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Love At Christmas

By Anne Greene

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CHAPTER ONE
October 1877, Wyoming
Was this really what it took to find a husband?
Amanda Geoffrey heaved a deep sigh and brushed dust from her traveling gown. She turned to one of the other mail-order brides jouncing on the buckwagon’s wooden seat beside her. “Yes, from my earliest memories people esteemed me as a mind-reader. I do possess a knack for reading people’s fleeting involuntary expressions.” She smiled. “People immediately erase those swift reactions hoping to mask their true thoughts.”
“Your ability sounds like a gift.” Though they’d been riding in the wagon almost eight hours, Henrietta’s eyes sparkled.
“When I concentrate, I can almost mind-read. But, after some awkward experiences, I’ve pretty much learned to keep the knowledge of my gift to
myself. I’m trusting you not to tell a soul.”
“You can be certain I’ll keep your secret. I hope we can become friends. Please tell me more about your gift.” Henrietta arched her back and rubbed gloved hands just below where the buckboard’s backrest ended.
“Expressions truly are the window to the soul, and I knew how to peek into that window and discover whatever the owner wants to hide.”
“That is frightening, Amanda. Can you read my thoughts now?” Henrietta turned a pretty face toward her.
“Like me you’re tired, hungry, thirsty, and frightened at what we shall find at the end of our long journey. These are not the fleeting expressions I’m speaking of. What I do is hard to explain. I study the emotions people try to hide. The emotion appears for less than a second and then the expression is hidden.”
“I see.”
But Henrietta didn’t, of course. She, like most people, never glimpsed those swiftly hidden feelings. Amanda so wanted her new friend to understand. “When we reach Angel Vale I’ll concentrate as if my life depends on what I see in my groom-to-be’s face.” Amanda gripped the tapestry purse jiggling in her lap until her knuckles whitened. Because her future did depend on what she identified in his expression.
Henrietta nodded and then leaned against the hard wooden backboard and closed her eyes. “I’m so glad we’ll be friends.”
Amanda pulled in a deep breath. Her heart beat fast. If only she could relax. After upending her life, she faced a fork in the road. And she’d use her gift to discover the best path to her new life.
She straightened her shoulders, stiffened her back against the wagon’s wooden seat, and planted her pointy-toed boots on the floorboard. Her gift gave her an advantage, but she needed every ounce of help she could secure. She had this one chance. So much could sour with this bridal agreement. So much could go wrong.
A headache pounded behind her eyes.
She rubbed her neck, trying to relax her rigid muscles. The wagon’s hard ride scrambled her insides. She dug her hankie out of the large handbag on her lap and wiped dust from her face. “Such a long, dirty trip from Merville, Maine. I won’t miss that smelly fishing village.”
Without opening her eyes, Henrietta murmured, “Oh, I’m sure I will.”
Amanda’s pulse raced faster than the rugged western countryside moving beneath the long wagon. After the punishing eight-hour ride from the train station in Cheyenne, the other mail-order brides jammed in with her looked as fatigued as she felt. But exhaustion couldn’t dull her foreboding,
which grew greater the closer they rode to Angel Vale.
She so dreaded meeting the cowboy. Neither Aunt Bessie Mae, when she lived in Atlanta, nor Uncle Stephan, when she lived in Merville, had wanted her. She had never been good enough for either of them. What if she wasn’t good enough for the cowboy either?
Lolled by the creak of wagon wheels and the cradle-rocking sway, a memory stabbed as if the rude awakening with uncle happened yesterday.
“You’re not a burden.” Uncle Stephan said.
Tears had pricked the back of Amanda’s eyes. She’d wiped her flour-covered hands down the front of her over-large pink apron, and picked up the cinnamon shaker to sprinkle the six dozen breakfast rolls. Uncle Stephan hadn’t been able to hide the instant furrows and lines crossing his forehead, nor the impatient thinning of his lips, before he turned his back and hurried to the front of the bakery to wait on a couple who carried a whisk of early autumn air inside with them.
She forced the tears away. Uncle Stephan yearned to get rid of her.
Reading people was a gift, but that day, as it often turned out, her knowledge led to despair.
She’d been right to send the Letter of Agreement to Angel Vale, Wyoming. Her heart had raced, and the shaker almost slipped from her clammy hands.
Wyoming sounded even more like falling off the edge of the world than Merville had before she arrived from Atlanta eleven years ago. No longer a spindly-legged, pig-tailed girl of eleven fleeing the Yankees burning her home, and with no control of her future, this time with the letter, she’d taken steps. She sprinkled cinnamon on the buns, set the shaker in its place near the huge ovens, and tugged the door open to a blast of heat. She slid the rolls into the hot oven and noted the time on the bakery’s banjo wall clock.
Uncle Stephan had been elated when both of them thought Beau Pettigrew of The Pettigrews, who had been leaders in Atlanta society and also refugeed to Merville, had been about to ask for her hand in marriage. Though Uncle struggled to mask his feelings at finally getting her out of his hair, he beamed happiness. Since Beau starting calling regularly, Uncle hadn’t grumped about his potatoes being cold, or his lobster too hot to handle, or his coffee too weak.
But she’d experienced too much heart ache in her life to count her crabs before she trapped them in her pots. And the night Beau came huffing to the door, his handsome face red and taut and his gray eyes darting everywhere but at her, her heart dropped to her laced-up boots. Beau would never offer that engagement ring.
Of course, she’d been right. In her twenty-two
years she couldn’t remember a single time she’d misinterpreted even one person’s expression. That day, she’d yearned to be wrong.
