Summer Fancy

By Anne Avery

Quiet, shy Zeke Jeffries is working hard to turn his run-down property into the best watermelon farm in Colorado. The last thing on his mind is finding himself a wife. Unfortunately, the match-making mamas of Rocky Ford have other plans for the handsome bachelor, and they aren't at all shy about letting him know it.

Plain, independent-minded Sophronia Carter is burdened with a flat chest and a mother intent on finding her only daughter a husband. Sophie isn't immune to Zeke's charms, but since she managed to bloody his nose and ruin his best suit the first time they met, he tends to run the other way whenever she appears. And then she inadvertently saddles him with the precocious son of the town's fancy lady. As her mother said, before she fainted dead away, "Oh, my! Sophronia! How could you?"

• Language: English
• Publisher: Anne Avery
• Release date: Apr 28, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386829393

Book preview

— CHAPTER 1 —

Friday, April 7, 1893

I reckon I’m in trouble now, and no help for it. I finally had to say I’d go to the church social on Sunday.

I told Mrs. Smith I didn’t want to go, but she’s a mighty persistent lady, even if she is no bigger than a minute. Her and Hiram—Mr. Smith, that is—live on the next farm over but one, and she’s been trying to drag me to church with them ever since I moved in. I thought I’d been doing pretty good holding her off with one excuse and another. Figured she’d get tired of asking before I ran out of excuses, but it didn’t work that way.

She came over on Wednesday. Day before yesterday, that was. Said she wanted to remind me that she’d take any extra milk once my Delphi freshened, but that was all an excuse. She sold Delphi to me in the first place so she knows she won’t be dropping her calf for another couple weeks yet, and we’ve already talked about the milk often enough for our jaws to have gotten sore from the chattering. Mine anyway. Mrs. Smith’s are a tad more toughened up.

Anyway, she spent about a minute flat on the milk, then, before I got half a chance to plan what kind of excuse I could try this time, she just charges right on to the matter of the church Social invite. Tried to tell me I’d meet lots of nice people. I headed her off on that one by saying I’d already met a passel of nice people. Darn near tripped over them every time I went to town, there were so many, I said.

I thought that was a pretty good reply, but it didn’t hold her long.

All the ladies would be bringing food, she said. There’d be so many good things to eat, I’d probably have trouble walking once I’d finished. I said I really appreciated the thought, but I didn’t dare risk it. All that good food after so many months of my own cooking was like to prove fatal, I said.

Well, that stopped her for a minute or two, but nobody ever said Mrs. Smith didn’t have spunk. She just came charging back with a half dozen more good arguments about why I should go.

In the end, I held her off, but it was a close run thing. I figure that little skirmish cost me a month’s worth of good excuses, minimum. Trouble was, I didn’t have any idea just how determined that little lady could be. If she’d been in charge of the Confederate army, I doubt even General Grant could have licked her.

I found that out when Hiram drove up this morning looking like a hound dog that had just been whupped. Zeke, he says to me, his voice sort of raspy, as if it hurt him to talk. You gotta go to the Social.

Of course, I told him I didn’t want to go to the Social, but he just shook his head and said, I know that. But Mrs. Smith don’t know that. Hiram always calls her Mrs. Smith, even if she is his wife. "She thinks you’re just shy or scared or something and she’s making my life miserable because of it. Says I’m supposed to convince you to come along. For your own good, she says."

Well, I knew then it was pretty serious. When the ladies start talking about a man having to do things for his own good, then you just know he hasn’t got a prayer, even assuming he’s on a good standing with the Lord, which I’m not going to try and claim. And this is a church Social we’re talking about.

Now, it’s no use saying that just because I’m six feet four and strong as they come that I can stand up to a lady like Mrs. Smith, because I can’t. Hiram’s an inch or so taller than me and he must weigh a good thirty, forty pounds more, and Mrs. Smith can’t weigh a hundred soaking wet with all her petticoats on. You’d think that kind of difference in size would settle the matter, but it didn’t take me ten minutes first time I met them to figure out who was tougher.

