Enchanted Christmas Read online

  They rode in silence for miles. Noah found himself intensely grateful that Mac seemed to be comfortable without conversation, because he knew himself to be deficient in the skill. Occasionally the old man would indicate a point of interest, but that was all.

  In truth, the points of interest were few and far between and consisted mainly of the region’s odd fauna.

  “See those birds over there?”

  Noah looked where Mac gestured with his ever-present pipe. “Yeah.” He squinted at them, and realized that, although they were small and perched on the ground, they were owls. He’d never seen owls on the ground before. He wondered if they accounted for the funny noises he’d just heard. What were owls doing there, sitting on the prairie as if they belonged there?

  “Burrowing owls,” Mac said, as if he’d heard Noah’s question. “No trees in this area, so they dig holes and live in the ground, like the ground squirrels and prairie dogs.”

  Noah had heard of prairie dogs.

  “Aye, I expect you have heard of prairie dogs, lad.”

  When Noah whipped his head around to gape at Mac, he found him looking as artless as a baby and staring up into the sky. Noah looked, too, and forgot to ask Mac if he could read minds.

  “Sandhill cranes, I think,” murmured Mac, still staring overhead.

  A V of migrating birds cut across the sky. They looked real pretty up there, Noah decided. When he tried to remember the last time he’d appreciated nature, his memory went blank.

  “Unless they’re geese. We get ‘em both out here this time of year, and these old eyes aren’t as keen as they once were.” Mac chuckled happily, as if his failing eyesight were a grand joke.

  “So that’s where those sounds were coming from,” muttered Noah, glad to have the mystery cleared up.

  “Aye. Noisy devils, I reckon. I like ‘em, though. Friendly birds, I’ve always thought. If they honk, they’re geese. If they gurgle, they’re cranes.”

  “Yeah,” said Noah noncommittally, thinking What the hell’s a friendly bird? And what’s the difference between a honk and a gurgle?

  And that seemed to be it as far as wildlife went. On his own, Noah spotted a herd of antelope. He didn’t point it out to Mac, because he couldn’t get his jaw to work.

  Once, after Noah had nearly dozed off from the quiet and the gentle rhythm of Fargo’s plodding gait, Mac’s voice jerked him awake again.

  “Come summertime, you’ll see the desert bloom, laddie.”

  “Yeah?” Noah squinted around once more. He had a hard time imagining this grim land in flower.

  “Aye, lad. Wildflowers. Every year I find ‘em surprisin’, since a body’d never expect such soft, sweet offerings of God’s mercy out here where life seems so harsh. But summer’s when we get our rain. And when the rain comes, the wildflowers bloom.”

  Noah stopped squinting at the landscape and squinted at Mac for a moment instead. Mac had the oddest way of expressing things, so that Noah felt as if he were speaking metaphorically, and that everything he said about the countryside could be twisted just a little bit and come back to be about Noah himself.

  In any other man, Noah would have begrudged it. In fact, he wouldn’t have tolerated it. He’d have left Mac and his picturesque manner of speech, and taken off by himself. There was something so benevolent about Mac, though, something so perfectly guileless, that Noah couldn’t manage to take offense no matter how hard he tried.

  As if he hadn’t a single inkling what Noah’s thoughts might be—which, of course, he didn’t—Mac went on. “Aye, we have us purple verbena and white bindweed and little yellow daisy-like flowers, and bigger yellow daisy-like flowers. I don’t know what they are, but they’re pretty.”

  He sounded as if he were offering an apology for his lack of knowledge about the local flora. Noah shrugged, his way of saying it didn’t matter.

  “And we have us Mexican hats, too. They come in all sorts of colors, and feel like velvet. Little Maddie likes to pick ‘em and play games with them. She pretends they’re people, you see.”

  Thinking he should say something, Noah murmured, “Enterprising of her.”

  Mac laughed as if Noah had uttered the cleverest bit of wit he’d heard in years. “Oh, aye, lad. A little girl has to be enterprising if she’s going to live out here, where there are no toys and no playmates. I expect more settlers will head out here before too long, though, and then maybe she won’t be so all alone.”

