The Bride’s Unknown Legacy (Preview)

Chapter One: Elsie

(Mankato, Minnesota, Early March 1888)

An infuriated Elsie Mays stomped her shoe on the carpeted floor in front of her father’s desk, both of them glowering at one another as she refused. “I will not agree to this, Father! I refuse to marry Oscar Weatherly and that’s all there is to it!”

“Yes, you will, Elsie Elizabeth Mays. His father and I have already agreed to the terms.”

“Terms! A fine way to describe a betrothal. Well, I haven’t!” Elsie denied. “Not only is Oscar Weatherly fifteen years older than me, he’s conceited, arrogant, and… and dumb!”

Luther Mays, leaning forward on his fists behind his desk, heaved a sigh and lowered his solid bulk into his desk chair, the iron springs protesting the movement. “You have no say in the matter, Elsie. Oscar Weatherly is a lucky catch for a twenty-two-year-old young woman who has yet to find a husband willing to marry her. And he may be conceited and arrogant, and, yes, even dumb, but at least he’s not stubborn, contrary, and disobedient!”

Elsie stood in front of her father, her face hot and her body practically vibrating as she crossed her arms over her chest. She fought back tears of frustration, fear, and yes, even a bit of rage. How dare he make such a life-altering decision for her! Why? Just because she had her own ideas about the man she wanted to marry someday?

“Oscar Weatherly comes from a good family, Elsie,” her father continued, his voice low as it did when he tried to rein in his own temper. “They’re rich and well respected in Rochester and he can provide a good life for you—”

“Oscar does nothing but follow his father around and do everything he’s told. You might as well put a leash on him for all the thinking he does for himself.”

Luther slapped the palm of his big, meaty hand down on his desktop. The ink bottle shivered. The metal tipped fountain pen he’d been using only moments earlier rolled across the desk, leaving small ink splotches in its wake. He grumbled, plucked the pen from the desktop and slid it back in the ink well.

“Now you listen to me, daughter. You are well past marriageable age. Why, by now you should have two or three children tagging along behind you. If something isn’t done, and soon, you’ll find yourself a spinster. Then where will you be?”

Elsie had two friends her age that had been married for five years already, one of them with two children, the other with three. The last time she had visited with them, they both looked exhausted, harried, and miserable. Oh, they loved their children, no doubt about that. Alice truly did seem to love her husband, although Beth didn’t seem to have a high opinion of hers. Every time Elsie visited them, which had been less and less the past year, they had looked nothing less than trapped. She stiffened her back.

“I am more than capable of choosing my own husband, Father, and I’m not going to settle for anything less than what I deem most important in a man.”

Luther sank back in the chair with a sigh and another ominous creak. He lifted an eyebrow. “And what is that? What is it that you’re looking for in a man that you haven’t found since you were old enough to court at sixteen?”

Suddenly put on the spot, Elsie could only stare dumbly at her father. “Love, what else? A deep, abiding love, along with respect.” She didn’t stop there. “I want to marry a man who is strong in faith and diligent in his work. I want a man who is capable of listening to the ideas of a mere woman and not just hearing her. I want a man who doesn’t expect me merely to breed and spend the rest of my days in the drudgery of scrubbing floors, working my hands red and raw with laundry, raising children all by myself, keeping quiet when he wants me to, or flaunting me when he’s trying to make a good impression—”

“Is that all?”

She stopped. He would never understand. He never had. How could he? Elsie didn’t think her father had ever loved anyone, not really. Not his wife and certainly not her little brother, both whom she had lost to a mysterious accident ten years ago when she was only twelve years old. It had been a crisp, cool, blustery autumn day. She refused to let the ache of that memory blossom in her heart or grow any larger. Even so, ever since then, she had been tormented with a myriad of emotions about that day. Anger at being abandoned by her mother, who had decided to leave her home and take her little brother to the market square. Following that day, the arguments, the shouting, and the tears had finally stopped.

She peered at her father, narrowing her eyes and tilting her head slightly, wondering what it was about this man that her mother had married. Yes, he was her father, but in many ways, he was also a stranger. Why had he kept the truth to himself all these years? Why had he lied? He was a big man, his face ruddy and his nose bulbous and covered with tiny blood vessels that bespoke of too much alcohol. That nose was also crooked, as if it had been broken a time or two in his youth. His skin was rough, his eyebrows bushy. What had her mother seen in him?