That bad, huh? I said, feeling pretty shaky.

He nodded, real sad, like a hound that not only got whupped, but got his favorite bone taken away, just for good measure. He said, Worse. She hasn’t hardly given me any peace since day before yesterday when she come home from visitin’ you. I don’t know if I got the courage to go back and tell her if you don’t agree to go to the Social.

Hiram, I said. "You know and I know that the only reason Mrs. Smith wants me at that Social is she’s planning on fixing me up with one of her single lady friends. Or maybe more, depending on how I take. I know how these ladies work, Hiram, and so do you."

He sighed, real deep and long, then said, I tried to hold out, Zeke, honest I did, but she was worrying it so this morning, she cooked my eggs till they was tough as old leather. And I like ’em soft with the yellow running into everything.

Then he looked at me out from under those droopy eyelids of his, just like a hound that’s begging to have his bone back, at least. "You gotta go to that Social, Zeke. As a favor to me. I just can’t stand to have tough eggs two days in a row, and there’s no telling what she’d do to the beans if she got real upset."

It was my turn to sigh then, but I just couldn’t let a man down who’s been as good to me as Hiram has. All right, I said, none too enthusiastic. But don’t you go blaming me if I make a fool of myself and upset the ladies, Hiram. I always do, and I don’t expect this will be any different.

I’m hoping I was wrong on that prediction, but I don’t think I was.

Had to go into town this afternoon. Coulter broke on the plow, so I took it into the blacksmith’s along with some parts from the traction engine I needed fixed. Seems like I just keep finding more and more on that thing that needs to be done. Finally had to break down and order some parts from back East, though it sure hurt to do it. The darned things will cost me a good nine dollars plus freight. If the money keeps going out at that rate, I’ll have to ship twice the number of melons I planted, just to break even.

Anyway, while I was waiting I wandered around some. Started to turn into Hodgeson’s Emporium, but there were two ladies standing there at the counter and I ended up backing out faster than I went in. Automatic. Don’t know how I’m going to manage the Social if I can’t face a couple of strangers in a general store.

THESE ARE THE VERY FINEST FACIAL CREAMS, Mrs. Carter, I assure you. Samuel Hodgeson, sole proprietor of Hodgeson’s Emporium, extended two bright blue bottles for inspection. There is no finer manufacturer of quality beauty products than Maison Riviere—he pronounced it Maysawn Riveeairee—and these have just come in direct from New York.

As Delphi Carter leaned across the wide store counter to study the bottles’ labels, Sophronia Carter shifted her laden market basket from her right hand to her left and sighed. Her feet hurt, her corset pinched, at least five hairpins were sticking into her scalp, and the day was unseasonably warm, but none of these arguments would be sufficient to persuade her mother to abandon her absorbing discussion of health and beauty products once it was well launched.

Delphi Carter had begun a quarter of an hour ago with an animated debate on the relative merits of Peruvian Wine of Coca versus a Nutritive Beef, Iron and Wine Tonic as a remedy for the physical exhaustion brought on by stress and overwork. Since her mother was the picture of robust good health, and the most strenuous activity in which she regularly engaged was sticking her nose into her neighbors’ business, Sophie couldn’t quite see the need for either restorative, but there was no dissuading Delphi Carter. The tall amber bottle of Nutritive Tonic now stood at one side of the counter along with a roll of Jaynes’ Sugar-Coated Cathartic Pills and a blue-paper-wrapped can of Bromo-Vichy, which Mr. Hodgeson had assured them was an excellent cure for Nervous Headaches, Neuralgia, Sleeplessness, and Over Brain Work.

From patent remedies, the discussion had moved on to the even more absorbing topic of beauty aids.

