In Search of Serenity, page 1
Copyright
ISBN 978-1-61626-038-5
Copyright © 2010 by Pamela Griffin. All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the permission of Truly Yours, an imprint of Barbour Publishing, Inc., PO Box 721, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683.
All Scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.
All of the characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events is purely coincidental.
Our mission is to publish and distribute inspirational products offering exceptional value and biblical encouragement to the masses.
One
1939
Cedarbrook, Connecticut
Before she could scream, a red-skinned man wearing hides and feathers clapped a hand over her mouth. With her back against the wall, she stared in horror. A sudden pounding shook the door of the cabin as whoever stood on the other side demanded entrance.
Would it be another wild man, such as the Sequoia who had come to raid her father’s cabin, or one of the settlers, come to rescue her? Attempting to wrest free, she bit the hand of her captor and cried out at the top of her lungs for hel—
“Hannah!”
Hannah Thomas slashed a long scrrritch through the rest of the word, ripping through the paper with the nib of her pen. She compressed her lips in irritation.
“Hannah!”
“What is it, Abbie?” Hannah woefully eyed the ruined notepaper bearing the past hour of her hard labor.
“Mama wants you.”
“And you had to tell me that, caterwauling my name at the top of your lungs as you raced into the parlor like a feline in a catfight?” Hannah eyed her little sister sternly.
“What’s a feline?”
“A cat.”
“I wanna be a bird instead.”
“You’re neither a bird nor a cat, but sometimes you act like a little wild Indian.”
“Can I be the little Indian girl in your play? The one who makes friends with the collynith?”
“The colonist, and never mind. You’re too young to remember all the lines.”
“Am not!” Abbie crossed her arms over her chest with another pout that some thought cute but only irritated Hannah. A curious sparkle came into Abbie’s eyes. “Whatcha writing?”
“Nothing.” Hannah folded her hands over the ruined words as Abbie moved closer.
“Ooo—you’re writing them shameful stories of intreak again! Mama said stories like that are sensatial claptrap. You shouldn’t write them, Hannah.”
“There’s nothing shameful about my stories of intrigue, and they’re far from being sensational claptrap. Anyhow, it’s none of your business.”
“I’m telling Mama you’re being mean.”
“I’m not being mean. I’m being truthful. And how do you know that I might not be working on the Founder’s Day play?”
“If you were, you wouldn’t have hid it from me.”
Hannah blew out an exasperated breath. “Don’t you have something to do? Dolls to play with or imaginary tea parties to hold?”
Abbie frowned. “They’re not ’maginary. They’re real.”
“Fine. Go have one then.”
“Can’t. Mama said I have to go to bed.”
“Good idea. Go back to bed.”
“There’s toys all over the top. And my bedsheet’s all mussed up.”
“Then pick them up. And straighten your sheets.”
Abbie pouted. “I wish we had servants like Uncle Bernard does. How come we had to move to this dumb ole house, anyway?”
Hannah sympathized with her sister. She also had grown accustomed to being waited on during the five years they’d lived in her wealthy great-uncle’s manor and didn’t relish this new turn of events. Why her mother insisted that life at their great-uncle’s wasn’t beneficial for the children, Hannah couldn’t understand. But Daddy had succumbed to Mother’s wishes and bought the old Fairaday house for a song. Little wonder he’d acquired it so cheap. With the way it creaked and groaned, Hannah wondered if the place might be haunted by old Fairaday’s ghost—perhaps his entire lineage.
And now her father was paying the price for his foolish mistake. What if it had been a ghost that caused him to fall from the roof, and not the sudden shock of hearing some wild animal chatter in a tree branch near his head? She wondered what kind of tale her pen could craft from that.
“Hannah!”
Her little sister’s demand broke Hannah’s imagination from spiraling down the latest path.
“How come we had to move?”
“I don’t know, Abbie. But what’s done is done.”
“I don’t like it here.” Abbie stomped her bare foot. “I wanna go back to Uncle’s. I want Mary to pick up my clothes and toys so I don’t have to.”
You and me both, kiddo. I don’t like it here, either. She didn’t air her futile thoughts, not wanting to set Abbie off on another tangent. “You just have to learn to make the best of things.”
“I don’t want to make the best of things. I hate this place!”
The doorbell rang, to Hannah’s relief. She waited for the newcomer to be escorted into the parlor, thus putting an end to Abbie’s complaints—then remembered they had no maid and she must answer the door herself. Mother was tending to Daddy, and Hannah’s younger brothers and sisters were at school, where Abbie should be, if she hadn’t come down with the sniffles and Mama hadn’t sent her to bed. She certainly appeared recovered.
Hannah moved to receive their guest, then thought twice and grabbed up her notebook of loose-leaf papers. No sense putting temptation in Abbie’s way, though she couldn’t read well, not enough to understand the novel Hannah toiled over at every opportunity. But she didn’t want to return to find her pages colored on, either.
Holding her story close to her heart, snippets of what she wrote revolved in her mind. Theatrically she wondered if the person on the opposite side of the door was indeed her rescuer. . .or a wild man come to wreak havoc.
