FULL PART 2 : The mail order bride arrived to find seven children and no mountain man

FULL PART 2 : The mail order bride arrived to find seven children and no mountain man

PART 2

The three knocks came again.

Slow.

Heavy.

Deliberate.

Norah stood frozen in the snow with Silas Hol’s bloodstained compass resting in her palm.

Behind her, Eli had gone so pale that the freckles across his nose seemed suddenly dark.

Tom clutched the hem of Norah’s skirt.

“That’s where I heard the scratching last night,” the little boy whispered.

Eli turned sharply. “You never said that.”

“You told me not to go near the barn.”

Another knock sounded from inside.

Three blows against wood.

Then silence.

Norah looked at Eli. “Who locked it?”

“Pa did before he left.”

“You saw him lock it?”

Eli hesitated.

That hesitation frightened her more than the sound.

“No,” he admitted. “I just found it locked afterward.”

Norah closed her fingers around the compass.

Six days ago Silas had supposedly ridden north through Black Pine Pass.

Yet his compass had been hidden beneath hay at the homestead.

And now something—or someone—was trapped inside his locked barn.

“Take Tom back to the house,” Norah said.

Eli stared at her. “You’re not opening that door alone.”

“I am if the alternative is bringing seven children closer to whatever is behind it.”

“I’m not a child.”

“You’re sixteen.”

“Out here, that’s old enough.”

Norah almost argued.

Then she looked at him properly.

The boy was frightened, but he did not move.

He had spent two winters being father, brother, cook, nurse, and guard to children who should never have depended on him for all those things.

So she nodded.

“Get the rifle.”

Eli returned moments later with an old Winchester.

Norah picked up the iron splitting maul from beside the woodpile.

Together they crossed the yard.

Snow hissed across the ground.

The barn doors were held shut by a thick chain threaded through both handles and secured with a heavy brass lock.

Norah examined it.

Fresh scratches marked the metal.

Someone had locked it recently.

“Stand back,” she said.

It took four swings.

On the fifth, the lock broke.

The chain dropped into the snow.

For a moment neither of them moved.

Then something shifted inside.

Eli raised the rifle.

Norah pulled one door open.

The smell struck first.

Blood.

Sweat.

Wet wool.

And beneath it, the sour odor of sickness.

Sunlight sliced into the dark barn.

A horse whinnied nervously from one stall.

Then Norah saw the boot protruding from behind stacked feed sacks.

“Eli.”

He rushed forward.

A man lay on the floor.

Not Silas.

He was perhaps fifty, broad-shouldered despite the gray in his beard, dressed in torn buckskins. One side of his face was bruised nearly black. His wrists had been tied with rawhide, though one hand had managed to work free.

Beside him lay a blood-smeared length of broken wagon spoke.

The weapon he had been using to knock.

His eyes fluttered open.

He looked at Eli.

Then at Norah.

His cracked lips moved.

“Silas…”

Eli dropped to his knees.

“Where’s my pa?”

The man’s expression changed.

Fear.

Not confusion.

Fear.

“He didn’t go north,” he rasped.

Norah felt the cold enter her bones.

“Then where did he go?”

The stranger tried to sit and failed.

“They took him.”

“Who?”

His eyes fixed on Norah.

“You the woman from Ohio?”

“Cincinnati.”

A bitter laugh escaped him.

“Then God help us. You came.”

Norah crouched beside him.

“My name is Norah Prescott. Tell me yours.”

“Jonas Creed.”

Eli inhaled sharply.

“You’re the trapper from Red Creek.”

Jonas nodded weakly.

“Your pa found me on the south ridge three nights ago. Men had jumped me. Thought they killed me. He brought me here.”

Norah glanced toward the locked door.

“And then tied you up?”

“No.”

Jonas’s eyes hardened.

“The men came here.”

Eli went rigid.

“How many?”

“Four. Maybe five.”

“What did they want?”

Jonas looked toward the house.

“The children.”

Norah’s grip tightened on the maul.

“Which children?”

“All of them.”

The words seemed impossible.

Seven hungry orphans in a forgotten Wyoming valley were hardly treasure worth stealing.

Yet Jonas’s face said otherwise.

“Why?” Norah demanded.

