Harper's Bride (28 page)

Why, then, could he no longer think of it
without picturing her in every room of the house he would build? He
had to decide his future, and soon.

"Morning, Harper."

Dylan turned to see Big Alex McDonald lumber
down the side street, carrying a bundle under one arm. He moved
slowly and spoke even slower, as if talking were a difficult,
unaccustomed thing he practiced. His heavy brown hair and enormous
mustache concealed most of his face, making him look like a
rendering of a Neanderthal. But while he seemed like a giant,
awkward rube, Dylan knew that no shrewder man lived in the North.
He'd amassed most of his fortune with the lay system Belinda had
tried to interest Dylan in, the one Big Alex had introduced into
the Klondike that reaped a portion of the gold that others
mined.

"Hi, there, Alex. I haven't seen you in a
while." Dylan propped one foot on a soap crate. "What brings you
by?" The towering Scotsman gestured up at Melissa's black and gold
leaf sign."I've been looking for your missus, the singing laundry
woman, but I haven't seen her for a while. I brought her some
shirts to wash."

Dylan shook his head. "The baby's been sick,
and she's taking care of her. I don't think she'll be opening her
business again."

The big man looked disappointed and paused
before speaking, as if mentally stringing the words together.
"That's too bad. Nobody in town does such a good job with shirts,
or sings so nice." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully with a huge
hand. "I got used to seeing her down here, working and singing to
the babe."

He wasn't the only one, Dylan thought.

"Well, give her this for me, anyhow." Big
Alex reached under his tidy bundle and withdrew a dog-eared
newspaper. "She told me she grew up in Portland. I got it from a
cheechako who just came into town."

Dylan glanced down at the masthead and read
Oregonian
. "Thanks, Alex. I'll tell her you stopped by."

Big Alex nodded and trudged back to Front
Street. Dylan watched him go, then looked at the paper again. It
was more than three months old, but it was good to see something
from home. He was glad, too, for the diversion.

With a last glance at the stairway, Dylan
walked back to the store and spread the yellowed newspaper on the
counter in front of him. He'd never followed the goings-on in
Portland, where the paper was published—the city was too busy and
brash compared to The Dalles—but some of the topics were familiar
to him. He turned the pages that looked as if they'd been soaked
and dried in the sun, taking vague note of advertisements placed by
general stores, carriage makers, and haberdasheries. He skimmed
headlines concerning shanghaiing on Portland's docks, political
disputes, and the war with Spain.

Then, just as he was about to fold up the
thing, one particular item caught his eye. It was a small piece,
located down in a corner and could have been easily missed, or
dismissed, by a reader. But Dylan stared at it in stunned
disbelief, reading and rereading the headline.

The Dalles Father-Son Banking Magnates

Perish In Carriage Accident

He jerked the paper closer and read that
Griffin Harper and son Scott, majority stockholders in Columbia
Bank, were killed when the carriage in which they were riding
apparently plunged into a deep ravine and overturned. The elder
Harper suffered a broken neck, while his son appeared to have died
of extensive injurious insults to the body.

Lowering the newspaper, Dylan swallowed and
swallowed, but his throat was suddenly as dry as talc. God—his
father, at least the only man he knew as his father, and his
brother were dead? Forcing himself to finish the article, he read
that Scott Harper was survived by his widow, Elizabeth Pettit
Harper. The eldest Harper son, Dylan, had departed from The Dalles
some years earlier, and his whereabouts were unknown.

He walked to the straight-backed chair next
to the stove and sat down with his elbows on his knees, letting the
newspaper sail to the floor. Dead—the man who had worked so hard to
bend Dylan to his will, he'd nearly broken him. The man who had
scrambled to grow wealthy on the misfortune of others. And Scott,
the stolid half brother who'd followed in the old man's footsteps,
who'd stolen his fiancée. Well, maybe "stolen" wasn't the right
word; Elizabeth had probably piloted that event. But they were
gone, their lives snuffed out like candles, and all their
maneuvering and all the money in the world couldn't save them.

