A Widower’s Unexpected Rescue (Preview)

Chapter One

Early summer, 1883
Logan Valley, Montana

Dear Lord, watch over and protect me as I journey into an unknown future. Give me the strength and the courage to face challenges with grace and dignity—

Cordelia’s heartfelt prayer was interrupted when the train car in which she traveled lurched to the right, pressing her shoulder into that of her fellow passenger. She turned to the middle-aged woman with an apology. 

“I’m terribly sorry, Missus Porter,” she murmured. “I wasn’t paying attention, lost in my thoughts.”

“No need to worry about that, Miss Fletcher.” The woman smiled. “It has been a rather rough ride on this narrow-gauge track, hasn’t it?”

Indeed it had. After she’d left Cleveland, the train ride across the plains had been mostly smooth and uneventful. After changing trains in Billings to take this smaller, narrower track west, the ride had been rougher. 

She’d met Margaret Porter as she boarded the crowded train there and they’d shared a conversation or two, especially when they had to stop to allow huge herds of bison or elk to cross the tracks. 

The landscape appeared flat but was anything but. Shelfs of land dropped off suddenly to expose wrinkles and grooves invisible until the train dipped or curved or had to cross a trestle. 

The cars weren’t as big, the rumble of the wheels beneath her louder and the jostling under the seats rougher. The train car itself shuddered alarmingly at times, and when it took a turn in the tracks, the walls seemed to lean an alarming degree to the right or left before righting themselves once more.

Cordelia was glad for the older woman’s company. She’d sat alone in her seat all the way from Cleveland, no one to distract her, no one to interrupt her constantly worrisome thoughts nor her frustration and anger over her uncle’s decree that it was time for her to marry. Then he’d gone ahead and arranged it without her knowledge or agreement! 

She’d had no say in the matter, no way to refuse. After all, she lived with her uncle only through his largesse. A confirmed bachelor, he had quickly grown tired of providing a roof over her head, along with food and a minimum of clothes. He’d begun to blatantly state that she’d “become a burden when she was of a marriageable age if she weren’t so stubborn about finding a husband.”

“Are you all right, dear?” Margaret asked, leaning slightly forward in her seat to peer at Cordelia. “You don’t look well.”

Cordelia took a deep breath. “I’m all right, Missus Porter,” she replied, somewhat startled by the tremor in her voice. “I’m just nervous, that’s all.”

The older woman frowned slightly. “It’s Margaret, my dear. And I shall call you Cordelia, since we are, after all, acquaintances?”

Cordelia nodded.

“And you’re nervous about what?”

After boarding the train in Billings, Margaret had told her that she made her living as a traveling companion for hire. She was on her way to meet a client in Helena after a brief journey accompanying a young boy to his grandparents in Miles City.

Cordelia glanced down at her dark blue velvet reticule in her lap, her fingers twisting about its silken ties. She opened it and reached inside to extract a small sheet of stationary, her heart skipping a beat before dropping into the pit of her stomach as she unfolded it. 

The ink was dark and the writing looked hasty, the letters small and tight, blotches of leftover ink smudging the margins. It’d been nice to have some company for a change, to keep her thoughts distracted from what she faced up ahead.

“I’m to be married,” she admitted. She lifted the letter in her hand. “My uncle’s doing.”

 Margaret lifted an eyebrow. “You’re a mail-order bride?”

Cordelia nodded in surprise. “Yes. You know of them?”

The woman laughed softly. “Of course I do.” She gestured out the window. Nothing but empty plains and pine-studded hills could be seen. “There’s quite a dearth of young, marriageable women in these parts, so mail-order brides are a common remedy.”

Cordelia nodded and glanced down at the letter, once more reading a few straightforward sentences—not one single query about herself, no information about himself, nor even a hint of affection or romance to be found. The sentences he’d written were cold and formal. 

She read about suitability and qualifications due to her medical and healing knowledge and familiarity with herbs, “which would come in handy,” he’d written. To her great disappointment, she believed she would soon be entering into a loveless match, no thanks to her uncle, who had rushed the arrangement and who had only told her that her future husband was rich, as if that was all that mattered.

