Heart of Gold (7 page)

When Todd saw his uncle striding up to the gate, he pulled the puppy into his arms, pressing him tight to his chest, clearly afraid Matthew was about to announce the pup’s true owner had been found.

“It’s okay,” he said, feeling sorry for the kid. “Looks like you can keep him.”

“I can?” His sudden grin looked a mile wide.

Funny how good that made Matthew feel. “How’s your ma?”

“She’s okay. She’s restin’.” Todd stood. “She helped me name the puppy.”

He cocked an eyebrow.

“I’m callin’ him Nugget.”

“Good name.”

“It’s ’cause of his color. You know. Like gold.”

“Yeah, I got it.” He motioned toward the front door. “Let’s go fix something to eat. Your ma’s probably hungry.”

“I’m hungry too.”

“Makes three of us.”

Matthew found his sister reclining on the sofa in the parlor, a blanket covering her legs. Sunlight streamed through the large window, illuminating dust motes in the air.

Alice smiled when she saw him. “Is it that time already?”

“It is. Are you hungry? Todd is.”

“I could eat something.”

“Cold beef with cheese and some bread and butter sound okay?”

“Whatever’s easy.” She closed her eyes, as if exhausted by the brief conversation.

He left the parlor and went into the kitchen.

A doctor consultation was in order, he thought, as he prepared the meal for the three of them. He needed to know what to do for Alice. She hadn’t been forthcoming when he’d asked questions about her illness. His gut told him she needed more than simple rest, but he didn’t know what that might be. He’d hardly been sick a day in his life. A cold every now and again, but nothing that put him to bed. And he’d broken his left arm when he was a boy.

He wondered if Alice remembered that. She’d been pretty small when it happened.

Taking up the lunch tray, he carried it into the parlor and set it on the low table before the sofa. His sister looked at him, and there was something in her eyes that caused a twinge of alarm. She seemed . . . disconnected . . . departed. Then she gave him a small smile and he thought he must have imagined it.

“Eat up.” He took up some pillows to put behind her back. “You need your strength.”

He was going to contact the doctor before this day was out.

Shannon stood on the porch, watching Sun Jie make her way down the street toward the south side of Grand Coeur. That was where—Mrs. Rutherford had informed them in front of their new housekeeper— the area known as Chinatown was located.

She could almost hear her father preparing his sermon now. She’d recognized his annoyance with the woman’s condescending attitude.

Delaney Adair was a Southerner through and through. No man could say that he wasn’t. But he’d disagreed with many of his friends and neighbors back in Virginia on the issue of slavery and the supposed inferiority of the colored races. He believed, deep in his soul, that all men were the same—white, black, yellow, red. He believed they should all be free to live and serve God as He called them. While her father was in favor of a state’s right to govern, while she was certain he would support the Confederacy once the new nation was free of Yankee invaders, Delaney Adair would also press for the emancipation of the slaves. He even admired Abraham Lincoln for that very act.

Imagine. A Southern gentleman admitting that he admired President Lincoln. It had cost him a number of friends, but he’d stood firm in his belief. Shannon reluctantly admired him for his unwavering stance before popular opinion.

“God would not have us discriminate between the races,” her father had told her on more than one occasion. “He would not have us be another’s master. He would have us respect one another. Respect even our differences. Serve one another out of love.”

Yes, she admired her father above all men. But she often wished he would keep such thoughts to himself.

Shannon turned and reentered the house. Her father was seated in one of the mismatched chairs, his Bible open on his lap, a pair of glasses perched on the end of his nose.

“It appears you won’t have many meals to prepare for your father after today,” he said.

“I like cooking for you.” She leaned over and kissed his forehead.

He chuckled. “When it suits your mood.”

She playfully slapped his shoulder.

But he turned serious again. “God has great work for us to do in Grand Coeur. There are men here from around the country, from around the world. ‘The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few; pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.’ That’s why the Lord has called us to this territory, Shannon. We are the laborers He needs to bring in the harvest.”

She nodded, although she wasn’t convinced. At least when it came to her part in this master plan.

“Think of it, daughter. It isn’t just these miners who so desperately need Christ. Sun Jie and her husband are believers. Perhaps we can be of help in the conversion of more Chinese. The gospel is the good news to all. Not simply to those of European roots. How exciting this could be.”

It seemed to Shannon that she was there by default. God had called her father, and the Lord got her in the bargain.

“Yes, Father,” she answered softly. “It is exciting.”

