Sixteen Brides (33 page)

“Forrest arrived at a house one night—a confinement, except it was just supposed to be a routine visit. There and back, Forrest said. The baby wasn’t due for weeks yet. But suddenly he was involved in a difficult case. He couldn’t leave. He gave Oliver a book, but . . . you know how boys are.” Hettie took in a deep, sobbing breath. “N-no one even realized he’d left the house.” She shuddered. For a few minutes she cried quietly. Finally, she swiped at her eyes and blew her nose.

“Th-the nearest they could figure was Oliver was reaching for the dipper hanging on the side of the bucket and—” She broke off and closed her eyes. While the tears streamed down her cheeks, she managed to say, “That well was nearly two hundred feet deep.” She spoke through fresh tears. “I
begged
him not to take Oliver with him that day. But he wouldn’t listen. He had to have his little buddy along.” Her voice was bitter. “His little buddy.”

Handkerchiefs swiped at tears all around the table. Sally finally broke the silence. “Men have turned into drunks over a lot less than that,” she said. “He musta been hurtin’ something terrible.”

“I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to Jackson,” Ruth murmured. “One thing is certain. You’ve been through the worst loss a woman could ever face.”

Mama reached over and took Hettie’s hand. “I can’t tell you what to do. But I will pray God’s comfort. For you both.”

Hettie took a deep breath. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you.”

Her hands caked with grime, her back aching, Caroline swiped at the sweat pouring down her face as she knelt to pick green beans
. Laws o’massey,
it was hot today. She couldn’t wait for Sally to finish the green calico dress she’d cut out just a few days ago. A dress that allowed for twenty-three inches of waist. Caroline would forgo her corset in favor of breathing.

She glanced toward the house, mindful of Sally’s furious pace on the treadle sewing machine. Hettie was taking a nap, although how that woman could sleep when it was this hot, Caroline didn’t know. They were going to have to can beans tomorrow, and that would be a caution in this heat. What she wouldn’t give for a glass of cold buttermilk right now.

A fly buzzed past. Caroline waved it away. Feeling a little dizzy, she worked to the end of the row, then sat back for a moment to catch her breath. Her throat parched, she stood up and wobbled her way toward the well. All she could think of now was a drink of cool water. When she finally got to the well and a stream of cold water burst from the pump head, she leaned down, welcoming the sensation of the frigid water dousing her dark hair. She straightened back up just as a scowling Matthew Ransom headed in her direction.

“I thought you were going to faint before you got to the house,” he said. “You can’t work in the sun without a bonnet on a day like today, Caroline. You’ll kill yourself.”

She ignored the scolding. “Did you find how that varmint is gettin’ at Sally’s hens?”

“I did. Patched it. He won’t be a problem at least for a while.”

“Well, I got almost all the beans picked. That’ll be a nice surprise for everybody when they get back from Jeb’s.”

“Certainly better than the surprise of finding you fainted from sunstroke.” He strode toward her then and, taking her hand, led her to the bench by the back door. Ordering her to sit down, he took a clean kerchief out of his pocket, went back to the pump, wet it with cold water, and brought it back. “Put this to the back of your neck,” he said, then got a quart jar from inside and filled it. “Drink,” he said. “All of it. I’ll finish picking the beans. You catch your breath.”

A few minutes later, he strode back, a basket filled with fresh-picked beans beneath one arm. “Set them by the well if you don’t mind,” Caroline said. “I want to have them all rinsed and snapped before sundown. But I’ve got a few other things to do before I get back to the beans.”

A new kind of heat set her heart to pounding when he smiled at her. “I could be convinced to linger and help a lady.”

Caroline forced a little laugh. “Be careful what you offer, Mr. Ransom. You might live to regret saying you’ll help.”

“Try me.”

“Well, now, let’s see . . . milk the cow, churn the butter, hem my new dress, knead bread . . . oh, and if y’all don’t mind, Jackson was just saying how he’d like his mother’s hundred sixty acres fenced before Lucas Gray brings his cattle over.”

Matthew frowned. “Luke’s giving Jackson some cattle?”

“Not giving. Just getting him started. They’ve got it arranged somehow.”

“I see.”

“Now, I know you don’t like Mr. Gray,” Caroline said. “But if you’d seen how excited Jackson is about those cattle—and besides, Ruth says Mr. Gray has changed.”

“Do tell.”

Caroline patted her neck with the cool cloth. “I’m just tellin’ you what Ruth said, Matthew. Don’t get all riled up because I spoke the name. I don’t want any part of whatever it is between you and Lucas Gray, and I already told him as much, and now I’m telling you.”

