Hill Country Courtship Read online

  After an endless minute, the contraction passed, and April Mae continued what she’d been about to say. “Don’t bother writin’ them—they disowned me after they figured out I was gonna be a mother and that Felix wasn’t likely to come back. I’ve been living on what I could beg or steal ever since I set out for Simpson Creek...”

  Maude mentally consigned the parents to the same place she’d wished Felix Renz. How could parents abandon a daughter who needed help, no matter what she had done? And only just fifteen, at that. That meant she’d been nothing more than fourteen when that wretched drummer had taken advantage of her innocence. Still just a child, without the wisdom or understanding to avoid falling for the wiles of a charming man.

  Just then Ella arrived with a pot of steaming water. “I boiled a knife in the water, Maude, in case you have to cut the cord. Good thing you told me about that time you helped your papa deliver those twins, or I wouldn’t have known you’d need one.”

  “Good girl,” Maude praised her friend with an appreciative look. She hoped Ella wouldn’t be too frightened to get married after tonight, knowing childbearing would likely be part of her lot.

  But where in the world could the doctor be? If he didn’t arrive soon, he might miss the main event entirely. She’d just seen a hint of fuzzy hair while checking the laboring girl’s progress during the last contraction, so delivery was imminent. She was going to have to handle the delivery herself, Maude figured.

  Both women started as the door banged open below.

  “I cain’t get the doctor!” Delbert bellowed up the stairs. “He’s away fer th’ night, his wife said, at someone’s deathbed out on a ranch. But she says she’s comin’ t’help just as soon as she can take her young’un to the preacher’s wife!”

  This might well turn into a deathbed, as well—a double one of both mother and baby, Maude thought grimly, as blood continued to stain the sheet crimson beneath April Mae. She’d be glad of Sarah Walker’s help, if she came in time, but while Sarah had assisted her husband, just as Maude used to assist her father, there was a limit to what either of them could do. While they’d both helped deliver babies in the past, she doubted Sarah knew any better than Maude herself how to stop the bleeding that was draining away April Mae’s life.

  “Did you hear me, Miss Maude?” Delbert called again. “I said Doc Walker ain’t comin’! You want me to ride t’San Saba for their sawbones?”

  April Mae’s eyes had grown even more frightened at what Delbert had yelled up the stairs, and her cheeks grew paler, if that was possible. Her breathing came in panted, ragged gasps.

  “Tell Delbert we heard him, so he can stop bellowing. There’s no time to fetch the Saba doctor,” Maude told Mrs. Meyer, who stood at the door as if guarding it from the other inhabitants—though she doubted any of the other boardinghouse residents would try to enter. This room was the last place any normal man would wish to be.

  Maude gently took hold of the girl’s chin and directed it so that April Mae looked at no one but her. “Don’t you worry, April Mae,” she said steadily. “I’m the daughter of a doctor and I’ve assisted at dozens of deliveries so I know exactly what to do.” It wasn’t quite a lie, but it was certainly an exaggeration. “The doctor’s wife is coming to help, and she, too, has assisted at births. And she’s a mother herself,” she added, praying Sarah would hurry. Sarah wouldn’t be able to run, for she was just about to give birth again herself.

  Lord, we could use Your help here, she prayed, and then April Mae’s hand tightened around her wrist.

  “It’s coming!” she cried.

  And it was. After another fierce, long contraction, April Mae’s baby girl slid into the world, screaming at the indignity of it all, with a thatch of black hair as thick as her drummer father’s.

  By the time Sarah Walker arrived half an hour later, breathing hard and rubbing her distended abdomen, they had the squalling baby wiped off and wrapped up warmly, and she had taken her first suckle from her mother. April Mae had fallen asleep with a weary smile on her face after telling Maude the baby’s name was Hannah.

  Mrs. Meyer had gone downstairs to make coffee, which Maude sorely needed. April Mae well deserved the rest she was taking, but Maude had resolved to stay awake until she was assured that all was well with mother and child.

  “I see you’ve taken care of everything,” Sarah said to Maude. “See, you didn’t need me after all. How is she?”

