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  Seth remained gallant. “My boss and I had a big dinner so there should be enough.”

  The two men somehow choked down the terrible meal, amid grinning townsfolk and cowboys. Looks of respect showed that Seth Anderson’s kindly bid had endeared him to Madera.

  Matt’s stomach had barely recovered from the box social when a few days later a young lad galloped up to the Diamond S corral where Matt and Seth were leaning against the fence. He reined in his horse and leaped from the saddle.

  Matt blinked in surprise. “What are you doing here, Johnny? And how come you’re in such an all-fired hurry?”

  Johnny rubbed a grimy hand over his freckled, sweaty face. “Telegram. Mr. Moore said I was s’posed to get it here pronto.”

  Matt’s heart lurched. A lump as solid as Bertha Bascomb’s sour bread and heavy cake formed in the pit of his stomach. He hated telegrams, especially since Dori had gone back east. Had something happened to her? Matt shook his head. It was far more likely that his impetuous sister had been expelled from the eastern academy she attended. Matt had received previous warnings about Dori’s conduct. Her shortcomings had only been tolerated by the grace of God and several generous contributions to the prestigious Brookside Finishing School for Young Ladies in Boston.

  Matt reached for the telegram.

  Johnny shook his head. “It ain’t for you, Matt,” he said. “It’s for Seth.” He tossed a soiled envelope to the younger man. “From St. Louis.”

  Seth’s face went paper white.

  Alarm shot through Matt as Seth ripped open the message. “Is it about Sarah?” he demanded. “Bad news?”

  Seth looked stricken. “The worst.”

  “Well?” Matt’s question cracked like a bullwhip.

  “Read it for yourself.” Seth thrust the telegram at Matt, eyes filled with pain and hopelessness.

  Matt snatched the message and read:

  SARAH DISAPPEARED STOP MAY COME TO MADERA STOP HOLD FOR

  FIANCÉ TICE EDWARDS AND ME STOP GUS STODDARD

  The words slashed at Matt’s heart like a hunting knife, cutting and tearing until he could barely breathe. Sarah engaged to be married? “Who is this Tice Edwards fellow?” he demanded.

  Seth looked defeated. “A real rat. Everyone in St. Louis knows him. He owns a riverboat where folks go to gamble.”

  Matt caught his breath. Such a monstrous thing couldn’t be true. Not when he had fallen in love with her picture. How could such a sweet and innocentlooking girl be promised to a riverboat gambler?

  Chapter 10

  The news that Tice planned to wed her the following day sent Sarah into a panic. She must disappear. Tonight. But how? At least Gus and Tice hadn’t waited until evening to spring the bad news. By midnight the children would be asleep, and the two men she hated and feared most would probably be having an early celebration: Tice, knowing tomorrow he would have her in his control, and Gus, ecstatic at having his six-thousand-dollar debt forgiven and at receiving unlimited gambling privileges.

  Sarah checked the time. It wasn’t quite six. No wonder Gus had been grumpy. After his nights of gambling and carousing, he tended to sleep much later. “Lord,” she whispered while beating the biscuit dough until it threatened to fight back, “I have eighteen hours. If I fly around and finish my chores quicker than usual, I should be able to make it.”

  A single glance around the shack sent hope plummeting to her toes. The place had never looked worse. How could she accomplish everything from washing the streaked windows to scrubbing the worn floor? She also needed to bake and wash clothes. Gus would rage if, on what he considered a special day, things weren’t spick-and-span. Sarah set her jaw in a manner that boded no good. If she did all that needed doing, she wouldn’t have a smidgen of time for herself. She would not bake bread. She would not wash clothes. They could wait until tomorrow—and by then she’d be gone. Fleeting pity for the burden soon to fall on Ellie’s eight-year-old shoulders stirred Sarah, but she shrugged it off. Let Tice hire someone to help. Or as Gus had said, he could always get a woman to replace his long-suffering wife.