Jonas closed his eyes.

“Because one of those children ain’t who Silas told you they were.”

Before Norah could speak, the baby began crying inside the cabin.

The sound carried faintly through the wind.

Jonas’s eyes snapped open.

“You need to get them away from here.”

Eli grabbed his shoulder.

“Tell me where Pa is.”

“I don’t know. They beat him. Dragged him outside. He fought like hell.”

Jonas looked down.

“When I woke, he was gone.”

“And the blood on the compass?”

“Silas’s.”

Eli turned away sharply.

Norah caught his arm.

“He’s alive until we know otherwise.”

“You didn’t see the blood.”

“I see you.”

The boy looked at her.

For one fragile second, all the hardness fell away.

He was simply sixteen again.

“I can’t lose him too,” he whispered.

Norah’s voice softened.

“Then we find him.”

They brought Jonas into the cabin.

The children crowded around the table while Norah cleaned the wound along his ribs.

His injuries were ugly but not immediately fatal.

Tom watched with enormous eyes.

The baby slept against twelve-year-old Clara’s shoulder.

There were seven children in all: Eli, Clara, ten-year-old Samuel, eight-year-old Ruth, six-year-old Ben, four-year-old Tom, and baby Grace.

Only Eli, Clara, and Tom were Silas’s by birth.

Or so Norah had been told.

Now she was no longer certain of anything.

When Jonas could speak without gritting his teeth, Norah placed Silas’s letters on the table.

“You said one child isn’t who Silas claimed.”

Jonas studied the children.

Then pointed.

Not at one of the orphans.

At the baby.

Grace.

Clara pulled her closer instinctively.

“What about her?” Eli demanded.

Jonas looked at Norah.

“You know anything about the Union Pacific payroll robbery at Rock Springs?”

“No.”

“Four years ago. Army money. Railroad bonds. Nearly fifty thousand dollars disappeared.”

Eli frowned. “What does that have to do with Grace?”

“The man accused of taking it was named Caleb Mercer.”

Norah glanced toward the sleeping infant.

“Grace’s father?”

Jonas shook his head.

“Her grandfather.”

The room grew quiet.

Caleb Mercer had been hunted for months after the robbery.

According to Jonas, he disappeared into the mountains with his daughter, Abigail, who later married a prospector named Henry Vale.

Two years ago, Henry and Abigail arrived at Silas’s cabin during a blizzard with their newborn daughter.

Grace.

Henry died from frostbite.

Abigail survived another three days.

Before dying, she gave Silas a leather pouch and made him swear that Grace would never be handed to Caleb Mercer’s former partners.

“Everyone thought Mercer stole the money,” Jonas said. “He didn’t.”

“Then who did?” Norah asked.

“Three businessmen in Cheyenne who used him as their mule. Mercer figured out what they’d done and kept the evidence.”

“What evidence?”

Jonas looked at Grace.

“Apparently Abigail carried it.”

Norah understood.

“And Silas has been hiding the child.”

“For two years.”

Eli stood abruptly.

“He never told me.”

“He was protecting you.”

“By lying?”

Jonas gave him a weary look.

“Sometimes grown men convince themselves those are the same thing.”

Norah thought about Silas’s letters.

Three children.

A modest cabin.

A lonely widower seeking a practical wife.

He had left out four children, a criminal conspiracy, and men willing to kill over evidence hidden somewhere on his property.

She should have been furious.

Instead, she found herself almost laughing.

Not because it was funny.

Because apparently crossing nine days of country to marry a stranger had somehow been the least reckless part of the arrangement.

“What was in the leather pouch?” she asked.

Jonas shook his head.

“Silas never showed me. But the men who attacked us knew about it.”

“How?”

“Someone talked.”

Eli said, “Who knew?”

“Silas. Me. Reverend Pike in Sweetwater.”

Norah looked toward the window.

“And whoever gave Grace to Silas.”

Jonas nodded.

Norah suddenly remembered something.

Silas’s final letter.

A sentence she had dismissed as nervous sentiment.

If anything delays me, trust the children before you trust any man who arrives smiling.

At the time she had thought it poetic.

Now it sounded like a warning.

A horse appeared on the road shortly after noon.

One rider.

Dark coat.

