Wanted: Engineer (Silverpines Series Book 11) Read online

  Wanted: Engineer

  Silverpines Book 11

  Cover design by JB Publishing

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental or used fictitiously.

  Dedication

  For all the fans of The Preacher David Nathaniel (Nathan) Ryder III.

  You asked for him. You got him.

  Table of Contents

  Introduction

  Prologue

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Other Books By George

  Introduction

  Maude Jones was a foundling, an orphan left on the steps of the Howard House. Her whole life she’s longed for a family of her own. Now all grown up she’s willing to sacrifice her dream of a family with the only boy she ever loved for the love of her friend, Betsy Sewell. When an investor demands that the mine be reopened, Maude sends an ad to the Grooms Gazette for an Engineer to reopen the mine. Knowing that love and her dreams may never come true. That is until an unexpected letter comes from that boy from her past. Now she must choose family or her friend’s need.

  Jeremiah Henderson left Silverpines at eight years old when his father took a job in New Mexico Territory. Now fourteen years later he hears of the disaster that has befallen his hometown and he has to know what happened to the little girl he left behind. The only girl he’s ever loved. When Maude responds telling him she is alive and single, Jeremiah knows he must return to woo Maude. If he can help his other friends reopen their mine, so much the better. But when he arrives in town with a western legend at his side, only to find a mining engineer after both his woman and the mine, he has to choose: step aside or fight for what he wants. He’s a miner, he doesn’t know how to quit. But will he win the woman, save the mine and give Maude everything she ever wanted, or die trying?

  Will love win, or will Maude settle for what she Wanted: an Engineer?

  Prologue

  March 1885

  Silverpines, Oregon

  Maude Jones climbed up into the cedar tree out behind the orphanage she lived in. She’d caught a glimpse of her friend Jeremiah heading that way right after breakfast. It was their special place to meet. She hadn’t even told her two best friends Betsy and Tonya about it because it was her special place to meet the only boy she’d ever love. Now that her chores were done she had rushed out to see why Jeremiah was there. Normally he let her know when he was going to be there so she could come spend time with him. But today he’d just raced past the house and straight for the tree. If she hadn’t been helping in the kitchen she would have missed seeing him.

  “Jeremiah,” she whispered as she climbed, “What are you doing?”

  There was a sniffing sound coming from further up the trunk on the other side. “Go away, Maude.”

  Was he crying? Why was he crying?

  “No, you’re in our tree but I can tell you’re upset; what’s wrong?”

  Jeremiah glanced down at her and she hurried up onto the branch beside him. “Pa says we’re moving. Uncle Nate asked him to take over running his goldmine operations in some place called Redemption. It’s way down in the New Mexico Territory! So I runned away.”

  Now Maude felt herself start to tear up, Jeremiah couldn’t move away. They had already decided they were going to get married when they were old enough. “You’re leaving?”

  Jeremiah shook his head “No! Pa is but I told you I runned way.”

  She looked at him with her eyes wide. “But where will you live?”

  Jeremiah patted the trunk of the tree. “Right here in our tree.”

  Maude giggled. “You can’t live in our tree. You’d fall out when you went to sleep.”

  Jeremiah thought about that. “Then I’ll take us over to see Preacher Edmonds and we’ll get married and then I’ll live at the orphanage with you!”

  “You can’t live at the orphanage! Only girls live here. They’ll make you go live in Portland with all the boy orphans. I think you should go with your pa.

  Jeremiah sniffed and then nodded. “Yeah, I guess.” Then he moved from his branch to the one Maude was sitting on and shifted so he was facing her. “When I’m all grownd up and have a hundred dollars I’ll come back and we’ll get married, Maude.”

  Maude looked in his eyes and whispered, “You better kiss me then because I’ll have to marry you if you kiss me.”

  “Okay.” Jeremiah nodded his head and puckered up his lips and closed his eyes. Maude puckered up her lips and closed her eyes and then he did it. Jeremiah Henderson kissed her right on the lips. “Now we has to get married when we’re grownd up. Don’t you forget it, Maude Jones. You’re my wife and I’ll be back when I’ve made a hundred dollars.”

  She blushed and smiled. “I’ll be waiting.”

  September 1899

  Goldtown, NM.

  “No, I’m telling you it’s a town full of women in Oregon. Almost all their men died back in April in a two-day earthquake event. The paper says their mine collapsed and the timber was destroyed in a mudslide taking all the men with it! We could go there, find the women who now own the mine and marry them, then we’d be working for ourselves.”

  Jeremiah Henderson looked across the diner at two of the miners that worked for him, as they sat listening to the lowlife he’d had to fire last week. Why was he still hanging around town? He should have been half way to somewhere else by now. The man looked up and saw that Jeremiah was listening. “Look, Mr. Henderson is smart. He knows mining law and things, he’ll tell you.”

  The two low level shovel operators looked up at him as he walked over to their table. “What are you boys talking about?”

