A Time to Love (21 page)

The next day after work, he went through more drawers in search of valuables he could sell for cash. “Funny,” he told himself, “no matter how much money a man gets his hands on, he always wants more.”

He decided to spend the rest of the evening in the library and lit a couple of lamps. He had never done a lot of reading, but the hundreds of books on the shelves suddenly seemed interesting. He was about to look for a book to read when his eyes fell on Blake’s desk at one end of the room. More drawers to go through!

Setting a lamp on the desk, he pulled open the top drawer. There were letters under a metal clip addressed to Blake from Linda Forrest.

“Ah, yes!” he said aloud. “Linda Forrest. I really should get around to sending her that wire.”

Haman took out the letters and began reading them. When he got to the envelope that contained the letter with her photograph, his eyes widened. “Oh, Linda!” he gasped. “You are so beautiful!”

He braced her picture in a standing position against a couple of thick books and gazed at it, captivated by her beauty.

“Oh, Linda,” he said in a whisper, “I wish there was some way I could have you for myself.”

He thought about the wire he’d promised Blake he would send. If only there were some way he could pose as Blake and make her his mail order bride. But how? If Blake had a picture of Linda, certainly Linda had a picture of Blake.

He read the letter that had contained the picture, then opened and read the next letter. He was surprised to find her saying that she’d never received his photograph. This stirred him to keep reading. He was able to pick up that Blake had Linda believing he was only a bank employee. He had not revealed to her that he was the owner of the bank. Probably wanted to surprise her in person that she was marrying a millionaire.

Linda’s final letter caused Haman’s heart to quicken pace when he read the date of her departure from Boston and the arrival date in Sacramento. She was due to arrive on Saturday, January 19—only a little more than a week from now! He smiled when he read her words:

“Blake, if you’re not able to get a picture taken and in my hands before my scheduled time to leave Boston for Sacramento, it’s all right. Though you’ve never described yourself to me, I have you pictured in my mind. I’m sure I will know you when I step off the train at the depot.”

Haman could hardly sleep that night for thinking of the beautiful woman in the photograph. How proud he would be to show her off as his wife!

He began working out a scheme to pose as Blake Barrett. The first obstacle was if Blake had been able to get a picture taken of himself and sent to Linda. If so, no scheming in the world could pull it off. If not,
there had to be a way. But how could he know for sure? Send a wire and ask if she’d gotten it? But that would be to downplay her own romantic words about already picturing him in her mind.

No. She might catch on that something was wrong. Haman would simply go ahead and send the wire as Blake had asked him to. Tomorrow … or the day after that.

The next day, Haman stopped at the post office after work to pick up his mail. Since the postal people knew about Blake being in prison, they might let him have Blake’s mail. He would try it. Who knew what he might find?

The postal people were cooperative, telling Haman how nice he was to look after Blake Barrett’s affairs. When Haman went through the mail, he was delighted to find another letter from Linda. He couldn’t wait to get home to read it. He scurried to a corner of the post office and tore it open.

It was dated January 11, 1878:

Haman could hardly contain himself. His idea was not impossible, after all! He could impersonate Blake, even to the point of talking and acting like a Christian. Blake had talked to him on numerous occasions about being saved, and Haman had been around other Christians enough to know their jargon. He was sure he could pull it off.

He read the brief letter again, then said to himself, “There’s still one big problem, Haman, ol’ boy. You can’t impersonate Blake in Sacramento. You’ll have to get clear out of California. Go somewhere else, somewhere you’re not known.”

He snapped his fingers. “Wait a minute! That bank in Wyoming!”

Haman had learned just the previous day that there was a bank for sale in Cheyenne City, Wyoming. The owner had died, and his widow had put it up for sale.

As he thought about it, Haman knew several bank owners in California who would love to purchase the successful Pacific Bank and Trust Company of Sacramento. He would sell it to the highest bidder.

The next morning, Haman told the bank employees that he would have to be away from the bank possibly all day, then he drove his buggy to the town of Stockton, where he was unknown. There he entered the Western Union office and wired the widow in Cheyenne City, using Blake Barrett’s name, to see if the bank was still on the market, and to ask how much she wanted for it. The return wire came back in less than an hour, saying the bank was still for sale, and the widow named her price.

Haman was happy to learn that the price was less than he would get out of the Pacific Bank and Trust Company. He wired the widow a firm offer for the price she was asking. Within another hour, the deal was agreed upon.

Haman then wired Linda—as Blake Barrett—telling her some changes were taking place in his career. He would be moving to Cheyenne City, Wyoming, to work in a bank there. He was sending the wire from Stockton because he was on an assignment from the Pacific Bank and Trust Company and needed to send it right away. She must wait in Boston until she heard from him in Wyoming, which would be a few weeks. He asked for her to send a return wire by the messenger who delivered the telegram to her door. He would wait in Stockton till he heard back that she had received it.

Linda Forrest was in her room, making final preparations for her trip in two days, when she heard a knock at the front door. She could hear her mother’s footsteps and a male voice saying something Linda could not make out. Then came her mothers voice: “Linda! You have a telegram here from Blake!”

She rushed to the front door and saw a tall, skinny messenger in a Western Union uniform.

As she drew up, Adrienne said, “Honey, this man needs you to read the telegram right now, because he has a note from the telegrapher that an immediate reply is needed.”

“All right.” Linda’s eyes were dancing as she took the paper and read it.