She couldn’t stop herself. “Did you ever love her, Father? Even a little bit?”

Luther’s face hardened even more as he eyed his daughter. His face flushed with color. His hands, now fisted on his desk blotter tightened still more. Finally, he answered.

“Ours was an arranged marriage, Elsie, as I believe you are aware.”

Elsie nodded, his glower not frightening her a bit. Oh, he yelled and blustered a lot, but he had never raised a hand to her. Still, she didn’t take his anger lightly, at least not most of the time. “I am aware of that, Father, but that wasn’t my question. I asked if you’d ever loved her.”

He opened his mouth, snapped it shut, and then shook his head, the beginning of jowls beneath his jawline trembling slightly. “That’s nothing I care to discuss with you, and it’s not an appropriate question that a daughter should ask her father.”

She said nothing, just continued to stare at him. He finally grumbled a reply. “Of course I loved your mother and your little brother. But you’ve got to quit blaming me for the accident that took them from you.”

The so-called accident. She’d only turned twelve a month before that day, her little brother seven. She knew that her parents’ marriage was not a happy one, but her mother always had a smile and a hug for her, and she doted on her little brother, Henry. Unfortunately, Henry had been born disabled, missing his left leg from the knee down. His left hand lacked fingers. In spite of his handicaps, he had been a sweet boy with such a gentle disposition…

She glanced up at him with a frown and challenged him. “You wouldn’t even let me attend the wake, to say a proper goodbye.” She didn’t mention that she had been terribly hurt and confused when her father had never approached her to provide comfort, nor to assure her that everything would be all right. Ever since then, she had always wondered why he had never appeared to grieve either one of them. He wouldn’t allow her to cry, or talk about her mother or brother at mealtimes, nor when she was troubled, nor as she grew older and naturally wondered what her mother had been like.

Her memories of them faded with every year that passed, a little bit at a time. First, she had forgotten the sound of her mother’s voice. She still remembered her mother’s dark hair and the trill of her laughter. She remembered Henry’s giggle. Yet with every year that passed, even those tiny memories faded bit by bit. 

“I couldn’t let you see them like that, Elsie.” His voice softened slightly. “They were… they were damaged in the accident.”

Elsie had never felt such heaviness in her heart. Why had he deceived her then? Why did he continue to lie to her now? He must have a reason. What was it? As she thought back, she remembered that there hadn’t even been a proper wake or funeral at the house following the buggy accident. The details surrounding it were sparse. In fact, nothing but a short investigation had followed. Funerals were supposed to take place in the home. Under most circumstances, someone sat with the body for three days to ensure… well, to ensure that loved ones were truly dead before they were buried. 

She had never even seen the coffin until the day of the burial. A single coffin that contained her mother and little brother as it was lowered into the ground, the mourners wearing black standing around it. Afterward, she remembered her father wearing a dark suit for less than a month or so afterward, or a simple black armband around his upper left arm. As a husband, decorum required that he observed mourning for at least a year. Within weeks, he had returned to his starched white collars and cuffs, and his butternut, charcoal gray, or checkered suits as well as his silk cravats.

She gave him a small shrug, knowing that she was pushing against the line in the sand that had been drawn. Most of the time, she toed that line, but sometimes, like now, she dared to step over it. “Then you can’t possibly understand what I’m saying. I don’t want to marry someone I’m told to marry because it makes it convenient for you or the man’s family. I want to marry someone I love, Father, and—”

Her father stood so fast that she felt a tingle run down her spine even as she took a step back in dismay. “The Weatherlys own one of the largest flour mills in the country east of New York, selling hundreds of thousands of barrels of flour every year!” He paused to catch his breath. 

Now she understood the true reason for the betrothal, and it wasn’t for her sake. It was a match practically made in heaven for her father. It was true. Samuel Weatherly, Oscar’s father, owned one of the largest flour mills west of New York City. According to her father, he wanted to branch out, not just with his barrels of flour, but to produce smaller sacks of flour ready-made to sell to local mercantile and grocery stores throughout the region. Her father owned a textile business, manufacturing linen cloth, sacks, and other fabrics used in clothing manufacturing. A union between the two families would stand Luther Mays in good stead. Weatherly would continue to maintain or even grow his wealth with the new scheme, and her father would have a market that would increase his wealth tenfold. The Weatherlys would produce the flour, and her father’s mill would manufacture the flour sacks. A match made in heaven. For them, not for her.

