Page 6 of A Secret Heart
Rancher, tall with good manners, nice-looking, desires acquaintance with upstanding young woman, must cook well; object matrimony. Box 256, Calvin, Wyoming.
A matrimonial ad for Isaac? Whatever pounding rhythm her heart had beat before, it slowed until the room spun.
Isaac wanted a wife.
“Rebekah?” Mr. Sullivan grasped the paper with one hand as he raked the other through his whitening hair. “Another rancher looking for a wife. We’ll put it in the next edition.”
“I can’t.”I was supposed to be his wife.
Mr. Sullivan made no indication he’d heard her over the clatter of the press. He surveyed her with a questioning crinkle to his brow, as if calculating why she stood so still. “Take it home with the other ads. Work it up. Make sure you run it in the next edition.”
There was no way Mr. Sullivan had any idea of her feelings for Isaac. Since the humiliation she’d endured in the schoolroom, she’d kept her true feelings close, never sharing them with anyone. Most of her acquaintances had forgotten that long-ago debacle. Except for the boy—now man—who’d engineered it. Ed.
Her eyes roamed the room, at first to distract herself. The stacks of papers waiting to be tied with twine, the dusty desks, the ink on her own fingers—all reminders of what Mr. Sullivan had done for her. He trusted her with the ads. And she wanted more, so much more.
Rebekah breathed deep, this time letting the odor of printing ink settle her nerves. She had no choice but to print the ad. Isaac McGraw was a paying customer.
Her fingers worked to untie the leather apron that protected her light-colored blouse.
You could answer Isaac’s ad.
The thought stopped her in her tracks as she climbed the stairs to gather her bag from the storage room above the newspaper office. Her well-worn satchel sat atop the cot that ran the length of the old newspaper stacks. Beyond them were boxes of filed papers, miscellaneous parts, and a lone window overlooking the street. She moved to the window. She’d wrestled with problems up here before, in the evenings when she stayed in town by herself. Mr. Sullivan’s house was two blocks over on the residential street, and he let her lock the doors for propriety’s sake.
Isaac McGraw couldn’t marry anyone else.
Through the glass, she spied Ed returning with his wagon loaded. She must have lingered longer than she’d planned. Her fingers were still without feeling as she lifted her satchel. Or had her brain simply refused to acknowledge the motions of her own body while her heart went numb?
Rebekah descended the stairs. From the desk in the corner, she gathered up the stack of ads waiting to be sorted and placed for next week’s edition. One particular ad glared at her from the top as she slid it into her leather workbag. What if it were to get lost in the busy news office? That was another option. Or a gust of wind might easily blow the ad away.
She finished gathering her work. With a wave to Mr. Sullivan, she spun to push the door with her back, lugging her satchel in one hand and the leather bag of ads in the other. As the door swung open, it met a thump of resistance. She turned to find Ed rubbing his nose. An apology stuck in her throat as he glared past his fingers at her.
“Ready?” The word came out clipped. He held out a hand for her things, but she brushed past him to put her bags in the wagon herself.
A swirl of emotions fought inside her. The last thing she needed was Ed’s commentary on her feelings for Isaac. Or more of his snickering, which still echoed in the back of her mind, along with all the other students’ laughter from that unfortunate incident years ago. She hoisted herself onto the seat, perfectly content if he didn’t speak to her for the entire ride home.
Ed settled beside her, pointing to her workbag as he snapped the reins. “Taking work home?”
“I usually do.” She refused to look at him.
“Don’t forget to putallthe ads in the paper.”
Insufferable.As if her professionalism would allow her to do otherwise. What did he take her for? Whatever his angle was, he’d not get the satisfaction of another word out of her.
She gripped the far edge of the seat, angling her body away from his as much as possible. As she did, he eased the wagon onto the small town’s main street. They passed buildings lining both sides of the street until Ed turned the wagon onto a side street. A row of small houses ran the length of the road.
Ed pulled up on the reins in front of a white clapboard house. “Wait here.”
“Why are we stopping?”
“I’ll only be a minute.” He jumped from the wagon without offering any real answer, then walked around to the back.
“Some of us want to get home before nightfall,” she called out after him.
He ignored her.
She shouldn’t care, but her innate curiosity got the better of her, and she stretched her neck to discover what mystery had halted their trip home.
From under the tarp, he pulled out a cradle. A beautiful, handcrafted cradle. His arms wrapped around the wood in a careful gesture, then he began the walk to the door. Rebekah followed his movements with renewed interest. She had a hundred questions, starting with, What was Ed McGraw doing with a cradle?