  The lowlife smiled. “I found this paper, it talks about this town in Oregon where their mine collapsed, killing all the miners during the earthquakes earlier this year. I was just telling the boys we should go marry a couple of the rich widows and help them reopen the mine. After we marry them we’d be rich and own the mine. That’s the law, right Mr. Henderson?”

  “Gulden, that isn’t the law. Oregon and several other states gave the women a right to vote and own property a few years ago. If those women owned the mine before you married, they’d still own the mine after. If they are smart enough to still own it after all this time, they’d know enough not to give it to the likes of you boys.”

  “Well dagnabit! Here I was all for making my way to Oregon and owning the Silverpines mine!”

  Jeremiah froze where he stood. “What did you say the name of the town was?”

  Burt Gulden handed him the torn and stained section of newspaper. “Silverpines, Oregon, the paper said. See fer yourself.”

  Jeremiah took the paper, his heart racing. “I grew up in Silverpines!”

  He began to read of how the mine his pa had designed and ran until they came south fourteen years back had collapsed, killing most of the male population and several of the females, followed by a mudslide that took out the timber industry.

  “Wow, it’s a small wo
rld ain’t it, Mr. Henderson? Just think, if you’d stayed there you might have died in that mine!”

  His mind reeled. Was SHE still there? Had she married and started a family? Was she a widow? What about Betsy Pike or Tonya Woodson?

  He looked at the men. “Excuse me, I need to get back to work and isn’t it about time you two get back in as well?”

  “Yes sir, we were about to head that way.”

  “Gulden, shouldn’t you be finding work or something instead of hanging around on Goldtown Mines’ property?”

  “Yes sir. I reckon I should probably get back to old lady Winslow’s farm and finish plowing under the field.”

  Jeremiah left and went straight to his office where he pulled out a sheet of paper and began to write.

  My dear Maude,

  I’m sure this letter comes as a surprise to you after all these years. I just heard about the terrible tragedy that befell Silverpines and I wondered about you and all our friends. Please tell me that you survived the tremendous events of this past April and that Betsy’s family and Tonya’s family did as well.

  I often think of those days when I’m not busy running the mine here in Goldtown. I wonder about you most of all, my first kiss. How naive we were back then. Have you married? Started a family? If so, did they all survive? How is Silverpines recovering. The paper I was shown said the mine collapsed. That seems almost an impossibility to me, though I rightly know it could happen.

  Myself, I am still single. I can’t seem to find a woman who understands the demands made on the head of a successful Goldmining operation. Mr. Ryder, Nathan, that is Old Nugget Nate’s grandson, relies on me to keep things running smoothly. But still, I find myself often thinking back to that day in the cedar tree when I promised to come and marry you as soon as I made a hundred dollars.

  Please write me back and let me know you are okay. Tell me all about Silverpines and what is going on there now after the quakes. Is the town recovering? Maybe Mister Ryder could help in some way if any is needed.

  Your almost husband, and long-lost friend;

  Jeremiah Henderson

  He quickly addressed the envelope to the only place he knew to send it. To Maude Jones, care of The Howard Sisters Girls Orphanage, Silverpines, Oregon. Then he rushed to the post office and sent the letter off. Next he went and packed a couple of saddle bags and let his secretary and the assistant mining engineer know he would be heading to Redemption on urgent business. He needed to see Nathan Ryder. No, if he was honest it was essential he get to Silverpines, to home, to the girl who still owned his heart. It was vital he get to Maude!

  One

  Maude sat looking at all the letters that had come in from men wanting to marry her and work the mine. She was convinced after reading them with her friends, Betsy and Tonya, that most of them wanted the mine more than they wanted a wife. But the truth was she hadn’t gotten a single second letter after they wrote a few and explained that they would have a job working the mine, they wouldn’t own the mine. That she was best friends with the mine’s owner, not the widow or daughter of the owner. Yet still there were the three that Betsy was expecting her to choose from. But she couldn’t. All she could think about was the letter she had in her apron, the one Widow Winslow had given her from New Mexico, the letter from Jeremiah. Her Jeremiah.

  She opened her mouth and sighed. Betsy looked up. “What is it, Maude? You haven’t heard a word we’ve said all afternoon. She looked at her friend and knew she needed to come clean. “I can’t do this, Betsy. I can’t send for one of these men.”

  “Why not? I thought you wanted to get married.”

  She nodded to her friend. “I do, but not to any of these strangers. Not anymore.”

  Tonya looked at her, her own new love still shining in her face. “It’s that letter, isn’t it? The one I saw you playing with before my wedding?”

  Maude nodded. “I didn’t realize you’d seen it.”

  Betsy looked between the two of them. “I’m missing something here; what letter?”

  Maude pulled out the already dogeared and folded and refolded letter. “Mrs. Winslow gave this to me Saturday. She thought it might be another candidate for my mail order husband. But as soon as I saw where it was from, I knew it wasn’t.”

  “Well, if not the Grooms Gazette then where was it from?”

  “It’s from a town in New Mexico called Goldtown.”

