A Promise for Ellie

by Lauraine Snelling

  A Promise

  for Ellie

  Books by Lauraine Snelling

  A Secret Refuge (3 in 1)

  DAKOTAH TREASURES

  Ruby • Pearl

  Opal • Amethyst

  DAUGHTERS OF BLESSING

  A Promise for Ellie

  Sophie’s Dilemma

  A Touch of Grace

  Rebecca’s Reward

  RED RIVER OF THE NORTH

  An Untamed Land The Reapers’ Song

  A New Day Rising Tender Mercies

  A Land to Call Home Blessing in Disguise

  RETURN TO RED RIVER

  A Dream to Follow

  Believing the Dream

  More Than a Dream

  LAURAINE

  SNELLING

  A Promise

  for Ellie

  A Promise for Ellie

  Copyright © 2006

  Lauraine Snelling

  Cover design by Dan Thornberg

  Cover image by William Albert Allard/National Geographic Image Collection

  Unless otherwise identified, Scripture quotations are from the King James Version of the Bible.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

  Published by Bethany House Publishers

  11400 Hampshire Avenue South

  Bloomington, Minnesota 55438

  Bethany House Publishers is a division of

  Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan.

  Printed in the United States of America

  ISBN 978-0-7642-2809-4

  * * *

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Snelling, Lauraine.

  A promise for Ellie / Lauraine Snelling.

  p. cm. —(Daughters of Blessing ; 1)

  ISBN 0-7642-2809-9 (pbk.) —ISBN 0-7642-0259-6 (lg. print : pbk.)

  1. North Dakota—Fiction. I. Title. II. Series: Snelling, Lauraine. Daughters of

  Blessing ; 1.

  PS3569.N39P76 2006

  813'.54—dc22 2006013799

  * * *

  DEDICATION

  TO ALL MY READERS who have been pleading for more about the Bjorklunds and Blessing, thank you for your love of Ingeborg and her family. A Promise for Ellie, book one in the DAUGHTERS OF BLESSING series, is dedicated to all of you.

  LAURAINE SNELLING is the award-winning author of over fifty books, fiction and nonfiction, for adults and young adults. Besides writing books and articles, she teaches at writers’ conferences across the country. She and her husband, Wayne, have two grown sons, a basset named Chewy, and a cockatiel watch bird named Bidley. They make their home in California.

  Contents

  PROLOGUE

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  EPILOGUE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  PROLOGUE

  Blessing, North Dakota

  May 1900

  THE CLANGING CHURCH BELL woke them all.

  Andrew Bjorklund and his father, Haakan, met at the bottom of the stairs, pulling up their suspenders as they shoved their feet into their boots by the back door. Clanging bells in the night always meant fire.

  Astrid pounded down the stairs, tying her hair back as she came. “Where is it?”

  “No idea yet.” Haakan stepped out onto the front porch of their two-story white house and scanned the area for the red of flames and billowing smoke. “Looks like the Olsons’ place. Andrew, you get the horses. Astrid, help me get buckets and shovels in the wagon. Andrew can ride on ahead.” He raised his voice. “You bring the rugs, Ingeborg.”

  “Ja, I will,” she called from the bedroom. “I’m almost dressed.”

  “Was there heat lightning?” Andrew asked a few minutes later as they threw harnesses over the horses’ backs.

  “Coulda been. I was sleeping too sound to hear any thunder. Besides, it’s clear now.” Haakan finished snapping the traces onto the doubletree. “You take Jack and get on over there.”

  Within minutes Astrid and Ingeborg were in the wagon and they started down the lane, Haakan driving the team all out.

  “Lord God, please protect our friends. Keep everyone safe,” Ingeborg prayed, her eyes open, hanging on for dear life as they took a sharp corner at only a slightly reduced speed. She kept praying the entire way.

  Haakan pulled the team to a skidding stop, the second wagon to have arrived. Already a bucket brigade had formed, but they were dumping water on the barn roof and soaking the other buildings. The fire roared as it devoured the machine shed, which was too far gone to try to drown the flames.

  “What happened?” Haakan hollered as he climbed a ladder to throw water on the house roof.

  “Don’t know. Woke to the dog barking.” Ole Olson handed up a bucket of water and reached for another from below as the lines grew with more wagons and horses arriving by the minute. “Just got to keep it from spreading.”

  As the flames died down, the firefighters gathered together. “Thank God there was no wind.” Ingeborg wiped the sweat off her face with her apron and glugged the cup of water someone handed her. She turned to the woman behind her. “Any idea what started it?”

  “None.” Mrs. Olson wrung her hands. “But if it weren’t for all of you, the entire place might’ve gone up. Thank the good Lord for friends.”

  Reverend Solberg nodded and drank deeply. “That church bell saved us again. And to think we almost didn’t put one up.”

  “We’ve talked about a fire wagon. I think it’s time to stop talking about it and start doing something about it.” Haakan clapped Andrew on the shoulder. “You young men did a fine job with the barn roof. That would have gone up next. And if the ground had been drier, a prairie fire may have started.”

