A Time to Love

by Al Lacy

  Hall ignored the questions and rose to his feet. “Anthony will take you now so you can shed that prison garb and get into your own clothes. When you’re ready, he’ll take you to the person who wants to see you before you see Sheriff Perkins.”

  As the two men walked down the hall to the room where Blake’s clothes had been kept since he’d come to the prison, Blake said, “C’mon, ol’ pal, tell me. Who’s the person who came with Sheriff Perkins to see me? Is it Haman?”

  “I can’t tell you,” Tubac said with a smile.

  “Do you know who it is?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why can’t you tell me?”

  “I’m sworn to secrecy.”

  “Really?”

  “Yep.”

  “Why is it so secretive? If it’s not Haman, it’s my pastor. That’s who it is! It’s Pastor Duane Clarke!”

  Tubac remained mum but couldn’t stop the slight curve to his lips.

  Ten minutes later, Blake was led back to the warden’s office. Hall shook hands with him and said, “I’m sorry you had to put in time here, Blake, but I’ll say you sure have been a model prisoner.”

  “I try to behave, sir,” Blake said with a grin. He still felt as if he were walking in a dream.

  “You take care, Blake,” said the warden as they stepped out into the corridor.

  “You too, sir. Good-bye.”

  The two men moved down the corridor to a heavy steel door with no window. Anthony said, “The person who came to see you is just on the other side of this door.” Then sudden tears filmed his eyes as he said, “Thank you for leading me to Jesus. The other guards you led to Him are all out with the chain gang, but I know they’d want me to thank you for them, too.”

  “The pleasure was mine, Anthony,” said Blake, giving him a pat on the back.

  “You have a happy life, my friend and brother, and I’ll meet you and Larry Huffman in heaven.”

  “You sure will,” Blake said with conviction.

  Anthony took a deep breath. “When you and your friend inside this room are ready to go, you’ll find Sheriff Perkins outside. He rented a buggy in town and will take both of you to the depot. The outside door of the room isn’t locked.”

  “All right. And thanks for everything.”

  Anthony unlocked the door. “There you go.”

  Blake stepped through the door and started as it clanked shut behind him. He paused, and as his vision cleared, he saw he was in some kind of conference room. His head swung toward a shadow by a curtainless window.

  And then he saw her.

  19

  LINDA’S SLEEP HAD BEEN RESTLESS, fraught with ugly dreams of Lewis and Janet and Haman. When she awakened for the third time from a bad dream, she lay there, unable to go back to sleep. Finally, she prayed that God would give her sleep, and she fell into quiet, restful slumber.

  Rising from bed early, she was excited yet nervous about meeting Blake for the first time that very day.

  She fussed with her hair, first pulling it on top of her head in an upsweep. Then, thinking it looked too severe, she let it all hang down her back.

  Shaking her head at herself in the small mirror, she said, “No, Linda, that’s too casual for this occasion.”

  At last she pulled it back, forming a soft chignon at the nape of her neck with tendrils curling around her face and forehead.

  “There, now,” she said to herself, “that looks more like the real you—the Linda that Blake saw in the photograph.”

  She had chosen a delicate pink dress of fine lawn cotton with a small white stripe in it. It had a round neckline and a delicate lace collar. The back was tied in a large bow, and it hugged her slender waist. She placed a white straw bonnet trimmed in pink on her head and tied the long pink satin ribbon in a becoming bow beneath her left ear.

  When she had fluffed the bow, she stepped back from the mirror and looked at her image with a critical eye. She turned from side to side, standing on tiptoe to see as much as she could of herself.

  I look a bit pale, she thought, and pinched her cheeks to bring a blush to them.

  Breathing a fervent prayer for God’s grace in what lay ahead, she left the hotel room to join Sheriff Claude Perkins for their train ride to Ukiah.

  A pulse throbbed in Linda’s temple as she stood near the curtainless window in the prison conference room. The California sunshine filtered brightly through the glass.

