The conversion of Mark Justice rocked Antelope. Nothing had set tongues wagging and heads nodding as much as the dramatic change in the cowboy once shot by the sheriff in self-defense. When the second storm abated and an unnatural warm spell followed, Nat went for help. Mark bit his lip to hold back the pain when his comrades lifted him onto a steady horse. The curses they expected to split the air never came. Blood ran down Mark’s chin from where he had driven his teeth into his lower lip but he said nothing and stuck on the horse.
At his request, the men took him to the Lazy H bunkhouse instead of into town. “What’s a little old broken leg?” he demanded once Adam pronounced the break clean and healing well. “You poor fish will have to be out checking on how many cattle got caught in the storm. I get to lie in bed or hobble around a nice warm bunkhouse, shoot the breeze with Cooky, and take me a va-cation.” He didn’t add what he told Nat later. “I’ll have a chance to read the Bible you gave me. Now that I’m riding with God, I want Sally Mae to know about Him. She always did listen to what I have to say and she’ll be coming around soon. I better get ready.” He clutched the Bible and jauntily waved goodbye to the Birchfields.
More of the story came from other Lazy H hands.
“Crazy kid,” one rangewise cowboy told Adam. “Never preaches. Just lays there readin’ that Bible.” He squirmed a bit then looked square into the doctor’s eyes. “He told us everything that happened there in the line shack. Blamed if I didn’t go and get a cinder in my eye just then and have to rub it out.” He cackled. “A lot of the other men sat there rubbin’ their eyes, too. Guess it kinda got to us.” He took a deep breath. “Makes a feller sort of wonder. I mean, Mark’s never been out and out bad but you don’t find them much wilder. He’s shore changed.”
“How come you never see Mark Justice around here no more?” became a standard question in Antelope.
“Aw, he’s got religion,” someone always answered, but a dozen times Nat or Adam saw the look in some of the other cowhands’ eyes, the look that “made a feller sort of wonder.”
“You know, Mark can be one of the best witnesses for Christ around here simply because he’s one of the cowboys,” Nat said one evening. “Any time a man or woman or child whose life isn’t so spotless accepts the Lord, that person can be a powerful influence.”
“I wonder how Mark can keep from preaching,” Adam mused.
“I told him just to live it and baffle his friends!” Nat confessed.
Winter passed with a spate of spontaneous get-togethers with various Antelope families, the church program, and snow, snow, and more snow. The infrequent letters from Ivy Ann, always with a brief message Adam suspected Laurel tucked in secretly, brightened days made long and weary by the fight against cold, sickness, and accidents. Adam gloried in knowing if he hadn’t been where God wanted him to be many of those who came down with pneumonia would surely be dead. If at times he longed for a companion, a wife, he quickly drowned the wish in the joy of being with his brother.
Suddenly, spring came, not stealing into Antelope like a thief in the night, but with a rush of warm days that release rivers from their captivity and sent them gleefully chuckling, free from winter hibernation under sheets of ice. Tiny flowers sprang up. New life abounded and Adam lifted up his head and gave thanks. Only one sore spot remained: It had been a long time since he heard anything from his friends, the Browns, or from Mother, who faithfully smuggled letters to him. How had they kept through the winter? What news Antelope had came slowly and only after a long time. If it weren’t for Dan Sharpe, who had already made one round trip out for a top-heavy load of supplies, the world since the snowfall might as well not exist!
One early evening Adam felt more tired than ever. If only his patients would follow his advice. At times he despaired of ever convincing these people that when he ordered rest it didn’t mean after all the usual work chores ended. Yet he couldn’t blame them. Every family busy with spring work toiled from sunup to past sundown. How could they do anything else when duty called?
Adam sighed, wishing Nat would return from whatever errand had called him out. The cabin felt empty without patients, or Nat. Too tired to eat the warm supper he found saved for him by his thoughtful brother, Adam restlessly paced the floor longing for he knew not what.
Suddenly the door flung open and Nat came in, his mouth stretched wide in an expression of glee. He tossed his hat into a corner.
“You look like the Cheshire cat in Alice in Wonderland, “Adam told him, unreasonably resenting Nat’s obviously high spirits when his own were mysteriously low.
“I’ve just seen a vision.”
“You’ve what?” Adam was jolted out of his doldrums.
“Not a religious vision,” Nat quickly amended, “but a vision of fair young maidenhood.”
“Sally Mae’s in town again?” Adam taunted while a quiver of anticipate went through him. “Since when is she a vision?”
“My good man.” Nat drew himself up as if offended, but his twinkling black eyes ruined the attempt. “I am not referring to Sally Mae Justice. I am referring to a young and lovely woman who pursued me down the street, clutched my arm, and looked into my face then said, ‘Hello.’ Furthermore, a young lady I have never seen before.”
