A Lantern in the Window Read Online Free PDF

Bets had to start working too.” A haunted look
came and went on her face. "Bets isn't as strong as me. The air’s
bad in a factory, and she coughed a lot.”
    She interpreted the look
on his face and added defensively, "She isn’t an invalid, honest.
All she needs is some fresh air and good food, and she’ll be fine
again. She hasn’t got consumption, or anything bad like
that.”
    He didn’t comment, because
he had his doubts. Instead, he went doggedly on. “You said in one
letter that your father was dead. Is that true?” What if her sop of
a n’er-do-well father turned up, looking to Noah to support him? He
shuddered. There were aspects to this proxy marriage that Noah had
never thought about till now.
    But she answered promptly,
and unless she was an accomplished actress, Noah was convinced she
was being honest.
    “Papa’s been dead four
years now. He fell and hit his head one night coming from the
tavern, and he died the next day.”
    It was a relief to hear
it, although naturally Noah didn’t say so.
    “Who taught you to read and
write?” He’d been impressed by her letter-writing ability, and he
found himself liking the proper way she talked. She sounded
educated, a rare thing in a woman of her background.
    “My mama taught both my
sister and me,” she said proudly. "Her father was a schoolteacher.
He taught her. We had books.”
    “Reading’s fine, but do you
know how to cook?” He was plain fed up with the meals he was forced
to throw together. They’d given him a new respect for good
food.
    She hesitated. “Some. A
little. Plain food, mostly. We never had money for anything fancy.
Bets is real good at making soup.”
    “You said you grew up on a
farm,” he went on relentlessly. “You talked of making butter, of
milking cows, of growing a garden.” More lies, he reminded himself
again. “How’d you know what to say about those things?”
    She looked down at the
table, her finger circling a mark on the cloth. “I have a good
friend, our landlady, Elinora Potts. Elinora grew up on a farm. She
helped me.” She raised her eyes and met his accusing gaze with
rebellious courage. “See, I’d answered three other advertisements
before yours, and I was truthful in them, and not one man wrote
back to me.”
    So he’d been the bottom of
the barrel. It wasn't exactly flattering, but somehow it amused
him.
    "Don’t you see, Mr.
Ferguson, I just had to get Bets out of there?” she went on, her
voice trembling. "She’d have died ." She leaned her arms on the table and bent towards him, intent
on making him understand. “Have you ever been inside a cotton
factory, Mr. Ferguson?”
    He shook his head no. He
was intrigued by the fierce passion in her voice, the fire
smoldering in her green eyes. Against his will, he was drawn to
her. Whatever else she was, she was wholly alive and very female,
this Annie.
    She didn’t seem to notice
that he shifted uncomfortably in his chair.
    “Cotton factories aren’t
healthy. The air's full of lint, it’s hot all the time; a shift’s
twelve hours with only a few minutes for lunch, and you’ve got to
pay close attention every second. Many girls are injured or killed
at the machines. Wintertime, you never see daylight at all.” She
tapped a forefinger against her chest. “Me, I’m tough.”
    The assertion made Noah
want to smile. She sat there, in her washed-out blue dress, her
body so thin it seemed a good wind would blow her away.
    “I got used to it. But
Bets—” her eyes welled with sudden tears and she brushed them away
with her palm. “She’s my baby sister, Mr. Ferguson. I promised Mama
I’d take care of her." There was a desperate plea in her voice, and
Noah couldn’t help the flood of sympathy her words
aroused.
    "When I saw your
advertisement, it felt like a last chance to save her. I—I was
scared. She was coughing all the time. She’s all I have for family.
So I”— the rest of the sentence burst out in a flurry of
words—“well,