Page 20 of A Convenient Heart
“An accident,” Merritt murmured.
“An accident.”
Relief flooded her. She hadn’t been negligent. But it was still a terrible reality that her students wouldn’t have their school.
“I made a report to Mr. Polk and the other two board members,” Danna continued, voice going low when they passed by the leather goods shop as someone was passing through the door.
“He wasn’t happy?” Merritt asked.
“It was difficult to tell.”
Merritt knew the man didn’t like her. She also knew Danna had endured her own troubles with the town council two years ago when she had first become marshal.
“He hinted that the school board is unhappy that the pageant must be cancelled.”
Merritt frowned. “I haven’t even spoken to them yet.” It’d only been hours since the cleanup. She’d been more focused on where the students would learn, how they would get supplies when the term began again.
“Will you have to argue to keep your job?” Danna asked.
The suggestion seemed absurd. Merritt had been schoolmarm in Calvin for more than eight years. She was an excellent teacher. She had signed a contract to teach through the end of the school year in May.
But Mr. Polk didn’t like her. Maybe he had the power to convince Mr. Goodall and Mr. Beauchamp to end her contract early.
“I suppose it doesn’t matter as much anymore,” Danna said quietly as they approached the general store. “After you marry, you’ll leave the classroom, right?”
Merritt shook her head. “I planned to stay through the spring, when my contract is up. They’ll need that time to find a new teacher for fall.” Though she had recently received a letter from her dear friend Darcy Weston that her younger sister Elsie might be looking for a teaching position.
Merritt thought of Clarissa and Samuel, Missy McCabe and Cody Billings. Even Daniel and Paul, who’d worked so hard to prepare for the pageant. Who had worked hard for recognition, to please their teacher.
She’d pushed Paul, knowing he had it in him to become a doctor or attorney if he worked hard enough.
She loved her students. And she wasn’t going to simply walk away from them. She couldn’t.
“If Mr. Polk still wants the pageant, we’ll perform it,” she said firmly. If her job was on the line, she’d give the town the best pageant ever performed. She wouldn’t abandon the children, not at this juncture.
The warmth of the potbellied stove inside the store wafted over her and she loosened her scarf. Breathed in deeply.
“I’ll make it happen somehow.”
* * *
Piano music swelled. Smoke was heavy in the air, and there was carousing, arguing, and chatting, though it was quieter at the round table where Jack had sat down with two other men. At the bar, a woman in a skimpy purple dress lined with black lace leaned over the elbow of the nearest man.
There was a handful of coins in the center of the table. Jack didn’t look at the cards face down on the table in front of him. He’d glanced at them once and memorized the cards before dropping them in front of him.
He was down a quarter so far, but that didn’t worry him. Another hour or so and he’d win enough for a train ticket and to hold him over until after the holiday.
“I fold.” The man with a bottlebrush mustache, across from Jack, tossed his cards on the table with a disgusted scowl.
“Same.” The quiet, burly man with a scraggly dark beard tossed in his cards too.
Which left Jack to drag the pot toward himself.
Mustache collected the cards and started shuffling.
Jack watched his hands, always alert for shenanigans, though he’d be shocked if this man tried to sneak a card up his sleeve. Jack had been sitting across from him for an hour, and he was a slow thinker. He didn’t have it in him to cheat.
The familiar sound of cards blitzing together should have lit Jack up. He spent more time at a card table than anywhere else.
