“I’m not going to California.”
“Might come a day you’ll wish you had.”
“It might, but that day isn’t now.”
“Oh well. Then best you crouch down out of sight and not let anybody see you with the likes of me.” He took up the reins.
She did as he said and huddled down under the blanket the way Twila had earlier. It wasn’t a very comfortable ride, but it was better than walking. And faster, although she still had no idea what time it might be. At least the rain seemed to have nearly stopped or was so light she couldn’t feel the drops under the blanket where everything was black and way too steamy. She pushed back the edge to get some air.
At last, when Adria didn’t think she could bear another minute under the blanket, the wagon stopped.
“This is as close as I dare go.”
Adria threw off the cover and sat up. The gray light of dawn was turning night to day. “How far to town?”
“Probably less than a mile. You can see the smoke.” He pointed at a dark cloud hanging on the horizon. “I told the truth when I said the fire was an accident. Not my fault.”
“You were still going to steal Louis’s freedom money.”
“I guess saying I’m sorry isn’t good enough on that one.”
“No.” She stood up.
He grabbed her hand before she could climb out of the wagon. “You could do your good deed and reform me. Make me into the kind of man you could love.”
“I appreciate what you chanced to help Twila and then me.” She gave him a long look. “You could come back to town with me and explain what happened to the sheriff. I won’t say anything about you trying to break into the safe.”
“Guess I’ll have to pass on that.” Logan shook his head. “I’m afraid I might have the smell of smoke on me, and being a stranger in town, folks would be glad enough to have somebody to blame for their troubles.”
“Then goodbye, Logan. I hope you make it to California.”
“No worry about that. I will. And I hope you make it to wherever you want to be.” He squeezed her hand. “But trust me on this. There are better men out there than Carlton Damon.”
“Or you?”
“Or me.” He laughed and raised her hand up to his lips before he turned her loose. “Good day, Miss Starr. It has been a pleasure. Perhaps I will long live in your memory as the man who saved you not only from getting trampled by a team of runaway horses but also from the disaster of marrying the wrong man.”
After he disappeared back the way they’d come, she headed toward town with an odd mixture of regret and relief. Smoky fog settled down around her as she walked. That was good. Better for her to smell like smoke than the mud of the road.
When the town’s buildings came into view, she did her best to smooth back her hair and brush off her skirts. She needn’t have bothered. The people wandering about in the streets looked every bit as bedraggled as she did. Here and there, a few men and women stood and stared at the smoking ruins of their homes or businesses where flames still flickered among the ashes.
Three hogs ran past her. Nobody was chasing them. The stock pens must have been opened for fear the fire would take the sheds and warehouses around them.
She was glad to leave the destruction behind and move on through town to where the buildings stood untouched. The bank. The hat factory. The drugstore. Billiter’s Mercantile, closed and shuttered. She needed to get home and cleaned up so she could show up for work like any other day. But ashes drifting past her in the air proved it wasn’t any other day.
A tremble swept through her as she thought about catching Logan trying to steal Louis’s freedom money. She whispered a thankful prayer that he hadn’t known all the numbers of the safe combination. The petty cash had been enough to satisfy Logan, but she needed to replace it before Mr. Billiter discovered it missing. She could always say she’d changed the hiding place.
More lies. Dear Lord, forgive her. That was all she had done since Bet showed up at the kitchen door. Lie. Right now, her whole life felt like a lie. Writing her abolitionist letters and sending them out under fake names. Thinking she could find a way to marry into a family of slaveholders. Pretending to be someone she wasn’t. She felt like a shell of a woman, something like the burned-out buildings she’d just walked past.
She looked up. The sun was burning off the fog and leaving only the drifting smoke behind. Did I do the right thing, Aunt Tilda?
No words came down from heaven, but the words were in her ears. The only thing.
