Angel Sister (Rosey Corner Book #1) , livre ebook

Baker Publishing Group - H. Gabhart Ann

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160 pages

English

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Description

It is 1936 and Kate Merritt, the middle child of Victor and Nadine, works hard to keep her family together. Her father slowly slips into alcoholism and his business suffers during the Great Depression. As her mother tries to come to grips with their situation and her sisters seem to remain blissfully oblivious to it, it is Kate who must shoulder the emotional load. Who could imagine that a dirty, abandoned little girl named Lorena Birdsong would be just what the Merritts need?In this richly textured novel, award-winning author Ann H. Gabhart reveals the power of true love, the freedom of forgiveness, and the strength to persevere through troubled times. Multidimensional characters face real and trenchant problems while maintaining their family bonds, all against the backdrop of a sultry Kentucky summer. Readers will be drawn into the story and find themselves lingering there long after they've finished the book.

Sujets

Historical fiction

Informations

Publié par	Baker Publishing Group
Date de parution	01 février 2011
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781441214218
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0432€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

Angel Sister
A Novel
Ann H. Gabhart
© 2011 by Ann H. Gabhart
Published by Revell
a division of Baker Publishing Group
P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287
www.revellbooks.com
E-book edition created 2010
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means for example, electronic, photocopy, recording without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
ISBN 978-1-4412-1421-8
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of
Congress, Washington, DC.
Scripture used in this book, whether quoted or paraphrased by the characters, is taken from the King James Version of the Bible.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Contents
Cover
Title
Copyright
Dedication
1 2 3 4 5
6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25
26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35
36 37 38 39 40
41 42 43 44
Author’s Acknowledgments and Notes
About the Author
Other Books by Author
Back Ads
To my mother, Olga,
and in memory of her sisters, Evelyn, Margaret, and Bill,
who shared their memories of growing up
during the Depression years and made this story possible.
1
______
Something woke Kate Merritt. Her eyes flew open and her heart began to thump in her ears. She couldn’t see a thing. Not even a hint of moonlight was filtering through the lace curtains at the bedroom window. The dark night wrapped around her like a thick blanket as she stared up toward her bedroom ceiling and fervently hoped it was nothing but a bad dream shaking her awake.
Next to Kate, Evie’s breath was whisper quiet. Her sister obviously hadn’t heard whatever it was that had jerked Kate from sleep. Slowly Kate’s eyes began adjusting to the darkness, but she didn’t need to see to know how Evie’s red hair would be spread around her head like a halo. Or that even in sleep she’d have a death grip on the top sheet so Kate couldn’t pull it off her. Kate always woke up every day with her pillow on the floor and her hair sticking out in all directions. The total opposite of Evie, who got up with barely a rumple in her nightgown.
Just a couple of mornings ago, their mother had laughed as she smoothed down Kate’s tangled dark brown hair. “Don’t you worry about not being as ladylike as Evangeline. Your sister’s going on seventeen. When you get older, you’ll be more like her.”
Kate jerked away from her mother. “Like Evie? I don’t have to be, do I? That would be awful. Really awful,” she said before she thought. Kate was always doing that. Saying things before she thought.
But she didn’t want to be like Evie. Ever. Evie wouldn’t climb trees or catch frogs down at the creek. She even claimed to prefer reading inside by the oil lamp instead of playing hide-and-seek after dark. The truth was she was scared of her shadow.
Evie wasn’t only worried about things in the dark. Day or night she shrieked if anybody so much as mentioned Fern Lindell. True, Fern who lived down the road was off her rocker, but Kate wasn’t a bit afraid of her. At least not unless she was carrying around her little axe. Then anybody with any sense knew to stay away from her.
One thing sure, Kate had sense. That was because she was the middle sister, and the middle sister had to learn early on to take care of herself. And not only herself. Half the time she had to take care of Evie too, and all the time Tori who turned ten last month.
In the cot across the room, Tori was breathing soft and peaceful. So Tori hadn’t been what woke Kate, but something had. Kate raised her head up off her pillow and listened. The middle sister had to make sure everything was all right.
Kate didn’t mind. She might be only fourteen, but she knew things. She kept her eyes and ears open and did what had to be done. Of course sometimes it might be better to be like Evie, who had a way of simply ignoring anything that didn’t fit into her idea of how things should be, or Tori, who didn’t worry about much except whether she could find enough worms to go fishing. Neither of them was holding her breath waiting to see if the bump in the night might be their father sneaking in after being out drinking.
