Cheyenne Mail Order Bride (Mail Order Brides Book 13) (6 page)

chapter Fourteen

I Can’t Do It

The letter arrived on Tuesday.

“Oh my,” Jennie said after reading it. She sat fanning herself with her hand.

“Now what do I do?” she questioned herself.

The letter was on her lap when Chris came in from the field.
“A letter, Mama? Did he say anything about Grandpa and me?”

“No, he didn’t mention it,” she said.

“Well, what?” he asked.

She handed the letter to him. He read it, looked at her and asked, “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” his mother answered truthfully. “I’ve hoped this would come about, and now that he asked, I realize just how big a step this would be. I would be going all of the way across the country, and if you didn’t go, I would probably never see you again. I’m not sure I can do it,” she said.

“You could just not answer it,” Chris said.

“I couldn’t do that. It wouldn’t be fair,” she said. “I’m going to have to think about it.”

The next morning…

“Did you decide what you are going to do, Mama?” Chris asked.

“I’m going to tell the truth. I’m going to tell him I’m not sure whether I can leave my family and what little I do have here for… for I don’t know what.”

“Mama, if you want to do this, I will go with you. You don’t have to face it alone,” he said.

“That would mean you would be giving up what you want, for something I don’t even know if I want. It’s so u
nfair, I won’t even consider it,” she said.

Dear Cal, I have spent the past two days considering this decision. I’m sorry for being so slow to answer your letter, but I’m overwhelmed by the enormity of taking such a step. I’ve tried to consider all of the things I know, but the things I don’t know
, bother me. To leave my family, and the place I’ve lived my all my life to travel somewhere across the country, I can’t bring myself to do it. I’ve discussed it with my son and he has said he would go with me, because he doesn’t want me to face it alone. That would mean asking him to leave the farm and the work he loves. I can’t ask him to do that.

I told you Chris and I have always taken what fate brings, and to do the best we can with it. I’m going to have to face what is in store for me here. I apologize. I’m deeply sorry for misleading you, but I truly didn’t know
my own mind.

Yours truly, Jennie.

Her eyes red from the tears she had shed, she sealed the letter with several drops of wax from a candle. She mailed it the next morning.

Cheyenne five days later…

Cal sat on the bench outside the store to read the letter from Jennie. The letter he had been waiting for. He opened it and began to read. As he read, his smile faded.
She couldn’t do it. She turned me down. Damn. Damn. Did I rush things?

He stuffed the letter in his shirt and walked down the street to the church. As he had expected, Clem was there, cleaning and making the church ready for the Sunday se
rvices.

When Cal walked into the sanctuary, Clem looked up and greeted Cal as always, with a firm handshake
and asked, “How have you been?”

Then he saw the expression on his friend’s face. “You look like you’ve lost your last friend. What’s wrong, bu
ddy?”

“She turned me down, Clem. I asked her to come out, o
ffered to pay her way and everything and she turned me down. I had really counted on this and was looking forward to showing her the ranch. And marrying. I wanted to marry her.”

“What did she say? Did she give you a reason?” Clem asked.

Wordless, Cal handed the letter to Clem. “Go ahead and read it,” he said.

Clem sat on a bench by a window to take advantage of the filtered light. He read it twice, and looked at the writing closely.

“Cal, come over here, and let me show you something.”

Cal sat by him. “What?” he asked.

“Look at the paper,” Clem said. “Those are tear stains. She was crying when she wrote this. She was afraid, and her fear kept her from doing something she wanted to do.”

“Are you sure?” Cal asked.

“As sure as I can be,” he said.

“Well, I’ll be. I think you’
re right,” Cal said. “She told me she had never been more than twenty miles from home, and I was asking her to travel across the continent. Why should she be the one to travel? Why don’t I do the traveling, and then let her decide?

“Clem, thank you. You have just helped me make a dec
ision that may change my life. At the very least, I’ll get to see a lot more of our country,” Cal said.

Clem smiled.
“Helping a friend always helps you more
,” he thought. “So, what are you going to do?” he asked.

“Do? I’m going to South Carolina. She doesn’t have to take on the unknown. I’m taking it
for her.”

Four days later, when the train pulled into the Yorkville station, the conductor came through, announcing the station and telling all interested, it was only a ten minute stop. Cal Pierce was one of two passengers leaving the train.

“Where might I rent a carriage and get some directions?” he asked the station agent.

“Mose, down at the livery, has a carriage he rents occ
asionally,” the agent said. “He can pretty much tell you where everything is around here.”

Carrying his luggage, Cal walked to the livery stable. “Are you Mose,” he asked the old man forking hay to the horses.

The old man spat, and wiped the tobacco juice from his chin. “Depends on who’s asking” he said.

Cal extended his hand. “Name’s Cal Pierce. I need a horse and carriage for a few days. I’m looking for the Sim
pson place.”

“Which one,” the old man asked. “
They’s two. They’s Clarence, and they’s Chris.”

“Chris Simpson is the one I want,” Cal said.

“Wa’al, Chris Simpson’s place is about five mile down the road toward Hickory Grove. He’s dead though. Killed in the war, he was.”

“Could you tell me how to get there?” Cal asked.

“Yep, I kin.” He looked Cal up and down. “That’ll be ten dollars for the horse and buggy. In advance.”

With the directions in his mind, Cal headed the carriage in the directions indicated by the old man.

He turned off the main road onto the path marked by the tall hickory nut trees on each side. He tied the reins to the hitching post in front of the faded white clapboard house.

