“I’m fine, Viola. I ain’t had so much fun in ages.” Hattie rolled out the dough, picked up the tin glass she was using and started cutting out circles. “You’d best give that wash pan to Mavis and get to the shakin’. We’re gettin’ behind.”
Viola glanced at the board that stretched from the stove to the table. It was covered with fried doughnuts. She handed the empty pan to Mavis, who was busy mixing up the next batch of dough, grabbed the muslin bag off the corner of the table, dumped in some sugar and cinnamon, added a dozen of the doughnuts and shook them. When they were coated with the sugar mixture, she shifted them to a basket, grabbed another dozen doughnuts and repeated the process.
“We’re running out of doughnuts!”
Margie’s bellow was clear, even over the hubbub in the kitchen. “Gracious, already?” Viola added another dozen doughnuts to the basket, picked it up and hurried to the front window. A line of stampeders stretched in front of Frankie, Margie and Lucy as far as she could see.
“Here you are.” Frankie handed half a dozen doughnuts to the man in front of her. “Just drop your donation in the bowl there.” She nodded toward the end of the table, grabbed up her empty basket.
“Here are more doughnuts.” Viola dumped the doughnuts in the empty basket Lucy brought to her and hurried back to the kitchen. “Lana, you’re a genius. The stampeders just keep coming and coming. I couldn’t see the end of the line from the window.”
Lana laughed, brushed a lock of hair off her forehead with her forearm and went back to tending the frying doughnuts. “At this rate, we’ll not only have money enough to pay for the materials to make the window swags and pads for all the pews, but we’ll be able to buy a carpet for the entrance hall as well. Did you hear any…comments?”
Viola’s stomach turned. She’d been so busy, had been enjoying the women’s company so much, she’d almost forgotten. She shook her head. “No. By the time the miners reach the stoop, they seem to have forgotten about…everything…but doughnuts.”
“Or Frankie’s fierce look changes their mind.” Lana giggled. “I do think Frankie’s volunteering to do the selling was smart. That pistol she has tucked in her belt discourages more than someone being light-fingered with the donations we’re collecting.”
“Yes.” She blinked her eyes, cleared her throat. “Frankie is a true blessing.”
“And so are you, Viola. To many of us, in many ways.” Lana smiled, started lifting fried doughnuts out onto the draining board. “Now let’s get back to work. We’ve money to make today.”
Thomas stepped away from the pile of plump burlap bags, tried to decide from the look on Ed Parker’s face if the news from Skaguay was good or bad.
The sheriff squinted, pulled his hat brim down against the lowering sun. “What’re you doin’ here? I figured you’d still be hiding in the woods.”
“I don’t need to until later.”
“What’s that mean?”
“It means Viola is safe until tonight. Some of the women from the church are at her cabin baking and selling doughnuts.”
“Doughnuts?”
“All day.” Thomas fell into step with the sheriff as he headed for his office. “Evelyn Harris was right, Ed. You can hardly walk down the road for the stampeders beating a track to Viola’s cabin.” He frowned, felt that clutch in his stomach. “It doesn’t start out that way, but by the time they get to her road, it’s doughnuts they’re after. And guess who’s standing on the front stoop selling them?” He glanced up at his friend. “Margie, Lucy and Frankie. Pistol and all.”
Ed Parker threw his massive head back and let out a belly laugh that drew gazes from the crowd around them. “No man would buck a crowd of women, especially if one is wearing a pistol like she knows how to use it.” He shook his head, grinned. “Trust women to come up with a way to protect one of their own.”
“For today.” Thomas followed the big man into his office. “But there’s still tonight. And tomorrow… What did you find out in Skaguay?”
“Good news. For Viola, not Karl.” Ed Parker tossed his hat onto a hook on the wall, stomped over and flopped down into his desk chair. “You’ll be able to sleep in that room you’re paying for at Mavis’s tonight.”
Thomas sat in the other chair, held on to his patience as the sheriff leaned back, lifted his legs and plopped his booted feet on his desk.
