The Preacher's Bride Claim

“Thank you,” she said. “But I’ve put my nursing career behind me. I—”

“The Lord must have sent you to us,” Elijah Thornton went on, as if he hadn’t heard what she had said. “We don’t have any sort of doctor here. I go around and pray with people who are ill, but they need so much more than I can provide, Miss Hawthorne.”

“But I’ve come to Oklahoma to farm,” she told him firmly. “My mother is not young, and she’ll need all my help, once we have our claim.”

“Is she here now? In Boomer Town, I mean?”

Alice shook her head. “No, I’ll send for her once I’ve managed to erect some sort of dwelling. And now I must be going, Reverend,” she added firmly.

“Miss Hawthorne,” Reverend Thornton continued, “please consider what I’ve said about nursing here. Pray about it, if you would. It’s not that there’s any great amount of sickness and injuries, but occasionally the need is great.”

“I will, Reverend. Good day.”

The man didn’t know how to take no for an answer, Alice thought, as she entered the muddy main street of the tent city. And yet, Elijah Thornton was not the least bit overbearing. There was something very kind in his twinkling hazel eyes.

He was certainly nothing like Maxwell Peterson. If only she’d met a man like the reverend in New York....

Still, she’d made her decision, and there was no use dwelling on “if only.” Marriage and family were not for her. She’d keep her independence and take care of her mother by working the land. No man was going to take over her life and divert her from that goal. Perhaps it was best if she did not return to the daily services at the Boomer Town Chapel, where she would have to listen to and look at Reverend Elijah Thornton—who did not wear a wedding ring, she’d noticed, nor had there been a wife hovering near him.

Yet the idea of not returning to the chapel sent a pang of regret through her. It had felt good to sing hymns with other Christians and to hear the preacher’s deep, resonant voice praying for all of them. But could any threat to her independence be worth it? If she got to know people better at the chapel, they’d start nosing into her business. They’d want to know why a decent-appearing unmarried lady like herself was here in the territory all alone. They’d suspect she was running from something—and they’d be right.

Perhaps it was better to keep to herself. There were only three weeks to go till the Land Rush. Surely she could manage to lead a solitary existence among the crowded tent city until then, so that no one would suspect that a certain man in New York would pay highly to know where she was and what she was about to do, to make sure she never needed anything from him.

* * *

Normally Elijah joined his brothers for the noon meal, which was cooked over their campfire by Gideon, and usually consisted of beans and corn bread, or if Clint had hunted, rabbit, wild turkey or prairie chicken stew. Today, though, still feeling the sting of LeMaster’s denunciation, he had gone to pay the promised visit to Asa Benton’s ailing wife and had been invited to share dinner with them. The meal had been a simple soup and the last half of a loaf of bread, but Mrs. Benton seemed to take encouragement from his company and to keep inventing reasons for him to stay longer.

He paid several other calls around the tent city after that. It appeared the community was buzzing with reaction to Horace LeMaster’s remarks, and Elijah spent a lot of time answering questions and easing their concerns as best as he could. Many would-be homesteaders came from the South, particularly Texas, and even these days—twenty-four years after General Lee had surrendered—the Civil War wounds had not completely healed between the North and the South. Some folks felt as warmly toward him as ever, while others were definitely cooler.

Ah, well, he was not called to be popular but to preach the Gospel. Perhaps this would all blow over, perhaps it wouldn’t, but he would be obedient to his calling.

Still he wondered where Miss Alice Hawthorne’s campsite was and kept an eye out for it. But he never spotted her.

Before he knew it, the afternoon had passed and it was nearly time to meet up with his brothers for their nightly trip to Mrs. Murphy’s dining tent for supper. The red-faced Irishwoman’s meals were filling, cheap and quickly served, and if her beef was occasionally tough as boot leather, her desserts always made up for it. And it made a welcome change from Gideon’s cooking.

Tonight, however, he arrived at their large tent only to be told they’d all been invited to take supper with a fellow Clint had met that day, one Lars Brinkerhoff.

“He’s a Danish fellow, Lije,” Clint said, using the name he’d called his eldest brother ever since he’d lisped his first words and couldn’t quite manage Elijah. “He’s been in this country a decade, he and his sister, and he’s lived with the Cheyenne. They taught him tracking. You’ll never believe how we met, but I think I’ll save the story till we’re there.”

