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He and Thomson shared the breakfast table with Jeb, Mrs. Thomson having taken her breakfast in her suite. The men watched Jeb attack another two hotcakes, and Mr. Thomson chuckled.
“I’ve forgotten what an appetite growing boys are endowed with. I’d hate to be in your shoes when the lad turns thirteen or so. Jenkins,” he said, addressing the butler, “tell cook to make sure she packs enough food to see these two men all the way home this afternoon. They’ll need plenty,” he added, grinning at Jeb.
“I appreciate your kindness, sir,” Nathaniel said. “As soon as the boy is done, we’ll be on our way if you could direct me to Mr. Carnegie’s office.”
“Do better than that, son. I’ll take you there. You drive your wagon, follow my carriage.”
Nathaniel opened his mouth to thank the man again when Thomson held up a hand. “No ‘thanks.’ It’s getting tedious. I know you’re grateful, but any more gratitude, my head won’t be fitting through those doors there,” he said, indicating the double doors that led into the dining room from the parlor.
“Besides, we should be thanking you for your service during the war. My wife had a hard time falling asleep last night, thinking about how hard it must have been for you to see your men fall in battle. It’s difficult choices we make and have to live with. All we can do is the best we can do. Sometimes Fate just has to be allowed to play itself out. There’s reasons for everything that happens, son. Reasons some people die and others live. Reasons we don’t always figure out until much later, if ever. Let’s just leave it that I know you’re thinking ‘Thank you,’ and I’m thinking the same. All right?”
Nathaniel nodded, impressed by the man’s graciousness. Thomson motioned to the butler to refill their coffee and Jeb’s milk.
*****
Nathaniel and Thomson were ushered in to Carnegie’s office as soon as they arrived. Several of the desks in the outer office were empty. Nathaniel assumed Carnegie had given his employees leave for the holiday. For a millionaire, Andrew Carnegie’s own office, huge though it was, was furnished much more modestly than Nathaniel expected, despite the large desk near the window. On closer inspection though, he could see the desk was ornately carved. Carnegie waved them to leather chairs set around a round table at the far end of the room, away from the desk.
“Happy Christmas, Edgar, Colonel. Jeb,” he added. “Would you like anything?” he offered.
“No, thanks,” Nathaniel answered, and wondered how to broach the subject of the money he hoped to receive. He needn’t have worried.
“Jeb, would you like to draw? I have plenty of paper and pencils. Maybe even some colored pencils you could use.”
Jeb’s eyes lit up and his grin nearly split his face in two. “Would I! Sir,” he hastily added. “I only once had a chance to use colored pencils! I would like that ever so much.”
Carnegie directed his secretary to bring the supplies, and took Jeb’s hand, led him to the great desk. He lifted the boy up himself, settled him in the high-backed chair. “Now you can see what it’s like to direct a big business. Make your fortune.”
He smiled at the boy, ruffled his hair once, then crossed the room back to where Nathaniel and Thomson sat, waiting. “Well, Colonel. Your plight, and that of Mrs. Treymont, is dire. But it is exactly the kind of thing that those of us who are more fortunate must see to. I adhere to certain principles, one of which is that I take what I need for my own needs, and share a substantial amount with those less well-off than I. I’ve been thinking of setting aside thirty thousand dollars a year for charitable use. As my wealth increases, so will that amount. I believe it is my duty to help others, since I’ve been so blessed.”
“That’s a most generous way of thinking,” Nathaniel said, firmly squelching the hope that he could get thirty thousand dollars.
“I also believe in helping a man to help himself,” he added. “Give him the capital to start things going so he can be self-sufficient afterwards.”
Nathaniel could only nod.
“That pertains to women, too, I might add, though I like to see a man helping her out. Life can be very hard for a single woman. And especially a woman who has undertaken a project like Mrs. Treymont has.”
“It is a tremendous thing she is doing,” Nathaniel agreed.
Carnegie studied him for a few moments. Then looked at Jeb, and back to Nathaniel. “He’s not your son, is he?”
Nathaniel took a deep breath. Was he to lose it all before he even got it because he didn’t correct an assumption? He shook his head. “No, he’s not. He is one of Mrs. Treymont’s orphans. The first one actually.” He looked down at Jeb, sitting so quietly across the room, engrossed in his pictures. “Although I will confess that lately, I’ve been feeling more like a father than a neighbor.”
“Do you know the boy’s story?”
Nathaniel dropped his gaze, worried. Should he tell all? Then again, if these men were going to help him, they deserved to know the whole truth. They hadn’t shied away from his own history. He could only hope they would be as understanding of Melanie’s. And so, with a deep breath, he quietly told Jeb’s-and through it, Melanie’s-story.
