The Swan

  The Twelve Days of Christmas Mail-Order Brides

  The Seventh Day

  by

  Piper Huguley

  Twelve Days of Christmas Mail-Order Brides

  The Swan: The Seventh Day

  by Piper Huguley

  © 2017 Piper Huguley

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without permission in writing from the publisher. All characters are fictional. Any resemblances to actual people or livestock are purely coincidental.

  Cover design by Erin Dameron-Hill and EDH Creations

  License Note

  This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Sandra Belle Calhoune, Vanessa Riley and Julie Hilton Steele—my three writing friends who continue to hold me up. Thank you.

  DEDICATION

  This one is for my tall, elegant sister—Heather Lynn Harris, always a lovely swan--never a cygnet.

  “But what did he see in the clear stream below? His own image; no longer a dark, gray bird, ugly and disagreeable to look at, but a graceful and beautiful [cob] swan. To be born in a duck’s nest, in a farmyard, is of no consequence to a bird, if it is hatched from a swan’s egg.”

  Hans Christian Andersen.

  The Ugly Duckling (Illustrated)

  CHAPTER ONE

  December 23, 1876

  This morning, Liam Fulton would not have believed that in the afternoon he would be in the fresh-smelling piney woods of Noelle looking for a Christmas tree to welcome the mail-order brides. He wasn’t one of the grooms. Yet, here he was. The proposition reminded him of his childhood. How beautiful the tree would look when they affixed small candles to the branches—once he was able to find them in his mess of a dry goods store. The memory of it all warmed him inside. He had to admit, it felt good to do something charitable for the other men in Noelle who were getting themselves gussied up for the arrival of their brides. Christmas was a special time, and he didn't mind helping others have a special time to get this community settled.

  Tom, one of the miners, nudged him as they walked through the woods. "You didn't want one of the brides, Liam?"

  "Good things come to those who wait." Liam intoned to his friend who liked to play checkers at his dry goods store.

  Orvis Stovall, another miner, spoke. "I agree. I think they'll have all the desperate ones in this first group. The next group, that one will have the real beauties."

  Liam frowned against the falling snow. "That's not what I meant."

  "Don't joke like that with this man," Tom said to Orvis. "He can get very defensive if you joke about the wrong thing."

  Well, who liked to be misinterpreted? In reality, Liam felt sorry for the brides. Some of the men, one, that fool JD Jones was very disrespectful about everything he was going to do to his bride as soon as they got married. Some of the men laughed at his crude pantomimes and jokes, but Liam didn't join in.

  Tom rubbed his hands against the cold. He needed a better coat but was too cheap to come into Liam's store. "Madam and her girls are here. It's good enough to blow off some energy with them. Liam likes that high yaller girl she got."

  "Is it really necessary to talk of these matters in the open air?" Liam shouted over his shoulder at the others. Liam was not an outdoors man. He was a shopkeeper and before that, a sometimes schoolmaster and soldier in the Civil War. He was in the middle of studying for his oral law exams to become a lawyer. A lot of these fellows didn't understand his approach to things, but he didn't want to judge. Still, one thing he knew was that he would stand up to combat injustice if he saw it. His father had been a friend of John Brown and, like him, had spoken out against enslavement long before it was fashionable to do so. The streak to protect the weak was strong in him.

  "Maybe you want to marry her."

  Liam shook his head. "I would want better than that for her. Angelique is just a kid."

  "Yet, you go to her."

  A fury rose up in Liam, but he said nothing. He gripped the handle of his ax a bit tighter, wanting to take his anger out on chopping down a tree instead of this idiot miner who might be a better customer one day. His encounters with Angelique were none of anyone's business. "There. What about that one?"

  "It's a little crooked."

  "You can cut off the branches on that one side to even it out. Will it fit into the saloon?"

  "I think so." Tom agreed.

  Liam walked up to the fir tree and stripped off some of the lower branches to prepare it for chopping. It would surely look beautiful all decorated for the holidays.

  He wanted a bride same as anyone. But when the time came, he would do his own choosing. William Cobb Fulton had always been his own man. He made his own rules. Noelle would settle just the same without him.

  Turning to the tree instead of the insolent miner, he brought his ax down onto the wood with a hearty and satisfying "thwack."

  December 24, 1876

  When they all got off the train and were taken to sleighs driven by mules, Avis finally understood by the cold and the snow that they were in the mountains of Colorado. She sat in the row next to the young woman holding a goose and another woman holding a baby. Interesting company. Their mere variety appealed to her. She had never had a friend that was her own age. No one would ever accept her for who she really was. If these brides knew her, really knew her, the rejections would continue. She didn't need that.

  The heavy weight of her tightly wound chignon pressed into her head and neck. It would be better if she kept far away from the other brides.

  She clutched her Bible. It tended to keep people distant. Not this time though, Molly, the young woman holding the goose, peered over. “You’re a believer, I see.”

  “Yes.” Another lie. "I'm praying because I can't wait to meet my future husband."

  “Who is he?” Kezia, the beautiful woman with the sweet baby girl, asked.

