Settlers' Hope by Kathleen D. Bailey

Author:Kathleen D. Bailey [Bailey, Kathleen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Christian Fiction, inspirational fiction, Clean and Wholesome Novels, Religion and Spirituality
ISBN: 9781522302940
Publisher: Pelican Book Group
Published: 2020-07-20T00:00:00+00:00

16

Oona was late today, she’d stayed too long at Pace’s last night, and she picked up her skirts and half-ran the last few feet to the mercantile. The first of spring’s freighters had gotten through the mountains yesterday with a load of precious commodities from the East. But she stopped short as a voice, rusty from tobacco and lack of use, called to her.

“You get it all in?”

Annie Two Stars, the owner of the mercantile and nearly everything else in Hall’s Mill, halted her pony cart before the store. Too big to walk or even ride, she got about in a two-wheeled cart pulled by a matched team. And get about Annie did, checking daily on the store, the saloon, and the shacks she rented to the dazed and desperate emigrants. Nobody knew where Annie had come from or how she had gotten her money. She was fluent in French and two Indian dialects. In English, her fourth language, she read, wrote, and spoke on a child’s level. But there was one language Annie had mastered: money.

“We got it all off the wagons and into the store. I’ll be sorting and pricing this afternoon.” Oona smiled at the big woman dressed in men’s clothing, whose graying braids reached to her waist.

“Moses. He help.”

Oona would be glad enough to see Moses Jackson, who’d unloaded the bulk of the new merchandise. If the job put a few more pennies toward the Jacksons’ claim, so much the better.

Annie’s leathered cheeks crinkled in a rare smile. “The school. Is good,” she said before she lumbered toward the saloon to see—or harass—Ed Petersen.

Yes. The school, it was good. Oona had seen the Jackson children come alive, from both their new friends and Caroline’s nurturing. The two boys from the hills still rode in together every day, and though they avoided adults, she heard them laughing and yelling at recess. And the Dale girls thrived, Elora, Ramona, and the invincible Rowena. And Deborah loved her friends.

Had Caroline’s God made something good out of something very bad?

He’d never done that for Oona. Mayhap there were different gods. Hers sat in judgment, instilled fear. Eight years of parish school and three years in the convent hadn’t changed her opinion. She couldn’t say she didn’t believe. But she was better off staying out of His way.

Oona made good use of her morning hours, unpacking crates of jarred vegetables, their colors rich behind the glass. A boon to both the bachelor loggers and the housewives who had arrived too late to put in gardens, who would reap their first western harvests next year. She wouldn’t be here to see it.

She listened to the murmur from Caroline’s improvised classroom, the occasional laughter. Caroline had found something she loved to do. Would Oona be that lucky? She’d never had a chance to ask herself what she wanted. She’d not really had a choice. She went to work in the manor house to help support the family, and then in the convent at eighteen.

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