A McKettrick Christmas by Linda Lael Miller Read Free Book Online

pity and amusement. She patted Mrs. Thaddings’s hand, still chilled from the perilous journey from one railroad car to another, and offered to refill her coffee cup.
    Once they’d finished off the coffee and started a second pot to brewing, Morgan and the peddler set out to break into and raid the freight car.
    As soon as they were gone, Whitley approached Lizzie, planted himself directly in front of her.
    “If I die,” he told her, “it will be your fault. If you hadn’t insisted on bringing me into this wilderness to meet your family—”
    Despite a dizzying sting—for there was truth in his words, as well as venom—Lizzie kept her backbone straight, her shoulders back and her chin high. “After staying alive,” she said, with what dignity she could summon, “my biggest problem will be explaining you to my family.”
    With a snort of disgust, he turned on one heel and strode to the other side of the car.
    And little Ellen tugged at the sleeve of the oversize conductor’s coat Lizzie had been wearing since the day before. “Do you think St. Nicholas will know where we are?” she asked, her eyes huge with worry. “Jack’s had a mean hankerin’ for that orange ever since Mama told us we could hang up stockings this year.”
    “I’m absolutely certain St. Nicholas will know precisely where we are,” Lizzie told Ellen, laying a hand on her shoulder. “But we’ll be in Indian Rock by Christmas Eve, you’ll see.”
    Would they? Ellen looked convinced. Lizzie, on the other hand, was beginning to have her doubts.

Chapter Three
    T he caboose, although not much safer than the passenger car, was at least warm. When Morgan and the peddler returned from their foray, they brought four gray woolen blankets, as many tins of canned food, all large, and a box of crackers.
    “There was a ham,” the peddler blustered, red from the cold and loud with relief to be back within the range of the stove, “but the doc here said it was probably somebody’s Christmas dinner, special-ordered, so we oughtn’t to help ourselves to it.”
    Everyone nodded in agreement, including Ellen and Jack, her younger brother. Only Whitley looked unhappy about the decision.
    There were no plates and no utensils. Morgan opened the tins with his pocket knife, and they all ate of the contents—peaches, tomatoes, pears and a pale-skinned chicken—forced to use their hands. When the meal was over, Morgan found an old bucket next to the stove and carried in more snow, to be melted on the stove, so they could wash up.
    While it was a relief to Lizzie to assuage her hunger, she was still restless. It was December twenty-third. Her father and uncles must be well on their way to finding the stalled train. She yearned for their arrival, but she was afraid for them, too. The trip from Indian Rock would be a treacherous one, cold and slow and very hard going, most of the way. For the first time it occurred to her that a rescue attempt might not avert calamity but invite it instead. Her loved ones would be putting their lives at risk, venturing out under these conditions.
    But venture they would. They were McKettricks, and thus constitutionally incapable of sitting on their hands when somebody—especially one of their own—needed help.
    She closed her eyes for a moment, willed herself not to fall apart.
    She thought of Christmas preparations going on at the Triple M. There were four different houses on the ranch, and the kitchens would be redolent with stove heat and the smells of good things baking in the ovens.
    By now, having expected to meet her at the station in Indian Rock the night before, her grandfather would definitely have raised the alarm….
    She started a little when Morgan sat down on the train seat beside her, offered her a cup of coffee. She’d drifted homeward, in her musings, and coming back to a stranded caboose and a lot of strangers was a painful wrench.
    She saw that the others were all occupied: John Brennan sleeping with