If Wishes Were Kisses: Six Beloved Americana Romances, a Collection (Small Town Swains)

by Pamela Morsi

  Princess was still in shock as the Nafees and Mr. Bashara made their way out to the garden. Her friend's news was completely unfathomable, but her questions flew out of her head with the arrival, at last, of her father.

  "Daddy, where have you been?" she demanded.

  "Stayed up late with a sick friend," he answered. "Is everybody here?"

  "Everybody but the host. You should have been here two hours ago. You've forced me to drastically rearrange the schedule of the day. That is so annoying."

  Her father walked on past her, not even bothering to reply. He went through the French doors and had his arms outstretched and was laughing within a half minute.

  "My God!" her father exclaimed loudly. "Is the whole damn territory here?"

  His question brought hoots of laughter from every corner. King Calhoun loved a party. And the bigger, louder, gaudier, and more expensive, the better.

  Princess had wanted the party to be a success. She was certain at this moment that it was. A grand, glorious success. She was rightly proud—and genuinely happy.

  That happiness turned to full-fledged perfection not more than an hour later, when the sight of a man in a Rough Rider uniform changed Princess forever. True love descended upon her like a dove from heaven. She stood staring across the lawn, and then her heart stopped in stunned recognition. She saw for the very first time the only man she would ever love.

  He was different than she had imagined him. He was far more handsome. Being a rather ordinary person, she had assumed that her true love would be also. But this man was far from ordinary. Even at this distance she could see that. Her heart was pounding. He was the most handsome man that she had ever seen.

  His hair, a little long and showing from underneath his slouch hat, was jet black and straight as a razor. His bearing was tall and proud. And his uniform was tailored to fit him to perfection. He had wide shoulders and narrow hips, and his legs were long and muscular in the sturdy brown trousers that fit so snugly. He had a stance that said power and confidence. And his eyes ... his eyes were compelling. They might be brown or green, or even blue, she didn't yet know, but the color was inconsequential. His eyes caught her, pinned her, held her. She couldn't have run from him if she had wanted to. And Princess Calhoun did not want to.

  He was perfect, in every way perfect. And he was hers, her own true love, of that she was certain. And he was walking toward her.

  Tom Walker had first surveyed the house described to him as "the Calhoun mansion" from the roof shade of the slapped-together barn that served as a stable. It was not a fine house. To Tom's mind it was only a middling house thrown together in such a way as to be merely a caricature of the grand palace it had obviously been meant to be.

  He'd only come here for the money.

  There were two things that Tom truly hated in this world. One was the smell of manure. He'd spent nearly half his life shoveling horseshit.

  And the other was being poor.

  Tom Walker was born poor. He'd lived poor. And if something didn't happen pretty soon, he was probably going to die poor. But then, he doubted that anyone had ever expected any other fate for him.

  He could almost hear old Reverend McAfee proclaiming to a group of summer visitors, "This unfortunate young man will be a contributing member of the community rather than a blight upon it."

  ‘A contributing member of the community.’ Tom snorted with disdain at the memory. That was the other thing he hated. Being a contributing member of a community created by the wealthy, for the wealthy. His contribution being service to the wealthy.

  "Now listen up, Rough Riders."

  The man who'd hired Tom two days before, when he was looking for work in Guthrie, spoke to him and the others standing around. All were dressed in the old slouch hats, blue flannel shirts, brown trousers, and kerchiefs recognizable as the uniform of the U.S.V.

  "You aren't to have a drop to drink or cause any ruckus whatsoever," he said. "These people are having a party, but you're hired hands for the day."

  "What exactly are we supposed to do?" a short, spindly-legged cowboy asked.

  "Just look like what you are," he answered. "You're veterans of our victory in Cuba. It's the Fourth of July. King Calhoun wouldn't have a Fourth of July picnic without showing off some veterans."

  The half-dozen men shrugged at each other and accepted the declaration. With President Roosevelt still so popular, even out of the White House, and his exploits in Cuba so well known, the American people had become fascinated with the breed of men that had made up the Rough Riders cavalry.

