Marrying the Preacher's Daughter

by Cheryl St. John

  He was relieved to have a task. Glad to be away from the unknown and uncomfortable atmosphere of child birthing.

  When Warren Burke heard the news about Mrs. Hart, the liveryman loaned Gabe one of his own horses. The sleek speckled mare was some sort of Russian trotter mixed with Arabian blood. The white spots on its dark gray flanks resembled stars.

  The horse had a black forelock and a gray tail that faded to lighter hair on the tips. Gabe took a liking to the unusually colored animal right off.

  His side already ached from the day’s exertion, but he pushed past the discomfort to focus on the job that needed doing. He checked the doc’s house first. Matthew Barnes’s wife told him her husband was right there at home, sleeping after his long night’s vigil.

  “I’ll wake him and send him over to the Harts’,” she assured Gabe.

  Relieved, Gabe rode out of town. The Quinn farm was about a half hour ride. According to the landmarks, it was set to the west of Gabe’s land, so it was probable his land adjoined the Quinn property. Studying the terrain again, he thought of all the years of travel, all the nights in a bedroll under the stars and those spent in a hotel room. Those hard years had paid for a future, and he was finally going to get to enjoy it.

  Ezra Quinn’s golden wheat fields waved under the afternoon sun. Gabe was no farmer, but it looked to him that it wouldn’t be long before the wheat needed harvesting.

  He’d grow hay to feed his horses and dig a well so Irene didn’t have to go far for water. He was looking forward to getting to know his sister, but it was likely she wouldn’t be with him that long. He would find her a good husband and see that she was settled and happy.

  He spotted smoke curling from a chimney. A young man met him as he rode close to a one-story house and dismounted, holding his side. “Never seen you before, mister.”

  The young man was in his twenties, dressed in plain dungarees and a cotton shirt.

  “Gabe Taggart. I’m lookin’ for Samuel Hart.”

  “You the fella who shot those train robbers?”

  Gabe nodded. “Is the preacher here?”

  “In the house.” The back door complained with a loud squeak as he led Gabe into a kitchen humid from an iron kettle steaming on the stove. “Back here. I’m Lester Quinn.”

  “Pleasure.” Gabe snatched off his hat and worked to silence his boot heels on the wooden floor of the hallway beyond the kitchen.

  Lester motioned for him to enter a dim room off to the left. Sam and a woman sat on chairs on opposite sides of a bed that held a motionless bald man.

  Sam looked up, and it took a moment for recognition to dawn in his face. “Mr. Taggart?”

  “Your wife’s having the baby soon,” Gabe told him.

  Gabe glanced at the sleeping man in the bed.

  “You go on home to your wife, Reverend,” the woman said. “There’s nothing more we can do here. I figure if God hasn’t heard our prayers by now, He’s not going to.”

  “He’s heard them, Nell,” Sam assured her. He followed Gabe outside, where the young man had anticipated his departure and hitched Sam’s horse and buggy.

  “Thank you, Reverend,” Lester said. “You bein’ here helped my mama a lot.”

  “That’s why I’m here,” Sam told him. “You see to it your mother gets some rest now. Maybe once I’m gone, she’ll lie down.”

  “Yes, sir, Reverend.”

  Gabe rode a generous distance ahead of Sam so the horse wouldn’t kick up dirt in his face, and they held a hasty pace. Thoughts of that brown bottle of medicine and the tranquil sleep it could bring taunted him. Doc Barnes had advised him not to ride, but he’d been all-fired convinced a lazy trip would do him well. He hadn’t planned on extended hours in the saddle, however. While the animal beneath him had a sure, easy gallop, regardless Gabe’s cracked rib had weathered a beating.

  The hill to the house was the longest stretch of the trip. At last the sight of the gabled and turreted home relieved his tension. He eased the horse to a halt and dismounted to take the buggy reins from Sam. “I’ll return the rig,” he told him. “You go on.”

