Spirit Riding Free--The Adventure Begins

by Suzanne Selfors

  Suddenly, Lucky got the urge to get as far away from this girl as possible. She’d go see what her dad was doing. Better yet, Cora was emerging from the office. Surely, Lucky needed to check in with her. “I’d better get—”

  “It’s official,” Maricela said with a delighted clap of her hands. “You are my new best friend. See you at school tomorrow!” With a quick turn on her heel, Maricela marched away, her head held high, her blue skirt swishing.

  “What a charming girl,” Cora said as she approached.

  “Don’t you mean what a snooty girl?”

  “Snooty?” Cora said as she opened her parasol. “Clearly she is a girl of good breeding and education. Look how she’s dressed. It gives me hope that this place isn’t completely uncivilized.”

  Jim stuck his head out the office door. “Cora, Lucky, I’m going to stay here for a bit. Looks like we’ll need to start dynamiting right away, so there are some details to work out. John will drive you to our new house, and I’ll meet you there later.”

  “Ma’am?” John held out a hand to help Cora into the wagon. He offered to help Lucky, but she’d already climbed onto the front bench. “So, you ready to see your new house?” he asked her.

  “Yes!” Lucky said with true enthusiasm. She hoped it would be much nicer than her “new best friend.”

  14

  Cora held tightly to the side of the wagon as the office employee, Mr. John Mercer, drove her and Lucky—and their numerous trunks—to their new home. This is not a permanent home, Cora reminded herself. Just a temporary situation until the railroad is finished. She would repeat those sentences over and over in her head during the next few days as a way to calm herself when things got tough. Temporary. Not permanent.

  “Schoolhouse is that way,” Mr. Mercer said, pointing down the road. “School starts at eight o’clock. Don’t be late or Miss Flores will make you clean the chalkboard.” Cora nodded approvingly. Maintaining discipline was important.

  The horses took a left at the town hall, then turned again and slowed as they made their way up a hill. Cora’s eyelids felt heavy. It had been impossible to sleep on that train. And to make matters worse, her stomach was still unsettled. She just wanted to sit for a moment on something that wasn’t moving. And this heat was too much. Once she had privacy, she’d take off her boots and stockings and cool off.

  “Mr. Mercer, must you hit every rut in the road?” she complained.

  “My apologies,” Mr. Mercer said kindly. “But please call me John.”

  “Indeed I won’t,” Cora told him. How could he suggest such a thing? They barely knew each other. “I will call you Mr. Mercer and you will call me Miss Prescott.” She considered educating him on the proper use of titles in various social settings, but that’s when a house came into view. Both Cora and Lucky gasped with surprise.

  “Wow, is that our house?” Lucky asked as she jumped to her feet.

  “Sure is,” Mr. Mercer replied.

  “Sit down; it’s not safe to stand in a moving vehicle,” Cora told her. But Lucky had already scrambled out of the wagon and was running toward the house.

  It wasn’t a stately manor like their home in the city, nor was it a sprawling estate like their house upstate in the country, but charm abounded. It stood three stories high and was painted a cheerful yellow. Two turrets on either side gave it a slightly royal air, like something from a fairy tale. A covered porch, which would thankfully provide plenty of shade, ran along the front. The entire house was accented with white decorative trim in a variety of patterns and shapes. As usual, James Prescott Sr. had spared no expense, wanting to be comfortable no matter where he traveled. A greenbelt of trees peeked out from behind the house, separating it from a craggy outcropping of rocks. Cora realized that the benefit of building the house up here was that it provided a sweeping view of the town. “This will do,” she said. It was, in her opinion, the prettiest house in town.

  Cora and Lucky carried their smaller trunks to the front porch while Mr. Mercer carried the rest. Once the trunks were all piled on the porch, he told Cora and Lucky that he needed to get back to the office right away. There were boxes of dynamite that had to be counted and then delivered to the work site.

  “Thank you, Mr. Mercer,” Cora said with a brisk nod.

  With a tip of his hat, he rode away, leaving Cora and Lucky to inspect their new residence.

  Cora closed her parasol, tucked it under her arm, and took a long breath. “Shall we go inside?” Lucky nodded eagerly. “Oh dear, we don’t have a key,” Cora realized.

