The Visions of Ransom Lake Read online

  She hoped desperately he would visit the store that evening. Then she could get a really good look at him. Oh, she told herself it would be hard not to stare, and she must be shrewd in her visual investigation of him. It would not do for him to sense any hint of her curiosity about him.

  “Vonnie?” Vaden whispered then, rolling over on her side and looking across the room to where Yvonne lay sleeping on her own bed. “Vonnie? Are you awake? I can’t sleep.”

  “For pity’s sake, Vaden,” Yvonne whined. “Let me rest. I know your mind is a whirlwind of excitement and questions…but I really do want to—”

  “Isn’t this all just too exciting? I can hardly keep still! Just think of the experiences we’re bound to have out here. Experiences that will help shape who we become and how we—”

  “Vaden!” Yvonne almost snapped, turning to face her sister. “I am tired. Go for a walk or something if you can’t let me rest. Go out into this dusty, spider-infested world and see the sights of the town. You’re sure to find something to interest you.”

  “I’m sorry.” Vaden knew she could be terribly over verbal most of the time, and she was not angry at Yvonne for being irritated with her. She rose from her bed, smoothing her skirt. “You’re right. I’ll leave you to rest. Goodness knows you’ll need it if you’re to remain patient with me for our first few days here.”

  “What are you doin’ up, dear?” Myra asked as Vaden entered the mercantile. “I thought you were restin’ with Yvonne.”

  “My body can’t rest when my mind is running faster than the wind, Auntie,” Vaden expressed with a dramatic, breathy whisper. “I’m just so entirely excited to be here. There’s something in the very air, Auntie. My life will change somehow because of this visit. I can feel it in my heart. I can feel it in the depths of my very soul.”

  Myra smiled at Vaden, amused at her niece’s theatrics. “Well, why don’t you find something to do? A walk maybe.”

  “Ah, yes! A walk. Fresh air for the lungs and food for the mind!” Vaden sighed happily, leaving by way of the mercantile front door.

  At her leisure, she meandered down the main thoroughfare of town. She passed a blacksmith’s shop, a barber, a feed and seed store, and several other businesses, all very quaint and interesting in their simplicity. However, when she at last came to the corner around which the wagon carrying the mysterious Ransom Lake had disappeared, something impish gained control of her will. She felt her body turn and start down the dusty road. As she walked along, the town fell farther and farther behind, and she didn’t care, for the sights to be seen on the roadside were visions of fantasy to Vaden.

  As she left the last building of town behind her, an enormous pumpkin patch, of such vast dimensions that she could not have begun to guess at the number of pumpkins, stretched nearly as far as she could see on either side of the road. Some of the pumpkins, already a stunning shade of orange, were peeking out from under large green leaves. She bit her lip, thinking a small child could easily become lost among the vines searching for just the perfect pumpkin to carve into a jack o’ lantern on October 31. She would have to ask her Aunt Myra who owned the patch and if the owner sold the pumpkins. She had to own one, just the right one! She would search for it herself until she found her perfect pumpkin. What fun it would be, wading through the mounds of vine and pumpkin. Vaden felt awash with delight at such a beautiful sight as the simple pumpkin patch and at the idea harvest would soon be upon Myra and Dan’s world. She thrilled at the thought of being witness to it.

  Sighing with delight, she spoke aloud the words of a poem she’d once read, “‘And midst the blue of heaven’s sky, the orange of sun’s set drawing nigh, doves fair and white amid it fly, with plumming purples drifting by…a kiss is born of you and I.’” The verse had simply popped into her mind as verse often did when Vaden felt inspired.

  Vaden loved to memorize and recite fragments of descriptive poetry. It was her opinion that particular phrases compounded the beauty of nature and romance, such wordings keeping the resplendence of loveliness fresh in one’s mind. Closing her eyes for a moment, she inhaled deeply of the untainted country air, savoring its freshness and letting the beauty of Mother Earth lift her spirits to even loftier heights than before.

