Pastor Stevens got up and knelt beside Sarah’s chair. “God loves you, Sarah. He didn’t promise we’d never have trouble or heartache. In fact, the Bible tells us we will. But he’s given us his Word to go with us every step of the way. Can’t you just trust him like you used to? I remember the old Sarah and how she believed God for every little thing in her life. Wouldn’t you like to be that same young woman again?”
“I just can’t!” She stood and moved to the window, her back to the pastor. “Maybe someday when the wounds aren’t still so fresh, I’ll be able to trust him like I should. But nothing has turned out like I expected. Every time I see the knoll on the other side of the woods, I’m reminded of the spot where Rand and I meant to build our home. Everywhere I look are reminders of how my life is in shambles.”
She turned abruptly. “If you don’t mind, Pastor, I have a lot of things to finish up.” She knew she sounded rude, but she just couldn’t talk about it anymore. It hurt too much.
He stood with reluctance, frustration etched on his face. “If you need to talk, you know where to find me. Please pray about this before you go through with it, Sarah.”
She didn’t answer him, and he left after gazing at her for a moment. She breathed a sigh of relief when she heard the front door shut. She pushed away a stab of guilt as she went to the kitchen to start supper. She’d chosen her course, and she’d stick with it.
THREE
T he train shrieked a warning of imminent arrival, and Rand Campbell jerked awake, his heart pounding. He licked dry lips—how he’d love a drink of his ma’s iced tea. The thought of sun tea brewing in a glass jug on the back step at home caused a fresh wave of homesickness to wash over him. It wouldn’t be long, though.
Then the fear he’d tried to keep at bay for the past three days flooded back. What would he find at home? He’d passed mile after mile of war-ravaged scenes. Homes burned to the ground, fences torn down, hopeless looks on the faces of women and children. What if he arrived and found his home gone and his family missing? And Sarah. What if she was dead? What if she didn’t wait for him? He pushed the thought away impatiently. His Sarah would wait no matter what. But then why didn’t she write? Why hadn’t his mother written? The unanswered questions made him feel sick.
The train whistle blew again, and he peered out the soot-streaked window. He was almost home. Eagerly, he scanned the rolling pastures. There was the Johnson place looking as neat and well-tended as usual. The Larsen farm looked unharmed. The train slowed as it began its descent into the valley. Through clearings in the lush canopy of glowing leaves, he could see the town just beyond.
The town of Wabash nestled between two steep hills, with the courthouse on the far hill overlooking the sprawling brick and wood buildings clustered neatly below it. He drank in the familiar buildings and the glimmer of water that ran in front of the town like a silver ribbon. During the heyday of the Wabash-Erie Canals, the river bustled with boats of all types and sizes, but since the railroad came, the canal traffic slacked off, and the river once again resumed its placid course.
Hungrily he watched for a familiar face. But the streets and boardwalks were almost deserted. The few people hurrying along were strangers, mostly women. So many men lost their lives in the war.
But the town looked just the same. There was Beitman & Wolf’s. And Martha’s Millinery, her fly-speckled window crowded with bonnets. Several old-timers in bib overalls lounged outside Lengel’s Gun Shop.
Did the younger members of town still patronize the Red Onion Saloon? He grinned at a memory of the last ruckus he’d gotten into at the saloon, much to his grandma’s dismay. She was always quoting Proverbs to him after an escapade at the Red Onion.
Those Bible verses he’d memorized at her knee were one of the things that got him through the horror of prison camp. Between starvation, dysentery, and murderous gangs, he’d watched a third of the men in camp die. He didn’t really understand some of the verses very well, but they were somehow comforting. Maybe when his life settled down a little, he could study the Scriptures for himself.
His smile faded. The war had changed him and not for the better. Was there a way to get past the horrors he’d seen? He pushed his grandmother’s memory away and gazed out the window intently.
