A Bride at Last

by Melissa Jagears

  “I know.” She tucked a wisp of a curl behind his ear. He desperately needed a haircut, but who was she to mention it? “Go on home. I’ll see you another day.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “I’ll be looking for work again tomorrow. If I’m near the school, I’ll walk with you again. But maybe, if you get your pa’s permission, we can paint this coming Saturday morning.” The streams around Salt Flatts were more mud than anything, so he’d actually have to try his hand at painting since murky brown water wasn’t as fun to poke around in as crystal-clear creeks.

  He shrugged. “Why won’t they let you teach? I can tell them what a good teacher you are.”

  “They don’t need me.” Though they did need another teacher—the first-year class was enormous—but the moment she’d mentioned she had no certificate, Mr. Scottsmore’s smile had faded. She’d figured the school board member who was also a lawyer would be the toughest man to convince, and so she’d started with him. And she was right. He’d dismissed her quickly.

  She gave Anthony a gentle shove, and he sighed and walked away. At about fifty yards, he turned to wave and she waved back before returning to town. Thankfully Silas hadn’t forbid the boy from visiting with her, but after the night he’d treated them to ice cream, she’d not seen him again.

  If only she could make herself walk to his place without invitation. She understood his hurt. Hadn’t she run from people when they’d disappointed her? But instead of running, Silas shut himself off. Was that how he always dealt with problems?

  She kicked a rock that had the audacity to be in her way. What to do?

  Salt Flatts sprawled out in front of her, but the hope of finding a job in this town had dwindled after another week of looking. She’d tried to find work but instead received two offers of marriage. One from the livery owner, the other from an old man spitting tobacco outside Lowry’s Feed Store—and he didn’t mean for his son. A shiver ran across her shoulders.

  She’d also had a less than proper solicitation to work for Mrs. Rosemary Star, who evidently ran a new brothel on the south side of town. Kate hugged herself as she turned onto Maple. Perhaps hasty marriages of convenience weren’t the worst option in the world.

  She made her way to the boardinghouse, a three-story building on the edge of town. Tall yellow prairie grasses waved their way up to the building’s eastern garden full of spent rosebushes. The fancy boardinghouse had a wrap-around deck swathed in a variety of soft green colors, its many gables and dormers painted maroon. At each corner, rain gutters ended inside a goldfish statue, its mouth wide open to spew water away from the foundation.

  If only she’d be so lucky to work here for room and board. But Fannie already had cleaning girls, and the job wouldn’t merit board in such a fancy place anyway. Was there somewhere in Salt Flatts as dilapidated as Mrs. Grindall’s back in Breton? Maybe she could afford to board in a place like that.

  Kate forced her feet up the stairs and into the boardinghouse. Thankfully Fannie was nicer than Mrs. Grindall and hadn’t kicked her out yet, despite Silas paying late for the upcoming week. She knew he couldn’t afford it—and making him pay for her when he was so worried about his homestead likely wasn’t making him any fonder of her—but what was she supposed to do?

  In the parlor, she pushed the center table to the wall, making room for the large quilting frame the women worked around every Monday. Kate lowered herself onto an embroidered cushioned chair and stared at the quilt. She hadn’t come down to sew last Monday because she couldn’t face the women. They would’ve asked her about the wedding since they’d helped hem her wedding dress the previous Monday.

  But she couldn’t stay holed away forever.

  The front door opened, and Kate busied herself with the thread spools.

  Rachel Stanton, the mother of Silas’s doctor friend, came through the parlor doorway and gave Kate a great big smile. “How are you Mrs. Jon—”

  “Miss Dawson.” She shrugged with embarrassment. “Still Miss Dawson.”

  “Oh dear.” The older woman came over and wrapped her arms around Kate as if they’d known each other their whole life.

  Tears welled in Kate’s eyes as the feeling of Rachel’s body registered soft and warm against her. She’d hugged Anthony many times, and Aiden had held her occasionally, but the last comforting embrace she remembered was her mother’s the morning before she’d died.

  She gave Rachel a gentle squeeze and stepped back, refusing to swipe at the tears on her face lest she draw attention to them. She turned to occupy herself with the spools again.