Gray hat.

Eli reached for the rifle.

Jonas tried to stand and nearly collapsed.

“Stay down,” Norah ordered.

The rider stopped in front of the cabin.

He was handsome in the polished way frontier men rarely were, with a trimmed mustache and leather gloves too clean for the muddy roads.

He smiled before he even dismounted.

Norah remembered Silas’s words.

Trust the children before you trust any man who arrives smiling.

“Mrs. Hol?”

“I’m Miss Prescott.”

His smile widened.

“Of course. You’ve only just arrived.”

Norah said nothing.

That surprised him.

He removed his hat.

“Name’s Everett Shaw. Friend of Silas.”

Behind Norah, Eli went rigid.

Everett noticed.

“Good to see you, son.”

Eli did not answer.

Norah stepped onto the porch and pulled the door almost closed behind her.

“What can I do for you?”

“I heard Silas is missing.”

“From whom?”

Everett paused.

Then smiled again.

“Word travels.”

“He disappeared six days ago. I arrived yesterday. Yet word traveled all the way to wherever you were?”

Something cold flickered behind his pleasant expression.

“Sweetwater is a small valley.”

“It seems very large when a man needs rescuing.”

The smile disappeared.

“I came to help.”

“With what?”

“Finding him.”

“Wonderful. We leave in ten minutes.”

Everett blinked.

Norah continued.

“You know the country. Eli has his rifle. We can ride together.”

“I meant I could organize some men.”

“Where are they?”

“Well…”

“Mr. Shaw, seven children have been waiting nearly a week for their father. If you came to help, help.”

Everett studied her.

Norah understood then that he had expected a frightened city woman.

Someone overwhelmed by snow, children, isolation, and uncertainty.

He had not expected questions.

Finally he said, “I’ll return this evening.”

“Why not now?”

“My horse needs resting.”

The animal behind him was barely breathing hard.

Norah glanced at its saddle.

There was dried mud on one stirrup.

And a dark reddish stain on the other.

Blood.

Everett saw her looking.

His hand moved casually toward his coat.

Inside the cabin, a rifle lever clicked.

Eli.

Everett froze.

Norah smiled without warmth.

“Careful, Mr. Shaw. These country children can be terribly clumsy with firearms.”

For the first time, he looked uneasy.

Then Tom’s voice came from behind the door.

“That’s the bad man.”

Everything stopped.

Everett stared toward the cabin.

Norah did not turn.

“What did you say, Tom?”

The door opened two inches.

Tom’s frightened face appeared.

“He was here when Pa yelled.”

Everett lunged.

Norah swung the iron maul.

Not at him.

At his horse.

She struck the saddle with the wooden handle.

The startled animal reared violently.

Everett stumbled backward, cursing.

Eli burst through the door with the rifle aimed at his chest.

“Don’t move!”

Everett drew a pistol.

The shot came from inside the cabin.

Jonas Creed fired through the open window.

The bullet struck the porch rail beside Everett’s hand.

His pistol dropped into the snow.

“Next one goes through your wrist,” Jonas growled.

Everett slowly raised both hands.

Norah picked up the pistol.

Ten minutes later Everett Shaw was tied to the same chair where the children had eaten breakfast.

His expression had changed entirely.

Gone was the smiling neighbor.

What remained was something meaner.

Something patient.

“You people have no idea what you’re involved in.”

Norah placed Silas’s compass on the table.

Everett’s eyes flicked toward it.

That was enough.

“You recognize this,” she said.

He stayed silent.

Tom climbed onto Norah’s lap, pressed against her, and whispered, “He hit Pa.”

Eli stepped forward.

“Where is he?”

Everett smiled.

“Maybe dead.”

Eli struck him.

Once.

Hard.

Norah caught the boy before he could swing again.

“No.”

“He knows!”

“And if you kill him, he tells us nothing.”

Everett spat blood onto the floor.

“Smart woman.”

Norah crouched until their eyes were level.

“You expected a foolish one.”

“I expected someone who’d turn around once she saw seven mouths to feed.”

“So that was the plan?”

His expression tightened.

“You knew I was coming.”

No answer.

“You knew exactly when.”

Still nothing.

Then Norah saw something at his collar.