She felt a hand briefly touch her shoulder and turned to Margaret, gazing at her with what she could only define as commiseration.

“A long time ago, I was married,” she said softly. She gave a small shrug. “It wasn’t quite what I expected, but time took care of that.”

Cordelia wanted to ask what she meant but refrained.

“Do you think you can make a love match?”

Cordelia sighed. “I don’t know.” 

“Well, give it your best effort, my dear.”

Cordelia wanted to ask her questions, about how Margaret had dealt with the fears and doubts. She’d been praying about it for days. Here on this train, though, it was just the two of them, and she felt she could express her fears. 

“I feel trapped, Margaret, trapped in an unwanted marriage, stuck between a stranger for a husband and a controlling uncle who wants nothing more than to be rid of his familial obligations.”

Margaret pursed her lips and patted her hand. “I know it’s frightening. Heaven knows I was frightened when I got married, too.” 

The woman didn’t say anything for several moments, so Cordelia believed the conversation was over. She turned to look out the window on the other side of the aisle, not finding the beautiful landscape comforting whatsoever. The train’s rhythmic clacking of iron wheels on the tracks, the creaking of the wooden train car they rode in, and the occasional groaning sound as they took a curve didn’t provide enough distraction for her anymore. 

“Tell me more about your fiancé, Cordelia.”

She glanced at Margaret, at a face that might have once been beautiful but now displayed signs of a difficult life. The woman’s dark auburn hair was streaked with gray. Thick powder dabbed on her cheeks barely hid liver spots. Her hair had been tightly combed against her scalp and pulled into a somewhat lopsided chignon at the nape of her neck. Large round spectacles made her green eyes look unnaturally large, and her calico print dress was faded, the edges of the collar and neckline frayed.

“There’s not much that I know about him,” Cordelia admitted, embarrassed. She shook her head and glanced down at the letter she still held in her lap. “I only had time to exchange one letter with him before the tickets were arranged and my uncle saw me off.”

Margaret nodded in understanding. “I’ve met a few women with the same story, different relatives,” she murmured. She leaned closer now, her eyes intent. “But tell me what you do know about him. It might help settle your nerves if you talk about him a little.”

Cordelia wasn’t so sure of that. Tired and exhausted, she wanted nothing more at this moment but to go home. Unfortunately, she no longer had one. Nor did she have a father anymore. 

Hers had been a good physician who had begun sharing his knowledge of basic medicine and herbal remedies with her as soon as she could walk. She blinked back tears of heartache, missing him with a depth that took her breath away. 

She missed Pennsylvania. She missed the small town of Hunter’s Gap where she and her father had lived. She missed her continuing medical training through his easygoing guidance. 

After her mother died of influenza four years previously, she had taken control of the house while at the same time becoming his assistant in the care of his patients. It all ended when her father died of a sudden heart attack a mere eight months ago. 

A month after his burial, Uncle Clayton stepped in. She’d met him only a couple of times in her life; Clayton and her father hadn’t had a close relationship. Clayton had sold the only home she’d ever known. Then she’d found herself living in Cleveland with her uncle, five years older than her father and not at all hesitant to let her know in various ways that he resented his sudden role as her guardian.

“Well, I know that he’s much older,” she told Margaret. “My uncle told me he was fifty years old. I’m not sure what he looks like. Apparently he’s a wealthy merchant who supplies goods to a number of towns and he also owns a few general stores.”

Margaret leaned slightly forward, a furrow appearing between her eyebrows. “A merchant? And he owns a number of general stores, here in Montana Territory?”

Cordelia nodded, wondering at Margaret’s slightly alarmed tone of voice. “He wrote in the letter that he had previously been married, but his wife died five years ago. He has a twenty-year-old son, who also works in the family business. He lives with a widowed older sister and employs her as his housekeeper.” She frowned. “He doesn’t sound very nice if he makes his sister clean his house to put a roof over her head.”

An odd sound softly erupted from Margaret’s throat. Cordelia eyed her with concern. “Margaret, are you all right?” The woman had gone pale, noticeable even beneath the powder on her face. She placed a hand on the woman’s arm. “What’s wrong?” 

