Chapter 9

Drinks and dinner were happy occasions that night. Heath was a sight and moving like an 80-year-old man, but he was alive. Nick looked better, and if his spirits were not as up as they usually were at the beginning, he loosened up as the food and drink went down. Jarrod put Mademoiselle Sophiette completely out of his mind and kept a smile on his face all evening.

Victoria and Audra had talked between themselves about the fortuneteller and the effect she was having on their men, but they decided to ignore the issue for the evening, too. It was at breakfast the next morning before any of it came up again, and it was Victoria who brought it up.

"What do any of you men intend to do about Mademoiselle Whats-Her-Name today?" she asked very bluntly after the prayer was finished.

Jarrod, Nick and Heath looked at each other. They hadn't really talked about it, but separately they had come to pretty much the same conclusion. Heath said it first. "I need to go into town and find her and talk to her this morning. I need to tell her what happened yesterday, and we need to finish some things up."

"And I need to stay away from her," Nick said. "I don't want to run the risk she'll start telling me my future again. I'm better off not knowing."

"Knowing what she saw did help you out yesterday," Audra said.

Nick smiled self-consciously. "Maybe. We didn't know the details when it happened though. I don't know. I just know I don't want to have another couple days like I just had. I don't need to be talking to her again."

"And what about you, Jarrod?" Victoria said. "Are you still comfortable with ignoring what she said about you staying away from Nick and Heath?"

"I've thought about it," Jarrod said. "I'll admit, after the detail she gave me yesterday about what she saw happening to Nick and Heath and how it worked out that way, I started second guessing myself. But, I'm with Heath on this. He needs to talk to her, and if there's anything more for her to say about me, she'll say it to him. I don't need to be talking to her again, either. And I'm not going anywhere."

"Are you comfortable with talking to her alone, Heath?" Audra asked.

Heath nodded. "Yeah. I am."

"Well then," Victoria said. "It sounds like we're all in agreement. And Jarrod will be in town if you need him, Heath."

Heath shook his head. "I don't think I'm gonna need him. I think I'm gonna be able to put things with Sophie to rest on my own."

So Heath rode into town with Jarrod, but they didn't talk much. Jarrod could see Heath was going over what he was going to say to Sophie in his mind, and Jarrod didn't want to interrupt him. He didn't envy Heath the conversation he was about to have – he knew how discussions with old flames could go, and this one was going to be more complicated than most.

When they rode into town, Jarrod said, "Let me check with the telegraph office and see if I've gotten anything from Pinkerton."

They checked together, but there was nothing from Pinkerton yet. Jarrod wasn't surprised. There hadn't been enough time for Pinkerton to do their job.

"I guess Sophie's at the Stockton House, don't you think?" Heath asked as they left the telegraph office.

Jarrod nodded. "Check the café there first. She might be having breakfast. Good luck, Little Brother." Then he gave Heath a clap on the arm and went off to his office.

Heath was moving better than he had been the night before, but he was still noticeably slow about it. He passed a couple ladies he knew as he went into the hotel and tipped his hat to them. Once inside, he went straight to the café – and ran right into Sophie coming out.

"Heath!" she said as they stopped and looked at each other. Then she saw his banged up face. "Oh – it looks like you did run into some trouble."

"Yesterday," Heath said. "Sophie, I'd like to talk, someplace private."

Her room was out of the question. "I took a walk yesterday and found a little park out behind the courthouse," she said.

Heath nodded and offered his arm.

As they left the hotel and started down the street, Sophie said, "I see your face is cut up a bit."

"I wrestled a tree," Heath said. "I'm banged up a bit, but you should see the tree."

Sophie chuckled. "I guess that's what you want to talk about. Jarrod told you what I said to him yesterday."

"Yes, but after I wrestled the tree."

They walked in silence then until they came to the small park behind the courthouse. There were benches there, none of them occupied at this hour. Heath guided Sophie to a bench out in the sunshine and they sat down. For another long moment, they just sat. Sophie adjusted her sunbonnet and placed her reticule in her lap.

Heath asked, "How are your shows at the Gaiety going?"

"Very nicely," she said. "I took a couple private readings yesterday evening, too. But frankly, I'll be happy to be finished here. I think you'll be happy to have me finished here."

"That's part of what I wanted to talk about," Heath said. "Something I have to tell you that you probably already know. All those years ago, one of the reasons I decided to leave was that thing you told me about killing a man. It was too much for a simple cowhand. It's pretty unsettling to have someone in your life who's always warning you about bad things that are coming up."

"And you got a nasty reminder of that when I told your brother Nick what I told him."

"I didn't get as nervous as he did. Guess I had time to think about it and when I saw him get nervous, I figured I had to steel up."

"But you still don't like it."

"No. I don't like it. I never know whether to believe it or not, and that makes me unsettled. Nick believed you, but he was nervous because he thought what was gonna happen would be his fault."

"Was it? It did happen, didn't it?"

