by Indiana Wake
“Mr. Swain, I love Jenny and I would never do anything to hurt her.”
“I think I know that, Arlon.”
“I just don’t know what to do next.”
“Why don’t you go on down to the house and knock on the door. Maybe if you tell Polly everything you just told me, well then, things might be a little different. And don’t look so worried, I’ll be back down at the house myself in an hour or so.”
“Then I’ll do just that. Thank you,” Arlon said and held his hand out for Jenny’s father to shake.
Chapter Eighteen
As disconcerted as he was on his approach to the farmhouse, his conversation with Gavin Swain had made Arlon certain that there was some hope of a future for him and Jenny. However, the nearer he got to the house, the more he was sure he could hear the sound of raised voices drifting out on the warm early afternoon air as if to greet him.
He paused, listening intently, holding his breath as if that might somehow help him to hear better. And then he heard it; the sound of two women in the throes of the most terrible argument.
To his shame, the larger part of himself wanted to hover at a distance, to wait for Gavin Swain to return from the farm and to be the first one through the door. But he was starting to see that all of this, everything he had suffered and was hoping to overcome, could only be cured with courage. The same courage which had propelled him across the field to speak to Jenny’s father must now propel him down to the house and render him an unwanted guest in the middle of a family crisis.
But if he wanted Jenny in his life, then surely, her family would become his family. He had to show them all that he could manage the crisis, help with the crisis, pour soothing waters onto the crisis.
And so he took a deep breath and began to march with purpose toward the back door of the farmhouse, which he knew led directly into the kitchen.
“I’ve had enough of this too, Jenny. I’m tired of explaining to you over and over why it is I need to protect you.”
“And I am tired of telling you over and over, Mother, that I do not need nor want you to protect me any longer. Your protection isn’t protection; its control, and I just won’t put up with it any longer.”
Arlon knocked on the door, but the two women were so furious with one another, so intent upon their argument, they did not hear it.
“I don’t want to be hard on you, Jenny, but I can see that I am going to have to be. There is no way you are ever going to see Travis Hurst’s son again. I can assure you of that. I know I said it before, but as long as you live under this roof that is just the way it is. And as for telling me that you’re going to get a job and rooms, well, I’ll believe it when I see it.”
“I am going to see Arlon again, Mother. I’ve already seen him, just this morning, and I know now that he loves me, even after the appalling way you treated him. I love him too, and you are not going to stand in my way. If this is how it’s going to be, then I am not going to stay here. Not in this house, not in this town, not even in Oregon.” Jenny was shouting at the top of her lungs as Arlon quietly opened the kitchen door and let himself in.
“You can’t! You can’t run off like that, not with him. How will I be able to protect you from him when you are hundreds of miles away? No, you have to stay here. You have to stay here with your daddy and me.”
“Forgive me,” Arlon said loud enough to have the two women finally realize he was in the room.
They were both too exhausted and shocked from their horrible argument to look surprised to see him, but he knew that the surprise was in there somewhere. Not only that, but the horrible sense of exposure— how appalling to have a family argument being witnessed by a man who was not a part of that family, at least not yet.
And now he realized that he might never be. Not because of Polly Swain’s determination, but because of Jenny’s. He couldn’t stand by and see a loving family tearing itself apart in front of him—because of him.
“Arlon, you came. I’m so glad you’re here,” Jenny said and raced across the kitchen to fall into his arms.
Polly Swain looked defeated, as if she had lost her daughter forever. And not only had she lost her, but to a man who would be better described as a monster. She glared at him with undisguised fury, despite the fact that her eyes told him clearly that her heart was breaking.
“Jenny, Jenny. It’s all right.” He turned his attention to Polly. “Mrs. Swain, everything is going to be all right.”
“How can it be? When you are stealing my daughter from me and I will never see her again, how can everything be all right? How can you stand there and say that to me when I have loved her with all my heart?”
“Mrs. Swain, I’m not going to be stealing your daughter from you. I’m not going to be taking Jenny anywhere,” he said and felt a horrible sick and dull feeling in the pit of his stomach.
Was he really going to do this? Was following the path of doing the right thing always so unutterably painful?
“Arlon?” Jenny said in a high-pitched squeak. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that I could never take you away from parents who love you so much. I love you, Jenny, more than I can ever put into words, but I can see that your mama and daddy love you too. Your daddy doesn’t know what to do for the best, and your mama doesn’t know how to let go of the fear. But me ripping you right out of here isn’t the answer.”
“Arlon, please don’t do this,” Jenny said, her beautiful face a picture of misery, her large blue eyes swimming in tears. “I love you too, I can’t live without you.”
“I’m not sure I can live without you either, Jenny, but I know for certain that I can’t live with myself if I tear up a family. If I do that, then I really am my father’s son, aren’t I?” he said and could feel his throat tightening with emotion.
More than anything in the world, he wanted to lift Jenny off her feet and run away with her, but he knew that everything he had said was right. This wasn’t the way and he would never be free of the demons of his father’s past if he went ahead and simply took what he wanted for himself.
