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He only read the first few lines before he glanced back up to study the young woman again. It was the ad his mother had created to find him a housekeeper. The ad Miss Stewart had answered. But that meant... No, it couldn’t be. This girl didn’t look a day over twenty, and the letter he’d received had clearly stated that his new employee was in her fifties. The woman in front of him, who looked as if she might give in to tears at any moment, couldn’t be Abigail Stewart.
“What’s wrong, miss?” Tommy asked her, having come to stand next to her, his small hand on hers.
Will watched as some of the anger and frustration melted out of her expression as she looked down at his son. “I’m not quite sure of that myself, honey,” she answered, pressing his hand with hers. “It’s been a long trip and I have had a very taxing day. I was looking forward to meeting my new employer and her...his family. But this hasn’t gone at all like I thought it would.” She looked up from Tommy to glare at Will. “Especially the part where I was left alone on the train platform while your father walked away.”
“You’re...you’re Miss Stewart?” Will said incredulously.
She straightened her back and tilted her chin up to look him straight in the eye. “Yes, I’m Abigail Stewart.”
Any answer Will might have given was interrupted by Tommy’s response. Throwing his arms around the woman’s waist, he squeezed tight while yelling out, “You’re our auntie House!”
Chapter Two
“Housekeeper, not Auntie anything,” Willy hissed at his brother.
Abby didn’t know how to respond to that, so she addressed their father. “I came all the way from Ohio just to be part of Mrs. Francis Hopkins’s household. Now what am I going to do?” she asked out loud, not expecting an answer from him.
“But you’re not old!” Willy burst out. Abby tried to focus on the boy, but her head felt clouded.
“That’s right. You wrote you were fifty-eight.” Will eyed her suspiciously.
“I did no such thing. I’m twenty-six, as I told you in my letter.” How could he say something so strange? She had been a little uncomfortable when Mrs....er...Mr. Hopkins had asked her age, knowing that the posting had specifically requested a “mature” Christian woman, but she decided to be honest, deciding that if her honesty somehow lost her the opportunity to work for the family, it was because God was closing that door. When there had been no further mention of her age in the letters, she had assumed her new employer had decided that it wasn’t important.
“Here, I’ll show you.” Mr. Hopkins reached into his worn denim shirt pocket and pulled out a pile of letters that even from a distance Abby recognized. Her heart sank. There was no doubt about it. She had been corresponding with Mr., not Mrs. Hopkins.
He shuffled the papers and then scanned one, holding it out to her, his strong, calloused finger pointing to a paragraph. As she took it, she noticed that the page was watermarked and that the ink had run. Even Abby had to admit that the number she had written out did look like a fifty-eight.
“I’m sorry. It must have gotten wet. I did write that I’m twenty-six. I never intended to be dishonest or misleading.”
“I believe you,” he replied gruffly. “But I’m afraid that doesn’t resolve the problem. I’m sorry if there was a miscommunication, Miss Stewart, but I was specifically looking for a, um...” He looked uncomfortable as he searched for the right wording. “A more mature woman. Someone closer to the age of my mother.”
“Well, I’m not the age of your mother, but I can cook, clean and teach as well as anyone twice my age.” Suddenly, staying here and keeping the job was important to her. If Mr. Hopkins withdrew his offer, where else could she go? She couldn’t go back to Ohio. Emma and Palmer would never welcome her back, and if she went anywhere close by, they would make life impossible for her and anyone who was daring enough to help her. No. She had to find a way to stay out here in Nebraska. And since jobs for women in the area seemed to be scarce, her best chance was to convince Mr. Hopkins that she could be his housekeeper after all.
“I don’t doubt your capacity, miss. It’s just that on the farm it’s just me, the boys and my nephew, Jake. It wouldn’t be proper or right for us to have you out there with us, a single woman of your age. I’ll take care of paying your passage back to Ohio and then you can be with your sister again.” His words were meant to be reassuring but elicited the opposite effect.
“I can’t go back,” she whispered to herself. This was worse than not being picked up at the station. Before, she had wondered if something had interfered with Mrs. Hopkins’s arrival, but now she knew she had been judged unwanted again.
“Why not? Did something happen to your sister?”
“My brother-in-law...” She almost spilled out everything but then remembered the boys listening. Straightening her back, she lifted her chin. “I can’t. I’ll have to look for work around here.”
