by Maren Smith
She was probably married.
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Maybe she was widowed.
He could already feel the sting of the buckshot hitting him for pursuing what he probably shouldn't. But, leaving the safety of the woods behind him, Judd headed for the house. He walked slowly, his eyes making a constant wary sweep across the windows of the house, down to the barn and through the cover of the garden. At any moment, he expected to be confronted by a gun-toting man with a riled temper and hell-bent on protecting what was his. Not that Judd would have blamed him; he more than intended to do the same when he finally got a house and family of his own. As he was nearing the porch, out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed a flash of movement and turned his head just in time to see two women, one of them his golden-haired songbird from the creek, ducking away from the window again. He stopped walking just as the front door flew open and an old man stalked out to meet him, a long-barreled Winchester rifle in both hands. It took effort, but he made himself smile. "Howdy!" he said, with all the cheerfulness he could muster.
Tall and thin, clean-shaven but for a thick bush of a snow white mustache, he glared at Judd with black eyes that all but snapped irritation. "Who the hell are you?"
"Judd Faris."
The old man didn't soften in the slightest. He didn't lower the rifle, either. "Trading post is four miles down the road." Judd glanced over his shoulder at his pack mules, then back at the old man. "Much obliged, thank you. But that's not why I'm here."
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"No?" Glancing down at the berry bucket, the old man narrowed his eyes speculatively. "What do you want?" Judd held the bucket up. "I was hoping I might return this to the little gal I ran across in the woods a few minutes ago. I surely didn't mean to frighten her, but I must have and this is where she ran to. I reckon she might well be your..." he hesitated, hoping the man might fill in the blank, before asking, "your wife, maybe?"
"Reckon again," the man told him flatly. "Ain't got a wife." She wasn't married, then. His smile widened into a grin. "I was wondering if I might be allowed to apologize to the lady, give her back her bucket, and maybe have a word or two before I..."
The old man looked past Judd at the same time that he became aware of horses coming up fast behind him. The old man's face darkened, and then he swore. "Aw, hell!" Judd turned just as the two women reined their horses to a stop in front of the house. Each swung themselves down to the ground and stalked angrily past Judd without so much as a glance in his direction.
"You always do this!" the red-head exclaimed. Her eyes were teary as she spat back at the dark-haired one,
"Everything I care about, you always take it away from me!"
"Oh, stop it!" the dark one snapped, following her sister up the porch steps. "It's not my fault he asked me to that picnic!"
"You know I love him!" The red-head was the first inside the house. Quick as a wink, she turned and slammed the door in the other woman's face.
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Grabbing the door, the dark-haired woman charged into the house after her sister. "Damn it, Grace!"
"You watch your mouth!" the old man bellowed, even as the door slammed shut once again.
Judd stared at the house, listening as one girl burst into tears and fled noisily upstairs to the second floor. The other woman followed, stomping her feet just as noisily and shouting in frustration, "But I didn't mean to steal him! I don't even want him! Take him back, if it means so blasted much!"
"You—y-you heifer!"
The whole house seemed the shudder as a second door slammed somewhere upstairs.
Judd's gaze drifted back down to the old man, who stood growling at his house. He tried to summon back his smile as, exhaling loudly through his nose, the old man turned to glare at him. "Boy, did you come here intending to do some courtin'?"
"If that's all right with you, sir," Judd countered diplomatically. "And if it isn't likely to get me shot, then yes. Yes, sir, I am."
The old man's eyes narrowed even more. "You Mormon?" Judd blinked. "Do I have to be?" The old man shooed at him with one hand, the one that still held the rifle. "You come back when you are. Then you can have 'em all. The whole damn lot of 'em!" Turning sharply, he headed into the house, leaving the door wide open behind him and grumbling under his breath, "Cussed women!"
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Judd stood on the porch, listening to the crying and protesting that was coming from an open second-floor window and to the grumbling complaints of the old man as he shouted up the stairs for quiet. He glanced back at his horse, rubbed his whiskered chin and wondered if perhaps this wasn't such a good time to come courting anyway. Of course, he still had the berries. And was it really trespassing to walk into another man's house if said other man left the door open to begin with? Judd rubbed his chin again, but decided he really didn't want to leave without first finding out his songbird's name.
He climbed the steps cautiously, but then hesitated at the threshold, the Winchester rifle very much in mind as he considered whether or not to simply pop his head inside and inquire as to the identity of his pretty blonde quarry. But as it turned out, he didn't have to. Instead, an old woman that he would otherwise have guessed to have been the old man's wife, if only the old man hadn't already clarified the matter, poked her head out and looked at him.
She smiled, her blue eyes sparkling. "You are still here, aren't you?"
It was easy to answer back with a genuine smile of his own. "Yes, ma'am. I'm still here." Reaching out her hand for the berry bucket, the old woman gathered up the flowers out of the top and gave him a knowing look. "Who are you after?"