The thumping of her heart increased as she opened the door. A stranger stood waiting. Taller than herself by at least half a foot, with wheat-colored hair and riveting blue eyes that reminded her of the bottom of a slow flame, the man took her breath away. His fair, patrician features could be described as romantic, even angelic, but the firm set of his jaw and intensity of his gaze beneath thick sable brows gave him the air of a rogue.
Wild man or rescuer?
It was difficult to tell from appearance alone.
She blinked, and he raised his brows. At that, she realized she’d been staring while holding her story clutched to her breast. “Can I help you?” she uttered breathlessly and pulled the notebook away. Unfortunately, she didn’t have a good hold on the edges, and a shower of papers rushed to the ground between them. Still in a daze, she could only stare at the top of his hat and the broad girth of his shoulders outlined by the gray suit jacket he wore as he bent to retrieve the escaped pages of her story.
Surely, a rescuer. . .
Her face warmed as his gaze dropped to and remained on one of the papers in his hand—long enough to take a look at the first sentences, surely—but he didn’t comment. She hoped he hadn’t read any of it. He handed over the last sheaf of papers as he rose to stand. Again, she felt emotionally wrung by his intense blue gaze.
Perhaps a wild man. . .
Maybe both.
“Are you all right, mademoiselle?”
His voice, rich and warm, had the opposite effect and made her shiver.
“Yes, of course.” Recalling that she still didn’t know why he’d come to their ramshackle house, and figuring that in his herringbone suit with empty hands he didn’t look like a salesman or a workman—not that her father would agree to hire one of those—she rephrased her question. “How may I help you?”
“Actually”—he gave her a smile that threatened to make her knees melt into goo—“I came here for your family.”
“Pardon?”
“This is the Thomas residence?”
“Yes?” Her reply came wary.
“Then this is where I was told to come.” He slipped his hand inside his coat. Alarmed, Hannah backed up a step, opening her eyes as wide as they would go. Surely, he wasn’t going for his gun?
He drew his brows together in clear confusion, and she wondered if she’d gone white as a sheet. Clutching her notebook to her chest as if it were a shield of armor, she watched as he withdrew an envelope, her relief that it wasn’t a weapon helping her marginally relax. She stared at the paper he handed her.
“It won’t bite.”
At his amused tone, she snapped out of her foolish trance. “What is it exactly?”
“I’m Eric Fontaine. . .and you weren’t expecting me.” The introduction he offered in calm confidence; the rest he added with uneasy knowledge.
“No, we weren’t.” His obvious embarrassment made her feel bad for him, also easing her anxiety. “The name is familiar though. Are you a friend of my father’s?”
“My father and your father are old associates. My father sent me to help out. He heard about your father’s accident. It’s all in the letter.”
His explanation erased any lingering doubt about his character, and she took the envelope, offering him a smile and stepping aside to let him enter. “Please, com
“I thought he would have phoned by now. I apologize for coming unannounced.”
“Oh dear. There’s one mystery solved. Our phone line isn’t working. This place. . .” She gave a little shake of her head, spreading her hands in apology. “It’s not in the best of shape on a good day, and—”
“Han-nah!”
She winced at Abbie’s banshee yell and tried to cover her embarrassment with a short laugh. “My little sister. She stayed home from school because she had a smidgeon of a temperature. She’s been restless all day.”
“Han-nah!” Abbie shot around the corner and stopped in surprise to see their guest. “Who are you?”
Hannah sighed. “What do you want, Abbie?”
“Mama said you’re to go up there right away.”
“Oh right. I forgot.” She turned to the man she wasn’t yet sure how to classify, as friend or foe. Surely, if he came to help, he was their rescuer and not a rogue. “The parlor’s through there. Make yourself comfortable—well, as comfortable as you can. The room’s rather cold. It’s certainly not the Ritz, not that I’ve been there. But, well, it’s a wonder this place doesn’t fall down around our heads. I’ll just go give Father your letter. I’ll be back shortly.”
She bounced from one topic to another, as she often did when nervous or excited, then bit her tongue to prevent further rambling. With a parting nod, she exited the room. The moment she left his line of vision, she raced upstairs, too excited to share with her parents the news of their unexpected caller to walk at a more sedate pace.
❧
Eric took a seat on the edge of a lumpy sofa, curbing the strong impulse to walk out the front door. The drafty house and uncomfortable surroundings didn’t bother him; he was accustomed to sparser conditions. What made him ill at ease was the intent inspection he now received from the child who sat in a nightdress on a chair across from him, her legs too short for her bare feet to reach the ground as she swung them like small pendulums back and forth, back and forth. . . .
And stared.
He glanced away several times. He should be accustomed to children, but the unusual circumstances of his arrival put him on edge. He threaded the brim of his hat through his fingers.
“So,” he said in an attempt to fill the uneasy silence, “your name is Abbie?”
A narrow-eyed nod was his reply.
“How old are you, Abbie?”