Matthew sat down beside her. Taking in a deep breath, he said, “I’d like to make it your business. If you’re willing to hear me out.”

The way he looked at her made Caroline’s heart thud. “I . . . I don’t know what you mean.”

He reached for her hand. “I think I’m falling in love with you, Caroline.”

It felt like someone had knocked the air clean out of her.

The reaction wasn’t exactly what he’d hoped. The minute he said, “I think I’m falling in love with you,” Caroline gasped and snatched her hand away. It only made him long to pull her into his arms, but he didn’t have the right. If he was ever going to have the right—or so much as a chance—he had to tell her everything.

He spent the next few minutes talking and thanking heaven she didn’t tell him to hush and get off her land. He told her everything: how he’d met Katie; how he’d cut in when she was dancing with Luke; how she’d chosen him over Luke; how he’d brought her out here and then failed her; how his anger and his jealousy had ruined everything; and how he’d spent the last few years since she died.

“And so,” he said, and swallowed, “when I plowed into Luke that day at the mercantile, it wasn’t for anything Luke ever did. It was because I’d spent years blaming him for the mess I’d made of my life. All those years of festering anger were in that one punch, and I threw it because Luke dared to smile at Linney.” He let out a breath. Caroline hadn’t moved. What did that mean? There was no way to know. He kept talking.

“You said Ruth thinks Luke has changed. Well . . . so have I.” He told her what he’d learned from reading Jeb Cooper’s Bible. “I’m still not sure how to articulate what happened that day, but I do know I’m different. I haven’t tried to put it into words until just now. But it’s . . . it’s like something rotten’s been scooped out of me.” He turned toward her. “Does any of this make any sense at all to you?” He couldn’t see her eyes because she wouldn’t look at him. But he could see tears spilling down her cheeks.

“I thought you might get mad. I didn’t expect you to cry.”

She cleared her throat. “Have you told any of this to Mr. Gray? About changing and feeling rotten before and things being different now? Have you said you’re
sorry
?”

Matthew shook his head. “I wouldn’t know where to start.”

Caroline got to her feet. “You start the same way you did with me just now. Oh, you don’t say the love part.” She blushed. “But, Matthew . . . you and I—” She shook her head. “Everything
isn’t
clean and new. Not until you make it right with Lucas Gray. You have to know that. You have to talk to him. You at least have to try.”

“You’re right.” He swallowed. “Do you think once I’ve done that—”

“You’ve got to do what’s right just because it’s right. Not because of me.” She cleared her throat. “I’ve been married to a coward, Matthew. I don’t know if I want to marry again, but one thing is sure. I will never knowingly walk into the space between two men who don’t have the courage to step over their egos and fix something worth fixing.” T ears gathered in her eyes again. “When I married Basil, my family disowned me. I thought they’d forgive me someday. I was so sure they would.” Her voice wavered. Fresh tears spilled down her cheeks. “Maybe they would have, if all three of my beautiful, intelligent brothers hadn’t died in the war.”

How Matthew longed to reach out to her. But he didn’t.

She sniffed and took a deep breath. “I’ve got no family in my life, Matthew. These ladies here at Four Corners are my family now. Having my first family disown me—that was my doing, and I have to live with it. But you have a chance to get your family back. To my mind, that is a treasure worth fighting for.”

She paused. “I’ll handle the churning and milking and such,” she said. “I think you’ve got more important things to tend to, don’t you?”

When he nodded, she laid one palm against his cheek. He closed his eyes, hoping there would be more, but there wasn’t. There was, however, reason to hope. “You be careful on your way to the ranch. We’ve been talking about having a harvest dance out here at Four Corners, and I have a particular fondness for waltzing beneath the stars with men who make my tender li’l Tennessee heart pound.”

CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for,
the evidence of things not seen.

HEBREWS 11:1

S
-so,” Hettie said. “I know it’s not what you want. But it’s the best I can do right now.” She’d agreed to come into town and talk, but now, as she sat back in her chair at the dining hall table and waited for Forrest to respond, her resolve wavered about what she was proposing. Zita said God would reward obedience, but Hettie wasn’t sure of that, either. Linney Ransom stopped by and poured coffee into their half-empty mugs. Neither of them had eaten a thing. They handed over their plates.

After an eternity of contemplating the cup of coffee before him, Forrest let out a long, slow breath. “All right, Hettie. If that’s what you want.”

