by Sarah Banks
Almost a Bride
Mail Order Matrimony, Book 2
By Sarah Banks
Copyright © 2019 Sarah Banks
All Rights Reserved
Chapter One
David saw her the moment she stepped off the train, her light brown hair glinting almost blonde in the bright midday sun. And he knew he wasn’t the only one that noticed her. There was a shuffle of feet behind him and a whistle of male appreciation over his shoulder. The arrival of the train in the small town of Noah, Colorado was an entertainment, an event few missed. Especially when it arrived at the noon hour and every single man employed at Noah Timber Company was on his lunchbreak. Not much more than goods usually got off that train and more people got on these days than off, but there was a passenger disembarking today, his mail order bride.
“That her?” Ira asked over his shoulder. David had confided in exactly two people at Noah Timber Company that he had advertised for a mail order bride. Ira, a friend who had been working side by side with him since the mill opened some eight years ago now and David’s boss, the owner of the lumber mill had been the other. Somehow everyone else at the mill, some thirty-odd employees, had known by the end of the day. David wasn’t sure who spilled the beans, but he supposed in the end it didn’t really matter. The town of Noah was small enough that soon everyone would know he got married anyway and they would want to know all of the details, the biggest one being where he had found a wife in the first place, considering single women west of the Mississippi were a scarcity.
David admittedly had been a little bit embarrassed, after all it wasn’t the most traditional way to find a bride. He had expected lots of ribbing but surprisingly had gotten very little. Instead, he received a great deal of encouragement, from married men and bachelors alike. The married men shared quite freely all the benefits of married life like good food and housekeeping and well, some other things that had made the tips of his ears burn. The bachelors showed an incredible amount of interest in the life the married men described as well as how David had gone about getting a bride. Based on their earnest attention he wouldn’t at all be surprised to find out he wasn’t the only one getting a mail order bride over the coming months.
David had decided nearly three years ago now that he wanted to get married and he was nothing if not determined, others might say stubborn. Once he made up his mind, nothing would stand in the way of what he wanted. And he wanted to get married and have a family. Other than his aunt whom he loved dearly, he didn’t have anyone else and hadn’t for quite some time.
Matrimonial options in Noah were limited so David had had to conduct his search wider. He had thought he’d have to travel east for a time to a more populated city to court a wife, something he really didn’t want to do. Besides there were no guarantees he’d even meet someone willing to travel back west with him. Although the west wasn’t quite as wild as it was twenty or thirty years ago, it was still a difficult life and not just any woman would do.
Traveling east to court a woman would require time and money which he had little of both to spare. Although he thought he might have little choice in the matter and had been stumped for weeks before finally a solution literally landed on his lap, well on a table in front of him rather.
He’d been eating his lunch one day at work, a beef tongue sandwich, what he ate every day for lunch and another reason he wanted a wife, when another employee tossed a discarded newspaper onto the table in front of him where other papers sat in a jumbled pile. David had briefly glanced up at the disturbance before returning to his sandwich but then he did a double take. It was a different newspaper than the two that usually circulated through. And it was still folded to a page that had advertisements for jobs covering the top two-thirds of the page and on the bottom, advertisements for brides. Now David highly doubted that Ernie had been looking for a wife himself considering he was already married and he assumed somewhat happily considering they had ten children.
The newspaper was out-of-date but that didn’t matter because it supplied the answer David was looking for – he would advertise for a bride. He grabbed the newspaper before someone else could, finished his sandwich in three large bites, stuffed the newspaper into his cubby and returned to work. Even though the paper was outdated it still provided instructions on how to place an ad in small print at the bottom of the page and that’s just what he would do, but not right away. Just as he was stubborn and determined, he was also a planner.
So now that he decided to marry and how he’d find a bride, he had to do his part and build them a home. Something better than the one-room cabin he currently lived in, that had already been on the property when he purchased it a few years prior. He had never done much to it as it was just himself living there but now that he would be getting married, he would build something better on the land that he loved.
He spent the following two years working his tail off. He worked every minute he could at the mill and within a year when the position had opened up, had been promoted to foreman. When he had spare time, which wasn’t often but that was okay because he truly enjoyed his job, he was working on their house. It was a home he was proud of and felt confident any wife would be happy to live in. A covered front porch led into a spacious main room with a large hearth. In the rear of the house sat an oversized kitchen and out the back door he already had a space plotted out where they would plant her garden, a large area close to the house that got plenty of sunlight. The house boasted two bedrooms, one on either side of the living area. The entire house, save one room, was furnished but not decorated. He would leave that part to his bride. The only room that was empty of furniture was the second bedroom, the one their children would share. Someday he hoped they would have enough children that he would have to add another bedroom, but he was getting ahead of himself.
