Cindy Holby

by Angel’s End

  The stage wouldn’t take me any farther, because of the weather. So I bought a horse and struck out on my own. He looked at Leah with what he hoped was confusion.

  “You don’t remember getting shot?”

  Cade looked down at the bandage and shook his head. “I don’t.” He was in it now. He just needed to play it out until he got his strength back. Until he could leave town.

  “I found you a couple of nights ago. Your horse brought you to town during the blizzard. You must have fallen off. You were in the snow, in the middle of Main Street, by the statue.”

  A statue of an angel? Was that what he saw that night in the snow? Or was that all a part of the nightmares he’d experienced during his fever? Cade kept his face blank. Things really were fuzzy, the line between what actually happened to him and what Timothy told him blurred.

  She smiled at his hesitation. “Actually, Dodger found you.”

  “Dodger?”

  “My dog.” The dog appeared in the doorway as if he’d heard his name. He gave a slight wag of his tail. “Since you’re supposed to live with me we brought you here. Angel’s End doesn’t have a doctor.”

  “I don’t remember any of it.”

  “Well, you were very sick.” She stood and fussed with the blankets, straightening them and tucking them in at the foot of the bed. “You didn’t have any money on you. I’m guessing that you were robbed.”

  That meant she hadn’t found the money he kept in his boot. Or maybe she had and was using his memory loss as a reason to keep it?

  “Maybe it will all come back to you.” She pulled her shawl up and crossed her arms. “Hungry?”

  “I am,” he said.

  “I’ll be right back.” She touched the top of the dog’s head as she walked by.

  When did you get so jaded? How could he think someone who more than likely saved his life could steal from him? Not everyone in the world was bad. It was just that the good were so few and far between that he sometimes forgot they existed.

  Dodger stared at him. Cade waited. It seemed as if the dog wanted to say something to him, which was a pretty crazy notion. Dodger moved beside the bed, sat down and placed a paw next to Cade.

  “What?” Cade asked the dog. He wagged his tail in response. The trouble was, he knew what. He was in it now. Masquerading as a minister. “She’s the one who said I was supposed to be here.”

  Cade picked up the Bible. Its weight made his arm drop and he had to drag it across the bed to his lap. “Dang, I’m as weak and helpless as a baby.”

  Dodger whined.

  “Also good for nothing,” he added.

  Dodger turned a circle before lying down on the small rag rug next to the bed. Cade heard the sounds of Leah in another part of the house: footsteps, the heavy sound of a plate being placed on a table, the clank of a pot lid.

  The leather of the covering on the Bible was worn smooth. There was an indentation in the spine. Cade recognized it as the result of years of wear and tear, from a palm holding it open so that it eventually warped the spine. He remembered the sight of Timothy holding it in his hand and waving it like a banner as Cade approached his fire. It was apparent the book had been read many times throughout the years.

  Cade tested the heft of it and a vision of his father appeared before his eyes. In it he held a Bible in one hand and thumped his other on a pulpit. Cade quickly blinked his eyes to chase away the image. His father had abandoned him, why should he waste a minute of his life thinking about him now?

  Cade flipped the Bible open. A verse was written on the inside cover.

  Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him; I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.

  With it was written the chapter and verse: Psalms 91:14. Obviously this verse was of some importance to Timothy or a former owner of the Bible.

  Cade read it again. Since it had been made quite clear to him through the years that he was not privy to God’s love he dismissed the verse with a shrug. “To each his own.”

  A rather extensive family tree filled the next few pages. At the bottom he noticed Timothy’s name and the date of his birth, followed by the birth of brothers and sisters who all died young. One sister, born several years after Timothy, did not have a death date next to her name. Cade studied the handwriting. There were notations of Timothy’s parents’ deaths in a different hand. He flipped back a page to look at the scripture again. It matched. Cade could only assume that Timothy wrote the deaths and the scripture since this was his Bible. He checked the date next to Timothy’s birth again. He was thirty-seven years old when he died. Twelve years older than Cade was now. Did he look thirty-seven? The town must know how old their new preacher was supposed to be.