  When at last she reached the final boundary of the immense patch of pumpkins, she recognized the leaves, vines, and large ripening ovals of a watermelon patch. Though this parcel of land was not as vast as the pumpkins had been, still it was tremendous. As the rather wicked inclination to taste the ripening fruit without asking rose foremost to her mind, Vaden reminded herself inwardly her mother would definitely consider it an act of thievery were she to snitch one of the lovely melons. Smiling, she remembered a time when she and Vonnie were children and sat at their Uncle Dan’s knee mesmerized by the tales he would tell about “snitchin’ watermelon”as a boy.

  As Vaden walked on, admiring the wildflowers flourishing in the uncultivated areas along the road, she noticed wagon ruts to her right. It was obviously a well-traveled path, though not well traveled enough to have created an actual and easily traversed road. Knowing full well she could not simply continue following after Ransom Lake (for she might actually meet up with him and have to offer an explanation of her presence), she turned down the wheel-rutted path and walked on.

  To her profound delight, perhaps half a mile down the path, she came upon the most enchanting vision of a brook. There before her, winding its way along, perhaps twenty feet in width, and lined on either side by large cottonwoods and maples, was a clear, gurgling creek. A quaint and rickety looking bridge arched over it nearby. She immediately ran to it, stepping onto its squeaking boards tentatively. The bridge’s railing seemed sturdy enough, and she leaned on it, peering down into the clear water flowing beneath. There were water spiders, minnows, rocks, and moss, and in the silence of the secluded area, the ramble of the brook sounded like the music of heaven itself.

  “This is it,” Vaden whispered aloud. All her life, wherever the family had lived, she had needed her own place—a secret, tranquil vicinage of her own where she could escape and think or mourn or simply sit. At home she had found such refuge beneath an ancient lilac tree on the family’s property. It was a difficult place to reach, for it required crawling on one’s hands and knees through the dirt to reach the open space behind the tree. Its troublesome accessibility was one of the reasons she loved it so. No one, especially Yvonne, was willing to crawl into it to retrieve or bother her. Certainly this brook was more publicly approachable, but her heart loved it immediately, and it was fairly well hidden by the enormous trees along its banks.

  Vaden watched a large maple leaf float gently through the air, landing quietly on the surface of the water. It traveled away from her as the water babbled on, and she smiled, knowing autumn was nearly upon this blessed part of the world. Oh, how she loved autumn! To Vaden Valmont, there was nothing so beautiful as the earth in autumn. Reds, yellows, oranges, greens, and even purples captured the leaves of trees, bushes, and vines. The air was crisp and cool and fresh, and apples and pears abounded. She inhaled deeply of the fresh country air and thought of what it must be like to watch harvest erupt in a small western town such as this. Certainly the aroma of baking apples with cinnamon and sugar or pumpkin laced with nutmeg would sweeten the air nearly every evening as women set their pies to cooling on windowsills. No doubt wagons laden heavy with pumpkins would ramble down the road through town when whoever owned the monstrous pumpkin patch began to harvest it. She envisioned a wagon overflowing with ripe, refreshing watermelon ambling awkwardly down the road, an ill-placed melon falling from the wagon and breaking open as it hit the ground. She smiled to herself as she thought of small boys dressed in tattered trousers and dusty shirts rushing to the ruined fruit to snatch up sections of it, dirty or not, and delightedly devouring it without any thought to the sticky juice dripping from their chins and elbows.

  Sighing contentedly and glancing at the sun hanging low in the sky, Vade
n let her feet carry her from the celestial view of the bridge and its brook and back toward town. She hated to leave the brook and the bridge, the watermelons ripe for snitching, and the marvelous fields of pumpkin. Still, as she turned the corner and saw her Uncle Dan standing on the porch of the mercantile looking down the street in her direction, her heart leapt, and she waved to him.

  “Vaden!” he hollered as he hurried to meet her.

  Vaden’s smile only widened as she watched him lumber happily toward her, his charmingly bowed legs giving him a funny, awkward appearance. His hair was nearly white where it once was dark, and the wrinkles around his merry eyes were plentiful from many years of smiles and laughter.

  “Uncle Dan!” she exclaimed as he reached her, at once taking her in his strong and merciless embrace.

