River to Redemption Page 10

  “Whether that was true or not, we will never know.” Adria folded the cloth and waited for the man to move his hand away from his head. “But, at any rate, we both ended up rolling in the dirt. My dress is quite ruined and who knows what happened to my hat.”

  The front of Adria’s dress was smeared brown with perhaps more than mere dirt. The roads could be dreadful when the wagons were going through town. Not only that, her hair was in a shambles, with dark curls tumbling around her shoulders. Adria rarely gave proper thought to appearances, but this was definitely a scene that would greatly upset Carlton if he were to appear at their door.

  Adria was in a far too intimate and familiar position with this stranger. In spite of the blood on his face, the man appeared very pleased with her attention. Ruth didn’t care at all for the way his eyes kept settling on Adria. She was a beautiful girl, but his gaze upon her lacked the proper reserve of a gentleman. Not that a drover could ever claim gentleman status.

  Ruth stepped into the kitchen and moved in front of Adria. “You best let me do that.” She reached for the wet cloth. As a schoolmarm, Ruth had tended to many scrapes and bruises over the years. She needed to take care of this situation efficiently and get this man on his way.

  “Kind of you, ma’am.” The man moved his hand to reveal a gash that was still leaking blood. “Logan Farrell at your service. Or I suppose you are the one helping me and for that I am grateful.” He took off his hat, and curls that might be blonde if clean tumbled down over his forehead. He pushed them back out of the way.

  “Sit still.” Ruth kept her voice brisk but her hand gentle as she swabbed the wound. “You need to let Dr. Adams stitch this up.” She looked over at Adria. “You should have sent him straight there.”

  Adria turned a little pale as she peered at the wound. “I knew it was bleeding, but I didn’t see it until now. His hand was over it.”

  “Hey, no fair swooning, my lady. Not now.” He reached to feel the cut. “It can’t be that bad.”

  Ruth shoved his hand away. “Don’t touch it. Your hand is filthy.”

  “My face too, I’m sure.” His grin was back. “Don’t worry yourself, ma’am. I’ll wrap a rag around my head and be fine in a few days. That is, if I don’t die of thirst first. I hate to put you to any trouble, but I’d be mighty appreciative of a tall glass of water to wash this dust out of my mouth.”

  “Of course.” Adria got a glass out of the cabinet and filled it with water.

  Ruth stopped pressing the cloth against the cut while he chugged down the whole glass.

  “Could I have another where that came from?” He handed the glass back to Adria.

  Blood dribbled down through his eyebrow and Ruth reached to wipe it away. “It’s not going to stop bleeding if you don’t get it stitched up.”

  He shivered as he reached for the water. “I don’t like sawbones. They get hold of you and kill you with their lances.”

  “I don’t think Dr. Adams will bleed you. You appear to be doing enough of that as it is. And surely you’re not afraid of a few stitches to hold your face together.”

  “Ugly scars make a man look tough.”

  “Or cowardly if that man is afraid of proper treatment.” Ruth refolded the cloth and pressed it hard against the man’s head.

  “No one has ever accused me of cowardice, ma’am.” Logan Farrell flinched and his smile slid off his face. “Foolishness, at times. Carelessness more often than that, but not cowardice.”

  “Nor was I, Mr. Farrell. I was merely making an observation.” Ruth turned to Adria. “Tear some strips off a clean dish towel and we will get Mr. Farrell on his way. I’m sure he has business to attend to here in town.”

  “No, I’m free as a bird.” His smile was back.

  “Aren’t you one of the drovers?” Adria asked as she handed Ruth the cloth strips.

  “Do I look like one of those rough characters?” He held up his hand with a laugh. “Don’t answer that. Just believe me when I say I haven’t always kept such coarse company, but a man’s situation can change in a flash. I needed a job. They needed a drover, but then the man in the lead wagon decided they had one drover too many. So here I am, as I said, free as a bird.”

  Ruth considered asking him what situation changed so quickly for him, but then decided some things were better unknown. She folded one of the cloth strips into a square and put it over the cut. “Hold that in place.”

