Softly Falling (19 page)

“It’s John James Sinclair. I was part of a twin that died. He was going to be James, so I got both names when they figured I was going to live.”

She had been on the Bar Dot long enough to learn a few things. “Tell me, do you have a brand for Bismarck?”

“I do, indeed.” He picked up the clean slate from Amelie’s desk and drew a circle, with two Js back to back. “Circle Double J. Ind . . . Pierre did it for me. I registered it last spring in Cheyenne. Some folks call my place the Double J, but I like Sinclair Ranch.”

She took a piece of paper and printed his name. “There you are: John James Sinclair, and Jack underneath.” She drew the brand too.

He took the paper from her and studied it; then he looked at her with that level gaze that allowed no wiggle room. He swallowed, but his gaze never wavered. “You know I can’t read, don’t you?”

“Do you want to learn?” she asked quietly.

“More than just about anything.”

“Maybe instead of
Ivanhoe
, I could teach you,” she said.

“Maybe both?”

“You drive a hard bargain, Mr. Sinclair,” she said. Lily went to the apple crate that Fothering had tacked up to hold her paltry supplies and took out the extra slate. She handed it to him.

“Amelie told me that you bought one too many.”

“I did it on purpose,” he told her. “I just didn’t know how to ask you. I’m too old for school.” He took the slate pencil she handed him and stuck it behind his ear. The slate went under his arm. He went to the door and looked back, his eyes going to the motto.

“Here’s a down-home, straight-from-Georgia expression for you, Lily: ‘Chile, if you don’t just beat all.’”

“What does it mean?”

“True Greatness, what else? See you tonight.”

C
HAPTER
18

S
chool was new to all of them. They settled into a routine that felt strange at first—Nick still dragged his feet into class—but grew into a comfort that Lily felt in her bones. As her simple lessons gave structure to the four children in her charge, they gave Lily a purpose too. After the second day, when her students returned with stories of how they got their names, and even Nick seemed animated, she knew she would succeed.

Then came the third day, when the whole thing fell apart.

The morning began as the others: a reading of a psalm, and then the opportunity for class members to report on whatever interested them. Since she had been routinely ignored at Miss Tilton’s and never close to her classmates, Lily wanted to make up that deficiency in the Bar Dot School.

True greatness struggled that third morning after Amelie had shyly mentioned she had found two yolks in one of the eggs she cracked for flapjacks.

“That
is
interesting, Amelie. Next time you get one of those, show me, will you?” Lily said. She looked around. “Any other events of note?”

Some red flag in her brain made her suddenly want to overlook the thundercloud that had settled on Luella’s face. Were her braids finally too tight? Lily could not ignore the upraised hand. “Yes, my dear?”

Her lips pinched as tight as her braids, she looked at the others. “One of you has purloined my Pink Pearl Eraser,” she declared.

Her announcement was met with stares. Nick spoke up. “What on earth does that mean?”

Luella gave a put-upon sigh of indignation. “One of you ignorant Indians, or French, or whatever you are has stolen my Pink Pearl Eraser! I left it here on my desk and it is gone.”

The stares turned into frowns. Lily knew she had to intervene.

“Luella, you must have misplaced it. No one would . . .”

“Chantal stole it,” Luella interrupted. “She is envious that I have an eraser.”

Chantal’s mouth opened in shock, and her face drained of color.

“See? I told you!” Luella said. “That is the look of guilt!”

Chantal put her head down on her desk and sobbed.

Lily leaped to her feet. “Luella, that is quite enough,” she said, struggling to keep her voice low when she wanted to grab the girl and shake her. “Chantal would never steal anything.”

Sublimely confident, Luella folded her arms and stared hard at the sobbing child. “I stand by my accusation. If she will produce the eraser, I will consider the matter closed. I am being supremely magnanimous.”

You’re being a cruel little prig
, Lily thought, at a loss. “That will be entirely enough, Luella,” she said. She put her arm around Chantal. “You would never do such a thing.”

Chantal shook her head, but the sobs continued.

“A thief and a liar,” Luella said, digging a deeper rut through the previous calm of the little classroom. “I will tell my father and he will turn off Madeleine Sansever immediately.”

Amelie gasped and turned as white as her little sister. Nick leaped to his feet, his fists balled.

Lily grabbed him, but he was strong. Using all her own strength, she pinned his arms at his sides. “Stop, Nick! The eraser has merely been misplaced and we will find it. Luella, one more word and you will leave this classroom. Chantal, dry your tears.”

Lily held her breath, wondering what she would do if Luella chose to ignore her. There was no need to feign indignation on her part. She drew herself up as tall as she could, which was tall enough, and kept her grip firm on Nick until she felt his shoulders sag and the tension leave his body.

Luella held her peace, staring straight ahead, her lips still tight together. She raised her chin and narrowed her eyes, announcing with her body language that her father was going to hear of this massive injustice. Lily’s heart sank.
Please, please let that eraser be at her house
, she prayed, she who had never petitioned the Almighty because she didn’t think He played fair.

