When they arrived home that evening, Jonah helped Bianca to her cottage. For the first time since she had first entered the house, Jonah followed her inside. For a while, they just stood staring at each other; the only light around them came from the moonlight filtering through the window. Bianca made the first move when she stepped closer to him and reached up to remove his hat. She placed it on the hook near the door and began to untie his scarf. Before she could pull it off of his shoulders, Jonah caught her hands and pressed them against his chest, drawing her even closer in the process.
He pulled her hands up and twined them around his neck and wrapped an arm around her waist. With the other hand, he lifted her chin and pressed his lips against hers. When she responded, he deepened it further and slid his fingers into her hair. After long moments, before the kiss could go any further, he broke it off, breathing heavily. He rested his forehead against hers and gazed into her eyes.
“The horses,” he said between deep breaths, “their still standing in the snow.”
Bianca nodded. “You should go put them in the stall.”
“Mmm. Bianca. I…I think I am falling in love with you. You are not at all what I expected. And…I have to know if you feel anything like that for me.”
Bianca’s heart soared. She didn’t say anything. She just nodded.
Jonah smiled. “I can’t believe you are mine.” He took a deep breath and opened his mouth to continue but was cut off by the sound of the horses’ whines. Jonah laughed wryly.
“Let me go take care of those horses and then I will be back.”
Bianca grinned and nodded before watching him leave.
Smiling softly to herself, Bianca headed to her room after hanging up her cloak, hat and mittens. She stripped off her gown and slipped into a peignoir and wrapper Cissy had insisted she buy. She took her hair out of the constraining bun and unbraided it to brush it out. When she heard her bedroom door close, she turned to greet Jonah shyly.
But the man who stepped into the candlelight was not Jonah.
“Who are you? How did you get in here?”
The man laughed harshly. “The name’s Frank, darling. I see my son hasn’t mentioned me. Too bad. I told him what I would do to the one he loves. He must not have believed me.”
As he spoke, he drew a knife out of his pocket. Its edge glowed sharply in the small light as he advanced on her. “That was a very touching scene you shared in the foyer.”
“You were watching us?”
“Indeed I was. I’ve been trailing you since this morning when you arrived at the festival. After I saw that kiss, I came back here and waited for you.”
As he spoke, Bianca edged sideways and Frank matched her moves, circling her, as if toying with her.
“Why?”
“My son stole my wife from me and now I will steal his from him. I warned him long ago that I would.”
Sudden understanding dawned on Bianca. “You’re the reason why he’s been so hesitant to take our marriage forward.” She didn’t fully understand but she knew she was right.
The back of her legs hit the table behind her and she grasped a heavy paperweight before moving away and closer to the door.
Frank followed her but he was done talking. He lunged at Bianca with the knife but she threw the paperweight at him with all her might and it caught him on the side of the head, dazing him. Bianca didn’t wait. She pulled the door open and ran out of the bedroom and then out into the yard, screaming for Jonah along the way.
She heard Frank crash through the living room and follow her. She twisted back to look and slipped on the ice in front of her and fell. Frank was faster than he seemed and the paperweight hadn’t done much damage.
He covered the distance between him and his pray quickly. Bianca tried to scramble away from him but the ice was slippery and Frank got to her first. He turned her over and straddled her stomach. The knife glinted in his hand in the moonlight as he raised it above his head with a maniacal laugh. When he brought it down, Bianca braced herself, just as a loud boom shook the night air and Frank screamed in agony as the knife went flying and blood spurted from his hand. Another boom and Frank’s shoulder jerked and he fell back away from Bianca.
Jonah came up alongside her, shotgun to his shoulder. He pulled her up with one hand, keeping the other steadily on the trigger of the gun firmly aimed at the other man. Bianca scrambled up and Jonah swept her behind him.