  Sarah patted out her biscuits with well-floured hands, planning as she worked. If I can catch Timmy alone and offer him a cookie he might help me, she decided. There’s no use asking the boys or Ellie for help, even if they were around. They’d make a worse mess just to be ornery. Her fingers itched to get started sweeping and cleaning instead of cooking mush and setting out butter and jam. Thank goodness they were out of bacon and eggs. Gus would roar, but when she’d asked for money to replenish the larder, he’d refused to give her any.

  The ticking clock counted off the racing minutes until seven of Sarah’s precious hours had been swallowed up in hard work. Sarah grew so frustrated she wanted to stomp her feet and throw a tantrum like Ellie did when she didn’t get her own way. Hindrance after hindrance continued to rise, as if conspiring against her. Instead of staying away with his cronies as usual, Gus popped in and out of the house, commenting on how well Sarah was doing for herself by marrying Tice. She longed to hurl bitter words at him but bit her tongue and reminded herself that, by this time tomorrow, she’d be shut of him.

  Not so for Ellie and Timmy. The older boys could fend for themselves, but the younger children would be at Gus’s mercy. Sarah was almost glad when the youngsters acted up worse than ever before, fighting and demanding her attention. The last straw was when Sarah forcibly separated them and ordered them outside.

  Ellie shrilled, “You ain’t our ma. I hate you, and I’m glad you’re going away. We don’t have to do what you say. We’re gonna get a new ma. Pa said so.”

  “And she ain’t never, ever gonna tell us what to do,” Timmy piped up, his face contorted with rage. He was so unlike the little boy who crept to Sarah for comfort it eased her guilt over leaving them, even though she could not stay.

  “I feel like Job’s granddaughter,” she muttered to herself. “The way I’ve been plagued, the devil himself must be in league with Tice and this family today.” She washed her hands and hot face, smoothed her hair, glanced around the cottage, and sighed. The place looked as good as she could make it, considering its shabby condition. Pale sunlight poured through the freshly washed windowpanes. Sarah had even washed the bedraggled calico curtains, and the floor smelled of the strong lye soap she’d used to scrub it to within an inch of its life. She’d relocated stacks of old newspapers and soiled clothing dropped at will by simply tossing them out of sight.

  Reheated leftover stew and more biscuits had made up dinner an hour before. Sarah racked her brain to think of something for supper. Baked potatoes, maybe, and there was enough buttermilk. She’d make corn bread, open one of the last jars of fruit she had canned last fall, and serve the few cookies she had hidden from the children. Gus would complain, but she didn’t care. It would be the last time she’d have to hear him rant and rave.

  The clock struck one. It was time for her to go for the final fitting of her wedding dress.

  Sarah sighed again. In spite of rushing, she wasn’t one inch closer to being ready to steal out in the dead of night than she had been seven hours earlier. Now she had to spend precious time in a final fitting of the elaborate wedding gown Tice had selected for her. Sarah hated every inch of fancy lace, every tuck, every thread of the fine satin dress. She hated the cloud of a veil held by orange blossoms that would shroud her until her husband-to-be lifted it. Most of all she hated the imagined stares of those who came to gawk at her in her bridal white, the knowing glances exchanged between men as vile as Tice himself.

  By supreme self-control Sarah refrained from tearing the wedding garments from her body and throwing them in the dressmaker’s smug face when the woman purred, “What a beautiful bride you will be, ma cherie ” in an accent as artificial as her smile. Sarah turned away. She had avoided looking at her mirrored image, but curiosity got the better of her. How would she look in bridal white should God someday send a man to love, honor, and cherish her? Not married wearing th
is lavish, pearl-beaded gown but in a modest white dress that did not silently shout its cost.

  Sarah faced the full-length mirror. Her mouth fell open. Costly the gown might be but how it flattered her strawberry blond hair, shining blue eyes, and the color in her blazing cheeks! A small smile trembled on her lips, adding the one factor needed to make the vision perfect. If only Matthew Sterling could see her in this gown!

  Sarah closed her eyes and allowed herself the luxury of a dream. What would it be like to walk up the aisle of a church in Madera in step with her brother? To see dark-haired Matthew Sterling, tall, strong, and straight, waiting for her? To watch love and wonder spring into his eyes when he first caught sight of her—the same love and wonder that filled her heart and overflowed into the joyous occasion? To hear the time-honored words, “ Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to unite this man and this woman in holy matrimony. Marriage is ordained of God….”?