“Are you making this up?” Adam demanded, while that same odd lurch of his heart pumped blood against all reason.
Nat’s keen look replaced his teasing. “No, Mrs. Greer explained it all. In the dim light the young woman mistook me for you.”
“What young woman?”
“You haven’t heard from Ivy Ann Brown for a long while, have you?” Nat grinned tormentingly with the expression that contrasted so to his serious demeanor when ministering.
“Impossible!” It burst from the depths of Adam’s heart. He must be mad to think of it. Yet wouldn’t a stunt like this be just like Miss Ivy Ann Brown?
“I am to tell you that Miss Brown will see you at the Widow Terry’s where she has taken up residence in one hour, or whenever you’re free.”
It was all Adam could do to keep from rushing to Mrs. Terry’s cabin. He bathed, shaved, and dressed in fresh clothing from the skin out. He ignored the gleam in Nat’s eye and his innocent comment.
“Wish I had a pretty girl from the East to visit.” A few minutes before the appointed time, he presented himself at the front door of Ivy Ann’s new abode, willing his usually steady heart to stop pounding.
The pink gown swirled around Laurel’s unsteady feet as she slowly walked to the door. She hesitated, one soft hand on the latch. Then she took a deep breath, lifted her chin with all her heritage of southern pride, and opened the door.
A tall, deerskin-clad figure stood before her.
Laurel’s quick survey took in the new man. Dr. Adam Birchfield in the western garb he had adopted for comfort and practicality outstripped the young man in fine broadcloth and immaculate linen she remembered.
“Hello, Adam.” Why did she stand frozen before the familiar stranger? She anxiously scanned his face, lean from hard work and outdoor calls, and felt relieved to discover the beginnings of a smile. Yet what shadow lurked in the watching dark eyes? It couldn’t be disappointment, could it? Her spirits that had been shored up by the warm bath and the pink gown fell. The next instant the look vanished and laugh crinkles half closed his eyes.
“Well, Miss Ivy Ann, you’ve done it this time! I thought you were the young lady who refused to give up the comforts of home for the good of our expanding country.” He threw back his head and laughed, just as his brother had done in the street earlier.
An icicle pierced Laurel to her very soul. So Ivy Ann had won again, in spite of everything. She opened her mouth to cry out the truth, but was stopped by Adam’s hearty voice.
“Don’t look so stricken.” He took her hand and shook it. Genuine welcome lightened his face. “It’s wonderful for you to be here no matter what the reason.” He led her to a settee and sat down beside her. “When I didn’t hear from you for a time I thought you had probably forgotten all about your Wild West doctor friend.”
“I could never do that.” Laurel’s lips moved of their own accord. Her mind ran in a dozen directions.
“How’s Laurel? And your father and mother?”
With a tremendous effort the distraught girl managed to mumble, “All my family is well, or at least they were when I left.” Inside she wanted to shriek. Any hope that the doctor had escaped Ivy’s charms without regret faded when Adam continued.
“Nat told me how you mistook him for me in the dusk.” Another laugh escaped. “Would you like to know what else he said about you?”
“Why, of course.” She nervously pleated her frothy pink skirt, hating it with all her heart and wishing she’d worn calico. Yet, would it have changed anything? Although Adam had heard her feelings about the West, never in a million years would he believe the quiet twin capable of the escapade she had just completed.
“It’s still hard for me to believe you’re here.” Admiration shone in Adam’s face. “Say, but we’ll have a good time. I have places to show you that will make you turn traitor to even your beautiful Red Cedars.” He went on making plans while Laurel numbly prayed for Mrs. Terry to return before she betrayed her identity. She must think and decide what to do. Laurel had been prepared for disapproval, even shock. She hadn’t even considered that Adam would take her for Ivy Ann.
By pasting a smile over lips that wanted to tremble, she oohed and ahed in all the right places and knew how a prisoner given a reprieve must feel when the Widow Terry swept in, greeted Dr. Birchfield, pointedly looked at the clock, and ushered Adam out.
“She’s going to be here for a spell. Now you get home and get your rest…The good Lord knows there are few enough uninterrupted nights for you.”
At last Laurel escaped from her landlady, if she could be called that when she obviously intended for Laurel to replace the daughter who had married and gone. In a tiny, piney-smelling room Mrs. Terry hastily cleared of cloth bolts and trims, Laurel stared out the single window at stars that looked near enough to pick. What would she do now? Seek Adam out at the first opportunity and confess?
