In a Stranger's Arms Read Online Free PDF Page B

her best to disregard the beguiling falsehood her nose was telling her. She removed the ammunition from Manning Forbes’s rifle and took the empty weapon down to the kitchen, where she set it on top of a tall cupboard. “I wonder if those worthless old hens have managed to lay an egg or two for the children’s breakfast?” she mumbled to herself, shuffling out the kitchen door.
    On the back step, the toe of her shoe collided with a spouted pot of battered tinware. If it had been empty, she might have kicked it over. But it wasn’t empty. The heavenly fragrance of real coffee could no longer be denied.
    Suddenly wary, Caddie glanced around at the outbuildings for Manning Forbes. She saw no sign of him. The notion that he’d been camped all night down by the creek, within earshot of the house, flooded her with a ridiculous sense of security.
    She tried to resist the pot of coffee. Accepting it felt traitorously symbolic of a more significant consent. And wasn’t it just like a Yankee to think she could be bribed into dishonor with small luxuries?
    Caddie’s noble self-denial lasted less than a minute. By the time the children began to stir, she had two cups of black coffee inside her, warming her belly and firing her ambition. She’d managed to collect four eggs and an armload of firewood to cook breakfast. As she hummed a chorus of “Dixie,” the restoration of Sabbath Hollow no longer seemed quite so daunting.
    ‘‘Where’s the fish man?” demanded Varina awhile later, her chin yellow with soft-boiled egg yolk and crumbs of cornmeal. “Will he bring us more for dinner?”
    “I don’t imagine so, precious.” Caddie wiped the child’s face with a damp rag while Varina grimaced and squirmed.
    “The creek is full of fish, free for the taking, though. Maybe Tem can rig up a line and catch us some.” Templeton pushed a long hank of hair off his brow, but kept his gaze fixed on his plate. “I don’t know how to catch fish. Besides, there might be wild animals down by the creek.”
    ‘‘If there are, they’d be far smaller than you, dear.” Caddie struggled to keep a sober face. There was nothing amusing about her son’s timidity. Any eight-year-old who’d lived through as many frightening experiences as Templeton had a right to be cautious. “Quite a few of them are good eating, too. Roast quail—mmm.”
    “Do you think Mr. Forbes would teach me how to fish and shoot a gun, Mama?” Tem looked up just then, with a pointed gaze that made Caddie flinch.
    “I don’t believe Mr. Forbes will be staying around these parts much longer, Son.” Though she tried to pass the remark off in a casual tone, the thought provoked strong conflicting feelings within her.
    “That’s too bad. He’s nice—for a Yankee.”
    “I don’t b’lieve he is a Yankee,” declared Varina, as if that settled the matter.
    “’Course he’s a Yankee, puddin’ head.” Tem made a face at his sister. “Just not like the Yankee soldiers from Richmond, smoking and cussing and ordering folks around. There must be some good Yankees, mustn’t there, Mama?”
    A spiteful retort died on Caddie’s tongue. No matter what her own feelings, she would not raise her children to hate. Not because the Yankees didn’t deserve it, but because a mother’s intuition warned her it would damage Tem and Varina to harbor such corrosive emotions in their young hearts.
    “You must recollect what I’ve always told you, Templeton. There’s good and bad in all of us, like vegetables and weeds in a garden. We need to tend to our virtues and root out our vices as best we can. Some folks let the weeds in their nature get away from them, until all the good is choked out.”
    Catching her children in an exchange of meaningful glances, Caddie chuckled. The rusty sound surprised her. She could scarcely remember the last time she’d laughed.
    “You didn’t think I could let our first morning back at Sabbath Hollow get by without a moral, did you?