Ada sank heavily onto the bench. Last evening, as Miss Fields’s letter had instructed, she had sent a wire giving the woman her arrival time. Where in blazes was she? Ada blotted her face again and fought a wave of panic. Suppose the offer of employment had been withdrawn? It had taken most of her cash just to make the long trip to Hickory Ridge. There wasn’t nearly enough for a return ticket.
Not that returning home was an option. Ada’s heart squeezed with sadness. She tucked away her handkerchief and blinked back sudden tears.
The agent returned with a glass of water, and she drank it gratefully.
“Better?” he asked.
“Yes. Much better. Thank you.”
He consulted his pocket watch. “I should get back to the office. You’re welcome to wait inside if you’ve a mind to, but the truth is, it’s cooler out here. I’m sure Miss Hannah will be along before too much longer.”
He went back inside. Restless with nerves, Ada rose and walked to the far end of the platform, which afforded a better view of the town. The streets rang with the clatter of horses’ hooves, the rattle of harnesses, and the faint tinkling of shop-door bells. Along one side of the street stood the mercantile, and next to it a bank with gold lettering on the windows. Farther down was a newspaper office and a dentist’s office. A haberdashery, a barbershop, and a bookshop occupied the opposite side of the street, next to the Hickory Ridge Inn. Behind the newspaper office sat the Verandah Hotel for Ladies, a faded blue building with drooping shutters and a weathered sign that hung unevenly from a rusty chain. In the distance, the tree-clad mountains stood like sentinels against the rain-washed sky.
Of course Hickory Ridge can’t compete with Chattanooga or Knoxville, Hannah had written, but for a small town we’re quite progressive.
Ada watched two women in old-fashioned poke bonnets emerge from the mercantile, their arms laden with packages. A progressive town was precisely what she needed to secure her future. Not that she planned to stay forever in Hickory Ridge. But the employment notice in the Boston Herald had seemed the perfect solution to her immediate dilemma. A chance to start over in a town where no one knew the first thing about her while she set her plan in motion.
It had seemed simple enough. Now she was much less certain that she’d made the right decision. It was one thing to make a plan and quite another to put it into action.
A buckboard rattled down the street and came to a stop near the elevated platform. The driver, a man in rough clothes, boots, and a wide-brimmed hat, smiled up at her. Backlit by the sun, he appeared muscular and broad shouldered. “Miss Wentworth? Ada Wentworth?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Wyatt Caldwell. I’m here to drive you out to Miss Lillian’s place.”
“But I thought Miss Fields was coming for me.”
He smiled, crinkling the lines around his eyes. “Yes ma’am, that was the plan.” He scanned the now-deserted platform. “I assume that trunk is yours?”
“Yes.” Ada took a deep breath to steady her nerves. Where was Hannah Fields? Had Old Starch and Vinegar dismissed her without any warning? Another wave of anxiety rippled through her. If that happened to her, where would she go? Her resources were nearly depleted. Letters to her mother’s Southern cousins had gone unanswered, leaving her with few options apart from the clattering, stifling textile mills of Lowell, Massachusetts—or, even worse, a life as a mail-order bride, brought west to cook and clean and bear children for a man she’d never met.
Her escort, his face shadowed by a battered Stetson, jumped lightly to the ground. Shoving aside a stack of wooden planks and a couple of gleaming saw blades, he hoisted Ada’s trunk into the back of the wagon.
“Ma’am, are you ready? Miss Lillian’s place is a good seven miles down this road. We ought to get going.”
Ada sized him up. He appeared trustworthy, but experience had shown her that people weren’t always what they seemed. “Thank you, but I’ll wait for Miss Fields.”
“Then you’re going to be waiting for quite a while. Hannah Fields up and left town last night without so much as a by-yourleave.” He smiled. “I’m afraid you’re stuck with me.”
He offered his hand to help her onto the buckboard seat and climbed up beside her. “I apologize for the undignified conveyance. I didn’t know until an hour ago that you were expected today. There