The Horseman by Marcia Lynn McClure Read Free Book Online Page A

orphan asylum, until the day Mrs.
Fletcher had arrived and plucked her from a group of ragged girls,
all of whom were hoping for escape. More tears came as Briney
wondered at what had become of her friends at the orphanage who had
not been rescued from hunger, cold, and abandonment the way Briney
had.
    Feeling the tears streaming over her cheeks,
Briney allowed herself to continue to cry. Mrs. Fletcher had always
maintained that tears showed weakness in a woman—that a woman
should never allow anyone to know what her true feelings were,
whether joyous or bitterly sad. And so Briney had spent many, many
years burying her true feelings—weeping only when she was certain
Mrs. Fletcher was sound asleep and would not hear her.
    But no longer. Briney was not subject to Mrs.
Fletcher now. She was all grown up and free, and she would cry if
she wanted to, laugh when she wanted to, and ride her horse when
she wanted to. And so she did.
    *
    “She’s been gone a long time, boss,” Charlie
mentioned. “And she ain’t never rode astride before?”
    “Nope,” Gunner confirmed.
    Charlie shook his head with sympathy for the
young woman who’d come to buy a horse. “Think she’ll be too sore to
walk back to town?”
    “Yep,” Gunner answered, grinning with
understanding at Charlie. “But don’t worry. I’ll just hitch up the
buggy and drive her on back. I’m hankering for a piece of Mrs.
Kelley’s peach pie anyhow.”
    Charlie chuckled. “Two birds with one stone,
hmmm?”
    “Yep,” Gunner said. “I’ll even bring you back
a piece of pie if you like, bein’ that I’ll have the buggy with
me.”
    “That would be mighty nice to look forward
to, boss. Thanks,” Charlie said gratefully.
    The fact was that Gunner was a whole lot more
worried about Miss Briney Thress having been gone so long than he
was letting on to Charlie.
    Mr. and Mrs. Kelley had explained the young
woman’s situation to him a few nights before when he’d been having
supper at their restaurant. Seems the old woman who had been Miss
Thress’s guardian and traveling companion had given up the ghost
and left Miss Thress all alone in the middle of nowhere. Well, at
least left her in the very unfamiliar surroundings of Oakmont. It
seemed the girl had no family, no home—nothing. And yet she’d come
to buy a horse from Gunner.
    Gunner shook his head a moment as he thought
of the sight that had greeted him when he’d walked into the
stables: Sassy cozying up to a stranger, a very pretty stranger—a
young women with hair the same color as Sassy’s bay and beautiful,
bewitching eyes the color of a dark blue horizon before a
thunderstorm. Sassy didn’t cozy up to anybody—well, nobody but
Gunner and Charlie. Sassy was shy. It had always seemed to Gunner
that Sassafras had somehow known the day his mother had passed.
Neither Gunner nor Sassy had ever been the same after that. And
Sassy, in particular, had become withdrawn.
    Therefore, as much as a part of his heart
hated to see Sassy with another owner, the greater part of it was
happy to know she’d obviously found someone who had captured her
heart the very moment the horse had seen her. It seemed Gunner and
Charlie wouldn’t have to ride her as often to keep her exercised
and cheerful. And anyhow, Sassy wouldn’t really be leaving home at
all, being that Miss Thress would be stabling her with Gunner.
Still, Miss Thress had been gone a long while—almost three hours,
in truth.
    But just as Gunner was considering saddling
up and going out to look for Miss Thress and Sassy, Charlie
hollered, “Here they come now, boss!”
    Looking in the southern direction where
Charlie pointed, Gunner felt his eyebrows arch in what was either
astonishment or admiration—or both. There, on the horizon, were
Sassy and her rider, Miss Briney Thress. They weren’t riding hard
at all, but it was obvious by Miss Thress’s appearance that they
had at some point in the day.
    As the horse and her rider neared,