Gabe shifted beside her. “It makes you sad to leave.”
She wiped away a tear. “Yes . . . it does. But I hope to return someday.” She hesitated, glancing back at the wagon. “Gabe, I was wondering . . . would you have time to help me take all this into town today?”
He looked at her as though considering her request, and Kathryn almost wished she hadn’t imposed on him.
Then he nodded, his blond brows arching. “I know a real nice woman you can stay with when we get there too.” His fathomless blue eyes lit like a child’s. “There’re lots of rooms where she lives.”
Later that evening, Gabe reined in the horses behind the Willow Springs mercantile and brought the loaded wagon to a sluggish halt. The mere thought of climbing down made Kathryn’s aching muscles weak with fatigue. The budding life inside her drained her energy, and she longed for her bed back at the cabin, but she pushed herself to climb down.
She introduced herself to the new owner of the mercantile, a Mr. Hochstetler. After speaking with him briefly, he agreed to sell her items, keeping a percentage for himself, which she deemed as fair. Gabe unloaded the heavier items and carried them into a back room. Overhearing him chat with Mr. Hochstetler, Kathryn learned that Gabe made deliveries for the mercantile on occasion. It would seem he got around and knew more people than she’d figured. Kathryn followed him inside with the lighter crates, but her thoughts kept returning to the bank across the street.
She planned on meeting with Kohlman tomorrow to offer a good faith payment—however modest—hoping to propose a payment schedule for her loan. Imagining his reaction to the idea made her cringe. Part of her knew it was foolish to try and come up with the money, but it wasn’t within her to quit. And maybe Larson would return. After all, God was in the miracle business, as her mother had always said.
Exhausted after several trips, Kathryn sank to the back steps of the mercantile and rested her head on her forearms. Feeling a gentle squeeze on her shoulder, she nearly wept.
“You’re tired, Miss Kathryn. The woman’s house isn’t far from here. I’ll take you.”
Kathryn started to rise, but at the familiar buzzing in her ears, she sat down again. She held up a hand. “Wait, Gabe. Give me a minute to rest, then I’ll be fine.”
He leaned close and, before she could protest, gathered her in his arms. Kathryn felt her eyes grow hot with tears again. She thought he was carrying her back to the wagon, but he walked on past.
“Where are we going?”
Gabe nodded down the street. “To Annabelle’s house. I’ve delivered stuff there before.”
“But what about the things in the wagon?”
“I’ll take care of them for you.”
After a minute, she tried again. “Gabe, I can walk now, I’m sure.”
But he shook his head and held her closer. His embrace was like that of a father cradling a daughter, and it gave Kathryn a sense of security she hadn’t felt in a very long time.
“You need to rest,” he whispered, looking straight ahead. “You miss your husband, you left your house where you lived for ten years, and you gave all your stuff to the mercantile.”
“Actually, I’m selling it,” she corrected.
“Still. None of it belongs to you anymore.”
Her throat tightened at his blatant observation, and a wave of fatigue moved through her. She couldn’t remember a time when she’d been more tired. Knowing Gabe wouldn’t mind, nor would he misinterpret her intentions, she closed her eyes and laid her head on his shoulder.
Vaguely aware of being deposited in a soft bed sometime later, Kathryn awakened, groggy. “Gabe?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he answered softly, arranging the bedcovers over her body. In the stilted shadows of the dark room, his massive stature appeared larger than life. He stood by the bed looking down upon her like a sentinel, the outline of his shoulders broad and commanding, his stance daring further harm to try and touch her. His body suddenly looked like it was chiseled from marble.
Kathryn reached out, and he took her hand. “Thank you for doing this for me.”
He didn’t answer, but she sensed his smile in the darkness.
She closed her eyes, unable to hold them open any longer. After a moment she turned back to thank Gabe again. Though she hadn’t heard the bedroom door open and close, the place where he had stood was empty. She must have drifted off and he’d left without her hearing. Kathryn curled onto her side and slept.