  “Maybe we don’t need one,” Lucky said, reaching out and grabbing the knob. Sure enough, the door swung open. Cora frowned. After seeing all those posters about train robbers and bank robbers, she thought a locked door would be a wise precaution. She made a mental note to discuss security with Jim. But before she could stop Lucky from rushing toward the house, a loud crash sounded. Cora gasped. Her worst nightmare had come true. One of the hooligans was inside!

  Cora pulled Lucky away from the door, then drew her parasol like a sword. “Hello?” she called. “We are the Prescotts and this is our home. Whoever you are, you must leave immediately, or I shall summon the authorities!”

  Her demand was met with silence.

  “Aunt Cora, maybe—”

  “Shhh.” Cora placed a finger to her lip. They stood, waiting, Cora’s parasol poised to strike if need be. Who was in there? Was it more than one robber? Perhaps it would be more efficient to hurry back into town and locate the sheriff, but indignation filled Cora’s veins. How dare someone enter her home! It was rude, plain and simple, and she wasn’t going to stand for it.

  Cora leaned forward, trying to see past the door, which was only halfway open. The front room was filled with crates, each labeled DELIVER TO THE PRESCOTT HOME, MIRADERO. Furniture her father had sent years ago, still unpacked because no one had yet lived here. “Hello?” she called again. “Is anyone here?”

  Her question was met with a scurrying sound, like something scratching against the floor. Both she and Lucky shrieked as a small face appeared. Low to the ground and rather round, it waddled toward them. “Heavens,” Cora said as she and Lucky backed away from its path. “What on earth is that?” It stopped in the doorway, then looked up at them with its tiny, dark eyes. Its fur was gray and covered with odd spikes.

  “It’s a porcupine,” Lucky said.

  “Whatever is it doing in our house? Oh, I do hope it doesn’t have a family. Imagine if there are babies and cousins to contend with. Don’t get too close. It might be poisonous.”

  “I’m pretty sure porcupines aren’t poisonous. But they can impale you with their quills if they get scared.”

  “Is that true?” Cora asked.

  “Don’t you remember last summer, at Grandpa’s estate, when the neighbor’s hound got a bunch of quills in his nose?”

  Cora shuddered. “No one is getting impaled. Not on my watch!” The fact that an animal could stab them with daggers was possibly the most alarming thing Cora had ever heard. “Go!” she told it, accentuating her order with a foot stomp. Fortunately, the creature didn’t appear to be the least bit interested in them. It waddled down the front steps and into the yard.

  “Good riddance,” Cora said. “Now, we must proceed with caution, in case there are more.” Parasol still drawn, she was about to go inside when something else appeared in the doorway. It was much smaller than the first creature, and it had sleek black fur and a white stripe running down its back. This time it was Lucky who grabbed Cora and pulled her along the porch.

  “Watch out! That’s a skunk!” Lucky warned.

  Cora opened her parasol, and she and Lucky darted behind it, in case the critter turned its rump at them and sprayed. But it didn’t. It scampered down the stairs and disappeared under a hedge. “I’m guessing they don’t like us any more than we like them,” Lucky noted.

  When would this end? How many more beasts would make an appearance? Cora and Lucky waited.
But nothing else emerged. “I think that’s it,” Lucky said after a full minute.

  “I certainly hope so. This is the worst welcoming party I’ve ever witnessed.”

  “I wonder how they got in,” Lucky said as she and Cora cautiously entered their new house for the first time. The answer greeted them immediately. One of the windows had been left open. Not only had critters invaded, but the wind, too, carrying with it enough dust and dirt to cover everything. While charming on the outside, the house’s interior was a disaster. The amount of cleaning and unpacking that needed to be done boggled Cora’s mind.

  “Oh dear.” Cora placed her handkerchief to her mouth. “What is that odor?”

  “Porcupine poop?” Lucky guessed.

  Cora and Lucky explored the house. The first floor included a kitchen, washroom, parlor, dining room, and living room. While most furniture was still crated, a kitchen table and chairs had been unpacked, as had a tall mirror, which leaned against a wall. Upstairs they found three bedrooms. “Oh, can I have this one?” Lucky pleaded. It was built in one of the turrets, with a lovely windowed reading nook.

