Redeeming Love (34 page)

wood to last the night and brought some of it to Miriam, where she and the others were gathered in the tent. She opened a small flap at the ceiling.

“Learned this from the Indians,” she said with a grin as she built a fire inside a wash tub right inside the tent. Amazingly, the smoke went up and out the hole.

Elizabeth looked so worn out, Angel insisted she lie down. Michael brought some of their supplies in, and she put together a meal. Still awake, Elizabeth was silent, watching her. Troubled, Angel glanced at her, wondering what she was thinking.

“I feel so useless,” Elizabeth said tremulously, and Miriam bent to stroke her face gently.

“Nonsense, Mama. We can manage. You rest.” She gave her an impish grin. “When you’re better, we’ll let you do it all by yourself again.” Her mother smiled at the tender teasing. “I’ll get some heavier wood,” Miriam said and went out. She came back with a large chunk and stacked it with the kindling. “The rain’s letting up.”

Elizabeth pushed herself up. “Where are the boys?”

“Papa’s got them. Leah and Ruth will stay put right here. You’ve no need to worry. Now, lie down again, Mama.” She looked at Angel. “She’s always worried about Indians,” she whispered. “A little boy wandered away from the wagons a hundred miles shy of Fort Laramie. There was no trace of him.

Ever since then, Mama’s been terrified one of us would be kidnapped.” She glanced back at her mother resting on the pallet. “She’ll get better now that she can rest.”

Miriam warmed her hands over the fire, smiling across at Angel.

“Whatever you’re cooking, it smells good.” Angel kept stirring without comment. “How long have you been in California?”

“A year.”

“Oh, then you didn’t marry Michael until you came here. He said he arrived in ’48. Did you come overland?”

“No. By ship.”

“Is your family in the valley Michael’s been describing to my father?”

Angel had known the questions would come and that making up lies would only tie her into tighter knots. Why not get it over with now, and 236

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then the girl would let her be? Maybe if they all knew the truth, they’d winter someplace else. Certainly that woman wouldn’t want to sleep in the same bed where a prostitute had slept. “I came to California alone. I met Michael in a brothel in Pair-a-Dice.”

Miriam laughed and then, seeing Angel meant what she’d said, fell silent.

“You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Yes.” Elizabeth was looking at her with an indefinable expression.

Angel’s gaze fell, and she kept stirring.

Miriam didn’t say anything for a long moment, and Elizabeth closed her eyes again. “You needn’t have said anything,” Miriam said finally. “Why did you?”

“So you wouldn’t have any shocking surprises down the road,” Angel said bitterly, her throat tight.

“No,” Miriam said, “I was prying again, that’s why. Mama says it’s one of my failings—always wanting to know everyone else’s business. I’m sorry.”

Angel kept stirring, troubled by the girl’s apology.

“I’d like to be friends,” Miriam said.

Angel glanced up in surprise. “Why would you want to be friends with me?”

Miriam looked surprised. “Because I like you.”

Taken aback, Angel stared at her. She glanced at Elizabeth. The woman was watching them, a tired smile on her face. Blushing, Angel looked at the girl and said softly, “You don’t know very much about me other than what I just told you.” She wished now she hadn’t said anything.

“I know you’re honest,” Miriam said with a rueful laugh. “Brutally so,”

she added more seriously. A thoughtful look came into her eyes as she studied Angel.

The boys came in, and with them a blast of cold air. The girls awakened and Ruth started to cry. Elizabeth sat up and held her close, admonishing the boys to quiet their excited chatter. John came in and with one word hushed them. Angel saw Michael just behind him. When he smiled at her, her relief was physical. Then she worried what he would say when he found out she had blurted out the truth.

Wet coats shrugged off, the men hunkered by the fire while she served 237

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beans into the bowls Miriam passed out. When everyone had their meal, John bowed his head, his family taking his lead. “Lord, thank you for delivering us today and bringing us Michael and Amanda Hosea. Watch over our lost loved ones, David and Mother. Please give Elizabeth renewed strength.

Keep us all well and strong for the journey ahead. Amen.”

John asked questions about land, crops, and the California market while Jacob and Andrew asked for second helpings of beans and biscuits. Angel wondered when Michael would be ready to return to their wagon. She felt Miriam watching her. She didn’t want to know what questions were running through the girl’s head now that she’d had time to think about it.

“The rain’s stopped, Papa,” Andrew said.

“Shouldn’t we go to our own wagon now?” Angel whispered to Michael.

“Stay here with us,” John said. “We’ve room enough. With the fire going, it’s warmer in here than it’d likely be in your wagon.”

Michael accepted, and Angel’s heart dropped as he went for their blankets. Excusing herself quickly, she went after him. “Michael,” she said, searching for words to convince him they should sleep in the wagon and not in the tent with the Altmans. He reached out and pulled her close, kissing her soundly. Then he turned her back toward the tent, saying next to her ear, “Sooner or later you’ll learn there are people in the world who don’t want to use you. Now, buck up your courage and go back in there and get to know a few.”

Pulling her shawl tightly around herself, she ducked back inside the tent.

Miriam smiled at her. Angel sat self-consciously near the fire and didn’t look at anyone as she waited for Michael to come back. The two boys pleaded for their father to read from
Robinson Crusoe.
John took a worn leather volume from a pack and began to read while Miriam laid out the bedding. Little Ruth, thumb still tucked in her mouth, dragged her blanket from where it was placed and put it next to Angel. “I wanna sleep here.”

Miriam laughed. “Well, I think you’d better ask Mr. Hosea, Ruthie. He might want to sleep there, too.”

“He can sleep on the other side,” Ruthie said, clearly staking her claim.

Miriam came over with two quilts and handed one to Angel. Bending, she whispered, “See? She’s likes you, too.”

