Mollie: Bride of Georgia (American Mail-Order Brides 4) Page 13

  “The ‘Grand Tour’?” Nick echoed as he took a match from the tin on the mantle and hunkered down a bit stiffly to light the fire. He couldn’t help smiling at Mollie’s happiness. And in truth, thanks to his wife, his home now was so much more charming and inviting that he could almost put the miserable thought of separate bedrooms out of his mind. Almost.

  “Don’t tell me we now have a tennis court and mineral baths,” he said, making an effort to keep his tone light.

  “No, I’m afraid not,” Mollie laughed. “Plenty of mud puddles out back, though. The trees can have themselves a nice soak, anyway.” She paused, and her smile faded. “Speaking of trees, I do wish the ornaments I ordered from Rich’s had come. I’d hoped to have the Christmas tree all decorated before you came home.”

  Nick stood, crossed to Mollie and took her once again in his arms. “We’ll do it together. But I don’t reckon there are going to be any ornaments prettier than you, Mrs. Avinger.”

  • • • • •

  Nick would have happily spent the rest of the day kissing his wife in the parlor, but Mollie’s excitement was about to bubble over, so eager was she that he see the changes to the rest of the house. Taking his hand, she tugged him down the hallway to his new office.

  This time, he paused only a moment in the doorway, his eyes glowing. He gave Mollie’s hand a squeeze, releasing her as he stepped into the room. He moved about almost as though sleepwalking, touching everything, running his fingertips over the bookcases and medicine and supply cabinets, the icebox, the examination table, the countertop, the pigeonhole desk. He turned the faucets on and off above the sink, then turned and gave a few experimental pumps to the foot lever that raised and lowered the examination table.

  He lifted his eyes, met Mollie’s, saw the tears of happiness there and felt the sting of tears in his own. His heart leapt in his chest, and suddenly Nick flung his arms wide, taking in the entire room. Then he grinned, exclaiming, “My God, Mollie! This is bully!”

  She ran to him, and he wrapped his arms around her, lifted her off her feet, whirled her around, stumbling only a little. When he set her down again, she said, a little breathlessly, “You like it?”

  “It’s perfect, sweetheart! Perfect! Why, just look at this!”

  He tugged her about the room, commenting on everything and listening to her explanations of why she’d chosen this furnishing or that, or one piece of equipment over another. He was starting around the office for a third time, suddenly seeing things he missed on his first two circuits, when there came a heavy knock at the front door.

  “Oh!” Mollie said. “I’ll bet that’s the decorations for the tree! I’ll be right back, darlin’.”

  She hurried back down the hallway, opened the door. A deliveryman stood on the porch, a pen and signature pad in his hand and a wooden box the size of an apple crate at his feet.

  “Delivery from Porter’s for M. B. Winters, ma’am,” he said.

  Mollie’s eyes grew wide as saucers. “From … from Porter’s?” she stammered. Abruptly a huge smile bloomed on her face. “Is it really?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Will y’all sign here, please?” He held out the pad and pen. Mollie all but snatched them from his hands and quickly scrawled her name on the receipt. She handed them back, thanking the deliveryman. He tipped his hat and turned away, heading down the porch steps to his wagon.

  Beside herself with excitement, Mollie hefted the box into her arms and staggered into the house.

  “Whoa, whoa!” Nick said, hurrying toward her. “Here, let me take that.” He set his walking stick against the hall tree and took the box from her arms, surprised at its weight. “Holy smoke! What’s in here, Mollie? Cannonballs?”

  Nearly dancing with excitement, Mollie clasped her hands at her throat. “I think it must be my book, Nick! Quick, bring it in the parlor so we can open it!” As he started toward the parlor doorway, Mollie added, “But be careful, now! Don’t y’all go hurting yourself again!”

  “Haven’t been kicked by a book yet,” Nick said, grunting as he deposited the crate on the game table. Dusting his hands, he added, “All right. Let’s get this opened up.”

  A few minutes later, the lid of the crate was pried off and set aside and crumpled newspaper packing was removed. Her hands trembling with awe and excitement, Mollie reached into the box and lifted out one of the dozen freshly printed books bound in rich, red cloth. Two bands of gold crossed the spine and the front of each book, and a woodcut print in green and black of a small, rustic cabin, nestled on a forested mountainside, stovepipe chimney puffing smoke, decorated each cover. Beyond the cabin, brilliant golden rays of the rising son radiated like a halo.