“I doubt there will be very much in the way of work for a decent woman.” He studied her for a moment more and then shook his head. “Why did you even apply to come out on the frontier at your age? You should be looking to settle down and marry. Have a bunch of kids of your own.”
He had no idea how she’d longed for that—a husband and children, a home of her own. But there had been no chance of that. No man in Ohio had any interest in a girl who wore her sister’s old castoffs and was too busy minding her nieces and nephews and looking after the housekeeping to go to any social events. This was the only way for her to leave her sister’s house—to find a job somewhere else. What would she do if that chance was taken away?
“I’m sure that once you get back to Ohio, some young man will be real glad to see that you’ve come back where you belong. And no doubt your family will be glad to have you home, too.”
“I wish it were that simple,” she answered. “I have lived with my sister and brother-in-law since my parents died when I was thirteen. My brother-in-law is very powerful... I can’t go back now that I left against their wishes.”
“So you disobeyed your sister and brother-in-law to come out here?”
“Yes. I came because...” She glanced at the boys and bit her lip. “I had to get away from Palmer—my brother-in-law. I didn’t feel quite...safe living with him anymore,” she finally finished, hoping he would understand what she had left unsaid. “But my sister, Emma, felt that I had a responsibility to stay and continue to take care of the house and the children. The day your last letter came to the house, Emma found it and I had to snatch it from her or I would never even have gotten the money or ticket. I ran all the way to my pastor’s house, and he and his wife helped me get away. I even have a letter from Pastor Gibbons for you...or at least it was to be given to Mrs. Hopkins.”
She reached down and once again sifted through the different letters until she found what she was looking for and handed it over to Mr. Hopkins. As she watched him unfold it, she felt dizzy. What if he still decided to send her back? What was she going to do?
“Have you made your choice?” The poor waitress was back, pad of paper in hand.
“Um...”
“Why don’t you try the chicken like me?” Tommy prompted.
“Or she could try the steak that I’m gonna get,” Willy suggested.
“I don’t know,” she answered honestly. She didn’t really feel like eating anything and was afraid that food wouldn’t stay in her churning stomach even if she could swallow past the huge lump of fear wedged in the middle of her throat. She took a sip of her water and willed it to stay down. “I guess I’m not really that hungry right now. It does all sound so good, but—”
“Don’t worry about the money,” Mr. Hopkins interrupted with a deep frown on his face, his eyes not even lifting for the first page of the letter. “I’ll cover it. It’s my fault, after all, that you’ve come all this way for nothing.”
Suddenly Abby knew that she had to get outside and breathe some fresh air. Her stomach threatened revolt. Even with the letter from Pastor Gibbons in his hand, the man was going to refuse to hire her.
Without explaining anything to anyone, she bolted from the room, out the door and around the side of the building. She was almost to the back of the clapboard restaurant when she couldn’t keep her stomach from emptying any longer. For the first time in her life, she wished she had died with her parents. What was to become of her? She was truly alone in this world—and in this strange and unfamiliar town. Back home, the sky had been high and the hills had surrounded her, but she had not known the immenseness of God’s creation until she sat hour after hour and watched prairie grass wave to an endless clear sky. She was a small speck on a wide-open prairie and only God cared she even existed. No wonder King David had asked, What was man that God was mindful of him? She was as insignificant as a stalk of the prairie grass.
“Oh, God, What am I going to do now?” she cried. The sobs that racked her body were almost as painful as the retching. She leaned her forearms against the clapboard wall and hung her head between her elbows. She didn’t even feel the coarseness of the building scratching her arms. Closing her eyes she prayed for a home. Somewhere to go where she could rest—where she could feel safe. She had traveled more than a thousand miles thinking she found a new home only to find it was the biggest mistake of her life.
* * *
Will sat staring at the spot the girl...Miss Stewart, had just vacated. He almost hoped that this was just a bad dream and he’d wake up any minute now to find that he was still camping down by the river on his way into Twin Oaks to pick up his new housekeeper. But Tommy’s little hand pushing on his shoulder, trying to get him to pay attention to yet another barrage of questions, made him aware this was all too real. The new housekeeper was a young, beautiful girl who looked as if a stiff wind could carry her off. She wouldn’t last a week on the frontier.
