Back Roads to Bliss (Saskatchewan Saga Book #6): A Novel (12 page)

Quiet in heart and spirit at last, he slept.

Mornings in the north, in winter, were times of desperation. Pity the husband and father, the man of the household, to whom was assigned the fire-building task.

Gritting his teeth, Parker slid from the cocoon of his quilts, thrust his feet into his shoes, and shivered his way to the stove.

Happy the dawning when a few live coals remained from the night’s fire. This morning Parker wasn’t so fortunate. First shaking down the grate and removing several scoops of ashes, he crumpled an old newspaper, placed it in position, covered it with fine chips and specially cut kindling, so called because it “kindled” or lit quickly, and set a match to it. Leaving the stove open for the moment, Parker huddled at its side, absorbing the first promise of warmth, feeding the fire with suitably sized wood until it was blazing brightly and popping cheerily.

The cold receded grudgingly, inch by inch. Soon the nail heads nearest the stove were free of frost; eventually the ice in the kettle thawed, the hot water began to steam, and a first washing of sooty hands was possible. Shaving would come later; baths were reserved for Saturday nights.

The day—when he started out later for the Morrison place—was sunny, bright with promise. Parker’s boots slid and stumbled over the rut-frozen roads, but if the schoolchildren could navigate them day after day, in fair weather and foul, so could he. It was with relief, however, that he turned in at the gate and trudged the lane to the house. Smoke spiraled from the stovepipe, and Parker anticipated a hot cup of tea and perhaps an oatcake or scone, usually forthcoming from this Scottish family.

The door swung open while his gloved fist was still raised to knock, and Molly’s fresh face and welcoming smile greeted him; her hand pulled him into the room. Her warm cheek was pressed to his cold one, and then she was unbuttoning his wraps, helping him out of them, hanging them up.

“Come to the fire,” she urged and led him to the favored spot.

Mary, gentle Mary, Molly’s mother, greeted him warmly, and soon Mam, beloved grandmother, came in to offer her cheek for a kiss. It was from Mam Molly got her abundant head of lively hair, though the one head was white now, and the other coal black; it was from Mam Molly got the bluest eyes imaginable, fading ever so little now in the lined face and sparkling with life and vigor in the other. Parker thought of his womanless estate and envied the life and warmth and beauty so abundantly displayed in the Morrison home. God willing, he would, one day soon, rob the house of its sweetest and best.

As he had anticipated, a hot cup of tea and a buttered scone were soon daintily served, along with a snowy serviette to cover his knee. Molly, lithe and lissome, restless with winter’s restrictions, folded herself on a braided rug at Parker’s feet, cup in hand, her eyes raised to his and filled with love and longing.

“What brings you tramping over here this time of the week?” she asked, knowing there had to be a reason in this weather.

“We need to talk, Molly,” Parker said, handing her his cup and drawing a deep breath.

Mary was instantly alert. “Mam and I have things to do,” she said with a twinkle, and the two—mother and grandmother—left for one of the bedrooms that had been added to the original cabin, making a sprawling and not unattractive log home.

“What is it, Parker?” Molly asked, eyes shadowed with the dread that, once again, her longed-for wedding would not take place.

“First of all,” Parker said, his voice a little unsteady, “it’s my father. My mother’s letter reached me yesterday, telling me that he . . . he died.”

“Oh, Parker—” Molly raised herself to her knees, her arms going around the seated Parker. For a moment their tears mingled for the man he would never see again and she would never know.

“Sit down, Molly girl,” Parker said finally, and she did so. Still her eyes were fixed anxiously upon him.

“It’s like this,” he said. “My mother needs me—it has to do with my father’s affairs, selling the business, settling property rights, and so on. I’ve got to go, Molly.”

“For how long, Parker?” Molly asked, just as directly.

“I think I should plan on several months. I’m going to suggest to the board that they contact a Bible school for a substitute; the church shouldn’t be without a shepherd for that length of time.”

“And us, Parker? You and me?”

“I have the solution, Molly. If you’ll go along with it. You remember, last year, when I was in such a turmoil about my call and my future and thought I might go east and teach for a while? You prayed about that, remember? And you weren’t agreeable to going with me; you said your place was here in Bliss—”

“For the time being, I said.”

“What exactly did that mean, Molly?”

“It meant, you silly boy—” Molly’s voice was rising with excitement, “that I didn’t feel we . . . I . . . should go east and be
a teacher’s wife. It means I feel I have my own calling, and it’s to be the wife of a pastor. Pastor Parker Jones, to be explicit.”

“Then simply going out for a short time—that wouldn’t be objectionable?”

“Parker,” and once again she was on her knees in front of him, this time searching his face, his eyes, her voice tight with control as she asked, “are you suggesting, are you saying, we can be married, and
I can go with you?
”

The smile on his face was enough for her. With a small cry she flung herself into his arms. He gathered her to him as a drowning man reaches for a rope. And now the tears were those of exultation. There would be no more delays, no more uncertainties.

Mary and Mam were invited back eventually, and kisses and hugs were exchanged, with explanations made. They offered their condolences, then joined in the happy plans that were laid.

“I haven’t thought of going until a thaw sets in,” Parker said. “But that can’t be far awayjust weeks, maybe days.”