“I went to Dengler’s ‘house’ in Skaguay. And you were right. Dengler left Karl to keep an eye on things while he and Dolph came to Treasure Creek. But Karl got greedy and tried to rob a miner of his winnings from a card game. Turns out the miner was better with a knife than Karl. Slit his gullet. And that’s not all the good news.” He crossed his huge arms over his massive chest and grinned. “Seems Dengler left Seattle in a hurry after one of his girls turned up dead. He come up to Skaguay and opened a place to get his share of the stampeders money. But one of the stampeders in Skaguay knew about the girl. He wrote his brother about Dengler’s new place, and a sheriff’s deputy come up north to arrest Dengler and Dolph and Karl for murder. He was looking for them when I brought them in. They’re going back to Seattle on the next ship. And they won’t be coming back.”
Thank You, Lord. Thank You for protecting Viola. “That is good news, Ed. Very good news.” He rose to his feet.
“Where you going?”
“To the boardinghouse. To get some sleep.”
“I thought maybe you’d like to come along while I tell Viola she doesn’t have to be afraid of Dengler or Dolph or Karl ever showing up at her place again.”
He wasn’t ready for that. He had a ways to go before he could talk with her about her past. The way his heart felt, maybe he’d never be ready to do that. But there was one thing he knew for sure. All that had happened proved he was head over heels in love with Viola Goddard. He shook his head, reached for the door. “I think she’d prefer you went alone.”
“Oh, Hattie, it’s over. I can hardly believe it.” Viola sank down onto the settle and buried her face in her hands. “Five years…five years of…” She shuddered, lifted her head. “It doesn’t matter. Not any more. It’s over. I’ll never have to live in fear again.”
Hattie nodded, knit another stitch on the mittens she was making for Goldie. “Seems like the good Lord is givin’ you a new beginnin’ all right. Mayhap now you’ll stop hidin’ them eye-catchin’ red curls ’neath them ugly snoods.”
“You knew?”
Hattie glanced up, shook her head. “Not ’til Dengler showed up. But once I learned ’bout everythin’, it wasn’t hard to figure out why you kept tryin’ to make yourself plain as possible. A woman beautiful as you would of had a lot of customers. Ain’t unlikely some of them would come passin’ through Treasure Creek, headin’ for the gold fields.”
“Yes.” The relief vanished like the smoke drifting up the chimney to disappear in the sky. What had she been thinking? She touched the healing cuts on her lips, massaged the scar on her hand. It wasn’t over. It would never be over. She would always have the scars. And the shame.
She looked up at the sampler she’d worked on in such faith. How foolish she’d been to believe it was possible for her to leave her past behind.
Tears filmed her eyes, blurred the words into shapeless forms without meaning. Thomas hadn’t come with the sheriff to tell her. And he would have. She knew he would have…before.
Chapter Eighteen
Thomas gritted his teeth, clenched his hands on the edge of the table at Jacob’s probing. “I was planning on using that shoulder again.”
“Not for anything strenuous. Not for some time.” Jacob frowned, put padding over the wound and covered it with a clean dressing. “This is not healing as fast as I would like, Thomas. That second tearing did more damage than I first thought.”
“Are you saying—”
“You have to stay in town, baby this shoulder and arm. No chasing around on the trail, no trips to Indian villages until I give permission. One slip…one wrench of tha
t shoulder and you might lose the full use of your arm.”
“That’s not what I wanted to hear.” Thomas slipped off the table, donned his shirt and tucked it into his pants. “I was hoping to go home today.”
Jacob shook his head. “Not a chance. I know how rough conditions are at that hut you live in. And at Goodge’s you won’t be chopping wood or hauling water. Or carrying injured stampeders off the trail and bringing them to me, for that matter. You stay in town.”
He nodded, frowned. He’d known something was not quite right with his arm, but…Jacob’s hand clamped on his good shoulder. He looked up.
“I’m serious, Thomas. The use of your arm is at stake here. It needs rest and time to heal. Do as I say.” Jacob released his grip. “Come back and see me in a week—unless there’s some change. Or you do something stupid.”