  There are days when I feel like I’m a hundred and seven…

  Footsteps in the hall alerted him to Leah’s return. He snapped the Bible shut and it slipped from his hands. The pages flipped open, and several flattened envelopes and folded pieces of paper escaped just as Leah entered the room with a tray in her hands. Cade made a grab at the letters but missed most. Dodger jumped up, instantly alert.

  “Oh my goodness!” Leah quickly put down the tray and bent to retrieve the sheets of paper from the floor just as Cade turned and weakly stretched his arm to the floor. His hand contacted soft flesh. Her breast? He yanked his hand back and it tangled in her arm. Leah jumped at his touch and the top of her head cracked on the underside of his jaw, knocking his head backward and into the headboard.

  “Ow!” He saw stars and his stomach heaved in response. Luckily there was nothing in it to come up.

  “Oh. My. Goodness. I’m so sorry.” She babbled. Her cheeks turned scarlet and she covered them with her hands before reaching for him, then pulling her hands back as if he were a pot of scalding water. “Are you hurt, of course you’re hurt, I am such an idiot at times. I can’t believe I did that.” She knelt down and gathered up the papers.

  Cade opened his mouth and then snapped it shut. Even that hurt. Think man, what would Timothy say?

  She was turned away from him, her upper body level with the bed as she straightened the papers. Cade hesitantly reached out and after a tentative pause, placed his hand on her head, cupping it within his palm. Her hair was soft and silky and he had to force himself not to pick up a lock and run it between his fingers. Leah stopped her dithering and turned to look at him. Her eyes widened behind the thick dark lashes and the gold flecks shimmered around the dark center. They drew him in. There was sadness in her eyes, and loss, both emotions he easily recognized. Emotions that were his constant companions. He pulled his hand away, surprised by the connection he felt between them.

  “No harm done.” Cade nodded his head toward the tray. “And that food smells wonderful.” He straightened his blankets and pulled them up around his chest, suddenly conscious of his lack of clothing.

  She smiled and bit her lip. She handed him the papers and the Bible. Cade shoved the papers inside the Bible and put it on the table. His mouth watered as she placed the tray on his lap.

  Chicken and dumplings, warm bread and something with apples in it. Cade couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a meal like this. His appreciation must have shown on the first bite. He closed his eyes as the succulent chicken settled onto his tongue.

  “Gretchen made it,” Leah quickly said. She dithered about with his clothes on the peg. His clothes were back. She must have brought them in while he was sleeping. She straightened his shirt. Flicked an imaginary piece of lint from the black frock coat. Timothy’s coat. “She’s Jim’s wife. Jim Martin? On the selection committee.”

  Was he supposed to know whom she was talking about? The selection committee? Something to do with Timothy and his letter of introduction. Who was he supposed to be introduced to? Maybe he should read that letter, and the rest of the papers that were stuck in the Bible.

  “She’s a wonderful cook,” he said after he swallowed. He might have been an orphan for most of his l
ife but he well recalled the manners his mother had taught him. “Please tell her I said so.”

  “You can tell her yourself,” Leah said. “Jim and Gretchen should be here soon. They promised to have Banks back by suppertime.”

  “Banks?”

  “My son.” Leah stood at the foot of the bed with his long johns folded over her arm. “He’s six.”

  The second bite was as good as the first. Cade chased it down with a piece of the bread. It was lightly toasted and spread with a soft creamy butter. Heaven…Or as close to it as he was going to get.

  “What about your husband?”

  She stiffened. “He died four years ago.” She put his long johns and pants on the end of the bed. “I thought you might want these now. I’ll be back for your tray in a bit.” She left without another word.

  Cade watched her go. I wonder what happened to her husband. Was he supposed to know already? Dodger padded around to Cade’s side of the bed. He placed his paw on the mattress and gave a slight whine.

