Log Cabin Christmas

by Margaret Brownley

  “Call him Mr. Carvajal, not Luis,” Jamie retorted. “He may have saved your life, but I don’t trust him. He wants this property back.”

  “He’s a lonely and sad man with much on his mind. I wonder if he knows that Mexican woman, Ana, who comes to the camp meetings?”

  “I be telling ye, Molly, don’t let your tender heart get ye into trouble. That Injun could have killed all of us, and ye would be inviting him to tea.” Jamie hit the peg so hard it split. He threw it on the ground and reached for another. “I’ll need to whittle more pegs.”

  “Just like Pappy Hanks says, God be watching out for us. He sent Luis in time.”

  “Maybe, but Carvajal watches ye too close. What was he doing at our watering hole, anyway?”

  Molly ducked her head. Over that first tea, Luis had watched her with an intensity that had made her feel both hot and shy. He’d stopped by several times since then for no apparent reason. Or at least no reason to satisfy Jamie. Molly smiled as she pushed a twig into the space between two logs and smoothed mud around it. “Luis has a sister—that’s why he be concerned for womenfolk.”

  “Right.”

  “What would make ye trust him?”

  Jamie snickered. “If I see him at a camp meeting, I might trust him. But the only Tejanos I see at camp meetings are older women like Ana.”

  “If we invite him, maybe he’ll come.”

  “Bat your eyelashes and invite him yourself.” Jamie split another peg.

  When Andy stuck his pudgy hands into the chinking, Molly showed him how to spread it along the logs. She hummed as she worked, thinking of how unsettled she felt in Luis’s presence. Her faith told her to soothe his troubled soul. Wasn’t that why she wanted to reach out to him?

  Of course Luis was their nearest neighbor, and a handsome one. Molly squirmed. She enjoyed watching him, too.

  Molly began to sing, “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing.” Jamie joined in. After they sang the final verse, Molly sighed. “When be the next camp meeting?”

  “Soon, at Ma and Pappy Hanks’s clearing out toward Ramsey’s. It’ll be good to see folks again.”

  “Aye. I wonder if there be any new folks in the area.” Molly scraped the contents of her bucket into an empty spot. “Time for more mud.”

  “You are brooding, mi corazón.” Mamacita took Luis’s arm as they watched Manuel train a colt.

  “I should have sent him away despite Maria and the baby,” Luis growled. “Your heart is too easily swayed.”

  “Perhaps yours is too hard,” his mother whispered. “Manuel acted in good faith. He thought you were dead. He apologized; he showed you what information he had. Your father would not have liked his choices, but you were not here. We are called to forgive one another, remember?”

  “I will not forget what Manuel has done. I don’t trust him.”

  “For good reason, but if he is here, we can harness his strengths.”

  Luis didn’t like it, but he agreed. Manuel could be useful if Luis kept him in line. The man handled horses well. “He owes us much. I am sending him to round up mustangs soon. We will work together breaking horses.”

  “What will you do with new ones?”

  Luis remembered how Molly had fussed over his stallion. “Anglos love horses. I can trade with them.” But what did she have to trade? His heart skipped as he wondered if the boy-husband would trade his wife. Luis snorted. Ridiculous.

  “Manuel has skill with horses,” Mamacita agreed.

  “Why did you let him marry Maria? With so few women around, surely other men offered marriage.”

  Mamacita sighed. “Maria is a silly girl, but she loves him. A priest was in Nacogdoches to celebrate the posada two years ago and available to marry them. You and your father were both gone; I thought it would be good to have a man run the ranchero. I know Manuel can be difficult, but why should we condemn her to his hovel when we have room here?”

  “A married woman belongs in her own home with her husband, not her mother.”

  “When you bring home a bride, we will send them to their own place. Perhaps you will find one at the camp meeting next week.”

  “I have no time for women. I must put the ranch in order and reclaim my land.” Luis frowned. “I did not think they would close the land records office in Nacogdoches because of the revolution. Someone must be in charge. But who?”

  “You said you wanted to live in peace without fighting. Can you not let it go?”

  “And do what instead?” he asked.

  Mamacita rubbed his arm. “You need to come with me to the camp meeting. She may be there.”

