Raoul eyed Nancy Hale, standing only a few feet from him among the two hundred or so mourners in the great hall of Victoire. What would she think, Raoul wondered, when he played his hand today? He pictured what the tall blond woman would look like naked under him in bed.
Oh, he'd make her sweat and moan and thank him for it.
But first, of course, he had to succeed today. He had to drive the mongrel away before he could court Nancy. Whether her preacher father approved of him or not, he couldn't turn away one of the biggest landowners in Illinois.
And that's what he'd be, after today.
He didn't see how he could fail. Surely the servants and the townspeople wouldn't take the mongrel's part.
Still warming himself by staring at Nancy Hale's straight back, Raoul thanked God he'd never been quite able to bring himself to marry Clarissa.
He felt a twinge of unease as he recalled that taking up with Nancy would mean kicking Clarissa out of his bed, and that might mean trouble with Eli. To his relief, Eli had accepted Raoul's not marrying Clarissa, even after she bore him two kids. But that was only because Eli figured it would happen eventually, maybe after Raoul got control of the estate.
Well, once he had the estate, he comforted himself, he could see that Clarissa and their two out-of-wedlock boys were well taken care of.
It galled Raoul to be so dependent on a man like Eli, to be—he hated to admit it to himself—afraid of him. A heap depended on Eli's playing his part today in helping him get control of the estate. Today, Eli would be leading the Smith County boys, ones who'd been at the Rock River last June. Having been offered a good day's pay, they would do a little more Indian fighting.
Raoul felt as if he were going to burst. He couldn't stand this waiting, while the priest droned on in singsong Latin at the linen-covered table that had been set up as an altar before the fireplace. Let the fight begin, for God's sake.