.
It was now painfully obvious Charles Swan was angling for her to wed Pastor Newton.
.
.
Sadness hung in the air between them, the regretful father and the loyal daughter.
Nothing would have made Charles Swan happier than to see Isabelle fulfilled, preferably wedded, with little children and a house of her own to keep.
Instead, she was tied down to an old anchor rusting in the mud.
Isabella, on the other hand, would have liked nothing more than for her father to accept she would never marry. Her happiness would never again depend on a man; she simply wasn't interested.
At the ripe age of thirty two, she was wholly resigned to spinsterhood and her only grievance was that she couldn't do more to make her father comfortable in his needful years.
"He's a good man," Charles continued softly once they were seated in their wagon.
Isabella sighed, knowing that nothing she said would halt this conversation.
"I won't marry Pastor Newton, Pa. I do wish you'd stop worrying about me. I've no mind to find a husband at all, let alone one holier than myself."
She could feel his exasperation without looking up to see it, and smirked a little at her own childish goading.
"I saw you looking at that fella, you know, the one that came riding along into town just now."
An awkward pause settled between them at that, and Isabella wondered what answer her father expected to this pronouncement. Should she answer truthfully- that she simply fancied the drifter's bearing? Should she perhaps say that she found his stature... attractive?
Yes, that was it; she had found the man on a horse attractive.
How this was possible without meeting him was a mystery, but Isabella knew for certain as soon as the thought had crossed her mind, that she did indeed find the drifter undeniably agreeable.
"I don't believe I've seen him around here before," she replied, attempting casual nonchalance, "Why, do you know him, Pa?"
She knew there was more to it when he just muttered under his breath. She did not press him, figuring their conversation at an impasse—she didn't want to talk about the pastor, he didn't want to talk about the drifter.
It surely didn't matter who he was.
.
.
Charles Swan contemplated lying to his daughter. He wanted so much to dismiss her question out of hand and press for Michael Newton's suit, because deep down, he thought that this was Isabella's only available course. That, or a life spent barren and alone.
The pastor had been persistently hinting at his interest for a long time, and Charles had finally decided to give his approval of the courtship, in the hope that this would finally push his daughter to look upon Newton favourably.
Lately, Charles had dragged them to church week after week, hoping that seeing the pastor with regularity would bring her around.
He dawdled and shuffled when it was time to leave, knowing that the pastor would wait at the door.
He held his breath the day that Pastor Newton kissed Isabella's hand as though it were a delicate flower whose petals he didn't wish to bruise.
She had shown no reaction at the time, but Charles despaired of her when the first thing she'd done upon walking into their home, was to wash her hands ever so thoroughly with lye soap and water, scrubbing off non-existent dirt until her fingers were red and shiny.
He knew then that the battle was almost lost. Inviting Pastor Newton to their home was Charles' last attempt at opening Isabella's eyes to the man's goodness, for there was no doubt that he was good, though officious and boring were also fair words to describe him.
Instead, whilst agreeing to entertain the Pastor for supper, she had just now flatly refused to discuss the possibility of this leading to a proposal she might accept.
Charles felt suddenly very, very old, and incredibly tired.
He supposed he could understand her stubbornness because he was certain that the trait came from him. Her reasons were also somewhat sound, when one was aware of the heartbreak in her past.
He had still hoped that one day she would see there was nothing to be gained by living in the past, and so he made the fatal mistake of misjudging her real reason for opposing the match.
He hadn't really considered that she might just not like Michael Newton. It did not enter his mind that his practical and clear-headed Isabella could be a creature led by her senses rather than her rational mind.
She had always seemed so much like Charles, rather than her sensual and imaginative mother.
He hadn't realised until today that her eye could be drawn—just like that—to someone else, to a man she didn't know from Adam, and one with an unfortunate past to boot.
A man whose name Charles doubted but a few of the local townsfolk would even know or recognize anymore.
A man such as Anthony Masen.
And so it was that Pastor Newton came to supper, complimented Isabella on the best home cooking he had tasted since his own mother—God rest her soul—was alive, and smoked a pipe contentedly with Charles Swan while discussing the changing times.
When the fire began to die on the hearth and Charles' soft snores were the only sounds to be heard above the shifting of burning embers, Pastor Newton rose to leave and asked Isabella to see him out.
He then threw all caution to the wind, and encouraged by the most pleasant evening he had just spent in her company, Pastor Michael Newton finally declared himself.
On her front porch and under the clear night skies, he proposed marriage to Isabella Swan.
"Now, I don't believe all the superstitious talk that you're bad luck," he reassured her kindly. "I'll be a steady and true husband, and provide for us both."
Reaching for her stiff fingers, he told her he'd admired her for years, and that he knew not to expect children, seeing as the both of them were no longer young.
"Those things are best left to God," he said.
And there, he made his final mistake.
.
.
A/N: I know I shouldn't be amused at people's generally uncharitable opinion of Mike. No, I shouldn't. No. Should not. Nope.