At times, a person had to put feet to her prayers. They’d done that with Louis. The whole town had. And she had done that with Twila. The only thing she could do, and the Lord had made a way. Perhaps he was showing her a way too. Out of Springfield. To the East where people fought against the injustice of slavery. She would telegraph Abigail to see if the room in her house was still available.
“Missy Adria. You is a sight for sore eyes.”
Adria turned to see Louis hurrying toward her, his face creased with worry. But then everyone she’d seen since she got back to Springfield had that look. A day to be concerned for the future of their town. But not for this man’s future. Before the sun went down again, he would be his own man and not have to answer to any master other than his Lord.
“Are you all right? Miss Ruth is some concerned about you.” He must have been fighting the fires since his clothes were covered in soot and ashes. “She was ready to set the sheriff to huntin’ for you, but I tol’ her to let me see if I could find you ’fore she did that. Seein’ as how the sheriff is so busy with the fires and all.” Louis looked off toward the part of town still smoking. “That you was prob’ly just out here somewheres fightin’ fires.”
“Yes, fighting fires.” There were all different kinds of fires to fight. “But I’m all right.”
“That’s good to know. I sure am happy to see you. Miss Ruth was some afraid you’d done run off with that drover.”
“No, I wouldn’t do that.”
“I knowed you wouldn’t. Leastways without tellin’ Miss Ruth. I tol’ her whatever you was doin’ it had to matter. We been prayin’ that you weren’t in trouble.” Louis looked straight at her. She could tell he knew where she’d been, but neither of them wanted to speak the words aloud.
“Sometimes prayers are answered.” She hoped he would know by those words that she had been able to get Bet’s daughter to the first house to start her journey to freedom.
He nodded. “All the time prayers are answered if you pray believin’ the Lord is there with you. He can get you through some hard times like them we’ve had here tonight.”
“Did anybody get killed in the fire?”
“Not so far as we know, but plenty is gonna have to find new places.”
“Including you, Louis. Today is your freedom day.”
A smile slipped across his face but didn’t stay, as though he thought it wrong to be smiling with the smoke of the fire lingering around them. “It don’t hardly seem true, but the reverend, he done tol’ me he’s payin’ the price for me soon’s the bank opens. And more than that. Makin’ a payment to Elias Brown. Mr. Brown done fixed me up a room in the back of his shop with a bed and ev’rythin’ I be needin’.”
“I know. It’s wonderful.”
“A miracle for certain. Now we best hurry on to let Miss Ruth knows you made it through the fires.”
“That I have.”
A smile stole across his face and settled in his eyes. “You gonna be some surprised when you get there.”
“Why’s that?”
“The reverend and that little girl child of his done took up residence in your front room. Lost his house in the fire, but the church is still standin’.”
“Pastor Robertson? I thought his sister had his child.” Adria frowned a little.
“I’m supposin’ things must’ve changed. Things has a way of doin’ that.”
“So they do.” The strong smell of smoke in the
air proved it, but nothing looked that different here with the hotel behind her and the houses clustered on Elm Street safe from the fire not that many steps away. The sun was up now, shining down on the tatters of the night. The lost buildings behind her. But it wasn’t only the buildings. The night had changed something inside her, made everything different.
Louis trailed along behind her as she started toward her house, talking now of the change she was going to find there.
“Appears Miss Ruth is done ready to take in another motherless child. The child is a pretty little thing. Some younger than you when Miss Ruth took you in after the cholera.”
“But I didn’t come with a father.”
“That you didn’t. Could make things some different this time for Miss Ruth, but from the way they was standin’ together, even while deep in worry ’bout you, seemed to be a best thing.”
“A best thing,” Adria softly echoed his words.
“That’s all we can hope for, missy, when troubles come our way,” Louis said. “For the Lord to take whatever happens and help us to find some of those best things in the midst of it all.”
She stopped and turned to face Louis. “‘And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God.’ Aunt Tilda taught me that verse a long time ago.”
“The truth in Scripture words is one of them things that never changes.”
