“Yes.” She began to regale him with tales of their neighbor girls, when the words died on her lips. “Dost thou have children?”
“Seven sons.” He chomped more cookies. “But my quiver is not yet full. I would have seven more to work my farm and a lovely girl or two—like thee—to care for and civilize the household.”
“Civilize,” Keturah said faintly. A vision rose before her of a gargantuan table surrounded by wide-mouthed blond Anakites with her and two skinny, pitiful girls shoveling food like hay. She broke out in a cold sweat.
Friend Squibb gave her a gooey smile, and her gorge rose. With a stammered apology, she ran out the door toward the barn.
Papa’s hands held her head as she retched. After she washed her face, he seated Keturah in the empty but still-warm washhouse. “I will inform Friend Squibb of thy illness.”
But Mama, returning from the house, already had done so. “When I said thee was feeling delicate, he expressed thanks for the meal but said perhaps he should leave thee in the tender care of thy mother and father.”
Keturah twisted her apron.
Her mother’s fine eyebrows drew together in a straight black line. “What did he say to thee? What did he do?”
“Nothing dishonorable,” Keturah assured her. “He complimented my good health. He wishes to marry and have seven more sons—”
“Seven!” Caleb appeared out of nowhere, as usual. “Seven who eat like him?”
“Seven more to help run his farm.” Keturah shuddered.
She knew Papa was searching for something positive to say. “Friend Squibb appeared a very…hearty man.”
Keturah bowed her head. “I—I did try to like him, Mama.”
“I am glad thee did not. He would work thee like a slave.” Mama sniffed. “I had not seen him at table. His god is his stomach.”
She laid a rough hand on Keturah’s cheek. It felt good. Her mother hastened inside to scrub Friend Squibb’s presence from her table.
Papa’s glance followed his wife fondly and then wrapped Keturah in a gentle embrace that quieted her heart, mind, and insides.
Perhaps Mama would think twice before finding her more suitors.
Chapter 4
Henry dropped his lunch poke. Beautiful Keturah looked straight at him. Standing near Scott’s store beside her brother, Keturah did not blink. Henry avoided her at Meeting each week, but now he could not escape that jeweled green gaze. His legs teetered, but his feet refused to move.
“Henry.”
Keturah’s smile devoured his breath. He looked away, trying to inhale.
“Henry?”
Was there a note of hurt in her voice? He rose from his seat on the ground, flattening his voice into politeness. “Miss Keturah, how are you? And you, Mr. Wilkes?”
Caleb nodded.
She giggled. “By now thee should know we Friends do not give each other titles.”
Last month she had played the fool, falling into the river. Today he was doing everything wrong.
“Do not worry thyself.” Keturah read his uneasiness. “Call me miss if thee wishes.”
“I—I don’t want to be too familiar.”
“Thee rescued me, and now thee knows my name. I know thine, as does Caleb. We worship together. Are we not friends?”
He let himself smile. “We are.”
“Would thee like Christmas cookies?” She eyed the leathery dried fish in his hand.
He puzzled at this, since it was only October. But his stomach growled at the sight of plump brown gingerbread cookies. “I would not eat your vittles.”
“We have eaten plenty.” She held them under his nose. “Even Caleb has had enough.”
Caleb nodded, his gaze wandering.
Henry took two. Mmm. Sweet and spicy. Like Keturah. She must be a wonderful cook.
Caleb’s stare fastened on a blond girl down the way. “Keturah, may I assume thee will not swim?”
She shot him an annoyed look. “I promise.”
“Remember what Mama said. Stay within my sight.”
Watching Caleb amble off, Henry laughed. “If you do fall in, I will teach you to swim. At least I will not have to seek your shawl.”
Her smile faded. “I do not trouble Mama further by wearing it in public today.
She does not think bright colors proper.” Keturah set her jaw. “But I wear it often alone, especially when I stitch my Christmas sampler.”
“Why does she dislike color?” He was being too bold but could not restrain his curiosity. “At Meeting, all wear gray or dark clothes.”
