Chevonne: Bride of Oklahoma (American Mail-Order Bride 46) by Leighann Dobbs Page B

kitchen stove over the embers of the breakfast fire. Sturdy kitchen towels covered them to keep the flies off. Luke had brought over fresh eggs, meat cutlets, a roast and a bucket of fresh milk, along with a block of ice for the icebox. She’d sent him off with several slices of the molasses fruit cake, earning her a gruff “mighty grateful” as he went out the screen door.
    She’d re-filled the egg tree, put the cutlets to marinate in herbs and vinegar so they’d be tender for breakfast, sliced eggplants and set the slices to soak in saltwater to remove their bitterness for fried eggplant to go with supper, and had the roast marinating in herbs and spices for supper.
    Then she’d boiled the milk and set it to cool. When she got home from shopping she’d ladle the risen cream into the cream pot, and refill the milk jug. By the end of the week, she’d have enough cream to churn some fresh butter to restock the butter pot. The loaves would be ready for baking on her return from town.
    Chevonne was very proud that she was managing to keep house and do her project work. Maybe she could make a good wife to some man some day and not let her Gram down. That had been her Gram’s wish for her too, to be happily married to a good, supportive man.
    It was why six years earlier the old woman had purchased for her granddaughter Marion Harland’s Cookery for Beginners: A Series of Familiar Lessons for Young Housekeepers , and she’d made Chevonne study it front to back. Then three years ago she’d purchased Mrs. Gillette’s White House Cook Book: A Comprehensive Cyclopedia for the Home , and she’d had Chevonne learn it from front to back and back to front. The two books, Chevonne’s household bibles, now held pride of place on a shelf in Trey’s ranch kitchen.
    Celia drove the buggy like she’d been born to it. Back in Lawrence most women didn’t drive buggies, but out here women were more self-sufficient, making them perfect customers for her Gram’s designs. Chevonne was sure she couldn’t be in a better place right now.
    The mercantile in Oklahoma City was a large building that sold everything from sugar to canvas. Even though it couldn’t have been more than a year or so old, it was dusty from the dirt of the road that wafted inside the windows and doors, and that was tracked in by customers. Chevonne smelled dry wood and spices as Celia led her down an aisle to the new fabric section in the back.
    Sun streamed in from the large windows at the back and splashed light on the colorful fabrics. Celia practically squealed with delight as she rummaged through the piles of bolts of fabric.
    “This new selection is divine,” she said. “I’ve had to make do with old scraps of clothing for my quilts. These will add some needed contrast and color, not to mention make beautiful new dresses.” Celia picked her way through the piles of cotton fabrics.
    Chevonne went for the soft and silky materials. “Look at this one,” she said, fingering a silky piece in a particularly beautiful shade of blue.
    “That’s just so pretty. Too bad silks don’t work well on quilts. But that color is lovely.” Celia glanced slyly at Chevonne out of the corner of her eye. “That’s Trey’s favorite shade of blue.”
    The thought of buying a fabric in her husband’s favorite color brought a blush to Chevonne’s cheeks, especially since she intended to make undergarments out of it. The thought of Trey seeing her in silky undergarments in his favorite color brought a surge of warm and tingly feelings she had a hard time deciphering. Straightening her back, she reminded herself that their arrangement was merely one of convenience, Trey would never see her in her undergarments.
    “That’s right, he does like blue.” Sarah Perkins appeared around a pile of fabric bolts at the end of the aisle, her beady eyes surveying Chevonne. “My, that’s a fancy outfit. Didn’t anyone tell you that we pioneer women don’t wear such frilly