“I don’t need your house. I still have my wagon,” Elizabeth said as she pulled away slightly and then turned around to start walking out of the store. “Thank you for your help, Annabelle. I appreciate it.”
The other woman nodded. “Stop by any time and God’s best to you.”
Well, if that didn’t beat everything, Jake thought. If he’d heard right, his bride was still thinking about wintering in that wagon of hers instead of in his cabin. That didn’t make any sense at all, not even for an Eastern woman who didn’t know these parts. He still had some things to buy before he left the store. Maybe if he gave her some time alone, the woman he was going to marry would tell him what was wrong.
Elizabeth wondered what she was going to do. She opened the door and took another good look at the streets of Miles City. There were no Help Wanted signs in any of the windows. Maybe the preacher would have some words of advice.
Elizabeth was glad Jake had stayed in the store after she went out on the street. She needed to think. There was a bit of a breeze outside, but Elizabeth scarcely noticed it. The woman with the red hair and blue serge skirt was standing in front of a store on the other side of the street. She had her head bent and was furiously talking to two other women who were both wearing simple calico dresses with sunbonnets. It was good to know there were some plain people in this town. The other women’s faces were weathered and pinched.
Whatever the women were upset about, Elizabeth figured it was not as bad as the predicament she was facing. It took a moment for Elizabeth to realize the women across the street had stopped talking and were staring at her. No, it wasn’t her. She looked to her left and saw Spotted Fawn.
Jake’s niece hadn’t moved an inch since Elizabeth first went into the store. Not unless it had been to push farther back into the shadows of the overhang that covered the boardwalk in front of the mercantile. Spotted Fawn might be very still, but she could hardly miss the antagonistic looks those women were sending her.
Elizabeth stepped over to stand beside the girl. “Don’t pay them any attention. They’re just curious.”
Spotted Fawn shrugged. “It does not matter.”
Elizabeth recognized that tone of voice. She had said the same kind of words when she was made to feel awkward in her place as the unpaid servant of the houses where she worked back in Kansas. One needed to feel some power in a situation to protest. Without that, a person merely endured.
Just then, Jake came out of the store and started to usher Elizabeth and his niece down the street. He told them they were headed to the schoolhouse.
Elizabeth didn’t say anything to Jake about the women. She told herself that they might have been just curious. And they could have been staring at her more than Spotted Fawn anyway. It wasn’t often that a woman who was supposed to be dead came to town to go shopping. Maybe one of them had seen her outside the fort and was worried about the fever. That made sense.
They came to a saloon and Elizabeth happened to glance into the half-draped window. She saw a woman standing beside a piano. Her blond hair was swept up and she was wearing a fresh white blouse and a gray skirt. “That woman works there?”
“Only because Colter is a soft touch. Virginia’s brother was one of the soldiers killed a few weeks ago so she needs the work. Her other brother is off somewhere prospecting for gold.”
“She’s not dressed like I would expect.”
Elizabeth wasn’t sure, but maybe she could work in this saloon if she were allowed to dress like a decent woman and stay in the back of the place. A couple of used glasses were sitting on the counter as the bartender poured whiskey for some man. “Do they pay someone to wash dishes?”
“Usually there’s a kid, Danny, who does that, but he’s been in jail for a few days. He stole a man’s watch,” Jake said as he turned to look at her. “But Colter wouldn’t hire you, if that’s what you’re thinking. A lady doesn’t belong in a place like that, especially not washing dishes.”
“I’m not a lady. Besides, there’s nothing to be ashamed of in washing dishes,” she continued. “People are entitled to a clean glass no matter what they’re drinking.”
Jake was looking at her skeptically. “I’d say a woman is entitled to a wedding ring, too.”
Elizabeth didn’t have anything to say to that. She didn’t want a new wedding ring. She didn’t want a new husband. But, she had to admit, she did want to spend more of her days holding a baby. And she wouldn’t mind seeing a smile on Spotted Fawn’s face. She wasn’t sure what she’d say when the minister asked if she’d take Jake as her husband.
