He moved to speak, then started coughing and was unable to stop for several minutes. Margaret held a handkerchief to her father’s mouth and a few tears dribbled out of her eyes when she saw it was covered in blood. Her father’s illness had seemed to be getting better for a while there—he had been weak but the coughing had become less intense and there hadn’t been any blood.
But now here it was, back again.
Margaret stood tall before her family. “I’m going to accept,” she said with finality. “If I’m not happy, I could always come home before the month is up.”
Her mother stood and hugged her. “That’s a very wise decision, my dear Maggie.”
Margaret lifted the letter and read its cold, detached lines once more. She wasn’t sure going west was the wisest decision, but it was the right one.
Chapter 3
Margaret looked eagerly out the windows of the train and watched acres of golden wheat pass by. She also saw plenty of sheep, just like the ones on the ranch where her sister Lizzie lived. Lizzie had complained about how boring the country was in her letters home (at least at first), but Margaret thought the endless green pasture was quite beautiful.
A conductor came through the train car announcing, “Fargo next! Fargo is our last stop, ladies and gentlemen, so please prepare to exit the train!”
Margaret’s chaperone Reginald grinned at her. “You excited to meet your fella?” he asked. His wife had a wardrobe full of dresses made by Margaret’s mother and he had family in Fargo, so he’d promised to help Margaret make the trip west.
Margaret held her handbag close and gave a small shrug. She was shy even around her family and had always had a tough time opening up around strangers (the adult-sized ones, anyway.)
The train stopped and Reginald gathered up his and Margaret’s bags, which left Margaret free to search for Mr. Bartly unencumbered. She saw a man with broad shoulders and wavy black hair sitting in a chair that seemed too small for him inside the station who vaguely resembled her photograph of Mr. Bartly.
“Mr. Bartly?” she asked him.
He looked up at her with eyes so dark brown that they were almost black. He stood, and Margaret (who was tall in her own right) nearly had to strain her neck to make eye contact. He was a handsome man with a strong jaw and well-sculpted features, but there was a wildness about him that scared Margaret a little.
“Miss Perry?” he asked in a deep voice. “You’re prettier than your photograph.” He said it as though it were an accusation rather than a compliment. He had said that he wanted a “sensible” woman. Perhaps he thought beauty and sensibility were mutually exclusive?
Margaret had no idea how to respond to this, so she simply said nothing and nodded.
“Well, Miss Perry, you’ll find that I run a tight ship here, and it will be up to you to keep up.”
“Yes, sir,” Margaret replied.
“I’ll not have my children spoiled,” he ordered. “They’re to become a proper little gentleman and lady under your care.”
“Yes, sir,” replied Margaret again.
Reginald joined them and shook hands with Mr. Bartly before heading off to meet his family. Mr. Bartly led Margaret to a carriage that he drove farther west until it became dark. The landscape became even more rural with only a few barns here and there. It was tough to tell in the dark, but it appeared that wheat was the main crop that Bartly Farm produced. His land went on for acres and acres.
Mr. Bartly’s farmhouse was made of dark wood and looked a bit like him: big, handsome, and a bit wild. He showed Margaret to her room with very little ceremony. “You’ll meet the children in the morning,” he told her. “Good night, Miss Perry.”
Margaret looked around the plain room, wishing she had a photograph of Janie and Thomas to rest on the bedside table. They’d both hugged her so hard when she’d come to bid them farewell. At least their new governess Nora seemed kind, if a little reserved. Margaret hoped she would be good to them.
At least I get to meet the children in the morning, Margaret thought to comfort herself. She fetched a nightgown, washed up in her room’s washbasin, and fell into an uneasy sleep.
Chapter 4
The next morning, the sound of a rooster crowing woke Margaret at dawn. She tried in vain to sleep through it but could not, so she rolled out of bed. A few moments later, there was a sharp knock at the door.
“Miss Perry?” Mr. Bartly called.
