The Wyoming Heir

“The manager of the accounting office in Albany has the official ledgers, but the mathematics teacher, a Miss Elizabeth Wells, keeps her own ledgers and reports to the accountant. You might check with her about the school’s current financial state, particularly in regard to the day-to-day details. She stays more informed about such things than the accountant or the school board.”

Miss Wells. Lovely. He could just imagine how that conversation would go. Howdy, Miss Wells. Now that I’ve pulled my sister out of your school, I want to scrutinize every last figure you’ve recorded in your books. “How much, then?”

Byron’s eyebrows furrowed together. “How much what?”

“How much money did Grandpa’s will bequest to them?” Luke spread the papers into a bigger mess across the top of the desk. “For all the figures on these papers, I can’t find the amount.”

“Your grandfather made no bequests for a single charity. Everything was given to you, with the exception of the sums for Cynthia and your sister. He probably assumed once you saw the extent of his philanthropic endeavors, you would continue donating in his stead.”

Luke stuck a finger in his collar and tugged. Likely another way for good old Grandpa to trap him in this uppity little eastern town. “How much did my grandfather usually donate?”

The lawyer pointed to a number on one of the sheets.

“Two thousand dollars for one school year?” Luke jumped to his feet, the thunderous words reverberating off the office walls. He could understand five hundred dollars, or maybe even a thousand. But two thousand dollars so girls could learn fancy mathematics? “That seems a little extreme.”

The lawyer’s eyes darkened, and he jerked the paper away. “On the contrary. As I already mentioned, your grandfather advocated educating women, and it’s only natural he use his money toward that end. Since its inception, the school has been very successful at seeing its graduates enter colleges across the country.”

Luke leafed through the pages. “But it looks like donations are down...enrollment, too. It isn’t much to say the graduates go to college, when there’s no one to graduate.”

“That is hardly the fault of the school,” Byron insisted. “The current economic state has, of course, caused some students to delay their educations. And of late, there has been a bit of local opposition to the school.”

Byron handed him two newspaper articles: An Editorial on the Necessity of Educating Young Women by Miss Elizabeth Wells, and Excessive Amount of Charity Money Wasted on Hayes Academy for Girls by a certain Mr. Reginald Higsley.

Luke let the papers fall to the desk. “The derogatory article appeared at the beginning of the week. Has the school board printed an answer?”

The lawyer shook his head. “Your grandfather always handled situations such as this personally. But if you’re concerned about the articles, you may find it interesting that your grandfather was a rather large investor in the Morning Times.”

Luke sunk his head in his hands. “I see.”

And he did. He hadn’t even been in Valley Falls a day, and his life had been upended, flipped around and spun sideways a couple times. He was never going to survive here for a month.

Chapter Four

“These numbers don’t look good.” Samantha frowned and glanced up from the ledger she’d had her face buried in for the past fifteen minutes. “Do you think the school will close?”

“I don’t know.” Elizabeth moved the chalk in her hand deftly across her slate, finishing up some ciphering with yet another depressing result.

She and Samantha had spread a blanket beneath a large maple tree overlooking the back fields on the Hayes estate. The afternoon sky boasted a brilliant blue, and the breeze snapped with autumn’s crispness; birds circled the air above, and the nearby brook babbled gaily as it flowed over rock and sticks.

In short, it was a perfect autumn afternoon. But Elizabeth could hardly enjoy it when her time with the ledgers last night had revealed a frighteningly small amount of money left in the bank account. The academy barely had enough funds to pay teacher salaries and outstanding bills, and it was only October. They hadn’t even purchased the coal for the boiler system yet.

Elizabeth set her chalk down. “The school board will make the final decision about the academy closing. But Jackson’s findings will be a big part of it.”

Samantha blushed and ducked her head at the mention of Jackson’s name. “That doesn’t sound very promising.”

“No. Did you spot any mistakes in my mathematics?”

Samantha shook her head and shifted the still-open book to the ground beside her.

Elizabeth sighed. If only there had been a mistake, an extra five hundred dollars tucked into an account somewhere. But Samantha would have caught something so glaring. Goodness, Samantha would have caught a mistake ten times smaller than that. The girl was a pure genius when it came to ciphering.

