Page 1 of Mail-Order Brides Wishes
Chapter One
Montana, 1891
Clackety-clack. Clackety-clack. By now she should be so used to the sound of the train traveling along the rails that she no longer heard it, but today the noise was loud and intrusive.
As her destination drew closer, Brynlee Faraday’s nerves twitched like dancing fireflies.
“Crow Crossing.” The conductor’s call put a halt to Brynlee’s fussing. She took a moment to look outside. A small town much like many she’d seen on the trip across America. She couldn’t see the mountains from her window, but they'd been growing steadily closer and larger as she continued westward. Majestic in all their glory.
Three-year-old Susie dozed on the seat beside Brynlee, her blonde hair tangled about her face despite the fact Brynlee had recently combed it and tied it with a bright blue ribbon. She shook the child gently. “We’re here.”
Blue eyes widened as Susie wakened. The little one jerked upright. “We go home now?”
“A new home, sweetie.” She’d explained it many times, but Susie clung to the hope they would arrive back with her mother.
An ache as big and sharp as the mountains clawed at Brynlee’s insides. Although she and Rowena had not been raised together and she was eight years older than her half-sister, they had grown close after Susie’s birth. Her passing had ripped away yet another person Brynlee loved.Please dear Father in heaven, let this move fulfill my heart’s desire.And if she didn’t have the confidence to put that hope into words, she knew God could read her heart.
Brynlee gathered together their belongings— a valise containing a few items of clothing, Susie’s favorite blanket, and the doll Rowena had made. Must remember not to say that name.
“Hold my hand, sweetie.” Susie had a habit of running ahead, guided by curiosity and enjoyment of life.
Would that she never lost the latter and learned to temper the former.
“That man is gonna get us and take us to his house. Our new home. Isn’t that right, Auntie Bryn?”
“That’s the plan.” She managed to hold Susie’s hand even when the little one tugged in her eagerness to leave the train and start their new life. For the child, the future beckoned with open arms.
Brynlee was less convinced, though when she’d gone to Mrs. Strong to arrange to become a mail-order bride and had seen the name Flint March, she’d taken it to be God’s direction.
“Mama be there?”
“No, dear. But there’ll be lots of exciting things. Horses, cows, chickens, and so much more.” Her trunk sat on the luggage cart.
She and Susie stood on the wooden platform. Several people hurried away. A horse was led from the box car. But no one approached offering her a home and marriage.
The sun shone overhead bright and welcoming. At least that part of Crow Crossing was kind. The train puffed out clouds of steam.
The conductor called out, “All aboard.”
Still, no one came in their direction. Her heart weighed like a rock.
Had she made a colossal mistake?
It was Brynlee’s sister who, when she lay dying, suggested she become a mail-order bride. “There are good people out west,” Rowena had said. “Good men.”
Brynlee guessed she referred to the man she’d met when she went to visit her aunt in Montana a few years ago before her marriage to Manfred. Flint March. So many times Brynlee had wanted to ask why, if this Flint March was such a good man, Rowena had turned down his offer of marriage and returned to marry someone who had proven to not be a good man.
Rowena had insisted that her husband sign a letter giving Brynlee custody of their daughter, three-year-old Susan. Not that he protested. “I want nothing more to do with her,” were his words.
“Take Susie and start over with my blessing.” Rowena's words provided the impetus for Bryn's decision.
An arranged marriage seemed her only option. There was nothing holding her in Ohio. Her grandparents who had provided her the only home she knew, were both gone to their heavenly reward. Their house had been sold. At twenty-eight, Brynlee was considered past marriageable age and attracted no suitors in her present location.
Rowena had continued, “Teach her to be as strong and self-assured as you are.”
Brynlee gulped as she looked across the now vacant platform. She didn’t feel at all strong or self-reliant at the moment.
But she had learned to get on with life.
