Dorothy Garlock Read Online Free

you keeping it a secret?”
    “We were afraid you wouldn’t give Tucker the job if you knew about me and . . . she’d never go away and leave me.” She paused to give him a chance to speak. He didn’t. “Mr. Steele, I’m not her sister, either. Tucker and I are orphans and we don’t have anyone but each other, but we’re not sisters. I feel I should be honest about that, too.” To her surprise he laughed. “You suspected that, too?” she questioned innocently.
    “I didn’t really think about it, but there’s no family resemblance,” he pointed out.
    “I know. People have told me that Tucker is beautiful. Very beautiful. Is it true?”
    “Yes,” he said simply. “Yes, she’s very beautiful, but so are you.”
    “I am?” She said it with disbelief. “Tucker said I was, but Tucker loves me.”
    “She’s right about that, anyway.”
    “I came to ask if Tucker still has the job. She’s awfully worried and I asked Lottie if she could get in the wagon and cry. She’d just die if she knew I said
that! She hates for anyone to see her cry. She’s real proud.”
    “I could see that,” Lucas commented dryly.
    “Well? Are you going to send us back?” Laura pressed.
    “What for? Have you another terrible secret to tell me?”
    Laura giggled. “Well . . . I could tell you about Tucker getting fired ’cause she whacked Mrs. Rogers’s husband with a razor strap.”
    Lucas chuckled. “That sounds like something I’d like to hear about.”
    Tucker’s tears dried up as soon as she got into the wagon. She had let them all out in front of Lottie and had felt like a ninny. She sat for a while and tried to convince herself that Lucas Steele wouldn’t be angry because she had been less than honest about Laura. How would a man like Lucas Steele know what it was like to be a woman and alone? No, not alone; she had Laura. If not for Laura she might have given up long ago and taken the easy way out, hired out to a farmer or plantation owner, or ended up working in a saloon. That was the usual fate of the girls from the throwaway farm. She’d had a taste of the pawing and the pinching. The very thought of it made the hair stand up on the back of her neck.
    She sat thoughtfully. A big green horsefly buzzed in under the canvas and she watched it buzz out again. A woman’s voice, scolding a child, reached her. A mockingbird sang in the tree above. Somewhere during this time her ambivalence left her.
She smoothed her hair with a few quick, artful movements and realized how stiflingly hot it was in the airless wagon. She wiped her face on the hem of her dress and climbed out. She had never before felt so physically and emotionally wrung out.
    Tucker circled the wagon before her eyes began to search the camp for Laura. Her heart started to pound as it always did when Laura wasn’t where she expected her to be. She began to walk rapidly down the line of wagons, but stopped when she saw Lottie coming toward her.
    “Where’s Laura?”
    Lottie took her time answering. “Over yonder.” She jerked her head back over her shoulder, a habit Tucker was to become used to.
    “Over where? She can’t wander around till she gets to know a place,” Tucker cried desperately.
    “She’s with Lucas. Leave ’er be.” The big woman said the words flatly, leaving no room for argument, and walked on.
    Tucker was stunned speechless for a moment, then resentment took over. She followed after Lottie.
    “You took her to him? I said I’d talk to him after supper.”
    “Yup. I took ’er. He’ll bring ’er back.”
    “Lottie!” Tucker’s heart was racing even though it felt as heavy as lead.
    “The little gal knows what she’s about.” Lottie kept on walking.
    “She doesn’t! She’s only . . . fourteen.”
    Lottie stopped. “If’n she’s fourteen, so am I. And
if’n she is, she’s got more gumption than some
teachers
I’ve met up with.”
    “Well . . . !” Tucker felt the color drain from her face.
    “I