Only when the house was completed did he allow himself to place an ad for a bride. He didn’t receive many responses, three in total, but that didn’t matter because he only needed one, the right one, and he found that in Kate, the third and final potential bride who had replied to his ad. They corresponded for a few months, exchanging a handful of letters. Their letters briefly touched on their past, somewhat of present time but mostly of the future they planned together.
After nearly three years of working toward his grand plan he found himself growing impatient, he could see the finish line and he wanted it more than ever. He proposed in his third letter and sent her a train ticket, gambling that she would say yes, and she did.
And now the time had come, his bride had arrived and tomorrow morning he would be at the front of the church getting married. Tomorrow afternoon he would be carrying his wife over the threshold of their new home and everything he worked so hard for these past few years was finally coming to fruition.
“Well, is it?” Ira asked again.
David knew with one hundred percent certainty that the woman who had just stepped off the train was indeed his mail order bride Kate. He had studied the picture that she had included with her first letter every single night for weeks, so much so that the edges had started to wear and he had forced himself to tuck it inside his family Bible for safekeeping. By then he had memorized every feature. What he couldn’t see in that picture was the exact shade of her hair or the color of her eyes. She described them both as simply brown in her letter. But David wanted to know more than that. He wanted to know the exact shades and textures, the smoothness of her skin, the softness and pink of her lips, how her smile would transform her face. Were her teeth mostly straight or did she have one slightly crooked one like he did? What did her voice sound like? And the sound of her laughter? Already
in person, she was much more than he could have ever imagined. As for the rest, all of his other questions were moments away from being answered. And he couldn’t wait.
“Who’s that with her?” Ira asked, without waiting for a response to his first question.
That was the question David himself wanted the answer to most of all. When she stepped off the train his eyes had gone immediately from her to the small, dark-haired girl at her hip. He hadn’t been around children much since he was one himself, but he’d guess the girl to be around three years of age. He had advertised for a bride with no children. Kate had confirmed that it would only be her in her letters. So who was the young girl with her?
Once both her feet were settled on the platform she turned, looked up and held out her hand. A boy of maybe six or seven ignored her outstretched hand and jumped down the set of train steps in one leap, something he himself would have done at that age. Kate visibly sighed and tightened her arms around the girl she held, who was currently sucking her thumb. She nuzzled the shiny black hair of the child in her arms and closed her eyes for a quick moment before opening them again. Then she took a deep breath, straightened her back, pushing back her shoulders and began to look around, her eyes searching the crowd.
“Yes, that’s her. And I don’t know who those children are,” David finally answered. He looked for anyone else getting off the train, a man or woman with dark hair matching those of the children, but there was no one else. Before Ira could ask him any more questions David continued, “I’ll see you Monday.”
Without waiting for a response, he took a step in the direction of his bride and the mystery children. Ira and everyone else would soon have to return to work but not David. He never took time off. Not only because he needed the money, but he genuinely liked his work and couldn’t imagine working anywhere else. But he had taken a half-day off today to meet his bride as well as the next day to marry her and they would have the remainder of the week along with the weekend to start their life together as man and wife.
Kate’s eyes had latched onto him before he fully made his way to her and she smiled in relief. “David?” She asked.
Her voice was low and husky, the sound of it making his heart beat faster. He breathed out a slow breath as he stopped in front of her.
“Yes. Kate?”
“Yes,” she confirmed with a wider smile. Her teeth were perfectly straight. Another question answered. She reached out a hand and then pulled it back. “I’m not sure what to do,” she said with a nervous laugh. “Do we shake hands? Hug? I’ve never done this before.”
He couldn’t help but give her a small smile in return. “Neither have I. I guess shake hands. For now,” he added. He didn’t mean it quite the way it sounded.
She blushed charmingly at his words and she held out her hand again.
He took her small hand in his larger one. Her hand was soft and warm in his, but not too soft. The small calluses on her palm indicated she was willing to do her fair share of work which he was glad for. He needed a partner to work his small homestead side by side. Life here in Noah was good but not always easy.
“It’s very nice to finally meet you,” she said.
“You too,” he replied sincerely. He squeezed her hand gently before releasing it. “And who is this with you?” He asked, nodding toward the children still at her side. The girl still had her thumb in her mouth, her head tucked into the crook of Kate’s neck but her watchful eyes on him. The boy stood slightly in front of Kate, as close as possible without actually touching her, his guarded gaze also on David.
“Oh yes, well, that’s a long story,” Kate began before a train porter stepped up beside her and cleared his throat.
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” the man said, before leaning toward her and whispering something close to her ear.
“Okay, we’ll do that. Thank you, Mr. Weaver, for everything.”
Mr. Weaver nodded, flashed a sympathetic look at the children before tipping his hat to her and hurrying back in the direction he had come from.
She turned back to David and asked rather urgently, “Is there somewhere else we can go? Somewhere maybe the children can run around?”