Margaret grabbed a robe off a hook on the door and put it on over her nightgown. She opened the door to find Mr. Bartly already dressed in a checkered gray shirt and overalls. Next to Mr. Bartly stood a little old woman in a dark gray dress.
“Miss Perry,” Mr. Bartly said, “this is Mrs. Foster. She’ll help you get washed up and dressed. I expect you down in the drawing room within the hour.” Without another word, he walked off. It seemed Mr. Bartly was no warmer in person than he’d been in his letters.
“Don’t fret, dear,” Mrs. Foster said in a delightful British accent. “He just misses Mrs. Bartly a great deal—it takes up so much of his heart still that there isn’t much left for anyone else.”
“Not even his children?” Margaret asked. She wouldn’t usually be so bold around a stranger, but something about Mrs. Foster put her automatically at ease.
Mrs. Foster frowned. “That’s not really for me to say. Now let’s get you into a nice hot bath, shall we?”
An hour later, Margaret was clean and dressed in a pale gray frock. She spun her long, dark hair into its usual bun at the nape of her neck, pinned it, and descended the stairs to the drawing room.
Margaret didn’t have time to notice anything about the drawing room—all she could see were that there were two children lying on the floor with their eyes closed, their limbs splayed out around them haphazardly. Immediately she rushed to kneel beside them. They were both dark-haired and pale, just like Margaret. Neither responded when she attempted to shake them.
“Charles!” she yelled to the boy, then “Emily!” to the slightly smaller girl. Then she called out for Mrs. Foster.
Mrs. Foster appeared in the doorway and surveyed the scene with her arms crossed. “You called?” she asked.
Margaret shook her head in disbelief at the maid. “Well, don’t just stand there! These children need help!”
Mrs. Foster continued to stand still and cross her arms, and just as Margaret was rethinking her immediate liking of the woman, she heard it: a giggle. Soon she heard an explosion of giggles behind her, and turned to find that both children had sat up and were laughing—at her.
Then she heard the sound of a throat being cleared in the opposite doorway. Charles and Emily quickly rose to their feet and were standing tall at attention by the time their father arrived in front of them. Margaret, on the other hand, remained on the floor.
“What are you doing down there?” Mr. Bartly demanded.
“I … they…” She shook her head to herself and used a chair to pull herself to her feet. “Nothing. I’m sorry.”
“Children,” Mr. Bartly announced, “this is your new governess, Miss Perry.”
He handed her a sheet of paper with a schedule that accounted for every hour in the day from seven until dinner at six. Most of the hours were to be spent “studying”, despite the fact that it was the middle of summer. “You are to follow this to the letter, Miss Perry, do you understand?” Mr. Bartly told her.
She gave him the same nod and curtsy she had always given the Edwards. “Yes, sir.”
“Good,” he replied. “I manage this farm and several others in the area, so you won’t see me very much. I’m trusting you.” Abruptly as usual, he left the room and Margaret could hear the front door slam shut behind him.
Emily and Charles immediately fell lazily onto opposite ends of the couch once their father was gone. “So, sister, what do you want to do today?” Charles asked Emily as though Margaret wasn’t even there.
“I don’t know, brother,” Emily replied, her green eyes shin
ing wickedly. “What do you want to do today?”
“Why, I don’t know, sister. What do you—?”
“Very funny,” Margaret interrupted them. “Your father has given us a schedule.” She looked down at it. “Now we’re to have breakfast in the dining room, then a brisk walk from eight until nine.”
“I want to eat breakfast on the porch,” Emily insisted.
“I want to eat my breakfast in here,” Charles said simultaneously.
But when Mrs. Foster called “Breakfast!” from the kitchen, both children raced for the dining room. There, they continuously tried to throw their scrambled eggs and sausage at Margaret, at one another, and very nearly everywhere that wasn’t into their own mouths. Janie and Thomas had sometimes acted young for their ages, but Charles and Emily took misbehaving to a whole new level.
