Believing the Dream (7 page)

“Not company.”

“Why, yes. Thornton came by, and I thought you’d be home earlier, so I asked him to stay for . . .” Her voice trailed off, then regained its normal forcefulness. “Coffee and cookies.”

If he brought me a present, I am going to . . . to . . . It’s your own fault if he did. Remember, you invited him to join you in that courting conspiracy. Any courting man would bring his intended a Christmas gift. Just because you don’t take the game seriously, remember that he has gone
out of his way to make it look convincing.

Elizabeth wished she could stuff a rag in that little voice that played at being her conscience. She’d just wanted to get her mother to call off the matrimony police. Asking Thornton to enter into a pretend courtship had seemed just the thing.

And it worked, didn’t it?

She forced a smile to lips that wanted to snap and followed her chatting parents into the parlor. The roaring fireplace drew her like children to light.

“Good evening, Elizabeth.” Thornton Wickersham stood, setting his eggnog on the whatnot table beside his chair.

“Good evening, Thornton.” She almost added the
mister
, but surely they’d progressed beyond that. “Cold out, isn’t it?”

“Bitter.” He came to stand beside her, both of them with their backs to the heat. “I would have come for you had I known you were at the office.”

“Thank you, but the walk home was good for us.”
Liar. You could hardly breathe
.

“Do you want hot cider or eggnog?” Her mother had taken her place at the tea tray. “Or rather coffee?”

“Hot cider sounds wonderful.” Since her gloved hands had been protected by her dyed rabbit muff, that was about the only warm part of her. But the thought of a hot cup was appealing.

Before she could take a step, Thornton had crossed the room to fetch the cup for her.

“Here you go.”

She glanced up at him, about to say something biting, but swallowed the remark into a meek “Thank you,” her mother’s dogged training in manners winning out.

“Elizabeth, are you not feeling well?” The twinkle in his amber eyes warned her more was coming.

She rubbed her forehead, trying to banish the beginnings of a headache before it became full blown. “Just tired.” Taking a sip of the cider wafted cinnamon and nutmeg through her senses. She inhaled again. Along with the pine fragrance from the tree, cedar from the garlands outlining doorways and windows, and vanilla from the candles burning on the mantel, the house wore a potpourri of Christmas smells. She inhaled the steam from her cup again, feeling the muscles in her neck relax. Knowing which ones needed to let go and making them do so were two different operations entirely.

“Thank you, dear Thornton, this indeed is just what I needed.”

He cocked an eyebrow at the
dear
.

She drowned an almost giggle in her cup. Her mother had heard.

Thornton leaned closer. “I’m preaching at the Congregational church tomorrow evening. Will you come to hear me?”

As a minister in training, Thornton often preached at some of the churches in town, but more often at smaller outlying congregations.

Elizabeth glanced at her mother, who nodded. Agreement came easily if her mother thought an event might add to the romance she assumed to be budding between her daughter and this “fine upstanding young man,” to quote her mother.

Guilt twanged.

“Elizabeth, any chance you might grace us with some Christmas music?” Her father leaned back in his chair. ““We’ve been so busy, it seems like weeks since I’ve heard you play.”

“That was me playing with the choir at school.”

“Along with the orchestra. How about a private concert?”

“Of course.” With a smile she placed her cup in Thornton’s extended right hand and crossed to the ebony Steinway in front of the drawn red velvet drapes. The piano was placed so she could see out to the gardens when she played.

Stretching out fingers and loosening her hands and arms, she took her seat on the bench, not bothering to place sheet music on the rack. She knew what her father wanted—a medley of his favorite Christmas carols, and for those she needed no music. Placing her fingers on the keys took her beyond the doorway into another world, a private place where she floated on the notes. Stroking the keys like a lover might his beloved, she segued from melody to melody with nary a pause, her eyes closed, the better to feel the ecstasy.

Her teachers, her mother, and sometimes her father had all encouraged her to continue with her music, but her entire being pleaded to become a doctor. Music was for delight. Healing people was her mission.