  With a distracted thank-you, Sam hurried up the steep brick stairs that led to the gate and the yard beyond. Gabe routinely checked the ground and the area for anything out of the ordinary, then tied the horse to the back of the buggy and turned the rig to head down the hill. He’d pay the liveryman’s helper to give him a ride back.

  He reached Main Street just as a locomotive released steam from its engine a few blocks away. He checked the street in both directions and made his way toward the livery.

  “Mr. Taggart!”

  At the call, his instincts went on alert. He turned to discover a reed-thin young man waving at him from the front of the telegraph building. The fellow stepped out from the shade of the overhang into the sunlight, and Gabe flexed his fingers without tensing his body.

  “I have a message for you.”

  Relieved at the harmless notice, Gabe relaxed and met him in the street.

  “I been lookin’ for you,” the younger man said. “Your sister is waiting for you at Mrs. Rhodes’s café. I told her I’d watch for you and give you her message.”

  “Did you say my sister is here?”

  “Yes, sir, Mr. Taggart.”

  Confused, Gabe reached into his pocket for a coin and flipped it in the air. “Thanks.”

  “I’m Junie Pruitt, by the way. In case you should need any errands done. Deliver messages, carry supplies, anything like that. You can find me on Main Street in the morning, and later in the day you can pin notes on the wall at the barber shop. I check ’em regular like.”

  “Good to know.” Looked like he wouldn’t be taking the buggy back just yet. Gabe searched out the café.

  Irene shouldn’t have arrived for another couple weeks. How was he going to take care of her when he’d had someone taking care of him until now? He hadn’t even looked at the house he’d rented, though Elisabeth had assured him it was clean.

  Why hadn’t he thought to ask Junie Pruitt to handle Irene’s luggage? This was a fine kettle of fish.

  He no more than made it through the doorway before a woman in a jade-green traveling suit stood from beside the table where she’d been seated. She wore a feathery little hat that matched her jacket. “Gabriel!”

  Her hair was as dark as he remembered, near black like his, but the rest of her… She looked nothing like the little sister he remembered. The person who hurried toward him was a beautiful woman, a woman with curves in places little sisters didn’t have curves. “Irene?”

  She flung herself toward him and before he could protect himself, she had crushed herself against him in an exuberant hug. The pressure against his ribs took his breath away. He managed to hold back all but a grunt.

  “What’s this?” she asked, leaning back and peeling open his jacket. Her eyes widened at the sight of his revolver. “I’ve never seen so many guns in my life as on my trip west,” she told him. “Seems everyone has a weapon.” She gave him a curious glance. “Am I going to need a gun? A woman on the train showed me the pearl-handled derringer she carried in her unmentionables. It was quite attractive actually. I wouldn’t mind one of those.”

  “I wasn’t expecting you for two more weeks,” he said.

  “I was weary of staying at a hotel,” she told him. “My welcome wore out at school. After graduation all the other girls my age left. I helped with the younger children, but I’m not really cut out for nursemaid duty.” She pulled a face.

  “Children take so much work, don’t you know. They are always hungry or spilling something…and the babies? Well, we won’t even go into that.”

  “Are your belongings at the station?”

  “Yes. I paid a nice fellow to watch them for me while I came here to get out of the sun. I can’t wait to bathe and change into fresh clothing. Is your place far?”

  “Actually…I’ve been staying with the preacher’s family. There was a mishap on the train the day I
arrived, and I was injured.”

  “Gabriel!” she said, her eyes wide with concern. “Are you all right?”

  “Fine. Couple of tender ribs is all. I do have a small place rented. We’ll stay there temporarily while our house is built.”

  “You’re building a house for us?”

  He nodded and urged her toward the door. The few patrons in the café had been staring while they reunited.

  “Where is it?”

  “Not far from town, but the building hasn’t started yet.”

  “We won’t be living in town?”

  “My land is to the southwest. Not far, I assure you. You can come to town whenever you like. Often.”

  “All right.”

  She didn’t appear entirely convinced about the idea of living away from Jackson Springs. “You won’t be cut off from friends or shops.”

