The Heart's Charge

by Karen Witemeyer

  “Just point me toward Kingsland, and I’ll see she gets there,” Mark vowed.

  Dr. Hampton nodded.

  After giving the infant a thorough exam and fashioning a diaper of sorts out of a square cut from the bed quilt, the doctor swaddled the babe in a flannel shirt Mark had in his saddlebag, then gave the men directions to Kingsland.

  Mark had never been so nervous on horseback in his life. Then again, he’d never carried such precious and fragile cargo before. Thankfully, a large sandbar provided a smooth place to cross the Llano, so they made it to the outskirts of Kingsland with no incidents.

  “There,” Jonah said, pointing to a two-story farmhouse set back from the road. “White house, green trim, just like the doc said.”

  Mark turned Cooper onto the path and followed Jonah up the drive. The closer they got, the more run-down the place appeared. Chipped paint, loose railings, a dilapidated barn. Mark frowned. What kind of place were they taking his little lady to?

  A wooden sign hung from the front porch eaves. A carefully carved sign that boasted a fresh coat of paint and read Harmony House Foundling Home. Beneath that, in hand-painted script, was a quote from Mark 10:14: Suffer the little children to come unto me.

  Mark knew it was probably nothing but coincidence, but the fact that the establishment chose to quote from the gospel of Mark instead of Matthew or Luke resonated in his soul like a signal from heaven. He was meant to come here. Meant to trust these people with his little lady’s care.

  Jonah held Cooper steady while Mark dismounted. His lady fussed at the disturbance. Mark untucked her from inside his vest where he’d placed her for extra warmth as well as another layer of security as they rode. His left arm ached from being held in one position for so long, so he switched to holding her in his right, bouncing her slightly in an effort to mimic the horse’s motion and hopefully lull her back to sleep.

  He paid little attention to his surroundings as he climbed the steps and reached a hand up to knock on the door. All of his attention centered on soothing his little lady.

  Until the door opened and a feminine voice inquired, “Yes?”

  The intonation sounded vaguely familiar. Mark lifted his head and his stomach promptly lurched into his throat.

  It couldn’t be. She was supposed to be half a country away. Safe. Sheltered. In the bosom of her family. Yet here she stood, the same sky-blue eyes that had haunted his dreams for the past ten years widening in shocked recognition.

  “Kate?”

  CHAPTER

  FOUR

  Katherine Palmer blinked three times, but the impossible vision before her failed to dematerialize. Mark Wallace was standing on her doorstep. The Mark Wallace. Favored son of Westfield, Massachusetts. Voted Whip City’s best potential husband by the girls of the Prospect Street School three years in a row. Talented musician on track to earn a place in the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Until she’d accidentally destroyed his life.

  Mark Wallace. The man she’d nearly married.

  “Kate? What are you doing here?”

  His voice was just as rich and smooth as she remembered. And his eyes . . . mercy, his eyes were like molten gold. She was melting into a puddle just looking at them.

  “Miss Katherine?” a younger male voice piped up behind her. “Everything all right?”

  Goodness. What was wrong with her? She was acting like the same besotted sixteen-year-old she’d been ten years ago. She gave herself a mental shake. She was an independent woman making her own way in the world. Responsible for others. One of said others being the nine-year-old boy trying to square off with an experienced cavalryman.

  “Yes, Abner. I’m fine.” Tearing her gaze away from Mark—who could have imagined that the handsome young man she remembered would look even better with a rugged beard hugging his jaw and a decade of living filling out his muscles?—she smiled at her self-assigned guard and touched his shoulder. “I was just surprised to find someone from my past on the other side of the door. This is Mr. Wallace. A friend from where I used to live in Massachusetts.”

  Abner’s gaze shifted left, and he jerked his chin in that direction. “And the other fella?”

  Other fellow? Katherine looked back through the doorway. Good heavens. There was another man standing on her stoop. She hadn’t even noticed.

  The black man pulled off his hat and dipped his chin. “Jonah Brooks, ma’am. We were told this was the best place to bring an infant in need of care.”