  “What happened, love?”

  Kate located a needle that needed threading and dug out scissors. “My past happened.”

  “Now, who doesn’t have a past?” Rachel looked fierce with her hands planted on her ample hips.

  “My past happens to make me the kind of woman Silas wants to avoid. But my real problem is finding a position in town so I can stay near Anthony.” She folded her hands in front of her. “I have to support myself somehow.”

  The front door opened again, and Nancy Wells came into the parlor, followed by her daughter Millicent. The lady’s red hair was wild and poufy in contrast to her stepdaughter’s limp brunette braids. Millicent’s gaunt cheeks and sallow skin indicated an ailing young lady.

  “Life could be worse.” At least the only sickly thing about Kate was her broken heart. She tried a smile. “I’ll figure out something.”

  Rachel patted her shoulder, and Kate could almost see a speech composing itself behind the older woman’s kind brown eyes, but with Nancy and Millicent finding their seats, Rachel must have decided to keep her words to herself.

  Nancy pulled a container from her needlework basket. “I made blackberry crumb bars. Had to make Mother’s group some too or they’d have followed me here.” She winked and set the cookies on the end table by the sofa. Fannie had mentioned another quilting group met in town, but it was more an excuse for Nancy’s mother, Mrs. Graves, to gather women for gossip.

  Had Mrs. Studdard informed them all about how quickly she and Silas had gone from flirtatious glances to cold shoulders?

  At least here, if she had to explain why she was still single, the details shouldn’t go past the door. Nancy and Fannie couldn’t stomach the tittle-tattle, so they’d started this group, wanting to focus on sewing stitches over sowing scandal.

  Nancy came over, wrapped an arm around her shoulder, and squeezed. “I heard Mr. Jonesey gave your marriage license back to Reverend Finch. I’m so sorry.”

  Kate’s lungs deflated. So much for keeping things within these four walls. “I suppose your mother knows?”

  “Yes, that’s how I know.”

  She sighed. “And here I’d hoped if Mrs. Stanton hadn’t heard—”

  “Gossip doesn’t make it far through corn fields, despite all the ears.” Rachel smiled and settled herself in a blue upholstered chair. “I’m usually the last to know of anything important. I rarely come in for the quilting, but Dex is helping Everett haul more lumber, and they’ve been kind enough to schedule their trips so I can attend.”

  “Lumber?” Kate latched on to any information that could shift the topic off her. “What are they building?”

  “Julia—Everett’s wife and my neighbor—insists they need more space. One room for boys, one for girls. She’s certain she’s got a girl coming.” Rachel turned to Nancy. “Kate told me she needs a job. I’ll ask Julia if she needs help since she’s been so sick lately, but that wouldn’t be a permanent position. You know of anything?”

  She shook her head, her lip bowed in pity. “I’ve looked a time or two myself, but haven’t had much luck. Eliza would be the one to ask.”

  “Ma’s sparking with Micah Otting.” Millicent grabbed a bar cookie. “Grandmother says marriage is the only business a woman ought to pursue.”

  Nancy gave her girl a warning glare, laced with mirth. “Yes, that seems to be the surest way to gain ‘employment.’ Don’t worry, Kat
e. Mother’ll be happy to help you pursue that avenue the next time she sees you. Make sure you have a pen and paper handy for the list of bachelors she thinks will suit.”

  “But she doesn’t even know me.”

  Rachel and Nancy both laughed.

  “Doesn’t matter.” Nancy winked.

  “Did I hear Millie say you’re attaching yourself to Micah?” Fannie came into the room with a tea set. “Isn’t he one of the regulars at my husband’s all women are bad meetings?” She chuckled, but the sound was not as merry as Nancy’s and Rachel’s laughter had been.

  Fannie had stayed up late last night commiserating with Kate over men not honoring their end of the marriage bargain. Evidently, she’d been put aside by her husband, Jedidiah, many years ago after he’d learned their firstborn wasn’t his. When they’d met, she’d been desperate to cover her pregnancy and latched onto him after an attempt to obtain a husband through a mail-order-bride service failed. Years later, she’d thought Jedidiah loved her enough to reveal the truth, but the man only seemed to harden toward her with each passing day.

