He didn’t answer her, but stood there in silence.
Carrie sighed. “All right, King Joshua, I have fulfilled task number one, not by the rules, according to you, so what is task number two? I hope there are only three tasks involved.”
At that inanity, Josh looked confused.
Carrie explained. “In all the fairy tales the princess is set three tasks. This morning you gave me a list that one human could never have completed, but I managed to do it—with the help of Rumpelstiltskin, of course. Rumpelstiltskin being the entire town of Eternity. So now, sire, what is task number two?”
As understanding began to dawn on Josh, he grimaced. “It’s as I thought: You think that all of this is a source for humor, something that you can tell your rich friends when you return home to Maine.”
“And you think that everything in life is a reason for gloom. What is it that I have to do to prove myself to you?” She stopped. “No, wait a minute. You know something that I never did understand in the tale of Rumpelstiltskin? I couldn’t understand why the young woman wanted the king. The king said that if she didn’t spin the straw into gold, he’d cut her head off. How was I to believe that she lived happily ever after if she had to marry a creep like that?”
“There is no happily ever after, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” Josh said heavily.
“Maybe you don’t believe there is, but I do,” Carrie practically shouted. “And it’s what I mean to have. I apologize profusely, Mr. Greene, for having played such a dreadful trick on you as lying to you and marrying you. Since your major concern in life seems to be money, then perhaps what I spent on your house will partially make up for what I did to you. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to pack.”
As she started toward the house, Josh caught her arm. “It’s the middle of the night. You can’t go anywhere.”
“Yes I can. If you can spare your second-best horse, I mean to go into town. Surely, after the amount of money I spent in that town today, someone will give me a bed for the night. And think, sir, of the satisfaction you will have in telling your children that I have gone. You can give them a much-needed lesson in the perfidy of women.”
“Carrie,” Josh said, reaching out his hand to touch her.
“Oh, so you know my name. I had no idea I was so honored. I thought that Miss Montgomery was all that you knew of me, but then, for you, my name is all you’ve needed to know—that and my looks, of course.”
When Carrie marched onto the porch of the house and flung open the door, she was greeted by two white-faced, scared-looking children who had obviously heard everything that had been said outside.
“You aren’t going to leave, are you?” Dallas said in a tear-filled voice, her little face white.
With a quick glance at Josh, Carrie saw that his face had an I-told-you-so smirk on it that she wished she could knock away with a baling pin. It was at that moment that Carrie decided to tell the children the truth. She’d often thought that adults terrified children by telling them there were things they were too young to understand and that it was ignorance that frightened people, not knowledge.
“I want both of you to sit down and I want to tell you everything,” she said.
Just as she thought he would, Josh began to protest, but she turned on him in fury. “Whether you like it or not, I am legally part of this family.”
The children sat at the table solemn and quiet while Carrie told them everything about how and why she came to be at their house.
“You loved us from the picture?” Dallas asked.
“Yes,” Carrie answered. “I did. But now I have to leave, because your father is afraid that if I stay here longer, when I do leave, I will hurt you very much, and he doesn’t want that to happen.”
“Will you leave us?” Tem asked in a very adult voice, but there was a child’s fear underlying the voice.
“If your father and I don’t love each other, then I guess I’ll have to. I’m afraid that I played a rather nasty trick on your father, and he’s very angry about it.”
Tears welled in Dallas’s eyes. “Don’t be angry, Papa.”
Taking the child onto her lap, Carrie held her in her arms. “Don’t blame your father. He’s probably right. I might get bored living here in this little town. You see, where I live I’m used to parties and dancing and laughter.” She was lying, but she knew it was for a good cause. She couldn’t bear to leave and make the children think her departure was their father’s fault. It was better that they dislike her than their father.
As Dallas clung to Carrie, Josh looked away. A five-year-old little girl was still a baby, for all that Dallas sometimes acted very grown-up.
“You can stay with us for the week, and we won’t cry when you leave,” Tem said, for once not looking at his father for approval.
Everyone turned to the boy.
“I don’t think—” Josh began.
“She can stay!” Tem shouted, and it was easy to see that he was on the verge of tears, all his self-control about to break.
It was Carrie who at last spoke. “Temmie,” she said, gently. “I am genuinely flattered that you’ve come to like me so much, but I know what you’re thinking, that maybe I’ll stay. I can assure that I will not. The only way I’d stay would be if I fell in love with your father, and I can promise you that will not happen. I rather stupidly thought that I knew what your father was like from looking at his photograph, but I didn’t. Your father is a judgmental, pigheaded, know-it-all who has no sense of humor whatsoever, and I could never possibly love anyone like him.”