by Natalie Dean
“I thought perhaps I might frighten away prospective suitors with my first one. I was gratified to see that you, apparently, were not frightened away.”
“Nope,” he said cheerfully. “I kinda liked it. I confess that I’m more partial to Dickens than Diogenes though.”
She laughed. “To tell the truth, I am as well, but it sounded so well that I could not resist the alliterative effect. I was in rather a foul humor when I wrote that. Or should I not admit to sometimes being in a foul humor?”
“I reckon I’ll know it when it happens,” he answered. She was more than pretty. Her face had a pure complexion that looked so creamy it ought to have strawberries on a plate beside it. Those blue eyes . . . for a brief moment, he wished that he had one of Mr. Wiessen’s lyrical tributes to his wife’s eyes when they looked blue, because if ever a woman deserved a poem for her eyes, it was Mary-Lee Jameson. She had a small, pink mouth that seemed as if the lips might, at any moment, curve up in a smile or maybe, later, a kiss.
She laughed and turned her head to look at him as they walked into the fort. “You are a veritable Hercules, Deputy Marshal Graves.”
“Hercules wasn’t much of a husband,” he countered. “I’m aiming to do better.”
She was silent. Had he said something amiss?
“I am sure you will,” she finally answered in a voice so low that he had the feeling she almost didn’t want him to hear her. But that was ridiculous. Why would any woman be troubled because her fiancé told her he wanted to be a good husband?
“I have some news that might bring on one of those foul humors you mentioned,” he said. They were inside the fort, and he was leading them to the chaplain’s office.
“Oh?” she stopped in the middle of the street, released his arm, and faced him. “What sort of bad news?”
“This is Fort Worth, so we still have a day’s journey until we get to Knox Mills,” he told her, wondering why she had reacted so swiftly without even knowing what the news was.
“So we actually live farther away?”
“Yes,” he said. “The stagecoach comes regularly to Fort Worth, but less so to Knox Mills, so I figured it would take less time if you came on this coach. Then we can get married by the chaplain. It’s not a church wedding.”
She gave him a brilliant smile. “It’s still a wedding, is it not? We shall still be married. That is not bad news, Deputy Marshal Graves. That is excellent news.”
“We’ll be married, then head on our way,” he said, emboldened by her response. “There’s folks waiting in Knox Mills to give us a proper celebration when we get there.”
“How very nice of them.”
“I hope you’ll like Knox Mills. I’m a newcomer myself, and I don’t know all there is to know, but it’s a growing town with a lot of good people.”
“I should think that not all people are good, or there would be no reason for a deputy marshal.” She took his arm again, and they continued walking.
He was handsome. Tall, so tall that she had to tilt up her head to see his eyes, but they were very fine eyes. Green eyes. She’d never known a man with green eyes. Not that she had known very many men. But he had grit, she could see that. Those fine green eyes weren’t just pretty to look at. He would be the one who could help her. She was going to marry him, just as she’d promised, but he need never know that she was getting the better part of the bargain. It might be a challenge to avoid falling in love with him, but she was acquiring a husband for a purpose, not for any other reason.
He would do very well.
Chapter 5
That night, late June 1852, Knox Mills, Texas
“Knox Mills is a nice town,” Benjamin told Mary-Lee as they began their journey from Fort Worth. With the marriage ceremony behind them, Benjamin was anxious to prove to his new wife that, although their wedding might have been lacking in the frills that he imagined most women wanted on that special day, she would not find her new home lacking in niceties. “It’s growing, and I admit it doesn’t have all the finer things that the big cities have, but folks are sociable, and they look out for one another. I expect you might not find us up to the standards of Abilene, but we’re trying.”
“I suggest that you not try too hard,” she advised. “When the cowboys come through on their drives, Abilene is worse than the city of Rome during a pagan celebration. Such abandon . . . “
“Yes, well . . . that’s likely to get worse, I’m afraid. There’s a huge market for beef back East and as long as there’s profit in cattle, there will be cowboys on cattle drives. We’re just at the beginning of it now.”
