A Pioneer Christmas Collection

by Kathleen Fuller

  A dog barked. But he didn’t come far from the campfire.

  “I just want to use your fire to get some warmth back in these bones.” The dog barked again.

  Jeremiah listened closely. No, that was not a warning bark. He dismounted and, rifle at the ready, walked closer, his horse following him.

  “Are you all right?”

  Surely the blanket-wrapped form moved. Beyond the fire he could see a wagon. As he drew nearer, he realized the wagon was now only a frame. It appeared someone had been using the bed for firewood. The dog barked again, this time moving between Jeremiah and the man on the ground.

  “Easy boy, not planning on hurting you or him.” Jeremiah kept up the singsong he used for animals of all kinds and sometimes humans, too. The dog whined. Jeremiah moved slowly toward the man that he could now see was wrapped in a quilt and moving.

  “I come to help you.”

  “Thank God.” The answer was so weak as to be almost blown away on the slight breeze.

  “Call off your dog, so’s I can come to you.”

  “Rusty—no. Down.”

  The dog dropped to his belly, keeping his gaze on the stranger. Had Jeremiah not been watching, he’d have missed the tip of the tail that moved side to side. “Rusty, good boy. That’s it now, easy.” He reached the man’s side. “Name’s Jeremiah Jennings, and I’m heading north to work on a ranch. Mean no harm to you.” While he spoke gently, he reached out a hand and laid it on the man’s shoulder. “Can I roll you over here so I can see you or sit you up or… ?”

  “Anson S–Stedman. I…I…too weak.”

  “Are you wounded?”

  “No. Sick.”

  Jeremiah kept one eye on the dog, who was bellying closer. “Is your dog the bitin’ kind?”

  “N–no. Just doing his best to help.”

  “I’m going to put some wood on that fire, see if we can get you warmed up some. How long you been down?” He reached a hand out to the dog and got a sniff and a wag. He stood and pushed two boards farther into the fire, where they flared immediately. “I see you been burnin’ the wagon. Do you have any food?”

  “Someone stole it. Figured I was dead.”

  Jeremiah found a sack of beans under a bag of oats. A cook pot lay overturned the other side of the fire. He went to his saddlebags and pulled out some jerky and hard tack, his traveling food. So far he’d found farms that allowed him to bed down in the barn and even provided a meal or two. He’d left Texas four weeks earlier to go work for the same rancher who also had a spread on the western edge of Dakota Territory. The northern ranch needed a new general manager and horse breaker. The storms up here in the north country had slowed him down. He should have been there by now.

  He filled the kettle with snow to melt and set it on the edge of the fire then returned to the man. “Can you sit up?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “I see. I’ll be right back.” He pulled the saddle off his horse and tied him to a wheel on what used to be the rear axle. Then he dumped the saddle on the ground and untied his bedroll. “I’m goin’ to pull you up against that if you can sit.” When the man slid to the side, Jeremiah tucked the quilt and the bedroll around him. “Be right back.” He returned with the sack of oats and laid that so Anson could use it more as a pillow. Had to get him warmed up. “Good. Now I’m melting some snow, and I found beans, but in the meantime I got some hardtack here that I can soak soft enough that maybe you can eat it.”

  Anson coughed, but his effort was so weak it hardly raised the quilt. Mucus slithered from the side of his mouth.

  “Where you headed?”

  “Home.”

  “And you took sick?”

  A nod. The dog crawled in next to the man on the ground, licked his cheek, and laid his head on Anson’s shoulder.

  “Good boy. Come on, snow, let’s get to melting here.” Shame he didn’t have real firewood. Spread the warm around some. He returned to the wagon and pulled another board off, shoving the end in the fire like the others.

  He poured the melted snow water into his own tin cup and set it by the fire to warm. Why did everything take so blasted long? Keep talkin’ to him. “You sure got a good dog there. How’d you keep the fire goin’?” He didn’t wait for an answer but broke off a piece of bread and dropped it in the water, stabbing it with his knife to soak faster. When it was warm, he took it to his patient. “Here we go. I’m goin’ to spoon this into your mouth.” He held the spoon of what was now gruel to Anson’s mouth, but when nothing happened, he paused. “Anson, you got to eat this. Nice and soft, warm. Come on, open your mouth.”