Whispered voices awakened her sometime during the night. They drifted through the apparently thin walls around her, but she couldn’t make out the conversations. A footfall, the creaking of wood, muted laughter. The strong smell of perfume and something else she couldn’t quite name scented the air. But she shut her mind to it and slipped back into sleep.
The next time she opened her eyes, a slanted beam of sunlight shone through a window cut high in the wall above her. She yawned and turned onto her back. Picturing Larson’s face, as she did every morning upon waking, she spread her hands over the secret blessing that would soon be visible to the world and breathed the familiar prayer. Lord, please bring him back to me . . . to us.
Blinking to focus, she listened for any of the sounds she’d heard during the night. A horse whinnied in the distance, then silence. She propped herself up on one elbow and looked around. The room was smaller than she’d sensed the night before, about a third the size of their bedroom at the cabin. In fact, it was mostly bed. A small table sat in the corner.
A knock on the door brought her fully awake. The door opened before she could respond. The first thing Kathryn noticed about the woman was her red hair. But it was unlike any shade of red Kathryn had seen before.
“My name’s Annabelle.” The woman plopped down on the edge of the bed, remnants of kohl smudging the edges of her eyes. Her lips bore evidence of a claret red long faded, and her dress was cut surprisingly low. The fabric left little to the imagination.
Kathryn caught the faint scent of cloves and noticed the woman chewing something.
Annabelle crossed her legs Indian style, despite the filmy garb. “Gabe said you needed a place to stay and Marcy was away last night, so you got her room. But on the nights all of us are here, you’ll have to stay in the room off the kitchen. There’s a cot and it’s near the stove, so you’ll keep warm enough till you find someplace else.”
Kathryn pushed herself to a sitting position. “Thank you for letting me stay in your home, Annabelle. My name is Kathryn. Kathryn Jennings.”
Annabelle stared at her for a second. “Sure.” Her smile had a mischievous quality. “Glad to do it.”
“We got in so late last night, and I certainly don’t want you to think that . . .” Kathryn paused, then smiled. “What I’m trying to say is that I promise I won’t impose on your generosity for too long. I’m planning on looking for a job today.”
Annabelle shrugged. Her eyes swept Kathryn’s face, then moved down over the rest of her body. She huffed. “Just watch out that Betsy doesn’t try and put you to work here.” Then she laughed as though she’d told a joke. “The other girls wouldn’t like that much, that’s for sure.”
Kathryn smiled along with her, wondering about this interesting woman. She guessed them to be about the same age, although Annabelle was shorter and claimed a more petite build. The dark brown roots of her hair tattled its true coloring, and Kathryn tried to imagine her without all the extra window dressing, as her mother used to say. Annabelle’s blue-eyed gaze was direct, and the slight tilt of her chin portended a stubborn will.
But one thing was certain—Annabelle possessed a kind heart. She’d let Kathryn stay here the night, and for that Kathryn was grateful. Her stomach growled.
“You hungry?” Annabelle asked needlessly, patting the bed. “Come on, let’s head to the kitchen before all the good grub is gone. The girls here eat like pigs!”
Kathryn got up and smoothed the covers and then her wrinkled dress as best she could. She followed Annab
elle down the narrow hallway, passing door after door. Two of the doors were ajar. She quickly surmised that all the rooms were about the same size as hers, and with the same sparse furnishings.
Part of her was embarrassed to meet the other women in the boardinghouse in her disheveled state, but Annabelle appeared accepting enough. Hopefully the other women would be too.
A cacophony of women’s voices met them in the hallway and soon blended with the delicious aroma of eggs, bacon, and coffee. How long had it been since she’d been in the company of a woman? Much less a group of women? Images of quilting bees and baking for church socials flitted through her mind. She’d asked God for another woman to share the joys of her current condition, and she smiled at how quickly He’d granted her request.
Annabelle pushed open a swinging door, then glanced back and winked. “Betsy may work us hard, but she feeds us good, I’ll say that for her.”
Kathryn followed Annabelle inside and took a seat beside her at the end of the long wood-plank table crowded with women. The steady hum of conversation suddenly dwindled. Kathryn looked up and scanned the faces now aimed in her direction.
