The Mistaken Mail Order Bride Read online

  “What kind?”

  “Any kind.”

  “We have some with a bit of apples in them.”

  “May I give one to Caleb?”

  With a nod, Phoebe went over to the cookie jar and took out a couple. “You can have the rest. We didn’t have many left, and Ma and I were thinking of making more.”

  “Thank you.”

  Caroline was sure Phoebe was wondering why she asked for cookies, but she didn’t know how to explain it to Phoebe. Something gnawing in Caroline’s gut told her the cookies represented something important.

  When the Union soldiers came to her home, she hadn’t acted on instinct. She and her mother should have hidden right away. She hadn’t believed gentlemen would harm a lady, even if they were on warring sides, but they came with the intent of harming her. When her mother tried to stop them, they killed her. Had it not been for Bee’s adult sons chasing the Union soldiers off, Caroline knew she’d be dead right now.

  So this was one time when she was going to listen to her gut instinct. She approached Caleb and waited for Phoebe’s mother to stop talking before she showed him the cookies. “Would you like a cookie?” she asked him.

  Caleb’s gaze went to the cookies, and for a moment, Caroline thought he wouldn’t take one. But then he scooted off the couch and accepted one. He took a bite and then took the other two before he returned to the couch, settling next to Phoebe’s mother.

  Huh. Well, that was a curious thing. He didn’t seem to have any trouble with cookies. He hadn’t even asked what kind they were, so he obviously wasn’t picky about which ones he ate.

  “I’m afraid the poor boy won’t have much of an appetite tonight,” Phoebe’s mother said, chuckling as she patted his back. “Though you are a growing boy. I remember my son had these spurts where he’d eat everything he could get his hands on. It was hard to keep up with him. Thankfully, Phoebe was a girl. Girls don’t eat nearly as much.”

  Phoebe grinned and came over to them. “Caroline, my brother still lives back in Ohio. He has a family of his own now.”

  “Yes,” Phoebe’s mother added, a wistful tone in her voice. “Children grow up so fast. We have to enjoy them while they’re still young.” Again, she patted Caleb’s back.

  Caroline watched as Caleb ate the second cookie without any hesitation on his part. What was it about Ida’s cookies that bothered him?

  “Would you like to see the property?” Phoebe asked Caroline and Caleb.

  “I would,” Caroline replied. She’d only seen the barn and garden next to it on her way in, but she was curious about the rest of the place. “Caleb, would you like to come along while Phoebe shows me around?”

  Caleb nodded, slid off the couch without dropping the cookies, and went over to them.

  “You want to come, Ma?” Phoebe asked.

  “No. I’ll let you two take him. I think I’ll get started on another batch of cookies. Seeing as how much Caleb likes them, I want to send you home with some,” she told Caroline.

  “Oh, you don’t have to go through the trouble,” Caroline said. “You’ve already given us so much.”

  “I’m happy to do it,” her mother insisted.

  “She is,” Phoebe assured Caroline. “She misses cooking for her grandchildren.”

  “Speaking of cooking,” Caroline began, figuring this was a good time to make her request, “I was wondering if either of you would be willing to teach me how to make meals.” Her face warmed at having to admit her inadequacies, but she had to if she ever wanted to be the kind of wife Eric deserved. “I grew up on a plantation where slaves did it for me. I also don’t have any idea how to make clothes, so if you wouldn’t mind lending me a hand in that area as well, I’d be ever so grateful.”

  “Of course, we’d love to teach you what we know,” Phoebe replied.

  “We sure would,” her mother added. “If anything, it’d give us an excuse to have you over more often.”

  Caroline relaxed. “I’ll have to pay you back for your kindness.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Phoebe said. “We’re just happy Eric got a good wife. Even if it wasn’t the one he was expecting, it seems to have worked out wonderfully, and after all he’s done for us, it’d be our way of thanking him.”

  Touched, Caroline smiled. “Thank you.”

