Enchanted Heart (34 page)

He took her face between his hands, staring into her swimming blue eyes, searching for the sign that he already knew was visible in the depths of her loving heart. A tear trickled from her long lashes onto his thumb, lingered between his skin and hers and binding him to her forever in his heart, if not his soul. Then, he slowly, ever so slowly, moved his face closer to hers, pressing lips to hungry lips, tasting the salt of her tears and the sweetness of her breath, consuming, being consumed by the surge of love that passed between them, a love that would continue to grow until he took his last breath.

When he finally released her, she stumbled backwards and touched her fingertips to her simmering lips before she smiled happily and said, “I thought you’d never come!”

“It took some time, but I’m here!” he said with a proud expression.

Marty touched a bright purple bruise on his cheekbone and eye and asked with concern, “What happened to you?”

“It’s a very long story,” Caid said before he embraced her again, kissing her cheeks, her eyes and finally her lips with the tenderness that she remembered.

Marty eased into his arms and pressed her body close to his, relishing the warmth that passed between them. All of the misery of missing him seemed to melt away like the winter snow.

Abruptly, Caid pulled away and held her at arms’ length and, even though he knew the answer, he wanted to hear her tell her side of the story, so he asked quickly, “Who’s Tyree Parnell and why was he ‘laying his hands on you’?”

Tossing her hand into the air to dismiss the significance of the man of whom Caid spoke, Marty merely answered, “He is nobody.”

“Sounds like he’s somebody,” Caid growled before he ranted, “and who was that kissing you Saturday night at the dance?”

“That was Tyree,” she said, not angry at him for questioning her fidelity toward him, but instead, still angry at Tyree for making advances toward her. “He forced himself on me.” Seeing Caid’s face turn to anger, she enhanced her account of the incident with annoyance of her own, “But he got a knee full of my temper in his private parts!”

Caid could not help but rear back and laugh at the woman whose feminine beauty could bring a man to his knees. But if ever the need arose, she could bring him down with her knees. Finally knowing exactly how she felt about Tyree Parnell and how ‘Fire Woman’ had defended herself, he knew in his heart that Marty loved him and him alone.

Then he became serious when he realized that Tyree had ulterior motives for his advances toward Marty when he had used her to make his true love jealous. However, Caid knew that he would not be the last man to find her irresistible and he blurted out the words that came from his heart, “Marry me, Marty! Right now—today!”

Taken by surprise, her lips curled in amazement at his spontaneous suggestion, but she argued, “We have to make plans! We have to make an appointment with the church. And, I would want Greta there.”

“But I want you to be my wife now, today!” he insisted, emphasizing his words by placing his hands on her shoulders and squeezing.

“And I want to marry you, Caid,” she said with amusement at his impatience. “But, we can wait a few days. I’ll talk to Father Dunham this afternoon.”

“We will,” he corrected her as he put his hands on his hips. “Let’s go now!”

“Wait!” she screeched excitedly. “I have my class!”

“Give them a holiday,” he offered as the children began to file back into the room and sit quietly in their chairs, but perked up with his suggestion.

“Well,” Marty started as she looked around the room at the expectant faces. “I suppose one afternoon wouldn’t hurt them. There’s a storm brewing anyway.” To the children, she joyfully declared, “Class dismissed!”

Cheers filled the room and then a flurry of scurrying feet shuffled out the door and the couple was left alone again. Marty sighed and lifted her shoulders before she said, “Let’s go to the church!”

Caid’s smiling face expressed his excitement and delight that she’d agreed with him and that they were on their way toward wedded bliss. He escorted her down the street to the church and sat with her in front of the parson while he droned on and on about each of their duties in the marriage. Then, he encased Marty’s hand into his when Father Dunham gave them a date for the ceremony.

By this time Saturday, they would be man and wife, anointed by God and let no man put asunder what was consecrated to occur. No man, including Tyree Parnell or any other man who tried to come between Caid and the woman that he loved. There would be the devil to pay for any intrusion into their lives, on their wedding day or any other. He was in love for the first time in his life and, by God, he was going to cherish that love, nurture it and protect it until his death, if that was what it would take to keep it.