  “Who?”

  “The woman who will fill your heart.”

  He stared at his mother. “Camp meetings are for Anglos. You would curse me with an Anglo bride?”

  “I would bless you with a woman after God’s heart who will cherish yours. It is not good for a man to be alone.”

  “Bah.”

  “I heard your voice when you told of the red man threatening the beautiful Anglo with the gentle heart. Perhaps the love of a good woman could soften yours.”

  Luis picked up a rope left by his slovenly brother-in-law and coiled it. His mother didn’t know about the ugliness in his heart. “I thought Maria was going with you.”

  Mamacita’s lips flattened to disappointment. “Manuel said she could not attend; he fears for her health. With the red men in the woods, I cannot go alone.”

  Luis looped the coiled rope over a fence post. “I will take you to the meeting, but do not expect anything else.”

  “I put everything into God’s hands,” she said. “He knows where your life belongs. Someone will welcome you at the meeting.”

  “I doubt even God will want me there,” Luis muttered as he joined his brother-in-law in the paddock.

  Chapter 6

  September

  Molly gal, it be good to see ye.” Ma Hanks’s face wrinkled in pleasure as she reached for her grandson. “How be my Andy?”

  “He be a good strong boy. Sarah would be glad.”

  The older woman dipped her chin. “It be good of ye to care for the young’un. How be Jamie? Where be his heart?”

  “He will always love Sarah, but he be ready to wed again.”

  Ma Hanks nodded. “That be the way of a man.” She brushed the blond curls away from Andy’s face. “Eighteen months be a long time for a man. He was a good husband to my girl.”

  Molly thought of Sarah, buried along the trail from Tennessee. “There be few womenfolk for him to wed.”

  Ma Hanks slipped Andy a handful of blackberries. “That be changing. A new family took a claim on Hat Creek, and they’ve got two marriageable daughters with red hair. Their neighbor be that recent widow, Hunter, whose husband left a nice spread. They all be coming to the brush arbor meeting today. You can meet ‘em and see for yourself.”

  Ma Hanks buried her face in Andy’s curls and whispered. “Jamie, too.”

  Molly left the toddler with his grandmother and joined a group of women standing beside a row of trimmed logs. Children stirred up dust in a game of tag.

  “Did ye hear Pappy Hanks be a few days late?” Lily asked.

  “Aye,” Molly said. Everyone knew the gregarious Pappy Hanks was always getting caught up in events that delayed his return home: weddings, baptisms, even a pretty piece of east Texas acreage for sale.

  “Jamie told us about the Injun who grabbed Andy.” Lily hugged her. “How did ye get him away?”

  “Luis saved us. He was hunting in the woods. I don’t know what would have happened otherwise.”

  Lily rubbed Molly’s hands. “Luis who?”

  “Luis Carvajal, our neighbor. The Injun was hungry. He snatched corn pone out of the spider, and I never saw him again.”

  “Luis sounds like a Tejano name,” Lily said. “Be he friendly?”

  “Aye.”

  “And he saved ye from an Injun. God be praised.” Lily turned toward the dense woods not far away. “Y
ou never know if they be out there, lurking and watching.”

  Molly shivered. “Not on a noisy day like today.” Molly scanned the wide clearing. Joy brimmed in her heart when she saw Luis help Ana dismount from a beautiful mare. Molly hurried to greet them.

  “Bendiciones a usted,” Ana said. “Blessings to you.”

  “And ye, too,” Molly replied. “Luis, how do ye know Ana?”

  “She is my Mamacita.”

  Molly clasped hands with the dimpling woman. “Mamacita suits ye.”

  Luis pulled rope picket lines from the saddlebags. “Where have you met my mother?”

  “At the spring camp meeting. She be very wise, particularly when the Holy Spirit falls upon her.”

  “The Holy Spirit?” Luis’s glance flicked between the two women.

  “Are ye a believer?”

  “I have read the Bible many times,” Luis finally answered. “There is truth in that book.”

  Molly felt breathless at the sight of Luis and his elegant, spotless clothes. His short black jacket highlighted his broad shoulders and trim waist. The startling white shirt emphasized his dark complexion. Ana wore a blue silk dress. Dangling earrings flashed from under her broad-brimmed hat as she inspected the gathering.

