DC03 - Though Mountains Fall by Dale Cramer Read Free Book Online

they did, none of them had said anything.
    The company of federales Montoya promised them had stillnot arrived, and with every passing day Caleb’s anxiety grew. What if the bandits attacked before the troops came?
    Then there was Miriam. On the days she wasn’t holding school in the buggy shed she would ride off to spend the day in San Rafael. She was already halfway gone, her chores divided among siblings as she slipped away to another world.
    In the evenings he would often find time to go up and sit on his rock alone, partway up the ridge where he could look over his valley and all the lives, the farms, the busyness and work, ten families toiling and carving out homesteads here, because of him. And now, more than ever, he wondered if he had done right by bringing them here.
    Gott’s will could be a burdensome thing.

    Sunday morning, a church day, and the others were all out doing chores an hour before daylight. Miriam had the upstairs bedroom to herself for a while, a rare and piercingly lonely circumstance for a girl with a large family on the day of her wedding. She dressed herself in her best dress and kapp, the only Amish clothes she would take with her, and perhaps the last time she would wear them. She was ready to go when she heard the padrino’s horse and carriage arrive to pick her up. After one last long look at the spare dresses and kapps in the drawer she slid it shut and left them behind. She would not be needing them now, and one of her sisters could make use of them. A small drawstring bag containing her scant possessions hung loosely from one hand as she went down the stairs. Only Mamm and Ada were in the kitchen, cooking breakfast.
    Mamm glanced at Miriam, at the bag in her hand, then her attention turned quickly to her frying pan. Ada looked up from cracking eggs and gave Miriam a big smile, oblivious.
    Miriam laid a hand on her mother’s shoulder. “My ride is here,” she said softly.
    Mamm nodded, once, without looking, her hands busy turning salt pork. “Go on, then.”
    Miriam waited a beat. Mamm swallowed hard, fighting back tears, but she was biting her lip and it was clear she would say nothing more. Miriam gave Ada a hug as she passed, and said goodbye, though it was never clear whether or not Ada really comprehended what was happening.
    Uncle Paco was waiting for her out back by the corral fence. He’d borrowed a fancy open-top carriage from somewhere, low-slung with a little entry gate in the middle, and plush upholstered seats. Pausing beside the carriage in the predawn stillness Miriam could hear her father’s hayfork scraping the boards up in the barn. He’d gone there on purpose to avoid this moment. He would have heard the carriage come. They all would. They knew why Paco was here, and yet they all stayed out of sight. Not one of them came to see her off. Not even Rachel.
    Miriam’s heart was breaking. Rachel had not said a word to her, not even so much as a goodbye. If this was a taste of what lay in store, she didn’t know if she could take it. In exchange for everything that awaited her she could bear to be shunned by all the world, but not Rachel.
    Please, Gott, not Rachel.
    Her padrino was decked out in his wedding clothes, tight knee-breeches and a trim waist-length gold-trimmed jacket over a ruffled white shirt. He grinned widely and made a grand gesture of offering his hand to help her up, and then he took his seat, pulled the reins and turned the carriage around.
    As the carriage rolled slowly past the house Miriam sat ramrod straight with her hands folded on her lap, eyes forward, refusing to look back. The future was all that remained now.But just as the horse broke into a trot at the top of the lane she heard footsteps, someone running hard, gaining on them. Paco must have heard too, because he looked over his shoulder and pulled up short.
    Rachel caught up with them and stood holding the side of the carriage for a second, panting, and then jerked open the little