Julianne MacLean

by Prairie Bride

  After a moment’s deliberation, he ran into the barn. “Good boy,” Sarah said, stepping outside and closing the door behind her. She heard Shadow barking his protest as she looked past the house.

  The garden.

  Feet drumming over the wiggling, crunchy ground, she ran into the house to fetch a knife and buckets. Up the stairs she dashed, pausing at the top. Briggs had tried to convince her to stay inside and the temptation was all too great. Sarah took a deep breath, searching deep inside herself for courage. He needed her help. This was her farm, too. They owned a crop that needed everything they both could give.

  She strengthened her will and pushed the door open. A warm wind of winged creatures blew into the house.

  “No!” Sarah yelled, forcing herself to dash at the swarm and slam the door behind her. Insects beat against her bonnet and clothing. She clutched the knife and ran to the vegetable garden.

  The blankets, she discovered in horror, were almost invisible, covered with locusts. Sarah ripped the blankets from the ground, sending a flurry of creatures into the air. Soon, she had filled two buckets with whatever vegetables were left, leaving the potatoes, which she hoped would be safe underground.

  She carried the buckets into the house, then ran outside again to help Briggs in the cornfield. He looked exhausted. His face was damp with perspiration, his hat literally being eaten off his head.

  “Did you save the vegetables?” he asked, wiping a sleeve across his forehead.

  “They’re in the house and all the animals are in the barn.”

  “Why don’t you tie up the stalks I’ve cut and pile them on top of each other?”

  “But we can’t leave them out here.”

  “It’s too far to haul them back and forth, even with the wagon. If the stalks are bunched, some will be safe.”

  Nodding, Sarah gathered what fell behind Briggs. The green stalks were fast disappearing, impossible as it was to keep up with the grasshoppers’ greedy jaws.

  Before they had stacked a tenth of the crop, the sun was setting. “It’s getting dark. What should we do?” Sarah called out, trying to see through the cloud of insects between them.

  Briggs stopped working and approached her. He was covered with sweat and dust. “You’re exhausted. Look at you.”

  Sarah gazed down at her feet. She wanted to be strong.

  “Why don’t we go inside?” he suggested.

  “We don’t have to stop on my account.”

  “No?”

  “I can keep going.”

  “I’m sure you can. But, my dear, I can’t.”

  My dear.

  “Let’s go,” he said, holding out his hand. “We need a break and I’m hungry.”

  Sarah placed her hand in his and let him lead her through the field toward home. When they walked into the yard, Shadow began to bark inside the barn. “It’s only us!” Sarah called out. “Maybe we could bring him into the house for the night. He’ll go crazy sleeping in there with the grasshoppers.”

  She realized, all of a sudden, that she was making an assumption: Briggs would be sleeping in the house, too.

  A tremor of distress ran through her. Where exactly would Briggs sleep? In the bed with her? Or on the floor with Shadow? It was ridiculous to think of such things at a time like this, but she couldn’t help wondering if he was contemplating the same thing.

  “I’ll get him,” he said. “Why don’t you go inside and get the food ready?” The look in his eye told her he wasn’t thinking about sleeping arrangements at all. He was thinking about the crop. And he was losing hope.

  Sarah nodded and ran into the house, anxious to escape the locusts.

  By the time Briggs came in with Shadow, Sarah had managed to get her salt pork stew onto the table while killing a few dozen grasshoppers in the process. She wiped a damp cloth over her forehead and tried to pat down her messy hair.

  Shadow sat down next to the stove. Briggs removed his hat. He looked solemn.

  “How long do you think this will last?” Sarah asked.

  “I don’t know.” He sat down at the table and rubbed his eyes.

  The house was all too quiet. “Do you think they’ll get the wheat?”

  “Looks that way.”

  Serving up the stew, Sarah sensed Briggs’s discouragement, his need to sit and eat without talking. He probably didn’t know how to tell her that the profits from the wheat harvest were supposed to be their sustenance for the winter. She wasn’t sure she wanted to hear it, either.

