclaiming it a house of worship.
When Matt turned the team toward the general store, Izzy pointed toward the church. “Shouldn’t we be looking for the preacher?”
He nodded. “That’s what I’m doing. But he won’t be there. He’s only there on Sunday. The rest of the week he can be found at the saloon.”
He pulled up in front of the store and climbed down to secure the team. Then, leaving Izzy and the children in the wagon, he made his way to the saloon.
Izzy watched his smooth, easy stride until her glance was caught by movement in the upper window of the saloon. A woman wearing what appeared to be nothing more than a chemise and petticoat stood in full view, watching her. Then she abruptly lowered the curtain and disappeared.
Izzy sat very straight and tall, wondering if the children had noticed the brazen display. But they were busy watching a group of children who had abandoned their game of hide-and-seek to walk closer and look over the newcomers.
“You here to trade goods?” a little boy called.
Aaron, Clement and Benjamin remained silent, refusing to even look at the boy.
“Uh-uh.” When her brothers refused to respond, Del chose to answer for all of them. “Our pa’s getting married today.”
“Why?” a little girl asked.
“So’s we’ll have a ma.” Del stood up in the back of the wagon and proudly tapped a hand on Izzy’s shoulder. “This is Miss McCree. She’s going to be our new ma.”
“Why would you want to take on that mangy litter of pups?” a bigger boy taunted.
His friends laughed.
“We aren’t pups,” Del shouted back. “These are my brothers. And I’m their little sister.”
That had the whole group of children laughing and pointing. “A girl? Liar. You ain’t no girl.”
“Am, too.”
“Well, if you are—” the bigger boy glanced at his friends for support “—you’re the ugliest girl I’ve ever seen.”
In a flash Aaron leapt from the wagon and grabbed the boy by the front of his shirt, lifting him off his feet. “You take that back, right now, or you’ll never be able to say another word.”
“Won’t,” the boy managed to say before Aaron turned him around and wrapped his arm around his throat. Without a word he began to squeeze.
“Aaron, stop,” Izzy shouted, but he ignored her and continued to shut off the boy’s air.
When the rest of the children moved in closer, Benjamin and Clement jumped down from the wagon and held them at bay, leaving the bigger boy alone to defend himself against this young giant.
“I…take it back,” the boy finally managed to croak.
“Say you’re sorry.” Aaron’s gaze was fixed on his little sister, whose eyes were filled with tears of shame.
“I’m…sorry.”
Aaron gave the boy a shove that sent him sprawling in the dirt. “Don’t you ever call my little sister names again. Or you’ll answer to me. Understand?”
The boy nodded, too frightened to speak.
When Aaron and his brothers returned to the wagon, the boy struggled to his feet and raced away to join his friends.
It had all happened in the space of a few seconds. And yet, Izzy realized, it had widened the chasm between Matthew’s children and these children here in town. Her heart turned over at the hunger she could read in the eyes of Benjamin, Clement and Del. As for Aaron, he looked as stiff, as unyielding as his father.
“Would you like me to talk to them?” she asked. “Maybe if I did, they would ask you to play.”
“No, ma’am.” Benjamin spoke for all of them. “We’re not welcome here. They call us trash.”
“But why?”
“’Cause our ma…”
Aaron shot him a look and he turned away with a shrug. “Just because.”
In the distance Izzy could make out the shouts and laughter of the children. And the cruel taunts aimed at the strangers in the wagon.
Some things, she thought with a rush of remembered pain, never changed.
She glanced at Del, whose tears trickled down her cheeks, making dirty streaks. In an effort to soothe, she drew her close. “Shh. Don’t cry, Del. They don’t mean anything by it. A lot of folks just don’t know how to treat strangers. So they say things that are hurtful.” She wiped the little girl’s tears with the hem of her skirt. “You’re so lucky to have big brothers to look out for you.”
Del sniffled. “Do you have a big brother, Miss McCree?”
Izzy shook her head. “No. But there were times when I surely wished I did.”
Aaron touched a hand to her sleeve. “You won’t tell Pa what I just did, will you?”
“But why not, Aaron? I should think he’d be proud that you stood up for Del.”
“No, ma’am. Pa doesn’t hold with fighting.”
“But…” She thought about the war that had divided this country and sent so many of its fine men to their graves. Could it be that Matthew Prescott had refused to fight? Or had he run away, as so many had, when faced with the horror of it all?
She nodded. “I don’t see any reason to mention what you did, Aaron.”
He gave a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Miss McCree.”
She glanced at the open door of the store and saw an old man with his hands tucked beneath a dirty apron, studying her with grave interest.
A tiny trickle of sweat made its way between her shoulder blades and down her back. What was taking Matthew so long?
She heard strangers’ voices. A woman’s, then a man’s. Both raised in anger. Glancing at the swinging doors of the saloon, she saw the woman from the upstairs window now standing beside a bewhiskered man who seemed to be pulling on his clothes. As Izzy watched, he tucked his shirt into the waistband of his pants, then slipped his suspenders over his shoulders. Matt helped him into his jacket and handed him a hat. He accompanied Matt outside, while the woman remained at the door, looking visibly annoyed.
As