Chapter 1 #2
Anita nodded. “Oh yes. I was raised on one in Wisconsin. I hope to be as successful as my folks’ farm has been. We won Best Cheese in the county five years running.”
“You don’t say?” Clara asked. “Well, that explains the book.”
Anita frowned.
“The one I found for you,” Cleo said. “I thought it was a romance novel initially. That was before I spotted the title. I think all books should be romances,” she added in a confidential tone.
“Do you like romances?” Anita asked her. She had always found it easier to speak to children than adults.
Cleo smiled and nodded vehemently. “I love them.”
“But she doesn’t get to read too many of them,” her mother said sternly. “Because her father thinks reading that sort of thing will rot her brain.”
“It won’t; he’s just being a dull man,” Cleo said with a little sneer in her voice.
“Cleo!”
“Yes, Mother, I know,” Cleo said.
She looked to be about thirteen or fourteen years old, and she certainly behaved like someone approaching adulthood.
“So, this Kevin, is he ruggedly handsome?” Cleo asked after a short silence.
Anita shrugged. “I don’t know,” she said, keeping one eye on her valise and trunk beside the bench. They were wedged between the bench and the ticket office and so weren’t going anywhere, but still. “In his letter, he said he had a full beard and would be wearing a green woolen hat.”
“Oh?” Cleo said. “That sounds promising. Well, hopefully he’s handsome and kind, and you will swoon into his arms?—”
“Cleo, that is quite enough!” Clara cut in with a roll of her eyes.
She shook her head. “I think I need to get her back to the inn. She has work to do, as do I.” She rose and turned to face Anita.
“If your fellow doesn’t show, please come and find us.
” Clara pressed a small card into Anita’s hand.
“You can stay with us. We run the local inn; it’s called the Lucky Bull. You can’t miss it.”
“Thanks,” Anita said and smiled. She was starting to feel better. “You’re so kind.”
“Well, good luck,” Clara said.
“Yes, I hope you fall madly in love,” Cleo said. “When you first see him, remember to give him a coy little smile. That’s how they do it in the books. Act shy at first. Later on you can be more forwa—Maaaaa!”
Her mother took her protesting daughter by the arm and marched her to the exit of the train station.
Left alone on her bench, Anita, who had no need to act shy, watched the people coming and going.
The train looked ready to leave. It was starting to chuff and belch steam again.
After a minute or two, it huffed, gave a shrill whistle, and was off again.
She watched it go, imagining all the people on board who were off on assorted adventures.
Maybe someone was even heading east to get married to a complete stranger.
Then again, Kevin wasn’t totally a stranger, she reminded herself.
They’d exchanged letters long enough that she felt she had a good feel for who he was as a fellow Christian and human being overall.
She wouldn’t have agreed to his proposal if not.
He seemed intelligent, kind, and like a man of faith.
Shortly thereafter, a knot of men entered the station. One was clearly the sheriff. He had a star on his hat and on his lapel and both shone. There were two young boys with him and another man. That man wore a green woolen hat.
Anita’s heart stopped. He had dark brown shaggy hair sticking out of the bottom of the hat and a full beard. He looked rather like a bear—a friendly one, she hoped.
They came right toward her, and dangling from the sheriff’s hand was Anita’s handbag.
“Hello, ma’am,” the sheriff said, coming up to her. “I understand that you were robbed this morning.”
“That is correct, Sheriff,” she said.
“I’m a deputy, actually,” the man said with a smile. “Anyhow, we didn’t manage to catch the culprit, but it appears the chase was too much for him and he gave up the pilfered goods before vanishing. Is this your handbag?”
“Yes, that is mine.” Anita took the bag and checked it. Thank you, God! Yes, there were the pictures of her family and her diary. She checked a little more thoroughly and found the bank book as well.
“It’s all here,” she said with a sigh of relief and another prayer of thanks to the Lord. “Thank you so much.”
“No need to thank me for doing my job,” the deputy said. “It seems we may have intercepted a gang of thieves. These two boys—” he shook his captives as he spoke, “may be able to provide information on who they’re stealing for. They’ll be spending the night in the cells.”