She tossed and turned, remembering how above all else Adam hated deceit. Her courage failed. At least until she made new friends Dr. Birchfield must remain a staunch ally to whom she could turn in this faraway land. “If I can do all the wonderful things he has planned we’ll be together,” she comforted herself. “Dear God, it isn’t that I won’t tell him. I will, but just not now. Besides, I never said I was Ivy Ann. He said I was. I just didn’t correct him.” She moved again and kept her gaze on the majestic stars. “I know you hate deceit even worse than Adam does, but I just can’t—”
Misery took over and the longing to be safely back at Red Cedars. She had thought nothing could be worse than living forever in her twin’s shadow. Now the shadow of her own making lay long and dark over any chance for happiness in this forbidding land. A wail in the distance didn’t help. A wolf? Coyote? She shivered under the warm, beautifully made quilts Mrs. Terry had brought out from her “saving for comp’ny” closet. Did everyone who broke free from home, especially those who slipped away without the family knowing, feel this way?
Before she finally slept, Laurel had wrestled with her knotty problem and decided she had no choice. Until she got close enough to Adam Birchfield to feel that he cared enough to forgive her, she must be Ivy Ann—not in what she said but in what she did. Perhaps he would attribute the differences she knew she could not hide to her being in a new place. Or maybe he had forgotten some of Ivy’s little ways.
She sighed. All the times she had played parts in young people’s entertainments hadn’t prepared her for the monstrous role she faced in playing her own sister! Perhaps she should have corrected Adam immediately. The one other option lay in going home.
“No!” She sat upright in bed. A surge of protest drowned out the sensibility of that move. “I’m here and I’m staying.” She slid back down under the covers and a hard core of stubbornness formed within her. So what if Adam built on his gladness to see Ivy Ann and fell in love? It would really be with her, Laurel, wouldn’t it? She fell asleep hugging the thought to her heart. If that happened, surely he would forgive her….
Laurel hadn’t counted on a new complication entering her already topsy-turvy plans. Blond-haired, amber-eyed Dan Sharpe had ideas of his own. Before Mrs. Terry and Laurel had finished breakfast the next morning, Dan rapped on the door.
Mrs. Terry’s cup hit the table with a little crash. Her thin face turned toward the door. “My, my, isn’t your beau impatient?” She marched to fling open the door and welcome Dr. Birchfield, then scowled in surprise.
“Morning, Mrs. Terry.” Early sun turned Dan’s hair to molten gold.
“Land sakes, Dan Sharpe, what’re you doing coming around here at the crack of dawn when a body’s getting ready for work?”
“Just paying my respects. Is Miss Brown here?”
“Bees to the honeypot,” Laurel heard her hostess mutter before she grudgingly allowed Dan to enter.
“I just wondered if you’d care to go riding a little later,” Dan drawled. “Every unmarried man around’s going to come calling.” He sent a significant glace at her bare ring finger. “According to Mrs. Greer, Doc has a prior claim but I don’t see any sign of it being staked out.”
In the middle of Mrs. Terry’s indignant gasp Laurel coolly replied, “I don’t quite understand your meaning, Mr. Sharpe, but it doesn’t really matter. I am to help Mrs. Terry and my work begins immediately. I’ll have little time to go riding, at least until I get settled,” she amended when she saw his reaction. “I do appreciate your calling, however. It’s nice to have the local people welcome me to my new home.” The next instant she wished she had bitten her tongue.
“You plan to stay permanently?” Dan’s gaze sharpened and drilled into her.
Again she thought of that tiger, under control but still dangerous. Laurel smiled in the way she had seen Ivy Ann do a hundred times, a smile guaranteed to disarm her inquisitive suitors. “Who knows?” She shrugged her shoulders in a dainty gesture. “I suppose much will depend on how I like Antelope. Now, if you’ll excuse us, I’m sure it’s time for Mrs. Terry and her new apprentice to go to work.” She held out her hand.
Danger signals in Dan’s eyes warned her the battle had neither ended nor been won but he merely bowed over her hand. “Remember, I asked first,” he said, then bowed toward Mrs. Terry and swung out, whistling the first few bars of “Dixie.”
“Well, of all the—I knew Dan Sharpe was presumptuous but this really beats it all!” Mrs. Terry’s astonished reaction sent Laurel into a fit of giggles.
“‘Remember, I asked first,’ “she mimicked. “Who does he think he is? I get the feeling he’s convinced that any girl would just be waiting for him to confer attention on her.”
“That’s Dan Sharpe.” Mrs. Terry’s thin lips closed tightly. Then she added, “I’m not one to spread gossip but according to the whispers there’s a whole lot about Dan Sharpe no one knows. Or at least if they do, they aren’t telling.”
Laurel stopped, her hands filled with the breakfast dishes she had gathered up. She impulsively said, “Mrs. Terry, I’m a stranger in a strange land who’s going to need a lot of help in understanding the people and the place. I really need you to guide me.”
A pleased expression lighted the older woman’s face. “I think we’re going to get along real well, child. Real well.” She folded the breakfast cloth, shook it outside the cabin door, and smiled in a way that did more to settle Laurel down than anything since she left West Virginia.