  She had clasped her hands to keep them from trembling, and her mouth was a bit dry as she set her eyes on the man she loved.

  Blake’s jaw slackened as he beheld the beauteous vision in pink and white. The lovely young lady he had dreamed about and prayed for was now standing in front of him. He closed his eyes, fearing that she would disappear when he opened them again.

  But open them he did, and she was still there in all her loveliness.

  Blake could only gasp, “Linda!”

  It was a moment of magic.

  Both were so elated at finally seeing one another, they rushed into each other’s arms, tears flowing freely.

  Their embrace was long and tender. As Blake held her, he said, “Linda, I love you! Oh, I’ve wanted to see you and tell you that for so long!”

  She had to catch her breath to speak, then said shyly, “I love you, too, Blake. I’m here because I love you.”

  They clung to each other for what seemed like an endless time, then Blake took her hands in his and said, “You are even more beautiful than your picture. Warden Hall said the person who was waiting in here would tell me the whole story. I have no idea what’s happened in your life, or with my friend Haman Warner, who was supposed to wire you and tell you about my being sent here. I asked him to explain that I was innocent, and to tell you I needed to hear from you. They won’t let me send any mail, or even a wire. I had one of the guards try to contact you or your parents in Boston by wire, but bad storms have the telegraph wires down. Oh, Linda, I’m so glad you’re here!”

  “Me, too,” she said. “Let’s sit down over here at the table, and all your questions will be answered, I’m sure, as I tell you the story.”

  Blake looked toward the outside door and said, “Sheriff Perkins is out there, isn’t he? I was told he came along with my mysterious visitor to take me to Sacramento.”

  “Yes, he’s there.”

  “How soon does the train leave?”

  “Late this afternoon.”

  “So we have time for you to tell me what’s happened before we go?”

  “Yes. Sheriff Perkins told me to take all the time we need.”

  As they sat down, Blake took hold of her hand and said, “You are so beautiful.”

  Linda blushed. “And you are so kind.”

  “Kindness has nothing to do with it,” he said softly. “It’s just the truth.”

  Smiling, she said, “This moment is a dream come true for me.”

  “For me, too,” Blake said, squeezing her hand.

  “I hope you’ll still feel toward me as you do now when you’ve heard the story.”

  “Linda, nothing could change how I feel about you. Why, you came here today because you love me. That’s what you said, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then that’s all that matters. Now, tell me what has happened.”

  As the story unfolded, Blake was stunned to learn that his trusted friend had turned out to be his heartless enemy.

  Linda explained in detail how Haman had sold the bank in Sacramento and bought the bank in Cheyenne City, and how he had impersonated Blake, both to the people of Cheyenne City and to her.

  When she came to the part of the story about her marriage to Haman, she broke down and sobbed. Blake took her in his arms and told her she couldn’t be blamed.

  When she was able to go on, Linda said, “Blake, I know the biggest question you have is how it came about that you were found to be innocent by the law and are now free.”

  “It is,” he said, “but I’ll wait for that pa
rt of the story.”

  “Well, that part begins right now.”

  He eyed her dreamily and said, “You are the most beautiful lady in all the world. Inside and out. The Lord has so blessed me.”

  This is the Blake Barrett who wrote those precious letters to me, she thought.

  Taking a deep breath, Linda went on. She told him how she was having questions about the “Blake” she was married to and had even told him in person that he wasn’t the same man as he was in his letters. She gave Blake examples of the times Haman had tripped himself up, and how she’d even baited him. She was sorely disappointed in “Blake,” and her marriage to him had become miserable.

  She went on to say that her misery and her nagging doubts about the man she’d married drove her to search among his belongings for answers. When she found nothing in drawers or closets, she finally broke the lock on his trunk and found an envelope containing clippings from the Sacramento Gazette about the real Blake Barrett’s arrest, conviction, and prison sentence.