A torn corner of paper.

She reached into his coat.

Everett jerked violently.

Eli pinned his shoulders.

Norah pulled out a folded sheet.

Her stomach dropped.

It was one of Silas’s letters.

Not a copy.

The original.

The first letter he had ever mailed her.

Her name was written across the front in his hand.

NORAH PRESCOTT

CINCINNATI, OHIO

But she had received this letter months ago.

“How did you get this?”

Everett laughed.

Norah unfolded it.

At first it appeared ordinary.

Then she noticed faint writing between Silas’s lines.

Different ink.

Different handwriting.

Instructions.

Woman alone. No close family. Thirty-one. Schoolteacher. Savings modest. Likely compliant.

Norah’s blood went cold.

Silas had not simply selected her from a matrimonial advertisement.

Someone else had selected her.

“Who wrote this?”

Everett leaned back.

“You should have stayed in Cincinnati.”

Norah slapped the letter onto the table.

“Who chose me?”

Everett’s gaze shifted toward Grace.

And Norah understood something even worse.

She had not been brought west only to marry Silas.

She had been brought because someone needed a replacement caretaker.

A woman without powerful relatives.

A woman whose disappearance would attract little attention.

“You were going to kill Silas,” she whispered.

Everett said nothing.

“Then leave the children with me.”

Nothing.

“And after I settled in…”

His smile returned.

“You would have signed papers.”

“What papers?”

“A widow with seven children can be convinced of many things.”

Eli went pale.

“The land.”

Everett’s smile widened.

Silas’s homestead sat on more than worthless mountain ground.

A railroad survey completed the previous autumn had identified a possible route through the lower valley.

If approved, landowners would receive substantial compensation.

Silas had refused every offer.

But a frightened new widow with seven hungry children?

She might sell cheaply.

Norah stared at Everett.

“This was never just about Grace.”

“No.”

“The stolen money?”

“Old business.”

“The railroad?”

“New business.”

“And Silas stood in the way of both.”

Everett shrugged.

“Your mountain man had a habit of collecting lost children and dangerous principles.”

“Where is he?”

Everett looked toward the floor.

Norah seized his collar.

“Where?”

His eyes met hers.

“Black Pine mine.”

Jonas cursed.

Eli grabbed his coat.

Norah stopped him.

“You stay.”

“No.”

“You stay with the children.”

“He’s my father!”

“And they are your family.”

The words struck him hard.

Norah took his face between her hands.

“I need you to do the hardest thing. Not the thing that feels bravest.”

His eyes filled.

“What if you don’t come back?”

Norah almost told him she would.

But promises made in fear could become lies.

So she said, “Then you keep them together.”

Eli swallowed.

“Like Pa did.”

“Better than he did. Tell them the truth.”

That made Jonas smile faintly.

Norah and Jonas rode out before sunset.

Jonas knew an old logging path leading toward the abandoned Black Pine mine.

Snow fell harder as they climbed.

They found signs almost immediately.

Three horses.

A dragged boot.

Blood on a branch.

Then, two miles from the mine, they found a man lying beside the trail.

Dead.

Norah recognized him from nothing except the polished boots Everett had described as belonging to one of his partners.

Jonas crouched beside the body.

“Shot in the back.”

“By Silas?”

“Maybe.”

They continued.

The mine entrance appeared beneath a shelf of black stone after dark.

One lantern burned outside.

No guards.

That worried Jonas.

“Too quiet.”

Norah took Everett’s pistol from her coat.

“I have seven children expecting breakfast.”

Jonas glanced at her.

“You really planning to marry Silas after all this?”

“If he survives, I’m planning to murder him myself.”

Jonas grinned.

“Fair enough.”

They entered.

The tunnel smelled of wet earth and coal dust.

Fifty yards inside they heard voices.

Norah recognized Everett’s name.

Then another voice shouted.

Deep.

Hoarse.

Alive.

Silas.

They moved toward the sound.

Through a crack between support beams, Norah saw him.

He was tied to a wooden post in an old excavation chamber.

His face was bloodied.

One eye swollen shut.

But he was enormous.

Not merely tall.

Broad through the shoulders, with dark hair falling loose over his forehead and a beard rougher than she had imagined.

