The Blacksmith’s Bravery Read Online Free PDF Page B

said.
    â€œMorning, Griff. There’s a letter for you over to the post office. Stop by my house tomorrow, why don’t you?”
    Griffin reared back and stared at him. “All right.” Probably from his sister. It had been two or three weeks since he’d received the disturbing telegram. That must be it. She’d most likely written himthe details of Jacob’s demise.
    He looked over the nearly filled sanctuary before sliding toward his usual pew—second from the back, on the left. In the row ahead of him, the sheriff sat on the aisle, beside his wife. Those two made quite a pair, Griff had to admit. He’d never expected Ethan to get married, but it seemed fitting that the best shot in town had won his heart. Trudy Chapman’s brother, Hiram, the gunsmith, sat in the middle of the row, beside Libby Adams, the emporium’s owner. No doubt they’d tie the knot soon. Romance seemed to have discovered Fergus. Griff shook his head. More and more so-called confirmed bachelors fell to the call of Cupid.
    The two girls who worked at the Nugget Saloon slipped in and found seats in the back row. They wore their low-cut satins to church but covered up with their shawls. Seemed nearly everyone in town came to church these days. Griffin supposed that was a good thing.
    The folks from the Spur & Saddle had claimed a pew just ahead of the sheriff and his party. That was a case where the last folks you ever expected to see in church had turned to Christ and flipped their lives head over heels. Vashti Edwards and Goldie Keller sat with Bitsy and Augie, and you’d have never thought to look at them that they’d ever been anything but respectable. Bitsy and the girls still had a heavy hand with the rouge and lip color, and they were too frugal to throw out their fancy dresses, but they’d altered them a bit. No one would think they’d been saloon girls for years.
    That set Griffin’s mind off on a rabbit trail. A passenger who occasionally rode the line on business had come in from Boise Friday. He’d complimented Griffin on the polite and beautiful young woman who now ran his ticket office. Griffin hadn’t let on about Vashti’s past. If anyone didn’t know, they’d assume she’d always been decent. She didn’t have a hoity-toity Eastern accent like Rose Caplinger, the milliner, but neither did she speak coarsely like the guttersnipes at the Nugget. And Goldie—why, that blond girl at the Spur & Saddle could play the piano like a professional. Last Christmas, she’d played a concert of carols at the church, and the whole town had lauded her. The reverend’s wife was getting up a new collection to buy a piano for the church so they could have Goldie play the hymns every Sunday.
    The Reverend Phineas Benton rose to open the service, and Griffin focused his attention on the front of the large room. The first hymn, “Amazing Grace,” helped. Griffin tended to let his mind wander when he was sitting still, listing all the things he needed to do when church was over.
    Of course, he never worked at the forge on Sundays. Not since the preacher came. People would hear his hammer and know he worked on the Sabbath. But if he didn’t putter around the livery on Sunday afternoon, some things would never get done. The horses needed to be fed, watered, and groomed. And Wells Fargo and Company had never heard of the no-Sunday-labor rule. The stagecoach schedules must be kept no matter what day of the week.
    Everyone around him sat down, and he realized the singing was over. He sat down on his pew.
    Preacher Benton gazed out over the congregation. “My fellow believers, this morning we’ll look at Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians and contemplate the virtue of benevolence. Gracious giving where it is perhaps not merited. Of course, if someone we love is in need, we do all we can to help them out. But what of the stranger or, even