Twice Blessed

by Jo Ann Ferguson

  “Here—” Her voice squeaked, and she shot Noah a glare before saying, “I’m over here, Reverend.”

  “There you are. Takes longer every year for these eyes to adjust from the sunlight. Who’s that? Ah, Noah, just the man I wanted to see.” Reverend Faulkner wove his way through the store as if he were being bounced about like the children’s ball.

  “Whoa, Reverend!” Emma rushed forward to keep a stack of cans from collapsing in his wake. “He’ll wait until you get there.”

  “True. Good news will wait,” the minister said.

  “As well as bad news,” Noah replied with a chuckle.

  Reverend Faulkner poured himself a cup of coffee from the pot on the stove. “Fortunately today, all the news I have is good. Good for you, Noah.”

  “I could use some good news.”

  The minister smiled, looking back at Emma. “We’re going to have a barn raising.”

  “I’d be glad to help you. I do know something about building.”

  “Help me?” Reverend Faulkner chuckled. “Noah, the barn raising is going to be at your place.”

  “Mine?” When he saw Emma’s bright smile, he knew the minister had already conferred with her on this.

  “As soon as Emma lets me know your supplies are in,” Reverend Faulkner said, “we’ll gather out at your place and help you rebuild that barn.”

  “They should be in on the next train,” Emma said, coming back to stand beside Noah. He wondered if she could guess that the brush of her sleeve against his was enough to throw every other thought out of his head—even this extraordinary offer. “On Thursday, Reverend Faulkner.”

  “Excellent.” The minister rubbed his hands together in anticipation. “It will take a while for the wood to be delivered out to your farm, Noah, so we will plan next Saturday for the barn raising.”

  Noah looked again from Emma’s twinkling eyes to the minister’s beatific smile. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Say you’ll have Gladys make several of her luscious chocolate cakes,” Emma said, putting her hand on his arm. “If you provide those and something to drink, folks will be glad to bring along potluck as well as their tools to help get the barn up.”

  “Was this your idea?” He knew he was treading on dangerous territory when the minister was here to witness this, but he could not keep from putting his hand up to caress her cheek.

  She nodded. “Yes, and everyone is eager to help after they saw the work you did here in the store during the flood. Folks here in Haven like to help one another.”

  “God helps those who help themselves,” the reverend intoned, then laughed.

  “Good advice,” Noah murmured as he put his arm around Emma and drew her back to him. He did not care who was watching as he kissed her with the longing he was finding more and more difficult to govern.

  When he released her, she wobbled and smiled. That smile tempted him to toss her back up on the counter and not let anything or anyone halt him from savoring every pleasure she could share with him. He ran his thumb along her jaw and saw the light of desire afire in her eyes.

  The minister clapped him on the shoulder and said, “I trust you won’t thank all of us like that.”

  “You don’t have to worry about that.”

  As Emma spoke to the minister, making arrangements for the following Saturday, Noah watched, his elbow on the counter. No, the minister did not need to worry about Noah kissing anyone else. Who would have guessed, after five years of traveling, he would find what he was looking for right here in this small town? Now all he needed to do was make sure he did not lose it … again.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Belinda came running into the kitchen. “They’re here! They’re here! Come and see!”

  Noah glanced with regret at his half-finished breakfast. He should have eaten earlier, but he had wanted to have the floor of the barn ready when the others arrived. Reaching for a piece of toast, he kneaded his right shoulder. The hard work on this farm reminded him how many years he had been supervising others instead of doing the work himself.

  “I have some liniment ready,” Gladys said with a knowing smile. “Miss Delancy was able to provide all the ingredients except the chloroform.” Counting off on her fingers, she said, “At the store, she had the alcohol I needed and laudanum and oil of hemlock—”

  “Don’t tell me all the ingredients. I’d rather not know.”

  She laughed. “Of course, you could just have that young lady rub your shoulders for you.”

  “Now there’s a good idea.” Picking up the piece of toast, he hurried out to where the barn floor was already surrounded by carriages and wagons.

  His usually quiet yard was filled with greetings and children tumbling out onto what grass had been able to grow back after the flood. The sentinel trees along the field still stood, but the smaller ones had been washed away. Yet already the grass and weeds were filling in what had been stolen by the Ohio.

  Women were taking the baskets that their menfolk lifted out and handed to them. Seeing the number of people parked under the trees and the line of vehicles coming down the road, he wondered if the long planks he had set out on sawhorses on the other side of the house would hold all the food. As the women streamed toward the house, he nodded to each of them until his head spun.

  Noah was astounded to see two wagons filled with people in the unrelieved black worn by the folks out at River’s Haven. No one had given him any idea that the people who kept so much to themselves in their isolated community would come to help here.

  “Don’t look so amazed,” said Emma, coming down the hill from the house with Sean in tow. “The River’s Haven Community has often helped us. They just don’t want our help. It’s the perfect day for a barn raising.”

  “Sunny and not too hot.” He took her hand. “Although it seems much warmer now that you’re here, sweetheart.”

  She laughed, but her rosy cheeks told him she was pleased with his suggestive words. He hoped she had thought as often as he did about the fiery kisses they had shared at her store.