“Pa, where’d she go?” Tommy asked, his confusion making Will regret even more having started all this craziness. Surely he and Jake could handle the boys on their own just as they had done in the past. Maybe he would not plant in the western field he had cleared last month. He would still make a profit, though not as much as he had hoped. Still, that sounded better than adding more chaos and anxiety to his boys’ lives.
“Pa!” Tommy’s hand pounded harder and Will finally focused on his small son.
“I don’t know where she went. Maybe she needed to get a breath of air.” What did he know about women anymore? He’d been a failure at being a husband, and it had been more than ten years since he had seen his own mother or sisters.
“Um, sir?” The waitress was back again. This time she had two plates full of mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, chicken and broccoli. The third had a large steak and a baked potato with the same side vegetables. “I have your meals.”
She set a plate in front of each of them and then leaned a little closer to him. “Is the young lady all right? Will she be joining you again?”
Will groaned and closed his eyes. That was the question, wasn’t it? Would she be joining them on their trip back to the farm, or would he send her back to Ohio? The sliver of the letter he had been able to read stated the pastor’s approval. According to the pastor, Miss Stewart was an upstanding Christian girl, well respected by the other members of the church where she had attended since she had been little. The pastor indicated that he had known her parents and wanted to make sure she was arriving to a Christian home where she would be protected and respected. It had confirmed what Will surmised about her from her letters.
The only problem was her age—how could he bring a young woman to live with them? True, they wouldn’t be completely alone, thanks to Jake and the boys, but it still didn’t seem proper. Yet it hardly seemed proper to abandon a young woman in a strange town, either.
“Oh...all right!” He gave in to his guilty conscience. He needed to go search her out and see what solution he could offer. It was getting later in the day and he still needed to be back to the river by nightfall. “Can you keep an eye on my boys for a minute?” he asked the waitress, wondering what he could possibly do to make this situation better for everyone.
“We’ll be just fine here, right, boys? I remember when mine were this size.” The waitress smiled at Tommy and Willy and then nodded to Will.
Maybe he could ask Mrs. Scotts to let Miss Stewart stay on their homestead. The Scotts were his closest neighbors, and Mrs. Scotts had always struck him as a kind woman. He played with that idea as he left the building and blinked in the afternoon sun. Once his eyes adjusted, he turned and followed the forlorn sound of someone sobbing. When he found her, she was leaning against the building, crying so hard she looked on the verge of collapse. She was the picture of distress and disillusionment. Knowing he had created this big mess, causing her so much misery, struck him like a sucker punch to his stomach.
He had prayed and sought God’s guidance each step of the process that had brought her here. Mother had started everything when she suggested he advertize for a housekeeper last spring. Being that it was her idea, he’d asked his mother to write his ad and get it placed in a good Christian publication. Miss Stewart’s copy was the first he had seen of the original ad. He never even dreamed she had used his given name—Francis, the name he had grown to hate as a boy growing up. Miss Stewart was not the first person to think it a woman’s name. How could it have gone so terribly wrong? Now the poor girl was in a strange place with no one to count on and nowhere to go.
God, I need a little help here, he prayed as he approached, wondering what he could possibly say.
“Um, Miss Stewart?”
She jerked around so quickly that she almost fell. Her pallid face looked as if she had powdered it with flour. Even her lips looked gray. Her red nose and red-rimmed eyes contrasted her lack of color.
She spun away from him just as quickly and her stomach heaved again, although she brought nothing up. A sob escaped her throat and ripped his heart in half. He stepped closer. Supporting her elbows with his hands, he felt her body shaking.
He felt an unaccustomed surge of protectiveness. He wanted to help this girl, shield and protect her from any source of pain. But right now he was the cause of her distress. What could he say or do to make that right?
* * *
Abby had thought the day couldn’t get any worse when she fled the restaurant, but apparently she was wrong. Now he was here watching her toss up her accounts. How embarrassing.
“I’m sorry, Miss Stewart. I wasn’t expecting you to be... I had thought... I’ve made a mess of this.”
His hands still supported her elbows and he sounded truly contrite, but what could she say? It was all right? That it was understandable after he had brought her all this way into the middle of nowhere that he was going to abandon her and leave her with nothing?
The nightmare didn’t seem to be ready to end. Silence stretched out and neither one knew how to break the uncomfortable tension. At least her stomach had settled to resemble a simple storm instead of a full-blown sea squall.
“Listen, I admit this is a mess.” He stated the obvious. If Abby hadn’t been so tense, she might have seen a bit of humor in that. Right now she didn’t have the energy to be amused.
