And fifty dollars?
Gideon’s eyes narrowed.
He wrote:
He asked me to forgive fifty dollars he owed me.
Rosalie stared.
Everything rearranged itself.
Merrick had borrowed money from half the valley during the previous winter.
He had gambled, drunk, and lost horses that did not belong to him.
Apparently one debt
had belonged to Gideon.
You forgave his debt?
Yes.
In exchange for me?
Gideon’s hand froze.
He looked furious.
Not at her.
At the words.
He tore the page from the notebook, crushed it, and threw it into the fire.
Then he wrote on a clean sheet.
No.
The pencil nearly tore through the paper.
He said if I agreed to marry you, your father would stop trying to send you east to a man named Bell.
Rosalie went cold.
Horace Bell.
A railway contractor in his late fifties.
Two years earlier, he had cornered Rosalie outside church and told her she had “good childbearing hips.”
Her father had laughed when she complained.
She had not known Bell had made an offer.
Gideon continued.
Merrick said Bell offered your father money.
Rosalie looked toward the fire.
“So Father chose the better price.”
But even as she said it, the numb
