The Farmer Takes A Wife. Barbara Gale

see a stranger, he tugged free his hat to get a better look, startling Maggie with his head of silky, corn yellow hair.

      “Who are you?” he asked, his shimmering blue eyes wide with surprise.

      Surprised by his ethereal beauty, Maggie wondered who was responsible for this angel in desperate need of a haircut. “My name is Margaret Tremont,” she explained between two violent sneezes into the last of her dusty tissues. “But my friends call me Maggie.”

      “You sure sneeze loud,” he said gravely.

      “She’s sick, can’t you tell?” Louisa scolded him. “Young miss stopped for gas. She says she’s a doctor.”

      Amos’ smile was an engaging confection of pure pleasure and unabashed curiosity. “Really? An honest-to-goodness real doctor?”

      “Honest-to-goodness,” Maggie promised with a watery smile.

      “Wow! Wait till I tell dad! I’mAmos Burnside, but my friends call me Amos,” he said with artless candor.

      “Glad to meet you, Amos,” Maggie rasped. “Uh oh, I think I’m starting to lose my voice.”

      “Louisa’s right, you do sound sick. If you’re a real doctor why don’t you make yourself better?”

      “Amos, if I knew how to cure the common cold, I’d not only feel better, I’d be a rich woman.”

      “My dad says that too, every time I get a cold! If I knew how to cure a cold would I be rich?”

      “The richest boy on earth, my friend.”

      “Well, then, maybe that’s what I’ll do when I grow up!”

      My hat’s off to you, kid, Maggie murmured to herself. And if you could manage to do it by tomorrow, I would be grateful.

      But Amos had moved on to new territory, in the way that children did. In one sentence, or less.

      “WhatareyoudoinghereDoctortremontissomeonesickhowlongareyoustayingitsnotsafetodriveatnightintherainmydadsaysso—”

      “Whoa, young man! That’s a lot of questions. Well, let’s see. No one is sick here that I know of—except me,” she explained with a small laugh. “I was on my way home—I live in Boston—when I got caught in the storm and stumbled into Mrs. Haymaker’s gas station. My good luck because I was nearly out of gas. I would be glad, as well, to stumble into a warm bed with a box of tissues! As a matter of fact, I was just asking Mrs. Haymaker directions to the nearest motel when you arrived.”

      Amos turned to Louisa with a puzzled look. “Louisa, why didn’t you tell her about the cabins out back? Sorry, doctor, Louisa must have forgot because we don’t get many visitors to Primrose.” Amos smiled as if it were his fault. “You must have missed the sign.”

      “I seem to have missed many signs,” Maggie said, sending Louisa a flinty look.

      “Louisa owns the motel out back. It’s called Jack’s Haven, after Louisa’s husband, Mr. Jack, except he’s not her husband anymore because he’s dead, but he would be her husband if he were still alive. Wouldn’t he, Louisa?”

      “Amos Burnside,” Louisa said, cool as a cucumber, “you know as well as anyone those cabins are unfit to rent. Cold as all get out, and damp, to boot,” she told Maggie firmly. “If you’re sick, you’ll want a better place to stay, somewhere warm, where the roof isn’t about to fall on your head.”

      “Louisa, the roof isn’t going to fall down! Dad patched them just last week,” the boy reminded her. “Don’t you remember? I helped! And anyway, there is no other place to stay. If it really is that cold in the cabins, I’ll be glad to help you build a fire. Dad taught me how to do it last weekend when he took me camping and—”

      If looks could kill, Amos would have been a photo in the old woman’s memory box, but there was nothing Louisa could do to stop the boy talking without embarrassing them both.

      “I’d be glad to build you a fire, Doctor Tremont,” Amos promised Maggie with an earnest smile.

      Biting her lip to keep from smiling, Maggie was all grave politeness. “Thank you, Amos. I would be grateful for your help.” Good lord, from what cloud had this child fallen?

      “Well…” Louisa hesitated, but knew she had no choice. Maggie must be allowed to stay, unless Louisa wanted to make a scene. “I suppose it would be all right…for just one night.”

      Maggie didn’t like that timeline, but if her foot was in the door, she would not ask for more. “Thank you, Mrs. Haymaker. The idea of driving to Bloomville was daunting, and the thought of sleeping in my car was…um…alarming.”

      Amos was impressed. “You drove all the way from Bloomville?”

      “No, I got lost looking for Bloomville,” Maggie explained. “I know from my map that Bloomville is not that far, only fifty miles or so, but with all the rain, I could hardly see the signs.”

      “It’s far enough that I’ve only been there once,” Amos said mournfully.

      “But how could that be?” Maggie asked with surprise. “It’s only on the other side of the mountain.”

      “My dad goes once in a while, on an emergency, and to get groceries and stuff, but he never lets me go with him. He says there’s nothing there, that we have everything we want here at home. Rafe says—”

      “Who is Rafe?” Maggie asked.

      “Rafe is my dad. Sometimes I call him dad, and sometimes I call him Rafe. He’s getting Louisa’s groceries out of the truck. Rafe says that people who leave home sometimes lose their way back. Like my mom. She left when I was a baby and we never saw her again. Rafe says—”

      “Amos!” Louisa snapped, visibly alarmed at the boy’s indiscretions. “I don’t think—”

      But before Louisa could explain further, the door swung wide and a rain-drenched man strode through the door, bringing with him the scent of wet leaves and damp wool. Tall as he was broad, he moved with grace as he slammed shut the door with his boot heel, his arms balancing three brown bags filled to overflowing with groceries.

      “Amos,” the man said, his voice admonishing yet gentle at the same time, “you sure did disappear in a hurry. You were supposed to see if Louisa was awake, then come back and help me with these groceries.”

      Maggie was intrigued by the low timbre of the gentle voice that still managed to sound stern. But whereas Amos Burnside was a ray of sunlight on this dreary, gray day, his father—it could be no other—was a rough caricature of beauty, his weather-beaten face a maze of deep creases and a day-old beard beneath a battered gray, felt hat.

      And Maggie could not stop looking.

      A silky black curtain, his long, dark hair clung damply to his forehead. His eyes were black coals beneath a thick, black brow. His nose was strong and straight, and a square jutting jaw lent him a sensual, masculine air. If his stained denim jeans and mud-splattered work boots weren’t enough evidence of a life led outdoors, his bulky plaid jacket added to the impression. But it was the size of him that was most remarkable. Standing at about six feet two, and maybe half as wide, he was one of those men who insinuated with pure, male presence. Maggie guessed there was probably no space he wouldn’t dominate.

      Something in the air must have revealed her presence because, suddenly on the alert, Rafe turned in her direction, still clutching the brown bags. Finding her, his eyes grew wide and he fixed her with a searching look, his demeanor changing with his discovery. His fierce frown didn’t help to disguise his annoyance, either. Maggie tried to smile, but he wasn’t buying into it. Watching his mouth work itself into a thin line of displeasure, she felt herself flush with embarrassment. But it was too late. She was a butterfly pinned by a single glance from his piercing blue eyes. Eyes that were at once outraged, contemptuous, and yet…revealed a concentration of interest. Surely it was the same look that