  Beside them in her best calico homespun, Molly reminded herself that God cared about her heart, not her appearance. All the same, she wished Christmas was sooner so she would have her annual new dress.

  Luis examined the clearing like a bird of prey. “What happens now we are here?”

  “Pappy Hanks be not yet back from riding the circuit, so one of his sons will lead the singing as soon as they finish building the brush arbor. He’ll bring a message from the Good Book. When he tires of speaking, or the Holy Spirit pauses, we’ll eat.”

  He nodded toward the basket strapped to his beautiful stallion. “Mamacita brought tamales enough for all. These are special; we usually eat them to celebrate the posada, your Christmas.”

  “Tamales?” Molly’s tongue twisted on the word. “Is that the spicy food you brought last time?”

  Mamacita nodded.

  “Much better than corn pone,” Molly said. “I remember so much flavor bursting when I bit into one, my eyes filled with tears.”

  Luis laughed. “Do you mean the chiles?”

  “I don’t know what they were, but my mouth burned.” Molly caught herself. “I be not complaining. I’ll enjoy the tamales.”

  Mamacita murmured, “I’ll enjoy seeing God at work.”

  Luis had been to the area before with his father, retrieving lost cattle. On that day a few wagons huddled together while oxen and a half-dozen tethered horses cropped grass. Not far away he saw the preacher’s dogtrot, new since he’d gone away three years ago.

  As he walked around the clearing, he listened to the conversations. Three men discussed the formation of the new Texas Republic as they tied up their horses. He paused when he overheard two couples talking about the closed land records office.

  “We came to Texas because of the cheap land,” one of the women said. “I just hope no one snatches away our chances.”

  “Land rights always get mixed up in revolutions. It takes years to sort it out,” the man beside her said. He looked speculatively at Luis, who stepped away.

  Luis stopped in the shade on the edge of the clearing to watch a group of Anglo men erect a spindly structure of wooden poles with branches laid across the top. Brush arbor, Molly called it. Arbor sounded like the Spanish word árbol, for tree.

  Several men, Jamie Faires among them, rolled large logs under the arbor for seating. His neighbor nodded when he spied Luis, and Luis returned the greeting.

  Mamacita brought him a tin cup of water, which Luis gulped in gratitude. “You must meet people,” she murmured in Spanish.

  “You have attended these meetings before?”

  “Sí. Your father met the preacher long ago.” Mamacita dimpled. “He returned after you went south, and your father brought him home for a meal. We had many conversations. The preacher was the only one who made sense to me when your father died. He told me I would see him again if I believed. So I believed.”

  “Believed what?” Luis asked.

  “The words written in the Bible. It helps me to know God is the husband to the husbandless.”

  A soothing harmony came from the women standing under the arbor. Luisrecognized the song as one Molly sang. Luis narrowed his eyes against the sunshine to find her. Mamacita waved her old Spanish lace fan.

  Jamie Faires stopped to speak with a blushing young woman with bright red hair. Luis frowned. Where was Jamie’s wife?

  The boy-husband moved to the front row log, where a weary woman in a dusty black dress rocked a small babe. Faires sat beside the woman and bowed his head, nodding at her words with an intensity that irritated Luis all over again. Flirting with two women?

  He heard Molly speaking to her little boy not far away while an older woman watched. “Can ye say my name, Andy? Say Molly.”

  “Ma. Ma.” Andy danced at her feet.

  Molly crouched at his eye level. “Molly. Ma Hanks wants to hear you talk.”

  “Ma-LEE!” Andy shouted. The women laughed.

  Luis scowled. Anglos. Didn’t they understand a boy should respect his mother at all times? What was he doing among them?

  Molly came toward him, her laughing face rosy from the heat. “Andy can say my name.”

  Mamacita applauded.

  “Why do you want your son to call you Molly, not Ma?” Even Luis could hear the harshness of his question.

  Molly flinched.

  He felt a pang of guilt, but she began to laugh, her fingers touching her lips. Molly stepped closer, and he could smell honeysuckle. “Andy be my brother Jamie’s son, not mine. Andy be my nephew.”

