PART 1: The Bird That Couldn’t Keep a Secret

“I want to marry you, Clara Bennett!”

The entire dining room went silent.

Then a bright green parrot sitting on top of the piano flapped its wings and shouted, “AND I’VE BEEN TOO CHICKEN TO ASK!”

Twenty-three guests turned toward the doorway, where the quietest cowboy in Willow Creek stood holding a bouquet of wildflowers.

Caleb Morgan looked as though someone had just informed him that his horse had joined the church choir.

“Oh, Lord,” he whispered. “Not tonight.”

The parrot bobbed its head.

“NOT TONIGHT! NOT TONIGHT! COWARD! COWARD!”

And that was how the most carefully guarded romantic secret in eastern Colorado began unraveling in front of half the town.

But the trouble had started three weeks earlier.

Caleb Morgan was thirty-two years old, six feet two inches tall, and capable of wrestling a stubborn bull into a pen without raising his voice.

He could ride through a thunderstorm, repair a broken wagon axle, and stare down the meanest ranch hand in three counties.

But put him within ten feet of Clara Bennett, and the man suddenly forgot how to speak English.

Clara was twenty-eight, with chestnut hair, warm brown eyes, and a laugh that made Caleb forget whatever important thing he’d been doing.

She ran Willow Creek’s little bakery, where Caleb had been buying unnecessary loaves of bread for nearly two years.

He didn’t particularly like bread.

He liked Clara.

Unfortunately, Clara didn’t seem to understand why a bachelor who lived alone needed twelve cinnamon rolls every Tuesday.

“You feeding an army, Caleb?” she’d asked one morning.

“No, ma’am.”

“Then why do you keep buying so much?”

He’d stared at her beautiful smile.

“My horse likes cinnamon.”

Clara had laughed so hard she’d nearly dropped a tray of biscuits.

By that afternoon, the entire town knew Caleb Morgan apparently owned the only horse in Colorado with a sweet tooth.

His best friend, Hank Dawson, considered the situation hopeless.

“You’ve been sweet on that woman since the day she arrived,” Hank said one evening. “Either ask her to marry you or start charging that horse rent for all the pastries.”

Caleb groaned.

“I can’t just walk up and ask her.”

“Why not?”

“What if she says no?”

Hank shrugged. “Then you’ll have an answer and a whole lot more money for cattle feed.”

Caleb didn’t find that particularly comforting.

For six months, he’d been writing letters to Clara.

Beautiful letters.

Honest letters.

Letters describing how the sunrise reminded him of her smile and how every quiet evening on his ranch felt incomplete without her.

He had written forty-seven of them.

He had mailed exactly none.

Instead, they sat in a wooden box beneath his bed, tied with a blue ribbon.

And every night, Caleb practiced reading them aloud to the empty room.

Then, one Saturday, a traveling merchant arrived in Willow Creek with an assortment of unusual animals.

Among them was a magnificent green parrot named General Pickles.

“Smartest bird west of the Mississippi!” the merchant announced.

The parrot promptly shouted, “YOU’RE A LIAR, FRANK!”

The crowd erupted with laughter.

Caleb stopped walking.

Clara had once mentioned that she’d always wanted a talking bird.

Her birthday was approaching.

And suddenly, Caleb had an idea.

He bought General Pickles for fifteen dollars, which was considerably more than he’d intended to spend.

The merchant handed over the cage with a peculiar warning.

“Mind what you say around him. That bird remembers things.”

Caleb smiled.

“That’s fine. I don’t talk much.”

The merchant looked almost sorry for him.

For the next three weeks, General Pickles lived in Caleb’s kitchen.

And every evening, while Caleb practiced his proposal, the parrot listened.

“Clara,” Caleb began one night, standing before a cracked mirror, “I’ve loved you since the first morning you handed me a warm biscuit and told me I looked lonely.”

“LOOKED LONELY!” the parrot squawked.

Caleb chuckled.

“That’s right, Pickles.”

He tried again.

“I don’t have much poetry in me, but I have a good ranch, two strong hands, and a heart that’s been yours for a long time.”

“HEART’S BEEN YOURS!”

“Good bird.”

Caleb continued.

“And if you’d have me, Clara Bennett, I’d spend every day of my life trying to make you happy.”

The parrot tilted its head.

“MAKE YOU HAPPY!”

Caleb grinned.

He had no idea he was teaching his feathered companion enough romantic material to ruin him publicly.

When Clara’s birthday arrived, the whole town gathered at her father’s house for supper, music, and dancing.

Caleb wore his best brown suit, polished his boots twice, and brought General Pickles in a handsome wooden cage.

Clara was delighted.

“Caleb! He’s beautiful!”

“Thought you might like him.”

“Like him? I love him!”

She reached through the cage bars and gently stroked the bird’s head.

“What’s your name, handsome?”

“PICKLES!”

Clara laughed.

“Well, hello, Pickles!”

Caleb relaxed.

Perhaps the evening would go smoothly after all.

He should have known better.

Halfway through supper, Clara’s father asked Caleb whether he’d like another slice of pie.

Before Caleb could answer, General Pickles announced from the piano:

“CLARA BENNETT, YOU’RE PRETTIER THAN A SUMMER SUNRISE!”

Every fork stopped moving.

Hank nearly choked on his coffee.

Clara blinked.

“Well,” she said slowly, “that’s a rather unusual thing for a bird to say.”

Caleb’s face turned scarlet.

“He’s probably heard it somewhere.”

“I LOVE YOUR BROWN EYES!” Pickles continued.

Hank covered his mouth with his napkin.

“AND YOUR CINNAMON ROLLS!”

Someone at the far end of the table snorted.

Clara looked directly at Caleb.

“My cinnamon rolls?”

Caleb stood so abruptly his chair scraped across the floor.

“I reckon the bird needs some air.”

“I WANT TO KISS YOU UNDER THE APPLE TREE!”

The room exploded with laughter.

Caleb hurried toward the cage.

“Pickles, hush!”

“KISS YOU! KISS YOU!”

“Please, bird.”

“MARRY ME, CLARA!”

Silence.

This time, nobody laughed.

Clara’s smile slowly disappeared.

She looked from the parrot to Caleb, who stood frozen with one hand on the cage.

“Caleb,” she whispered, “have you been teaching this bird to propose to me?”

He opened his mouth.

Nothing came out.

Then General Pickles delivered the final blow.

“FORTY-SEVEN LETTERS! FORTY-SEVEN LETTERS! HIDING UNDER THE BED!”

Hank’s eyes widened.

“Forty-seven?”

Clara slowly rose from her chair.

“What letters?”

Caleb wished the floor would swallow him whole.

“Clara, I can explain.”

But before he could say another word, the parrot flapped its wings wildly and shouted something Caleb had never taught it.

“SHE ALREADY KNOWS! SHE ALREADY KNOWS!”

Clara went completely still.

Then she turned toward her father.

And the old man’s face went pale.

Because hidden inside the pocket of his Sunday coat was a letter Caleb believed had never left his ranch.