  Blake shook his head in amazement at what he was hearing. Suddenly Linda reached into her handbag and pulled out the brown envelope. Removing the clippings from the envelope, she said, “Here they are. Take a look.”

  Blake spread the clippings before him, his eye catching the big page with the glaring headlines and pictures of both Haman and himself. “Well, I guess you figured it out real quick when you saw these pictures,” he said.

  “That’s for sure. And let me tell you right here, that even though I had not seen a picture of you, I had a mental image. The day Haman met me at the Cheyenne City depot, I was terribly disappointed. I just knew that you were tall, blond, blue-eyed, and handsome.”

  “Well, you had the first three right, anyway,” he said, chuckling.

  “I got all four right,” she countered.

  Getting serious again, Blake said, “So you took the clippings to the law, I suppose.”

  “Yes. Sheriff Bob Coffield in Cheyenne City wired Sheriff Perkins to advise him of what I had found, and that Haman was living in Cheyenne City as Blake Barrett. Sheriff Coffield and his deputies arrested Haman and jailed him. Sheriff Perkins wired for a deputy U.S. Marshal out of Denver to take Haman back to Sacramento so he could face grand theft charges.”

  Blake looked down soberly and said, “I never would have suspected Haman. So he’s in Sacramento now?”

  Linda let a few seconds pass, then said, “No. He’s dead.”

  Blake’s scalp prickled. “Dead?”

  “He hung himself in his cell at Cheyenne City.”

  Blake shook his head from side to side and said, “I tried so hard to win him to the Lord. He wanted nothing to do with Him.”

  “One of the things that made me suspicious of him was that he had no spirituality and knew nothing of the Bible. Yet he maintained that he was a Christian.” As she spoke, Linda reached into her handbag again and produced another envelope. “He left a suicide note … he asked you to forgive him.”

  Blake read the note, folded it, and gave it back to Linda without comment.

  She then handed Blake the affidavit signed by Sheriff Bob Coffield. “It was the note and this affidavit that freed you today.”

  “By the hand of the almighty God of heaven,” he added.

  “Yes, praise His name.”

  Blake drew a deep breath. “I trusted that man implicitly. He wasn’t a Christian, but I really thought he was my friend. Shows me the truth of Psalm 118:8: ‘It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man.’”

  Linda began to tremble as she looked at Blake with an expression of inward pain and apprehension. Her eyes glittered with unshed tears, and her lips quivered.

  Blake took hold of a hand again and leaned toward her. “Linda, what’s wrong?”

  She bowed her head as tears glided silently down her pale cheeks and dripped off her trembling chin.

  “Linda, what is it?” Blake asked, concern riding his voice.

  She tried to speak, but choked on the first word. Swallowing hard, she raised her head and squeaked, “Now that you know I’ve been married to Haman, you don’t want me, do you? I feel so … unclean.”

  “Aw, honey,” he said, taking both of her trembling hands in his, “that’s not so. You’re not unclean … I do want you. I love you! What kind of man—what kind of Christian would I be to turn away from you now? You’re innocent in all of this.”

  “Oh, Blake,” she said in tearful elation, “thank you! I thought it would be all over for us when you learned that I was Haman Warner’s widow.”

  Blake cupped her face in his hands and lovingly wiped away the tears, saying, “Dear, sweet Linda, you’ve had so many heartaches. I want to give you all the happiness I can. I’ve got some money in an account at the Pacific Bank and Trust. That is, unless somehow Haman stole that, too. Right now, I don’t know where I am as far as material goods, but I want to ask you something.

  Linda looked deep into his eyes, and her silence told him she was waiting for his question.

  “Will you marry me?” he asked.

  “Do you mean it?”

  “I mean it. If you’ll say yes, we’ll take care of it as soon as we get back to Sacramento.”

  “Oh, yes, my darling! Yes! I’ll marry you!”

  They embraced and held each other tight for a long moment, then Linda drew back so she could look into his face. “Blake, do you recall the opening verses in Ecclesiastes chapter three, where it starts out, ‘To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven’?”

