Introduction

It is 1844 and Lacey Bishop's life is a tangled mess. Estranged from her own family, at age 16 she went to work for a preacher and his wife. When his wife died, the preacher convinced Lacey that the only decent thing to do was to marry him. That way she could continue to act as mother to the little girl who was left on his doorstop. But Lacey never expected he would decide to take them all off to a Shaker village. There she's still married but living in a community that believes marriage is a sin. And to make matters worse, she finds herself drawn to Isaac Kingston, a man who came to the Shakers after his young bride died. But of course any notion of love between them is only a forbidden dream. How will Lacey ever find true happiness?

Readers will find themselves engrossed in this heartrending tale of commitment and forgiveness, the latest from popular author Ann H. Gabhart.

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Excerpt

Autumn 1843

Isaac Kingston didn’t think his Ella would really die. Not

actually stop breathing and die. She’d told him she would,

but he didn’t believe her. At least not soon enough.

A person didn’t die because her mother wasn’t there to

stroke her head. If that could happen, he would have died

when he was thirteen, but here he was still breathing while he

watched them lower his beautiful Ella down into the ground.

Every breath seemed a betrayal of his love.

He’d brought her home. He had to. The Fort Smith doctor

who bled Ella advised Isaac to wait for her fever to abate before

making the trip back to Louisville, but the doctor didn’t

understand. He wasn’t the one being haunted by the memory

of Ella looking him right in the eye the day before the fever

hit and telling him she’d die if he didn’t take her home. It was

Isaac who had to live with that memory seared into his soul.

She’d been telling him the same thing every day since they’d

left Louisville weeks before, until the words had meant no

more than someone mentioning the sun shining or the rain

falling outside. Not that he didn’t feel bad that she was unhappy.

He did. He loved her. So some of the time he tried to

kiss away her sadness. Other times he would grab her in his

arms and dance her around their tiny boardinghouse room

until she laughed. But there was no laughing once the fever

struck, and he began to feel her words might be prophetic.

So he’d given up his westward dream, sold his horse and gun

to hire a wagon to take her overland to the Mississippi River

and then for the ticket up the river to Louisville. He’d carried

her up the steamboat’s gangplank before daylight so nobody

would know how sick she was and try to stop him from bringing

the fever on board. He had been so sure being on the way

home would pull her back from the fever. Bring the light back

to her eyes. But when he whispered their progress up the river

toward Louisville into her ear, her fever-glazed eyes stared at him

with no recognition, and it was her mother she called out for.

He told her over and over that he was taking her to her

mother. Patiently at first and then angrily. She had to understand

how he was giving up everything to do what she

wanted, but the words too late whispered through his mind

and turned his anger into sorrow. She died before they reached

the Ohio River.

Now the preacher Ella’s father had gotten to say words

over her grave was talking about Ella going home to a better

place. The home awaiting all who reached for the Lord with

faith and sincerity.

A chill wind blew across the open hole that was swallowing

Ella and ruffled the pages of the worn Bible the old man

held. His hands trembled as he smoothed down the tissue-thin

page and continued to speak the Bible words without looking

down to read them. No doubt he had spoken the same verses

over hundreds of newly departed souls.

“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of

death, I will fear no evil.” The preacher’s voice quavered and

sounded properly mournful.

Why couldn’t it have been the old preacher who had walked

through death’s shadow instead of Ella? Isaac’s eyes shifted

from the preacher to Ella’s ancient grandmother. The old

woman had to be pushed in a chair everywhere she went

and now sat huddled in a black shawl with tears gathering

in the deep wrinkles on her cheeks as she stared at the grave

of her youngest grandchild. Why couldn’t it have been her?

Isaac looked down at the coffin. Why couldn’t it have been

him? It should have been him. This was the second time in his

life he’d stood in a graveyard with those thoughts. But everybody

told him that was wrong when they buried his father.

Nobody told him he was wrong this time. Ella’s parents

would have gladly pushed him into the grave and covered

him over if that would have brought their Ella back to them.

Judge Carver had his arm around his wife, holding her up.

Isaac was able to bear the judge’s accusing eyes on him, but

the despairing look in the eyes of Ella’s mother smote him.