She ended with “Silent Night,” letting the notes drift off like a memory.

“That was magnificent.” Thornton leaned against the piano, reverence deepening his gaze.

“Thank you.” Opening her eyes took a concentrated effort, staying transported with the dream was much easier.

“I must be going before I wear out my welcome.”

“Did you walk?” Phillip roused himself from his reverie.

“Yes, but my uncle’s house is not far.”

“I’ll have Tom hitch up the sleigh. If you slipped and fell on the ice or some such nonsense, you’d freeze before you hit the ground.” Phillip hefted himself to his feet. “Thank you, my dear. That was magnificent.”

Moments later, hearing the jingle of harness bells, Elizabeth picked up her insistent cat, Jehoshaphat, and clutched him under her chin as she walked Thornton to the door.

“I’ll see you tomorrow night then?” Thornton took her hand.

“Not in the front row.”

“Surely my intended should sit up close to the front.” His waggling eyebrows made her giggle.

She put one finger to her lips. “You don’t have to go that far,” she whispered. “She believes. She believes.”

“Your gift is under the tree.”

She pulled her hand away. “I was afraid of that. Why did you—?”

“Isn’t that proper?” He donned a stricken look.

She stepped back, still shaking her head. “Good night and merry Christmas.” Now she’d have to come up with a gift for him. And she had planned on staying home tomorrow doing a whole lot of nothing. What kind of monster had her game of pretend created?

CHAPTER SIX

Blessing, North Dakota

“Thorliff’s coming home, Mor, Thorliff’s coming home.” Astrid danced about the kitchen, twirling in place before the stove.

“You be careful you don’t fall in the oven.”

“Mor, I can’t fit in the oven no more.” Astrid tweaked her mother’s apron strings as she spun by again.

“If you’ve got so much energy, you can haul in two more loads of wood. Why is Andrew late again?”

Astrid stopped spinning and swooping. “Ah . . .”

Ingeborg turned from checking the chicken baking in the oven.
“Astrid?”

“Ah, I’ll get the wood.” The girl dashed from the room, snagging her wool shawl off the peg by the door as she ran by.

Ingeborg sighed and wiped her hands on her apron. What had that young son of hers gotten into now? She crossed the room to look out the window. The sun already hung low in the west, painting the
scattered clouds in shades of vermilion and cerise. The snow on the ground caught matching tints. Surely Pastor Solberg wouldn’t keep Andrew into dusk?

Astrid dumped the first armload into the woodbox and hustled out for the second before her mother could ask her anything else.

Ingeborg picked up her rolling pin again and gave the sour-cream cookie dough another two passes. What could be going on with Andrew? Cutting the cookies, she tried to figure out ways to help her younger son deal with his too quick responses with his fists. Could Haakan talk with him again? She shook her head. Haakan thought Andrew’s method of championing the underdog quite remarkable, to the point of giving him lessons in fisticuffs. Should she talk with Pastor Solberg—again? Somehow it didn’t seem fair that Andrew be set to chopping wood when the altercation was really someone else’s fault.

She sighed and picked up the thread of an ongoing conversation with her Lord.

“It really isn’t fair, you know. But I understand he has to learn better ways, and I do try to help him see that.” She made a mouth shrug. “And yes, I suppose the woodpile gives him time to think on other ways.” She stopped cutting cookies to lift them to the cookie sheet with a pancake turner. “But then, if I know Andrew, he uses that time to figure a way to get even with that Toby Valders.”

“Who you talking to, Mor?” Astrid paused in the doorway, the pieces of split wood weighing her down. “I know, you and God, huh?” At her mother’s nod, she added, “About Andrew again, ja?”

Ingeborg could feel the corners of her mouth tilt up. The look on her daughter’s face would make any mother laugh. When and where did Astrid learn to cock her head and raise an eyebrow just so?

“Have a cookie.”

Astrid dumped her load in a woodbox that looked close to becoming kindling itself.

