Nearly all the couples were lifelong friends of Lona, yet she seemed not to care at their aloofness.
Grandpa Bevo began picking at his fiddle then. Soon, two other fiddlers, a guitar player and a pianist launched a session—this time beginning with a waltz. Danner led Lona onto the floor and they drifted with the music through several numbers. When the square dancing started they left the floor and returned again when the round dancing resumed. Lona was in one of her quiet moods, yet she seemed content enough.
Once Danner spotted Wainright dancing with Melinda, and he guided Lona in that direction. Melinda was all woman tonight, clad in a fluffy black dress that probably had come from some fancy store back East. When she laughed at something Wainright had said, the hardness about her face vanished. Danner hadn't seen her so much as smile since the Colonel's death.
By ten o'clock the air grew so warm Danner removed his black broadcloth coat. Most of the other men present were in their shirt sleeves by now.
Billy McDaniel claimed Lona for a dance and Danner drifted outside to smoke his pipe. Other smokers on the porch glanced at him but no one offered a greeting. The cool air refreshed him and he felt a reluctance to return to the stuffy room. Regretfully, he tapped the dottle from his pipe and idled along the porch to the doorway, and stepped inside. Then he noticed the cloakroom to his left, a long and narrow room with wall pegs.
Gun belts hung from every peg. No one seemed to be looking in his direction, so he stepped into the hall-like room and worked his way from gun to gun, examining each. He found a variety of Colts, some Smith & Wessons, one Dance revolver and an old Merwin and Hulbert. Then he started back up the other side, examining a shiny new D. A. Navy; the model had come out only a few months back. Next to it, he found an old percussion pistol that had been converted to the use of cartridges; then some more Colts, old and new. But nowhere did he find any type of pin-fire weapon.
A waltz started as Danner worked his way around the edge of the dancing area. McDaniel whirled by with Lona, holding her as if she were a China doll in danger of slipping through his heavy fingers. His face caught Danner's attention, a heavy-featured face now wistfully slack. Even when they bumped into another couple, McDaniel didn't seem to be aware of it. Danner moved over to his chair and lost sight of them.
Wainright and Melinda danced past, and Danner's gaze followed them. Melinda moved with the grace of a ballet dancer he'd once seen in Kansas City. The music ended and Wainright led her to the far side of the room. Then Wainright excused himself with a slight bow and moved toward the refreshment table, leaving Melinda alone. Acting on an impulse, Danner moved quickly across the floor. She stood looking at the dancers when he stopped beside her.
'Will you dance with me?' he asked abruptly.
Surprise widened her eyes. She hesitated, appraising him uncertainly, and Danner silently cursed the impulse that had brought him across the floor. But Melinda nodded pleasantly enough, and he guided her into the moving couples.
Occasionally his chin brushed her hair and he caught the scent of an elusive fragrance. By the stiffness of her back under the palm of his hand, he knew her thoughts. A mixture of amusement and temper touched him briefly, drawing him out of his silence.
'Do you think you'll ever succeed?'
Her eyebrow arched sharply as she looked up into his face. 'Succeed in what?'
'In making up your mind about me.'
The startled look that spread across her features told him he had guessed right, and he smiled. Surprisingly, she smiled in return and seemed to relax, which made dancing more enjoyable. They finished the dance in silence, and remained in the center of the floor until another number started. Danner lost his thoughts in the dancing until Melinda spoke.
'You are a strange paradox.'
'How so?'
She danced silently for so long that Danner thought she wasn't going to answer. When she did speak again, it was to ask another question.
'Are you really so indifferent to what people think of you? I mean, you've made no effort to stop people from blaming you for that Spaulding robbery. Yet I understand you once half-killed a man for calling you a foul name.'
'There's a difference in what people think about me and what they say in front of me,' Danner said. 'If I ignored a spoken insult, I'd be inviting every tough in the territory to move in on the railroad.'
'That's a rather harsh philosophy.'
'Perhaps.'
'What about your dispute this morning with Mr. Wainright?'
'If he told you that much, I guess he told you the rest of it.'
Danner couldn't be sure in the uncertain light, but he thought he saw a flush touch her cheeks.
'Mr. Wainright is your employer now. Perhaps you should—'
'He's a bitter and warped man, more crippled in mind than body.' Danner felt her back stiffen under his palm.
'He hasn't always been that way,' she said. 'He was a fine athlete when I first knew him in Baltimore. But after the accident—well, a thing like that would change almost any man.'
'Only if he lets it,' Danner said. He bumped into a lanky granger without offering an apology. Melinda pulled away from him almost to arm's length.
'That's an easy thing to say for one who isn't handicapped.'
Danner pulled her closer again without losing the rhythm of the music. 'All men have handicaps of one kind or another. If they are any sort of men at all, they must learn to live with those handicaps.'
'And what is your handicap?' she challenged him.
'Men like Wainright.'
Slowly the hardness returned to her face, revealing an inner toughness she had acquired from the Colonel. Even her diminutive loveliness couldn't hide that. Once again she was uncertain about him. With a moment's regret, Danner blamed himself for the transformation, then he put the thought aside. What she thought about him shouldn't matter, now or ever, he thought.
They finished the dance without further talk, and when the music ended, Danner escorted her from the dancing area. Wainright waited, a cup of punch in his hand, bright flames of fury in his eyes.
Danner returned Wainright's curt nod, then thanked Melinda for the dances. She eyed him thoughtfully before nodding. He crossed the floor to the stage and found Lona and McDaniel standing in front of the chairs. Lona glared at him angrily. Without a word to him, she turned to McDaniel.
'I believe you wanted another dance, Billy.'
'Huh?' McDaniel showed his bewilderment with slack jaws. 'But you said—'
'I changed my mind.'
'Is it okay, Jeff?'
Danner spread his hands.
'Of course.'
Happily, McDaniel whirled Lona onto the floor.
Danner eased into his chair, knowing he shouldn't antagonize Lona by showing any interest in Melinda. Lona really couldn't help the jealousy she felt toward Melinda. Or was that really it? He wondered if maybe it really wasn't a jealousy of his love for railroading, with Melinda a personification of what Lona disliked the most. He abandoned the thought when he saw Wainright striding up, glaring at him.
'Could I have a moment with you outside?' The unmistakable indignation in Wainright's face held Danner's attention for a moment, then he nodded and led the way through the crowd and across the porch to the yard. Halting by a buggy, he waited for Wainright to speak. Even in the semi-darkness the face of Wainright shone whitely, his mouth a thin and compressed line, and Danner began to feel his own self-control ebb.
'Mr. Danner,' Wainright broke the heavy silence. 'I think you need a lesson in company policy.' He leaned close, his face not more than two feet away from Danner.
'There are two kinds of people in the Great Plains Central family—the hired hands and the employers. There's a distinct line between the two, and GPC doesn't approve of hired hands attempting to cross that line. Do I make myself clear?'