Ella looked like her mother. Delicate with beautiful pale skin

and often the hint of a tremble in her fingers. Ella had needed

a man like her father to hold her up and shelter her.

Instead Isaac had ripped her away from her family and

headed west where he planned for them to start a new life. The

kind of life he wanted. One full of adventure and challenge.

Ella had no desire for adventure. She wept when he said they

were going west. He held her gently while she cried, but he

didn’t change his mind. Instead he assured her he was strong

enough for both of them. He talked of the land they’d work,

the children they would have, and because she loved him, she

had gone with him. He’d never considered the possibility that

she might refuse to go. She was his wife.

The judge offered to buy them a house if he would stay in

Louisville. When Isaac told him he didn’t need a house, only

opportunity, the judge ordered him to leave Ella behind. To

go west and establish his claim, if that was what he had to

do. When he was settled, he could come back for Ella. Isaac

should have listened. Then he wouldn’t be standing beside

Ella’s grave, mashing down the desire to knock the Bible out

of the old preacher’s hands if he spoke one more word about

the Lord calling Ella home.

The Lord hadn’t called anybody home. Not that Isaac was

on good enough terms with the Lord to ever hear the first

thing he might call out. He’d sat in some churches. First with

his mother. Then with the old farmer who gave Isaac bed and

board in exchange for his labor after his father’s death tore

their family asunder.

The McElroys believed in church, but they lived a far piece

from any church house, so they didn’t make the trip more than

four or five Sundays a year. Even so, the old couple hadn’t

neglected spiritual matters. Mrs. McElroy made him read

the Bible out loud to her by candlelight nearly every night

after the supper meal. She claimed the Scripture could be a

powerful comfort and help if a person let the Lord’s message

speak to his heart, but Isaac had let the words slide off his

tongue without paying them much mind. Bible words were

for the old and the fearful.

And the dead.

The preacher’s mournful words kept spilling out of his

mouth. He read through the funeral psalm, but he didn’t

close up his Bible the way Isaac hoped he would. Instead he

thumbed through it searching for more Scripture. The rustle

of the pages was loud in the silence. Once he found the proper

spot, his preacher voice grew stronger and lost its quaver.

“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in

trouble.”

The preacher looked up at the sky and then across the grave

at them and spoke the Bible words again as if he feared they

hadn’t heard him the first time. Then the quiver was back in

his voice as he went on. “Sorrow comes to us all. May you

lean on the good Lord’s strength and call upon his help to

carry you through.”

Isaac let his hands curl into fists against his side, crushing

the stem of the yellow flower someone had handed him.

What good did it do to call for help now? Ella had needed

help a week ago. When the fever was burning through her.

He stared across the grave at the preacher who met his eyes

without turning away. He was the first person to do so since

Isaac had brought Ella home dead. Everybody else couldn’t

seem to bear letting their eyes light on him. Isaac understood.

He couldn’t bear the sight of his own face in a mirror when

he was combing his hair.

But the old preacher’s eyes settled right on him as he kept

going in his preacher voice. “The Lord giveth and the Lord

taketh away. As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of

the field, so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it, and it

is gone. But the mercy of the Lord is everlasting to everlasting

upon them that fear him. Amen and amen.”

Amen. That was a Bible word Isaac was glad to hear fall

out of the preacher’s mouth. Isaac stared at the grave that

held Ella. They were all waiting for him to drop the flower

he held down on her. He kept his eyes on the ground. He

couldn’t do it. His feet wouldn’t move forward. His hand

wouldn’t turn loose of the flower.

The silence pounded against his ears and he almost wished

the old preacher would start up with some more Scripture.

Anything to push the silence back. The seconds stretched

into minutes. A bird began to sing in a tree not far away, and

while only seconds before, Isaac wanted some noise to break

the silence, now he wished for a rock to silence the bird. With

a keening wail that sliced through Isaac, Ella’s mother gave

way to her grief. The undertaker, a man so slim and gray in

his black suit that he seemed part of the shadows, produced

a chair from those shadows to push under her before she

could fall. A woman Isaac didn’t know and the preacher

knelt beside her to offer comfort.