  Anson’s eyes fluttered. Slowly he complied. But the liquid leaked out the side.

  “Come on, man, you got to swallow.”

  Eyes of such sadness as to make his throat catch stared at him. “Save Belle.”

  “Where is Belle?”

  Anson gathered himself. “W–west. Near river.” He collapsed, as if those words took all his strength. “Rusty.”

  “You mean the dog could show me where you live?”

  The faintest of nods.

  “We’ll get you strong enough, and we’ll set out.”

  A faint movement of his head was all Anson could muster. “Baby.” His eyes opened again, and Jeremiah watched the life fade away. He closed the man’s eyes, shaking his head. “Sorry I didn’t get here sooner. Lord God, what am I to do now? Can’t bury the body, no animal here to carry him. How far away is home? You got to be lis’nin’. You said You do.”

  He melted more snow and watered his horse. Shared some of his jerky with the dog, likewise a piece of hard tack. But his gaze kept returning to the body on the other side of the fire.

  Rusty sat by his master as if he knew there was no way to warm him and stared off to the west.

  “Rusty dog, I promise you, we’ll start out first light.” What a way to spend the night before the night before Christmas.

  Chapter 3

  Christmas Day

  Belle floated awake on the most amazing dream. At least she figured it must be a dream. She laid there, eyes closed. No pain. Something moved next to her side. Eyes wide, she moved her head just enough to see a baby all wrapped and snuggled up to her side. Moving her head slightly, she realized she could see the fireplace at the end of her feet. No mountainous mound. Hadn’t she decided not to add more wood to the fireplace, instead saving wood?

  A clatter of the stove lids, and she saw Abel settling the lids back in place. He had replenished the stove. And the fireplace? Had she birthed and wrapped her baby and cared for herself without knowing? How could that be? She shut her eyes again, allowing herself to float back into her dream. A man had come. Who? Anson came home? She mentally shook her head. Abel would not be tending the stove were his pa here. But who and where was the man now?

  His hands—he laid his hands on her belly, and with a wrench, the baby moved. The pain of it only teased the edges of her mind. No matter how she tried, she couldn’t remember taking care of the baby or herself. She had fainted, that’s why. But his voice. She heard his voice. But what had he said?

  “Do not be afraid.” That’s what he said. Who was he?

  “Thank you, Son.” Her voice scratched. The baby nuzzled her side.

  “Ma, you’re awake. The man said you were, but you didn’t wake up.”

  “What man?”

  “The man who was here. He fixed the fire and said to take care of you. He said Pa was in heaven. He won’t come back?”

  Belle nodded. Somehow she heard the man’s voice again. He had said that. “Did you see him leave?”

  Abel knelt beside her. “No.” He touched the baby’s face. “I have a sister.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “He said so.”

  “Oh.” Such a little word with such a wealth of meaning.

  “Merry Christmas, Ma, and Angel, too.”

  “Angel?”

  Abel nodded in his definite four-year-old way. “I named her
.”

  Belle heaved a sigh of relief, of joy, of…She wasn’t sure what all, but their Angel was surely a gift of peace. The gift beside her squirmed again and whimpered, going to a full-throated wail on the next breath.

  “She’s hungry.”

  “Ja, she is.” Can I get up to sit in the rocker Anson made for me? Without another thought, she rolled to her knees, babe in her arm, stood, and walked the three feet to the chair and sat. No pain, no weakness. “Please bring me your quilt, Abel.”

  Setting the baby to nursing was easy, too. Angel latched onto the nipple like she’d done this many times and nursed, her gaze on her mother’s face. Belle sucked in a deep breath and let herself relax. Thank You, dear Father, for the miracles I see all around me: Angel in my arms, and I am sure an angel came to visit us. Thank You for keeping my Anson safe and now home with You. That the room was warm was miracle enough for right now. The others she would think about later. Now she understood the verse, “And Mary pondered all these things in her heart.”

  She put her daughter to her shoulder and rubbed her back to hear a loud burp that made Abel giggle.

  Abel cocked his head and looked toward the door. “Did you hear him?”

  “Who?”