David’s brows drew together and he tried not to frown. He had no idea what was going on. Who the children were, what the train employee had said to her so secretly, not to mention the sympathetic look? Whatever it was, he felt a sense of foreboding.
David obliged her with a nod, leading her away from the train station toward the town’s schoolhouse. It would be quieter over there, away from the hustle and bustle of the train station and give them a chance to talk while the children played.
It was a short, quiet walk from the train station. He was thankful lunch was over at Noah Timber and there was no one left outside to gawk as they walked past. They reached their destination in a few short minutes. School was in session and the schoolyard was empty. There were swings, teetertotters and even horseshoes for the children to play. Occasionally a curious head would appear at one of the windows of the schoolhouse before quickly disappearing again.
Kate set the girl on her feet next to the boy. She pointed to the swings and told him to mind his sister. Neither child made a move to leave until Kate further prodded them, “Go on. I’ll be right over here.” Finally, the boy took his sister’s free hand and gently tugged her away. The girl looked at them over her shoulder, her thumb still buried in her mouth. Kate watched them, waiting until they were a couple dozen feet away and out of earshot before she turned to him.
“I suppose I should explain,” she began nervously.
“I’ll admit, I am rather curious.”
She gave him a small smile. She took a deep breath but all she said was, “I’m sure you are.”
He couldn’t help but ask, “They’re not yours, are they?”
“No, not exactly,” she said cryptically.
“What does that mean?” David felt himself fill with anger but he tamped it down. He saw the edges of his dream start to scorch and burn. “You said you didn’t have children.”
“I don’t. I didn’t,” she corrected. “They’re not mine, not really. I met their mother on the train, we both boarded in Spencer.”
He knew from her last letter that the town of Spencer was where she began her journey west by train. “Well, where is she now? I didn’t see anyone else getting off the train.”
“She’s dead.”
David could hear the tears in Kate’s voice, but she quickly blinked them away as she tried to regain her composure.
“It happened just past the halfway point of our trip. Mary was weary from the moment she boarded. I thought she was just under the weather. She frequently fell asleep and I watched over the children. I didn’t mind at all. But a few days into our journey, I went to wake her for the evening meal. I waited as long as I could so that she could rest but the children were hungry and getting restless. I thought she was just sleeping, but she wouldn’t wake up,” her voice hitched.
Kate turned her back to the children just as a tear escaped and tumbled down her cheek. She quickly wiped it away with the back of her hand. “I don’t want them to see me upset. I need to be strong for them. The reason I wanted you to take us away from the train platform so quickly was because the train porter informed me they needed to unload the body. I didn’t want the children to see that.”
Despite only meeting her in person a few short minutes ago David wanted to pull her into his arms to comfort her. When she accepted his proposal, he considered them as good as married. He cared about what happened to her and how she felt. He didn’t want her to be sad or upset. He settled for taking her hand in his again and squeezed it.
“I’m sorry Kate.” And he was. It must have been traumatizing for a fellow passenger to die right next to her. If it had been halfway through the trip that meant they had spent a significant amount of time together and had probably gotten to know each other rather well. He was sorry she had to go through that. He glanced at th
e children. But he was mostly sorry for them. He knew what it was like to lose your parents young. They had a rough road ahead of them.
“They’re orphans. They don’t have anyone else. No father or grandparents. Their mother, Mary, was just like me, traveling west as a mail order bride. David, I can’t just leave them,” she whispered.
He stiffened. “We’ll leave them with the church. They’ll be well cared for,” he promised her.
“No!” She softened her voice. “David I can’t do that. I just can’t.” Her liquid brown eyes met his. “Please understand.”
He sighed. “Kate, I admire that you want to take care of them, I do, but I don’t want to raise another man’s children,” he said honestly.
“I can’t leave them. They need me.”
I need you, David wanted to say. But he realized her mind was made up. Just as much as his own was. He found himself rubbing his chest. An ache had begun just above his heart. He forced his hand back down to his side.
“Then I’m sorry Kate, I can’t marry you.”
Chapter Two
So that was that. He wouldn’t marry her. Kate couldn’t say she was surprised. She had made her mind up rather quickly after Mary died that she would step in and take care of her children. She and Mary had spent quite a few hours together on the train talking. Kate knew there was no one else. And when Mary would nod off, which was often throughout the journey, Kate would read aloud to Olive and play cards with Lee. They spent every meal together. She had grown rather fond of the children as the days passed. Mary was effusive with her thanks but Kate was all too happy to help. She loved children and couldn’t wait to start her own family.
After Mary passed, they were all in shock. Lee barely said a word, a drastic change from the talkative little boy who had boarded the train in Spencer. He rarely slept for long and ate very little. He held himself so tensely all of the time. Kate was worried for him. Olive had been inconsolable when the train employees had taken her mother away. She was only quiet when being held by Kate, holding her brother’s hand or when she fell asleep, and she always had her thumb tucked in her mouth.
