Page 24 of My Darling Clementine

Wait, Clem didn’t ask me to marry her, there was no proposal.

Well, there was, but it wasn’t for a wedding, and Kizzy was the one who made it, right after Clem saved her from those men. She didn’t even realize she was in danger, and if they had caught her out by herself... Clem rescued her, without even knowing who she was. She was Kizzy’s hero — big, strong, and oh, so good-looking. Warm prickles rose on her skin, remembering the touch of Clem’s hands.

She wanted those hands on her body again. But did she want a fake husband in what did they call it in the penny dreadfuls? Oh, yes. A marriage of convenience.

The pre-dawn light was enough to see the clock — 4:30 in the morning. Clem would ‘collect’ her at noon. She threw off the blanket, leaving only a thin sheet to cover her in the rising morning heat. She’d get some sleep, eat some breakfast, and then figure out what to do next.

She woke at nine when the bouncy young housemaid knocked. Waiting with her grandmother’s lace shawl around her shoulders, she sat by the window and watched the people of Independence. As Kizzy did every morning without fail, she unbraided her hair and brushed it one hundred strokes, making gold highlights shine in the light.

The busy maid, no more than a girl, darted around the room refilling the water jug, giving the bed linens a shake and straighten, and replacing the slop bucket under the bed, chattering away non-stop. After she left, Kizzy enjoyed the quiet while she washed and dressed.

She wore her second petticoat for propriety’s sake, and being an engaged person, opted for the best of her three dresses, a somber blue wool with a high neckline. She divided her long hair into sections, braided it, and let the heavy weight of it hang down her back.

Seated in the dining room, once again surrounded by men eating alone or in small groups, she ‘confided’ to the serving girl, the same busy housemaid, “Today is my wedding day.” After the teenager squealed and congratulated her, Kizzy whipped up a tall tale in a breathy voice meant to carry.

“My fiancé wasn’t at the railway station yesterday to greet me. I waited for three hours! Well, I was so mad after all our families did to help me get here, and embarrassed that he stood me up, I walked all the way here from the station alone, can you imagine?”

The girl, eyes wide, shook her head no, she couldn’t.

“I locked myself in my room and cried the whole afternoon, sobbed myself to sleep. After all, a woman alone in a strange place? What would become of me?” Kizzy looked around, but none of the men were paying attention. “But all that time Clem was already checked in, waiting for me! My father wired the wrong day in the cable, can you imagine?” Kizzy giggled like a schoolgirl, enjoying her storytelling, the young maid hanging on every word.

“By the time I went down to dinner the kitchen was closed, and most everyone already done. It’s a miracle I saw him get up to leave, and I chased him out into the street to catch him. I didn’t know him at first, he’s bigger than the last time I saw him.” She blushed. “I’ve filled out some myself, I’m not the same scrawny girl as when he saw me last three years ago.” Shaking her head, she added, “I’m such a ninny. Clem was here all along.”

Kizzy and the serving girl squealed together, laughing with delight, sharing the joy of a young woman’s wedding day. “He pretended to be angry, and threatened to spank me like a naughty child.” She shook her head and rolled her eyes. “But he cuddled me instead, dried my tears, kissed me, and swore he missed me something terrible. It was such a relief after thinking he’d changed his mind and abandoned me. We’re getting married this very evening!”

“Oh, miss,” the serving girl gushed, “it’s quite romantic, isn’t it?”

The men in the room didn’t change positions or acknowledge in any way that they were listening, but a different attitude settled around Kizzy. When they met her eyes now, they smiled in a pleased, brotherly manner, rather than with the calculating assumption of a predatory male. As someone about to become a wife, her stature in the community rose.

Marriage is the magic that will make me respectable.

She ate her breakfast with a hearty appetite, happy with the decision she was making. Her mother and the church ladies had warned her, “Marry in haste, repent in leisure,” but that applied to regular, legal marriages making a woman a man’s property. If she ever wanted to leave Clem, all Kizzy had to do was walk away. If anyone challenged her right to do so, she’d tell them the truth. Since two women couldn’t wed, no one would make her return to a marriage that didn’t exist, or to a woman disguising herself as a man. She felt better with that knowledge, an escape should she need one.

Still unaccompanied, she spent an uncomfortable hour making some necessary purchases. The man behind the ammunition counter laughed when she showed him the pistol, but found a small holster to fit, and the right caliber bullets. Kizzy bought five boxes, as well as a cleaning rod and oil, then accepted the store owner’s help to carry her package back to the hotel, thereby providing her with a reasonable companion.

At the front desk, she paid a penny for a stamp and envelope and sat down to write her mother, announcing her marriage and new name … which, it occurred to her, she didn’t know. And her mother would only worry if she thought Kizzy jumped on the first man she saw and settled, as she’d done. She would wait before sending a letter describing a new son-in-law.

At five minutes before noon, a soft tap sounded at her door. When Kizzy opened it, she found the hotel clerk who’d signed her in the day before grinning from ear to ear. “A gentleman caller is waiting downstairs for you, Miss Walker.” He handed her a card that read:

She squared her shoulders and returned the clerk’s smile. “Please tell Mr.” she checked the card, “Kabooblebopper I’ll be down in a moment. Ask him to wait at a table in the dining room. Thank you,” she said, closing the door.

Kizzy Kabooblebopper? Oh, good lord, no. She bent at the waist, hands on her knees, and laughed for a full minute at the sheer absurdity of it all. Wiping her eyes with a damp handkerchief, she counted to ten and made her way down to the dining room.

“Clem,” she said, sweeping forward in her best dress. As her fiancé rose to greet her, Kizzy reminded herself everything depended on people believing he was a man. She gave her both hands, staring up into her face with a wide smile. “Darling, you’re right on time.”

Her fiancé held her at arm’s length, admiring her dress. “Don’t you look lovely? Just right for a sermon or funeral.” She laughed. “Woman, this is your wedding day, and you’re dressed in dark, what is that, wool? In this heat?” Clem shook her head, “You’ll pass out before you say I do.”

“But this is my best dress,” Kizzy protested. “I don’t have anything more suitable.” She didn’t mention she was already a sweaty, itchy mess in two petticoats. As she used the handkerchief to mop the back of her neck, her mother’s voice whispered in her ear, A proper woman does not scratch in public, Kizzy. That kept her hands down, at least for the moment.

“Visiting the seamstress is first on the list of things to do,” Clem said, observant dark eyes watching her. “Let’s have lunch, and I’ll tell you what I’ve accomplished since I saw you last.”

As they ate fried chicken so good they licked their fingers, followed by a slice of rhubarb pie both sweet and sour, they talked about their plans.

“I found a judge at the county courthouse who agreed to perform the ceremony this evening, after close of business. And our hosts, Mr. and Mrs. Bates, have agreed to let us hold it in the hotel parlor at six o’clock, and be our witnesses. Then we can have dinner here at the hotel, and celebrate at the bar until we leave for whichever of our two rooms,” she winked at her soon to be bride, “we’ll share on our wedding night.”

“Oh, Clem,” she said, laughing with a playful slap to her hand, “you tease.” She blushed at the smoldering heat in the brown eyes devouring her, well aware she wasn’t teasing.

Because the idea flamed a matching heat in her, rather unbearable in her wool, she changed the subject, asking about the wagon. “How big is it? I only have one suitcase.”