Give Me Tonight(8)

"Your brother, Cade. Remember?" he inquired in tones saturated with sarcasm, and tugged her arm until she struggled to her feet and looked at him with aston­ishment. What an insane thing to say. Was this a joke? Or was he crazy? He was a stranger. But the sight of him was curiously familiar. With a sense of amaze­ment, Addie realized she had seen him somewhere be­fore. He was taller than she was, sturdy-limbed, glowing with the pent-up energy of an adolescent boy. Cade, if that was his name, was a handsome youth with shiny gold-brown hair and rich brown eyes. The shape of his face, the curve of his mouth, the tilt of his head . . . she knew it all.

"Y—you look like me," she stammered, and he grunted.

"Yeah. My bad luck. Now, come on. We gotta leave. "

"But Leah . . . " Addie started, and despite her be­wilderment, she felt her eyes sting with remembered grief. "Leah—"

"What are you talking about? Leah's at home. What are you cryin' for?" Immediately the boy's voice soft­ened. "Adeline, don't start leakin' all over the place. I'll handle Ben, if that's what you're worried about. He's got every right to be mad, but I won't let him yell atcha. "

Only half-hearing his words, Addie turned to look at the end of the street, wondering how she had gotten from her front porch to the middle of town. And then her heart stopped, and her grief over Leah's death was swamped by a wave of shock. The house was gone. The house Leah had brought her up in had disap­peared. There was only empty space where it had once been.

"What's happened?" She put her hands over her chest to slow down the violent thunder of her heart. Nightmare, She was still in a nightmare. Her eyes wandered swiftly over the scene, searching for familiar things, finding only a trace here and there of the Sun­rise she had known. Even the air smelled different. The paved street was a dirt road now, gouged with deep holes and thousands of hoofprints. The shiny Ford automobiles had disappeared, and there were only horses and wagons lined up in front of the wooden­plank sidewalk.

The sedate little stores were gone, and . . . why, the whole street was practically nothing but saloons. Sa­loons! What about Prohibition? Had they just decided to ignore the law? No electric signs, no movie palace, no bakery, no strings of telephone wires along the street. Sunrise was nothing but gaudy painted signs and rickety storefronts . . . and the people . .. Good Lord, the people! It looked like they were all at a costume party.

The few women she could see had piled their hair on their head in heavy masses, and they wore long, cumbersome dresses with high necks and tight collars. There were cowboys everywhere, wearing sugar-loaf sombreros or low-crowned plainsman hats, soiled ban­dannas, heavy batwing chaps, spurs with filed-down rowels, boots with arches and pointed toes. Heavily bearded and mustached cowboys, weighted down with firearms and pouches of ammunition.

A half-circle of them stood right around Cade and Addie, hats held respectfully in their hands, staring at Addie with fascination, respect, and something ap­proaching awe. The strangeness of the scene fright­ened her. She had lost her mind, or they were all playing a trick on her.

Let me wake up soon, oh, please let me wake up. I'll face anything rather than this. Just let me wake up so I know I'm not crazy.

Why are you lookin' around like that?" Cade de­manded, taking her elbow and pulling her off the plank sidewalk into the street. He had to shoulder through the group of cowboys, who muttered expressions of concern until he said impatiently, " 'S all right. She didn't really faint. She's just fine."

Numbly Addie allowed him to lead her down the street. "We gotta find Ben," Cade said, sighing heav­ily. "He's been lookin' for you at this end of town. God Almighty, he must be hoppin' mad by now."

"Cade . . . " There was only one Cade she had ever heard of, and that was Leah's uncle. But Leah's uncle was an elderly gentleman who lived in the Northeast, a respected lawyer. Surely he had no connection with this impudent boy. She spike the name that was on the tip of her tongue, deciding at this point that there was nothing to lose. "Cade Warner?"

"Yes, Adeline Warner?"

No. No! I'm Addie Peck. Adeline Warner was my great-aunt-she disappeared fifty years ago. Oh, yes, I'm dreaming. But was Ben Hunter a dream too? Was Leah's death a dream?

"Where are we going?" she managed to ask, sti­fling a distraught laugh as she realized that she, too, was dressed in the confining clothes she had seen on the other women. She was swathed in a pink dress that pinched tightly at the waist. It was hard to walk in such heavy skirts.

"We're going home as soon as we can find Ben. Why were you two hours late? Flirting again? I don't mind you kickin' up your heels, but don't do it on my time again. I had stuff to do today!"

"I wasn't flirting."

"Then what were you doing?"

"I don't know. I don't know what's going on." Her voice cracked. Cade looked at her sharply, seeming to notice for the first time how pale she was.

"You feelin' all right, Adeline?" But she had no time to reply, because they came to a halt in front of a cast-iron-and-wood buggy with wicker seats, fancier than the other vehicles on the street, and Cade was helping her into it. "Just sit here while I go look for him," he directed. The wicker seat creaked as she settled into it, and she gripped the side of the buggy, hanging her head and breathing deeply. "I'll be back in a minute," Cade said.