Chapter 4

"S houldn't you be at home resting?"

At the familiar voice, Merritt turned from where she'd been staring into space, standing in the center of the empty dance hall. Danna strode inside, crossing the echoing room to Merritt.

"I could ask you the same thing." Danna had been at the site of the fire last night for just as long as Merritt had. She had a two-month-old baby at home, along with her toddler daughter.

This morning, after walking a silent Jack to the boardinghouse, Merritt had gone home to her tiny bungalow and slept fitfully for a couple of hours. Turned out he hadn't wanted to talk after all.

When she couldn't keep her eyes closed against the winter sunlight seeping past the edges of her curtains any longer, she'd dressed and come down here.

Merritt dropped her hands from her waist, slipping the piece of paper and pencil into her skirt pocket. She'd thought to make a list of everything she would need for a makeshift classroom.

But the list was so long that she'd frozen, unable to write a thing. Her paper was blank.

"Are you all right?" Danna asked as she came to stand next to Merritt.

Merritt smiled. "Of course not." Danna knew how Merritt thrived on order. On knowing what today's plan would be, and tomorrow's…

Right now, she didn't know what the future held for her classroom.

Perhaps their friendship was unconventional. Danna was a woman in a man's job. Town marshal. She'd been a deputy for years before her first husband had passed away. She wore trousers and a vest beneath her slicker, a gun belt around her waist, and a silver star pinned to her chest.

Some around these parts thought she shouldn't have her job as marshal.

But she was good at it. And she still managed to be a good mother.

Merritt sighed. "Perhaps the church would be a better fit for a makeshift classroom. There are pews for the children to sit in."

The church building was right across the street from the burnt remains of the schoolhouse. She could only imagine the children's drooping shoulders as they arrived each day.

"We could put a few tables in here and they'd have a place to write. Have their books in front of them." Danna said the words with a calm assurance, motioning around the empty room. Merritt wished she felt the same confidence.

"We have no books or slates." She had a couple of teaching manuals at home that had been collecting dust on her personal bookshelf, but most of her teaching materials were gone as well.

"Chas and I are gonna put some readers on order with the general store. A donation, as it were."

Her heart swelled with gratitude toward her friend.

"That's very generous." She reached over to give Danna a hug. "Give Chas my thanks."

Startled to find her eyes pricking with tears, Merritt drew away and swiped at her cheeks with her fingertips.

She caught Danna's questioning gaze. "I'm exhausted, but I couldn't sleep." She explained the tears away.

"Hmm." Danna glanced around the cavernous space.

Merritt was already thinking about how some of her younger students would try to run and play in the large space.

"Let's go to the general store and borrow a broom," Danna suggested. "Taking action might help some of your worries fade."

"And some buckets, soap, and rags." Merritt fell into step beside her friend, passing through the doorway and out onto the boardwalk.

She squinted against the sun.

"How come I didn't know about your Jack?" Danna's words were spoken casually, but Merritt heard the undertone of hurt beneath.

Warmth tickled her neck and cheeks. "I thought of telling you so many times…"

Danna's sharp gaze made her flush intensify.

Why hadn't she? "I suppose…I suppose there was a part of me that didn't think he would go through with it."

Now Danna's brows drew tight with confusion. "Whyever not?"

"I am not exactly prime marriage material." She said it with a self-deprecating laugh so that the words would hurt less. "I'm not a young woman fresh from the schoolroom, dewy-eyed and naive."

One of Danna's brows rose in gentle humor. "Were you ever dewy-eyed?"

The marshal knew better.

"I'm independent and I know what I want. I speak my mind far too often and I'm—" She'd been going to say that she wasn't attractive enough to catch a husband in the traditional way.

But a memory popped into her mind. The way Jack had looked at her last night in the shadows and flickering light thrown by the fire. Like he'd wanted nothing more than to hold her close.

She hadn't felt average then. Or overlooked.

She'd felt…seen.

"Pssh." Danna made a dismissive sound, and Merritt blinked out of the memory as she stepped across a broken board.

Danna saw too much. "But he did show up. And he certainly seems interested in following through with the marriage."