“Almost six.”
“Really? I have a sister your age. Her name is Marguerite. We call her Merry, because she laughs a lot and likes to play games. Do you like to play games?”
This time her nod didn’t seem as if it veiled a spitting kitten.
“Merry likes to hold tea parties. We run a mission, and sometimes she holds them with a few of our guests who’ve become like family.”
A spark of reluctant curiosity lit her dark eyes. “What’s a mission?”
“A place where people go to get help.”
“Papa doesn’t want no man’s help. He said so.”
Eric wondered just how welcome he would be at the Thomas residence. His father had led him to believe a pair of willing hands would be appreciated.
“Has your family lived here long?”
She shrugged. “I don’t like this place. It smells funny. And nothing works right.”
Eric withheld a smile, her little miseries reminding him of something his youngest brother might say. “Old houses do tend to have a musty odor. But what would you say if, assuming your daddy gives permission, I make things work right again?”
Curiosity warred with suspicion in her eyes. “How?”
“I have some experience fixing up old places.”
“This place is really, really old.”
He grinned. “I have experience with those places, too. The mission my family owns is really, really old.”
For the first time, the girl smiled. “Are Merry’s tea parties ’maginary?”
“Imaginary?”
“Like people in the stories Hannah writes.”
“Ah.” His smile grew. “No, I would have to say they’re very real.”
Two
Hannah stood at the foot of her father’s bed, curiously watching his face lose color, then flush darker as he read the letter. She wondered what Eric’s father had written and almost wished she had slipped the contents from the envelope earlier, to see for herself.
Her father’s lips thinned as he lowered the paper, his eyes lifting to Hannah. “He’s downstairs?”
“Yes. I left him in the parlor.”
“Tell him thanks, but we don’t need his help.”
“Bill, you must not speak so.”
Her mother stood by his bedside, her bearing as regal as ever, her fluid voice soothing to hear after his terse words. Hannah often wished she could emulate her mother who behaved like the princess her name, Sarah, meant. But Hannah didn’t come close, her behavior too strong-willed and animated to be compared to quiet aristocracy. Her great-grandfather may have been chieftain of his tribe on the island where her mother was born and lived the greater part of her life, as the only child of an island princess and an American missionary. Yet though such royalty existed in Hannah’s bloodline, regrettably any outward manner of the nobles would never reign in Hannah.
“With winter soon here and your need of recuperation, any help this young man could give would be welcome,” her mother continued quietly.
Her father glanced from her mother to Hannah, his manner furtive. Her mother followed suit and addressed her. “Hannah, please go downstairs and tell Mr. Fontaine that I’ll be down shortly to receive him.”
Disappointed to be dismissed yet again, she stubbornly hesitated. Why were so many secrets kept from her? What about the intriguing man downstairs did Hannah’s father not want her to hear? At her mother’s raised eyebrows, she whirled on her heel and left the room.
Seventeen years old and they still treated her as a child!
She brought the door to a close, losing her grip on the notebook. Her precious story fluttered to the floor. Aggravated, she bent to retrieve it, the door barely ajar. Her parents must not have heard the rustle of pages, for they resumed their conversation, unaware Hannah knelt close by.
“I won’t have any son of his under my roof!” Her father used a harsh tone she’d rarely heard, except when events went beyond his control. Like when the doctor told him he must remain in bed several weeks to allow the break in his leg to heal.
“He told you he has changed when you last saw him,” her mother replied in her quiet, logical way.
“That was over ten years ago! How do I know it’s true? That he hasn’t reverted to his old schemes and taught his offspring the same? What if this is all some huge con of Eric’s for power or revenge? He was a master at manipulation. He knew tricks I’d never dreamed of.”
“You have changed.” The reminder was delivered gently. “Besides, what would he have to be vengeful of? You saved his life. He saved yours.”
Stunned, Hannah stopped gathering papers. Eric Fontaine Sr. had saved her father’s life? From whom? The Piccoli gang?
She knew little of her father’s past—only that he’d been the target of a mobster long ago when he washed up on her mother’s island. There, he found the Lord through Hannah’s grandfather. But the mobster who had been pursuing him, Vittorio Piccoli, struck out in revenge against Hannah’s father once he returned to America with his new wife, and as a result, her mother had almost died, like their child she’d been carrying. Those facts Hannah overheard one night, many years before, when all the children were thought to be in bed asleep and her parents were visiting with Uncle Brent and Aunt Darcy, Aunt Charleigh and Uncle Stewart. The adults had quietly been reliving the past after a few of them had gone to see Eric Sr. that day, having received the startling news of his proximity through a guest visiting the Refuge. Any other details regarding her father’s life before Christ had been omitted from Hannah’s curious knowledge.
Though she knew she shouldn’t, she gathered the papers more slowly while craning her ear to the door, eager to hear more of the past she’d never known.
“Sarah, there’s one thing I learned when it came to dealing with a man like Eric Fontaine, and that is the moment you begin to trust him is the moment you’ve put your life in jeopardy.”
