Chapter 5 - Abigail's Table
The new dining hall seated sixty.
On opening day, ninety-three men arrived.
Abigail didn't turn one away.
Tables spilled onto the porch.
Cowboys ate standing.
Freighters balanced plates on barrels.
The smell of roasted beef, onions, biscuits, beans, and coffee drifted across the ranch.
At sunset, Abigail counted more money than Whispering Pines had earned during the previous two months.
Caleb sat opposite her.
"Marry me."
She stopped counting.
"What?"
"You heard me."
"You proposed between twelve dollars and seventeen dollars."
"I got nervous."
Abigail looked at him.
"Ask again when you're not."
He smiled.
"So that's not a no?"
"That's an instruction."
Business grew.
Abigail hired widows from Coldwater.
Then immigrant families.
Then two women nobody else would employ because they had children.
Abigail provided a small schoolroom.
Soon Whispering Pines wasn't merely a ranch.
It was a settlement.
Caldwell returned in June.
He brought investors.
And lawyers.
His strategy had changed.
If he couldn't starve Caleb out, he would buy everyone around him.
Within a month, Caldwell controlled three neighboring ranches.
Then four.
Then the grain mill.
Prices doubled.
Abigail responded by planting wheat.
Caldwell purchased the freight company.
Abigail organized independent wagon teams.
Caldwell pressured the bank.
Abigail created a cooperative with neighboring ranchers.
Every trap produced another enterprise.
One evening Caleb found her asleep over accounting books.
He lifted her gently.
She woke.
"Put me down."
"No."
"I can walk."
"I know."
"Then why are you carrying me?"
"Because nobody ever carries you."
Abigail went quiet.
Caleb placed her on the bed.
"You don't have to save everybody."
"Somebody saved me once."
"Who?"
"My mother."
She looked toward the kitchen.
"When everyone else told me there was something wrong with me, she taught me that a body isn't decoration. It's a tool for living."
Caleb touched her cheek.
"She sounds wise."
"She was."
"Abigail."
"Yes?"
"Marry me."
This time there were no coins.
No audience.
No interruption.
Abigail smiled.
"Yes."
Outside, a rifle cracked.
The bedroom window shattered.
Caleb threw himself over Abigail.
Another shot struck the wall.
Men shouted outside.
By the time they reached the yard, the shooter was gone.
But nailed to the barn door was a message.
LEAVE THE VALLEY.
Caleb tore it down.
Abigail stared into the darkness.
Caldwell had stopped attacking their business.
May you like
Now he was coming for their lives.
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