  “I thought my hands were filthy.”

  “They are, but you’re touching the cloth, not the wound, and I can’t hold it there while I tie the bandage in place.”

  “Her hands might be cleaner.” He tilted his head toward Adria.

  “I should hope so.” Ruth shot Adria a look and the girl backed away from the table. “But you holding it will work fine.”

  “I promise I wouldn’t bite.” His infectious smile flashed across his face again.

  “That’s good to know.” Ruth wrapped one of the strips around his head and tied it in place as tightly as she could. “Wagons come through all the time. I’m sure you can get another job without a problem.”

  “That could be, but I’m thinking on sticking around here awhile. I thought being a drover traveling all through the countryside would make for adventure, but believe me, it’s nothing but hard work, a bed on the ground, and dust and mud. So since I hear Springfield is a town of opportunities, I thought I’d try my luck here for a while until adventure calls from some other direction.”

  “You don’t have family?” Adria sounded sorry for him. She wanted everyone to have family. That was what she had first asked Ruth to be. Her family.

  “A man can’t lean on family forever. There comes a time when he has to strike out on his own. See what he’s made of.”

  “Well, we wish you luck finding a job, Mr. Farrell.” Ruth kept her voice cool. “Springfield has a hat factory, a hemp walk, a couple of slaughterhouses. Many stores. As you say, opportunity.”

  “I can’t see me making hats, but I’m sure something will jump out at me before I run completely out of coin.” He drank the last of the water in the glass Adria had handed him and stood up. The blood was already seeping through his bandage.

  “You really need to see a doctor. Dr. Adams is a couple of blocks away on Cross Main.” Ruth went over to the sink and pumped out water to wash her hands. She needed to get this man on his way.

  That needed to be soon, with how Adria’s face had changed while the man talked. She was curious about him now, and that could only lead to trouble. A drifter spouting about freedom. Adria would be hearing more than he was saying. But the man appeared to be in no hurry to leave.

  “You could be right, ma’am. I am feeling a little wobbly on my feet. Guess I cracked my head harder than I thought.” He grabbed the back of the chair.

  “Maybe you should sit back down,” Adria said.

  “Adria, I think it best if we let Mr. Farrell go find a doctor.” Ruth used her sternest voice.

  “Adria.” The man flashed his smile. “A lovely name for a lovely lady.”

  A blush warmed Adria’s cheeks as she met the man’s gaze. Ruth could practically see sparks flying between them. Not at all what she wanted to see. Adria often let her emotions get carried away, but Ruth needed to nip this in the bud. She stepped between the two. “As I said, the doctor is on Cross Main. Not far, but if you have difficulty finding the doctor’s house, anyone on the street can direct you.”

  “But what if I stagger into another post?” He looked over Ruth’s head toward Adria. “I might knock myself unconscious.”

  Ruth was having none of it. “Then I’m sure some kind Good Samaritan will help you up.” She pointed toward the door. “Good day, Mr. Farrell.”

  He stayed where he was. “But I thought I’d already met that Good Samaritan. Perhaps Adria could walk with me to ensure I don’t stumble.”

  Adria started to say something, but Ruth spoke first in her best schoolmarm voice. “I think not. Time for yo
u to be on your way. Now.” She stepped over and opened the door.

  “Yes, ma’am. I wouldn’t want to outstay my welcome.” He put on his hat and finally stepped toward the door. There he stopped and tipped his hat at Ruth. “Your kindness is much appreciated.”

  Ruth inclined her head a bit in acknowledgment.

  Then the man looked at Adria. “Perhaps we’ll meet again, Adria, in circumstances more in keeping with a lady’s sensibilities.”

  “That could be,” Adria murmured.

  Ruth shut the door behind the man, glad to see him gone. She turned to face Adria. “A man like that is nothing but trouble.”

  “I thought him very charming.”

  “Indeed. And he as well thought he was very charming.” Ruth frowned. “It was a game with him seeing if he could engage your feelings. A game I fear he was altogether too good at playing.”