“How does it happen we wrangled a dinner invitation on such short acquaintance?” Elijah asked, though he was always happy to meet new people. Reaching out to others was his job as a preacher, after all.

Clint grinned. “That’s part of the story. Let’s just say we went after the same antelope,” he said with a wink.

“Neighborly of the fellow to invite us,” Gideon remarked in his low, rumbling voice. “But I sure hope he doesn’t plan on pairing us up with that sister of his—at least, not you or me, Elijah—since we’re confirmed bachelors. Right, brother?”

Elijah knew Gideon’s light remark was an attempt to conceal the ache that had resided in his middle-born brother’s heart, losing both his wife and child to the influenza, and Elijah knew Gideon wasn’t expecting a reply.

Precisely at six o’clock—Elijah checked the time on the silver pocket watch that, as the eldest, he had inherited from their father—the men walked down one row of tents and up another to where Lars had told them the Brinkerhoff tent was located. Since Lars’s sister would be present, they’d washed, shaved and put on clean shirts—not that they didn’t do such things regularly, but the prospect of being in the presence of a lady certainly gave them additional motivation.

Their noses told them before they reached the Brinkerhoff tent that they were in for a treat, for the air was redolent with the smell of cooking meat and baking bread and some sort of additional sweet scent.

A tall, well-built man arose from a hay bale on which he had been sitting and came forward. Dressed in fringed buckskin and knee-high leather boots, he had hair that fell to midshoulder and was so pale a yellow it was almost white. “Velkommen—welcome, gentlemen. I am Lars Brinkerhoff.” He looked at Clint. “I am glad you and your brothers could come.”

The men shook hands, and Elijah and Gideon introduced themselves.

“And this is my sister, Katrine,” Lars said, gesturing. A young woman of middle height with the same sparkling blue eyes and flaxen hair—hers was confined in a long, thick braid down her back—straightened from where she had been bent over a cast-iron pot. When she smiled, dimples bloomed in each cheek, and Elijah supposed she could be considered beautiful, but he couldn’t help wondering if Alice Hawthorne had anyone to dine with tonight, or if she had to eat her supper alone.

“Sister, may I present the Thornton brothers,” Lars said, then pointed at each in turn, “Elijah, Gideon and Clint.”

“I am very pleased to meet you,” the young woman said, smiling at each. “I am happy that you could dine with us.”

She had the same thick Danish accent, but coming from her, it sounded charming.

“Miss Brinkerhoff, it is our very great pleasure,” Elijah said, stepping forward and bowing to her.

“Ah, but you won’t really know that until you have tasted my cooking, will you?” she teased. “Perhaps you will not like it.”

“But in such pleasant company, how could any food be less than wonderful?” Clint responded with a smile.

Elijah shared a look with Gideon, both of them clearly amused at their brother’s unaccustomed gallantry.

“Well, let us put it to the test, shall we?” Lars said. “Gentlemen, will you have a seat?” He gestured to a low table made of a wide, flat board set atop bales of hay. They would have to sit on the ground, but provision had been made for that, with a folded blanket set at each place.

“It is not how I would like to serve guests,” Katrine apologized, indicating the tin plates and eating utensils carved from wood, along with a crockery pitcher and wooden cups. “For now we travel light, yes? But Lars has promised me proper china and silverware once we build our house.”

“Please don’t worry about that, ma’am. Our eating utensils aren’t fancy, either, but they get the job done,” Gideon assured her politely, surprising Elijah that Gideon had spoken. He was quiet, even with his brothers, but usually talked much less when in the company of others.

“Mr. Elijah Thornton, since you are the sognepraest—the minister—will you say the blessing, please?” Lars asked.

Elijah did so, thanking God for the privilege of dining with their new friends and for the delicious food of which they were about to partake.

Lars began to carve slabs off the savory antelope haunch that had been roasting on the spit and placed them on a tin platter, which he passed to the men, while Katrine lifted the lid from the thick pot and brought out a golden-brown loaf of bread.

“This is kartoffelbrot, potato bread, so it may taste a little different from what you are used to, gentlemen,” she said as she sliced it. “I was fortunate to be able to trade for some fresh-churned butter, too,” she added.

For the first few minutes, no one spoke except to exclaim at the deliciousness of the food. The antelope had been done to a turn, and Elijah wondered about what herbs Lars’s sister had used to give it such an exotic flavor. The potato bread was hearty and satisfying.

