Morning Comes Softly Read online

  Mary couldn’t help wondering what they’d think ten years from now when they viewed pictures of themselves.

  “Some rancher is advertising for a wife,” Sally continued, her amusement high. “Can you believe it?”

  “A rancher looking for a wife,” Mary repeated, tucking around her ear a strand of pale brown hair that had strayed from her carefully coiled chignon. “Well, that’s certainly original.”

  “Karen says she might answer him herself.” Sally’s words were followed by a bout of smothered laughter as Karen came toward the front desk.

  “I said no such thing,” she argued. Karen’s hairstyle was almost identical to Sally’s, only the second girl sported a long thin queue that reached halfway down her back.

  “Right, Ted would never let you.”

  “You’re jealous because he asked me to Homecoming instead of you,” Karen shot back, and with a jaunty step returned to shelving books from the polished oak cart.

  If Ted, whoever he was, had asked Karen instead of Sally, then Mary knew why. Karen wore her skirts several inches above her knees, several inches above discretion, to her way of thinking. Miniskirts had been popular in the sixties, as Mary recalled, but had apparently made a recent comeback. The girls wore leggings with the skirts now, clinging nylon pants with a lacy fringe at the ankles. The youth these days were certainly creative in their means of dress, Mary mused.

  Both girls returned to their tasks, teasing one another about Homecoming. Impatiently Mary watched them go, wondering briefly if she’d ever been that frivolous. Or, for that matter, that young. One thing was for certain, she’d never had to worry about which young man would ask her to the Homecoming celebration. In four years of high school, she’d never once been invited.

  A sting of regret, of sharp grief, caught her by surprise. It took her a second to remind herself what was important in life. While she was in high school it had been grades and the school newspaper. Mary had been the editor for both her junior and senior years, an honor that hadn’t been bestowed on any other high school student before or since. Although Mary hadn’t been asked to Homecoming or the junior-senior prom, she’d certainly never been as desperate for a date as Sally and Karen seemed to be. The two had been agitated for weeks, vying against one another for the elusive Ted’s attention.

  This rancher who advertised for a wife was clearly desperate. Daring and reckless, too, as far as Mary was concerned. There was no telling what kind of riffraff would respond.

  The poor man was from Montana, no less. Personally Mary could think of no one who’d be willing to move to the harsh, unforgiving land of the untamed West. She equated Montana with thick dust, scrawny cattle, and frightfully cold winters. A barren region. It was certainly no place where she would ever consider living. Not when her home was in the South. Her home and her life.

  Petite was a small town, with fewer than five thousand inhabitants, situated between two bayous. It was encompassed by marshy waters, and a warm mist rose up in the mornings, giving the area about town a delicate air of mystery and romance. Mary loved Petite and the slow, easy pace of life. The hours seemed to meander just the way the quiet waters of the bayous stirred softly at dawn.

  As a girl she’d often fished with her older brother. They’d leave early in the morning, and Clinton would take her in a pirogue, a small dugout, and they’d drift across the still water, their lines dangling just below the surface, teasing the catfish. Bearded in Spanish moss, the trees drooped heavy arms in welcome. Those had been the happiest moments of Mary’s childhood, fishing with Clinton.

  Clinton was gone four years now and she missed him still. No sister could have asked for a better brother. He’d been her protector, her knight in shining armor, her bright morning star. Her older brother possessed everything that was good in the Warners. Not only had he been strikingly handsome, he’d been clever and daring and fun. Their house had never been quiet when he’d visited.

  Often, when the scent of magnolia blossoms filled the evening air, Mary and her mother would sit on the porch sipping homemade lemonade. Clinton would steal up behind them and set the swing in motion, then hoot with laughter at the way Mary and his mother would cry out with surprise.

  Everyone in Terrebonne Parish had grieved at the tragic loss.

  Montana. Mary sighed and shook her head sadly. The poor, dear man wasn’t likely to attract many bridal prospects coming from that bleak part of the country. Due to her ignorance, she was sure, she viewed ranchers as a rough and coarse breed, hardworking, hard-living men. Certainly no Montana cattleman could hope to compete with a refined southern gentleman.

  As Mary recalled, the West had little appreciation for good food, either. She likened Montana with Rocky Mountain oysters and thick, blood-filled steaks cooked over an open fire.

  Louisiana’s cuisine, on the other hand, was as rich and flavorful as its history. Early each morning Mary savored dark Creole coffee and often delicious hot crullers or doughnuts still warm from the stove. She’d read once that chuckwagons boiled coffee over an open fire and served it grounds and all. The mere thought caused her to cringe.

  Louisiana had shrimp so plentiful that steaming bucketfuls were emptied directly onto the tabletop and shelled by eager hands. Louisiana was filled with soul and spirit, and try as she might Mary couldn’t view Montana as anything but ruthless and desolate. It was little wonder the rancher had resorted to advertising for a wife.

  Sally and Karen continued returning books to the shelf, and every now and again the sound of their giggles drifted to the front of the library. Once Mary thought she heard Karen telling Sally she should answer the ad herself just so she’d have a date for Homecoming.

