Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
The telegraph boy looked like he’d run all the way from the depot. He stood in the doorway, his cheeks flushed from the cold, his cap askew. “Urgent telegram for the Sisters’ Mail-Order Bride Company!” he announced, just in case anyone had missed it the first time.
Augusta flinched. “Oh no. Not another one.” She hurried forward, snatched the slip from his hand, and unfolded it with trembling fingers. Margaret and Josie closed in on either side of her, reading over her shoulder.
Braxton stood and watched from the table where he and Phoebe were working. Phoebe stayed seated, her eyes on the messenger boy. George lay under the desk like an attentive rug, ears pricked. But he didn’t bother getting up.
Augusta’s face drained of color. “Oh,” she breathed. “Oh, dear heavens.”
“What?” Josie gasped. “What is it?”
Margaret plucked the telegram from her sister’s hand and read aloud.
“It’s from Mr. Henderson in Cotton Ridge.
” She looked at Braxton and Phoebe. “We were sending both Mr. Joseph Henderson and his brother Darrel Henderson a bride. One lives near Silver Falls, and he’s friends with Robert Newman of Cotton Ridge.
” She plastered on a smile then returned her attention to the telegraph message.
“No bride arrived. Stop. Groom in Silver Falls has no bride. Stop. Please advise immediately. Stop.” She heaved a sigh. “Can you see the confusion?”
Silence fell for a heartbeat. Then the sisters all started at once. This was worse than Braxton first thought.
“We’ve stranded a bride in a strange city!” Augusta cried. “But where?”
“Good grief, what if she’s somewhere in the mountains!” Margaret added. “Didn’t we send a bride off to Nevada City? Isn’t that in the Sierra Nevada?”
“Her groom is in Silver Falls with nothing but an empty platform!” Josie wailed. “Oh, wait, or is it Cotton Ridge?”
George whined and crawled deeper under the table.
Braxton stepped forward. “All right,” he said, keeping his voice even. “Panickin’ ain’t gonna bring anyone to the right place. Let’s see the names.”
Augusta thrust the telegram at him. “It doesn’t list them. It just says bride and grooms and—oh, it’s a catastrophe!”
Phoebe rose from her chair, skirts rustling, and joined them. “We have the master list,” she said. “We can trace it. If we go carefully.”
Her calm steadied him more than he wanted to admit. “Get it,” Braxton said.
She returned to the table, picked up the ledger and brought it to the nearest desk. There she spread it open. Her neat script filled the pages, each bride and groom recorded with more order than the office had seen in weeks.
He looked down at the list, then at her. Something in his chest eased. “Start from Silver Falls,” he said.
Phoebe ran her finger down the column. “Silver Falls… here. Groom: Darrel Henderson. Bride: Miss Beatrice Greeley.” She squinted at a row. “Eight-seven-two and eight-seven-three.”
“And Miss Greeley was sent to?” Braxton asked.
“Silver Falls,” Margaret said. “I’m almost entirely certain.”
Josie made a small noise. “Almost… entirely?”
Augusta let out a huff. “Look at the St. Louis column.”
Phoebe flipped a page. “St. Louis. Groom: Mr. Henry Cummings. Bride: Miss Lydia Marsh. Eight-seven-two and eight-seven-three.” She stopped. “Oh.”
“Ohhhh,” Margaret echoed.
Braxton frowned. “Those are the same numbers you just read.”
“Yes,” Phoebe said slowly. “They are.”
“So, somebody,” he said, looking at the sisters. “Wrote the same numbers down twice for two different towns.”
Margaret winced. “In our defense, the ink was smudged.”
Josie pressed her hands over her mouth. “We’ve created a traveling circus of brides.”
George put his paws over his nose as if he agreed.
Phoebe scanned the list again, brow furrowing. “If Miss Greeley went to St. Louis, then the bride actually meant for St. Louis…”
“…went to Silver Falls,” Braxton finished.
“And the Silver Falls groom is standing there waiting for Miss Greeley,” Phoebe said. “While Miss Greeley is in St. Louis with no clue.”