He kissed the top of Jenny’s gleaming dark hair and extricated himself from her grip as kindly as he could before turning to walk out of the farmhouse. He could hear Jenny’s desperate, heart-shredding crying coming from the house and it was all he could do to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
Chapter Nineteen
For the next two weeks, Jenny struggled to function every day. Joanne had spent hour upon hour with her in her room trying to comfort and console her to no avail. Jenny was heartbroken, devastated; finished.
Her only comfort had been that her father, hearing of everything he had missed by just minutes that day, had been furious with his wife for the first time. And even two weeks later, husband and wife were barely on speaking terms. Something which would have torn her heart in two just weeks before was now the only thing which gave Jenny a sense of justice. If she was miserable, if she was desperately unhappy, then why should her mother and father not suffer the same fate? It was only fair, wasn’t it?
Knowing that she couldn’t wallow in self-pity forever, Jenny had found some comfort in making a plan. She got up early, dressed herself carefully, and was fully intent upon heading into town to find herself some work. This was just the beginning of a new life and, if she could not have Arlon, she would have new horizons instead. However long it took to have the money behind her, Jenny would keep her head down and work hard, never losing sight of her dream.
Furthermore, she knew that the barge that carried the only man she would ever love would have drawn in to dock late the previous night. The man who had walked away from her so easily was within reaching distance and it was the most awful feeling in the world. Jenny needed this day; she needed to be busy, to be filled with purpose. Anything to keep her mind off Arlon Hurst.
“You’re up early, honey,” Polly said, still in her nightgown as she set water to boil on the stove for her husband’s coffee.<
br />
Polly Swain was trying to carry on as normal in a house where nobody was connecting any longer. The very moment that Jenny began to feel sorry for her, she forcibly hardened her heart.
“I’m going into town looking for work, Mother,” Jenny said simply.
“Would you like me to get you a little breakfast first?”
“No, I’m going to walk down into town and, by the time I get there, the diner will be open. I’ll get something while I’m out.”
“Please don’t do this, Jenny,” her mother said, her voice small like a child.
“I am not keeping myself here as a prisoner any longer. You had your way about Arlon, you ruined my chances with him, and you took away my choices. You will never have the opportunity to take away my choices again. I’m not arguing with you about it, Mother, I’m just telling you the way it is. And if you don’t like it, then you have only to throw me out of your house. I am under your roof after all.” She added the last with a cynical sneer.
“You don’t need to go and look for work in town, Jenny. You don’t need to work for extra money. You don’t need to do any of it.”
“Oh, why is that?”
“Because you are going to go down to that barge and find Arlon Hurst. I know they arrived last night,” Polly said, tears streaming down her face. “Any man who walks away from a woman he clearly loves for what he sees as the greater good can only be a good man. Travis Hurst would never have done that and the idea of it is something I haven’t been able to shake these last two weeks. I judged Arlon to be exactly the man his father was, and I now know that was wrong. And I judged you to be as weak and as silly as I was at your age and now, I know that was wrong also.”
“Mama, I don’t know what to say,” Jenny said, realizing that she was crying and not even knowing when the tears had begun.
“Just say that, when you have worked everything out with your Arlon, that you might spare a little time to find it in your heart to forgive me. Jenny, honey, I really am so sorry for all of it. All these years I thought I was a good mother, and now I can see that I wasn’t.”
“Oh, Mama, of course you were a good mother,” Jenny said, beginning to sob as she closed the distance between them and scooped her mother into her arms. “You loved me fiercely, you fed me, you clothed me, you kept me warm, and you taught me so much. I do not blame you for all the fear you felt all these years, it just makes me sad to know what you went through. How you tortured yourself all this time, I only hope that you can find some peace.”
“Well, one thing at a time, huh? But first things first, you need to run down to that barge and see if you can find your man, don’t you?” Polly said and sniffed loudly, wiping away her daughter’s tears with her thumbs before kissing her forehead. “Go on, get going.”
Jenny ran all the way from the house, through the woods towards the riverbank. The sun was already up, although it hadn’t been up for long, and she wondered if Arlon would have already begun his day’s work. Even if he was free to speak to her, did he still love her? Did he still want her after all this trouble?
As she burst out into the clearing, panting breathlessly, she shrieked with surprise when she saw him standing there. He was a lonely figure, a man with his hands thrust deep into his pockets and his head bowed as he stood on the very spot where they had first met.
When he heard the terrible noise she was making, he spun around and looked at her, his eyes wide with wonderful disbelief.
“Jenny? Is it really you?” he said and raced toward her, reaching out to touch her as if he had fully expected her to be nothing more than a vision; the manifestation of wishful thinking.
“Yes, it’s me. It’s really me.”
“I am so sorry for the way I left, but there wasn’t anything else I could do. I hope you know how much I love you, and I hope you know how much it broke my heart to walk away. But I just couldn’t do it, I couldn’t tear up a family so easily as my father always could.”