  A tiny fussing sound emanated from the region of Mark’s chest. He bent his head and made soft shushing noises while gently bouncing his cradled arms. All thoughts of handsome swains and missed opportunities fled Katherine’s mind the instant she caught a glimpse of the tiny babe’s face peeking out from a mound of green plaid flannel.

  “Yes. This is the right place. Come in.” She opened the door and stepped aside to let the men enter. She positioned herself at Mark’s elbow, however, and immediately began cataloguing pertinent information. “How old is the child?”

  “A couple of hours,” Mark answered, a dozen questions swirling in his gaze.

  His questions could wait. Hers couldn’t. Not if the baby was that new. Time was critical.

  “Abner?” Katherine cast a glance over her shoulder at the boy who was closing the front door. “Fetch Miss Eliza. Quickly.”

  Abner dashed off, and Katherine steered the men into the front parlor that functioned as their office. They kept essentials on hand in here for any child brought to them. After Ruby arrived on their doorstep bloodied and broken last year, they’d started keeping this room ready for emergencies. Much more efficient than running upstairs to retrieve clothing or medical supplies.

  Katherine led the way to an old sideboard that stood against the wall, snatching a quilt from the back of a nearby sofa as she passed. She folded the quilt into a pallet and laid it atop the sideboard, then pulled a clean diaper and baby gown from one of the drawers.

  “Lay the child here.”

  Mark came alongside her. His large frame hovered so close, she might have been intimidated had he not been cooing to the baby in such sweet tones.

  “Shh, little lady. It’s all right,” he said when she protested his pulling her from the warmth of his chest. “Miss Kate will get you all fixed up. Don’t you worry.”

  The newborn’s pink skin looked healthy, and her lungs appeared strong, as she worked up a full-blown wail when Katherine unwrapped her swaddling. “Sorry, sweetheart,” she said. “But you’ll feel better in clean clothes and underthings.”

  “Dr. Hampton checked her out,” Mark said, pressing his belly against the sideboard as if worried the baby might roll off if he didn’t create a barrier with his body. “Said I didn’t mess anything up too badly.”

  She could hear the smile in his voice, even though she didn’t look up. She’d always found his tendency toward self-deprecation his most charming feature. Most handsome men had inflated egos from all the pandering they received, but Mark had always had a way about him that made others feel as though he considered them the special ones.

  When she pulled herself away from memory lane, the impact of what he’d said finally sank in. I didn’t mess anything up too badly.

  Katherine halted, diaper in hand, and crooked a glance his way. “Did you deliver this baby?”

  He shrugged. “Fern did all the work. I just caught the little one once she made her entrance.”

  Hearing another woman’s name on his lips grated like scratchy wool against her skin, but she shoved the feeling aside. She hadn’t seen him in ten years. He likely had a wife and a half dozen children by now. “Did the mother survive?”

  Mark’s smile dimmed, and Katherine turned her attention back to the child.

  “Yes, despite her best efforts to the contrary.” He sighed. “Dr. Hampton and some folks from town will be tending to her. Unfortunately, she refuses to have anything to do with her baby. Seems determined to join her dead husband in the great beyond.”
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br />   A grieving widow. Katherine could only imagine the woman’s emotional pain. She must have loved her husband a great deal if she was unable to imagine life without him. Yet a mother’s life was not hers alone. She had a duty to her children. To love them and protect them and train them in the way they should go. Turning her back was not an option. Not to Katherine’s way of thinking, anyway. She knew the sour taste of a mother’s rejection. Oh, her mother hadn’t kicked her out of the house or refused to feed and clothe her. But she had withdrawn her support. Abandoned Katherine emotionally. No child deserved such treatment.

  Katherine’s heart ached for the babe as she fit the clean diaper to her tiny body and pinned it in place. Working at Harmony House these last few years had brought her more joy than she could have ever imagined, but her heart broke over the tragic stories behind each child’s arrival. When she and Eliza had started Harmony House, they’d pledged that no child in their care would ever feel unloved or unwanted. They would accept all who came through their doors with open arms, no matter their background or situation. And that would be the case with this little one, as well.

