Season Of Hope Read online

  Copyright

  ISBN 1-58660-383-3

  © 2001 by Carol Cox. All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the permission of the publisher, Truly Yours, PO Box 719, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683.

  All Scripture quotations, unless noted, are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

  All of the characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events is purely coincidental.

  one

  1881, Prescott, Northern Arizona Territory

  “Come in, Rachel. Have a seat.”

  Rachel Canfield slid into the dark leather chair facing Ben Murphy’s massive oak desk, her back straight, chin up, trying to exude an air of confidence she didn’t feel. The bank manager’s office was a familiar setting. Goodness knew, she’d been in there often enough with her father, but having to conduct business on her own gave the room an odd sense of unfamiliarity today.

  “I want to tell you again how sorry I am about your father’s accident.”

  Rachel nodded briefly, appreciating the sentiment, but not wanting to deal with the fresh wound of her loss right then. She cleared her throat, then hesitated, lacing her fingers into a white-knuckled knot. What was wrong with her? Ben Murphy had been her father’s friend for all the time they’d lived in Arizona Territory. In her present hardship, she knew she could count on him to be an ally. She had absolutely no need to be nervous.

  Ben leaned forward, giving her an encouraging smile. Rachel breathed a quick prayer for courage, squared her shoulders, and got right to the point. “The farm is doing well. Very well,” she added for emphasis. “I fully expect to make a better profit than ever this year.” Ben nodded, obviously pleased, and Rachel drew in a long, shaky breath. She had just given him the good news. Now for the hard part.

  “Unfortunately, we’ve had a good many extra expenses, what with the doctor and the. . .the funeral and all.” Rachel’s voice shook, and she pressed her lips together for a moment, trying to regain her composure. “I’d like an extension on our loan payment—just for a few months,” she added hastily as Ben’s smile faded and his eyebrows drew together. “Just until we catch up a little bit.” Her voice trailed off, and she sat speechless, hating the way her lower lip quivered, but powerless to stop it.

  Ben looked at his hands, at his inkwell, at the Seth Thomas clock on the wall—anywhere but at Rachel.

  What was going on? The Canfields had always paid their debts and always would. Ben knew that. Why did he suddenly look so unfriendly? Why did he refuse to look Rachel in the eye?

  “I’m afraid I can’t do that.” His eyes focused on a Currier and Ives print across the room.

  Rachel’s breath came in short, jerky gasps. “But–but why?” she faltered. “You know you’ll get the money.”

  Ben ran a finger back and forth inside his collar. “If it were up to me, Rachel, you’d get the extension. Your father was a man of honor, and you’ve always followed him that way. But the board of directors has already met to discuss your loan. They don’t believe two young women can keep the place up by themselves, so if you and your sister have any problem making this year’s payment—any at all—I’m supposed to hold you strictly to the terms of the agreement.”

  “I don’t believe it!” Rachel slammed her palms down on the polished desk top, relishing the way the blow made her hands sting. The pain shocked her out of her confusion and helped her marshal her thoughts. “Do you mean to tell me that after all the years I’ve worked with my father, Doc Howell and Ed Silverton don’t think I’m capable of making a go of the place now that he’s gone?”

  “It’s–it’s not Doc and Ed exactly,” Ben mumbled.

  “Then who?” Rachel demanded. “Who’s left? Everyone around here knows I’m a hard worker and that I know what I’m doing. That makes me a good investment, Ben. Who would want to see me fail?”

  Ben stared miserably at the rug as if fascinated by the floral pattern. “I don’t know that Hiram wants to see you fail, exactly. . . .”

  “Hiram? Hiram Bradshaw?” Rachel’s voice rose to a screech. “What does he have to do with this?”

  “He just invested in the bank, Rachel. He’s on the board of directors now.” Ben’s gaze met hers at last. “In fact, he’s the biggest investor in the bank, so he has the biggest say in what we do. And what he said about you was that I was to give you no leeway on this. None whatsoever.”

  “What about all the time you and Pa spent together?” Rachel hurled the question at him. “Didn’t his friendship mean anything to you?”

