by Yvonne Jocks
Putting down his boots and turning to open a cabinet, Stuart paused mid-wince to stare at his brother. Then he shook his head and considered the package of paper collars that Montgomery Ward had sent him free, last time he ordered suspenders. Mariah deserved to be courted proper.
He'd always believed that.
Dougie shook his head. “She's really worth this?”
“Yup.” Stuart need not even think to answer. It seemed Mariah was always dancing through some piece of his thoughts or his dreams, smiling or laughing or looking at something in that eager, delighted way of hers....
Trouble was, Stuart wanted more than dreams of her. He'd wanted it for years. No number of beatings would change that.
“And she thinks you're worth it?” Which sometimes did seem odd, but...
“Apparently.” Stuart decided on the paper col ar. It was better than no collar at all , even if he had no proper paper cuffs to match.
Dougie looked around him, at the confines of Stuart's home. "And the lass knows you live in a wagon?"
“She's nae daft, Douglas.” He'd told Mariah about the wagon as soon as he bought it, a year previous. Most herders, like Dougie, made do with tents and bedrolls. But Stuart meant not merely to herd sheep but to own them. And unlike Dougie, Stuart had meant to marry even then. Had Mariah realized the leap of faith buying this wagon, instead of more sheep, had taken? It would be better than starting out in a mining camp tent, a nester's dugout or soddie, or his folks' place.
Some newlyweds barely managed that.
“She's not daft,” he said again, annoyed by the lingering pain in his ribs. Mariah knew what he had and, blacked boots and paper collars aside, it would do him no good to start questioning his worth now.
Her father and the town would sure enough do it for them.
Mariah's nervousness, arriving at church that Sunday, had little to do with her appearance and everything to do with her father's continued censure.
“I never meant to hurt you,” she whispered desperately up at him, clutching at the sleeve of his great coat after he helped her down from their surrey. “Not you or anybody else.”
“Then don't,” said Papa curtly, turning away. It was one of the few times he'd spoken to her all week.
When Kitty slipped her mittened hand into her older sister's, Mariah smiled her best reassurance for the little girl—and, she supposed, for herself. Everything would be fine. She'd never known her father to be less than loving or fair, even at his most stern. Never! She had to believe that he thought himself fair, even loving, in this as well .
But as she fol owed her mother and sisters out of the cold and into church, conscious of the townspeople's undue interest, Mariah also knew her father was mistaken. The thought felt blasphemous. But she need not peek toward Stuart, already seated in back with his own family, to accept its truth. In this one thing, Mariah's father was wrong.
As she passed the MacCallums, she peeked anyway.
Stuart's gaze met her own, determined—and he nodded at her. “Miss Garrison,” he murmured in greeting, low but sure.
In that moment, Mariah forgot the weight of everyone's scrutiny, Papa's disapproval, her sisters' anxiety. She smiled, nodded back. Everything would be fine.
Then Stuart's gaze shifted, sharpened—and Papa's hand settled against the small of Mariah's back.
She obediently resumed fol owing her family. But oh, he was mistaken. Sooner or later, her father would realize as much. And until then ...
Until then, Mariah meant to remember her duty as his daughter in every way that did not require forsaking Stuart. She owed him that. As she sat between Kitty and Audra, on the pew that had been her family's since the church was built, she decided that would surely keep peace until everyone came to their senses.
It had to! And for a prize as wonderful as Stuart, she could endure until then.
After services, when the family usually talked amongst their friends, Elise and Audra tried to tug Mariah toward the surrey by both hands, as if fearing the confrontation to come. But Mariah, looking for Stuart, set her heels. She found his family. Though never formal y introduced, she easily recognized his lank, mustached father and prim, severe mother, and of course she knew the older of his siblings from her schooldays. When she smiled a shy greeting to them, her cheer felt more artificial than ever, even before they stared solemnly back. Was everyone watching her? And where ... ?
Fingers brushed her coated shoulder, more tentative than her father's, and Mariah spun to face Stuart MacCallum directly. Here in the wintery sunlight. In front of God, her father, and everybody.