He slowly advanced on Frank but the man didn’t move. When Jonah stepped over him, he was surprised to see Frank looking at him with wide, glazed eyes. A dead man’s gaze. Jonah turned him over and found the knife Frank had used on Bianca lodged in his back. It must have landed hilt first in the snow when it was shot out of Frank’s hand and Frank had impaled himself on it when he fell back from the second shot.
Jonah felt nothing but relief. The shadow specter of Frank Cassidy was no longer hanging over his life like a gloom. He was free.
The next week, on Christmas morning, Jonah and Bianca sat down before the hearth and sipped on hot chocolate. They had a pile of wrapping paper flung all over the living room and both were as giddy as children as they took in their gifts. Jonah excused himself and went to his room. When he came back out, he had a small package wrapped in gold with a red bow in his hands.
Bianca looked at him curiously when he presented it to her. I bought it a month ago but I wasn’t sure if I was ready to give it to you. At least, not until the Christmas Festival. I had already decided that I would give it to you that morning and Frank’s demise just gave me more of a confirmation.
“I am sorry about what he put you and your mom through, Jonah. I am glad he can’t hurt you anymore.” Jonah had explained everything about Frank to her after that fateful night and Bianca was glad Jonah was finally able to move past it.
She carefully unwrapped the package and opened the small box inside. The gift inside stunned her. Jonah knelt next to her.
“I know I said when I met you that I did not want a wife, only a maid. But you changed all of that. You turned my world upside down. You are genuine and generous, practical and fun. I can’t imagine anyone else that I would rather spend the rest of my life with. We have been married for several months now but as of yet, we have not lived as husband and wife. But I love you and I want you to be mine alone. Bianca Cassidy, would you be my wife and companion from this day on for as long as God gives us breath to share?”
Bianca just stared at him. Her Christmas miracle had occurred. He was everything she ever wanted and she loved him with all that she had.
Bianca leaned forward and kissed Jonah. She didn’t have words to say what she wanted to say but he knew what she was saying all the same. He slipped the ring on her finger and enfolded her in his embrace.
*****
THE END.
Western Love
Mail Order Bride
CHRISTIAN MICHAEL
Chapter One: Run-ins
California, 1885
Constance Lowell allowed her father to help her from the carriage, lifting her skirts to keep them from the mud that lay along the roadways.
“Be careful pumpkin,” Mr. Robert Lowell said as he held his daughter’s arm to save her from slipping. “If you ruin that dress your mother will have my hide for certain.”
“I’ll be careful, papa.”
“Good,” he smiled. “So Rupert, tell us more about this clothing company.”
“Yes, sir,” Rupert Merchant said with a solemn nod of his head. “The Bethel Clothing Company was founded on a street corner during the Great California Gold Rush. With no more to work with than rags, the owner’s wife would sew them into worthwhile breeches for men to purchase at half the cost of buy them brand new. As time went on, she garnered enough sales to purchase new material. Still, she kept her prices low and business poured in. By the time the gold rush lost interest, Mr. and Mrs. Smitz had built up enough revenue to purchase this here building and the acreage that surrounds it. It’s in the proc
ess of being passed down to their son Jameson, but as he’s away in college, there’s no telling when the transition will actually happen.”
“Can we take a more detailed tour of the facility?” Constance asked, her green eyes clearly interested in how a clothing company ran from the inside.
“Absolutely, Miss Lowell.”
She followed her father inside and gasped at the intense heat inside the building. Almost immediately it became harder to breathe and she started to sweat. She brought out her fan and began fanning herself as she scanned the workers. For the most part they looked worn thin, their bodies adapted to the life of hard labor. But when her eyes fell on a child who couldn’t have been more than seven, pushing around a car to collect garments in, Constance felt an unspeakable rage rush through her. She marched up to the foreman, taking leave of her father and demanded. “Does Mr. Smitz condone letting children labor in a sweat shop like this?”
“Excuse me, Miss?”
“I asked if Mr. Smitz supports the idea of letting children work in a sweat shop, doing no doubt, work meant for an adult?”
