The Teacher's Bride: Mail Order Bride (Boulder Brides Book 1) Read online

  The Teacher’s Bride

  Boulder Brides Book 1

  Natalie Dean

  Eveline Hart

  Kenzo Publishing

  © Copyright 2017 by Kenzo Publishing - All rights reserved.

  In no way is it legal to reproduce, duplicate, or transmit any part of this document by either electronic means or in printed format. Recording of this publication is strictly prohibited, and any storage of this document is not allowed unless with written permission from the publisher. All rights reserved.

  Respective authors own all copyrights not held by the publisher.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  About Author - Natalie Dean

  If you enjoyed reading this book…

  Other books by Natalie Dean

  Sneak Peek: A Soldier’s Love

  Sneak Peek: Lottie

  BONUS BOOKS

  BESS: BRIDES ON THE RUN BOOK 1

  BARBARA: BRIDES ON THE RUN BOOK 2

  CLARA: BRIDES ON THE RUN BOOK 3

  Chapter 1

  The blonde prairie grass rolled by, waving like wheat in the sun. Waving like the last goodbyes of her family, who had shrunk slowly until they were barely perceptible black dots still holding their arms over their heads. The plains didn’t enthrall her. Greta Samuelson had lived in Atchison all her life, and all she really knew was the plains. She gripped her crocheted, drawstring purse tightly in her hands and listened to her companions.

  They were more interesting. The three women who shared the stagecoach with her all hailed from Richmond, Virginia. They had seen the worst of the war. They had seen it in its most brutal, life shredding form, but Greta believed she had seen it longer.

  Greta didn’t remember a time before there was either war or talk of war. She remembered events by age instead of by date. She was ten when the abolitionists brought the slavery issue to their doorstep, even younger when the first battle cry sounded. What the abolitionists nor the pro-slavery people seemed to understand was that their community was neither pro-slavery nor willing to support those who used violence to settle their differences.

  Like many of the early community, her family was Wesleyan in convictions and principles. Her uncle was an early circuit rider who had carried his convictions to Kansas. In 1856, while the fate of the territory was being decided by outsiders planning to use their home as a staging ground, her brother, Lester, heard the sound of the mission and joined the covered wagon groups traveling west to Oregon.

  It was because of Lester that she had taken an interest in the stagecoach traveling the Overland Trail, bringing letters, news, and parcels, and sometimes, a special message from her brother. It was because of Lester that she also yearned to travel west.

  This might have remained a fantasy if not for a very lucky circumstance. One of the regular stagecoach drivers, Owen, developed a fondness for her. Not an inappropriate one, by all means, but with the pleasure of an older man watching a child grow into a young woman. This child had watched, wide-eyed, not understanding the terrible passions that make men kill each other, asking only for news from the Overland Trail and its far more dangerous cousin, the Oregon Trail.

  Owen’s years of experience as a driver had given him a deep perception into human nature. As the war ended, his duties as a mail delivery driver were coupled with a delivery service of future brides. The war had left only broken pieces of men for single women to comb through. It left widows, destitution, and broken promises. At the same time, to the west, gold had been discovered, and the frontiersmen who had rushed to its calls had done so without wives or lovers to follow them. Now they were lonely. Some dreamed of starting families. Some just wanted a warm body to hold them at night. They all wanted the presence of women; any woman willing to live in a mining camp.

  Owen

  Owen’s mail bag was often stuffed with advertisements to give to the local newspapers, announcing the needs of the western pioneers. They weren’t always from the mining camps. Some were from cattle people and farmers who had staked their piece of land but had no companion. A few were from Christian communities hoping to develop their missions. The advertisement he carried with him the day Greta’s world began to change was a little different than the usual as he knew the author of it as well as he knew Greta.

  His mind became occupied by the young girl whose face was beginning to flower with her coming maturity and unblemished character. As pretty as she was, with sun-ripened curls framing her properly covered head, it seemed a waste to resign her to spinsterhood or a broken piece of man embittered by war. She deserved more.

  Greta greeted Owen as he pulled his mail bag from the seat and handed him a fresh-baked roll. “I’m taking these to the shelter,” she told him. “But I thought you should have one. Our wounded men aren’t the only ones who should be treated as heroes. Do you have anything for me today,” she asked as he thanked her.

  “No, but there is something you might still be interested in. It’s an advertisement. I’m obligated, mind you, to take it to the newspaper publishers, but I thought you might like to be the first to read it.”

  The advertisement had been short and to the point. “School teacher seeking wife. Must be able to read, write and know arithmetic. Prefer a woman of good composure, modest dress, and clean habits. Dancers, performers, and women of ill repute need not apply.”

  “You think I should be interested?” Greta had asked.

  “He is a good man and I know your heart is not here.”

  The advertisement was then circulated with the rest of the mail designated for Boston, but by then, there were so many far more exciting offers making the rounds of the major cities, there was very little notice given to this more demanding request. As a result, Greta had been the only one to answer his inquiry. Fortunately, Greta wrote very gracefully, and the school teacher had been intrigued.

