A Baby for Her Widowed Heart (Preview)

Prologue

Dailey Ville, Texas

May, 1880

Gone! My baby is gone!

White muslin curtains billowed in a slight wind from the open window. The cradle, tucked near the big walnut bed, rocked slightly-like it had been disturbed recently. It was as if someone had come inside, snatched the sleeping infant from the soft nest of quilts, and spirited her away. A scrap of paper lay where the baby had slept just moments before. The soft glow of the oil lamp shone down on wording that blurred beneath the woman’s tear-filled eyes. A pain seized her heart at a loss so enormous, she couldn’t even believe this wasn’t a nightmare. That any second she’d wake up from a sound sleep, reach out a hand and …

Shaking, the woman reached down to the cradle, and her fingers lifted the paper from the warm nest.

The young mother’s hand trembled as she read the note.

If you ever want to see your baby again, you’ll pay me $10, 000 in ransom. This will cover your husband’s gambling debt with interest. Do not tell anyone, or you will never see the child alive again. Once you have the money, come to the twisted pine tree on the road near Forney. We will exchange money for the baby. I’ll have someone waiting for you to arrive. Come quickly.

The woman dropped the note into the empty crib, heart pounding like condemning fists in her chest. It couldn’t be happening, it couldn’t! Yet Ellie’s crib was empty, the small Dove in the Window quilt of bright green and yellow tossed casually aside. A small impression in the sheets showed where she’d laid the precious baby not long before.

What am I to do? Oh, Martin, why did you have to get us in this predicament?

Although she wanted to beat her hands against the wall or throw the oil lamp to the floor and smash it into shards, she kept her anger in check. Martin was dead. Whatever he had done to set this in motion, she couldn’t blame him now. Oh, she wanted to rant and rail and scream – just as she had so many times before when he’d come home a sniveling, cowering mass of remorse or promises. Life with Martin had turned quickly into a living nightmare after the first rosy blooms of the honeymoon, because Martin had a problem. He gambled.

How she’d hoped this time would be different. He’d found a decent job with a railroad, an honest job. For weeks he’d brought home his pay faithfully and given it to her. When she’d told him about the baby coming, he’d promised, with tears in his eyes, to stay honest. Yet, the whole time, he’d been leading a double life. Owing money to men who would snatch an innocent child from her cradle.

Oh, Martin, how could you?

After one hurried cry, the woman realized it was up to her to save Ellie. Frantic, she hurried into the bedroom and packed a small satchel. Somehow, she must convince this monster she had the money and get Ellie back. But she knew the balance of her meager bank account, and it had nothing close to the amount he demanded. Maybe, if she went to Forney, she could find the sheriff or someone to help her. Maybe Will would come and look for her.

Oh, Will!

Tears poured down her cheeks as she thought of her dear brother. She wanted to leave him a note, but what could she say? Admit her beloved husband, Martin, had been a scoundrel? That she’d kept the true state of her marriage from him by writing bright, cheerful letters? What would he think of her then? When she told him her whole life had been a lie?

It was barely dawn when the young mother hurried into the small stable behind her house and saddled the sturdy morgan. She rode out of town toward Forney, more than a day and a half distant. As she pushed the horse as hard as she dared, she prayed, more than she’d ever prayed before. She hoped somehow, she could get Ellie back. Those were the longest hours of her life, even longer than the agonizing hours leading up to the baby’s birth.

Within a few miles of Forney, the sky grew cloudy and threatening. A storm surged across the horizon, masses of angry gray black clouds, forks of lightning darting out like arrows. Old Joe had always been a placid horse, easy to ride, never rambunctious or distracted. That night, something in the loud claps of thunder must have spooked him. After one jarring, earth thundering boom, he whinnied in fear and took off like a racehorse. The young woman’s arms strained trying to hold him back, “Joe, it’s all right, settle down. Joe!”

Those were the last words she managed before the horse reared on hind legs and toppled her to the ground. Her head hit a rock, and she lay still as death. The clouds burst open, and rain drenched her in a steady downpour. After one brief nudge with his nose, Old Joe turned and headed for the scent of oats and a barn.