“Just long enough to get everything ready,” Molly added. “Oh, Parker, it can be a wedding trip!”

“At my mother’s expense,” Parker said a trifle ruefully, being as poor as a church mouse himself and the fact well known to his prospective bride.

“But you’ll be such a help to her,” Molly encouraged, taking his hand. “And I’ll do what I can.”

“Mother will love you, darling Molly,” Parker assured her. “And my sister, too. What a wonderful opportunity for the girls in my life to get to know one another. My
other
girls,” he corrected, with an apologetic grin at Mary and Mam.

And at that moment Parker Jones, in spite of flat purse and barren cupboard, worn shirt collars and no means of transportation save his own two feet, felt himself to be the richest of men.

Q
uincy Middleton, as a mill owner and part of the despised (in his thinking) merchant class—along with clergy, doctors, and bankers—supposed himself to have attained the rank of Third Class in British Society. No one had specifically qualified him as such, nor were there lists, to his knowledge, to which one’s name was added when he attained a certain status or removed when he slipped from proper protocol and importance. No matter that the Map of English Society was drafted years ago; in people’s minds, if not on their bookshelves, it existed.

Now, however, with these shenanigans of his older daughter, he felt he was in grave danger of slipping to the dreaded Fourth Class—along with lesser clergy, doctors, teachers, lawyers, shopkeepers, artists, and merchants of the lower class. (Quincy had nightmares from which he woke up perspiring over the dreadful possibility of such a demotion.)

People of moderate income were also in this bracket. Quincy’s income remained large, though his workers were restless, grumbling concerning their need of better pay. But they hadn’t
a leg to stand on; Quincy had them where he wanted them. They lived in his houses, on his property, and if dismissed from the mill, they lost both wages—meager though they might be—and home.

No, Quincy had not slipped in the matter of his income, and he hoped that fact alone would suffice to maintain his place in the Third Class ranks.

“This evil,” he was saying to his wife as he paced back and forth in the room that was designated as his study, his face red, his eyes snapping, “has got to be nipped in the bud. And quickly.”

“Evil? Allison? Oh, Quincy! And anyway,” Letitia, seated nearby, was twisting her handkerchief, “she’s home again. It’s over now—”

“Over? Over? People don’t consider it over. They see a family brought low by their offspring. They see her actions as a horrible smirch, misconduct of the vilest sort. And it’s destroying my reputation and the Middleton name!”

“Quincy,” Letitia begged, “be reasonable! Your reputation has nothing to do with it. As for her own, perhaps, given time—”

“A canker, that’s what it is,” Quincy pressed on. “And it certainly does have something, everything to do with my reputation!”

“Canker?” Letitia repeated faintly and shuddered.

“Canker!” Quincy repeated, rolling the word around on his tongue like some sweetmeat. “Her behavior is like a canker, Letitia. A canker, for which there’s no cure except it be excised! Cut out!”

“What are you saying, Quincy?” Letitia was alarmed—there was no operation to remove traits of character. And Allison was hotheaded, rash, independent. Only life itself would change the character of Allison Middleton.

“I’m saying,” Quincy said, stopping before a window and staring out at the little kingdom he had built—wide green grounds around a beautiful house and, in the distance, the mill discharging
heavy black smoke—“you can’t put a plaster on something like this and expect it to get well. A
canker
is a gangrenous growth—”

Letitia was growing tired of the word and wished he’d move on. But Quincy wasn’t finished.

“The only solution is to remove it.”

His long-suffering wife sighed. “What do you propose?”

“You’ll see soon enough.”

Quincy stepped to the bell pull, gave it a hefty yank, and turned his heavy face toward the door, his finger tapping impatiently on the desk at his side, his cheeks flexing in cadence with the clenching of his teeth. Quincy, angry, was a fearsome sight to behold and a frightening power to encounter. Although his temper was not turned on her this time, Letitia was understandably nervous.

“Sit down, Quincy. Surely you don’t have to pace around like a, like a wounded bull.”

Her husband’s high-colored face turned even redder. A wounded bull! Quincy desired, above all, to act and react as an aristocrat would. Letitia had, across the years, managed to curb his brutish side more or less by her criticisms, her suggestions, her mockery. Now, hearing her, Quincy bit his lip.

With massive control he turned to the chair behind the desk and sank into it. And though he would never admit it, Letitia was right—he immediately felt more dignified, more in charge than when raging aimlessly around the room. Like a judge behind the bench, he was ready to pronounce sentence.

“Yes, sir?” It was Buckle, standing prim and trim before the desk, having entered the room quietly, like the shadow he was.

“Bring Allison . . . Miss Allison, downstairs, please, Buckle.”

“Yes, sir!”

He needn’t sound so happy about it, Letitia thought with some annoyance. Quincy irate, Sarah sniveling, the servants titillated—it was a three-ring circus. Perhaps she, Letitia, should have insisted on seeing Allison, preparing her a little in advance for this moment. But the child had behaved shockingly; she should be made to suffer for it. And three days of seclusion on
bread and water should have been sufficient punishment. But Quincy’s wrath had not subsided one whit. Letitia was uneasy about Quincy’s possible heavy-handed retribution.