The train gave one final, wheezing bellow, then came to a shuddering stop under the overhang of the depot. Rand took a deep breath and stood, pulling his haversack out from under his seat. Wouldn’t it be grand if Pa or Jacob were in town? No chance of that, though. For one thing, he was here a good week earlier than he’d written he’d be. Lot more likely to find them in the field on the way home, if Jacob was even here. And if he survived the war.
His weak leg, injured by a bayonet, gave out as he stepped down, and he fell into an elderly, stooped man. “Why, I-I cain’t believe it! Rand Campbell, is it really you?” Liam Murphy had worked at the train station for as long as Rand could remember. He grabbed Rand by the shoulders and peered into his face.
His hair was even more grizzled than Rand remembered, and his breath stank of garlic. Rand suppressed a grin. Liam’s wife believed in garlic’s medicinal qualities, so most folks steered clear of her specialties at the church picnics. “It’s me all right, Liam.”
“Rand,” the old man gasped again before enfolding him in a bear hug. “We heard you was dead, boy.”
Rand hugged him back until his words penetrated, then drew back in shock. “What do you mean, dead? I wrote my folks and Sarah every few weeks. I’ve been in the hospital in Washington, D.C.”
Liam pulled a filthy handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face with a shaking hand. “Wait till Myra hears ’bout this!” He put the dirty cloth back in his pocket. “Don’t know nothing about no letters. No one here got no letters, I’m sure. Your folks been grieving themselves to death over you. Had a memorial service at church for you last spring, and I ain’t never seen so many people at one of them things.” He stared in Rand’s puzzled face. “I’m telling you—we all thought you was dead!”
Rand felt like he’d been punched in the stomach. He couldn’t catch his breath. How could something like this have happened? “I-I sent a letter with Ben Croftner to give to Sarah,” he stammered. “Didn’t he make it back here?”
A look of surprise and something else Rand couldn’t identify flickered across Liam’s face. “Yeah, he got back—let’s see. Must be pert near five months ago.” He paused and glanced at Rand. “But he didn’t say nothing about no letter.”
Something was odd in Liam’s manner. “What aren’t you telling me?” He fixed his eyes on the old porter’s face.
The man flushed. “Well, now—I-I guess you have to hear it sooner or later,” he stammered. “Ben’s supposed to marry Sarah tomorrow. Right after church. Whole town’s been invited. Ben’s been strutting around all important-like.”
The strength left Rand’s knees, and he sat on the passenger bench outside the depot. The implications of what Liam said began to sink in, along with the bitter knowledge of Ben’s betrayal. “I thought he was my friend. He let her go on thinking I was dead.” He stood and slung his haversack over one broad shoulder, then turned south and strode off without saying good-bye to Liam, his slight limp more pronounced because of his fatigue.
Rand clamped down on the rage that was building in him. How could Ben do such a thing? And Sarah. How could she be so fickle? Why, he must have been declared dead only a few months before she took up with Croftner! Was that all the time she mourned someone she was supposed to love? His emotions felt raw, and he just couldn’t seem to make any sense out of it.
By the time he made his way to the livery stable, paid for a horse, and swung up into the saddle, he was shaking with fury. He patted the mare’s neck and set off to
ward home.
Being astride a horse again for the first time in a year cleared his thoughts, and he was more in control of his emotions by the time he pulled the mare off the road and headed up the deeply rutted track that followed the river. To gather his thoughts, he let the horse graze in the knee-high grass along the dirt track. He’d have Shane return the rental horse to the livery. His own horse, Ranger, would be glad to see him. He sat a moment and gazed out at Campbell land. The fields were tawny with drying corn. Harvest would be in a few weeks.
He turned the horse’s head and urged her up onto the road again. They rounded the corner, and his heart quickened as the white two-story home on the hill overlooking the river came into view. Home. How he’d longed for this moment.
He pulled the horse up sharply. Should he go home first or see Sarah and demand an explanation? He could just see the roof of the large Montgomery house over the next rise. He let the horse prance on the path for a moment as he decided what to do.