  Hearts of the Windswept Range was printed in large black script across each top gold band, and by M. B. Winters across each lower one. At the very bottom of each cover was Willis Porter’s hallmark, circled by the words Porter Literary House. Mollie clutched the book to her breast, then held it out to admire again. “Oh, Nick!” she whispered. “I can hardly believe it! Look how lovely it is!”

  She began leafing through the book, running her fingers over the pages much as Nick had the furniture and equipment in his new office. Now his heart seemed to fill his chest as he took in his wife’s delight and savored every minute of it. When she reached up to brush a tear from her cheek, Nick said heartily, “I do believe this calls for a celebration!”

  He took the book from her hand and carried it to one of the bookcases flanking the fireplace. Moving aside a small bronze sculpture of a pair of lions that sat atop it, he carefully stood the book in its place of honor, angling it so the cover was boldly displayed. “There.” He nodded with satisfaction, then turned and took Mollie’s hand, drawing her close and cupping her waist with his other hand.

  “May I have this celebratory dance, Mrs. Avinger?” he asked.

  Mollie’s eyes widened as she began to move with him. “There’s no music, Nick,” she protested with a laugh.

  “We’ll make our own,” he promised, and despite the small amount of open space in the parlor and the wobbliness of Nick’s leg, they managed very well indeed.

  CHAPTER 21

  Nick stalled Mollie from giving him the rest of the “tour” until long after Nestor had left for home and they had finished their own supper. They spent several happy evening hours in the parlor before the fire, reading aloud to each other from Hearts of the Windswept Range. After a while, they fell into a pattern of sharing the narration, while Mollie read the women’s parts and Nick the men’s. When he first began reading the part of Nathaniel, the dashing frontier hero, he gave him an exaggerated, blustery voice that made Mollie laugh and playfully swat him. Soon, however, he was as caught up in the story as she.

  But finally, as the fire burned low, Mollie began to yawn and Nick found himself woolgathering, staring off with glazed eyes into the glowing embers. Shaking off the drowsiness, he knew it was finally time to face his monk’s cell.

  He stood, rotated his shoulders to shrug off fatigue, and gathered up his walking stick.“All right then,” he said, a little too heartily, “let’s see what you have done with the second bedroom, shall we?”

  Mollie swallowed and stood. She said a quick, silent prayer – Please, God, let me have done the right thing – and smiled, taking his hand. “Of course,” she said. “I-I hope you’ll like it, Nick. I did put a lot of thought into it.”

  Not certain how to respond, Nick just nodded. Together, they walked from the parlor and slowly down the hall to the second bedroom. Mollie opened the door, stepped inside to turn on the gas lamp in its wall sconce, then moved aside. After a pause in which he seemed to be collecting himself, Nick stepped past her and into his new “cell.”

  He stopped, staggered. He looked about the room, which took only seconds, as it was very small, having had about half of its original space appropriated for the new veterinary office. He looked around a second time, then slowly turned to Mollie. “What…?” he began, then simply shook h
is head.

  “Well,” Mollie began brightly, though her voice trembled, “as y’all can see, this is going to be a dual-purpose room. I need a place to write, so I’ve put my desk there under the window, where there’s lots of light.” She gestured toward a small writing desk, flanked on one side by another glass-fronted bookcase and on the other by a set of open shelves.

  As Nick continued to stare at her, she swallowed and forged on. “That’s … that’s a new door connecting this room with your office, so I’m close at hand if y’all need me. The bathroom door, of course, is still right here.” She stopped, clasped her hands, gave him a hopeful smile.

  “And….” he prompted, his voice little more than a croak.

  “And,” Mollie continued, “there was just enough room left in this half of the room for a nursery. Ida was ever so kind to give us the bassinet and the little dresser and table. They were Marie’s, you see.”

  “Nursery,” Nick repeated blankly, as if he had no idea what such a thing might be.

  “Yes, well, we’ll need it sooner or … or later, after all. Sooner, I do hope.”