She grew so angry at herself for not realizing it sooner. So angry that she almost blurted her secret. Instead, she lifted her chin and stated her truth. “Be that as it may, I refuse.”

“You will accept the marriage agreement that we have drawn up, and you will be betrothed to Oscar Weatherly, daughter. With our two families united, you will never want for anything in your life. You’ll live in a fine house in Minneapolis and have a summer house on the shores of Baxter Lake. You’ll be able to attend the finest theaters and join the circle of the city’s finest women’s leagues…”

Elsie groaned. “I don’t care about any of that and—”

He straightened, his face a deep red now. His eyebrows lowered as he thrust out his arm, his blunt index finger pointed directly at her. “Go to your room, Elsie! This is not a discussion. You have no choice in the matter. The papers have been signed.”

“I never signed any betrothal agreement!”

“You don’t have to,” he growled. “I’ve already signed the documents myself.” He started to step around the desk.

Elsie took a step back, her heart pounding and her own anger prompting her hands to tremble as she dared to fist them on her hips. “You can’t do this to me, Father, you can’t!” He paused at the front of the desk, making an effort to calm himself as he placed his arms behind his back as he leaned his upper body slightly toward her, his grimace plain. She hadn’t seen him this angry in a long time.

“I can do this, Elsie, and that’s all I have to say on the matter. Oscar and his father have accepted the terms I’ve set. The official engagement party will be held in four weeks. Samuel and I have agreed that the wedding should take place no later than mid-June. Oscar agrees.”

Elsie could only stare wide-eyed up at her father, shocked and rendered speechless. A myriad of emotions battered her all at once, from fury to despair. “How can you do this to me?” she uttered, her voice barely above a whisper.

He didn’t move. “How can I do this? I’m doing this for you, Elsie, for your own good. For your reputation.”

She swallowed thickly. “For my reputation? Or yours, your bank account, and your political aspirations?”

With that, and with as much dignity as she could possibly muster, Elsie turned her back on her father and left his study. It took everything she had not to slam the exquisitely carved and polished oak door quietly behind her. Her head felt like it was floating, her heart pounding hard, so hard that she placed her hand over her chest to prevent it from bursting. She turned and took the carpeted stairs up to her room, her mind spinning and her mouth dry. For several moments she felt resigned to playing her part in her father’s schemes. He was a hard man, embittered by his own failed marriage, his only concern how much money he made. Her father didn’t seem to realize that money wasn’t everything.

What was it that Christ had said? It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into heaven? She felt sorry for her father, and beyond angry at him at the same time. She made her way up to her room, ignoring her high, four-poster bed, the beautiful quilt fashioned by her friend Maggie lying atop it. She didn’t see the highly polished dark walnut armoire, nor the fine walnut table beside the bed with its painted porcelain lamp. She made her way to her small secretary in the corner, the afternoon light filtering through both corner windows.

With a quick glance over her shoulder, she opened a narrow drawer just beneath the desktop, where she kept pencils and fountain pens. A small pile of stationary paper and envelopes were tucked into the drawer. She slid her fingers beneath them and felt the hard-edged iron tintype and slowly extracted it. Her heart racing, she peered down at the image of her lovely yet unsmiling mother. She wore a somber dark-colored dress, her hand resting on the shoulder of her son, sitting in a chair beside her. The left leg of Henry’s trousers was tucked underneath the stump of his left leg. His malformed left hand was hidden under his right hand, resting in his lap.

She had found the tintype a week ago, up in the attic. She’d climbed up there out of boredom, but finding the tintype had changed everything, especially when she looked at the back of the thin iron plate and seen the faded maker’s mark scratched into the surface. Johnston Photography, Cheyenne, WY, 1880. The tintype had been made eight years ago, two years after their supposed deaths.

She had stared long and hard at that tintype so many times since she had discovered it. While her mother looked pretty much the same, her brother looked a little older than she remembered since the last time she’d seen him. He was maybe nine or ten in the image, his torso taller than she recalled, his face a little thinner, his hair a little longer.