  He guided her to the buggy and headed toward the station. “I was thinking more about wild animals and Indians,” she said. “I’ve heard stories about the danger of leaving civilization behind.”

  “Any Indians out our way will be friendly.”

  “What about wolves and bears?”

  “I’ve spent years on the trail, and I’ve never had a run-in with a bear.”

  “A wolf?”

  “A time or two,” he answered begrudgingly.

  She gaped at him in obvious concern.

  “Maybe I will teach you to use a rifle,” he decided. It was better to teach her to use a gun safely and with confidence than to leave her unprotected. He would have work to do and couldn’t watch her every minute.

  At the station, Gabe paid the fellow watching Irene’s trunks and valises to load them into the buggy. He supposed he could check the two of them into the hotel. Josie had generously offered that his sister could join him at the Harts’, but now with the baby arriving today, he didn’t want to add more work and additional complication to their lives.

  Briefly, he explained that his hosts were in the middle of a family event. He stopped the buggy and gestured for Irene to climb the steep stairs ahead of him. At the top, he masked his grimace and fatigue to take her hand and lead her up the porch stairs and, with a tap on the door, into the house.

  “Oh, there you are!”

  He looked up in surprise to see Elisabeth and Abigail coming from the back hall. Elisabeth handed the covered tray she carried to Abigail, and the girl carried it up the stairs.

  “How is Mrs. Hart?” he asked.

  “She’s just fine,” Elisabeth answered. “And so is the baby.”

  “He came already?”

  “She,” she said with a smile. “Rachel.” She turned to Irene with a questioning expression.

  “This is my sister, Irene.” He gestured to Elisabeth. “Elisabeth Hart.”

  “I had no idea you would be here so soon.” Elisabeth surprised him by taking Irene’s hand and offering her a warm smile. “Welcome to Jackson Springs and to our home. You must be exhausted.”

  “I am weary of the dust,” his sister replied with a smile. “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Mrs. Hart.”

  “Oh, no, just Miss, but you must call me Elisabeth. There are far too many Miss Harts around here to keep us all straight.” She glanced at Gabe, then back. “We’ll get your belongings carried up to a room for you. I’m guessing they’re outside now? And meanwhile I’ll run you a bath.”

  “I was gonna get my things and take Irene to a hotel,” Gabe told her. “You folks have your plate full already without us adding to the workload.”

  “You know Josie would never allow that to happen,” she replied. “You will both stay right here until we get you situated in the parsonage.”

  “The parsonage?” Irene asked.

  “My father’s the preacher,” Elisabeth told her. “But when you see the house, you’ll know why we never lived there. Not that it isn’t clean or nice,” she hastened to add. “Just that we’re a big family, and the house is small.”

  Abigail came back downstairs at that moment, and Elisabeth made introductions. “My sister Abigail will show you back to the bathing chamber and get water for your bath while I see to having your things brought in.”

  Once the two young women were gone, Elisabeth turned to him. “You didn’t tell her, did you?”

  Chapter Eight

  Only years of inflexible restraint kept him from revealing his panic at her question. What did she know? “What?”

  “That you were shot.”

  His alarm subsided. “How did you know that?”

  “Because you’re standing there with pain written on every angle of your face, but she didn’t show a fleck of concern. Had she known, she would’ve sent you to bed, like I’m doing right this minute.”

  He jerked a thumb over his shoulder toward the door. “But I—”

  “No discussion. I’ll see to the trunks and the buggy. Take the medicine on the bureau if you know what’s good for you.” She took his arm and guided him toward the stairs. “I’ll settle your sister for a nap of her own, and you won’t be missed.”

  Gabe took in her flushed face, the earnest concern in her blue eyes, and felt the warmth of her hand through his sleeve. Her tone and words were as brusque as ever. Yes, she was as sensible and practical as always, but for this moment genuine warmth was evidenced in her behavior as well, catching him more off guard than his sister’s unexpected arrival.

  His thoughts traveled unerringly to their kiss that afternoon. That had been a mistake. He’d intended to tease and see her reaction, be it disgust or shock, but he hadn’t intended an honest-to-goodness kiss. Never in a thousand years had he expected her to lean in and kiss him back.