  It was the foolishness of an old man desiring to be a matchmaker that started Greta’s journey away from home, but it was a journey that had been blessed. Greta had four sisters, all either of marriageable age or approaching it, and to have one well invested in an educational career was better than any of them could really hope for.

  Her hands twisted around the purse strings again, then she pulled out the letter to read one more time. There had been a lot of one more times on the trip, each one assuring her and giving her a little more courage as the stage carried her further from home.

  “Dearest Greta,

  I am gratified to call you this, as your letter hit a resounding note. It was a relief to know your handwriting is quite legible and you apply your skills intelligently. It was also of some interest that you already have a brother who has taken the noble course of bringing a civilized, God-fearing people into the west.

  It is of this nobility we shall speak. Boulder is a robust, active town in the Colorado/ Wyoming territory. Its growth brings a great deal of notoriety. There are the uncouth, the brazen, and the gun-slinging lawless, as well as good people who labor hard to wrestle a living from the land and who strive for peaceful communities.

  These peaceful communities cannot remain so without the proper guidance and education of their children. It is to this end that I have devoted my life, but this end would be better influenced by a proper wife and family to set an example. I am a man of modest but consistent means. You will not lack for food or shelter, although there shall
be very few frivolities and indulgences. The rewards will be what our hands and minds have put together. If you are in agreement with this proposal, I have entrusted monies with the driver to bring you safely to our humble city.”

  It was signed, “Joseph Marston”. Greta liked the sound of the name. It rolled off the tongue easily enough. She wondered if Joseph Marston would look like Abraham Lincoln. She had seen him once, in her childhood, when he was campaigning for the presidency. She had thought he would look different from the plains people, but he didn’t. Tall and lanky, he looked very much like a younger version of the neighbor, Mr. Engel, who kept two wives on his farm as his first wife had borne only two children, which weren’t enough to cover all the duties.

  Some people criticized Mr. Engel’s decision, but her family never did. “It’s not our place to judge,” her father had said, just as it wasn’t their place to get involved with the Civil War.

  “You actually already have a marriage arrangement for when you arrive?” Asked one of the women, who kept a fan constantly brushing over her face while she gazed out over an endlessly rolling landscape, with nothing to decorate its swells except the prairie grass.

  “Oh, yes,” said Greta. “It would not have been permitted if I had traveled alone, without prospects.”

  “But haven’t you heard? The prospects are enormous! Look!”

  One of the ladies unfolded the newspaper containing the advertisement they were answering. It read, “Women needed at mining camp for cleaning, cooking, and entertainment. Marriages can be arranged with consent of both willing parties. Close to Boulder. All serious applicants will be considered.”

  “Then you are traveling entirely on faith?” asked Greta with astonishment. She was a little in awe of these women. The youngest was close to thirty, while the oldest looked like she was in her mid-forties. They dressed far more fashionably than she did, with hooped skirts, velvet bonnets, and satin bows. They rouged their lips and powdered their skin. Their eyes were hard, bright and wise.

  “Oh, I could call it faith,” said the oldest one, who had introduced herself as Laura. She gave Greta a sidelong glance. “I would more likely call it faith in numbers. In Richmond, the dead outnumber the living. The men who are left are very old or very young, crippled in body or in soul. But in the west, the men are bursting with wealth and have no women to share it with. We have faith we can help them.”

  “Who is your betrothed?” asked the youngest one, Beatrice, a little more gently. “Did he strike it rich with a gold claim?”

  “No. He has a teaching position.”

  “Oh, my dear! Why ever did you give your consent? A young girl like you could make a fortune where you’re going!”

  Greta cast down her eyes and shook her head. “Look what you’ve done!” scolded Laura. “You have embarrassed her. You have made her blush. We aren’t really so terrible, honey. We used to harbor more honorable thoughts until all honor disappeared. We used to be fine ladies. You can’t even imagine and you shouldn’t. We need the devout to give proper guidance to the future. We need people like you.”

  “Oh!” said the woman whose age hovered somewhere in the middle range of thirty. “There is a sight worth viewing!” In the distance, a herd of buffalo were ambling toward a faint blue horizon that was just a little darker and more irregular in formation than the sky. It wasn’t an extremely large herd. They looked more like gigantic cattle scattered over the plains. It was a sight worth viewing, however, and Greta held her breath for a moment. She really was, she thought with a sudden thrill of excitement, going into the wild.

  Over the next couple of days, the irregular horizon deepened into a jagged mountain range. Greta’s eyes feasted on the bonanza of color, the dark blue and green streaks among ruddy cliffs, the height of the mountains growing taller and taller, until she realized with a shock, they were climbing them. They were going up and up over rocks and fiercely gouged ruts. They were entering tall trees and tangled brush. “Do you think,” whispered Beatrice, with just a note of fear, “we could be attacked by wild Indians?”