  “More people? You expect a big migration out here?” Noah didn’t like the sound of that, whether it would benefit Maddie Richardson or not.

  “Well, not so many as a lot of other places. It takes a certain kind of person to want to settle here.”

  The old man’s eyes glittered and sparkled, and Noah got the impression he176 176` was laughing at him again. A prickle of irritation bloomed briefly in his chest and died. Mac was just too damned nice to get mad at.

  “I mean,” continued Mac, “no matter how you look at it, this is a hard land. A fellow has to be willing to live rough to tame it.”

  Immediately Noah thought about Grace Richardson. Evidently her husband wanted to tame some land around here. But where was he? Who was he? Maybe he’d gone out to build a place somewhere in the area, and Grace and Maddie had stayed in the comparative comfort of Rio Hondo while he accomplished it.

  Something savage churned in Noah’s stomach when he thought about Grace Richardson and her husband and their daughter, and he couldn’t account for it. So he said not a word, but rode beside Mac in silence as the old fellow, with good cheer and an ironic glint in his eyes, expounded on the types of settlers who might brave the territory, the types of wildflowers that would surely bloom in the springtime, and the amazingness of God’s handiwork.

  “Why, lad, just think on it. Right here in the territory, He’s created a land most folks would consider rough, if not downright hostile. Yet He’s also given us flowers to pretty it up, and gentle women to smooth the harsh edges away.”

  Feeling beleaguered and not a little hostile himself, Noah grumbled, “I wouldn’t know about that.” Mac went into a gale of laughter that seemed likely to carry him off entirely, unless that was only Noah’s own unkind interpretation of the dratted old fellow’s hilarity.

  “Ah, laddie,” Mac choked out at last. “Ye’re a welcome sight for these old eyes, ye are. And a balm to this old soul.”

  Noah eyed him shrewdly for several seconds. “Am I?” His voice couldn’t have been any dryer if he’d left it out in the New Mexico sun for a week.

  After another robust laugh, Mac wiped his eyes and said, “Oh, aye, lad. Aye, ye are.” He took note of Noah’s sour expression “There, lad, I won’t be teasin’ ye anymore right now. I’ll shut me old trap and leave ye be.”

  Noah considered thanking him, but thought it would be impolite. After all, Mac didn’t know anything about him; he couldn’t be faulted for assuming he was a man like any other; one who still had the capacity to love and hate, laugh and cry. He did nod his gratitude, though. He couldn’t help it.

  Mac grinned a grin around his pipe the likes of which Noah had never seen. Then he shut his mouth, and didn’t say another word until they pulled their horses up several miles later.

  They had headed to the north and east of Rio Hondo. After an hour or two of dull, beige desert, the landscape began to look slightly more interesting. At least they’d come upon one of the rivers that had prompted folks to call this area the seven rivers country.

  “That there’s the Pecos River, m’boy. The very river that’s given the place its name. The Pecos Valley, folks call it.”

  “Heard of it,” muttered Noah. His voice had gotten used to resting and cracked again.

  He thought he heard Mac chuckle, but when he turned to look, the old man was sitting on his horse, as sober as a judge. Noah got the distinct impression—although he couldn’t have said how—that Mac’s sobriety of demeanor was for Noah’s benefit alone, and that he didn’t mean it.
/>   The Pecos River snaked through the plains like a sluggish, silvery-gray ribbon. Some gray-green scrubby bushes hugged its banks, but there was nothing colorful about it. Noah eyed the river critically and decided he liked the effect of it. It didn’t rush along in a hurry like the rivers did back east. The Pecos was peaceful. It looked as if it took every ounce of its energy to move at all. Noah saw a fish break its placid surface and turn a somersault in the air. Sun glinted off the water droplets thus produced, as if the fish had brought a net of diamonds out of the water along with it.

  “Looks quiet now, but when the spring rains come, it’ll be roarin’ along like a banshee. Ground’s hard hereabouts, and rain water doesn’t soak in like it does in more civilized places.”

  Noah glanced at Mac. This was far from the first time the old fellow had seemed to have read his mind. On the other hand, there was very little to observe around here; maybe it was only logical that people’s thoughts traveled along the same paths.