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Feeling an odd pang in her stomach, Angel glanced around at them.

Michael came in with more blankets. “Storm’s coming. If we’re lucky, it’ll blow itself out by morning.”

As the others slept, Angel lay awake beside Michael. The wind howled, and the rain pelted against the tent. The sound of the storm and the smell of the wet canvas reminded her of her first weeks in Pair-a-Dice.

Where was Duchess? And Megan and Rebecca? What had happened to them? She tried not to think about Lucky dying in the fire. She kept remembering her saying, “Don’t forget me, Angel. Don’t forget me.”

Angel couldn’t forget any of them.

When the rain ceased, Angel listened to the breathing of the sleepers around her. Turning slowly onto her side, she looked at them. John Altman lay beside his frail wife, his arm curled protectively around her. The boys slept nearby, one sprawled on his back, the other curled on his side with the blanket over his head. Miriam and Leah were curled together like spoons, Miriam’s arm around her sister.

Angel’s eyes came to rest on Miriam’s sleeping face. This girl was a new entity.

Angel hadn’t known many
good
girls. Those on the docks had been warned away by their mothers. Sally had said once that good girls were dull and critical and that’s why when they grew up and married, their husbands frequented brothels. Miriam was neither dull nor critical. She had poked good-humored fun at her father all evening while seeing to her ailing mother.

Her sisters and brothers clearly adored her. Only Jacob balked when she told him what to do, and one glance from his father ended that. When it was time for the children to settle down, it was Miriam who tucked them in and prayed with them quietly while the men talked.

“I’d like to be friends.”

Angel closed her eyes. Her head ached. What would she and Miriam have to talk about? She hadn’t a clue, but it seemed she was going to be faced with it. The men had already developed an easy rapport. Both loved the land. John Altman talked about Oregon as though it were another more desirable woman, and Michael talked about the valley in the same way.

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California was paradise until we rolled down out of the Sierras.”

He shook his head. “It’s more crowded here than in Ohio. The whole ter-ritory is crawling with fortune hunters.”

“All those good boys from good homes,” Miriam said, and a dimple showed in one cheek. “Maybe even a few from Ohio.”

“Gone wild,” John Altman remarked grimly.

Miriam poked his shoulder. “You’d be panning for gold in a stream, too, Papa, if you didn’t have all of us to watch over. I saw the gleam of greed in your eyes when that gentleman was telling you about making a good strike on the American.” She included Michael and Angel. “The man owns a big store now with goods to the rafters. He said he arrived in California with little more than a shovel and the clothes on his back.”

“One chance in a million,” John told her.

“Oh, but think of it, Papa,” Miriam went on dramatically, a hand to her heart and her dark eyes sparkling with mischief. “You and the boys could pan and work the Long Tom while Mama and I run a little cafe in the camp and serve all those poor, dear, downtrodden, handsome young bachelors.”

Michael laughed, and John tugged his daughter’s braid.

The Altmans fascinated Angel. They all liked each other. John Altman was clearly in charge and would tolerate no disrespect or rebellion, but it was clear he was not held in fear by his wife and children. Even Jacob’s brief rebellion had been handled with good humor. “Whenever you don’t listen, there’s going to be stern discipline,” his father said. “I’ll supply the discipline, and you’ll supply the stern.” The boy capitulated and Altman ruffled his hair affectionately.

What if they did decide to stay in the valley? Angel massaged her throbbing temples. What did she have in common with them? Especially a young, doe-eyed virgin? When she had blurted out her past profession and how she and Michael had met, she had fully expected the girl to be shocked and leave her alone. The last thing she expected was that look of questioning concern and an offer of friendship.

Angel felt movement beside her and opened her eyes against the pain in her head. Ruthie snuggled against her seeking warmth in her sleep. Her thumb had slipped out of her mouth. Angel touched the smooth pink 240

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cheek—and suddenly she saw Duke’s enraged face swimming before her eyes. She felt the slap across her face again. “I told you to take precautions!”

She could feel him grabbing her by her hair as he dragged her up from the bed so that his face was right in hers. “The first time was easy,” he said through his teeth. “This time I’m going to make sure you never get pregnant again.”

When the doctor came, she had kicked and fought, but it had done no good. Duke and another man strapped her to the bed. “Do it,” Duke ordered the doctor and stood by watching to make sure he did. When she started to scream, they put a strap in her mouth. Duke was still there when the ordeal was over. Consumed in pain and weak from loss of blood, she’d refused to look at him.

“You’ll be fine in a few days,” he told her, but she knew she would never be all right. She called him the foulest name she knew, but all he did was smile. “That’s my Angel. No tears. Just hate. It keeps me warm, my sweet.

Don’t you know that yet?” He kissed her hard. “I’ll be back when you’re better.” He patted her cheek and left.

The black memory tortured Angel as she gazed at little Ruth Altman. She wanted desperately to leave the tent but was afraid if she got up she would awaken the others. Staring up at the canvas ceiling, she tried to think of something else. The rain started again, and with it came all her old ghosts.

“Can’t sleep?” Michael whispered. She shook her head. “Turn on your side.” When she did, he drew her back against him, tucking her into his body. The child shifted, snuggling deeper into the quilts and pressing into Angel’s stomach. “You’ve got a friend,” Michael murmured. Angel put her arm around Ruth and closed her eyes. Michael put his arm around both of them. “Maybe we’ll have one like her someday,” he said against her ear.

Angel stared into the fire in despair.

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Nineteen

You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

J E S U S , M A T T H E W

1 9 : 1 9

Michael settled the Altmans comfortably in the cabin and shouldered his own trunk. Angel followed him to the barn, biting off any protest. She could see his mind was set. What in the world was he was going to get out of this deal? Why do this for total strangers?