“So how did you and Lars meet?” Elijah asked Clint. “You promised to tell the tale when we got here. Something about an antelope you both shot at?”

A grin spread across Clint’s tanned face. “Yes, and I was mighty upset at him for a couple of seconds for killing my antelope. I was out on the prairie east of here, lying on a bluff next to some rocks, drawing a bead on a prairie antelope down below. But before I could shoot, Lars, here, shot from the bluff across from me at the rocks right next to me.

“Well, I jumped up, mad as thunder, sure this fellow here was trying to murder me. But then he pointed below the rocks, and curled up amid them, there was the body of a rattlesnake, split right in two. I hadn’t spotted it when I’d settled in there. If I’d shot at the antelope or maybe even moved the wrong way, that snake was close enough to strike me easy. I might’ve died!”

Clint’s recital had been dramatic, but there was sobering truth in what he’d said. Clint might have been found on the prairie later, after he’d gone missing, dead of snakebite, but for the Dane’s quick action.

Elijah had been sitting next to Lars, and now Elijah laid a hand on the other man’s shoulder. “Mr. Brinkerhoff, we are most deeply in your debt. I can’t thank you enough.”

“Please, you must all call me Lars,” the other man said, grinning. “I was—” it came out vas “—happy to do it.”

“Better yet,” piped up Clint from across the table, “Brinkerhoff didn’t let the antelope get away, either. While I was still gaping at the rattlesnake and pondering how I had almost died, this fellow shot the antelope that had run fifty yards away! Then after he had retrieved it, he was kind enough to offer to share the meat with us tonight,” he said, pointing his fork at what remained on the spit.

“Why did you brothers decide to come to Oklahoma? If you do not mind that I ask, of course,” Lars added.

“Of course it’s all right,” Elijah said. “We hail from Virginia, originally. Our parents had a plantation there before the war, Thornton Hall. You’re familiar with our American Civil War?” he asked.

“The Northern states fought to free the slaves that the South held, ja?” Lars asked.

“Basically, yes, though there were other issues, as well,” Elijah said. “Our pa sent us North to live with a cousin to avoid the unpleasantries of being loyal Unionists in the rebel South.”

Elijah and Gideon were the only ones who clearly remembered leaving home. Clint had been only four, but Elijah and Gideon had told him stories of the middle-of-the-night flight from Thornton Hall, leaving behind all they knew, including their playmates, the Chaucer boys from the neighboring plantation. Elijah felt a twinge of pain as he always did when he thought of their former friends, but it seemed worse now because of the incident today.

Perhaps because Elijah had been lost in thought, Clint now picked up the story. “Pa died in battle, so we went on living with Cousin Obadiah in Pennsylvania,” Clint went on.

Elijah saw the involuntary twist of distaste on both Clint’s and Gideon’s mouths at the mention of their father’s distant cousin, who’d hated all things Southern, including the innocent boys. He’d grudgingly allowed them space in his home, but not his heart.

“Then we sold the plantation for a good profit,” Clint said, “since we were no longer welcome in Virginia, and bought a place in Kansas, where Elijah went to seminary, Gideon worked on a ranch and I became a sheriff. It was all right...but when we heard about the opportunity opening up in the territory, we knew we wanted to come here and start over on our own homesteads.”

“You plan to start a church on your land, Reverend?” Lars asked Elijah.

Elijah nodded. “That is my purpose in coming to Oklahoma,” he said. “God willing, and with the help of God’s people, I mean to use my land to build a church in which our community of faith can be united in purpose. Together we can make Oklahoma a great state someday.”

He felt that same inner certainty he’d been feeling for some time that his goal was in line with God’s will for him as well as the territory. But once again, he said a quick prayer that if his feelings were in error, the Lord would show him—either by that still, small voice that He used, or by the way events unfolded.

Chapter Three

Had he sounded too pompous? Too stuffy? But a glance at Lars and Katrine showed only approval shining from their blue eyes.

“May the good Lord bless your efforts,” Lars said fervently.

“Thank you,” Elijah said. “And now, may I ask you the same question? Why did you leave your home? Clint tells me you have been in this country for ten years. What brought you to Oklahoma, from wherever you first settled?”

