“If the wounds get red and puffy, or start to stink, call in a doctor. Only, please don’t tell Irv I was the one who suggested it.”

Remembering what Irv had threatened to do if Thatcher took him to a doctor, Laurel bit back a smile.

Thirty

Laurel had learned that the girl’s name was Corrine. She had been very useful, eagerly fetching and carrying, handling everything with remarkable efficiency considering that she had the use of only one arm and limited eyesight.

She reentered Irv’s room now. “There was a pie in the pie safe. I cut each of y’all a piece and started a pot of coffee. Take a breather, I’ll sit with the old man. Irv’s his name? Never mind that bloody water in the washbowl. I’ll pitch it out the winda.”

“Did you help yourself to some pie?” Laurel asked.

“It looked too good to pass up. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all. You’ve been extremely helpful tonight. Thank you.”

Corrine shrugged off the thanks, and with her free hand made a shooing motion for Laurel and Thatcher to leave the room. Irv was snoring loudly through his open mouth. Laurel didn’t think she would be missed.

Thatcher followed her into the kitchen. When they were out of earshot of Corrine, she asked quietly, “Who is that girl? Where did she come from?”

“She works at Lefty’s.”

Laurel looked toward Irv’s room, then back at Thatcher. “Not upstairs, surely?”

The look he gave her said otherwise.

“She’s just a girl.”

“Seventeen.”

She was about to say more, ask more, but then remembered that Thatcher had been at Lefty’s tonight when it was raided, and that what he was doing in the company of a teenage prostitute was none of her business.

He stood there, looking down at her as though waiting for her to pose questions she had thought better of asking. Then, stepping around her, he said, “I’ll be right back,” and went out through the back door.

She loaded a tray with the slices of pie Corrine had prepared, cups of coffee and the fixings, and carried it into the dining room, where she laid two place settings on the table. Since she and Irv had begun eating their meals here, she’d bought a secondhand sideboard. At each end of it, she’d placed matching kerosene lamps with milk-glass chimneys. Preferring their glow to the glaring overhead electric light, she lit them now.

As she leaned down to adjust the flame, her long braid swung forward. Lord! Throughout the ordeal with Irv, she’d lost sight of the fact that she was in her nightclothes, barefoot, her hair plaited for bedtime.

But it was too late to correct these oversights. The back door squeaked open. She made certain her housecoat was fully buttoned, flipped her braid over her shoulder, and called, “In here, Mr. Hutton.”

He must have gone to Irv’s truck to get his suit jacket. He’d put it on over his undershirt. His braces were no longer lying loose against his hips, so she assumed he’d pulled them back onto his shoulders. He might also have smoothed down his hair, although it seemed to have a will of its own. In spite of the bloodstains on his undershirt, he looked more respectable and suitable to the setting than she did.

They sat down across from each other. She tucked her bare feet beneath her chair, then pulled it closer to the table in a belated attempt to hide her dishabille.

She placed a napkin in her lap. As she poured a dollop of cream into her coffee, she noticed that he hadn’t yet started on his pie. His hands were loosely fisted on either side of the plate, and he was studying it. “You don’t like peach?”

“Oh, a lot. I was just wondering how you get the crust to wave like that at the edge.”

“I flute it.”

He raised his head and looked over at her.

“Like this.” She used her fingers to demonstrate. “To the dough.”

“Huh.” He picked up his fork and began to eat.

After a full minute of strained silence—at least to Laurel it seemed strained—she asked, “Have you been thrown from a horse again?”

“Only once today.”

“I was being serious.”

He gave a lopsided grin. “So was the horse.”

She laughed softly and shook her head. “I don’t know how you do that.”

“Well, I don’t know how to flute pie dough.”

They smiled across at each other, then she set her fork on the rim of her plate and clasped her hands in her lap. “You were right, Mr. Hutton. I—”

“Why won’t you call me Thatcher?”

For a moment she was thrown by his interrupting her to ask that. She picked up her fork. Set it back down. “It wouldn’t be appropriate for us to use first names.”

“How come?”

“Because we’re not that well acquainted.”

“Using first names would be a start in that direction, wouldn’t it?”

All things taken into account, not the least of which was the privacy of this moment, relaxing the rules of etiquette was a risky step she was unwilling to take. Once a boundary was breached, it was difficult, if not impossible, to reestablish. Breaching boundaries with him seemed particularly chancy.

“I think we should leave things as they are.”

He didn’t respond immediately, but ultimately made a gesture of concession with his shoulder. “You were saying?”

It took a moment for her to remember what she’d been saying. “I apologize for the curt way I turned down your offer to help with Irv. I couldn’t have adequately tended to him by myself. Thank you for getting him home; thank you for staying.”

“You’re welcome, Mrs. Plummer.”

He didn’t smile, but his eyes—the bluish-gray color of storm clouds—glinted with humor. His amusement made her feel silly and prudish for making first names an issue. But it would take on greater significance if she amended her position on the matter now.

Instead, she changed the subject. “I grew up on a farm. The nearest doctor was ten miles away, at least. Accidents happened frequently. Even as a girl, I patched up cuts and scrapes, bound up sprains, things like that. I don’t faint at the sight of blood. But I never had to deal with a bullet wound before. I hope I never have to again.”

“How ammunition can rip through a body can be ugly, all right.”