  “Rusty, that was Rusty’s bark. Ma, Rusty’s home.”

  Belle shook her head. “I’m sorry, Son, but—” She heard it, too. At the same time she realized the quiet. The wind had died.

  “Pa!” But Abel shook his head. He said to himself, “Pa is in heaven with Jesus.” The bark came again, closer, more insistent.

  Abel leaped to his feet and headed for the door.

  At that moment, a pounding on the door made him look around at his mother, his eyes rounder than the plates on the shelf.

  “Bring me the rifle.” She spoke softly and nodded to the gun in the corner. Abel did as she said, and when she had a firm grip on it and had it pointed at the door, she told him. “Go ahead, answer it.” Lord, how can this be? Rusty would not leave Anson. Right, but Anson was gone, the man said so.

  Abel lifted the bar and pulled the door open. A two-foot drift blocked the entry, but a brown-and-white bundle of fur leaped over and through it and threw himself at Abel, whining, whimpering, and yipping. The boy rolled on the floor, giggling and clutching at his best friend.

  Belle had one eye on the dog and the other on the man with a flat-brimmed hat who filled the doorway.

  “If you can give me a broom, I can sweep this out and close the door. That is if I can come in.”

  “Are you an angel?”

  “Not that I know of. In fact, never been called an angel in all my life.”

  Belle started to rise, but he waved her back. “Let me get the door closed again, and then we can do the proper introductions.” Abel had untangled himself from the dog and fetched the twig broom. He handed it to him.

  “I think you are an angel, no matter what you say. My pa went to heaven.”

  “I know.” He shut the door.

  “How do you know?” Belle shook her head. Nothing more would ever surprise her. If someday she could ever sort all this out. “Come over and warm up at the fire. And Merry Christmas.”

  He nodded and removed his hat then unbuttoned his heavy wool coat. Standing in front of the fireplace, he rubbed his hands together in the heat. “This feels mighty fine, ma’am. Thank you.”

  Abel, one fist locked in Rusty’s neck ruff, came over to look up in his face. “How come you talk funny?”

  “Abel, that wasn’t polite.”

  “Never mind, Miz Stedman. I got me a story to tell you. Wish it could have a happy endin’.”

  Belle nodded, one foot setting the rocker in motion. “Anson is gone.”

  “Yes ma’am. He is. He died when I was tryin’ to get him to eat and drink something warm. I came upon his camp. Don’t know how he kept that fire goin’, sick as he was. Dog was watching over him, probably kept him from freezing to death. He said someone took all his supplies, left him for dead. He burned the boards on the wagon.”

  “I see.” A tear rolled down her cheek and dropped on the blanketed infant. “And the mule?”

  “Weren’t no mule there. Maybe the robbers took that, too.”

  “How far away from here?”

  “Fifteen miles or so. Guess he got too sick to continue. We’ll most likely never know what all happened.” He paused to remove his coat. “I wrapped his body in my ground sheet and put him under the wagon frame, blocked as well as I could. To keep the wild animals from him. Didn’t find another farm between here and there. Didn’t mean any disrespect.”

  Belle nodded. “I understand. Thank you for doing the best you could. And for being there with him.” She closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them, she sucked in a deep breath at the same time. “Thank you. We don’t have much for dinner, but you are welcome to join us.”

  “Ma’am, I reckon you don’t need to be a-fixin’ for me. Let me take care of that. You just tell me where to find things.”

  “We keep our food in a box in the lean-to.” Abel looked up from his talk with Rusty. “I will show you.”

  “Did I hear a hen cacklin’?”

  “We brought the chickens and our cow up to the lean-to ’cause Ma couldn’t make it to the barn, and she said I was too little to take care of them.”

  The disgust in his voice made Belle roll her lips together.

  “My pa said I was to take care of Ma and our baby. He didn’t know if it was a boy or girl. But we got a girl, and her name is Angel.”

  “How about I go put my horse in the barn? I brought a sack of oats and one of beans. All the other supplies were gone.”

  “Anson was bringing our winter supplies back.”

  “So the wagon was full?”

  She nodded. “Most likely.”

  He huffed a sigh. “Shame, ma’am. That surely is a shame. What will you do?”