Merritt thought of the way he'd strided beside her away from the wreckage—distance between them, hands dangling by their sides, not touching.

Of course, he must've been exhausted.

But she didn't think she was imagining the distance he'd put between them since he'd embraced her last night.

Had it felt as frightening to him as it had to her? The feeling of knowing someone so intimately while not really knowing them at all?

"You must be thinking I'm a fool to marry someone I barely know," Merritt said.

All the misgivings she'd felt building last night at supper writhed inside her like a coil of live snakes.

"If he's someone you could grow to love, what does it matter what I think? Or anyone else?"

Danna's matter-of-fact words hit with the force of a bludgeon.

Grow to love .

Merritt had been hoping for a friendly affection for Jack. Something calm and warm that would last years. A safe companion. The family she'd always wanted.

But when he'd held her last night, she'd felt the start of something so much bigger.

That felt more dangerous than anything else. What was she doing?

The cold wind bit into the skin of Merritt's exposed face, and she wrapped her scarf more tightly around her neck. And thought of Jack's hat. He'd given it away so easily.

"You overheard Mr. Polk this morning?" Danna asked.

Merritt nodded. "He wanted to be heard."

Danna frowned. "It didn't take much to discover where the fire started. The café had a fire in their kitchen last night. It was contained—Mrs. Steele thought it was out. But the wind was blowing straight toward the school, and some sparks must've carried over."

They'd had such a dry winter. The dusting of snow yesterday had been the first hint of moisture in weeks. It probably hadn't taken much for the wooden structure to catch fire.

"An accident," Merritt murmured.

"An accident."

Relief flooded her. She hadn't been negligent. But it was still a terrible reality that her students wouldn't have their school.

"I made a report to Mr. Polk and the other two board members," Danna continued, voice going low when they passed by the leather goods shop as someone was passing through the door.

"He wasn't happy?" Merritt asked.

"It was difficult to tell."

Merritt knew the man didn't like her. She also knew Danna had endured her own troubles with the town council two years ago when she had first become marshal.

"He hinted that the school board is unhappy that the pageant must be cancelled."

Merritt frowned. "I haven't even spoken to them yet." It'd only been hours since the cleanup. She'd been more focused on where the students would learn, how they would get supplies when the term began again.

"Will you have to argue to keep your job?" Danna asked.

The suggestion seemed absurd. Merritt had been schoolmarm in Calvin for more than eight years. She was an excellent teacher. She had signed a contract to teach through the end of the school year in May.

But Mr. Polk didn't like her. Maybe he had the power to convince Mr. Goodall and Mr. Beauchamp to end her contract early.

"I suppose it doesn't matter as much anymore," Danna said quietly as they approached the general store. "After you marry, you'll leave the classroom, right?"

Merritt shook her head. "I planned to stay through the spring, when my contract is up. They'll need that time to find a new teacher for fall." Though she had recently received a letter from her dear friend Darcy Weston that her younger sister Elsie might be looking for a teaching position.

Merritt thought of Clarissa and Samuel, Missy McCabe and Cody Billings. Even Daniel and Paul, who'd worked so hard to prepare for the pageant. Who had worked hard for recognition, to please their teacher.

She'd pushed Paul, knowing he had it in him to become a doctor or attorney if he worked hard enough.

She loved her students. And she wasn't going to simply walk away from them. She couldn't.

"If Mr. Polk still wants the pageant, we'll perform it," she said firmly. If her job was on the line, she'd give the town the best pageant ever performed. She wouldn't abandon the children, not at this juncture.

The warmth of the potbellied stove inside the store wafted over her and she loosened her scarf. Breathed in deeply.

"I'll make it happen somehow."

* * *

Piano music swelled. Smoke was heavy in the air, and there was carousing, arguing, and chatting, though it was quieter at the round table where Jack had sat down with two other men. At the bar, a woman in a skimpy purple dress lined with black lace leaned over the elbow of the nearest man.

There was a handful of coins in the center of the table. Jack didn't look at the cards face down on the table in front of him. He'd glanced at them once and memorized the cards before dropping them in front of him.