"She's about this tall." Judd estimated his songbird's height against his own chest. "Hair the color of sunshine and the sweetest voice this side of heaven." 20
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"Ah," the woman nodded. "My name is Margo. The young lady you want is Constance."
"Judd Faris," he introduced himself. "Pleased to meet you, ma'am."
From somewhere inside, the old man blustered, "Is that boy still here?"
"Yes," Margo said, and quickly added. "You be nice!" She beamed another smile at Judd. "Come inside, Mr. Faris. And don't let Buster scare you off. He's not so bad once you get to know him. I'll go get Constance."
"Constance?" the old man exclaimed as Margo bustled past him, headed for the kitchen. He came back to the door and glared at Judd. "I'm not giving you Constance. Take the red head. Better yet, you take her older sister. Get her the hell out of this house!"
"Buster!" Margo came back out of the kitchen and glared at him reprovingly.
The old man spun around, completely unrepentant. He flung his hands up, indicating the racket of the two women still fighting and crying bitterly overhead. "I ain't had a lick of quiet, not in sixteen years! Can you hear that? Am I askin' so blamed much? I want quiet!"
Suddenly grabbing up his rifle again, he thumped it vigorously against the ceiling. The cacophony upstairs fell instantly silent.
Buster eyed the ceiling with grave mistrust, but gradually lowered the rifle again. "Won't last," he muttered darkly.
"Never does."
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Judd cleared his throat. "Sir, if you'll allow me to come wooin' your daughter, I can assure you, although I'm not a wealthy man by most standards, neither am I poorly. I'll take proper care of her. She'll not want for the necessities of life. Not if I can help it. And I'll treat her well." Upstairs, the squabbling returned, albeit in slightly quieter tones. Casting the ceiling a quick glance, Judd leaned in close to Buster, lowering his voice so only the old man could hear.
"I promise, she'll never have
reason to come cryin' home to you and wantin' to stay."
The old man leaned over, closing the distance between them even more. He turned his face almost sideways, peering at him out of one squinting black eye so intently that Judd had to fight the urge to retreat a giant step backwards.
"She ain't the one that causes the problems, boy," he said solemnly. "But even so, if that's what you want, I'll give you my permission. But that right there's the road to madness. Them girls don't look all that troublesome at first. They're right easy on the eyes and the softness of woman's touch is a siren's call, bound to lure any unsuspecting man to an early grave. Fight it, boy! Don't make the same mistake I did!
Because the minute you do, it's all over. You'll never have you another peaceful moment, not for as long as you live!" Done with his prophecy, he then turned and cast a baleful glare towards the ceiling, where the girls' squabbling was rapidly rising in pitch.
"I love him!"
"Then take him back!"
"I can't! He loves you, you ... you heifer!" 22
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Buster scowled, and then as though his self-restraint had suddenly snapped, he grabbed for the door. Judd quickly sidestepped to keep from being shoved back outside, but the old man only grabbed for a thick length of leather that was hanging behind the door and turned and stalked angrily for the stairs.
"I said I want quiet!" he bellowed as he charged up them. The fighting ended abruptly when he was no more than halfway up them. "Don't think you're either of you too big for me to take across my knee! I'll give you both the whuppin's of your lives! Serenity, hah! Serenity, my foot! Get over here!
Grace, don't you run from me, girl!"
There was a shrill shriek, followed by the rapid scrambling of two sets of feet, racing across the second-story floor, before another door slammed. Heavy furniture was immediately shoved across the upper room, no doubt barricading the girls safely out of the reach of that strap. Judd watched the ceiling, his eyebrows rising slowly towards his hairline as Buster angrily pounded to be let into the room. "You'll not lock me out of my own house or any part of it! You've both had this a-comin' to you, by God! You open this door right now, or I'll take a layer off your backsides like I ain't never done before!"
"I'm sorry."
Startled, Judd turned towards the kitchen and Constance, hovering shyly in the open doorway. She was holding the flowers he'd picked in her plump hands and looking highly embarrassed.
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Above them, the old man pounded even harder at the door and then began to throw his weight against it. "Open up!
Serenity, you spawn of the devil! Grace! You get this door open right now!"
There were minute squeaks of furniture legs scraping against the wooden floor as the barricade was slowly pushed out of the way, inch by inch. Twin footsteps retreated across the room over their heads.
"You should probably go," Constance said, and his eyes came back to her again.
He shook his head. "I was the second oldest out of nine kids. This," he gestured to the ceiling. "This doesn't bother me a bit."
Constance wrung her apron in her hands, almost miserably. "Wait a while."
"A hot bottom never did anyone any lasting harm," he said, walking towards her. "And I've known quite a few folks for whom it did a lot of good. But if you like," Judd held out his hand. "We could take a walk. Just you and me. I'd love to talk to you for a while."
From inside the kitchen, Judd heard Margo tsk and say,
"There she goes."
In a flash of calico skirts, the dark-haired woman, Serenity, dropped past the open window that was next to Judd. She waved her hands to her sister. "Come on, Grace!