“Mr. Smitz wants efficiency and there’s no better way to get it, than the way I’m doing it.”
“I demand to speak with him.”
“Constance,” Robert Lowell said, a grin on his face. “Leave the man alone. He’s got a business to run.”
“Absolutely not, father. I beg your pardon, but I cannot stand by and watch a child suffer under the constraints that are barely tolerated by full grown men and women. He’s seven, maybe. How is it fair to ask that of him?”
Constance knew she was making a scene, but rarely did she care about such things. Stopping the boy with a gentle hand on his shoulder, she kneeled down in front of him, smudging her new dress with dirt. “What’s your name?”
“Billy, ma’am,” the little boy said. His frail body made tears swell in Constance’s eyes and she worked hard to swallow them back.
“Won’t you come with me now, Billy?”
“But I have to work, ma’am. If I don’t work, Mr. Strickland won’t pay me and that’s all the money my mama has.” The boy’s plight nearly broken Constance in two as she took the boy’s hand.
“Mr. Strickland, from here on out Billy will go to school and will never set foot in this factory again.”
“Whatever lady,” The foreman replied. “Just so you know, though, when his mother is better she’ll be out of a job.”
“Constance Marie,” Robert said, catching up to his headstrong daughter. “You can’t just yank a boy out of his job. What does he do tomorrow when his mother has no money because you took his job away?”
“He’s going to school just as I said father.”
“And how will his mother survive, let alone provide for him?”
“I’m going to hire her while we’re here. Then, I’m going to talk to Mr. Smitz about the operation he’s running here and the deplorable conditions of his workers, let alone the atrocity I witnessed today.”
“Oh, I blame your mother for you streak of stubbornness. And thank you very much by the way, she’ll tear me a new hide for the stain on your new dress.”
“It couldn’t be avoided and I’ll pay to have it professionally laundered out of my allowance.”
“What are you going to hire Billy’s mother to do exactly?”
“She’s going to be my assistant as I’m going to make sure that the Bethel Clothing Company is strongly reprimanded for hiring children and working them to the bone as if they were full grown adults. Despicable practice,” she huffed, taking her seat when her father handed her up in the carriage.
***
Jameson Smitz sat in his office trying to finish the inventory he’d need to send in today if he wanted to continue to supply clothes for is branding line without interruption. Frustration kept the numbers from tallying and every time Jameson tried to make them, he just succeeded in making himself madder. Tossing his pencil on his desk, He stood up and stepped outside, taking a deep breath of fresh air.
“Thank you, Lord,” Jameson said, planting a smile on his face.
“It seems odd to see a man thank God when he can’t even abide by decent labor practices,” came a soft, feminine voice from behind him.
“Excuse me?” Jameson said, turning to see a beautiful, if young, woman standing with her hands on her hips.
“I said, you shouldn’t be thanking God when you can’t keep children from working themselves to the bone in your sweat shop.”
“And you are?” Jameson said, feeling a headache develop behind his eyes. Her blonde hair was done up in a way that drew his gaze to her angry face, and the fire that seemed to spit from her pretty green eyes. Jameson had the urge to grin at her, but given her current stance, he figured it’d probably get him a kick in the teeth rather than a polite smile in return.
“My name is Constance Lowell. My father Robert is here attending an advisory meeting at Stanford University and I’m visiting with him. We took a tour of your factory yesterday and I was beyond appalled by the presence of a seven years old boy name, Billy, who was pushing a garment cart around. His face was darkened by dirt and he looked slim enough to fit in the leg of one of the pairs of britches your factory makes. Are you so hard up for workers that you’d take on a boy who should be in school learning?”
“You’re saying that there was a little boy working in my factory yesterday?”
“Yes,” she huffed, making Jameson grin after all. She had some attitude going on that was for sure.
