The Blacksmith’s Bravery (5 page)

Griffin dashed about his one-room home, the other half of the smithy
building. He always intended to get to church in plenty of time, but sometimes he lost track. Even though he had a watch, he couldn't get used to being at the new sanctuary on the hour. For that matter, he still had trouble making sure the stagecoaches left at precisely the right time.

He wet his comb and slicked down his unruly hair. He'd have to cut it again soon. Someone had mentioned that Augie Moore would cut hair for a dime. Maybe he should get the brawny restaurateur to do it. Augie was a good friend, and he was having a hard time financially, so it would be a good arrangement all around.

By the time he got his hair to lie flat, it was soaked, with drips drenching the collar of his one good shirt. Griffin sighed and tried to pull the comb through his beard. The tangles put the brakes on that plan. He threw the comb down. No time to put on a tie. He grabbed his hat and ran out the door. Why had they built the church two blocks over, anyhow? When the congregation met in the old haberdashery on Main Street, he usually made it on time.

The bell rang out over the town as he hit the boardwalk beside the Fennel House, and he lengthened his steps. Nice thing, that bell. The ladies had campaigned for it and raised money all last winter with bake sales and a quilt raffle. The preacher took three special offerings, and the bell had arrived on one of Oscar Runnels's freight wagons a month ago. The sound of it made him feel as though he lived in a civilized town.

A few stragglers climbed the church steps as he approached. That made him feel a little better. Of course, he'd never make it to Sunday school, though the preacher encouraged everyone to come out for that an hour earlier than the worship service. Griffin puffed up the steps behind the Nash family. Peter saw him coming and held the door open.

“Thanks,” Griff said.

“Morning, Griff. There's a letter for you over to the post office. Stop by my house tomorrow, why don't you?”

Griffin reared back and stared at him. “All right.” Probably from his sister. It had been two or three weeks since he'd received the disturbing telegram. That must be it. She'd most likely written him
the details of Jacob's demise.

He looked over the nearly filled sanctuary before sliding toward his usual pew—second from the back, on the left. In the row ahead of him, the sheriff sat on the aisle, beside his wife. Those two made quite a pair, Griff had to admit. He'd never expected Ethan to get married, but it seemed fitting that the best shot in town had won his heart. Trudy Chapman's brother, Hiram, the gunsmith, sat in the middle of the row, beside Libby Adams, the emporium's owner. No doubt they'd tie the knot soon. Romance seemed to have discovered Fergus. Griff shook his head. More and more so-called confirmed bachelors fell to the call of Cupid.

The two girls who worked at the Nugget Saloon slipped in and found seats in the back row. They wore their low-cut satins to church but covered up with their shawls. Seemed nearly everyone in town came to church these days. Griffin supposed that was a good thing.

The folks from the Spur & Saddle had claimed a pew just ahead of the sheriff and his party. That was a case where the last folks you ever expected to see in church had turned to Christ and flipped their lives head over heels. Vashti Edwards and Goldie Keller sat with Bitsy and Augie, and you'd have never thought to look at them that they'd ever been anything but respectable. Bitsy and the girls still had a heavy hand with the rouge and lip color, and they were too frugal to throw out their fancy dresses, but they'd altered them a bit. No one would think they'd been saloon girls for years.

That set Griffin's mind off on a rabbit trail. A passenger who occasionally rode the line on business had come in from Boise Friday. He'd complimented Griffin on the polite and beautiful young woman who now ran his ticket office. Griffin hadn't let on about Vashti's past. If anyone didn't know, they'd assume she'd always been decent. She didn't have a hoity-toity Eastern accent like Rose Caplinger, the milliner, but neither did she speak coarsely like the guttersnipes at the Nugget. And Goldie—why, that blond girl at the Spur & Saddle could play the piano like a professional. Last Christmas, she'd played a concert of carols at the church, and the whole town had lauded her. The reverend's wife was getting up a new collection to buy a piano for the church so they could have Goldie play the hymns every Sunday.

The Reverend Phineas Benton rose to open the service, and Griffin focused his attention on the front of the large room. The first hymn, “Amazing Grace,” helped. Griffin tended to let his mind wander when he was sitting still, listing all the things he needed to do when church was over.

Of course, he never worked at the forge on Sundays. Not since the preacher came. People would hear his hammer and know he worked on the Sabbath. But if he didn't putter around the livery on Sunday afternoon, some things would never get done. The horses needed to be fed, watered, and groomed. And Wells Fargo and Company had never heard of the no-Sunday-labor rule. The stagecoach schedules must be kept no matter what day of the week.

Everyone around him sat down, and he realized the singing was over. He sat down on his pew.

Preacher Benton gazed out over the congregation. “My fellow believers, this morning we'll look at Paul's second letter to the Corinthians and contemplate the virtue of benevolence. Gracious giving where it is perhaps not merited. Of course, if someone we love is in need, we do all we can to help them out. But what of the stranger or, even more, the person we know slightly and do not like? Can you be gracious when you don't feel like it? My friends, if you see someone unsavory in need, can you meet that need without resentment and bitterness? Ask yourself what Christ would do in this situation. Unto the least of these…”

Griffin tipped back his head and gazed up into the rafters. He dealt with unsavory men all the time. And the good Lord knew he'd been gracious to one of his drivers. He ought to have fired Jules Harding the first time he showed up for work drunk. But Griffin had tossed him in the watering tank behind the livery to sober him up and put him on the box of the stage dripping wet. The second time, he'd turned him away and driven the run to Dewey himself—big mistake. As experienced as he was with horses, Griffin wasn't much of a hand with a six-horse hitch. But they'd made it through. It wasn't until time number three that he'd given Jules the boot. That was benevolence, wasn't it? Giving a man three chances when old Cy Fennel would have cut him loose the first time.