  “Pa always said God would provide.” Abel spoke in all seriousness. “He sent us an angel.”

  “He sure did.” Jeremiah smiled at Belle and indicated the baby.

  “No, He sent us a real angel. You tell him, Ma.”

  “We will save that for another time.” She watched the man in front of the fireplace. Perhaps God had sent them three angels. The baby in her arms, the visitor of the night, and the man standing right before her.

  Chapter 4

  Seems to me God got us in a real pickle here, Sanchez.” Talking to his horse had become habit since Jeremiah rode alone so many miles. Otherwise he might have gone stark raving crazy. He’d heard that happened to homesteaders on these northern plains. The wind here was indeed something to respect. Opening the barn door required a shovel to move away the drifted snow.

  That was one prepared woman, he told himself. Now, where would she or that poor husband of hers have kept the shovel?

  “Mr. Jennings! Mr. Jennings!” Abel called as he came dragging the shovel. He was so light, he could walk on the snow, far easier than a man or a horse. Jeremiah scolded himself. The boy shouldn’t have come out. He should have done something different. What?

  Abel handed him the shovel.

  “Thanks for the shovel. Now you’d better get back to the house before you freeze.”

  Abel gave him a disgusted look. “I shoveled snow before.”

  Backpedaling, Jeremiah figured he’d better be more observant and less opinionated. “I am sure you did. Are there two shovels?”

  “One in the barn.”

  “Okay, we’ll get that out, and you can help me.”

  The boy’s eyes lit up. “Can I pet your horse?”

  “His name is Sanchez, and he would like that right well.” Jeremiah dug out the door enough to swing it open to let his horse in. He didn’t need to clear it all. From the looks of the lowering sky, more snow was on its way. “Why don’t you run back to the house and ask your ma…” What did he need? “Uh, if we need more hay up there.”

  “It’s about gone. I fed the cow thi
s morning.”

  “You want to lead Sanchez inside for me?”

  “Ja, sure. You betcha. My pa used to say that.” He took the reins and eased the horse around the half-open door.

  He could hear Abel talking to his horse in the far stall of the three. A pile of hay filled the remainder of the barn. The other shovel hung on pegs Anson had driven into the sod wall.

  Abel was struggling with the cinch strap when Jeremiah reached the stall.

  “Here, let me help you.” He loosened it, and Abel finished the job. Sanchez turned his head and nuzzled the boy’s shoulder.

  “He likes me.”

  Thank you, Sanchez. “He does. You petted him, and he sure does love to be petted.” He threw the saddle over the half wall between stalls and stripped off the bridle.

  “We melt snow on the stove for the animals to drink.”

  “You have a bin we can pour the oats in? Hate for the mice to eat it.”

  “We could take that to the house.”

  Talking to this child was about as good as talkin’ to a man. Did his ma and pa realize how smart he was?

  “Do the chickens and cow stay up there all winter?”

  “No, first winter we had the lean-to. Pa and Ma built it during the summer.”

  “I see. You want to fork some hay in here?”

  “Ja, I will.”

  When they finished taking care of the horse, Jeremiah asked if they had a sled to pull hay up to the house.

  “I’ll get it.” The boy scampered out the door and returned, dragging the sled behind him. By the time they had it loaded and pulled to the house, dusk was already falling. Jeremiah parked the sled at the door to the lean-to, and together they forked it in. The chickens clucked as they settled on their roost across the far corner, and the cow rumbled deep in her throat—the comfortable sounds of contented animals. The baby whimpered in the other room, and the mother comforted her. More sounds that spelled home.

  Jeremiah sucked in a deep breath. Sounds he had not heard for years immediately brought back a landslide of memories. He could picture his mother rocking the cradle of the newest addition to the family. Ten children had taken up her life. Jeremiah was the eldest and helped when he could. He and his pa and the others, as they grew old enough, planted the cotton, hoed it, and finally—when, thanks to God, there were no natural catastrophes—picked it. After hauling it to the gin, they had some money to buy more seed and even put food on the table. They grew most of their food themselves, with the smaller children helping the most there. He had left home when the others were old enough to take his place. Sharecropping was not the way he wanted to spend his life, so he headed west.