Griffith was a small man, not more than an inch or two taller than Jessica, but he was strong and wiry. And while he was a quiet man, he was not of a weak mind by any means. “You would make a terrible businessman, Matthew. You are far too generous.”
“You are a farmer, John, not a day laborer. You also have three children to care for, with another one on the way. I’m single. I can do what you’re doing here and earn more than sufficient for my needs. But I can’t do that in Haun’s Mill. The work is here in Far West.”
“I know all that—”
Matthew held up his hand. “Now, listen to me. I don’t want to be that tied down. I want to do missionary work. This will give me that freedom.”
“I can’t do it. Your father got the land for you.”
“No, my father got that land for Jessica and Rachel. I just came along to help Jessica.” He turned to Jessica. “Tell him, Jessie. What will Pa say when he finds out what I’ve done?”
Jessie smiled, her eyes shining. “He’s right, John. You didn’t get to meet Benjamin Steed. He’s one of the most generous men you’ll ever meet. He’ll put an arm around Matthew’s shoulder and tell him he did right in this.”
John Griffith sat back, obviously still very uncomfortable. Matthew grinned at him. “Then it’s settled. I brought my stuff with me in the wagon. I’ll help you pack tomorrow.” He turned to Rachel and the two Griffith boys, who had been watching the proceedings with wide, curious eyes. “Get your stuff together, kids. You’re going to Haun’s Mill.”
* * *
“Mr. Morris wants to see you in his office.”
Maggie Stumps dropped her eyes as Derek looked up in surprise from the ledger book. “He does?”
“Yes, immediately.”
Surprised and a little flustered, Derek stood, putting the quill pen back in the inkwell. He brushed off his shirt and trousers and checked himself quickly. Mr. Morris almost always came out into the clerk’s area when he had something on his mind. Derek had been in the back office only two or three times.
As he came out from behind his table, Maggie cleared her throat quickly. She was just two years older than Derek but already a mother of two. She worked at the table beside him, and they had become good friends. She was one of the people he had talked to about the gospel. “Derek?”
He slowed his step. She glanced nervously in the direction of Mr. Morris’s office, then concentrated her gaze on her ledger book. “I won’t be comin’ to the meetings anymore.”
He stopped, peering at her. “Why?”
Again her eyes darted toward the back office. “I just won’t.”
Derek was stunned. She would not look up again, and finally he made his way slowly toward the back office.
Alexander Morris was looking at some papers on his desk when Derek stepped inside his office. He did not lift his eyes, though Derek knew he was aware of his presence. For almost a full minute he kept reading, leaving Derek standing there awkwardly. He kept frowning as he clamped his teeth on his unlit cigar.
Finally, he pushed the papers aside and leaned back. His eyes were cold and his jaw set. “Ah, Mr. Ingalls.” It came out oozing, but beneath the veneer his voice was hard and challenging.
“Yes, sir?” Derek tried to force himself to breathe normally.
“How old are you now, Ingalls?”
“I’ll be twenty next month, sir.”
“You’re a strapping lad for twenty. How long did you work shoveling coal in the boiler rooms?”
“Four years, sir.”
“Did you enjoy that?”
He smiled faintly. “Not especially, sir.”
Where is this leading?
“You prefer working here in the office?”
“Yes, sir. I really enjoy what I’m doing.”
“Good. You wouldn’t want to leave, then.”
Derek felt his heart plummet. “No, sir. Of course not, sir.”
Morris took the cigar from his mouth and laid it in the ashtray. “Then you’ll not be doing anything more with those Mormons, will you?” he asked softly.
Derek rocked back, too flabbergasted to comprehend what he had just heard.
“The stories are true? You have been listening to the Mormons?”
“Uh . . . yes, sir, but—”
“No buts, Ingalls,” Morris snapped. “Either you have or you haven’t. Which is it?”
“I have, sir, but I don’t see what that has to do with my work. I—”
Morris leaned forward, cutting him off. “I’m a deacon in my church, Ingalls. Our minister called us together yesterday. He told us what has been happening. We’ve already lost four of our congregation.” He shook his head in disbelief. “When he told me some of my own factory workers—”
“Sir, it’s not what you think. I can tell you sure, sir, Mormonism—”
“Silence!” the man roared, slamming his fist down against the desk hard enough to make the inkwell jump. “Do you think I brought you in here to preach to me?”