“America is the land of opportunity, is it not?” Lars said in reply. “When we arrived in America, we were not content for long in the East. We decided to journey to the West and see the ‘wide open spaces,’ as you Americans say. It was harder than we thought it would be. Perhaps we were naive, but the ‘land of milk and honey’ did not seem to be there for everyone.”

“You mentioned living with the Indians, Lars,” Clint said. “Miss Brinkerhoff, did you live with them, too?”

Katrine shook her head. “Lars did not want to expose me to danger and hardship, so I stayed in the city to work,” she said, and then Elijah saw her duck her head.

Something had happened to Katrine while the siblings had been parted, Elijah thought. Something she did not want to talk about.

But Clint didn’t seem to notice. “What kind of job did you take, Miss Brinkerhoff?”

She looked away. “I minded the children of a prosperous businessman and his wife for a time,” she said, “but then I...left that and worked in some...ah, restaurants as a waitress...” Her voice trailed off as her eyes lost focus. “Then Lars returned from the Indians and told me of the Land Rush. We also thought it was a chance to make a fresh start, and—how do you say it?—wipe the slate clean. And here we are.

“I hope you have saved room for dessert, gentlemen,” Katrine said brightly then. “I have made ableskiver, which is a kind of doughnut.”

The brothers groaned when she uncovered a plateful of the Danish doughnuts, which were each topped with a dollop of blackberry jam. Elijah had thought his stomach couldn’t possibly hold anything more, but he found himself reaching for one just as his brothers did. Lars and Katrine each took one, too. In seconds there wasn’t so much as a crumb left.

The Brinkerhoffs answered their questions about life in Denmark, and Lars regaled them with tales of life among the Cheyenne until it grew dark. Then, full of good food and the pleasure of making congenial new friends, the Thornton brothers headed back to their tent. The sounds of the tent city settling in for the night were all around them—the faint tinkling of piano music from one of the many whiskey tents, the occasional nicker of a horse, the sleepy whine of a child who did not want to go to bed yet.

Elijah waited until they were back at their campfire, having a last cup of coffee, to discuss the unpleasant incident at the chapel this morning. He hadn’t wanted to end the evening on a sour note, but he thought he’d better warn his brothers about the Chaucers.

Gideon looked up from the embers of the fire he’d just stirred up. “The Chaucers are here?”

Elijah nodded. “Figured I’d better tell you both, in case you run into them around Boomer Town, as we likely will.”

Clint gave a disgusted snort. “Guess it was too much to hope that we’d left that problem back East. And they’re already vilifying the Thornton name in Boomer Town?”

Again Elijah nodded. “So it seems.”

“They better not be doing it when I’m in earshot,” Gideon grumbled. “I know you’ve got to ‘turn the other cheek’ and all that nonsense, Lije, but I’m no preacher.”

“Me neither,” Clint said. “They start acting high-and-mighty ’round me, they’ll wish they hadn’t.”

Elijah sighed. He couldn’t blame his brothers for their reactions. They’d left Virginia because of the Chaucers and their kind, knowing the Thorntons would never be accepted and welcome in their old home. Now the Chaucers had come to Oklahoma, too, and had apparently brought their old enmity with them.

“Look, we’ve just got to be civil and get along with folks until the twenty-second,” Elijah told them. “The Chaucers—and others like Horace LeMaster whose minds they have swayed—probably just want the same thing we want. Free land. Chances are, once the Land Rush is over, they’ll settle somewhere in the territory far away from us, and we won’t ever set eyes on them.”

Clint dug a groove in the dirt with the heel of his boot. “Hope you’re right, Lije. Sorry that happened to you this morning. Did the rest of the service go well? Did more people come?”

Elijah was just going to tell his brothers about Alice Hawthorne and his hope that she would lend her nursing skills as needed, when he heard the sound of running footsteps heading toward them.

A heartbeat later a wild-eyed man burst into the circle of firelight. “Preacher, you got t’ come! Deacon Gilbert’s hurt bad—he’s cut his leg and he’s bleedin’ somethin’ terrible! I’m afeared he’s gonna bleed t’ death! His missus sent me to fetch you!”

“How did it happen?” Elijah demanded, as he strove to control the dread that threatened to swamp him. What could he do in the face of a serious injury but pray and try to comfort? Was he about to lose the man who’d been the very first to step forward and support Elijah’s work?

“He cut hisself with his own ax—he was choppin’ firewood. I—I gotta get back there!” the distraught man cried, already turning to run in the direction he’d come. “Miz Gilbert, she’s carryin’ on somethin’ fierce!”