  Not this marriage!

  Had she spoken aloud? No. The dressmaker was busily straightening a fold of the ostentatious train of the gown.

  Sarah shuddered, but the picture of what a wedding could and should be had started a train of thoughts that could not be derailed. How she would welcome the opportunity to love and cherish a man such as Matt Sterling! Like Ruth in the Bible, she would unhesitatingly say, “Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.” Unlike marriage with Tice, she would not be unequally yoked. What she’d learned about Matt from Seth’s secret letters had convinced her that Matt Sterling was a true Christian.

  Her thoughts trooped on, repeating the majestic promises in the wedding service:

  “For better. For worse. For richer. For poorer. In sickness. In health. Mutually agreeing to be companions. Forsaking all others. Keeping themselves for each other as long as they both should live.” And finally “Whom God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.” How did anyone dare take those vows lightly, only to break them as Gus had done…and as Sarah knew in her heart Tice would do?

  “Does mademoiselle wish me to remove the gown?”

  The dressmaker’s question jerked Sarah from her wool-gathering. Her dream crumpled. It was highly unlikely that Matthew Sterling or someone like him would ever see Sarah Joy Anderson in a wedding dress. Worse, if her escape plan failed, only her miserable stepfamily, Tice Edwards, and his cohorts would gloat over the vision she had seen in the mirror. Depression filled her. Was this how maidens of old felt when forced into loveless marriages by domineering fathers desirous of forming strong alliances? Sarah’s heart ached for all those denied the chance for true love and sacrificed on the altars of greed.

  “Please take the dress off,” she quietly said, ignoring the woman’s babble and wishing only to slip into her own clothing.

  When Sarah reached home, another two hours had passed. Now only nine of the eighteen remained. The relentless tick tock, tick tock of the clock greedily nibbled away at the day. It reminded Sarah of the “Grandfather’s Clock” song that had come out a few years earlier. The chorus rang in Sarah’s head:

  Ninety years without slumbering, tick tock, tick tock,

  His life seconds numbering, tick tock, tick tock,

  It stopp’d short, never to go again, when the old man died.

  “I won’t be ninety, and my body won’t die if I have to marry Tice Edwards, but my life will stop short,” Sarah grimly told herself. “I feel like my seconds are being numbered, just like the grandfather’s were.”

  Matthew 6:34 popped into her mind: “Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.”

  In spite of her troubled heart Sarah couldn’t help smiling. Today’s evil was more than sufficient! The scripture cheered her up, and she resumed her duties with a lightened heart—until someone knocked on the door. Now what?

  The “what” proved to be two fashionably dressed, strange women.

  “Miss Anderson, we just had to come and call,” one gushed.

  “Yes,” said the other. “Dear Mr. Edwards said you might appreciate our help, since you lost your dear mother so recently. So sad, just before your wedding.” Her laugh grated like broken glass.

  “Mama isn’t lost,” Sarah quietly said. “She’s gone to heaven.” She swallowed the words: And there would be no wedding if she were here.

  The women gasped as if Sarah had shown bad taste in speaking so. “Oh yes, of course,” the gusher said. “Now what can we do? Last-minute arrangements and all that.”

  Sarah laughed. What would they think if they knew her “last-minute arrangements” consisted of packing what she could carry and fleeing from “dear Mr. Edwards” like a rabbit from a hound? “You’re too kind.” As in kind of nosy. “Thank you for coming, but things are in control.” In control of my heavenly Father. “Now if you will excuse me…”

  “Oh, to be sure. Come, Estelle.” Clearly disappointed, the gusher took her friend’s arm and sailed across the unkempt yard with a disapproving sniff that showed what she thought of “dear Mr. Edwards’s” choice of a wife.

  Sarah closed the door, leaned against it, and laughed until tears flowed. Taking advantage of an empty house, she raced to the attic. Gus and the children, perhaps even Tice, might appear at any time. She didn’t know where they were, and she didn’t care whether they were in school or playing hooky. Either way, one more day wouldn’t make a difference.

