An Unlikely Love

by Dorothy Clark

  “Miss Bradley?”

  She halted, turned.

  A short, stocky man stepped away from the station door, removed his hat and gave her a brief, polite nod. “I’m Cyrus Nielsen, Miss Bradley.”

  “And what business have you with me, Mr. Nielsen? And how do you know my name? We have never met.” She stepped to the side, glanced toward the station door.

  “That’s true, Miss Bradley.” The man nodded, stepped back. “I’m sorry if I gave you a fright. Your father set me to watch for you. He told me to look for a young lady with golden curls wearing mourning clothes.”

  “My father sent you?” A cold chill ran up her spine. “Why would he do that, Mr. Nielsen? I don’t understand.” Please, Lord, let my mother be all right. Please—

  “He said I was to give you this letter, Miss Bradley.”

  A letter? Why would her father send a man to her with a letter? Her stomach knotted. She stared at the sealed envelope the man removed from his pocket and held out to her. It was true. The bold B impressed in the sealing wax was her father’s insignia. A dozen dire reasons for the letter chased through her mind. She held her breath to quell her shaking and took the envelope into her hand.

  “Good evening, Miss Bradley.” Mr. Nielsen dipped his head, put on his hat and walked away into the night.

  She was trembling so hard she was afraid her legs would collapse if she moved. She inched her way over to the bench beneath the lantern and sat, her fingers clutching the letter, fear clutching her heart.

  Men removed trunks and bags from the train, stacked them on the platform against the station wall. Hers was there, its alligator cover and domed lid plainly seen against the bricks.

  Two men walked out of the station and boarded the train.

  The whistle blew. The bell clanged.

  “All aboard for Dunkirk and parts north!”

  The porter glanced her way. She managed to shake her head, and he shoved the steps into the car, leaped up and closed the door. Steam huffed from the stack. The train rolled forward, grew smaller and smaller, then disappeared from view.

  Her lungs wouldn’t obey her command to breathe. The band of fear squeezing her chest drew tighter. But delay would only make it worse. She slid her fingernail beneath the wax, lifted the envelope flap and pulled out the folded paper inside.

  Our Dearest Daughter,

  It was her mother’s handwriting. Her mother was all right! Still...why would her father send the man to meet her with a letter? She unfolded the paper, smoothed out the creases and read on.

  Oh, Marissa, the most wondrous thing has happened. And, my dear daughter, it is all because of you.

  It was good news, then. The painful constriction stopped. Air filled her lungs. She frowned, stared at those last words. Because of her? How could that be?

  Yesterday, your father found your most recent letter about Miss Gordon choosing your lecture on the “abused victims of those who overindulge in wine or other strong drink” for her feature article in the Sunday School Journal. I was so frightened when I saw your letter in his hand.

  And then it happened. Your father read what you wrote about the abused needing “a place where they can shelter and be safe until the imbiber sobers and the danger passes” and how “the abused require a place where they know they will receive understanding instead of judgment and not be made to feel shame” and he cried out, “What have I done to my family! God in Heaven, help me!” and he began to weep.

  I scarce knew what to think! And then he ran to his study, smashed his wine decanter and glasses upon the wood laid up on the hearth, then leaned out of the window and emptied all the rest of his wine bottles out onto the grass. He promised me he would never drink wine again.

  Her father had thrown away his wine! Tears welled into her eyes. She blinked them away and devoured the remainder of her mother’s letter.

  Your father spent last night on his knees praying. This morning he told me to pack a trunk for each of us, that we are going to move from Fredonia, away from the many hurtful memories, and make a new life elsewhere. And that we are leaving this very day! He said he was going to give up town life and go back to farming, and that he had heard there was good land to be had to the south, near the Allegheny River. He also told me to write this letter to you explaining what has happened. His intent is to include a bank draft in your name so that you may live in the hotel until we find a place, settle and send for you. To that end, I have packed your things in a trunk to be delivered there. Your room will await you.

  Your father will leave this letter with one of his trusted employees, a Mr. Nielsen, to give to you when the Chautauqua Assembly is over and you come home. There is insufficient time to reach you by post.

  But to return to my story: I packed in a frenzy, uncertain of what would happen next, and then began this letter. In a short time, your father returned. He told me he had sold his business and our house, including all of the furnishings, to Mr. Ferguson, who has wanted to buy both for some time. And then he showed me the carriage and team of horses he had purchased.

  Marissa, I feel I am dreaming, but it is all true. I am finishing this letter to you while your father loads our trunks and the few little things I cannot part with into the carriage.

  And now it is time for us to go. But I cannot close this letter without telling you how different your father is today. He is the man I married so many years ago. He has returned to me. Please do not worry about me, Marissa, my dear. I am safe. I am well. I am happy. There may be days and nights ahead when troubles arise, but I now have hope that your father and I will face those times together.

  Your father gives you his love. His provision for you is enclosed.

  Be well, our dearest daughter. We will send for you when we are settled in our new home.

  Your loving,

  Mother and Father

  It was wondrous indeed. And impossible to believe. She wanted to, but— Her father had sold his business and their house? That gave her pause. Perhaps it was all true.