He looked at the date on the newspaper
again—Thursday, May 12, 1898. That was more than three months ago.
When he'd told Melissa he didn't expect to see his family again,
he'd never once guessed that death would be the reason. Gathering
the scattered pages from the floor, Dylan folded them up with hands
that trembled slightly. Then he stood, walked outside, and rounded
the corner to head upstairs.

He'd been trying to decide whether to spend
another winter in Dawson or go back to Oregon.

With his fate turning on a brief visit from
Big Alex McDonald, the decision had been made for him.

*~*~*

"I'm going home, Melissa. Back to The
Dalles."

Melissa sat at the table, sewing a button on
one of his shirts. Swept with astonishment, she dropped the work
and her hands fell still. He looked as pale as milk, and all the
expression in his eyes seemed to have disappeared. "When? Why?"

He pushed the newspaper across the table to
her. Then with a heavy tread, he began pacing a short track in
front of the stove, his head down, his hands jammed into his
pockets.

"As soon as I can sell this place, I'm
leaving. I have to go back. My father and brother were killed three
months ago."

"Oh, dear God—"

He gestured at the paper. "It's all there on
page seventeen."

Struggling to grasp this abrupt turn of
events, Melissa glanced at the masthead, then opened the newspaper
to the page he indicated. She read the opening lines of the story,
then looked up at him. "Dylan, I'm so sorry. I know you weren't
close, but—but this is horrible."

He walked to the window and looked out at the
hillsides beyond Dawson, apparently lost in thought and time, with
his arms crossed over his chest and his weight shifted to one hip.
Finally, he shrugged, as if baffled by his own decision. "I guess
old ties run deeper than I thought."

Melissa wondered if she would feel grief or
sadness when her own father died, and didn't really know. Life with
him had been so dreadful, all she might mourn is what could have
been instead of what was. She looked up at his pensive, handsome
profile. "I'd really be surprised if you felt nothing. In fact, I
suppose I'd be disappointed."

But he hadn't said "we're going," she
realized. He was going.

Reading further in the small newspaper
article, though, she encountered one sentence above all others that
stood out as if written in flaming letters six inches high, and
perhaps explained Dylan's true purpose.

Scott Harper is survived by his wife,
Elizabeth Pettit Harper.

"It doesn't make any sense to me, but I have
to go and get back what's mine," he continued. "There sure was no
love left between us. But death, somehow that puts things in a
different light."

"Yes, I'm sure it does," she replied, feeling
cold and hollow inside.

. . . survived by his wife, Elizabeth . .
.

He turned for a moment and faced her. "Look,
this doesn't change anything between you and me, not at all."

She gazed at him, but said nothing. Of
course, everything had changed, at least from her point of view.
She felt as if every wish and dream she'd had besides wanting a
good life for Jenny were suddenly crashing down around her. She
knew she'd been a fool to let her hopes run away with her common
sense, but there wasn't much comfort in the knowledge. Maybe for
Dylan nothing had changed because he had no feelings for her beyond
their original agreement. Right now, she envied him that as much as
she resented him for it. Better that she had stuck with her
original goal, to achieve independence for herself and Jenny, and
not depend on a man for anything. Not even love.

Pushing a hand through his hair, he began
pacing again. Then he stopped and peered her. "You don't want to
stay here alone, do you?"

"In Dawson? Certainly not."

He looked oddly relieved. "Good. I'll sell
this place as soon as I can."

"That's fine. It's time for me to go back to
Oregon and stand on my own two feet." She tried to keep her voice
from quivering.

A slight frown creased his forehead. "Well .
. . yeah, sure—if that's what you want."

"It is. It's what I've worked for." It wasn't
what she wanted at all. But what choice did she have? She couldn't
compete with his memory of a woman, even if that woman had been, by
his own admission, treacherous and scheming.

"I'll book us passage on a steamer back to
Portland. Once you're settled there, I'll go on to The Dalles."

. . . Elizabeth . . .

He walked to the door then, muttering to
himself about finding a buyer for the store, or at least his
inventory, about getting the details wrapped up before cold weather
closed the rivers. "See you at dinner."

A chilly gust blew in when he opened the
door. Then he was gone.

Melissa listened to his boots on the steps.
She finished sewing on the button and carefully folded his shirt,
smoothing the fabric with her hands. Then she hugged it to herself,
burying her face in its folds, and wept.

