Mail Order Surprise

Chapter 1

Janice tugged on her gloves for the hundredth time since she had boarded the train out of St. Louis. Two weeks of swaying and rattling in a train car, and now six days swaying and rattling on a stagecoach. It had been a very long trip that had been far from comfortable over the rough terrain. She would be glad to walk on solid ground again.

She peeked past the drawn shade and watched the land that flew by her. It was all brown and dreary with the onset of winter not far away. It was also vast. She had never seen so much land in all her twenty-one years. Then again, she had only lived in Kentucky all those years. The grass-covered state was nothing like the land that flew by her as though she was a bird flying low to the ground.

Franklin, Kentucky. The idea of home seemed so far away. Her home was now somewhere unknown and foreign to her. Yes, it was part of the same country, but it was as though she had been transported into a land that only existed on the pages of a fanciful book. It had been wild looking from the windows of the train and even more so now from the stagecoach. She longed to see what it was really like, yet she was terrified to actually find out.

Stop acting like a sissy, she chided herself. She was not some whimpering damsel in distress. She was a strong and determined damsel in distress.

With a small tilt of her dark blonde head, she yet again observed the passengers around her. There were only three, and they were all men. Who but men would be heading out to such a wilderness with not even a church within miles of the place? Well... aside from herself. Then again, when had she ever done anything conventional?

Janice looked down at the watch pin on her once smart, now rumpled, grey suit. It was her first outfit since she had stepped out of mourning and had been new when she had left. Her nose wrinkled. The smell coming from her many days in the suit distracted her and she forgot to note the time. She only hoped the town had a small hotel she could have a bath in before...

Her pale skin crinkled on her forehead as she frowned. Janice's hand drifted down to the hidden pocket in her skirt and felt the paper tucked inside.

Steve Young. He seemed to be a relatively educated man by his words, or at least he could read and write with competency. That was something, considering the wild land where she assumed many couldn't even write their own name. That is what the newspapers said anyway.

She felt the stagecoach slow down. Peeking out again, she noticed a few buildings a short way ahead of them.

"About damn time Belle showed up," grunted the man across from her as he shifted in his seat. His eyes widened when he realized she was across from him. "Sorry, ma'am."

Janice gave him a smile and nodded in acceptance of his apology. She wasn't too surprised he had forgotten a lady was among them. He had fallen asleep as soon as he had gotten in the coach. The other men ignored them both. That was fine by her. She had enough on her mind without having to fake politeness.

Belle. That was to be her new home, or at least the closest town to her new home. Mr. Young owned a ranch several miles outside of the small town. She hoped it had enough to give her any essentials she needed. She had read that the catalog companies made a pretty penny this far out. The worst case scenario would be ordering what she needed and having to spend a fortune only to wait.

Twenty minutes later, the stagecoach pulled up to a small building. The man across from her opened the door and stepped out. Remembering his manners this time, he reached up and took Janice's hand to help her down. With trepidation in her heart, she stepped onto the land she would be calling home.

She took a deep breath and looked at Belle. There was more to it than she had feared, thank goodness. The building in front of her was just small enough to hold the clerk who sold coach tickets. It was attached to a long building with a sign declaring it to be the local stable. The boardwalk moved in the other direction, toward the heart of the town. She noticed that it was nearly half a mile long with buildings on each side. A few buildings behind the main street showed the town to be expanding. A small steeple even caught her eye over the top of one building.