Catherine gave him a gentle swat on the arm, and Jonathan pretended to be appalled. It was so easy to be in her company that it was difficult to remember a time when she wasn’t here by his side.
It seemed a fair number of people had the same idea they did as the mercantile was busier than normal on a Sunday after church services. Jonathan handed Catherine bills with which to use for her purchases, and then left her chatting with Mrs. Lowry as she perused ladies’ toilette items.
Jonathan found what he was looking for at the counter in the rear. A shiny gold locket, oval in shape with a tiny filigree engraving of a vine, hanging from slim golden chain from a peg behind the counter.
“May I look at that locket?” Jonathan asked Mr. Griffin. The man handed him the piece of jewelry, and Jonathan held the delicate item in his palm, he knew it was perfect for Catherine. The tiny locket clasp opened to reveal room for a little photo or a lock of hair. He could imagine it nestled at the hollow of Catherine’s neck
The price was about what he’d anticipated, and so, his purchase wrapped carefully in his hand, he waited outside the door for Catherine to complete her shopping. He’d come back another time to purchase other gifts, perhaps when the mercantile was less crowded.
As he watched the townsfolk walk to and fro, he wondered at the idea of having a larger sort of Christmas celebration at the boarding house. If they were already planning to have their guests, it might be fun to invite a few friends from town for Christmas dinner. Not a great number, as he didn’t want to add to Mrs. Bell and Catherine’s work, but some close friends. The pastor and his wife, of course, maybe the Lowrys and the Denzingers since Catherine had grown close to both of those ladies. He’d speak with Catherine and Mrs. Bell about the idea later.
“Papa, look at the train!” A young boy, maybe seven or eight, stood in awe at the mercantile window where Griffin and his wife had set out a few fine toys they’d recently received. Inside the store, a man held a tall soldier doll, but the boy’s gaze was fixed on a shiny black train engine. It was not too small or too large—the perfect size for a boy of that age. Jonathan smiled as he watched, thinking that it was just the thing that would have caught his eye at that age.
“I told you not to dawdle.” A slim, tall man who Jonathan presumed was the boy’s father, turned and marched back to him.
Jonathan’s smile fell when the man raised a hand and the boy flinched. Icy fear stung his veins as the two left, the boy running to keep up with the man. How many times had he been in that boy’s position? How many times had he been thankful they were in public, because at home, there would have been no hesitation.
All of the hope and joy he carried—about Catherine, the baby, his business—all of it vanished in an instant as his mind seemed to spin backward in time. It was as if everything he’d built, the man he’d carefully made himself into, all disappeared in the face of that one scared little boy.
That boy would grow up, and perhaps he’d become a father to a son or daughter. Like Jonathan’s brothers, and now like Jonathan himself. Would he be the same type of father, or something different? Jonathan had seen these things repeat themselves. Even as he grew into manhood and had just begun contemplating leaving home, he remembered his eldest brother, Edward, coming to visit with his two young children. His sharp tongue and threats each time the children stepped out of line had sent eighteen-year-old Jonathan’s spine rigid and his teeth on edge.
He’d vowed never to be like his father, and his brothers had done the same, so why had Edward failed?
Jonathan shoved that taunting fear away as he watched two men enter the mercantile. He should have intervened on that boy’s behalf. He wouldn’t fail his own child.
Hecouldn’t.
Chapter Fifteen
THE HAPPY SPRUCE TREEseemed to make the parlor an even warmer warm that it already was. It was Catherine’s favorite place in the boarding house. She thought she could sit for hours while the snowed swirled and whirled outside and a fire burned brightly inside, just looking at that pretty tree, all decorated in ribbon and pretty round bits of glass and strings of popcorn and dried cranberries.
She sighed now as she gazed upon it, waiting for Jonathan to emerge ready for the excursion he’d promised. Mr. Denzinger had ordered a sleigh from back East to rent out to the townsfolk to enjoy over the winter, and Jonathan had surprised her earlier by drawing up in it outside the boarding house door.
“Are you ready?” Jonathan emerged from the hallway, wrapped up in his black wool coat, a hat, and warm knit scarf. When she nodded, he held open the door and Catherine stepped out into the gently falling snow.
As he helped her into the sleigh, she thought she’d never tire of seeing the fluffy white flakes. It was mesmerizing, the way they drifted down from Heaven to land in a soft blanket upon the ground. She didn’t even mind the biting cold that came with the snow’s presence.