“What do you do for a living?” Elizabeth suddenly asked as she looked up at Jake.
She saw his jaw tighten.
“I’m not a banker, if that’s what you’re asking,” he said. “I don’t rightly know what I am. I panned some gold in the Black Hills, though, and I’ve got enough to stake myself to some cattle when the time is right. This country is changing and I figure that’s the next thing for a man to do.”
“You don’t poison wolves?”
Jake shook his head firmly. “I don’t poison anything.”
Elizabeth let out the breath she was holding. Well, that was that. Not that he might not have some other dark secret he was hiding, given the friends that he had.
Elizabeth wondered if there would be any witnesses to the marriage if it did take place. She didn’t know anyone she could ask to do it. Those women she’d seen staring at them earlier might be following to see what they were doing, but she couldn’t ask them. She even refused to look behind her to see if they were following her and Jake.
Elizabeth reached up to pat her hair. She’d washed herself as best as she could in her tent before folding up the canvas and storing it on top of the wagon earlier. She was glad now that she was clean even if she was rumpled. She might not be good enough to go calling on people, but she was wearing her gray dress. It had been suitable in Kansas; it should be good enough for the streets out here.
Those women could stare at her if they wanted, but she dared them to find genuine fault. Her dress was so neatly mended that no one could tell where the spark had settled on the skirt or the seam had parted under the arm. And her hair might be slightly damp from the rain, but it was firmly anchored behind her head in a bun.
Footsteps made their own sound in the mud, but Elizabeth didn’t pay any attention to them until she heard someone muttering behind her. She looked back and saw the women she’d seen earlier marching straight toward her.
The women did not wait until they were even with Jake before they started talking.
“Where did you get her?” the woman in the blue skirt demanded of Jake.
Elizabeth was taken aback by the hostility in the woman’s voice. They must think she was still carrying the fever. Surely it must be fear that brought out such antagonism. Then she felt Jake tense up beside her. The woman was not looking at Elizabeth; she was looking at Spotted Fawn.
“Good morning, Mrs. Barker,” Jake said. “This is my niece.”
“She’s just a child,” Elizabeth added. Who could be afraid of a child?
“She’s a heathen,” Mrs. Barker said as though that settled everything. “She needs to be sent back to her people.”
“I am her people,” Jake said.
“Nonsense. Anyone can look at her and see she doesn’t belong with you. You might have lived with some of those people, but that doesn’t make you one of them. Take the girl back to her own kind. She belongs with the other heathens out there.” Mrs. Barker vaguely waved her hand to the vast unsettled land outside of town.
“She’s not a heathen. She believes in the same God that you and I do,” Jake said.
“I doubt that very much. You listen to me and you listen good, Jake Hargrove. This town is no place for her kind. God doesn’t want people mixing. Everyone should keep to their own kind. That especially goes for the heathens.”
“It doesn’t say that in the Bible.”
“Well, t
hen, it should. We won’t stand for it. Mark my words on that.”
The women gathered up their skirts and stomped past them, their skirts all swaying as they went.
Elizabeth watched them walk down the street.
“Sorry about that,” Jake muttered.
“It’s not your fault.”
Elizabeth was angry. Even the women who had looked down their noses at her back in Kansas hadn’t been this rude. No one should treat anyone as Mrs. Barker and her friends were doing. Before her recent tragedy, Elizabeth would have shrugged off their behavior. But not anymore. She might be all alone in life once again, but she wasn’t going to let those women treat an innocent young girl as if she was a criminal just because they didn’t like the color of her skin.
Elizabeth knew enough about dyes to know that a piece of cloth could turn out red or yellow or blue and still be the same fabric, woven on the same loom. Dyeing was just something the maker of a garment did. It didn’t make the cloth itself better or worse.