“You don’t have to worry—”

“I don’t worry!” Ingeborg interrupted her daughter to receive another roll of the eyes and slight headshake. “Excuse me.”

“Like I was saying”—Astrid’s grin held a wealth of secrets—“Andrew isn’t at school, but you can’t ask me where he is ‘cause then I’d have to break a promise, and you don’t ever want me to break a promise ‘cause you said a promise is a sacred thing, and I—”

Ingeborg held both hands in the air, a sure sign of surrender.
“Enough.”

Astrid picked up two cookies still warm from the oven. “These sure are good. You make the best cookies anywhere.” Her grin pleaded with her mother to not ask more questions. “After all, it is almost Christmas.”

“Oh.” Ingeborg felt a grin tickle her cheeks. “Guess I never thought about that.” At Astrid’s slow shake of her head, Ingeborg clarified. “For me, I mean.”

“Now, you know I didn’t say nothing.”

“Anything.”

Raised eyebrows and rolled eyes. “Anything.”

I wonder what he is making for me?
Ingeborg knew she was nearly as bad as the children when it came to delight over presents. Why, the year Haakan surprised her with a Singer sewing machine . . . such finagling he’d had to go through to keep her from buying one herself.

“What are you smiling about?” Astrid snatched another cookie.

“Just thinking back to other Christmases.”

“I sure do miss Thorliff. He would have written a new Christmas play if he was here.” She sank down on a chair and propped her elbows on the table. “Just ain’t the same without him here.”

“Isn’t.”

“That’s what I said.”

“No, you used ain’t, and that is not proper.”

More eye rolling. “Sorry. How come we have to say everything right?
Other kids don’t. Lots of the grown-ups don’t neither.”

“Either.”

This time a sigh. “They don’t.”

“I know, but Tante Kaaren worked really hard to make sure we all
learned to talk English right. I believe that since we live in America, we should talk like good Americans.”

“That’s what Pastor Solberg says too.” Astrid traced a finger trail in the flour on the table. “Toby Valders said a bad word today and got his mouth washed out with soap, and then he had to write on the board fifty times. Used up two whole pieces of chalk.”

Ingeborg sighed.

Forgive me, Lord, but I sure am grateful you didn’t let Penny and
Hjelmer adopt those two, no matter how disappointed she was at the time.
And now look, you blessed them with Gustaf, the pride of Bridget’s heart
. They had named their little son Gustaf after Hjelmer’s father, who had died after most of the family emigrated to America.
How Penny would
have managed those two ruffians along with her store is beyond me. But
then, who but you knew all that in advance?

Ingeborg slid her flat pan into the oven under the rack holding the roasting chicken. All the while she glanced out the window, checking the barns where the men, including George McBride from the deaf school, were busy milking. Andrew should be out there too. Did Haakan know where the boy was so he wasn’t worried?

Astrid wrinkled her forehead, her book on the table as she studied for the morning.

“You may light the lamp if you want.”

“All right. But let me finish the chapter first.”

That alone told Ingeborg her daughter wasn’t doing her arithmetic. Like her brothers, she loved to read.

“You could read aloud. Goldie and I like stories too.” Ingeborg nodded at the orange-and-white-striped cat curled on the rug by the stove. At his name, the animal opened his eyes and treated them to a throat-inspecting yawn. The barbs on his tongue gleamed as he rolled and stretched that too, then began to straighten his fur.

“It’s about a jumping frog contest. Do you know where Calaveras County is?”

“Some place in California, I think. Ask Andrew. He read that story a couple of years ago.”

“We could have a jumping frog contest in the summer. The bullfrogs from over in the swamp jump real good.”

“Sure you could.”

“The jumping frogs of Walsh County.” She wrinkled her nose. “Doesn’t sound as good, does it?”

“Who cares. It would be fun. We could do it just before harvest starts. We’ll need a party about that time anyway.” Ingeborg pulled her cookie tray from the oven and looked up at the sound of boots kicking off the snow on the back porch.