Two armed men stood nearby.

A third searched through crates.

“You buried it somewhere,” one said.

Silas spat blood.

“Keep digging.”

The man struck him.

Norah’s hand tightened around the pistol.

Jonas whispered, “Wait.”

Then one of the men said something that changed everything.

“Shaw should’ve brought the Prescott woman by now.”

Silas’s head snapped up.

“If you touched her—”

“What? You’ll kill us?”

Silas strained against the ropes.

Despite his injuries, the wooden post actually creaked.

The man laughed.

“You lied to her anyway. Seven children. Mercer’s evidence. Railroad men buying your land. You really think she’d stay if she knew?”

Silas lowered his head.

And for the first time Norah saw something in him that softened her anger.

Shame.

“I hoped she wouldn’t.”

The gunman frowned.

Silas continued.

“I hoped she’d see the children, curse my name, and take the first wagon east.”

Norah’s throat tightened.

“You needed her here,” the man said.

“No. I needed someone to come after I was gone.”

“What?”

Silas looked up.

“I knew you were closing in.”

The chamber went silent.

“I wrote to twelve women.”

Norah nearly dropped the pistol.

Twelve?

Silas gave a broken laugh.

“Eleven refused me.”

The man grinned.

“And Prescott?”

“I tried to frighten her off.”

Norah’s eyes narrowed.

That explained the final letters.

Silas had suddenly emphasized winter.

Isolation.

Wolves.

Crop failures.

She had interpreted his honesty as admirable.

Apparently the idiot had been trying to discourage her.

“And she came anyway,” the man mocked.

Silas closed his eyes.

“Yeah.”

Something in the way he said it made Norah’s anger change shape.

The gunman raised his pistol.

“Then she dies with you.”

Norah fired first.

The bullet struck the lantern above him.

Darkness exploded across the chamber.

Jonas fired.

A man screamed.

Silas roared.

Wood cracked.

Norah heard boots scrambling.

A shot flashed.

She dropped behind a crate.

Another gunshot.

Then a body struck the ground.

“Norah!” Silas shouted.

She froze.

He knew her voice?

She had never spoken.

“How do you know it’s me?”

“Because Jonas shoots better!”

Despite everything, she laughed.

Then she saw movement.

The last gunman rushed toward Silas with a knife.

Norah fired.

The bullet struck his shoulder.

Silas broke the weakened post free and drove it into the man’s chest like a battering ram.

The gunman collapsed.

Silence returned.

Norah stepped forward.

Silas stared at her.

For months, they had known each other through ink.

She had imagined his face a hundred ways.

None of them had included dried blood, one swollen eye, or the bewildered expression of a man seeing a ghost.

“You came,” he whispered.

Norah walked up to him.

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry.”

She slapped him.

Jonas burst out laughing.

Silas blinked.

Norah untied his hands.

“That was for saying three children.”

“I can explain.”

“That was also for writing twelve women.”

“Eleven said no.”

“That does not improve matters.”

“I was hoping you would too.”

“Even worse.”

Silas rubbed his jaw.

Then Norah wrapped both arms around him.

For one second he did not move.

Then this battered mountain of a man held her like he was afraid she might vanish.

“I thought they’d hurt you,” he whispered.

Norah closed her eyes.

“They tried.”

Silas pulled back.

“Where’s Shaw?”

“Tied to your kitchen chair.”

His good eye widened.

“You tied Everett Shaw to my kitchen chair?”

“Eli helped.”

A slow smile appeared beneath his bruises.

It was the first time Norah understood why a woman might cross nine days of country for a man she had never met.

Then Jonas called from the rear of the chamber.

“You two should see this.”

Behind a collapsed timber wall was a small iron strongbox.

Silas stared at it.

“That isn’t mine.”

Jonas pried it open.

Inside were railroad bonds.

Stacks of currency.

And a ledger.

Caleb Mercer’s missing evidence.

All of it had been hidden inside the mine.

Silas looked genuinely stunned.

“I never knew.”

“Abigail did,” Jonas said.

Then Norah saw an envelope tucked beneath the ledger.

One word had been written across it.

GRACE.

Silas opened it.

Inside was a letter from Abigail.

He read silently.

His face changed.

“What?”