  “Lots of maybes and might haves. Let’s pray and thank our God for what is.” Reverend Solberg waited for silence. “Father in heaven, we offer our heartfelt thanks for your providence, for keeping the fire within bounds, for all the willing hands who came so swiftly, and for keeping us all safe. To you, O Lord, we commend our work, our dreams, our lives. In Jesus precious name we pray.” Everyone joined him on the amen.

  “Uff da, what a stench a fire can make.”

  “Pa, you better come look. I think there’s a body in that shed.” Andrew’s face appeared green behind the smoke stains.

  May 1900

  BLESSING. I’m going home to Blessing. Home to Andrew.

  “Ellie, you daydreaming again? I asked you to take this over to your pa.” Her mother, Goodie Wold, peeked around the doorframe, a handled water jug in her hand. “Uff da, look at you. One would think you’re pie-eyed or some such.”

  “Pie-eyed?” Ellie turned from holding her graduation dress in front of her to see in the mirror. A lock of wavy golden hair lay over one shoulder. Concern wrinkled her wide forehead until she saw the teasing glint in her mother’s eyes. “Pie-eyed?”

  “You know, mooning
over that young man of yours. Here we’ve been gone from Blessing for two years, and you ignored every suitor who has come to call. Now take that handsome Mr.—”

  “No, you take him and send him elsewhere. Andrew Bjorklund is the only man for me, and he always has been.” She swung back and drew the waistline of the baby blue lawn dress against her slim middle and, with the other hand, held the bodice to her chest. “This turned out well, don’t you think?”

  “Of course it did, you silly child. Everything you sew turns out beautiful.” Goodie sat down on the edge of the four-poster, the lovingly turned posts a tribute to Ellie’s adoptive father, Olaf Wold, who made the most beautiful furniture west of the Mississippi. Right now he was working on a table and six chairs for Ellie and Andrew’s wedding present.

  “Perhaps I should have made this in white and used the same dress for both graduation and my wedding. That would have been more practical.”

  “Ah, Ellie, dear heart, you are always so practical. This is a good time for you to be at least a little bit impractical. Besides, I think we can afford a few extra yards of dress goods.”

  Ellie finished studying the dress and glanced at the smiling face above it. Dreamy might be a good word to apply to her. Her father said she looked like an angel, but she knew too well the streak of stubbornness that ran like double-strength whalebone up her spine. While some might say she was persistent, she knew it went beyond that. Bullheaded, more likely, although she managed to cover it with sweet smiles and soft words. Andrew likened her hair to golden wheat flowing down her back, so for him she kept it long; although she’d been tempted to follow the new trends and cut it shorter when some of her friends did. Short hair on her forehead might cover the marks that remained from her bout of chicken pox as a small child.

  One thing bothered her—her eyes. They were gray and slightly tipped up at the outer edges and always reflected the color she wore. Toby Valders had once called her Cat Eyes when she was wearing a green dress. She shuddered at the memory. Andrew had nearly beaten him into the ground for that and had later promised her he would never fight again.

  Andrew, whom she hadn’t seen since Christmas, when the entire family took the train back to Blessing. Andrew, who’d been her protector since the day she was carried into the Bjorklund home, ill and half starved. Her whole family would have died had it not been for Hjelmer Bjorklund, who had stopped by their soddy on his way home all those years ago. Andrew, whom she’d had to leave behind when Olaf decided to move his family out of the flood plain of the Red River Valley and settle in Grafton. Not that far away from Blessing yet more than half a day’s journey by buggy or horse.

  She’d be forever grateful that Reverend Solberg said she could come home to graduate with her class—the friends she’d grown up with.

  “Tante Goodie?” her young cousin Rachel Anderson said from the doorway. “Onkel Olaf says he needs you.” Rachel had come to stay with them the year before, when her mother died. The little girl was the only member of the family to survive cholera.

  “Tell him I’ll be right there.” Goodie stood with a bit of a groan.

  “I will.” Rachel dashed off, never walking when she could run.

  “Your knee still bothering you?” Ellie asked as she hung her dress on a padded hanger and then on the bar in the clothespress.

  “Some, but mostly when I get up. Falling like I did . . .” Goodie shook her head. “Enough about me. When Rachel gets back, you two go get the mail, would you please?” She smiled at the delight bursting on Ellie’s face. “I know. Most likely there’s another letter from Andrew, but the rest of us get mail now and then too. Poor Rachel, she is already feeling sad that you’ll be leaving us.”

  “Mor, I won’t be gone, just a ways away. Besides, the wedding isn’t until the end of June. We have to get our house built first.”

  Soon after Rachel returned they headed out to pick up the mail. Ellie swung her cousin’s hand as they strolled the four blocks to the post office.

  “I don’t want you to go away.” Rachel stared at Ellie from under the wide brim of her straw hat—the same hat Ellie had worn the year before.

  Today Ellie wore a new straw hat, this one with a narrower brim and a more rigid crown. A pink rose centered the white ribbon with strings down the back.