  “Yes, I think this will suit you,” Cora said. “That will offer excellent light for homework.”

  The beds had been set up with mattresses, but they were bare. “There should be linens in these crates, somewhere,” Cora said. At her father’s request, she’d been the one to order most of the furniture and accessories, hoping to make his home-away-from-home comfortable and cozy. And she’d known that she would make a visit one day; that’s why the linens were of a top thread count. “We’ll find them later.”

  “This looks like an attic,” Lucky reported from the topmost floor. “There’s nothing up here but a couple of little mice.”

  Mice? Cora closed her eyes and pressed a finger to her temple. While she was grateful that the train journey had ended, it appeared that another, more complicated journey had begun. It was going to take a great deal of effort to turn this chaos into order.

  “Aunt Cora? Can I go outside and explore?”

  Cora opened her eyes. Lucky was shuffling back and forth in the doorway as if someone had set a fire under her shoes. “Now is not the time to investigate the outdoors. We have a mess to contend with. It would appear we do not have a housekeeper.” Why hadn’t her father supplied them with one? This was terrible planning. “So it’s a very good thing that I’m here. Tomorrow, my first item of business will be to place a help wanted advertisement in the local paper. In the meantime, we’d better start making this place livable.”

  If Lucky was disappointed by the mess or the lack of organization, she didn’t show it. Rather, she searched until she found a broom and a bucket. Then she ran outside to the well for water. Cora looked at the small gifts left behind by the porcupine, then at her clean white blouse. Since she rarely did any sort of manual labor, Cora owned no work clothes. But she owned an apron she wore during needlepoint, so she searched through one of her trunks until she found it. She also found a box of tableware and put two of the crisp cloth napkins to work as rags.

  Side by side she and Lucky worked, dusting and sweeping, and by the time she began to scrub the floor, she’d given up on trying to keep her dress clean. They’d finished the kitchen and parlor when someone knocked on the front door. Finally, Jim had arrived, but why was he knocking? Cora clenched her jaw. She was going to give him a piece of her mind for leaving them to do all this work!

  “Hello?” a woman’s voice called.

  Cora scrambled to her feet. Who could it possibly be? It was not proper to pay a visit without making prior arrangements. Cora was not prepared with adequate food or beverage. “Hello?” the voice repeated. “I’ve come to welcome you.”

  There was no time for Cora to hide her apron, or toss away the wet rag in her hand, or pick the dust balls out of her hair, because the woman barged in.

  “Hello. I’m Mrs. Gutierrez, the mayor’s wife.” She held out a platter of cookies. “These are for you. Welcome to Miradero.”

  Cora took the platter. “Thank you. I’m Miss Cora Prescott and this is Lucky Prescott.”

  “Hello.” Lucky grabbed a cookie before Cora could stop her. She shoved it into her mouth as if she hadn’t eaten in days, though Cora knew this simply wasn’t true. Why was her niece always so hungry? “Yum. Did you make these?”

  Mrs. Gutierrez snorted. “I don’t bake. My housekeeper made them.”

  “You have a housekeeper?” Cora asked with relief. This was excellent news. “I need to employ one, right away. As soon as possible. Today, perhaps. Is yours available?”

  Mrs. Gutierrez looked around. “Yes, you do need help. You poor thing.” She patted Cora’s arm. “I hate to be the one to break the bad news, but it took us months to find our housekeeper.”

  “Months?” Cora asked. “Why did it take so long?”

  “We placed an advertisement, but then we had to wait and wait and wait. You see, there aren’t a lot of people looking to move to a small town like this, and when you find one, well, the train comes out here only twice a month.” A train whistle blew out in the distance. “There it goes, heading out. Now you’re stuck.” She took one of the cookies and delicately nibbled around the edge.

  Cora’s heart skipped a beat. Stuck? Yes, she was stuck. And it was her own fault. She’d invited herself. She didn’t belong in a place like this. How would the Ladies’ Social Betterment Society survive without her guidance? What had she done?

  But then Cora looked at her niece and her panic subsided. She’d done what she had to do. Lucky needed her, and nothing was more important. The Ladies’ Social Betterment Society would have to make do without Cora Prescott for a while.