“Friends prefer to keep their lives simple and free from pride. I see their wisdom.” She raised her chin. “But surely the God who created cardinals, dandelions, and pumpkins, who paints the sunrise each day, does not forbid the joy of color to His people.”
He nodded. Looking into her emerald eyes, he knew their Creator must take even more pleasure in them than he.
“I want to open my life to beauty.” Keturah cupped her hand over her eyes to scan the Ohio. “I was born here yet know the river so little because of my mother’s fears.”
“Why is she afraid of the river?”
“Her sister drowned one spring.”
No wonder. He’d seen the river flood, changing overnight into a roaring monster that swept dead people and animals downstream before his very eyes.
“That was years ago.” Impatience tinged her voice. “Tell me what thee has seen.”
He didn’t want to frighten her. “I see it sparkle in the sun’s light and hear its voice in the dark. I’ve keeled many boats, even past where the Ohio meets the Mississippi.”
“Thee has ridden a steamboat?”
He basked in her smile of admiration. “Occasionally.” Twice, actually.
“Thee has met travelers. How exciting.” She gestured to the east. “And has thee explored the big cave?”
Henry nodded, but uneasiness chilled him. Pa knew the big cave too well.
“Thee must have many stories to tell.” Like a little girl, Keturah hugged herself. “I would see the cave, but Papa forbade it. I heard pirates once lived there, preying on passing boats. Some say they still stop boats—even steamships—and demand money. Did thee ever meet up with pirates?”
His soul dropped like an anchor. Finally he wet his lips and said, “Yes. A time or two.”
♦ ♦ ♦
How glad Keturah was that Mama, regretting Friend Squibb, allowed her to go to town now. She wanted to know Henry better. Once past his first shyness, he seemed almost lighthearted with a boyish smile that warmed his feline eyes. As they talked, she felt more comfortable with him than with her own brother. But now his face stiffened. He said little as she chattered. Still, she was disappointed when Caleb and Priscilla walked toward them.
“I must go.” She sighed. Back to the farm where adventure consisted of runaway livestock. “I will see thee at Meeting?”
“I would not go elsewhere.”
The hunger in his voice startled her. She had gone to Meeting every week since a babe and never encountered such fervor.
“Come, then, and feast,” she said impetuously.
His face lit up.
“Till then. Good-bye.”
Henry nodded and faded into the forest. She blinked and turned to her brother. “How does he vanish like that?”
“Because he looks like a walking sapling.” Caleb waved farewell to Priscilla. “Except for the black hair.”
“The sapling calls the sapling thin.” Keturah crossed her arms.
“He is much thinner than I.”
She was about to say, He does not eat as many cookies. Instead, she said softly, “He does not eat as often as we.”
Caleb nodded, his eyes suddenly serious. He said no more as they walked back to Papa’s wagon.
“What, thou art not late? Nor soaked?” Papa gave them a quizzical look. “To what do we owe this strange state of affairs?”
Keturah impulsively held his hand agai
nst her cheek. “Sometimes Caleb and I forget to be thankful for all we have.”
Papa looked pleased but more puzzled than ever when Caleb did not add a retort. As he urged Sam on home, Keturah thought perhaps the farm with its snug four-room cabin, full table, cellar, and smokehouse was not a bad prospect after all.
♦ ♦ ♦
“Where you goin’ so early?”
Hand on the door latch, Henry felt Ma’s words hit him between the shoulder blades like birdshot. “I can’t sleep.”
“You’re goin’ to see that Quaker girl.”
Ma knew. How? He dropped his head.
“I saw you talking to her in town. Pretty. You have an eye for the ladies. Like your Pa.”
Pa was dead, shot in Kentucky when vigilantes hunted down his pirate gang. Why couldn’t Ma let him die? He wanted to run but faced her. “I’m going to Meeting.”
Ma’s face and hair had absorbed the gray morning light. Her weary mouth twisted in a chuckle. “Henry, I’m your ma. You may present a fine front to others, but don’t try it on me. Meeting? You, a Quaker?”