The wagon jerked and strained as the big six-seater crossed a wooden bridge. The Morgan horses’ hooves thwacked like hammers on the wide span over the clear, rushing stream. One of the other ladies covered her ears with gloved hands.
Jake Underwood, owner of Jake’s Mercantile in Angel Vale, and Matthew Thomas, the Marriage Broker, would meet them in Angel Vale.
The driver turned from the driver’s seat to gaze back at the brides-to-be. The driver swayed in the seat with the jolting of the wagon and cupped his hands around his mouth to be heard over the wagon and team noise. “Angel Vale, next stop. Angel Vale, next stop. Five minutes to arrival.”
Amanda’s fingers trembled as she replaced her soiled hanky inside her large tapestry hand bag. Her knuckles slid against the envelope. Best to refresh what the Wyoming groom wanted. She braced the letter against her knee.
Widow Sophie Webster and Miss Becky Patterson
Community Church, Merville, Maine
I enclose the price for one bride’s train and wagon passage to Angel Vale, Wyoming. If more money is needed, please let me know. Matt Thomas,
our Marriage Broker here in Angel Vale, tells me you want a description of the type of woman I need.
This being my first purchase of this kind, I thought long and hard about the woman I want. So, here is the list:
The lady must be a Christian.
She should be between the ages of 20 and 30. Amanda touched the smeared ink on the thin parchment paper. Maybe he couldn’t decide how old he wanted his bride. How old was he?
She must love children, as I have a motherless baby. The motherless baby spoke to her heart. When she’d first read the cowboy/miner’s requirements, she’d cried for the child.
She should have a little money saved in the event we are not compatible and she wants to return to Merville, Maine.
Amanda shook her head. No, if she left Angel Vale, she’d move back to Atlanta. She dabbed at an unruly tear. No, much as she’d loved Atlanta, she could never return to the South. The mere sound of a male voice with a southern accent sent chills spiraling her spine. She never wanted to hear a man speak with a southern drawl as long as she lived. One Beau Pettigrew was enough. As was one Uncle Stephan. No more slow-spoken twang for her. Did people speak with crisp, clipped accents in Wyoming as they had in Maine?
I am partial to blondes who don’t carry too much weight. However, I will settle for a darker shade of hair if necessary, since I really need a wife.
Amanda smoothed a hand over her blonde French Roll and then twirled a curl falling around the side of her face. She would at least please him with her looks. Before Beau humiliated her in front of the whole town, she’d been the belle of Merville. And as a youngster when she’d lived in Atlanta, Aunt Bessie Mae loved to scoff, with turned-up nose and disapproving tone, at how Amanda’s mother had been the belle of Atlanta. Amanda touched the gold locket dangling from her neck. Mother’s picture inside displayed a delicate-faced lady with Amanda’s golden hair and large eyes. The familiar clutch at her heart made her pinch her lips together. Would life have been different if Mother had lived? Amanda so knew how lonely a motherless child could be. She blinked and returned to her letter.
She should be of independent nature, but not willful.
Amanda harrumphed. Leave it to a man to want independence and meekness in the same woman. Where did she stand on that spectrum? She shrugged. Aunt Bessie Mae declared to anyone who would listen that Amanda was a hand full. Her aunt couldn’t wait to get rid of her and ship her from
Atlanta to the rocky shores of Maine to Mother’s only surviving brother. Uncle Stephan never had a kind word to say, but he’d provided handsomely for her trip. He’d even let her keep the lovely wedding dress and veil he’d had sewn by the seamstress in their small fishing village. Uncle had so hoped for that wedding with Beau. Amanda tried to tidy her hair by tucking in other loose strands. She should have refused the dress. The elegant fabric spoke to her of pain and loss. But the soft satin fit so beautifully, and she would need something to get married in. She shivered and clasped the letter in her icy hands.
7. She will need a vocation. Our cabin is not completed, so she will have to live in the lodging house until Christmas, when I foresee the cabin will be ready for her and the baby.
This last requirement had decided her. She’d have November and most of December to decide if she wanted to accept the man’s proposal. If not, she’d give him the money Uncle Stephan insisted she take, which was more than enough to repay the man for the train and wagon fare. Money was not a problem. Nor was the vocation. She loved baking, and every town needed a baker. She would rise early as she had in Merville, bake the day’s goods, and keep the baby with her while she sold her delicacies in the village or to the gold miners.
How much care could an infant take? And she had plenty of love to give.
Yours sincerely, Frank Calloway
Amanda refolded the letter.
She so needed to refresh herself before she met the man. Surely she could have a bath at the lodging house. And a good shot of Bourbon whiskey would help. Of course she’d never tasted alcohol, but the drink always worked for Uncle Stephan.
The horses puffed and blew. The wheels creaked slower. With a screech of brakes, a lurch, and a mist of steam rising from the horses, the wagon stopped.
She drew her cloak close around her. She should be accustomed to being shipped to strangers like unwanted baggage.
But this time was different. The Wyoming gold miner wanted her.
She squared her shoulders, straightened her spine, and smoothed her well-tailored brown travelling dress. She would make the best of a really awkward situation. She stood, furled her blue velvet cape around her body and clasped the pearl neck button. She’d make a new start, a new life, in a new town where no one knew of her humiliation and pain.
So here she was. Some man’s personal
Christmas Angel. What kind of man was Frank Calloway?

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