She smiled.
Stuart quickly moved his hand, but he did not step back from her. Instead, hat in hand, he offered his arm.
Mariah noted his shined boots and proper collar, flattered by the effort he'd obviously made. She noted, too, how the wind ruffled through his thick hair, wheat-brown; noted the cleft in his chin, the curve of his clean shaven jaw in the sunlight. She noted the very real breadth of his chest, the set of his stocky shoulders as he proffered his arm.
But mostly, Mariah noted the stubborn certainty in Stuart's solemn brown eyes and oh, she felt glad for his tenaciousness! He had always meant to court her....
Taking his arm, which felt as solid as a stone or a tree and just as enduring, Mariah allowed him to keep his word.
Then someone cleared his throat in an ominous growl—and together they turned to face her father.
Chapter Eight
Even the solidity of Stuart's arm under her mittened hand could not soften Mariah's unease at so blatantly defying her father. Her entire life, this man had stood unflinchingly between her and bears, marauders, even cold and hunger. Mistaken or not, he deserved her respect—hers and Stuart's both. If only he would accept it.
“I mean to walk my fiancée home,” announced Stuart, low but clear, before Papa could even speak. “The weather is fair, and we will stay in plain sight. I'll let nothing happen to her.”
Which was all respectful enough—except for the not-asking-permission part. So why did it sound uncomfortably like a dare?
Papa continued to stare at them both, eyes bright but unreadable in the shadow of his black hat.
When he shifted that formidable gaze to Mariah, it was al she could do not to squirm beneath his silent condemnation. Never had she or any of her sisters ever disobeyed him so blatantly, even in private. Not even Laurel! Now here she stood, in full view of the town ...
Her throat burned as her need to speak battled her inability to form words. She could not apologize for her boldness without seeming to apologize for Stuart, which she would not do. She could not plead for his blessing without giving him yet another opportunity to deny it, this time in public. So Mariah grasped at the only thing she hoped might sway him: sincerity.
“He's a good man, Papa. Real y!”
Only her father's quick blink indicated that this, he'd not expected. Mariah reached for his sleeve, bridging the two men she loved with her two hands.
"If only you got to know him, you would understand! Stuart's a decent man, Papa, honorable and hardworking like you, and—"
Papa lowered his gaze to her touch. Was he listening? Finally?
Then he abruptly turned away, strode away to the surrey, to his wife and daughters.
The daughters who did not defy him.
The only thing that kept Mariah's heart from cracking was Stuart's unwavering presence at her side. At least Papa had left her standing with Stuart. Not, she suddenly saw, that he had accepted defeat just yet.
Hoisting himself into the driver's seat of the surrey, Papa glanced purposefully across the street—at a cowboy.
Mariah recognized the young man slouched against the hitching post. Young Dawson rode for the Circle-T. Like most cowboys he had not, she thought, attended services. So the only reason he would be in this part of town on a Sunday morning was if he were courting, or if his boss had sent him here. And he had not dressed as if he were courti
ng.
As Papa drove away, Dawson swung into the saddle of a waiting cow pony. Then he tipped his Stetson toward Mariah, raised his eyebrows almost comical y at Stuart, and waited.
“A guard,” muttered Stuart, arm rigid beneath her hand. He sounded like he had an ugly taste in his mouth. “Him.”
“A chaperone,” clarified Mariah anxiously, turning to watch Stuart's profile. Normal y his face seemed so gentle, his jaw rounded and lips soft, even his eyes with an innocuous, heavy-lidded slant. But his expression took on a hardness she'd not seen in him before. "Just like we wanted, remember?"
Of course Stuart would know the difference. Only certain people could be chaperones—parents, brothers, respected matrons. Cowboys were the kind of men chaperones protected young ladies from. And yet...
She and Stuart did have to start somewhere to earn her father's trust, didn't they?
Stuart angled his brown gaze down at her, annoyed enough that his brows had leveled out. "A chaperone," he challenged, low.
Mariah nodded hopefully. “So that we don't cause a scandal.”
