The Cripple’s Bride

by Elliee Atkinson

  The cottage was surrounded by fog, so he couldn’t see what was to the left, to the right, or behind the building. He also couldn’t see the true size of the cottage, as it was covered in fog. He hesitated, pondering how he would approach this situation. The lantern seemed to be there for a reason. Was it so that someone lost in the snowstorm might be able to find his or way to safety? It seemed the only logical explanation to Daryl. If that was the case, he wanted to meet this old woman and thank her. And he wanted to do it as quickly as possible before his tongue froze in his mouth and he was unable to speak altogether.

  He struggled with his leg as he tried to get down from the wagon. He almost fell, but caught himself. When he grabbed the side of the bench to steady himself, his hand slipped and he hit the side of his head on a piece of wood holding the fabric of the canopy.

  Not able to believe the bad luck he’d had since leaving Louisville, Daryl had to stop for a moment and collect his thoughts. He pressed one hand against his forehead and sighed. “Oh God, what did I do to offend You?” he murmured.

  He maneuvered his leg over the side and hopped down as he had done before. This time, he tried bouncing slightly when he landed so that his foot wouldn’t take the complete impact of his weight. It helped some and he turned back to grab the walking stick.

  Holding on for dear life, Daryl made his way through the snow, hoping beyond hope that he would not find a hole accidentally. He used the stick to poke into the snow, ensuring there was solid ground underneath it. The lantern light came closer and closer as he approached the house.

  He stopped in front of the house and looked through the window.

  On the other side, light see-through fabric drapes were drawn closed but did not hide what could be seen. He froze in place, watching a woman moving about through the house. She was holding a cloth. She would disappear and then reappear and disappear. She seemed to be singing and at times, she would stop and sweep her hands through the air, dancing with an invisible partner.

  Daryl’s heart skipped a beat. He was enthralled from the moment he saw her. Her long tresses were piled up on her head but a few had fallen down and strands surrounded her face on both sides. She had high cheekbones and small button nose. Her lips looked perfectly kissable.

  For the first time in his life, Daryl knew what it was like to feel love at first sight. He had thought what he felt for Laura was love. Now that he saw the woman in the cottage, he knew that he had been wrong. He didn’t know love until that very moment.

  CHAPTER SIX

  DARYL MEETS RACHEL

  DARYL MEETS RACHEL

  Rachel O’Connell moved around the living room, a tune running through her mind that she hadn’t been able to get rid of. It made her want to swing and dance around the room with wild abandon. She didn’t think she’d ever heard it played on piano or organ. It was an original song. A song just for her.

  She ran the cloth over the shelf for the third time, turning in place and wiping it again. She moved on to the mantle, picking up the small animal statues she’d placed there and dusting underneath. She wasn’t afraid of the snowstorm outside. She’d taken Adam and Mark’s advice and loaded up on firewood in the house. She had food stocked and was ready to ride out the storm. The wind was bad, but her cottage was built strong. She wasn’t at all worried.

  The flames in the fireplace burned high, licking the rock around it before going up the flue. She built it strong so that she would stay warm. She’d brought in enough firewood to last the storm even if it was a week long.

  Rachel stopped in her tracks when she saw something strange through her window. The lantern reflected her face in the window. But when she turned a certain way, she could see through the window and the light reflected off a man, or at least something in the shape of a man. He was wearing a large coat and a hat with a scarf tying it down. He was leaning on a stick. Focusing in let her see that one of his legs was injured. As she watched, the man collapsed.

  “Oh!” Her hands flew to her mouth. She rushed over to the door and pulled down her large coat from the hall tree. She put it on hastily and shoved her feet into her galoshes. Tying the sash around the belt and flipping the hood up over her head, Rachel flew out into the snowy night, stomping through the snow with fury.

  “Oh dear, oh dear,” Rachel reached Daryl and leaned down, setting the lantern on the ground. She pulled on his arm and ducked under it so that she could hoist him to a standing position with her shoulders. He struggled, his right hand desperately clutching the walking stick.