“What’s his name?” Margaret asked, voice barely above a whisper.

“Horace Bingham,” Cornelia replied.

“Oh dear.” Margaret murmured.

Oh dear? Cordelia frowned at her comment. “What is it?”

Margaret leaned back against the bench seat, lips pressed inward as she lifted a hand to her forehead, rubbing it as if it suddenly pained her. She swallowed hard before turning to Cordelia. 

She spoke hesitantly. “I believe… I think I know of the man.”

Cordelia had to lean closer, eyebrows raised. “What? Did you say that you know him?” She frowned. How could that be? The plains and the mountains beyond were vast, dotted only here and there with small towns and a few ranches or farms. How could she possibly know Horace Bingham?

“Yes.” Margaret’s shoulders sank inward for several moments. She inhaled deeply and straightened her back, turning to Cordelia with a steely look in her eyes. “Quite a long time ago. I… I used to work for him.”

Cordelia couldn’t believe it. “You know him?” What were the chances of that? Margaret turned to her, her gaze now steady and filled with concern.

“Yes, I do… or did.” She quickly glanced away. 

Margaret’s reaction caused Cordelia’s stomach to tighten and her heart to pound. She couldn’t deny that she already harbored serious doubts about this arranged marriage. Those doubts grew larger and heavier with every mile that took her closer to him.

“What’s he like?” she asked.

Margaret turned to her. “He’s a successful man, no doubt about that. Rich, too. But… he’s also calculating and ambitious. Often too ambitious for his own good.” She hesitated again. “I shouldn’t be talking to you like this.”

“Margaret, you have to tell me. Please.” Why did she feel so desperate all of a sudden?

The older woman heaved a sigh. “What I remember of him is that he can be quite ruthless when it comes to business, and… and sometimes, in his personal life, he’s not a very soft man. He can be somewhat possessive and controlling.” She shook her head. “I’m so sorry to be telling you these things—”

“You’re sure we’re talking about the same man?” 

“I’m sure.” Margaret nodded. She lowered her voice and leaned closer. “There were rumors, back then, that he killed his former wife, Eleanor—”

“What?” Cordelia gasped, eyes wide. “Why would he do such a thing?”

Margaret hesitated, lips pursed.

“Please, tell me,” Cordelia urged. “You have to!”

Margaret looked out the window for several moments before turning back to Cordelia. “He married well. Eleanor was from a prominent family, which gave Horace the social connections he craved, along with a certain amount of money and power…”

“But?” Cordelia prodded.

“But his success in business didn’t make up for a lack of success when it his home life was concerned. He was severely lacking in love or devotion.” She swallowed and turned once more to the window.

Cordelia feared she wouldn’t say more, but she did, her somber gaze reflected in the glass.

“He isolated her, first from family and then friends, creating a literal prison for her within their own home.”

“And you said you worked for him? How long?”  

“Yes, I worked for him… nearly ten years,” she murmured “I stayed for her. It was only after her death that I left. I felt such pity for her. Horace Bingham is… he’s not an easy man…”

“But… but these rumors that he killed her… are they true?”

Margaret grimaced. “He told people that Eleanor died due to her delicate condition, but I know for a fact that she was no wilting flower, and she wasn’t physically sick. She was heartsick and lonely, yes.” She turned to Cordelia with a frown. “But she was locked her in her room most of the time. Horace barely allowed her out of it, not even to go outside.”

Awful, just awful! Cordelia felt sick to her stomach. What was she supposed to do? Not only had her uncle condemned her to a life of misery, but possibly a dangerous one as well. She looked out the window again but saw nothing but open prairie, empty of people or towns. 

“But… but if I don’t marry him, what am I supposed to do? Where can I go? I have no money, no friends or relatives out here…”

Margaret finally turned once more to face her. “I have a few dollars I can give you, Cordelia, perhaps enough so that you can get off at the next stop. You can hire a horse or purchase a ticket on a stagecoach to take you somewhere, maybe eastward.”

