The Winter Rose by Melanie Dobson

Author:Melanie Dobson [Dobson, Melanie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FICTION / Christian / Historical, FICTION / Romance / Historical / 20th Century
ISBN: 9781496444240
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers
Published: 2022-01-11T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Two

July 1947

Ruby shot through the back door of the farmhouse like a torpedo. But instead of exploding, shaking the entire house, she waved a white envelope addressed to Grace.

Ruby dropped the letter on the breakfast table as Louis trailed into the house behind her. “This came to Château sur la Colline.”

Grace glanced at the return address from London. Urgent stamped in red below.

She didn’t want to touch it, afraid at the news it might contain. And she was also concerned—why had Ruby taken it upon herself to deliver this personally instead of returning it for the postman to carry down the hill?

“Aren’t you going to open it?” Ruby eyed the envelope as if she’d been blessed with X-ray vision to see the contents inside.

“Later.” Grace took a ham out of the oven for Charlie’s seventeenth birthday celebration. “It must be something for Roland.”

“The envelope’s addressed to you.” Ruby glanced at the doorway into the living room. “Where is Roland?”

“Probably the barn,” she said even though it was more likely to find him in the small studio he’d built out back, installing lights for Marguerite. The girl spent every free hour in there, spilling color out on canvas.

Ruby hiked up a penciled eyebrow, her cherry-glazed lips out of place in this plain kitchen. “I was already in the barn.”

“So you brought me this letter in order to see my husband?”

Ruby’s eyes narrowed. “I brought you the letter because it belongs to you. And I want to ask Roland a favor.”

Grace eyed the date on the postmark. It was mailed more than two months ago. “How long have you had this?”

When Ruby shrugged, Grace wondered if it had been days or weeks even. The envelope was her mother’s ticket to visit the farmhouse. Spend time with the man Grace had married after her mother’s male guests returned home.

“There you are.” Ruby’s voice turned sickly sweet. When she smiled at Roland, a hammer in hand as he stood in the doorway, an icy anger froze inside Grace. Her mother could have any number of men who called, sporting their pin-striped suits and fancy cars and cigars, but not this one.

Roland placed the hammer on the kitchen counter, Marguerite close behind him, and took Grace’s hand, his eyes warming the chill, their fingers entwined. This man was hers.

“How can I help you, Ruby?” he asked.

“I have a leak in my kitchen faucet.”

“Then we’ll call for a plumber. Mr. Lange, I’m told, can fix about anything.”

“I don’t like that man.”

Grace covered her mouth when she coughed, certain that Mr. Lange was not fond of Ruby either.

“He will do much better work than I ever could,” Roland explained.

But it wasn’t about the work; even he knew that now.

“I don’t trust him. It’s like he’s just waiting to steal something when I turn around.”

Grace bristled. “That’s ridicu—”

Roland squeezed her hand, quieting Grace before she said something she would regret, the same way he’d done when they had been stopped by the militiamen in France. No good would come from her accusations, even if they were true.

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