“It isn’t a common practice for Bethel Clothing Company to hire anyone under sixteen, ma’am,” Jameson said, his own eyes hard, focused, and serious. In fact, it is strictly against our hiring policy and I guarantee you that I will deal directly with the person who’s in charge of hiring for that particular job.”
“Thank you,” she said, not quite smiling. “I’m sorry if I came off rudely Mr. Smitz. I just couldn’t stand by and let it go. I should also tell you that I took that little boy home, saw that he cleaned up, and escorted him to school. I’ve also hired his mother for the remainder of the school year so that Billy can attend class as a boy his age should.”
“I agree,” Jameson said, admiring the young lady’s spunk. She wasn’t one to just let things slide because it wasn’t exactly her place to speak of them. She was a go-getter and would make someone a very active and interesting wife when she was old enough to marry. “I promise Miss Lowell that this matter will be handled immediately. And to go a step further, I will keep in touch with you about the matter if you’re agreeable to that?”
“I’d greatly appreciate that, Mr. Jameson.”
“Excellent,” he smiled. He extended his hand and shook hers lightly. “I suppose I’ll see you at the gala at Stanford on Saturday night?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’ll look forward to it,” he said, adding a wink. “For now, I must ask you to excuse me. I have business to attend to, including a reprimand for my employees.”
“Yes, please. Ado, Mr. Jameson.”
Chapter Two: Heading Home
Constance didn’t know exactly how she should feel as the train pulled away from the station. She’d had a wonderful time in California. Visiting Stanford and seeing prominent places, meeting important people. She’d changed two lives while she was there. Little Billy Porter was able to stay in school until summer and his mother, Agnes, had risen to the opportunity she’d been offered. As a parting gift, Constance had asked her father for an advance on her allowance and sent a gift basket to the impoverished woman. Inside she’d tucked nearly five hundred dollars, enough for a year’s income. Hopefully it’d give her enough time to find a decent job. Constance had also written her an exemplary performance review, praising her work ethic and skills.
Her heart, however, was torn in two. She’d indeed seen Jameson Smitz at the Stanford gala that had been put on to raise money for the Leland Stanford, Jr. Museum. Jane Stanford was the main speaker of course, telling o
f the heartbreak of losing her only son.
“He was the light of my life,” she’d said, “Without him I am only existing.
“Opening this museum will be like bringing my son back to me and will give the public a glimpse of his brightness and the treasures from far off places.”
Still, if Constance was to choose a moment that changed her entire outlook on where her life was headed, it was confronting Jameson Smitz about little Billy Porter. Being an outspoken woman, she was used to seeing a plethora of people at speeches, women suffrage parades and the like. Even then she’d never seen a man as handsome as Jameson. His thick brown hair was as unruly as a child’s sticking out everywhere when the breeze blew so that he had to run a hand through it to keep it out of his eyes.
His face was young, despite the two-day beard he’d sported and his smile had been warm and welcoming. But if she were asked and forced to be honest, she’d have said it was the allure of his beautiful sky blue eyes that had truly pulled her in.
“What did you think, Pumpkin?”
“Excuse me?” Constance said, blushing a little when she realized her father had been addressing her and she’d neglected to listen. “I’m sorry, father. What did you ask?”
“I mentioned to mother that Jameson Smitz seemed to be an honorable and trustworthy young man, certainly worthy of consideration as a board member.”
“You’re going to resign as a board member of the university?”
“Your mother and I would like to travel during our golden years. You yourself will be off to school and there’s no sense of us waiting around for you to graduate and settle into a career or motherhood.”
“Oh,” Constance said, wondering which she’d choose when the time came. “Well, I suppose that’s the practical solution then.”
The train pulled into New York two weeks later and all too soon, Constance was back into the routine of school, friends, socials, and celebrating the Women’s Suffrage movement. Two weeks later her first correspondence from Jameson arrived and her hands shook just trying to open the letter.
[2016] Widow Finds Love Page 6