“No. I suppose not.” Aron got up, poured coffee, and set steaming mugs on the table before them. “I apologize if this is upsetting you. I just wanted—”
“If you’re upset about some conspiracy to hide the truth, that’s not why I asked Freddie if we could avoid repeating the gory details.” She was surprised when tears sprang to her eyes as she thought back to that day.
“No,” Aron said, shaking his head. “That’s not it at all. I just wanted you to know …” He reached across the table and took her hands in his. “I just wanted you to know how glad I am you’re both all right. And how sorry I am you had to go through something like that—with or without angels in attendance.”
Was it her imagination, or was he fighting off tears? “Thank you,” Mattie said. It wasn’t until her palms were warming around a steaming mug of the strong brew that she spoke again. “So—what did you tell Freddie? What do you think?”
“About?”
“Angels. Miracles.”
He thought for a moment before saying, “I’ve never personally witnessed a miracle. I suppose most people would be inclined to think Freddie was … exaggerating.”
“That’s the main reason I told him we should keep the details of that day to ourselves.” She looked down at the table as she murmured, “People probably get put in asylums for telling stories like that. And Freddie … Freddie gets made fun of enough already.”
“I know what you mean.” Aron sat back in his chair. “We don’t ever have to talk about it again if you don’t want to.” His blue-gray eyes stared at her intently. “I only brought it up because when I realized how close I came—we all came—to losing you …”
Suddenly she did want to talk about that day. To have him know how it had impacted her. “I prayed,” she blurted out. “Up there. That day.”
“You must have been so terrified.”
She shrugged. “I was at first. But then … it changed. I prayed and it changed.” She paused. “It wasn’t even a real prayer. All I could think was help me help me help me. No heavenly Fathers or even an amen. But the minute I threw those words up, this unbelievable calm just … descended.” She shook her head. “And even though I was in the middle of the worst thing I could imagine happening, I had such an uncanny sense of … peace.” She frowned. “Do you think that was God?”
“Of course it was God,” Aron said. “He answered the thief on the cross. He answered me. Why wouldn’t He answer you?”
She swallowed. “There’s something else. I was really getting caught up in the gold.” She stared into her coffee. “In spite of all your sermons warning against it. Anyway, that day, all I cared about was Freddie being all right. The gold didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but my sweet friend.” She choked back tears. “You know, right before that happened I told God it would be all right if he wanted to dump some faith on me.” She looked across the table at Aron. “You were part of the reason I did that.”
“I was?”
She nodded. “Seeing what faith did in you made me wish—” She paused. “Both you and Aunt Lou have something I don’t. Didn’t, I guess I should say. Lately it seems like maybe God has dumped some faith into my hard head.” She looked straight at him. “Does it work that way?”
Aron smiled. “You mind some preacher talk?”
“I think I’m asking for preacher talk.”
“All right, then. There’s a verse that speaks to what you’re asking me. It goes like this: ‘For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast.’ What I understand that to mean is that our salvation comes through faith. And that not only is the salvation a gift, so is the faith. Both come from God.”
“So God does dump faith on people.”
Aron chuckled. “Yes.”
Mattie smiled. “I think He’s done it to me. Actually, I think he did it before whatever happened between Freddie and his angel. I can’t really say when, but things I knew in here,” she said, tapping her head, “started making sense here.” She put her hand over her heart.
“Dumping’s good,” Aron said.
“Yes,” Mattie agreed. “It is.”
As December went by, the snows piled high and the temperature dropped. Mattie completely gave up the idea of wintering on her claim. She climbed the gulch once a week and played at prospecting just enough to “prove interest” should Ellis Gates and company decide to challenge her right to the claim, but otherwise she continued dividing her time between working at Garth and Company and cooking with Aunt Lou. It became common knowledge that if you needed the preacher, the first place to look was wherever Mattie O’Keefe was hanging her hat.
Mattie was sweeping the store one day when the back door opened and a tree walked in. At least that was how it looked, for Freddie was entirely camouflaged in a mass of evergreen. “Mor says we’re having a true Christmas this year,” Freddie said, his face beaming with joy as he clomped toward the front of the store and leaned the tree against a counter while he took off his coat. “Can you help me set it up?”
Mattie and Freddie spent the next hour trimming bottom branches away, melting enough snow to fill a bucket with water and bracing the tree inside the bucket until finally a bona fide Christmas tree graced the front window of Garth and Company. That evening, Swede and Mattie and Aunt Lou gathered around the storeroom table with paper and scissors, creating ornaments and a paper chain garland for the tree while the men played checkers. It was, Mattie thought, as close to a perfect evening as she’d ever experienced.
On Christmas morning moonlight reflected off the deep snow outside Mattie’s window at the Berg sisters’ shop and provided just enough light for her to see that Justice was at the door wagging his tail at whoever had just awakened her by knocking on the door. Throwing a blanket across her shoulders, Mattie climbed out of bed and padded barefoot across the cold floor to stand beside Justice. She opened the door to see footprints in the snow and a piece of paper weighted down by a rock. With a glance in either direction, Mattie picked up the note and closed the door. Lighting the lamp at her bedside, she read, Have coffee brewing at the store. Aron.
“He has coffee brewing,” Mattie grumbled as she looked down at Justice. “I think I’m being summoned. Should I go?” Justice gave a low yip and wagged his tail.
“You just want to go out and play in the snow,” Mattie said. “You don’t care that it’s twenty below, do you?” By way of answering, Justice scratched at the door. “All right, all right,” Mattie said. “Coffee with a handsome preacher. I guess there are worse ways to spend Christmas morning.”
Whatever Mattie had expected to find at the store, this wasn’t it. He’d lighted the candles on the tree. Just for her.
“I got permission,” he said softly as he put his open hand at her waist and guided her closer.
“It’s … breathtaking,” she said.
“No, you are breathtaking.”
Mattie turned to look up at him.
“Merry Christmas,” he said. “Do you like my surprise?”
She nodded. “And … you. I like you.”
He chuckled. “I was honestly hoping for a little more than liking. But I’ll settle for like. For now.”
She swallowed. “Maybe I lied.”
“About what?”
“Just now. I mean I do like you, but … it’s changing.”
He cupped her face in his palm and traced her jaw slowly, ending at her lips. His eyes never left hers. “You can’t lie if you’re gonna be a preacher’s wife.”
Mattie took in a quick breath. “Wife?”
He nodded. “I love you, Mattie. Will you marry me?”
Closing her eyes, Mattie leaned in, wrapped her arms around him, and murmured, “I will.”
“Thank you, Father,” the handsome preacher said. And they kissed in the golden light of Christmas morning.
Give thanks unto the Lord, call upon his name,
make known his deeds am
ong the people.
Sing unto him, sing psalms unto him,
talk ye of all his wondrous works.
1 Chronicles 16:8–9
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