Love Inspired December 2014 - Box Set 1 of 2: A Rancher for ChristmasHer Montana ChristmasAn Amish Christmas JourneyYuletide Baby

by Brenda Minton

  He went on to pray for the Shaws and the Masseys, for Faith and Dale in particular, and soon he was naming just about everyone in the town—the McGuires, Mamie, the Middletons, the Franklins, the Harcourts, the Lakeys, Wilbur down at the bank and Myrtle at the diner, the Masons, Rusty, Coach Randolph and Deputy Sheriff Calloway, the Shoemakers and Coopers, Abigail, Chauncey, the women in the a cappella quartet, even Pete Daniels, wherever he’d gotten off to—and then the town itself.

  He literally emptied his heart of every concern for his town, his church and the woman he loved. Then he began to pray for his family. He prayed for his father, that his faith would hold true through his incarceration and especially afterward. He prayed for his aunt, who had been like a mother to him in so many ways. He prayed for his little niece, who had never known her own father. He prayed for his sister’s broken, unforgiving heart.

  When he had wrung himself dry like an old rag, he slipped beneath the covers and blanked his mind for sleep, weary to the pit of his soul. As soon as he began to drift away, his phone rang.

  He didn’t think about not answering or even look at the caller ID. At this time of night, the call would be important, and it was a pastor’s lot in life to share the bad news that often came to his congregants at a late hour. He swiped a thumb across the bottom of the screen even as he lifted it to his face.

  “This is Pastor Ethan.”

  “Well, now,” said one of the dearest voices on the planet, “then this would be Pastor Ethan’s sister, calling to wish him a merry Christmas.”

  *

  Every time the phone rang the next day, Robin expected to hear Ethan’s voice telling her he’d heard from his sister. She did not expect to hear Rusty Zidek’s.

  “Just thought you’d wanna know that the Shaw boys came to see me.”

  “Oh? And did they believe you?”

  “Hard to say,” Rusty admitted. “I think they wanted to, but it seems to all come down to the gold. Without proof that it exists, they can’t quite swallow the rest.”

  “And we have no proof that the gold exists,” Robin said around a sigh.

  “To prove it exists, we’d have to prove Jackson took it,” Rusty told her.

  That was it, then, Robin thought. They were beat.

  It began to snow late in the afternoon. Ethan finally called—to ask if Robin could come early for quartet practice. Assuming that the other ladies had expressed concern about being on the roads after dark with the snow coming down, she asked Olivia if she could take off early.

  Olivia shrugged and laughed. “Go on. Your mind’s been somewhere else all day anyway.”

  Robin couldn’t help feeling depressed. Between Rusty’s news and wondering why Colleen hadn’t called, she didn’t feel terribly upbeat. It didn’t help, either, that she and Olivia were working on a display of antique wedding dresses, including a beautifully beaded Arapaho garment on loan and Elaine Shaw’s simple cotton tulle frock, now aged to the color of tea. Robin kept imagining her own wedding dress, one she doubted she’d ever get to wear.

  A particular dress from the late fifties had especially caught Robin’s eye. With a simple straight skirt and long sleeves, it seemed terribly elegant, especially as it was topped by a little hooded cape trimmed in feathers. Robin thought that style would be lovely for a winter wedding, especially if the feathers could be replaced with high-quality faux fur. She might even cut off the skirt at tea length and add fur to the hem, not that it mattered. She wasn’t going to marry in winter, not in Montana anyway. She almost wished she didn’t have to see Ethan again, and drove over to the church only reluctantly to find Ethan alone in the vestibule.

  “Once again, I am in your debt,” he said, his eyes shining as he caught her hands with his.

  Relief and joy suffused her. “Colleen called you.”

  “We talked late into the night. It was so good to hear from her. I cannot thank you enough.”

  “I’m just glad it worked out.” At least something had.

  Ethan reached into the pocket of his jeans and drew out a tiny, velvet-covered box that made the breath seize in Robin’s throat. “Glad enough to marry me?” he asked, placing the box in her upturned palm.

  As she opened the hinged lid with trembling fingers, he explained that he’d phoned her father that morning.