No. He dug his heels into the mare’s flank and turned up the Campbell lane. His family first. At least they’d mourned for him.
By the time he reached the front yard, his heart pounded and his palms were slick with sweat. A nagging headache persisted just behind his eyes. He pulled his horse to a stop and dismounted, a little disappointed no one was outside. He guided the horse to the shade of a big oak tree and tied her where she could reach the grass.
As he approached the back door, through the window he could see his mother washing dishes. A wave of love welled up in him as he saw the new gray in her hair and the fine web of wrinkles at her eyes. He breathed in the familiar scent of apple pie baking in the oven as he quietly opened the door.
His mother’s back was to him, and he watched her a moment as she picked up a dish and proceeded to wash it. “I think I heard a horse,” she said to the little brown dog lying on the rug by her feet. “Probably one of the menfolk home.”
The little dog pricked her ears and whined as she looked toward the door. His mother dipped the soapy plate in the pan of rinse water and laid it to drain on the wooden chopping block beside her.
Rand let the screen door bang behind him, but she didn’t turn. “Don’t bang the door,” she said. Jody yipped and launched herself in a frenzy toward the door. His mother wiped her soapy hands on her apron and turned. Her eyes went wide as her gaze swept over him, then returned to lock with his.
“Ma.” Rand knelt and picked up the little dog as he stared at his mother.
She froze, and Rand saw one emotion after another chase across her face. Uncertainty, disbelief, hope. She clutched her hands in the folds of her apron.
“Ma, I’m home.” Rand patted Jody and laughed as the dog wriggled in his arms and licked his face joyously.
Her mouth opened, but no sound emerged as she stared at him.
“It’s me, Ma.”
“Rand?” she whispered as she took a faltering step toward him. “Rand!” With a noise something between a cry and a croak, she threw herself into his arms as the tears started down her cheeks.
Rand inhaled the aroma of her sachet, something sweet with a rose scent. He struggled not to let the moisture burning his eyes slide down his cheeks. Home. He was finally home.
“Let me look at you.” She held him at arm’s length, then hugged him, laughing and crying as Jody whined and wagged her tail joyfully.
Rand clutched his mother so tightly he was afraid he hurt her. Ever since he was captured, he’d longed for his ma’s gentle touch on his brow. At night when he awoke bathed in sweat from the pain, he had ached to lay his head on her breast and hear her soothing voice as she sang to him. He had been so hurt and bewildered at her silence after his release. Every time the door to the hospital ward opened, he had expected to see her anxious face.
“We thought you were dead.”
“I know. There’s a lot to tell you. How about some coffee?”
Jacob stopped short when he saw the strange horse munching grass in the shade. “You expecting anyone?” He shot a quizzical look at Shane and his pa.
Jeremiah shook his head. “Looks like that new bay from Larson’s Livery. Must be someone from out of town.”
They turned their horses over to one of the hands, then headed toward the kitchen door. A low murmur of voices drifted out the screen door, and Jacob paused. It almost sounded like Rand. But he knew better than to fall for that trick of his mind. There were times when he thought he caught a glimpse—out of the corner of his eye—of Rand in his favorite red plaid flannel shirt, striding past. He pushed into the kitchen as a dark-haired man, dressed in a blue Union uniform, rose from the kitchen table and turned to face him.
“Jake.”
Rand had coined his nickname, and no one said it quite the way he did. Jacob opened his mouth to question this smiling, dark-eyed stranger who looked like—but of course couldn’t be—Rand.
“Rand!” Shane flung himself past Jacob into Rand’s waiting arms. A moment later all four men were hugging and slapping one another on the back, unashamed of the tears streaming from their eyes.
“The good Lord answered our prayers after all.” With a shaking hand, Pa wiped at his eyes with his bandanna. He was breathing hard, as if he’d just run all the way from the back pasture to the house.