  He grunted to let Mac know he’d heard and understood and went back to contemplating the river. Unless he’d seen it himself, he’d never have known a fish had just turned a somersault there; the water had reverted to its former placidity, its surface unbroken.

  If a fellow had a piece of land out here, he might plant himself a couple of willows and a cottonwood or two, and have a nice shady chunk of peace for himself if he didn’t watch out. In fact—Noah squinted into the distance—by damn, somebody already had planted some trees. He wondered if whoever it was had found life too hard here and wanted to sell the land. Or perhaps something less savory than a move—an Indian attack, flood, or illness—had prompted whoever it was to give up the place. He didn’t ask.

  Mac cleared his throat. In his contemplation of the river, Noah had almost forgotten he was there.

  “Reckon this is the first bit o’ land I wanted to show you, Mr. Partridge.”

  That was encouraging. “Yeah?”

  “Aye, lad. This is a prime piece of property, all right, and a perfect place to settle, if you ask me.”

  After taking another look around, Noah nodded judiciously. He tried to convey the impression that he was withholding a final judgment, but wasn’t sure he achieved his aim. He did say, “It looks all right,” because it was the truth.

  “Aye. It’s a pretty place.” Mac began to repack his pipe. “Belongs to Grace Richardson.”

  Noah, who had been contemplating the river and deciding whether to build his house right on its banks—on stilts, like he’d seen in other places—or on a rise some little distance from the water, jerked his head around and scowled at the old man. “Mrs. Richardson? She owns this land?”

  “Aye.” Mac twinkled at him, as blithe as an angel. “Willed to her by her late husband, Frank. They aimed to homestead it. Got through the Homstead Act.”

  Noah’s thought processes scrambled like eggs in a frying pan. From contemplating his home on the range, his mind’s eye threw an image of Grace Richardson into his brain: pretty, soft, womanly, kind. Widowed. He stammered, “Her—her late husband?”

  “Oh, aye. Poor lad died two years ago. Struck by lightning whilst he was ridin’ home one evenin’. Grace like to died, too, poor lass. If not for havin’ to care for little Maddie, she might have. On account o’ grief, y’know.”

  She might have died of grief. That was one scenario Noah’d had no experience of.

  Mac shook his head sadly. “She’s been true to her Frank ever since. Won’t even look at another man.”

  “Yeah?” True to a dead man, was she? Well, wasn’t that something? Hell, Noah’s fiancée hadn’t even been true to Noah as a live one. He found himself envying the dead Frank Richardson for having so irrevocably secured the love of a woman like Grace.

  “Aye. Poor lass.”

  Poor lass, my ass, thought Noah bitterly. He looked at the land again, then at Mac. Maybe Mac was trying to tell him something in his own convoluted way. He pushed his hat back on his head and scratched an itchy spot.

  “So, you say she wants to sell this place? Wants to get rid of it?”

  Mac’s eyebrows shot up into two telling arches. At least they told Noah something. He’d begun to frown even before Mac enlightened him.

  “Sell this land? Grace? Nay, lad, she won’t sell. This was her Frank’s dream, and Grace means to see it through.”

  Then why the hell did you bring me out here? Because he anticipated only one more of the old man’s cryptic excuses to account for the odd things he did, Noah didn’t ask. Instead, he pulled his hat down again, stared for several long moments at the land he wanted and couldn’t have—because it was a dead man’s dream—then squinted at Mac.

  “So, now that you’ve had your little diversion, you want to show me some land that’s for sale?” The venom in his heart leeched into his voice.

  Mac only chuckled. Noah found himself unsurprised.

  “Oh, aye, laddie, I’ll be happy to show you some land for sale. First, though, let’s us eat this fine lunch Grace and her little Maddie made up for us.”

  Noah sucked in a deep breath. He felt like hollering at Mac that he didn’t want anything to do with Grace or her little Maddie, and that included lunch. He restrained himself. For one thing, he sensed Mac would only laugh at him again. For another thing, he was hungry. Besides, he knew damned good and well such a declaration would be a lie.