Hurry!"
But from the upper floor, they heard, "My dress! I'm stuck!"
And an instant later, the barricade of furniture gave way. 24
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"No, papa! Wait, please!" Grace began to beg fervorously. Abandoning her sister for lost, Serenity ran for the barn.
"What are you doing hangin' out the blamed window?" Buster snapped.
"No, please! Please don't spank me, papa!" When Judd looked at Constance, her face was pale and her eyes were closed. She was cringing.
It was not a look he liked on her.
"Come here." Taking her small hand in his, Judd pulled Constance towards the door. They were off the porch and halfway to the garden before the first hard crack of the strap fell.
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Saga: Contance's Story
by Maren Smith
CHAPTER TWO
The two year old was standing in the metal wash tub screaming, the three year old was tucked under Buster's right arm, and the four year old was running naked through the garden. Bath time was not going as he'd initially planned it. Buster glared after the dark haired child, who was streaking through his corn. She hadn't done one cooperative thing since they'd got home. In fact, she seemed to be going out of her way to be just as difficult as possible. As far as Buster knew, that was probably how children worked. Hoping she wouldn't go far without her sisters, Buster decided that two children in hand was better than three streaking through the brush, and he dropped the three-year old into the tub. He may as well have dropped her into a bucket of snakes. The little girl screamed and latched her arms around his neck, pulling her feet up out of the lukewarm water, but Buster was determined. Despite her kicking and thrashing, he started with her toes and scrubbed all the way up to her head until the water was murky and all he could see of her skin was slippery and pink.
About the time that he was washing her face, the red head had calmed her squirming and stood still before him, sniffling and hiccuping as he soaped her hair. She still had her hands clenched tightly into the folds of his soft shirt. In fact, she hadn't let go of him once.
And the little blonde two year old hadn't stopped screaming once.
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"Hush," he growled at her, but she only cried all the louder. And when he finally deemed the carrot top clean and turned his attention to her, she snapped around, flung one grubby leg over the side of the tub and tried to flee. Buster was quicker. Holding her down with one arm, he steadfastly scrubbed at whatever part of her was most conveniently presented to him by her squirming. And while he did, she thrashed, kicked and yelled fit to wake the dearly departed.
As Buster struggled to wash what looked to be a week's worth of caked on grim from off her knees and out between her tiny toes, the three year old watched the torturous process being done to her sister and said, "Get her elbows." A rock came flying out of the corn field. It hit the ground nowhere near to him, but the intent was the same, and it left him glaring at the tall green stalks, searching for a little pink glimpse of the dark-haired hellion he'd been saddled with. Another rock slapped aside the corn leaves and ricocheted off the trunk of a towering pine near his house before cracking against the side of the chicken coop, scattering the hens scattering in an excitable state of wing-flapping alarm. If he ever got his hands on the blasted, fool woman who'd gone and left these confounded girls on his doorstep—he didn't care what her reasons were—she'd be real darn fortunate if he didn't tan her hide!
Buster shook his head and went back to scrubbing the loudly objecting blonde. He even managed to wash her hair, although he all but had to tuck her into a headlock before he could get her to hold still for it. And the hellion hiding in the 27
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corn pegged him twice with her projected nuggets of displeasure.
Margo Magnets or not, could anything possibly be worth this kind of aggravation?
Buster felt an almost icy chill fist in his gut. What was he thinking? Of course Margo was worth this! A woman
like that was worth damn near anything! Even knowing he could never hope to win Margo for his own, just the chance of being near her, if only for just a few days, was worth any aggravation these three girls could throw at him!
A clod of dirt hit the back of his neck, exploding up into his hair and trickling down into the back of his shirt. Buster snapped his eyes shut, ducking his head and hunching his shoulders against the spray of grit that rained down over him after the initial impact. His breath left him in a low, rumbling growl that stopped the two year old's struggling and even shut her up for the first time in almost twenty minutes. Both blonde and red head stared up at him with eyes as round as fine china saucers as Buster rose to his feet. These girls were as clean as they were going to get, he suddenly decided as he faced the corn field. It was time he caught up with that ornery little hellion and showed her which of them was in charge.
He headed for the corn field, already rolling up his sleeves. The shoulder high stalks rustled as she fled deeper into the cover of them and his eyes followed the bowing line of shoulder-high vegetation that betrayed her location.
"Get on out here!" he bellowed. 28
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Another clod of dirt slapped aside the thick leaves of corn and hit him in the gut. Growling, Buster charged into the thick of the vegetation and chased the little girl, who was no taller than his leg, from one end of the cornfield to the other. He very nearly missed the slight, pink, bare-bottomed glimpse of her as she darted out of the field entirely, but finally caught his first tangible hold on her as she tried to scramble under the henhouse.
"You ain't hiding from me." Hauling her back to the tub under one arm, Buster growled, "If Margo's coming here in the morning, by Harry, you're gonna be clean! I won't have it said that I can't take care of three little girls any better'n some crazy woman!"