A Lawman's Christmas_ A McKettricks of Texas Novel - Linda Lael Miller [23]
There, she took the two letters Mr. McKettrick had delivered earlier from her apron pocket, and sat down.
The kerosene in the lamp was getting low, and the wick was smoking a little, but Dara Rose did not hurry.
She knew the plump missive was from her cousin, Piper, who taught school in a small town in Maine. She meant to save that one for last, and she took the time to weigh it in her hand, run her fingers over the vellum and examine the stamp before setting it carefully aside.
She opened the letter from the Wildflower Salve Company first, even though she knew it was an advertisement and nothing more, and carefully smoothed the single page on the tabletop.
Her eyes widened a little as she read, and her heart fluttered up into her throat as her excitement grew.
Bold print declared that Dara Rose was holding the key to financial security right there in her hand. She could win prizes, it fairly shouted. She could earn money. And all she had to do was introduce her friends and neighbors to the wonders of Wildflower Salve. Each colorfully decorated round tin—an elegant keepsake in its own right, according to the Wildflower Salve people—sold for a mere fifty cents. And she would get to keep a whopping twenty-five cents for her commission.
Dara Rose sat back, thinking.
Twenty-five cents was a lot of money.
And there were prizes. All sorts of prizes—toys, household goods, luxuries of all sorts—could be had in lieu of commissions, if the “independent business person” preferred.
Out of the goodness of their hearts, the folks at the Wildflower Salve Company, of Racine, Wisconsin, would be happy to send her a full twenty tins of this “medicinal miracle” in good faith. If for some incomprehensible reason her “friends and relations” didn’t snap up the whole shipment practically as soon as she opened the parcel, she could return the merchandise and owe nothing.
Five dollars, Dara Rose thought. If she sold twenty tins of Wildflower Salve, she would earn five dollars—a virtual fortune.
The kerosene lamp flickered, reminding her that she’d soon be sitting in the dark, and Dara Rose set aside “the opportunity of a lifetime” to open the letter from Piper.
A crisp ten-dollar bill fell out, nearly stopping Dara Rose’s heart.
She set it carefully aside, and her hands trembled as she unfolded the clump of pages covered in Piper’s lovely cursive. The date was nearly eight months in the past.
“Dearest Cousin,” the missive began. “News of your tragic misfortune reached me yesterday, via the telegraph…”
Piper’s letter, misplaced all this time, went on to say that she hoped Dara Rose could put the money enclosed to good use—that the weather was fine in Maine, with the spring coming, but she already dreaded the winter. How were the girls faring? Did Dara Rose intend to stay on in “that little Texas town,” or would she and the children consider coming to live with her? The teacher’s quarters were small, she wrote, bringing tears to Dara Rose’s eyes, but they could make do, the four of them, couldn’t they? There were crocuses and tulips and daffodils shooting up in people’s flower beds, Piper went on to relate, and the days were distinctly longer. For all that, alas, she was lonesome when she wasn’t teaching. She’d been briefly engaged, but the fellow had turned out to be a rascal and a rounder, and there didn’t seem to be any likely prospects on the horizon.
Dara Rose read the whole letter and then immediately read it again. Besides Edrina and Harriet, Piper was the only blood relation she had left in all the world, and Dara Rose missed her sorely. Holding the letter, seeing the familiar handwriting spanning the pages, was the next best thing to having her cousin right there, in the flesh, sitting across the table from her.
But what must Piper think of her? Dara Rose fretted, after a third reading. She’d written this letter so long ago, and sent such a generous gift of money, only to receive silence in return.
The lantern guttered out.
Dara Rose sighed, folded the letter carefully and tucked it back into its envelope. She took the