“Really!” She speared him with a pointed look.
“I’m... Why don’t we go back and sit down? Maybe if you eat something...”
“It’ll come right back up,” she mumbled before he even finished his idea. “All I want is to go home...to have a place to go and lie down, a place that’s safe, where I belong.”
The last word caught in her throat. A place to belong and to be loved—it was what she had been searching for a long time. Her fight drained out of her as quickly as her ire had ignited. What was she doing, telling this man her heart’s desire?
“Um... I was thinking. I’ve got neighbors a few miles away who might be willing to let you stay with them while you work for us. At least until we can come up with another solution.” He paused and then asked abruptly, “Do you know how to ride a horse?”
Abby swallowed hard. He was offering her an option. Granted it wasn’t much of an option since it depended on this other family agreeing, but it was a better option than nothing. Clearly he wasn’t planning for her to stay permanently since he’d hardly want her imposing on his neighbors for very long, but at least she would have a place to stay for a few days. She nodded, afraid to say anything.
“We’ve got an extra horse that you could take each day….” He was already planning, but Abby couldn’t suppress a shudder. Did he expect her to ride the prairie for a few miles on her own each morning and night? Would it be safe? “We’ll work something out, at least until harvest. The winter months we spend closer to the house and I can see to the boys. In the meantime, I’ll write to my mother….”
He continued to talk, but she was having a hard time concentrating.
“Well?” he asked, obviously waiting for her to respond.
“Thank you,” she whispered. She almost sank to the ground in exhaustion. The entire trip was now taking its toll. From the moment she had received his letter and realized she was finally free of her sister and brother-in-law, she had slept very little, first packing and then traveling by coach and finally by train for the last week. A woman alone, she only dared to catch catnaps and felt so vulnerable. She had assumed that once she had arrived, everything would be calm and she would be shown her room and be able to rest—not sit for almost an hour in a strange town with no one looking for her and then discover that her job itself might fall through.
“I think you need to get in, out of the sun, and rest. Shall we?” Without waiting for her to answer, he slipped an arm around her waist and half walked, half carried her to the front of the building.
“Mr. Hopkins, I can do this on my own,” Abby declared as firmly as she could in her shaky voice. She couldn’t afford to leave him with the impression that she wouldn’t be able to take care of herself, much less do her work. She swiped at the tears on her face and groaned inwardly. Her face must be a sight, all red and puffy.
“All right,” he acknowledged, releasing her waist and tucking her arm around his like a perfect gentleman, turning them both toward the front door.
Abby firmly tapped down the hope that things were going to work out. It would be doubly devastating for her to start feeling as if she fit in and then have to pack up and leave. But the way Mr. Hopkins opened the door for her, led her back to the table and pulled out her chair, she felt certain she would be safe with this gentleman farmer.
The boys had both been eating their food, but when they saw their father lead Abby back inside, their eyes lit up and Tommy started his barrage of questions. “Is she okay? Will she come home with us? Are you gonna ask for your food now? Is she still sick? Do you want to try some of mine?”
“Tommy, she’s not gonna come to our house ’cuz Pa made her cry,” Willy hissed at his brother.
“Well, boys. We’ve talked and Miss Stewart is going to come with us for a while. I’ll see if the Scotts can let her stay with them until we can make some other arrangements.”
Abby nodded her head, but even that slight motion sent everything spinning. She just wanted to lie down somewhere quiet and sleep. The waitress came back with a teapot. Before Abby realized what she was doing, the waitress had poured a cup and then sweetened it with a sugar cube that she had plucked from the sugar bowl in the center of the table. The boys’ eyes grew large when they saw what treat was concealed in the bowl.
“This might help settle your stomach, miss.” The matronly lady spoke softly, placing the cup and saucer in front of Abby. “Why don’t you try a few sips at a time? It’s chamomile—it always helps me feel better when I’ve had a rough day.” She smiled and patted her shoulder, reminding Abby of Mrs. Gibbons, the reverend’s wife from back home. Abby wished that she could let the older woman coddle her a bit more. She managed to keep the tea down and drank yet another cup before the boys became too restless.
She hoped it would be enough to give her strength for the trials that lay ahead.
