“Even from us?” Ellen said. “You have to keep it a secret from us?”
She stood then and went into the back of the cabin.
“Shame on the pair of you. I expected much better,” Abigail said. Then she rose and went after her daughter.
David stared after his wife, then over at Jim.
“Maybe we should have told them,” he said.
Jim said nothing.
He’d never seen Ellen like this. She’d been angry with him before, several times in fact, but he’d never seen her so hurt. He wanted to run to her, wanted to beg forgiveness. Why didn’t she understand? Why couldn’t she just appreciate that their prayers had been answered? They were saved if they could keep the secret a spell longer.
“I haven’t seen Abigail this mad in a very long time,” David said. He clapped a hand on Jim’s back. “Don’t worry, though. Sometimes this sort of thing happens. They’ll come around, eventually.”
Jim wanted to believe him, but all he could think of was the hurt he’d just caused his wife. Had he just broken something he couldn’t repair?
“I’m going after her,” he said.
David caught his arm. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea. Some time to cool down might help.”
Jim shrugged off David’s hand and started for the room he shared with Ellen.
David gave him a shrug and sighed. “Suit yourself.”
Jim took off his hat and rapped his knuckles on the door. “Ellen,” he said. “Can we talk about this?”
He could hear her inside, sobbing.
“Ellen, can I come in?”
Silence.
Tentatively, he reached out and opened the door. Their room held little by way of furniture or decorations. Few things had made the long trip overland from Kansas. A chest belonging to Ellen’s grandfather sat next to the door, lid closed. She kept her clothes in there. Jim’s own clothing was folded and stacked neatly on a set of shelves he’d built into the cabin walls. There were two books there as well, the Bible and a copy of Plutarch’s Lives, along with an oil lantern. He’d been working with Ellen to improve his reading.
In the room’s center was their bed. Ellen lay on the far side, facing away from him and toward the wall.
Jim sat at the foot of the bed, shuffling his hat in both hands and staring down at it. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” he said.
“Why didn’t you?”
“Your father and I didn’t want the secret getting out. We have a chance at something real here, something that would set us up for life.”
“And you thought telling me would ruin it.”
“No, not that, we just…” The words trailed off. Jim looked at it from her perspective. He’d never believed telling her would ruin their plans, but that was how he’d treated her. “I made a mistake. I should have trusted you with the truth.”
She was looking at him now, still angry but a little confused, too. “You should have. I am your wife. You can trust me with everything, and I want you to.”
Jim took a breath. “You’re right. It won’t happen again.”
Ellen shifted around to sit beside him, close enough that their shoulders met.
“Jim, you have to understand,” she started. “Clive lied to me. He lied to me all the time and about everything. He kept things from me.”
“I am not like Clive,” Jim’s voice raised. He’d killed the man both for what he’d done and then tried to do again to Ellen and Walt.
“No, you’re not.” Ellen’s voice was firm. “But you understand why I can’t bear the thought of you hiding things from me?”
“I do,” he said. “I won’t let it happen again. But you have to understand, if anyone finds out what we have here, this valley will be swarmed by gold-hungry miners. Unless we find the gold’s source, they’ll take everything from us. We’ll be left with almost nothing. You’ve seen how those men are down in town, how hungry they are for gold.”
Ellen took a long breath and said, “Fair enough. We can’t let that happen.”
Jim fished the piece of precious jewelry-rock from his pocket and handed it to Ellen. She ran her fingers over the stone, turning it in the light.
“It is quite beautiful,” Ellen said. “How much have you found so far?”
“Your father thinks three thousand dollars’ worth.”
“Three thousand!” Ellen’s breath caught. Her eyes widened, and she faced him fully. “So much?”
Jim nodded, afraid he’d roused her anger again. “But we can’t find how it gets in the stream. We’ve searched everywhere.”
“What will you do with the gold you have so far?”
“We need to ride down to Onionville and sell it. We need the money, but when we do—once we sell that much gold—there’ll be no keeping it quiet. Everyone will know what we’ve found.”
Ellen stared down at the jewelry-rock. “What if you didn’t sell it in Onionville?”
