Lynna Banning - Smoke River Bride

The shiny-faced clerk picked up a pen and absentmindedly turned the hotel register toward her. “If you’ll just sign here, ma’am, I’ll—”

He looked into her face and stopped short. “Just a minute, there. I’m afraid this hotel is full.”

“But it was not full two minutes ago,” she protested.

Thad strode over to the desk and positioned himself behind her. “No, it isn’t full, Sam,” he said in a flat voice.

“Sorry, Mr. MacAllister,” he mumbled. “We don’t cater to…to Celestials.”

Thad’s bare fist came down hard on the polished oak counter. He leaned over it and spoke in a tone as clear and hard as ice. “This lady is as American as you or me, and tomorrow she’s gonna be my—” he took a breath “—my wife. You’ll cater to her now , understand?”

The clerk goggled at him. “I h-heard ya, Mr. MacAllister, but—”

“How much is the room?”

“Dollar and a half,” Sam choked out. “But—”

Thad slapped four coins onto the counter. The clerk flinched, reached to one side and dropped a room key into Thad’s deliberately extended palm. “Third d-door on the right.”

Thad bent to retrieve Leah’s battered leather valise, grasped her elbow and ushered her up the stairs.

Instantly conversation buzzed in the smokefilled lobby. “My Gawd, didja see that?”

“Never thought a Celestial…”

“Hell, Thad’s bit off more’n he can chew this time.”

“Celestial or not, didja see her face? She’s downright pretty!”

Leah followed Mr. MacAllister down the musty-smelling hallway and waited while he unlocked the door to her room. He stood aside, and she edged past him.

The room was small, with one lace-curtained window overlooking the main street, a coverlet-swathed bed, a tall oak armoire and a washstand with a blue-patterned china basin and water pitcher. The place smelled oddly of both dust and furniture polish.

Mr. MacAllister shifted from one foot to the other and finally spoke from the open doorway. “I’ll be back in the morning, Miss Cameron.”

Leah turned toward him. “I will be ready, Mr. MacAllister.”

For a long minute he didn’t move. “One last thing I’ve got to say,” he grumbled.

She braced herself. She knew it! He didn’t want her. In the morning he would send her away.

“You do not want me because I am—”

“Nah, not a bit of it, Miss Cameron. Don’t you mind what people say. I—I’m glad you came.”

She studied the tall man in the beaver coat. His gaze seemed direct; laugh lines wrinkled the corners of his eyes and his mouth could change from a grim line into a smile in a single heartbeat.

She liked him. She couldn’t say why, exactly. He was gruff, his manners untutored, but she sensed a steadiness about him. He was like Father but not so disapproving. Father had always worried about her Chinese half, even though he had braved Third Uncle, Ming Sa’s guardian, to marry her mother. The Chinese did not respect the White Devils, but she knew Father had loved Ming Sa.

“I am glad I came, as well,” she said softly. And God knew she needed to belong somewhere safe, even if it was a farm on the rough, uncivilized Oregon frontier.

Thad tipped his hat, backed into the hallway and turned to leave. “Whatever happens, it should be interesting.” He tossed the remark over his shoulder.

Leah jerked as if bitten by a horsefly. “Wait!” she called. “Your gloves.” She pressed them into his large hand. To her surprise she found his fingers were trembling.

In that moment she guessed what lay beneath his gruff exterior. Underneath, he was as frightened as she was. But, being a man, he would never, never admit it. Never show fear , Father had said.

When the door closed behind Mr. MacAllister, she let her heavy wool coat slide off her shoulders onto the scuffed hardwood floor. She undressed by the light seeping through the lacy curtain, poured water into the basin and rapidly sponged off the travel dust and soot from every inch of her body. Then she shook out her silk tunic and trousers and hung them in the armoire along with her coat.

Ravenously hungry, she unwrapped her last dried bean cake, pulled on her pink silk sleeping robe and crawled into the welcoming bed.

She had been fortunate in America thus far—except for those terrifying days imprisoned at Madam Tang’s. Leah had finally escaped in the horse-drawn laundry cart that came each morning and found her way to a church. Now, after a day and a night on the train from San Francisco to Portland, and another half day to Smoke River, here she was. Tired to the bone, but safe in the biggest, softest bed she had ever slept on. God was surely looking out for her.

She stretched luxuriously, nibbled the edge of the hard bean cake and listened to the street noises below her window. Horses clipclopped down the main road, harnesses jingling. Dishes clattered in the restaurant across from the hotel. Men’s raucous voices drifted from the saloon next door. Oh, it all sounded so…American! What a strange and wonderful land this was!

Thank you, Lord, for this place of safety and for this man . She would be a good wife to him.

Nodding over the uneaten bean cake, she curled into a ball and fell asleep listening to the sound of a woman’s voice from the saloon below, singing a song about a train and a round mountain.

Seven-year-old Teddy MacAllister looked up at his father accusingly. “Where ya been, Pa? I had to shoo the chickens inside the henhouse all by myself, and keep the fire goin’, and…” His voice trailed off. His father was not listening, as usual.

“What? Oh, I’ve been in town, laddie. Tomorrow I’ll have a surprise for you.”

Teddy’s blue eyes lit up. “A horse, Pa? Is it a horse of my own?”

Thad regarded his son with eyes that saw only a small part of the boy’s eagerness. “Nope, not a horse. Something better.”

“Ain’t nuthin’ better than a horse,” the boy grumbled.

But Thad did not hear. He busied himself at the woodstove in the kitchen, heating the kettle of beans he’d set to soak before he’d left to meet the train. His gut felt as if it were tearing in two directions. On the one hand, he wanted to give Teddy someone who could fill the gap left by his mother’s death. Someone to keep house and bake cookies and knit socks for the boy.

On the other hand, he did not want Miss Cameron, no matter how capable or understanding she might be, to replace Hattie. Thad and she had grown up together in Scotland, and later, when he had settled on the Oregon frontier, she’d come out from New England to marry him. Her upbringing hadn’t prepared her for the hardships on a ranch; in fact, she had disliked living so far away from the life she had grown used to. But Hattie had said she loved him, and she had given him a son.

Teddy dawdled near the dry sink, still stacked full of plates and cups from last night’s supper. “Kin we have biscuits?”

“What? Biscuits take mixin’ up.”

“Then kin I mix ’em? I learned real good from Matt, uh, Marshal Johnson,” he amended. “I even know how to bake them on a flat rock!”

“Got a good oven right here.” Thad thumped one leg of the nickel-trimmed stove with his boot. “Build up the fire some, Teddy. Need these beans to cook.”

“Yes, Pa.” He moved to the wood box near the back door, stacked an armload of small oak logs along one arm and staggered to the stove.

“Guess what?” he said as he chunked one piece into the fire box.

Thad didn’t answer.

“Pa?”

Thad spooned some bacon grease into his bowl of flour and stirred it up, paying scant attention to the boy. Usually, he thought about his dead wife, or worried about his new wheat field—was some insect nibbling the shoots? Would the snow stunt the sprouts? But this evening, he couldn’t get his mind off tomorrow morning.