“I suppose I should learn to shoot a gun,” she said.
The comment took Benjamin by surprise. True, most of the women of Knox Mills were probably familiar with firearms, but the knowledge had come as a natural part of their upbringing, living on farms where animals and humans alike face the threat of creatures who could do them harm. But somehow, he wouldn’t have thought that a schoolteacher . . .
“I reckon it wouldn’t be a bad idea,” he said after he’d had time to consider the notion. He recalled reading that there was a new weapon, called a Philadelphia Deringer, that could fit in a small space like a pocket or a woman’s purse. Single barrel pistol, back action percussion locks, walnut stock, barrel length of one and a half to six inches—
“Excellent. A woman should be capable of defending herself,” Mary-Lee stated.
“I reckon so, but I don’t propose to leave you defenseless.”
“It is your calling to defend the townspeople who have hired you as a deputy U.S. marshal. I do not intend to be an impediment to your ability to perform your duties to their expectations.”
“I don’t suppose they’d think much of me as a deputy U.S. marshal if I allowed my wife to come into harm’s way.”
She was silent, considering this. Benjamin wondered what she was thinking. It crossed his mind that, petite as she was, she seemed quite able to defend herself with her words. Of course, varmints on two legs weren’t generally talked off their harmful intentions just by words, he realized. She was just being practical.
He’d already noticed that she was used to doing for herself. When he’d held out his arms to help her into the wagon, she’s surprised him by getting in on her own, gripping the sides of the wagon and pulling herself in, leaving him standing and looking, he thought, mighty foolish. Maybe schoolteachers had to be independent, he supposed, having to tend to children and the schoolhouse with all the responsibilities that those duties entailed. He didn’t know much about schoolteachers; back in Ireland, he’d had tutors at home when he was young, and then he’d boarded at a boys school in Dublin until he was old enough for college.
“I do not wish to burden you,” she said at last, as if she had examined the matter and reached a conclusion.
“Miss Mary-Lee, you’re my wife, not a burden.”
She considered this. She was his wife. His wife. The term implied ownership—and Mary-Lee Jameson did not intend to be owned by anyone. Then she realized for the first time that she was no longer Mary-Lee Jameson. She was Mary-Lee Graves, and this strapping young man with the fascinating green eyes was entitled to the ownership of marriage. As she was entitled to the same, as his wife. He had sworn to love her. He would protect her. That was what she wanted, was it not? She wanted an ally who could assist her in her determination to bring her uncle to justice, to find out the truth about her father’s fate and how he had come to his end. It had been a stroke of luck that the man who answered her advertisement was a lawman.
She had not given any thought to the notion that marriage was not designed so that a daughter could avenge the crimes and misdeeds of her villainous uncle. Even the chaplain at Fort Worth had been clear that marriage was instituted by God. But Mary-Lee was not entirely sure that she and God were in agreement on a number of things. Why had God allowed her, a child of twelve, to be separated from the father she loved in order to become the charge of the uncle she despised. She had feare
d him then. She did not fear him now. Mary-Lee did not allow herself to fear anything. Fear only brought defeat and tears. She was twenty years old—and she did not intend to fear anything or anyone.
“I shall be your helpmeet,” she said. “I shall fulfill all the promises that I made in the advertisement. You will not be disappointed in your choice.”
“I hope you won’t be disappointed in me as a choice, Miss Mary-Lee,” he said. “I reckon you could have chosen from a whole slew of husbands.”
“They were not what I wanted,” she answered.
Benjamin began to feel a little more hopeful. She hadn’t shown any of the feminine softness that he yearned for in a wife, but at least, if she had chosen him over the others, she must have had a reason for her decision. Maybe schoolteachers just had to be firmer than most ladies because they were teaching children who might be unruly if allowed to be so.