  She hastily gathered her things. The need to leave Seth’s “treasures” behind saddened her. Sarah discarded most of her own as well—but not all. She took the tattered copy of Little Women Seth had found on the docks and her mother’s worn dressing gown. The little wooden pistol Seth loved went into her reticule. She and her brother would at least have those reminders of their once-happy home.

  Sarah feared the money her mother had hoarded for her wouldn’t be enough for a quick trip west by rail. It seemed unwise to plunk down all she had in the world. She must count her pennies carefully, even if it took weeks or months to reach California. Perhaps she could find work along the way. She was pretty sure her stepfather would have no idea where she was headed. Sarah and her mother had taken great pains to keep Seth’s location a secret.

  When the clock struck midnight, Sarah slipped from her cot, praying the rustle of husks wouldn’t awaken Ellie or the boys. The plan of escape hinged on Sarah’s being able to sneak out undetected. With a silent prayer she began her long journey to freedom.

  Chapter 11

  Sarah crept down the ladder from the loft and into the brooding St. Louis night, thankful when it closed around her and muffled her light footsteps. She started down the road toward Jefferson City, clutching her heavy carpetbag in one hand, her reticule in the other.

  It was the longest night of Sarah’s life, a night that taught her the true meaning of 1 Thessalonians 5:17: “Pray without ceasing.” She jumped at the slightest sound. Passing hoofbeats drove her into hiding every few hours. “Lord, I know this is what You want me to do,” she whispered. “I know You will be with me. But I’m still frightened. It is so far to California. Please help me be strong and not afraid.”

  The rising wind whisked away Sarah’s prayer and fluttered the long cloak she had donned over her mother’s worn, but still serviceable, Sunday-go-to-meeting dress. Sarah shivered and pulled the cloak closer, thankful both it and the dress were dark blue. With dark gloves, Virginia Anderson’s old black hat pulled low, and a thick dark veil hiding her face, Sarah was next to invisible. Why, then, did concern over what Gus would do if he realized she had escaped haunt her? Every shifting shadow, every night noise set her heart pounding until it felt like it would burst.

  A horrible screech from a nearby tree sent Sarah into a panic. She began to run, thankful for the few stars that broke through the murk to light her way. The unseen culprit scre
eched again. This time the flapping of wings followed.

  Sarah stopped short. “You noisy bird,” she told the owl that glided over her head. “Go on with your hunting. I’m too big to be your prey.” She laughed softly. “Sarah Joy Anderson, if a stupid bird can scare you, how will you ever survive in California? There will be a lot more terrifying things there than a silly old hooting owl.”

  Not as terrifying as staying in St. Louis.

  The thought dried up Sarah’s laughter like drought parched a prairie. Nothing the unknown West might have in store for her could be more threatening than the horror of having to marry Tice Edwards.

  Step-by-step, Sarah’s shabby shoes carried her away from the gambler and her stepfather. In an effort to stem the nightmare image they conjured up, she began repeating scripture. A wave of gratitude filled her once more, as it had done all through her ordeal. Gratitude that John and Virginia Anderson had instilled in their children a love for the Bible and its promises from the time Seth and Sarah were born. Each verse from the psalms that Sarah murmured in the semidarkness quieted her troubled spirit. She ended by reciting: “ ‘In my distress I called upon the Lord, and cried to my God: and he did hear my voice out of his temple, and my cry into his ears.’ ”

  When no more verses came to mind, Sarah fought the darkness surrounding her by softly singing hymns. Each brought comfort, most of all the hymn her mother had always sung when things with Gus became unbearable. Now, although Sarah kept her voice so low it didn’t even carry to the treetops, the much-loved words came straight from her heart:

  He leadeth me! O blessed tho’t!

  O words with heav’nly comfort fraught!

  What-e’re I do, wher-e’re I be,

  Still ’tis God’s hand that leadeth me.

  Sometimes ’mid scenes of deepest gloom,

  Sometimes where Eden’s bowers bloom—