* * *
What had he gotten himself into? Will wondered to himself for the hundredth time as he drove the wagon back toward the homestead. They’d stop tonight at the river. He and the boys could camp out under the stars and Miss Stewart could sleep in the wagon. Getting home and dropping her off at the Scotts’ house on the way would be the easy part.
The Miss Stewart he’d imagined had been a sturdy, solid woman who knew her own mind when she said she was unafraid of the challenges of prairie life. This beautiful, delicate girl was another matter altogether. For now she seemed determined to give the job a try, but how long would that last? How long would he have—weeks, maybe a month or two—before she realized that Nebraska was a place where no young woman could ever want to be?
There was no convincing her of that now, of course. She’d have to see it for herself. Until then, perhaps Miss Stewart could help Willy to be more sociable. Maybe she could train Tommy not to say just anything that came to mind—or maybe not. He hoped she could feed them something more substantial than what he normally managed to burn or leave half-raw. Maybe she could get some meat on their bones and make his house feel more like a home... Or maybe he’d just invited trouble to make itself comfortable at his dinner table.
Not that she would be that much trouble. She seemed well educated and her letters bespoke of a nice girl, but to have a beautiful, single, unattached woman out in the middle of the prairie full of single men, all looking to settle down and start families in a place few women would venture... He might just have opened the door to a whole lot more than a housekeeper. Since he employed her, he would be responsible for her safety and reputation, and he’d also have to ensure that she didn’t make any decisions she’d later regret. She seemed so set on not returning to Ohio that she might fall into marriage with one of the local men. He’d do everything he could to make sure that didn’t happen. She needed to be free to leave the prairie whenever she chose—the choice that Caroline had never had.
Out of the corner of his eye, he watched her shift around to look over the landscape. He studied her profile. What must she be thinking? Was she asking herself what she had just gotten herself into, as well? The wind had pulled tendrils of hair out from her pins and he was sure that if she hadn’t been so tired from her travels, she would have been trying to control the mass of corn silk better.
Stealing a glance at her sitting at his side on the wagon bench, he pondered how to explain their route. “Listen,” he started, trying to broach the subject, then cleared his throat and tried again. “Our homestead is not very close to Twin Oaks. In fact, it’s more than another six hours’ ride from here, so we’ll be stopping at the river to spend the night.”
He turned his eyes back to the road, feeling her stiffen next to him. Her words still echoed in his head, the way she had said that she wanted to “Go home... To have a place to go and lie down.” He would have let her stay at the hotel tonight and headed out at first light, but that would have meant he wouldn’t get her to the Scotts’ until late in the night and then it would be too late to get home. Jake would be on his own for five days. It was too much to ask the boy.
“I can sleep with the boys out under the sky and you can have the wagon all to yourself. I know it’s not the hotel or anything fancy, but by tomorrow night, you’ll be bedding down at the Scotts’ house. Mrs. Scotts will take real good care of you and make sure you get the rest you need after this long trip.”
The line of saplings and small trees at the edge of the river came into view. “See those trees?” He pointed to the horizon.
“Hmm.”
“That’s the river. We’ll be there in just a few more minutes.”
* * *
Once they had arrived at the river, he helped her down from the seat and held her upright until her legs stopped shaking and supported her weight. Acting the consummate gentleman, he didn’t even look angry. Abby couldn’t say if it was the fear of what her future held or the long ride that had her shaking so bad.
“Why don’t you walk around here by the wagon for a minute and get your land legs back? The boys and I will go and check that there’s nothing around to bother you and then you can freshen up down by the river.” His words were soft and she felt protected. Maybe her first impressions had been correct. He made her feel safe.
Within a few minutes, Tommy ran back to her. “We made lots of noise so no critters would come out and scare you, Auntie House.” She followed hesitantly, finding Mr. Hopkins and Willy in a small clearing with a sandy bank sloping into the river.
“We’ll go and set up camp now, Miss Stewart. You should be perfectly safe here. We’ll stay out of sight, but all you have to do is give a yell and we’ll come running,” the man reassured her as soon as she came into the clearing. As they left, she heard Tommy whine about having to wait for a swim, but she was glad they were gone for a minute. The water looked so cool and refreshing.
When Abby ventured back to camp afterward, she found a small tent erected and a fire started. The boys sat on both sides of Mr. Hopkins and were watching as he cooked some sort of meat.
“Hi, Auntie House,” Tommy called out, hopping up and running toward her. “Do you feel better now?”
