The Preacher's Bride Claim

by Laurie Kingery

  The Appaloosa mare was everything Elijah’s brother had said she would be—good-natured, well-mannered and responsive, needing only a touch of Alice’s heels to speed her from a sprightly trot to a smooth rocking-horse canter. But Alice sensed the mare was politely waiting for the command to go faster.

  “Would you like to try a gallop? See if she’s got the speed Gideon promised?” Elijah asked, reining his bay gelding closer to her.

  “I thought you’d never ask,” Alice said with a smile. “Shall we make it a race? Say, to that rise over there?” She pointed to a bluff protruding from the prairie about half a mile away.

  “Why not? It’ll be good practice for the big day coming up,” Elijah said. “Just be careful, and watch for gopher holes. Ready? Hyaaah!” He dug his heels into the bay, and the gelding rocketed out in front of the mare.

  Alice touched her booted heels to Cheyenne’s side. It was all the mare needed, and she took off like a shot, soon catching up with Elijah’s gelding. She was glad she’d worn her divided skirt and had tied her bonnet on firmly, for there was no way she could have kept it on otherwise. Nor would she have wanted to try to cling to the pinto’s back using a sidesaddle, even if there had been one available. She bent low over the mare’s neck, savoring the rush of the wind in her face and the company of the man beside her.

  Alice and Cheyenne reached the rise first. “I won!” she cried, swiveling in her saddle to see Elijah reach the finish line and rein his gelding in. “Though I suspect you were holding your horse back, weren’t you?”

  He smiled and raised his hands in mock surrender. “Guilty as charged, but in my defense, I wanted to be sure to see if the mare stumbled or gave you any trouble.”

  She smiled, touched by his consistent thoughtfulness. Elijah Thornton always considered others first.

  “Well, I’m very impressed with Cheyenne so far,” she said. “Gideon and Lars chose well. I’m sure she’ll have enough speed to get me to a perfect claim.” She wheeled the mare around so that they faced west and, holding her hand up to further shade her eyes, peered into the distance.

  “I wish we could go look over the Unassigned Lands, figure out the best spots,” she mused aloud. “How will we know which way to head, after the rifle shot sounds, and we’re all running at once?”

  “Lars has explored and hunted there, and knows the territory like the back of his hand,” Elijah told her. “He said he had a map he made while he was with the Cheyenne that he’ll show us and advise us where would be best for us, based on what we’re wanting. I’m hoping everyone going to the tent chapel will be able to find a homestead in the same general area, if they wish.”

  His steady hazel eyes gazed down at her from his taller mount. Was there more to what he meant than what he said? Did he hope she would find a homestead near his? Did she want him to hope that? she wondered.

  “Shall we ride back to that creek we passed about a hundred yards ago?” he suggested, pointing to it. “I’m thirsty, so I imagine these horses are, too.”

  They rode back to the stream at a walk, letting the sweaty horses cool down. Once there, Elijah assisted her to dismount, and they led their horses to drink. Then Elijah pulled a canteen from his saddlebag, knelt and filled it from the stream. Straightening, he handed it to her first, and she drank, enjoying the cold water.

  “Shall we sit for a few minutes in the shade and let the horses graze?” he said. “They won’t go far—Gideon said your mare’s been trained to ground-tie.”

  She nodded, knowing the term meant that once the reins were dropped, the horse wouldn’t wander more than a few steps while she cropped the grass.

  They sat in the grass in the shade of a cottonwood tree, and for a moment neither spoke, enjoying the quiet, which was broken only by the soft soughing of the breeze and the call of a mockingbird perched on a bough above them.

  She’d missed this, Alice realized—the peace of being in the country, far away from the constant hustle and bustle of city traffic at all hours, with its streetcar bells, cries of newsboys calling out the big news stories, the ever-present noise outside that penetrated even the busy wards of Bellevue. All that time she’d spent in New York City, pursuing her dream of a nursing career, she’d missed this peace, she knew now. She should have left as soon as she had finished her nurse’s training and sought employment with some country doctor near her parents’ farm, she thought. Then she would have seen that her father was ill, and even if she couldn’t have saved him, the place might not have fallen to rack and ruin.