Augusta clutched her heart. “We are going to be sued.”
Braxton shook his head. “Not if we fix it fast.” He tapped the telegram. “We’ve got two brides in the wrong town, one groom waitin’ in the right town, another that probably hasn’t figured things out yet, and a telegraph office wondering if we’ve gone mad. That sound about right?”
“Yes,” Phoebe said.
“Then we tell ‘em what to do.” He looked toward the messenger boy, who was still hovering by the door. “You in a rush to go anywhere else?”
The boy shook his head quickly. “No, sir.”
“Good.” Braxton turned back to the desk. “We’re gonna need three answers. One for St. Louis, one for Silver Falls, and one for Cotton Ridge.” He turned to Phoebe. “Write this down.” Braxton dictated, words coming as if he were home directing his ranch hands.
“To Mr. Henry Cummings of St. Louis. Bride for Silver Falls arrived St. Louis by error. Stop. Keep her safe. Stop. Put her on next train to Silver Falls. Stop. Charge our account. Stop.
He thought about a young woman in a strange city with possibly no money. He looked at Phoebe. “Add, please ensure bride is given safe lodging and food until train departure. Stop. Will reimburse funds.”
He paced. “Now to Mr. Henderson in Silver Falls. Tell him…”
Augusta gasped. “We must be gentle. He’s probably furious.”
Braxton snorted. “I’d be furious too, if I were him. But I’d rather be told the truth than left wonderin’.”
Phoebe nodded, pen poised. “Go on.”
“Bride for Silver Falls arrived St. Louis by error. Keep bride meant for St. Louis safe. Stop. Put her on next train to St. Louise. Stop. Charge our account. Stop.”
Phoebe added, “Deepest apologies. Stop. Will send longer letter by post. Stop.”
Braxton glanced sideways at her. “Always polishing my words, aren’t you?”
Her mouth curved. “Someone has to.”
He ignored the way his chest warmed at that. Braxton rattled off instructions for Mr. Joseph Henderson and that his bride was… delayed. They still had to figure out where she wound up. Nevada City?
Augusta sagged into a chair. “What a mess. Are we sure it’s all fixable?”
“It will be,” Josie said. “Once we stop sending people to the wrong cities. And that can only happen if we fill out our own forms correctly. Our brides are trusting that we know what we’re doing. Unfortunately, we haven’t done a very good job of it since Val left.”
Margaret dabbed her eyes. “She was so capable and efficient. How are we going to survive until she gets back?”
August smiled at Phoebe. “By hiring a temporary assistant. Phoebe Hale. Let’s face it, she’s efficient, well organized, and lives here.”
Phoebe ignored the praise. She blotted the words, folded each message neatly, and handed them to the messenger boy. “Please see that these go through as quickly as possible.”
“Yes, miss.” He stuffed the slips into his cap with great seriousness. “I’ll run.” The door closed behind him. Phoebe heaved a sigh of relief and returned to the desk and sat.
Braxton’s hands were braced on the desk. He straightened slowly, easing back before he did something foolish like cover her hand with his. “You’re… going to work here?”
Phoebe smiled at him. “I have to do something to earn money.” She blushed a deep red, her next words a whisper. “I can’t expect you to… well, do what you did for me again.”
He smiled back and lowered his voice. “I would, you know.”
She met his gaze and swallowed hard. “I don’t know how I’m going to repay you…”
He held up a hand. “You’re not.”
“Do you think it will be enough?” Augusta said, eyes still on the office door.
“It’ll be a start,” Braxton said. “We can’t fetch them ourselves, but we can give the folks in those towns’ clear directions. That’s more than we’ve been doin’ so far.”
Phoebe closed the ledger. “And we can write proper letters tonight. Explain everything, and offer what we can.”
Margaret sniffled. “We don’t deserve you two.”
Josie stepped closer, studying them both. “Look how well you work together.”
Augusta’s eyes shone. “You’re like a disaster committee.”
“Like a marriage already,” Josie said then snapped her mouth shut.