Mary-Lee recalled the other responses she had received from other potential husbands who answered her advertisement. They were not lawmen. Perhaps they were craven, or lacking in the enterprise that would be needed to bring Augustus Jameson to justice at the end of a rope. None of the other answers had impressed her. Benjamin Graves had shown by his writing and his credentials that he had character and courage. U.S. Marshals were not known for cowardice. They were the most effective administrators of the law that an untamed West could rely on. She knew, from her father’s accounts when she was a young girl, that the Texas Rangers also counted on the U.S. marshals as the bulwark that would keep Texas and the West from falling into abandon.
“Let justice flow down like waters,” she quoted from memory, “and righteousness like an everlasting stream.”
“Ma’am?” Benjamin’s voice intruded upon her meditation.
Mary-Lee didn’t realize that she had spoken aloud. “It was a favorite piece of Scripture that my father was fond of quoting.”
“Your father? He is deceased?”
Tears stung her eyes. She had not spoken of her father in such a long time. In Abilene, she was known as the niece of Augustus Jameson, not the orphaned daughter of Aurelius Jameson. When she went into the guardianship of her uncle, she had felt as though her father’s memory was deliberately amputated from her life.
“Yes,” she answered shortly, turning her head so that Benjamin would not be able to see the tear that was spilling down her cheek.
But he did see it, and his heart was warmed by the realization that this feisty little woman had known her share of grief at a young age. If she seemed to be tougher than he might have liked, she had her reasons.
“Miss Mary-Lee, if you’re of a mind to talk about your father, I’d be glad to hear about him.”
She started to respond with an abrupt denial, but to her astonishment, the words came pouring out. “He was a Texas Ranger, committed to upholding the law. He was often away. I lived in Oklahoma with our housekeeper and a nanny, who looked after me. Papa came by whenever he could, and then . . .”
So she didn’t have a mother either, it seemed, or one who had been there to take care of her while her father was away. The frontier was hard on women, Benjamin knew. That would be a question for another time.
“And then?” he asked gently.
“And then he didn’t come again, and my uncle came for me.”
It was apparent, judging by the tone of her voice, that she had no fond feelings for this uncle. But that, too, would be a question for another time.
“Your father . . . he was a Ranger? What was his name? Jack Walker, he’s the U.S. marshal that I work for, he was a Texas Ranger, and they’re a close-knit bunch. Maybe he knew him.”
Benjamin saw that those beautiful blue eyes were fixed on him as if he had just handed her a gift she’d been longing for. “Aurelius Jameson. I haven’t seen my father in eight years,” she said. “Was Marshal Walker a Texas Ranger then?”
“No, not back that far, but if your father was a Ranger, someone will know of him. You haven’t seen him nor heard from him since you were twelve years old?” There was a good chance, Benjamin realized, that her father had died in some part of the West where gunfighters and desperadoes left no traces of their crimes. But there was also a good chance that Jack would be able to find out something, from one of his former Ranger associates, about Mr. Jameson. It was worth a try anyway. Lawmen, as Benjamin knew, had their sources of information, and they could pull things out of folks like they were pulling pearls out of reluctant oysters. Folks didn’t want to end up on a Ranger’s bad side, so they were likely to divulge what they knew, as long as they were confident that there wasn’t a trail leading the disclosure from the law back to the person who had originally done the telling.
“No.”
“I’ll see what I can do.” And then, to let her speak of her father in a lighter vein, Benjamin went on. “Aurelius Jameson. Aurelius is quite a name to live up to.”
“That’s just what Papa said,” Mary-Lee exclaimed eagerly, turning in the seat so that she was able to see Benjamin better. “He said that, as he hadn’t the inclination to go to law school and honor the legal ancestry of his name, he’d decided to do the next-best thing and become a lawman.”
Benjamin chuckled. “I do wonder what those old emperors would have made of our world today, especially the West. I wonder if they would have thought us hopelessly primitive.”
“I suppose they thought the ancient Britons and Germans were rather primitive,” she answered.
“As they were,” Benjamin said. “Your father must have been quite forward in his thinking if he talked to you about the Roman emperors.”