  He chuckled, his husky voice wonderfully familiar. “Vaden! You’ve grown up, girl! Just take a look at ya.” Dan held Vaden away from him for a moment as he studied her carefully. “Dang! You can’t be that same little girl who used to sneak in on me when I was sleepin’ at night and stick beans up my nose.”

  Vaden laughed and shook her head. “Uncle Dan, you know I was so small then.”

  “Yeah, I know. But it just weren’t too comfortable a way to wake up—them hard ol’ lima beans in my nose.” They both laughed.

  “It just always seemed to me when I was little that people’s nostrils were made for more than breathing in and out of,” Vaden explained, giggling at the memory of her Uncle Dan shouting as he sat up from a deep sleep and tried to pry the beans out of his nose.

  “Oh, child,” Dan Valmont sighed as he cupped her face in his roughened hand. His skin was like tough leather, and Vaden liked it that way. “How you’ve grown. Makes a man feel old, I’ll tell ya.”

  “You’ll never grow old, Uncle Dan. You’re as handsome as you ever were, same as Daddy.”

  Dan chuckled and put his arm around Vaden’s shoulder. “Let’s get on home. Your Aunt Myra will tan our hides if we’re late for dinner. She’s got apple pie coolin’ on the back porch.”

  Vaden smiled and sighed contentedly. “I’ve missed you.”

  “I’ve missed you too, sweet pea.”

  

  That night after dinner, Vaden and Yvonne sat in the parlor with their aunt and uncle. The day had cooled into a comfortable evening, and the early dusk breezes breathed through the kitchen.

  “Aaaahhh,” Dan sighed, patting his stomach dramatically. “That was the best pie ya ever done baked, Myra.”

  Myra smiled and shook her head at the girls. “He says that every time I make a pie.”

  “Well, I guess ya just get better and better at it, honey,” he explained.

  Vaden looked over at her sister, who sat busily working on her needlepoint. “It’s coming out truly beautiful, Vonnie,” she complimented.

  “Oh, I don’t know. I had to pick a patch out earlier today while you were off wherever you were off to,” Vonnie explained, winking teasingly at her sister.

  “Well, you’re the one who told me to go for a walk, Vonnie,” Vaden defended. “And I’m so glad you did. What a pumpkin patch just outside of town, Uncle Dan! Whoever in the world owns it?”

  “I figured ya might have found that already, Vaden,” Dan chuckled. “That monstrosity belongs to none other than Vaughn Wimber. How he keeps after it, I’ll never know. But he’s had it out there every year since…well, since we been here, ain’t that right, Myra?”

  “Goodness, yes! It’s quite a sight when he starts in to harvestin’ those fields.” Myra added.

  “I can imagine,” Vaden agreed.

  “What else did you find on your travels, Vaden?” Yvonne asked. “Any handsome young man that might do for a beau for your spinsterly sister? You didn’t run into that frightening, hairy recluse man, did you?”

  “No. On both accounts,” Vaden sighed, disappointment obvious in her tone.

  “What frightenin’, hairy recluse?” Dan inquired.

  “Oh, Ransom Lake rode through town just after the girls arrived today, Danny,” Myra explained. “He gave Yvonne quite a fright…but I think our little Vaden found him somewhat of an interest.”

  “He’s a good man, that Ransom Lake. I spoke with him just today, in fact. And you’ll never believe it, Myra.” Dan dropped his voice at his next utterance. “He’s movin’ into town for the winter.”

  “No!” Myra exclaimed in a whisper. Her brow wrinkled, and her eyes widened in disbelief.

  “True as blue! He’s bringin’ down his stock and everything this year. Says he has his reasons and that he feels like he’s neglected the farm here near town for too long.”

  “Glory be!” Myra whispered, shaking her head, still obviously astounded.

  “Where does he usually stay in winter, Uncle Dan?” Yvonne asked. Vaden smiled, for she could see her sister had laid her needlework aside, indicating her attention was truly arrested by the conversation at hand.

  “In the mountains. We usually don’t see hide nor hair of the man from October to early May. Not that we can expect to see any more of him when he’s here anyway. He’s to himself. Likes it that way.”

  “Why?” Vaden asked simply.

