Silverton: Claims On The Heart Read Online Free PDF Page A

agreed to join them.
    Kathleen wavered, thinking it over and wondering if letting Martin buy her lunch was a smart thing to do.
    Collin strode up and alongside their group.
    She stepped beside him. “Mr. McAllister. We met at my father’s store. Do you remember?”
    He tipped his crowned hat. It looked handsome on his head. “I remember. Are you getting settled in?”
    “Yes, thanks. Though I thought I might take the afternoon off and go to the picnic. I’d like to meet some of these people. Are you going?”
    He stared into her eyes. “Will you be going?”
    “Yes. And so should you. I’ll bet you could do with some fun after working hard all week.”
    He smiled and a dimple showed at the corner of his mouth. “How could I turn down a promise of fun?”
    “Good. Then, I’ll see you there.”
    He stuck his hands into his pockets and sauntered away.
    Martin glowered, but he smoothed the irritation from his face as she joined them once again.
    “A new friend?” he asked.
    “Yes. We met in the store.”
    “I’d be careful who you make as a friend. A beautiful girl like you could be taken advantage of by a rough miner.”
    “Collin does not strike me as a rough sort.”
    “I wouldn’t be so sure. You’re a city girl. You’re not used to these men.”
    Before she could assure him that she could judge the character of her friends, Nancy broke in to arrange their picnic plans. “Why don’t you get the lunches and meet us back at the church at 12:30?” she asked Martin. “Then we can all walk up to the Galena Mountain meadow together.”
    “That sounds like a very good plan,” Martin said, smiling at Nancy. He tipped his hat and strode off to complete his mission of garnering lunches.
    Nancy watched him go, and then turned to Kathleen with a grin. “How does it feel to be admired by one of the richest men in town? Marry him and I bet he would build you a fancy house.”
    Kathleen remembered watching cattle being herded through a chute into a pen when she was a little girl. Those cows hadn’t liked it one bit. She hardly knew Martin, yet everyone was trying to match them up. She frowned. Was it sheer stubbornness on her part that made her resent their efforts, or was it Martin himself? She raised her brows as she cast a sideways look at her friend. “I’m not in any hurry to marry. My father and I are setting up a comfortable home. And I won’t change that until I’m sure I have the right man.”
    They strolled a few more paces.
    “Do you know anything about Collin McAllister?”
    “I’ve never heard of him. He’s not one of Tom’s friends.”
    “He works in a mine.”
    “Surely you can’t prefer a miner to the owner of a stamp mill?”
    “I don’t know. Collin doesn’t seem like an ordinary miner.”
    Nancy raised a feathery brow. “And how many miners do you know?”
    “Only Collin.”
    Her admission made them both laugh.
    They stopped in front of Kathleen’s house.
    Nancy was still grinning as she left Kathleen and scurried home with Tom to put their own picnic together.
    Papa had gone straight to the store, so Kathleen had the house to herself. Nancy’s words about Martin giving her a fine home rang in her head as she studied their plain and rather bare parlor. It did not bother her at all. There were more important things than money.
    Even if Martin did ask her one day, she wouldn’t sell herself in marriage just to get a fine house. When she married, it would be for love and nothing else. And she would not have her decision hurried.
    She sailed her hat onto her lumpy straw bed and sat down with a plop. Kicking off her slippers, she stretched her legs and wriggled her toes inside creamy cotton stockings. She was happy to have been here only two days, to have found a comfortable church and Nancy as a new friend.
    Her thoughts drifted to Collin. She’d like to have time to get to know him without Martin hanging around. But right now, she needed to get ready.
    Nancy had surely changed