Besides, Spotted Fawn might be an Indian, but she had a family. She had her uncle, Jake. They shared the same blood. He was her people. Elizabeth didn’t want to see anything happen to this new family, not if she could help it.
Standing right there, Elizabeth made her decision. She was going to get married. Higgins might put poison in her tea and those women might drive them all out of town, but she’d stand up for Spotted Fawn and the baby until that day. If anyone knew what it was to be all alone at Spotted Fawn’s age, Elizabeth did.
“Don’t pay them any attention,” Elizabeth said in a furious whisper to Spotted Fawn. The girl didn’t look as though she’d heard Elizabeth any more than she’d heard the women speaking earlier. If Elizabeth didn’t know Spotted Fawn spoke good English, she would have thought the girl hadn’t understood what had been said.
They didn’t stop walking until Jake brought them to the steps of a white frame building. More humble than the stores and with no walkway out front, the building did have a landing at the top of the steps large enough for a dozen people to stand. They climbed the steps, Jake knocked and a man’s voice told them to come inside.
“School is out for the day. The reverend will be expecting us,” Jake said as he opened the door.
Spotted Fawn stood to the right of the doorway just as she’d stood beside the door of the mercantile. Elizabeth finally realized the girl didn’t feel welcome.
“I hope you’ll come inside with us,” Elizabeth said to her.
Spotted Fawn made no move.
“You can hold the baby,” Elizabeth added softly. “I don’t know if there’s any place to lay her down inside. Wait a few minutes and come when Jake comes, please.”
Spotted Fawn nodded. “I will come.”
“Thank you,” Elizabeth said as she turned.
She looked back at Jake. “You said I could have some time with the pastor before—”
Jake nodded.
Elizabeth hoped the pastor had some comfort to give to her. It wasn’t right to marry another husband when she hadn’t made her peace about losing her first one. Granted, it wasn’t a real marriage that Jake was offering. And she’d already decided to do it, even if she had a feeling it would cause more trouble for everyone than they would know what to do with. But, still, she’d like to confess what she was doing to a minister. She hoped he understood about the baby.
Chapter Four
The inside of the schoolhouse smelled of damp wool. The children must have played outside and gotten wet before they left this afternoon. Light streamed in the three windows, two located on each side wall and one by the door. There was a glass-fronted wood case beneath one of the side windows and it held plants and leather-bound books. A map was tacked to the wall beside one potbellied stove. Another small stove sat in the opposite corner. Elizabeth could imagine children being very happy here. She took one step into the room as the man in front stood up from his desk.
“You must be Elizabeth,” the man said with a welcoming smile. “I’m Reverend Olson. I got Jake’s message that you were coming.”
The man walked down the aisle between the rough-hewn log benches. Each bench had a long, thin table in front of it. There were inkwells and small pieces of chalk to show the places where students sat. She supposed the children kept their lead pencils with them; they wouldn’t want to lose those.
Jake had kept his word and hadn’t followed her inside the schoolhouse so Elizabeth had closed the door behind her.
The reverend stopped when he was a few feet away from her. “I only wish I’d been in town when your family had the fever. I was up at Fort Benton picking up some books I’d ordered for the school.”
Elizabeth shrugged. “There’s nothing you could have done.”
She’d guess the man was about fifty years old. His brown wool suit was well-worn, but his white shirt was crisply ironed. His hair was a thick gray and his eyes looked at her with sympathy.
She didn’t want sympathy.
“I could still go with you and pray over the grave if you’d like. If you’d find that comforting.”
Elizabeth shook her head. “Maybe later. Jake’s going to make a marker. Maybe then it would be good to—” Her voice trailed off. She swallowed, but continued in a whisper. That was all she could manage. “Maybe by then I will be able to do it.”
