Part 14 (1/2)

I looked sharply at the woman beside me. ”My mother always said he was buried in Denver, near where we used to live.”

”Maybe she didn't want you to know, what with all the trouble connected with that time. I guess Mrs. Morgan persuaded your mother to let her bury him here.”

In spite of the sun I felt suddenly chilled in this unsheltered i68 place. Wind blew down the valley between the peaks, and I turned up my jacket collar.

”Can you show me which grave is his?”

She pointed. ”Over there in the corner-the one that's been taken care of so carefully. She sends somebody over every week with flowers. And she has Jon keep the plot clear. Of course Jon has graves of his own here to look after.”

As she threaded her way among the stones, I followed, with Red coming along beside me. My father's grave was near one of the retaining walls at the top of the little cemetery, where the mountain rose above, dwarfing it still more. Again the stone was of granite, and I bent over the inscribed lettering. It was simple enough. Just my father's name, the date of his birth, and the date of his death-the year of my eighth birthday. I touched the stone and it seemed icy in this shady spot by the wall-as though it somehow rejected me.

That was being whimsical, and I turned to walk among the other graves. So many old dates and forgotten names. No one cared anymore that some distant cousin who bore the Morgan name had been born in Wales. Perhaps no one even remembered how he had died or whom he had loved and fathered. It didn't matter anymore. None of it mattered.

”Makes you think, doesn't it?” Belle said beside me. ”These over here are Jon Maddocks' family. His father and mother. And his wife.”

I looked down at the three graves. ”I didn't know he'd been married.”

”It didn't last all that long. She was a wild little thing-like one of those chipmunks-and she didn't last much longer. The baby is buried with her.”

Sorrow for the younger Jon rose in me, and for my fatherfor all of them. I wrenched my thoughts away from death. It was life I must deal with now.

169.

”You seemed different yesterday at Timberline,” I said to Belle, drawn to her, however reluctantly.

”That's what I've grown into,” she said, tipping her chin at me in slight defiance. ”Mark's world. When I come out here, maybe I'm trying to find me the way I used to be. I think I had stronger feelings about everything then than I do now. But you'd better not tell Mark-he'd laugh at me. He only believes in the present and in the kind of future he wants to make happen.”

”How do you feel about that? I mean about the future he plans for all this.”

Under my eyes she seemed to toughen and harden a little. ”I'm on his side-make no mistake. I owe him a lot, and what he tells me I'll do.”

This was what I expected of her, but I pushed a little more. ”I wonder what he was like as a boy.”

”That's not something he talks about, and he doesn't enjoy questions.”

Nevertheless, I wanted answers. ”How did you happen to meet him?”

”I don't like questions much either,” she said, and turned away from me.

I didn't want to let her go. She had shown me a softer side, and I wanted to know more about her-more about any of them over at the Timberline.

”I wonder why Mark Ingram bothers to fight an old woman like my grandmother. If he would just wait and let her alone, she might die quietly. Then perhaps everything would come his way. Why upset her now?”

”Mark's not given to waiting,” Belle said. ”He wants what he wants right away. And I can tell you he means to have it. He means to get things started up the valley soon. He needs time to clear the slopes and put up a lodge in Domino. And he's not going to let Mrs. Morgan hold him off much longer.”

1/0.

”But he wants more than that, doesn't he? He wants to punish her in some way. Because a long time ago Noah Armand was his friend. What did my grandmother do to Noah Armand?”

The question didn't seem to upset her. ”I don't know anything about that. I just know that Mark Ingram gets what he goes after. One way or another. And you'd better remember that. Sometimes it's just as well to be afraid.”

She was entirely on his side, and her words carried a hint of threat. Just the same, an obstinacy that had its roots in anger was rising in me.

”I'm not going to let Mark Ingram scare me. It's not going to be all that easy for him to win this time. I think perhaps I'll stay and see this through.” Suddenly the plan I needed was burgeoning.

Belle gaped at me. ”You're crazy if you set yourself against Mark. He'll squash you like he'd squash a bug.”

”Maybe not,” I said. ”What if the land comes to me when she's gone? I don't care about her money or any of her other property, but if she wants to leave me that house in Domino and the Jasper house as well, I might stay right here and hold out against Mark Ingram.”

There! I was promising what Jon wanted. I was committing myself, and now I didn't want to turn back.

She looked a little frightened. ”I don't think you're very smart.”

”Why not? Why shouldn't I stay and live in Morgan House if I choose?”

”You're liable to find out why not,” she told me. ”If you lock horns with Mark Ingram, you're liable to find out.” She started away from me, and then stopped and looked back. ”How is she? Mrs. Morgan, I mean.”

”Sometimes she seems fine. Sometimes not. Jon says that when you were there she wasn't kept sedated so much of the time.”

171.

”Is that what they're doing to her-Caleb and that nurse? What is that woman up to, anyway?”

”What do you mean?”

”Last night she came sneaking up to the hotel real late.”

”I've wondered if she could be tied up with Mark Ingram in some way.”

If I expected to get a rise out of her, I was disappointed. She smiled at me, and it was a smile I didn't trust-a smile that hid too much that I wanted to know.

”I wouldn't put it past her,” she said.

”I'm going to get rid of Gail Cullen if I can.”

”Not a bad idea.”

Of course she would be pleased if I rid her of a younger rival. But her next words surprised me.

”Look, Miss Morgan, if you get in a jam anytime with your grandmother, let me know. Mark wouldn't approve, but I could fill in in a pinch. Though not for long.”

”Thanks. I'll remember that,” I said.

She waved a hand at me and went off down the hillside. I watched her go, more than a little puzzled. If it hadn't been for Mark Ingram, I might have liked Belle Durant. There was a natural wisdom in her, and perhaps more generosity than she was always willing to show.

For a few moments longer I stood beside the grave where my father was buried, trying to evoke some memory of him. It ought to be possible, here of all places. But nothing came to me out of the past. Nevertheless, I was experiencing an oddly euphoric feeling because I had at last committed myself. I still had no power to back up my words. I didn't even know if Persis Morgan wanted this. Yet I had taken a decisive step in my own mind. I had stopped running. I wasn't hiding, I wasn't leaning.

I wondered what Mark Ingram would do when he knew.

i/a This wasn't going to be an easy road I had chosen, and it might even be dangerous.