  Maude motioned for Sarah to leave the room with her. “We’ll be right back, Ella.”

  Her friend looked up from where she sat holding the sleeping baby and nodded. “We’re not going anywhere.”

  “I’m worried about her, Sarah. She lost too much blood. Did you see how pale she was?”

  Sarah nodded, her face solemn. “Did you check her abdomen?”

  Maude knew she referred to whether or not the womb had firmed up again after the delivery. The difference could be felt through the skin. If it hadn’t, April Mae might continue to bleed. “It’s still softer than I’d like, but I kneaded it.” Both women knew rubbing the area firmly could make the womb tighten up and stop the bleeding.

  “You’ll have to keep checking every so often. Why don’t we pray, and enlist the help of the Great Physician?” Sarah suggested, holding out her hands to Maude, and together they stood in the shadowy hallway, as Sarah began, “Lord, we come to You in great need of Your healing touch for April Mae Horvath...”

  * * *

  “So yer trip inta town was an utter failure, Jonas?” Coira MacLaren inquired from her rocking chair near the fire. Her brogue was as thick as a stack of Scottish oatcakes, as if she’d just disembarked the ship that had carried her and Jonas from Scotland this month rather than six years ago. Though her son sat behind her, not wanting to be so close to the heat, she didn’t turn to aim her disapproval. She knew quite well the power of her spiteful words. Whether she faced him or not, she could be certain they would hit the mark. They always did.

  Still, Jonas was glad she couldn’t see his involuntary stiffening. “I didn’t find anyone looking for work whom I thought suitable to see to tend you, Mother, but I wouldn’t call the trip a total waste of time,” he said, keeping his tone calm. “I had a pleasant meal.” One free of your carping. He wasn’t about to tell her he’d attended the barbecue put on by the Simpson Creek Spinsters’ Club or she’d be on him again about marrying and producing a bairn or two before she died.

  Before he’d gone into town, he’d been vague about the details of his intended trip, only implying that he’d be in a position to speak to several females about becoming his mother’s companion.

  “Whatever you ate, ’twas nothing you couldn’t have gotten from Senora Morales without wasting precious coin,” his mother grumbled. “But I warn you, Jonas, the time will come, and soon, when that poor overworked woman will refuse to do all the cooking and cleaning and tending of your old mother, and then she’ll quit altogether. Then where will you be? It’s not as if you could do all of that extra work and still tend your ranch, could you? You didn’t speak to a single lass about hiring on here?”

  An image of Maude Harkey’s riot of red curls and eyes the hue of spring bluebonnets swam into his head. “Aye, I did speak to one, but she didn’t want the job,” he said, and hoped his mother would leave it at that.

  “Just one? You’d said you’d be able to speak to several,” Coira MacLaren snapped.

  His mother’s health wasn’t robust, but there was nothing wrong with her memory, unfortunately. Her mind was sharp as a dirk and her tongue just as cutting. He’d learned to cope by pretending nothing she said affected him, or sometimes, when his temper was truly frayed, by responding in kind, but it didn’t make him feel better to do so.

  “There were, but I thought the one I spoke to was the best candidate.” He couldn’t say why he thought so, other than the air of com
petence Maude Harkey wore like a shield—and the firmness of her resolve that made him believe she might be a match for even his mother’s cantankerousness. It certainly wasn’t that he was attracted to her for his own sake. No, he was done with all that.

  “Did you think to be a miser and offer her less than the thirty dollars a month we agreed upon?” his mother asked, suspicion threaded through her voice like the tightest-woven wool tartan.

  It was ironic that she accused him of miserliness—normally it was his mother who took Scottish frugality to the extreme.

  “No.” He hadn’t even gotten to the subject of wages, as he recalled. As soon as Maude Harkey learned what he was asking, she’d refused to consider his proposition outright. Now he wished he had gone ahead and taken the time to meet some of the other young ladies at the barbecue. He shouldn’t have let the redheaded Miss Harkey blind him to the possible suitability of the others. As he’d said, it wasn’t as if he was seeking a wife.

  “Well, you’d best be searching for some way to convince a woman to come out here,” his mother continued. “I’ve no time for your nonsense or your dillydallying.”