  “Mmm-hmm. Says there’s a time to be born and a time to die, and goes on about all the different times in people’s lives on earth.”

  “Yes, and in verse 8, it says there is a time to love.”

  “I remember.”

  “My pastor in Boston was going to use that passage in the wedding that never took place. And when my whole world fell down around me, I thought a time to love would never come for me. Then when I married Haman, thinking he was you, and it turned so sour … again, I thought I would never have my time to love.

  “My best friend in Boston was a girl named Joline Jensen. She’s married and lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, now. Joline came and saw me often, because I just couldn’t go out in public with the shame Lewis Carter and my sister had put on me. Once when Joline was there, she said, ‘Linda, believe me, you will have your time to love. The Lord has the man, the time, and the place. Let Him work it out.’ Well, I now have the man at this time and this place. My Jesus, indeed, has worked it out.”

  “Let’s thank Him right now for the way He’s made all things work together for good to both of us,” said Blake.

  Tingles ran up and down Linda’s spine as Blake prayed and gave thanks to the Lord for answered prayer and fulfillment of Scripture.

  When the amen came they embraced again, then Linda said, “Before we go, darling, let me fill you in on one thing.”

  She told him about her conversation with attorney Edgar White concerning Haman’s will, and that she now legally owned the Great Plains Bank of Cheyenne City. She assured Blake that even if he had not wanted to marry her, she would have given the bank to him. In view of what Haman did in stealing the Sacramento bank from him, the Cheyenne City bank was actually his. She also told him of the large account Haman left behind in the Great Plains Bank, and that when they married it would belong to both of them.

  Blake was overwhelmed at the news and praised the Lord that he could go back into the business he knew and loved, and most of all, that he could build his new life with Linda at his side.

  Hand in hand, the happy couple stepped outside. They saw Sheriff Claude Perkins some fifty yards away, standing beside a horse and buggy. Perkins waved.

  Blake stopped walking and said, “Linda, let me just smell the air of freedom for a moment.”

  They stood together, holding hands, and took in the beauty of the cerulean sky and the golden sun shining down on their world.

/>   Blake took a deep breath and said, “Thank You, Lord, for Your goodness. And thank You for our time to love.”

  The Sacramento Gazette carried a front-page story of Blake Barrett’s release from prison, and a photograph of him and his bride to be at the depot when they arrived with Sheriff Claude Perkins. Beneath large headlines was the story of Haman Warner’s underhanded deeds, his death at his own hand, and the suicide note clearing Blake of all guilt.

  Blake found his house just as Haman had left it and moved back in. Linda was going to stay at one of Sacramento’s hotels, but when the couple went to Pastor Duane Clarke to make arrangements for their wedding, the Clarkes invited her to stay with them until she and Blake were married.

  Linda immediately wrote to her parents to tell them all that had happened, giving God the praise for answered prayer. With joy she informed them that in a few days she and Blake would be married.

  She also wrote to Joline to confirm that she was right. God had the man, the time, and the place all worked out.

  Blake and Linda wanted nothing elaborate for their wedding—just a small private ceremony with a few of Blake’s closest friends. As they took their vows, both bride and groom were glowing with such happiness and contentment that they, the pastor, and the guests could strongly feel the heavenly Father smiling down on this blessed union.

  Two days after the wedding, the newlyweds were eating breakfast together in the kitchen of the Barrett house.

  Blake talked about how good Linda’s cooking was, then said, “Sweetheart, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.”

  “Yes?”

  “As you know, we’ve already got two different families who want to buy this house.”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “When I was at the bank yesterday, I asked the new owner if he knew of any towns in California that needed a bank. He said Stockton is growing rapidly, but the town has no bank. The people there have to do their banking at Manteca or Concord. When he said that, I remembered that not long before Dad became ill, he’d mentioned that he was thinking of starting a new bank in Stockton. I never thought any more about it until yesterday.”