A family came in the front door, their child skipping alongside them jabbering in what Hettie thought might be Swedish . . . she wasn’t sure. She only knew the child was about Oliver’s age, and the sight of him tore at her heart. She swallowed. “I don’t
know
what I want. I just know what I
don’t
want. I
don’t
want to ever see that house again. And I
don’t
want to leave my friends.” The family sat down, and Linney hurried over to them with a bright smile. “And I don’t want to feel this way forever. Zita says I won’t. She says I should have faith that things can be better between us.” She glanced at Forrest and then away. “Zita says I should give us time, and she’s one of the wisest people I’ve ever known. I think I should listen to her.”

Forrest closed his eyes for a moment and sighed before saying, “But you aren’t willing to listen to
me
. To believe I’m telling you the truth when I say the drinking is done.”

“I
did
listen. I just . . . I can’t go off with you and be all alone again if you . . . if something happens. I need my friends. I need their support.”

“It’s asking a lot to expect me to battle all those women and what they’re telling you to do. Not that they aren’t fine women. That’s not what I mean. But they exert a formidable influence on you.”

Hettie pushed her spectacles up on her nose. “You don’t have to battle them. You should be grateful for them. They’re the ones who came up with what I’m proposing.”

Forrest picked up the napkin he’d had spread across his lap. Folding it, he laid it on the table. “All right, Hettie. I’ll leave first thing in the morning. I’ll take care of everything. Just get me a list of anything you want from the house.” He reached across the table and laid his hand atop hers. “And promise me you’ll still be here when I get back.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” Hettie blinked the tears away.

It was a week before Matthew caught up with Luke, not because the rancher was hard to find, but because . . . well . . . because Matthew had to talk to Jeb about things and then plan a speech and practice it and . . . because for all his talk to Caroline about how he felt clean and new, he still dreaded facing Luke, who would likely toss Matthew off the ranch. Maybe plant his own fist on Matthew’s jaw. And then what? What would Caroline do when Matthew reported that he’d collected enough courage to go ask for forgiveness, but Luke wasn’t willing to give it?

Jeb Cooper said that all God expected of a man was for that man to do his part. To be obedient and leave the results with God, since a man couldn’t control results anyway. It was called living by faith, Jeb said, and Matthew understood the concept, but acting on it was one of the hardest things he’d ever done.

Jeb agreed. “It’s called living by faith,” he said, “not sight.”

When Matthew rode into the green valley that comprised the heart of the Graystone Ranch, Luke was standing in the middle of a corral lunging the same gray stallion Matthew had watched him unload back in April. His heart pounded just like it had back then. Only now it wasn’t hate that caused the reaction. Now it was just plain nerves. At least there weren’t a lot of other wranglers about. Matthew was grateful for that. He hadn’t planned on even dismounting—at least until he saw how Luke was going to react to what he had to say, but the stallion didn’t seem to like the idea of Patch getting too close, so Matthew retreated to the big barn, dismounting and hitching Patch before returning to where Luke waited. He’d stopped lunging the horse and reeled him in.

“Mrs. Dow said your leg healed up pretty well.”
Stupid
. Not what he had planned to say at all. But looking Luke in the eye for the first time in years seemed to have erased his practiced speech.

Luke nodded. “Thanks to both of them—Ruth and Hettie.” He stroked the stallion’s neck. “No thanks to me and my cursed pride.”

Matthew glanced around. “Things look good.”

“Could be better. That late spring snow didn’t help with calving.”

“Ruth’s son. He thinks a lot of you. He likes Pete, too. But he talks about you more.”

Luke shrugged. “Did you ride all this way to tell me that Jackson Dow likes me?” He rubbed his jaw. “Or did you want another chance at knocking me clean to heaven—or hell, where I likely deserve to go.”

Matthew shook his head. “I don’t want to knock you anywhere. I want—”
Why is this so hard?
He nodded at the stallion. “He’s a beauty. Reminds me of Silver.”

“Silver was a good horse.”

“Well, he would have been. If I’d listened to you. But I didn’t. I was too bullheaded to listen. About a lot of things. And then when he turned up lame I blamed you.” Sweat trickled down his back. “I’ve blamed you for a lot of things that weren’t your fault. Things I should own up to. More important things than that horse I ruined.” His voice wavered. He stopped talking.

Luke reached up to unsnap the lead from the stallion’s halter. The horse gave a little snort and danced away. Still, Luke remained in the center of the small corral. “I didn’t betray you with Katie, Matthew. I did love her. I did want her. And I did beg her to stay with me that day. But she didn’t. She loved
you
. I was wrong to act on my feelings. I was wrong, and if I could take back what I said to her that day—and to you—I’d do it.”