“Don’t know if I’ll be a Quaker. But I find peace there.” He took a deep breath. “I find God.”
“And that girl has nothin’ to do with your gettin’ religion?”
He knew his face was turning red. He threw the door open. Today I’ll do it. I’ll run and run and never come back.
“Henry!” Her tone dropped to almost a whisper, a thin chain that pulled him. “This foolish dream can’t come true. She and her thee-and-thou family will never think of you as anything but dirt. She doesn’t know you—”
“You don’t know me, Ma!” The cry ripped from his chest as if she had opened it with a knife. “You never have!”
He ran for the meetinghouse as if his life depended on it.
♦ ♦ ♦
“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”
Papa had read this scripture weeks ago. The words sprouted in her daily thoughts, and now, sitting before the crackling fire on a gloomy October afternoon, she stitched them onto the sampler she had marked herself.
“I am glad to see thee so industrious.” Mama, trimming candles they had made, smiled approval, but her voice held a note of amazement.
Keturah did not wonder; she had cared little for samplers—until now. “This scripture comes to me during Meeting. I think on it almost every day.”
The verse was not among other familiar passages women sewed. Keturah feared Mama would remark on the bright red crewel, which had not faded during her unplanned bath in the river. She soon saw, however, that Mama was not about to discourage this combined spiritual and needlework miracle.
Nor did Papa as he brought in more wood. “An excellent verse.” He beamed. “Friend Henry questioned me about it. I loaned him my pamphlet on the Corinthian epistles. That boy asks good questions.”
“Humph.” Mama sniffed.
Keturah feared her mellow mood had departed with Papa. Mama eyed the decoration Keturah had marked on the sampler. “Roses? Such large roses.”
“Yes, Mama. One above the scripture, one below.” Green pine needles and holly would give it a Christmas air, but she wouldn’t point that out.
“Lilies would match the verse’s meaning better.”
“The rose does symbolize love.” Keturah knew what Mama feared: Romantic overtones would feed local gossip. “But Christ’s love makes us new. What better flower for my sampler?”
Mama nodded. Though she lived her faith and her love, her mother did not speak easily of either. Mama bustled upstairs to battle imaginary dust.
Keturah chuckled then hummed “While Shepherds Watched,” a carol her friend Delilah had taught her. Her awkward fingers gained speed, stitching the wondrous words and Christmas roses in bright red.
♦ ♦ ♦
“Henry!” She waved from the bench outside Scott’s store and readied her Christmas cookies. Sharing them had become almost a ceremony, though she now added thick bread-and-butter sandwiches and apples to her food packets.
He joined her, his face rosy with the brisk October day. While he munched, she read poetry, including a Robert Burns poem, sung in Scotland on Christmas and New Year’s Day.
“‘Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind? Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and days o’ auld lang syne.’”
He grinned. “I doubt that would be read at a Friends’ Meeting.”
“Mama likes Christmas songs no more than she likes red.” Keturah rolled her eyes. “But I have decided this year to celebrate Christ’s birth with poems and carols.”
“My grandmother sang carols in French every Christmas.” His eyes glistened a little. “Sometimes Ma sings them.”
“Is thy papa French, too?”
“He was a Shawnee.” Henry’s eyes hardened to sandstone.
“Thee has not yet eaten thy cookies.” Although itching with curiosity, Keturah changed the subject. “I shall finish mine. When Caleb returns, he may try to steal them as he only ate a dozen before we left home.”
The strained lines around Henry’s mouth relaxed.
Until a teasing voice broke in. “You could share one with your hungry little brother.”
Turning, Keturah nearly dropped her treasured book of poetry into the mud.
Wide, dark eyes fastened on hers. Rich black waves of hair curled on his bronzed forehead and neck. The most handsome man she ever imagined gave a slight bow. He took her limp hand in his and kissed it.
Chapter 5
You going to introduce me, Henry?”
“Guess you’ve done that yourself.” Heat and ice fought in Henry’s stomach. He tried to steady his tone. “Keturah, this is my brother, Charlie. Miss Keturah Wilkes.”