  Even if he did have time or the inclination to take a wife in the future—and it for sure wouldn’t be until after Irene was married off and his ranch was established—this woman with her talk of heaven and Jesus, along with her persnickety ways, wasn’t suited to him.

  His ribs hurt so bad he was sick to his stomach. He lent all his energy into making it up the stairs and to the bed without losing the contents of his stomach on her shoes.

  He hated that she’d recognized his weakness. He wasn’t accustomed to letting anyone see him less than strong and confident, but there was nothing he could do about it at the moment. He made it as far as the bed and half fell onto the quilt.

  She reached for a boot and tugged it off, then the other. “Take off your gun,” she ordered, and he complied. She took it from him, surprising him again, rolled the holster and tucked the gun and belt under his pillows. “Will you take the medicine?”

  “Half a spoon,” he conceded. She measured the dose and held it to his lips. He swallowed and collapsed back upon the pillows. “Thank you, Elisabeth.”

  “You’re welcome.” She slid the curtains shut, closing out the late afternoon sun.

  He felt better already.

  Before he was aware, she’d left the room, closing the door behind her.

  Elisabeth and Abigail prepared and served a late supper. Their father took his seat, appearing weary, but joyful. He said a blessing over their meal, thanking God for the new life in their home and for Josie’s recovery.

  “Are you happy baby Rachel is a girl, Papa?” Phillip asked.

  “I’m quite happy,” Sam replied. “It was time we had another girl.”

  Kalli sliced ham for the twins and cut it into bite-size pieces. “She’s sure a pretty little thing. I never knew babies were so tiny.”

  “You don’t have any younger siblings?” Sam asked.

  “No, Reverend,” Kalli answered. I have two older brothers. The only babies I’ve seen are those at church, but they’re so much bigger.”

  “You’ll be surprised how quickly she will get bigger,” Sam told her.

  “Mr. Taggart’s sister arrived this afternoon,” Elisabeth said. “I’ve given her my room, so I’ll be bunking with you until we get them settled down the street.” She glanced at Anna.

  “Isn’t her arriv
al sooner than expected?” Sam asked.

  Elisabeth explained with what little she knew.

  “You did exactly what Josie would have,” Sam told her. “Of course Irene and Mr. Taggart are welcome here until they can move to the parsonage.”

  “Where is she?” Anna asked.

  Elisabeth explained that Irene had been exhausted from her travels. “I’ll prepare plates for both of them and keep their food warm.”

  “I am blessed that my daughters are capable cooks and gracious hostesses,” their father said with a smile for each of them. “You will make fine wives for three lucky young men.”

  “I might not get married, Papa,” Anna said.

  Her father and siblings studied her curiously.

  “I want to study, like you,” she said earnestly. “I want to be like my namesake in the Bible and do great things for God.”

  Sam appeared thoughtful for a moment before he spoke. “I am confident that all my children will accomplish great things for God,” he said kindly. “Whether they are married or not.”

  At his words, Anna smiled and picked up her glass of milk.

  Elisabeth looked upon her younger sister with fond appreciation. She’d begun to wonder whether or not a husband was in her own future. If the disappointing selection of possible mates she’d seen so far was any indication, she doubted she’d become a wife anytime soon. No one could measure up to her father.

  A bright bit of burnt orange caught her attention at the doorway, and Elisabeth glanced up to find Irene standing hesitantly at the entrance to the room.

  “Come in!” Elisabeth stood to usher her toward an empty chair. Picking up a plate and silverware from the extras on the sideboard, she set a place before her and handed her a napkin. “We’ve only just sat down.”

  Elisabeth made introductions. “Were you able to rest?”

  “I had a pleasant nap, thank you. Where is my brother?”

  “He’s resting,” she replied. “I’ll keep a plate of food warm for him if he doesn’t come down now.”

  Irene took the bowl of fried potatoes Kalli passed and helped herself. “Is it common for him to sleep through supper?”