Cordelia heard the tension in the woman’s voice. Was this all true? Was Margaret telling the truth or just relaying rumors? What if she continued on and everything the woman said turned out to be true? She’d be trapped in a loveless marriage. Yet if she didn’t go through with it, she might be putting herself into a worse predicament. 

“Perhaps you can return to Billings,” Margaret suggested. “There’s plenty of jobs to be had there, and cheap enough lodgings.” She tilted her head and eyed Cordelia with concern. “I’m sorry to frighten you, but I felt you should know. What you do now you must decide for yourself.”

Cordelia’s head felt like it was spinning. The train had passed through Billings hours ago and was headed to Livingston, then Bozeman, then northward toward Butte and finally Missoula. She stared wide-eyed at Margaret, now reaching for a small traveling bag at her feet. She lifted it onto her lap and opened it, digging inside to extract a small silk coin purse. From it she took several bills and handed them to Cordelia.

Cordelia stared at the bills. Margaret wouldn’t give a practical stranger her hard-earned money if she wasn’t telling the truth, would she?  She had no idea what to do. She could find a job, she supposed, perhaps with a town doctor or apothecary. She knew enough about that. Or she could hire on as a ladies’ companion or even a governess for children… 

She was over a thousand miles away from home, from Pennsylvania. If she went back to Hunter’s Gap, her uncle would be able to track her down. For that matter, she had stay away from Ohio, too. So where was she to go?

The train started to slow. A conductor opened the door at the end of it and called out, “Livingston, five miles!”

With that, he strode down the aisle between the bench seats, disappeared through the door at the rear end and likely continued with the announcement in the next car. Cordelia turned back to Margaret, who was eyeing her with a mixture of pity and concern. She extended the money again.

“Go ahead, take it, Cordelia. You can probably hitch a ride with someone back to Pinewood. We passed it about six miles back. The stagecoach stops there every few days. If you can get to that, there’s enough money here to get you to Denver, from where you can go practically anywhere.” 

She squeezed the money into her hands. “If you can’t get the stage, rent a horse and head back to Billings. You’ll find work there, and lodging, at least until you decide where you want to go.” She hesitated. “I’m so sorry to have told you this,” she said softly. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have. But in good conscience, I had to.”

Her heart pounded at Margaret’s almost desperate tone. Lord, what’s happening? Help me! She didn’t know what to do. She wanted to believe Margaret, to trust her, but she barely knew the woman. Yet why would she tell her all this if it weren’t true? 

She fought back tears and a burgeoning fear that threatened to take every bit of strength from her. She was barely managing to hold herself together as it was.

“I don’t… I don’t know what to do, Margaret.”

Margaret leaned closer, meeting her eyes. “You need to be strong, young lady. I wish I could help you more, but I don’t have a permanent home in these parts. You’ll be all right. Lean on your faith to see you through.” She sighed. “I’m glad I met you, Cordelia. I know you’re afraid, but when this train stops in Livingston, you find someone to take you to the stagecoach depot in Pinewood. Barring that, there’s a horse rental at the local livery stable. Just head east. By horse, it’s about fifteen to twenty miles away.”

Speechless, Cordelia could only stare, first at Margaret and then out the window. She was in a strange land, surrounded by strangers, no friends to count on, and no one to help her. She wanted to doubt Margaret’s words, but she believed they were true. She felt that truth deep in her heart. 

Margaret Porter had just saved her from a life of misery. 

She reached for the older woman’s hands as the train began to slow, great clouds of steam hissing past the windows, the chug of the engine rumbling through the cars, and the rhythmic clacking of the iron wheels slowing. 

“Thank you, Margaret, for telling me.”

“Thank you for believing me,” Margaret said softly. She gave Cordelia’s hands another squeeze. “God go with you, Cordelia. God be with you, dear.”

Chapter Two

Micah turned the buckboard northeastward out of Livingston, heading through an open valley before slowly winding his way up into the foothills toward his Rocking R ranch in Logan Valley, another twelve miles away. Though only mid-morning, the day was heating up. 

