Free Paxton and the Lone Star by Kerry Newcomb Page B

“There’s so much to do here.”
    â€œOh, certainly!” Lottie pinched her cheeks to bring out the color and set to work on her hair. “Like being ogled by Dennis and Mackenzie Campbell, as if we were a pair of brood mares trotted out for them to play stud to. Well, no thank you.”
    â€œNot so loud,” Elizabeth shushed.
    Lottie’s hair hung in a cascade over her shoulders. She pinned it up over her ears to keep it away from her face and once again regarded herself in the mirror. “Really, Elizabeth,” she said with a tinkling laugh. “No one can hear. They’re all out by the fire.” She adjusted a pin, arranged a curl just so. “Anyway, you carry on too much. Natchez Under the Hill! Why, the very name is exciting. And I intend to be a part of it, even if it is only for a little while.”
    â€œBut it will be dark in a while. And it looks like rain. What will I tell Papa? He’ll expect you at table.”
    â€œWell, I won’t be there is all.” Lottie pulled aside the rear flap and checked to see if anyone was watching. “You can tell him I’m sick or something. That it’s my time,” she said, gathering her skirts and stepping over the rear gate. “Unless—” She leaned back into the dimness. “—you want to go with me.”
    â€œYou know I can’t do that,” Elizabeth whispered, shocked.
    â€œWhy not?” Lottie asked. “You’d be real pretty if you gave yourself half a chance. Why not get out of that men’s homespun and put on a dress and come along? It’s time you had a man, and don’t tell me you haven’t thought about it.”
    â€œOf course I haven’t.”
    â€œOh, pooh. You’re lying.” She pulled her cape from the top of the trunk and threw it over her arm. “It only hurts for a minute, and that’s little enough to pay for all the fun you’ll have afterwards.”
    Elizabeth’s face burned with anger. “You can’t be satisfied, can you?” she snapped. “We left behind trouble in Pennsylvania, with those Rueben boys fighting over you. Now you want to disobey Papa and see what new strays you can bed with here. By the time we reach Texas you’ll no doubt have the Campbell boys at each other’s throats as well. And you’ll keep on until you get pregnant or someone gets hurt, and all because you have to have your fun.”
    â€œThat’s right!” Lottie retorted angrily. “You sound just like Papa. Well, all I have to say, Miss Prissy, is that you’d better not tell.” She jumped down from the wagon, then poked her head over the gate for a final, parting shot. “Maybe time will make you understand and trim your high and holier-than-thou ways, Elizabeth Michaelson. I certainly hope so!”
    The flap dropped in Elizabeth’s face. Not sure of what to do, she leaned back against the cedar-lined trunk where the clothes were kept. The wagon was neatly arranged with household necessities packed inside and farming implements, sacks of seed, and water barrels rigged to the exterior. The niceties of life, chairs and tables, beds, wardrobes, tubs, and the like would have to be purchased in San Antonio or built from what trees they found on their land, for the mules could pull only so much weight. The most important item of all was the parchment signed by Cirilio Medina and cosigned by an official of the Bustamente regime in Mexico City. Elizabeth crawled forward, removed a heavily waxed leather pouch from the special compartment under the driver’s seat, and opened it. The document inside was penned in Spanish and bore the seal of the government of Mexico. Similar to others secreted in each settler’s wagon, it stated that for a sum of money already received, the government recognized the transfer of title of one thousand hectares or, in more familiar terms, two thousand, four hundred