  “We had a long talk. He didn’t say that he approved of our marriage, but he did say that he only wanted your happiness. I’m convinced that with a little time we can win his full blessing.”

  “Oh, Ethan,” Robin gasped, her eyes swimming with tears. “It’s so beautiful.” She blinked so she could keep the delicate ring with its sizable diamond in sight for a moment longer. Then she closed the lid on the little box and pressed it back into his hand, her heart breaking. “But I can’t.

  “Robin.” He made it half plea, half scold. “I can’t believe I’ve misread you in this.”

  “I spoke to Rusty earlier,” she told him tonelessly. “It’s over, Ethan. We can’t fight Jackson.”

  “I don’t accept that.”

  “Nevertheless, I’ll be leaving right after Christmas.”

  The other ladies began arriving then. Even as she quietly dried her eyes, she was perversely glad. She couldn’t resist the sanctuary of Ethan’s arms, no matter how temporary, and that would only make leaving more difficult. At least she would take with her the knowledge that he and his sister had made peace. She would know that he’d loved her enough to ask her to marry him, and that she hadn’t cost him his pastorate and his home.

  She didn’t know how she managed to sing after that. Her throat felt thick and clogged, and the backs of her eyes burned with unshed tears. Ethan seemed positively morose and lethargic to the point almost of paralysis. He didn’t even go into the sanctuary to play the bells from there.

  To Robin’s surprise, Faith dropped by during the practice with last-minute questions for Ethan about her own wedding. Her first comments, however, were words of praise for the music.

  “I’ve never heard anything so lovely! Could you possibly sing this song for my wedding Christmas night? I mean, since you’re all invited to the wedding anyway.”

  “But we’re not all invited to the wedding,” Robin blurted.

  “Of course you are,” Faith said, taking her hand. “I know it’s short notice, but it would be a simple thing to slip out here just before we say our vows, sing and slip back inside again, and the song is perfect. Don’t you think so, Ethan?”

  “We might leave out the bells to make it less Christmassy,” he said, staring at Robin.

  “I wouldn’t want to upset your father,” Robin muttered to Faith, who waved that away.

  “Oh, don’t worry about him,” she said, leaning close. “He’s got Dale’s mother for that now. It’s fine. Trust me.” She squeezed Robin’s hand. “Please.”

  Robin made a face. “You’re very kind to ask after the way I insulted your family. I shouldn’t have said those things. You and your brothers and sister have never been anything but polite to me.”

  “You were provoked,” Faith said. “We all understand that. Now, will you do me the honor of singing at my wedding?”

  “Of course,” Robin acquiesced. She hadn’t meant to leave on Christmas Day anyway. Besides, it would give her a chance to speak to Jackson, to tell him that she was leaving and would deny her great-grandmother’s claims, if necessary.

  Faith hugged her. “Thank you! Oh, I’m so thrilled. I’ll make sure the musicians know about the change. Now, if I could have just another moment of your time, Ethan…”

  He walked off with her, and they conversed for several moments. He nodded, and Faith rushed out. The other ladies began to gush about being asked to sing at Faith Shaw’s wedding. Robin only hoped Jackson wouldn’t make a scene, but why would he? That would just make her claims public, and surely he wanted to avoid that.

  Before she left for the evening, Ethan tried to convince her to talk to him, but she knew that would only make what she had
to do that much more difficult.

  “Robin Elaine Frazier,” he scolded her, “where is your faith?” Then he reminded her that he would see her the next afternoon.

  For the first time, she regretted agreeing to help him with the Christmas program, but she’d given her word, and she only had two more days to get through.

  Then it was just a matter of getting through the rest of her life without him.

  *

  Ethan had chosen the hour of five o’clock for the Christmas Eve service for several reasons. It allowed the congregation to enjoy the pageant and still get home in time to spend the evening with their families. Also, given the unpredictability of winter weather, it seemed wise to have everyone off the roads as early as possible. Finally, and most important personally, five o’clock came an hour before the regularly scheduled recorded carillon of the bells, which meant that his bells could not be confused with those. Ethan had decided to toll each bell every minute for ten minutes, bong-bong, then to ring them continuously for a full minute, hoping they would play themselves out for several moments afterward.

