Page 41 of The Prospector's Only Prospect
She had an employer. More than one. Just this morning, a young man had offered her fifty cents to write a letter to his sister. Marigold had earned enough since arriving here to pay down five dollars and twenty-five cents of her debt to Virgil.
She still owed him well over a hundred dollars and had no way to pay him back if she went back to Topeka.
The owner of that watch is nothing compared to the hound on your heels that I am when someone owes me money.
Jaded shadows shifted in Virgil’s eyes. Tension invaded his wide shoulders and around his mouth. He expected her to leave him holding a debt and children he didn’t have time to mind. She heard his hackles rising as he pondered his own short list of contingency plans.
She couldn’t stand for him to think she was so faithless. That’s what it came down to.
So, with the same impetuous gamble she’d taken when she’d decided to use the ticket he’d sent, she said, “I wonder if I could give you a letter to post? To my sister.” She had been writing one, when she found a moment here or there. In it, she put on a brave face and glossed over all the dangerous moments so Pearl wouldn’t worry too much. “She’ll want to know I’m settling in.”
It felt like the burning of a bridge to say it aloud. Soon the weather would change, and getting back to Topeka would become impossible until spring. However, despite the deprivations here, she felt as though she had more freedom to speak her mind and be herself than she’d had at any other time in her life.
“’Course,” Virgil said gruffly as he set Harley on his feet. He gave the boy a nudge to come to Marigold as she held up the boy’s clean shirt, freshly washed in the creek yesterday. “Make a list of anything you need. I’ll get what I can.”
“Do you think you could find slates for the children’s lessons?” she asked.
“I’ll look.”
“Thank you.”
Rather than an atmosphere of relief, their conversation felt even more stilted. Marigold wanted him to be pleased, she realized, but Virgil wasn’t letting on whether he was happy or not that she was willing to stay.
“Lessons,” Levi groaned.
He’d had two years at a Catholic school in St. Louis. From what he’d said of it, they had been very strict, but they’d taught him enough that he could read the most common words in the scraps of newspaper they used for starting fires and left in the john. Nettie recognized her numbers and letters, thanks to her mother’s teachings before she passed.
There was plenty of room to continue with both of them, but Marigold reasoned she would have them captive once the snow kept them indoors. She was easing them into that eventuality by showing Levi how mathematics allowed him to measure out the checkerboard. Nettie had practiced her counting when she had found the black-and-white pebbles. They were both learning subtraction as they captured each other’s markers.
“Finish the stew. We’ve eaten.” Marigold got Harley’s arms into his sleeves. “One more game, children. Once you’re in bed, I’ll read the rest of Rip Van Winkle.”
Ira had invited her to borrow from his small library so she could read stories to the children. They were currently working their way throughThe Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon.
“You don’t want to read out here?” Virgil asked as he used a stick to move the pot from the dying fire onto a log round. “Light’s better.”
Only marginally, since the first stars were poking holes in the sky. She would need a candle either way.
“If you want to hear the story, you have to be in bed,” Nettie informed him, repeating the rule Marigold had set.
“Huh. Knew from the beginning you were the sneaky sort,” Virgil drawled.
Marigold paused in dressing Harley.
Virgil froze, too.
“That was a joke,” he grumbled and began eating straight from the stew pot.
Was it? Most jokes had a basis in truth. That told Marigold exactly how far she’d come in earning his trust. Not so much as an inch, apparently.
She smiled tightly and went about getting the children into bed. A few minutes later, when she was about to begin reading, Virgil came in to say good night to the children.
“Levi, you’ll help Emmett and Yeller build the winter paddock while I’m gone, but ask Marigold first if she needs anything, hear? Fetch the water and firewood for her.”
“Yes, sir,” Levi said solemnly.
“I know I can count on you.” His hand landed with two pats on Levi’s bent knee. “And Nettie, you’ll help Marigold with our little turnip?”
She giggled. “I will, Papa.”
