Houston managed to tell her mother that it was Kane who didn’t want her, not the other way around. It wasn’t quite the truth but, somehow, lies to one’s mother, to placate her, were acceptable.
Houston returned to her typewriter and tried not to think of what was past.
* * *
Opal Chandler Gates slowly made her way up Hachette Street toward the Taggert Mansion. She was supposed to be shopping downtown this morning, and Mr. Gates had never questioned why she was wearing her new fox-trimmed suit with the little matching fox hat, but then men rarely understood the importance of clothing. Today, she had to took her best, for today, she was going to beg Kane to take Houston back—if he’d indeed thrown her out as Houston’d intimated.
Houston could be so rigid, Opal thought. She was so much like her father in that. Bill would be friends with someone but, if that person broke his trust, Bill would never, never forgive him. Houston had a tendency to do that. Opal knew that after what Leander had done to Houston, he could disappear for all Houston cared.
And now, something had to be done about Kane. Opal was sure that Kane had done something dreadful, something clumsy and awkward and stupid. But then, that was one of Kane’s most appealing characteristics: he was as rough as Houston was polished. They were perfectly suited, and Opal meant to see them together again.
At the big front door of the house, she knocked but there was no answer, so she opened it and went inside. The hall echoed with emptiness and the lonely feeling of an unoccupied house.
Opal ran her finger along a table in the hall. It was amazing how much dust could collect in two short weeks.
She called Kane’s name, but there was no answer. She’d only been in the house once before and didn’t know her way around very well. It took quite a while to walk through both the downstairs and the upstairs. While she was upstairs, in Kane’s bedroom, she looked out at the gardens and saw him walking across the lawn.
She practically ran down the stairs and across the grass that badly needed mowing. Following a twisting path downward, she found him at the bottom, standing near a tree, smoking one of his lovely, fragrant cigars, and staring into space.
He turned to look at her as she approached. “And what brings you here this mornin’?” he asked cautiously.
Opal took a deep breath. “I hear you got angry and tossed my daughter out of your house.”
“Like hell I did! She walked out on me! Said somethin’ about she didn’t respect me.”
Opal sat down on a stone bench under the tree. “I was afraid of that. Houston’s just like her father was. Would you tell me what happened? Houston won’t tell me a word. That’s also just like her father.”
Kane was silent as he looked back into the garden.
“I know it’s private, and if it has anything to do with . . . well, the bedroom, I know Houston is probably a little frightened, but I’m sure that if you’re patient—.”
“Frightened! Houston? You’re talkin’ about the woman that married me? She ain’t afraid of nothin’ in bed.”
Opal fidgeted with her gloves, her face red. “Well, then, perhaps it was something else.” She waited. “If you’re worried about secrecy, I assure you—.”
“Ain’t nothin’ much secret in this town. Look, maybe you can understand what made her so mad, I can’t. You know I used to work in Fenton’s stables? Well, all the time I worked there I was never allowed upstairs in his house, and I always used to wonder what it’d be like to be master of a big house like that. And later, when I wanted to marry Fenton’s daughter, he said I wasn’t good enough for her. So I left and started makin’ money, yet in the back of my mind was this dream that someday I’d have him to dinner at my house, which was bigger than his, and I’d have a lady-wife sittin’ at the end of the table.”
It took Opal a few moments to realize that this was the end of his story and she was going to have to piece together the rest of it. “My goodness,” she said after a moment. “Do you mean that you built this enormous house and married my daughter to fulfill your dream?”
There was no answer from Kane.
Opal smiled. “Well, no wonder Houston left when she found out. She must have felt quite used.”
“Used! She was damn well usin’ me, too. She married me for my money.”
Opal looked at him seriously, all smiles gone. “Did she? Do you have any idea how hard Mr. Gates worked to keep her from marrying you? In fact, many people advised her not to marry you. But she did. And as for money, neither she nor Blair have to worry about money. They aren’t rich, but they have enough to buy all the dresses they need.”
“Considerin’ Houston’s dress buyin’, that’s a fortune,” he mumbled.
“Do you think Houston wants more, the kind of riches only you can give her?” Opal continued. “Does she strike you as greedy?”
Kane sat down on the bench.
Opal put her arm about his big shoulders. “You miss her, don’t you?”
“I’ve only known her a few months, but I guess I . . . got used to her. Sometimes I wanted to strangle her because she was always makin’ me do things I didn’t wanta do, but now . . . Now, I miss steppin’ on her hairpins. I miss havin’ her interrupt me and Edan. I miss Edan. I miss baseball with Ian and my son. I miss—.” He stood, his face angry. “Damn her! I wish I’d never met her. I was a happy man before I met her and I will be again. You go tell her I wouldn’t have her back if she came crawlin’.”
Kane started up the path toward the house, Opal hot on his heels.