Phoebe jolted. “Oh, we’re not…”
“We only meant,” Augusta cut in. “That you make an excellent team. We’re grateful. Truly.”
Braxton watched as red crept up Phoebe’s neck. She didn’t look at him and. instead, reached for a stray envelope and dusted off imaginary crumbs.
Braxton cleared his throat. “When I came to Chicago, I thought this whole get myself a wife business would be simple.”
Phoebe glanced up.
Braxton kept his eyes on the ledger. “I figured I’d pay the fee, read a few letters, pick a sensible bride from a stack of papers, and take her home before the snow got too bad.”
Augusta made an apologetic noise.
“I didn’t bargain on a dog causing such a ruckus, a snow storm, and brides goin’ to the wrong cities,” he added, mouth twisting wryly.
Phoebe’s lips curved. “Nor did I.”
He looked at her. Really looked. “What did you expect?”
Phoebe swallowed, fingers curling in George’s fur. “I thought I would fill out a form,” she said quietly. “Answer a few questions. And the sisters would hand me a respectable, steady husband who never raised his voice. A grocer, perhaps. Or an accountant. Maybe even a preacher.”
“You wanted a quiet life,” he said.
“I wanted… a safe one,” she admitted. “Predictable. Boring, even.” She glanced at the sisters, then back at him. “It seems I was chasing an idea, not a man.”
He considered that for a moment. “You still want that? A safe, predictable life with a man who ain’t never had dirt under his nails?”
Her gaze lingered on him, his workworn hands, the faint ink smudge on his jaw, his steadiness that hadn’t wavered once while everyone else was falling apart. It was one of the things his family loved about him.
“No,” she said, very softly. “I don’t think I do.”
The room seemed to tighten around them.
“I used to think I wanted a woman who looked good standing beside me while I talked to the bank.”
Phoebe’s throat went dry. “And now?”
He held her gaze. “Now I think I want someone who fits in the mess that seems to be my life.”
She searched his eyes, but he wasn’t sure what she was looking for. “You deserve someone who understands your life,” she said. “The land, work. Your family.”
“Maybe I already found someone who understands more than I gave her credit for,” he said.
She blushed and looked down, suddenly fascinated by George’s ears.
Margaret clapped her hands softly. “Well. That settles it.”
Phoebe blinked. “Settles… what?”
“That you two are in charge of disasters from now on,” Margaret said. “We clearly can’t be trusted.”
Augusta nodded. “Yes. From this moment, any telegram, or tangled file goes through your hands first.”
Josie sniffed. “We’ll stick to tea and biscuits.”
Braxton huffed a laugh. “Reckon we can manage that.”
“We’ll do our best,” Phoebe said with a smile. “But what are you going to do if both of us are gone before your assistant returns from Wild Rose Ridge?”
“Don’t you worry about that,” Augusta said.
“The way things are going, we might not find what the two of you need until after Christmas.” She turned to Braxton.
“We wouldn’t blame you if you left for home before then, Mr. Jones.
” She gave them a parting nod. “I’m going to make some tea. Sisters, come along and help me.”
The three drifted toward the back room, arguing quietly about whose teapot had the fewer chips. George yawned and flopped onto his side, rolling until his back rested against Braxton’s boots and his paws touched Phoebe’s skirt.
Braxton watched Phoebe as she reopened the ledger, carefully drawing a line beneath the latest entries. She wrote the words “Silver Falls / St. Louis. Resolution in progress” with steady strokes.
She’d come here alone, desperate, clinging to the promise of a faceless, sensible husband. Now she sat in the middle of chaos, ink on her cuff, dog hair on her hem, quietly putting the world back in order.
Braxton felt something in his chest settle. There might not be a perfect match written in some misfiled packet, or some letter tucked into a ledger book. The sisters’ promises had crumbled like stale biscuits. But there was this woman. In this office. In this mess.
Maybe he didn’t need a name on a form. Could it be, he just needed her?
But Braxton wasn’t ready to say it aloud. Not yet. But for the first time since arriving in Chicago, he knew exactly what he wanted. And it wasn’t a bride on paper.
It was a partner in the middle of a storm.