Seven Brides for Seven Mail-Order Husbands Romance Collection

by Davis, Susan Page; Dietze, Susanne; Franklin, Darlene

  Drew didn’t like thinking of it. “I don’t know what’s true with Toovey, but she should be warned in case. I have no proof though, ma’am. Just my report, on my honor as a gentleman, a Christian, and a soldier.”

  “A Confederate soldier.”

  Ah, there it was—the reason her lips had pursed the minute he’d started talking at the schoolhouse. “I was in the 5th Tennessee Volunteer Cavalry Regiment from Murfreesboro—a Union regiment.”

  There went those eyebrows again, up to her hairline. “A Tennessean enlisting in the Union army is brave. Almost as brave as being a Jayhawker.”

  A chuckle escaped his throat.

  She shifted. “Pardon me, Mr. Cooper. I’d like to speak to Mr. Toovey.”

  Oh no. “I should be the one—”

  But she had marched inside, and he had no choice but to follow her to where Mr. Toovey shook hands with her friend, Frieda.

  Miss Green sashayed between them. “Mr. Toovey, may I ask one thing before you go?”

  He sneaked a glance at Drew. “Anything for a friend of Mrs. Lomax.”

  The schoolmarm folded her hands at her waist, a posture that made her look exactly like a woman of her occupation should. “What did you farm in Maryland?”

  A tiny pause. “Vegetables.”

  “Beans? Cabbages?”

  “Exactly. Cabbages and all sorts of beans, from green to skunk.” Toovey exchanged grins with Frieda.

  Drew folded his arms. Where exactly was the schoolmarm going with this? He’d expected her to accuse him of being married, not ask about the farm he didn’t have.

  Miss Green blinked up at Toovey. “I haven’t done well with skunk beans in our garden. When did you find it the best time to plant them?”

  Frieda touched Miss Green’s arm. “We can discuss planting another time, Birdy.”

  “No, I don’t mind.” Toovey gave the schoolmarm a condescending smile. “After the frost.”

  “Well, yes, but when, precisely?”

  “Follow the Farmer’s Almanac, I always say.”

  “I agree.” Miss Green nodded. “So the waning moon, then, right before the new moon? Because the dark is good for the seeds?”

  Drew pitched his head forward. Had he heard her right?

  “Yep. Waning moon.” Toovey rocked on his heels. “Maybe your soil is the problem.”

  She fixed her disappointed schoolmarm expression on him. “Incorrect. I live on a farm, you see, and several of my students will grow to be farmers, so I use the almanac in my schoolhouse, yet most of the children already know above-ground crops like beans are planted in the waxing moon. It’s a practice as old as agriculture, but science has proven seeds absorb more water during the waxing and full moons than at other phases of the moon.”

  Drew burst into laughter, but Toovey burst into a sputtering froth. “You tricked me. I wasn’t thinking.”

  “Forgive me for employing chicanery, sir, in my quest to learn the truth.”

  “Shi-kaner-what?”

  “Deception. Flimflam. Underhandedness by purposefully misspeaking to test your response.” She sounded like a human dictionary.

  Drew liked it. “Come on, Toovey, the jig is up.”

  Frieda pinked like a ripe berry. “Are you a farmer or not, Mr. Toovey?”

  Toovey lifted his hands, but the gesture revealed a fine-looking manicure and no calluses. There was the answer to her question.

  “Well, I—I should like to learn to be one.” Toovey said it like a question, hoping it was the correct response.

  “And so you might have, on my farm, had you been honest with me. A husband with a sound knowledge of farming is important to me, yes, but such skills can be learned if a man is hardworking and eager. And honest, but I could never trust you now.” Frieda gathered her shawl, so she didn’t see Toovey shove past Drew, out of the inn.

  Miss Green put a comforting hand on her friend’s shoulders. “He’s gone, and his phony farm isn’t the worst of it. He might even be married—Frieda? What are you doing?”

  Lips clamped shut like she was holding back tears, Frieda dashed out of the inn. Drew rubbed his jaw. Exposing Toovey as a liar was the right thing to do, but if he’d spoken to Toovey privately, he could’ve spared the ladies hurt or embarrassment.