To her relief, Stuart smiled then—a quiet, closemouthed smile that nevertheless crinkled up into his eyes.
“Mustn't cause a scandal,” he agreed gently. His gaze flicked away from her for a moment, toward the dozens of faces pretending not to watch them and further. Mariah saw the MacCallum wagon already departing toward the north before Stuart's attention returned to her, serious and somehow resolved. “May I escort you home, Miss Garrison?” he asked formal y.
'Twould be honored, Mr. MacCallum,“ agreed Mariah, so very glad to smile again. ”Assuming your intentions are honorable"
Now, when Stuart glanced down at the frozen ground, his brief smile even revealed a dimple.
“Well ... I intend to marry you, if that's what you mean,” he murmured, very low. “I canna speak for the rest of it.”
“Stuart MacCallum!” Mariah had to whisper her protest, lest their guard—rather, their chaperone—misconstrue. Or construe correctly. “You are too bold, sir.”
For some reason, Stuart's gaze crept back to where Dawson waited, watching their exchange, and hardened there. “If I have to be,” he said.
But she was too busy fighting a blush to ask what he meant by that.
The November air smelled sharply of snow, and their footsteps sounded a kind of joint heartbeat on the wooden sidewalk. For years, Stuart had longed for the day when he would walk openly through the middle of Sheridan with Mariah Garrison on his arm. Now here they were.
But never had he imagined a guard fol owing on horseback, much less a cowboy who had overseen his thrashing not a week earlier. The growing injustice of it burned in his chest, framed by the ache of lingering bruises, and did nothing to improve his ease with words. He and Mariah had spoken together countless times before, but that had been in secret, under the bridge. That was before it had mattered to anybody but them.
Now townsfolk watched—from carriages and the opposite sidewalk, from windows and stairways.
More than ever before, Stuart meant to prove the town wrong by remembering his manners.
Since Mariah seemed occupied dividing her attention between the gray sky and sneaking shy peeks at him, up from beneath her fancy oversized hat, Stuart shouldered his responsibility as best he could. “I... enjoyed the sermon.” When he hadn't been busy glaring at nosy parkers who could not keep their attention on the minister, anyway.
Mariah smiled perhaps too brightly. "Oh yes! I've always liked Reverend Adams's viewpoint.
Although I admired Dr. Terrence's thoughts as well , when he visited last spring"
Then she looked down and her hat hid her face again.
“He had interesting things to say,” agreed Stuart quickly, hoping she would not ask him about any of them. This felt nothing like their conversations beneath the bridge.
Mariah tilted her head back to look at him more directly—and, he thought, a little more honestly.
Not that she'd been lying before! “Does this feel... awkward to you, Stuart?”
She felt awkward? Was it his fault that she felt awkward?
He would rather blame the cowpoke riding several lengths behind them.
“Yes,” Stuart admitted, wishing he knew how to fix their discomfort. If only he could whittle a good conversation with a jackknife, or build one from stones.
To his surprise, Mariah squeezed his arm in one of her impulsive gestures, and much of the awkwardness faded on its own. "Thank goodness it's not just me! Not that I'm uncomfortable being with you of course. Or even people knowing about it. But..."
“But they're watching for us to make a mistake.” Stuart glared briefly toward a cluster of boys who stood across the street, hoops hanging useless in their hands as they stared. "Judging us. They've made up their minds already. I've lived with it al my life. It helps to keep your head up. Don't let them think they're better than you."
It wasn't until he'd finished speaking that he heard the unintended vehemence in his words—and realized just how many he'd spoken.
Mariah's up-tilted hat revealed her wide gray eyes and pretty face, pinker in the cheeks than the November wind merited. “I mean ... going against Papa.”
Oh. Now Stuart looked off toward the gray sky. When Mariah asked, "Have people real y stared and judged you your whole life?“ he said, ”Never mind. You get used to it."
He had. But would she?
After that they walked in silence for a good block or two. At least Mariah's warmth beside him did not feel uncomfortable, even if the silence did.