Chapter One

Dallas, Texas

June, 1880

Splat!

“Blast you, Delilah!” Lydia Grayson jumped back, upsetting both the milking stool and the tin pail. “That’s how I want to start the day, with a cow’s dirty tail smacking me in the face.”

“Moo,” Delilah answered without a touch of remorse. The large cream colored Jersey, went so far as to nudge Lydia affectionately in the face with her dirty nose. Her black, blubbery lips chewed a wad of grain, her limpid brown eyes looking around with resignation.

An annoyed grin crossed Lydia’s sunburnt face as she righted the milking stool. Lifting her green calico skirt above her knees, she plunked down, reached for the tin pail, and began the morning’s chore. This time being careful to stay a little farther from the cow’s swishing tail.

Pushing a strand of blonde hair behind her ear, Lydia looked out the open barn door. Another day of endless sunshine. The prairie grasses waved in a welcome breeze Texas didn’t often enjoy, like green and golden waves. A long time ago, Lydia had been to the seashore and seen the Atlantic Ocean rushing toward land in frothy, bubbling waves. Whenever the wind blew this way, it put her in mind of her childhood. Though back then, she’d seen tall buildings and plumes of smoky soot when she looked at the sky. Out here, as far as the eye could see, the sky stretched in an endless arch of pale blue. Lydia had never imagined Texas as such a vast, unbroken plain of emptiness.

Loneliness. Enough to make your heart ache. Lydia tried to remember if the words came from a book or a poem. “Sure not what I imagined my days would be, Delilah.”

As a young girl in New York, she’d dreamed of getting married, having children. Lots and lots of babies to love. Growing up in the orphanage, before Papa Ralph adopted her to care for his home, Lydia had cherished helping with the babies. Each time one left, it broke her heart, even though the matron told her not to grieve but to be glad.

On that glorious day when she’d married Tom Grayson and had come west to help him start a ranch, her hopes had been higher than the clouds. They would have babies. Build a ranch and a life on the wide, open land stretching as far as eye could see. With Tom by her side, their little world had seemed just right. Content.

Now, four, long, achingly desolate years later, Lydia knew only the reality of having her hopes and dreams crash to the red, Texas dirt. Plop. Flatter than a cow pat.

Lydia’s hands tugged the cow’s udder in a gentle rhythm, the milk spritzed into the pail. “You ever been lonely, Delilah?” She asked, just to hear a voice, even if it was her own. Unless she hitched up the buggy and drove the ten long miles to town, Delilah was one of the few living creatures she could talk to these days.

The patient cow turned her head, a spark of interest in her brown eyes. A crumb of grain slobbered to a corner of her mouth and Delilah swiped in with her tongue.

“No, I guess not, you got a lot of friends out there in the pasture, huh? ‘Cept don’t get too attached to any of them. They’ll go to market soon enough.”

I hope.

Texas longhorns brought a fair price, and despite having to do all the manly jobs alone, Lydia took pride in the herd. Tom would be proud.

After she’d stripped the last of the milk into the pail, Lydia stood and poured a small portion into a cracked saucer for the three kittens she’d brought out from town a few months ago. Even now, she could hear her minister Papa’s shock if she told him she’d paid a whole dollar for three kittens.

“Daughter!” His voice would have thundered. “That’s sinful, a waste.”

“Maybe so, Papa,” she spoke to the kittens, watching their cheerful antics as they plunged tiny pink noses into the milk. “But you don’t live on a ranch where field mice eat through your sacks of grain and leave droppings in your coffee. Kittens are a necessity here. Besides,” without Papa around to hear, Lydia could be as disrespectful as she liked, “they’re good company.”

With the whole day stretched before her, Lydia took her time letting Delilah out into the pasture. She groomed her only horse, Jonathon, and tossed some scraps to the chickens. Maybe later she’d mix them up a mash. She gathered eggs, happy to see she had enough to bake a cake. Although a cake for one got mighty stale before she could eat it all.

As usual this time of day, the ache of missing Tom weighed on her heart. When her husband was alive, there weren’t enough hours in the day to do every chore, follow every plan. Now, the days spread before her in a ribbon of unrolling time. The minutes hung heavy on her hands. Today, she planned to weed the small kitchen garden, but the constant wind swept that idea to another day. There would be time enough. There was always enough time.