Adria kept her gaze on Louis, their unspoken words loud between them. “Did I do the right thing, Louis?”
“That’s not for me to say.” Louis met her look without wavering. “But sometimes when fires is burnin’ out of control, then a body has to do whatever he can to put ’em out.”
Thirty-four
A person’s life could roll along the same for years and then overnight that life could have an earthquake upheaval. Ruth hadn’t been born yet when the New Madrid earthquakes in the western region of the state heaved up the earth and made the Mississippi River run backward, but she had heard a few eyewitness accounts and read even more. Those earthquakes had changed the landscape. Even filled up a new lake where there had been no lake the day before.
That was how she felt. As if she had started out the day yesterday considering joy and had ended the day amidst smoke and flames, one hand firmly clasped by Will and the other holding his daughter’s hand. Her daughter now. Another daughter of the heart.
Years ago, after the cholera epidemic, she had shied away from Adria calling her mother. Aunt Ruth seemed more appropriate. But Ruth’s reluctance about the title “mother” hadn’t kept Adria from finding a forever place in Ruth’s heart. That was why Ruth had to fight off panic when she and Will got to her house last night to find Adria gone.
She’s gone to fight the fire, Will said. Perhaps, conceded Ruth.
Or to guard the store against the flames or those who might take advantage of the confusion to break a window and lift some of the merchandise. But Mr. Billiter wouldn’t expect Adria to do that. He had always shielded Adria from the riffraff that showed up at the store from time to time.
Riffraff. That brought Logan Farrell to mind. The drover entranced Adria. His good looks. His easy smile. His lust for adventure. As much as Ruth didn’t want to believe Adria would let the man talk her into running away with him, the worry that it might be true kept poking her. Love could make a woman do foolish things.
Just look at her. Ready to join her life with a man she barely knew. She’d heard him preach. She’d seen his care for Willeena. And she did know Will was a man who appreciated books and poetry. That knowledge might explain why she had put her hand into his with so little hesitation. Some things were simply meant to be. The Lord’s providence in a person’s life.
She didn’t believe Adria and Logan Farrell were meant to be, but all through the long night the sick feeling Adria might not realize that had churned inside Ruth. She hadn’t slept. How could she while not knowing where Adria might be or if she was safe?
Will hadn’t slept either. He had come to the house but then went back out along with Louis to look for Adria. Somehow Louis had feared Adria might be missing. He had come to the house to look for her and then, in spite of the worry creasing his face, told Ruth it might be best not to call in the sheriff’s help to search for Adria.
When Ruth asked why, Louis kept his eyes down as he answered. “Lots of happenings goin’ on this night. The fire and more. Let me and the reverend do some lookin’ first. The sheriff, he’s bound to be extra busy anyhow.”
Louis knew more than he was saying, but Ruth hadn’t pushed him to tell her what he was thinking. She wasn’t ready to have this new worry awakening in her out in the open air. Perhaps an even more fearsome thought than Adria going off with Logan Farrell. One more dangerous for Adria and perhaps for them all. What was the girl doing?
After Will and Louis left, Ruth checked on Willeena again. The child was so small, curled there in Ruth’s bed, sound asleep with her doll still fiercely clutched to her chest.
Ruth remembered how Adria had clung to her doll, Callie, when she first came to Ruth. A connection to her mother who’d made the doll. Willeena’s doll was made by Will’s sister, the only mother the child had ever known. And now Ruth would have the chance to mother her. Her heart softened as she leaned down to brush a kiss across the little girl’s hair.
Then she went back to stand watch at the front window. A little after sunrise, her prayers were answered when she saw Adria coming down the street with Louis trailing her, almost as though herding her home. Dear Louis. He had once more brought Adria to her.
A dirty, disheveled, exhausted Adria.