  Katherine fit the gown over the baby’s head, then carefully slipped one arm at a time into the sleeves. “Does she have a name?”

  Mark shook his head. “I’ve just been calling her Little Lady. It didn’t seem right for a stranger to name her. Besides, the doc is hopeful that Fern will eventually emerge from her grief and want her daughter back.”

  Katherine lifted the baby, carefully supporting her head as she snuggled her close. “Well, if the mother decides to claim her, she can name her whatever she likes, but in the meantime, this baby needs a name. Every child that comes through our doors is special, created in our Lord’s image, and deserving of a name.” She met Mark’s gaze. “You helped bring her into the world. You should name her.”

  His eyes widened. “Me?” He darted a nervous look toward his friend, the man standing so quietly in the corner behind them that she’d forgotten he was even in the room. Mr. Brooks offered no words of wisdom, however. Just a shrug.

  Mark turned back to her, his usual confidence adorably absent. “I don’t know. I . . .” He shook his head. “Something as important as a name shouldn’t be doled out on the spur of the moment. She deserves something meaningful. Something . . .”

  “Name or not,” Eliza said as she swept into the room, instantly commanding both men’s attention, “what the girl needs most right now is food.” She strode up to Katherine and handed her a bit of moistened, tied-off cloth. “Here, I made her a sugar-tit. She can suck on this until we get her to a wet nurse. It should pacify her for a bit.”

  Katherine had never heard of a sugar-tit, but she trusted Eliza’s judgment and offered the substitute nipple to the unhappy baby. Curling the babe near her own breast in order to mimic the instinctual position of mother and child, she rubbed the cloth bulb against the baby’s lips until she latched on.

  She smiled up at the woman who had become a big sister to her in the last five years. “It’s working.”

  Eliza nodded. “Of course it is. There’s not a babe been born that doesn’t like sugar water.”

  Katherine longed for the self-assurance that came so naturally to Eliza. She was four years older than Katherine but seemed decades wiser. Katherine’s sheltered upbringing hadn’t prepared her for the challenges of raising outcast children in a world that would rather throw them away, but with Eliza’s help, she’d come into her own. Taking care of the least of these was Katherine’s God-given mission. In it, she’d found a sense of purpose. As a young girl who’d been raised to believe her value centered solely on being a godly wife and mother, she’d floundered after the fiasco with Mark left her reputation in tatters and her chances of securing a good match too low to bother calculating. But God had redeemed her future. Given her important work—work she never would have found if she’d accepted Mark Wallace’s proposal all those years ago.

  She stole a glance at the man she still thought about in her weaker moments. She told herself she was glad she’d rejected his offer of marriage. She never would have met Eliza otherwise. Never would have found the children. Found her purpose. It had been the right choice.

  So why did her heart pound in her chest when she looked at him? And why couldn’t she stop herself from hoping he didn’t have a wife and a passel of kids tucked away somewhere?

  Thankfully, Eliza cut into her thoughts with a healthy dose of pragmatism, just the medicine Katherine needed to get her mind back where it belonged.

  “Abner will be down soon. I told him to dump out one of his dresser drawers and line it with a blanket. I’ll hitch up the wagon and take the babe to Georgia. She’ll know who can nurse the child.”

  Katherine caught Eliza’s arm and dragged her a few steps away from the men. “We can’t afford much compensation,” she murmured softly. “Donations have dropped off this last year. We’ve run through nearly all our discretionary funds.”

  Eliza frowned. “We’re not just asking for feeding. With the constant attention a newborn requires, we’re asking someone to sacrifice sleep and time and energy. For four months. Once the baby can take solid food and tolerate goat’s milk, we can take over her care, but until then . . .” Eliza didn’t finish, but she didn’t have to. Katherine understood the implication.

