By the end of the second week she knew half the people of Legend by name, and the wagon drivers bringing goods up from Denver always saved the best of the produce for her to use in the Stewarts' kitchen. By the third week she was known as the best cook in the country, "maybe even in the whole world" thanks to a fairly continuous round of dinner parties the Stewarts gave. So now she and Jeremy had been here over a month and she was sitting in a courtroom waiting for the trial to begin. Right after their one and only confrontation, Cole Jordan had left town and had only returned last night, so Kathryn had not seen him during her long stay in Legend.
But now she was sitting at a table on one side of the courtroom, and he was on the other, half hidden behind his three lawyers. This morning the Stewarts had dressed Kathryn all in black, pulling her dark hair back so tightly that her eyes watered, then an old-fashioned black silk poke bonnet had been pushed down onto her head. When Jeremy had seen her, his eyes had widened, and he'd said in a whisper, "You look like a Raphael Madonna." Looking in the mirror, Kathryn agreed that she looked pale and... well, untouchable.
"A virgin widow," Mr. Stewart decreed, as he put his arm around his wife's plump shoulders. "I knew you could do it, Honey Lamb," he said to his wife.
"I look ridiculous," Kathryn said, pushing at the high collar of her heavy black silk dress with the cameo at its neck.
"I think she looks beautiful, Mrs. Lamb," Jeremy said, blinking at his mother. He'd called Mrs. Stewart that behind her back for all the first week, but one night at dinner it had slipped out, and the Stewarts had laughed so hard that he'd called her that ever since. Even Kathryn had slipped twice and called her Mrs. Lamb. It was easy to do since Mrs. Stewart was kind and gentle--and ruled her home and husband with an iron fist.
So now Kathryn was sitting in the courtroom and awaiting the next moments that would decide the course of her life, for Cole Jordan had been called to the stand.
Mr. Stewart had just asked Cole why he hadn't honored his contract and given Widow Kathryn the job she so desperately needed for the support of herself and her dear little son.
"I refused to hire her because she couldn't handle my son," Cole said smoothly, ignoring Stewart's insinuations and smiling at the courtroom with absolute confidence. He even smiled up at Judge Bascom, but Kathryn was relieved to see that the judge did not smile back.
"All of you know my son," Cole continued. "He can run a whorehouse; he can gamble. But look at her. She's never drunk put of anything except porcelain, so what does she know about a boy like mine?"
John Stewart looked puzzled, as though he didn't understand Cole's comment. "But isn't that what a governess is for? To teach things like tea drinkin'? If you wanted someone to teach the boy how to drink out of a beer mug, why bother hirin' someone from Philadelphia? We got beer-drinkers right here in Legend."
At this the courtroom erupted into laughter until Judge Bascom banged his gavel.
"However," Mr. Stewart said loudly, "we concede that your son has the knowledge of a criminal and the manners of a jackass--"
"Just like his pa!" someone in the courtroom yelled, and there was more laughter until the judge shouted at everyone to shut up.
"Now, according to your story, you thought you were hiring an older woman who was experienced in dealing with incorrigibles and the criminally insane. Is that correct?" Mr. Stewart didn't wait for Cole to answer before he continued. "Then am I to believe that you wanted to hire a, shall we say, masculine woman to teach your son to be a gentleman? Can you tell me how that works, Mr. Jordan?"
As far as Kathryn could tell, Cole Jordan was unperturbed by Mr. Stewart's questions. But then she knew how people who owned everything reacted to the law. People like the Jordans made the laws; they didn't obey them.
"I need someone who can control him first before she can teach him anything," Cole said smoothly.
"Mr. Jordan," John Stewart said, "tell me, how tall are you? Over six. feet?"
"An inch or two," Cole said modestly.
"I see," Mr. Stewart said, walking away from where Cole was seated, all six feet two of him sprawled out, lounging in the chair as though he hadn't a care in the world. "Six feet two and a couple of hundred pounds, right?"
Cole gave a one-sided smile. "Better ask some of the ladies. They might know something about the size of me."
His meaning was unmistakable, and the courtroom filled with feminine laughter. Cole looked up at Kathryn. She thought maybe he expected her to smile at him, but the look she gave him would have turned him to stone if he'd had a heart. He winked at her, then looked back at Mr. Stewart.
"Mr. Jordan, what I'd like to know is, if you can't control that hellion of a son of yours, how do you expect any woman to?"
There was more laughter from the court, but the judge just waited for it to subside as he leaned across his desk and looked expectantly at Cole. "You wanta answer that question, boy?" the judge said, and Kathryn was pleased to hear the hostility in his voice. She had been told in full the story of how Cole had "jilted" Judge Bascom's eldest daughter. But, to be fair, from what Kathryn had heard, most of the pursuit had been on the daughter's side, and the complaint had been that she had not been able to snare Cole Jordan into being the husband she wanted so much.
"The point of this whole thing is," Cole said evenly, "I don't think she was going to try to control him or even to teach him." He leaned a bit forward as though confiding a secret. "I think her concerns were with the father, not the son."