  “John D. Jones. He’s a miner.”

  One of the brides, Josefina, had deep olive colored skin and black silk ringlets that danced when she laughed. She had approached Avis back at Benevolent Lambs, reached out her hand and said, "Call me Fina."

  Fina now said, “You got a miner? Bueno! I have the restaurant owner. We'll make our money feeding everyone. I'm looking forward to laying eyes on that Nacho. What do you think your man will be like?"

  "Goodness." Avis wanted to say she hadn't given John D. Jones a moment's thought. He was old, like forty or something. He said something in his letter about wanting a family to hand his fortune off to and marrying a devout woman who would teach them to love the Lord.

  She recalled what Mrs. Walters said to her. "That's why I matched you with him, Avis. I thought you would be perfect."

  Foolishness. Nothing but foolishness. Where would some man twice as old as she get babies from with her? She shuddered but could see that Fina was waiting for her answer, as were all of the brides. They stopped what they were doing, all curious about her. "I don't know, " Avis answered quickly. "I guess we'll find out soon."

  "We’ll certainly be there soon." Fina smiled at her, but the smile didn't light up her face as the other smiles she had given did. Now that Fina could see Avis wasn't like her and wouldn't laugh or crack jokes like the other brides, she rejected Avis.

  There were some bumps in the journey. Once, some of the brides had to dig the sleigh out of the snow and Avis helped. It kept her hands busy. She did her work and said nothing. She had done worse before. At one home, she was forced to pull a plow through the rocky New England soil like a mule. So digging out a wagon was nothing. That one named Maybelle did nothing, but Avis did her part. She wanted no thank yous. She really didn't care to speak to Maybelle at all.

  Don't worry about her. Worry about what you came to do.

  Still, the brides cheered when a young man came out with a team of mules to save them from further digging in the snow. It looked like everything was working out for them. The other brides all seemed glad to arrive. Avis felt glad for them. They deserved happiness.

  Their excitement still didn't give her comforting feelings for what would happen…after. Would she finally be accepted in a real home somewhere? After confronting Betsey?

  The man with the mules escorted the brides to a large building that read, The Golden Nugget. It was the town saloon, clearly. Avis had seen enough of those in her day. Still, each woman was treated as a piece of porcelain. But to Avis, this seemed silly. That wasn't her.

  One man stood at the front of The Golden Nugget, waving his hat. He reached up and helped each one of the brides off of the first sleigh. A murmur went through the brides and finally reached her. "Avis," Mrs. Walters said, "That's John Jones. I recognize him from the description I was sent."

  He wasn't very tall, she noticed and no matter how she tried to quench it, a bubble of disappointment rose within her. That was her husband? The murmur went back to where he was standing. Several of the brides indicated to him that she was Avis Smith.

  When he reached into the sleigh for her, his look shifted to an all too familiar loo k of rejection.

  The nervousness in his face shifted to something hard. Something familiar.

  "Good day," Avis said in her best pious lady voice.

  The man's beady eyes shifted to the ground. "Hmmm, Yeah. Heh."

  He dropped her hand from her as if she were a hot coal and ran away like something were after him, not helping the rest of them down. What was wrong with him? Was he disappointed?

  More rejection. She should have been used to it, but it still rankled. Oh well, she was in Noelle now. She needed to figure out where Betsey Smith lived in this community.

  When they all gathered in the large saloon, the brides stood in a group on one side and some of the men watched them. Including JD Jones. He didn’t approach her, but stood to the side with his lip thrust out in a most unhappy gesture.

  Mrs. Walters seemed preoccupied with the gentleman who had introduced himself as Reverend Chase Hammond as they exited the wagons. She had a problem, and it looked as if Mrs. Walters had a problem too. Avis could see her waving her hands, talking loud, but not loud enough for them to hear.

  In a few moments, Mrs. Walters came to them, her green eyes snapping with fight. “We are going to be taken to better quarters than this, fortunately. There will be no weddings until I’m assured that the quarters we were all promised really do exist.”

  “Come this way, ladies,” Chase Hammond said in voice that rang false to Avis. Some reverend this town had.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Even though Liam had a lot to do on Christmas Eve, his curiosity got the better of him. He had prayed for JD’s bride and he wanted to see her and the arrival of the brides. The brides huddled at one end of the saloon. JD was being confronted by one of the women, who was well-dressed and very attractive, but clearly upset. What could be the problem?

  Liam's gaze went to where JD Jones stood, pouting. He knew Jones was behind this in some way. He had drawn a short straw, and Liam bet he was at the bottom of this trouble. From the door of the saloon, he could smell the pitiful man above everything: the tree, the sweat of nervous men and the perfume of the frozen women. It tested his nerve that the town might fail because of that sawed-off, short, powder keg of a man, with his slicked-up hair which stunk of the bergamot he got at Liam's store. He used way too much, probably in hopes of covering up his putrid body odor.