  Caroline had missed her friends as they left one by one to seek their futures as mail-order brides. There were some things a lady could only share with another lady. While she was thrilled to be with Eric, she was glad he’d introduced her to Phoebe. She had a feeling they would become good friends in the years to come. Again, she was thankful to Bee for encouraging her to take a chance on the unknown by answering a mail-order bride ad.

  Chapter Eleven

  It wasn’t until the next day that Eric noticed people were looking at him different than they usually did. He became aware of it when he left the jailhouse to go to a man’s house to intervene on behalf of a squabble he was having with his neighbor.

  Halfway to the house, he came across Mike and Jerry, who were having another one of their arguments.

  “All your wife does is cause trouble,” Jerry told Mike. “If it was me, I’d tie her to a chair and forbid her to leave the house.”

  “I don’t appreciate you talking about Ida that way,” Mike replied, crossing his arms. “She happens to be curious, that’s all.”

  “Curious? She’s downright nosy. She has no right butting her nose into other people’s lives. Who cares how people want to live? That’s up to them. We have no right to pass judgment on them. Your wife is worse than a snake in the Garden of Eden.”

  Mike gasped. “Oh yeah? At least my wife doesn’t sound like a flock of ailing geese when she laughs.”

  “Her laugh isn’t that bad.”

  “No? Then why do my children want to know if there’s a wounded animal whenever she cackles?”

  Jerry let out a huff. “If you weren’t my brother, I’d punch you out for that.”

  “Oh? Just like I should be punching you for comparing my wife to the devil?”

  It was at this point Eric passed them, and it was then that the two grew abnormally quiet. Eric slowed his steps and glanced their way. Both men quickly looked away from him. Before Eric could ask them what was wrong, they hurried off in opposite directions.

  That was odd enough as it was because those two had never stopped arguing just because he was around.

  But then when he was settling the dispute between the two neighbors who couldn’t agree on where one’s property ended and the other’s began, a group of kids were passing by, and the kids stopped to stare at Eric.

  Eric stopped talking to the men and looked over at them.

  One of the boys whispered to his companions. The children all giggled and then hurried off.

  Then, as Eric was heading back to the jailhouse, he happened to pass Hank and his friend as they sat outside the general store. Since he was coming up behind them, they didn’t see him coming, and had it not been for the fact that both men were over sixty and had bad hearing, they might not have said as much as they did. But when Eric heard Hank say his name, he slowed his steps and listened to them.

  “If it was me,” Hank was telling his friend, “I’d set my wife straight. A woman’s job is to take care of the man. Eric needs to put his foot down and demand she do her part.”

  “Come on,” his friend replied. “She just got here. You can’t expect her to do everything all at once.”

  “Sure I can. Every woman needs to know the basics. It’s her duty. She wasn’t raised right. I don’t know what’s wrong with the younger generation. They don’t understand the correct order of things. The day a woman can dictate what a man does is the day we’re doomed as a country.”

  “Marriage is more complicated than that,” his friend replied. “But you wouldn’t know that since you never married.”

  Eric stepped in front of them. They gasped, and Hank put his hand over his heart. “Goodness, She
riff. You’re going to give an old man a heart attack.”

  “Yeah,” his friend agreed. “Why did you sneak up on us like that?”

  “I think a better question is why you’re talking about me and my wife,” Eric said. “What do you mean about me needing to put my foot down?”

  Hank’s face went bright red, and he bolted to his feet, a surprising feat for a man who claimed to have all sorts of strange illnesses Eric had never heard of. “I just remembered something I got to do.”

  “Me, too,” his friend said, unable to get up as fast as Hank had, though it wasn’t from lack of trying.

  “Oh no you don’t,” Eric protested, jumping in front of them as they turned to head off down the road. “This involves me and my wife, and because of that, I have a right to know.”

  “If you want to know, then go ask Ida. She’s the one who’s been spreading the rumors,” Hank’s friend said.

  “Rumors? What rumors?” Eric asked.