*~*~*

"Sure, Dylan, I'll put the word out. I'll
even take some of the goods off your hands if I can use them here
in the hotel." Belinda Mulrooney waved off her bartender and poured
coffee for Dylan herself.

Dylan leaned against the counter in Belinda's
fancy hotel bar. With her ear always listening for business deals
and deal makers, not much escaped her attention. He thought she'd
be a good person to see about selling his inventory.

"Thanks, Belinda. I already talked to Seamus
McGinty, too, so I'm hoping I can have this wrapped up within a
week or two."

"Dawson will miss you," she said, smiling,
"but if you have family affairs to settle, I guess you'd better go
back. Myself, I've been on my own for so long, I can't imagine
having family to worry about."

Just then, a fussy-looking clerk bustled
over. "Miss Mulrooney, there you are. Count Carbonneau is here,
asking for you."

Belinda blushed prettily, surprising Dylan.
"Oh! Tell him I'll be with him immediately, Ambrose." She turned
back to him. "Dylan, if you'll excuse me," and she hurried off with
the clerk.

Although she was plain-featured, her wealth
made her the best catch in the Yukon for an ambitious bachelor. But
Dylan had never known one who could even get close, much less call
on her. He thought back to the conversation he'd had with Ned
Tanner the day that seemed so long ago now. "Belinda is too danged
outspoken and too smart for her own good," Ned had complained.

"Count, my mule's rump," he heard an
eavesdropper chuckle farther down the bar. "That Charlie Carbonneau
is nothing more than a slick-tongued barber from Montreal who came
up here to sell champagne. I heard it from a French-Canadian who
recognized him."

"Maybe someone ought to tell Belinda," his
companion suggested.

"Hell, someone did. She doesn't care." The
man shrugged. "I guess she likes the compliments he pays her and
the roses he sends over every day. I'll bet you she marries
him."

"Belinda? Naw."

"I'll bet you a whole day of dust she
does."

Even the smartest of women could be taken in
by the right smooth-talking man, it seemed to Dylan. The
conversation grew more boisterous then as the bar patrons debated
Belinda's future marital status. But distracted by his own
thoughts, he took a swallow of coffee and ignored it. With the load
of regret resting on his heart, he would rather have had a whiskey,
but decided that might be a bad idea. Sometimes liquor loosened a
man's tongue and got him to admit things he wanted to keep to
himself. With a couple of drinks in him, he might get the notion
into his head to go back to their room and tell Melissa how he felt
about her—that he didn't want to take Jenny and her to Portland and
leave them there.

He'd hoped she wouldn't want it either. But
regardless of the intimacy they'd shared and the crises they'd come
through, she was determined to make it on her own. Well, let her
go, then, he told himself impatiently. He wouldn't risk revealing
his heart, only to have her reject him. He'd stick to his original
plan, and so would she.

He wouldn't tell her that he'd grown
accustomed to coming upstairs in the evening to the aroma of her
cooking. Or that the sight of her nursing Jenny could, by turns,
arouse him to a fever of desire, or put a lump in his throat that
nearly brought tears to his eyes. He'd keep it to himself that her
quiet singing was the sweetest sound he'd ever heard.

He could just imagine the startled look on
Melissa's face if he were to tell her that sometime during their
summer together he'd begun to think of her as his wife.

*~*~*

Three short days later, dressed in a navy
wool traveling suit and an elaborate hat graced with an ostrich
feather, Melissa stood in the doorway and took one last look at the
room where she had lived for the past few months. She'd swept the
floor and dusted the plain furniture to leave a tidy place for the
next occupant. Dylan had found a buyer to take not only his stock,
but the building and its furnishings, too. Now he was off to hire a
wagon to take them and their belongings to the docks where they
would board a steamer for home.

Home. She let her eyes follow the line of the
rough log walls and the small area within them. Her gaze touched on
the stove where she'd heated her irons and cooked their
meals . . . the table where Dr. Garvin had
examined Jenny that horrible night she got
sick . . . the big, rough-hewn bed where Dylan
had taken her with fierce, tender passion.