The Brides of the Old West: Five Romantic Adventures from the American Frontier

by Peggy Darty, Darlene Franklin, Sally Laity, Nancy Lavo

  “Fire!” The shout was followed by more bellows and the sounds of men running. Henderson and Jan dropped what they were doing and raced out of the livery, into the open square around which the buildings of the fort were built.

  The smell of smoke and the sound of the flames crackling as they consumed canvas assaulted the men.

  “The wagon,” Henderson exclaimed.

  Two burly mountain men slashed at the canvas on the Borjesson wagon, ripped it from the frame, and threw it to the ground. Two other men stood beside the wooden wagon and beat the flames with horse blankets. Another man ran up with a bucket of water and emptied it on the flames. He immediately ran back from where he’d come.

  “Tildie, Evie!” Jan ran to the end of the wagon and tried to look inside. Heavy smoke choked him and stung his eyes. He could see nothing even as the men pulled off the canvas covering. “Tildie,” he shouted again and started to climb in.

  Two hands grabbed him from behind. “I’m here. I’m here.”

  Jan twirled around and grabbed her into a strong embrace. “Evie?” he gasped.

  “She’s here, too.”

  He felt the child wrapped around one of his legs before he looked down and saw her. He let Tildie go in order to bend over and peel the frightened child from his leg. He hoisted her into his arms to hold her tightly and pat her back, murmuring words of comfort. He moved them away from the wagon. “I just left her with you.”

  Tildie smiled through her tears and nodded. “Yes,” she agreed, “but you forgot little girls should go potty before they go down for their naps. She woke me and we left the wagon.”

  Jan looked down at his wife. “Thank God, Tildie!”

  She nodded and leaned against him.

  The noise around the wagon subsided, and they looked to see the men had put out the fire. They had acted quickly. A fire in the fort of dried wooden structures was a serious threat.

  Several of the men came over to where the family had gathered. Boister stood with Mari. Henderson stood behind them with a hand on each of their shoulders.

  “Thanks,” said Jan to the crowd.

  The men signaled their acknowledgment with curt nods. “You okay?” one of them asked Tildie.

  “Yes, thank you.”

  “Did you see the dirt was on fire underneath the wagon?” asked a tall, dark man. He’d been beating the flames.

  “What does that mean?” asked another. “Dirt don’t burn.”

  “Kerosene.” The man spat in the dirt. “Someone poured it on the canvas, and it dripped on the dirt. You can smell it, too.”

  “It was des Reaux,” said the man who had carried the bucket. “I saw him walking fast toward his place with something under his coat just before I saw the fire.”

  An angry murmur ran through the group of men. Nobody liked the Frenchman. A fire endangered all of them. Jan sensed that at any moment the men would decide justice was needed, and they were the ones to administer it.

  He held up a hand, stopping them just as they were about to turn en masse and storm through the fort to the Frenchman’s store. “Wait!” he ordered. “First of all, we only think he did this. Did anyone see him pour the kerosene? Light the wagon?”

  “The swine did it,” proclaimed one of the men loudly. “None of us did it, so it must’ve been him.”

  “No one else had a reason,” agreed another.

  “Fine,” said Jan. “We’ll go talk to him about it. Did you hear what I said? We will talk to him.”

  Jan handed Evie into Tildie’s arms and pushed her toward Henderson. “Stay here,” he advised and put himself at the front of the band of men marching to the mercantile.

  There were seven men behind Jan, and he prayed that he would be able to control the situation. Wrath thrummed through his veins like a tympani. Still the Holy Spirit dampened his anger. This devil had almost hurt Tildie and Evie, but he had no desire to see the Frenchman dangling from a rope, pierced with knives, or whatever else these rough men could think of as “just punishment.”

  They entered the store, bursting through the wooden door with such force it slammed back against the wall.

  Des Reaux dangled from the grip of two mountain men who had evidently followed him without waiting to discuss the matter. The short man’s face was bloodied.