  She read the letter again, and then for a third time, her emotions swinging between worry and elation. In the end, it didn’t matter. She did not know where her parents were, and had no way to help her mother now, should her help be needed.

  The bank draft was in the envelope. She tucked it and the letter into her purse and stood. Her trunk sat alone beside the station wall. She stared at it, pulled open the station door and managed a polite smile when the stationmaster looked up from his papers with a query in his eyes. “I shall return for my trunk tomorrow.”

  “Very good, miss.”

  The hotel was not far. Flames flickered in the gas lamps atop posts that bordered the walkway, whispered their sibilant hiss as she passed. The brass knob on the ornate door was cold to her touch.

  She entered the large lobby, adjusted her shawl and crossed to the long, paneled counter.

  The clerk swept an assessing glance over her and lifted his lips in a polite smile. “May I help you, madam?”

  “I’m Miss Bradley. I believe you have a room prepared for me.”

  “Oh.” The polite smile warmed. “We do indeed, Miss Bradley. If you will sign here, please.”

  * * *

  The room was spacious and well appointed. The hot bath was a glorious luxury after two weeks of washing from a bowl full of warm water in the tent. Marissa fastened the loop closures on her dressing gown—a yellow dressing gown. She ran her hand over the lovely bright-colored fabric. It made her feel brave to wear it. Not that she had a choice. There were no dark mourning clothes in the trunk her mother had packed for her. She yawned and cast a covetous eye toward the bed.

  A blue-and-white woven coverlet was spread over the mattress. She stepped to the side of the four-poster, placed her palm on the coverlet and pushed. No crackles. She would sleep on fe
athers tonight. After her hair dried. She moved to the fireplace and bent forward to fluff her wet curls in front of the small fire that had been started to chase the chill from the room.

  What was Grant doing? An ache spread through her at the thought of him. Was he sitting on the back porch with his mother drinking coffee and talking? Was he thinking of her? Worrying about her? What if he came to find her, to see if she was all right?

  She jerked erect, horrified by the thought. Grant would go to her home and she wouldn’t be there! She would miss seeing him, unless— Unless...

  The notion floated at the edge of her mind, drifted closer. A perfectly lovely notion. A tempting...beguiling...absolutely wonderful idea.

  She would stay at the hotel in Mayville.

  A smile touched her lips. Not next year...tomorrow! Oh, Grant...I’ll be with you again tomorrow! Energy spurted through her. She whirled around the room, then returned to her task, fluffed her damp hair in front of the fire and thought about the details. She would select the dress she would wear, then repack and have the hotel deliver this trunk to the train station the first thing in the morning. But what of her parents? The thought put a damper on her excitement. How would she get her parents’ letter telling her where they had settled? She had no idea of when to expect it. She frowned, nibbled at the corner of her lip. There has to be a way...

  She walked to the window and looked out at the street, watched a carriage pass and thought of her parents starting a new life together. Oh, Lord, grant them happiness, I pray. Let my father’s promise to my mother be true. Help him, Lord, to never indulge in strong drink again.

  A whistle blew. Light split the darkness, then swept out of sight.

  The train.

  Yes, that might work. Excitement bubbled up, made her stomach flutter. She would leave notice at the desk downstairs that she was expecting a letter from her parents and ask them to take it to the train station. Then she would ask the stationmaster to please give it to the porter and have him give it to the stationmaster in Mayville. The hotel there was only a few steps from the train station. She could check every day to see if the letter had arrived.

  It would work. It had to work. Now to choose the gown she would wear tomorrow so she could hang it over a chair to let the packing wrinkles fall out of it. She hurried to the trunk and went to her knees to begin her search. She knew the very gown she wanted to wear, if her mother had packed it. The blue one, with the two-tiered, blue-and-cream-checked underskirt. The blue matched her eyes, and Grant had said he loved the color of her eyes...

  Chapter Seventeen

  Grant swept his gaze over the lush vines. The gray splotches of powdery mildew that dusted the leaves were scattered throughout the canopy but not yet prevalent. And it was only the vines on the lower end of the trellises in this portion of the vineyard that were infected. He needed to get those infected leaves cut off before it rained.

  He cast a jaundiced look at the dark clouds gathering overhead. If they opened up and raindrops started splashing against the diseased leaves, they would scatter the spores everywhere. But at least it was something he could fight.

  He slipped his hand beneath an infected leaf, folded the two sides against each other to contain the flyaway spores and severed the stem from the vine with a slash of his knife. A quick thrust of his hand deposited the leaf into the canvas bag hanging from his belt. He moved on to the next gray-splotched leaf.

  Was Marissa all right? The idea that her father might have struck her was driving him crazy! His face went taut. He slashed the knife through the leaf stem, jammed the leaf in the bag and moved on. The slow, careful work was annoying. He wanted to lay about him with the knife like some crazed pirate with a sword!

  Women and children who are abused need a place where they can shelter and be safe until the imbiber sobers and the danger passes.