"Yeah, just like you told Jarrod yesterday. A heavy rain and I got caught in a flash flood, and Nick did kind of feel the blame for it, since he sent me into the creek right before the flood hit. But that's all over now. I'm all right, he's all right. We didn't know all the details you told Jarrod when it happened, and knowing them probably wouldn't have made much difference anyway. All that did was make Jarrod uneasy, once he found out what happened to us."

Sophie sighed. "And your brother Jarrod was already uneasy with me – well, he was downright angry."

"Jarrod's the oldest of us. He gets protective. It's always been his job."

"I have a hard time believing you'd let anyone get protective toward you."

Heath smiled. "Now and then it's kinda nice. But that's the other thing I need to talk to you about. What you said to Jarrod – about staying away from me and Nick. It made Jarrod more angry with you, but after yesterday, it unsettled him a bit. And Nick, he's still trying to decide if what happened to me was his fault and now he's got Jarrod in the back of his mind – "

"I lied, Heath," Sophie said suddenly.

Heath looked at her.

She looked back and shrugged. "I lied. I made Jarrod angry? He made me angry, too, so I just pulled that warning out of thin air to upset him. And maybe you were right when you first came to see me at the Gaiety. Maybe I still wanted to get back at you for leaving me. I did see what I said I did, about you and Nick, but Heath, I haven't seen anything about Jarrod, and I haven't seen anything more about you or Nick or anybody in your family. I'm sorry."

Heath sighed, happy to hear there was no other warning to worry about, but troubled that she had lied to hurt Jarrod intentionally, and to hurt him. Had she done that to him at any time when they were together years ago? He didn't want to know now. "That gift you have can be a weapon, too, Sophie."

"And I used it as one," she said. "I don't blame you if you hate me about it. It was hurtful of me. I knew it was wrong of me when I did it, but that doesn't excuse anything, does it?"

Heath looked at her. She did seem to have genuine regret in her eyes, but - "No, it doesn't excuse anything," Heath said.

Sophie sighed, and smiled a little. "I guess that's all there really is to say. I'm still a petulant girl who wants to help other people but can't avoid hurting them when they don't appreciate me, or don't give me what I want, or leave me."

"There really is a lot to love about you, Sophie," Heath said. "You're still young. You're still gonna do some growing up. Someday, somebody's gonna come along and you're gonna want to keep your gift as a gift, and throw away the weapon."

Now she laughed and looked up at the sky. "And pigs will go flying over in a V formation, just like geese. Ah, Heath. I'll never change. I'm sorry I hurt your family. I'm not sorry I warned you to be careful, but I am sorry for the rest of it. But this gift, this curse – I'm never gonna be able to tame it. I think it would be best if you and yours just let me finish my engagement here and go on my way. Don't any of you come see me again."

Heath didn't bother to tell her they had all decided on that already. She didn't have to be a fortuneteller to know it. He stood up, and he leaned over and kissed her. "Don't you give up on yourself, Sophie. I'll always wish the best for you. Good-bye."

He left her there, walking away as stiff and sore as ever. He tried to put her out of his mind when he reached the street, but he saw the Gaiety and he saw Jarrod's office, and he saw Nick's horse hitched outside the office. Heath went on inside Jarrod's building and climbed the stairs.

Jarrod's secretary's eyes grew wide when she saw the state of Heath's face. He smiled. "Is he available?"

She nodded.

Heath gave a knock on the door to the inner office and then went in, finding Jarrod seated behind his desk and Nick seated in front of it. They looked up at him as he came in and took the chair next to Nick's.

"Is it over?" Jarrod asked.

Heath nodded. "She admitted she lied about seeing some reason you should stay away from Nick and me. She was mad at you for doubting what she said to Nick and getting angry with her. Don't go getting mad about this, either one of you. There's a lot of little girl still in that woman."

"She's young, she'll grow out of it," Jarrod said.

"I'd rather not be around to see that she does," Nick said.

"She knows she won't be seeing any of us again. I think she's just as happy about it. I know you just got here, Nick," Heath said, "but I'm ready to head on home and get back to work if you are."

Nick got up. "I'm ready. And by the way, Jarrod, I never gave her any money, so we don't owe each other a thing on that bet. And warning or no warning, we're gonna be extra careful today. Neither one of us is in tip-top shape."

Heath stood up, too, but then so did Jarrod. "Hang on a minute," Jarrod said. "I can put today's work off until tomorrow. Maybe I'll go help you finish up stringing that wire across the creek, just to prove we're not jinxes for each other."

"Why in the world would you want to fix fence?" Nick asked. "You wanna look as banged up as we do?"

"No," Jarrod said with a smile. "But since I DON'T have to avoid being around you, I might as well help you two cripples out."

"We're gonna have to repair that bridge across the creek, too," Heath said. "Some storm debris from yesterday banged it up worse than we got banged up."

Jarrod grabbed his hat and they all headed for the door. Nick said, "Here's hoping it doesn't rain any more today."

It didn't.

The End