  “If you want to keep up on social news, you have to wait for the big-city newspapers, which are weeks old by the time we get them. And if you want to special-order anything, it can take ages before it finally arrives.” Mrs. Gutierrez set the half-nibbled cookie back on the platter. “We get lots of snow in the winter, so you’ll need someone to shovel. Do you know how to can tomatoes or make jam? I don’t do any of those things, but my housekeeper does. I would be lost without her.” An awkward silence followed, during which Cora pondered the reality of her situation. She’d never canned anything in her life.

  Mrs. Gutierrez turned her attention to Lucky. “I’m so glad you’re here. My daughter tells me you are her new best friend. She doesn’t like the other girls in town, and who can blame her? They are cut from ordinary cloth, if you know what I mean.”

  Lucky gave Mrs. Gutierrez a strange look. “Um, not really,” she said with a shrug. Then she held up the linen napkin she’d been using as a rag. “Seems to me a fancy cloth picks up dirt just as good as an ordinary cloth.” Cora narrowed her eyes at Lucky, warning her to not be rude.

  But Mrs. Gutierrez didn’t seem to understand Lucky’s comment. “My Maricela is special. She’s very smart, at the top of the class. She excels in spelling, geometry, and diction.”

  “Diction is most important,” Cora said. “I always tell Lucky, when you speak, do so clearly and with confidence.”

  “That is good motherly advice,” Mrs. Gutierrez said.

  “Oh, she’s not my mother,” Lucky told her, carefully wiping cookie crumbs from the corner of her mouth. “She’s my aunt.”

  “I see.” Mrs. Gutierrez looked around. “And where is your mother?”

  “She… she died,” Lucky said. “When I was two.” Cora had heard Lucky answer that question many times before, but the unfair reality still stung. And the realization that ten years had already passed shocked her.

  “I see,” Mrs. Gutierrez said in a matter-of-fact way. “Well, these things happen, don’t they?” Her expression was blank. She’d shown more emotion when mentioning tomato canning.

  Cora didn’t want Lucky to be made uncomfortable by Mrs. Gutierrez’s uncaring reaction, so she decided to change the subject. “Tell me, Mrs. Gutierrez, what sort of clubs do you have? I was the treasurer for the Ladies’ Soci
al Betterment Society back home, and I served on the Art Selection Committee for the museum.”

  “We have nothing like that here,” she replied with a sigh. “Well, good day.” And just as quickly as she had barged in, she retreated, her skirt sashaying as she made her way down the driveway.

  No social betterment clubs? Cora turned and caught her reflection in the mirror. “Oh my word!” she exclaimed. Her hair was a tangled mess, her face was streaked with dirt—what had the mayor’s wife thought?

  “Uh-oh, Aunt Cora, you’re not going to like this!” Lucky called. “Shoo! Shoo!”

  “Oh for goodness sake, what is it now?” Cora hurried into the kitchen, where Lucky was trying to pull the parasol out of a goat’s mouth.

  “I accidentally left the kitchen door open,” she explained. “And he wandered in. Hey, stop eating that.” With a groan and a tug, Lucky finally pulled the parasol free. But it had been shredded. The goat bleated at them. Lucky shooed it with the broom, then shut the door.

  Cora Prescott examined the ruined parasol, then sank onto a chair. “What have I done?” she mumbled, wishing she’d made her escape with that porcupine and skunk. The sound of the train’s final good-bye whistle echoing off the mountains made her feel even worse.

  15

  Night had fallen by the time Jim joined them at the house. He brought groceries and a big dose of enthusiasm, which both Lucky and Cora needed after hours of cleaning. He showed his sister how to start a fire in the stove and how to use the griddle, a skill he’d learned in his bachelor days on the ranch. They fried eggs and ate tortillas, Lucky’s new favorite food. For dessert there were dried plums and the rest of the cookies.

  Lucky couldn’t stop thinking about tomorrow. Her first day of school. What if Maricela was right? What if the other girls were… the worst?

  Jim talked between bites—and during bites, which would normally drive Cora mad, but she seemed too tired to notice. It had been a long afternoon. Lucky hadn’t minded the hard work; it had been a welcome distraction. And she’d been surprised by Cora’s willingness to get down on the floor and scrub. And scoop critter poop. Who would have thought?