Finn skidded to a halt at the edge of the platform, waved an arm in wide arc, and then dropped over the side. He no sooner alighted than he was spinning around and calling to his brother who was at that moment emerging from the station.
“Hey, Rabbit! Come see who’s here! It’s Mr. Longstreet and his special delivery.” His head snapped around and he looked wide-eyed at Jane. “Sorry, ma’am, but I can’t recollect what comes after ‘Middle.’ Burn? Bury? Borough?”
“Bourne,” said Jane. “Middlebourne.”
He snapped his fingers. “Got it.” He hollered back to Rabbit who was rapidly approaching. “It’s Miss Middlebourne!”
“Finn,” Morgan said, wincing slightly as he tugged on one ear. “You don’t need to yell like he’s standing at the other end of town. Besides, shouldn’t you both be in school?”
“On my way. Got plenty of time. Mrs. Bridger is usually a little late these days on account of her condition is what you call delicate. I think there’s a lot of puking so I’m not clear about what makes it delicate, but that’s what Gran says it is.”
Jane recalled seeing Mr. and Mrs. Bridger the previous afternoon on her way to the Pennyroyal. Perhaps the secretive nature of their smiles had something to do with Mrs. Bridger’s condition and nothing at all to do with her being in the company of Mr. Longstreet. She liked to think that was it. It occurred to her that the marshal’s wife could only be in the early stages of her pregnancy. There were no obvious signs.
Jane said, “How many children does Mrs. Bridger have?”
Finn’s eyebrows fused together as he counted on his fingers. His lips moved silently around the names of each child. “I make it to be thirteen,” he said at last. “How many you got, Rabbit?”
Rabbit jumped down beside his brother. “Got what?”
“Mrs. Bridger’s kids. How many?”
Rabbit used the same counting method as his brother. “Thirteen. Six that come and go, but mostly thirteen.”
“Thirteen?” Jane blinked. “That can’t be?—”
Morgan interrupted. “They’re telling you the number of children Mrs. Bridger has in her classroom.”
“Oh.”
“She and the marshal have no children of their own.”
“So this will be their first. She must be delighted.”
Frowning deeply, Finn poked Rabbit hard in the side with his elbow. “What’s she mean about Mrs. Bridger’s first?”
Rabbit shrugged. “What did you mean?”
Jane looked from Finn to Rabbit and back to Finn, and when nothing came to mind that would extricate her from her dilemma, she turned to Morgan.
There was no sympathy from that quarter. He said, “From now on, you probably want to mind where you step around these two.”
Jane sighed. It was sound advice even if it was offered after the fact. She regarded the boys again who were regarding her expectantly in turn. “Perhaps you should ask your grandmother to explain ‘delicate condition.’”
Beside her, Morgan whispered out of the side of his mouth, “You will not make a friend there.”
Jane resisted the urge to follow Finn’s suit and poke Morgan in the side with her elbow. She told the boys, “We are going back to the Pennyroyal. Would you care to walk with us as far as the schoolhouse? Mr. Longstreet has been telling me about your town.” As an exaggeration, Jane rated it as somewhere between mild and moderate.
“Sure,” said Finn. “Me and Rabbit know a lot about Bitter Springs.”
“Rabbit and I,” Jane said automatically.
Finn screwed his mouth to one side and shook his head. “I’m just not gettin’ the hang of that one, Miss Middlebourne, and you ain’t the first to point it out. Mrs. Bridger bemoans it real regular-like. So does the marshal, come to think on it.” He shrugged. “C’mon. Which side of the street did you come down? We’ll go up the other. That good with you, Mr. Longstreet?”
Morgan’s ears were still ringing with Finn’s enthusiastic narrative by the time he and Jane reached the Pennyroyal. Rabbit had only been marginally more restrained. “Well?” he asked Jane as he escorted her up the steps. “Was there a detail they omitted?”
“It beggars the imagination.”
He opened the door for her, but his attention was diverted by the sudden appearance of Marshal Bridger at the foot of the steps.
