The Bridegroom Read Online Free PDF Page B

not.
    “Helga was,” Mittie said righteously. “Millie and I would never do any such thing. It wouldn’t be genteel.”
    “To hell with ‘genteel,’” Helga said joyously. “He might as well have laid you down and had you good and proper as to kiss you like that!”
    Mittie and Millie gasped and put their hands to their mouths.
    Even the wanton hussy was a little shocked.
    “Helga!” Lydia erupted, her face on fire.
    “Such talk,” Mittie clucked, shaking her head.
    “Major Bentley Alexander Willmington the Third used to whisper naughty things in my ear,” Millie confessed, succumbing to a dreamy reverie, “while we were rocking on the porch swing of an evening. Papa would have had him horsewhipped if he’d known.”
    “Millicent!” Mittie scolded.
    Helga laughed out loud. “Glory be,” she repeated, turning to leave the room. “Glory be!”
    “You don’t understand,” Lydia said, for the second timethat afternoon. The wanton hussy had suddenly vanished, leaving the fearful, reluctant bride in her place, virginal and wobbly lipped and tearful. “Gideon accused me of—he left here in a rage—” She began to cry. “He’s never coming back.”
    “You’re a damn fool if you think that,” Helga answered, from the doorway. “He’ll be back here, all right, and in plenty of time to put a stop to this wedding foolishness, too.”
    “You didn’t see—he was furious—”
    “I saw him,” Helga countered, more circumspectly now that the glory be s had subsided. “He nearly knocked me down, storming through this doorway like he did. No denying that he’s fighting mad, either. But he’ll be back just the same. You mark my words, Lydia Fairmont. He’ll be back.”
    The prospect made Lydia feel both hope and fear, as hopelessly tangled as the mess of embroidery floss in the bottom of her sewing basket.
    Mittie, now solicitous, patted her arm. “Has your headache returned, dear?” she asked. “You really do look dreadful. Perhaps you should lie down, and Helga will bring you your supper in bed—”
    “I will not serve Miss Lydia’s supper in bed!” Helga shouted, already halfway to the kitchen, from the sound of her voice. “She’s not an invalid—so just forget that nonsense, all of you!”
    Mittie, Millie and Lydia all looked at each other.
    “I think Helga has grown a mite obstinate,” Mittie confided, wide-eyed.
    “Papa would never have tolerated such insolence,” Millie observed, but her expression was fond as she gazed toward the space Helga had occupied in the parlor doorway.
    “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Lydia snapped. “Have neitherof you noticed, in all these years, that Helga not only manages the household, she manages us?”
    “Perhaps we should send her packing,” Mittie said, tears forming in her eyes at the very idea.
    “Show her the road,” Millie agreed, crying, too.
    “She’s not going anywhere,” Lydia told her aunts, softening at their obvious dismay. “You’re not, either, and neither am I.”
    Mittie sniffled. “We’re not?”
    “No,” Lydia assured her, slipping an arm around each of her aunts’ shoulders.
    No, echoed a voice deep within her heart, with sorrow and certainty. Because Gideon Yarbro or no Gideon Yarbro, tomorrow afternoon, at two o’clock sharp, you’re going to do your duty as a Fairmont and marry Jacob Fitch.
    Lydia lifted her eyes to the Judge’s portrait, glaring down at her from above the fireplace.
    Sure as sunrise, he was breathing.
     
    T HE FIRST THING G IDEON had to do was talk himself out of going back to the Golden Horseshoe Saloon and swilling whiskey—forget beer—until he stopped thinking about Lydia Fairmont.
    The second thing was track down Jacob Fitch.
    That was easier. He asked about Fitch on the street, and was directed to the First Territorial Bank, right on Main Street.
    Still full of that strange fury Lydia had stirred in him, Gideon strode into that bank as though he meant to hold it up at gunpoint, and