“Me? Never.” He tugged on his jacket, dropped payment in the bowl and went out the back door. Now what? He glanced toward the mountains that encompassed the town, stepped out from behind the clinic. Rising wind, from the direction of the harbor, chilled his face. He sniffed the air, frowned. The storm the sky had promised when he woke was getting close. A walk in the woods was out of the question. He started left across the intervening lots, toward the back of the boardinghouse, but the agitation in his gut told him it was impossible to go and sit in his room. And he sure didn’t feel like talking to anyone.
He retraced his steps, bucked the flow of people heading to and from the clinic and the new hotel a short distance behind it, crossed the road and cut through the lot between Mack Tanner’s house and store. People clustered at the corner of the road, milled around the store. He turned away from the hubbub of the waterfront, skirted Lana Tanner’s fenced backyard garden, put his right hand on top of a picket in the fence that separated the Tanners’ yard from the church property and hopped over.
The hum of conversation from the crowded waterfront muted, then faded away as he strode across the wide, deep lot behind the church. He paused beneath a tree with bare branches and scowled up at the sky. It was as gloomy as the grim prognostication for his shoulder and arm, as stormy as his thoughts.
The faint sound of chatter from the cabins that lined the road running along the other side of the churchyard floated to him through the quiet. He leaned against the tree trunk and rubbed his gritty eyes with the heels of his hands. He’d spent a restless night going over every single thing that had happened since Viola ran into him on the walkway outside Tanner’s General Store the day of Goldie’s kidnapping. It was impossible that it was all simple coincidence. And the logical conclusion for it all…the only answer that made sense…was that God had wanted him to stay in town to protect Viola. But Dengler, Dolph and Karl were no longer a danger to her. So why had things worked out so he could not go home and return to his ministry of the Tlingits and the stampeders on the trail? He’d figured everything was over. Except the way he felt.
He picked a piece of loose bark off the trunk, absently sliced his thumbnail along its length, shredding it. Viola’s need for his protection was gone. And his love for her, his desire to be with her forever would fade…in time. Not that he would act on it, even though he now accepted that Louise’s and Susie’s deaths were not his fault. As Hattie had told Viola, there was both evil and good in the world, and bad things happened because of it. He’d just forgotten that for a while. Allowed the truth to be pushed out by his emotions. But God turned the bad to good for those who loved Him, who were called according to His purpose….
He brushed the clinging bits of bark from his hands, folded his arms across his chest and stared down at the ground, examining a new thought. What if God had a twofold purpose in all that had happened? Perhaps God had purposed to set him free of the burden of guilt he had carried for the past three years and to protect Viola. Falling in love with her was his own doing. But things had changed.
Only your knowledge of her past.
The words flashed into his head, settled in his spirit. Conviction came, swift and unrelenting, leaving his heart stripped bare. He had come to a place of understanding that night in the woods. But the hurt and anger were still lodged in his heart. He was still sitting in unfair judgment of Viola. Blaming her for not trusting him enough to tell him of her past. And for a betrayal that existed only in his own heart.
Thunder rumbled. Dark clouds tumbled across the sky. But the light had never shone brighter. He pushed away from the tree and strode toward the church, heedless of the rain that was starting to fall. A hinge squeaked quietly as he opened the door and entered the building. Frankie, Margie and Lucy had wasted no time. The pile of lumber and the sawhorses were gone. A smell of paint hung in the air. He swept a glance over the new, vertical-sided walls and stepped into the sanctuary.
A hush enveloped him, broken only by the rain tapping softly against the stained glass windows. He walked down the center aisle between the pews, knelt in front of the altar and bowed his head.
Teena’s herbs had worked wonders. Viola peered at her image in the mirror, turned her face this way and that to better see in the tenebrous light from the window. The cuts were healed. Only the redness of the scar at her temple remained, and it was fading. A few more days and the redness would be gone. There would be nothing left to remind her of Dengler’s last, terrifying attack. Except the stain on her soul.
Lightning flickered, the white brilliance dancing across the mirror. Thunder grumbled. She pulled her hair back into a cluster of riotous red curls at the crown of her head and reached for the blue snood that matched her skirt. No. She lifted her gaze, looked straight into the violet-blue eyes in the mirror. “You will not cower and hide in shadows. You will not live in fear any longer.”