“I submit to you, dear people,” the reverend said, “that sometimes God would have us give our fellow man another chance. Remember the question about forgiveness?”

For some reason, Griffin's mind drifted to Vashti Edwards. Should he give her a chance at driving coaches? She was no more a stagecoach driver than he was. Less of one, if the truth be told. He'd be foolish to allow a girl who used to drive her daddy's farm wagon to climb up on the box. The passengers' lives would be at stake. No, he'd done the right thing to turn her down. And hadn't he shown grace by letting her work at the office? Of course, he paid her a pittance—and only when she sold tickets. A dim spark of guilt flickered deep in his heart.

Phineas Benton wasn't through yet. “We've all had times when we were down—when another person reached out and gave us a hand. When someone gave us a boost we needed but didn't deserve.”

That was true enough. Griffin liked to think he'd built his own career. He'd been apprenticed to a blacksmith back in Pennsylvania when he was an awkward kid. His master had been tough on him, but he'd shaped Griffin into a competent farrier and ironworker. When his apprenticeship was over, Griffin had stayed on long enough to earn the money to buy his own tools. Then he'd come west. Opportunity lay in the West, he'd heard. The little town of Fergus, Idaho, had given him the chance to build his smithy and run his own business. Five years later when the livery stable owner moved on, Griffin had saved enough to buy him out, so he became one of the town's most prominent business owners.

But how much of that was due to his own hard work? To hear the preacher tell it, none. It was all God's doing, and in a way, Griff could see that viewpoint. God could have kept him from succeeding. But the Almighty had blessed him and first made it possible for him to get started and later made him able to buy the livery.

Then there was Isabel Fennel. Her father was once the richest man in town. When Cyrus died, she could have hired anyone she wanted to fulfill the Wells Fargo contract, or she could have simply told Wells Fargo they needed to find a new man to oversee the Fergus branch line. But no. She'd turned to Griffin and offered it to him. He had a lot
to be thankful for. But did that mean he should turn around and put a green-as-grass girl who wasn't strong enough to control a newborn filly on the box to drive six coach horses? Griffin shuddered. “All rise, please, for the benediction.”

As they filed toward the church door, Vashti craned her neck. Griffin wasn't hard to keep track of—he stood several inches taller than anyone else in the line ahead of her.

Her friend Goldie nudged her. “Who you staring at?”

“Mr. Bane.”

“You're mooning over your new boss?”

Vashti frowned at her. “No, I most certainly am not.”

“What are you doing, then?”

“Trying to figure out how to make him let me drive the stage.”

“You might as well forget about that. He's told you more than once he won't let you.”

A lanky young man stepped into the aisle beside them. “Morning, Miss Vashti. Or should I say, ‘afternoon'?” Johnny Conway cracked a broad smile at her.

“I expect it is past noon,” Vashti said absently.

“You're one of the stagecoach drivers, aren't you?” Goldie asked, gazing up at Johnny with her overlarge blue eyes.

“Yes, ma'am. Have we met before?”

“Maybe.” Goldie fluttered her lashes. Vashti had scolded her for continuing to flirt with men since they gave up being saloon girls, but the habit seemed ingrained in Goldie. “Ever been to the Spur &

Saddle?”

“Well, sure. You're the gal who plays the pianner.” Johnny's smile slipped. “I ain't been there since they changed over—well, you know.” “That's all right,” Goldie said.

“You still work there?” Johnny asked.

“No, I work in the Paragon Emporium now, but I still board at the Spur & Saddle, same as Vashti.”

“Oh.” Johnny looked from her to Vashti and arched his eyebrows as though he expected something.

“Her name is Goldie Keller.” Men were always fascinated by Goldie's china-doll looks. Vashti didn't mind, so long as they didn't get fresh with her friend. But Goldie had been around saloons long enough that she knew how to keep most fellows in line.

“I haven't seen you in church before,” Goldie said, smiling up at him.

“Well, I don't usually stay over Sunday in Fergus. Most weeks I'm over to Murphy.”

They had reached the door. Vashti turned her back on Johnny and Goldie and shook the pastor's hand.

“Good day, Miss Edwards.” Pastor Benton always greeted the girls cheerfully, but it was his wife who soothed Vashti's heart. Though Vashti smiled at the preacher, she turned eagerly to Apphia.

“Hello, Mrs. Benton.”

“Vashti, so good to see you again. You must come visit me this week, if you have a chance.”

“I'd like that, thank you.”

“Why don't you come Tuesday afternoon, if that won't interfere with your work? I understand you have two jobs now.”

“I'm putting in a few hours at the Wells Fargo. But I could come over around two thirty.”

“Wonderful. I'll have the teakettle on.”

Vashti stepped out into the sunlight, feeling warm to her toes. Mrs. Benton genuinely cared about the ladies in this town, whether they were rich or poor, refined or crude. Vashti had seen her reach out to women many would consider among the least desirable residents of Fergus. She'd befriended the girls from both saloons back when there were two in town. At the time, Vashti had been jealous of the attention Apphia paid the girls from the Nugget. But now she understood. That was Apphia's nature: to love them all impartially. Even so, whenever she spent time with the pastor's wife, Vashti felt almost as if she were Apphia's only friend and certainly the one she loved best.

She went down the front steps. Griffin Bane had disappeared, probably going back to the livery or the smithy. She waited while Goldie greeted the Bentons. Johnny Conway didn't leave her friend's
side. He shook the pastor's hand, too, and spoke to Apphia. He came down the steps with Goldie.

“Say, Miss Vashti, why are you so keen on learning to drive?”

Vashti bristled. “I already know how to drive.”

He laughed, and it stung a little. “All right, then. Why do you want so badly to drive a stagecoach? Griff told me you've been hounding him to hire you to drive.”