The judge stepped up beside Isaac and whispered fiercely

in his ear. “For the love of God, Kingston, do what has to be

done so we can leave this place.”

But what Ella’s father didn’t understand was that Isaac

didn’t think he could leave this place. Not and surrender

Ella to the earth. An even more piercing wail rose from Ella’s

mother behind them.

When Isaac didn’t move, the judge gave him a little shove

toward the grave. “You killed her. Now be man enough to

bury her.”

Do what had to be done. That was what his mother told

him after the boilers of the steamboat Lucy Gray had blown

up and stolen his father from them. They did what had to be

done. He had to go to live with the McElroys. Marian had to

go live with the Shakers. And she, his mother, had to marry

the dour old banker, Mr. Ludlow. Nobody was promised happiness.

But if everybody kept going—kept moving forward

and doing what had to be done—then maybe around some

corner happiness might be waiting. At least for some of them.

He had thought to round that corner with Ella. Out west

where opportunity awaited those brave enough to chase it.

That’s where happiness could be found. And now it was all

dust. Dust to dust.

Isaac stepped forward at last and dropped the aster he held

into the grave. Ella’s father followed after him and then the

others. It was done. What had to be done was done.

None of his family had shown up for the funeral. Too

many miles separated them. And too many years. He hadn’t

seen his mother since he was eighteen and left the McElroys.

That visit hadn’t gone well with Old Man Ludlow hovering

in the shadows behind Isaac’s mother, anxious to see him

away from his door. What choice did she have but to send

him off to make his way as best he could? She and the sour

banker had no children, but there were Isaac’s young brother

and sister to consider.

She had kissed Isaac and then held his face in her hands

for a long moment before she said, “You’re like him. Like

your father. Live like him.”

Isaac knew what she meant. His father had carried enthusiasm

for life in his pocket and shared it with everyone he

met. Everything was an adventure to him, and an opportunity.

The steamboat explosion had ended that and plunged them

all into new lives. And now another death had plunged Isaac

into despair.

Isaac hadn’t gone back to see his mother since that day.

The only one he kept in contact with was Marian at the

Shaker town. He’d gone to see her there a couple of times.

She claimed to be content. Claimed to want to be shed of the

world. So perhaps she had turned the corner to happiness,

even though she hadn’t used that word. Peace and perfection

seemed to fit better on the Shakers’ tongues and on Marian’s.

And there in that village with those solemn people, it could be

she would never have that happiness or peace ripped from her.

He’d sent Marian word of Ella’s death but not with any

expectation she would make the journey to Louisville. While

she didn’t deny he was her natural brother in the worldly way,

she claimed no part of that world now. Her life was there in

the village at Harmony Hill with her Shaker brothers and

sisters. So there was no one to put an arm around Isaac, to

offer a word of sympathy.

In every face as they moved away from the grave toward

the carriages waiting to carry them back to Ella’s house,

Isaac saw the reflection of the judge’s condemnation. You

killed her. It was almost a relief when the judge stepped in

front of him as they were leaving the cemetery to block his

way to the carriage that had carried Isaac from the house to

the burial ground.

While Ella’s father was several inches shorter than Isaac

and stooped a bit by age, what he lacked in size, he more

than made up in authority. He was a judge. When he spoke,

people did as he said.

He tipped back his head and glared at Isaac from under

the black rim of his hat. “You took our child from her home

and stole her from us.”

“She went with me of her own free will.” Isaac was surprised

to hear his voice speaking up in his own defense.

“She went with you in tears.” The judge’s voice grew even

harsher. “You are not to darken our door ever again.”

“I didn’t kill her. The fever did.” His words sounded lame

even to his own ears.

“A fever you took her to find. She would still be alive if you

had stayed in Louisville. If you had let me build her a house

where you could have lived.” The judge’s voice cracked and

his eyes flooded with sorrow. “She would have never wanted

for anything. And now all I can build her is a monument

over her grave.”

“Your sorrow is no deeper than mine. She was my wife.”

The hard knot of pain inside Isaac’s chest made it hard for

him to breathe.