This Creme Incomparable is a marvelous addition to Maison Riviere’s Eau de la Jennesse, Mr. Hodgeson said, delicately waving first one blue bottle, then the other, under Delphi Carter’s nose. "Of course, you don’t need such aids, Mrs. Carter. Why, just the other day Mrs. Hodgeson was saying to me that she didn’t know how you managed to keep your complexion like you do, considering our dry western climate."

Sophie’s mother beamed and shoved back her shoulders, which made her stays creak and her impressive bosom thrust out even farther than it already did.

It is a trial, Mr. Hodgeson, I assure you, she said with a heartfelt sigh. Her fingers fluttered at her breast, delicately hinting at just how much a trial it was. Although I do flatter myself I’ve managed better than most. Mr. Carter, may heaven rest his soul, always said my complexion was a great blessing and that I should take care to protect it. ‘Delphi, my love,’ he’d say to me, ‘you be sure to take care of yourself. A beautiful woman is a joy for a man’s eyes and you’re a true wonder.’ That’s what he’d say.

I don’t doubt it, Mrs. Carter. Indeed I don’t. Mr. Hodgeson’s heavy eyelids drooped in soulful appreciation of Mr. Carter’s perspicacity.

Delphi Carter was clearly fighting against the urge to preen. She settled for lightly brushing her fingertips across her smooth pink cheek. I’ve found, however, that a judicious use of Dr. Rose’s French Arsenic Complexion Wafers is a great preventative against whatever damage our weather might cause. You might suggest them to Mrs. Hodgeson, if she is concerned.

Her smile turned to a ladylike frown as a new and less pleasant thought occurred to her. She glanced at Sophie. "Some people are wise enough to take a well-meant suggestion."

Sophie pressed her lips tight together and turned to scowl at a poster advertising Geyserite Medicated Soaps, patented February 3, 1885 and manufactured only in Denver, Colorado. The central design, which looked more like an exploding volcano than a geyser, roused a certain sympathy in her. She’d been fighting against the urge to let off steam all morning, herself.

Against her mother’s wishes, Sophie had ordered her new summer suit to be made in a practical brown broadcloth. Worse, she’d chosen unfashionably narrow lapels and none of the decorative trim and braid that so appealed to her parent. As if that weren’t transgression enough, her four new shirtwaists were similarly neat and practical, and completely lacked any of the heavy pleating or ruffling that might have helped disguise her hopelessly flat chest.

The plain brown straw hat she’d chosen had been, literally, the last straw for her mother’s already abused and overburdened sensibilities. At sight of it, Delphi Carter had launched into yet another diatribe on Sophie’s deplorable inattention to the finer points of feminine dress and beauty, and she hadn’t calmed down yet.

It wasn’t her fault she hadn’t been blessed with her mother’s womanly charms, Sophie reminded herself rebelliously. If she could have, she would happily have traded a few excess inches out of her five feet ten inches for a corresponding increase in her bust measurement. But that wasn’t possible and she saw no sense in trying to pretend she was anything except what she really was, a tall, thin, rather plain spinster of twenty-six who looked even taller, thinner, and plainer when compared to her buxom and eminently feminine mother.

The silence might have stretched uncomfortably, but Mr. Hodgeson was too experienced a salesman to let the sudden tension between his best customer and her daughter divert him from a profitable sale.

Well, I’ll be sure and tell Mrs. Hodgeson about those arsenic wafers, Mrs. Carter, he said with respectful enthusiasm. I thank you for the suggestion. Your comments on such matters are always so very helpful and informative, you know. That’s why I thought you would be an excellent judge of the quality of these new products here. Just in from New York, as I do believe I mentioned.

Diverted, Delphi turned back to the more immediate concern of just how much benefit might be obtained by trying the proffered beauty creams. Ever since her daughter had grown into a rather lank and unpromising womanhood, she’d found it increasingly difficult to ignore the unwelcome hints that her own youthful beauty was fading. Patent medicines, expensive beauty creams, and the surreptitious use of face powder and rouge had all come to occupy a central spot in her limited range of interests, second only to her preoccupation with her daughter’s worrisome unwed state.