  Dan shrugged his shoulders. “Don’t know. Could be he’s afraid some little character of a girl will be shovin’ lima beans up his nose when he’s not lookin’.” He laughed heartily as Vaden rolled her eyes and sighed, pleased by his memories of her.

  “Well, now,” Myra began, “you girls keep your mind off ol’ Ransom Lake. I got other boys in mind for the two of you.”

  “Oh, help us all now,” Dan mumbled, shaking his head.

  “Quit that,” Myra scolded, teasingly slapping the man on one thigh. Turning to the girls, she said, “I think any number of our young men hereabouts would make wonderful husbands for you two girls.”

  “Like who?” Dan asked, unconvinced.

  “Like Nathaniel Wimber or Toby Bridges. And that nice Jerome Clayton. Now he’s one that’ll catch your eye, Yvonne.”

  “Yvonne and I have quite high expectations when it comes to beaus, Aunt Myra,” Vaden mentioned, smiling lovingly at her aunt.

  “Yes. Incredibly high,” Yvonne affirmed. “Lofty, in fact.”

  Myra chuckled and sat back in her chair, smiling as if she held some great secret. “Believe me, I wouldn’t let just anybody come acourtin’ my nieces.”

  “Are there nice girls here as well, Auntie?” Vaden asked.

  “Yes. We have some very nice young ladies in town. A couple of real cats too. But for the most part, they’re all darlin’ girls. I’m certain you girls will find some friends hereabouts.”

  Vaden stared into the fire in the hearth, wondering what kind of friends she would find. All too quickly, however, her thoughts returned to their musing over the oddity of Ransom Lake. He intrigued her. She had seen him only once, but something about him kept bringing her thoughts back to him.

  Even as she lay in bed that night looking out through the bedroom window at the bright, shining stars set in the darkened western sky, she thought of him. She wondered again what turned the eccentric Ransom Lake to the life of a hermit. What had squelched the bright star in his soul?

  CHAPTER TWO

  After a nourishing breakfast of griddlecakes and bacon the next morning, Myra set about teaching Yvonne and Vaden how to tend to the store. There were so many things to be explained—which customers were allowed credit, which weren’t, where things were kept, how to work the cash register holding the money, and so forth. Numerous townsfolk came into the mercantile that morning as well. Vaden began to wonder how many of them were visiting just to gawk at Myra Valmont’s nieces, for very few purchased any merchandise.

  “Oh, some days I guess folks just want to visit, and others we sell a lot of things. Today I think folks are in the visitin’ mood,” Myra explained.

  “I’ll never remember everyone’s names,” Yvonne sighed. There had been so many people in and out of the store in such a v
ery short time even the ever-positive Vaden felt a bit rattled.

  “It’ll be easier at the social tonight, Yvonne. Faces and names will come together easier then. They always do at get-togethers,” Myra said.

  “When will we ever find time to successfully stock a dress shop, Auntie?” Vaden asked, for she was indeed quite overwhelmed by all the new faces, new names, and new tasks at hand.

  “We’ll get to the dress shop eventually.” Myra smiled at her niece with understanding. She knew Vaden only longed to be out exploring. She understood how madly Vaden pined for the outdoors and its beauty.

  “Sable,” Myra greeted as a woman of about her own age approached, accompanied by a handsome young man. “Jerome! How wonderful to see the two of you out today. This is Mrs. Sable Clayton and her son, Jerome, girls.”

  “How do you do?” Yvonne greeted, taking Mrs. Clayton’s offered hand. “I’m Yvonne Valmont, and this is my sister, Vaden.” Mrs. Clayton smiled and offered her hand then to Vaden, who shook it, smiling pleasantly.

  “I’m Jerome Clayton,” the young man informed them. He grinned at Vaden, tipping his hat in a friendly manner before turning and repeating the gesture to Yvonne. Vaden smiled at the charming looking young man. His hair was blond and his eyes a deep brown. His grin was rather boyish and delightsome, and he was handsome, tall, and well formed. Obviously, he was polite as well. Vaden remembered her aunt mentioning this particular young man the night before, and she could see why she had felt inclined to do so.