As his pair of horses leaned forward into their harnesses, the wagon wheels bounced over a narrow two-track that led gradually upward. The still-bright green leaves of cottonwood groves dotting the landscape shivered gently in the ever-present breeze. 

Prairie grasses bent gently with it, turning a little browner now, hinting at an early hint summer. Overhead, an incredibly blue sky spread from horizon to horizon, only briefly interrupted by a scattering of thin clouds drifting slowly overhead. 

He grinned. If he had his twelve-year-old daughter Evie with him, they’d make a game of giving shapes to those clouds.

“Heaven on earth,” he murmured. The majesty and rugged terrain of this part of Montana never ceased to amaze him. He’d heard the phrase “God’s country” from travelers passing from east to west and couldn’t deny it. There was something about this place that tugged at his heart and soul and brought him closer to God, even in the depths of his ongoing grief.

When he was out on the prairie, he often talked to himself, not just to keep himself and his horses company, but so that he didn’t feel so infinitesimally small and alone in the vastness of the countryside. Sometimes when he was out here alone, he felt like he was the only living soul on earth. 

He wasn’t alone, of course. He’d envision his daughter, Evie. She’d begun to outgrow some of the more precocious behaviors of childhood and now neared the cusp of womanhood. Seeing the changes in his daughter made him miss his wife all the more.

“Why did you have to go, Susannah?” he asked, looking up at the sky. “You’d be so proud of her. You’re still watching out for us, aren’t you?”

He didn’t expect an answer, and he didn’t get one. Susannah had been gone for three years now. Though he focused on remembering her smile and her laugh, the actual sound of her laughter had faded through the years. Inevitably, thoughts of his love for Susannah was almost always coupled with memories of the day of her death.

They’d been busy preparing the Rocking R for winter. He’d been in town loading up on supplies. His wife and daughter were at the ranch house on that cold day in early November. By the time he got home, a fast-moving snowstorm had rolled over the mountains, working its way up to a blizzard. Though he tried not to, he recalled that day as if it had just happened…

He arrived home just before the blizzard struck, pulling the horses and buckboard into the barn before quickly unhitching them and turning them into their stalls. By the time he left the barn, he could barely see the house. 

When he entered the house, stamping snow from his boots at the doorway, he found, to his dismay, nine-year-old Evie on her knees on the horsehair sofa gazing out the frosty window of the sitting room.

She turned from the window. “Where’s Mama?” 

Two words. Two words that had prompted his heart to plummet to his belly and his head to pound. He stared at his daughter, looking back at him with wide, worried eyes. 

“Where’d she go?”

“She went to get the mare, the one about to foal.”

He held back a groan just as Clementine, their full-time cook, appeared from the kitchen, hands nervously twisting her apron. “I told her not to go, Micah,” she said, her voice trembling with worry. “It was just before the storm hit.”

Without another word, Micah rushed from the house and returned to the barn where he quickly saddled his stallion, Cain, who for once didn’t fight the saddle, perhaps sensing his worry. Tying his hat on his head with his neckerchief and knotting it under his chin, he hunkered deep into his sheep’s wool-lined coat and then a slicker. 

Leaving the barn, heart pounding, he prayed for all he was worth that Susannah had found shelter somewhere along the foothills edging the north pasture. He could hardly see more than twenty feet or so in any direction, but he counted on the Lord to keep him heading in the right direction in time to find Susannah and get her back to the house before the storm grew any worse.

Bits of sleet struck his face, the snow falling fast and hard, the wind whipping at both horse and man as he searched, shouting his wife’s name even as the wind ripped it away. Then he’d seen a horse standing stiff-legged, rump facing into the wind, head down. Nearby lay a dark bundle on the ground. A cry of horror left his lips but the wind swept it away even as he tried to deny the truth of it.

He’d carried his unconscious wife back home in his arms, trying to shield her from the storm as best he could. She never woke up. He’d never had a chance to tell her again how much he loved her, to beg her not leave him and Evie. She’d succumbed to her injuries later that night. 