Goldie gurgled and waved her arms in the air. Rain spattered against the window.
Viola leaned down, caught and kissed the chubby little hands. “I wasn’t talking to you, little Miss Goldie. But thank you for offering your opinion. I guess, since you’re smiling, it’s a favorable one.” She straightened, looked in the mirror at the dark red curls at her temples and on her forehead, lifted her hand and touched the ones that nestled against the nape of her neck. She would not hide her “eye-catchin’ curls” any more. A smile touched her lips. Hattie would be so pleased.
Lightning slashed a yellow streak through the murky gray outside the window. Thunder crashed. Goldie let out a squall. “No, no, little one. There’s no reason to be afraid. I’m right here.” She scooped her up, cuddled her close and carried her to the kitchen.
“’Bout time you two got here. This gruel’s fixin’ to boil away to—” Hattie stopped and stared. The pan in her hand dipped dangerously.
“Hattie, the oatmeal!”
“Now see what you made me go and do.” Hattie clucked like a hen and set the pan back on the stove, padded across to the dry sink, grabbed a damp cloth and came back to wipe up the spill. “I knew you was beautiful, Viola, but…my!” She straightened, shook her head. “I ain’t never seen such gorgeous hair. It’s shameful the way you been hidin’ it.”
“Well, no more, Hattie.” Rain tapped on the chimney cover, echoed down the pipe. She propped Goldie on her hip, used her free hand to spoon a little of the oatmeal into a small bowl and carried it to the table. “I’ve decided my hair is to be my symbol of freedom from…from everything.” She added a sprinkle of sugar, poured milk on the cereal and stirred it smooth. “Here you are, sweetie.” She spooned some of the oatmeal into Goldie’s welcoming mouth.
“More like a banner of victory, if you want my thinkin’ on it. The Good Book says a woman’s hair is her glory. An’ my, my, but the good Lord saw fit to glorify you.” Hattie dished up her oatmeal and plunked down in her chair. “The glory’s plumb faded out of my hair, but I got my memories.” She chuckled, poured milk in her bowl and added a heaping spoonful of sugar. “Charley said he picked me that first time ’cause my hair looked like spun gold.” She frowned, scooped up a spoonful of the hot cereal. “He had a weakness for
gold. The old fool!”
“Well, judging from the thousands of stampeders passing though town and braving the Chilkoot Trail, Charley was not alone in his weakness for gold.”
Lightning glinted against the wet window panes. Thunder growled. Viola fed Goldie another spoonful of oatmeal and tried not to wonder if Thomas was safe in his hut, or caught in the storm somewhere on that dangerous trail, climbing the mountain.
Thomas lifted his head. The rain had stopped. The storm was over. He rose to his feet, glanced at the splotches of shimmering colors thrown on the floor by the sun coming through the wet, stained glass of the windows. A smile tilted his lips. He turned, started up the aisle and stopped, staring at Mack Tanner who was staring right back at him.
“Hello, Thomas. I didn’t expect anyone to be here.” Mack strode down the aisle toward him. “Why the smile?”
“I was remembering the look on your face the day I gave you the gold nuggets to buy the stained glass windows.”
“Nuggets I had buried, in the hope men would get sidetracked into looking for them and stop looking for my real buried treasure.” Mack shook his head, laughed. “I sure didn’t expect you to be the one that found my decoy treasure.”
“That was obvious from the look on your face when I gave them to you.”
“I guess.”
Thomas frowned. “I hadn’t thought of it before, but…I think that may have been the beginning.”
“The beginning of what?”
“All that has happened since.”
“You mean with Viola?”
“Yes.” Thomas looked up at the windows. “If it weren’t for finding those nuggets, I could not have afforded to stay in town like I have. And I wasn’t even looking for them…. God always pays for what He ordains.”
Mack stared at him. “Now see, it’s nuggets of truth like that…” He shook his head. “Pure gold. The true riches…” He narrowed his eyes. “Did you ever think God might have had more than one purpose in giving you the ‘wherewithal’ to stay in town, Thomas?”
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