  Was Silas’s current cold shoulder saving her from being rejected and discarded years from now like Fannie? No, she just couldn’t believe Silas was like the post office manager she’d met, who eyed her with suspicion every time she was in his presence.

  Nancy shrugged. “Micah only attends because Lynville’s there. He finds them amusing and likes to play chess, though he doesn’t go often since he’s busy with his surveying and railroad work.”

  “Silas is a part of that group, right?” Rachel’s frown deepened.

  “Yes, but I haven’t gotten the impression from Micah that Silas was as adamant about avoiding marriage.” She cast an apologetic look at Kate. “Though I’m sure Lynville isn’t. He’d shuck his bachelor status as soon as an available lady accepted his court. If you want to marry a homesteader, Kate, Lynville has a nice farm. He’s younger than Silas, so his place isn’t as nice, but it’s a good spread. I don’t have anything bad to say about him besides he’s often overeager when pursuing a girl—so you’d have to be firm with him. Otherwise he might plant a kiss on you the first night he came calling.”

  “I’m not looking to marry.” No one but Silas anyway. If only the women knew how she’d reacted to the first kiss he’d laid on her without even so much as a “May I walk you home from church?” “I tried to get a job with the school, but Mr. Scottsmore was disappointed with my lack of credentials.”

  Fannie passed around teacups and saucers. “Mrs. Crismon should be along soon; she’s on the board. Maybe we can convince her to give you a chance.”

  Kate shrugged. No reason to get her hopes up. “Men always hold more sway.”

  “Won’t hurt to mention it,” Nancy said as she scooted her chair to the quilt block she’d worked on last week.

  “I guess.” But even if Mrs. Crismon didn’t care about a state certificate, if she wrote Mr. Kingfisher to get a teaching reference, he surely wouldn’t respond with anything that would make them want to hire her.

  The front door opened again, and ladies’ voices came in all aclatter. Kate busied herself with her thread.

  As the women shared good-natured stories about children and neighbors, Rachel’s motherly gaze wandered to Kate often. Was she worried for her? Who wouldn’t be? If Nancy couldn’t find work in a town she’d grown up in, who’d bother to hire an outsider with no skills?

  What she really needed was for Silas to take her back. Would these women think her pitiful if she admitted she still wanted the man who’d rejected her?

  This past week, Fannie had turned away two long-term boarders because of her, so she had to find somewhere else to live soon. She couldn’t sit around and hope.

  She’d written her sister to let her know she was alive, but could she stomach writing her abusive brother-in-law and begging to return?

  Surely there was something else she could do.

  The whack of ax against wood from the other side of Silas’s cabin grew louder with each step Kate took. He’d not had a wife for more than ten years, but he’d kept a flower bed, which flanked both sides of the front door, though it held nothing but dead plants at the moment. The yard wasn’t a trash heap like one of the homesteads she’d passed on the way out of town, and the fancy little coop looked newly painted, red with white trim. Surely he’d make up for Peter Hicks’s negligence quicker than most, considering he cared diligently for his property.

  She walked past the barn, surprised Yellow Eyes hadn’t yet barked at her arrival. Taking deep breaths, she forced herself closer to the steady crack of firewood splitting.

  She found him on the other side of the house, his back turned as he heaved his maul above his head. She’d wait for him to notice her, so as not to disturb his work. But the wind was chilly in the shadows. She crossed her arms tighter about herself.

  Silas stopped to wipe his sleeve across his forehead. With his maul safely on the ground, she cleared her throat.

  He startled and turned to face her. His chest expanded with a deep breath, the corner of his mouth jumping a little. “I didn’t know you were coming.”

  “I hope you don’t mind the visit.”

  “I don’t mind seeing you, Kate.” He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, then wiped at the back of his neck. “I don’t hate you or anything of the sort.”

  “Well good, though I’m afraid you won’t like what I’m here to talk about.”

