A Touch of Forever Page 2

  So here he was facing Lily Salt, age thirty-four, a widow whose husband had perished in a fire almost two years earlier, mother of four children, seamstress employed in the dress shop owned by Mrs. Fish, and doing well enough on her own that she had no interest in inviting a man into her life, though according to Mrs. Springer, a number of men had tried.

  This last was rather more than Roen had expected or even wanted to hear, since he had no interest in such an invitation, but Amanda Springer, once sprung, said what was on her mind. All of it. Her husband, an affable man who tended bar at the Songbird Saloon, seized on the opportunity to disengage her at the first sign she was winding down. Later, Roen rewarded Jim Springer’s strategy by buying him a drink at the saloon, though he never explained the reason for his generosity.

  At the risk of Lily Salt turning tail and fleeing her own kitchen, Roen offered a slim, apologetic smile. “Your boy was a help to me,” he said. At the stove, Clay glanced over his shoulder and gave Roen an appreciative eyeful. Roen ignored him. “Thought it was the least I could do to see him home.”

  Lily’s slim hand, the one that curved over the back of a chair, tightened so her knuckles stood out in stark white relief. Her chin came up. “I reckon Clay knows the lay of the land a mite better than you do even with all of your fancy instruments.”

  Clay stopped stirring and stared openmouthed at his mother. “Ma!”

  Roen thought Lily appeared more surprised by her temerity than she was regretful of it. Her lips parted but she had no words. It fell to Roen to supply them. “You’re correct, Mrs. Salt. Clay was a better escort to me than I was to him, and I’ll be taking my leave now.”

  “Ma!” This time Clay’s cry was plaintive. “I invited Mr. Shepard to take supper with us.”

  “Did you now?” she asked without taking her eyes off Clay’s guest.

  “I did. He’s been taking his meals regular at the hotel and I figured home-cooked food would do him right.” He jerked his chin in Roen’s direction. “You can see for yourself that some meat on his bones wouldn’t come amiss.”

  Lily’s eyes did not stray from Roen Shepard’s angular face, but it was impossible not to note that her son was correct. The man standing in her doorway probably filled out a black coat and tails just fine, even excellently, but his blue chambray shirt drooped some at the shoulders. The butternut leather vest was loose across the chest, and his denim trousers looked as if they would benefit from a belt and suspenders. Someone needed to take him in hand. That thought flitted uncomfortably through her mind, but what she said was, “The Butterworth serves excellent food.”

  She stepped back to the stove, took the spoon from Clay, and set it aside. “Go do what I asked you to do.”

  Uncertain, Clay nonetheless hurried from the kitchen.

  When he was gone, Lily pointed to the pegs to the left of the door. “You can hang your hat there.”

  Roen did as he was told and closed the door behind him. Lily was already turned back to the stove when he was done. Her thick hair was neatly arranged in a braided coil at the back of her head. His eyes settled on the fragile nape of her neck as she bent to her work. “What decided you?” he asked.

  “It’s the least I can do to make amends for my son pestering you.”

  “Oh, but he didn’t.”

  Lily picked up a folded towel and used it to open the oven door. She removed a pan of cornbread, but not before she gave Roen Shepard a jaundiced look that said she knew her son as well as her son knew the lay of the land. It was gratifying that he accepted that silent reprimand and said nothing in return.

  The warm fragrance of cornbread was wafting through the kitchen as Hannah came rushing in from the hallway. She skidded to a halt, closely followed by her younger sister Lizzie, and the pair of them held up their hands to show they’d been washed clean. Droplets of water flew from their fingertips as they shook them out. Whatever admonishment Lily meant to say when she opened her mouth to speak came to nothing as Hannah interrupted her mother.

  “So you are here!” she said, addressing Roen Shepard. “Clay said you were but I didn’t know if I could believe him. He likes to play tricks. Say hello, Lizzie, to Mr. Shepard.”

  Lizzie, at five, was a practiced coquette. She gave Roen a sidelong glance and a sweet smile while tilting her head just so. Her curls, the color of sunshine, swung to and fro when she righted her head. “Hello.” Then she sidled closer to her sister, where she sought the protection of Hannah’s gingham skirt.

