Chapter 12 - The Town That Laughed at Hattie
The Silver Crown Saloon went quiet when Hattie walked inside.
Exactly as it had on the day Gideon chose her.
Only this time she was not trembling.
She wore a heavy brown coat over practical frontier clothing.
Her injured arm was bandaged.
Snow clung to her boots.
Gideon walked beside her.
Red Lawson entered behind them in chains, escorted by Marshal Samuel Crowe.
Mercer followed carrying the ledger.
Nobody laughed.
Hattie recognized several men from her wedding day.
One of them stared at her arm.
Another stared at Red.
Loretta Finch sat near the far wall.
Her eyes widened.
“Hattie?”
Hattie looked over.
Loretta still looked beautiful.
Perhaps more tired.
She was married now too, judging by the ring.
She approached cautiously.
“What happened to you?”
“Marriage.”
Loretta blinked.
Hattie smiled.
“Not that part.”
Marshal Crowe ordered everyone toward his office.
The town courthouse was little more than two rooms beside the jail.
They spent hours giving statements.
Red denied everything.
Then Mercer opened the ledger.
The denial ended.
Crowe examined the letters.
Mary’s journal.
Investor contracts.
By evening, Red Lawson faced fraud charges, attempted robbery, assault, and several accusations Hattie did not fully understand.
She did understand one thing.
He would not be returning to Dead Man’s Peak soon.
But her father’s name remained in the ledger.
Hattie sat outside the marshal’s office staring at the entry.
Gideon joined her.
“You don’t have to solve it tonight.”
“I spent months hating my uncle.”
“You had reason.”
“What if I was wrong?”
“You said he threw you out.”
“He did.”
“Then you weren’t entirely wrong.”
Hattie sighed.
A shadow fell across them.
Loretta.
“May I sit?”
Hattie looked surprised.
“Of course.”
Loretta sat.
For a moment she twisted her gloves.
Then said, “I owe you an apology.”
Hattie waited.
“In the saloon.”
“I remember.”
“I called you…”
“A monster.”
Loretta’s face reddened.
“Yes.”
Hattie could have made her suffer.
Once she would have.
But life on the mountain had changed the weight of old insults.
“You were scared.”
“That isn’t an excuse.”
“No.”
Loretta looked down.
“My husband says cruel things about my weight.”
Hattie looked at her.
Loretta laughed bitterly.
“Ironic, isn’t it?”
“You’re half my size.”
“Apparently still too large.”
Hattie suddenly understood something she wished she had understood years ago.
There was no winning a game designed to keep women ashamed.
Too heavy.
Too thin.
Too loud.
Too old.
Too plain.
Too beautiful.
The target moved endlessly.
“I’m sorry,” Hattie said.
Loretta looked surprised.
“You’re apologizing to me?”
“For what you’re living with.”
Loretta’s eyes filled.
“Gideon doesn’t say things like that?”
Hattie glanced toward him.
He sat several feet away, pretending not to listen.
“He once called me the heavy one in front of fifty people.”
Gideon groaned.
Loretta laughed.
Hattie continued.
“He learned.”
“I did apologize,” Gideon said.
“You did.”
Loretta smiled.
Then she lowered her voice.
“You look happy.”
Hattie thought about it.
She was.
Despite bullets.
Fraud.
Snowstorms.
Ghosts.
She was happier than she had been in years.
“I am.”
Loretta looked toward Gideon.
“You chose well.”
Gideon answered before Hattie could.
“Yes.”
The certainty in his voice made Hattie’s cheeks warm.
Marshal Crowe emerged.
“Mrs. Hayes?”
Hattie stood.
“A telegram came.”
“For me?”
“From Philadelphia.”
Her heart lurched.
Only one person there knew she was in Colorado.
Horace.
She took the paper.
The message read:
HEARD LAWSON ARRESTED. DO NOT BELIEVE HIS RECORDS. YOUR FATHER’S INVESTMENT WAS REPAID. I CAN PROVE IT. HORACE MILLER.
Hattie read twice.
“Repaid?”
Gideon looked over her shoulder.
“If Samuel got the money back, why is the business gone?”
Hattie folded the telegram.
“I intend to ask.”
Marshal Crowe said Horace was already traveling west.
He had received news from another investor.
He would arrive within a week.
Hattie dreaded seeing him.
But she would not run.
That evening, she and Gideon rented a room above the general store.
It was the first proper bed they had shared as husband and wife.
Hattie stood awkwardly beside it.
Gideon noticed.
“I can sleep downstairs.”
She looked at him.
“Do you want to?”
“No.”
The answer came immediately.
Hattie smiled.
“Then stay.”
He removed his coat.
Hattie sat.
For a while they simply talked.
About Philadelphia.
About her father.
About Mary.
About the cabin.
Eventually Hattie said, “I want to change Mary’s room.”
Gideon became quiet.
“Not erase her.”
“I know.”
“I thought perhaps a sewing room. Or storage.”
“Anything you want.”
“Our house.”
His eyes met hers.
“Yes.”
“Our.”
Gideon sat beside her.
Hattie rested her hand in his.
For once there was no fear between them.
Later, after the lamp was extinguished, Hattie lay with her head against Gideon’s chest and listened to his heartbeat.
She thought about how strange life could be.
Months ago, she had believed marriage to Gideon Hayes was another humiliation she would endure to survive.
Now she could not imagine returning East without him.
The next morning bells rang through town.
A stagecoach had arrived early.
Hattie looked from the window.
A familiar man stepped down.
Older.
Thinner.
Still wearing the expensive coat purchased with money he had once claimed did not exist.
Horace Miller.
Her uncle looked toward the building.
Their eyes met.
He froze.
Hattie stood.
After everything the mountain had taught her, she was finally ready to face the man who had taken her home.
But when Horace entered the room, the first words from his mouth were not an excuse.
They were a confession.
May you like
“Hattie, your father made me promise never to tell you what really happened.”
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