But Helen had another secret, too, and she wondered how long she could delay telling Rafe what had been troubling her for days.
She was pregnant.
This should have been a happy time for her. It was what she’d always wanted — a baby. And a child formed of the love she shared with this glorious man… Well, it was the answer to all her dreams.
But not Rafe’s.
She kept putting off her disclosure, wanting to hold on to the priceless bond between them a little bit longer. The instant she told him, she knew their relationship would change. She didn’t doubt his love for her. He wouldn’t abandon her. But she didn’t know whether his love was strong enough to withstand this test. And, more important, she didn’t want to burden him with her dream.
“And even though the town is jist ’bout deserted, we got us a padre, and Papa’s hired a Mexican band to play here for the next two weeks,” Mary rambled on. “Don’t that beat all? A town what won’t let furriners get a mining permit puts out the welcome sign for a Spanish priest and a Mex band?”
Helen jolted back to attention. They all sat at a table in the Indiana House dining room, where Mary had taken them before even showing them to a room.
Then the words sank in.
“Padre!” Rafe exclaimed, casting Helen a significant look.
“Padre!” Helen echoed breathlessly.
“We can get married,” Rafe whispered and dragged her close to his side, kissing the top of her head. They sat side by side on a bench. “Thank God, I can make you an honest woman now.” He pinched her bottom playfully for emphasis. “I wouldn’t want to be jumping off a cliff with that sin on my soul.”
Swatting his hand away, she hissed, “Behave! Mary’s watching.” Helen smiled affectionately at Rafe then, even though mixed sentiments of elation and guilt engulfed her. Elation because she would be marrying the man she loved; guilt because she was, in fact, not quite an honest woman.
Should she tell him about the baby now?
Should she wait?
“Did you see that prospector outside with eight blasted kids running all over the place?” Rafe was asking Mary.
Helen stiffened.
“That’s the new postmaster,” Mary informed him.
“God! It looked like a regular baby factory.” Rafe shivered with distaste.
Helen decided her news could wait.
On the thirtieth of October, 1850, Helen Anne Prescott married Rafael Joseph Santiago in a canvas tent chapel in Rich Bar, California. Their only witnesses were the padre and a perplexed Mary and Yank, who didn’t comprehend why they wanted to remarry.
Rafe tucked the marriage document into the jacket of the black suit Yank had sold him from his general store. Mary had lent Helen her mother’s cream-colored gown, which was of some silky material that shimmered with gold threads. It was edged with green and gold embroidery. In Rafe’s opinion, there was never a more beautiful bride in all the world.
“You’re mine now,” he murmured huskily as they followed behind Yank and Mary and the padre, heading toward the wedding party. He couldn’t believe he’d actually gotten married, or that he was so happy about it.
“I was yours before the wedding, Rafe.”
“But it’s official now.”
“I doubt whether it will be legal in the twentieth century.”
“We’ll get married again. See how eager I am to please?”
“I noticed,” she said suspiciously. “What do you want?”
“Well, I was wondering if we could skip the food and drinks and dancing and move on to the good stuff.”
“Like what?”
He whispered a few explicit “for instances” in her ear.
“RA-AFE!”
“God, my mother’s going to love you.”
They had, in fact, left the party early, begging exhaustion from all their travels and the necessity of an early start in the morning.
They’d fooled no one.
Helen had blushed repeatedly at Rafe’s blatant efforts to seduce her in the midst of all the Indiana House guests. It had been a lovely party, which served the dual purpose of a welcoming event for the new postmaster. In fact, the celebration still carried on. He heard the band playing through the open bedroom windows.