Family Lessons

by Allie Pleiter

  “I was trying to show you how I feel.”

  “Great guns, woman, do you think I have any doubt about how you feel? You follow me around like some kind of puppy, thinking all kinds of good about me when any fool with half a wit would know better. I’ve told you what kind of bad I am. I think I did a mighty fine job of showing you. And still you won’t wake up. I’m bad news, Miss Sanders. Wise up and steer clear.”

  “I don’t see why my trying to understand makes me—”

  Mason threw his hands up in the air. “There is nothing to understand!” He stormed past her, then turned to face her one last time. “Forget it ever happened. Forget whatever you think I am, because you couldn’t be more wrong.” He made no effort to hide the fury in his eyes. “Go away, Holly. Stay away. For crying out loud, hear me this time and stay away.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  “Miss Sanders, are you feeling all right?”

  The wire clerk peered over the top of his spectacles at her, seeming to doubt the stiff smile she mustered up as reassurance. Not that she would admit how Mason Wright had rattled her. And anyway, Heidi’s fate was more important than any sheriff’s grumble-some irritation. How dare he make her feel the way she did! “Yes, Jason, I’m just a bit tired, that’s all. It’s been a long week.”

  “You need another form?” She’d had to ask for another form twice already. Her brain just did not want to make polite inquiries at the moment.

  “No, I’m quite fine. I’ll just need a minute.”

  She took a deep breath and tried again: Inquiring about orphan boy Jakob Strauss STOP Placed by Orphan Salvation Society in Glenwood, Iowa, to Robinson family STOP Sister here in Evans Grove Nebraska STOP Reunion possible? STOP

  Reunion possible? Did she have a right to make so bold an inquiry? She imagined that most people would question what a child Heidi’s age knew of family ties. But Holly knew that this young, scarred girl had made a very grown-up decision, made a sacrifice few adults would embrace. It hardly seemed fair to cut her off completely from the brother she’d tried so hard to help. Was it bold? Yes. Did it feel like setting something right in a world where too much had gone wrong?

  Yes, Holly told herself as she signed her name to the form and pushed it across the counter to the clerk. Too much in Holly’s world refused to make sense lately, and this was one of the only things where she could clearly see her next step.

  * * *

  The next day, Holly went straight to Rebecca the minute Heidi and the boys were settled into their chore teams. The reply telegram she’d received this morning had been burning a hole in her pocket since the wire clerk brought it over, but this wasn’t the kind of news she could share around the children.

  Rebecca was leaning against one of the benches on the town square, looking exhausted. Holly hesitated, not sure if the news in her pocket would make things better or worse for the OSS agent. “We’ve got to get you a room at the hotel, Rebecca. You can’t keep sleeping at the schoolhouse like this. You’re not getting enough rest. Why don’t you let me take one night a week? Then you wouldn’t even have to worry about the hotel. You could sleep in my bed. We can get volunteers to take some of the other nights.”

  “It’s just hard...alone. Stuart was a grumpy old man some days, and I used to wonder how on earth he had enough compassion in him to leave his wife and daughter alone to do these long trips, but he was a partner. A second set of hands, even on his worst days.”

  “You’re not alone. Amelia and Charlotte and I? We’re here to help you. And the rest of the committee—you know they want to help any way they can.”

  Rebecca pinned a strand of hair back up into place. “I’m not so sure about Miss Ward’s intentions.”

  “Don’t mind her.” Holly sat down beside Rebecca. “She just...well, she’s difficult and opinionated.”

  “I’ve met less difficult and opinionated mules.” A small smile crept across the woman’s tired face. “And I haven’t met that many mules.” She sighed. “She means well, I do understand that. It’s just that she can be so...so...”

  “Downright mean?” Holly leaned in and offered.

  Rebecca laughed. “I was trying not to put it so sharply.”

  “We’re all sort of used to her bluster. Pauline Evans said to me once that she believes fighting with Beatrice Ward is part of the glue that holds Evans Grove together. I don’t think she’s half wrong on that. Beatrice is loud but mostly harmless. Even Sheriff Wright said, ‘she’s all roar and no claw’ the other day.”