Well, Mr. Hodgeson, since you ask. She sighed delicately, as if in recognition of her responsibility to the less well-informed women who might come after her. I suppose we could try one or two of them. Sophronia is occasionally troubled by the dryness, you know, and with my delicate skin, I am peculiarly sensitive to the sun.

Rather than explode like the soap poster, Sophie bit her tongue, spun about on her heel, and, head high, marched down the aisle toward her favorite spot in town—the small glass case at the back of the store where Mr. Hodgeson’s collection of books was displayed. A few minutes spent in the presence of books never failed to calm her too-quick temper; although the way she felt right now, she might well have to spend an hour or two buried in the store’s shadowy depths before it would be safe for her to reappear.

She rounded the display of farm tools that occupied the center of the floor only to discover, to her dismay, that she was not alone.

A thin, grimy boy of about ten, dirty hands pressed flat against the glass, stared hungrily at the clothbound books primly arrayed before him, just out of reach.

Sophie stopped short. She’d seen the boy around town before. From a distance, he’d appeared to be in need of a bath and clean clothes.

Closer inspection revealed that one bath wouldn’t be near enough to remove the dirt ground into his hide, and his clothes didn’t have a chance of surviving a washing, even if they hadn’t been too small and too full of holes to be worth saving. Bony elbows poked out of tattered shirt-sleeves. Scrawny ankles showed three inches below the ragged edge of his pants. He was barefoot and the soles of his feet were so thick with calluses that Sophie doubted he could wear a regular pair of shoes, even assuming he had them, which she doubted.

He hadn’t heard her approach. He was too intent on the books to be aware of anything else.

There wasn’t much for him to see, really. Just the titles on the spines of the three or four dozen cloth and cheap paperbound books lined up side by side along the shelf.

From her own frequent investigations of the case, Sophie knew it contained books by novelists as diverse as Mark Twain and Edward Bellamy, as well as some of her favorite romantic novels like the ones penned by Mrs. Southworth. There were stories by Harry Castlemon and Horatio Alger for boys, and some of the Fireside Series for girls. What puzzled her was that the boy didn’t seem to be concentrating on the novels, but on the manuals and handbooks at one end.

Sophie edged forward, curious to see more clearly. A floorboard creaked beneath her, startling the boy. He jumped away from the case and whirled to confront her, eyes wild beneath a broom-corn thatch of dirty yellow hair.

I wasn’t doin’ nuthin’.

Sophie smiled encouragingly and set her basket on the floor out of the way. I didn’t think you were. She glanced at the books, then back at him. I like to look at them, too. My favorites are Sir Walter Scott and Mrs. Southworth. What about you?

She asked out of politeness and because she couldn’t think of anything else to say. Tatterdemalion boys like this one seldom spent enough time in school to learn to read, let alone read anything as difficult as a novel.

The boy hesitated, eyeing her uncertainly, but the case with its precious cache of books was stronger than his doubts. He edged closer and peered through the glass.

That one, he said, pointing. An’ that one.

Sophie leaned closer, trying to make out the titles. "A. B. C. of Electricity?" She frowned. Surely she was mistaken.

"An’ Electricity Simplified. I saw ’em in Mr. Sobeck’s office when he let me come in one night when Ma was busy and it come on to storm real sudden."

Wouldn’t your mother let you into the house in a storm? Shock at his casual statement temporarily drove out Sophie’s surprise at both his choice of reading material and the fact that he’d found shelter with the town’s irascible telegraph operator, who lived for his telegraph and the electrical gizmos he was always experimenting with.

The boy shrugged. "She had company. You know. An’ I don’t like to stay around when she does."