Micah had been left a widower with a nine-year-old girl who didn’t understand what dying meant. He barely remembered those first months after her passing, his mind clouded with grief and not a little fear of being left not only to raise a daughter but to run his ranch alone. He’d wanted to curse at God for taking her from him, but as the months passed he’d realized he was only hurting himself and his daughter more. Still, it didn’t take the anger away.

“Why, Lord, why? Why did you take her so soon?” 

He tried to push the awful memory from his mind but it was always there, hovering just below the surface. He clenched his jaw and urged his team forward, feeling a sudden urge to get home. It was just Evie and him now. 

After he’d gotten over feeling sorry for himself, he’d focused on building the ranch to the success it was now, three years later. He had no time for anything but his ranch and Evie, though he knew there was a woman or two in town who wouldn’t have minded marrying him.

“Not interested,” he said. His horses shifted their ears at the sound of his voice. “I wasn’t talking to you, girls.”

An hour or so later, having already crossed the boundary of his property, he guided his team of horses up one hill and around a familiar curve in the road and then up another, steeper slope. Here a number of boulders were scattered about. 

He had no idea where they’d come from. There were no mountains here, although they did rise abruptly and jutted into the sky a couple of miles further north. The foothills at this point surged and dipped, the trail rough. He stopped his buckboard to allow the horses to rest at the top of the rise. 

The horses blew, their tails swishing at flies. He sat on the bench seat, gazing at the landscape spread out around him, not another living soul to see, but… his gaze paused on something in the near distance, maybe fifty yards away and down at the bottom of the swale. What was that? 

“Hold on, girls.” 

He shoved his boot against the brake handle, tied the reins around it, and hopped down from the buckboard, keeping his eyes on whatever that was. A decaying elk carcass? No. No buzzards circling in the sky.

He spied a maroon and gold carpet bag lying halfway down the hill on its side against a clump of sage. He frowned, looking around. He saw the barest hint of horseshoe tracks along the edge of the gully in the hard-packed dirt, but nothing else. The soil crunched softly under his boots as he warily approached. As he stepped closer, he slowed in dismay. 

An unconscious woman lay sprawled at the bottom of the gully. She wore a dark blue dress covered with dust and dirt, torn in several places. Long, honey-blonde hair spread out on the dirt beside her, and a splotch of blood marred the side of her head above her right ear. He didn’t see any signs of any other tracks around, neither animal nor human. 

He glanced back up at the slope. Had she been up there and been thrown from her horse? Or had she been riding out here at some point, gotten off her horse, and then it wandered away, leaving her on foot?

“What are you doing out here?” he asked out loud. He hurried to her side and crouched down, brushing the hair from her neck as he reached a hand toward it, fingers feeling for a pulse. He grunted in relief to find her alive. 

“Lady?” he said, gently touching her shoulder. “Lady, can you hear me?”

No answer. He glanced up the slope toward his buckboard and then back down at her. Was she badly injured? He certainly couldn’t leave her here. He was closer to his ranch now than he was to Livingston. He had no choice but to take her home and send one of his ranch hands into town for Doc Wilson. 

He heaved a sigh as he slid his hands beneath her, one arm under her knees, the other bracing her neck and upper shoulders. He lifted her up and into his arms. She was a petite thing and hardly seemed to weigh more than a sack of potatoes.

He turned and began to make his way up the slope, his thighs burning as he struggled with the limp woman in his arms. Her head rested against his shoulder, her breath warm on his neck. When he finally reached the top of the slope, breathing hard, his horses watching dispassionately, he eyed the bench seat of the buckboard, and then the back of the wagon.

He sighed. “I’m going to put you down for a minute.” He felt kind of foolish talking to an unconscious woman, but there was a chance she might able to hear him. He’d heard Doc Wilson say that one time.

“Even though a person is unconscious, they might be able to hear, even if they can’t respond. I encourage loved ones to speak to those near death and tell them what they need to hear.”

Well, he’d talked to Susannah, his voice whispering near her ear. He’d told her how much he loved her, that he would miss her every day of his life. He told her that he’d take care of Evie, that he’d never love anyone as much as he loved her.

