'At best--and that's if I'm in the mood to be cavalier-- it was a tie,
Miss. Stuart.'
'At best for you, Lieutenant.'
He smiled.
'Half of your acreage, Tess.'
'A quarter.'
'That remains to be seen,' he told her, riding close.
'But then, a lot of things remain to be seen, don't they?' He nudged
Lucifer and rode to the rear of the wagon.
'Jon, you ready?
Where's Dolly?'
'Here, here, I am coming, I do declare, the rush you boys get yourselves
into! I was just down at the brook, cleaning up the pans, and there you
are, riding off without me.'
'Dolly! We'd never ride off without you!' Jamie promised her solemnly.
'Never,' Jon echoed.
'But times awastin', Dolly,' Jamie said.
'And suddenly, I'm just darned eager to reach Wiltshire.'
Dolly climbed onto the wagon. Tess lifted the reins against the mules,
and they were under way again.
By late afternoon of the following day they had reached the outskirts of
Wiltshire. Then Tess gave the directions to her home, a large ranch
outside of town.
Tess held the reins. As the house came into view, she saw Jamie pull in
on his big roan and stare. He glanced her way.
'That's it? That's your--ranch?'
'That's it.'
He started to laugh suddenly, looking at Jon. Then he spurred the roan
and raced toward the house. Tess flicked the reins and hurried after him
with the rumbling wagon. The house was magnificent. Joe had put years
and years of work into the sprawling, two-story ranch house. There were
two large barns to the left and a large red carriage house to the right.
The vegetable garden, lush with summer, could be seen behind the house.
The paddocks, stretching before and behind, seemed to go on forever.
Horses, her uncle's prize thoroughbreds, roamed in the paddocks, the
yeaifs foals seeming to dance alongside their mothers.
Tess knew about the weathered paint on the fine old house, however.
Since the war, nothing much had been done. They had considered
themselves lucky to hang on to the property once the battles had ended
and the dust had died down. There were floorboards on the blue~-gray
porch that needed to be mended, and Tess thought that if Jamie Slater
looked long and hard at the velvet drapes in the parlor, he would see
the material was old and fraying.
In the past few years, all their efforts had gone into their battles
with von Heusen.
She drove the wagon hetwcen the paddocks toward the house. Jamie and Jon
were far ahead of her. They'd reached the clearing before the house, and
Jamie was turning around on the huge roan, looking at everything around
him.