  In the west this was especially true. Because of congressional restrictions, Roosevelt had been able to recruit his men only from the four U.S. territories: Oklahoma, Arizona, New Mexico, and Indian. Other than a few personal friends of Roosevelt and a handful of Ivy League athletes, it was the hometown boys who'd gone to war. And the people here in Indian Territory had a special sense of pride in their victory.

  "You can eat all you want," the man continued. "You can laugh and joke and visit among yourselves. And if you don't cause no troubles, you'll each be paid ten American dollars at the end of the day."

  "Easiest money I ever made," a burly fellow with a handlebar mustache commented.

  "And if you're interested in long-term work, there are jobs to be had out on the drilling rigs. A man with mechanical experience can bring home twelve dollars a week."

  One of the fellows whistled.

  It sounded pretty good to Tom, too.

  "Don't cause any embarrassment for Mr. Calhoun," the man continued. "And do whatever he or Miss Princess tell you, too."

  "Miss Princess?" The question was Tom's.

  "King Calhoun's daughter," the man answered.

  Tom's brow furrowed in amusement. "Princess? What kind of name is Princess?"

  The Calhoun employee appeared personally offended at the derision in Tom's tone. "It's the kind a man who calls himself King Calhoun would think up for his daughter," he answered disdainfully.

  "Princess." Tom shook his head. "It sounds more like a name for dog than a woman."

  The fellow with the mustache spoke up. "You've seen Miss Calhoun then."

  His words brought hoots of laughter from the men in the wagon.

  "She's plain?" Tom asked.

  "Oh Lord, drag me screaming!" the mustached fellow exclaimed. "Princess Calhoun is not just plain, she's plain ugly!"

  Tom laughed with the rest.

  "Oh, she ain't so bad to look at," another piped in. "Better than your wife, I'd say."

  That provoked a round of hoots and a few harsh words.

  "She ain't hard-out ugly," a young cowboy suggested. "Really she's just built kind of like the rig named in her honor, narrow at the top, wide at the bottom."

  Tom glanced at him in interest. "She's got a rig named after her."

  The cowboy nodded. "It's one of those they're drilling out on the hill. The P. Calhoun Number One, the latest exploration well of King Calhoun's Royal Oil."

  "A working oil well is one dang purty sight," he continued. "And Princess Calhoun ain't no dog."

  "Oh no?"

  "To an old ranch hand like myself, I'd describe her more as a little brown heifer."

  "A heifer?"

  "She's a heifer all right," the mustached man said. "Guess her name ought not to be Princess but Bossy!"

  "She sure knows how to tell a man what to do," another fellow agreed. "I worked for her on this house, she about wore my ears out with her ideas and orders."

  "Bossy, that's a good name for a heifer."

  "But what a heifer," the cowboy declared. "Worth one million dollars on the hoof."

  Beside him a man whistled in awe.

  "A million dollars?"

  Tom's throat went dry at the thought.

  "The man who marries Princess Calhoun won't be breaking his back on a damned old oil rig," the lanky cowboy said with certainty. "And he won't be having to dress up in his old army uniform to earn an extra te
n dollars on his day off, neither."

  "You know, that gal ain't half so ugly as I was thinking!" the burly fellow with the mustache exclaimed.

  The rest of the men laughed with him.

  "Not so plain, maybe," the mustached man agreed. "But what kind of man would be wantin' to be told 'come here and sic 'em' for the rest of his life."

  Tom was no longer listening. A million dollars. A woman worth a million dollars. It was almost more than a man could get his thoughts around.

  Ambrose Dexter was probably worth a million dollars, he thought. But then, Ambrose's family owned a steel factory, a linen mill, and their own bank.

  Rich people. He knew them, understood them, and sometimes despised them. And more than anything else, he was determined to become one of them.

  The recruits were admonished once more. "Don't get drunk. Stay clean. And show up on the podium when Mr. Calhoun begins the festivities."