  Jan stopped, as did the others behind him. With one look at what had already transpired, the men surged forward, eager to finish the job.

  “Stop!” yelled Jan. “I don’t want to be as low as this worm.”

  The other men turned to look at him. This strange statement arrested their attention. Relieved, Jan saw confusion on their faces. He needed to make them think before they plowed ahead, running purely on mindless revenge.

  “He’s a weasel, an unscrupulous beast,” said the preaching Swede. “He’s not a human. He’s an animal.” The two men holding the limp Frenchman aloft lowered him to the floor, but didn’t let him go.

  Jan took a few steps forward so he could snarl into des Reaux’s face. He saw the terror in his eyes and knew the man recognized these mountain men wanted to kill him.

  “This is a snake.” Jan hissed the words in the frightened man’s dirty face. “Like the serpent in the Garden of Eden, he crawls on his belly and brings destruction. This is not a man, but a creature of evil.”

  Jan turned suddenly to look his listeners in the eye. His steady gaze went from one man to the next. “We recognize him for what he is, because we’re not the low, cowardly brute that he is. No man here would douse a man’s property with kerosene and torch it. Maybe he thought my wife was in there, or maybe he saw her leave and only wanted to destroy what belonged to me. Either way, his evil jeopardized this entire encampment.”

  The men grunted agreement and pressed forward. Jan again held up his hand. “But,” he exclaimed, “I don’t wish to be identified with this scum. I won’t join him in his wickedness. I stand apart.”

  “We’ll take care of him for you,” volunteered one of the men.

  “You don’t have to take care of him for me. ‘Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord.’ God Almighty will deal with this man. I pity him. We might hang him, and that few moments of agony would be all that des Reaux had to pay for his crime—but God tells us that for men like des Reaux, He has a lake of fire, a place of never-ending torment. God says He’ll throw this man into the outer darkness where there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth, agony we cannot understand. Do you see why I don’t want to be like him?” Jan stopped to gauge how his audience responded. He didn’t often rail on about hell and damnation, but he was a preacher, and he knew how to get his point across.

  Three hours later, at Tildie’s insistence, Henderson went over to see what was happening. He returned to say that it appeared her husband was conducting a revival.

  “Can I go listen, Mama?” asked Boister.

  Tildie looked at him with a blank expression. She couldn’t quite comprehend what had happened. Jan had left with a small mob of men bent on violence. Now he was preaching! Reserved Boister had called her, “Mama,” as if it were the most natural thing in the world, and he was hopping from one foot to the other waiting for her to give him permission to go listen to a sermon. She turned questioning eyes to Henderson.

  “It would be all right, Madame, if the young man were to sit on the edge of the crowd.”

  “Crowd?” she whispered.

  Henderson smiled. “Jan is standing on the roof of the mercantile, and most of the people in the fort and from the surrounding encampment are gathered in the square. He moved out of the building some time ago when it became too crowded. He must have realized there were people outside who could not hear.”

  Tildie walked over to the barn door and pushed it open. She saw the backs of people who pressed closer to be able to see and hear her husband. She heard the familiar cadence of his speech but couldn’t make out the words.

  “Please, Mama,” Boister begged.

  “I’ll watch after the boy,” offered Hend
erson.

  “Yes, go,” she answered. Boister and Henderson bolted out the door.

  “What’s Pa doing?” asked Mari.

  “He’s telling the people about God.”

  “Like he tells us?”

  “Yes,” answered Tildie.

  “Uh-uh,” disagreed Evie from where she stood in the door at Tildie’s feet.

  Tildie swung her up in her arms. “What do you mean ‘uh-uh,’ little one?”

  Evie giggled and covered her ears. “Pa yelling!” she exclaimed.

  CHAPTER 23

  Well,” said Tildie when Jan crawled in beside her, “What happened?”

  Jan chuckled. “You know when I headed across that square toward the mercantile, I never expected that I was going to see God working. I thought I had a pretty fair chance of seeing some miserable men claim justice their own way. I was praying mighty hard with every step.”

