House of the Rising Sun (Hackberry Holland 4)

“She’s young. A serving girl wants a strong and prosperous man to take care of her. It’s nature’s way. Later on she starts to have doubts.”

He shook his head. “We’re doing just fine,” he said.

But Maggie had gotten to him. He remembered the times he had seen Ruby steal a look at the grocer’s son, a tall blond boy reading for the law in Austin, and the day he caught her watching the Mennonite boy from down the road, washing himself under the windmill.

“We could make quite a pair,” Maggie said. “I’m a good businesswoman. You know how to put the fear of God in the worst of men. We could write our names on the clouds.”

“Ruby and I have a little boy.”

“Out of wedlock, you do. I’m still your wife.” She put her arm through his.

“You shouldn’t have talked about Ruby that way,” he said, stepping away from her.

“I’ll be a good wife and a lover and a friend. We’re two of a kind. We can take on the whole world, Hack.” She looked into his face, biting down on her lip, her eyes brimming with certainty and promise. There was no question that she was one of the most beautiful women he had ever known. An empty hearse passed in the street, the rims of the wheels thick with mud and dung. Hackberry wiped his mouth with his wrist and widened his eyes and took a breath, staring into space.

“Atwood will go in front of the judge in the morning,” he said. “Maybe you can pay his fine and take him home with you.”

“Give me some credit.”

“I do, Maggie. That’s why you scare me.”

“I want you, Hack. Look into my eyes and tell me I’m lying.”

When she stepped closer to him, he felt a sense of arousal he thought he had gotten rid of long ago.

TWO DAYS LATER, he could not get Maggie’s words about Ruby out of his head. It was Sunday. The windows were open, the river green and smoking in the sunrise. Ishmael was playing by the fireplace with a toy wagon Hackberry had carved for him, the wheels grinding on the wood floor. Hackberry could not remember a little boy who laughed and smiled as much. Ruby came out of the bedroom, dressed for church. “I heard Cod Bishop talking at the grocery store last night,” she said. “He was telling people you whipped an unarmed man with a pistol.”

“Did Bishop mention that the unarmed man was a lowlife bucket of goat piss by the name of Romulus Atwood who was fixing to drop me with a hideaway?”

“Cod Bishop also said you were escorting Maggie Bassett across the street.”

“Cod Bishop says these things because he’s a liar. Liars tell lies. That’s why they’re called liars.”

“You were walking arm in arm?”

“No, I was not.”

“Ishmael, will you stop that grinding?” she said.

“I don’t want to criticize Maggie,” he said. “I didn’t do right by her. She’s what she is. But I was not walking arm in arm with her, or escorting her anywhere, or having any kind of conversation that protocol didn’t require.”

“Ishmael, I said to put your wagon away. You can play outside with it.”

“Don’t take it out on the boy.”

“Take out what?”

“You leave a teakettle on the stove, it boils over,” he said. “Don’t take your unhappiness out on others.”

“Your wife was a prostitute. You were seen coming out of a café with her. But I’m not supposed to bring up the subject.”

“Maggie was a schoolteacher when she was nineteen. She was a shootist in a Wild West show, too. She had some misadventures that put her in a bad way. I don’t think it’s fair for me to criticize her.”

“I wish I could have done those things instead of waiting on tables and cleaning fish and washing clothes for deckhands fresh off a shrimp boat.” She sniffed at her hand. “Maybe I should go scrub. Do I smell bad?”

“We don’t have to do this,” he said.

Ishmael scoured the wagon across the plank floor. “I told you to stop making that noise,” she said. She jerked the wagon out of his hands and slammed it down on the mantel, breaking off one of the wheels. She picked up the wheel and looked at it helplessly. “I’ll fix it. Stop crying,” she said to the boy.