  But she wouldn’t have come to this peaceful, beautiful countryside and been sitting here, the tall grass giving her and Elijah a pocket of privacy that made her feel as if it was their own world.

  “We should have packed a picnic,” Elijah said all of a sudden.

  She was so surprised she dropped the sprig of bluestem grass she had been chewing.

  Why had he said that? They weren’t courting—were they? Did he think they were? Oh, why had she gone on this ride alone with him? It had caused him to misconstrue their relationship, imagine their friendship was something more.... Yet she wanted it to be something more, she realized. But, no, it couldn’t be. He would only turn into Maxwell and try to control her every move. Better to remain as she was, alone.

  “Wouldn’t that have been nice?” he murmured, apparently unaware of the tension that gripped her. “Fried chicken, fresh bread, cheese, pickles... Something other than Gideon’s endless corn bread and beans.” He chuckled, then noticed that Alice was silent. “What’s wrong, Miss Alice?”

  She made a waving motion with her hands. “Nothing,” she said with an airy assurance she didn’t feel. “I—I didn’t sleep well last night, that’s all.”

  Elijah looked unconvinced. “You looked happy before I spoke.”

  Just as on the day they had met, she thought those hazel eyes saw too much. “It’s nothing.”

  “Miss Alice, why did that reporter’s request for your name make you afraid?”

  It was eerie how he had keyed into what had precipitated her nightmare. “Who says I was afraid?” she said quickly. “My name just wasn’t any of that nervy fellow’s business, that’s all.” Her words came out more sharply than she’d intended. “I’m sorry, Elijah. I—I just don’t like the idea of my name being plastered all over some newspaper back East.”

  “You’re not—and please believe me, I only want to help—in any trouble, are you? Back East, I mean?” His tone was gentle and uncondemning, but there was disappointment in his eyes.

  Her throat felt thick with unshed tears and regret that she had spoiled the serene atmosphere of this place. And what he must be imagining...

  “No, Elijah. I didn’t rob a bank, or murder anyone,” she said. “I’ve committed no crime. I just don’t want my name in some newspaper, that’s all. My mother always said a lady’s name didn’t belong in a newspaper except when she was married or when she died.”

  “All right, forgive me for asking,” he said, his voice a little stiff.

  The moment between them had been spoiled, and it felt as if there was now a wall between them.

  He took a breath and looked away. “I suppose we should be getting back,” he said, rising. He held out a hand to help her up, and she took it.

  She couldn’t leave things this way, not with this feeling of strain. “Elijah, there’s nothing to forgive,” she said softly, looking him in the eye.

  Impulsively she laid a hand on his wrist, and the warmth of his skin gave her courage. “Please, I’m sorry if I sounded cross. I don’t want anything to spoil our friendship—or the partnership we have to help the people of Boomer Town.”

  His stiff posture relaxed some, though his eyes still held a wary watchfulness. “I’m glad to hear you say it,” he said at last. “In these few days I have come to value both things highly—and hold you
in a position of great esteem.”

  So formal. So careful. But she supposed he was only trying to stay within the boundaries she had set for them. Friendship, not courtship.

  She glanced upward at the position of the sun. “But you’re right, we should be getting back. I—I need to do some mending before we go on our rounds tonight.”

  “Would you like to meet us at Mrs. Murphy’s for supper?” he said. “Lars and Katrine are coming, and he’s going to bring the map I mentioned.”

  She smiled, relieved that things would once again be more on an even keel between them. “That sounds good. The usual time?”

  * * *

  Full of hearty helpings of Mrs. Murphy’s chicken stew—which was a lot tastier than her chewy beef, Elijah thought—they all stared down at the map Lars had spread out on the table. It was made of deer hide, tanned until it was amazingly supple. On it, in the flickering light of a pair of lanterns that hung over their table, Elijah could see undulating lines of rivers in the Unassigned Territories had been painted in some kind of blue dye. The hills were inverted brown vees. Stylized buffalo and deer dotted the area.