The wind tugged her hair, so Lydia pulled on a sunbonnet and headed toward the small rise a short distance from the frame house. Tom had planted the trees their first year on the ranch. It seemed a fitting place to lay him to rest. A weathered wooden cross rose above the mound where her husband lay in eternal rest. Thomas Grayson Beloved Husband.

It had grieved her that she couldn’t add Beloved Father. Even though Lydia wanted a child more than anything else in life, they had never been blessed. It grieved her more each day. If Tom and I had a child, it would be four now. It was four long years since Tom died when the barn caught fire.

“You’re still young enough to find a husband and have a baby,” Matron had written in answer to Lydia’s latest letter.

There was truth in what the older woman said. Twenty-four was still young enough to birth a baby. If I still had a husband. Not that I’m likely to find one. Months often went by when Lydia saw no other human. She went into town every so often to shop for supplies and pick up mail. Sometimes, when she spoke to another person, her voice sounded rusty, like a gate never oiled. There were neighbors in town who came to visit on rare occasions. Most were hard-working with their own lives, their own ranches, too busy to bother with a widow.

Lydia wondered, at times, if a person could actually die of loneliness. If one day she might just die in her rocking chair, her body turned to bones before a neighbor found her. Or maybe the coyotes she heard howling in the night would carry her off. The idea didn’t frighten her as much as the dark, forever nights when daylight seemed years in coming. How many years will I live like this?

“Oh, Tom, why aren’t you here?”

She sank to the grass beside his grave, placed a hand over the mound. A small patch of orange and yellow marigolds bloomed around the marker, glowing in the afternoon sun as it filtered through the cottonwoods in shafts of warm light.

“What was it Papa used to say, Tom? That the flowers were giving glory to the morning? Or maybe that was morning glories, not marigolds. It’s too late to ask him now.”

Papa had gone to his reward even longer ago than Tom.

“I wish you were still here, Tom. I’ve thought of going to live in a city … oh, I know we talked about staying here forever, building up the ranch. But, I’m tired and alone.” The tears came as they usually did when she thought about leaving. Lydia knew she wouldn’t. It would mean leaving Tom, and she had no one else.

When the sun began to sink toward the western horizon, Lydia stood, trudged down the hill to the barn and began the evening chores. The thought crossed her mind that she might scramble some eggs for supper, use the heel of the loaf of bread and spread it with the last bit of honey given to her by a neighbor. The idea lifted her spirits for one wispy thread of a second, then floated away.

She wasn’t hungry for food but for companionship, for life. Weary to the bone from doing mostly nothing all day, Lydia slipped off her green calico and pulled on a muslin nightgown. Too tired to light an oil lamp, she lay down on the wooden bed Tom had carved. Tonight, she might sleep. So many nights the blessed nothingness of slumber abandoned her too.

A cry.

The noise startled her awake. Lydia sat up, pulling the nine-patch quilt to her chest. Beneath the muslin gown her heart thudded in fear, and her breath came in short, frantic gasps. The latch hook was pulled in, she’d made sure of that before bed. There were sturdy locks on the kitchen door and pegs to keep the windows from opening. No one can get in to hurt me. She reached slowly down to a wooden box beside the bed where she kept Tom’s old army revolver.

The strange cry came again. Lydia listened carefully and had to smile at her imagined terror. Often she heard coyotes or bobcats coming to prowl. The barn was shut tight, Delilah and the kittens snug inside. Unless … those kittens had been a lively bunch lately. Had one of them gotten out and come to the porch?

“I guess I’d better go see,” she said out loud, her voice quivering slightly.

Her feet touched the bare plank floor, and she shivered. Lydia took time to light an oil lamp before she walked out of the bedroom and toward the front door. Again, the odd cry, almost like a … a baby? I’m imagining things. Why would a baby be out here? Unless someone needs help …

Lydia threw caution to the wind, unlocked the door, and pulled it open. A wicker basket sat on the front porch; a gray blanket draped over whatever was inside. She set the lamp carefully down beside the basket, lifted the blanket and stared into the sweet, soft face of the most beautiful baby she’d ever seen.