  Ben squirmed, looking more like an errant schoolboy caught in a misdeed than the manager of a financial institution. “I wish it were up to me,” he said, shaking his head. “I really do.”

  Rachel rose from her chair and leaned as far over the desk as her five feet five inches would allow. “All right, Ben Murphy.” She ground out the words. “We worked hard to build that farm up out of nothing but a hole in the forest—too hard to let it slip away to a scoundrel like Hiram Bradshaw. I don’t know just how we’ll manage it, but you can expect to have the full two hundred dollars right here on your desk December 15, and not a day later.” She stood up and smoothed her skirt with trembling hands, preparing to make a sweeping exit. Ben’s quiet voice stopped her.

  “It’s not two hundred, Rachel.” At her sharp glance, he squirmed again. “Your father borrowed more money for mining equipment last spring. He signed a paper, promising to pay that in full, along with the loan amount. You’ll need to come up with three hundred dollars.”

  Rachel’s knees gave way, and she sagged back into the chair.

  “Your father anticipated getting enough from this year’s crop and his mine to pay it all off with no problem,” Ben explained with a sympathetic look. “I know he never dreamed he’d leave you girls in the lurch like this.”

  Three hundred dollars! Rachel’s mind whirled crazily, trying to calculate ways and means of coming up with that amount. Stiffly, she rose to her feet once more. “Then that’s what you’ll have,” she said through taut lips. “I don’t know how, but you’ll get your money, Ben. Every penny of it.”

  Ignoring the pitying disbelief in the banker’s eyes, Rachel pivoted and stalked out the door, her back ramrod straight and her head held high. No one, least of all Hiram Bradshaw, would take their land from them. And no one was going to see her look the least bit concerned about it! She climbed into the wagon seat and gathered the reins in one fluid motion.

  ❧

  Thumb Butte. Granite Mountain. Williams Peak. The familiar landmarks stood in the same places they had occupied for thousands of years. Rachel could gauge her location within a hundred yards just by a quick glance at her surroundings. Nothing had changed outwardly, yet everything was different, just because of Pa’s passing.

  Rachel viewed the passing landscape with shock-dimmed eyes, barely noticing the wagon turn when the road curved in the direction of Iron Springs and home.

  How much longer would she and Violet be able to call it home? Her brave declaration to Ben Murphy had sounded fine inside the bank, but how on earth could she possibly come up with three hundred dollars in the space of three months?

  “That prideful streak of yours is going to land you in trouble some day, Rachel.” She could hear Pa’s voice as clearly as if he’d been riding in the wagon seat next to her. How she wished she could turn and see him sitting there! She needed his calm guidance now, more than ever.

  Rachel groaned aloud, and the wheel horse flicked one ear back, checking out the unexpected sound. With their
lives suddenly turned upside down, raising two hundred dollars would have been challenge enough, but three hundred? “It’s impossible,” she informed the horses. “Utterly impossible.”

  With God all things are possible. Rachel gasped and spun about on the wagon seat, her heart pounding wildly. No one but she and the plodding horses were in sight. “ ‘With God all things are possible,’ ” she whispered, the verse from the Gospels sounding clear and fresh. “All things. Not everything but getting enough money to keep Hiram Bradshaw’s greedy fingers off our land. All things.” A way existed, and God would provide it. All she had to do was find out what that way might be.

  The vague outline of a plan had begun to form in her mind by the time she turned off the road and into the farmyard. Wanting to share the idea with her sister before she lost her train of thought, she pulled the horses to a stop in front of the house and hurriedly dismounted from the wagon. “Violet!” she called. There was no answer. “Violet?” she tried again, louder this time.

  A quick glance from the front door showed no sign of her sister. Rachel stood on the porch, hands on her hips, and tapped her foot impatiently. Wasn’t that always the way? Here she had a perfectly wonderful notion just waiting to be shared, and Violet was nowhere to be found.

  Rachel took a deep breath, ready to call out again, when a wail burst forth from the barn. “Violet!” she shrieked and raced across the hard-packed dirt, skirts held high, visions of mayhem flashing through her mind.

