The New Year's Bride (Holiday Mail Order Brides Book Two) Read Online Free Page B

men there were in Nowhere. Other girls would have to leave the orphanage.  Would Mrs. Ridgley send them here?
    “Spencer,” Mrs. Riley began.  “Who is that talking with Clayton?”
    “I have no idea.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen him before.  He must be a stranger in town.”
    Mrs. Riley peered at him a little closer.  “I don’t think he’s a stranger. If he was he wouldn’t look familiar to me.”
    Spencer looked between his mother and the young man speaking with his brother.  “Well, there’s only one way to find out,” he said as he made his way across the street to the pair.
    “Come along dear,” Mrs. Riley told Elle.  “Let’s find out who it is.”
    Elle shrugged.  Either way, she was sure she didn’t know the man.  Not after just arriving in town herself.
    “Ah, here he is!” Clayton said as Spencer hopped up onto the boardwalk. “This is Sheriff Riley.”
    The stranger looked at the two brothers.  “Sheriff Hughes told me to report to Sheriff Riley, but I thought you were the Sheriff,” he said to Clayton.
    “I gave it up, that’s wh y uncle Harlan sent you our way,” Clayton told him.  “Good old Spence here is the newly appointed Sheriff in town.  You’ll work with him, not me.”
    The handsome young man scratched the back of his head and looked Spencer over. “Well, if you say so.” He held his hand out to Spencer. “Deputy Thomas Turner reporting for duty, sir. Sheriff Hughes down at Clear Creek sent me.  Heard you were short handed.”
    “Uncle Harlan sent you?”  Spencer asked.  “All the way up here?”
    “Harlan sent you a deputy?” Mrs. Riley chimed in.  “Well now, isn’t that nice.  I thought you looked familiar!  Why, I must have seen you the last time I went to visit my brother. What did you say your name was?”
    “Thomas Turner , ma’am.’”
    “Thomas Turner, Thomas Turner,” she said to herself.  “Oh yes!  Now I remember you!  Your folks are farmer s down that way.  Isn’t your mother’s name Mabel?”
    “Yes ma’am.”
    Elle watched and listened as Mrs. Riley managed to pull the young man aside and get caught up on all the happenings in a town called Clear Creek that was a few hundred miles to the south.  Her brother Harlan Hughes was the Sheriff there and when he found out Clayton was going back to apple farming and that Spencer was now Sheriff, he sent one of his deputies up to help out.
    “We could have found a deputy here,” Spencer told Clayton while their mother continued to interrogate the young man for scraps of new s and gossip from the other town.
    “Well, you know how Uncle Harlan li kes to help.  Besides, this will give Charlotte Davis someone new to chase.”  Clayton turned to Spencer and smiled. “Maybe then she’ll stay out of your hair and let you court Miss Barstow in peace for a few weeks.  That is still your plan isn’t it?”
    Spencer looked to Elle who could hear every w ord they said, but feigned interest in a horse across the street.  “Yes, that’s my plan.  Convincing mother of that is another story.  If she had her way, she’d have us married this afternoon.”
    Clayton glanced to Elle, than slapped him on the back.  “Would that be so bad?”
    Spencer rolled his eyes at his brother, left Thomas Turner to deal with his mother’s long string of questions, and went to stand next to Elle.  “Are you feeling better now?”
    “Oh yes, quite.  Lunch was lovely.”
    “Yes, all three courses.”
    She looked at him, puzzled. “Courses?”
    “Soup, the roast beef, dessert … you know. Courses.”
    The truth was she didn’t know.  Growing up in the orphanage didn’t exactly consist of fancy dining.  She gave him a weak smile and nodded.  She had a lot to learn.  Which reminded her, “Do you have a telegraph office in town?”
    “Yes, why?”
    “I … ah … wanted to let Mrs. Ridgley know I ’ve arrived safely.”
    “Oh yes, of course.  But w e can take care of that