Victor Merritt learned to drink in France. At least that’s what Kate overheard Aunt Hattie telling Mama a few months back. They didn’t know she heard them. She was supposed to be at school, but she’d run back home to get the history report she left on the table by the front door. Kate tiptoed across the porch and inched the door open to keep it from creaking. She aimed to grab the paper and be in and out without her mother hearing her. That way she’d only be in hot water at school and not at home too.
They didn’t know she was there. Not even Aunt Hattie, who just about always knew everything. After all, she’d delivered nearly every baby who’d been born in Rosey Corner since the turn of the century thirty-six years ago. A lot of folks avoided Aunt Hattie unless a baby was on the way or they needed somebody to do their wash, but not Mama. She said you might not be able to depend on a lot in this world, but you could depend on Aunt Hattie telling you the truth. Like it or not.
That morning last spring when Kate had crept back in the house and heard her mother and Aunt Hattie, it sounded as if Kate’s mother wasn’t liking a lot of things. She was crying. The sound pierced Kate and pinned her to the floor right inside the door. She hardly dared breathe.
She should have grabbed the paper and gone right back out the door. That was what she should have done, but instead she stood still as a stone and listened. Of course she knew her father drank. Everybody in Rosey Corner knew that. Nothing stayed secret long in their little community. Two churches, one school, two general stores the one run by Grandfather Merritt had a gasoline pump and her father’s blacksmith shop.
“But why?” Kate’s mother said between sobs.
Aunt Hattie didn’t sound cross the way she sometimes did when people started crying around her. Instead she sounded like she might be about to cry herself. Kate couldn’t remember ever seeing Aunt Hattie cry. Not even when she talked about her son dying in the war over in France.
“Some answers we can’t be seein’, Nadine. We wasn’t over there. But our Victor was. Men right beside him died. He got some whiffs of that poison gas those German devils used. He laid down on the cold hard ground and stared up at the same moon you was starin’ up at but without the first idea of whether or not he’d ever be looking at it with you again. He couldn’t even be sure he’d see the sun come up.”
“No, no, that’s not what I meant.” Kate’s mother swallowed back her tears, and her voice got stronger, more like Kate was used to hearing. “I mean, why now? I grant you he started drinking over there, but when he got home, he didn’t drink all that much. Just a nip now and again, but lately he dives into the bottle like he wants to drown in it.”
“It ain’t got the first thing to do with you, child. He still loves his girls.” Now Aunt Hattie’s voice was soft and kind, the voice she used when she was talking to some woman about to have a baby.
“The girls perhaps. Me, I’m not so sure anymore.” Kate couldn’t see her mother, but she knew the look that would be on her face. Her lips would be mashed together like she had just swallowed something that tasted bad.
“You can be sure. I knows our Victor. I’s the first person to ever lay eyes on him when he come into the world. And a pitiful sight he was. Barely bigger than my hand. His mama, Miss Juanita, had trouble carryin’ her babies. We lost the two before Victor. You remember Miss Juanita. How she was prone to the vapors. She was sure we would lose Victor even after he made the journey out to daylight and pulled in that first breath, but no how was I gonna let that happen. Raised him right alongside my own boy. Bo was four when our Victor was born.”
Kate heard a chair creak as if maybe her mother had shifted to get more comfortable. Everybody knew it wasn’t any use trying to stop Aunt Hattie when she started talking about her boy. “My Bo was a sturdy little feller. Stronger and smarter than most. Soon’s Victor started walking, Bo took it upon hisself to watch out for him. Miss Juanita paid him some for it once he got older.” Aunt Hattie paused as if realizing she’d gone a little far afield. “Anyhows that’s how I knows Victor hasn’t stopped carin’ about you, girl, ‘cause I know our Victor. He’s just strugglin’ some now what with the way things is goin’ at his shop. Folks is wantin’ to drive those motorcars and puttin’ their horses out to pasture. It ain’t right, but a pile of things that happen ain’t right.”
Kate expected Aunt Hattie to start talking about Bo dying in France, but she didn’t. Instead she stopped talking altogether, and it was so quiet that Kate was sure they’d hear her breathing. She wanted to step backward, out the door, but she had to wait until somebody said something. The only noise was the slow tick of the clock on the mantel and the soft hiss of water heating on the cooking stove. Nothing that would cover up the sound of her sneaking out of the house.
Kate was up to fifty-five ticks when her mother finally spoke again. “I don’t believe in drinking alcohol to hide from your problems.”
“No way you could with how your own daddy has been preaching against that very thing since the beginnin’ of time. Preacher Reece, he don’t cut nobody no slack.”
“There are better ways of handling troubles than making more troubles by drinking too much.” Mama’s voice didn’t have the first hint of doubt in it.
“I ain’t arguing with you, Nadine. I’s agreein’ all the way.”
“Then what am I supposed