  Shoulders sagging, Miss Green looked up at Drew. “Thank you for the information, Mr. Cooper. You’ve protected Frieda from a grave mistake. I wish you well finding a bride in the auditions.”

  “Oh, I’m not here for the auditions.” Drew peered down at her. “I’m here for you, Miss Green.”

  Chapter 2

  I am not seeking a husband.” Truer words had never left Birdy’s mouth. She might be unmarried, standing in a room full of husband-seeking females, but she was not one of them. Not that way.

  She’d had her chance at happily-ever-after. She didn’t get another.

  Mr. Cooper’s dark brows rose. “No, I need to speak to you. Because you’re the schoolmarm.”

  Heat suffused her face. How foolish of her to assume he’d been lost, looking for the auditions. Why, he could be the parent of a prospective student, come to meet the teacher. What must he think of her for dragging him here? “I am terribly sorry, sir.”

  He gestured for her to precede him outside, a good idea considering how hot the room had suddenly grown. “It was only natural to assume I was looking for the auditions. That’s why all the men are here, isn’t it? Well, almost all of them.”

  But not him. Nodding, she preceded him down to the street where she shut her eyes for the briefest of moments, grateful for the tickling of the late afternoon breeze against her nape. “How can I help you? Will you and your wife be enrolling students in the school?”

  “Another reasonable assumption, but I don’t have any young ’uns. I’ve never been hitched.” He grinned. “I was hoping to borrow some books.”

  One wrong guess after another, where this man was concerned. Birdy folded her hands tightly together. “Books?”

  “For reading.” His eyes twinkled.

  “You can’t read? You said you went to school.” The words blurted out without delicacy or discretion, and she shook her head at herself.

  “I can read my Bible and my Farmer’s Almanac, but I’d like to improve my skill and my mind by attempting some literature. Do you have anything I could borrow?”

  Birdy’s hand flew to her chest. Oh yes, she had literature. What an understatement. “I do not boast a great library, to be sure, but I own several dozen volumes.” Her mind searched her collection for titles that might appeal to a man. “What did you have in mind? Dickens? Hawthorne? The Count of Monte Cristo?”

  “I never read none of ’em, ma’am, but I’m game to try anything.” He toed the dirt with his boot. “I’ve always wanted to get a gander at Shakespeare, though.”

  Birdy gasped. Except for her schoolmasters, she’d never met a man who actually wanted to read Shakespeare. Her fiancé, Emory, had happily tolerated—but tolerated, nonetheless—her sonnet recitations. Pa bought her books without ever wanting to read them himself, and when she tried to share them with her brother, Lemuel, he’d rolled his eyes and told her “If the hogs have no use for sonnets, I don’t either.”

  Birdy had teased that, clearly, the same was true in regards to soap and table manners.

  But that was before the war, when her house and heart were full.

  She took a shaky breath, banishing the memories far away, at least for now. Besides, Mr. Cooper had sought her out because he wanted to read Shakespeare—he really did. His eyes sparked and he had a look of eagerness about him few of her students ever expressed.

  “You’ll be in town for a while?” The moment she asked it, she bit her lip. What a silly question. If he was auditioning to marry a local woman, there was a good chance he’d be wed within the fortnight.

  “I’m at the Tumble Inn now, but yes, I’m looking to buy ranchland here in Turtle Springs.”

  “Splendid.” She hugged her journal
to her chest. “Are you able to meet at the schoolhouse tomorrow morning at nine?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Very well, Mr. Cooper. Tomorrow I shall introduce you to Shakespeare.” She held out her hand.

  The grip of his handshake was perfect, firm enough to show respect but not so tight she’d be wincing and shaking her fingers to restore blood flow. “Thank you kindly, Miss Green.”

  “Hey, Miz Green?” Chester Spitts, a man of middle years with a fondness for whiskey and whose farm was as poorly tended as his gnarled, dirty hair, leered at her from across the street.

  She took a fortifying breath. “Yes, Mr. Spitts?”

  “I thought you were all high and mighty about not auditionin’, but you got yourself a new man already?”

  She almost blurted, “He’s not my man,” but she wouldn’t dignify his loathsome question with a response. Then she realized she still clasped Mr. Cooper’s hand. She yanked it back and prayed for a breeze to cool the heat flooding her cheeks for the umpteenth time this afternoon.