  Jonas gritted his teeth and forced himself not to respond. After all, his mother wasn’t entirely wrong. He did need to find her a companion as soon as possible. He resolved that he would make another trip into town, as soon as he could find the time to get away from the ranch.

  And this time, he wouldn’t leave until he’d found a woman who’d say yes.

  Chapter Three

  After their middle-of-the-night ordeal, Maude slept right through Sunday breakfast. When she finally awoke, she felt a pleasant sense of accomplishment. Despite April Mae’s sudden and entirely unexpected appearance on their doorstep, they had helped her deliver a beautiful, healthy baby. Maude’s father would have been proud.

  She couldn’t help grinning. There was a baby in the boardinghouse, a pink innocent creature all fresh and new, with that incomparable baby smell. Soon they’d have to do what they could to track down tiny Hannah’s errant father and insist he do right by April Mae and their child, but for now, Maude could enjoy the presence of an infant in her dreary life for her to care for.

  Excited about the prospect of holding tiny Hannah, Maude dressed, washed her hands with water from the ewer, dried them on a towel and left her room. She’d go to church, then on to Ella’s café and help her friend there for awhile, but she couldn’t resist taking a few minutes to cuddle the baby first and see if the new mother was resting all right.

  She found Mrs. Meyer had beaten her to it. The old woman was sitting in the rocking chair in April Mae’s room, humming, little Hannah in her arms. An old wooden cradle sat on the floor between the bed and the rocking chair. Mrs. Meyer must have brought it down from the attic, Maude thought. Had it been from that long-ago time when the proprietress had been a young mother? How nice that it was getting used again.

  April Mae’s eyes were closed, but she opened them at the creaking of the opening door. Her gaze darted first to the infant, then, satisfied, to Maude.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Tired. Sore...but ain’t she purty?” April Mae said, smiling at her child, her eyes bright with pride.

  Mrs. Meyer rose and handed Maude the baby. “I’d better go start workin’ on dinner—noon’ll be here before we know it,” she said, and left.

  “She’s perfect,” Maude agreed, even as she took note of the purple shadows under April Mae’s eyes. Her face was slightly swollen from the exertion she’d gone through the night before, but Maude told herself not to jump to conclusions that anything was amiss. All women looked like that after delivering a baby, more or less. “Is she nursing all right?”

  “She’s getting the hang of it,” April Mae said, still smiling, but her eyelids flickered drowsily.

  “It’s all right to go back to sleep,” Maude assured her. “You need to rest up after the wonderful job you did last night, bringing Hannah into the world. I’ll just sit and hold her for a few minutes, then put her in the cradle when I have to leave. Will you be able to get her if she wakes?”

  “Mmm-hmm...”

  Within seconds, her soft snores told Maude the girl slept. Now she had time to think about how April Mae and the baby’s coming was likely to change life here at the boardinghouse—and how that was likely to affect her.

  But the image of Jonas MacLaren and his job offer, delivered in that delicious accent, kept intruding on her mind.

  * * *

  Reining in his horse on the knoll overlooking the flock, Jonas MacLaren doffed his wide-brimmed hat and took a moment to rub both temples with his thumb and fingers.

  “What’s wrong, patrón?” Hector asked, bringing his mount alongside Jonas’s. “You got dolor de cabeza? A headache?”

  Jonas gave his segundo a sideways glance. “I’m all right.”

  “With respect, senor, you do not look it,” his Tejano foreman said in his forthright manner. “I think you are hungry. Why not go back to the big house and have something to eat? You been out with me since dawn, and I’m thinking you did not break your fast before you left the house, sí? The flocks will still be here when you return.”

  Jonas stared down at the peacefully grazing cluster of merinos that dotted the slope below like so many little clouds of creamy white, though some of the “clouds” had long, curling horns. They were but a small portion of his flock, which numbered about two thousand. Scattered among these were Angora goats, similarly colored, that produced prized mohair.

  “Maybe I’ll see what’s in the pot in the bunkhouse,” Jonas muttered. “It’s not real peaceful in the big house at the moment.”