Then she said, “Papa real y is a good man,” as if he wanted to hear about her father's finer qualities. "I can't remember him ever behaving so rudely. I'm sure once he adjusts to the idea of... well , of us ..."
“He won't,” predicted Stuart, gently but firmly.
He might as well not have spoken. “Of course he will ! Papa just wants what is best for me, is all ....”
And it clearly was not Stuart? He remembered the blow of Schmidt's fist against his ribs, the effort of not crying out. What was best for her?
"... old bias against sheep, but they aren't sharing the same range anyway, are they? Perhaps you could explain that to him yourself, and then he'll see...."
Stuart's leg still ached from where a rock dug into his shin when he finally dropped, kneeling, glaring impotent murder at those damned cowboys.
“... perhaps even become friends,” insisted Mariah cheerful y.
Stuart blinked away the memory of lying crumpled on the range—on his land—and the sound of cow ponies riding away. Breathing had felt precarious, swallowing an agony. He'd struggled for God knew how long before he could even whistle Beauty over, roll onto his back with his dog licking worriedly at his face. At the time, despite how the pain jolted through him on every heartbeat, Stuart had felt relief to be left alive.
He had worse memories than that though, if he thought back far enough. Every single one of them was connected to cattlemen.
“We won't ever be friends,” he told Mariah now. He felt surprised to see that they'd almost reached their bridge, and more annoyed than ever by the cowboy still following them.
“You've seen him at his worst,” she insisted—which was truer than she realized. She did not know about the thugs sent to rough him up, likely did not understand the truth about who had hired Idaho Johnson. Mariah thought her father was decent and honorable. Like him!
Stuart doubted he would ever fully understand the world Mariah saw through those earnest, predawn eyes of hers. But as her affianced husband, he meant to protect it as best he could.
As they began to cross their bridge, footsteps harmonizing again like on the sidewalk, he stopped her and fumbled at his breast pocket.
“Here,” he said, and pressed his granny's ring into her mittened hand. “For you.”
Mariah's eyes widened as she stared at the aged gold ring, an amethyst chip mounted atop a tiny thistle design. His mother had given i
t up grudgingly, complaining that Miss Mariah Garrison probably owned ear-bobs of more worth. But his sister Emily had secretly polished it for him, so at least it shone.
If Mariah had ear-bobs worth more, she did not let on. Instead she said, "Oh! Here—hold it while I get my mitten off!"
He took the ring back while Mariah fumbled at the mitten on her left hand. She finally used her teeth to remove it, then tried to say something and, in doing so, spit out the mitten. She stepped on it quickly, so that it would not blow off the bridge, but did not stoop to retrieve it. Instead she peered at the ring Stuart held.
“Oh Stuart. It's beautiful”
Her approval relieved Stuart considerably, eased a tightness in his gut that he'd mistakenly attributed to bruising. He so very much did not want to start their official engagement by disappointing her.
“For you, lass,” he insisted again. Likely a man from Europe—or Cheyenne or Denver—would say something fancier than that, but he did not. “So that nobody doubts our intentions.”
“Put it on me?” she pleaded, with an excited bounce. Glad for so simple a means to please her, Stuart clumsily slid the ring onto her soft, ladylike hand.
When she raised her shining gaze to his, he did wish he was someone who'd even been as far as Cheyenne. Then maybe he could tel her what she meant to him, what he would gladly endure to be with her, how proud she made him by accepting his suit and his grandmother's ring. But even if he could wrap his ungainly thoughts around such ideas, his mouth would never have kept up; he would only embarrass them both. So Stuart just stood there and held her soft, bare hand in his while, together, they admired the ring, tipping their heads comfortably—but not too improperly—close.
They had done it. After years of secrecy, they were truly engaged to marry.
The air smelled of snow. The creek rushed endlessly past beneath them, as it had during all of their trysts, all of their kisses. But now they stood above the bridge, in plain sight of neighbors ... and their “chaperone.” The air and the water were the same. They had changed.
“I had best get you home,” Stuart said finally, crouching to retrieve her fallen mitten for her.