Sarah: Bride of Minnesota (American Mail-Order Bride 32) Read Online Free PDF Page B

room's obvious disuse. There was a thick layer of dust on everything, including the stove.
    She got rid of the dust, did the few dishes that were there, and was just about to tackle the floors when a knock came at the front door.
    She hurried through the house, opening the door wide. A young man was standing there with two big boxes of goods. "Where do you want them, ma'am?"
    "Oh, would you put them in the kitchen please?"
    The boy hurried through the house with the first of the boxes, dropping it on the kitchen table. "Did you just move in?"
    With the state of the house, she had no question why the boy had asked. "Yes, I moved in just this morning," she told him honestly, omitting the fact that her husband had lived there for years.
    "I'll get the other box." He rushed from the room, returning a minute later.
    "Thank you," Sarah said with a smile. "I appreciate you bringing them into the house this way."
    "Oh, it's no problem, ma'am. Have a good day!" He hurried out the door, and she heard the front door shut behind him.
    Sarah frowned at the food in the boxes. She hadn't had time to clean off the shelves for food yet, but she would do that now. And she needed to see if the icebox was empty. If so, she could put things into it immediately.
    The icebox looked as if it had never been used, so she set the things that needed to be cold into it. She was excited to have such a modern convenience. It would make cooking for her new husband so much easier. Her mind wandered as she put things away and cleaned off the shelves. She couldn't help but wonder if Roberta was finding her new home so welcoming.
    She hummed under her breath as she worked, enjoying the hard physical labor, because she was used to it. She'd always felt that a woman who forgot what hard labor was, meant she was forgetting what it was to be one of God's children.
    Once the kitchen was clean, she put some beans on to soak for dinner, and she cut off a few slices of bacon to flavor them with. Then she returned to her task of scrubbing the kitchen floor.
    An hour later, the beans were boiling and the floor was spotless, so she moved on to the next room, which was his bedroom. There was a mess there, with clothes strewn all over the floor and a bed that looked as if the sheets hadn't been changed for many months. She couldn't help but wonder why he hadn't had his kindly neighbor wash his sheets while she was doing everything else.
    She opened the door that obviously led to the basement, going down the steps carefully, because it was dark. When she reached the bottom, she lifted the lamp she'd brought with her, to look around and see what was there.
    The basement was lined with shelves, obviously meant to store jars of canned goods, but there was not one jar down there. This would be an ideal place for her to hang their laundry during the cold winter months.
    She hurriedly went back up the stairs to fetch a broom and her pail and scrub brush, cleaning off the shelves down there. Yes, the more she cleaned, the more she could see that this would be a perfect place for her to both wash and hang the laundry when it was too cold to hang it outside. No one wanted their laundry to freeze still instead of drying. She would have to start on that tomorrow.
    Going back up the stairs, she opened a chest at the foot of his bed, and she found some clean sheets and a quilt, so she stripped the bed and made it nicely. She went to the top of the basement stairs and gave the dirty linens a good heave, throwing them down the steps. Next, she gathered up his dirty clothes and did the same thing, pitching them down the stairs to be dealt with the next day.
    She used a broom and mop in his room until it was clean enough that she could sleep in it without being bothered by it, and then she opened the window and left the door open, hoping it would air out nicely. There was a faint musty scent in the room, probably from all of his dirty clothes.
    She returned to the kitchen and mixed up a batch