She quickly counted eleven women, besides her, Annabelle, and a bountifully girthed woman laboring over the stove. The eyes boring into hers belonged to women of all ages, shapes, and sizes. Most were younger than she, but two looked older. Much older.
A common thread twined itself through the group. Kathryn couldn’t quite put a finger on it, but . . .
The joy inside her flickered. Her smile faded.
“Girls, this is Kathryn,” Annabelle announced, waving her hand in a queenly gesture. “She needed a place to stay last night so she took Marcy’s room. She’ll be with us for a few days till she lands some work.”
Gawking expressions darkened to frowns. All but one.
A small dark-haired girl at the end nodded, almost imperceptibly. Her cinnamon almond-shaped eyes flicked to Kathryn’s. Away. Then back again. A pretty smile curved her diminutive mouth.
“Well, she’s not takin’ my room!” a stout blonde declared with authority.
The aging brunette beside her banged the table with her fist. “Mine either. And I don’t appreciate Betsy hirin’ someone without talkin’ to us first!”
Heat poured through Kathryn’s body. She fought the impulse to get up and run. Her eyes darted from face to face as tainted images of what these women did—of what they were—turned her stomach. The aroma of eggs and bacon suddenly became fetid.
What on earth had Gabe been thinking? He hadn’t found her a room in a boardinghouse. He’d delivered her to a house of ill repute!
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ISAIAH ACCOMPANIED LARSON the first day of his journey, explaining that he wanted to make sure Larson found his way back through the obscure mountain pass that led to their secluded valley. Larson didn’t bother telling him he already knew the way. Instinctively. He’d grown up reading the position of the sun and had memorized the peaks of the Rockies. Never once had he been lost in this land. Ever.
Isaiah moved over the rocky terrain with surprising agility for a man his size, and though he purposefully lagged his pace, Larson had to work to keep up with him. Close to noon, Larson paused and leaned heavily on his staff, resting for a moment before attempting the steep climb before him. The cool mountain air felt good in his chest, but he still couldn’t seem to draw in enough of it to satisfy his lungs.
Watching Isaiah up ahead, he wondered again how the man had gotten him back to the cabin after finding him in the burned-out shack. Later that night he took the opportunity to ask.
Isaiah grew quiet at the question, smiling in that way of his that signaled his hesitance to speak on the matter.
“You’re a powerful man, Isaiah, I’ll grant you that. But I’m no trifling,” Larson needled him, edging back a good ways from the fire Isaiah had built. “Or I didn’t used to be.”
Isaiah laughed, then grew quiet.
“Seriously, how did you get me back there?” Larson asked again, his curiosity roused.
Isaiah rose, gathered timber in his arms, and laid it on the fire. White sparks shot up into the dark night sky, and the crackle of flame consuming wood sent involuntarily shivers up Larson’s spine. He appreciated the fire’s light and welcomed its warmth, as long as he didn’t have to handle the flames.
Isaiah took his time in answering, a wistful look filling his eyes. “A fine ol’ gal named Mabel carried you.”
Larson laughed. “Mabel, huh? She must be one brute of a woman.” Isaiah laughed along with him. Then, watching him closer, Larson felt his humor drain away. “What happened to her?”
Isaiah stoked the fire with a long branch. “I heard of a man looking for a good mule, so I sold her a while back . . . at a small mining camp not too far over the ridge there.” He pursed his lips as though trying to decide what to say next.
Larson stared at the former slave sitting across the fire from him, the words forming in his mind less of a question and more a statement of fact. “You sold her to buy what you needed to care for me.”
Isaiah shrugged a broad shoulder and stared into the flames.
Larson tasted the salt of his tears before he realized he’d shed them. Was there no end to this man’s generosity? He quickly wiped them away but knew that Isaiah had seen.
“Tears carry no shame, Larson. ’Specially not tears of gratitude. I’ve shed so many in my life I’ve lost count. I was afraid to cry in front of Abby at first, but she taught me that every person’s been hurt and has wounds. Some scars are just easier to see than others.” Isaiah’s dark eyes seemed to focus somewhere beyond Larson, on a memory long past. “The outward scars aren’t what determine what a man will become. It’s the inward scars that can keep a man from living the life God intended.”