Marty’s anticipation and exhilaration was also apparent when they hurried to tell Greta and Buck of their news. She could not contain herself when she hugged her sister and announced their impending nuptials. And she squeezed Greta’s shoulders happily when her sister agreed to stand at the altar with her. They all had tea in the parlor, recounting the months and the perils that had kept them apart and the love that had brought them back together.

Caid asked Buck to stand beside him in the ceremony. Linda Blue Sky and ‘the boys’ would be there as well. But all were stricken with remorse when it was mentioned that Seraphina could not be a part of the wedding.

“I wish that she could be here,” Greta said sadly, wringing her hands and looking to Buck for support.

“Me too,” Buck said, hugging his wife with love in his heart. “But, she’ll be here soon enough.”

“I’ll go back to Fort Concho after the wedding to fetch our Sera Dear,” Caid offered.

“I wouldn’t think of sending you right after your wedding day,” Greta argued. “I’ve waited all these months; I can surely wait one more.”

Caid looked to Marty, who raised her shoulders and smiled before she said, “You do want a honeymoon, don’t you? And there is the business of finding a home. Josie won’t let you stay in her house with me.”

“I guess you’re right,” Caid said with a nod. He thought better of telling Marty that Tyree had been in the very house where men were not allowed. Instead, he declared, “Next month, I’ll go to get her and you can come along.”

“I would love to!” Marty exclaimed. “I’d enjoy seeing the Enchanted Rock again.”

“First, let’s find you two a place to live,” Buck interrupted. “There’s a small farm just outside of town that’s for sale. What do you say we go over there and see if it would suit you?”

“Now?” Marty said in unison with Caid. They looked at each other and smiles passed between them before they looked back at Buck with anticipation.

“Sure!” Buck said with booming exuberance.

“Let’s go!” Caid said after looking to Marty for her nod of approval.

With excitement in the afternoon air, they drove down a dirt road just outside of town and then down a tree-lined lane until it stopped in a yard where a dilapidated house stood. Despite the ominous clouds that gathered above, Marty and Caid were filled with hopes and dreams for a shining future as husband and wife when they stepped from the carriage and looked around, holding their breath as if this ramshackle house would furnish them with assurance through its enchanting charm.

Chapter Thirty-Five

It was a small farm. Over the years, it had been subdivided until it included only eighty acres out of the original three-hundred and twenty. There was a small decrepit house, a small ramshackle barn and a small split-rail corral where an underfed horse ambled around lolling its head in melancholy solitude. But, to Marty, it was home and she told Caid of her plans to have a garden and a chicken house and a pig pen even before she had seen the inside of the house.

With the exuberance of a child, she pointed to the barn where her cow would be housed and where that poor old horse could bed down at night. Then, her eyes fell upon the pecan tree where she expected to have many a summer picnic and then looking beyond the tree to the field where a garden would be tilled and planted. She turned back toward the house where a small porch, which would have to be enlarged to the full length of the tiny house, would boast a wooden swing where she could watch the evening sun disappear behind the horizon. All of this, she declared without the benefit of knowing what lay beyond the weathered front door.

They stepped onto the splintered porch steps and a long board on the wooden floor teetered beneath their feet, causing Caid to catch Marty’s arm and pull her away, fearing that she might tumble down and crack her head open. He reached for the doorknob and it protested his intrusion with a rusty, angry screech before it finally gave way. When it did, the door clanked down onto the threshold with a sudden thud after slipping from its crusty hinges and then it sailed in slow motion to the dusty floor where it clapped the planks loudly enough to startle the horse outside.

Undaunted, Marty stepped onto the door as if it was a bridge to her new enchanted adventure and she opened her mouth to say how quaint and cozy the house was inside. In her mind, it was already decorated with inviting calico fabric on the windows and hand-braided rugs on the floor. She waved her hand as she began to tell Caid of her plans for it.