  “Hello, Lizzie. Hannah. What a pleasure it is to see you again.”

  Lily set the pan of cornbread on a warming plate on top of the stove. “Set the table, Hannah. Bowls and spoons. Lizzie, take your seat.” To Roen, she said, “How do my girls know you?”

  Hannah answered before Roen could. “We see him in church, Ma. Same as everyone.”

  Lily recognized the truth in that, but she also recognized there was something left unsaid. “I was speaking to Mr. Shepard.”

  Roen hadn’t moved more than two feet into the kitchen. His place at the table was not clear to him, and he waited to be invited to sit or asked to help. “They introduced themselves when we were in Hennepin’s mercantile.”

  Lizzie plopped herself into her chair and swung her feet under the table. “He bought us a bag of licorice whips and horehound drops.”

  Lily frowned deeply. “Why would you do that? No, Lizzie, I don’t want to hear from you. I want to hear from Mr. Shepard.”

  Lizzie clamped her lips closed and regarded Roen sorrowfully. She had told the truth but her mother’s expression led her to believe it wasn’t the right answer.

  Without the least regret, Roen said, “It appears I overstepped, and that certainly was not my intention. Indeed, my intention was to move them along. As I’m sure you’re aware, Mr. Hennepin has a large selection of candy and your girls could not decide between the peppermint, the butterscotch, or the horehound drops. It was amusing at first, and then it was painful. I had an appointment, you see, and needed to be on my way, and Mr. Hennepin was giving the girls their due, as a good shopkeeper should. I chose the horehound candies for them and added the licorice whips because I wanted one myself. And that’s how it came to pass. They were grateful and I was on time for my meeting with the town council.”

  He thought he saw Lily’s lips twitch, but whether she was amused or skeptical, he couldn’t say. After a moment she nodded once and the subject was closed. Lizzie’s sigh of relief was audible and Hannah actually winked at him. If Lily noticed either girl’s reaction, she did not comment.

  “Can I help?” Roen asked as Hannah set bowls on the table.

  Lily pointed out a chair. “You can sit yourself there. Ham will sit beside you. The girls opposite. Hannah. See what’s keeping your brothers.”

  He assumed from the position of the chairs that it meant Clay sat at one end and Lily at the other. Roen went around the table but stood behind his chair rather than sit down.

  Lily cut the cornbread and placed the warm pan on a trivet on the table. As she ladled chili into the bowls, Hannah reappeared with her brothers on her heels. The boys held up their hands for inspection, and when Lily pronounced them fit, they moved to the table.

  Unlike his whip-thin older brother, Ham was a sturdy boy with a cherub’s face and deviltry in his eyes. Roen noticed he wasn’t wearing shoes and his hands were considerably cleaner than his feet. As soon as Ham sat, he leaned over to the empty chair designated for Roen and patted the seat. “This is you here, Mr. Shepard. Beside me.” With the unaffected aplomb of a six-year-old, he held out his hand and announced, “I’m Hamilton Salt, by the way, and I am glad to make your acquaintance.”

  Lily regarded her younger son with suspicion and then her gaze slid sideways to Clay. He made a show of shrugging just as if he hadn’t been helping Ham master that introduction.

  Roen solemnly extended h
is hand and shook Hamilton’s. “It’s a pleasure.”

  “You can sit now,” said Ham.

  “I am waiting for your mother.”

  “Oh.” His mouth screwed up to one side while he considered this as Lily returned the chili pot to the stove.

  Roen skirted the table and held out Lily’s chair for her. She stared at it and then at him. A vertical frown line appeared between her eyebrows. She sat slowly, hesitantly, almost as if she anticipated the chair being pulled out from under her. That didn’t happen. Roen pushed the chair closer to the table.

  Ham watched this all with naked curiosity. “She’ll just get up again,” he said. “She always does.”

  “Hush,” Lily whispered, and under the table, Hannah kicked him.

  “Ow!” He glared at his sister. “Why’d you do that?”