  Nick’s heart cracked right along with his voice. “Mollie … Sweet Jesus, Mollie, I thought I made myself clear. I thought it was settled that this would be a separate bedroom.” He raked a hand through his hair. “You don’t … you don’t know what all this is doing to me.”

  Mollie dropped all pretense of cheer. She took Nick’s hand, felt his resistance. She tugged it to her heart, felt him heave a bone-deep sigh. “Nick,” she said gently, reaching up to turn his face to her. “Do y’all really want to sleep alone?”

  “Judas Priest, of course I don’t!” he blurted, then shook his head. “God, sweetheart, I just … I just don’t know what to do anymore.”

  “Yes, you do,” she said tenderly. “You do. Come with me now, darlin’. Just for tonight. We can talk it all over again in the morning.”

  He shook his head, managed a dry rasp of a chuckle. “’Just for tonight?’ Reckon I’ve heard that before. Mollie, are you going to say ‘just for tonight’ for the rest of our lives?”

  Mollie’s mouth curved in a shaky smile. “If I must, but I’m hopin’ I won’t have to, Dr. Avinger.”

  She felt a tremor go through his body. He blew out a deep sigh, gathered her close, buried his face in her hair. “All right, Mollie, my love. All right. I can’t fight how much I want you. So I reckon you win. Just for tonight.”

  And so in one bed they loved with a tender, poignant passion, and sated, fell twined together into exhausted sleep.

  • • • • •

  He was too young to go to hell, wasn’t he? So how had he ended up there?

  Nick crouched behind the hastily dug earthworks on Bald Hill, the roar of Union artillery and exploding shells raining deadly fire and shrapnel on dug-in soldiers already broiling in the sweltering, Georgia summer sun. Nick could see nothing through the black haze of gunpowder and smoke, hear nothing but the thunder of artillery fire and the hideous screams of dying men. Soon a murderous blue horde would rush at him, swarm over him, destroy him if it could, just as it had destroyed his father, his brother, and only minutes before, his poor, brave grandfather. A shell had exploded nearby, and just like that, Granddaddy was gone. Just … gone. Here one minute and the next … not.

  Too shocked and horrorstruck to grieve, Nick had simply turned away, turned to face the onslaught that was coming. Coming, relentlessly and terrifyingly, for him.

  Well, come on then, he growled, a wolf pup cornered and furious. Y’all come on, you bastards. You won’t get past me. You won’t get to Mama and Ida and Miss Willie, I swear it.

  A hideous, yipping yowl, a Rebel Yell, arose, screaming across the hill as men rose in a wave from the embankment and rushed forward to meet the enemy. Nick tried to join in the Yell, but all his throat could produce was a vicious, feral growl. Blinking through the sweat and grime dripping into his eyes, he clutched his old musket until his knuckles turned white beneath smears of red Georgia clay. He knew the musket would be next to useless in hand-to-hand combat, for it had no bayonet and could be used only as a club. Big as he was for his age, a grown man would have the edge one-on-one against him, unless.…

  His hand shaking, Nick dropped the musket into the dirt and pulled his Bowie knife from its sheath. The hilt was slippery in his sweaty hand, but the odds of surviving had just improved a bit.

  He switched hands, wiped his palms one at a time on his woolen trousers. Gripping the knife, he began to scramble over the berm as shrieking chaos erupted around him. Another rain of solid shot and canister exploded just in front of him, flinging him backwards into the ditch. This time, however, there were no screams of agony following the explosion. There was no sound at all. Instead, a strange hush rolled over Bald Hill like a blanket of new-fallen snow.

  Flat on his back, Nick shook his head, trying to clear his mind and unplug his ears. He’d been blasted into deafness – that was all he could make of the silence. But it was more than silence; it was as if the battle had faded away behind a veil, raging somewhere just beyond his sight and hearing. Nick’s body trembled, and he hissed out a long breath. Slowly, carefully, he sat up. When he realized he was still in one piece, he pushed himself up to a crouch. Balancing on the balls of his feet, he clutched the knife and prepared to leap once more into the fight, wherever it might be.

  “Nick.” A light, musical voice close beside him made him jump. He whirled, stared at the young girl who sat with her back against the side of the ditch. He would have sworn she had not been there a moment before. She wore a lacy summer frock, and her reddish-brown hair, tied with a pink ribbon, hung in a long, thick braid down her back.