  For a moment or two Mary toyed with the idea of chastising the pair for being so insensitive, but she changed her mind. The two were only teasing. They’d never do anything so heartless.

  Although Mary was fond of the girls, she found their amusement uncharitable. But they were young yet and didn’t understand what it meant to be so hopeless and lonely that one was reduced to reaching out to strangers.

  There’d been a time—years ago, of course—when she might have been tempted to be amused herself. Years ago. The thought echoed in her mind like a loud, unexpected clap of thunder. Agitated by her musings, she patted her hand down the front of her dark blue skirt. Years ago. Suddenly she felt dowdy and old. Although she was only thirty-two, she felt forty. More profoundly, she knew to the depths of her soul what it meant to be alone. Isolated. Removed. Her heart went out to the rancher because she understood all too well what had prompted his placing the ad.

  These unwelcome feelings could be attributed, Mary realized, to her mother’s death this past February.

  She was alone, she reminded herself. Orphaned. Her father had died when she was sixteen, and Clinton, her dearly beloved older brother, had perished in a plane crash. Savannah Warner, her mother, had never recovered from the death of her son. Although she’d been in splendid health, Mary’s delicate southern mother had carried her grief with her, dragging it from one day into the next until the weight of it had burdened her heart so terribly that it had eventually failed her. Mary had done battle with her own grief in the months following Clinton’s death and then her mother’s.

  Sally and Karen left at closing time, waving and smiling to Mary as they bounced out the door. The pair reminded her of playful cocker spaniel puppies. Once they were gone, she set about closing the library for the evening.

  She reached for her sweater and stood in the middle of the two-story structure, gazing proudly on row upon row of neatly shelved volumes. The polished mahogany stairway curved up to the second story, and a scent of lemon oil wafted lazily between the two floors.

  There wasn’t a sound, not even a hint of one. How empty the building seemed.

  Empty.

  Hollow.

  She drew in a wobbly breath. That was exactly the way she felt inside. Knotting her hands into tight fists, she turned away. Rarely did
she allow herself to be so open and honest about her life. Hearing about the rancher was responsible for this, and she experienced a flash of resentment toward him.

  By all outward appearances she lived a busy, active life. There was her work at the library, which was fulfilling and challenging. In addition she sang in the church choir and was an accomplished seamstress. She had several friends, the best of whom was Georgeanne McKay.

  Few would guess. None would recognize the emptiness of Mary’s struggle. Today was worse than others. Worse than it had been in a good long while. It was as if the giant void inside her had yawned open to reveal itself and she was left to hurriedly stuff it back inside. She was reluctant to drag it out, examine it, weep over it. There was a certain comfort in denial. This fragile peace with her consciousness had to be maintained at all costs. Ignored and buried.

  Standing as she was, alone in the library, the vast barrenness of her life seemed suddenly to echo against the walls, reverberating back not a song, as she longed to hear, but silence.

  An empty, lonely silence. One so loud it was all she could do not to cover her ears to block out the lack of sound.

  Hurriedly Mary collected her purse and the latest Jean Auel novel and headed toward the back door. Her delicate fingers rested against the light switch…when she hesitated.

  A wife.

  Mary paused as the word, so soft and gentle, fluttered through her mind, bringing with it the promise of what she’d always dreamed would someday be hers. Those dreams had faded over the years until they were little more than aspirations.

  A wife.

  The word exposed hidden feelings, forgotten hopes, and dug deep, rooting out the loneliness she battled so hard to hide from the world, and harder from herself.

  Mary had forsaken the idea of ever marrying. Every eligible man in Petite, Louisiana, had long since stopped looking at her in that way.

  She wasn’t unattractive. She was small-boned and barely five feet two, as delicate as her mother had been before her. Some said she was lovely, but it wasn’t the type of pretty that attracted attention. Her grandmother had told her from the time she was little what beautiful eyes she had. Blue, they were, as blue as a field of spring irises.

  Mostly Mary was shy. Apparently men expected a woman to do the talking, and she could never seem to find much to say that would interest a man. From the time she was in grade school the boys had avoided her because she made top grades. Evidently girls weren’t supposed to be intelligent. It did something to their fragile male egos, at least that was what Georgeanne McKay had once explained to her.

  Being both quiet and clever had worked against Mary while she attended college, too. Later, after she’d been chosen to become Petite’s librarian, she learned that she’d inadvertently shut herself off from opportunity.

  When she hadn’t married by age thirty, most everyone in the small bayou town had given up hope Mary would find herself a husband, including Mary herself.

  With a determination she could barely understand, Mary turned and headed back into the main part of the library. She walked over to the section that displayed the newspapers and reached for the Billings Gazette. With trembling hands she turned page after page until she located the personals column. The ad was at the top and her eyes found it almost instantly.

  Need wife to help rear three orphaned children ages 12, 8, and 5.

  Must know how to cook, sew, and sing.

  Appreciation of ranch life would be helpful.

  Write for information:

  Travis Thompson

  Grandview, Montana 59306

  Children.

  Sally and Karen hadn’t said a word about there being children involved. Mary’s heart softened at the thought of those three precious youngsters, then swelled with an excitement, an anticipation, she couldn’t squelch. There was a family, a real family, in need. Little ones lacking a mother’s tenderness, hungry for love and gentility.