  Tom nodded. He had no intention of doing anything to muddy his uniform or risk losing the money he was to be paid. Ten dollars was a month's wages in most places he'd been. Here in the oil fields, it was about the cost of a fine steak dinner. But then, crackling meat was more what fellows like him were eating.

  The men began to move away from the barn. Tom wandered off by himself, content to go it alone. The area behind the mansion was barren and rough. There were no formal gardens with stone paths between an abundance of flowers and shrubs. There was merely a wide expanse of half-hewn prairie grass and a few hardy wildflowers, resistant to the midsummer heat. In the center stood a raised wooden platform, shaded rather ineffectively with a tarpaulin roof, grandly referred to as "the gazebo."

  "Pitiful," Tom whispered aloud and shook his head.

  He reached the far end of the open area and leaned against the sturdy trunk of an aged Cottonwood. He surveyed the area as a whole. The gardenless garden, the raw, unattractive barn and the rather small, ill-conceived house. With a million dollars, this was the best King Calhoun could do?

  Tom shook his head derisively. It was all very raw, very new. Nothing looked like it really belonged there. Tom had seen the graceful gardens of the rich. He had seen the casual elegance that came with old money and the tasteful taming of nature by the finest families in the country. He had seen Ambrose Dexter's country house. In his mind he pictured the place—lush magnificence, understated elegance.

  Poor King Calhoun, he thought to himself, like a scrub brush set among the ornamental ferns. No matter how long he grew there, he'd never cease to draw attention to himself.

  Calhoun, like Tom himself, was up from nothing, and everybody knew it. The difference was that Calhoun could now buy off his detractors, but apparently the fellow didn't know how. Tom knew exactly what to do, but didn't have a nickel to his name.

  His year in the Rough Riders had taught him much about life and the world. More than he could have ever learned in the Methodist Indian Home. Much of that knowledge, however, was about inequity and injustice. Life was a stacked deck, loaded dice, an unleveled wheel. A man born with name and fortune could find success at every turn. A man born with neither soon learned that even the mildest triumph would continually elude him. Some days Tom wished he didn't understand so much. Sometimes he wished he were still the silent, mixed-breed stable hand Reverend McAfee had intended him to be. But he had been Gerald Tarkington Crane. It was an experience a man didn't forget.

  The French doors at the west end of the house were flung open and a steady stream of servants bustled in and out. The air seemed almost charged with the abundance of hectic activity. Everywhere he looked, tables were being set, flowers being arranged.

  Servants. The word was a bitter taste in his mouth. Servants, those who serve. At least they knew who they were. They understood what they did. Most people were not so lucky. Tom had discovered that in the great America where all men were created equal, there existed only those who are served and the people who served them.

  An argument broke out concerning spoons. Tom almost smiled at the resulting pandemonium. It might be a picnic, but it was obviously not an occasion for hiding the good silver. King Calhoun might be the unwashed, but he was definitely the wealthy. King Calhoun and the men like him were the examples to emulate, Tom thought. He was a servant who was now being served. That's what Tom wanted for himself.

  A movement at the doors caught his eye. Talking a mile a minute, a young woman stepped from the doorway into the yard. She was regally gowned in a mustard silk trimmed with Irish lace, her waist was cinched fashionably narrow. Her hair was coiffed in the prevailing style made popular by the Gibson Girl, but the effect was spoiled by the bottle-thick lens of her spectacles. Tom looked her over, head to foot and gave his personal nod of approval.

  So this was King Calhoun's Princess. Tom eyed her assessingly. Neither dog nor heifer, this one million dollars on the hoof would win no blue ribbon at any county fair. But it was not that she had anything desperately wrong with her, Tom thought. She was burdened with no tragic limp, no frightening scars, no horrible disfigurement. She was tall, actually quite tall for a woman, although she was not particularly slim and lithe. Her hips were wide and Tom had always preferred dainty, delicate females. But he'd been around enough to appreciate a full-bodied voluptuous woman. She had a round, provocative backside. Unfortunately her bosom, though generously decorated with ruffles and lace, was decidedly boyish.