  “Because Lizzie’s legs are too short.”

  It was true, but it was hardly the answer Ham was looking for. He settled into his seat and tucked his legs under him. He was quiet until Roen took his seat and then he announced, “We pray now,” and bent his head over dimpled hands folded into a single fist.

  Roen bowed his head. The prayer was familiar, one he had learned as a child, but he chose to mouth the words rather than give voice to them with the rest of the family.

  As soon as every “amen” was said, Ham reached for the pan of cornbread. Lily lightly tapped him on the back of his hand with the bowl of her spoon. “I should let you burn your fingers. We serve our guest first.” She slipped a turner into the pan and removed a square of cornbread. Roen raised his chili bowl toward her and she set the bread neatly on the lip. She did the same for Ham and herself and then let Hannah serve Lizzie and Clay.

  “Go on,” Lily said, tipping her head in Roen’s direction. “Tuck in.” She saw him nod, but she also noticed he did not take his first bite until she had. She acquitted him of suspecting that she was trying to poison him. His reticence was born of good manners, and while she was grateful for what he was demonstrating to her children, it made her distinctly uncomfortable. She wasn’t used to this deference and doubted that she deserved it.

  Lily’s throat felt thick. She choked down the first mouthful of chili and was grateful that no one noticed her distress. It faded with the second bite and was nothing at all by the third.

  “There’s plenty more,” she told Ham as he shoveled chili and cornbread into his mouth. “Slow down.”

  “It’s good, Ma. Real good.”

  “I’m happy to hear it. Now slow down.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Roen saw Ham dutifully slow the lift of his spoon to his mouth but not the size of his bite. Aware that Lily Salt was watching him now, Roen took care not to smile. Amusement would not have been appreciated just then.

  “Your chili is excellent,” he said. “A family recipe?”

  “No. Mrs. Butterworth’s. If you take your meals at the hotel, you’ve met her.”

  He nodded. “Ah, yes. Ellie. The owner’s wife.”

  Clay spoke around a mouthful of cornbread. “She’s the sheriff’s mother. Did you know that?”

  “I believe she mentioned that,” he said, his voice a tad dry. “Several times.”

  “Well, she’s that proud,” said Lily. “And no one faults her for it. Sheriff Ben is good people.”

  “I’ve had the pleasure.” Roen guided another spoonful of chili to his mouth. The aroma teased his senses. “He welcomed me, took me around to meet the shopkeepers and the gentlemen who manage the land office.”

  “Dave and Ed Saunders.”

  “Yes. The brothers. They’ve been helpful providing me with maps and plotting boundaries.”

  Clay said, “Mr. Shepard was looking at Double H land this afternoon, but I told him that Ol’ Harrison Hardy isn’t going to fool with the railroad.”

  Lily raised a single eyebrow and regarded her son with a seriously set mien. “Maybe. Maybe not. That’s business between Mr. Hardy and Mr. Shepard.”

  As a reprimand, Roen thought it was a mild one, but nevertheless Clay ducked his head and nodded.

  Lily served another square of cornbread to Roen. “How long will you be staying in Frost Falls, Mr. Shepard?”

  For all that the question was politely posed and made with an offering of sweet cornbread, Roen had the sense that if his answer was more than a few more days, it would be too long. Unless she was anticipating that he would be a frequent dinner guest, Roen couldn’t imagine why it mattered. “It’s never clear this early,” he said, hedging. “It’s hard to project a timeline at this juncture, and Northeast Rail has hired me on to see this through.”

  “But roughly,” said Lily.

  “I’ll know better inside of six weeks.”

  “Oh.”

  Roen could see nothing in the placid composition of her delicate features to indicate that she was aggrieved; yet he couldn’t shake the feeling that she was. Her children, on the other hand, appeared to be delighted.

  Hannah said, “So you’ll hardly be a visitor to Frost Falls. More like regular folk.”

  “I suppose that’s true.”

  “Oh, it is. Especially since you’re staying in Sheriff Ben’s house, or what used to be his house, and not taking a room at the Butterworth.”

  Lily frowned at her daughter. “And just how do you know so much about it?”