  “Don’t worry, Aunt Ruth. I’m not so foolish as to let my emotions run after a man I’ve only just met. But how do you think it would feel to be so free?” Adria stared toward the door with a sigh. “Able to do or go wherever your whim took you.”

  “Whims can lead you astray. Best to think things through. Especially for a young woman like you or even an older woman like me. A lady has to consider appearances if she doesn’t want to spoil her chances for a good life.”

  “But what is a good life? Having to fit yourself in the mold some man prepares for you? A mold that you don’t like?” A slight frown wrinkled the skin between Adria’s eyebrows as it always did when she was trying to understand something.

  “No, my dear. Not at all. Love makes the mold you want to fit.”

  “Was it that way with your Peter?”

  “Yes. Yes, it was.” Ruth closed her eyes for a moment. It was harder and harder to bring up Peter’s image in her mind, but she had no trouble at all remembering their love. She opened her eyes and looked at Adria. “I wanted nothing more than to be his wife and the mother of his children.”

  “And what did he want?”

  Ruth hesitated. She had wrapped her wants so completely around him in her memory that she wasn’t sure exactly how to answer. What had Peter wanted? “To live, but he was cheated of that chance by the cholera. But he did love me and shared my desire for children. We would have had a beautiful life together. I have no doubt of that.”

  “If he loved you so much, wouldn’t he want you to be happy now?”

  “Of course. I am happy.”

  “Are you?” Adria kept her eyes on Ruth. “Really happy?”

  “No one can be happy every moment of life. You know that.”

  “But shouldn’t we try for that kind of happiness?”

  “I think we do try, don’t you?” Ruth said.

  Adria was silent for a moment as if searching for the right words before she spoke. “You should have married again. Had the babies you so wanted and that I couldn’t be for you.”

  “I’m thankful for you being in my life, Adria.”

  “Yes, I know. And I’ll be forever grateful for what you did for me. You were my Good Samaritan when I most needed help.”

  “I’m still here for you.” Ruth reached to touch Adria’s hand. She started to step nearer to hug her, but they had never shared that many hugs, even when Adria was young.

  “But I’m an adult now, and I have to find my own way.”

  “That doesn’t mean I must stand by and watch you make wrong decisions without trying to help you see more clearly what your future should hold.”

  “And I will listen.” Adria leaned over and kissed Ruth’s cheek. “I will always listen, but you might have to listen to me too.”

  Ruth squeezed Adria’s hand. She chose her next words carefully. “I promise to try. I want only the best for you.”

  Adria smiled then. “I suppose right now the best for me would be a bath. As Mr. Farrell so ungallantly put it, we did roll in the dust and who knows what else.”

  “I’ll put some water on to heat.” Ruth turned to pump water into a kettle. She felt better when doing something for Adria. Taking care of her physical needs. Reading to her. Teaching her. That was easier than talking about being a Good Samaritan. But then hadn’t the Good Samaritan been a man of action?

  Thirteen

  Ruth was right about Logan Farrell. He had been much too forward. Calling Adria “my lady.” She wasn’t his lady. Far from it. She had refused to even tell him her name, although Ruth had let that slip. Ruth hadn’t aimed to let the man know anything about them. She was not at all pleased that Adria invited the man into their kitchen.

  Invited might not be the right word, Adria thought as she headed down the street toward the store on Saturday morning. Allowed. She had allowed the man to come into their house.

  Ruth could be a stickler about using the right word. Sometimes when they were reading to one another at night, she would stop the story to point out that this or that word would be better. Not only better, but more accurate. That came from writing poetry, Adria supposed. Ruth loved words. She had instilled that love in Adria too, except Adria was more interested in the power of words instead of the poetry of their sounds.

  She was continually searching for the strongest words to use in her letters condemning slavery. She sent her missives in plain envelopes to a woman in Boston so no one would suspect that she was involved with an abolitionist group. For all the postman knew, she and Abigail Summers were doing no more than corresponding about the latest fashions and their marriage prospects. Abigail clipped articles from the papers and sent them to Adria. An abolitionist newspaper would never make it out of the Springfield post office.