  Hank pointed at him. “That’s what you’re supposed to ask her.”

  “Why do that when I can ask you both?” Eric demanded while they went around him.

  “We don’t have time to talk, Sheriff,” Hank called out as they shuffled down the road as fast as their age allowed.

  Eric had no trouble keeping up with them. “Make time.”

  “We haven’t done anything wrong,” Hank replied. “Talking isn’t a crime. We have a right to express our opinions.”

  “Freedom of speech,” his friend agreed. “It’s in the Constitution.”

  “And I have the freedom to hear it,” Eric argued.

  “Sorry, Sheriff, but we have a right to privacy, too,” Hank replied.

  “This isn’t right, and you know it,” Eric snapped. “If someone’s going to say something bad about a man and his wife, that man should know about it.”

  “Oh, Sheriff, you sure are naïve about the way the world works,” Hank said.

  Eric couldn’t be sure, but he thought he detected a chuckle in Hank’s voice. He stopped following them. They weren’t going to give him an honest answer, and because of that, it was pointless to waste his time. But he could leverage his position in this town.

  “Next time either of you need my assistance because one of the children are too loud when they’re playing, don’t come to me,” Eric called out after them. “You’ll just have to deal with it!”

  Unfortunately, he didn’t get the satisfaction of having either man respond to his threat. Gritting his teeth, Eric headed on home. Maybe Caroline knew what was going on.

  ***

  As it turned out, Caroline was blissfully unaware of everything as she and Caleb made their way to the post office. Eric had told her it was located in the general store. “Once you get into the store, go to the left,” Eric had instructed. “You’ll need to go past the fabrics, but you can’t miss it.” So she had no trouble finding the little alcove inside the store.

  A gentleman came over to her. “Do you have something you need to mail out?”

  “Yes, sir,” she said.

  She showed him two envelopes. One contained a missive to Bee, updating her on how everything was going. Bee couldn’t read, but one of her sons could, and he’d read the missive to her. The other envelope contained the missive she’d written to Charles Dunwick explaining why she hadn’t made it to Georgetown. Hopefully, he’d understand. At the very least, he’d know she wasn’t coming and could post for another mail-order bride.

  “The stagecoach will be here in two days,” he said.

  “That’ll be fine,” she replied.

  “Do you have the money to pay for this, or should I bill your husband?”

  “Do you know who my husband is?”

  The corners of his lips turned up into a smile. “Ma’am, around here, everyone knows everything about everyone. And if you don’t, they will soon enough. You’re Sheriff Johnson’s mistaken mail-order bride.”

  Was that what people were calling her? She returned his smile, though she wasn’t sure how she felt about being called a mistaken mail-order bride. Yes, coming here had been a mistake, but she didn’t know if she’d refer to the marriage itself as a mistake. Forcing a polite good-bye, she led Caleb out of the general store.

  As they headed toward their home, she came across a group of ladies. They all turned their gazes to her, so she offered a polite greeting. One lady scanned her up and down as if she found something wrong with her. Caroline’s steps slowed, but the ladies all turned back to each other and hurried away from her. Only one glanced back, and when she did, she shook her head in disapproval.

  Caroline frowned. What was that about?

  Caleb wrapped his hand around hers, drawing her attention to him. She wasn’t sure, but she thought she detected sympathy in his eyes. What a curious thing. For a child, he seemed to pick up on much more than a lot of adults did.

  “All I know is that I couldn’t be married to her,” came a gentleman’s voice. “I can’t help but feel bad for the sheriff.”

  She turned her head in the direction where he’d spoken and saw he was coming out of the boot repair shop, a gentleman following behind. She urged Caleb into the doorway of the next shop and hid from the two gentlemen.

  “Maybe the sheriff didn’t have a choice,” the other gentleman said.

  “Oh, he had a choice,” the first gentleman replied. “He should have waited for the right woman to come in. I mean, Caroline doesn’t know how to do anything. She sits around all day and lets him wait on her hand and foot. Ida said she won’t even take the time to learn how to do the things a wife ought to do, like she’s better than everyone else.”

