The Courtship of the Vicar's Daughter

by Lawana Blackwell

  “Caught?” Mercy asked, dazed.

  “Discovered would be a more appropriate word, I suppose.”

  Mercy glanced up at her brother and noted with satisfaction that he had decided to take advantage of this idle time to loop the reins over the back of the seat and curl up for a nap. Still, she lowered her voice. “Mrs. Kingston—are you in need of help? My father and brothers—”

  “Oh my … no, dear.” Mrs. Kingston also sent a glance up to the wagon seat before leaning closer. “There is a certain gentleman who has joined me on my walks for the past two days now. I wish to convey the message that I’m not so predictable, nor my company so available.”

  “Why don’t you just ask him to leave you alone?”

  “Actually I took that very action at first, which is why he finds himself so intrigued with me now. I believe you young girls call it ‘playing hard to get.’ ”

  Mercy covered a smile with her hand. She had never heard any woman talk this way. “You mean you’re doing this because you like him?”

  “Oh, very much,” Mrs. Kingston answered with a chuckle. “And you know? It’s rather fun!”

  Warmly they bade each other good-day, and the woman resumed her walk. Mercy climbed back into the wagon and woke her brother. Minutes later they were forced to creep along a herd of cattle being led to the Bryce by a boy. “Why are you doing that?” Dale asked beside her.

  “Doing what?”

  “Grinning. You look like a dimwit, sitting there grinnin’ for no reason.”

  Mercy had not even been aware that she had been doing so. She turned to him and smiled again. “I enjoyed talking with Mrs. Kingston.”

  “That old woman?” He snorted.

  He could not ruin her day, and she even felt sorry for him. How sad it must be to go through life refusing God’s gifts because of scorn for the packaging. “I’ll be back,” he told her as he pulled the reins to a stop outside of Trumbles.

  “Papa said not to take too long,” she reminded him.

  Already on the ground, he set off across the lane for the Bow and Fiddle. Mercy realized now why Dale had gone to the trouble of combing his hair. According to Harold, he was smitten with Mary Sloane, the serving girl Mercy knew from the Wesleyan Chapel, and took every opportunity he could to sit at the establishment over a pint of ale. Unfortunately for Dale, his mouth was his most unattractive feature whenever he was in his cups, and the girl sensibly ignored him.

  “Have you met your new neighbor?” Mr. Trumble asked as he assembled Mercy’s order.

  “Only his son. His name is Thomas.” Mercy ran her hand over a bolt of raspberry sateen on a table stacked with new bolts of cloth and fought the urge to buy a length. She had two dress-up gowns for church and couldn’t justify the extravagance just because a pretty color caught her eye. Besides, Jack and Edgar should have new shirts for school, and she needed to start sewing on those.

  “Just came in yesterday,” the shopkeeper said. “You would look awful pretty in that sateen, Miss Sanders.”

  Mercy smiled at him. However he had felt about her in the past, she knew he wasn’t flirting, because he was that friendly with everyone. “Just five yards of this, please,” she replied, bringing a bolt of serviceable blue cotton to the counter. “And a spool of thread.”

  “Right away,” he smiled, picking up his shears. “He has only that one child, you know.”

  Mercy stared for a second before realizing he was referring to her new neighbor. “Yes?”

  “Polite little fellow,” the shopkeeper went on. “Mr. Langford, too, for that matter. But kind of recorsive, if you ask me. I suppose that’s why he bought that place.”

  “Recorsive?” Mercy blinked.

  “You know … don’t have much to do with other people.”

  “I see.”

  The bell over the door jingled. Mr. Sykes, the churchwarden of Saint Jude’s, walked inside. He tipped his hat to Mercy and she flushed, recalling how her father had chased away him and the rest of the school board less than two weeks ago.

  “I’ll have my brother collect the packages,” she murmured to Mr. Trumble. But before she could walk to the door, Mr. Sykes stepped up to her.

  “Fine decision your father made, changing his mind like that. Please thank him on behalf of the board.”

  Knowing full well why the board didn’t deliver the thanks in person, Mercy managed a smile. “I’ll tell him.”