They sat around the kitchen table as Ma hurriedly poured them each a cup of coffee and joined them. Just as she sat down, the front door slammed.
Hannah, the eldest and the only girl, hurried into the kitchen. “Sorry I’m late, Ma.” She stopped and looked at the group clustered around the table. Her puzzled stare stopped when her gaze met Rand’s. She opened and closed her mouth several times, but no sound escaped.
“What! My gabby sister with nothing to say?” Rand stood, a teasing light in his eyes.
Hannah screamed and dropped the basket she was holding. Potatoes rolled across the wooden floor, and she almost tripped on them as she rushed toward her brother. She threw herself into Rand’s arms, and he nearly toppled over.
“Careful,” he said. “I’m still not quite myself.”
She held him at arm’s length. “Explain how this happened.”
She hung onto his arm as he limped back to the table and sat down. “I was just about to tell Ma when you so rudely interrupted.” He grinned. “Of course, that’s nothing new—you’ve never learned how to be quiet.”
“Very funny!” She punched him on the arm and sat beside him.
“Ouch.” He rubbed his arm, then turned his grin at his family. “I was captured in northwest Georgia in September of ’63. I’d been on reconnaissance, trying to see where the heaviest troop concentrations were. That’s how I spent most of the war, slipping back and forth through enemy lines. The Rebs took me to Andersonville prison camp—”
“Andersonville!” Jacob shuddered, remembering the newspaper reports. “That camp is notorious. I heard the Union army found twelve thousand graves there when the war was over. They liberated it last May. You’ve been free for five months.”
Rand nodded. “I was lucky I wasn’t one of them. You can’t imagine how bad it was. We had to build our own shelters, usually just a lean-to made with whatever we could find. Blankets, clothing, sticks. Some of the men could only dig a hole in the ground and cover up with a thin blanket. There were so many of us we just barely had enough space to lie down. And the food—”
He broke off and took a deep breath. “Well, it wasn’t like yours, Ma. We were lucky if they gave us a little salt, maybe a half a cup of beans, and about a cup of unsifted cornmeal. Death was welcome for most of those guys. I helped bury over a hundred bodies in a common grave.” His face was white.
Ma laid a trembling hand on his arm. “I just thank God you survived it, son.”
He covered her hand with his. “I was delirious by the time we were freed. The doctor said I had dysentery and malnutrition.” He smiled grimly. “I weighed less than a hundred pounds when I was brought to the hospital. A skeleton really. I’ve spent the last five months at Harewood General Hospital in Washington, D.C., recuperating.”
“Why didn’t you write?” Hannah burst out.
“I did. At least once a month.”
Jacob shook his head. “We never received a single letter. Just a notification from the army of your death.” He looked at his mother. “You want to show him, Ma?” He felt an inexplicable need to explain their willingness to believe Rand dead.
“I have it right here.” Their mother hurried from the room and returned moments later waving a paper. “See, right here.” She thrust it under Rand’s nose. “Official notice.”
Rand studied it a moment, then handed it back. “There was a lot of confusion in the camps. It’s not uncommon for this to happen.”
“I knew you weren’t dead. I just knew it,” Shane put in excitedly. “I told Sarah just last week!”
At the mention of Sarah’s name, Jacob’s gaze went to his brother. He’d been dreading telling Rand about Sarah. He wouldn’t take it well.
Rand stared back at Jacob, his eyes no longer smiling. “What about Sarah, Jake?”
Jacob started, then forced himself to look in his brother’s hurt eyes. He knew. “What have you heard?”
“I already know she’s going to marry Ben Croftner.
How could she do that—didn’t she mourn me at all?”
“Mourn you? You idiot!” Hannah stood and raked a hand through her mane of chestnut hair. “We all feared for her sanity! She refused to eat for days. Even now she hardly smiles. And you know what a perky, bubbly little thing she always was.”
A Journey of the Heart Collection Page 3