  “Good day, Mr. Cooper.”

  “Thanks, ma’am.” Mr. Cooper kept his gaze on her, even though he surely heard Chester Spitts’s amused hoots as well as she did. Bless him for ignoring them.

  Birdy’s farewell nod was curt. Holding her head high while she passed Chester Spitts, she hastened toward the Lomax farmhouse. Poor Frieda. Birdy hadn’t realized she’d take Mr. Toovey’s deception so to heart. He was hardly even an acquaintance, and the town was full of other prospective grooms who were indubitably more honorable. Frieda should be grateful, not sad.

  Frieda lived close to town, so it didn’t take more than a few minutes for Birdy to reach the borders of the Lomax farm. Passing rows of young corn, she hurried until she reached the white-rail fence surrounding the house. Frieda had left the gate open, so Birdy shut it behind her and trod the path to the porch steps to the clapboard house.

  The door stuck, like the one at the schoolhouse. The white paint around the door peeled and crackled. Once inside, the savory scent of stew mingled with the faint odor of mold, something they hadn’t been able to fully eradicate since the roof started leaking this past winter. Although she and Frieda and done their best to fix the roof, the smell lingered along with new drips and a dark circle staining the rag rug in the parlor.

  Frieda’s new husband, whoever he would be, had quite a list of chores waiting for him.

  At once, Birdy was greeted by a knee-high, buff-colored terrier, and she reached down to give him a proper patting. Diggory—named because he was a good digger—might not be a purebred variety, but he was as pure in heart as a dog could be. With a final pat, Birdy rose and dropped her journal and pencil onto the scratched-up table in the vestibule. She hadn’t buffed or polished it in a while, and it showed. Tomorrow, she’d get to that and the other chores she’d postponed this past busy week. “Girls? Frieda?”

  The only response was the clank of the cast-iron skillet in the kitchen. Birdy passed the dining room table—set for five, thanks to Mary Ann and Minnie—and turned into the kitchen, where Frieda dropped the kettle on the stove with such vigor that the clatter made Birdy jump.

  “Frieda? What are you doing? The auditions are still going on.”

  Frieda didn’t look up from measuring tea into the brown glazed pot. “I’m not going back.”

  Diggory scratched at the kitchen door, so Birdy let him out. He ran to join the girls on the small rise in the yard behind the house, but then they started back down and Mary Ann said something about playing with the new piglets sleeping in a special little pen in the barn. “Don’t let them out again, girls!” Birdy turned back. “What do you mean, not going back? Of course you are.”

  Frieda’s head shook.

  “Whyever not? You were the first to sign up when this harebrained idea was proposed. You couldn’t have been more eager.”

  Frieda’s glare could’ve frosted the cornfield. “You said auditioning husbands was a fine idea, but now you’ve admitted what I suspected all along. You think it’s harebrained!”

  Birdy’s big mouth! She chomped the inside of her cheek. “It is fine.”

  “For me, maybe, but not for you.”

  “I don’t have three children and a farm to consider.” Birdy’s spine stiffened. “You have to admit, it’s a little extraordinary to audition husbands—”

  “You said harebrained, not extraordinary.”

  “Well, I’m sorry I said it.” Birdy sighed. “You know I support you in this. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have come today to help assess the gentlemen—”

  Frieda sloshed water as she filled the pot. “You did more than assess Sherman Toovey.”

  Shouldn’t Frieda be grateful? “He lied. Mr. Cooper overheard him say he’s married, and while we can’t prove it, it’s as obvious as his bushy mustache that he’s no farmer.”

  Frieda’s shoulders slumped. “I would’ve figured it out in about a half hour, Birdy. I’m capable. But you made me look like a fool in front of all the men in the restaurant. I can’t face them now.”

  Birdy picked at a hangnail. “That wasn’t my intention. I only wanted to protect you.”

  “I don’t need protecting. I need a friend who won’t turn me into a spectacle.” Frieda sighed. “Mr. Toovey may have been trying to swindle me of my farm—oh yes, I’d expected some men might not be in Turtle Springs for the right reasons—but you and that Mr. Cooper fellow, whoever he is, might have been wrong. You should have spoken to Mr. Toovey privately.”