  Hannah shrugged. “It’s like you say. Everyone here knows everything.”

  Lily felt her cheeks warm. It was her own voice she heard in Hannah’s ironic tones. Her daughter was a perfect mimic. “Yes, well, you don’t have to repeat everything you hear.”

  “No, ma’am.”

  Roen said, “Northeast Rail is renting the sheriff’s house for the duration of my stay. I spend a lot of time in hotels and railroad cars, so this is a welcome change.”

  Clay said, “Sheriff Ben likes having someone living in the house. He told me. I work for him sometimes. Me and my friend Frankie Fuller. Odd jobs mostly. I’m real good at a lot of things. So is Frankie.” He tilted his head to the side as he regarded his guest. “You ever have a need for an odd jobber?”

  “Clay.” Lily said his name quietly, without inflection, but he nevertheless sat back in his chair as though pushed. “This is supper, and Mr. Shepard is your guest. You can talk business after over cigars and port when the rest of us retire to the front room.”

  Her response was so unexpected that Clay’s jaw went slack. Hannah stared at her mother. Lizzie and Ham looked at each other with identical frowns. For his part, Roen threw back his head and gave a shout of laughter.

  Lily took this all in, nodded faintly, satisfied, and smiled in a way that suggested she had swallowed a secret.

  Chapter Three

  Roen Shepard wasn’t sure why Lily’s Mona Lisa smile came to him off and on that evening and again the following morning as he took his seat in church. Because of Ham’s chatter and Hannah’s shushing, Roen was aware when the Salts took their usual place in the last pew. He didn’t turn to acknowledge them, presuming that Lily would not appreciate the attention. She struck him as an isolated individual and one who was not unhappy about it. Her children, on the other hand, were creatures of the never-met-a-stranger variety, and he couldn’t help but wonder if they took after their father in that regard. Except to tell him that Jeremiah Salt had operated a forge and perished in a fire, Amanda Springer had nothing else to say about the man, and Roen hadn’t minded in the least back then. Now, upon meeting the family, he found that he was curious.

  No one spoke of Jeremiah Salt at supper. They either thought Roen already knew the story or didn’t think the absence of a father and husband was important enough to mention. As with so many things he contemplated from time to time, the matter of Jeremiah Salt was likely to remain as persistently annoying as a pebble in his shoe. He wished to hell he knew why.

  H
is interest in a dead man didn’t make sense to him. He generally concentrated on the living. He’d learned early on that his job was made easier when the locals understood what he was doing and how the railroad figured to improve their lives and their livelihood. There were always skeptics and folks who resisted change, but he was a good listener and made it a practice to look for compromise. Clay’s information, offhandedly offered, about Harrison Hardy and the Double H land was something worth knowing early, and Clay Salt, at twelve years old, was likely a superior source of intelligence to Amanda Springer. He genuinely meant to be helpful. Certainly he lacked the older woman’s guile.

  Maybe, Roen thought, that’s why he wanted to know what sort of man Clay’s father was. In his experience, it never hurt to know how far the apple fell from the tree.

  When the service was over, he turned toward the back of the church. As expected, Lily and her children were among the first to leave, pausing only long enough to pass pleasantries with the minister. Roen didn’t realize he was staring after them until Ben Madison nudged his elbow and spoke so softly that only he could hear.

  “Careful Lily doesn’t take notice of your interest.”

  Surprised, Roen gave a small start. “What?” He blinked, collected himself, and turned his head to the sheriff. “Oh. I was hoping Clay would look back this way. He asked me if I had need of an odd jobber.”

  Ben flashed a quicksilver grin and repeated dryly, “Odd jobber.”

  “That’s what he said, which I took to mean a person who does odd jobs. He told me you hire him and another boy for that purpose.”

  “Uh-huh. Frankie Fuller. Good workers, the both of them. Why, do have some work for him?”

  “I’ve been thinking I might. I have some modest regrets about firing my last assistant. I’ve never worked with anyone as young as Clay Salt, but I could train him, and I have a feeling he’d be a quicker study than Joe Watson was.”