He finished the tale, looked up at Carnegie. “The boy needed care, and she stepped in to be his mother.”
“Yes, I thought so. Do you love her, Colonel?”
Nathaniel startled and furrowed his brow. “Why do you ask?”
Carnegie tilted his head, examined Nathaniel’s face. “You’ve taken on a big responsibility, helping her and her children. It’s not something most men would have done. I expect most men would have run for the hills as soon as they met her. But you’ve stepped right in, helped out, done things one would expect of a husband. I’m just wondering if you love her.”
Nathaniel looked from Carnegie to Thomson and across to Jeb, who raised his head upon hearing the question. “She would be very easy to love,” Nathaniel said, hedging. “She’s a woman of strength, integrity and boundless love. And beautiful, too,” he added with a warm smile. “Yes, she would be very easy to love.”
Carnegie studied his face for long moments while Thomson leaned over to his friend. “I told you so, Andrew. It’s the right thing. They’re the right people.”
Carnegie nodded, got up and crossing the enormous room, took a file from the corner of his desk. “I must tell you, although he couldn’t be here this morning for this meeting, Mr. Scott has taken a hand in our decision as well. Thomson here and I have taken the liberty of gathering a few papers in advance of our meeting this morning,” he started, at once the successful businessman Nathaniel had expected.
*****
Nathaniel drove home in a daze. Only Jeb’s constant chatter kept him grounded at all. The papers Carnegie had given him that morning lay tucked in his knapsack, but their words were burned into his brain. Forever, he suspected.
They stopped halfway to eat the lunch the Thomson’s cook had prepared for them. It was enough to feed three grown men, but Nathaniel had to smile as he watched Jeb wolf down a fair portion of it. Growing boy, indeed, he thought warmly. He could put a serious dent in Bossy’s milk supply all by himself.
Though it was only late afternoon, dusk was fast approaching and they were just passing the church and rectory. The priest must have been watching for them, for as they passed he ran out and waved them down.
“I hoped I could catch you going past,” he said, breathless from the short run to the road. “Please wait here.”
He hustled back into the rectory, returned with a small bundle in his arms. A squalling bundle.
“This young’un’ was left on the church steps this afternoon,” he panted. “I wanted to bring her to Mrs. Treymont, but, well, with getting ready for services tonight and all, and she was sleeping so soundly for a bit... Would you take her with you? I know you have little room for another, but I can’t care for her here, even with Mrs. Grinkov’s help. Please?”
Fifteen, now, was all Nathaniel thought as he smilingly accepted the small bundle. That’s a nice, round number.
“I’ll need your help, Jeb,” he said, looking from him to the infant. “Think you can handle it?”
He smiled as Jeb swallowed hard, his eyes wide and a bit afraid. “I’ll try, sir. I never held a baby before, though.”
“Nothing to it,” Nathaniel said, hoping he hid his own trepidation. He’d never held a newborn either, but it couldn’t be that hard, could it? Besides, he couldn’t drive the wagon and hold the babe at the same time. He settled the infant in Jeb’s arms, arranging him so his small arms were supported from underneath and wrapped the blanket securely around the two of them.
It was full dark when he pulled into the drive of his own home and Benjamin and Bernard rushed out from the barn to greet them. They were quickly followed by Emma, Lorna, and Miriam. A moment later, Melanie came out, wiping her hands on an apron.
“You came back,” she said simply.
“Did you think I wouldn’t?” he asked her, drawing her into his arms and hugging her. He released her, turned to the wagon where Jeb still sat, holding what probably looked like a bundle of blankets. He took the bundle from the boy and passed it to Melanie. “I had to come back, to give you this. The reverend found her this afternoon, and well-she needs you. But more importantly, I need you. I wanted to come back. To you. To them,” he said, looking at the children that had assembled around them.
“I was so afraid...I thought you thought I wasn’t fit to-that I wouldn’t be a proper mother-what with Jeremy, and all and...
“I was so afraid,” she whispered.
Nathaniel smiled down at her, seeing, it seemed for the first time, the soft eyes, the delicate nose and full lips. He bent his head and gently kissed those lips. “Don’t ever be afraid again. Fate has finally revealed the reason we’re here.”
She looked at him quizzically, but Nathaniel could only chuckle as she absently rocked the infant in her arms. He pulled out his knapsack and withdrew the papers from Andrew Carnegie.
“Mr. Carnegie, Mr. Scott, and Mr. Thomson in Pittsburg have given us a Christmas gift,” he started, and one by one, held up the papers.
“First, the deed to the property of the old orphanage. There won’t be any ‘foundling’ built there. There will be a new orphanage built instead.”