They were supposed to be dead. Her father had told her all those years ago that they had died in a buggy accident. Now she knew that he had lied. But why? She had almost asked her father about the tintype nearly half a dozen times, but always lost her courage. Why was he hiding the truth? Why did he have the photograph in the first place? Questions and doubts assailed her, coupled with her despair over her father’s announcement that she would marry Oscar Weatherly in three months’ time. She shook her head, tucked the tintype back under her stationary sheets, and then glanced at the folded, week-old newspaper she had brought upstairs a couple of days ago.

She made her decision. Her heart pounding and her hands trembling once more, she opened the paper and turn to the second to last page where ads and announcements were found. She folded it in half and then in half again, staring at the black print font emblazoned over a half dozen ads and found it. The Matrimonial Section of the classified ads.

Taking a deep breath, she reached into her drawer once more and extracted a single sheet of paper, an envelope, and one of her metal-tipped fountain pens. Placing the stem of it between her teeth for a moment, her brow furrowed in thought, she finally dipped the pen into the ink well, lowered pen to paper, and began to write.

Chapter Two: Carson

Eyes squinting against the heat and sweat rolling down his forehead, a trickle of it down his back between his shoulder blades, thirty-year-old Carson Galloway swung the hammer once more, each clang of iron against iron reverberating around him. His gloved left hand tightly grasped the pinchers, the reddish orange glow of the coals glowing, fading and bursting with their own life. Every time the hammer met the horseshoe, sparks flew upward. Some of them singed the hair on his forearms. He ignored them.

His muscles aching, his concentration intense, he also ignored the particularly intense sensations that he felt on his right forearm, the right side of his chest, and areas around his right hip and thigh. He couldn’t remember when he had actually become accustomed to that particular pain, but he was used to it and there was nothing he could do about it. He had a living to earn.

As the only blacksmith for twenty-five miles around Rock Ridge at the southeastern edge of the Wind River Range of western Wyoming, the townspeople depended on him to provide them with everything from horseshoes to iron frying pans to plowing tools. When he wasn’t fixing something for someone or pounding out horseshoes, he made cooking utensils, mining tools, and buckets full of nails of various sizes.

Clang! Pause. Clang! Pause. Clang!

Momentarily satisfied, he lifted the pinchers clasping the half-formed tempered metal and plunged it into the bucket of water next to the forge, a hiss was followed by a cloud of vapor momentarily cooling his hot skin. He glanced around at his three-sided smithy, connected to his actual shop by a door to his left that stood open so he could watch for customers. He hadn’t seen nary a one all morning. He heaved a sigh and shook his head, mumbling under his breath.

Giving his aching shoulders a momentary rest, he peered through the opening to view the southernmost edge of town. Then he turned to gaze out the window that offered a looked to the west, up the steep slope just beyond, early spring grass growing in the field beyond. The meadow stretched to the base of foothills. Rocks and boulders of various sizes that had long ago been propelled from the sheer granite cliffs that scattered throughout. The sky was blue as a robin’s egg. The darker blue surface of the river that meandered its way along the southern edge of town flowed down from those mountains, some of the slopes still clinging to snow that refused to melt even though April was well underway.

Staring into the distance, he wished he were out there with his horse, riding through pastures and keeping an eye on a small herd of cattle, the ground already tilled and ready for planting corn and wheat… but he had no farm, not anymore. After losing his parents when he was thirteen years old, Carson had held down part-time jobs on various ranches and farms in his native Colorado, so he knew plenty about farming. Because most of the people who hired him on held some pity for the young orphan boy, they had given him free room and board. He had saved every penny he had earned and finally, at eighteen years of age, had saved enough money to buy his own plot of land, his dreams big and his hopes high.

That year, his corn and wheat crop had just been about ready to harvest when a sudden and vicious hailstorm had ruined everything. All of his hard work gone in less than an hour. He couldn’t pay the property taxes that fall and lost his property. Jobs were hard to come by, as tens of thousands of former soldiers, both Yankee and Confederate, picked up the pieces of their lives, many of them heading west. Some of them found jobs on railroads, others on ranches, many of them heading even further westward toward California and the lure of easy gold. 