He was down a quarter so far, but that didn't worry him. Another hour or so and he'd win enough for a train ticket and to hold him over until after the holiday.

"I fold." The man with a bottlebrush mustache, across from Jack, tossed his cards on the table with a disgusted scowl.

"Same." The quiet, burly man with a scraggly dark beard tossed in his cards too.

Which left Jack to drag the pot toward himself.

Mustache collected the cards and started shuffling.

Jack watched his hands, always alert for shenanigans, though he'd be shocked if this man tried to sneak a card up his sleeve. Jack had been sitting across from him for an hour, and he was a slow thinker. He didn't have it in him to cheat.

The familiar sound of cards blitzing together should have lit Jack up. He spent more time at a card table than anywhere else.

But tonight, the cigar smoke was irritating his eyes. The noise of that lonely cowboy doing an awful job of charming the saloon girl grated on his nerves. Even the feel of the cards under his fingers was off.

He couldn't stop thinking about those moments facing Merritt on the wide porch of the two-story boardinghouse. The words had been right there on his lips to tell her the truth, but the exhausted lines in her pretty face had dissuaded him. He couldn't do it.

He'd taken the coward's way out and agreed that they should meet for breakfast in the morning.

Except he'd seen the train schedule and knew there was an eastbound train leaving early in the morning.

He'd be on it. Gone from her life. Away from this town where he didn't belong.

It would be a good thing too. He couldn't forget that Morris had been on that train just yesterday. Some distance from that part of Jack's past wouldn't hurt.

Agitated, he tossed his cards down and folded. He'd lost track of the cards during this hand, a mistake he hadn't made since the early days when he'd started playing.

He told little white lies all the time. Being a little flexible with the truth was often a way to gain the good graces of someone Jack wanted to get closer to. It was part of how he was able to help people.

But something about speaking the lie to Merritt was bothering him like a pebble inside his boot.

He scratched the back of his neck, still missing his comfortable old cowboy hat. Straightened his shoulders and sat back in his chair a bit. He just needed to focus.

"Mind if I join in?" a new voice asked.

Jack vaguely recognized the man in a sharp vest and trousers and nodded a welcome. He'd met several folks and bumped elbows with a dozen others over the course of last night and this morning. He couldn't remember them all and only had a vague recollection of seeing this man before.

A new set of cards was dealt, and the antes were slid to the center of the table.

The new man flipped open the side of his jacket to reveal a fine vest underneath and a gold pocket watch dangling from inside. He placed a stack of dollar bills on the edge of the table.

He must've been sizing up Jack in the same way Jack had been doing, because his eyes narrowed.

"Do I know you? Ah. You're Miss Harding's beau."

Jack had kind of hoped to spend his hours here tonight avoiding any talk of Merritt. None of the other men in here had given any hint of recognition.

He picked up his cards for a glance and to keep from answering.

"Does she know you're here?" Pocket Watch pressed. He hadn't touched his cards yet. "She's such a sobersides—you can bet that once you're hitched, she won't allow for this kind of fun."

Scraggly Beard guffawed and Pocket Watch slapped his knee, amused at his own cleverness.

A thunderous anger stirred inside Jack. He didn't know Merritt—not really—but he'd judged her as an upstanding woman. How dare these two mock her?

But there was a deeper part of him that knew Pocket Watch was right.

He couldn't imagine Merritt liking someone like him—the real him. The Jack who earned his living at a card table.

It shouldn't matter. He was leaving in the morning.

You aren't playing against the man across the table. You're playing against yourself. Don't let your emotions get the better of you. Bybee's voice echoed in his mind.

The man had taught Jack everything he knew about cards. And then some. And that voice from his past was right.

Jack stuffed the anger down inside until all he felt was a cool indifference.

Even if he did feel a thrill of vindication when he won a total of two dollars off Pocket Watch.

He knew better than to press his luck or raise suspicion, so he pushed back his chair after the next hand.

Pocket Watch watched him with a baleful stare while Scraggly Beard and Mustache were busy counting their remaining funds and organizing the cards for the next hand.

Jack went out onto the boardwalk. Clouds had rolled in, though it wasn't snowing or raining. He stuffed his hands in his pockets. He'd won a little—not much more than he'd need for a train ticket.