  Rebecca raised an inquiring eyebrow. “And how is the good sheriff? Don’t think I haven’t noticed how you two avoid each other lately. You never did tell me how you built your drawbridge.”

  “It wasn’t a bridge of any kind. It broke into a thousand pieces and fell into the moat, that’s what happened, but I don’t want to talk about that.”

  Rebecca turned to face her. “You sure? Both of you look miserable. He practically scowled the entire meeting and he’s been avoiding the schoolhouse like he’d catch something if he came near.”

  “I have much more important things to discuss.” Holly pulled the telegram from her pocket. “I’ve had a telegram from the selection committee in Glenwood, Iowa.”

  “Already?”

  “Well, it seems there’s a reason they wired back so fast. Jakob has disappeared. He ran away the second night he was in Glenwood. He’d been inconsolable from the moment he learned Heidi was back on the train.”

  Rebecca came to the same instantaneous conclusion Holly had. “He’s run away to come find her, hasn’t he? He always was protective of her, like nothing I’ve ever seen.” Concern furrowed her brows. “That’s got to be eighty miles from here.” Her eyes scanned the rough, bare landscape to the east, as if she could see Iowa from their shady spot on the town square. “This is no place for a city boy on his own, even a smart one like Jacob. I can’t bear to think what’s become of him.” Rebecca’s hand went to Holly’s arm. “We can’t tell Heidi.”

  “I’m glad you see it that way. It’d only make things worse. She feels like she’s sacrificed herself so he could have a better life. If she finds out he’s in danger on her account—and I suppose we don’t know for certain that he is—she’ll be heartbroken.”

  Rebecca’s sigh was enormous and heavy. “She’s already heartbroken. She’s been through so very much, so young.” Both women cast their gaze in the direction of Gavin’s General Store, where Heidi was helping Mrs. Gavin sort through seed packets this afternoon. “After losing her parents in the fire that gave her those scars, her brother was all she had. It broke her heart to let him go. I keep asking God why he saw fit to allow so much suffering in her short life. I haven’t gotten an answer.”

  “I’ve had a bit of a go-round with God on that very subject myself.” Holly shrugged her shoulders. “Too many good people—even young ones—lost their lives in the storm and the flood. There was a week where I went to a funeral every single day. After a while, you get so filled up with the hurt you can’t see the good even if it’s right in front of you.” Holly’s hand found her handkerchief in the pocket next to the telegram and she thought about how she’d had to hang damp hankies over the chair backs every evening in her room that week. So many tears. Far too many.

  “There is good, you know,” Rebecca offered. “Tom’s made wonderful improvements in his reading and Lizzie wrote her name the other day—even if the Zs were crooked, they were lovely Zs.” She caught Holly’s eyes. “You’re a very gifted teacher, and the children adore you. I don’t know what I’d have done without you on that awful day.” Rebecca folded her hands. “I’m actually glad we’re here. I think you were right when you said you were sure God delivered these children to Evans Grove. If only I could get Patrick and Liam to see it as clearly as I do.”

  Rebecca’s tone told Holly what she’d already guessed when the boys were overly tired and quarrelsome last night. “They snuck out again, didn’t they?”

  “For a w
hole hour. I’ve been just waiting for someone to come shouting about whatever damage or trouble they’ve caused. They tell me they’re only wandering around exploring, but we both know that’s hardly likely.”

  “I’d really hoped the chore teams would help them get that out of their systems.” Holly tucked her feet underneath her and looked at Rebecca. “Do we know if they’ve actually taken anything?”

  “I imagine we’d have heard from Sheriff Wright by now if they had.” The pretty blonde woman returned Holly’s gaze with a sly smile. “And then again, maybe not. He has such a soft spot for Liam, even if he’d never admit it in a million years.”

  “He does at that, but I doubt even that would stop him if he felt the boys were stealing.” Holly smiled as she recalled Mason’s inability to hide his grin around the boy. “Mason Wright isn’t the kind of man to play favorites—especially where the law is concerned. As a matter of fact, I expect he’d come down extra hard on Liam if he caught him—probably gave him an earful already about keeping out of Beatrice’s suspicions.”