  “I’m here to help you,” Rachel said, nearly dragging the big man through the snow to get to her cottage. “Can you walk? It’s okay. I’ve got you. I won’t let you fall again. I’ve got you.”

  Rachel was amazed that she was able to help the man walk at all. He was much bigger than her, a muscular, handsome man with dark hair and dark eyes. She thought for a moment that she could drown in those eyes. Especially if they continued to look at her the way they were now. He was gazing at her intensely, but the look didn’t make her uncomfortable. It made her want to giggle and flutter her eyelashes like a timid schoolgirl, something she was far from being.

  Ashamed that she should be thinking about that right at that moment, Rachel put all of her strength into getting the man into the house so that he could thaw out. He was shivering so hard, his teeth were chattering. She reached out to grasp the doorknob of the storm door and pull it open. He started to tip over and she caught him. “I’ve got you,” she whispered. They caught each other’s eyes and stared for a moment before she looked away, pushing him through the doorway.

  As soon as she touched him, Daryl felt better. She was warm. To him, she was an angel. He knew he was losing his faculties when he couldn’t think for the life of him what he was doing out in the middle of a snowstorm to begin with. What was he thinking? Was he an idiot? There was a good chance he was.

  In his delusional mind, he walked for hours before finally being placed in front of a warm fire to thaw out. However, the doorway and the fireplace were only about six steps apart.

  He pushed himself to it with the walking stick while Rachel pushed her shoulder against the door to close it against the strong winds trying to force it open. She slid the bolt lock over and stood up straight, smoothing the apron on top of her dress. As soon as the door was bolted, she flittered past him like a butterfly, moving all around the room as she prepared it so that he would be comfortable as he warmed up. He turned his head back and forth, watching her putting water on to heat, gathering towels and her own bandage kit. He watched her as she cut through the material of his trousers, exposing the swollen spot where he was sure to have broken the bone inside.

  She looked at it in dismay before moving her eyes up to him. “This is not good. I can’t help with this. We need Dr. Campbell and I don’t think I can get him in this weather.”

  “Do…” He was out of breath and the pain seared him whenever he spoke. “Do what you can for me. Please. I will… pay you.”

  She almost looked offended. She shook her head and got back to her feet. “You relax. I will help you get well. You should never have been out traveling in this bad weather. Why, you are lucky to be alive, you know that, don’t you?”

  Daryl tried to laugh but it didn’t come out. “I know. I… didn’t expect the weather to be this bad.”

  “Well, if you had paid attention to Adam’s prediction, you would have. People need to have more faith in that man. He knows what he’s talking about.”

  “You mean Adam Collins?” he asked, his mind focusing in as his body warmed. The only problem now was that with the warmth came greater pain as his nerves awoke.

  “Of course I mean…” She looked at him sharply as she checked the temperature of the water on the stove fire. “Oh you aren’t from here, are you?”

  He shook his head. “I hail from Louisville. I am coming through to visit. I must tell you, I heard the prediction before I crossed the mountain, but by the time I heard it,
it was too late and the source I heard it from, well, let’s just say I didn’t know the man from Adam.”

  Rachel laughed. When Daryl realized what he’d done, he laughed too.

  “Anyway, I do believe your Mr. Collins has hit on to something. I would love to know how he predicts weather patterns.”

  “Well, the seasons are all different,” Rachel knelt in front of him, preparing a towel under his left leg, which was stretched out toward her. She had cut away all the fabric of his trousers and was tending to the cuts and wounds on his legs. After a few moments, she rose and tended to the ones on his face and arms.

  “Did you injure your chest? Do you have wounds that need tending?”

  “I… I don’t know. My whole body hurts. But if I take my shirt off, I will be half naked in front of you, ma’am, and I don’t think that’s proper. We haven’t introduced ourselves and you have cut my pants from my legs.”

