Chapter 9: Breaking Boxes

~Let me be a little kinder, let me be a little blinder, to the faults of those around me.~—Edgar A. Guest

The evening of the second day found Dannie and Jake setting up camp out in the open once more.

“If you can’t drink this coffee, then just think of me yesterday,” Dannie said, handing Jake a cup.

“That’s not very comfortin’. Jake lifted the cup to his lips. “It’s passable,” he said after tasting her brew. “You need a lot more practice, but I guess it will do for a first time.”

“Yes, well, Rome wasn’t built in a day,” Dannie said, sitting down at the other side of the fire.

“What?”

“It’s just a saying, meaning everything takes time.”

“So…” Jake leaned back on the large rock behind him. “I take it you like books? Seein’ as you had those two trunks full of ’em?”

“It’s something Papa and I had in common. We could spend all day in his library poring over books. It was Papa who taught me to read and write in Latin and Greek.”

“I’m wonderin’, Miss Preston, how does it all stay in your head? My brain would have long exploded from all that knowledge being stuck in there.”

Dannie giggled. “I’ve just got a talent for languages. Papa said so. Mamma kept getting upset at him for keeping me in his study all day. She said the last thing men want is a woman who is smarter than them. Papa kept saying that those silly country boys had no business marrying me anyway, and that my husband should come with a mind to match my own.”

Dannie paused here and bit her lower lip.

“What about that man you said you were supposed to marry? Was he smart?” Jake hoped he wasn’t prying too far, but ever since he had found out about Dannie’s ruined engagement, he had been bursting to know why the promise had been broken.

“Paul?”

“That was his name?”

“Yes, Paul Richardson. He was very smart, studying to be a lawyer when I met him. When he proposed to me, no one was surprised—except for me, perhaps. I couldn’t believe that someone would consider marrying me.”

Surprise registered on Jake’s face. Sure, he could easily believe that no one would want to marry such a stubborn and rude girl with such a very high opinion of herself. But the fact that she herself was surprised that anyone would want to marry her—well, that sort of didn’t fit into the box he had originally placed her in.

“Why couldn’t you believe that someone wanted to marry you?”

“There is no need to mock me.” Dannie’s voice was rather hurt. “I’m sure you could come up with plenty of reasons why no one would want to marry me.”

Jake felt his face turning hot. “Yeah, well, that’s me. You know I have a low opinion of any woman. What surprises me is that ~you~ couldn’t believe it.”

At this, Dannie let out a bitter laugh.

“Really, Jake, I should think it painfully obvious. All my life, I have never had much male attention, mainly because there are two things that men look for in a future wife. The first is money. Even a hideous girl will become attractive if she has several thousand pounds to her name. If she doesn’t have any money, then they will look for an attractive face—which unfortunately, I haven’t got.”

“Oh, come now, Miss Preston, even I wouldn’t say that you are ugly.” For some reason, he thought of her long black hair falling down her back as she combed it out at night.

“I never said I was ugly. Rather, I am just plain, so very, very plain. I have no outstanding features. There is nothing striking about me. I am about as ordinary as they get. In a crowd of girls, I am the first one to be overlooked.”

Jake shook his head in disagreement but Dannie pressed on.

“It works like this. There are the beautiful girls and the hideous ones, and they are the ones you notice because they have features, be they pretty or ugly, that make them stand out.

“And then there are the plain girls, the ones who are so ordinary, so commonplace, they are virtually transparent. You see right through them and forget about them within five minutes. I happen to fall into that category of women.

“When Paul came around, I thought he was different from all the rest of the men. I thought he saw something in me besides my facial features and figure. But I proved to be wrong.”

Dannie’s tone became bitter. “Paul was just like the rest of them. Smart wasn’t so bad, but beauty and money come before all, and a pretty face with ten thousand pounds is more desirable than the brightest of minds.”

Jake tried to make sense of this. “He ended the engagement because he wanted to marry someone richer?”

Dannie let out a sigh. “It’s a tale as old as time. Money will always come before everything, even love. It’s been a long day. Goodnight.”

With a stiff set to her shoulders, Dannie made her way to her bedroll—but Jake sat, staring at the flames.

Dannie’s parents were dead, and her engagement had been ended due to her lack of fortune. It really was quite pathetic.

When he first met Miss Danielle Preston, he would never have thought her to be in the middle of so much heartbreak.

She was brave. He had to give her that much.

After about an hour of gazing into nowhere, when Jake was sure Dannie was asleep, he quietly crept over to where she had placed her bag. Fishing out her Bible, he returned to his comfy rock and began flipping through the pages.

Ever since this morning, he had been wondering about the two verses mentioned in the note from her father. At last he found the book of Isaiah and went to chapter 41. The darkness made it hard to read, and Jake brought the book closer to the fire.

His eyes scanned over the words till he found verse 13: ~For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, fear not; I will help thee.~

“Interesting,” Jake mused. He then sought out the other verses: ~When the poor and needy seek water and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them.~

~I will open rivers in high places, and fountains in the midst of the valleys, I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water.~

Jake shut the Bible and returned it to Dannie’s bag.

Miss Preston’s parents seemed like nice people—the kind who would have friends and family who could have helped her had she stayed in England.

So why had she come here?

And why did he feel like he needed to know?