Read Online A Lawman's Christmas: A McKettricks of Texas Novel by Linda Lael Miller - Free Book Online Page B

focused, for the moment, on her elder daughter. “You may visit the O’Reillys on Saturday morning,” she stated, rising to begin clearing the table. “But only because you gave your word and I would not ask you to break it.”
    â€œIf I hadn’t promised, you wouldn’t let me go?” Edrina pressed. She’d never been one to quit while the quitting was good, a trait she came by honestly, Dara Rose had to admit. She had the same shortcoming herself.
    â€œThat’s right,” she replied, at some length. “I have to think about your safety, Edrina, and that of your sister.”
    â€œMy safety? The O’Reillys wouldn’t hurt us.”
    â€œNot deliberately,” Dara Rose allowed, “but it isn’t the most sanitary place in the world, and you might catch something.”
    Although she didn’t mention it, she was thinking of the diphtheria outbreak two years before, during which four children had perished, all of them from one family.
    â€œIs that suitable talk for the supper table?” Harriet asked sincerely.
    â€œNever mind,” Dara Rose said. “It’s time you bothgot ready for bed. Shall I walk with you to the outhouse, or are you brave enough to go on your own?”
    Edrina scraped back her chair, rose to fetch her coat and Harriet’s from the pegs near the back door. Her expression said she was brave enough to do anything, and protect her little sister in the bargain.
    â€œMaybe that’s why Addie’s so lonesome,” Edrina said, opening the door to the chilly night, with its flurries of snow. “Because everybody is afraid of catching something if they visit.”
    Chagrin swept over Dara Rose— out of the mouths of babes— but she assumed a stern countenance. “Don’t stand there with the door open,” she said.
    Later, when the children were in bed, and she’d read them a story from their one dog-eared book of fairy tales and heard their prayers—Harriet put in another request for the doll from the mercantile—kissed them good-night and tucked them in, Dara Rose returned to the kitchen.
    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 toweigh 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