Promise in men (Arthur Morgan)

Prologue - new world

Everyone was ready for the ferry to stop about three days before it did. Food had become scarce and tensions had started to flare between some of the passengers and crew, so tense in fact the moment that they docked there was hollering and hooting from so many, all understandably relieved to see solid ground again. They'd finally arrived in the new world. To settle and cultivate the land, and most of all, start new lives.
Shenden and her family stood out on the dock and stared at this vast open land before them. It was most likely the dingy dewy morning they'd arrived in, but the world glistened and glimmered in the early light, for a moment, it seemed this world was brand new, just for them the eerie beauty overtook from the hustle of the city around them, rendering it silent in the back of their minds, just cool clear earth awakening in them all a sudden surge of freedom.

No one made a peep as Shenden started her journey towards the stagecoaches, the three children followed behind her like ducklings.
'We seek passage to San Antonio,' Shenden asked in her broken English, the driver stared at her.
'You got cash?' Shenden looked at him, eyes widening in confusion, 'money, can you pay?'
'Yes we pay,' she affirmed. The driver demanded more than the journey should've cost for the distance, but driving the mixed race family of a single brown skinned woman was a task few men wanted to be with.
Shenden climbed into the coach last, after ensuring that her three children were all in comfortably, with their luggage secured. She didn't speak the language well, and knew that it was unlikely anyone would speak hers for a long time.

Just as the coach pulled out the horses started and squealed, someone had approached the driver,
'You heading towards San Antonio?' He asked,
'Yessir, I'm headed that way, but I already got a fare, you'll have to ask if they mind, but they don't seem to speak much English,'
The family heard his boots stomp the wet ground as he approached the door,
'You folks mind if I hitch along with you, happy to pay some of my share,' he directly addressed Shenden when he spoke, she looked at him, eyes full of fear as she took in the gun over his back, she looked to her eldest daughter,
'Do you mean you wish to ride this coach with us?'
The man stopped, taken aback by this young girls voice, he realised quickly he needed to respond and pulled his jaw up,
'Yes little miss I do,'
The girl explained in her own language to her mother, waited for response and looked back at the man,
'That would be quite alright sir,'
He hopped in with ease, a drastic contrast from the scrambling in the children had to do. The man smiled politely at the family on board. Their eyes flitted back and forth between each other anxiously. This man was armed to the hilt, and the children had only seen, at most their fathers prized and pristine duelling pistols in a box in his office.
The tension and silence was somehow stronger now than aboard the horrible ferry.
'Where are y'all from?' The man asked, directing his attention now at the eldest daughter,
'We're from England,' she said, finding her own voice more comfortable now.
'You don't look... english,' the man stated weakly.
'I don't think the colour of our skin could possibly tell you where we were born' answering the question she'd answered a thousand times before.
The man laughed, 'I suppose you're right,' he smiled at the very idea this young girl, no older than 13 had put him so profoundly in his place.
The girl seemed pleased that the man had accepted her fairly sharp remark and instantly felt more relaxed in his company, even with the guns glistening in the early light.
'This is my mother, Shenden Gregory, of the Toungoo dynasty, she married my father when he was travelling in her country, and decided to raise us in my fathers native England, as Burma has been war torn for some time,' she elaborated, mostly due to knowing that question really means, 'why are you brown'
'That is an exiting past for you to have, what led you here?'
'My father has died, we cannot afford to live at home anymore. We do not wish to reside in a place we will surely die in the conflict, people at home spoke of this rich untouched land, my mother decided it would be best for all of us, we're headed to Laredo, my mother knows people there, they said there was a home for us there,'
'I sure hope there is miss...' he gestured that he didn't know her name,
'Madeline, they called me maddie back home though, my brother Sebastian, and my sister Annabelle'
She gestured to the other, younger children,
'I'm Hosea, it's my pleasure to meet you all' the man nodded his head towards each member of the family. Margot giggled at this man talking to her family, and treating her sister as a conversational counterpart.

They were used to a high level of society in England. This fairly gruff, but admittedly well spoken man was mystical to them, completely unaware that their own brown skin and almond eyes would be considered mystical to those in the new country.
Hosea was a fine coach guest, he shared apples and candies with all of them, including their mother, and showed not a flicker of shock when Shenden lit the biggest cigar he'd ever seen. Although it did look comical, a heavy fat cigar in this tiny woman's dainty fingers. The only slightly unnerving aspect was that he wouldn't disclose much about himself, other than that he didn't have a family or any children, and that he lived mostly off the land as he travelled.

Four days passed of sleeping on the ground and living off the meagre supplies retained from the ferry and what Hosea was willing to part with, by which point San Antonio was a pleasing sight on the horizon.
Hosea helped them get their luggage from the carriage and got them situated in the train station.
'Good luck Gregory's!' He waved as he parted ways with the sweet family he'd travelled with, hoping for a comfortable life for them.

He watched them all wring their hands and twitch with nerves as the train pulled in, before he turned tail towards the three familiar horses hitched outside the saloon.