  Jan stroked her arm absentmindedly. He sighed with contentment. “It’s always a pleasure to watch the Master at work, to see Him turn things around, working all things together for good. To see His way plow through a situation gone sour and turn it up sweet.

  “Over thirty—I lost count—of those rough men accepted Christ as their Savior. Seven of the Arapaho decided the same. I tried to keep count so I’d know how many Bibles to send here.”

  “What about des Reaux?”

  “He had the smell of kerosene on the inside of his jacket. Made a perfect example of how sin clings to you and there’s nothing you can do to remove the stain, get rid of the smell. Next step was to introduce them to Jesus, who washes all their sins away.”

  “So what’s going to happen to des Reaux?” asked Tildie impatiently.

  “He’s going to be escorted to Bent’s Fort, where the U.S. Calvary will take him in hand.” Like Fort Reynald, Bent’s Fort was actually a privately owned establishment, not a military outpost. It, however, was on the Santa Fe Trail, and the U.S. Calvary found its location convenient.

  “What about us?” asked Tildie.

  “Well, I don’t think we’ll be leaving tomorrow, but we should be heading out by the middle of next week. Des Reaux generously donated any supplies we lost in the fire out of his stock.”

  “He did?”

  “Well, I think he thought that would barter him out of his predicament.”

  Tildie thought this over and decided she wouldn’t inquire as to how that came about. She didn’t want to waste any more time on the Frenchman. Other questions had been stirring in her mind. “Do you want to stay here and shepherd the flock?”

  Jan laughed again and pulled her closer to snuggle her back against his front. “Where’d you ever hear a phrase like that?”

  “From you,” she answered, trying to ignore the nuzzling he was doing to her ear. “You said you wanted to have a church and a congregation, and you wanted to ‘shepherd the flock,’ teaching them to be strong in the Word.”

  “Mmm.” He began nibbling on her ear and then down her neck.

  “Jan,” she spoke as sharply as she could in a whisper, not wanting to wake the others who slept in the barn.

  “What?”

  “I’m trying to talk to you.”

  “Tildie, I’ve been talking for hours. I don’t want to talk right now.”

  He turned her toward him and kissed her eyes, her cheeks, and her lips. She sighed and gave up trying to get any more information out of him.

  Jan spent most of his time talking to people while Henderson and his family repacked the repaired wagon. Henderson had bartered with some Indians for a large piece of leather formerly used for a teepee. He began cutting it to replace the burned canvas. Due to the men of the fort’s quick action, not much had been damaged under the canvas. A barrel was charred, and they had to put the blankets and buffalo hides out to air. The buffalo hides were cured in what amounted to an Indian smokehouse, so they didn’t smell much worse than before.

  “Tildie, come with me.” Jan stood at the door of the barn, holding out his hand. She took note of how serious he looked and immediately crossed over to take his hand. With a look over her shoulder to see that the children were supervised by Henderson, she went with him.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  They passed through the front gate of the compound, and he strolled off toward the river. When they reached the huge cottonwood tree, he sat down and pulled her down beside him.

  “The men who took des Reaux to Bent’s Fort just got back.”

  “Did they kill him?” she asked with her eyes wide. The despicable man had a talent for provoking people, and he wouldn’t be smart enough not to antagonize his captors.

  “No.” Jan shook his head. “He got there all right. The men brought back some disturbing news.”

  “What?”

  “Comanches are terrorizing the lower part of the Kansas territory, down through Texas and in parts of Oklahoma.”

  “The ranch? The settlement—Breakdon?”

  “Breakdon was wiped out.”

  “Oh no!” Tildie gasped. Pictures of the dusty main street, the clapboard buildings, the hitching rails flitted through her mind. Individual faces of people she had met on the rare occasions she’d gone to town sprang up. She saw the owner of the general store carrying a sack of flour to a buckboard outside the front door of his establishment. She saw three children running after a dog down the main street. She leaned against Jan and closed her eyes trying to block out those images. Those people were most probably dead. Were the men left behind on the ranch also dead? Would they ever know?

