Western Christmas Proposals: Christmas Dance with the Rancher / Christmas in Salvation Falls / The Sheriff's Christmas Proposal. Carla Kelly

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      “Ned, you might try Third Street. There’s a First Methodist Church on the corner.” He chuckled. “And you might try the Second Methodist Church on the opposite corner! There was a theological argument, I believe, and some chairs were thrown around.”

      Uncertain, Ned lingered at the depot. For some reason, he turned his attention to that corner of the lobby where only two nights ago, he had noticed a woman sitting on a trunk, chin in hand. He thought it odd that she wasn’t sitting on the bench, which made him suspect she trusted people as little as he did.

      She was long gone now, but he remembered her pale skin and her brown eyes, probably nothing special in themselves, except that her eyes were large and the brown so deep.

      He also remembered the worried look in them, and how he had just resisted the urge to go over there and ask her if something was wrong, and if he could help. He had even checked back later that evening, but she was gone by then. Whoever was supposed to meet her in Cheyenne must have finally arrived. Ned couldn’t help hoping she gave the man—husband, fiancé, whatever—a piece of her mind. Ladies had no business sitting alone in train depots.

      Never mind that. “Chore girl, chore girl,” he muttered out loud as he went first to the Plainsman to get a room for the night, ate lunch, and then went in search of the First or Second or maybe Third Methodist Church in town. Or maybe it was the Second Methodist Church on Fourth Street?

      The First Methodist Church promised some help, if only because a man stood by a signboard, putting up letters to spell next Sunday’s sermon. Ned watched for a moment as The Wag turned into The Wages of Sin.

      Ned thought about his most recent sin, a pleasant one, really, committed four days ago in Nettie Lewis’s parlor house on Third Street. Hopefully the man putting up the sign wouldn’t be able to read Ned’s misdemeanors on his face.

      “Sir, I’m looking for a chore girl,” he said, with no preamble. “The stationmaster said you might know some poor unfortunate lady a bit down on her luck and...”

      The man pointed across the street to the Second Methodist Church. “He takes in strays.”

      That was one way to put it. Ned couldn’t help conjuring up the image of a bedraggled pup that had wandered onto the Eight Bar many years ago. Mama had let him keep the ragged morsel until it became obvious they were harboring a wolf.

      Ned crossed the street to the building with raw, unpainted wood proclaiming itself the Second Methodist Church. He heard someone singing “Rock of Ages” in a vigorous baritone, and followed the sound.

      The singer was a man almost as short as he was round, slapping on paint in rhythm to his hymn. Ned watched in real appreciation until the man noticed him and stopped.

      “Did you come to help, sonny?” the man asked.

      Ned came closer and saw that the painter was at least a decade older than his own father, but brimming with health and energy that Dan Avery no longer possessed.

      “Not quite, sir,” Ned told him. “I’m from the Eight Bar near Medicine Bow and I need to hire a chore girl in the worst way. A neighbor lady told me the Lord would provide, so I’m here.”

      “Reverend Lucius Peabody,” the man said. “Racine, Wisconsin, come West to rescue the damned. In the worst way, you say? That’s an odd way to phrase your needs in front of a minister of the gospel.”

      “Oh, no!” Ned began. “I mean I need to find such a person right now to help care for my father, who has heart disease, and look after the house. I’ll pay thirty dollars a month, but she has to be respect...”

      The minister held up his hand, brush and all, appearing not to notice the paint dripping down his arm. “I don’t run an employment agency,” he said, “but I might be able to help you. Come closer.”

      Ned did as he was bid, holding out his own handkerchief when the little man appeared not to possess such a thing. Reverend Peabody took it with a nod and wiped his arms after setting the brush in the tin can.

      “Two nights ago, the sheriff brought a little miss here. She’d been waiting for her fiancé from Lusk to pick her up at the depot.” The minister had dropped his voice to barely above a whisper.

      I know, I saw her, Ned thought, filled with chagrin that he had done nothing about his charitable impulse.

      “He hasn’t showed up yet?” Ned asked.

      “Worse than that,” Peabody said with a shake of his head. “She said her fiancé was a man from Maine, name of Saul Coffin. Sheriff Miller got a garbled telegram from Lusk’s sheriff, something about a shooting that left one man dead or nearly so, and the other in jail.” The minister looked skyward, as though expecting a vision. His hand went up to trace imaginary letters, courtesy of Western Union. “Bar fight. Stop. Coffin. Stop. Deader than Abe Lincoln. Stop.” He put his hand down. “Miss Peck said her fiancé had a foul temper, but who’s to say the coffin was just a coffin, with anybody in it, or the sheriff meant Saul Coffin?”

      “If Mr. Coffin never showed up, that’s a pretty good indication,” Ned began. “What’s the law like in Lusk?”

      “’Bout like this letter, sketchy, garbled and confused,” Peabody replied. “And the sheriff fought for the South. Writing coherent messages has never been his specialty.”

      He stood there for a long moment, sizing up Ned, who gazed back. “You don’t seem like a bad customer,” he said finally. “Follow me.”

      Not sure whether to be offended or amused, Ned followed him around the church to a side already painted, which featured a young woman standing on a wooden box, scrubbing the window.

      She was humming to herself and hadn’t seen them yet, so Ned hung back just to look at her, the same young woman he had noticed two days ago in the depot.

      Her hair was covered in a bandanna, but he already knew it was smooth and dark brown. He couldn’t see her entire face yet, but he recognized her trim figure.

      “Miss Peck?” the Reverend Peabody called.

      Even before she turned around, Ned knew he would see brown eyes of considerable depth. Now he saw interest and even recognition.

      “You were in the depot a few nights ago,” she said to Ned.

      At least, he thought that’s what she said. Her accent was charming, but nearly incomprehensible and made him shake his head.

      She must have seen that reaction several times since she had left wherever it was she came from. She repeated herself more slowly, and the words came out stilted and exaggerated, but understandable.

      “I was,” he replied. “Beg pardon, ma’am, but where are you from?”

      “The US, same’s you,” she said. “Maine.” She spoke slowly and distinctly. “Maybe you would introduce yourself?”

      Of course. Lord, he was a ninny. “Um, Edward Avery, ma’am, and you are?”

      “Katherine Peck,” she said. Still standing on the box, she set the wet rag in the bucket, swiped her hand across an apron many sizes too large for her, and held it out to him.

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