  “Where are you?” she hollered when she arrived, panting, at the wide-open double door.

  The dreadful yowling erupted again, just overhead. Rachel’s head snapped back to scan the hayloft. What could her sister be doing up there? And what was happening to her to cause her to produce that inhuman sound? Rachel mounted the ladder leading to the loft. “I’m coming, Violet,” she called breathlessly. “Just hang on.”

  “Thank goodness you’re here.” Violet’s legs swung precariously near Rachel’s nose to dangle over the edge of the loft. Bits of hay adorned her glossy dark hair and her skirt was rumpled, but otherwise she seemed in good condition—and remarkably unruffled for someone making such an unearthly noise.

  Rachel stared openmouthed at her younger sister. “What on earth is going on?” she demanded, panic making her voice harsh. “You sounded like you were being murdered.”

  Violet blinked in surprise at her sister’s accusing tone, then grinned. “Not me,” she said, laughter gurgling in her throat. “Come on up.” She scooted to one side and helped Rachel scramble from the top of the ladder to the loft.

  Rachel wrinkled her nose at the hay dust she stirred up. She slapped at her skirt and sneezed violently when a cloud of the fine dust assailed her nostrils. “All right. What—choo!—is making that horrible noise?” Violet pointed to one corner. “I don’t see any–any–ah–ahh—” The discordant wail sounded again, cutting her off in mid sneeze.

  “It’s Molly,” Violet explained, indicating the gray tabby cat that crouched against the wall, swiping her paw at a large orange-and-white tom. “Well, not Molly exactly,” she said, watching the male visitor tilt his head back for another round of impassioned caterwauling.

  “It’s that tomcat of Jeb McCurdy’s again!” Rachel fumed. “And after I’ve told him a dozen times to keep the mangy thing at home.” Snatching the amorous cat by the scruff of the neck, she carried him down the ladder, ignoring his loud objections. “Where’s that old sewing basket?” she asked Violet, who had followed her down, carrying Molly in one arm.

  Violet reached behind a pile of grain sacks and pulled out the covered basket, which Rachel snatched gladly, depositing the lovesick tom inside and fastening the lid securely before he had a chance to escape. “There,” she announced triumphantly. “That ought to hold him until I get him to McCurdy’s place.” She stalked off to the wagon, where the horses still stood in their harness.

  Preparing to swing the basket onto the seat, Rachel paused to shade her eyes and peered at a distant figure coming toward them on the road. “Talk about timing!” she crowed. “There’s Jeb McCurdy in his buggy now.” With a grim smile, she grabbed the basket and strode off to intercept their neighbor.

  Shielding her eyes with one hand, she waved her other arm in a wide arc. McCurdy slowed his horse to a walk, staring curiously. “Need some help, Miss Rachel?” he asked congenially, shooting a stream of tobacco juice neatly to one side of the buggy.

  “What I need, Mr. McCurdy, is for you to keep your wayward animal at home.”

  “My what?” McCurdy rubbed his grizzled chin with a work-worn hand, a puzzled frown creasing his forehead.

  “This wanton feline of yours.” Rachel raised the basket and shook it menacingly in the surprised farmer’s face, bringing indignant yowls of protest from the prisoner within. “I have asked you repeatedly to keep him from wandering onto our property, but he was back again today, tormenting our poor Molly.”

  The owner of the treacherous tom cast a bewildered look at Violet, who stood nearby holding Molly, then back at the avenging fury before him. “But I thought your sister’s name was—” A second glance at the cat nestling comfortably in Violet’s arms brought illumination to his weather-beaten face, and a muffled chuckle escaped his lips. “Molly—she’d be your cat, would she?”

  “Of course she is,” Rachel snapped. Her feelings raw after learning of the possible loss of the farm, she found a certain satisfaction in venting her pent-up anger. “The poor thing was cowering in a corner, trying to fend him off. Who knows what might have happened if we hadn’t intervened?”