  # # #

  “I like Mr. Noah, don’t you, Mommy?”

  Grace glance up from the letter she’d just received from her sister Eleanor back home in Illinois. The letter had only been posted three months ago. The mail service out here was getting faster every day.

  She grinned to find her daughter covered head to toe with garlands made of paper rings they’d cut out and pasted together. The garlands were intended to serve as Christmas-tree decorations, but Maddie had evidently found another use for them. She held her arms out as if she were modeling a fur piece, like the ladies in the five-year-old fashion magazine her mother let her look through if she was careful with them.

  “Mr. Partridge seems like a nice man, yes.” Even as she spoke the words, Grace wasn’t sure she meant them. To her, Mr. Partridge had seemed as remote as the stars in the sky. Either he was a naturally cold man, Grace thought, or life had battered him around more than his humanity could tolerate, and he’d removed himself from it. Although she had nothing by which to base her feeling, Grace suspected the latter.

  “Do you suppose he’ll bring you the reed organ pretty soon, Mommy?”

  Maddie twirled around, and the garland floated in the air beside her, reminding Grace of angels’ wings. Which reminded her of Frank. Which made her heart ache.

  Oh, my, she missed Maddie’s daddy. Especially now, as Christmas approached. Frank had adored Maddie. Often, as he and Grace had lain in bed at night, spent from love, Frank had wrapped his arms around Grace and talked about the Christmases they’d share in years to come. He had looked forward to watching their little girl grow up into a young woman. He’d even anticipated grandchildren someday.

  And now Frank was dead. And Maddie was pretending to be an angel in a paper Christmas garland, and Grace was fighting tooth and nail to keep Frank’s dream alive. And to keep from crying.

  She wiped away a tear. “The organ, dear?” Her voice broke, and she was ashamed of herself for showing her daughter this weakness.

  Maddie, however, didn’t seem to notice. As she carefully unwrapped herself from the paper garland, she said, “The reed organ. The one he’s going to bring you.”

  Grace cocked her head and was sure she looked as puzzled as she felt. “Mr. Partridge isn’t going to bring me a reed organ, sweetheart. I don’t even know him.”

  Maddie looked at her mother as if she’d just said something unutterably silly. “Yes, he is. Remember? I dreamed it. Just yesterday.” She frowned and picked at a paper loop that seemed to be stuck in her hair. “Or maybe it was the day after yesterday.”

  “The day before yesterday, swe
etheart?” Grace smiled at her daughter’s careful but determined efforts to disentangle herself from the garland.

  “Yes. The day before yesterday. I dreamed it. He’s going to bring you a reed organ. An’ then we can sing Christmas carols like you said we did when daddy was ‘live.”

  Grace’s eyes smarted with tears again. Dear Lord, why did you visit this on us? With an effort, she pried her heart out of the morass of sucking grief it tended to wallow in. She knew she and Maddie were luckier than thousands of women and children in the country. At least she had a little bit of money—and a job. And Alexander McMurdo, who’d been as kind a friend as a body could wish for. At least she’d known Frank’s love for several years. And she’d been with him at the end, too.

  She glanced down at the letter resting on her lap. Eleanor’s husband’s body had never been found, although it was presumed he’d died at Shiloh. Eleanor had never been given the chance to say good-bye to her Charles. At least Grace hadn’t had to go through that misery and uncertainty.

  Although Eleanor never said so in her letters, Grace knew—because she’d have done the same thing herself—that Eleanor secretly, in her heart of hearts, hoped that Charles would come home someday. It was too hard to imagine his bones resting in an unmarked grave in the south, where everybody had hated him and what he’d been fighting for.

  They’d written a letter to Miss Clara Barton’s Office of Missing Soldiers, but so far, they’d heard nothing. The closest Eleanor had come to her Charles through Miss Clara Barton was when she’d received a letter from a man who’d met him once. That hadn’t helped much.

  Grace shuddered and heaved a heavy sigh, then put the letter aside. “Here, darling, let Mommy help you.”

  Maddie obediently stood still and suffered her mother’s assistance in detaching her from paper loops. All at once she smiled.

  “I know!”