  What if Marissa was hurt? He cut away a cluster of infected leaves and plunged them into the bag. If her mother was also injured and her father was drunk, who would help her? He crossed to the other side of the path and started on the second trellis of vines. What if she needed a doctor?

  His stomach clenched like an unseen fist had punched him.

  I want to continue to see you. With all my heart I want to. But I cannot. Not as long as you have a part in making the wine that has destroyed my family and killed my brother. Every time I see those vines, I see Lincoln and my mother and father.

  What if she was right? He paused his work and stared at the trellised vines, seeing them through her experience. Had any of the grapes he grew and sold to the vintners made their way into the bottles of wine Marissa’s father consumed?

  Every time I think of those wagonloads of grapes you raised I wonder how much suffering and misery they will cause.

  He’d never thought of it that way. Never considered that the end product of the grapes he grew might be misery and suffering. A Bible verse slipped into his head. He looked at the vines and spoke the verse aloud, hearing the words not only with his ears, but with his heart. “‘But judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block or an occasion to fall in his brother’s way.’”

  The words were unsettling. He’d never thought about that verse in conjunction with growing grapes, but it could surely apply. He frowned and turned back to his work disturbed by his new insight. He didn’t want to make another man “stumble” or cause anyone harm by contributing to the making of wine. But what was he to do? He had a debt hanging over his head and acres of grapevines. Caring for them was what he knew how to do. He had no other skill, no other way to clear off that debt and provide a living for himself and his mother. He was trapped into managing the vineyard.

  He cut away more of the powdery mildew-infected leaves and put them in the burlap bag, being careful to keep the light, easily airborne spores contained when he folded the leaves. He finished the second row and crossed over to the next working steadily, methodically. The idea that he could be unintentionally bringing suffering into someone’s life stayed with him. It troubled him as he worked.

  He went over all the financial facts again. But it was an exercise in futility. There simply wasn’t any way out of his present situation unless he could make the land more valuable so its sale would bring in money enough to pay off the mortgage and purchase another business. He gave that some thought but could come up with nothing. He was tied to the vineyard for at least two more years. But then, if he could convince his mother to move from the house she loved, he would not have to be connected to the vineyard in any way. But how could he ask that sacrifice of his mother?

  “Lord, I have never intended harm to anyone by growing these grapes. And I don’t want to contribute to anyone’s suffering by doing so now or in the future. But I can find no way out of this situation. So unless I can convince my mother to move or You show me another way, Lord, I am bound to this vineyard.”

  He shook his head at the futility of the prayer and moved on to the next row. His mother kept insisting God would work this out, and he held his tongue. But there wasn’t any other way. His life was shackled to the vineyard. Completely so for two more years.

  Two more years.

  Marissa.

  That unseen fist punched him in the gut again. “Keep Marissa safe, Lord. Please keep Marissa safe.”

  * * *

  Oh, my, flowers. Should she? Wasn’t she defying convention enough by wearing the blue dress? Marissa turned the hat in her hands, tugged at the corner of her lower lip with her teeth. The blue ribbon did match the dress. And the cream-colored roses were—

  I like it, Sissa. The flowers make me think of summer.

  The memory of Lincoln, his head tipped to the side as he admired her new outfit, flashed into her head. Pain stabbed her heart. She missed her brother.

  “If you were here, I’d give you a good shaking, Lincoln Bartholomew Br
adley!” The empty threat she’d always made him popped out of her mouth.

  Dare you to try.

  His standard, laughing answer echoed in her mind. Tears smarted her eyes. “I would if I could reach you. And then I would hug you so hard...”

  She firmed her trembling mouth, lifted the hat in pure defiance of the pain and settled it forward of the mass of curls that started at her crown and tumbled down the back of her head and neck. Nothing was going to make her sad today.

  She pinned the hat in place, slipped the carry cords of the cream-colored reticule over her wrist and made a last survey of the hotel room. There was nothing left. Her trunk had already been carried downstairs. She ran to the window and looked out, caught a glimpse of the large trunk being loaded onto a handcart for transport to the train station. Flutters tickled her stomach.

  Grant was going to be so surprised! She hurried to the pier glass, checked to be sure the cascading fabric of her bustle was in place and stepped out into the hallway. The blue-and-cream-checked pleated ruffle that formed the short train of her gown’s underskirt whispered from tread to tread as she descended the stairs to the lobby.

  The clerk looked up from his work at her approach. His eyes widened. He snapped his gaping mouth shut and dipped his head in a small polite bow. “Good morning, Miss Bradley. We are saddened by your leaving.” He glanced at his watch. “It is still early for the train.”

  “Yes, I know.” She smiled and stepped closer to the counter. “I have a request, sir. I am expecting a letter directed to me from my parents to come to this establishment, though I can’t say when. And I wondered if you would be so kind as to make a note to carry the letter to the stationmaster for me? I will be happy to pay any fee for such a service.”

  “It will be our pleasure, Miss Bradley. There is no fee for such a small item.” The clerk looked up from his note taking and smiled. “Are there any instructions for the stationmaster to accompany the letter?”