  Troubled, she scooped some water out of the bucket for each of them and gave Briggs a cup. He quickly downed it, his face contorting sourly after he’d swallowed. “Agggh!”

  Sarah cringed, examining her own cup of water. “Oh, no,” she said. “I scooped them out of the bucket as best I could—the ones that were floating. There must have been some at the bottom.”

  He set down his cup. “It’s not your fault.”

  “I could make coffee. That might mask the flavor a bit. The stove’s already lit.” She prepared a pot and while it was heating, she sat down to eat.

  “I’m inclined to skip the prayer tonight,” Briggs said. “I don’t see much to be thankful for. The timing couldn’t have been worse. If that swarm had just waited another week, the harvester would have arrived and cut all twenty acres in a couple of days.”

  Sarah looked across the table, hearing the gloom in her husband’s voice. Even so, he seemed all too calm, and it worried her. Maybe he thought this would be the final thing to send her running and screaming back to Boston. Well, not so. Not so…

  “We mustn’t fret over what we can’t change,” she replied, closing her eyes and clasping her hands together. “We need prayer now, more than ever. Thank you, Lord, for giving us the strength to save some of the corn and the vegetables. Thank you for keeping Briggs and I safe through all of this. And thank you for this supper. Amen.”

  She opened her eyes to see Briggs staring dazedly at her, his mouth slightly open. “Amen,” he said, finally.

  “Go ahead, dig in,” Sarah prompted.

  They began to eat, both of them famished. Occasionally, a stray locust would spring onto the table, only to meet a sudden death under Briggs’s heavy hand.

  “I wonder how the Whitikers are managing,” Sarah said. “Do you think they were invaded, too?”

  “I hope not. Howard has a bigger crop, more to lose.”

  “But they have the children. Frank would be a help, I think.”

  “Yes, he likely would be. Mollie wouldn’t like it much, though. I hate to think of it.”

  Sarah felt her heart throb for the little girl. “I hope she’s all right.”

  Briggs finished his first helping. “Is there any more?”

  “Yes, I’ll get you some.” Sarah rose to fill her husband’s plate.

  When she sat down again, Briggs rubbed his forehead. “I have bad news. Before I came in, I went to the vegetable garden to get the blankets we’d left there. I’m afraid there wasn’t much left.”

  “Much left of the garden?”

  “No,” he answered, his voice tired. “There wasn’t much left of the blankets.”

  Sarah covered her mouth with her hand and looked toward the bare mattress on the bed.

  “The darn things chewed right through them,” Briggs added. “They were in shreds.”

  “That was all we had.”

  Shadow perked up, whimpering at her.

  “I know,” Briggs said. “You’ll have to cover yourself with some clothing, at least until we can get something else.”

  But without the wheat harvest, how could they buy blankets, much less the bare necessities for the winter?

  Briggs slid his chair back. “I should go milk Maddie and water the horses.”

  “What about the coffee?”

  “When I come back,” he answered, donning his hat. “Can you keep it hot for me?”

  “Of course.”

  Briggs left, taking Shadow with him, and Sara
h set to work clearing away the supper dishes. Milking Maddie was supposed to be Sarah’s job. Truth be told, she couldn’t face stepping outside again, where it was dark and she wouldn’t be able to see the locusts. She’d only hear them crunching under her boots and feel them beating into her face.

  A short time later, Briggs returned with a bucket of milk in his hand. Shadow followed, tail wagging. Life from inside the house seemed almost normal until Briggs set the bucket down. Sarah looked inside and saw a tidy layer of insects squirming about in a panic, trying to crawl over each other to save themselves from drowning. “Ugh!” she groaned, as gooseflesh tingled down her back.

  Briggs appeared beside her and scooped them out with a cup.

  She felt tears coming, tears she’d fought against all day. As she considered it more, she realized they were the same tears she’d been fighting every day since she’d stepped off the train. Every time her husband looked at her with that disappointed expression, she’d wanted to weep. But she hadn’t. And she wouldn’t now. Things could be worse, she told herself. Though how much worse, she could not imagine.

