A Ranch To Call Home. Carol Arens

Two

      Two wagons were for sale in the livery. One was small and weathered. It would carry her home but would not work to transport all the goods she would need in order to set up housekeeping.

      The other one was large and new. She smelled the freshly sawed wood the moment she walked into the livery. It would only take one trip to bring everything she needed. But it would require a pair of durable workhorses to pull it. Saffron, her sweet saddle mare, was not used to such hard work.

      Laura Lee knew exactly how much money was in the pocket of her petticoat by the weight of it. It had gotten heavier, but only slightly, since she left the Lucky Clover Ranch.

      Before Johnny came for her in Travers Ridge, she, along with Agatha Magee, had worked as cooks. First for a hotel that went bankrupt, then for a traveling circus.

      Laura Lee had managed to collect her pay from the hotel owner, who was a good and decent woman. Sadly, the owner of the circus was neither good nor decent and still owed her a week’s wages.

      If she had her way, she would have gone after him and pestered him until he paid, but Johnny had come for her, and what really mattered other than that?

      Loving man that Johnny was, he thought their time would be better spent in a hotel room. Naturally, she’d reminded him that an even better use of time would be spent with a preacher.

      Given that they were traveling together, and in constant company, he’d tried to convince her it was like being married. He vowed that he was as devoted to her as he would be when they were officially wed and that waiting was hard for a man. Especially when he loved a woman so. In the end, he’d accepted the wait. He even promised to replace the money the circus owner had cheated her of.

      He had more than kept the promise. He’d bought her a house...and land! Even though she was not yet Mrs. Johnny Ruiz, she soon would be. Johnny would return, just like he swore he would.

      Yes, it was disquieting to remember the look on his face when he rode away, like it was the dream of a lifetime to be running free.

      When that image threatened to subdue her joy, all she had to do was remember the deed packed away in her trunk.

      That piece of paper proved his vision for their future was the same as hers...to settle down in their own little home and raise babies.

      A huge gray-and-brown dog wandered into the barn, distracting Laura Lee from her woolgathering. Bartholomew Rawlings, the liveryman, shooed it outside with the bristle end of a broom. He shook his head, sighed, then set the broom against the gate on the larger wagon.

      She dearly wanted that one. Did she dare risk spending so much of her money on it? Johnny had been vague about how long he would be gone. What if a mortgage payment became due before he returned?

      She would need an income in order to cover it.

      Mending and washing laundry...she knew those skills with the best of them. But one needed clients before she could begin earning money that way. The only person she was acquainted with in Forget-Me-Not was Auntie June.

      Besides that, she did not particularly enjoy mending and washing.

      “You can’t beat this wagon, ma’am.” Mr. Rawlings gripped the large front wheel of the wagon, shook it to demonstrate how solid it was. Then he pointed a finger to a stall on the far side of the barn. “Whittle and Bride are only two years old but are already working well together. You couldn’t ask for a better bargain.”

      Given that a bargain was only a bargain as long as one could afford it, Laura Lee nipped her bottom lip, silently watching the horses eating hay. As large as they were, there would be some expense in feeding them.

      Still, the ranch had three hundred and twenty acres that would need tending, not the acre or two that she had envisioned.

      “I wonder, Mr. Rawlings...does the town have a market day?”

      “Oh, yes, it’s quite an event. Every other Friday, farmers come from all over to sell what they have. In the winter, the ladies gather in the library to sell their jarred goods.”

      Farmers worked hard, built up strong appetites. Pastries and coffee would be welcome while they sold goods on market day, she imagined.

      She could set up her own little booth. In her mind’s eye, she watched her business flourish. All over town, folks were eating her muffins and pies, happily sipping her freshly brewed coffee. In time, perhaps, people would seek her out to provide pastries for parties and festivals.

      If she could satisfy the appetites of circus performers, surely she could do the same for the folks of Forget-Me-Not.

      “This Friday or next?” The idea sent a shiver of excitement through her. She would earn a bit of money doing something she loved and the enterprise would keep her busy until Johnny returned.

      “This. Only five days from now.”

      “I’ll take the large wagon and the team, Mr. Rawlings. As long as you include their tack and load the wagon with a week’s worth of feed.”

      She extended her hand to shake on the deal, hoping he would accept her conditions. If she had to buy the feed and the tack, she would not be able to purchase the other things she needed to begin life in her own sweet home. Especially now that she would need to invest a bit of her precious funds in her new business venture.

      The liveryman stood with his hands in his pockets for a long moment, rocking back on the heels of his boots.

      When she thought she might faint in anticipation of his answer, he reached out and accepted her hand.

      The deal was made.

      At this point, it would have broken her heart to be forced to purchase the smaller wagon. Once she’d made up her mind on a course, nothing else would do.

      Just like when she’d realized she was in love with Johnny, she’d decided that they should be married and no other man would do.

      With a skip in her step, she approached the horses. She stroked Bride’s brown nose, then Whittle’s black one. Because she had spent much of her life on the Lucky Clover Ranch, she felt comfortable around the large beasts.

      Of course, the acres Johnny had given her were dwarfed by the vastness of the ranch she had grown to womanhood on. She carried deep attachments for those countless acres and for everyone who’d worked along with her to keep them running. For many people, living out their lives on the Lucky Clover where they had grown and raised their families was their dream.

      That was not the case for Laura Lee. She needed a place to call her own. To know that come what may, it was her own spot on the earth to just...be.

      When she was small, her father had a need to wander and was never happy to settle in one spot overlong. About the time Laura Lee would make a friend or feel secure in a new bed, she was dragged off on another “adventure.”

      All she’d ever wanted was a place to call home.

      Her toes were nearly dancing inside her boots because very soon she would be sitting in four snug walls that were her own. She would rise with the sun and plant a garden...and a peach tree so she could sit under its shade on a hot afternoon.

      As much as she would miss the Lucky Clover, would even bring her children to visit one day, she now had a home of her own and her heart was bursting with the joy of it.

      “You ready, Bride?” she asked, gazing into a large, gently blinking brown eye. “Time to go home.”

      * * *

      With Saffron tied to the back of the wagon, Laura Lee sat tall on the wood bench, her gloved hands gripping the team’s reins. As advertised, the horses got along well and were easy to handle.

      Seeing a movement beside the wagon, she glanced down. The dog that Mr. Rawlings had chased from the barn trotted beside the wagon wheel. It glanced up, woofed quietly in greeting and wagged its long, fanlike tail.

      She