  “Who knows, indeed?” McCurdy mumbled, rubbing a hand across his mouth.

  Rachel pressed on, heedless of the interruption. “I want your word—your solemn word, Mr. McCurdy—that you will keep that beast on your own property from now on. We have enough to do to keep the place running without having to deal with the attention of unwanted intruders.” She folded her arms and fixed McCurdy with a severe look, daring him to argue.

  The faintest curve tilted one corner of McCurdy’s mouth. “Has it occurred to you, Miss Rachel, that his attentions might not be totally unwanted? By Molly, that is,” he hastened to add.

  Rachel’s fist tightened on the basket handle, fighting the urge to fling it, cat and all, straight at her neighbor and knock that infuriating smirk right off his face. “Mr. McCurdy,” she said in icy tones, “I assure you that none of us, Molly included, have the slightest desire to entertain that creature. Please take your appalling animal and keep him at home. Or at least away from here!”

  McCurdy caught the basket Rachel thrust at him and fumbled with the lid. “Oh, no,” she told him, replacing the latch firmly. “Keep him in there until you get him home. You can return the basket later.”

  Nodding agreement, McCurdy snapped the reins and started his horse down the road. A rasping laugh floated back over his shaking shoulders to where Rachel stood glaring after him.

  Hot tears stung her eyes, and she balled her hands into fists. How dare that old reprobate make fun of a serious situation! No wonder his cat behaved the way he did, she told herself; he was a reflection of his owner. Sniffling, she whirled purposefully toward the house and walked headlong into a tree that hadn’t been there earlier.

  two

  “Ow!” Blinded by tears of pain, Rachel doubled over, with both hands clamped to her nose. Voices, one Violet’s, one she had never heard before, floated above her.

  “Rachel, are you all right? What happened?”

  “I’m not sure.” This from the strange voice, a mellow baritone. “She just ran smack into me.” Strong hands took hold of Rachel’s shoulders with a firm yet gentle grasp. “Are you hurt? Let’s see.”

  Rachel raised her head slowly, still pressing her throbbing nose, to see two blurry figures before her. Blinking rapidly to clear her vision, she focused on the tall, sandy-haired man standing next to Violet. “Who are you?” she asked, her voice muffled by her hands. She threw a look at her sist
er, silently demanding an explanation.

  Violet gave a nervous laugh. “We have company,” she said helpfully. “You didn’t hear us talking, because you were, ah, busy with Mr. McCurdy.”

  Jeb McCurdy! Rachel felt her cheeks flame, remembering the dressing-down she had given the grizzled miner. She must have sounded like a fishwife! What must this man, whoever he was, think of her? She turned back to him, pulling her hands from her face, and heard Violet gasp. Looking down, Rachel saw the bright red blood staining her fingers and a blotch of the same color on the front of the stranger’s white shirt.

  Mortified, she clapped her hands to her cheeks, regretting the action the instant she felt the sticky warmth from her fingers. She squeezed her eyes shut, wishing with all her might the man would be gone when she opened them again. Instead, he still stood before her, holding out a snowy handkerchief. Rachel took it without a word and held it to her nose, gratified that the bleeding seemed to have slowed.

  “I’m Rachel Canfield,” she said through the folds of fabric. “I take it you’ve already met my sister, Violet.”

  “Daniel Moore,” replied the stranger. He held out his right hand, then appeared to reconsider and tucked it into his pocket. His gaze swept over Rachel from head to toe, and she felt as though she’d been appraised by his deep green eyes and found wanting. “I apologize for coming up on you like that. I thought you had finished your conversation, and I was coming to introduce myself. I didn’t realize you were. . . preoccupied.”

  Rachel flinched at the reminder of her outburst. “I’m the one who should apologize, running into you like that. Look what I’ve done to your shirt! And your handkerchief,” she added lamely, staring at the crimson-spotted square of fabric in her hand.

  “Mr. Moore was a friend of Pa’s,” Violet said happily.

  Then why haven’t I seen him before? The day’s upheaval made Rachel leery of putting her confidence in a total stranger.