She turned away, and her gaze fell upon the table near a window where she’d set out the cherished portraits and photographs brought from home. There were portraits of her grandparents and another of her mother that had been made the year before she died. There was a photograph of a number of young women of the county—good friends, all—taken in 1860, the year before the war began. What innocents they’d been. And there was a photograph of Benjamin, the man she was to have married. But the Yankees had killed him at the Battle of Malvern Hill, just one of more than twenty thousand gallant men of the Confederacy killed in that weeklong campaign in Virginia.

She crossed the room and took up the framed photograph. How handsome Benjamin had looked in his uniform, his black hair combed back, his mustache and goatee neatly trimmed.

I should have married him before the war started. Maybe he wouldn’t have joined the army so soon. Maybe he wouldn’t have died. Why wasn’t I in more of a hurry to wed him? Now who will I marry?

Shame washed over her. What a horrid person she was. Benjamin had been killed on the battlefield, and here she was thinking of herself and how her life had been inconvenienced. So different from what she’d thought it would be. If her father could read her mind . . .

Perish the thought.

Delaney returned to the church that afternoon. He’d planned to begin work on his sermon for the following Sunday, but instead he found himself on his knees at the altar.

“Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you . . . Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing . . . Pray without ceasing . . . Pray without ceasing
.”

Earlier this afternoon he’d felt great excitement at the prospect of being able to help Sun Jie and Wu Lok bring the good news to other Orientals in Chinatown. But as he’d walked from the house to the church, truth had pierced his heart. The Orientals needed the Lord no more and no less than the godless men who nightly frequented the saloons of Grand Coeur. And neither people group would be easy to reach. He couldn’t depend upon them to suddenly appear at one of his services. Prejudice would keep the Chinese from the white man’s church, and strong drink and riotous living would keep most of the miners away. If he meant to win souls, he would have to go out to meet them where they were.

He’d seen his daughter’s reluctance when he’d shared his excitement, but now he felt reluctance himself. Throughout his ministry, he’d enjoyed the society of people quite like himself. That was no longer the case. What if he wasn’t up to the task? What if he hadn’t the knowledge he would need? Or even the compassion. If his daughter had been spoiled by the life they’d enjoyed in Virginia, then it was no less true of himself. Until the war began, he’d lived in comfort and plenty. Even now he wasn’t without financial resources.

“In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you
.”

“Lord, I thank Thee for bringing us to Grand Coeur. I thank Thee that my daughter is out of harm’s way, that the war can’t endanger her here. Be with our loved ones who are still in Virginia. Be with our soldiers and their families. I thank Thee for this church and for the congregation I have come to this territory to serve. Lord, empower me by Thy Holy Spirit to reach out and evangelize. Show me common ground with those who are different from me. Fill me with Thy compassion.”

“Pray without ceasing
.”

“Lord, please help my daughter find contentment here. Please send her a friend so she won’t feel alone.” He remembered the way she’d looked at the photographs earlier and the loss that had flickered in her eyes as she’d remembered Benjamin. “Please heal her heart and perhaps allow her to find love again.”

6

“I’m sorry, Mr. Dubois. There is no easy way to say this: your sister is dying.”

Matthew stared at the doctor as if he were speaking another language. “Dying?” He looked toward the bedroom door. “But I thought all she needed was to rest and regain her strength.” He raked the fingers of his right hand through his hair. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.” Hiram Featherhill, a man not much older than Matthew, removed his spectacles and cleaned them with a handkerchief from his breast pocket. “Her heart is weak. Most likely the result of a prior infection such as scarlet fever. But I daresay it’s a cancer in her abdomen that will rob her of life first.”

“Did she know she was dying when she came here?”

“I should think so. Her physician in Wisconsin must have told her the seriousness of her condition.”

Matthew nodded. “How long does she have?”

“A few months at most.”

Alice was going to die and leave her son an orphan. Matthew would be Todd’s only living relative.

God help him.

Matthew walked to the end of the upstairs hallway and looked out the window. A haze lay over Grand Coeur that morning, as it did most mornings when there wasn’t a breeze. From the vantage point of this house on the hillside, he could see the three long streets that ran east-west and several shorter streets that ran north-south. Someone had carefully platted what would be the main thoroughfares of the town, making the streets wide and straight. But as he looked farther out from the center of town, the streets became less defined, narrower and more crooked. The buildings were of all shapes and sizes, a large boardinghouse next to a small shoe shop, a restaurant a stone’s throw from a livery stable. And plenty of saloons. All those lonely men with gold dust in their pockets needed a place to go at night because their wives and sweethearts—if they had them—lived far away.

He faced the doctor again. “What is it I need to do for her?”

“I think it best that she not be left alone. She shouldn’t exert herself. Perhaps you could send to Boise City or Idaho City for a nurse.”

His brows lifted. “I know. Check with the new reverend. He might be able to direct you to a woman in his congregation who could stay with your sister while you’re working.”