“A wife can be replaced. A daughter cannot.” With his

mouth tightened into a grim line and his hat pulled down low

on his forehead to hide eyes awash with tears, the judge turned

and stalked away from Isaac toward his waiting carriage.

Silently Isaac watched him go. He had nothing left to say.

He was empty of words. Empty of feelings. He’d dropped

it all in the grave with Ella along with the flower. His spirit

was crushed by her death. As crushed as the autumn leaves

underfoot on the pathway. The man who had wanted adventure

and love, the man Ella had fallen in love with, that

man was gone.

The carriages left the graveyard in a slow, somber black

line. Even after they had disappeared from sight, Isaac imagined

he could hear Ella’s mother’s anguished keening.

He didn’t turn back to look at the grave. He could hear

the gravediggers putting the dirt in on top of Ella, but he

couldn’t bear to look at them. Instead, he began walking

back toward town. The old preacher offered him a ride with

a goodly amount of kindness in his voice, but Isaac claimed

he’d rather walk. He told him he needed to be alone. He

couldn’t have borne the old man praying over him all the

way back to the city.

He didn’t deserve prayer. He didn’t deserve to still be

breathing in and out. But he was. His beautiful, fragile Ella

was not. Because of him. view abbreviated excerpt only...

Discussion Questions

1. Lacey was ready to do whatever she had to in order to continue mothering Rachel even to marrying a man she could never love. Do you think she made the right decision? Do you think you might have done the same if you’d been in her shoes?
2. Lacey depended on Miss Mona to teach her what she believed about the Lord. She trusted Miss Mona to know the truth. Why was that not enough? Why did Lacey need to learn to trust with her own heart and not just because it was what Miss Mona would have wanted her to believe?
3. Isaac blamed himself for his wife’s death. Do you think he had reason to feel that way? Was he wrong to want to go west even though Ella didn’t want to leave her family?
4. Isaac was so depressed after his wife’s death that he wished he could die. Do you think that if Brother Asa hadn’t come along, Isaac might have ended up in the river? Do you believe that the Lord sometimes places someone in our path to keep us from doing the wrong thing or making the wrong decision? Have you had something like that happen in your life or known someone who has?
5. Lacey had a rocky relationship with the Ebenezer Church women. She couldn’t seem to do anything that pleased them or at least that’s what she thought. Do you think she was too hard on them or that they were too hard on her? How was that changed by the end of the book?
6. Reuben was a likable character from the first minute he showed up in the church graveyard. Since it was unlikely that he would ever marry and have his own family, do you think it was a good thing that he counted the church his family? Do you think the church can be a special blessing to people like Reuben when they are allowed to work for the church and thus for the Lord?
7. Lacey has a hard time believing that an angel is really speaking through Aurelia. She certainly never expects to see any angels and she can’t keep from doubting Aurelia’s claims to see the angels. Do you think that showed a lack of faith on Lacey’s part? Do you believe Aurelia could have really been an instrument of the angels?
8. When the eldress allows Lacey to go see Rachel, the visit doesn’t turn out the way Lacey expected it to. Why do you think Rachel was so cold toward Lacey? Did you guess who was poisoning Rachel’s mind against Lacey?
9. Why do you think Miss Mona kept Aurelia’s secret? Was it to protect Aurelia, Rachel or the preacher? Or perhaps herself? Do you think she did the right thing?
10. After he went to the Shakers, Preacher Palmer became obsessed with achieving balance. Do you think he really believed that he could find that place of peace in between earth and heaven where he would not be tormented by his failures and his sins would not be counted against him? Was he trying to earn that peace instead of accepting the free gift of grace and forgiveness?
11. Isaac started to ride on past Sadie Rose’s house when he saw the new preacher on his knees in front of Lacey. Why do you think he turned his horse and rode up to the porch instead? Do you think Lacey would have eventually married the preacher if Isaac hadn’t come looking for her?
12. Lacey’s mother taught her to welcome spring by doing a dandelion dance. Why do you think it was so important to Lacey to continue that tradition as the years went by? Can you see her as a gray-haired grandmother still dancing to welcome spring each year? Have you ever wanted to dance to welcome spring or celebrate some other time in your life?

Weblinks

»	Publisher's Book Info
»	Ann Gabhart's web site

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