Carson had ventured north and found a job as an apprentice to a blacksmith in Casper. He’d lived with that old curmudgeon, Ned Watkins, for years. When the old man died, he inherited all his tools, his knowledge, and most of his skills. For the past eight years, Carson had called Rock Ridge his home. Yet, at thirty years of age, he had nothing really to call his own except for this blacksmith shop, a small room and bunk in back of the office that he called home, and hard labor every day except Sundays. He was still trying to save up for another land purchase, and almost had enough to afford about twenty acres of land and a nice pasture to the north of town. He could—

“The fire’s going to go out, Carson.” The deep voice of his best friend, Jacob Kemper, pulled him from his reverie with a scowl. 

“Naw, it’s not, it’s hotter than Hades in here.”

He and Jacob had been friends since the latter had arrived in Rock Ridge about seven years ago. For years, the townspeople had given Carson a wide berth. He kept to himself, didn’t allow himself to get close to anyone—why bother—and did his job to the best of his ability. Jacob was the exception to his rule. Jacob owned the hardware store in town, and caught the eyes of the ladies, young and old alike. 

While most people in town accepted Carson, and overlooked his scars, the women still hesitated to meet his gaze or offer more than polite greetings. He didn’t really understand why. After all, the accident hadn’t damaged his face, though a swath of scarring on his neck was often visible if he wasn’t wearing a neckerchief. Other than that, only the swatch of scarring on his right forearm was visible when he worked. 

“I got a new stallion,” Jacob commented, gesturing out the open side of the smithy. “He’s a beauty, just got delivered to the livery. Want to see him?”

He did. In addition to owning the hardware store, through which Carson sold some of his products, Jacob Kemper also owned a small ranch about two miles outside of town. He bred horses and sold most of them to regional military posts. His friend was his opposite in many ways. Where he had light brown hair and brown eyes and stood several inches over six feet tall, Jacob had black hair, very dark brown eyes, olive toned skin, and stood maybe five-foot-eleven. Jacob had some Cheyenne blood in him, courtesy of a grandmother who had been a medicine woman, which also probably accounted for Jacob’s knowledge when it came to herbal remedies.

Carson was quiet and somber while Jacob was almost happy-go-lucky, friendly, and easily caught the eyes of ladies with his easy smile. There were at least two marriageable women in town who were vying for Jacob’s attention at the moment. Plus an older woman had been badgering him lately about the possibility of marrying her spinster daughter, to no avail.

Carson wasn’t jealous of his friend. Anyone who managed to throw a halter on Jacob would find that they had gotten a very good catch. He doubted that he would ever be so fortunate. He knew that some of the ladies in town seemed afraid of him, of his hulking form, his quiet but watchful ways, and the knowledge that he had been terribly scarred in an explosion that had occurred in the smithy back in Casper, which had ultimately led to the death of his mentor.

Carson belatedly nodded and then banked the fire, watched it for a moment, satisfying himself that it was safe before he followed Jacob outside. The midmorning sun felt good on his shoulders, and he breathed a deep lungful of fresh, cool air. He stretched his shoulders forward and back, trying to ease the tightness from them. Scar tissue and the forge fire did not get along, but he had no other skills with which to make a living. In fact—

“I’ve got something for you.”

He glanced at Jacob, who had produced a dirt-smudged and more than slightly wrinkled envelope from his back pocket. He frowned. “What’s that?”

“It’s a letter.” He extended it toward Carson, who merely frowned. “It’s for you.”

Carson stopped walking to frown at his friend. They stood at the edge of town, a ripple of laughter floating toward them from the boarding house owner, Lenora Drummond. She owned the two-story boarding house with four rooms to let, almost always occupied. Her reputation as the best cook in town gave her a brisk business. Across the street, he spied Lester Marsh, the mercantile owner, sweeping the boardwalk in front of his store, his wife Lois watching from the open doorway, arms akimbo and a frown on her face. The two were almost always squabbling, but he figured that they liked it that way.

Cowboys, a buckboard, and two buggies made their way down the rutted dirt of Main Street. Over the years, the town had grown a bit and now boasted a barber, a dentist office, a dressmaker’s shop, and at the far end of town, a small saloon. Of course there was a sheriff’s office too, a small post office with a telegraph machine, and the livery and stables. A small schoolhouse shared duty with the town’s church—

“Carson?”