Things didn’t improve from there. When Margaret told the children they needed to go outside for their “brisk walk,” Charles told her that ‘outside was stupid.’ Emily then proceeded to tell Charles that he was stupid, and a physical fight would have escalated from there if it hadn’t been for Mrs. Foster’s intervention.
For three terrible days, Margaret simply endured the children’s regular abuse and tried her best to keep them to their schedule, though there wasn’t much point. She knew they weren’t retaining anything from the workbooks one of the servants had provided—each moment the children didn’t think she was looking, they would start giggling or hitting each other, depending on their moods at that particular moment.
At night, Margaret retired to her room to find some new creature hiding in her bed. The first day it had been newts, the second spiders. Now, on the third day, she found frogs waiting for her when she retired for the evening.
She sat down in the rocking chair in the corner and tears poured down her face. How was she supposed to make it a month here, much less a whole lifetime? These children were as demonic as Janie and Thomas had been angelic. And could she really marry a man as cold and reserved as Mr. Bartly? If he even asked her—he seemed interested in little but a governess, though she wondered why he wouldn’t have just had Mrs. Foster do that. She seemed to have a better handle on the children than anyone—certainly better than Margaret.
Margaret picked up one of the frogs on her bed and petted its little head. “What do you think? Should I just call it a day and head back to Binghamton?”
The frog simply ribbited in reply, which gave Margaret an idea. Perhaps she wouldn’t have to head home in disgrace just yet…
Chapter 5
The next morning, Margaret descended the stairs with a small cage she’d found out in the barn in hand. Emily was lying on the couch in the drawing room while Charles tore up the pages of a book (probably his workbook) and threw them at his sister.
Emily sat straight up when she saw Margaret in the doorway. “What is that?” she asked.
Margaret held up the cage in her hand, which held the frog who’d ribbited at her the night before. “This is my new friend, Ribbit. I’d like to thank you ever so much for him; he’ll make a lovely pet for me.”
“He wasn’t a gift,” Charles insisted, pausing in his page-ripping.
Margaret shrugged and gave them a wide smile—the sort she used to reserve only for Janie and Thomas. “Well, thank you all the same.”
Emily frowned. “I want a pet frog. Miss Perry, give him to me.”
Margaret held the cage out of Emily’s reach. “First off, you both gave him to me, and now he’s mine. Secondly, I’ll have no more of this ‘Miss Perry’ business. You will call me Margaret, or Maggie, or Mags. Understood?”
Both children nodded and looked at the ground. “I want a pet frog, too,” Charles whined quietly.
“Well, I need to take Ribbit outside so he can catch some nice flies to eat, and to put some grass and things in his cage. If you come with me, perhaps you’ll be able to catch frogs of your own.”
The children agreed and Margaret raced to ask Mrs. Foster if they could push breakfast back by an hour before Charles and Emily changed their minds. Margaret walked quickly once they were outside and the children jogged behind her to keep up.
They reached a charming little pond where Margaret released Ribbit from his cage. She was pleased when he didn’t stray too far—only far enough to catch a few flies. Then he passively allowed her to return him to his now grass-filled cage. The children in the meantime found their own frogs so Margaret walked them to the barn to get cages for them.
By the time the group arrived back at the house, the children were too exhausted from their walk to fling food at one another during breakfast. As they each finished their eggs, Margaret said, “Now, how would you like to go back outside and I’ll read to you?”
“But we’re supposed to study for the next two hours…” Charles said. He’d apparently forgotten that he’d torn his workbook to shreds.
“Yes, well, I think you both could use a bit of fun. Besides, you could take turns reading to me if you’re worried about getting your studying in.”
Charles puffed his chest out. “I’m the best at reading.”
“Only ’cause you’re two years older,” Emily said. “I’ll be better than him when I’m his age.”
Margaret was in awe of the change a little morning exercise and fun had made in the children. “I’m sure you’re both wonderful readers. Shall we?”