  “This is the Canadian, that is the North Canadian and here is the Deep Fork,” Lars said. Then he pointed to another river that ran north of the others. “This is the Cimarron, here.”

  “What does Cimarron mean?” Alice asked. “Is it an Indian word?”

  Lars shook his head. “It is Spanish,” he said. “It means ‘wild’ or ‘untamed.’”

  “Cimarron,” she said again. “It’s a beautiful name.”

  There was a bit of a poet in Alice Hawthorne, Elijah thought. It hadn’t even occurred to him to ask the meaning of the word.

  “And you think this spot here, on the south bank of the Cimarron River, would be a good place for us to head to?” Elijah asked.

  Lars nodded. “Ja. There is plentiful game here, and a number of tributaries run into the river, so the land is well watered. The land is gently rolling, with wooded areas breaking up the prairie. Right here,” he said, pointing to a bend in the river, “a large boulder sticks out of the water. This would be ideal for your—our—town, I think.”

  “Then that’s where we’ll try to stake our claims on the twenty-second,” Elijah said. “Agreeable to you, brothers?”

  Gideon and Clint nodded.

  “Just over two weeks from now,” Katrine murmured, next to Lars.

  “Will you folks be wantin’ dessert? I made my ginger cake,” Mrs. Murphy said, hands on her ample apron-covered hips as she stood by their table.

  “Why not? We’ll all take a piece,” Clint said.

  The Irishwoman was back in less than a minute, bearing a large round cake with brown sugar topping, still steaming from the oven.

  “We’d better cut our pieces first, Alice,” Katrine said with a chuckle, “or there’ll be nothing but crumbs left for you and me.”

  Everyone laughed—everyone but Mrs. Murphy, who had been distracted by the map and was staring down at it with a wistful expression on her face. “Would that be where you’re goin’, then, the lot of you?” she asked in her lilting Irish accent, pointing at the bend of the river that Lars’s hand still rested upon.

  Elijah nodded. “God willing. Are you going to try for a homestead, Mrs. Murphy, or do you plan to return to where you came from?” There were a lot of entrepreneurs in Boomer Town, he knew, who were only here to make money satisfying the needs of the would-be homesteaders and would return home until the next section of Oklahoma was opened.

  The big Irishwoman shrugged. “I’m going to try to get my own place. Mind ye, I don’t really want to farm. I just want a lot in a town where I can build a café—a real café, I mean, not just a tent,” she said, nodding at the canvas walls around them. “With tables, not crude benches.”

  “Do you have a wagon? Will you be driving it?” Elijah asked, realizing with some shame he had never spoken to the woman other than to order his food. He wondered if she had ever managed a team of horses.

  “Yes, we have a wagon, Sean and I,” Mrs. Murphy said. She jerked her head in the direction of a carrot-topped, freckled youth washing dishes in the corner of the tent. “That’s my son, the only child Shamus gave me before he passed on, God rest his soul. Sean will be at the reins when the day comes.”

  “Then why don’t you do your best to head to this bend in the Cimarron, too?” Elijah suggested. “I’m going to build a church on my homestead here, and I hope a town will spring up around it. There must be others who’d like lots in a town, so they can start businesses. I’m sure we’ll need a café.”

  “And Gideon can supply your beef,” Clint told her. “He’s going to raise them on his ranch, aren’t you, brother?”

  Down the table, Gideon nodded his shaggy head and grinned.

  “Then sure as my name is Molly Murphy, I’ll be there. We’ll be there!” the woman cried, indicating her son and beaming.

  Elijah gazed around the table, savoring the moment. All of them united in one purpose—and now Mrs. Murphy and her son, too. Thank You, God. May these souls be the core of Your town and Your church in this settlement. Hopefully the Gilberts, his deacon and deaconess, would be there, as well.

  As if she could hear his prayer, Alice raised her head and returned his gaze, her blue eyes beautiful in the flickering overhead light. He saw her check the small gold watch she wore pinned on the bodice of her flower-sprigged calico dress. “Elijah, perhaps we’d better get going on our rounds,” she murmured. “There were several who asked for prayer this morning for ailments, and I ought to check on the Lambert girl again and make sure she’s getting the proper diet.”

