Page 30 of Silver Lining
For one long shameful moment, Low Down considered painting a pink gloss over her past. But these people were her new family, and they deserved better. So did she. Lifting her chin and gripping the coffee cup between her hands, she drew a deep breath then told her new mother and sister-in-law the unvarnished truth about herself beginning with the orphan train.
At the end of her story, they stared at her in wide-eyed silence.
When the grandfather's clock in the hallway chimed the half hour, Livvy and Gilly blinked. "Max must be walking up to the Houser's door right now," Gilly said in a low voice.
He'd ridden away without saying good-bye to anyone. Low Down lowered her head and gazed at the gold wedding band circling her finger. She'd believed he would check on her before he left.
After a minute she realized she was being foolish. She'd never required looking after, and she didn't now.
She turned her attention back to Livvy McCord and her daughter, both of whom were staring at her as if she'd sprouted antlers.
Low Down squared her shoulders and forced a shy smile to her lips. "I know you ain't too happy about me. But I'm so glad to be part of a family. I used to wonder how it would feel to sit at a kitchen table with a ma and a sister and a niece and just talk about things. It feels nice."
"Would you tell the part about the Chinaman and the laundry again?" Sunshine requested, enthralled.
Low Down laughed and retold that part of her history.
CHAPTER7
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Aterrible situation was about to get worse, Max thought, biting down on his back teeth as he tied his horse to the hitching post outside the Houser residence. There wasn't a thing he could do about it.
He'd awakened this morning feeling guilty and bowed with regret. Making love to Louise had been a mistake. The honorable thing would have been to wait until after he'd told Philadelphia that he couldn't marry her.
If he had waited, then he might have accepted his mother's surprising suggestion that he and Louise divorce immediately. He would have bet everything he owned that Livvy McCord would never advise a divorce under any circumstances, yet she had.
But if he'd divorced Louise without attempting to give her the baby she wanted, then he couldn't count himself as a man of integrity. Forever afterward, each time he made a promise he'd hear the men from Piney Greek shouting inside his head, telling him that he couldn't be trusted, that his word wasn't worth a plug nickel.
No matter what he did or didn't do, he seemed to make the wrong choice and ended by making the situation worse.
Standing beside his horse, delaying the long walk up to the door, he thought about the interminable ride to Fort Houser. If his plans had unfolded as they should have, he would have arrived at the ranch alone and received a joyous welcome. Instead, he'd brought shame and an unsuitable wife to his family.
He'd known the McCords would treat Louise cordially, and they had. But he'd sensed his sister's dismay, had read sympathy in Wally's and Dave's uneasy grins. He'd heard his mother step out of character and offer a suggestion that ran against everything she believed.
Thrusting a hand into his pocket, he gripped the green marble hard enough to bruise his palm, and he frowned at the Houser mansion, wondering if he imagined the curtains twitch beside the door.
This would be the last time he walked up those steps and knocked at that door. The last time Howard Houser called him son and shook his hand with warmth. The last time that his beautiful Philadelphia would gaze at him with a loving mischievous sparkle in her blue-green eyes or dimple into a smile for him alone.
The marble was such a small and insignificant thing to have had such a devastating impact on his life.
How was that possible? To wreak this much damage it seemed that something much larger and more dramatic was required.
The heavy carved door swung open as he lifted his fist to rap, and Mr. Houser's man, Ridley, beamed at him. "Welcome home, Mr. McCord. You're expected in the family sitting room." Smiling broadly, Ridley took Max's hat.
Then he heard her voice. "I won't wait another minute!"
She ran into the foyer in a swirl of rose-colored silk and bouncing gold curls and threw herself into his arms, not caring that she might shock Ridley. A week ago Max would have laughed and been charmed by her scandalous eagerness to see him. Today his chest tightened until he thought his ribs would crack.
"Oh Max. Thank heaven you're home!" Her arms circled his waist, and she gazed up at him with tears sparkling on her lashes. "When I learned you were so ill, I was desperately afraid you would die. I didn't know what I would do if that happened! Thank heaven, thank heaven!" Raising her fingertips, she lightly touched the tiny scars on his jawline, and he noticed the high color burning on her cheeks before she spun away from him. "You must see the wedding gifts. Every surface in the parlor is covered with wonderful things! No, you'll want to see Father first. Come with me, then. We'll have sherry, and dinner, andthen we'll examine the gifts." She stopped and cast him a long lingering look that he couldn't read. "I have so much to tell you." And then she hurried toward the double doors leading into the family sitting room where her father waited.
A sweet rose scent lingered where she had touched his skin. But this was a Philadelphia he hadn't seen before, spinning from one topic to another, whirling from one door to the next. Then it occurred to him that of course she would be nervous. This was mid-September; they hadn't seen each other since the end of May. She believed they would marry within days, without a real opportunity to become reacquainted.
Or was it more than that? He recalled thinking her last letters had seemed strained.
Wishing himself anywhere but here, wishing with every fiber of his being that he could reach into the hat again and this time draw an unscratched marble, he followed her into the family sitting room and shook hands with Howard Houser.
"Welcome home, son." Howard accompanied his greeting with what Max thought of as a banker's two-handed grip and direct sincere gaze. "You look tanned and fit after your final frivolous summer as a bachelor. Sit down, sit down. Ridley, bring glasses and the sherry decanter. And yes, my dear," he said to his daughter with a smile. "With the wedding so near, you have my permission to sit beside Mr.
