Authors: Pamela Morsi
Making Hay (9 page)
T
he train shuddered
to a stop at the new clapboard station. The porter put down a block of steps, and two young children scampered down from the train followed by Lessy and Vassar Muldrow.
“Lena June!” Lessy called out to the little girl. “Mind your brother while your daddy and I get the bags.”
The porter handed down two well-worn grip sacks and received both a tip and a thank you from Vass.
Lessy looked around the clean, modem new station in a town that hadn’t even existed when the two had taken their first trip, their honeymoon trip, nearly eight years ago.
Theirs had been the fanciest wedding that the county had ever seen. Vassar had worn a brand-new suit that was swell enough to get buried in. His dad and brothers had made the trip from Arkadelphia to stand up with him. And both his mother and Mammy Green had worn new store-bought dresses from Kansas City.
Lessy’s fine white gown had been silk and lace, which she had fancifully embroidered with tiny ducks and geese around the bodice and hem.
They had delayed the wedding several weeks to come up with all the finery, including satin ribbons on the church pews and dripless candles of pure white from the Montgomery Ward catalog.
“We are only going to marry once,” Vass had said. “We want the public symbol of it to be as special as our private happiness.”
Poor Reverend Watson had become a little anxious for the day to arrive. The young couple had become so calf-eyed and openly affectionate, they had become a near scandal and a clear embarrassment to the community. Lessy giggled even now at the memory of the hang-dog expression that had been on Vass’s face those last few nights when they’d had to part at bedtime.
Finally, when they’d stepped out of the church, laughing and delighted to be Mr. and Mrs. Vassar Muldrow, he’d lifted Lessy clear off the ground and twirled her around like a whirligig until they were both laughing and dizzy and the congregation thought them half crazy. With almost discourteous haste, they’d made their getaway in the brightly festooned buggy as if they could hardly wait for the privacy of their honeymoon Pullman car to Kansas City.
“What are you thinking about, Lessy?” Vassar asked as he managed to grasp both bags in one hand and chivalrously took her arm. “You’ve got a faraway look on that face I know so well.”
She grinned suggestively. “It’s so nice to be able to ride the train all the way home,” she said. “My least favorite part of our yearly vacations was always that long buggy ride home from DeQueen.”
“That buggy ride was downright romantic until we had two wild Indians that we have to practically tie to the buggy.”
Lessy smiled wryly and nodded agreement.
‘Tommy, Lena June, don’t go running off,” he called sternly after the children, who seemed much in danger of doing exactly that.
As the couple made their way off the platform, to the newly bricked street that was the pride of the brand-new town, the children followed in their fashion. With a blast of whistle and a smoky puff of steam, the train headed on down the track to Texarkana.
“Look, Daddy!” the little boy squealed, pointing a chubby finger at a new, brightly colored billboard next to the station.
The two adults surveyed the signboard as Lessy read it aloud. “ ‘Welcome to Peach Grove, Arkansas. Population 1,895. Home of Ripley-Muldrow Agricultural Works. Arkansas Machines for American Farmers.’ ”
“That’s our name!” young Tom exclaimed with a delighted giggle.
Vass gave a wry grin and a long-suffering sigh. ‘That Rip can never seem to remember the ‘silent’ in ‘silent partner.’ ”
Lessy waved away his objection. “It’s a good name. You are the one who helped him get started.”
Vass shook his head. “We’ve received plenty of compensation for that over the years. It was only a little investment that paid off. It was Rip’s business, his designs, and his hard work that made the company and gave this little community a bit of commerce and enterprise aside from farming.”
Lessy couldn’t argue that.
“He should have called it Ripley and Sons,” Vass said firmly.
Lessy giggled at his affronted puffiness. ‘That would have been a good name for it, considering all the sons that he has. It seems like poor Sugie Jo is in the family way nearly all the time.”
Vass grinned. “And such big boys they are, too.” His eyes were wide with feigned innocence. “Why, that oldest of theirs, nearly nine and a half pounds the day he was born! And a full three months early at that.”
“Vassar!” Lessy hissed through her teeth. “The children.”
Her discomfiture only brought a deep chuckle and a broader smile to his face. “Now, Lessy honey, don’t be acting all proper and saintly on me now. If there is one thing I’ve learned about the woman that I’ve married, it’s that she is plainly just as fraught with human frailties as I am.”
As the children moved on up ahead of them, Vassar began to hum a familiar tune, and taking up the challenge, Lessy joined in, quietly singing the bawdy words that her husband had taught her and that she now knew by heart.
“She was curved and plump
And broad of rump
And her drawers were pink and frilly.
As years may pass, I’ll oft recall
That day spent plowing Millie.”
T
erritory Trysts
Wild Oats
Runabout
T
ales from Marrying Stone
Marrying Stone
Simple Jess
The Lovesick Cure
A Marrying Stone Christmas (coming soon)
S
mall-Town Swains
Something Shady
No Ordinary Princess
Sealed With a Kiss
Garters
The Love Charm
W
omen’s Fiction
Doing Good/Social Climber of Davenport Heights
Letting Go
Suburban Renewal
By Summer’s End
The Cotton Queen
Bitsy’s Bait & BBQ
Last Dance at Jitterbug Lounge
Red’s Hot Honky-Tonk Bar
C
ontemporary Romance
The Bikini Car Wash
The Bentley’s Buy at Buick
Love Overdue
Mr. Right Goes Wrong
S
ingle Title Historicals
Heaven Sent
Courting Miss Hattie
Sweetwood Bride
Here Comes the Bride
N
ovellas
With Marriage In Mind in the collection
Matters of the Heart
The Pantry Raid in the collection
The Night We Met
Daffodils In Spring in the collection
More Than Words: Where Dreams Begin
Making Hay
N
ational bestseller
and two-time RITA Award winner, Pamela Morsi was duly warned. “Lots of people mistakenly think they are writers,” her mother told her. She’d be smart to give it up before she embarrassed herself. Fortunately, she rarely took her mother’s advice. With 30 published titles and millions of copies in print, she loves to hear from readers.