“No, sir,” Derek stammered. His mouth had gone dry, and he felt his knees trembling.
Morris leaned back, his tiny eyes glittering and narrow, his mouth pulled back into a grimace of a smile. “Tell you what, Ingalls. You’ve been a good worker. I understand how easy it is to be misled. Don’t let me hear any more about this, and I’ll forget the whole thing.”
Derek’s jaw dropped. He didn’t know what to do except stand there and stare at the man.
After a moment, the veneer smile faded away. “Do you understand what I’m saying to you, lad?”
Derek felt dizzy, as if he might faint. He shook his head slowly.
Morris leaned forward, his hands spread-eagled out on the desk top. “I’m saying you’ve got until lunchtime to tell me you’re going to stop this ridiculous flirtation with these Mormons. And by the way, there’ll be no more preaching to Mrs. Stumps or any of the other workers either. If that’s not to yer liking, then you’re out of a job. Now, is
that
clear enough?”
“But I’ve already been baptized,” he blurted.
“Then renounce it!” he thundered. “You’ve got until lunch. I’ll want your answer by then.”
Something snapped in Derek. He straightened slowly, squaring his shoulders. “I don’t need until lunch to make that decision, Mr. Morris.”
Morris was starting to rise, to dismiss him. He froze in position. His face went almost instantly livid. “Then get your things and get out!”
Derek didn’t answer, just spun on his heel and started for the door.
“Ingalls!”
He stopped but didn’t turn around. “On your way out, stop at the cutting shed and pick up your little brother. He’s fired too.”
* * *
The September mist was heavy in the air as dawn began to break over Preston. Peter came creeping up the cellar stairwell, looking cold and tired and frightened. Relief instantly crossed his face when he saw Derek sitting on the upper stairs.
Derek slid over without a word and then put his arm around his brother’s shoulders and held him tight up against him.
“Have you been up all night?” Peter asked.
There was a quick nod.
Peter’s lower lip started to tremble, and he bit down on it hard.
“It’s going to be all right, Peter.”
“What will we do? Mrs. Pottsworth says other factory owners are saying they won’t hire any Mormons.”
“I’ve thought about it all night, Peter.”
“And what have you decided?”
Derek reached down and picked up a small leather bag. It was black with coal dust, and Peter knew it was the bag his brother had kept so carefully hidden in the coal bin below them. Derek bounced it up and down, and there was the soft jingle of coins.
“How much do we have?” Peter asked.
“Not quite ten quid.”
Peter’s eyes went wide and round. “Really? I didn’t know we had anywhere near that much. We can live for quite a while on ten quid.”
Derek immediately shook his head.
“We can’t? Why not?”
Derek raised his head, let his eyes run down the dingy row of workers’ housing that stretched on down the street for as far as the eye could follow it. “Do you remember when we were reading from the Book of Mormon, Peter? About how Lehi and his family left Jerusalem?”
“Yes.”
“Where did they go?”
“To the promised land.”
“Yes.”
Peter’s eyes widened. “But the promised land was in America.”
“Yes, Peter, it was.” He tossed the bag up in the air and caught it neatly with a sweep of his hand. “It not only
was
in America, Peter. It still
is
in America.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
How much money do you have, lad?”
Derek’s mind raced quickly. The captain of the American clipper ship seemed kindly enough. But after a week in the harsh environment of the Liverpool waterfront, Derek had learned that caution was required at all times. He also knew that human nature sought to make the best deal possible.
“Not nearly enough, sir,” he finally said carefully.
The captain eyed him for a moment, then chuckled. “Normal steerage-class passage is eighteen American dollars. That would be . . .” His head bobbed back and forth for a moment. “About six pounds each.”
That didn’t surprise Derek. He had been asking around now for the past week about passage fare. Five to six pounds was about average. He had just slightly more than that. When the missionaries had announced Derek and Peter’s determination to go to America, Heber C. Kimball had asked for a collection from the branch. Even from their poverty the Saints had collected more than three pounds. That gave them a total of about thirteen quid. But since their arrival they had spent almost a pound for a place to stay and eat—a shocking price for the filthy room and awful gruel they were receiving—and Derek knew that every day they stayed in Liverpool took money from the purse. And besides that, if they spent it all on passage, there would be nothing on which to live when they arrived in New York. And there was still the problem of getting from there to Ohio.
The captain was watching him closely. “Your family can’t help you?”
