crackers won’t disappear. Take your time.”
Charley grinned at him and Nate took a bite of his apple as he settled in to watch the traffic on Main Street.
Two doors down was a saloon, and beyond that were signs for several more. Across the street, a large building had a sign, The Mystic Theater, but from the look of the young women leaning over the rail of the balcony, much more than theatrical entertainment was available there. James MacFarland had been right about the saloon girls—they seemed to be everywhere. This must be the Badlands of Deadwood he had heard the bullwhackers mention.
Nate took another bite of his apple and looked closely at the women on the balcony. The youngest seemed to be no more than sixteen, while a couple of them wore the bored look of years of experience in their business. The apple turned sour in his mouth. He swallowed that bite and then offered the rest to Charley.
Mattie, if she was still alive, would be the age of those older women. Did her face bear that same expression? She would be thirty-two years old by now, and it had been almost fourteen years since she had disappeared.
He watched the two women, their mouths red slashes against their pale, white faces. The dresses they wore had been brightly colored at one time, but now looked sadly faded next to the younger girls, like roses that clung to a few blown and sun-bleached petals.
He hoped that Mattie had found her way out of that life.
He sighed and took a cracker. Turned it in his hands. The last time he had searched for his sister and come home again with no news, Andrew had told him to give it up. If she wanted to come home, she’d find her way.
But Andrew didn’t live with the memory of her face the night he told her he was running away to join the army. The hard, crystalline planes that shut him out.
“You’ll kill Ma and Pa,” she had whispered as she tried to wrest his bundle of clothes from him. “And then what will I do?”
He had turned from her, bent on following Andrew, but she had been right. By the time he had come home after the war was over, Ma and Pa were dead, and Mattie was gone.
He looked back up at the balcony of the Mystic. He’d never give up looking, hoping that someday he’d find her before... The cracker snapped between his fingers. He refused to listen to that voice inside that kept telling him it was too late.
When Charley finished his lunch, Nate wrapped up the rest of the crackers and cheese.
“Let’s go see what the town looks like.”
The street was crowded with men all going nowhere in particular and Nate pulled Charley closer to his side. Between the coarse language and the open bottles of liquor, he knew this wasn’t a place Andrew and Jenny would want their son to be. But this was where they were.
The businesses crowded together between the hills rising behind them and the narrow mudhole that passed for a street. Nate slowed his pace as the storefronts turned from the saloons to a printing office. Next came a general store and a clothing store, with a tobacconist wedged in between. Across the street was Star and Bullock, a large hardware store that filled almost an entire block.
And in the middle of it all, just where the street took a steep slope up to a higher level on the hill, men worked a mining claim. Nate shook his head. In all his travels through the West, he had never seen anything quite like Deadwood.
“Look, Uncle Nate. There’s Miss Sarah!”
Charley ran ahead to where the MacFarlands stood at the end of the block. Nate halted, watching Sarah’s face as she greeted the boy. She looked truly happy to see him. From what he had seen, busybodies from schools and orphanages never seemed to like the children they claimed to care so much about.
She didn’t fit the mold. She didn’t fit any mold.
Charley pointed his way and she looked for him. Another smile. The crowded streets seemed to fall silent, and Nate saw several of the men on the boardwalk look in her direction. He hurried to catch up with Charley.
“Miss MacFarland.” He found himself smiling, and he turned to the elder MacFarlands. “Mrs. MacFarland. James.” Lucy reached for him and he lifted her into his arms.
Sarah’s wide skirts swung as she turned toward him. “Was your errand a success?”
“The broken axle is being repaired as we speak.”
“We were just on our way to see the new storefront Uncle James rented. Would you and Charley like to come along?”
“Say yes, Uncle Nate. Please?” Charley clung to his free hand, while Olivia hopped up and down. He couldn’t say no to them.
“We’ll be pleased to accompany you.”
They all followed James as he turned down a side street and led the way toward a boarded-up saloon. Nate let Sarah go ahead of him, Charley and Olivia each holding on to one of her hands, while he followed with Lucy. Anyone watching would think they were a family.
Nate let that idea sift through until it soured his stomach. A family? He hugged Lucy close as he carried her. These children were all the family he needed, and he didn’t deserve even this.
* * *
When they reached the building on Lee Street, a few doors from the corner at Main, Sarah took Lucy’s and Olivia’s hands while Nate and Uncle James pulled the slats from the boarded-up door. Once there was an opening, Uncle James led them in.
“This is a church?” Olivia let go of Sarah’s hand and stepped farther into the room. “It looks like a saloon.”
Uncle James cleared his throat as Margaret followed Olivia to the bar that extended from one end of the room to the other. “The latest tenants ran a drinking establishment, and it needs work.”
Aunt Margaret stared at him. “You said you had found a storefront.”
Lucy tightened her grasp on Sarah’s other hand at the ice in Margaret’s voice. Sarah gave her small hand a reassuring squeeze. “It does need a lot of work, but I can see the possibilities.” She led Lucy to the center of the room to get a feeling for the size of the space. “If that bar is removed...”
“And that hideous mirror behind it.” Aunt Margaret waved her hand in the direction of the gold-flecked monstrosity on the wall. A narrow hole in the center radiated spiderweb cracks in all directions.
“There will be room enough for whoever comes to worship.” Sarah glanced around the room again. A piano listed to the side in one corner. Perhaps there would be someone in town who knew how to repair it.
She glanced back at Nate, standing in the doorway. He was removing nails from the wood slats, one by one. He didn’t seem to want to come any farther into the dusty building.
Margaret sniffed as she ran one finger along the top of the bar and inspected her glove.
“You need to see this place as I do, dear.” Uncle James crossed the room to his wife and pulled both of her hands into his own. “With some effort, we can redeem this place for the Lord’s work.” He turned to look around the room. Sarah had to smile at the grin on his face. Uncle James was a hopeless optimist.
No,