  Rebecca rose and dusted off her skirts. “Well, it hasn’t worked. No doubt something new has gone missing and we’ll hear tell of it soon if there’s not talk already.” She hugged her arms to her chest. “Time isn’t our friend here, Holly. I was sure once Friedrich was placed, some of the other families would step up and take the other three in. I know they should stay. They belong here, not in Greenville, or back in New York. But we can’t wait for families forever.”

  * * *

  Before the sun came up Saturday morning, Mason was stepping into the saddle and heading west toward Greenville. It was a long ride, but he needed the time and space. It would have been easier to take the train, but Mason wasn’t fond of the notion of heading back to the tracks any time soon. Tracks meant Holly and Liam and all the things that had begun poking themselves into his neatly boxed life.

  His neatly boxed, woefully lonesome life. For a man who claimed to enjoy his solitude, he was coming to care too much about the wrong people. Lately it felt like every day found a new way to shake up his spirit, to burst things open that ought to stay locked and hidden. He was too plum fond of Liam for any good to come of it. What could he hope to offer the boy? Liam needed a stable home and family, and he’d never find them while playing shadow to a lonesome lawman. Still, the scraggly redhead was as stubborn as Holly in his belief that they made a team.

  Holly. Every time he was sure he’d been gruff enough to put her off for good, she’d come back with some new request. What kind of woman asked for an explanation of a kiss? God in His Heaven must find it amusing that her directness—the very thing he liked most about Holly—would be such a torture to him.

  And that God in His Heaven—if He really was the way Mason thought of Him—also knew justice must prevail. Debts must be paid, sins must be punished. Holly could cling to mercy all she wanted, but she wasn’t riding into Greenville to watch a man hang for his crimes. The world required order and balance. Dead men—and dead mothers—could never be revived and that’s why killers had to hang.

  Almost against his will, Mason’s memory recalled the one place dead men could be revived. There was one man who hadn’t let death be the end. His hand found its way to his shirt pocket, where he’d carried her inscribed page from that book of Psalms. Christ had been in his life once, before his terrible lapse in protecting Phoebe. Christ had extended forgiveness to a convicted criminal right next to him on the cross, hadn’t He? Why had that fact come bubbling out of his memory? He was sure Holly would quote it as evidence of the “forgiven future” she offered.

  She was sweet, but she was naive. Today’s destination only proved such a thing wasn’t really possible.

  * * *

  “What’s wrong?” Holly opened her door an hour later to find Mary Turner standing with an alarmed look on her face.

  Mary pulled her shawl tighter against the early-morning chill. “It’s Charlie Miller.”

  Holly pulled the door open farther and ushered Mary inside. “What’s happened?”

  “He’s dead. He’d been working all day repairing damage to the shop and then having the picnic. Charlotte confided in me that he wasn’t very happy about the prospect of so many children in his yard, and he complained of not feeling well that evening. He was out of bed when she woke this morning, but it wasn’t unusual for Charlie to be in the shop early. She went to fetch him home for breakfast and found him cold on the ground.”

  “That’s horrible.” More death. It hardly seemed fair. “How is Charlotte? Sasha?”

  “James is with them now. Doc Simpson was with them earlier, but he left with Charlie’s body so they could tend to it away from the house. No one wants Sasha to see too much.” The woman shook her head, tsking. “Poor Charlotte. I’m so glad God saw to give her little Sasha so she wouldn’t be alone in all this.”

  “She’s not alone,” Holly declared. “She has us. We’ll all help her get through this.” Holly finished putting her hair up in a bun and grabbed her shawl. “I can’t stand the thought of another funeral.”

  “James said the same thing. He said ‘I’ve prayed over too many fresh graves,’ when Bucky Wyler came and got him this morning.”

  “Bucky?”

  Mary’s eyes teared up. “Both he and Mel Hutchinson arrived at the shop at the same time and found Charlotte standing over the body. He was stopping by before work to ask Charlie to help him build a cradle. Seems Cindy’s expecting. It’s so sweet and so sad.”