  Just as Drew Cooper had intended to do. Birdy rubbed her aching head. “But—”

  Frieda held up her hand, forestalling Birdy from speaking. “I don’t want the tea anymore. I’m not hungry either. I’ll call the girls in from outside and you can eat supper without me tonight.”

  Birdy gaped. She hadn’t meant to embarrass Frieda. Wasn’t a brief scene far preferable to a lifetime of pain and remorse? If Birdy was overzealous, well, she hadn’t been able to protect or control much of anything in her life, especially since the war started.

  Birdy forced a smile as the girls filed in to wash up for supper, eyes wide with questions. They didn’t ask them while they ate their stew and cornbread, though. Birdy nibbled, mulling over her conversation with Frieda. They’d never had an argument like this before, and Birdy had lived here since Pa died in the summer of ’61.

  Before his passing, she hadn’t known about Pa’s debt to the bank. Within a week of losing him, she’d lost her home, too. She’d been blessed to take the teaching post vacated by the previous schoolmaster, who’d marched off with her fiancé, Emory, and her brother, Lemuel, when the war broke out. The schoolmasters always lived with the Lomaxes as part of their compensation, so Birdy hadn’t felt like she was taking charity when she moved into the vacant room. The arrangement helped Birdy and Frieda both, since Frieda received a few dollars for housing the schoolteacher. As an added blessing, they’d grown so close living together, they’d become like sisters.

  Then one cool autumn afternoon, when the sky was lead dark and the wind whipped the bluestem grass like waves of water, two letters arrived for her at once, one telling her Emory was dead, and the other stating the same news about Lemuel. The three most important men in her life, Pa, Lemuel, and precious Emory, were gone, and soon thereafter, word arrived that Frieda’s husband, Hank, had succumbed to dysentery.

  Quickly, Birdy had become aware how little control she had over anything, but she and Frieda held each other together in those dark days. Was it any wonder Birdy wanted to protect Frieda now?

  “Ith Ma getting married?” Minnie asked while they cleared the table.

  Polly rolled her eyes. “She left the audition, Minnie, so no.”

  “There are ways to meet gentlemen without auditioning them,” Birdy said, trying to inject hope into her tone. The girls wanted a new father as much they wanted a husband for their mother. “Tomorrow, I need your help tidying the schoolroom.”

  “But tomorrow’s t
he Founder’s Day celebration. I wanna go bad.” Mary Ann’s lower lip protruded.

  “You want to go badly. Go is a verb, so it must be described by an adverb.” They might not be in the schoolroom, but Birdy couldn’t stop teaching. “As for the celebration, there will be plenty of time for you to enjoy the festivities.”

  She’d make sure of it.

  They cleaned the kitchen, saw to the livestock, and retreated to the parlor, where the girls played with Diggory and Birdy read. Frieda joined them after a while, but she didn’t look Birdy in the eye. It was a relief to retreat to her bedroom to plan each grade’s spelling lists and reading assignments for next week. Which reminded her—

  She had a new student. She crossed her tiny room to her bookshelf and pulled down the volume of Shakespeare.

  Smiling, she wrote the name of the man who would be borrowing it on a page in her notebook.

  Library List: Drew Cooper.

  The next morning, Drew hurried over his breakfast, hardly tasting the molasses on his hot corn mush.

  “You’re going to get a bellyache, eating so fast.” Drew’s companion, Jeb Washburn, had the look of a man who’d worked outdoors for twenty years or more—tanned, muscled, with deep lines around his eyes from squinting in the sun. He was jovial, too, and Drew had found Jeb to be one of the most amiable fellows staying at the Tumble Inn.

  “You should talk, Jeb. Have you looked at your bowl?”

  Jeb looked down at his near-empty bowl and laughed. “Guess we’re both hungry. Say, I’ll go with you to look at land, if ’n you want. After working cattle ranches since I could shave, I know a thing or two about grassland.”

  Drew knew a fair shake about cattle. He’d researched ranching and had the funds to buy land, thanks to an inheritance from his mother split between him and his brother, Clement. In many ways, he was well prepared for this new enterprise, but he’d be a fool to turn down Jeb’s expertise.

  “I’d like that, but this morning I have a meeting with Miss—Nevermind.”