Melanie’s mouth gaped open. “How...?”
“Second,” he went on, grinning, “we are to buy more livestock. Enough cows for milk and cheese for—fifteen I think it is now? children, enough chickens for eggs to eat and to sell, pigs, horses to plow the extra fields he’s given us to plant with vegetables both for ourselves and to sell, and so much more. Melanie, our farm just tripled in size.”
“How are we supposed to do this?” she asked.
“With this,” he said, withdrawing the last paper he had purposely been holding back. He handed her a check, made out in her name, for seventy-five thousand dollars.
“My God,” she whispered. “Nathaniel, is this real?”
“Doesn’t get any more real,” he answered, grinning.
*****
Their dinner benefited from more of the Thomson cook’s largesse, which turned out to be a blessing as all the children made their way to the farm, brought back by their caretakers to celebrate the night together again. But the only place large enough for them all to fit was out in the barn. Everyone trooped out there, Benjamin and Bernard helping William to go out to a stable he hadn’t been inside of for three years. He looked around in approval. “Knew you boys would take good care of things.”
It seemed only fitting that as they all settled on hay bales and upturned buckets, they started talking of all they wanted to do with the money.
“Now,” Melanie said. “This is Christmas Eve, and while we are benefiting from Mr. Carnegie’s and Mr. Thomson’s and Mr. Scott’s generosity, we should remember what the day is all about. Tomorrow is Jesus’ birthday, remember. He was born in a stable much like this one.”
“Tell the story,” Emma asked. “I always love to hear it.”
And so, Melanie told it—the real reason they were all together.
Partway through it, someone knocked on the stable door. William, nearest to it, softly called out, “Open it.”
A young man poked his head in. “This the Walker place?”
At William’s nod, the man asked, “Colonel Walker and Mrs. Treymont here?”
Again, William nodded, and motioned to Nathaniel to come over.
The young man stood, cap in hand. “We’re sorry to interrupt, sir, but we have a delivery to make.”
“From whom?” Nathaniel asked. “I didn’t order anything.”
“It’s from the ladies, sir. Mrs. Thomson, Mrs. Scott and Mrs. Carnegie. They sent it all for you and the children. It’s their Christmas gift to you.”
“Melanie, I think you need to come here,” he called as he looked out the open door.
In his driveway stood four wagons, loaded to near overflowing. As they stood in the doorway together watching, the men pulled back the tarps on each wagon. Underneath them were packages of all shapes and sizes.
“The ladies said to tell you there’s clothes in here, boys’ and girls’ of all kinds of sizes. Toys, too. And books and new slates. Some things for you, too, Ma’am,” he added. Then he looked out at the children ranged behind them. “Who’s Miriam?” he called.
The little one held onto Benjamin’s hand and quietly said, “I am.”
He smiled at her. “I’ve got a special package for you.” He reached under the seat of his wagon, pulled out a bundle wrapped in soft wool and tied with a ribbon. “It’s a blanket,” he said, and handed it to her.
Miriam pulled at the ribbon and the blanket fell open, revealing a perfect dolly with flaxen hair and a red dress. “Oooh,” she said, eyes bulging and immediately hugging it to her chest. “Thank you.” She seemed lost in thought a moment, then asked him, “Are you St. Nicholas?”
The man laughed. “I wish I was. No, I’m just a delivery man, who needs to get home to his family. Happy Christmas, everyone,” he said, waving, and turned to leave.
“Wait! Your wagons!” Melanie called.
“That’s part of the gift, ma’am,” he said.
For the first time, Melanie noted the horses tied behind each wagon. Each of the drivers untied a horse and mounted, waved to them all and left.
“I don’t believe you did all this,” she said to Nathaniel.
“I didn’t do this,” he said, indicating the wagons. “But I understand now why the ladies were so eager for information about you and the children and everything.
“Mr. Andrew asked Colonel Walker if he loved you,” Jeb piped up.
“Did he?” Melanie asked. She glanced at Nathaniel’s face in question.
“You want to know what I said,” Nathaniel stated. He took hold of one of her hands, put his other on the infant she still held. “I told him the truth. That you would be very easy to love. Very easy, indeed.”
“As would you,” she murmured. “You are an amazing man, Nathaniel Walker. With this gift, we can start building.”
“Yes. I think it’s time we both start building-a life. Together if you’ll have me. But for right now, I’ll settle for building a Christmas for these children.”
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, to all of it. And you.”
The End
Be sure to check out Patricia Bond’s full-length historical romance, By Love’s Honor Bound, available soon from your favorite ebook retailer.
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By Love’s Honor Bound