  Hector’s dark eyes took on a gleam of understanding. “Ah. Senora MacLaren, she is on the warpath again?”

  Jonas couldn’t suppress a rueful smile at his mother being compared to a rampaging wild Indian. Between all the Spanish and “Texanisms” he was picking up since he’d bought the ranch and moved himself and his mother to the Hill Country of Texas, he’d added considerably to his vocabulary.

  “Yes, she is. This morning she threw a dish of huevos rancheros at Senora Morales, saying respectable scrambled eggs didn’t need heathenish peppers in them.”

  “Ay yi yi,” Hector said, but his attempt to look concerned was utterly defeated by the grin he couldn’t quite stop. The senora’s tantrums were legendary, and on the ranch they had become a source of great amusement...to those who didn’t have to experience them firsthand.

  “You smile, but Senora Morales told me if I didn’t find a companion for the senora within the week, she would leave and go back to her sister’s in San Antonio.”

  “Do not worry, patrón. She doesn’t mean it.”

  Jonas raked a hand through his hair. “This time, I think she just might,” he insisted.

  “If she left, I could ask my sister, the one who lives in Refugio to come and be your cook,” Hector offered. “It would take her a while to travel so far, though.”

  Jonas shook his head. “You already told me how sweet-tempered she is. I’d hate to inflict my mother on someone like that. And it really is too much work, to handle the cooking and cleaning, and care for my mother on top of that. No, she needs a dedicated companion. And to fill that role, I’m starting to think what my mother needs is someone as strong willed as she is.”

  Unbidden, the image of Maude Harkey came to mind once again. He resolutely banished it. Miss Harkey had already said no, and that was the end of it.

  Hector shrugged. “It’s possible.”

  “Meanwhile, I’m heading for the bunkhouse. Tamales eaten in peace are better than risking my ears in the ranch house right now.” Maybe he’d get an inspiration while he ate for where he could find the right lady.

  He had missed his chance to speak to several ladies at once by not taking full advant
age of the Spinsters’ Club barbecue. It was unlikely he’d find so many potential candidates in one place again. But he wouldn’t let that obstacle stop him. If he knew anything, it was that no man in the world was more tenacious than a Scotsman. He would find the right woman to see to his mother’s needs.

  But in the meantime he’d enjoy a quiet meal, and he might just grab a siesta afterward on one of the empty bunks. He would find a companion soon, but not tonight. And in the absence of someone to abate her tantrums, he knew he’d need his rest before he had to face his mother again.

  * * *

  “You go ahead, Maude,” Ella Justiss said that evening, when the last customer had left the little café that Maude helped her run. “I’m just going to wash these few remaining dishes. Would you want Nate to walk you home? By the time he did that and came back, I’d be ready to go.” She nodded toward Nate Bohannan, her fiancé, who was sitting at one of the tables, having just finished a helping of Ella’s fried chicken. “I know you want to go check on little Hannah.”

  “I’d be happy to walk with you, Miss Maude,” Nate confirmed.

  “There’s no need, but thank you, Nate. I’ll be fine. You two have wedding plans to discuss.” She had no fear at the prospect of walking back to the boardinghouse by herself. Simpson Creek was a safe little town, even at night. Untying her apron, she hung it up on a peg by the door and removed her shawl from another peg.

  “I’ll light a lantern for you, at least,” Nate said. “Then you can be on your way.”

  Maude couldn’t deny that she was eager to see that tiny little bundle of perfection, with her rosebud mouth and the thick thatch of downy black hair, so she walked quickly across the bridge over the creek and down darkened Main Street, taking a shortcut via the alley between the mercantile and the hotel to reach the boardinghouse on Travis Street.

  She would discuss finding the baby’s father with April Mae, too, Maude decided, after she’d made sure the new mother had eaten some supper. Now that the girl wasn’t in labor, she should be thinking more clearly and might remember where Felix Renz had planned to go next on his circuit. The man sold pots and pans and other kitchenware from a cart, so he wouldn’t be traveling all that fast. And it was high time the man was made to take responsibility for the girl he’d left in the family way—and the new baby that had come into the world as a result. Surely when he saw that precious infant, he’d want to do right by her and her mother.