Sophronia stiffened, suddenly uncomfortable. She knew who the boy’s mother was now, though she’d never gone near the tumbledown house at the far edge of town where Mrs. Peabody conducted her sordid business. Even the most redoubtable members of the Ladies Missionary Society had refused to have anything to do with her after she’d driven them away by swearing and flinging empty whiskey bottles at them.

If the boy noticed her reaction, he gave no sign of it. Sophie hated to think he might have learned to take such reactions for granted.

Mr. Conner, the stationmaster, he don’t much like me hangin’ around, he said confidingly, but the station was closed and it was snowin’. Mr. Sobeck, he showed me how his telegraph worked, and this light he’s got rigged to a battery, and stuff like that. Didja know you don’t need oil for a lamp? There’s a newfangled kinda thing called a ’lectric light bulb. You heard about that?

He waited just long enough for Sophie to nod encouragingly before plunging onward. "Bright as day, purty near. An’ you don’t hafta scrub no chimneys! Well, that’s when I decided I wanted t’be an engineer an’ put ’lectric lights in everybody’s houses, an’ maybe have ’lectric trolleys and cars like Mr. Sobeck said they got in Pueblo an’ Denver. An’ telephones! I could build telephones, too!"

Excitement shown in the boy’s blue eyes, bright as the electric lights that had caught his young imagination.

Sophie smiled, inexplicably touched by his eagerness. That sounds like a wonderful plan to me.

He looked as if he hadn’t eaten a decent meal in weeks. He certainly hadn’t seen a bath in all that time. Yet even dirty and half-starved, he’d been lured into Samuel Hodgeson’s store by books he probably couldn’t read even if he’d had the money to buy them.

No, she corrected herself a moment later when he turned back to study the contents of the glass-fronted case. It wasn’t the books that had drawn him here, it was a dream. An impossible dream.

And if there was one thing Sophie Carter understood, it was impossible dreams.

Her mother’s voice, raised in a peremptory command, jerked her out of her thoughts. Sophronia, come here. I want you.

Startled out of his reverie, the boy shrank back against the edge of the case, suddenly wary.

It’s my mother, Sophie reassured him. Her odd feeling of kinship with the boy grew stronger. Delphi Carter often had the same effect on her.

I’ll be back, she told him, and surprised herself in saying it.

Without stopping to see if he’d wait, she turned on her heel and headed back to her mother, who wasn’t at all fond of waiting.

I’ve made my selection, Sophronia, Delphi informed her grandly. "Mr. Hodgeson and I decided it would be best if I tried all of them. Except, of course, for the hair tonics and the freckle remover. It would be impossible for me to judge such things since my hair is naturally luxuriant and I have never had a freckle in my life."

Delphi’s right eyebrow arched in a silent reminder that her daughter, regrettably, had been known to display a freckle or two whenever she heedlessly exposed herself to the sun.

Sophie refrained from rising to the unspoken challenge, but it wasn’t easy.

Mr. Hodgeson, wise in the ways of his customers, kept his attention firmly fixed on the column of numbers he was toting up. The effort might not have been so notable if he weren’t perfectly capable of adding the figures in his head faster than most people could manage with paper and pencil.

When Sophie remained silent, Delphi reluctantly continued, I’ve told Mr. Hodgeson that you will settle the bill. I have decided to drop in on dear Mrs. Bassett. There are a few matters I wish to discuss with her regarding the Ladies Missionary Society.

Yes, Mother.

You may feel free to go on home when you are done here. I don’t know when I shall return.

Sophie just managed to keep from balling her hands into fists. Of course, Mother.

Rather than risk losing her temper in public, she looked away. Anywhere, just so long as she wouldn’t be forced to see the all too familiar disappointment and frustration—disappointment and frustration with her—that glittered, as it so often did, in her mother’s eyes. Her gaze swung to the front of the store...and stopped.