He looked down at the ground. Took his hat off, brushed his forearm across his forehead, and put it back on. “I was wrong and I’m sorry. Of course saying that after all this time isn’t enough.” He gestured around him. “You may not believe it, but I’d give everything you can see and more to fix things for you. But money can’t fix the really important things.” He broke off. “Can you do it, Matthew? Can you forgive me?”

“I came to say I’m sorry,” Matthew blurted out. Surprise shone in Luke’s eyes.

“All these years I’ve blamed you. It wasn’t your fault. None of it. I wouldn’t see it. It’s taken me all this time to see it true.” He took a deep breath. “So I came out here to ask you to forgive me.” He held out his hand. It felt like the hand stayed out there for years. In reality, it was just the seconds it took for Luke to cross the corral and grasp it.

“Done,” he said.

Matthew nodded. “Done.”

Awkward silence reigned for a few seconds. Finally, Matthew said he’d be getting on his way. He turned to go.

“Matthew.” When he turned back, Luke nodded toward Patch. “That horse know anything about driving cattle?”

“Not a thing. Why?”

“Well, I promised Jackson five cows. I haven’t gotten them to him and—well, I thought maybe you could help me drive them that way when I have the time to deliver them.”

Matthew’s heart sank. He’d seen Lucas talking to Caroline that first day. Of course he hadn’t known it was Caroline then . . . but she’d been there in the mercantile, too. What if it wasn’t Linney that Luke was following? What if it was Caroline?
History repeating itself. Would God let that happen?
The rock returned to his gut.

Luke cleared his throat. “I suppose I should confess there’s a little more to my interest in Four Corners than taking cattle to Jackson.”

Here it came. Matthew steeled himself to hear it.

“The truth is . . . I’d like to call on Ruth.”

Sometimes Ella wished that Jeb Cooper wasn’t quite so smart. Every time the windmill creaked and sent water through Jeb’s system of pipes toward the garden, it made her think of him and how much she was dreading meeting his bride. Jeb Cooper had gone back east to get the woman who was sending him those letters. At least that was what Ella concluded when he said he’d be gone for a while and didn’t explain himself any more than that. Not that he owed her an explanation.

Even Martha Haywood thought that’s where he went. As postmistress to the area, Martha saw everyone’s mail, and when Ella was in town on Saturday, Martha didn’t have a letter from Elizabeth Jorgenson and thought that was odd since Jeb usually got a letter nearly every week from her. And then Mavis Morris came in hinting and asking if they knew where Jeb Cooper was going on the train yesterday all dressed to the nines.

Ella came back home, and as she and the other ladies worked to put up their garden produce, she hoped on hope that Elizabeth Jorgenson knew how to work hard, because if their well was deep enough to supply a reliable amount of water, that woman was going to have a good garden—just like the ladies at Four Corners. She was
that woman
in Ella’s mind
.
She could not bring herself to think in terms of
Elizabeth Cooper.

They were into canning season now, spending hours a day over the hot stove processing tomatoes and beans, carrots and beets. They filled gallon crocks with brine, and Mama showed them how to make pickles. They shredded small mountains of cabbage and added crocks of sauerkraut to the larder. No longer did the fruit cellar smell like earth. Now it smelled of vinegar and spice.

Jackson located chokecherries and buffalo berries, elderberries and plums. They gathered baskets of ripe fruit. Even Hettie went along to gather wild fruit, now past the early weeks of her pregnancy and feeling better. The ladies spent long hours in the kitchen making jam and jelly and drying fruit for winter pies.

Still there was no sign of Jeb Cooper. No sign of Matthew Ransom, either. Ella thought Caroline seemed almost as distracted as she felt. But she didn’t bring it up. Still, she wondered if once again, she and Caroline, the unlikeliest candidates for such a thing, shared similar concerns about certain things.

Sometimes, Ruth thought, emotions were like a horsefly. Just when you thought you’d banished it from the kitchen, here it came buzzing back.
If only there was a flyswatter that could kill stubborn, stupid, illogical . . .hope.
She’d been doing so well. She hadn’t thought about Lucas for several days. At least not very often. In fact, she had convinced herself that she would rarely think of Lucas at all if it weren’t for Jackson’s wondering aloud about when the Graystone cattle would arrive. And now here they came, bawling their way across the prairie on the last Tuesday morning of July, driven by none other than the rancher himself, looking so handsome Ruth wanted to— She stopped in mid-thought at sight of the other wrangler.
Cattle driven by Lucas Gray and Matthew Ransom—together? But—that’s impossible.