“And now you don’t have to,” Jenny said, crying and smiling and wondering if every emotion came at you all at once at such points in life.
“I don’t?”
“Let me just say that my mama has finally seen the light,” she said and beamed at him, throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him on the lips.
“I can’t believe it! Really?” he said between kisses.
“Yes, now kiss me. I love you.”
“And I love you, Jenny. I will always love you,” he said and lifted her off her feet, twirling her around before kissing her again.
Epilogue
“You really are too kind, Gavin,” Arlon said a little sheepishly.
“There’s no kindness in it, son. You’ve earned that money. I don’t just give money away, that’s for sure, but I reckon I’ve never had anybody work here on this farm harder than you’ve done this last year.”
“It’s good of you to say,” Arlon said, knowing that he had, truthfully, earned every dollar.
In the year since Arlon and Jenny had been married, they had both worked hard on the farm which would one day be theirs. But they both had an itch to scratch and even Polly Swain, despite her nervousness, could see that it needed to be done.
“So, where’s the first stop again?” Gavin Swain asked and Jenny laughed.
Her father knew every part of their itinerary back to front, inside out, and upside down. But it was wonderful to hear both of her parents speak of their upcoming travels with enthusiasm—it was the one thing she had never expected.
Having saved hard for a whole year, having worked every single day of their married lives on Gavin Swain’s farm, they had finally got together enough money to see something of America. Maybe one day they would see something of the world, but for two people who had only ever seen California or Oregon, the list of wonderful places in America was certainly enough to be going on with.
“We’re taking stagecoaches until we can get on the train,” Jenny said excitedly; she’d only been on the Oregon trains before, and even then, only now and again. She had a great sense that the newly completed Transcontinental Railway Line was going to be a far cry from all that. “I’m so excited, I can’t even get to sleep at night.”
“I just can’t believe that folk can get across the Oregon Trail now in just a week or two,” Polly Swain said, shaking her head with a look of awe on her face. “It took us five months.” She laughed. “Then, just twenty-odd years later, my baby is going to be able to head back and see where she came from in no time at all.”
“And it’s not just Missouri and New York, it’s everything we’re going to see in between. So many states that, as a boy, I thought I’d never lay eyes on. Idaho, Montana, Iowa. I reckon I’m not getting a lot of sleep at the moment either.” Arlon grinned like a child.
More than once, Arlon was reminded of the time that Ted told him he was certain there was some way in between all his worries to find an answer. In the end, it had all been so simple. Arlon and Jenny didn’t need to leave, not forever, just for a little while. Right now, Gavin Swain had all the help he needed on the farm and they had all agreed that Arlon and Jenny should travel and do the things they had dreamed about their whole lives. And then, when it was done, they would come home again and settle down on the farm, a husband and wife team, content with everything they had.
“I can’t wait to see New York,” Jenny said excitedly.
“I don’t think you’ll find it any nicer than Missouri,” Polly Swain said, and everybody laughed. “It was a lovely place to grow up.”
“Hey, New York was the best place to grow up,” Gavin Swain added in mock defense of his hometown.
“Well, as long as we don’t accidentally end up in California, I’ll be a happy man.” Arlon grinned and put his arm around his wife’s shoulders. “You excited, honey?”
“I am so excited, Arlon. Three days until we set off and I know I’m going to be wide awake for all of them.”
“Yeah, me too,” he said and leaned in
to kiss her cheek. “And just think, we’ll be able to test the theory that The Bear can be seen from anywhere in the northern hemisphere.”
“What bear? You have to be careful of bears, don’t let your guard down,” Polly Swain said in an unconscious and brief return to her old self.
“The Great Bear, Polly. Ursa Major, not an actual bear,” Arlon said and laughed hard. “Stars!” he exclaimed happily when she still looked confused.
“Oh, I see,” she said with the expression of somebody trying to cover for a lack of knowledge.
“Mama, it’s a collection of stars that make a picture, and it’s the same picture every night, it just moves a little here and there. But everywhere in the northern hemisphere, it can be seen, at least that’s what we learned at school. Arlon and I always said that we wanted to make sure that what we’ve been told was right.”
“Oh, now I do see,” Polly said, and they all laughed again.
“Well, let’s wash up and eat this meal your mother has made before it goes stone cold,” Gavin said, clapping his hands and getting the whole family moving.
“I could never have imagined this day coming, Jenny. I could never have imagined being this happy,” Arlon whispered into her ear as the two of them set out plates for dinner.
“I could never have imagined it either. And I’m so grateful to you for doing the right thing, for keeping this family together. You’re the finest man I’ve ever known.” Her eyes met his. “And I love you with all my heart.”
“And I love you, Jenny Hurst.”
If You missed book one, grab Suki’s Heart then read on for a preview of the next wonderful story in this series.
Honey’s Grace Preview
“Honey Goodman, how times have changed. It used to be you trying to convince me to dance with a nice young man. Now I can’t get you to move from the spot. What happened?” Suki Reynolds laughed good-naturedly.