Standing in the open doorway, head and shoulders haloed in sunshine, was the hero of all the romances she had read so avidly, over and over and over, then tucked away at the very top of her closet, where her mother would never find them. His perfectly sculpted features, half hidden in shadow, highlighted by sun, were those of a man destined to dare great things and suffer untold agonies for the sake of the woman who claimed his heart. His broad shoulders were wide enough and strong enough to bear the burdens of the world, yet he would, Sophie knew instantly, be gentle and infinitely loving when he at last drew his love into his arms and bent that perfect head to kiss her. He was Ivanhoe and Ben Hur and Rochester and every other tormented and wildly romantic man of legend who had ever driven a heroine to despair, then opened her soul to a passionate, spiritual love that transcended time and space and—

And he was gone.

Sophie blinked, then swallowed uncomfortably. Her cheeks flushed.

Fool! Silly, romantic, unrealistic fool. She’d let her mother upset her and now she was seeing fantasies, right there in the open door of Hodgeson’s Emporium.

She reluctantly turned her attention back to her mother, but dropped her gaze to the wide plank floor so no one could see her confusion...or her shame. It wasn’t until her mother was out the door that she realized she’d been holding her breath, fighting against the sting of tears.

Ever discreet, Mr. Hodgeson waited until Delphi Carter sailed past the front window and out of sight before announcing the results of his calculations. That will be five and a quarter, Miss Sophronia. That is, if you don’t want anything else.

I don’t think so, thank you, Sophie said, then remembered the boy by the bookcase and her abandoned market basket with her day’s purchases of meat and vegetables.

With a quick apology, she retreated to the shadowy depths of the store, grateful for a moment alone to regain her composure. She had more time than that. It only took an instant to determine that both boy and basket had disappeared.

The corner of Sophie’s mouth twitched upward, in spite of her. Her mother liked to be of use, and she’d clearly provided the distraction the boy had needed to slip away without Mr. Hodgeson spotting him. Sophie tried to imagine her mother’s expression if she ever learned that her little speech had cost her her shopping basket and her dinner. The mind boggled.

She glanced at the row of books. They were all still there, the romantic novels at one end, the electric handbooks the boy had yearned for at the other.

Sophie’s heart skipped a beat.

She’d been right earlier. It wasn’t books, but dreams, that were locked away behind that glass. All it took was a dollar or so to bring them out. But no matter how much she wished it were otherwise, hers would always remain nothing more than wishful fantasies. The boy, on the other hand, still had a chance of turning his into reality.

After a moment’s foot-tapping deliberation, Sophie returned to the front counter. Actually, Mr. Hodgeson, there are a couple of items I’d forgotten.

The shopkeeper beamed. That’s not a problem. What can I get for you?

I need a market basket—Sophie pointed to a woven basket with a hinged lid that hung from a hook overhead—"and the copy of A. B. C. Of Electricity that’s in your case."

Mr. Hodgeson’s eyes widened, despite their drooping lids. Then he blinked. Miss Sophronia?

I’ve decided to take up science, Mr. Hodgeson. Who knows? If I find it promising, I might be back for more.

— CHAPTER 2 —

Sunday, April 9, 1893

Well, I did it. I made a fool of myself, just as I knew I would, sooner or later. Only thing is, I would a whole lot rather it had been later.

Hiram and Mrs. Smith took me up in their buggy this morning. Right off, Mrs. Smith looked me up and she looked me down, and that’s when she got the first doubtful look on her face.

I’d put on my only suit, but Mama bought that suit when I was seventeen and Daddy died, so I’d have something fitting for the funeral. It’s a good suit with lots of wear left in it, but I’ve grown an inch or two and filled out a tad in the eight years since then. I had it let out when it looked like we were going to have a funeral for Mama, too, but the pants and the sleeves still run to high water and there’s no denying it’s good and tight all over. Makes me sweat a bit whenever I go to sit down, wondering if I’m going to be able to stand up again and still be decent.

