Mr. Mercer would not have listed you as a candidate if you did not meet my criteria. He recommended you in glowing terms.”
He obviously had a much higher opinion of the head of their expedition than she did. She’d grasped Asa Mercer’s lifeline of an offer to travel around the continent to Seattle and teach, but the trip had proved to her that the fellow was too shrewd in his dealings. He had accepted money from a number of men to bring them brides, but he hadn’t told the women someone had helped pay their passage or why. There was mounting evidence that he’d sold some of the women’s belongings without their permission so he could pay for unexpected costs for travel. This man’s connection to Seattle’s so-called emigration agent only raised her concerns.
“How much did you pay Mr. Mercer for that recommendation?” she demanded.
His brows shot up. “Nothing, ma’am. He was happy to oblige an upstanding fellow like myself.”
An upstanding fellow he might be, but she smelled deceit. “If you are one of those men who paid Mr. Mercer to bring him a bride, you can leave right now,” she informed him.
That look was all innocence. “A bride, ma’am? I assure you, I’m here for a schoolteacher.”
Alexandrina shook her head. “I know your game. You intend to carry off some unsuspecting lady with promises. By the time she realizes the error of her ways, her reputation will be compromised and she’ll be forced to marry you. You should be ashamed of yourself for offering false promises to those in need! I will go nowhere with you and neither will any of the ladies in this house.”
She thought he might back away, offer apologies. Certainly men had scrambled to oblige when the woman she’d known as Mother had used such a tone. Instead, his reaction to her set down proved his determination. He approached her and took one of her hands in his, holding it reverently and gazing at her beseechingly. He had the eyes of the deepest blue. They pulled her closer more surely than his grip.
“Miss Fosgrave, please don’t dismiss my offer,” he urged. “Nothing I said was false. We need someone of your intelligence and sophistication to bring culture to our youth. Who else but a lady of your refinement could adequately guide them into the future?”
As fulsome compliments went, his weren’t bad and neither was the earnestness of his manner. Under other circumstances, her resolve might have even wavered. But he couldn’t know that she’d heard far better from veteran charlatans who had pulled the wool over the eyes of hundreds of townspeople. His considerable charm paled in comparison.
She drew back. “Unless you have someone to vouch for your purpose, sir, I must ask you to leave.”
He frowned as if he wasn’t used to being refused. A gamin-like grin, a well-worded tease and copious amounts of compliments had probably won the day for him more times than he could count. But he would find she was made of stronger stuff.
“Do you know Miss Madeleine O’Rourke?” he asked.
Now Alexandrina frowned. “Yes. We share a room.”
His brow cleared. “Then she can vouch for me.” He grabbed her hand again and attempted to tug her toward the door.
She dug in her feet, the soles of her slippers dragging against the carpet. “Release me this instant!”
He complied immediately. “Forgive me, ma’am.” He nodded toward the door. “It’s just that Miss O’Rourke was out on the porch when I arrived.”
Did he think her so dim that she’d venture out of doors with him? “How very convenient. We must ask her back inside.”
“If you wish.” He clapped his hat on his head and strode out of the room for the front door. She followed cautiously. She let him open the door and step out onto the wide front porch, where wooden chairs sat sheltered from a misty rain. Sure enough, the redheaded Maddie was leaning against one of the porch supports, looking out toward a waiting wagon. Yet it wasn’t her friend but the team of black horses on the street that drew Alexandrina’s gaze.
“Oh, what beauties!” Just as the man beside her was one of the most prepossessing gentlemen in Seattle, his team was one of the best she’d ever seen. Those strong haunches, those alert ears, all those fine lines. She hadn’t seen their like since the sheriff had confiscated her team. Before she knew it, she was out on the porch.
“Do you race them?” she asked the man beside her.
He cocked his head as if he could not have heard her correctly, and too late she realized prim and proper schoolteachers should not know about racing horses. But he merely straightened and adjusted his bow tie. “Certainly not. I’m a serious horseman.”
That she could not believe. Even now she could see the gleam in those deep blue eyes, daring her to laugh with him. Going back inside was no doubt her best option short of ordering him out of her sight.
But she’d challenged his word, and the least she could do was follow through. She turned to her irrepressible roommate. “Do you know this man, Miss O’Rourke?”
Alexandrina had met Maddie O’Rourke aboard ship. Her short stature belied the force of her personality. Alexandrina might have had cause to doubt many people, including herself, but experience had taught her that Maddie would always speak her mind.
The Irishwoman pushed away from the porch support now with a nod. “I’ve had the misfortune of meeting him,” she said, brown eyes twinkling over her russet gown. “This rogue is James Wallin, brother to the man who wed our dear Catherine.”
Oh, no. Alexandrina had attended Catherine Stanway’s wedding, but she’d sat at the back to allow closer friends to sit near the bride. She hadn’t paid much attention to the men who’d ranged alongside the groom, but she’d heard from several of her traveling companions that they’d been an impressive group. If this man had been one of them, she had indeed misjudged him and cost herself a position in the process. She’d destroyed her future by focusing on her past. She wanted to sink into the rough boards of the porch.
Yet James Wallin seemed to bear her no grudge. He went so far as to bow to her as if they had been introduced at a formal ball. “Miss Fosgrave, a pleasure.”
She nodded, unable to meet his gaze. “Mr. Wallin. Forgive me for doubting you. I truly did suspect you were here for a bride.”
“And how could you not?” Maddie asked with a tsk. “Mr. Mercer must have collected bride prices from more than a dozen men, all of whom have had call to visit. But you needn’t worry about James here. Catherine tells me he’s a sworn bachelor.”
She could only feel relief at that statement. Unlike some of the women who had journeyed west on the good ship Continental, she hadn’t planned to marry. So many of the things she’d grown up believing had proved false, yet she still felt that marriage meant two people giving themselves to each other. They shared dreams, hopes, feelings. They benefited from the association. They became one. She wasn’t sure she could ever trust another person to that extent again. At times, she didn’t even trust her own judgments.
“I hope you’ll hear me out now, ma’am,” James Wallin said, standing taller as if about to address a congregation. “We really do need a teacher. And I believe we have a great deal to offer—a new schoolhouse that can seat as many as thirty students. A large room to yourself. A salary of forty-five dollars per quarter. All the wood you could want, chopped and stacked just outside your