She hadn’t realized she’d neglected to give a prayer at the burial. The doctor from the fort had read some scriptures over the grave and he had said a prayer. But Elizabeth had been silent. She hadn’t cried, either. Not even after everyone else was gone. She hadn’t grieved for the ones she’d lost, she’d merely waited to join them. But now—
The reverend nodded. “It’s always hard when someone we love dies.”
“They were all I had and God took them away for nothing.”
“I know it feels that way.”
Elizabeth looked up sharply. “Do you have a wife?”
The reverend nodded.
“Then you don’t know how I feel.” Her whisper was gone. Anger filled her voice. “I had no family before I married Matthew and now—” she spread her hands “—I was trying to be so good. So careful. But now I’m alone again.”
“God is with you,” the reverend said.
Elizabeth didn’t know what to say.
Reverend Olson smiled encouragingly at her. “I know it’s not always easy to see His hand in our lives, but He loves us all the same.”
Elizabeth couldn’t keep silent. She’d kept the words inside until now, but it all came bubbling out of her. “I don’t care if He loves me. I don’t love Him anymore. He took my Rose. That’s the end—”
Elizabeth stopped. Her cheeks were burning. She’d been right earlier when she had begged God to let her die. If He’d done it when she asked, she never would have spoken this blasphemy aloud. She could have saved them both the accusation in her voice and the pity on the reverend’s face. She wondered if she had damned her soul forever.
The reverend put his hand on her shoulder. “He understands how you feel.”
Elizabeth just stood there. If God understood her, He understood more than she did. She just wanted time to go backward to those days when her family was alive. Her only consolation had been the hope of being with Rose and Matthew soon in Heaven and God was not even giving her that comfort. He might never give her that blessing now, not when her feelings were out in the open where everyone could see them. How was she going to live without her baby?
Jake stood outside of the schoolhouse door. It had been almost half an hour since Elizabeth had gone inside. Spotted Fawn had wanted to hold the baby and he had given the little one to her. He couldn’t hear anything inside the schoolhouse. He wondered if Elizabeth was changing her mind about marrying him.
Well, if she was, he couldn’t blame her. It wasn’t just the harshness of the land that might deter her. Mrs. Barker had just demonstrated the extra problems any woman would have in this town if she married him. A woman who was used to t
he ways of the polite world couldn’t be faulted for wanting to avoid that.
And Mrs. Barker had been more charitable than she might have been. Jake suspected there were people in this town who would say he belonged with the heathens as much as the girls did. To them, it didn’t matter what a man believed; everything turned on the way someone looked and he still looked more like a mountain man than a gentleman.
Jake was questioning whether he should open the door and tell Elizabeth he understood. He might as well save her the agony of admitting she was going back on her decision. Besides, he had an ominous feeling about Mrs. Barker. He was half-surprised that the woman hadn’t followed them to the schoolhouse to complain to the reverend that he and Spotted Fawn were dirtying the steps by standing on them.
Mrs. Barker liked to believe the church could not go forward without her guidance, but she held things back more than drove them forward. And it wasn’t just the church that suffered. It was the whole town.
If it weren’t for her talk about the railroad, people wouldn’t listen to her. In Jake’s opinion, the railroad was fool’s gold. It might or might not ever come by here. Unfortunately, Mrs. Barker had a cousin who worked for one of the big railroads back East and somehow she’d used that to make herself the local judge of what a railroad wanted in a town they’d consider for a regular stop.
If she and her Civic Improvement League said one of the saloons needed to wash their windows every week, the windows were washed. If they said the hotel needed to get more bathtubs for their guests, the order was sent back East. Everyone wanted Miles City to be a railroad stop and they were willing to obey Mrs. Barker to see that it happened.
Just then the door opened and Reverend Olson asked Jake and Spotted Fawn to come inside. Jake let his nieces go into the schoolhouse and then stepped inside himself, wondering what he would find.
Elizabeth stood at the front of the room. The afternoon sunlight was shining through the window and surrounding her with its glow. She had a small red flower in her hand.
Calico Christmas at Dry Creek Page 6