Be Still My Soul: The Cadence of Grace, Book 1 by Joanne Bischof Read Free Book Online Page A

pot boiling on the stove told him she had no time for his predicament.
    “Oh.” He shook out his hand as casually as he could lest she see the damage. He was already embarrassed enough. “It was an accident. It’s not that bad.”
    His ma clicked her tongue. “Well, go and wash up. Mae’ll see to your hand.” She dipped a slice of rabbit meat into a pan of flour before dropping it in the frying pan. “I’ve got hungry kids waitin’ for their food, and I ain’t got time for your foolishness.” Her tone indicated that she meant more than a battered hand. For a moment, Gideon wanted her to know that he hadn’t done what they had already judged him for. But the thought passed quickly. There was no point. And he was too tired to care.
Let ’em think what they want
.
    He grabbed the kettle and moved to the far end of the room. With his back to the children crowded around the table, Gideon dipped his hand into the washbasin. The hot water stung.
    His sister stepped from the bedroom and leaned over his shoulder. She clutched a pair of crumpled sheets beneath her arm. “What on earth did you do?” she whispered.
    He let out a heavy sigh but didn’t respond.
    “Pa told me what happened.” Mae pursed her lips, making her cheeks dimple. She took Gideon’s hand and spoke with motherly concern far beyond her fourteen years. A trait she’d developed with four rowdy brothers to look after. “Let me see that.”
    Gideon let her take his hand. “What else did he say?”
    Mae dabbed at the dried blood with a damp rag. “He said you were going to marry Lonnie Sawyer.” She glanced up. “He said her pa is
makin’
you.”
    He grimaced at the shameful truth in her words. Gideon exhaled and lowered his voice. “Did he tell you why?”
    “Didn’t have to. It’s obvious, and Ma isn’t too happy about it.”
    Gideon winced when Mae squeezed his hand too tight. She rinsed her rag and dabbed at the wound. “ ’Sides, you know how Ma feels about the Sawyers. She hasn’t liked them for as long as I can remember.” She glanced over her shoulder and continued in a quiet voice. “Granny used to say it was because Joel Sawyer picked Maggie over Ma and Ma never got over it.” Mae’s chestnut eyes glistened as they narrowed under the weight of her words.
    His eyes flicked to his ma’s back. “I remember her saying that.”
    He held up his hand as Mae dried it off. She wrapped a scrap of old fabric around his torn flesh as a makeshift bandage.
    A muscle twitched in his jaw when she knotted it tightly. “Well, Ma’s gonna have to learn to live with it.”
    And so would he.
    “We’ll see.” Mae dropped the rag in the dingy water. “But Ma didn’t take too kindly to the news. It seems you’ve gotten yourself into more trouble than you’re used to, Gideon. I don’t know what’s gonna happen.”
    Across the room, their ma dropped a spoonful of grits in front ofBillie and Sadie. Their bare feet were streaked with dirt and dangled just below the oversize chair they shared. Ruth’s hip knocked the table as she skirted the rough corner, finally lowering steaming bowls in front of John and Charlie, who stuffed food in their mouths as fast as they could scoop it.
    Gideon nodded toward the food. “We better eat”—he watched as his ma brought the frying pan to the table and set it in front of her lanky sons—“before those two hogs get it all.”
    “Well, that oughta hold it for now.” Mae fiddled with the loose end of Gideon’s bandage. “Just don’t go and do something as foolish as that next time.”
    “I’ll try.”
    Gideon sat at the end of the bench and speared himself a piece of fried rabbit. He thought of another supper taking place on the other side of the hill. He rubbed his sore wrist as his ma spooned grits onto the plate in front of him.
    “Thanks,” he mumbled, then took a hearty bite. He was too worn out to worry about anything else for the night.

Six
    D roplets fell here and there, striking