“I don’t suppose it matters much either way for me.” Samantha gave a careless shrug of her shoulders—hardly a ladylike gesture—and slumped back against the tree trunk. “It’s not as if I’ll be around.”

An image of Luke Hayes, standing in the school hallway with his arms crossed and that frown on his face, flashed across her mind. “Is your brother still determined to take you out of school? If there was such a problem with your attending, why didn’t he or your father protest earlier, when you first started?”

“It’s not my going to the school that’s the problem. It’s staying in Valley Falls now that Grandfather is gone. Luke’s decided I have to return to Wyoming.”

The breath stilled in Elizabeth’s lungs. Pulling Samantha out of school was bad enough, but to take her all the way back to Wyoming? Samantha’s future would be ruined. “Why would he want such a thing?”

Samantha tucked her knees up into her chest and huffed. “Because he’s a tyrant, that’s why.”

“I’m sure there’s more to it than that.” There had to be. No one would be so cruel without a reason, not even the intimidating man she’d argued with yesterday.

“Not really. All he’ll say is that Ma and Pa miss me, there’s no one left to care for me here and I belong back on the ranch.”

Elizabeth reached over and squeezed Samantha’s hand. “Do you think it would help if I talked to him? Maybe if I explained all the opportunities graduating would give you, he’d let you stay.”

“It won’t work, not with my brother. Once he gets an idea into his head, he doesn’t listen to reason.”

Elizabeth let the silence settle between them, punctuated by the chirping of birds, the nattering of squirrels and the constant trickle of water over rocks. There wasn’t much she could say, really. She’d speak with Luke Hayes, all right, do anything she could to keep Samantha here. But Samantha knew the man better than she did, and if Samantha didn’t think anything was going to change Luke Hayes’s mind, the girl was probably right.

“How long since you’ve been home?”

“Three years.”

“That is rather long.” Elizabeth bit the inside of her cheek. “Christmas doesn’t afford a long enough break for you to travel home and come back, but maybe if you offered to return to Wyoming for a visit after you graduate, your brother would let you stay until then.”

“Actually, I’ve been thinking of something else...” Samantha drew in a breath and fixed her eyes on the ground. “Do you think it’s wrong to...to hope Jackson proposes? Then I could stay here, marry him and not bother with anything Luke says.”

The meadow grew silent around them as she stared at Samantha’s flushed cheeks. Her brother and Samantha certainly showed signs of being a good match. But Samantha had dreams of being an architect, and she was still so young...

“I—I think marriage is a very serious decision, one that affects the rest of your life. If you marry Jackson, you should do so for the right reasons. Because you love him, want to spend the rest of your life with him, and will be happier with him than you’d be without him. Marrying for any other reasons will just cause trouble.”

It was a lesson she’d learned far too well when she’d been Samantha’s age.

A horse nickered somewhere in the distance, and the ground reverberated with the steady thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump of the beast’s gallop.

“I suppose you’re right.” Samantha looked up from the speck on the ground she’d been staring at. “That sounds like Triton’s gait, but who would be riding out this far? The stable hands don’t usually head this direction.”

A moment later, a rider in a cowboy hat appeared atop a magnificent dark brown steed at the far edge of the field.

Samantha scowled. “I should have guessed. My brother has to spend at least six hours of his day on a horse, or he goes crazy.”

Elizabeth tried not to watch as Luke Hayes approached, but in truth, she could hardly take her eyes from him as he raced across the field. He seemed to move as one with the strong horse, his legs hugging the beast as though it were an extension of his own body. It hardly seemed possible to imagine the man stuffed into Jonah Hayes’s office, going through the endless papers.

“Good afternoon.” Mr. Hayes reined the horse to a stop beside the blanket, towering over them like a king; then his eyes narrowed on his sister. “You didn’t say anything about coming out here, Sam.”

Samantha’s eyes flashed, and she crossed her arms over her knees. “I wasn’t aware I needed to ask permission to go for a walk on the estate.”