“Why do you have a picture of her on your dresser?”
Another mistake, and I wish I could put up a dam to keep the words I’m thinking from flowing out of my mouth, but a strange, desperate fear has gripped me so hard that I don’t think I could do it for all the gold in California.
He slams his pipe down on the table. “You’ve been in my room.”
“Just . . . once . . . to clean. I was sweeping that day. I haven’t gone back in since.” That last part, at least, is true.
He says nothing. We stare at each other a long moment.
“Open the other package,” he says.
My fingers tremble as I untie the twine and fold aside the paper to reveal another pair of women’s boots, even fancier than the last, with little cuffs of lace folding over the ankles.
“I’ve commissioned a gown also,” he adds. “It will take time to finish, but there will be a Christmas ball in Sacramento, the first ball to be held in the goldfields. It’s imperative that you look your best, for I expect it to be well attended. I plan on making several good connections there.”
I stare down at the shoes. They are the silliest things I’ve ever seen. I couldn’t make it from here to the outhouse without ruining them.
“Leah?”
“You didn’t answer my question. About my mother.”
Hiram pauses, as if deciding something. Finally he slides onto the bench and gestures me to sit.
I do, folding my hands carefully in my lap to hide their trembling.
“Your mother was very special to me,” he begins.
“I know,” I admit. “Free Jim told me you were sweet on her. Everyone was surprised when she went and married my daddy instead of you.”
His fist comes down hard on the table. “We were sweet on each other!”
I flinch back. “Yes. Of course. That’s what I meant.”
Some of the fight bleeds out of him, and he says, “No one was more surprised than I. Elizabeth and I were engaged. Then one morning I went into town and learned that she and Reuben had tied the knot, all secretive.”
His gaze becomes distant. “That was the worst time of my life, you know. I’ve never felt so betrayed. So . . .” He swallows hard. “So lonely. My brother stole the woman I loved right out from under me.”
This part I knew, but it still doesn’t explain why he’s dressing me to look like her. Or why he killed them both. I keep my voice neutral when I ask, “Why did Daddy do it, do you think?”
He frowns. “I wish you’d stop talking about him.”
“Why? So you’ll stop feeling guilty for murdering him?”
He stares at me, neither in shock nor rage, but like a bookkeeper adding up a column of numbers. He retrieves his pipe and takes a good long puff. I expect he’s working himself up to deny everything, but what he says is: “He deserved it.”
I gape at him.
The vision appears unbidden in my head: my daddy lying on the steps, his blood staining the wood, his face frozen in surprise.
“He took everything from me,” my uncle continues. “Everything!” His fist pounds the table again, and the corner of his mouth gleams with wetness.
“Just because Mama chose to marry him—”
“He took my woman, my land, and you. Even you.”
“What in tarnation are you going on about?” Tears are leaking from my eyes now. They’re born of anger and frustration and a whole heap of grief that I mistakenly thought had faded to a tiny tickle in the back of my head. But in this moment, facing down my deranged uncle, I miss Mama and Daddy more than anything.
“Don’t you see, Leah? Haven’t you figured it out? Reuben always said you were a smart girl, but—”
“For heaven’s sake, Uncle Hiram, just spit out whatever’s on your mind.”
“You’re mine. My very own girl. Born of the love shared between Elizabeth and me.”
My face prickles with sudden heat, and my breath feels thin and forced. “You’re mistaken.”
“Have you ever looked in a mirror, my Leah? You’re my spitting image. Your jaw, your chin, the shape of your mouth . . .” His eyes rove my face, searching, desperate to see.
“It’s not unusual for a niece and her uncle to share a passing resemblance.”
“Anyone with eyes to see knows it’s more than that,” he insists. “I’m your father, no doubt about it.”
I’m shaking my head against the possibility. It’s too horrible to bear. “Mama and Daddy were years married by the time I came along.”
“Yes. We were . . . This is not a proper conversation to have with a young lady.”
“Fine. Don’t tell me anything, and I’ll persist in never believing you.”
He sighs. Reaches forward and fingers the lace of my new boots. “We were intimate. Once. Several years after she married Reuben. I came upon her in the barn, and . . . well, something came over us, and . . . we were true with each other at last.”
His gaze is shifty, refusing to light on any one thing. And I know, as sure as I know the sky is blue, that his story stinks to high heaven. My hands tremble.
“That’s impossible,” I tell him, my hand going to the locket at my heart. “My mother would never . . .” He coils in on himself, like a viper about to strike, so I let my words hang in the air, unsaid.
He’s still touching the lace, rubbing it gently between thumb and forefinger. He says, “She had boots just like this.”
The boiled oats and molasses I ate for breakfast churn in my belly. I breathe deep through my nose, afraid of what might happen if I vomit up my meal all over my new clothes.
“I’d appreciate it if you put on the new boots,” he says.
“Right now?” I practically squeak.
“Now,” he says firmly. “To check their fit.”
“All right,” I manage. Keeping one eye on him, I bend down to unlace Daddy’s boots. They make my feet look huge, but they’re his, and they’ve held up through miles of mud and rock, of sun and rain, of happiness and heartbreak.
I give a quick thought to the small bag of gold shoved down inside the toe of one, but I doubt Uncle Hiram will think to check, and I plan on putting these boots back on at my soonest opportunity.
Reluctantly, I slide them from my feet. Uncle Hiram’s eyes are wide as I slip on the new ones, with mania or fever or something I don’t quite understand. He is not my father. He’s not.