“There now. We will continue with our letters this morning,” she said finally. “Luella, take a good look at home tonight. I will go through the classroom carefully.”
And find what?
she asked herself with some exasperation.
We have so little in this room. Where could the eraser be?
“There is probably a simple explanation for the disappearance of your eraser.”

Chantal dried her tears. Nick sat down. Luella continued to stare straight ahead as though the sight of the Sansevers was abhorrent to her. Lily saw the fear in Amelie’s eyes as Luella’s threat sank home. Lily suspected that Mr. Buxton was entirely capable of doing what Luella said.

The day seemed years long, especially the hour that Lily spent alone with Luella while the Sansevers hurried to help their mother. When Luella opened her mouth, her eyes still full of ill-use, Lily put up one finger. “Not a word about this,” she said. “You and I are here to study and that is all.”

Luella glanced toward Chantal’s desk. “We could look . . .”

“We will not. Now, let us see how many words you can create by adding letters to i-n-e.” With a hand that shook, Lily wrote the three letters on Luella’s slate. “You’re a bright child and you can read already. Surprise me with two-syllable words, if you can.”

When Fothering came to fetch Luella for lunch, Lily whispered in his ear what had happened as Luella walked ahead. “I don’t know what to do. If she tells her father . . .”

The butler patted her shoulder. “Miss Carteret, she may tell her father, but I can assure you he pays little attention to what anyone says.” He peered at her in such a kindly way that she wanted to burst into years like Chantal earlier and sob it out on his chest. “We’ll get through this.”

She nodded, feeling her own ruin and disgrace as a teacher settling around her ankles like a petticoat with a broken gathering cord. Three days into teaching and she had already failed.

Somehow they all struggled through that miserable day, Nick the portrait of gloom, and Chantal and Amelie with fear in their eyes. Luella was calm and superior, and the Pink Pearl was nowhere in sight. At the end of the day, Amelie approached Luella with her own eraser in hand. She held it out to Luella, who stomped out, muttering about a used eraser that wasn’t as good as her own.

Lily held up through dinner in the dining hall. When Jack came to their shack for his reading lesson and a chapter of
Ivanhoe
, she nearly sent him away, pleading a headache, which was no lie. He took one long look at her, and that was all she needed. Horrified with herself, she burst into tears. Humiliated, she tried to turn away but he took her arm and pulled her close, his hand on her hair, much as he had probably comforted the Sansever girls when their father died.

“What in the world is wrong?” he whispered into her ear. “Madeleine is looking nearly haunted, and the girls have been crying, even though they won’t admit it.” He handed her his handkerchief. “Blow your nose and tell me.”

She did as he said. Jack had a way about him that demanded obedience without even exerting the dubious tool of a raised voice. He released her and she sat down. He sat close beside her but not touching. Her father retreated to his room.

Between gulps, she told him about the whole, horrible day. “Jack, I know Chantal is disappointed that she doesn’t have an eraser, but she would never do that. I . . . I even thought maybe Nick might do something to sabotage the school, but . . .”

“Oh no,” Jack said, his voice grim. “I made it perfectly plain to him that there would be school or I would not hire him. Did you look for the eraser?”

“Everywhere,” she said, her nose deep in the handkerchief again. “After they left, I searched the little space under each desk where they can keep things. Luella’s pencil case was in hers, but the others don’t have anything.”

Jack leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “I’m at a loss,” he told her.

“All I can do is carry on,” she said.

“Luella wouldn’t . . .”

“No, I am certain she would not,” Lily said with conviction. “She was genuinely upset.”

He sighed. “I’ll ask the hands if they’re playing a prank.”

Her heart dreary and weighed down, Lily turned for comfort to the alphabet. She had written out the alphabet—upper- and lowercase letters—on a piece of cardboard. She sounded out each letter, which only reminded her how frustrating English could be.

“Sometimes C is hard, as in
cat
,” she said, pointing to the letter. “Sometimes it is soft, as in
cease
. Sometimes it has a
ch
sound, as in
chaps
.”

“We pronounce’um shaps here.” He grinned at her. “What do you say in England?”

She socked his arm. “We don’t say the word there. Don’t tease me.”

“But it’s fun when you get all huffy,” he teased. “I recommend Sir Walter Scott now, because you’re getting cranky and I have a pranking streak.”

“I am n . . .” She stopped. “I probably am.”

He picked up
Ivanhoe
and opened to the bookmark. She moved from the table to sit beside him on the settee.

He pointed at the page. “Huh. Chapter.” He nudged her shoulder. “I know it’s not shapter.”

She couldn’t help but laugh, and maybe she had her own pranking streak. She never would have suspected such a thing before Wyoming. “Shapter Twelve.”

He pointed at the heading. “Chapter,” he repeated “Ch, ch. Ta Waw.”

“Put it together.”

“Twa. Twelve.”

“There’s hope for you. ‘Morning rose in unclouded splendor, and ere the sun was much above the horizon . . .’ ”