  “What are we going to do?” she whispered.

  “I want to go home to Ohio,” he said without preamble. “Ohio?”

  “Yes.” He squeezed her shoulders. “I never really wanted to settle at the homestead. I thought it best for the children, so I was willing. My real desire is to go back East. My brothers are working to help colored people get to Canada.”

  “Runaway slaves?” Tildie breathed the question, eyes wide with apprehension.

  Jan merely nodded.

  “That’s very dangerous.”

  He nodded again.

  “What do you want to do, Tildie?” he finally asked when her silence stretched too long.

  Tildie leaned back and looked at him. Tears coursed down her cheeks. He reached out callused fingers and gently wiped them away.

  “Yes, Jan, I want to go, too. I didn’t want to go to Uncle Henry’s. It doesn’t hold any good memories for me, and I don’t think it does for Boister, either.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Because I didn’t think you really loved me.”

  His mouth fell open and for a moment, he didn’t speak. “You didn’t think…?”

  She dropped her chin so she wouldn’t have to look at his incredulous expression.

  “Didn’t think,” he repeated. “What do you think now?”

  “I thought you chose me because I was the only one around, and if more women had been available, you wouldn’t have picked me.”

  “And what do you think now?” he repeated.

  “I thought you were lonely and you liked having the children because it reminded you of your family growing up.”

  “And what do you think now?”

  “I think I love you so much that I can’t stand the thought of you not loving me.”

  “But you’re not sure I love you.” His calm voice cut through her, and she folded up as much as she could over her round belly and cried into her hands.

  He put his arms around her and stroked her spine, hugging her and rocking her back and forth.

  “Tildie, does God love you?”

  She sniffed and nodded affirmative against his chest.

  “Is He always saying ‘I love you,’ day in and day out, in ways you can see, hear, and feel?”

  She shook her head, still not raising it from the comfortable position where she could hear his heartbeat and his voice rumble.

  “But you know He loves
you?”

  She nodded yes again.

  “Well, Matilda Borjesson, I love you. I’m only human, and I can’t do near the things God has done to prove His love for you, but you’re just going to have to believe I love you and know I love you.” He tilted her head back and began kissing the tears away. “And when we get back to a place where there’s a preacher other than myself, I’m going to marry you again. Not because we aren’t married already in the eyes of God, but because you want it. And, if you want me to marry you once a year, I’ll do it. If you want me to marry you once a month or once a week, I’ll do it. But Tildie, my love, for all that marrying, I won’t mean the vows one bit more than I do right now. The words will stay the same, but the love is going to grow.”

  He captured her lips then and kissed her with the commitment binding them together.

  She believed.

  EPILOGUE

  Get up! Get up!” Mari bounced on the bed.

  Tildie forced her eyes open. Blurry figures stood all around. Startled at the sight of so many people in her room, she reached one hand over and found Jan’s place empty in the big feather bed.

  Astrid, Jan’s sister, stepped forward with a bundled baby in her arms. Her words came pouring forth in the same rush that characterized everything she did.

  “Tomi is impatient for his breakfast. And Mother is beside herself, thinking of all the details for your wedding. Jan has gone to the church to help with the decorations Aunt Julee is determined to see hung from the rafters. She’s stripped the woods of ivy and woven a garland with lovely white flowers. You must see for yourself. She’s been up half the night. If you don’t stir yourself out of this bed, the next delegation of in-laws will be the brawny brothers.”

  Tildie sat up with a grin and took her squirming son. With a practiced flip of the small blanket and rearrangement of her gown, she soon had the sturdy four-month-old baby nestled against her breast. Tildie still wasn’t use to this Swedish sisterhood who invaded her room without a thought. She modestly covered Tomi’s bald head and her shoulder with the blanket.