But, Caid saw the dirt that plastered the floor, walls and windowsills and he pressed his lips in a thin line. He watched the frightened mice that skittered along the baseboard as if they had forgotten the location of the hole that they had gnawed in the corner of the kitchen and he narrowed his eyes at a chicken nesting comfortably in the wash tub near the water pump, which was a modern convenience to its earlier owners but rusty and useless now. He looked up at the ceiling and saw a bright patch of sunlit sky. He cut Marty’s words of excitement off with one word of aversion, “Disgusting!”

Marty twirled slowly around the room in one spot, her skirt sweeping a circle on the dirty floor beneath her feet. She hugged herself in unbridled glee and her light blue eyes glistened with pure joy at seeing the ruins around her, for she saw only happiness.

The small living room was sparsely furnished. There was a homemade settee constructed of hewn logs and topped with threadbare horsehair cushions. A rocking chair, which must have been made from bent willow branches by someone’s grandfather, seemed to be possessed because it tilted back and forth in the sun-dust that danced around it like illuminated fairies. In the kitchen area, there was a small table with two rickety ladder-back chairs that sat pushed away from the table and empty as if someone had hurriedly scooted them out to escape from this filthy house.

“Oh, but it has such potential!” Marty sighed as she stepped toward the bedroom door.

Inside, there was a plank bed, without a headboard. The tattered mattress was stuffed with lumpy chicken feathers, making it resemble the waves of the ocean. Those waves billowed with dust when Marty smoothed the tatting on the mattress lovingly with her hand and then sat down on it, sending a huff of dust wafting around her, instantly inciting a sneezing fit.

Caid stopped at the threshold of the bedroom and crossed his arms at his chest while he watched her touch each piece of furniture in the bedroom that the former inhabitants had abandoned while her face lit up with love. Then he walked toward her and encased her in his arms, pulling her back toward his chest so that they could stare at their reflection in the dressing table’s cracked mirror. His cheek brushed her auburn hair before he rested it there, staring into her flushed face and finally seeing the room, the whole house, through her enthusiastic eyes. He was eager to please her, to see that look on her face forever, so he kissed her head and said, “If this is what you want, we’ll buy it.”

For a fleeting moment, he thought of the mansion in Vermont that his Grammy had left to him, which was a stark contrast to this tiny, structurally unsound house and he wondered if he should remind her that they could live there instead. But he knew that she wanted this one, that it would be hers and his, theirs forever. To make Marty happy was his incessant mission so he bought the farm the next day and then went back there to begin making it fit for human habitation. With the help of Buck and his two Comanche sons and Linda Blue Sky, Caid and Marty’s little house would become a home.

By that Friday, the house was cleaned and whitewashed, the pump was repaired and the hole in the roof was covered with new shingles. The porch was enlarged to accommodate a swing and a rocking chair. A new door and glass for the windows were delivered by a driver from Ransleben’s General Store. All of the necessary provisions including pots and pans, dishes, linens and enough food for a month were also on the wagon. Chickens were brought to the new coop that Buck had built beside the barn and the horse was turned out to pasture to graze on the green Spring grass. The mattress was hauled outside by the men, slapped with rug irons until the dust was eradicated, and then plumped with more feathers by Marty and Greta, who was ushered to lie down afterwards when a fainting spell overcame her.

The kitchen was put together by Linda Blue Sky, Buck’s Comanche maid, who darted around the tiny house, scrubbing and dusting and occasionally cautioning Greta about getting up to help. The introverted Indian woman had finally come out of her assumed shell and seemed to have become a vital part of the family that consisted of Buck, his new pregnant wife, the two Comanche braves and amiable Linda Blue Sky. And she had become a vital part of Marty’s life as well, for the shy Comanche woman and the strong German woman seemed to be bound together by their contrasting qualities.

Marty wished that her friend Josie could also be a part of the wedding as well. But when Marty returned home after looking at the farm, Josie was nowhere to be found. A note penned by her and placed on the parlor table stated that she had gone to Paris and that the house was Marty’s to enjoy. But, Marty had no plans to stay in the big blue house alone, for she was going to have her own home and a husband to love. So, since Josie was not available to make her a magnificent wedding gown, Marty had to buy a mediocre gown at the dress shop in town. But what she was wearing meant less to her than the reason that she was wearing it, so it didn’t matter which one she picked as long as it was demure and alluring at the same time.