  Like most women, Mary had dreamed of someday rearing a family. But those dreams had been shelved, like the forgotten books in her library, among tightly packed queues of other romantic, whimsical fantasies.

  Montana! Mary cringed, thinking of rodeos and vulgar cowmen. Surely the men who lived there possessed little or no appreciation for the finer things in life.

  She shook her head firmly. What had gotten into her? She didn’t know. For a second, a very brief moment, she’d actually considered writing the rancher herself. It was sheer craziness. If she ever was to marry, Mary had decided she would do so only for love. Never anything less. Every woman was entitled to a little romance in her life.

  Romance. She nearly laughed out loud. What did she know of such things? Precious little. A few stolen kisses behind the gym when she was fifteen, a note someone left in her locker once back in her senior year of high school.

  Her actual experience with men might be limited, but Mary was well read and not nearly as naive as those around her chose to believe.

  “Travis Thompson.” She tested the name on her tongue, liking the sound of it. It felt solid to her. The name of a man who was trustworthy and sincere. A man as despairing and as lonely as she was herself.

  “He’s probably looking for someone much younger,” she argued with herself as she walked out the door, locking it securely behind her.

  Once she was home, Mary stared into the living room. The polished oak floors shined back at her as untouched as they’d been when her mother had been alive. It was as if no one had ever stepped across the pristine wood. The drapes were made of a heavy chintz fabric and had hung precisely this way for the last thirty years. The furniture hadn’t changed in two generations. A rose-colored velvet sofa with mahogany claw-shaped arms and legs had been a family heirloom, along with the matching chair. Her mother’s tea cart rested against one wall, and the photographs of her somber-faced grandparents were there to greet her each evening.

  The living room had been reserved for company, although neither Mary nor her mother had entertained in years. If the living room had an untouched feel to it, then so did every other room. How tidy everything around her was. How orderly and uncluttered. Just like her existence.

  Pushing aside any additional pessimistic thoughts, she moved into the equally immaculate kitchen and prepared herself a sensible dinner of shrimp and rice. Everything about her, Mary realized, was ridiculously sensible.

  Seldom, if ever, did she do anything rash. Answering a rancher’s ad for a wife might well be the most absurd thing she’d ever contemplated in her life. For the second time she shoved the idea from her mind as though it were something ugly lying dead on the side of the road.

  It was while Mary was dealing with her leftovers that she hesitated for no reason, standing in front of the refrigerator as though she expected a genie to jump out and grant her three wishes.

  The weekend before, Mary had been to visit her friend Georgeanne and been amused by the crayon-colored papers proudly displayed on her friend’s refrigerator door. Every inch of available space was covered, and the door was smudged with the grimy fingerprints from Georgeanne’s two sons.

  Mary’s refrigerator door was so clean that her own reflection glared back at her accusingly. She stared at it for several moments, analyzing her small breasts. Men were said to appreciate a woman who was well endowed. It was little wonder she hadn’t attracted much attention. Frowning, she turned away to wash up the few dishes she’d dirtied.

  As she stood at the sink, Mary couldn’t keep her mind from envisioning three children crowded around a kitchen table, chattering away like magpies, eager to share the activities of their day. Three children to love and to hold and to read to each night, the way her mother had read to her and Clinton.

  Mary’s thoughts only magnified her loneliness. With a determined effort, she reached for the novel she’d brought home from the library.

  Fifteen pages into the book, she set it aside. Funny how she’d never realized what poor company a novel could be, what poorer company t
he nights had become.

  Children. Three of them, and all so young.

  Mary could feel her resolve shifting, and she closed her eyes against the onslaught of churning emotions. She didn’t want to hope because hope brought with it the opportunity for pain, and there had already been so much pain in her life. She was an adult, old enough not to be seduced by the promise of being needed and loved. Promises were often empty, and there was enough emptiness in her life.

  Nevertheless, fifteen minutes later, Mary weakened and reached for a pen and a sheet of scallop-edged paper.

  Dear Mr. Travis Thompson:

  I am writing in response to your advertisement in the Billings Gazette. My name is Mary Warner. I’m thirty-two and have never been married. I’m currently employed as head librarian in Petite, Louisiana.

  In regard to your ad, I meet the requirements you stated. I’m an excellent cook, my specialty being boneless chicken with oyster dressing and gingersnap gravy. My sweet fig pie recipe won a blue ribbon two years back, and I’d be more than pleased to share the recipe with your family, if you so desire. I also serve up a respectable etouffee and apple pie.

  As for my ability to sew, I am an accomplished seamstress and have been making my own clothes from the age of sixteen. Over the years I’ve sewn several complicated patterns for friends and family, including my best friend’s wedding dress, which entailed five hundred pearls to be stitched on by hand.

  Now, in regard to my ability to sing. I have been a first soprano for the Petite Regular Baptist Church for the past ten years and have given several solo performances. I’ve sung at weddings, funerals, birthday parties, and anniversaries. If you wish to review a tape of my singing voice, I will willingly supply you with one.