  She laughed softly, holding out her hand. “I am Rachel O’Connell. My brother Sam owns the Horse N Saddle. He likes to call me the horse that no one can tame.” Her eyes sparkled when she said that and he had to look away quickly, though he took her hand and shook it several times.

  “I’m Daryl Parker. I’m just going to see my sister and her husband. They’re the Samuels. They live on the other side of Wickenburg from you, so I am told.”

  “Yes, that’s right. I chose this side because it’s the side the Collins’ live on. They are the finest family in all of Wickenburg. Not that there is a problem with your family. The Samuels have a wonderful reputation for being new to the area.”

  “They’ve been here for over a year.”

  She nodded, looking at him with eyes that he realized were a dark green color, like dark emeralds. Her dark red hair was let loose and only held away from her face by a green headband. The cascade fell halfway down her back, waving and curling all around like it had a life of its own.

  “To me, they are newcomers. I have been here most of my life.”

  “Do you live here with a husband or… children?”

  She leaned around him and smiled. “Does it look like this house is big enough for more than one person to you? How flattering. I am usually told it looks like the house of an old spinster with a dozen cats.”

  Daryl remembered his “old crone” thought and could only smile at her. “I suppose it is a very small house, isn’t it? So you live here alone then.”

  “I do. I am very content here. Everyone knows me…” She grinned at him as she dabbed at the blood on his face with a cloth. “Everyone who has lived in Wickenburg for any amount of time anyway.”

  Daryl watched as she moved, wringing out the cloth she was using to clean his wounds. It looked as if every movement was a dance, elegant and smooth. Her hips swayed from side to side as she walked, her arms moved like the wings of a bird as she cleaned his wounds. He was finding it hard to breathe and didn’t know if it was because of how cold he’d gotten, another type of injury or whether he was just too enthralled with her beauty.

  “Have you ever been married?”

  She was wrapping a clean cloth around the long gash on his arm. “This is going to scar badly,” she murmured before looking up into his eyes. “When you decide what story you want to tell to excuse these injuries, let me know. I’ll go along with it.”

  He chuckled. “I’m a pretty honest man, Rachel. I don’t like to lie about things. Even if it makes me look better in the eyes of a beautiful woman.”

  She grinned and her eyes twinkled with laughter. “I don’t have a chance to believe another story,” she said softly. “I already know the truth.”

  “I haven’t told you what happened yet.”

  “Well, it wasn’t a brawl at the saloon, was it?” She became serious and touched the side of his face with her fingertips. “It looks like you had an accident in the woods. You have particles in your skin that would only come from a long and repeated fall. I’d say down a ravine and into a stream. But not the stream outside my home. There are no hills high enough for a man to fall and sustain the kind of injuries you have.”

  Daryl was impressed with her. He was almost lost for words. However, there was one thing he knew he wanted to say. He leaned forward and scooted back a little in the chair so that he was sitting up straighter. “You, uh, you have any liquor?”

  “I do. I have wine, brandy, and whiskey. I think you look like a whiskey man. When I am done here, I’m going to tend to your horses. I’ll take them into my barn so that they will not be in this weather. I have extra feed and I don’t mind sharing. I have several extra horse blankets, too. They will stay quite warm.”

  “Thank you so much for your hospitality,” Daryl said. “I do appreciate it.” He watched her walk to the kitchen, lean down and take a bottle from a cabinet near the icebox. Then she stretched up a bit and took a cup from a cabinet above her head. He took the time to wonder why, if she had this home built just for her, she would put cabinets too high for her to reach comfortably. She brought the bottle of whiskey and the cup back to him.

  “Here you go. If you need anything else, I will be right back. Will you be all right while I’m out there?”

  He grinned through his pain. “Yes, of course. I’m a grown man. I daresay I’ve been in worse pain before.” That was not entirely true. He didn’t actually remember ever having been in so much agony. His leg was still throbbing, sending bolts of pain through his entire body. He’d never been shot, never broken a bone, and had had a fairly calm life up to that point. It was something he hadn’t realized until that day. The day that everything went wrong.

