“Horrible. Dreadful. Sleb says that cats have better voices than these women.”
Maddie ignored ’Ring’s knowing smile.
Jamie continued. “But Yovington said he had a real good imagination, so he had these women following him around wherever he went. Sleb said the men could stand Yovington’s hangings and they could stand the cold and the loneliness, but they could not stand the singing of those women. Every three months or so the men would run the woman off and that would give them some peace before Sleb could train another one.”
“And that’s why he kidnapped Laurel?”
“I guess he thought he could kill two birds with one stone, one golden stone, that is. Sleb thinks that when you got to the end and had sung in all six towns and the kidnappers hadn’t returned your sister, Yovington was going to send you a message saying that he’d found your little sister and would you please come to Desperate and get her.” Jamie looked at Maddie. “I’m not sure he meant to release you after he had you. Sleb thinks he meant to return Laurel to you only if you married him.”
“Marriage?” Maddie said, horror in her voice.
’Ring smiled at her. “I’ve heard of worse ideas.”
Maddie looked away, hiding her red face.
“We’ll leave in the morning,” ’Ring said to his brother, and Jamie nodded.
“Leave for where?” Laurel asked.
“It’s my guess they mean to make heroes of themselves,” Toby said, and his tone told what he thought of the idea.
Neither Jamie nor ’Ring said a word.
“ ’Ring,” Maddie said softly. “Where are you going?”
“To Desperate, of course.”
Immediately, her heart began to pound, but then she tried to calm herself. Her mother had always said that there was nothing so
unreasonable as a man who had his mind made up. “Why are you going to Desperate?”
“Unfinished business.”
She started to raise her cup to her lips, but her hands were shaking too badly. “Guns,” she whispered. “You mean to go in there with guns. You mean to do some killing. You mean to get yourself killed.”
“I have no such intention,” he said indignantly. “I mean to take Yovington off his mountain and see that he’s brought to trial for what he’s done.”
“It isn’t any of your business. You should leave this to…to people in authority.”
“And who would that be?”
“I don’t know. The army. Yes, that’s it, take your army up there.”
He gave her one of those indulgent smiles that men seem born knowing how to do. “This has nothing to do with the army, and, besides, the army assigned me the job of taking care of you and it’s you who Yovington has hurt the most.”
She stood up and looked down at him. “Yes, it’s me who the man has hurt the most, and it seems that it’s my right to say what I want. I have Laurel back now, and that’s all I want. Tomorrow you can take me back to my father’s house, and we’ll leave Laurel there.”
He looked up at her. “I have to go after Yovington.”
“You have to have revenge, that’s what. That’s all this is, revenge, nothing else.”
He caught her hand in his. “No, it’s not revenge, it’s something that I have to do.”
She looked down at him and knew that there was nothing that she could say that was going to change his mind, and she suddenly saw what love really was, that it was accepting a person as he was. Not trying to change him into what you wanted him to be, but accepting him just as he was. He was a man who took his responsibilities seriously, a man of honor who would do whatever he thought needed to be done, regardless of any danger to himself.
She blinked back tears of fear as she looked down at him and squeezed his hand in hers.
He smiled at her, then pulled her to sit on the log beside her.