He handed it to Norah.

She read.

Then read it again.

Grace was not Caleb Mercer’s granddaughter.

Not biologically.

Abigail had adopted the baby after finding her beside a burned wagon near Fort Laramie.

The infant’s true mother had died in the attack.

Around the child’s neck had been a small silver medallion bearing a family crest.

And a name.

Prescott.

Norah stopped breathing.

Silas looked at her.

“What is it?”

She reached into her dress and pulled out the necklace she had worn since childhood.

A silver medallion.

The same crest.

Jonas stared.

Norah’s hands began to shake.

She had once had an older sister.

Margaret Prescott.

Margaret had traveled west with her husband three years earlier.

Their wagon had disappeared.

No bodies were ever recovered.

Norah looked at the letter.

At Grace’s recorded age.

At the medallion.

“My sister had a baby,” she whispered.

Silas understood first.

“Grace…”

Norah could barely speak.

“She’s my niece.”

The mountain seemed to tilt beneath her.

She had crossed nine days of country because of a matrimonial advertisement.

She had believed she was traveling west to marry a stranger.

But somehow she had arrived at the one cabin where the last surviving child of her dead sister had been waiting.

Silas slowly sat on a crate.

“I swear to you, Norah, I didn’t know.”

“I believe you.”

And she did.

For the first time since arriving, she believed him completely.

They returned to the homestead at dawn.

The children saw Silas from the window.

The cabin door flew open.

Tom ran barefoot through the snow.

“Pa!”

Silas nearly fell getting off the horse.

All seven children surrounded him.

Even Eli.

Especially Eli.

The sixteen-year-old boy buried his face against his father’s shoulder and cried with the helplessness he had denied himself for two years.

Norah stood back.

Grace was carried out last by Clara.

Norah looked at the baby differently now.

Not as one more child Silas had hidden from his advertisement.

Family.

Her family.

Grace reached toward her.

Norah took her.

Silas watched quietly.

Then Tom looked between them.

“So are you our mama now?”

Everyone froze.

Norah looked at Silas.

He looked horrified.

“Tom,” he said, “Miss Prescott has every right to take the next coach east and spend the rest of her life warning women never to answer letters from Wyoming.”

Norah considered that.

Then she handed Grace to Clara.

Walked to Silas.

And said, “You owe me a proper proposal.”

His mouth opened.

“Right now?”

“Preferably before I reconsider.”

He looked at the children.

At Jonas.

At Eli.

Then he lowered himself onto one knee in the snow.

“Norah Prescott, I have lied about the number of children in my house, endangered your life without intending to, attempted unsuccessfully to frighten you away, and failed entirely to meet you at the door as promised.”

“That is an accurate summary.”

“I own forty acres of questionable soil, three good horses, one leaking roof, and approximately seven times more children than advertised.”

Tom whispered, “Ask her.”

Silas smiled.

“And I cannot promise you an easy life.”

Norah’s eyes filled.

“I’ve had an easy life. It was lonely.”

Silas swallowed.

“Then will you marry me?”

“Yes.”

The children erupted.

Even Jonas cheered.

But Eli did not.

He was staring toward the road.

A wagon had appeared beyond the trees.

Then another.

And another.

Six wagons in all.

Men riding beside them.

Armed men.

Silas rose.

His expression hardened.

“That isn’t Shaw’s crew.”

Norah shaded her eyes.

At the front rode an elderly man in a black coat.

Beside him flew a small flag.

Not railroad colors.

United States Army.

The convoy stopped outside the homestead.

A gray-haired officer dismounted.

He removed his hat.

Then looked directly at Norah.

“Miss Prescott?”

“Yes?”

The officer’s expression became strangely emotional.

“I have been searching for you for three years.”

Norah tightened her grip on Silas’s arm.

“Why?”

The officer looked toward baby Grace.

Then back at Norah.

“Because Margaret Prescott was not the only passenger who survived that wagon attack.”

Norah stopped breathing.

The officer reached into his coat and removed a sealed photograph.

“Your sister is alive.”

Norah stared at him.

Behind her, Grace began to cry.

And far down the valley road, a seventh wagon appeared.

A lone woman sat inside it.

Her face was hidden beneath a dark traveling veil.

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