“He was. He said there was no reason why girls should lack an education that was freely given to boys. He wanted me to be a schoolteacher, and it was what I wanted to be as well. Does Knox Mills have a schoolteacher?”
“We do, but she’s an elderly lady who would, I reckon, be just as happy to give up her teaching and retire to her posies.”
“I suppose that Knox Mills does not permit married women to teach.”
“Here on the frontier, ma’am, we’re grateful for what fate sends our way. If fate has sent Knox Mills a teacher who happens to be married, I don’t reckon that the town leaders will find fault with her.”
“And what about you?” she asked, blue eyes sparkling like they were being fired out of a rifle. “How do you feel about having a wife who is also a schoolteacher?”
“As long as you’re not going to start smacking my hands with a ruler or making me sit in the corner with a dunce cap on my head, I’ve no objection.”
She laughed. “I’d have rather a difficult time trying to put a dunce cap on your head, Deputy, as you are so tall. And . . .” her blue eyes surveyed him thoughtfully. “I do not think anyone would find you deserving of a dunce cap.”
“Thank you, Miss Mary-Lee,” he said sincerely. It was a compliment. Not the sort of one a man expected from a wife, more the kind of observation that a colleague would award. But he recognized the authenticity of her comment, and he appreciated it.
“I fear that you may have taken on a lot in marrying me,” she said suddenly.
What did she mean by that? She’d known some hard times, sure, but most folks had as well. She was smart and honest—and pretty as a painting—and he couldn’t conceive of any reason why they wouldn’t thrive in marriage. In fact, he thought that she was just the kind of woman he’d been looking for, with the kind of spirit that would keep marriage from ever becoming dull.
“I think I’ve taken on just what I want to take on,” he answered.
She smiled, almost shyly. How gentlemanly he was. She had not expected to find a chevalier in the West, but here was a man who would not falter at danger. He had married her with the expectation of taking care of her and that was a novelty for Mary-Lee.
As the dusk began to fall, Mary-Lee found it easier to talk with him. Benjamin realized that, at some point during the conversation, she had moved closer to him in the wagon seat so that their
bodies were touching. It was a pleasant feeling. It was also a challenging one. There was a party up ahead before he and Mary-Lee could go home and explore this fragile, tantalizing feeling of closeness between them. And however honest and forthright she was, Benjamin reminded himself that she was an innocent young woman, inexperienced and vulnerable. His duty to protect her began the moment he put that ring on her finger, and he would do so, in every way that she needed protecting.
Chapter 6
“There it is,” Benjamin pointed, as he steered the horse up a slight incline toward a house at the top. It was an attractive house, Mary-Lee noticed with some relief. She’d been a trifle apprehensive that she’d be living in some sort of shack because Knox Mills was not likely to have the means to experiment with architecture. But her fears were allayed. The building had two stories and a wide, welcoming veranda in front. Although it was starting to get dark, she could see that the house was surrounded by a necklace of bright flowers that, in the sunlight, were probably particularly pleasing to the eye.
“It’s lovely,” she said. “I wasn’t sure what to expect.”
Benjamin smiled in satisfaction. “As soon as you answered yes in your letter,” he told her, “I started building one like it for us. It’s not all finished yet,” he cautioned, “but it will be. And when it is, I promise you’ll be pleased.”
His thoughtfulness was moving. “I am sure that I shall be pleased,” she said. “As a teacher, I board with one of the families of my pupils, so I am looking forward to a home of my own.”
So she had taught in Abilene, and lived in Abilene, but didn’t live with her uncle in the home where she had grown up in Abilene. That was interesting.
But his pondering was interrupted as the front door to the Walker house opened and Elizabeth ‘Piper’ Walker emerged, her bright red hair a flaming beacon in the descending darkness.
“Finally!” she called out as the newlyweds approached. “Carson, can you see to Benjamin’s horse while Jack and I introduce Mrs. Graves to our guests?”