  He promised the cast and crew of the pageant a surprise, then warned them not to abandon their posts before hurrying out to remove the shelves for the last time, Robin at his side, both dressed in period clothing.

  “I can get someone else to help me if you want,” he offered morosely, but she shook her head.

  Grudgingly relieved, Ethan prepared to ring the first bell at a quarter to five. It wouldn’t have been the same without Robin. They’d been in this together from the beginning, and he wouldn’t have wanted to do this without her. He didn’t want to do anything without her, and he resented her refusal to marry him, even if she did it to protect him. Didn’t she have any faith at all? Didn’t she see that God had worked out every problem so far? Surely all they had to do was give Him time to work out the rest.

  The first peal reverberated throughout the building and across the countryside just as the sun sank below the western peaks, followed quickly by the deeper bong of the larger bell. The effect was startling, lyrical. Through the open doors of the sanctuary, they could hear people asking what that was. When the second toll began a couple seconds later, they heard applause. With the third came shouts of praise.

  Robin kept time for him with a stopwatch. He pulled the ropes, one after the other, with several seconds of silence between each lovely bong-bong. People poured into the church from outside, the Shaws among them. They crowded the vestibule, gathering around the closet to watch him pull the ropes. When he began the arduous eleventh minute, Brody Harcourt and Ellis Cooper stepped in to take over. His arms and chest burning, Ethan gladly yielded. Both were grinning and gasping for breath when Ethan brought the exercise to a stop sixty seconds later.

  People stood around looking upward with their hands in the air, marveling at the sound and feel of the bells as they continued to toll. Robin hurried into the sanctuary ahead of Ethan, no doubt to avoid the Shaws as much as to get the cast and crew back into position. He took his place, promising to explain about the bells. He did so as soon as the congregation and the bells quieted.

  “The bells were a gift to the church from Silas Massey and his wife, Grace,” Ethan explained. “They fell into disuse after the Masseys left Jasper Gulch, but they are obviously sound, so Robin and I acquired new ropes, attached them to the bells and planned to surprise you all by ringing them today to call you to this Christmas Eve service. It seems fitting as this is our centennial year.” He looked pointedly at Jackson Shaw then, asking, “Don’t you agree, Mayor?”

  Jackson stood, nodded and said, “I do, indeed, Pastor, very fitting.”

  Ethan felt a pang of regret that Robin’s great-grandmother’s wishes for her were not to be fulfilled, but then he mentally scolded himself for a lack of faith, the same lack of faith that he’d been telling himself Robin had displayed by rejecting his proposal. How was she to have faith if he could not?

  Ethan prayed aloud, put on his smock over his period clothing, and the pageant began. The bells had set the tone for the production, which went with as few hitches as possible when children and animals were involved. Poignant in places, precious in others, it somehow managed to be a reverent retelling of the Christmas story, and the timing couldn’t have been better as the congregation filed out just as the preprogrammed recorded carillon played “Silent Night” through the speakers in the belfry.

  The cast seemed jubilant afterward, even as they hurried away, with Ethan’s blessing, to join their families for their personal Christmas Eve celebrations. A few stayed behind to help clear the sanctuary of the pageant set and prepare it for the Christmas-morning service. To his disappointment, Robin was not among them. She’d slipped away before he could speak to her. Perhaps, he decided, it was just as well. He didn’t know what he might say or do in his current state of mind. He only knew that he loved Robin and that she wouldn’t marry him out of some misguided attempt to protect him from Jackson Shaw.

  Well, who was going to protect Jackson if the mayor went after Robin, who had never meant harm to anyone in her life? God Almighty surely would not let that pass. Ethan himself would not let that pass, pastor or no.

  After the sanctuary was restored to its normal state, Ethan locked up, changed his clothes, then walked across the street to the parsonage. To his surprise, he found a package on the front porch, addressed not to him but to Robin, though the address was clearly that of the parsonage. It even said, “C/o Parsonage, Mountainview Church of the Savior.” The return address was a street in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Overnight had been stamped all over the thing.