  “You know that new fellow, Mr. Langford, has a young boy too,” Mr. Trumble offered from behind his counter. “You might want to see what his plans are as far as schooling.”

  Mr. Sykes nodded. “I just spoke with the vicar out in front of the Larkspur. He says he was already planning to pay a visit out there this morning and would mention the school.”

  After bidding the men in the shop good-morning, Mercy ended up having to cross the lane to the Bow and Fiddle to fetch Dale. He was well into his second pint in spite of the early hour and shrugged off her attempt to get him to leave.

  “Go ’way!” he mumbled while grinning and trying to catch the eye of Mary, who obviously was taking great pains not to look in his direction. Mercy thought that she could not possibly have looked more dim-witted earlier than her brother did now.

  “Papa’s going to want us back,” Mercy leaned down to whisper, for she was highly embarrassed. He waved her away.

  “I’ll be there directly.”

  She straightened and gave a helpless look to Mr. Pool, who sent one back to her. Unfortunately none of the villagers cared to risk the ire of the Sanders men. While they bickered among themselves like blue jays, any outsider who dared come against one of them quickly found himself facing a unified front.

  It was either stand there in mortification or go back to the wagon. Mercy chose the latter. She sat on the bench with her back rigid and shoulders squared because of the curious looks sent her way from the occasional passerby. Had she yielded to her inner inclination, she would have curled up in a ball in the back. It’s so unfair! she thought, vexed that she had to wear the reputations of her family like a garment. She had no doubt that if she were to achieve world fame by writing beautiful songs or better yet, discovering cures for every disease, people in Gresham would still remember her as “one of those awful Sanderses.”

  She felt a tear trickle down the right side of her nose and wiped it with the back of her hand. Please forgive me, Lord, she prayed silently. You’re so good to me, and I spend so much time feeling sorry for myself.

  “Miss Sanders?”

  Mercy turned to see Vicar Phelps standing at the side of the wagon. Not being a member of Saint Jude’s, she had never spoken with him except to return his greetings on the few times she had crossed his path in town.

  “Good morning, Vicar Phelps,” she managed and was mortified to feel another tear trickle down the same side of her nose. She ignored it and hoped he didn’t notice from where he stood on the ground.

  “Forgive me for disturbing you, but are you all right, Miss Sanders?”

  The kindness in his voice caused another tear to form, this time in her left eye. Mercy blinked both eyes and angled her face away from him. “Yes, sir—thank you.” From the corner of her eye she could see him glance over his shoulder in the direction of the Bow and Fiddle. Of course he knows, she told herself, for how many other times had Dale or Harold replayed this little drama? She wished she had the nerve to risk Papa’s anger by taking up the reins and driving the wagon home herself. It didn’t seem difficult, and the horses knew the way. …

  The kind voice cut into her thoughts again. “You know, Miss Sanders, I happen to be on my way out to Nettle Lane to pay a call on the new family. I’ll pass right by your cottage. May I offer you a ride?” He didn’t mention her brother, acting as if she were merely sitting there because the horses refused to budge. Such kindness would have moved her to more tears had she not willed herself to keep them from forming.

  “Thank you, sir,” she replied, still not quite lookin
g at him. “But I have supplies inside Trumbles.”

  “Would they fit in the boot of my trap?”

  She opened her mouth for another polite refusal but then told herself, It’s better than sitting here in the middle of town, and you have work to do. Turning her face and this time making herself meet the vicar’s eyes, she said, “I would be grateful, sir.”

  With Mr. Trumble’s assistance, Vicar Phelps soon had her supplies in the trap. The sacks of oats and flour were too heavy for the vicar’s lone horse, so they heaved them into the bed of the wagon for Dale to bring home. As the trap moved over the cobbled stones of Market Lane, the vicar did not attempt to engage her in small talk. Mercy was relieved at this, for what could she possibly have to say that would interest someone as esteemed in Gresham as Vicar Phelps?