  “That’s how those people are from plantations. They had slaves, you know. They think everyone exists to serve them.”

  “Well, she’s useless out here, and what’s worse, she brought that bastard kid with her. Like we need another bastard in this town.”

  The two gentlemen passed by, and thankfully, they didn’t look in her or Caleb’s direction.

  “She’s made a fool of the sheriff,” the first one said.

  “I don’t know whether to feel sorry for him or not,” the second one replied. “I mean, he comes off as knowing what he’s doing. Maybe he wants this.”

  “Or maybe he feels bound to help her. She’s not all that smart if she got off in the wrong town. It wouldn’t be so bad if she was better looking. At least then Eric would have a reason to want to do everything for her.”

  From there, they turned down another road, so she was free to step out into the road. She made sure no one else was nearby before she urged Caleb to head on home with her. It wasn’t far away, but it seemed to take forever to reach the small cabin that had become the only sanctuary in the entire town.

  When they finally got there, she opened the door and let Caleb in before she slipped into the home. She glanced out the window to see if anyone had seen them. This was foolish. It didn’t matter if anyone saw them or not. They’d still be talking about her in the most unflattering way possible.

  She didn’t understand it. She’d thought her visit with Ida Conner had been a good one. What had she said or done to upset the lady?

  She ran through the conversation they’d shared, and she couldn’t think of a single thing she’d done wrong. She’d behaved properly, doing everything her parents would have instructed her to do. So why did Ida find it necessary to spread such horrible rumors about her?

  “Caroline?” Caleb softly asked.

  Turning her gaze from the window, she was surprised to see Caleb standing next to her, looking up at her with compassion in his eyes.

  It was then the tears came. She quickly moved away from the window, in case anyone saw her—and knew they could hurt her with their words. Under no circumstance would she allow them to see her break down and cry.

  “People only have power over you if they can see they can get to you,” is what Bee had said.

  And the last thing Caroline was going to do was let them
get power over her.

  But that didn’t mean the words didn’t sting. She collapsed on the couch and placed her face in her hands. She’d been raised a lady. She was going to have to act like she hadn’t heard anything. That was the only way she was going to be able to face those people. Otherwise, she’d have to hide in this cabin for the rest of her life, and she knew that wasn’t an option.

  She felt a hand touch her shoulder. Not wishing for Caleb to see her cry, she took a couple deep breaths to hold her tears at bay. She had to think of him. Whatever happened to her, it didn’t matter. She needed to be strong for him.

  When she trusted herself to remain calm, she looked up from her hands, once again surprised that someone so young should seem older than his years.

  “Ida’s not nice,” Caleb said.

  Her eyebrows furrowed. Caleb had said so little up to now she hadn’t expected him to say something like this. She thought maybe when he felt comfortable with her, he’d tell her something about his past. But instead, he’d chosen this time to speak up.

  Then she recalled the day Ida came over and how Caleb wouldn’t eat one of her cookies. “Caleb,” she began, “did you know Ida was bad when she was here?”

  He nodded.

  “How?” she asked. Because she’d believed Ida was nice. Nothing had warned her to be wary of her.

  “Don’t know,” he said. “Just did.”

  “What about Abe and Phoebe? What did you think of them?”

  “They’re nice.”

  He’d had no trouble eating Phoebe’s cookies, she recalled. “Well, you have a wonderful gift,” she told him. “I wish I knew who I could trust. It’d make life a lot easier.”

  “You’re nice,” Caleb said. “Eric’s nice, too.”

  This time when her eyes brimmed with tears, it was for a pleasant reason. She wrapped him in her arms and gave him a long hug. Usually, he wouldn’t hug her back, but today, he put his arms around her and returned her hug.

  “You’re such a sweet boy,” she whispered. “Eric and I will do everything we can to give you a good life. I promise.”