  “Who will listen to me in the middle of the night when I have a bad dream?”

  Ellie smiled at her young cousin. At ten, Rachel looked more like a bundle of sticks walking than the lovely young woman she promised to become. She would rather fish and chase with the neighbor boys than worry about keeping her nose from freckling. But her silky eyelashes and curly hair were the envy of all the budding girls at their church. Rachel just didn’t recognize such things yet. “You haven’t had a bad dream in a long time. I think you are over them.”

  “But who will braid my hair so it doesn’t fly all over the place?”

  Her pleading glance near to broke Ellie’s heart.

  “Tante don’t braid—”

  “Doesn’t.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “I know, but you have to speak properly, otherwise you sound slow and stupid.”

  “I’ll never be like you.”

  “Ah, Rachel, you don’t want to be like me. You want to be the best you that you can be. God made you special in His eyes, and He has a plan for you that only you can fill.”

  “How come He don’t . . . er . . . doesn’t tell me?”

  “He often doesn’t, just gives glimpses and peeks sometimes. But look at your feet.” They both stopped and looked down. “Now step with your right foot.” They both did. Oh, Lord, how to explain this? “See, until you took one step and then one with the other foot, you couldn’t take the second with the first. Some things you just can’t know ahead.” They looked at each other, and Rachel shook her head.

  “Hmm. I see what you mean.” She stepped one foot at a time again. “So if I just keep walking, God will guide my footsteps?”

  “He said so. But you have to read your Bible to hear His instructions.”

  Rachel groaned.

  “I know you think it doesn’t make sense sometimes, but some things are very clear. Every story in the Bible is there to teach us something.”

  “Like David and Goliath? I like that one.” Rachel made a whirling motion with her hand. “Five little pebbles from his sling, and bam, the giant fell.”

  “So, what’s the lesson in that story?” They were nearly at the post office.

  “Learn to use a sling real good. I’ve been practicing but don’t get it yet.”

  “Well, not good. Food tastes good. We do things well.”

  “See, you go away, and who’s going to teach me to speak proper?”

  “You might listen in school instead of writing notes to Elspeth.”

  She opened the door of the post office, and they both stepped inside.

  “Wold mail, please,” Ellie said to the man behind the counter. He turned to the rows of boxes and pulled out a packet, then handed it to her.

  As soon as she saw Andrew’s handwriting on an envelope, Ellie wanted to find a quiet spot and read it, hugging all his words to herself, letting them soak in and join all the others she had stored away in her heart.

  Rachel groaned and rolled her eyes. “Andrew is a buttinsky.”

  “What a thing to say.” Ellie tucked Andrew’s letter into her pocket and sorted through the remainder of the mail to make sure nothing that didn’t belong to them had made its way into their box. The day before she’d had to bring back something belonging in the post office box next to theirs. The young woman putting out the mail was in love, and even if the whole town collapsed, she’d never notice. Pieeyed, for certain.

  Good thing I’m not that way, she said to herself. But does that mean I’m not really in love with Andrew? The thought stopped her short. What if she’d loved him for so long that she was not in love love but in brotherly love? Like the way Astrid loved her brother. Lord, do I kn
ow the difference?

  “Come on, let’s hurry. I’m going over to play with Elspeth after we get home.”

  “You go on ahead. I’ll be along shortly.”

  “Give me the rest of the mail, then, so you can go mooning over Saint Andrew’s letter.”

  Ellie gave her the mail and a swat on the bottom. “Someday you’ll be in love, and then I’ll get even.” She arched her eyebrows. “Why, Mr. Whatchamacallit, did you know that Rachel used to chew her fingernails and her braids too? Why, I remember when . . .”

  Rachel hooted and took off up the street. “Ellie and Andrew sitting in a tree, K-i-S-s-I-n-G.”

  Ellie shook her head. Why not let the whole world know their private business? She took the envelope from her pocket and stared at the handwriting. Andrew, so big and strong yet gentle and kind. A warmth started in her middle and curled lazily up to set her heart to thudding. She’d not been running, but she felt like she might have been. Surely one didn’t feel this way about a brother. Surely this was love so true as to be ready for marriage. The length of their love only strengthened it.

  She sat down on one of the benches by the town park and carefully slit the drop of wax free from the paper. Andrew had drawn a small heart in the wax. She caught it in her skirt, picked it up, and slid it into the envelope. One more thing that Andrew had done especially for her. She unfolded the paper.

  “Ellie, Ellie?”

  Only Maydell would call like that from half a block away. Ellie sighed and tucked her letter into her reticule. She watched her best friend in Grafton come dancing across the grass, holding her hat with one hand and, of all things, a fan in the other. Now what scheme was she concocting to attract poor Mr. Farnsworth, the new choir director at their church? In a pink dress matching her cheeks made more pink by the run, Maydell was as short and round as Ellie was tall and slender. They were matched in determination.

  “I was afraid I wouldn’t see you before you left.” Maydell sank down on the bench beside Ellie and unfurled her fan to cool her face.