  Feeling Briggs’s gaze upon her, she looked up. He stared at her, his eyes full of apologies. Apologies for what? she wondered. For the grasshoppers? For the lost crop? For the coming winter? Or was it for all that had passed between them?

  “I can’t believe this is happening,” he said. “When I brought you here, I didn’t mean for it to be this bad.”

  As she digested his words, all her efforts to keep tears away failed her. All she’d wanted for so long was a kind word from her husband, anything to say he cared for her, even just a little. She’d wanted to see the gentle man she had seen in the courthouse on their wedding day, the man who had cared enough to sit her down and fan a cool breeze into her face….

  And here, now…there he was….

  “It’s not so bad,” she managed to say, her voice shaky.

  “I have to go back out. I have to try to save whatever’s left. You don’t have to come. You can stay here. Get some rest.”

  She thought of him out there in the darkness alone, cutting cornstalks and fighting off the insects. He would be discouraged and he would lose hope with each passing hour. No, she decided. She would not let him down. Not now. She would go out there, frightened or not, and carry the cornstalks or what was left of them to safety.

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “You don’t have to.” But she saw the look of gratefulness in his weary eyes. She saw, for the first time, that he was not disappointed in her.

  His appreciation breathed new life into her exhausted body. Sarah picked up her bonnet, tied it tightly under her chin, and gazed with a driving purpose at her husband. “Just try to stop me.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Briggs and Sarah worked until midnight in the cornfield, cutting what was left of the stalks and tying them into secure bundles. Neither of them said it, but they both knew there was little chance much of the crop would survive the night.

  Worn-out and thirsty, they returned to the dark little sod house. Briggs could never have imagined any place on earth more warm and welcoming. While Sarah lit the lantern, he went outside to fill a bucket with water from one of the barrels. He had to scoop the grasshoppers out with his hand, and he knew it would taste bitter, but his mouth was so dry, he could have devoured a gallon of sour milk.

  When he entered the house, he and Sarah both filled their cups and gulped down the water. “Ugh,” she groaned, her delicate features twisting into something unrecognizable. “Do you think the creek water will taste like this, too?”

  “Probably.”

  “Will it ever taste good again?”

  “I reckon sooner or later.”

  A locust fell from the grass ceiling and dropped discreetly onto Sarah’s head without her noticing. Briggs set down his cup and moved toward her to brush the insect away. As he approached, a glimmer of surprise danced across her face. The closer he came, the wider her brown eyes grew, and he could not help but wonder with an odd sense of regret if she feared him in some way….

  He reached out and flicked the insect into the air.

  She did not flinch. Most women, he thought, would cry or shriek or do worse, but he supposed Sarah had toughened considerably somewhere between the nibbled geranium plant and the ingested cornfield.

  He lowered his hand and noticed her eyes were still as round as two harvest moons. “Something wrong?”

  “I’m just tired.”

  He stood close enough to brush his nose lightly across the top of her head. He could smell her—not the rosewater this time. It was just her. He shut his eyes, wanting to enjoy it for a few seconds. “I couldn’t have done this without you,” he said.

  Her soft hand cupped his cheek.

  Without a conscious thought, he turned his lips into her warm palm and kissed it. He wanted to cocoon into her warmth and stay there forever. He didn’t want to face the grasshoppers, the field, the certain devastation that would greet him in the morning. To his complete surprise, he only wanted Sarah.

  Startled by his feelings, he forced himself to let go of her hand and take a step back. He was just searching for solace because of what was happening outside. Tomorrow, the crop would be gone. Making love to Sarah tonight would not bring it back. It would only plunge him into that black sea of heartache if she decided to leave him.

  After this ordeal, that was a very real possibility.

  Sarah kept her features composed, but he saw in her eyes that she’d been wounded by his withdrawal. “Are you all right?” she asked.

