Two Brides Too Many by Mona Hodgson Read Free Book Online Page A

fire, and his leg’s hurt pretty bad.”
    “Follow me to the surgery room,” said Sister Coleman, spinning around and taking long strides down the hallway. As Morgan followed behind her and the men, he heard her murmuring a prayer. He hoped he could be God’s answer to the sister’s petition, and maybe he could finally make a difference.

S EVEN

    N ell found herself surrounded by chaos. Pews were stacked on top of one another around the edge of the room to maximize the floor space inside the church. Babies cried, and mothers called for their toddlers, who were running around the sanctuary. Hundreds, maybe even thousands, of people had been displaced by the fire, their homes and belongings lost to the hungry flames, and Father Volpe had opened up the St. Peter’s Catholic Church as temporary housing for displaced women and children. Pallets of bed sheets and blankets covered its floors, but still more women came, seeking shelter.
    Nell glanced around the room at the weary mothers. She couldn’t imagine their heartache—their husbands in the center of danger, fighting the fire, their children to care for, and no home. Lucille, who had ridden into Cripple Creek on the train with Kat and Nell, was there with her mother, aunt, and baby cousin.
    Church folks whose homes had been spared had brought extra blankets and clothing, and food was on its way, but Nell’s heart achedfor the children huddled around the room. She tried to remember what used to help her when she was scared. Sometimes Father would gather her and her sisters for a story. Nell looked around the room, but she didn’t see any books. Well, she knew a few stories. Nell moistened her lips and whistled, drawing the children’s attention.
    “It’s story time, everyone. Come sit down.” Nell sat in the middle of the pallets and motioned for the children to join her.
    “Does anyone want to hear a story?”
    “I like the purple cow one.” The request came from a boy who was missing a front tooth.
    “That sounds like a good place to start.” Father had read Gelett Burgess’s poems from the newspaper just weeks before he announced his news about Paris, and Nell knew the short poem by heart. Nell recited the first three lines, and the children joined in on the last one.
    “‘I’d rather see than be one!’” The little girls giggled and the boys laughed. One little guy with a cowlick mooed like a cow, spurring them on.
    The scene reminded Nell of a verse from Proverbs. Something about laughter being good medicine. She knew it was good for her, and she could see in the faces of the children that it was, at least, a healthy distraction from the fear that had held them in its grasp only an hour earlier.
    “You’re good with children, Miss Nell.” Lucille’s aunt rocked her infant son.
    “Thank you, ma’am.” She’d hoped the Lord would bless her and Judson with many children. Now that seemed little more than a childish dream. He’d received her wire more than a week ago, and now that she was here, she’d not heard a word from him.
    “Miss Nell.” Lucille stood over by a mountain of pews, reaching into her valise. “I have my book. You could read a story from Grimm’s Fairy Tales .” She pulled the worn book out and walked back over to Nell. “As long as it’s not ‘Cinderella.’” Soot smudged the girl’s face as surely as the fire had sullied her romantic spirit.
    Nell took the book from Lucille, vowing to keep her own ideals alive. She knew her prince was real and his letters true.
    Please, Lord .

    Kat opened her eyes, trying to orient herself. A dim light mottled the tattered curtain that surrounded her cot. She tried to figure out where she was. Voices swirled around her, but she didn’t hear Nell’s among them. Then she remembered. Nell was off helping the Sisters of Mercy, or back at Hattie’s. Father was working in Paris, and Vivian and Ida were with Aunt Alma in Maine. And here she was lying in a hospital in a town that