Ruth stepped out on the porch to wait for her. Even before she was close enough for Ruth to look into her eyes, she knew Adria, like Ruth, had experienced a seismic upheaval in her life since she’d last seen her yesterday. The droop of the girl’s shoulders spoke of more than exhaustion.
“Here she be, Miss Ruth. I found her comin’ home,” Louis said as Adria stepped up on the porch. “I best be huntin’ up the preacher to let him know.”
Adria turned back toward Louis. “Don’t say anything to anybody else. You don’t want to chance messing up your freedom day.”
“Can’t nothin’ mess that up, missy. Not now that I know you’re safe. But you know I ain’t never been one for talkin’ unless’n I had somethin’ to say and I ain’t got nothin’ to say about the fires.” He settled his gentle eyes on Adria for a few seconds before he turned back toward town.
Ruth wanted to ask where Adria had been, but instead she took her hands. “I’m glad you’re home.”
“Home.” A smile slipped across Adria’s face but didn’t stay. “I’m glad it’s still here. I’m glad you are here.”
“I’ll always be here for you, Adria.” Ruth tightened her hold on Adria’s hands.
“I know.” Adria looked near tears. “You were the answer to a little girl’s prayer.”
“And you were the answer to a prayer I didn’t even know to speak.” Ruth blinked back tears of her own. “I was so afraid I wouldn’t know how to take care of you. I think that was why I was hesitant to claim the title of mother to you.”
“But you have been a mother to me.” A few tears leaked out of Adria’s eyes. “I love you and I never wanted to bring you trouble.”
“I don’t know what trouble you mean, and it’s probably better I don’t. But the town has plenty of trouble to think about with the fire. Whatever else has happened may be lost in those ashes.” Ruth let go of Adria’s hands to put her arm around her and turn her toward the door. “Come. You need to clean up and then hear my news.”
“The preacher?” Adria’s eyes showed more life then. “Louis says his daughter is here.”
“She is. Their house burned.” Ruth hesitated, but it was time to say it aloud. “I’m going to marry him.”
“When?”
“As soon as we can post the bond.” Ruth felt a thrill at the words. Anticipation with a tickle of fear.
“Are
you sure?”
“He needs a place to live. His little girl needs a mother.”
“Is it only for a house?” Adria’s frown showed her concern. “Or for his daughter? A marriage of convenience for him?”
“No. He wants me to be his wife.” Ruth’s voice softened. “I want to be his wife.”
Adria’s frown vanished as her face lit up and she grabbed Ruth’s hands and danced her in a circle. “That’s wonderful!”
Ruth couldn’t keep from laughing at her excitement. “I can’t believe I’m getting married again—before you. I always thought you and Carlton—” Adria’s stricken look stopped Ruth from finishing her thought.
The girl’s shoulders drooped as she let go of Ruth’s hands. “I sent Carlton away. I can’t marry him. And it’s not only the way he thinks about slaves. I don’t love him enough. Not nearly enough. And he has never loved me. Not the real me. He only loved who he hoped I could be.”
“I’m sorry.” Ruth looked at her for a long moment before she asked, “Is it Logan Farrell?”
“You don’t have to worry about him.” Adria looked sad. “I turned down his proposal too. No marriage bells in my future.”
“The Lord will send you the right man someday.”
“If it’s meant to be,” Adria said.
“Ruth.” Willeena was standing in the doorway to the bedroom, still holding her doll. Her voice wavered a bit as she edged into the room.
“Come, Willeena.” Ruth held out a hand toward the little girl. “Adria wants to meet you and Maysie.”
Adria squatted down in front of the child. “I’m very glad to meet you, Willeena. Would you like to be my sister?”
Willeena’s face crunched up as she thought about that. “I have a sister at Mama Hazie’s, but she’s not big like you.”
Adria smiled. “Sisters come in all sizes and I think it would be fun to have one your size. Don’t you think it would be good to have one my size?”
Willeena looked up at Ruth and then back at Adria. “I have to ask Daddy.”
River to Redemption Page 28