  Both Betsy and Tonya were surprised. “Do you know someone in New Mexico?”

  “Yes, and so do you.”

  Betsy looked surprised. “We do?”

  Maude knew she was blushing, she couldn’t help it. Even though she’d been six the last time the two of them were together, it was still fresh in her mind how she’d demanded a kiss and Jeremiah had given her one. Her only kiss to date.

  “Yes. It’s a letter from Jeremiah Henderson.”

  Both women gasped. “Jeremiah! My goodness, that’s a name from the past, isn’t it?” Betsy said. “Why in the world would Jeremiah be writing to you after all this time?”

  Maude blushed again. “You know we used to be good friends.”

  “I know, you used to say you’d marry him when you grew up but then he moved away.”

  “Yes, that Jeremiah Henderson.”

  Tonya looked at her and Maude could see the calculations in her eyes. “Why did he write you after all this time?”

  Maude found herself blushing again. “He just saw an article about the disasters and wanted to check on all of us.”

  “Okay, but why out of everyone he knew did he write you, Maude?”

  Maude sighed. She’d never told anyone about what had happened in that tree fourteen years ago or how his words had burrowed deep in her heart all that time. “We were friends, Tonya, you know that.”

  “I know the two of you were always sneaking up into that old cedar tree over by the edge of the pond.”

  Again, the thought of that day made Maude blush. “I still don’t understand, Maude. Why does getting a letter from Jeremiah Henderson make it so you can’t go through with helping me find a mining Engineer?”

  Maude handed Betsy the letter. “Here, read it and then I’ll try and explain. It sounds stupid, but I just can’t.”

  So, her friend took the letter from her hands and the two of them read it. “Oh, I think we need to know more of this kiss and promise. Maude Jones, you’ve been keeping a secret from us all this time,” Tonya said, a silly smile on her face.

  “It was simple childs kiss. You know how we were back then, always planning who we would marry and how. The day before they left I saw Jeremiah climb our tree and went to join him. He told me they were leaving and that when he was all grown and had a hundred dollars he’d come back and marry me. I made him kiss me so we’d have to get married.” She laughed, “It was a silly childish fantasy and I’d mostly forgotten about it until I got that letter. Now that he wrote, I keep wondering about what if. What if he’d stayed? What if he’d come back? Would we be married and living here? Would he have died in the disasters or would we be down in New Mexico with children all around us right now?”

  Betsy looked at her and she saw the tears in her friend’s eyes. She was sick, stuck in bed, and had that awful Willard Francis Lunsford insisting that she reopen the mine and bring him the promised return on his investment that Mr. Pike had promised him. To do that they needed to open the mine. And to open the mine they needed a man who knew what he was doing. “That name sounds familiar,” Betsy said.

  Maude was a bit startled by the shift in topic by her friend. “What name?”

  “Nathan Ryder. I’ve seen it somewhere before.”

  “Probably in the papers. He’s a famous gunslinger and U.S. Marshal as well as a wealthy business man.”

  Betsy shook her head. “No, something in Pa’s papers I think. Tonya, can you bring me the stack about the mine from the desk? The ones I compared Mister Lunsford’s investment papers to.”

  “Sure.” The other woman we
nt to get them, and Betsy took Maude’s hands. “Don’t worry about a mail order husband. I think you should write Jeremiah back. You never know what might happen. Answer his letter and be honest with him. Tell him you’re wondering the same things. Maybe he’s your mail order husband. Maybe children and New Mexico is your future.”

  Maude shook her head. “I promised you.”

  Betsy nodded. “You did because you’re my friend. But I’m your friend too, and I can see that you’ll never be happy unless you try, Maude. At least write him and see if there could be something there.”

  They both looked up as they saw Tonya had come back in the room. “I agree, Maude. We both got our happily ever afters; you deserve one too. Obviously Jeremiah holds a special place in your heart even now, you have to explore it. What do you have to lose?”

  While she’d been talking, Betsy had been looking through the papers and gasped. “I knew I’d seen his name. Oh, now that’s interesting!”

  Maude looked up, “What?”

  “Well it seems that a Mister David Nathaniel (Nathan) Ryder III owns a third of Pike Mining Consortium. He’s my partner. According to this letter, he inherited from his grandfather his part of the mine. Maybe I should write to my partner and tell him about one Willard Francis Lunsford and his demands. And see what my partner thinks.”

  Tonya grinned and went back in the office returning with two fountain pens and several sheets of stationary. “Get to writing, ladies. Let’s see how we can change Silverpines today.”

  Jeremiah sat in the office of the Dueling N’s Ranch. His boss Nathan was behind the desk and Nathan’s lawyer sat in the chair across from Jeremiah. When Jeremiah had gotten to the Dueling N’s he’d been told Nathan was out of town testifying in a case in Santa Fe and wouldn’t be back for two weeks. So as much as Jeremiah needed to get to Silverpines he’d gone back to Goldtown, letting Mister Cody know he needed to meet with the boss as soon as he returned. Nathan had sent for him last night.