  “Go get your own,” Cade said. He could hardly wait to sample the apple treat. As for the arrival of Jim, Gretchen, Banks and the selection committee, he was more than willing to wait on that treat.

  SEVEN

  “Nate’s been dead four years.” Leah swiped at the tears that clung to her lashes. Why was she getting so emotional now? “He’s a minister for God’s sake.” She laughed at her play on words.

  The rattle of the kettle let her know the water was hot. She poured some into her teacup to let it steep and the rest into the sink for the dishes. She looked mournfully at the pump. It was broken, thus the need to melt the snow for water. That was the one good thing about all this snow. Shoveling it into a pail sure beat hauling water from the stream.

  Nate would have fixed the pump in a heartbeat. He was handy about things like that. This house was proof of it. He’d carefully planned it, laid out the four rooms for efficiency, gave it a center hall, with doors on both sides so the air would flow through and cool it in the dry summer months and two chimneys between the sets of front and back rooms to keep it warm in the winter. If only he’d pursued a career building houses instead of being a sheriff.

  Leah scraped the scraps from her dinner into a bowl for Dodger and added some milk from the crock. A bit sloshed over as she sat it on the floor. She didn’t worry about it. Dodger would take care of it. As always there was no sense in crying over spilt milk. Nate was Nate, he wanted, no, he needed to do good. He thought he could accomplish it best by being a sheriff. If he had known he’d wind up dead, leaving a wife and son…

  “Maybe he should have been a minister.” Leah tried to imagine Nate standing in the pulpit, wearing a black frock coat like Timothy’s, quoting scripture. She couldn’t see it, couldn’t even see his face. She usually didn’t have any trouble picturing him.

  Leah took a sip of her tea. Banks should be back soon. Maybe she was just feeling melancholy because she missed her son and she was still so bone tired. That was why she couldn’t see Nate’s face when she closed her eyes. Four years wasn’t long enough to forget the way someone looked, was it?

  Or it could be guilt because of the way she felt when Pastor Key touched her hair. “What’s wrong with me?” It was just that it had been so long since she’d been touched by an attractive man. Of course she’d feel a spark of attraction. You don’t feel it when Jake touches you.

  Leah looked out the window. The ice and snow had ceased earlier in the day, trailing off with a few remaining bursts as if the clouds shook themselves out like a rug before moving onward. The sun was weak in the sky and cast an odd shine on the ice-covered streets. The barest hint of her reflection showed in the glass and stared back at her with recrimination. Leah told herself she was attracted to Pastor Key because it had been so long since she’d been loved. That explained the knot in her stomach, her raw and tender emotions and why she got emotional when Pastor Key asked her about Nate.

  But if that was the case, why didn’t she feel the same thing when Jake touched her, or when he kissed her? She couldn’t remember ever feeling this unsettled and restless. “I must be losing my mind.”

  A movement caught her eye. Dusty stood on the porch step of the Devil’s Table, waving his arm. Leah hurried to the door and stepped out into the frigid air.

  “How’s the preacher?” Dusty yelled.

  “Better. His fever broke and he’s eating.”

  “Good.” He stomped on the porch boards and swung his arms about in an effort to keep warm. Leah had the benefit of some shelter from the parlor wall that jutted out even with the porch and protected her from the wind. “I’m opening in the morning.”

  “I’ll be there,” Leah called back. Dusty always sounded crotchety even when he was saying something simple. He waved at someone down the street before ducking back inside the café. Leah grabbed her broom from the hallway to beat the snow from her porch back into the street.

  “Momma!” Banks plowed through the snow with Jim behind him. Both were bent over against the wind that gusted down from the mountains. The confusion that plagued her earlier disappeared at the sight of her son. Banks was all she needed to think about. Banks was what she had to live for. Nothing else mattered. Now if she could just figure out what he was carrying in his hands. He struggled mightily, breaking through the drifts with great determination. Joy oozed off him. Obviously he’d had a great visit.

  He was carrying a kitten. Not really carrying, she realized, as he got closer. It was more like he had it trapped beneath his coat. Its little head was stuck up under his chin and its meows rang in her ear as Banks got closer. Jim looked apologetic behind him.