  “Mollie!” he cried, recognizing the girl immediately in the strange way of dreams, though he’d never in his life seen her as a child. “What are y’all doing here? Get away! They’re coming! The Bluebellies are coming!”

  He tried to push her away, but strangely, found he was pulling her closer, wrapping his arms around her and holding her to his chest. “They’re coming,” he repeated desperately, until it became a sob. “They’ll hurt Mama and Ida and Willie. I have to kill them.”

  The girl reached up, stroked his tear-streaked face with infinite tenderness. “No, no, you don’t, Nick. They’re gone from Bald Hill. They’ve been gone a long time. Take a look, now, won’t you, and see?”

  Trembling, he released her and scrabbled up the side of the ditch, risking exposing himself to enemy fire. But only a peaceful Georgia countryside rolled away before him in every direction, and the only cannon in sight were a few relics scattered here and there over the hillside, their thunder stilled forever.

  He slid back into the ditch, sank down with his back against the berm. “They’re … they’re gone,” he whispered. His eyes met Mollie’s, and he had no idea fresh tears spilled down his cheeks. “How can they be gone?”

  “It’s all over, Nick,” the girl said. “It’s over and you survived. Y’all did what you had to do, but now it’s done. You’re safe, and you don’t have to fight anymore.”

  Nick swallowed, dragged a filthy sleeve across his eyes. “Then can I … can I go home now?”

  Misty-eyed, Mollie smiled and nodded. “Oh, yes, Nicholas. It’s long past time you came home.” She stood up, held out her small hand to him. “Come on, now, Nicky. Y’all come on home with me.” Nick scrambled to his feet, and sheathing the knife, took her hand. Together, the two children walked away from war.

  • • • • •

  Nick came awake suddenly, opened his eyes to find his arms around Mollie. She slept peacefully with her head pillowed on his arm, her back curled into the curve of his belly and legs. He lay for a long time simply holding her, taking in her scent and the sweetness of the rise and fall of her breathing.

  He knew he’d had the nightmare again. He could feel the sweat on his body, feel the phantom hilt of the Bowie knife in his hand. But somehow, he could not remember the rest, the terrible fea
r and fury that usually left him struggling for his life.

  Slowly, he took stock, and he realized in amazement that, although his cheeks were streaked with tears, his heart was not trying to pound its way out of his chest, and no hairs stood up at the nape of his neck. His mouth was not bone dry, and his hands did not shake. However, other parts of his body were making themselves known, and all at once he wanted nothing more than to wake Mollie, to lose himself in her in the sweetest, wildest way. His fingers began to move gently over her, stroking and teasing first with tenderness, then with deepening need.

  Gradually, she stirred and turned to him. “Mmm,” she murmured, snuggling into him. Then she smiled, and without opening her eyes asked lazily, “Y’all askin’ me to dance, suh?”

  “Reckon I am,” he whispered back. “Reckon I don’t aim to miss any more dances with you, darlin’.”

  Now Mollie opened her eyes, met his in the moonlight that spilled across their bed. “Just for tonight?” she asked, gently stroking back a lock of hair that tumbled over his forehead.

  He captured her hand, kissed her palm. “No, ma’am,” he said. “Not anymore.” Tucking her beneath him, he paused with his mouth barely an inch from hers. “From now on, sweetheart, it’s for much more than just tonight. From now on, come hell or high water, no matter what, it’s for always.”

  A NOTE TO READERS

  Thank you, my dear readers, for choosing to read MOLLIE: BRIDE OF GEORGIA. I hope you’ve enjoyed it, and I always appreciate comments and reviews. Feedback from readers is very important to me. You can find me at:

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  The characters in MOLLIE are fictitious, but a few are based on real people. I hope they will forgive the literary license I’ve taken with them.

  George Valentine Gress (1847-1934), born in New York, moved to Georgia in 1870, where he became an outstanding, public-spirited citizen. He was the founder of the Gress Lumber Co., one of the largest and most successful enterprises in the post-war South, operating mills throughout the state. He did indeed purchase the defunct Hall and Binkley circus at auction in 1889, donating the animals to the city of Atlanta for the purpose of establishing a zoo in Grant Park.