  He nodded, feeling badly, but at the same time trying to remember that he had a duty to himself to maintain an emotional distance between them—at least until he felt more sure of her.

  “We’ll get by,” she said.

  He stared into her dark eyes and for the first time saw the enormity of her strength, and against his better judgment, he saw his partner. His companion. His mate. How could he stop himself from feeling what was growing inside his heart? He took a step forward again and gathered her into his arms. Her body melted into his. She was small and warm and refreshing. The day’s trials had emptied him, but as he held his wife, he felt hope returning.

  “Sarah,” he whispered. “There won’t be anything left in the morning. The wheat crop will be gone.”

  She nodded, pressing her face into his chest.

  Instead of the deafening hiss and crackle of locusts, Briggs heard only the sound of his own breathing, light and slow, and knew he was feeling everything he’d vowed never to feel again.

  “We should get some sleep,” Briggs said, leaning back in his chair as they sat across from each other at the table. “There’s no point staying up all night worrying. We’re going to have a lot to do tomorrow.”

  Sarah couldn’t bear to face the idea of tomorrow. But when she turned her exhausted mind toward sleep, she realized uncomfortably they were both inside the house together, both staring at the single, narrow bed.

  Uncertain as to what to do, she glanced at Briggs and fought the tightening in her chest. They had not shared a bed since their wedding night, and that had turned out to be a disaster. In fact, both times she’d given her body to a man, it had caused nothing but despair.

  Wouldn’t it be better to wait until Briggs had forgiven her and gotten over his anger completely? she wondered, biting her thumbnail. She and Briggs had come so far, she did not want to remind him of their painful beginning and spoil things again.

  She realized uneasily that her hands were shaking. She dropped them to her lap to hide them under the table.

  Briggs stood and scratched his head. “I guess I’ll sleep on the floor. The bed’s not really big enough for two.”

  Sarah’s shoulders slumped. All her nervous reasonings seemed silly, now. Briggs didn’t even want to sleep with her.

  She rose from the table and sat on the edge of the bed, wishing she had a blanket to cover herself. She removed the pins from her h
air and set them on the rough bedpost while Briggs lay down on the dirt floor beside the table. Within seconds, Shadow curled up beside him and Sarah could not help but envy the body heat they were sharing.

  Resigning herself to her empty bed, she reached into her bag for her nightdress and made her own blanket, forcing her mind to stumble backward into a restless sleep.

  The next morning, Sarah awakened to the sound of Shadow shaking himself, his ears flapping noisily like a startled pigeon. Briggs had risen and was dipping his tin cup into the bucket of water. He gulped it down, and his eyes clamped shut at the sharp taste.

  “I could make coffee,” Sarah offered.

  Briggs set down his cup. “I didn’t know you were awake.”

  “I wasn’t. Until a moment ago.” Still wearing her clothes from yesterday, she threw off the nightdress she’d used as a cover and stood. She tried to ignore Briggs, who stared at her while she filled the stove with cow chips. Feeling self-conscious, she struck a match, which thankfully whisked and flared on the first try.

  “Your hair,” he said, squatting to pat Shadow.

  Sarah froze with uncertainty, then realized she was still holding the burning match. She tossed it quickly into the chips, feeling like her cheeks were catching fire as well.

  “I’m used to you wearing it up,” he added.

  She turned around. “I’ll be putting it up in a minute or two.”

  Still stroking Shadow, Briggs glanced briefly at her, then away. “Whatever suits you.”

  “Have you been outside yet?” Sarah asked, changing the subject.

  “No, and I can’t see anything out the window. It’s too dark. Maybe I’ll go milk Maddie while the coffee’s brewing.”

  “I’ll do it. It’ll take a while for the stove to heat up, anyway.”

  Briggs pulled on his hat and studied her a moment. “We’ll both go.” He gestured for her to follow. They climbed the steps and reached the door. Briggs lifted the latch, but before he pushed the door open, he turned and looked down at Sarah. “I hope you said a prayer last night.”