The Horseman

The Horseman

Copyright © 2015

by Marcia Lynn McClure

www.marcialynnmcclure.com

All rights reserved.

All rights reserved. Except as permitted
under the US Copyright Act of 1976, the contents of this book may
not be reproduced, transmitted, or distributed in any part or by
any means without the prior written consent of the author and/or
publisher.

Published by Distractions Ink

1290 Mirador Loop N.E.

Rio Rancho, NM 87144

Published by Distractions Ink

©Copyright 2015 by M. Meyers

A.K.A. Marcia Lynn McClure

Cover Photography by ©George
Kroll/Dreamstime.com and ©Sofiaworld/Dreamstime.com

Cover Design and Interior Graphics by Sandy
Ann Allred/Timeless Allure

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition, License
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All character names and personalities in this
work of fiction are entirely fictional,

created solely in the imagination of the
author.

Any resemblance to any person living or dead
is coincidental.

McClure, Marcia Lynn, 1965—

The Horseman:
a novel/by Marcia Lynn
McClure.

To Gina—

For being a solace and healer to my soul,

An inspiration and beacon of respite for my
mind,

And (unknowingly) reminding me last week that
I need to write something beautiful every day!

Mrs. Enola Fletcher had been a reasonable
woman. Certainly she’d been a woman who believed that her great
wealth and family name entitled her to immediate respect and that a
good measure of servitude should be provided her, by each and every
human being on earth. Still, her tongue was not too sharp, and she
did smile and laugh a bit here and there. Indeed, Enola Fletcher
had owned moments of humility (albeit very few) and greater
kindness than some sharing her high rank of social stature.

Therefore, as Briney stood watching the train
pull away from the small station platform, studying the large
boxcar in which Mrs. Fletcher’s casket rested, she felt new tears
of compassion and mourning brimming in her eyes. A man closed the
boxcar door just as the train’s caboose rattled past, and then she
was gone. Mrs. Fletcher was gone.

Exhaling a heavy sigh of blended sorrow,
trepidation, and even guilty reprieve, Briney turned and descended
the plank stairs of the train platform. The past few days had
seemed like a bad dream—as if they couldn’t have truly heaped upon
Briney what they had. In fact, Briney was so entirely awash with
the sensation of surrealism that she paused before heading back to
the boardinghouse in town—paused to glance about at her
surroundings, breathe in a deep breath of fresh, free air, and
assure herself that she really was standing near the train station
in little-known Oakmont, Colorado, having just sent her dead
benefactress’s earthly remains on their journey east to New York.
Mrs. Fletcher’s children would see to her burial there. After a few
more moments of reflection, Briney was convinced that Mrs. Enola
Fletcher really was gone and that, for the first time in near to
ten years, Briney Thress was on her own.

Straightening her posture, Briney started
down the dusty main road leading to Oakmont. At first, she
quickened her step. After all, it was her habit to walk quickly any
time Mrs. Fletcher wasn’t with her—in that Mrs. Fletcher could
hardly do without Briney for one moment and therefore forever and
always told her to, “Hurry, Briney! Hasten your step, for I do not
want to be long without your company.”

But even as the memory of Mrs. Fletcher’s
demands that Briney “hurry” pricked at her mind, Briney slowed her
pace to that of a body having nowhere to be at no particular time.
After all, Briney had no pressing reason to hurry—no elderly woman
waiting impatiently at home for her, expecting to be entertained in
some fashion.

Yet Briney found such a slow pace was far
too
slow. She was not at all used to strolling and thus sped
her step a bit—to a pace she rather guessed might resemble that of
ambling.

“Yes,” Briney whispered to herself as her
face at last donned a smile. “I mean to amble back to town…walk at
my leisure.”

It was another thing Briney hadn’t been able
to do for almost half of her life—speak her thoughts aloud—and she
found it invigorating!

Suddenly, however, her thoughts began to
flood her mind in an overwhelming cascade of worrisome succession.
She wondered whether she would truly be able to provide for herself
the necessities of life, even
with
the generous sum of money
Mrs. Fletcher had gifted Briney hours before her passing—for she
truly had no idea how to figure what her needs would cost her in
the years to come. Likewise, she began to worry that perhaps the
Kelleys hadn’t truly meant what they’d said—that Briney could stay
at their boardinghouse for as long as she needed or wanted to.
Perhaps they had simply felt sorry for Briney when Mrs. Fletcher
(Briney’s sole financial support and semblance of family) had
passed away so unexpectedly, leaving her charge, for all intents
and purposes, homeless. Perhaps pity was the only reason the
proprietors of the Oakmont boardinghouse had offered her a
permanent room in their establishment.

Other worries raced through Briney’s mind as
she walked. She’d always felt lonesome—her entire life. But at
least she’d had Mrs. Fletcher to talk to! Whom would she converse
with now? Whom would she serve? What would she do with her
time?

With anxiety fast filling her bosom near to
bursting, Briney’s attempt at ambling was all too soon replaced by
her usual hurrying pace.

