The Awakening (Montgomery/Taggert 11)

She walked away toward the swings and her little girl and Hank followed her. “What’s it like up there?” she asked softly, motioning her head toward Amanda. “The Cauldens treating you right? You here to teach Amanda?”

“It’s all right, and Amanda seems to be teaching me.” He paused a moment. “You know her?”

“I did. We went to elementary school together, but her father took her out of school just about the time she started liking boys, you know?”

Hank couldn’t imagine Amanda liking anyone, but he nodded. “He hired her a tutor?”

“That man Driscoll. I’ve only seen him a couple of times. He doesn’t come into Kingman, but I’ve seen him ride through in the back of a car. Not my type,” she said, smiling more broadly at Hank.

Not mine either, Hank thought. So, Amanda was going to marry her tutor. That made sense, what with her little mind being nothing but a catalog of information.

The woman started to say more, but the little girl fell off the swing and started to scream and the woman picked her up. She didn’t seem to be really hurt, just scared, and she kept peeping around her mother at Hank.

Hank put out his arms to her and the child went to him.

“Flirt!” her mother said, laughing.

Hank held the little girl and they studied each other. He liked children and hoped someday to have several of his own.

“Miss your kids?” the woman asked, prying for information.

“No kids; no

wife.”

“Are you and Amanda…?”

“Heavens no!” he said before he thought. “I mean, she’s engaged to her tutor, Taylor Driscoll. I figured everybody in town would know. Usually in small towns doesn’t everybody know everybody else’s business?”

“Not the Cauldens’,” she said, again lowering her voice. “They may be rich as Croesus but there are some things that can’t be bought. Not that I care, but to my mother’s generation it mattered a lot.”

“What did?” Hank asked.

The woman looked past him and he saw Amanda approaching. She took her child and stopped her confidences.

“Hello, Amanda,” she said.

“Hello,” Amanda answered, and by her blank face it was easy to tell that she had no idea who the woman was.

“Lily Webster. We went to school together.”

“Yes, of course,” Amanda said. “How are you?”

“Overworked. Well, I better be going. Nice to meet you, Hank.”

“Same here,” he said, and smiled as she walked away, all three children hovering around her. Hank turned back to Amanda. “You ready to go?” He paused, for she was staring after the woman as if she’d seen a ghost. “You all right?” he asked.

Amanda recovered herself. “Yes, I’m ready.” She remembered Lily. When they were in the fourth grade together they had sneaked into the cloakroom and tied and buttoned every piece of clothing together. They had just finished when the teacher caught them and made them unfasten everything then stand for two hours with their noses in a circle on the chalk-board. When her father heard of it he had been horrified but her mother had laughed delightedly.

But that had happened before Taylor came. Sometimes she didn’t seem to remember anything that existed before Taylor came. It was as if his presence blotted out everything that had happened before his arrival.

Now her fellow prankster, Lily, was married and had three little children and Amanda didn’t even know when her own wedding was to be.

She frowned at Dr. Montgomery’s back. His questions were beginning to bother her. He was making her wonder what Taylor had planned for them. She knew when the wedding was to be—when Taylor felt she was ready and not before. And at the rate she was going in doing what he wanted her to do with Dr. Montgomery, she was never going to be ready to be married.

She walked just behind him the rest of the way into town and breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the limousine waiting in front of the Opera House. But to her chagrin, Dr. Montgomery turned away from the car. “Here it is,” she called, hoping that perhaps he just hadn’t seen it.

He ignored her and kept walking toward a restaurant. Amanda dodged two old Ford pickups and crossed the street after him. He had to go back to the ranch for luncheon because she had to pick up the schedule for the afternoon.