Lessie: Bride of Utah (American Mail-Order Bride 45) by Kristin Holt Page A

at the handle.” Lessie reached for the knife but knew enough to stay away from the blade.
    The wooden handle had been etched with the Opinel company name, but far more had been added by a different blade. Someone had carved letters into the handle.
    Three stocky, crudely formed letters. M.T.G.
    Lessie nudged him and he met her eye. “Some fancy monograms have the last name initial in the middle. The Mill hemmed handkerchiefs once.”
    “I don’t think this is Trengove’s.”
    M.T.G.
    Maurice T. Gibbons.
    A guess, but a valid one.
    He had no idea if Gibbons had a middle name or if said hypothetical middle name began with a T. But he wouldn’t put it past him.
    Perhaps Gibbons had sold the knife to Trengove.
    Then again, there might be half a dozen men in Big Ezra with the initials M.T.G.
    Could be Trengove had picked up the knife long before coming to work for Cannon Mining and it had no connection to anyone within a hundred miles.
    He really needed to talk to Edgar Kerry, Trengove’s shift supervisor, and ask him what he knew of any relationship between Gibbons and the dead man.
    Richard pushed the blade back into the hardwood handle and dropped it on the blankets spread across their laps. He’d find Kerry in the morning, but first, he needed to know what paper the dead man had carried in his pocket in a sealed envelope.
    My dearest Emilie,
    The moment you open this missive, you’ll become immediately aware I have enclosed no money. I’ve done my best, precious wife—
    “Read aloud.” Lessie nudged him. “I do better with typeset than handwritten, but I don’t read well.”
    “I forgot. I apologize.” Lessie didn’t seem the slightest bit uncomfortable with her near-illiteracy, so he refused to make it an issue. He could read aloud, and he would.
    He began at the salutation, his heart breaking for Herman Trengove, his bride Emilie, the infant son he’d never met…
    …and his urgent need to send money home for the care and keeping of his family.
    He read to the end, though the letter contained highly personal declarations of love, longing to see her once more, promises to find a way to gather the necessary cash money.
    Herman’s letter referenced the need for funds several times, but never disclosed why. Obviously his wife understood, and waited with
    “I’ll write Mrs. Trengove tomorrow.” He’d find her address, somehow. Someone on this mountain had to know Trengove left a wife and where she might live. “She needs to know her husband has died.”
    Better yet, Trengove probably had a small trunk or case containing personal belongings. He might find letters from his wife bearing a return address.
    He tucked the letter back inside the envelope, folded it with care. This letter he’d not taken the time to address would find its way to the intended recipient, within an official letter from Cannon Mining.
    No young wife wanted to learn of her husband’s demise.
    Somehow, Lessie found her way into his arms, burrowed her face into the hollow of his throat. She clung to him with a fierceness he’d not expected. Almost as if her compassion for the widow and infant caused her acute pain.
    “Tell me something.” Lessie blotted her eyes against her sleeve, as if tears had formed but she refused to acknowledge them as such. “When was payday?”
    “Payday? On the first of the month.” He hadn’t thought of it because— “We pay in scrip. Not cash.”
    Lessie stilled. “Then where was Herman Trengove hoping to obtain cash?”
    As Adam would say, the thousand-dollar question.
    “I don’t know.”
    “Why would he work for you for scrip, if his family needed cash for some reason at home? Why didn’t he leave your employ and find work somewhere that pays in currency?”
    “I don’t know.” Maybe no one at Big Ezra knew. Miners, for the most part, kept their business to themselves.
    “If a man like Herman Trengove received scrip on payday, and if he had a need for United States currency, how would