  But it was not the physical appearance of Princess Calhoun that made a strong impression. It was the sound of her voice. It had a deep, almost masculine pitch, and the tone was brisk and strident.

  As Tom watched her he was reminded of cavalry drill. The snapping of orders that men and animals obeyed without question. It was almost as if he could hear her calling cadence.

  Fold those napkins, find those spoons

  Serve the stuffed goose with the prunes

  The imagined scene brought a grin to his face. Princess Calhoun, Tom decided, would have made an admirable drill sergeant. That was not a virtue generally found attractive to gentlemen.

  Poor Princess, Tom thought to himself and then hastily discarded his sympathy. She was not poor. She was an heiress. She was the wealthy and undoubtedly spoiled daughter of a millionaire. She probably gave orders because she believed herself intrinsically superior to those around her. If she had a strident voice and a less than cuddly corset shape, well a man could suffer deafness by choice and any deficiency in bust measurement could more than be compensated for by the size of the young lady's pocketbook. A clever determined man could devote himself to following her orders and making her feel beautiful the rest of her life.

  Chapter Two

  Tom watched the festivities with a skeptical eye. The great King Calhoun had not deigned to show up until things were well under way. Arrogance. Tom was certain that was it. Pure arrogance. He could admire that. He certainly had his own share of it.

  "Who exactly do you think you are?" Cyril Upchurch had asked him angrily one evening in San Antonio.

  "Whoever I damn well choose to be," Tom had answered.

  In some ways that was true. In others it was the biggest lie. Tom had been pretending most of his life. He'd come into the world with no name at all. He therefore felt that whatever name he gave himself was just as valid as the one that Reverend McAfee had given him.

  One summer he'd called himself John L. Sullivan and routinely bloodied the nose of any boy who dared refer to him as Tom. By the following winter he was Billy Sunday, holding tabernacle revival meetings every afternoon.

  Tonight, he was completely anonymous. People moved around him, but they knew neither his face nor his name. He was nobody. He could be anybody.

  The food was good, the people welcoming. The uniform had always commanded a great deal of respect, but it had been a long time since Tom had worn it.

  He'd tossed a few horseshoes and listened to a few rowdy jokes. Somebody dragged a hundred length of two-inch jute rope across a bar ditch, and a tug of war between the rig b
uilders and the tank builders ensued. The friendly competition between the two groups of workers was made lively by such derisive taunts as "chop down the pond gougers" and "set the flametorch to those sawdust sifters."

  Tom clapped and cheered along with the others until the rig builders finally managed to pull the tank line into the ditch. There was some frustrated cursing from the losers, but the defeat was accepted with fairly good grace.

  The gray of the evening was beginning to leaden the sky as the torches around the gazebo were lit. Calhoun stood on the dais joking and laughing with the crowd.

  The man who'd hired him caught Tom's eye and motioned him toward the gazebo. The other uniformed Rough Riders were also headed that way.

  Here's where I earn my ten-spot, Tom thought to himself, and made his way through the crowd. He joined the other men on the stage standing behind the host of the festivities.

  The audience gazed up at them in undisguised admiration. Tom allowed his eyes to wander among them. Most were poor working folks, like himself. But there was money among this crowd.

  The trappings of wealth and privilege, when not anointed by blood, could only be achieved in two ways, either hard work or underhanded means. In this place, in this time, with rich, black crude oil greasing the way, hard work had been the answer for

  these people. Tom Walker was not so particular about the method, only the outcome.

  King Calhoun was energetic and long-winded. If stirring up shouts for the red, white, and blue was good enough for politicians, it was good enough for Royal Oil. He apparently loved hearing the sound of his own voice, and at length the rich oil man talked about another Fourth of July eight years earlier.

  "The Rough Riders had taken heavy casualties on the charge up San Juan Hill," Calhoun told the crowd. "They would not march victorious into Santiago for two more weeks."

  King, florid-faced and portly, shook his head dramatically. Not a sound was heard from those assembled. "We know that they were tired," he continued. "And we know that they were hurting, many dying on the bloody fields of Cuba."