  Luis nodded, clicked his heels together, and stomped into the woods, his emotions awhirl.

  Embarrassed, he shoved aside the branches and bushes that snagged his coat. So she wasn’t married to the boy-man. How had he missed that?

  Luis trampled through wild grapes and blackberries on his way toward the creek, but by the time he reached the water, the bubbling inside his gut had spread to his lips. He smiled, and then he laughed long and hard. Never had he been so happy to be found a fool.

  Chapter 7

  During the week-long camp meeting, Molly would stay at the roomy Hanks dogtrot cabin the Tennessee party had built when they arrived in east Texas a year and a half ago. She and Jamie had wintered there with the infant Andy, sharing grief over Sarah’s death with her parents, that first year. The Hanks clan was her second family. Along with Jamie and Andy, they were her only family now.

  Molly loved camp meetings. The sweet hymns sung by the women reminded her of her own mother’s songs. The Bible stories captured her imagination and made her feel closer to God. Camp meetings were opportunities to fellowship and swap stories; “sparking” often went on between young couples.

  They were fortunate to live near Pappy Hanks, both in Tennessee and now in Texas, so they got to attend more often than most folks on the frontier. When Pappy Hanks was home from riding the circuit, he welcomed all believers to study the Bible with him. Almost everything Molly knew about the Good Book came from Pappy Hanks’s teaching.

  Pappy Hanks rode up two days late to the meeting. His arms spread wide for a hug when he saw Molly. “Ye get prettier every day, Molly gal. I don’t think ye will be long without a husband.”

  “Are ye prophesying, Tom?” Ma Hanks joined them for an embrace of her own.

  “Nay, just saying the obvious. Christmas be not long a’coming.” Gaunt with the leathery skin of a man who spent many hours in the saddle, Pappy Hanks swept into the cabin and sniffed. “Got ye any food?”

  Ma Hanks slathered butter on a wedge of cold corn pone and set it on the table. When Andy scrambled up beside him on the bench, Pappy Hanks took the boy onto his lap to share.

  Pappy Hanks filled them in on his travels. “Peopl
e are on the move, trigger-happy and scared. It be good to be home.”

  “Ye be safe here,” Ma Hanks said.

  He smiled. “I be safe wherever the Spirit leads me.” He finished his food, set the boy on the floor, and held out his hand. “Come, Andy, let’s go tend Grandpa’s horse.”

  Molly cleared the table and picked up the broom, happiness humming in her soul. Luis would get to hear Pappy Hanks preach. She’d pray the Spirit would move in Luis’s heart and smooth away the sadness he wore like a blanket. Or maybe a serape since he was Mexican. She smiled to think of their different cultures.

  “Ye sure like to sweep the floor, Molly.” Ma Hanks stirred the cauldron suspended over the cooking hearth.

  “It be a pleasure to sweep a wood floor. The dirt floors be fine at our place, but I feel like a better housekeeper if I can push the dirt out the door, rather than stomp it back into the ground.”

  Ma Hanks laughed. “Your work be done, gal. Go visit. I’ll finish up here.”

  Molly set the broom in the corner and grabbed her bonnet.

  “Mind ye, Ana’s son,” Ma Hanks said. “He holds sorrow to his soul. His heart be gentle in the past, but it could be calloused now. Be he washed in the blood of the Lamb?”

  “Why ask me?”

  “He been coming the last two days.”

  “He escorts Ana,” Molly said.

  “His eyes follow ye, gal. Does his heart rest well with ye?”

  Molly sighed. “We be very different. I be not sure what he believes.”

  “I be praying for ye,” Ma Hanks said. “God often uses unlikely vessels to get our attention. Or to test our character.”

  Molly tied on her bonnet and went outside. She paused when she reached the stretch of ground where the horses cropped at the late summer grass. On the dusty road from Nacogdoches, she spied a rider cantering on a roan gelding. He tugged the black hat from his head when he stopped before her.

  “Eli Parker,” Molly said.

  “Molly, sweetheart, just the woman I longed to see. Are you wed?”

  “Ye still be full of nonsense. I be not wed.”