  It wasn’t fair to the ladies to be cold and huddled together. He left his table to see if he could assist Chase Hammond, but he and the other woman had left, and the women were leaving with them. He was too late. "What's going on?" he asked Tom who had also come to The Golden Nugget to see the arrival. stood next to him, watching the attractive women depart back into the cold. What a rude and unpleasant arrival.

  Tom stood next to him, watching the attractive women depart back into the cold. What a rude and unpleasant arrival.

  “JD says his bride is a daughter of Ham. He says he ain't gonna marry her and now..."

  "Now what?” Liam asked. “I'm not surprised JD is the one trying to wriggle out of what he promised to do." The man owed him hundreds of dollars.

  Liam stepped out into the cold outdoors and watched JD watching them go. A small group of miners joined them. The little man stomped on the wooden sidewalk. "What if we got buyer's remorse?"

  "What?" Liam’s brow furrowed. Which one of those poor women had been cursed with the burden of this infernal man?

  JD whirled on him. "I said, what if we got the buyer's remorse? You know we saw what we got but don't want it?"

  A murmur went through the crowd of men. Tom spoke up. "Well now, JD. You drew your straw, signed on for this and paid for your lady to get here. Now she's here, and you don't want her?”

  Liam shook his head. “We’ve got to show this town is getting settled with these twelve couples and you just can't—"

  "I said I don't want her," The little man screamed like a child. "They ought to send her back.”

  Cries of "Why not?" echoed across the group.

  The handful of men looked over to where JD pointed at the retreating back of one of the brides. The one with the eyes who had connected with Liam.

  JD sputtered. "She's one of them mulatto womens. From down in New Orleans way."

  "What are you talking about, JD?" One of the men shouted. "These brides come from Denver."

  The little man shook his head back and forth; his stringy black hair slid from his pate. "You don't get what I'm saying. She's… she's colored."

  The men murmured amongst themselves as JD spoke his accusation.

  What difference did that make? Why should these women be so rudely received in Noelle? Liam couldn’t take it anymore and started down the street after the retreating women. He was determined to get to the bottom of this. Disappointment surged through him. The men had thought there would be weddings today. They had even gathered some of the miners who played instruments together for music to be played for the weddings. Liam loved music. It was one of the reasons he came today, even though he wasn't a groom. And what of the tree? Should they move the tree?

  They seemed to be going down to the cathouse. It was cold outside, but in short order he caught up with the women who had just reached La Maison. He stood at the edge of the group and went in with them as they were all admitted. He followed a young woman of Chinese descent who seemed hesitant to enter. He could understand why.

  Liam approached Chase Hammond, but he couldn’t get to him because he was almost knocked down by Sam Goodwin who ran out of the cathouse in the “altogether.” Liam sighed. Just another day at La Maison du Chats. Some of the brides screamed at the sight of Goodwin’s pallid hindquarters retreating into the dusk of the day. Well, they were Benevolent Lambs. He turned to help the Reverend apologize at this turn of events. Their faces, swathed by hoods and covered with bonnets, contained degrees of upset. He opened his mouth, but then another man, who was even more naked than Sam Goodwin, ran out into the cold. Many of the women covered their mouths to stop the stunned sounds from escaping. Many, except one. The one with the eyes, and the most beautiful woman he had ever seen dared to look at him, unashamed and unafraid of who she was. She stood, proud like the Christmas tree he had cut down yesterday. There was no shock or startled scream from her. JD’s bride.

  He had prayed for the woman ever since JD had drawn a short straw. He wanted to come closer to the focus of his prayers. The women had started to take off their wraps, so he could see she had a black dress on — appropriate for the occasion of having to marry JD. She took off her bonnet and her dark brown eyes refocused on him with curiosity.

  He could see her strength in her eyes and the way she held her elegant, long neck. She wasn't afraid of anyone in this room, and he admired her spirit.

  Liam stepped to the other side of the room. "Is everything okay, ladies?"

  Just as the words came from his mouth, two of the women fainted. He rushed to them, but several of the brides surrounded them both, blocking his view.

  The woman stepped in next to him. "They’ll be fine. It’s been a long journey."

  "We have food and coffee.” Milly, the cathouse cook, stepped forward, eager to make a good show. Milly used her bulk to edge her way in to seeing after the brides who had fainted, but they were already coming around. “Pearl can show you to your rooms.” She gestured toward blonde Pearl who was one of Madam’s girls.

  "Yes, please." One of the ladies peeled off towards the door, declaring, "So many awful things. Naked men and Avis is a Negro. Who could imagine? There shouldn't be any Negro people in Noelle. Negroes give me the creeps. They’re bad luck."

  Liam said a quick prayer for whomever would have to marry that one. He noticed the mean one had glared and gestured to the woman who was right next to him.

  Turning to her, he took some time to appreciate her lovely face more closely. Her nose was freckled and something inside of him warmed at the sight. The freckles only increased her charm. "Are you all right? Do you need a glass of punch? Maybe a glass of our best spring water?"

  Her brow furrowed, and in that long moment, Liam noticed the woman's lips. They were well shaped and full, but not like a Negro's full lip. He was having a hard time seeing it in her.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11