Chapter Two

Fort Clark, Texas

“Are you sure you don’t want to stay on here, Will? You’re a fine soldier.”

Major Will McGraw stood at attention before Colonel Ambrose and shook his head. “I’d like to, Sir, but there’s a family matter I must see about. I haven’t heard from Abigail in several weeks, and I’m concerned. Now that her husband is dead and she’s expecting a child, I feel it’s my duty to help her.”

Colonel Ambrose nodded. “Yes, yes, of course. Well, we’ll miss you, but if you ever want to come back, let us know. The Army needs more men of your caliber. You’ve been a faithful soldier and I was sorry to see you’d chosen not to reenlist.”

Will clapped a blue forage cap over a wavy head of black hair. “Thank you, Sir.”

“Godspeed.”

A feeling of sadness settled in Will’s heart as he closed the door of the office for the last time, but he quickly shoved it aside. The Army had been his life for the past ten years. Now, his sister and that new little niece or nephew needed him. It was time for family to come first.

“Ready, Chief?” his asked the sturdy brown stallion tied to the hitching post. Will had loaded his saddle bags, tied on a bedroll, and cleaned out his quarters before talking to the Colonel. It was time to leave with nothing but regrets. Those he would keep buried. It was time for the long ride back to Dailey Ville, Texas, where Abigail and her late husband, Martin, had made a home.

***

“Where are you, Abigail?”

Sitting straight and tall in the saddle, Will trudged along another hard packed dirt road. In the past week, he and Chief had covered miles. For the last month, his thoughts hadn’t been too far from his younger sister and what might have happened to her. Maybe she had died in childbirth, but surely one of her neighbors would have let him know.

Then, there was that last confusing letter before he left Fort Clark.

Dear Brother,

I’m fine, and by the time you read this you’ll have a new little niece or nephew to welcome to the world. How I wish Martin could be here for the birth of his little one. Why does God allow such tragedies to happen?

I’m getting along well, although there are a few things I’d like to talk to you about soon. There’s something you should know. It’s been troubling me, but it can wait until you arrive. Please hurry home once you resign. Love always, Abby

Something was wrong. Abby’s words were straightforward and clear. His little sister needed help. Now that Martin was dead, lost in that freak train accident, Abby needed a man around her place. That’s my job.

He and Abby had been close, ever since Ma died. Pa did his duty to give them shelter and food, and saw they got to school, but he’d never really cared. After Pa’s death, Will had done his best. He’d sent Abby to a fancy finishing school back East. When she wanted to come home, he’d allowed it. It had taken several months to set Abby up in a respectable boarding house, working as a teacher. Then she met Martin Simon. Will’s relief to see Abby settled into a solid marriage put his mind at ease. Martin and Abby had been happily married for over ten years before Abby learned she was going to have a baby. His little sister’s joy knew no bounds.

His brother-in-law was a decent, hard-working man. Abby’s letters were full of joy as they set up housekeeping. Then this past year, the news about the upcoming baby. It wasn’t like Abigail not to write. She wrote faithfully every week. Often, he didn’t get the letters until weeks later, but his sister wrote like clockwork. Something she’d done ever since he’d sent her off to that eastern school.

“I was in love once,” Will spoke to Chief, just to hear a voice. The road was long, lonely, and dusty. He’d passed only one stagecoach, exchanged waves with the driver, and ambled on. “Her name was Maureen. Pretty as springtime, green-eyed like new sprouts in the garden, and the richest auburn hair.”

Chief snorted and shook his head, causing the bridle to shake.

“You’re right. Pretty is as pretty does, as Ma would say. Didn’t take Maureen long to find someone else.”

Will sighed and shifted his hands on the reins. He’d hoped to marry Maureen one day, until the letter she’d sent. Will had read it while freezing in below zero weather, worried about a hole in his boots that wouldn’t withstand another crossing through a creek. Only one slim page to tell him she’d met someone else and hoped he understood. I didn’t. It had ached then, but after months went by, he’d decided he was better off on his own. Women were trouble, no doubt about it.