  Georgia Harris and the women in her community had hearts as big as the Texas sky, and they’d never turn away a babe in need. But they had children of their own to provide for and woefully thin purses with which to do so. It wouldn’t be fair to add to their burden without offering something in return.

  “Take a few dollars from the kitchen crock. I’ll figure something out.”

  Eliza smiled. “You always do.”

  Katherine wished it was as simple as Eliza made it sound. When they’d joined forces to establish Harmony House, Katherine had brought two things to the partnership—money and connections. Eliza supplied everything else: experience with children, practical competence, knowledge of the need and how to serve it. Katherine had possessed none of those necessary skills. All she’d been able to offer was an untapped dowry for purchasing property and connections with potential donors. That had been enough in the beginning. But the longer she stayed away from Westfield, the weaker her ties to those connections became. If she didn’t find a new source of benefaction soon, Harmony House might take a decidedly discordant turn.

  Without warning, a handful of banknotes appeared between the two women.

  “Here.”

  Katherine followed the line of hand to arm to shoulder until her gaze reached the face of the man whose hearing had always been far too keen for her peace of mind. How had she forgotten that the very ability that made him such an excellent musician also made him an unbelievably gifted eavesdropper?

  “If you need more, I can get it.”

  More? He had just shoved twenty dollars in her face.

  “Sarah deserves the best care. Whatever she needs, I’ll see she gets it.” His jaw was set at a mulish angle, as if he expected her to argue.

  The girl she used to be would have. She’d never been one to accept charity, after all, not even in the form of well-meant marriage proposals. But there was no room for personal pride when it came to providing for the children in her care.

  “Thank you,” she said. “That’s very generous.” She tipped her head and grinned at him. “Sarah, huh? After your mother?”

  The defensiveness melted from his expression, and one corner of his mouth crooked up. “She’s always hounding me in her letters about getting married and giving her grandchildren.” He shrugged. “This might be the closest I get to giving her what she wants. Figured I’d name the little lady in her honor.”

  Katherine barely made out the end of his explanation over the sudden roar of blood pumping furiously through her veins.

  Mark Wallace wasn’t married.

  CHAPTER

  FIVE

  If there was one thing Eliza Southerland c
ould recognize on sight, it was trouble. And the man smiling at Katherine as if she were the sugar in his coffee had Trouble written all over him. Abner had mentioned their visitor was someone Katherine knew from back East, but this was more than knowin’. This was personal history. Romantic history, if she didn’t miss her guess. Eliza’s hackles rose. Katherine’s tender soul had suffered enough damage over the last decade. She didn’t need some sweet-talkin’, woman-leavin’ man adding new scars to her heart.

  Katherine wasn’t like Eliza. She hadn’t built up callouses around her heart to keep the hurt out. She bled far too easily. Eliza had spotted tears in her friend’s eyes yesterday when four-year-old Ted scraped his knee, for pity’s sake. Katherine had too much backbone for this Wallace fellow to break her, but he could inflict serious bruising. A situation Eliza aimed to avoid. Loyal companions were a rare commodity on this earth, and she wasn’t about to let some slick charmer hack away at the happiness of one of the truest friends Eliza had ever known.

  It was time to get these fellows on their way.

  “I’ll hitch up the wagon,” Eliza said, even though she could tell Katherine was only half listening. “Pack up a handful of extra diapers and a change of clothes for Miss Sarah, then meet me in the yard. The sooner she feeds on real milk, the better.”

  Katherine tore her gaze away from Mr. Wallace and put it back on the baby. “All right.”

  Satisfied, Eliza marched out of the room, her strides sharp.

  The quiet fellow leaning against the wall inside the doorway fell into step behind her as she exited. “I’ll join you.”

  “I can manage,” she said in a tone designed to discourage without being rude.

  “I’m sure you can,” the irritating fellow responded, purposely ignoring her wishes by continuing to follow.

  Once outside on the front porch, Eliza spun to face him. “Look, Mister . . .” Shoot. She didn’t know his name. Abner had only informed her about Mr. Wallace.