“Both of our parents died of cholera.”
The captain nodded, already expecting some such answer. His mouth softened. “My parents indentured me when I was eleven,” he said. There was a quick shrug. “They had eight mouths to feed. Boston was not a good place to do it. By the time I was thirteen I had crossed the Atlantic six times.” He eyed Derek up and down. “You a good worker?”
“I shoveled coal twelve hours a day for four years.”
There was a quick nod. “All right, tell you what. I’ll give you twenty-five cents a day as a deckhand. Figure eighteen days passage, two days unloading the cargo. That’s five dollars. I’ll lower passage for the two of you to thirty dollars. Make it an even ten pounds.”
Derek’s face was impassive. He didn’t want to seem ungrateful, but he sensed they were still in the bargaining phase. “My brother, he’s thirteen. He’s been working in the mills since he was seven. He’s very quick.”
The American shook his head. Then when Derek didn’t flinch, he finally laughed. “Can he cook?”
“He’s been cooking for us since he was ten.”
“All right, all right. Ten cents a day for him being a cabin boy. That’s”—he calculated quickly—“about two dollars more. Eight pounds for the two of you. But if you’re seasick and can’t work, you owe me that many more days on arrival. Fair enough?”
Derek felt an immense rush of relief. “More than fair, sir.”
“Do you think she’ll ever learn to crawl like a normal baby?” It was said not as a criticism but with evident pride. Joshua was watching Savannah scoot across the woolen carpet that covered all but the outer edges of the parlor. He had rolled a ball across her line of vision, and she had immediately changed directions and gone after it, pulling herself forward rapidly by her elbows, but not pushing with her legs at all.
Caroline laughed. “For a child who is barely six months old, this one has a mind of her own. I think she will do what she darn well pleases, whether it’s the traditional way or not.”
As though she had understood exactly what her mother said, Savannah stopped and turned her head to gravely survey her parents. Her eyes were a deep blue, like the surface of a lake in the afternoon sunshine. Her cheeks were losing their baby chubbiness, and she was becoming quite a beautiful little girl. She had never lost her baby hair, and new hair was coming in thick and fast. And it was as red-orange as the leaves on the maple trees behind their home.
Joshua stood. “Thanks for dinner. I’d better be getting back. We’ve still got that load of fabric from St. Louis to unload. I’ll be—”
A knock on the door cut him off. “I’ll get it,” he said. As he moved to the entryway, Caroline stood and retrieved Savannah from the floor.
“Hello, Joshua.”
Joshua blinked in mild surprise. “Well, hello, Clint.”
Clinton Roundy had his hat in his hand and was fidgeting nervously. He looked past Joshua. “Good afternoon, Mrs. Steed.”
“Good afternoon, Clinton.” She was obviously surprised too. Feelings were still quite awkward between her and the father of Joshua’s former wife, and so Clinton Roundy had come to their home only once before.
Joshua stepped back. “Come in, come in. Would you like some johnnycake?”
Clinton shook his head quickly. “No, thank you anyway. I’ve only a minute.” He reached inside his jacket and withdrew an envelope. Again he shot a nervous glance in Caroline’s direction before turning to Joshua. “I got a letter from Jessica this morning.”
“Oh?” Joshua watched him closely, also wanting to see Caroline’s face but not daring to turn around and look. Jessica still occasionally wrote to her father, and from time to time Clinton would get someone to help him write her back. Sometimes when Joshua was at the saloon, Clinton would tell him what was going on with her. But Joshua had strictly forbidden Clint from saying anything to Jessica about him. Somehow Jessica had heard about his trip to Georgia and thought it was permanent. That suited his purposes fine, and he hadn’t let Clint correct her thinking.
One time Clint had tried to suggest that Joshua come north with him to see Rachel. They could even look up Joshua’s younger brother Matthew. Joshua had cut him off bluntly before the suggestion was half finished. He often thought of Rachel—she would be six in January—and there was something deep down inside him that ached to see her, but seeing Rachel meant seeing Jessica, and that was not appealing at all. There was too much pain. He was glad that Jessica had married again. Glad for her. Glad that it put a bad chapter in his life to rest. And the idea of seeing Matthew was equally unappealing. Sometimes when he thought of his little brother—still six and towheaded in his mind—he physically hurt inside. But seeing Matthew or Rebecca or any other family member meant all kinds of other complications as well, complications he was not willing to face.