For one thing, Briney knew she’d feel better
about everything once she’d returned to the boardinghouse. Not only
was the money Mrs. Fletcher had gifted her hidden in her room—along
with all her worldly possessions—but Bethanne Kelley would be at
hand, as well. Bethanne had been such a comfort to Briney over the
past few days. Truth be told, even before poor Mrs. Fletcher had
passed, Bethanne had quickly earned Briney’s gratitude and
affection, and Briney knew that just the simplest of conversations
with Bethanne would lighten her own anxious mood.

Bethanne Kelley was the daughter of Walter
and Sylvia Kelley, the proprietors of the Oakmont boardinghouse.
And it had been Bethanne who had first greeted and welcomed Mrs.
Fletcher and Briney to Oakmont. Briney would never forget the
moment she first met Bethanne, for she was so astonished at the
girl’s radiant countenance and pleasant, easy manner of
conversation that she’d immediately thought her the brightest,
kindest person she’d ever in all her life met.

Bethanne was taller than Briney, with
beautiful strawberry-blonde hair—the color of hair Briney had
always wished she’d been born with, instead of her own rather
“snuff-colored” hair, as Mrs. Fletcher had once termed the shade.
And Bethanne had beautiful blue eyes—eyes the color of the late
summer sky. Briney knew her own eyes, though blue, were nothing as
bright and inviting as Bethanne’s were.

“Your eyes remind me of two pieces of cobalt
sea glass I once found while beachcombing in the southern
states—dark and cold,” had once been how Mrs. Fletcher described
Briney’s eyes.

Still, Briney wasn’t envious of Bethanne and
her rare beauty of spirit and face—only admiring of her. Not only
was Bethanne radiantly pretty, but she also owned a heart of gold
and a manner of sincere kindness that Briney had rarely
experienced.

Bethanne was entertaining as well. Oh, not in
the way Briney had to be entertaining when caring for Mrs.
Fletcher. It wasn’t Bethanne’s ability to read aloud to another
person for hours on end or to sit and listen to Mrs. Fletcher
ramble on and on and on for more hours on end that made Bethanne
entertaining. It was her wit and remarkable sense of humor, her
ability to see everything in life as either lovely or amusing.
Briney admired that quality in Bethanne most of all and often
wondered if she herself might have been a more jovial sort had her
life circumstances been different.

Therefore, the moment Briney stepped back
into the boardinghouse after having sent Mrs. Fletcher’s earthly
remains on to New York by way of the train, she instantly felt more
hopeful—relieved and less anxious.

Exhaling a heavy sigh of compassion, Bethanne
placed a hand on Briney’s shoulder, smiled with sympathy, and
asked, “I suppose it’s done then? Is dear Mrs. Fletcher on her way
to New York?”

Briney nodded, comforted by Bethanne’s
concern. “Yes,” she answered, nodding.

“So the old girl is off to New York, and
you’re a free woman now, eh, Briney?” Mr. Kelley asked, striding
through the entryway toward the parlor. His arms were filled with
wood, no doubt intended to restock the wood basket near the parlor
hearth.

“Daddy!” Bethanne scolded. “Don’t be so
indelicate!” Bethanne placed a reassuring arm around Briney’s
shoulders. “Why, Briney’s just lost someone very near and dear to
her. I’m sure her heart is still very tender.”

“I’m sure it is,” Mr. Kelley called from the
parlor. “But I seen the way that old bat treated you, Briney,” he
added, striding into the entryway once more. “And I don’t mean to
sound hardhearted, but I feel like your bonds of slavery have been
loosed, and now you can make your own life…and in whatever way you
see fit.”

Briney couldn’t help but smile at Mr.
Kelley’s forthright explanation of things. Part of her did mourn
Mrs. Fletcher’s passing. Yet if she were to confess the truth to
anyone, she felt exactly as Mr. Kelley said—as if her bonds of
slavery had been loosed and she’d been set free.

“I-I know it might sound just morbid,” Briney
began, glancing away uncomfortably for a moment, “but I do feel a
mingling of fear and trepidation, loneliness…yet freedom and
excitement that I’ve not felt in so, so long.”

Bethanne took Briney’s hands in her own.
Staring into her face and nodding, Bethanne encouraged, “Go on.
It’s all right to say it, Briney. Truly it is.”

It was as if some pent-up emotion Briney had
never allowed herself to express burst from her bosom, up through
her throat, and out of her mouth before she could attempt to stop
it.

“I had everything I ever needed—food,
shelter, clothing,” she began. “Nice clothing, comfortable shelter,
and the majority of the time better food than most people enjoy on
a regular basis. As far as temporal needs, I wanted for
nothing.”

“Perhaps not,” Bethanne said. “But…but it
doesn’t seem as if you had much…well, much fun, much merriment at
all.”

Briney nodded and continued. “No…no, not
much. But I was far happier and better cared for than I would’ve
been had I been forced to stay in the orphanage until I was
eighteen. And even then, what future awaited me when I was of age
and turned out from the institution?” She sighed, burying her
disappointment in having lived a life of servitude in Mrs.
Fletcher’s care in favor of being content with the fact she had not
had to linger cold, alone, starving, beaten, and neglected in the
orphanage asylum. “In truth, it was a life many young ladies would
diligently seek after, I suppose. As Mrs. Fletcher’s companion,
I’ve been to nearly every country in Europe. I’ve seen lions and
elephants on the vast plains of Africa, lingered in grand palaces
in South America.”