The Mail-Order Brides

It had ended far too quickly. She remembered the pain—remembered feeling chilled and oddly disappointed. As if she had reached for a rainbow that hadn’t been there. Henry had rolled over onto his back, his clothing awry, and stared up at the ceiling. Feeling bereft, she had waited for him to reassure her that their wedding would take place quietly, as soon as decently possible, because she needed him now more than ever.

Only he hadn’t.

When she’d asked what she should do now that her home was going to be sold out from under her, he’d looked at her as if she were a stranger.

“What to do?” Rising to stand over her, he began tucking his shirt back into his pants. “My advice to you, dear Dora, is to find yourself a paying position. There must be something you’re good at. God knows, the last thing I need if I’m going to have to start all over again is a spoiled, whining wife hanging around my neck.”

She remembered thinking it must be some horrible, tasteless joke. Only how could he possibly make jokes at such a time, when her whole world had crumbled around her? When she’d needed him more than ever?

When they had done what they had just done.

“Henry—”

“Goddammit, Dora, I’m ruined, don’t you understand? I lost every damned cent I could beg, borrow or steal! Why do you think I asked you to marry me? Because you’re so damned irresistible? Come, girl, even you can’t be that stupid. Once I got wind that things might be headed for trouble, I started looking around for a backup plan. And there you were, daddy’s precious darling, ripe for the plucking.” In the rapidly fading light, his features had twisted into those of a stranger. “So I thought, why not? The old man can’t live forever, and once he dies, I’ll be set for life.”

They were standing stiffly apart by then. Dora, her gaping gown held together by only a few buttons, felt behind her for a chair. “Th-that’s not true. You—you’ve been drinking. Besides, if you thought something was wrong, why didn’t you tell my father? Why didn’t you warn him before he—before he—?”

“Before he blew his brains all over your fancy French wallpaper? Because I didn’t know the old bastard had gone out on a limb to put everything he could scrape together into the same lousy deal I had, that’s why! It was supposed to be a private, limited opportunity!” By that time he’d been yelling, patting his pockets as if to be sure he hadn’t lost anything. “Five investors, one in each state, I was told. All names kept secret, they said. Once it paid off, we’d all be rich beyond our wildest dreams. God, I can’t believe I was so stupid! They must’ve rounded up every idiot who could scrape together a few thousand dollars and sold them the same bill of goods!”

She had stared up at him, dazed, struggling to make sense of what she was hearing after the absolute worst three days of her life. “But—but then, why did you—”

“Allow you to seduce me?” His bark of laughter had made her flesh crawl. “Why not? You landed-gentry types sure as hell owe me something for all the time I wasted in this crummy little backwater town.”

He’d started to leave, turned back and said, “Oh, yeah—I forgot this.” Lifting her limp hand, he’d kissed her fingers and then removed the diamond engagement ring she had scarcely had time to get used to wearing.

She’d still been there, numb with shame and disbelief, when her maid, one of the few servants who had stayed on, had found her. Bertola had taken one look at her face, then at the condition of her clothes, and said, “He done it to ye, didn’t he?”

The little maid was hardly more than a child, but Dora had turned to her and burst into tears. “He—he doesn’t want me,” she’d wept. “He said he—said I—we owed him…”

“Hush, honey, you come on back to the house now.” And Dora had allowed herself to be led back to the house that would soon no longer be hers. “I’ll run warm water in the tub. You might want to smear some salve down there, where—you know. So it won’t burn so much. I know it don’t seem like it now, but you’ll feel better by an’ by, Miss Dora. I’ll bring you some hot whiskey and sugar, it’ll help you sleep.”

Such wisdom and understanding from a sixteen-year-old maid. Dora had been in no condition to wonder about it at the time, and now that it occurred to her, it was too late.

She had slept that night…eventually. Slept and woken in time to say goodbye to the last of the servants. Head aching, heart numb, she had waited for her three best friends to call, as they’d promised to do after the funeral. She’d been told she could stay on until the house was sold and the new owner took possession, but she would rather not stay alone and there was no money to pay anyone to stay with her. She was warned not to think of selling any of the furnishings—as if she would.

Bertola had offered to stay on, but Dora knew she would need to find other work as quickly as possible. It was just beginning to dawn on her that without a home—without funds—people might actually starve.

Surely one of her friends, Dora had told herself, would invite her to stay with them until she could think more clearly about the future. They had all visited back and forth, she in their homes, they in hers.

So she’d continued to wait in the big old house with its familiar polished woodwork, its familiar faded murals, its tall, arch-topped windows draped in black. She’d blamed the rain when no one came to call the next day.

Then, too, she’d told herself, they were probably embarrassed for her. First, losing her father in such a shocking way, and then losing her home—practically everything she possessed. Granted, she was now poor while they were still wealthy, but surely their friendship had been based on more than a shared social position. They couldn’t possibly know what had happened in the summerhouse. Henry certainly wouldn’t brag about it, not after breaking their engagement the very same night. Gentlemen didn’t break engagements, much less…the other. If he even hinted at what had happened, he would quickly find himself run out of town—or worse.

It was Bertola, as the two of them were packing Dora’s trunk a few days later, who finally told her the truth. Not content to take her virginity—although she’d been a willing partner, to her everlasting shame—Henry had deliberately destroyed her reputation. The scoundrel had put it about that when he’d hurried back to town to offer her his condolences, Dora had seduced him, intent on making sure he married her as quickly as possible.