He could go back in there. Something about Pocket Watch had tangled Jack's emotions. But with a few breaths of cold fresh air, he thought he could try again. Another couple of good pots and he'd be set for two weeks or more.

And he wouldn't mind lightening Pocket Watch's pocketbook after his insinuation about Merritt.

Several cowboys moseyed up the boardwalk, heading for the saloon. Jack trailed them inside.

But he quickly saw that the poker table had been abandoned. Jack settled in at the bar, scanning the room…There. Pocket Watch was nearby, partially blocked by two of the cowboys who'd bellied up to the bar. He was talking with another man in a sharp suit.

"It's a tragedy," the dark-suited man said. "A real shame." But his voice sounded gloating. "I would've burned down the school myself if I could've figured a way to do it without getting caught."

Jack froze. Who was that, and why was he talking about the school like that?

"Hey, boss!" the barman called out, waving a decanter of a golden-colored liquid, and the man in the sharp suit waved a hand at him. Boss ? He might be the owner of the saloon.

He kept talking, unperturbed by the distraction. "Miss Harding has been a thorn in my side for months."

Pocket Watch fiddled with the squat glass on the table in front of him. "She's stubborner than an old mule. But the other two coots on the school board love her."

It clicked then, the connection that had been niggling in the back of Jack's mind since the man had sat down across the table. This was one of the men who made up the school board. Merritt's boss. He'd been at the site of the burnt building today.

The cowboy at Jack's side shifted, and Jack missed the next part of what was said. Then, "…I'd love to have that parcel of land. Doesn't your cousin work for the land office?"

"Ernie? Yes, he does, but the deed for the school land belongs to the town."

The school land?

From his vantage point, half hidden behind the cowboy and trying not to give away that he was listening, Jack couldn't see the saloon owner's face. But he distinctly heard him say, "Pages can disappear from those record books."

What a slimy snake. How low would he sink to take away the school?

"The town council won't allow the town to be without a school for long," Pocket Watch said. "They'll rebuild. Somewhere else, maybe, if…ah…something happened to that deed."

"Think how much of a failure it'd be for her and the other church ladies if I built a saloon right across the street from their church."

Things began to clear up in Jack's mind. Merritt had turned her nose up at the saloon when they'd been walking to the restaurant that first night. A thorn in my side for months . It didn't take much imagination for him to picture Merritt rallying some of the mothers around town to protest the saloons. Cause what trouble she could.

And now this man wanted revenge for the slight.

"It's not enough," the saloon owner said, thumping his fist on the table. "I want her fired. Give her a reason to leave town."

Pocket Watch leaned closer, over the table. "I just played a coupla hands of poker with her mail-order fiancé."

The saloon owner perked up. "You don't say."

"I do say."

"I wonder what the other church ladies "—the words were spat with contempt—"would think about their prim and proper schoolmarm marrying a man of disrepute."

Pocket Watch laughed. "There's probably a paragraph in her teaching contract about maintaining an impeccable reputation."

Jack's temper sparked and he left quickly, pushing through the swinging doors and out into the night. He didn't hang around this time, didn't look up at the sky.

He was angry at the two men for their plotting—but also at himself.

He should've told Merritt the truth from the beginning. He hadn't thought his presence in town could hurt her, not when he would disappear so quickly. But the man he'd just played cards with had the power to mess with Merritt's job. Jack's mind whirled as he tried to come up with a solution. How could he make this problem go away for Merritt?

He thought of those kids, their bright eyes and eagerness to please the teacher they loved so much. He thought about Merritt. About the man who was supposed to have arrived on the train but had taken the coward's way out.

If Jack left now, the men plotting to take the tract of land and get Merritt fired would have free rein to do whatever they wanted. No one the wiser.

Merritt would be alone. Without a job. Those kids would be without a teacher.

It wasn't right.

And it was just the kind of problem Jack liked to solve. Men who thought they had power over others, who wanted to take something that wasn't theirs, thinking they had the right.

This problem wouldn't be solved by winning a few high-stakes hands at the poker table.

But was there another way?