Micah moved to the back of the buckboard and quickly re-situated some of the supplies to make enough space to put her back there without danger of her falling off. As he carefully lifted and settled her in the space he’d made, he looked around again. 

She was in the middle of nowhere, many miles from Livingston or any other town. The only thing that lay in the direction she had been heading was his ranch, a sprawling thirty-square-mile spread where he ran nearly nine hundred head of cattle, many of them grazing on open range land to the east and south. 

By the time he got to his ranch, it was after noon. As he pulled the buckboard into the yard, his foreman, Ezra Hollis, emerged from the corral, wiping his hands on a neckerchief that he shoved into his back pocket. He walked with a slight limp, courtesy of the war. He started to say something when Micah lifted a hand.

“I need you to send a hand into town and fetch the doc, Ezra.”

Ezra’s eyebrows rose. “You hurt?”

Micah leaped from the bench seat and moved toward the rear of the buckboard. “No, but she is.”

Ezra caught up with Micah as he once again slid his arms under the woman’s unconscious form.  

“Oh good Lord, where’d you find her? Is she hurt bad?”

“Found her about five miles back. She was just lying out there. Looks like she lost her horse. I don’t know how bad she’s hurt, which is why need someone to ride to town and get Doc.”

Ezra nodded and headed for the barn. “I’ll go.”

Micah didn’t turn around as he carried the unconscious woman toward the house. Before he was halfway across the yard, the door opened and Clementine Abernathy, his sixty-year-old cook, housekeeper, and unofficial member of the family, emerged. 

She was a no-nonsense woman with salt-and-pepper hair that she always wore in such a tight bun it looked uncomfortable. Nevertheless, she’d been with him for years and ran his household efficiently. The widow was part of the family now, living in a small clapboard house on the property a half-mile to the north.

“What in heaven’s name—”

“Found her on the trail,” Micah said. “Let’s get her onto a bed.”

Micah’s ranch house had three small bedrooms: one he had shared with Susannah, one a former nursery and now his daughter’s bedroom, and one tiny guest room barely big enough for a narrow bed, a bedside table, and a very small armoire. Once upon a time, he and Susannah had talked about making the bedrooms a little larger, especially in expectation of a larger family, but it had never happened. They’d run out of time.

He swept through the open doorway just as his daughter emerged from the kitchen, cookie hovering halfway to her mouth.

“Who is that?”

He heard the sound of hooves leaving the yard and hoped that Doc Wilson was available. He turned to his daughter. “I found her a few miles from here. I think she—” He bit off what he was going to say, that the woman might have fallen from her horse and gotten hurt. The same way her mother had been injured and died. “I’m not sure, but Ezra’s riding into town for the doc. Can you pull the covers back on the bed in the spare room?”

“But—”

“I need to put her down, Evie. Hurry, please.”

Evie slid her cookie into the pocket of her dress and hurried down the short hallway, opening the closed door on the left. She pushed it open and led the way inside the room, pulling down the covers on the narrow bed inside.

“Can you open the window, please?” He laid his bundle gently down on the bed and straightened.

Evie did as instructed and then turned toward the unconscious woman. “What’s the matter with her?”

Micah glanced at his daughter and saw her worried gaze. “I don’t know. She was unconscious when I found her. That’s why I sent Ezra for the doc.”

“Is she going to die?”

“Now, enough of that,” Clementine announced, following them into the room. She gazed at the woman with a frown of concern before turning to Evie. “Would you please bring me a basin of cool water?”

Evie gave one last glance at the injured woman and left the room. Micah glanced over Clementine’s shoulder and lowered his voice. 

“Looks like she got thrown by her horse or else she dismounted and the horse ran off.”

He felt her eyes on him, his thoughts somber, remembering how Susannah had died. Before he could say anything, Evie returned, balancing a sloshing enamel basin half-filled with water, a square of linen floating inside. Clementine reached for it.

“Thank you, Evie, now you and your Pa skedaddle and let me take care of her until Doc arrives.”

Micah turned to leave although Evie didn’t move, staring at the woman. “Is she going to die like Mama?”

 

Clementine frowned. “Not if I have anything to say about it. Now scoot!”