That’s when he’d discovered, to his astonishment, that far from being a virgin, his fiancée was a bold, experienced adventuress. His heart, of course, had been shattered beyond repair, but how could he possibly accept damaged goods? How could he possibly bestow his honorable name on a woman half the men in town must have known intimately?

Bertola claimed tearfully that she’d done her best to refute the wicked tale, for hadn’t she known Miss Dora ever since she’d first come to work at Sutton Hall as a scullery maid? But who would take the word of a servant over a fancy gentleman from up north?

“That Polly,” she’d exclaimed indignantly, Polly being the personal maid of Dora’s best friend, Selma Blunt. “She’s the worst. It ain’t enough she steals and then brags about it, but to lie about something she knows ain’t the truth, the devil’s gonna take her right down to the bad place!”

Dear, faithful Bertie. Dora had given her a coat, three dresses and a lace collar, but she had refused to take any money. Of all she’d left behind, it was Bertie she missed the most. Riches could be lost. True friendship was invaluable.

Now, months later and many miles away, Dora sat in companionable silence with the man she had married in desperation and silently closed the door on the past. Somewhat surprisingly, the pain had lessened with time. Someday perhaps even the scars would fade.

“Thank you, Emmet, for listening. I feel better for having told you.” She had told about her father, and about the fiancé who had broken their engagement because she hadn’t, after all, been an heiress. But she’d held back her most shameful secret of all. That she was damaged goods, as Henry had called her.

It no longer mattered, because Emmet didn’t expect that of her. One of the advantages of moving to the ends of the earth, even though it was only some fifty-odd miles away by water, was that no one here knew about her past. Here there were no friends to snub her, to huddle in corners and whisper about her, or cross the street when they saw her coming. No expectations to live up to, no reputation to guard as if it were the crown jewels. From here on out, the slate was clean. Her future was what she made of it.

“Don’t forget to take your bedtime pill,” she reminded her husband as he got to his feet and reached for the cane he still used, even though his ankle was completely healed. Pills at night, tonic in the morning. Reminding him made her feel better, as if she were doing something in return for his patience in hearing her without comment, question or criticism.

And for giving her a home when she’d had nowhere else to turn.

Tomorrow she would store the last of Sal’s things in the attic. She had finally uncovered the bed. It was small, but not at all uncomfortable as long as she didn’t turn over in her sleep and fall off onto the floor.

From his castle on the hill, as some jokingly called the weathered old structure that had first been built nearly a hundred years earlier and added onto by succeeding generations, Grey watched for some indication that the woman was up to no good. Watched as they sat in the two porch rockers with their morning coffee, talking together, gesturing occasionally, seemingly content. He watched as Sal’s old gander chased Dora around the backyard.

Sal had rescued the bird from the dogs and nursed him back to health. The creature was mean as a three-legged weasel. Emmet claimed he was too tough to cook, but Grey had a feeling the old man kept him for sentimental reasons. And so the bird stayed on, escaping every few days to chase after Dora whenever she stepped outside.

Grey continued to watch her, waiting for her to show her true colors. At the first misstep, he vowed, she’d be gone, set aboard the next boat out. If he had to, he’d go with her and find some decent middle-aged widow to come out in her place to look after Emmet. Marriage in his condition, wouldn’t matter. What he needed was someone capable of keeping him company and seeing to his needs.

Instead, the poor fool had gotten tangled up with a haughty baggage who managed to get herself talked about by half the men on the island. He was damned sick and tired of hearing Miss Dorree this, and Miss Doree that. Just let her pick up her pan and walk down to the landing for fish, and every man on the island started panting.

She damned well had to go before his whole plan came unraveled.

Chapter Five

Seated at his desk the following day, Grey tried to concentrate on rewording his advertisement. What with all the distractions, concentration was becoming more and more difficult. “Young women with farm experience.”

To do what? Milk the cows? St. Brides boasted one poor old bull, whose duty it was to service the dozen or so cows descended from those that had been brought out generations ago by some misguided stock-man, or had since escaped from a cattle barge and swum ashore. There hadn’t been a calf produced in the past four years—which meant no fresh cows. Which meant no fresh milk. It was all the stockmen could do to keep the poor creatures supplied with hay. There were no pastures to graze on, only the wild sedge; not even Grey St. Bride could command grass to grow in windswept, tide-prone sand.

He had a choice of having the cows butchered and salted down, the meat to be distributed among the men, or he could have a young bull shipped out. Making a note on the order he was working up for Captain Dozier, Grey went back to his advertisement.

“Wives needed. Must be young, strong, healthy.”

Not for the first time, he asked himself why any young woman in her right mind would agree to move to a place that lacked even the most basic amenities, to marry a man who worked from sunup to sundown and bathed only on rare occasions. The younger men might even take a notion to ship out whenever a ship came in that was shorthanded, and be gone for months, if not years. For the most part they were decent, hardworking men. Still, what did they have to offer a woman?

More to the point, why had he ever thought he could turn this place into a settled, civilized community, one where children could grow up and learn a trade, or be taught their letters until they were old enough to go off to school? Once grown, some would move on—a few always did. But of those few, some would eventually marry and return to the island with their families.