  “Well, well,” said Gladys after she had greeted Emma and Sean. “Don’t that beat all.”

  Noah had to agree when he saw Murray’s dilapidated wagon bouncing down the road. His cantankerous neighbor parked it next to the others. Taking out a bag of tools, Murray strode toward the barn.

  “You’d best get to work,” Emma said, giving Noah a teasing shove. “Let Reverend Faulkner direct the teams and see which one can get their wall up the quickest.”

  “A contest?”

  “A barn raising bee should be fun.” She smiled at Gladys. “I hope you have some special dessert for the winning team.”

  “I will.”

  Emma turned to Sean as Noah and Gladys walked away in opposite directions. “There’s a baseball and a bat in the back of the wagon. Get it out, and take the other children out into the field over there.”

  “No.” His tone was abruptly sullen.

  “You don’t know the rules? They’re quite simple.”

  “I know how to play baseball. I just don’t want to.”

  “Why not?” she asked softly.

  “The kids in Haven don’t want anything to do with us kids from the train.”

  She kept her sigh silent. When Sean had stopped complaining about being ostracized at school, she had thought the situation had gotten better. All that had changed was that he was suffering in silence.

  “Take the ball and bat,” she said, “and find some of your friends from the train. There are certain to be many of them here today. If the other children want to play, too, they’ll join in.”

  He folded his arms in front of him. “I don’t want to play with the Haven kids.”

  “You play with Belinda.”

  “She’s different. She doesn’t look down at me.”

  Putting her hands on his shoulders, she said, “Sean O’Dell, no one can look down on you if you keep your own chin high. But if you keep your own nose
high in the air, you’ll never see the ones who are trying to catch your eye to become a friend.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Think about what I said, and you may.” She gave him a shove as she had Noah. “Go and get the ball and bat, and see what happens.”

  “All right.” His glum answer suggested she had no idea what she was talking about.

  Emma wished she could call him back. His steps were heavy, and he was staring at the ground. If he wanted to stay in Haven, and now she knew he did, he needed to find a way to bridge the differences between himself and the other children. She smiled when a redheaded boy ran up to him and greeted him with a big hug. Because she did not recognize the boy, she knew he must be one of the orphans.

  Going into the house, she headed for the kitchen. It was as busy as a beehive and buzzed just as loudly. Gladys was keeping order somehow with all the women who had brought food and were looking for a place to put it. The housekeeper waved rather desperately to Emma.

  Like someone going down for the third time? Emma laughed at the thought and waded into the cacophony. Greeting her neighbors, she saw one woman standing off by herself. In amazement, she realized it was the woman from River’s Haven who had been in the Grange Hall the day the orphan train arrived. No one else was talking to her.

  “It’s nice of you to come for the barn raising,” Emma said with a smile.

  “Thank you.” The woman’s black hair glistened beneath her simple bonnet.

  Emma recognized the terse answer as a dismissal, but she went on, “I saw you at the Haven Grange when the children arrived from back east. My name is Emma Delancy.”

  “I’m Rachel Browning.” Her face lost its cool sternness. “You were at the Grange Hall with Reverend Faulkner, weren’t you?”

  “Yes. I was talking to him and Mr. Barrett about Sean O’Dell, who’s now living with me.”

  “Sean O’Dell is with you?”

  “Yes.”

  “May I ask you some questions, Miss Delancy?”

  “Of course.” She gestured toward the door out of the kitchen. “I would like to go outside. Would you like to come, too? We can talk out there while we watch the barn raising and the children at the same time.”

  Miss Browning hesitated for so long that Emma thought she would say no. Then she nodded. As Emma walked back toward the front porch, she noted how the women coming into the house cut a wide path around Miss Browning.

  “You shouldn’t let it bother you, Miss Delancy,” Miss Browning said as she held the door open for Emma.

  “It?”

  “The looks I seem to attract wherever I go.” She smiled, and Emma was astounded at the transformation. Miss Browning’s face came alight with her smile. “The looks everyone from River’s Haven attract. Don’t let them bother you. I don’t … anymore.”

  A dozen questions whirled through Emma’s head, but she silenced all of them. She could not use this opportunity to pry into the closed ways of the River’s Haven Community. When she delivered items from the store, she was allowed to drive down the main road. There she sat in her wagon while the supplies were unloaded.

  “Miss Delancy?”

  Emma hoped Miss Browning had not said more than that, because she had not heard anything but her name. “Yes?”

  “You said Sean O’Dell is living with you?”

  “Yes.”

  Miss Browning hesitated, then said, “Kitty—I mean—”

  Emma laughed. “Sean calls her Kitty Cat whenever he speaks of her, which is often.”

  “She speaks of him, too. Often.”

  “They miss each other, it seems.” She heard shouts from the direction of the barn. Hammers hit wood, and laughter was unrestrained—both from the barn and from the field where the children were playing baseball. She could not tell if both the Haven and the orphan train children were playing together, but it seemed there were too many in the field to be just the children off the train. “Is Kitty Cat here?”

  Miss Browning shook her head. “The children remained at the Community to finish a project they had started in school earlier in the week.”