  “Momma, look.” Banks stomped onto the end of the porch.

  “I see.”

  “We found them in the barn. Nonnie said the momma cat was looking for a place to hide them before the snow.”

  “And why isn’t this baby still with its momma?”

  “Oh they’re plenty old enough to be on their own,” Jim said sheepishly. “And considering how many were in the litter…”

  Leah took the kitten from Banks. It was gray and fluffy with bright green eyes. “Oh it”—she lifted it higher—“she, is precious.” Leah tucked the kitten up under her chin and a purr rumbled loudly against her throat. “How many were there and how come I get a girl?”

  “Seven,” Jim said. He tickled the kitten’s cheek with a finger.

  “And the brood decided there was one for each of them?”

  “With this one left over for Banks.” Jim laughed. “Gretchen is not happy. She’s determined to find homes for at least four of them.”

  “Poor momma kitty. I wonder where she came from?”

  “Probably one of the mining camps. I’d never seen her before. I found her curled up in one of the empty stalls, exhausted from ferrying all her babies. I don’t mind having her around. We haven’t had a good mouser since the coyotes got Blackie.”

  Banks’s eyes swelled wide and his mouth formed a perfect O. “Momma?” he gasped.

  “The coyotes don’t come close anymore because the town is too busy.” Leah gave Jim a look that let him know how unhappy she was with his directness. “But that doesn’t mean that you don’t have to watch her carefully when she’s outside.” Visions of tiny kitten puddles and other presents on her floor suddenly filled her mind. “I need a box.”

  “I’ll send one of the boys back with one. I guess I should have thought of it before we came down here.” Jim grinned a little sheepishly.

  “It’s the least I can do after springing the animal on your household. So how’s our preacher?”

  “Take your kitty inside and fix her a bowl of milk.” Leah handed the kitten to Banks. “And stay away from the pastor’s room.”

  “Yes, Momma. Will you help me name her?”

  “I will.” Leah waited until the door was firmly shut behind her and she could see Banks through the kitchen window. “He’s awake and he’s eating.”

  “That’s g
ood news,” Jim said. He leaned against the wall with his hands jammed in his pockets.

  “Yes, but there’s also something strange. He doesn’t remember what happened to him. The last thing he recalls is getting on his horse and striking out for town. As far as getting shot…” Leah shrugged. There was something else that bothered her about Pastor Key’s story but she couldn’t put her finger on it. She didn’t want to voice her concerns in case they were tied up in the strange feelings she’d been having since his arrival. “He didn’t have any money in his pockets. Did he have any belongings on his horse? A change of clothes. Anything?”

  “Nope. Not a thing. Not even a bedroll. But he could have been robbed, or it could have fallen off in the storm. Or he could have left his trunk at the stage stop for them to bring on when the weather breaks.”

  “I guess you’re right,” Leah said. Should she mention his boots? If that was all he had to wear, Jim would see them for himself soon enough.

  “He was shot, sick and got lost in a blizzard,” Jim said. “He’s bound to be a bit confused. It’s not exactly the welcome he was expecting.”

  Leah nodded as she chewed on her lower lip. “I’m kind of surprised Jake didn’t come around to check on him.”

  “I’m not. Jake is back at his ranch.”

  “He left in the middle of the blizzard?”

  “There’s only so much rejection a man can take Leah.”

  “So it’s my fault that he didn’t have enough sense to wait out the storm in town or at least wait until daylight to go home?” Darn that Jake for making her into the villain. She never asked him to care about her. Was she supposed to feel guilty because Jake chose to act like an idiot at times? Did he think that would change her mind, or her heart?

  “Can we take this inside? I know I’m cold.” Jim rubbed his hands over his arms. “How about you?”

  “Apparently I’m made out of ice and my heart is solid rock.” Leah went inside and Jim followed her. “And my love life, or lack thereof, is excellent fodder for the town to gossip about.”