“Oh?” Anita asked. “Shouldn’t they be given to their parents?”
“What parents?” one boy asked sullenly. “I’m taking care of myself. I’m an independent operator?—”
“Yes, yes, you’re big and brave,” the deputy said. “Come on, apologize.”
The boy, who was dirty and scrawny, glared at Anita and then mumbled something that might have been sorry.
“It’s okay,” she said, feeling pity for the two wayward children.
She was certain the silent boy on the sheriff’s left arm was a brother to the more vocal of the two.
They looked very alike, with thin, freckled faces and wild red hair.
If they had no parents to guide them, no wonder they’d fallen into a life of crime.
They departed, leaving the man in the green hat behind.
He smiled at her. His dark eyes seemed kind. “Are you Anita Nordling?”
She nodded. “And you’re Kevin Munson?”
He nodded.
For a moment they stared at each other.
Anita really liked the look of him. He was handsome in a rough kind of way. He could do with a haircut, but other than that, she liked the way he smiled at her.
“It’s lovely to meet you,” he said at last, rather awkwardly. “I’m so glad you arrived safely. I’m terribly sorry for the poor impression you may have received of the west in your first few minutes here.”
“Actually, I’m impressed by the kindness I was shown,” she replied.
“It was a shock at first, yes, but so many people tried to help me. I’m honestly not sure that many folks would have come to my rescue back home.
So … I’m glad to be here. Truly. And I, uh, I’m very glad to finally meet you in person.
” Where she’d gathered the boldness to say the last few words, she wasn’t sure, but she blushed immediately to the soles of her feet.
To her surprised delight, Kevin blushed too. “I’m just as glad to meet you. I’m glad you weren’t put off by that incident. Hopefully the sheriff will find a way to help those boys out. It’s no life for a boy on the streets, whether west or east.”
She’d been right about the tone of his letters. He was kind. Anita smiled.
“Should we go?” he asked after another awkward silence. “The cart is just out front.”
“Yes, please,” she agreed.
They both went to get her luggage at the same time and got in each other’s way.
Anita giggled nervously as she bumped into him, and he knocked her valise over.
Thankfully, this time it didn’t pop open, and all her things remained inside it.
What she would have done if her fiancé laid eyes on her unmentionables before they’d so much as even exchanged a chaste kiss … She shuddered at the thought.
“Um … Should I take the valise?” she asked.
“If you want to,” he said. “I can manage both.”
“Oh, no, that’s not necessary,” she said with a smile. “I can carry it.”
They agreed to him trundling the trunk and her carrying the valise, and they set off for the exit.
The cart was right there on the street, and Kevin had no trouble loading her belongings into the back. She watched discreetly as he heaved the heavy trunk upward and thought to herself, My, he’s strong!
There were sacks of provisions and baskets of things already in the cart.
“I had to do some shopping,” he said. “The town is coming along, but we don’t have a general store yet, so …”
She noticed a lot of building supplies in the back of the cart. “Have you finished building your house? In your letters, you said it was almost done.”
“Oh, yes,” Kevin said with a smile. “It’ll be our house though, you know.”
She beamed, taken by surprise at the shy sincerity in his words.
“I hope you like it. I added in the big windows in the parlor like you suggested.” He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand and flushed slightly.
“There’s an inn you could stay at in town, but …
Well, do you think we should just go ahead and get married today?
There’s a chapel on the way back home …” He let the question hang in the air.
Anita considered it. As proposals went, it really wasn’t one.
He’d already asked on paper. She knew that she was going to marry Kevin—that was the point of coming out here.
That and the dairy farm. So, why wait? Why put it off?
It certainly wouldn’t be proper for her to live with him otherwise.
Not even in a house she’d helped plan, albeit from a distance.
“Okay,” she said, squaring her shoulders and smiling. “Let’s do it.” It was the bravest, boldest thing she had ever done, apart from getting on the train to Texas. It filled her with a frisson of excitement at the sheer adventure of it all!