  Mel, Charlie’s apprentice, was a kind man. He and his wife had taken Lizzie into their home. But it was Bucky who was closest to the wheelwright. Charlie wasn’t a social, gregarious man, but he and Bucky had struck some kind of chord in each other since the flood. A sort of father-son relationship had sprung up between them, as Charlie had no children and Bucky’s pa was lost in the flood. Now, it seemed Bucky would be a father with no father to guide him. “Poor Bucky. Poor Charlotte.” Holly’s mind went to Bucky’s other friend, Mason.

  Mary sighed and wiped her eyes. “I thought about finding Sheriff Wright next. He and Bucky are friends, aren’t they?”

  “He’s not here.” Holly felt the weight of death pressing in all around her. “He went into Greenville early this morning to attend the hanging of the railroad bandit.” Death upon death. Death compounding death. Death to repay death. It all seemed like such a fruitless waste. She hugged her arms to her chest. “A baby. I can’t think of anything Evans Grove needs more than a new baby.” She patted the hand of the pastor’s wife. “Thanks for coming, Mary. You head on home now. You look as if you’ve been up for hours. There’s no school today so I’ve plenty of time to tend to Charlotte and Sasha.”

  Holly walked up to the door of the Miller house. The chore team had just painted it earlier this week. How many times had Mason sent Liam over to Charlie’s for nails or hinges or whatever as the boys worked? Holly looked down the street toward that smithy shop, imagining its glowing forge now dark and mournfully quiet.

  Reverend Turner pulled open the door. “I’d say ‘good morning,’ only it’s not so good. Charlie was quiet, but he worked hard. Honest men are always hard losses for a town like this.”

  “And we’ve lost so many.” Holly felt like this last one tipped the scales from “hard” to “unbearable.” In a sad bit of practicality, she found herself wondering if Gavin’s even had any black cloth or ribbons left.

  “Doc left an hour ago.” The reverend nodded somberly toward the doctor’s office down the street. “It’s best I be going now. Dave Holland’s agreed to step in and build the casket on account of...well, you know.”

  She did. Everyone in town knew that Charlie Miller was the man to build caskets when kin died in Evans Grove. He’d always managed some sort of decoration on the lid nails so the caskets looked dignified and pretty. That was until the flood, when it was all he could do to build them fast enough for the onslaught of bodies. Now not only was there no Charlie to help Bucky build a p
retty cradle for his bride’s new baby, there was no one to bury Charlie Miller in the dignity he’d given everyone else. Holly looked up into the gray sky, thinking it ought to just open up and rain sorrow on the whole world today.

  “Miffanders?”

  Holly found a smile somewhere down in all the gray, pasting it on for the little girl who rushed up to her as she stepped into the Miller home. Never quite able to get her tiny mouth around Holly’s name, Sasha’s “Miffanders” had become a charming joke between Charlotte and Holly. She pulled the girl into her arms. “Hello, sweetheart. How are you doing?”

  “Mama sad.” She said it in the innocent, incomprehensible way a child grasps catastrophe.

  Holly gave Sasha an extra tight squeeze. “Of course she is, darling. We all are.”

  She stepped farther into the small but homey single room of a house where Charlotte sat at the table with a vacant face. Charlotte was usually an energetic, get-things-done kind of woman, but today she sat quietly. “Hello, Holly.” Her voice held no emotion. “You’re kind to come.”

  Holly eased into the seat across from Charlotte. “How could I not? You’ve been such a help to me and the school. Even last night, giving the picnic for the children like you did.”

  That brought a response from the woman. “It was lovely to have a yard full of children like that. Charlie said the noise alone would wake the—” She stopped, unwilling to finish the morbid metaphor under the circumstances. “It was loud. But a wonderful sort of loud.”

  “Why don’t I make us some tea?” It seemed a feeble way to stave off the gray of the morning, but when Charlotte made no objection, Holly lit the stove.

  There came a knock at the door. “A bit early for condolence calls, but why don’t you let me get it?”

  Holly returned to the door and pulled it open to find Mel Hutchinson. He doffed his hat, awkward at the intrusion. “Mrs. Miller?”

  Sasha had climbed up into her new mother’s lap, and Charlotte looked up from fussing with her braids. “Yes, Mel?”