“A dog ran across the path with a little boy chasing him.”
“A little boy?” His eyes narrowed as he scanned their surroundings. “That’s mighty interesting. I don’t suppose you got a good look at him?”
“Nothing more than a glimpse.”
He opened the door for her. An acrid smell reached her nose. Since she was a horrible cook, it was one she knew all too well. “Something is burning.”
“Uh-oh. Why don’t you wait in the parlor while I take care of this?” David rushed away, presumably to the kitchen.
Left alone in the foyer, Caroline caught a glimpse of the parlor through the half-open door on her right. Her eyes widened as she stepped inside. She crossed the room to where the upright piano stood against the wall. She pressed middle C. The note filled the room until a discordant cry drowned it out. Was that a baby?
As though in confirmation, the cry seeped down through the ceiling above her head. Hadn’t Matthew said David had been a widower for five years? What on earth could he be doing in possession of a baby? She was halfway up the stairs before realizing it was bad manners to explore someone’s house uninvited. Still, she couldn’t ignore the baby. Not when she was so close and willing to help. She followed the cries to the nursery, then stopped short when she discovered there were three babies and that they weren’t alone after all. An older woman with a cloud of white hair sat in a rocking chair. The baby in the nearby crib caught sight of Caroline and stopped crying in order to watch her attentively.
She gave a little gasp. “Oh my! How adorable! Are they triplets?”
The woman blinked in surprise, then offered an amused smile. “Why, yes, they are. And who might you be?”
“Caroline Murray. I promise I didn’t just walk in here off the street...or range. David invited me in.”
“Did he?” Surprise filled her warm brown eyes, followed by a speculative look. “Well, then, welcome to our home. I’m Ida Winthrop.”
Not David’s mother, then. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Winthrop. Are you the triplets’ caretaker?”
Ida laughed. “I’m everyone’s caretaker. I’m David’s mother.”
“Oh, I—”
“It’s confusing, I know. My late husband and I adopted David when he was only a little tyke. We knew that David had been separated from his two brothers. We tried to find them. When we couldn’t, we decided we’d better keep David’s last name McKay in case his family came looking for him.”
“Eventually they did,” David chimed in as he stepped into the room and immediately lifted the baby from the crib into his arms.
Ida’s face lit up with love for her son. “Yes, they did. They were both grown with families of their own and living in Little Horn. We decided to sell our old ranch and move nearer to them. And so here we are.”
“Yep, here we are.” David stole a quick glance at Caroline before turning back to Ida. “I took our lunch off the stove, but I think it was too late to save it.”
“Oh, no! I completely forgot I had something on the stove when I came up here. Maggie could have gotten burned.” Ida shook her head in dismay when David tried to reassure her. “No. It isn’t fine. I can’t believe I did that. It’s just that I don’t know if I’m going or coming these days.”
It was obvious that David’s mother was overtired and in need of a break. Caroline stepped forward to take the drowsy baby. “Why don’t I take the triplets for a little while?”
Ida looked relieved. “Would you mind? I really do need to figure out what I’m going to do for lunch.”
“I wouldn’t mind at all.” Caroline carefully laid the baby in the crib.
Ida sighed. “Thank you, dear. I’ve tried rocking them, but it doesn’t seem to be doing much good.”
“Are they sick?”
“No.” Ida handed Caroline the baby with the little green booties. “They aren’t sleeping. Not on any kind of schedule anyway. I think that’s what has them so fussy.”
Caroline held the sweet weight close to her chest. “Well, I can understand that. I’d feel grumpy, too, if I was in their shoes.”
“Louisa—she cared for the triplets before us—said they like to sleep touching each other, but when I put them down, one will inevitably start moving around and awaken the others. I’ve done everything I know how to do—rocking, pacing, singing and praying. We need to put them back on their schedule. They need their naps.”
“Caroline and I will work on it, Ma. You go on and do what you need to do.”
“Thank you.” Ida gave them both grateful looks before hurrying out of the room.
David whispered, “Thanks for helping out, Caroline. Hey, I can’t tell. Is this one sleeping?”
She met the baby’s large brown eyes. “Not even close.” She laughed at David’s small groan. “How on earth did you end up caring for triplets?”
His brow furrowed into serious lines as he told the story, and that as a member of the Lone Star Cowboy League, he felt he should step up to care for the triplets. His answer was short, succinct, to the point and hardly revealing.
“What made you offer to take them in?”
He shrugged. “I felt responsible. After all, I encouraged the league to keep the boys together. Splitting them up into different homes would have made it easier for the community to help them. You heard my story from Ma. I was separated from my brothers for most of my life. We’re reunited now, but we can’t get those years back. They’re gone. I didn’t want these little ones to go through that.”
“That’s beautiful, David.”
He gave her a quick smile. “Well, I don’t know about that, but it was the right thing to do. Of that, I’m absolutely certain. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been easy—especially now that they no longer have a nanny.”
She frowned in confusion. “Oh? What happened to the nanny?”
“Pa!” A little girl yelled from downstairs. “Pa, come quick! I think I killed somebody!”
Their eyes caught and widened simultaneously. David tensed. Caroline jerked her head toward the door. “Go. I’ll handle the triplets.”
That was all the encouragement he needed to lower the baby into the crib and rush out the door.
There was no way Maggie could have killed someone—leastwise, not on purpose. Even so, someone might need help. Right now that person was his daughter. As soon as he descended the stairs, Maggie launched herself into his arms. He caught her close. Over her shoulder, he exchanged a worried look with his mother, who stood at the kitchen door holding a scouring pad and a burned pot. David shifted Maggie in his arms so that he could see her face. She looked downright terrified. “What happened?”
“I spooked a lady’s horse. It ran off with her. She was barely hanging on. She probably fell off and died like Ma did.”
He glanced at his mother. They both knew this wasn’t anything like the way Maggie’s mother had died. Laura’s horse hadn’t bolted. It had tripped because Laura had been galloping through the night in a storm—running away with another man. Of course, David couldn’t tell Maggie that. He hoped she’d never find out, either. Better that she think Laura’s death had simply been a tragic accident than that her mother had been willing to abandon both of them.
Tears filled