  Blessing the parcel-delivery service, Ethan loaded the thing, which had considerable heft, into his car and drove it straight to the inn. He knew that Robin had been invited to join Mamie and several of her guests for a Christmas Eve celebration. He knew this because he had been invited, too. That being the case, instead of going to Robin’s room, he went to the great room of the lobby.

  The old-fashioned tree there had been up for so long and had dropped so many needles that it was beginning to look a tad spindly. In fact, many of the decorations on Main and Massey streets were looking worse for the wear, as some had been up for six weeks or more now. The fresh snowfall lent it all a clean, sparkling quality, however.

  Mamie greeted him with a mug of hot apple cider in her hand. “Glad to see you. Maybe you can cheer up our girl.”

  “I don’t know about that,” he said, shouldering the heavy box. “Maybe this will, though.”

  He carried the box over to the chair near the rock fireplace where Mamie led him.

  Robin looked up, frowning, to ask, “Ethan, what have you done?”

  Bending to place the box at her feet, he shook his head. “Not me, sweetheart. You refused my gift, if you recall. Your parents had this overnighted to the parsonage. At least I assume it was your parents.”

  Ignoring his reference to the engagement ring, she studied the box. “That’s their address.”

  He produced a pocketknife so she could cut through the packaging. Two minutes later, she caught her breath, looking at the jumble of pieces encased in bubble wrap.

  “It’s Great-Grandma’s antique brass floor lamp.” Abruptly, she dropped her face into her hands and began to cry.

  Ethan looked at Mamie, who seemed as puzzled as he was. After several seconds of Mamie’s ineffectual patting, Ethan did the only thing he knew to do. He simply scooped Robin into his arms.

  “It’s all right now,” he told her, holding her close. “There’s no reason to cry. I’m sure your parents thought you’d like the lamp.”

  “I love the lamp!” she wailed against his shoulder. “Don’t you see? It was always meant to be mine when I m-m-married! All of Great-Grandma’s antiques are.”

  He glanced at Mamie, wondering how much she knew. Apparently she knew enough, for she bustled away, herding the others in the room toward the kitchen by promising them treats.

  “You haven’t
told your parents that you turned me down,” he guessed gently.

  Robin shook her head. “I haven’t even told them that you asked, but they must have assumed…and this is their way of giving us their blessing.”

  He closed his eyes, whispering, “Thank You, God.” One more hurdle cleared. One more problem solved. If a man couldn’t believe in that, what could he believe in?

  Shifting onto one knee, he dug the tiny ring box from his pocket. “Robin Frazier,” he said, “I’m not just asking you to promise to marry me. I’m asking you to perform an act of faith. Put this ring on your finger as a sign that you believe God will make a way for us.”

  She took the box, but she didn’t open it. Instead, she hedged. “What if Jackson—”

  “Jackson Shaw is not God, and he’s made no move against either of us.”

  “But—”

  “Robin, sweetheart, once the church learns about my past, they may not want me anyway.”

  “Of course they will!” she insisted. “You’re a wonderful pastor, and you love it here.”

  “I love you,” he told her. “Just put on the ring, Robin, and instead of waiting to see what Jackson will do, wait to see what God will do.”

  She stared at him for a long moment. Then she opened the box, took out the ring and slid it onto her finger.

  He let out a silent breath of relief, kissed her and said, “Merry Christmas, my love.”

  She melted onto his shoulder, sighed and asked, “Have you ever considered taking a pastorate in Albuquerque?”

  He laughed, but at the same time he was praying.

  Oh, Lord, we’re depending on You, all of us, me, Robin, the Shaws, the church, even this town. This can end well, with truth and forgiveness all around, or it can go the way so much of human history has gone, with half measures, hidden motives, resentments, broken relationships. If it’s Your will that I leave here under a cloud, I’ll leave here under a cloud, and I’ll trust You to bring me into the sunshine again somehow, but it seems to me that this town and this church have lived under a cloud long enough. I’m asking You to make it right, for Your own glory in this, the season of glory.