It'd been almost a month since Kay had been found and taken in by Sully and in that time the two had recently moved to the homestead where Sully spent a few days setting things up outside after Kay had recently sold two of the dresses that she had made and hand embroidered at the general store.
The price of which had shockingly enough had surprised Sully.
Yet she had made more than enough to buy some vegetable seeds, some other odds and ends to work on, and to give him some money to go buy a few dozen head of cattle, two dozen chickens, five baby goats, seven or so turkey's, nine pheasants, six pigs and four horses.
All of which, had cost close to eight hundred and seventy dollars in total.
Currently he was working on a new fence for a pen- though he had no idea what it was Kay had wanted to put in there. She had been very specific that if he would put up another two fences, one at least a mile big that could be opened up into the field on occasion, then she would go hunting and fill them up with animals that she'd bring back with her.
To say that he was curious as to what she could fill the pen up with, was an understatement to say the least. In actuality, he was dying to know what his girl was up too.
But she had been refusing to tell him. Claiming that she simply wanted to surprise him so that he'd have to leave her be. At the moment she was inside making some more of those wonderful berry and molasses cookies as well as baking a few other things for tomorrows church event and for the two of them to enjoy.
Sully would be lying if he said that he wasn't looking forward to tomorrow after church. He just hoped that she would set aside a batch of the cookies for the two of them to enjoy.
He had noticed of late that she seemed more tired than usual. And had even caught her collapsing several times, and though she said that she was fine- he was a little bit hard pressed to completely believe her. Especially since just last night he had caught her falling asleep while waiting on dinner to finish cooking.
He'd tried to rouse her by shaking her awake, but hadn't been able to. So he'd simply picked her up and removed her from the table so that she could sleep in her bed.
He knew the cause of her exhaustion. Had witnessed others like her making themselves sick making things and stuff. Some people simply took on far too much of a work load.
And that was exactly what she was doing.
No- that wasn't quite right. It's what she'd been doing from the get go, though he didn't totally understand the reasons behind her behavior- he knew enough to know that she didn't want to be of burden to him.
He understood that, he could even respect it- but she didn't need to work herself to the damn bone so much to help out.
And he wasn't going to lie, she did help out. She cooked, and sewed for him inbetween working on her stuff. She also kept the house unbelievably clean. She did! He didn't exactly know how she did it, given how tired she was and how often she worked on her stuff, but she did nevertheless.
And in town the other day she'd special ordered some roses in such pretty pinks and yellows and reds. Along with some more exotic stuff to plant around the house and make it look nicer. She had even planted some seeds from the Lorne's store, lavender, snapdragon's, daisies and the like that would look amazing coupled with the roses and more exotic flowers.
She had spent about two hundred in total on them, mostly because she had gotten some apple tree's and pear trees too to surprise him when he had commented on getting some soon to plant an orchard.
He was so lost in thought that he completely missed her coming outside with some food and a cup of something to drink for him, wearing one of her little outfits that he'd bought for her. "Sully! Lunch time!" He blinked upon hearing her voice calling out to him and smiled, wondering what his little one had come up with today.
The other day she had fried up some fish that he'd caught down at the creek. Nice big fat ones. And he'd ate a nice hearty meal of fish, some green beans, corn and some fresh bread slathered in the butter that he'd made. It'd been delicious. And the day after that, he's had slow cooked beef with onions and mushrooms and some mashed potato's.
Which had been mouthwateringly good and tender all at once that he'd ate so much that his stomach had ached afterwards.
Today he believed that she must have whipped him up something using some of the left overs from last night since there was nothing left of the slow cooked beef from the night before. He'd made sure to take some with him the other day when he went out to visit Cloud Dancing and had taken enough for him and his brother to eat for lunch while they hunted.
Kay walked up to him wearing one of the outfits that he'd bought for her. The black ankle skirt with the ruffles, and the white button up blouse with the little pearl buttons, and a little black satin ribbon tied in a bow peeking from underneath her shirt collar.
Her long dark hair was up in a high ponytail and held in place by another black ribbon.
"Kay, how are you feeling today? Did you sleep okay?" Sully asked as he reached out and took the plate of food, sandwiches and left over mashed potato's with milk. It didn't hold as much flair as the other meals that she had been making for him so far, but that was easy to overlook given how good everything usually was and how exhausted she still looked.
"I slept okay." She said in a slight huff. Her soft tan skin still looked somewhat pale to him despite her assurances and he sighed and moved to seat himself on the ground a few inches away from the post that he'd been working on. Once seated, he patted the ground next to him and waited for her to sit herself down before he said.
"You know that you don't have to be up and working today. You can rest a while longer. I don't mind if you take a couple days."
"I don't need too. There's too much to do."
"I don't want you to keep working so hard. You're making yourself sick." Sully said insistently. Kay flinched. She actually, visibly flinched upon hearing his words and slowly nodded her head before saying.
"I have only a little bit left to do. Once it's done, I was going to stop making the big stuff- like dresses, and scented waters for about a month. I was going to keep making the soaps, maybe take it slower on a few more dresses, and the cookies. So you don't have to worry about me making myself sick. I was also thinking that during my down time," She had such a peculiar way of speaking sometimes, Sully mused to himself as he reached out and picked up half of the sandwich and brought it to his mouth and took a bite as he refocused on her words. "I was going to see about getting my hands on some beads and stuff and making some jewelry. I'd like to have some to go with some of the dresses that I'm making."
