Midnight Rider

“And I’ve told you how I feel,” he said narrowly. “Eduardo hasn’t been near the place in two weeks,” he added, and refused to let her know how that worried him. He didn’t think much of her abilities to attract Europeans, but Eduardo had this way of looking at her just recently. He liked Eduardo, too, and respected him. It would have been the ideal match. He wondered why Eduardo had apparently changed his mind after their discussion. “It seems that he’s no longer in the running, my girl, so it’s my two candidates or else.”

What he said was true. Eduardo hadn’t come to call, which was very unusual for him, and Bernadette had worried herself sick about the reasons. It was impossible to invite herself to his ranch, so she waited in vain for him and watched her dreams disintegrate. She knew that without the hope of Eduardo as a suitor, her father would turn quickly to his other two candidates. As he had.

Bernadette stared down at him with a drawn face. “Maybe they won’t want me,” she said daringly.

“They’ll want you,” he replied tersely. “Because they want my money!”

She made one last attempt to reason with him. “Don’t you care if I’m happy or not, Father?” she asked miserably. “Don’t you care at all?”

His face closed up, went tight and hard. “I’m not happy,” he pointed out. “I’ve been alone and miserable for twenty years because of you!”

Her features contorted. “You aren’t blameless!”

He looked as if he might explode. “How dare you speak to me in such a way!” he blustered. “How dare you!”

Her lower lip trembled. She gripped her riding crop more firmly, until her knuckles went white. “I hope I never live long enough to treat a child of mine the way you’ve treated me,” she said huskily. “And I hope you live long enough to be sorry for it.”

He pulled himself up to his full height and glared at her. “That day will never come.”

She turned her horse and rode away, leaving him standing alone.

She couldn’t remember ever feeling quite so low and desperate. Eduardo was out of her reach, and her father’s candidates were to arrive the following day. She wondered if she could run away without being caught. It was a poor way to cope, but she knew that other young women in similar predicaments had done such things. If all else failed, it was one workable solution, even if her precarious state of health made it impractical.

* * *

SHE WAS DEEP IN THOUGHT, without any real idea of where she was going. This area of south Texas was mostly scrub brush and cacti, sand and dust and heat, even in the spring. But she loved the sense of freedom it gave her with all that long empty horizon in front of her. It was like looking at the stars at night; it made her little problems seem very insignificant. Right now, she needed that most of all. The imminent arrival of two titled Europeans made her sick to her stomach. Perhaps they wouldn’t like her. But if they needed money badly enough, they’d probably be willing to marry a scarecrow, a cow, anyone. Even her.

She guided the little mare toward the stream that crossed her father’s land. There were a few willow trees there, along with mesquite and some poplars. The leaves were the soft, pale green of new growth, and there was a breeze. It wasn’t as smoldering hot as it usually was, either. She dismounted under a big mesquite tree and tossed her flat-brimmed hat to one side as she bent to wet her handkerchief in the stream.

Birds called overhead and she wondered at their sudden burst of noise just as she heard hoofbeats approaching.

She turned, moving closer to her mount. It was a lonely place, and there were often bandits about. But as the rider approached, she recognized him at once and sighed with relief. As usual, a thrill of sheer joy went stabbing through her at the sight of him. He sat a horse like a soldier, very straight and proud, and she loved just looking at him.

“What are you doing out here alone?” Eduardo called curtly as he drew close.

His words breaking the spell she seemed to be under, she smiled ruefully. “I’m escaping Mrs. Carlisle.”

His eyebrows arched under the wide brim of his hat and he smiled. “Mrs. Carlisle?”

“She’s organizing the grand ball,” she informed him. “I’m trying to stay out of her way. So is everybody else. The whole staff may resign any minute now.”

“Shouldn’t your out-of-town guests be arriving soon?”

“My father’s handpicked matrimonial candidates arrive tomorrow,” she said with undisguised revulsion. “One’s German, the other’s Italian.”