  The fact that Adria was corresponding with the abolitionists worried Ruth. Adria seemed to be good at that. Worrying Ruth. Just like with Logan Farrell. Ruth was right. Adria shouldn’t have brought him to their house. She should have pointed him toward the doctor, but she really hadn’t expected him to have such a gash in his head. She thought it would be a mere scrape, easily cleaned and bandaged.

  As Ruth often reminded her, she forgot to think about appearances or the consequences of ignoring those appearances. Ruth was right about that too. Carlton would be upset if he heard about her encounter on the street with a drifter. Not if. When. Nothing that happened in the middle of Springfield’s Main Street had much chance of being unnoticed or, once noticed, not remarked upon.

  Carlton wouldn’t believe the man was saving her life. She didn’t believe the man had saved her life, although when she thought about it, those horses’ hooves were very close when they thundered past after Logan knocked her down. Perhaps she could have been trampled. Even killed. She needed to keep that thought and an attitude of gratitude when she told Carlton about what happened. Ruth thought she should tell him. First. Before the gossips made the story even better than it was.

  Perhaps she could forget to mention taking Logan Farrell home with her to dress his wound. She supposed it was wrong to keep secrets from a man she was considering marrying. But she was already doing that with her letters in support of the abolitionist cause. Carlton roundly condemned the northerners who wanted to free the slaves. If she married Carlton, he would demand she cut all ties with the abolitionists. But she wasn’t standing at any marriage altars yet. She was still free to do as she pleased. Maybe not free as a bird, the way Logan Farrell had claimed, but free.

  Free as a bird. A sparrow flew past her with a bit of straw in its beak. Birds seemed free, flying here and there and not tied to the earth, but how free were they? They were always busy building nests, feeding their baby birds, searching for the next worm. Not that much different than people. Busy taking care of needs. Maybe it would be better to say free as a cat.

  That made Adria smile. Her Gulliver had been a free spirit as soon as he was old enough to roam. That cat would come stay with them in the winter, and as soon as the days warmed to spring, off he’d go. Out hunting new mama cats to charm, new mice to catch. Doing whatever he wanted, when he wanted.

 
; “My lady looks pleased with the world this day.” Logan Farrell stepped out onto the walkway in front of her.

  “Oh, you startled me.” Adria put her hand to her chest. She had been so wrapped up in her thoughts she hadn’t noticed him waiting there. Obviously watching for her. “I fear I was lost in thought.”

  “Happy thoughts it seems.”

  “The best kind.” She let her smile stay. In spite of his bandaged head and black eye, the man looked more presentable this morning. No blood and dirt smeared his face. His straw-colored curls looked freshly washed when he took off his hat and tipped his head toward her in greeting. His clothes were worn, but clean.

  The one thing not changed was the way his blue eyes seemed to demand she notice him as he tried to charm her with his words. “The only kind. Just looking at you brings a smile to my face.”

  She supposed she did look much better herself, with a fresh white blouse and brown skirt and her hair properly pinned up. The requisite hat perched on her head. It was a bit frayed around the brim, but it would have to do until she could get another since she’d lost her newest hat in the dirt yesterday.

  “I’m sorry about your eye,” she said. “Did you find the doctor’s house without trouble?”

  “I did. Managed to survive his administrations. He suggested I put a steak on my eye, but I told him I’d much prefer eating a steak rather than wearing one.” The man laughed. “He was a talkative old gent. Filled me in on a number of things in Springfield.”

  “Job opportunities, I hope.” Adria did hope that, but she feared the old doctor had let Logan pump him about her own situation. Dr. Adams, the same as most everybody else in town, thought it was well past time Adria accepted her proper feminine role and married Carlton.

  “Among other things.”

  “Dr. Adams can be quite the talker when he’s working on a patient. It’s his way of putting a person at ease. He’s liable to say most anything then.” Adria pushed a smile back across her face. “It’s been pleasant talking with you, but I must be on my way.” She started to move past him. She had already noted several curious glances toward them from others on the street. She hoped Carlton was at work at his father’s hat factory, far from any windows.