  He nodded his assent and stood, waiting while she gathered her medical bag from beneath the table.

  Lord, You’ve brought Alice Hawthorne into my life, and at the moment, Your purpose in doing so isn’t clear. She’s made it plain that she only wants to be my friend, and I’d already decided I wanted to serve You, not to marry. Yet why is there this growing warmth in my heart for her, Father?

  Elijah only hoped God would show him what He wanted him to do.

  Chapter Eight

  It was late by the time Alice and Elijah finished their last visit, a stop at the Ferguson sisters’ campsite. Cordelia was down with a head cold and a fever, and was so hoarse Alice had finally encouraged her not to speak while Alice brewed her some willow bark tea. But her talkative sister, Carrie, had more than made up for her sister’s silence.

  “I think instead of crying as soon as they were born, those two started talking,” Alice remarked once she and Elijah had left the sisters.

  Elijah chuckled. “I believe you’re right—” Suddenly he stopped stock-still, holding up a hand. “Listen. Did you hear that?”

  Alice stopped, and then she heard it—a child’s frightened cries, interspersed with a man’s angry shouts.

  “Whatever can that be about? Come on, Elijah!” Alice cried, taking off at a run in the direction of the commotion. Was some parent going overboard in disciplining a child? But as they drew nearer, she realized that the child’s shouted words were in some language she didn’t recognize. A woman’s voice pierced the night, adding to the cacophony. “Webster, stop! Just let him go!”

  From behind her, Elijah cautioned her. “Miss Alice, please, let me go first. We don’t know what sort of man—”

  Heedless, she plunged ahead. No one was going to mistreat a child, even if he was his father.

  When they came around a wagon, she saw them—a red-faced man holding a struggling child by the hair and boxing his ears. Even in the dancing light of the fire, Alice could see the child was filthy and disheveled. An Indian, she realized, seeing the boy’s frightened obsidian eyes and darker skin. He was clad only in muddy rawhide leggings, his chest bare.

  “Stop that! Stop that!
” Alice shrieked, lunging at the man.

  “Stop hitting that boy at once!” Elijah shouted, coming right behind her. “Miss Alice, be careful!”

  Startled, the other man let go of the boy.

  Alice was sure the boy would rabbit away into the darkness. But to her astonishment, he ran straight to her, clutching her around the waist and trembling.

  “There, there,” she soothed, not knowing if the boy understood her as she ran a comforting hand down his shaking back.

  “Mister, I’m within my rights,” she heard the man protest. “I caught this little redskin thief stealin’ our food.”

  “He’s a child,” she heard Elijah retort. “It’s never all right to beat a child, no matter what race he belongs to.”

  “You’re safe now,” Alice murmured to the clinging boy. “Oh, Elijah, look at him—he’s skinny as a rail! He’s obviously starving.”

  “You’re that Thornton preacher fellow the Chaucers were talkin’ about,” the man growled. “The one whose family stole their land, and now he wants everyone to think he didn’t do nothin’ wrong.”

  Alice groaned inwardly, while keeping a watchful eye on the man. Another one who wants to hold the Thorntons accountable for long-ago wrongs and at the worst time.

  “I’m Elijah Thornton, yes, but—”

  “Webster, you let that child have that food,” called a woman—the man’s wife, Alice assumed—from the wagon. “You weren’t going to eat it, anyway. Now come to bed.”

  Webster turned back to Elijah. “He kin have the vittles, providin’ you go away and leave us in peace, all right?”

  Elijah picked up the tin plate, motioning for Alice and the boy to follow. The man and his wife disappeared back into the wagon.

  When they were a few yards away, Elijah handed the plate to the child, who fell on it like a famished wolf, apparently confident enough in the presence of his protectors.

  Alice looked at Elijah over the boy’s bent shoulders. The boy was too busy shoving biscuits into his cheeks to care about anything else.