  Mercy could see most of her brothers at their chores when the vicar’s trap finally halted in the drive. Or rather, they had been at their chores, for now they stared curiously in Mercy’s direction. Oram, however, stopped staring and started running toward the barn. Papa, she thought. And he won’t be happy that I left Dale. The worst thing about her father’s anger was that it almost always spilled out onto whoever else happened to be in the vicinity. Vicar Phelps was winding the reins around the whip socket—she turned to him before he could hop down.

  “Please, sir, may we leave the packages here?”

  He gave her a questioning look. “On the ground?”

  “Yes, sir. My brothers will carry them inside.” She glanced at the barn again. “Please?”

  “Of course,” he nodded, as if she had made a perfectly rational request. He got to the ground and hurried around to help her alight, then started stacking her packages on the ground, waving away her efforts to assist.

  She thanked him after he had set down the last package, a five-pound sack of sugar. “You’d best leave now.”

  He climbed into his trap, but instead of leaving, he held the reins and directed a fatherly smile at her. Or rather, what Mercy would imagine a fatherly smile to be, for she couldn’t recall ever receiving one from her own father.

  “God sees our good deeds, Miss Sanders, and sometimes other people do as well.”

  “Sir?”

  “Your pastor has told me how kind you were to Mrs. Brent. I feel privileged to have shared your company this morning.” With that he tipped his hat to her as if she were a respectable lady. The trap left the drive and moved on toward the end of the lane, leaving Mercy staring in its wake.

  “Where’s your brother?” Her father’s belligerent voice broke into her thoughts. “And why were you riding with thet vicar fellow?”

  Mercy turned to meet the glare from his green eyes. “Dale wouldn’t leave, and Vicar Phelps offered me a ride.”

  “Well, if he thinks he’ll be allowed to come around here courtin’ …”

  “Papa,” she sighed. “He was only being kind. Besides, he’s engaged to marry the lady from the Larkspur.”

  That pacified him somewhat, for he let out a snort, albeit a subdued one. “Just as long as he remembers that. Why, he’s twenty years older than you if a day!”

  It was useless to argue, for Mercy was aware that if the most eligible bachelor in the village—and her own age at that—had offered her the courtesy of a ride home, her father still would have complained. Especially in that case, for the possibility of losing his unpaid servant to someone in marriage would be an even greater threat.

  Oram, Fernie, and Jack appeared then, and after much grumbling, they obeyed their father’s orders to carry in the packages.

  “Why didn’t you have him bring them up to the door?” Jack whined, bent under the load of sugar. “Where’s Dale?”

  “In town.” Mercy picked up the parcel of cloth and started for the cottage.

  Still cross, her father admonished her from behind. “You should ha’ made him come home. He’s got chores to do.”

  Make him come home? The package in Mercy’s arms felt heavier. I can’t even get him to wipe his feet at the door.

  Andrew found Mr. Langford balanced precariously on a windowsill in the milking shed while attempting to rake broken shingles from the roof with a hoe. On the ground out of the way, a young boy squatted over an old board and was attempting to remove a nail with the claw of a hammer. Unaware of his presence, both boy and man jerked heads in his direction when Andrew cleared his throat.

  “Good day. I’m Andrew Phelps,” he hurried on. “Vicar of Saint Jude’s. No doubt you’ve seen the steeple?”

  The man clinging with his left hand to the top of the window nodded. “I’m Seth Langford, and this is Thomas.” It was said politely enough, but then followed with a dismissive, “We’re Wesleyans.”

  “I see. Well, the Reverend Seaton is my good friend. He’ll be happy to know it.”

  “Yes.” Again a dismissive tone, while the boy stared.

  Andrew offered the boy a smile, which he returned timidly. “I can see that you’re busy, Mr. Langford, but might I have a word with you?” He glanced at the white-knuckled grip the man had on the top portion of the paneless window. “And wouldn’t you fare better with a ladder?”

  “The ladder’s rotten.”

  Andrew looked about him at the shambles that had probably once been a decent building. The hay barn seemed in the same shape. He knew next to nothing about carpentry, but it seemed that it would take one man weeks to render both buildings serviceable again. He was about to offer his apologies for the intrusion and leave, when Mr. Langford tossed the hoe clear to the side and eased himself down from the window. The blisters on the hand he offered to Andrew and the sunburn across his face indicated a man who was unused to heavy outdoor labor despite his muscular build.

