Plum Creek Bride

Jonathan jerked. “Your room?”

“Yes, please. I come to stay, help with baby.”

Jonathan watched the slim young woman hoist her traveling bag and turn toward the wide mahogany staircase. Tess had not told him about the baby in the first place, and when she did, she hadn’t admitted how risky it was for her. Now he found his wife had engaged a-a what? He already had a housekeeper. A mother’s helper?

He groaned inwardly. Another surprise.

“You cannot remain here, Miss Scharf. My wife is. She passed away three weeks ago. There is no mother, and there is no need for a mother’s helper.”

“But there is baby!” Erika protested.

As if in corroboration, a thin wail drifted from behind a closed door. The honey-haired young woman stared at him accusingly.

“I come all the way from New York, from Bremerhaven on ship. I cannot go back. I have no money for ticket.”

“I will pay your—”

“Besides,” she interjected. “I do not want to go back. I like America. And Or-e-gon.” She pronounced each syllable with care. “I like very much. So I do not go back.” She folded her arms across her tiny waist and lifted her chin. “I stay.”

“On the contrary, Miss Scharf. This is my house and my child. I can do whatever I feel necessary.”

“But—”

“When the infant is six months old, I intend to send her to my mother in Scotland.”

“You cannot,” Erika exclaimed, her blue eyes widening. “Baby needs father.”

Jonathan raked the fingers of one hand through his hair. “Baby needs—” He cleared his throat. “The child needs a mother. Someone to care for it, feed it. In Scotland—”

“In Scotland is not mother. Or father. Here in Plum Creek is family. You. Papa.”

A smile flashed across her face, lighting the sapphire blue eyes from within. In the next instant, the curving lips pressed into a thin line and the sparkle in the wide-set eyes faded. “Next best thing to mama is mama’s helper. Me. Erika Scharf.”

She brushed past him, leaving the scent of lavender and travel dust in her wake. “I work now.” She headed toward the staircase. “I will put on apron and then meet baby.”

The doctor stepped forward. “You will not!”

Erika paused on the first polished riser. “And why not is that?” She suppressed a smile of triumph at so many correctly pronounced w’s today. She was learning! But the English came slowly.

Dr. Callender’s hands closed into fists. “Is there something wrong with your hearing, Miss Scharf? I said I intend to send the child to Scotland.”

“Nein.” She met his gaze with an unflinching stare of her own. “Hearing good. Seeing also good. Thinking—” she tapped a forefinger against her forehead “—best of all! Baby stay here, with papa.”

He drew himself up to his full height. “Now, look, miss. You may stay the night, and that is all. In my home, I decide what is best.”

Erika tipped her head to meet his gaze. “Ja, of course,” she agreed. “But baby not on Scotland ship now. Later maybe, not now. Now, baby is here. I am here. You—papa—are here. Is for the best, I think. You will see.”

She spun and started dragging the satchel up the stairs. “Which room, please? I put on apron now.”

Erika did not look back at him on purpose. She didn’t want to give the frowning man at the bottom of the stairs one second to open his mouth and stop her ascent to what was surely the closest to heaven she’d ever been in her twenty-four years.

A house! A big, welcoming house, with beautiful furnishings and lace curtains at the windows—and so many windows, the glass sparkling clean, not dingy with soot as in her parents’ tiny cottage at home. Mama would be so happy for her! Mama had always wanted a window.

A house in America! It was almost too good to be true. America. Land of the free, Papa had said. Where people were equal. It was all he’d talked about before he died. In America, even a poor German cobbler could eat.

More than that. An unmarried woman could work hard and save money, could stay respectable even if she did not marry. A young woman in America had a future.

And now that she was finally here, nothing—not fire or flood or Dr. Jonathan Callender—would keep her from starting her new life. It was what Papa had wanted for her. It was what she wanted. In fact, it was the only thing she wanted—to live in America.

She reached the last door in the long hallway and tentatively laid her hand on the polished brass knob. This one? she wondered. The door was smaller than the others.

Now at last she was here, at the home where she was needed. She quailed at her defiance of the formidable-looking physician, but she would never, ever give up her only offer of employment. Or her dream. And, she resolved, she would never, never admit how frightened she was.

She twisted the doorknob and walked in.

Erika stared at the lovely room. A Brussels carpet in tones of rose and burgundy spread over the floor, and on top of it, centered between two tall multipaned windows, stood a narrow bed swathed in ivory lace. There were few other furnishings except for an imposing carved walnut chiffonier and a night table next to the bed. On it sat a white china basin and matching pitcher.

The small, simple room looked comfortable and inviting. It was sumptuous, by Erika’s standards. Surely she must have opened the wrong door! Mrs. Callender had promised she would have her own room, but this—this seemed far too grand for a servant’s quarters. This was luxury indeed, compared with the threadbare boardinghouses and dirty hotels she had occupied this past month of traveling from New York across the plains and mountains to Portland and then south to Plum Creek.

In spite of herself, she took a cautious step onto the richly patterned carpet. Mercy, her travel-stained shoes would surely soil it! Quickly she unhooked the laces, stepped out of the brown canvas shoes and edged onto the patterned carpet in her stocking feet. The thick, soft wool caressed her toes. What heaven!

Yes, it must be the wrong room. But so beautiful. So welcoming, as if waiting just for her. On impulse she slid one bureau drawer open. Empty.

She slid it closed and opened another. Empty, except for a spray of dried lavender scenting the flowered paper lining. If the room belonged to someone, would not the drawers be full? With a gasp of pleasure, she realized Mrs. Callender’s intention: the room was to be Erika’s!

She felt as if she had died and floated up to live with the angels. A room to herself! A private, quiet place where she could be alone! Never in her life had she had a door she could close to keep the world out.

And a bed covered in lace, like a wedding cake! She plunged her hands under the bedclothes. And a real mattress!

Hers! Her throat closed with emotion. Hurriedly she scrabbled in her satchel for the clean, white apron folded at the bottom and dumped the remaining contents into the open bureau drawer. The doctor had to let her stay! He had to!

With shaking hands she removed her straw hat and drew the apron neckband over her head, fashioning the ties into a wide bow at her waist. Smoothing out the sharp creases in the starched material, she surveyed herself in the oval mirror propped on the chiffonier.

She pinched her cheeks with both hands to make sure she wasn’t dreaming, then reinserted a hairpin into the loose bun of honey-colored hair piled on top of her head. Tomorrow she would braid it into a crown as she had in the old country.

Hastily she flicked her cambric pocket handerchief over the dusty shoes and was bending to pull them on when a piercing cry penetrated the quiet.

Erika jerked upright The baby. Casting a quick look at the pristine, feminine bedroom, she bolted for the door and pulled it shut behind her.

A lusty wail rose from below, punctuated by a man’s impatient voice and the thump of footsteps as he apparently paced back and forth. Erika paused at the bottom of the stairs, consciously straightened her spine and drew in a fortifying breath. She was ready.

She moved toward the crying that rose from behind a closed door. Just as she lifted her hand to knock, the door jerked open.

“It’s about time,” the physician barked. “What the devil were you doing up there?”

Erika took an involuntary step backward. Perspiration beaded the doctor’s high, tanned forehead. Tendrils of black hair curled awry, as if he had combed his fingers over his scalp. The penetrating gray eyes narrowed into shards of slate as he awaited her response.

“I was putting on my—”