Carefully chewing his food before swallowing, he tilted his head to the side ever so slightly and asked. "You make jewelry too?"
She blushed a little bit and smiled kinda shyly up at him as she said, "Yeah. My mom and Grandma both ran their own company, and taught me hoe to make clothing and jewelry and such when I was really little. I make my first pieces when I was five. And they were so proud that they put them in their shop and sold them for nine hundred and seventy dollars."
Sully choked a little bit on his milk as he stared at her wide eyed in shock before finally rasping out.
"Nine hundred and seventy dollars!"
"Yeah. I tried to talk them down on the price but they didn't want to hear any of it. It was a really pretty piece with an old Victoria cameo carved out of green jade, which upon further thinking on- was by itself worth millions up until I took it out of it's original setting. And the rest of the necklace was pearl and crystal. It was four strands- and the pattern in the beads was floral. It was really advanced for a kid. Even for most adults. But the work and the beads themselves were well worth it."
"After that, I made three more pieces. Not quite like the first, but similar enough to bring in over one thousand and eighty nine dollars and ninety nine cents. Mom and Grandma decided then and there that everything that I made would go into their company and they would sell it for me and put some of the money back for me to use if I decided to go into business for myself."
Sully set his food and drink down for a second and tried to think of what to say. But really what could he say to a heiress? Especially if that was her long term goal in life.
He had no right to dissuade, or naysay her objective if that was what she wanted.
Her family would have been supportive of her. He should be too, right?
"I-Is that what your trying to do? Get ready to go into business for yourself? Is that why your working so hard?"
"Well- I'm not going to lie and say that it wouldn't be interest or fun to give it a try. And depending on how long I stay in business, when the town finally grows a bit more, it would mean having more high quality items to sell which would bring new blood to the town and in the long run it would create growth and even new jobs for some of the people."
Sully nodded, following her so far.
"Also part of having a good business, is having a good reputation as far as the goods that you sell," Again, he nodded his head in understanding. "But at the same time, if I did go into business for myself- I wouldn't stop at just one store or place. My long term goal in the business world would be to expand the horizons of the people here. Create places where people could work and feel proud of their achievements."
Sully's lips quirked a little bit at her words before he made a thoughtful humming sound and said, "You sound as if you have everything figured out."
"Well, no- not everything. But I think I would start out with two small business's and see what happened. If they did well, then I'd be able to help Lorne's general store expand instead of going under, and I would even be able to special order some stuff from the cities like medicine's for both the town and it's people and the Cloud Dancing's village. Also, I'd like it if Cloud Dancing and his people would occasionally come into town and trade with me."
"You wouldn't mind?" Sully asked her before tacking on. "Even if people protested their presence and stopped shopping in your store?"
Her response to his question was to deadpan, "I do not negotiate with terrorists."
Whatever that meant. He took it as meaning that she didn't give a damn about the public's opinion. She obviously intended to think of a way for everyone to benefit from her abilities. And he couldn't say that the idea of what she wanted, didn't interest him.
It did. And he would bet that it would interest a great many others as well.
"Okay. Let's say that you did go into business for yourself. Aside form a place to sell your jewelry, dresses, soaps and scented water- what kind of place would the second one be? What would it offer the town?"
"A diner."
"A diner."
"Uh-huh. A diner. Big cities have these fantastic eateries that have all kinds of foods form all over the world. I can bring some of that here. Open a nice place, fins some others to help out with the customers and the cooking when I'm not there. They would be paid decent wages. At least twenty dollars for every three hours that they work. But it would open in the morning and go through lunch on some days and on others it'd be open for dinner. Like on Sunday's. That way anyone who didn't want to cook on Sunday could stop by with their families. We could even do special's for specific occasions, like holidays, weddings and so on."
Sully smiled as he listened and thought of how many people in town would be clamoring for such a job. His poor girl didn't know what she was getting herself into here. Despite how sound her idea was.
Still, he knew a few people in town that were a bit worse off than others and would appreciate a decent wage for their work. And twenty dollars for every three hours, was more than generous.
Which made him wonder, how much was she willing to pay someone working for her at the other place? It would probably be the same amount since she didn't seem the type to treat anyone poorly. Regardless of their background. Though just to be sure, he'd introduce her to one of his friends in town soon.
After all, just because she had nothing against Indians like Cloud Dancing didn't mean that she didn't have prejudices against others. And if she did, he needed to break her of it before she got too old and set in her ways.
"How much more do you need to do today before you're done?" Sully asked, wondering if she had finally finished the pretty little pink colored dress that she had been working on as well as the cookies for tomorrow's church social.
"I still have a little bit of embroidery left to do on the dress. After that I should sew on the buttons and be done."
"Do you plan to sell it too?" Sully asked, wondering what she was intending to wear to church tomorrow.
"No. I plan to keep it and at least two others."
"Oh?"
"Yeah. The pink one, a yellow, and the white one that I finished a little while back."
Sully made a thoughtful humming sound as he recalled the yellow and white dresses, they were both pretty. And either one would do for tomorrow's event. But he couldn't help but wonder what the pink one would look like once she finished it. She did such excellent work with such beautiful detail that he couldn't help himself from asking which one she was planning on wearing.
She merely gave him a slow, slightly devious looking grin that made his heart do weird flip flop in his chest and simply stated that he'd have to wait and see as she slowly got up and then dusted herself off and left him to finish his now, late, lunch and milk.