Ten years had gone by giving his heart and soul to the army. He’d have stayed on for more years if not for Abigail. I’ve got no time for love.

The horse plodded along, and Will gave the coffee brown mane a pat. “Good boy, Chief we’ll find a nice barn and some oats before long.” Despite his promises to Chief, a prickly sense of unease kept him riding forward until long after dark each night. A few times on the road, he tied Chief to a picket, yanked his bedroll off the saddle and slept a couple hours in a field. The sooner they could eat up the miles, the faster he could find Abby and make sure she was all right.

It was after midnight when the horse finally reached the outskirts of Daily Ville. Will knew from Abby’s letters that she lived in a small house near a café. The idea of waking up someone didn’t appeal to him, so he decided to just make camp on the edge of town until morning. He found a stream and a grove of trees, near enough to see the dark shapes of buildings. After he’d unsaddled Chief and tied him to a tree, Will set about building a small campfire and chewing a wad of jerky. In the morning, he’d go into town.

As soon as dawn gave a faint glow of color to the sky, Will walked Chief into town and found Abby’s house. He knocked on the door, but it was obvious no one was home. An air of neglect covered the place, with dust and leaves on the wooden front porch. Streaks of dirt marred the windows. Will peered through a crack in the curtains and saw an unmade bed and clothes dropped over a chair. The only sign of a baby was a sturdy cradle beside the bed. Empty. A quick look in the barn showed him empty stalls and a dried-up water trough. Not even a chicken or a stray cat. For whatever reason, Abigail’s house was deserted.

Where are you, Abby?

Will walked next door to the café, saw a closed sign, and wandered around the back to the kitchen. If the enticing aroma of frying salt pork and eggs was any indication, someone was making breakfast. Through the screen in the door, he could see a plump woman in a gray dress covered with a white apron. At his knock, she brushed at a smudge of flour off a reddened cheek. “Yes? We don’t open for another hour.”

“No, Ma’am, it smells fine, but the truth is I’m Will McGraw. I’m looking for my sister, Abigail Simon. I haven’t heard from her in awhile and her house looks empty.”

“Will!” The woman beamed, both cheeks as round and rosy as apples. “Abby’s spoken of you many times. Now, you come on in and have a cup of coffee and some food. I’m Mrs. Clark, maybe she wrote about me?”

“That’s really not necessary. If you could just tell me where to find Abby.”

Mrs. Clark’s face fell, and a frown took the place of the smile. “Now, I’m really sorry, Mr. McGraw, but I don’t know what to tell you.”

She’s dead. Abby’s dead. He forced himself to ask the question, “Did she die in childbirth?”

“Pshaw! No!” This time her lips curved in an emotion between sad and glad, more like perplexed. “As far as I know, your sister and that sweet little Ellie are alive and well. But the truth is I’m worried too. It’s been near on three weeks since I last seen them.”

His heart thumped back into an easier rhythm after the wild leap when he’d thought Abby had died. “I don’t understand. You say, Abby had the baby and then … what …”

“That’s what I don’t know. When she knew Ellie was on the way, she come over to get me. I went right over, had my Sam go for the midwife. Between us, we brought that sweet baby into the world. A couple of days later, I went over and took Abby food, checked in on her. Then one night, I says to Sam, you go over and see if anything’s wrong. The lamp wasn’t lit and I hadn’t seen her all day. That was oh… maybe Tuesday about three weeks ago. Hasn’t been anyone around since. I thought maybe she went visiting somewhere, but she surely would have told me.”

“Where would she have gone?” Even as he asked the question, Will knew there wasn’t anywhere he knew. As far as Abby had written, Martin had no family in the area. All of her friends lived in Dailey Ville. And why would Abby go anywhere with a newborn baby? It made no sense.

Where are you, Abigail?

“You could ask the sheriff,” Mrs. Clark suggested, “might be he’d know something.”

“Thank you, if you should see her …” Will took a deep breath to calm himself from all the crazy thoughts darting into his mind. “Tell her I’m looking for her.”

Chapter Three

Grayson Ranch

A baby? What in the world is a baby doing on my doorstep?