Charlie did not drop her hand. “So glad to make your acquaintance.”
Of that Henry was sure. “Thought you were headed downriver today.”
“Ma asked me to change my plans.” Charlie sounded like an obedient choirboy.
“Of course she did.” If Ma couldn’t shipwreck his friendship with the “Quaker girl,” she would do it through Charlie the Lady-killer.
Keturah gave Charlie the same smile Henry remembered when she spoke of her red shawl. “If thee is hungry, I’ll gladly share my cookies.” She handed all three to Charlie.
“I would not think of it.” He returned them, looking hopefully at Henry.
He clutched his Christmas cookies like a greedy five-year-old. But he offered his brother two.
Charlie ate them slowly, telling Keturah how delicious they were. She forgot to eat while he told stories of fascinating ladies and gentlemen who traveled on the river—neglecting to mention he often picked their pockets.
You do it, too, Henry’s conscience prodded him. Faces of their thievery peered around the corners of his mind, shrinking away in terror. As Charlie continued the I’m-so-wonderful script Henry knew well, he sat mute.
When Caleb returned from his rendezvous with Priscilla, he raised his eyebrows at Keturah, who did not notice. Henry wanted to escape, but he would not leave Keturah and Caleb alone with Charlie. Finally Friend Wilkes drove up. Henry watched Charlie assess Keturah’s father. A Quaker, but a big one with a shrewd eye, not to mention an adult son and a hunting rifle beside him. For now the Wilkeses were safe.
As they drove away, Keturah turned and waved. “See you at Meeting!”
He marveled that the frost on the ground did not melt from her smile’s warmth.
But did she smile at him? Or at Charlie?
♦ ♦ ♦
Henry and his brother had left town, yet Charlie still wore his choirboy face. “You could have given me more than two cookies.”
“Or I could have knocked you down.” Henry held his fist under Charlie’s nose. “Thinking of robbing them? Don’t try it.”
Charlie threw him a scornful look. But at Henry’s intensity, he stepped back. “What�
�s gotten into you? We were the best together, even as boys.”
“You mean the worst.”
Charlie laughed. “And proud of it. Until you started reading too much.” He rolled his eyes heavenward. “Why did you have to steal that Bible?”
Henry felt the familiar flood of shame but glared at Charlie. “It wasn’t my idea to rob a circuit preacher.”
“I figured on Monday he’d be carryin’ a fat offering.” Charlie snorted. “His wallet was skinnier than he was.”
“What made us think we knew anything about preachers?” Henry shook his head.
“You’re gettin’ along good with them now.”
“Quakers don’t have preachers. They believe God has put His Light in all His followers.”
“That would be you, right, Henry? And Keturah.” Charlie cast sly eyes at him. “She makes you feel downright holy, don’t she?”
Henry ached to beat his brother into the mud. He could do it, despite Charlie’s muscles.
Charlie knew it, too. He took off like a deer, and Henry darted after him. They wound through the forest, panting, sweating, running all four miles. How many times had he chased Charlie home? He had lost count.
Henry ran most of his fury off. Drawing near their cabin, he wondered if he had overreacted. Still Ma might try anything to keep him away from the Quakers. And he wouldn’t put anything past Charlie, especially when it came to a pretty girl.
He was breathing down his brother’s neck as Charlie burst through the cabin door. “Hoping Ma will protect you?”
Charlie turned with his infuriating smile. “She always does.”
A snore fairly shook the cabin walls. Ma, her mouth as open as the big cave’s, lay on her corn husk tick. They knew better than to awaken her.
Charlie rummaged an old wooden box they called the cupboard. “No hardtack.”
“Any cornmeal?” Henry rummaged another. Nothing like food concerns to unite enemies.
Charlie shook his head then headed for the loft ladder. “Oh well. Got to catch a few winks.”
“Business tonight?” Henry glared. “Make sure it’s not with Keturah’s family.”
A Plain and Sweet Christmas Romance Collection Page 41