  Greta shook her head. “This route has been heavily guarded for a long time; even before the war. The Overland Trail Stagecoach is the safest way to travel.”

  “Until they finish building the railroad,” said the oldest woman. “I read it in the paper. There will be a railroad and we will no longer have to travel by coach.”

  “Well, the stagecoach is far more modern and comfortable than those ugly wagons some folk still insist on using,” said Hannah, the mid-thirties woman. She reached into her handbag and pulled out a small mirror to powder her nose. “I believe the prairie sun has put quite a burn on my complexion.”

  That evening, their rest stop was a lodge built from solid logs. It had a fairly large living space decorated with a worn out, stuffed sofa, a hand-hewn rocker and a fireplace, a kitchen, a long dining table with benches instead of chairs, and two dormitories with bunks. One for the men, the other for the women. There was a barn for the horses, a shed for tools, but other than that, there were no other buildings in sight.

  The mattress Greta laid down on that night was filled with straw and made her skin itch. She scratched the tiny bumps that were a mixture of the straw’s irritation and insect bites. Tomorrow they would arrive in Boulder and she was a terrible sight. Unwashed, wearing the same clothing for days, her skin blotchy with all the pestilences nature had hurled at her. “Dear Lord,” she prayed inaudibly. “I know I shouldn’t ask for much, but do you think tomorrow I could get a bath?” She didn’t hear or expect an answer.

  Chapter 2

  Ask and you shall receive, although the truth is it was Hannah who asked boldly out loud, “How much would it cost us for washroom services?”

  As it turned out, bathing was available for a price, or if you didn’t mind the cold water, there was a creek nearby. Greta wavered between paying to have water drawn and heated for a warm bath or bracing herself for the icy cold creek. Her frugality won out. She scrubbed herself at the edge of the creek, gasping and tingling, while the other women paid for the luxury of the tub.

  Their individual toiletries interrupted Owen’s time schedule enough that he grumbled and hurried them a little, but it was all the casual manifestations of a man who liked to assert his authority. Every one of the four women, who had seen the worst of what mankind can do with one another, understood this and were equally nonchalant in their rebuttal.

  Despite the delay, they arrived in Boulder well within schedule. It looked makeshift to Greta, like the military camps that had been hastily built, using whatever materials were available. Many of the buildings were squat cabins, unadorned with anything except burlap curtains at the windows, and sometimes a crude sign to announce its type of employment. At one end of the town was the newly finished school and at the other, a collection of taverns and casinos.

  The stagecoach stopped in front of an official-looking building squatting between a hardware and a grocery store. A chalkboard was attached to one side of the door, recording the Overland schedule. The sign on the building stated, “Banking, Mail Delivery, Stagecoach Services”. Around six or seven men clustered together, waiting for their arrival. They had shaved once, several days ago, and now stubble was freely erupting from dust-coated faces. Their flannel work shirts were in no better condition. They held in their hands a placard stating, “We need wives.”

  “These are the miners?” asked Greta. “They look somewhat disreputable.”

  “Oh, I’m sure they’ll clean up right nicely,” said the oldest woman. “Especially if they struck gold.”

  They giggled as they stepped out of the coach. The group of men whistled and called. Greta watched shyly as the three women boldly made their introductions and asked about the camp. She pressed against the familiar form of one of the horses and asked Owen hesitantly, “Is my fiancé among this lot?”

  “No mam,” he told her. “This lot is the fallen and the wayward you are beset to civilize. It appears Mr.
Marston hasn’t arrived yet.”

  “Is he late?”

  “Oh no. The stagecoach doesn’t always arrive on time. Usually, we’re a little late. The unpredictable happens. It gets stuck. It loses a wheel. It gets caught in a storm or a flash flood. We made very good time. Perhaps you bring a little lady luck.”

  “Luck never has anything to do with it, Mr. Owen.”

  “That as it may be, it was still a fortunate smile that fell upon me.”

  It was another twenty minutes before Joseph Marston arrived. In the meantime, the horses had been unharnessed and taken to the stables. The stagecoach had been unburdened, with her portmanteau and other pieces of yet unclaimed luggage laying on the ground. Greta knew it was him because Owen tugged on her arm and pointed him out.

  He wasn’t at all like she had pictured. He wasn’t tall and lanky. He was just over medium height with a medium build. He had straight brown hair that was kept fairly short, a closely shaven face and a wide mouth that fit tightly within a square jaw. He wore tweed slacks and a white shirt rolled at the sleeves, under a knitted vest. His most outstanding feature was his eyes. They were a dark, penetrating blue and flashed with their own fiery storm.

  “Miss Samuelson, meet Mr. Marston,” said Owen, sweeping his arm elegantly to and fro.

  “Miss Samuelson,” nodded Joseph, his voice reserved.

  “Mr. Marston,” acknowledged Greta. “Are your arrivals habitually late?”