“Indeed!” Billy interjected. “Why, the historical section alone could account for an entire room. I think I should have never come out if Cousin Elizabeth had not insisted.”
Miss Darcy smiled tightly and dipped her head. “Miss Bennet, what do you think of the trams? I presume you have nothing of the kind in Wyoming.”
“No, we had seen nothing so splendid,” Jane agreed.
“That is not entirely true, for we saw them in New York before we sailed,” Elizabeth objected.
Jane smiled, glanced briefly at Elizabeth with widened eyes, and then turned back to her hostess. “Ahem. Riding in Mr Darcy’s motorcar was a novel experience for us.“
Miss Darcy inclined her head. “My brother purchased them only last year. I say ‘them,’ because he has another here at the estate. However, he uses this one but seldom.”
Elizabeth’s eyes widened as she spooned up a bit more soup. Two motorcars! And one not even driven often!
“…magnificent!” Billy was declaring. “That we should live in such a time!”
Miss Darcy acknowledged whatever Billy had been saying with a demure smile, then turned her attention to the butler to ask after the next course.
Elizabeth frowned and said no more through the rest of the meal.
“Jane,whathappenedtoyou?”
Jane gathered the folds of her robe and slipped onto the divan beside Elizabeth. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, you had hardly an original idea or opinion of your own! You were as dull and boring as Miss Darcy.”
“Oh, Lizzy, do not call her dull. The poor girl is frightened out of her wits trying to entertain us.”
“Frightened! ‘Poor girl’? Jane, you are too good to pronounce her the snob she is, but I am not. She has not a single thought in her head that her family and her finishing school have not put there.”
“Lizzy, do not be so harsh on her. After all, she has shown us every consideration. She is so young to be managing a household.”
“How old is she? Have you heard?”
“She told me herself that she has just turned seventeen.”
“Really?” Elizabeth tipped her head. “She looks older. I mean, not that she appears aged, but she is so… poised. How does one go about achieving that air of sophistication?”
“I expect that is all she has ever known. Remember, she was not born to harvesting hay and branding calves, as we were.”
“Oh! I hear it in your voice, you are thinking meanly of our own heritage now. Do no such thing, Jane Bennet, for ours is a proud history. I should like to see one of these fashionable Darcys sitting up all night with a sick animal, all covered in muck and cold and praying they both see the dawn. And what of staring at a half-empty cellar in the dead of winter, wondering if it will last a family of seven through to the next harvest? I would not trade our sort of courage for all the social graces in England.”
Jane squeezed her hand. “Yoursort of courage, you mean. You are the brave one. I am—” she shrugged, then offered a weepy smile—“just Jane. The one everyone speaks well of, but no one has any use for.”
Elizabeth tugged her sister close. “I do. I need you, dear Jane, if I am ever to come through this.”
Wyoming, United States
April 1900
ColonelFitzwilliamsurveyedthemotley herd assembled before him. Three hundred horses crowded the groaning corrals, most of them with humbled heads cast low, placidly lashing their tails against the biting flies. “Theseare your best?” he asked incredulously. “They are not even fit to drag the wounded off the field!”
The top hand in charge had introduced himself as Jake Bryson—a rather tallish sort of bloke, whose shirt and hat brim were stained with sweat and grime. Bryson leaned against a hitching post, shrugging his avowal that these were, indeed, his best animals, and spat a vile stream upon the ground.
Richard would not permit the man the satisfaction of seeing him grimace. Americans were revolting—or, at least, this specimen was—and they all seemed to delight in provoking some reaction from him.
“If it’s wounded men you’re thinking of, Colonel, I’ve got a handsome little stallion behind the smithy. Crushed Murph’s nose, he did, and poor old Blake’ll never walk straight again. But he’s a looker! Prettiest dappled grey I ever saw.” The hand chortled to himself, shifting the chaw about his gums and never seeming to blink as he stared back at Richard.
“My men have enough trouble with bullets without the bother of outlaw mounts. I require trained animals, ready to answer the call of the bugle. Are these mongrels even broken to ride?”