Lydia lifted the lamp and held it up to look around the yard. “Hello? Who’s out there?” Surely the person had just set the baby’s basket down and gone back to tie up a horse or unhitch a buggy. She hadn’t heard a horse or buggy, but the baby couldn’t have gotten there on its own. Someone must have put the baby on the porch, but who? More importantly, why?

“Hello?”

Not for the first time, Lydia wished she had a dog who would bark and alert her to strangers around the raunch. “Is anyone out there?”

Startled, the baby let out a shrill cry. Lydia looked around, but except for the pool of lamplight, the hour before dawn was darker than the inside of a well. The sky was a black lid pressed over the earth. Blacker silhouettes of trees, the small barn, and corral fences stood sentinel around the yard. Nowhere did she see a human presence. “It’s all right, I won’t harm you. You can come out.”

Shaking but not afraid, Lydia held the lamp higher to chase away the gloomy, trembling shadows and stepped off the porch. “Is anyone out there?”

The only reply was the sleepy stirring of the rooster. The wind whistled softly in the cottonwoods and stirred up a small dust cloud in front of the porch. In the basket, the baby whimpered and let loose with another full-throated cry, its tiny body quivering with either anger or hunger. Lydia stared at the tiny infant snuggled in the basket. Its rosebud shaped mouth opened in a protesting mew.

Lydia hurried back up the porch steps, put the lamp on the kitchen table, then retrieved the basket. It lifted easily, and she set it on the table beside the lamp. Seeing the light, the baby hushed for a moment, then began to suckle a tiny fist. Lydia made sure to bolt the front door.

Who would leave a baby on a doorstep and not care if it was fed?

“Sh, sh, it’s all right.”

The first thing to do was build a fire in the stove. To the tune of the baby’s whimpers and cries, Lydia hurried to toss in kindling, a few scraps of newspaper and lit a match. Soon, the crackling of the logs let her know it was time to ease in a few bigger sticks of wood. Shivering in her thin nightgown, Lydia went into the bedroom for her green shawl and wrapped it around her shoulders. The baby had gone from being content with his or her fist to more hungry cries.

She turned her attention to the basket, just an old market basket. There didn’t seem to be any tag or anything to identify the baby. The child was wrapped in a threadbare gray blanket, almost like an old army issue, barely warm enough for a dog’s bed. Lydia grabbed a soft patchwork quilt and laid it on the table. She bent over and scooped the slight weight of the child. A dampness seeped through the gray blanket as Lydia noticed a scrap of paper, torn from a store broadside. One side advertised farm fresh eggs. On the other side a cramped hand had written: Please keep baby safe until her mother comes for her.

Her.

“So you’re a little girl?”

A shrill scream was the baby’s answer.

“Oh, my, you’re soaking wet, that’s part of your problem. And what am I to do about it?”

The baby needed a clean, dry diaper and something to wear. She wore a thin, muslin gown that might once have been pretty. There was a little lace edged collar and tiny tucks that showed someone must have cared. The stitches were so fine and even. A couple of little ribbon roses had been sewn on the front, but were so filthy and torn it was hard to tell the color they’d been. “Poor baby…” Lydia crooned.

She needed clothes and food.

Lydia put a pot on the stove and poured some of Delilah’s milk she’d been saving. While it warmed, she went back into the bedroom, carrying the baby to her bed. The baby’s face flamed red with hunger, but there was nothing to be done yet. “It’s all right, little one, let me see if I can find you some clean clothes.”

In her cedar trunk, Lydia found a small shirtwaist that had been hers when she was about seven. She’d always kept it because the matron had allowed her to choose the fabric to have it made. It was the first thing she’d ever owned sewn just for her, not hand-me-down from the other orphans. It was way too big for the baby, but it was dry and clean. She pulled off the sodden gown.

Under the gown, a glimmer of gold shimmered on the baby’s heaving chest. It was a gold, heart shaped pendant on a slim chain. An elegant A was engraved on the front of the heart, surrounded by small flowers. Lydia peered closer. They looked like lilies of the valley. What on earth? Had the mother put it on her? The baby’s gown showed she’d been loved and cared for. The mother, or someone, had left an expensive necklace around her neck. And yet, maybe that same person had abandoned the baby on a stranger’s porch.

