Long Road Home, The by Lori Wick Read Free Book Online Page A

the movement of the incoming train.
    Memories of arriving less than a month ago assailed Abby, and she laughed a little. Both Mac and Grandma Em stared at her. She knew she had to explain.
    “When you came toward me the day I first arrived, I was terrified of you.”
    “I know,” Mac said with a grin.
    Abby smiled back. “I thought you must eat small redheads for breakfast.”
    “No, only at afternoon tea.”
    The light banter helped ease the minds of Grandma Em and Abby. All of Grandma Em’s grandchildren had come to her and offered to go to Paul, either with Abby or alone. But in talking together, they agreed that a nonmember of the family would be better at this time.
    Abby was not a woman easily intimidated, so going alone did not frighten her. Her greatest worry was having to come back and tell this special family that their loved one was dead. The smell of death was too fresh in her nostrils, and she wasn’t sure if she was more afraid for the family or for herself.

12
    Hayward, Wisconsin

     
    The days of trusting God were over. Paul Cameron believed he would plot his own course now, because he could certainly do a better job than God had done recently. Paul knew the thought to be irreverent, blasphemous even, but the anger and bitterness that grew with every mile he moved away from Baxter overrode him. He gave into that sin of angry bitterness without a fight—not even a whimper.
    Now, weeks after leaving his grandmother’s home, Paul walked alone into the woods at the start of a new day. It didn’t matter that the sun was breaking clear and bright over the land; miles and miles of gigantic pine trees cast darkness over everything.
    As Paul walked, he noted absently his arms and legs no longer screamed in agony from a day of cutting logs. Not that he minded the pain in his body—it helped dull the pain in his heart.
    The other ninety-odd men heading into the “pineries,” a nickname for the massive stretches of pine trees in the Wisconsin north woods, steered clear of Paul. He had worn an expression in the cook tent at breakfast that told them he was not in a mood for jokes.
    From the first moment he arrived in camp, Paul’s height had made him stand out. With the help of the logging trade,the breadth of his chest, along with the way the muscles bulged in his arms made him a man only the foolish would challenge or even speak to if Paul’s mood was wrong.
    Generally he was well-liked in camp. He could drink with the best of them, and he never cheated at cards—parting with his hard-earned money better than most. His living habits were clean, and he always pulled more than his weight on any job.
    Paul was careful in not getting too close to anyone. The men he worked with knew nothing about him, so they had no way of knowing that this morning’s mood stemmed from a dream about Corrine—not the smiling, beautiful Corrine of the first few days of courtship, but the Corrine of the last days, pale as the sheets she lay on, so still and near death....Paul shoved the thoughts aside and continued on into the trees.
    Paul’s family would have been hard put to recognize the man he had become. His hair was long, obviously having not seen a barber since he’d left Baxter, and a full, dark beard covered his face. But the biggest change was in Paul’s personality. Gone was the carefree youth with the sparkling blue eyes with whom they had grown up. Gone was the dedicated man of God they had watched him become. In his place was an angry, bitter man who believed his life was over because he felt dead inside.
    There wasn’t a day that passed when Paul did not hear the voice of God beckoning to him. Paul was fast becoming proficient at pushing such thoughts aside and going about as he pleased. However, he had promised his grandmother he would stay in touch. So upon arriving and getting work in the logging camp, he had written her a brief note.
    “Gram,” it stated simply, “I’m on a logging crew in Hayward.