  He watched her dressing up again, ready to take on the weather outside just to help his horses stay alive. He was a little ashamed, wanting to take care of them himself or at least help. He was a man. He shouldn’t be making a woman do his work for him. Nevertheless, he couldn’t move without the fire of pain bursting through him.

  Instead, he sat back and enjoyed the warmth of the fire, lifting the bottle directly to his lips and letting the liquor slide down his throat and into his belly. Soon, his head would be in a fog and he would sleep through the pain. When it worsened, he would wake up and have to get a new bottle. He hoped Rachel was up to having a house guest for a few days.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HIDDEN BLESSINGS

  HIDDEN BLESSINGS

  When Daryl woke up, it was completely dark other than the crackling fire that lit up and heated the room simultaneously. He tried to sit up, but pain flowed through his body like a tidal wave. He dropped back against the pillows under him and stared up at the flickering light on the ceiling. He didn’t want to admit how much it hurt, but it was overwhelming.

  Time passed slowly as he lay there, trying not to move. Every time he did, it made the pain worse. He began to hear soft sounds around the quiet house, sounds he wouldn’t have heard if it was daytime and the earth was awake with life.

  He heard the sounds of life at night. He focused in on them, one by one, the crickets outside, the soft hoot of an owl, the unmistakable sound of steady breathing in another room. He turned his head toward the breathing and saw that Rachel had left her door open in case he stirred and needed her help.

  Daryl couldn’t help being amazed by the woman. She was living a happy life, by herself almost completely, all the time. She kept her home clean and looked as healthy and strong as a woman could be. The fact that she had left her door open displayed a level of trust Daryl would not have expected in most circumstances. She was confident he would not hurt her, even though they did not know each other.

  He forced himself to sit up, cringing at the pain that shot through his leg when he moved it. The splint had loosened while he was sleeping and he took his time fixing the bandages so that they were wrapped tighter around his leg and knotted firmly. He moved both legs over the side of the couch, wincing at each touch anywhere on his left leg. He noticed a difference though. The pain was ebbing away, remaining a constant throb, but the sharp agony of the d
ay before was gone.

  He scanned the room, noticing there were two whiskey bottles on the floor by the couch. One was empty, the other had about a third of the liquid left. He leaned down and grabbed the one with some left in it, uncorked it and took a long drink. The heat of the alcohol ripped through his throat and he gasped for breath.

  What was left of the pain would soon dissolve, at least for a time. He glanced toward the front door, wondering if his horses were all right and what the weather looked like. She hadn’t fetched a doctor, so it must have been too bad for her to venture out in. If the weather was too bad for her, he felt like it was too bad for him, too. She was an independent woman. It seemed she was capable of anything.

  What he saw leaning up against the end of the couch only proved his point. It was the stick he had been using to walk with. At some point, she’d found time to strip the bark from the outside and sand it down to a smooth finish. It was a sturdy stick and what she’d done to it made an impression on him.

  He shook his head, scooting down the couch to pick it up and inspect it more closely.

  “What an amazing woman,” he murmured. He looked up at her open door with longing eyes. He would marry her someday, he was sure of it. All he had to do was go through a little pain to get what he most desired. He looked up at the ceiling again.

  You do like making me suffer for good things, don’t You, Lord? he thought. I don’t know what I did to You, but I am sorry. Thanks for the blessings, though. I mean that.

  He looked back down at the stick. Rachel was a blessing. One of the most important ones he would ever have in his lifetime.

  He used the stick to push himself to his feet. Once he was sure he was balanced, he took a few hobbled steps to the window by the front door. He pushed aside the drapes and looked out. What he saw made him grunt with displeasure. He could barely see the barn, which was no more than 25 feet from the house to the right. The ground was completely covered with white snow, as were the surrounding trees and any other plant life that grew around her house. He stared at it in dismay. His sister and her family were probably worried sick about him. They probably thought he was caught out it in somewhere, freezing and close to death.