  He leaned his maul against the house, then wiped his hands. He seemed broader than she remembered. Maybe it was the way his shirt wasn’t buttoned up to his neck, or how the damp fabric clung to his muscles, or maybe it was because he’d filled her dreams every night and her visions hadn’t done him justice.

  “What do you want to talk about?”

  She dragged her gaze off his chest and stepped back so she wasn’t close enough to smell the lye soap and the woodsy air that smelled so good on him. “I can’t find a decent job in town. Most everyone wealthy enough to hire housemaids already have them. One older man did offer me a cleaning job . . . or his hand in marriage, but I didn’t like how he leered at me.”

  “Old man—Old Man Carson?” He croaked.

  “If he’s the one who spits tobacco outside the feed store—”

  “Yes, that’s him.” Silas’s eyes turned hard. “You were right to turn him down.”

  “He’s not the only one offering marriage. I’ve—”

  “You’re considering marrying someone from around here?” Silas’s eyebrows hiked.

  “It’s a possibility.” She crossed her arms and stared at him.

  Silas wiped his hands with his handkerchief again, though there couldn’t be anything left to wipe off.

  “So what’re your thoughts on me marrying?”

  He looked off in the distance for a bit, then closed his eyes. His face contorted, and he seemed to have difficulty swallowing. “If Ned Parker offers, don’t choose him. He’s . . . He wouldn’t treat you right.”

  If he was having difficulty thinking of her marrying this Ned fellow . . . “Fine, I won’t consider him.”

  “Good.” A muscle in his cheek twitched as he shoved his handkerchief into his pocket.

  She gave him a long look. “I can’t sew well enough for the seamstress, the school isn’t hiring, and Mrs. Star—”

  “No.” He grabbed her arm. “Tell me you didn’t set foot in her place.” His eyes shot daggers toward town.

  “I didn’t. She overheard me inquiring about a job.”

  Silas remained silent, and Kate let whatever was going on in his mind churn uninterrupted. Maybe she wouldn’t have to say anything more. If he thought she might have to turn to something so horrific to support herself . . .

  He looked back at her, more intense than she’d ever seen him, and his hold tightened. “Tell me you’d never take a job with her.”

  “No.” But if he thought she’d consider another man, could she get him to reconsider by starting a fl
icker of jealousy? “But what do you think about Mr. Arnett?”

  “James?”

  “The nice-looking livery owner?”

  He closed his eyes, and she kept from mentioning that his grip on her arm was too tight. “Yes, he’s a good fellow. He’d—” Silas’s black dog barreled right in between them and jumped on her.

  “Down, Yellow Eyes.” Silas let her go and grabbed the mongrel by the ruff.

  She smiled at the dog’s clunky name but sobered quickly.

  “Sorry about that. He likes people too much.”

  The dog settled next to Silas’s feet, his tail thumping wildly, his tongue hanging out of his mouth as if asking for permission to jump on her again.

  If only the dog hadn’t broken Silas’s train of thought.

  But she had time to wait—unless a letter from her sister came with a train ticket for her to return home. Because if Peter spent money on a ticket, he’d expect Kate to return to Georgia to be their housemaid—an unpaid housemaid.

  No, she’d do almost anything to keep from going back—maybe even marry someone else.

  No! What was she thinking? She might threaten Silas with the mention of proposals from other men, but she wasn’t about to accept one.

  She could endure a few months at her sister’s while she looked for somewhere else to live. But then, she’d be nowhere near Anthony . . . or Silas, who needed to realize what he was doing to her.

  She puffed her chest and tilted her chin up. “You owe me money, Silas.”

  He looked to the sky as if he kept a tally of debts there. “Come again?”

  “You told me if I came to Kansas, there’d be a wedding.”

  “But—”

  “I used my savings to get here—not to mention your kiss at the train station caused me to lose my job.”

  He rubbed his brow with his thumb and fingers as if trying to squeeze away a headache. “I’m sorry, but my finances aren’t in good shape. I had the trip to Missouri, the extra ticket for Anthony, the man I hired to watch my place who also stole my wagon, my plow, my—”

  “I’d need more than the cost of a ticket to Breton to compensate. You’ve made it impossible for me to go back there.”