Again, Lydia thought about the perplexing question. Who would abandon a baby here? The baby’s shrill screams and flailing feet brought Lydia back to the task at hand.

We need diapers.

There wasn’t anything like that in the trunk, but Lydia did have a new length of flannel she’d planned to sew into a warmer gown for winter. While the baby fussed and cried, Lydia hurried to cut a few lengths of flannel for a make-do diaper. She got a wet cloth and wiped the baby clean, which set off a new round of screaming, put on the flannel diaper and tied it stout around the baby’s waist. Then she put on the shirtwaist. It was miles too big, but it was dry. Lydia managed to tie the sleeves around the baby like a swaddling cloth. She pulled a small lap quilt around the baby for warmth.

Now, food.

In the orphanage, when there hadn’t been a wet nurse, the matron had taught the older girls how to feed abandoned babies. With the baby cradled in one arm, Lydia went back into the front room. The milk was warm but not hot, to the touch. She pulled it off the stove, managed to pour some into a bowl and set it on the table. Pulling a clean rag out of her kitchen cupboard, Lydia sat in a rocking chair beside the table. It took both hands to tie a knot in the rag, while the baby fussed and squirmed on her lap. Thankfully she was tiny enough not to be able to do much yet.

Lydia dipped the rag in the milk, let it soak for a moment, then placed it in the baby’s mouth. The baby’s natural sucking took over and her little lips closed over the milky rag. Each time the milk drained out of the rag, the baby fussed until Lydia soaked it up again and started the process over. It felt like a long time before the baby acted full and its tiny blue eyes fluttered to sleep, a drop of milk easing out of her pursed pink lips.

Lydia stared down at the little heart shaped face, such sweet perfection.

Nora Mae. The name came out of nowhere, but Lydia knew she’d always wanted a daughter to name. She sat on in the rocker, her heart full of an emotion she hadn’t felt in a long time. Joy.

“How did you come to my doorstep?” That was the most perplexing question of all. Who would abandon such a tiny morsel of life and just leave? The baby didn’t look more than a few weeks old at most.

While she wanted to think God had heard the loneliness of her heart, Lydia knew such things didn’t happen. Only in fairy tales were people’s impossible prayers answered in unexpected ways. A real, living person had put that baby out there. And someone might come looking for her. Even though she’d only known the baby for a short time, the idea squeezed her heart tight.

“I’ll have to ask people in town who she belongs to …” but not just yet. She bent her head against the fluff of hair on the baby’s soft head. Lydia didn’t know how long she sat with the baby cushioned on her breast, content and happy.

The rooster let out a full-throated morning cry. From the barn, Lydia could hear Delilah’s anxious moo and Jonathon thumping against his stall. A rosy dawn filtered through the window and shone on Nora Mae’s downy dark hair. Though she didn’t want to lay the baby down, there were chores to do.

Nora Mae would need milk, lots of milk. Then there would be diapers to sew. Lydia allowed herself a few more minutes to hold the warm, solid weight in her arms while she made a list in her mind. Having a baby brought a whole list of chores she’d have to do right away.

Though she didn’t go into Dallas often, Lydia knew most of the people nearby. As far as she knew, no one had been expecting a baby. Her neighbor, Mrs. Miller, had given birth about seven months ago – she knew this because she’d cooked some meals for the family and ridden over in the buggy to take them.

Lydia’s ranch wasn’t on the main road into Dallas. Tom had wanted room to spread out, to let his herd graze. Someone would have to go off the beaten path to find her place, then to sneak up to the door. So why here?

I have a lot of love to give her and plenty of practice from the orphanage. If no one claims her, I’ll just keep her.

There were more immediate concerns. Reluctantly, Lydia carried Nora and laid her in the middle of the bed. The baby began to whimper, Lydia could see the dampness seeping from the diaper. After the milking, she’d have to cut out and sew diapers. A great many diapers… suddenly, there didn’t seem to be enough hours in the day to get all her chores done, and it was barely dawn.

Still in her nightgown, Lydia grabbed up the milk pail and hurried out to the barn in her bare feet.