The Rancher's Courtship. Laurie Kingery

Чтение книги онлайн.

Читать онлайн книгу The Rancher's Courtship - Laurie Kingery страница 2

The Rancher's Courtship - Laurie Kingery Mills & Boon Love Inspired Historical

Скачать книгу

Dear Reader

       Questions for Discussion

      Chapter One

      Simpson Creek, Texas

      October 1868

      Jack Collier looked up and down the main street of the little town of Simpson Creek, but try as he might, he didn’t see a druggist’s store. A hotel, a mercantile, a post office, a combined barbershop-bathhouse, a jail, a bank, a doctor’s office and a church, yes, but no druggist’s shop. A search of the side streets and Travis Street, which ran parallel to Main Street, netted the same lack of results.

       He’d been the recipient of several second looks by the townspeople, as he rode down the streets, his own horse flanked by the dependable old cow pony that didn’t mind his twin daughters riding double on it. People tended to stare at twins, and yet it seemed to be his own face they focused on, not Abigail’s and Amelia’s.

       Well, he’d always been told he looked a lot like Pete, so that must be the reason for the stares. He started to ask one or two of them if they knew where to find his brother, but he had wanted his arrival to be a surprise for Pete. He didn’t want anyone running ahead of him with the news.

      But where was Pete? Had he gone into some other line of work since he’d last written Jack? It was possible, Jack supposed, but it wasn’t like Pete to change his mind on such a matter. Pete had always set a course, then held to it. He’d traveled up to the Hill Country town in San Saba County last year with the announced goals of meeting the lady he’d been corresponding with and opening up his own druggist’s shop. Around Christmas, Pete had written that he and Miss Caroline Wallace were in love and would be married in early spring. He wanted Jack to be there.

       That was the last time he’d heard from Pete—no letter, no wedding invite had followed.

       Mail went astray all the time, though. He and his daughters had probably missed the wedding, but Jack had assumed he’d find Collier’s Drugs and Patent Medicines prospering, with his happily married brother as the proprietor. Pete and his bride would have a little house on one of these side streets, no doubt with a picket fence around it and the smell of freshly baked bread wafting from the kitchen.

       “When are we gonna find Uncle Pete, Papa?” queried his daughter Amelia, clutching a china-headed doll to her chest.

       “Yeah, and Aunt Caroline?” her twin sister, Abigail, piped up from behind her. “Did they go someplace else?”

       Jack rubbed his chin and considered the matter. “I don’t know, girls, but I’m sure enough going to find out.”

       After riding up Travis Street, they’d passed the churchyard and headed back onto Main Street, but now he paused by the jail to look around him, wondering where the best place to make inquiries would be.

       “Can I help you, mister?”

       Jack looked down to see a lanky Mexican youth with black hair and dark eyes looking up at him from beside the open door of the jail. He wore a five-pointed star that had “Deputy” inscribed across its middle.

       The sheriff ought to know where to find any of the small town’s inhabitants, Jack reckoned. “Is the sheriff in, Deputy?”

       “Sheriff Bishop is away for a few days, sir. I’m Deputy Luis Menendez—perhaps I may help you?” The last part was said with courteous pride.

       “I hope so. We’re looking for Peter Collier and his wife, Caroline. He’s my brother. He was supposed to have started a druggist’s shop here in Simpson Creek, but I don’t see one, so maybe his plans changed. Would you know where they live?”

       The young man’s brow furrowed, and something troubled shone in the obsidian depths of his eyes. “Miss Caroline is the schoolteacher. Perhaps it is best you speak to her.”

      “Miss Caroline?” What in thunder? Had Caroline and Pete had a falling-out and never married? Had Pete left Simpson Creek? Why hadn’t he written Jack about it? Jack had made plans based on what Pete had told him, and if the marriage was off and Pete had gone elsewhere, Jack was going to find himself in a right pickle.

       He was conscious of the youth still studying him, a hand shading his eyes from the bright sun. “May I direct you to the schoolhouse, Mr. Collier?”

       Jack shook his head, “No, we passed it a while back, while we were looking for his shop, so I know where it is. Thanks.”

       The rapping at the door startled Caroline. Who could it be? Her pupils were all present and accounted for—two dozen in number and ranging from first to sixth-graders. Now they all raised their heads from the slates on which they were working sums and looked behind them. No one in Simpson Creek would think of knocking on the door of the one-room schoolhouse. If they had to interrupt the schoolmarm during class, they’d likely just barge right in and explain their business.

       When the knock quickly sounded again, as if whoever stood outside had grown impatient, Lizzie raised her hand. “Miss Wallace, do you want me to see who’s there?”

       “No, thank you, Lizzie. I’ll do it. Please continue your work.” Rising, Caroline left her desk, walked down the aisle that separated the girls from the boys and went to the door. She hoped whoever it was wouldn’t stay long. It was hard enough to keep her students working on arithmetic in the last hour of the school day, even without interruptions. Most of them were fidgeting, staring longingly out the one-room schoolhouse’s open window to where fall sunshine beckoned. When would she learn to drill them in mathematics in the morning, when they were still fresh? But she’d only been the schoolteacher for a month, having taken on the job when Miss Phelps left.

       She opened the door to see two little girls standing on the uppermost step. They were as alike as two peas in a pod, both dark-haired and blue-eyed, each one’s hair done in two thick braids with red bows at the end, their dresses blue gingham with white pinafores. Each clutched a doll with a dress that matched what its owner wore.

       Beyond them she could see a man with his back to her, securing the second of two horses to the hitching rail next to the mule a pair of her students rode to school.

       “Them girls is exactly the same,” breathed Lizzie, peeking around her teacher from behind.

       “Those girls are exactly the same,” Caroline corrected automatically. “Please go back to your seat, Lizzie.”

       “Ain’t you ever seen twins before, Lizzie Halliday?” one of the boys hooted scornfully.

       “Haven’t you,” Caroline corrected again. “Class, be quiet while I speak to their father.” She could only guess the man was here to register his daughters, though why he’d come in the afternoon, rather than first thing in the morning, she couldn’t imagine—nor why a father would be bringing the children, rather than their mother. A closer look at the girls’ dresses revealed a smudge on the hem of one, a rip in the sleeve of the other. Maybe their mother was ill? Or…well. Perhaps there was no mother anymore.

       The two girls smiled in unison at her, and Caroline felt an instant liking for them. Already mentally rearranging the seating chart to accommodate two more students while the man was turning from the hitching rail, she now focused on his face.

Скачать книгу