For two hours, she sat with the children in the shade of a tall maple tree and they all took turns reading Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen to one another. The fact that it was one of Janie and Thomas’s favorite stories made Margaret homesick for the children she’d left, but it was just so wonderful to see Charles and Emily behaving themselves. They still bickered every so often about who was the better reader (it was Charles, of course, though Emily was a bright little thing), but it was such a vast improvement from the previous three days.
After a while, Emily fell asleep with her head on Margaret’s leg. Charles looked up at Margaret shyly. “Do you like rocks?” he asked her.
“I love them,” Margaret replied.
At that, Charles raced off and began looking for rocks to show her. He brought back rocks of all shapes and sizes, in gray, brown, and black. Soon he got tuckered out as well and fell asleep with Margaret’s arm around him.
Margaret looked down at the children and released a happy sigh. At first, she’d been afraid that Janie and Thomas had just been a fluke—children so angelic that an idiot could have made them happy. But no. She was good with children, even the misbehaving ones.
Later that evening after the children had gone to bed, there was a sharp knock on her bedroom door. Margaret threw her robe over her nightgown and opened the door to reveal an angry-looking Mr. Bartly. Without being asked, he stepped inside the room and shut the door behind him.
“Can you explain to me why I saw my son running around getting his clothes filthy today when he was supposed to be studying?” Mr. Bartly demanded.
Margaret felt tempted to duck her head and apologize, but then she looked at the collection of rocks on her night table and found strength. “He had been studying. He read from The Snow Queen so beautifully earlier—you would have been impressed.”
“My children aren’t supposed to be learning to read fairy stories. They’re supposed to be a fine little gentleman and lady who—”
“Who what?” Margaret interrupted. The words fell out of her mouth, one after the other. “Who never talk or misbehave? Well, I’m sorry, but you’re never going to have that. That’s not how children are. And your children misbehave more than most—it’s no wonder those other women went running as fast as their legs could carry them. Maybe if you were ever actually here to spend time with them, things might be different. They miss their father.”
Margaret put a hand to her mouth, shocked at what she’d said. He would ask her to go back to Binghamton for sure, and with good reason—and right when she’d found some common ground with the children, too.
/> Instead, Mr. Bartly simply said, “Good night, Miss Perry,” before rushing away from her door.
For the next few days, Margaret felt sure that Mr. Bartly was just biding his time before he sent her away, particularly when he nearly stepped on Ribbit III in the drawing room. But instead, he simply let Margaret and the children be, not once mentioning that they weren’t keeping to his strict schedule. And now sometimes when he would come to check on the children, he would pat one or both of them on the head, which was more affection than she’d ever seen him give them.
Charles and Emily still weren’t easy to deal with by any means, but they seemed to be warming more and more to Margaret with each passing day. Charles kept finding more and more shiny rocks for Margaret—so many that they’d taken over the entirety of her night table. Emily had started wanting to do everything that Margaret did—if Margaret read a passage from The Little Mermaid, Emily wanted to read the same passage. She’d even started wearing her long dark hair in a bun similar to Margaret’s.
Today the three of them were lounging around in the shade of their favorite maple tree. They were all taking turns reading Little Red Riding Hood, and in between her passages, Margaret sketched the landscape before them on a pad in her lap.
Emily looked at the pad and gasped. “You’re so good! Teach me! Teach me!”
So, Margaret taught Charles and Emily the basics of drawing people, since portraits were what she and her sisters had first learned from their father, who was a very talented artist in his own right. Later that afternoon, Margaret continued working on her landscape while Charles and Emily drew on their pads on the rug in the drawing room.
Mr. Bartly passed by the doorway to the drawing room and Charles eagerly held up his pad. “Look, Father, I’ve drawn a duck!”
Mr. Bartly walked in and looked over his son’s shoulder. “Very good, son. And what did you draw, Emily?”
Brides of Grasshopper Creek Page 35