Long into the night, Larson lay awake thinking about what Isaiah had said. And when Isaiah laid a hand to his shoulder the following morning as they said good-bye, the wisdom had taken firm root.
“You’ve been led down this path for a purpose, Larson. It’s not one you would’ve chosen—I know that.” His laughter mixed with a sigh. “I wouldn’t have chosen most of what’s happened in my life either, but I’ve come to trust that my sweet Jesus can see things better from where He is than I can from here . . . as hard as that seems sometimes.”
He pulled Larson into a hug and Larson returned it, unable to keep from smiling at how uncomfortable he would’ve been hugging another man before this. He squeezed his eyes tight against the emotion rising in his throat.
From the slope of the afternoon sun, Larson estimated three more hours of light. He and Isaiah had covered roughly four miles yesterday, and today he would push his body to its limit to cover three. His progress was gratingly slow, and it goaded his pride when he recalled how he used to walk twenty plus miles a day without fatigue. He reached down and massaged his right leg. It was already paining him, but he pushed on.
Near dusk he stopped, his leg throbbing. He eased the pack from his shoulders and sank to the ground. After a quick dinner of Abby’s biscuits and jerky, he filled his canteen from the stream running in a fury down the mountainside, evidence of the spring snow melt. Isaiah had told him this particular watercourse fed the lake by their cabin, then flowed all the way to the lower towns at the base of the Rockies. Larson dipped his finger briefly in the icy water, watching it flow downstream and wondering if that same water would soon churn down Fountain Creek past his cabin.
Tipping up his canteen, he drank deeply of Adam’s ale, recalling the first time he’d used that phrase with Kathryn.
“What are you calling it?” she’d asked, grinning.
“Adam’s ale.” He’d pushed back a damp strand of blond hair from her shoulder, enjoying the smirk of disbelief on her face. “It flows out of the mountains, fresh from the heart of the earth, clear as crystal.” She’d used the term ever since.
Larson walked back to where he’d left his pack and pulled the wrapped bottle of
liniment from the pocket. He shed his pants and long johns and rubbed the dark brown mixture into his aching muscles. The welted reddened flesh bunched and rippled beneath his fingers. He winced, wishing again for Abby’s firm but gentle touch, and for Isaiah’s conversation.
Dressing again, he unrolled his bedding and lay down. He would have liked to continue reading in the Bible Isaiah and Abby had given him but light was fading, and he let the matches at the bottom of his pack lay untouched. The chill from the ground seeped through to his bones, but he shut his mind to the cold.
Instead, he turned his thoughts back to the first time he’d pictured Kathryn as an older woman—one Abby’s age, and again the image touched him. As Abby had tended him one afternoon, he’d found himself studying her features and had quickly decided she’d been a beauty in younger years. Abby still possessed a comeliness about her, but it shone now more from within.
He closed his eyes and Kathryn’s face came into view, her warm brown eyes and honey hair, the silk of her skin. He’d long appreciated her outward beauty, but he suspected that Kathryn’s beauty would one day deepen into a radiance similar to Abby’s, and the thought warmed him. His body responded, and he hungered for the intimacies shared between a husband and his wife.
In an unexpected moment of hope, he allowed a fissure in his heart wide enough to entertain the possibility that he might enjoy that with Kathryn again someday. If she were able to look past who he was on the outside now, to what lay beneath.
He slowly turned onto his back to study the night sky and put his hand out as though reaching for the handle of the Big Dipper. How could he have ever doubted the woman Kathryn was? Or her loyalty to him?
But he knew the reason, and his chest ached with the truth of it. Kathryn had borne the brunt of his suspicion and distrust stemming from his mother’s faithlessness. Images of mistreatment at his mother’s hand, and at the hands of her countless lovers, crowded the night’s stillness. One particular memory stood out, and Larson’s stomach hardened as he relived the scene. . . .
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