Elijah started to follow the messenger, but he had a sudden idea and turned back to his brothers. “I’ll go to the Gilberts’ and see what I can do for Keith. You two split up and see if you can find a Miss Alice Hawthorne in one of the tents. She came to chapel this morning, and she’s a nurse. She has dark red hair and blue eyes, and I’d reckon she’s in her mid-twenties. Ask if she’ll come help. Tell her to bring bandages, and whatever else she thinks is needful, and come with you to help Mr. Gilbert.”

Then he turned and ran toward the Gilberts’ campsite, sending up a silent prayer that one of his brothers would be able to find Miss Hawthorne quickly among the maze of wagons and tents, and that she would be willing to follow his brother and help save a life.

The Gilberts’ tent lay on the other side of Boomer Town, but it didn’t take long for Elijah to reach it at a dead run, even though he had to weave through campsites, and dodge wagons and picket lines to which the horses were tied. Even from a distance, he could hear the sound of a woman’s shrieks, and after hurdling the tongue of a freight wagon, he spotted the circle of men and women.

Half a dozen lanterns held by onlookers illuminated the scene, their lights bobbing and flickering. At the edge of the crowd, another woman held the wailing Mrs. Gilbert. Everyone was talking at once, some calling out advice to a kneeling man dabbing at the wound, others softly opining as to whether Keith Gilbert would bleed to death or die later of blood poisoning—assuming it was even possible to stop the bleeding. A handful of women joined the chorus of Mrs. Gilbert’s wails, wringing their hands.

“Let him through, fellers. He’s the preacher!” cried the man who had come for Elijah. “Don’t let Keith die without so much as a prayer said fer ’im!”

His words parted the crowd like a sword, and in the pale light of an upheld kerosene lantern, Elijah beheld Keith Gilbert, lying there pasty pale with wide, terrified eyes. Someone had rolled up a coat and put it under his head. A bloody-bladed ax lay amid an armload of kindling at his feet. But it was the crimson-stained left pants leg and the spreading pool of blood in the dirt that captured Elijah’s attention.

“P-please, Preacher, d-don’t let me die!” Keith Gilbert begged, panting and raising his arm in a feeble beckoning gesture. “It was my own fault—somethin’ d-distracted me just as I swung my ax—a fool thing, to take my eye off an ax I’d just sharpened...”

Dear Lord, spare this man, Elijah prayed silently as he went forward and knelt by Keith. Let Clint or Gideon find Miss Alice quickly, bring her here and give her the skill to save this man!

“You’re not going to die,” Elijah reassured his deacon, though he had no idea if he was telling the truth. The man had already lost a good deal of blood, and he was pale as a shroud. “I’ve sent for a nurse, and I’m sure she can stop your bleeding.” Someone had laid a towel over the wounded leg, and it was already saturated with blood.

Elijah aimed a look at Cassie Gilbert. Maybe giving her something to do would help her calm down. “Mrs. Gilbert, may I please have your apron?” he said. The apron was wrinkled and stained here and there, but it was better than nothing.

As he’d hoped, the deaconess untied it with shaking fingers and threw it to Elijah, who caught it and wadded it up. Elijah yanked off the blood-soaked towel, replaced it with the apron and leaned on the bleeding leg with all the force he could muster. When Alice got here—if his brothers could find her—he’d need to rip open the trouser leg so she could see the wound, but for now, trying to stop the bleeding was the first priority.

“Reverend,” rasped Gilbert. “I know I’m a sinner, but the preacher at home said, if I gave my heart to the Lord, He’d take me straight into Heaven. That’s right, isn’t it? I’m a Christian, so He’ll keep His promise, won’t He?”

“Of course He will,” Elijah assured him. “But we’re going to do our best to save you. The nurse I spoke of will be here any second now,” he said, and hoped it was true.

“Lord, in Jesus’s name, please help Your servant Keith Gilbert so he can go on doing Your will on earth,” Elijah prayed aloud. Please, Lord, let Miss Alice get here in time.

It seemed like an eternity that he leaned on the wound, not daring to let up on the pressure lest the scarlet stain spread farther on the trouser leg. Then he heard booted feet shifting in the circle of onlookers around him, and suddenly Gideon was leading Miss Hawthorne through the crowd.