He knocked on the door. He heard noises within, so he waited. The door opened…

chapter Fifteen

Jennie? I’m Cal

When Jennie opened the door, she was surprised to find a well-dressed man in his thirties standing there, holding what she would call a cowboy hat in his hand. He was one of the handsomest m
en she had ever seen. He was not from around Yorkville; she knew everyone there, and there were not many men his age in the county.

“Yes?” she said in her soft voice.

Cal saw the door had been opened by a lovely woman in her thirties, wearing a yellow dress, protected by an apron with a floral print. Her hair was tied up in a green scarf. She brushed back the strand of red hair that escaped from beneath the scarf.

“Jennie? I’m Cal,” he said.

She dropped the feather duster she was holding in her right hand, her hand covered her mouth. “OhmyGod! You’re Cal and you came all this way to see me! I don’t believe it.”

He smiled.
“After I got your letter, I realized you had never traveled, and I was asking you to travel over fifteen hundred miles to a place you had never heard of. I decided it was a bit too much and that I should be the one to travel.”

“I can’t believe you’re here. How long did it take?” she asked.

“I just got here. It took four days,” he said. “The ranch won’t even know I’m gone.”

“I’m forgetting my manners. Come in, come in and sit down,” she said.

He followed her into the living room. There were two chairs, a davenport and a table. On the mantle over the fireplace was a faded ambrotype of a serious looking young couple. “Is that you and Christopher?” he asked.

“Yes, Papa had that taken as our wedding present. It’s the first picture ever taken of me. A
lso the only one I should say.”

“Where’s Chris?” Cal asked.

“He’s working. I think he’s looking for worms on the cotton. We have to be careful. They can wipe out a field in a day. He stays ahead of it mostly, but he works hard,” she said.

“I guess it’s like any decent work, hard if you do it right. The cowboys have to be out with the herd in storms because the noise can spook the
cattle into a stampede.”

The sound of the screen door in the kitchen told Jennie Chris had come in. “Chris, come in here. You’re not going to believe this.”

The strapping young sixteen year old came in; his overalls dirty from the soil he had been working with. “Not going to believe what?” he asked.

“This is Cal Pierce
. Cal, my son Chris. Cal came all of the way from Wyoming to see us,” she said. “He’s the one your Grandpa sent the telegram to.”

“Sir
, we…

Cal
held his hand up. “I would have done the same for my Mama. There’s nothing wrong in a man looking out for his mother. I admire what you did, son.”

“What are you
planning to do here, sir?” Chris asked.

“
I hope to convince your mother to go back to Cheyenne with me as my wife, I also hope to convince you to go with us.”

“
What would I do in Cheyenne?” Chris asked.

“The same thing as we do. Make sure the grass for the  cattle is good, and the cattle are ready for the market.”

“
Mr. Pierce. How many cattle do you have any way?

“Our
last count had us around 4,500 head after the fall roundup and sale. The Circle CP has around 35 thousand acres after the last purchase. A man can never have too much land in Wyoming, because the growing season is so short.”

“That’s a lot of cows,” Chris said.

“Cattle. We milk cows, we sell cattle,” Cal said. “A lot of our cattle get shipped east for processing and to the stores in the big cities. My first herd was made up of cattle I paid four dollars a head for and sold for as much as sixty-two dollars a head. Now, we’re increasing the size of the herd and don’t have to drive them 900 miles.

“Chris, if you’re worried about me being able to care for your mother,
don’t be. The ranch house is large, and less than five years old. It is comfortable. I have fifteen ranch hands and a foreman. I also have a housekeeper.”

“How long are you going to be here?” Jennie asked.

“”As long as it takes, or until you tell me I’m wasting my time,” he said.

Chris said, “I need to do the milking and feed the hogs.”

“Would you mind if I came with you?” Cal asked.

“You might get dirty,” Chris said.

“I’ve been dirty before,” Cal said. “You have water, don’t you?”

Chris grinned. “Yessir, we have water.”

In the barn, Chris got hay for the cows, and with a pail and stool, sat down to milk one of the two cows. “Why don’t I milk the other, and we’ll finish up sooner?” Cal asked.

Chris pointed to a table that had another pail on it. Cal got it and a stool, and began to milk. He quickly saw Cal was no stranger to the task. When they finished, they set the pails on the porch and then took care of the hogs.

They washed up under the pump that was on the edge of the back porch. “What do you think of my marrying your mother?” Cal asked.

“It helps that you’re here,” Chris said. “It helps a lot. I didn’t like the idea of her going off by herself.”

“You’re protective of her, aren’t you?”

“Yes sir. She’s had no one to take care of her since Papa went off to war. I wasn’t even born, and she had to go through all of that
by herself. Then Grandma and Grandpa Wisher died and all she had left was Grandpa and Grandmama Simpson and me. She has had to work hard all of her life, but never complained about it.

“She was really upset when I quit school, but I had to. Else we would have lost the farm.”

“A lot of responsibility for a sixteen year old boy,” Cal said.

“Yessir, I guess it is.”

“How would you like to go back to school?” Cal asked.

“I can’t do that, Mr. Pierce. Too much work around here to do. There’s no time for school.”

“If your mother and I marry, and if you come back to Cheyenne with us, you can go back to school,” Cal said.

“For true?”

“For true,” Cal said.

“I’d like that,” Chris said. “Are you going to ask Mama to marry you?”

“I am.”

“Good.”