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BRIDES IN THE SKY
BRIDES IN THE SKY
STORIES AND A NOVELLA
CARY HOLLADAY
Swallow Press / Ohio University Press
Athens
Swallow Press
An imprint of Ohio University Press, Athens, Ohio 45701
© 2019 by Cary Holladay
All rights reserved
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The stories below have been previously published in slightly different form.
“Brides in the Sky” and “Operator,” The Hudson Review
“Shades,” Epoch
“Comanche Queen,” The Cincinnati Review
“Interview with Etta Place, Sweetheart of the Sundance Kid,” Freight Stories
“Ghost Walk,” Philadelphia Noir
“Hay Season,” Great Jones Street
Portions of “A Thousand Stings” have been published as stand-alone stories: “A Thousand Stings,” Shenandoah; “Summer of Love,” Epoch; and “The Best Party Ever,” Oxford American. “A Thousand Stings” received the Goodheart Prize for Fiction, awarded by Shenandoah.
Although several real-life figures appear in these stories—including Cynthia Ann Parker, her family members, and the Texas Rangers Sullivan Ross and Tom Kelliher in “Comanche Queen,” and Etta Place and Harry Longabaugh in “Interview with Etta Place, Sweetheart of the Sundance Kid”—their portrayals are entirely fictitious. All of the characters, events, and situations in these stories are the product of the author’s imagination.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Holladay, Cary C., date. author.
Title: Brides in the sky : stories and a novella / Cary Holladay.
Description: Athens : Swallow Press, 2019.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018043052| ISBN 9780804012034 (hardback) | ISBN 9780804012041 (pb) | ISBN 9780804040938 (pdf)
Subjects: | BISAC: FICTION / Short Stories (single author). | FICTION / General.
Classification: LCC PS3558.O347777 A6 2019 | DDC 813/.54--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018043052
In remembrance of my mother Catharine Gardner Mitchell Holladay 1925–1994 the first writer I knew. Mama, the bells of your memory were always ringing.
Contents
Interview with Etta Place, Sweetheart of the Sundance Kid
Brides in the Sky
IN MARCH 1854, KATE and Olivia Christopher lost their parents to illness and inherited the family farm in Augusta County, Virginia. At one time, there were over a hundred acres, but whenever the Christophers needed money, they’d sold land to a neighbor, Mr. Cole. About thirty acres were left, much of it steep and rocky.
They couldn’t get the winter out of their lungs, was how Kate thought of her parents’ deaths. The shock of losing them left her unable to cry.
In the burying ground, a light snow was falling.
Mr. Cole approached the sisters. He wore a long black coat. Up close, with his round cheeks, he looked younger than Kate had thought he was. A breeze spun his hat away. He ran to retrieve it and smiled at her.
“If you want to sell,” he said, “I’ll buy.”
She’d been afraid he would ask for her hand, or Olivia’s. A bereaved woman, whether widow or daughter, could find herself affianced before the earth was spaded over the coffin. She was eighteen, Olivia twenty, and they had no money. Mr. Cole was a widower and wealthy.
“We don’t want to sell,” she said, and Olivia didn’t contradict her.
“What are you going to do now?” asked Mrs. Spruill, an old friend of their mother’s.
