Accidental Sweetheart by Lisa Bingham

Author:Lisa Bingham
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2018-01-26T18:49:02+00:00

Chapter Eleven

Myra and Miriam Claussen casually walked toward the barbershop, each of them carrying enormous baskets in one hand and their bulging reticules in the other.

“Do you have the sign?” Myra whispered, sotto voce.

“Of course, I have the sign,” Miriam muttered under her breath.

They could hear Mr. Bramblyhurst setting up inside his shop. From the opposite end of town, they could pick out the last few notes of the postlude being played in the distance.

“Tack it up, tack it up!”

Miriam quickly hung the placard next to the front door.

Free haircuts and shaves for the first 20 men.

Form line here.

The door rattled as Mr. Bramblyhurst unlocked it, but thankfully, he didn’t open it.

A wave of miners began to appear, moving from the Meeting House to the cook shack for the first meal of the day. Myra and Miriam began calling out, “Free shaves and haircuts!”

It only took a few minutes for a line to form. Miriam made her way down the queue counting. When they had twenty men, she lifted her arm to show Myra that they’d reached their limit.

Myra immediately opened the door. “This way, gentlemen. Move toward the rear until everyone is inside. Thank you. Thank you.”

“What’s going on here?” Mr. Bramblyhurst called out as he stepped in from the back room. “Some of you will have to come back later.”

As the last gentlemen stepped inside, she and Miriam slammed the door shut, set their baskets on the ground, then removed a pair of revolvers from their reticules.

“You’re all under arrest!” Myra shouted. “Get down on the ground!”

The men whirled to face them, their eyes widening as they took in the sight of the twins brandishing their weapons.

Miriam chanced a glance at her sister. “They aren’t under arrest,” she muttered under her breath.

“Oh.” Myra gathered her thoughts. “You aren’t under arrest, but you’re now our prisoners, so sit down!”

The men mumbled in confusion, but the sound of a pair of hammers being cocked caused them to lower themselves to the floor.

“Excellent, excellent!”

Myra waited a beat of silence. Two. Then looked at Miriam. “What were we supposed to do next?”

“The baskets.”

“Oh, yes.”

“Gentlemen, you will not be allowed to leave this barbershop for any reason until we tell you...that...that you can go.”

She glanced at her sister in time to see Miriam roll her eyes.

“Get the windows, Miriam!”

Miriam quickly went to pull the blinds on the large picture window. Then, she moved to the door, flipped the sign to CLOSED, and pulled the smaller shade over that one as well.

“The back door, Miriam.”

Miriam hurried to do the same to the storage room, effectively closing them all into the shadowy narrow shop.

“Well done, Miriam.”

“Thank you, sister.”

“Gentlemen, we apologize for the inconvenience, and presently we’ll explain ourselves. In the meantime...”

Miriam lugged the baskets to the center of the room and whisked off the checkered cloths to reveal a mountain of food.

“Is anyone hungry?”

* * *

The bell to the company store jingled overhead as Emmarissa Elliot and Louise Wilkes stepped inside.

“He’s alone,” Emmarissa whispered to her friend, referring to Marty Grooper who ran the establishment.

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