Thorn had smothered a grin at Trilby’s last riposte. “You get used to things when you have to, Ted,” Thorn said.
Trilby felt a twinge of sympathy for him. He’d lost his wife, and he had probably cared about her a great deal. He couldn’t help being rough and uncivilized. He hadn’t had the advantages of an Eastern man.
“That was good pie,” Thorn said directly, and sounded surprised.
“Thank you,” she said. “Grandmother taught me how to cook when I was just a little girl.”
“You’re not a little girl now, are you?” Vance asked curtly.
“That’s right,” Teddy agreed, not realizing that the question was more mockery than query. “Trilby’s old. She’s twenty-four.”
Trilby could have gone right through the floor. “Ted!”
Thorn stared at her for a long moment. “I thought you were much younger.”
She flushed. “How you do go on, Mr. Vance,” she said stiffly. “Speaking of going on…”
Vance smiled at her. It changed his face, made it less formidable, charming as his black eyes sparkled. “Yes?” he prodded.
“How old are you, Mr. Vance?” Teddy interrupted.
“I’m thirty-two,” he told the boy. “I suppose that puts me in the class with your grandparents?”
Teddy laughed. “Right into the rocking chair.”
Vance laughed, too. He got up from the table and pulled his pocket watch out of the slit above the pocket of his jeans. He opened it and grimaced. “I’ve got an Eastern visitor arriving on the train this afternoon. I must go.”
“Come again,” Teddy invited.
“I will, when your father’s home.” He glanced at Trilby speculatively. “I’m having a party Friday evening, a get-together for my Eastern visitor. He was a relation of my wife’s, and he’s somewhat famous in academic circles. He’s an anthropologist. I’d like you all to come.”
“Me, too?” Teddy asked excitedly.
Vance nodded. “There’ll be other youngsters around. And Curt will be there, with his wife,” he added, with a pointed glance at Trilby.
Trilby didn’t know what to say. She hadn’t attended an evening party since they’d been in Arizona, although they’d been invited to several. Her mother didn’t like social gatherings. She might agree to this one, because it wouldn’t do to offend someone as wealthy and powerful as Thornton Vance, even if he did look and act like some sort of desperado.
“I’ll mention it to Mama and Papa,” she told him.
“You do that.” He took his hat in hand and walked with easy strides to the front door with Trilby and Teddy behind him.
It was tilted at the usual rakish angle when he swung lazily into the saddle. “Thanks for the pie,” he told Trilby.
She tilted her chin at just the right angle and smiled at him coldly. “Oh, it was no trouble at all. I’m sorry I couldn’t offer you some cream with it.”
“Had you lapped it up already?” he tormented.
She glared at him. “No. I expect you curdled it.”
He chuckled with reluctant pleasure. He tipped his hat, wheeled the horse gently, and eased him into a nice trot. Trilby and Teddy watched him until he was out of sight.
“He likes you,” he teased her.
She lifted an eyebrow. “I’m not at all the kind of woman he’d be interested in.”
“Why not?”
She glared at Thorn’s back with mingled excitement and resentment. “I expect he likes his women with their necks on the ground under his boot.”
“Oh, Trilby, you’re silly! Do you like Mr. Vance?” he persisted.
“No, I do not,” she said tersely, and turned back into the house. “I have a lot of things to do, Teddy.”
“If that’s a hint, sis, I’ll go find something to do myself. But I still say Mr. Vance is sweet on you!”
He ran off, down the long porch. Trilby stood with the screen door open watching after him, worried. She didn’t think Mr. Vance was sweet on her. She thought he was up to something, and she didn’t know what. But she was worried.
When her mother and father came home, Teddy related Mr. Vance’s visit to them, and they smiled in that same knowing way. Trilby flushed like a beet.
“He isn’t interested in me, I tell you. He wanted to see the both of you,” she told her parents.
“Why?” her father asked.
“He’s having a party Friday night,” Teddy said excitedly. “He said we’re all invited, and I can come, too. Can’t we go? It’s been ever so long since we’ve been to a party.” He glowered at them. “And you won’t let me go to see Mr. Cody’s show Thursday afternoon. They said it will be his very last show—and he’s got Pawnee Bill’s Far East Show on the same bill, with real elephants!”
“I’m sorry, Teddy,” his father said, “but we really can’t spare the time, I’m afraid. We’re shipping cattle to California this week, and we’re still behind some of the other cattle companies getting ours en route.”
“Buffalo Bill’s last show and I’ll miss it,” Teddy groaned.
“Perhaps he isn’t really retiring. Besides,” Mary Lang said gently, “there’s sure to be one of those new Boy Scout troops starting up soon in Douglas, what with all the publicity the movement is getting. You could join that, perhaps.”
“I suppose. Can we go to the party? It’s at night. You can’t work at night,” he added.
“I agree,” Mrs. Lang said. “Besides, dear, it really wouldn’t do to offend Mr. Vance when we’re neighbors.”
“And I suppose,” her husband said mischievously as he looked at his daughter, “there won’t be anyone for Thorn to dance with if Trilby doesn’t go.”
Which called to Trilby’s mind an image of the reprehensible Mr. Vance dancing by himself. She had to smother a grin.
“Trilby calls him Mr. Vance,” Teddy pointed out.
“Trilby is being respectful, as she should be,” Mr. Lang replied. “But Thorn and I are cattlemen. We use first names.”
Thorn suits him, Trilby thought to herself. He was just as sharp as one, and could draw blood as easily.
She didn’t say it. Her father wouldn’t approve of blatant rudeness.
“We’re going, then?” Trilby asked.
“Yes,” Mrs. Lang replied, smiling at her daughter. She was a pretty woman. She was almost forty, but she looked ten years younger. “You still have a nice dress that you haven’t worn since we’ve been out here,” she reminded Trilby.
“I wish I still had my lovely silk ensemble,” Trilby replied, smiling back. “It was lost on the way here.”
“Why is it called such a silly thing?” Teddy muttered.
“Well, I never!” Trilby laughed. “And don’t you think naming a stuffed bear for Teddy Roosevelt is silly?” Trilby asked absently.
“Of course not! Hoorah for Teddy!” Teddy chuckled. “His birthday is Thursday, the same day of Buffalo Bill’s show; I read it in the paper. He’ll be fifty-two. I was named for him, wasn’t I, Dad?”
“Indeed you were. He’s