“So what is it, Linda?” Adrienne asked.

“Blake says he’s changing jobs. He’s leaving the bank in Sacramento and taking a job in a bank in Cheyenne City, Wyoming. He wants to know I’ve received this telegram, and I’m to wait a few weeks until I hear from him.”

“He must be bettering himself by this job change.”

“I’m sure he is,” Linda said. “All right, sir. Please send this wire for me: ‘Received your wire. Am excited for you. Will wait in Boston until I hear from you again.’”

H
AMAN WARNER DROVE AWAY
from the Western Union office in Stockton, happily shaking the telegram he held. “Yes! Things couldn’t have worked out any better than this! Linda, honey, just wait’ll you meet your darling ‘Blake’!”

That evening, Haman sat at the desk in the Barrett library, reading Linda’s letters over again and letting his eyes devour her beauty as he kept glancing at her photograph.

Grinning, he said, “I’ll go along with this Christianity stuff for a while, to keep your favor, but in time I’ll turn you from it. I’ll keep you so busy doing fun things you won’t want to go to church. I’ll do it ever so slowly, but ever so surely. You wait and see. The day will come when you’ll wonder why you ever embraced that ‘Jesus Christ stuff’ in the first place.”

At the Ukiah State Prison, Blake Barrett found Larry Huffman in a state of confusion on spiritual matters. He dealt with him about salvation, hoping to lead him to the Lord so he would die on the gallows a saved man. Though Larry would say he believed the Bible was the Word of God, he still threw up a wall between himself and Blake, unwilling to listen to what Blake was trying to show him from the Word.

Each day when Blake returned to the cell, weary from working on the chain gang, he pressed the gospel to Larry’s heart, but Larry would only listen a little while, then turn the subject to something else.

On the evening before Larry was to be executed, he sat on his cot, holding his head in his hands.

Blake’s heart was heavy for him. He had prayed continuously that the Lord would convict Larry so powerfully that he would come to Jesus. Looking at him by the lantern light in the cell, Blake said, “Larry, you’ve listened to me these past six nights, but you really haven’t listened. You’re going into eternity tomorrow morning at sunrise. I’ve shown you in God’s Word that unless you turn to Jesus in repentance of your sin and ask Him to save you, when you hit the bottom of that rope, you will keep on going right down—all the way to hell.”

Larry looked at Blake through misty eyes and said, “I haven’t been honest with you, Blake.”

“What do you mean?”

“You asked me on the first night if I believed the Bible is the Word of God. I told you I had no doubt that it was. I should have said that I think it might be, but again, it might not be.”

“Larry, you told me that you know the Bible says there’s a burning hell out there for murderers like Melvin Packman and Larry Huffman. That’s what you said, didn’t you?”

“Yeah.”

“And what was my response?”

Huffman thought on it a moment. “You said: ‘Yes, and for all other kinds of sinners who die in their sins.’”

“Right. I said that because it sounded like you thought murderers ought to go to hell, but people guilty of lesser sins shouldn’t have to. Is that what you meant?”

Larry’s hands were trembling. “I … I guess so.”

“You guess so?”

“Blake, I’m not sure about anything right now. I’m not sure there’s a hell or a heaven.”

Blake knew if he was going to reach the condemned man, it had to be tonight. He could pull no punches. “Larry, what you just said about not being sure of anything right now.

“Yes?”

“That’s not true. You’re sure of one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“You’re going to die tomorrow morning at sunrise.”

Blake’s words were like hammers, striking hard with reality. Larry bent his head low and rubbed the back of his neck.

“Well, aren’t you?” Blake pressed.

Without looking up, the condemned murderer said, “Yes.”

“So where are you going when you take that plunge?”

“I don’t know if I’m going anywhere.”

“Excuse me?”

Larry chewed on his lower lip for a moment. “I told you I haven’t been honest with you.”

“Okay. Be honest now.”

“My parents taught me from the time I was a little boy that humans are only a higher form of animal. That when we die, like the lower forms, we simply go out of existence. They said there is no punishment for sins. There is no hell. There is no heaven. There is no afterlife, and there is no holy God to face in judgment.”

“Wait a minute,” Blake said, praying in his heart the Lord would help him say the right thing. “You said your parents taught you there is no punishment for sins.”

“They did.”

“You don’t believe that.”

Larry raised his eyebrows. “How can you be so sure?”

“What about Melvin Packman? He sinned when he murdered your mother, didn’t he?”

“Absolutely.”

“And didn’t you tell me you went after him to exact your own justice because the law didn’t punish him for what he did?”

Huffman looked at Blake, wide-eyed. “Uh … yes.”

“So you really do believe there should be punishment for sin.”

“I guess you’d say I do. I went after Packman and put punishment where it belonged.”

“Then how about the righteous God of heaven who created us? What’s so hard about believing that God punishes sin just like you did?”

“If there is a God.”

“You know there is.”

“What makes you think so?”

“Because God says you know He exists.”

“Aw, c’mon.”

“Romans 1:19 says of the whole human race, ‘That which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.’ God has shown every man that He exists—even you. We’re being honest here, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then tell me you’re an atheist. Tell me there is no God.”

Huffman’s shoulders slumped. “I can’t tell you that. You’re right. I know God exists.”

“Of course you do. Now, again, are you afraid to die?”

The condemned man’s countenance seemed to sag. “Yes.”

“But why should you be if when you die you’re simply going out of existence?”