  “Sean will be very disappointed.” She sat on the railing and let the soft breeze uncurl the strands at her nape.

  “I’d like to find a way for the two of them to have some time together.”

  “You would?” Emma could not have been more surprised if Miss Browning had thrown her black skirt over her head and danced a jig on the porch.

  “I’m not sure how yet, but I plan to speak to the Assembly of Elders to find out if there’s a way. First, I wanted to be certain you’d welcome her in your home.”

  “Sean’s friends are always welcome.”

  Miss Browning smiled again. “Thank you, Miss Delancy. I’ll be sure to petition the Assembly of Elders as soon as possible.”

  “Good luck.”

  Miss Browning started to reply, but someone called to her from down closer to the barn. Guilt banished her smile. Not just guilt, Emma realized, but a flash of rebellion. That amazed Emma, for she had thought everyone in River’s Haven accepted their odd laws. The very fact Miss Browning had suggested a way for the children to meet again might be a revelation that she had not completely acceded to those ways.

  As Miss Browning hurried away, Emma went back into the house. She should be helping Gladys in the kitchen.

  She had not gone more than a pair of steps when Belinda popped out of the parlor. With a laugh, Emma caught the little girl before they collided.

  “What are you doing inside, Belinda? I thought you’d be out playing with the other children.”

  “They say I’m too small.” She took a bite of the cookie that had already sprinkled crumbs down the front of her ruffled, light blue dress.

  “You should show them that they are wrong. Tell them you’re able to catch the ball.”

  “But I can’t.”

  “Then you can always cheer for everyone else.” She squatted down so her eyes were level with Belinda’s. “Tell Sean that I said I thought you’d do very well in the outfield.”

  “Everyone is out in the field.”

  “Not out in the field. Outfield.”

  Belinda’s forehead threaded. “Isn’t that just the same?”

  “Not in baseball.”

  Straightening, Emma found her gaze caught. Not by living eyes, but by those in the photograph on the mantel. She should not be standing here as she stared at Noah’s late wife’s portrait. She could not look away. The smile the woman wore was so happy and hopeful.

  “That’s Martha,” Belinda said and took another bite of the cookie.

  “Who?”

  Belinda pointed at the photograph. “That’s Martha.”

  “I thought it was a picture of your mother.”

  “It’s Martha.”

  “Who is Martha?” She should not be asking these questions, but her curiosity had been piqued. She had assumed that the photograph was of Noah’s late wife, which was why it held this place of honor.

  “Martha was Mr. Sawyer’s sister,” Gladys said, shooing Belinda out of the house. “She died a while back.”

  “I didn’t mean to snoop.”

  Gladys laughed. “Of course you did. Mr. Sawyer should have told you who was in the picture. After all, he had you tote it out of the house for him when the river was trying to run right through here.” She waved her hands and apron. “Now you shoo, too. The house during a barn raising is fine for us old folks. You should be out watching the work.”

  “The other women—”

  “Are here with their husbands! Now shoo.”

  Emma grinned. Gladys was proving to be an ceaseless matchmaker, and the match she wanted to see made now was one between Emma and Noah. Her heart fluttered at the thought of becoming his wife. The very sound of Noah’s voice thrilled her. And when he drew her close, she could lose herself in the enchantment of his touch.

  Hearing Gladys laugh as she wandered out onto the porch again, Emma walked
down the steps. She took a deep breath. It was no longer thick with the mud washed up from the river, but filled with the return of everything green. Soon, except for the unweathered wood on the barn, there would be no sign the river had flowed up over its banks here.

  “Good morning.” Mr. Atherton tipped his hat to her as he walked back toward where the wagons were parked.

  She smiled, wondering how she could have been so wrong when she had been uneasy about this man being in Haven. Her first impressions were usually reliable, but she had been so wrong about him. “Mr. Atherton, I didn’t realize you were still in Haven.”

  “I’m leaving on the next train north, but I wanted to thank you for making a stranger feel welcome.”

  “Others haven’t?”

  He laughed. “No, no, I didn’t mean to suggest that. The people here have been very friendly and have taken the time to answer all my silly questions.”

  Emma stiffened in spite of her efforts not to. “What silly questions?”

  “Oh, about how this town was settled and the residents, both new and old.” His smile remained warm, so she guessed he had not taken note of her reaction. “I haven’t had a chance to visit this part of the state before, so I figured I should learn all I could. Your story about fleeing just ahead of the flood is probably the most fascinating one I heard.”

  “It wasn’t fascinating at the time,” Noah said, coming to stand by her side.

  “Noah,” Emma said, hoping her voice did not sound breathless as it did so often when he was near, “this is Mr. Atherton who has been visiting Haven. Mr. Atherton, Noah Sawyer.”

  Mr. Atherton’s smile grew so wide it revealed all his teeth when he shook Noah’s hand. “I suspect it wasn’t fascinating at the time, but Miss Delancy has given you much of the credit for saving her, your housekeeper, and the children.”

  “She’s too modest.” He put his arm around her shoulders, and she could not keep from nestling closer to him. “If it hadn’t been for Emma guiding us into Haven, I believe we would have ended up sitting on the house’s roof while the water swirled up around us.”