  “I say, you’ve taken on quite a job for yourself,” Andrew said.

  Mr. Langford pushed back the brim of his cap and wiped his flushed brow with a sleeve. “Aye.”

  “I hear you’re planning to raise horses?”

  “When the buildings and pastures are ready.”

  “I wish you well.” Andrew looked around. “We’ve some fine carpenters in Gresham. Forgive me for prying, but wouldn’t hiring a couple help?” And according to Mr. Pool, who had offered this bit of unsolicited information, the man had enough money for such doings.

  Mr. Langford seemed to consider that for a moment, but then turned to the boy, who was now standing at his side. “Would you fetch us some water?” He gave Andrew a questioning look, to which Andrew replied that he would indeed like some water.

  When Thomas was out of earshot, Mr. Langford wiped his brow again. “I appreciate you coming by, Vicar …” In the pause he appeared to be searching his memory for the name.

  “Phelps,” Andrew supplied with an understanding smile.

  “Thank you. I hope you can understand that we chose this place for the privacy. I wouldn’t care to have carpenters here every day.”

  “I see.” Feeling a little awkward, Andrew took a step backward. “Then perhaps I should take my leave now.”

  “Wait.” Now it was Mr. Langford who seemed to feel awkward. “I wasn’t suggesting that you do that, Vicar Phelps.”

  “Oh.” Andrew glanced at the hoe lying amongst a heap of broken slate shingles. “Is there anything I can do to help you?”

  “No, thank you.” But then he followed that with, “Actually, there is.”

  Thomas returned carrying a pail half filled with water. Judging from the wetness of his trouser legs, Andrew imagined that it had been full when he left the pump. Mr. Langford insisted that Andrew take the first dipperful.

  “Thank you,” Andrew said afterward to the boy.

  “You’re welcome, sir,” he replied.

  He in no way resembled his father, but Andrew gathered no implications from this—he had lived long enough to know that sometimes that happened. Thank God my girls look more like their mother had come to his mind more than once over the years.

  It took three dippers of water to quench Mr. Langford
’s thirst, and when he had finished, he wiped his sleeve again and absently put a hand on the boy’s head. Thomas looked up at him with something close to awe across his young face. “Why don’t you set that in the shade?” Mr. Langford told the boy. “We’ll likely want some later.”

  Thomas obeyed immediately, looking back for approval when he had found a relatively clear spot beside an outer wall.

  “That’s fine,” Mr. Langford said, then turned to Andrew again.

  “I’m having some lumber and shingles delivered tomorrow,” he said, then gave a sheepish little shrug. “And a ladder.”

  “Fine enough. Now, how may I help you, Mr. Langford?”

  The man glanced again at his son, who had returned to digging at the nail with the hammer. “I noticed there was a school in Gresham, but I was too concerned about acquiring this place to make inquiries. Is it possible for Thomas to attend?”

  Andrew smiled. “That’s actually the second reason I came here. The first being to snare you for my congregation, of course.”

  For the first time, Mr. Langford’s face eased into a smile. “I’m sorry about that, Vicar.”

  Waving a hand, Andrew said, “We’ve some fine Wesleyans in Gresham. As to the school, Thomas is more than welcome to attend. In fact, a member of the school board asked me to speak with you about it.”

  “That’s good—thank you.” And then the man’s face took on a thoughtful cast. “I suppose there are supplies he’ll need? And lunch … should he bring one, or am I supposed to fetch him at noon? I’ve horses. …”

  He spoke like someone with no experience with the schooling of his child, and yet the boy looked old enough to have had at least a year or two behind him. Perhaps the boy’s mother tended to all of that in the past, Andrew thought. Obviously Mr. Langford was a widower, and perhaps a recent one. Andrew’s heart went out to the man.

  “Thomas’s teacher will tell him if there are any supplies required. And yes, most of the students bring their lunches. Fact is, one of my daughters will be attending boarding school this fall, and I’m sure her lunch pail has been consigned to the cellar by now. Why don’t I bring it to you one day when I’m out making calls?”