My hair didn’t please Mrs. Smith any too much, either. I’d tried to trim it up a bit with shears. I didn’t have any proper scissors since I’d given Mama’s pair to Miss Becky before I left because she’d always admired the silver-plated handles. I’d used the window in the kitchen for a mirror. I didn’t feel I’d done too bad, considering, but I didn’t have any brilliantine to slick things down with proper and I have to admit there were a few rough edges. Not to mention that cowlick at the top that I can’t seem to settle no matter how hard I try.

Then there were my boots. I don’t have any proper shoes, but I’d done what I could with my best pair of work boots. Even polished them twice with spit to get a good shine. I didn’t think they looked too bad, but Mrs. Smith frowned something fierce and I could see that I hadn’t quite come up to scratch, as far as she was concerned.

At least she can’t say I didn’t try to keep out of it.

Actually, she didn’t say anything at all. About the way I looked, I mean. She had plenty to say about everything else, and every dozen words or so she got in a pitch for one or another of her lady friends I could tell she was aiming to sic on me.

She told Hiram and me about Miss Neumann and her wonderful dried apple pies and about Mrs. Talbot’s daughter, Annie, who took the prize for elocution at some fancy ladies seminary back East last year. She had quite a bit to say about a Mrs. James, who had been widowed young but was working hard to care for her elderly father and was an upstanding example to the community of dedication and sacrifice and true Christian womanliness. According to Mrs. Smith, this Mrs. James was a woman a man could depend on. I took that to mean I’d have to be pretty fast on my feet if I was going to keep out of her way. There were a few others whose names I can’t remember now. Enough so I knew it was going to be rough hoeing, no matter how hard I tried to keep out of the field.

Of course, I didn’t say anything, but I couldn’t help staring at the back of Hiram’s head because it was his fault I’d landed in the whole mess in the first place. He didn’t say anything, either, just tended to the horse and the road, but I could see the back of his neck getting redder and redder, so I felt some better. At least he was sorry for what he’d gotten me into. Not that it did either of us much good.

It was only when we were coming up to the church that he seemed to come awake. Zeke, he says, real casual like, I’m gonna let Mrs. Smith off at the door so she don’t get her skirts dusty, but I’d sure appreciate you helping me tie up the horse and carry in the food.

Well, Hiram didn’t need any help from me with the horse, and Mrs. Smith had only packed one big basket of food, which Hiram could have carried just as easy as me. I knew it and Mrs. Smith knew it, but before she could say anything, he’d pulled up in front of the church. Of course, I hopped right down and helped Mrs. Smith climb out, then hopped back in quick as a jackrabbit with a coyote on its tail, in spite of that tight suit. Hiram drove off before I’d even gotten settled, which made me plop down with a jerk, but I figured he must have something pretty important to tell me in private for him to risk getting Mrs. Smith riled like that.

He pulled up in the field by the church and twisted ’round in his seat. He was looking a mite wild-eyed and nervous, so I quick turned to look where he was. All I could see were the folks trailing in to church. I just had to warn you, Zeke, he said, swallowing hard. Spotted ’em coming down the street and figured you needed to know.

Know what? I asked, real puzzled.

See that lady? he asked, pointing to a mighty impressive middle-aged woman marching down the street.

I had to admit I did. If I hadn’t been so nervous about Mrs. Smith and her plans, I would have noticed her first thing. Would have been hard not to.

First off, she was wearing a hat that must have had at least two stuffed birds on it, if not three, not to mention a big blue bow and a couple dozen flowers. Hat like that stands out in a crowd. I hoped we didn’t end up sitting behind her in church, because it was so high even Hiram wouldn’t have been able to see over it if he was sitting down.

But that wasn’t all you noticed about the lady, though I’ll admit a real gentleman wouldn’t have been thinking such things. If she’d been a plow horse, she would have needed an extra big collar—she had one of the biggest, deepest chests I’d ever seen on a woman. She carried it thrust