“He invited them, then,” he murmured under his breath. This was a surprise. Colston Barron hadn’t seemed interested in other candidates for Bernadette’s dowry the last time he’d spoken with the man. Of course, he’d avoided the place like the plague since then. Guilt had kept him away; it disturbed him to think of using Bernadette for his own ends. He was ashamed of himself, of his less than noble motive, wooing a woman he didn’t love for the sake of financial gain. It was dishonest at best, and he was too honorable not to be suffering from a bad conscience.

“Of course he invited them,” Bernadette replied. She glanced at him sadly, with faint accusation. “You’re not one of his prospective hopefuls, by the way, in case you were wondering. That should be of some comfort to you.”

He pulled a cigar case from his shirt pocket and extracted one of the Cuban cigars he favored. He produced a small box of matches and lit it before he spoke. “I see.”

She wondered why he should suddenly look so thoughtful, so tense. He turned away and she studied his profile. Could he be upset because he wasn’t a candidate for her hand? She didn’t dare hope so. But what if he was?

He felt her avid gaze and turned to meet it. She colored prettily. “How are you going to feel about living abroad?” he asked.

“It’s that or find some way to support myself,” she said wearily. “My father says either I get married or I get out.”

“Surely not!” he exclaimed angrily.

“Well, he threatened to do it,” she replied. She rubbed the mare’s soft muzzle absently. “He’s determined to have his way in this.”

“And will you do what you’re told, Bernadette?” he asked quietly.

She looked up at him, red-cheeked. “No, I will not! Not if I have to take a job as a shop girl somewhere or work in a factory!”

“Your lungs would never survive a job in a cotton mill,” he said softly.

“The alternative is to be someone’s servant,” she replied miserably. “I couldn’t hold up to do that, either. Not for long.” She leaned her cheek against the horse’s long nose with a sigh. “Why can’t time stand still or go backward?” she asked in a haunted tone. “Why couldn’t I be whole instead of sickly?”

“I can’t believe that any father would cast off his daughter just because she refused to marry a candidate of his own choosing,” he said irritably.

“Isn’t it done in Spanish families all the time?”

He dismounted, cigar in hand, and moved to stand beside her. He was so much taller that she had to toss her head back to see his lean, dark face when he was this close.

“Yes, it is,” he replied. “In fact, my marriage was the result of such an arrangement. But American families usually don’t make those kinds of choices.”

“That’s what you think,” she replied. “It’s done all the time in the wealthier families. I knew a girl at finishing school who was forced to marry some rich French vintner, and she hated him on sight. She ran away, but they brought her back and made her go through with the ceremony.”

“Made her?”

She hesitated to tell him why. It was vaguely scandalous and one didn’t speak of such things in public, much less to men.

“Tell me,” he prompted.

“Well, he kept her out all night,” she said reluctantly. “She swore that nothing happened, but her family said she was ruined and had to marry him. No other decent man would have her after that, you see.”

His dark gaze slid down her slender form in the riding habit and he began to smile in a way he never had before. “How innovative,” he murmured.

“I went to the ceremony,” Bernadette continued. “I felt so sorry for her. She was in tears at her own wedding, but her father was strutting. Her new husband was a member of the old French nobility, the part that didn’t die in the Revolution and was later restored to its former glory.”

“Did she learn to accept this match?” he probed.

Her eyes clouded. “She hurled herself overboard on the ship taking them to France,” she said, and shivered. “Her body washed up on shore several days later. They said her father went mad afterward. She was his only child, and his wife was long dead. I felt sorry for him, but nobody else did.”

Eduardo smoked his cigar and stared at the muddy water of the stream. There had been a good rain the day before, and the ground was soaked. He felt oddly betrayed by what he’d heard. He wondered why Bernadette’s father had such a quick change of heart. Perhaps he realized that Eduardo wouldn’t be easily led in business, or perhaps he felt that a man who was half Spanish wasn’t the sort of connection he wanted to have. It stung Eduardo to think that Colston might feel he wasn’t good enough to marry his daughter.

“I’m sorry if I’ve embarrassed you,” she said after a long silence had fallen between them.