He tugged his attention back to Jacob. “Who is it from?” He wasn’t expecting any letters from anyone. He didn’t know anyone outside of Rock Ridge.

Jacob’s eyebrows rose. “How should I know? I didn’t read it. But it looks like a lady’s handwriting if you ask me. Maybe you finally got an answer.”

Carson glanced down at his friend, momentarily confused. An answer to what? Then he recalled how a few months earlier, Jacob had convinced him to write an ad seeking a wife. He did want a wife, truly he did. He wanted to find someone that could share his life with him, provide some companionship, maybe even love. He’d only done it to keep Jacob from pestering him about it, but after weeks passed with no reply, he had forgotten about it.

Jacob shoved the envelope toward him, and he reluctantly took it. He inspected the writing on it and Jacob was right. It did look like a woman’s hand, neat and precise, with little flourishes here and there. Did he want to open it? Jacob cleared his throat and Carson glanced at him again. He stood now with his arms crossed over his chest, impatient.

“Open it, Carson. Read it.”

With a small sigh of impatience, Carson did, his heart thudding nervously, unsure what to expect. After all, in his ad he hadn’t mentioned that he was disfigured. He had mentioned that he was a blacksmith who could provide for a wife, although he didn’t think that a wife would be too happy to learn that his home consisted of a single room at the back of his blacksmith shop. Still, a roof was a roof. He pulled a single sheet of stationary paper from the envelope. It was thick and expensive looking, folded into thirds.

“What does it say?”

Carson swallowed and unfolded the letter. He glanced at Jacob. “You want me to read it out loud?”

“No,” Jacob replied with sarcasm. “I want to remain in mysterious suspense.”

Carson glowered, and then, his heart thumping again, he began to read aloud.

‘Dear Mr. Galloway,

I read your ad with interest. I am a 22-year-old from Mankato, Minnesota, seeking a husband who is no more than ten years older than me. As you’re only eight years older than myself, I believe that we might make a good match. I will be blunt and confess that I am responding to your ad in an effort to escape a forced betrothal arranged by my father, to a man I have no fondness for whatsoever and never will.

What I want, what I am seeking, is a man who might accept me as I am. I believe I am fair enough to look upon, with dark blond hair, green eyes, and a slender figure. I am a woman of faith, one who does her best to treat everyone with kindness. Now to my faults; I can be quite stubborn, contrary, and disobedient, per my father. I’m sure I have more, but those are all I care to identify at the moment without deeper introspection. I have been raised in a fairly wealthy household, and while I am not sure of what kind of skills a frontier woman might require, I am willing to learn and work hard to make and share my life with a husband in western Wyoming—’

“She sounds all right so far,” Jacob commented. He glanced down at the letter. “She has nice handwriting.”

Carson frowned at his friend and continued reading. ‘If you believe you might find me acceptable, I am prepared to leave Mankato immediately and make my journey west. I can pay my own way, which I would prefer at any rate, so I will not be obligated to you in any way in the event that you decide that I am not suitable to you. If I am, please reply by telegram, if possible, to Miss Elsie Mays, care of Maggie’s Haberdashery in Mankato. I am prepared to leave immediately.’ 

“That’s it,” Carson said, glancing at his friend with a lifted eyebrow. He still found it quite shocking that a woman had actually replied to his ad. Now that someone had, and had expressed interest in accepting a none-too-fancy marriage proposal, and in a newspaper ad at that, he felt uncertain. “I should’ve told her.”

“Carson, you’re more than your scars. You’re loyal, a hard worker, and you’re very gifted in metalwork. The townspeople of Rock Ridge count you a friend.”

“They accept me, Jacob, and count on me for their needs, but friendship?” He shook his head. “Even when I go to church, I end up sitting by myself. I haven’t been invited to any box suppers, any dances—”

“Would you have accepted even if you had been?”

He frowned. “That’s not the point.”

Jacob jabbed a finger at the letter. “You got a reply. She sounds nice. What are you going to do?”

Carson heaved a sigh, looked at the mountains surrounding the town for several moments, and then gave his friend a small smile. “I’m going to go to the telegraph office.”

Jacob let out a whoop that prompted curious glances from both the boarding house owner and the mercantile owner’s wife. He gave them each a grin and a wave, then followed on Carson’s heels as he headed to the telegraph office at the far end of town.

---

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