Her Hesitant Heart. Carla Kelly

correctly. “Mrs. Hopkins, you are in no danger! When I finish organizing this little work party, I’ll introduce you to Nick Martin. There is no prisoner who will do anything other than what he is told, once Nick fixes the stink eye on them.”

      She looked in the post surgeon’s eyes. “You’re going to keep me safe, aren’t you?” she asked.

      “To quote your cousin, the profane Stanley, ‘Damn straight,’” he told her. “I doubt we’ll ever have another teacher with three years’ matriculation at Oberlin College. You’re valuable.”

      With a nod, Major Randolph left her in the dusty room. She watched his jaunty stride to the adjutant’s office, and then across the parade ground to the guardhouse, a man on a mission. The room was cold, but she took off her coat anyway, and her bonnet. Standing on the stool, she unhooked the draperies from the metal rods and sent them to the floor in a cloud of dust. “‘You’re valuable,’” she repeated out loud. “Major Randolph says so.”

      By the time the corporal of the guard quick-marched a half dozen soldiers dressed in coats with a large P on the back into her classroom, three privates from the quartermaster department clattered up with brooms, buckets, mops and scrub brushes. The corporal found a keg somewhere and sat on it, as she handed each prisoner a broom and issued her own orders for the removal of the draperies.

      No one had anything to say—Susanna didn’t know what was proper with prisoners—so they worked in silence until the bugler blew what must have been recall from fatigue, because the men put down their brooms and mops. The corporal stood up and spoke for the first time.

      “We’ll be back here in one hour, ma’am,” he told her, as his prisoners lined up and marched out.

      “Amazing,” she said, looking around at the bare room, which smelled strongly of pine soap now. She knew it was time for luncheon; the bugle said so.

      Her stomach growled, but she sat on the stool, reluctant to return to her cousin’s quarters because she felt no welcome there. Probably Major Randolph had returned to his hospital.

      Funny she should think of him. A moment later, she heard a man clear his throat and then tap on the open door. “Meditating? Nurturing second thoughts? Hungry?” the major asked, standing there.

      “Two out of three,” she replied. “I quit second thoughts somewhere around Chicago.”

      “Excellent!” He turned around. “She’ll be pleased to see you, Katie.”

      As Susanna watched, the surgeon ushered in the woman who’d been on the porch yesterday. She was in an advanced stage of pregnancy, and possessed of lively green eyes and red hair.

      Susanna stood up and gestured to the stool. “Please have a seat.”

      The lady glanced at the surgeon. “Should I sit before I actually admit who I am?” she asked him, humor evident in her lovely brogue.

      “I suspect she knows who you are,” Randolph replied. “Let me introduce Katie O’Leary, your neighbor through the wall.”

      Susanna offered her hand, and Katie shook it before sitting down. She handed Susanna a sandwich wrapped in waxed paper. “It’s only bread and butter with a lump of government beef that I mangled with my food grinder to make it less intimidating. That is, if you’re hungry.”

      “I am. Did you bring a sandwich for yourself, Mrs. O’Leary?”

      Katie nodded and pulled a second sandwich out of a cloth bag. “I have carrots for later.” She frowned. “Major, I didn’t prepare a morsel for you.”

      Randolph held up his hand. “No worries. I think there is some kind of mystery chowder lurking in my quarters. I wanted you two to meet. I’ll be back later.”

      He turned to leave. “Major …” Susanna began.

      He looked back, with a kind expression. “Mrs. Hopkins, make no bones about this—I respond better to Joe.”

      “I couldn’t possibly,” Susanna said automatically.

      “Try it sometime,” he told her. “Until then, yes, what can I do for you?”

      “I doubt this fireplace draws well.”

      “I’ll have the quartermaster clerk send over our nearest approximation to a chimney sweep.”

      “And that would be …”

      He shrugged. “I have no idea, but I doctored two of the clerk’s children through a fearful round of diarrhea, and he will help me, by God. Good day, ladies.”

      With another nod in their direction, he left. Susanna looked at Katie O’Leary. “What do you make of that?” she asked.

      “It is simply Major Randolph,” Katie replied. She put her hand to her mouth as though trying to stop a laugh. “I don’t know that I’ve seen him quite this animated before.”

      “I couldn’t possibly call him Joe.”

      Katie shrugged, and eyed her sandwich. “I never knew Major Randolph not to mean what he says.”

      “But you call him Major Randolph!” Susanna exclaimed.

      “I do,” the woman replied simply. “He never suggested I call him Joe.” She laughed. “Let’s eat.”

      Katie unwrapped her sandwich and took a bite, rolling her eyes. “My husband, Jim, loves Fort Laramie,” she said. “There’s nowhere nearby he must run to, to satisfy my midnight food cravings.”

      “I take it you have other children,” Susanna said, enjoying the pleasant lilt to her companion’s voice. She took a bite of the sandwich and decided the government beef had been helped along magnificently by sweet relish. “Nice sandwich, Mrs. O’Leary.”

      “It’s Katie,” the other woman said. “Surely we can stand on less ceremony than you choose with Major Randolph. I suppose your cousin has other names for me.”

      Susanna felt her face grow warm. Before she could comment, Katie touched her arm.

      “No fears! Jim is certain she calls us the trolls through the wall. We have one son, Rooney.” She patted her belly. “And another soon.”

      “Your son …”

      “… is home with my servant,” Katie finished. “Your cousin envies me because servants are hard to keep. Mary Martha is a corporal’s wife who helps me during the day.” She winked. “She’s Irish, too. I have it on good authority that she prefers me to your cousin.”

      “Will you have any children in my school?”

      Katie nodded. “Rooney is six, and he will go. I’ve taught him his letters and he can count to twenty-five.” She ate the last of her sandwich and pulled out a sack of carrots. “Yes, I can read and write, and no, we don’t swear through the walls to trouble little Stanley.”

      “Emily has always enjoyed an exalted opinion of her own gentility,” Susanna said. “Stanley and I have had a few plain words about his bad habit, which you and I know can be blamed on his father!”

      “That expression ‘swear like a trooper’ had to come from somewhere,” Katie joked. “What should I do? You may have my afternoon.”

      That’s a charming way to put it, Susanna decided. No one except Katie O’Leary and Major Randolph have given me anything lately.

      They decided Katie would sweep the floor while Susanna washed the windows. The corporal of the guard returned with two prisoners who wiped down the desks, then left. Susanna perched on a ladder to reach the top of the tall windows, balancing a bucket of ammonia and water on the crosspiece.

      “If you make it too clean, some lieutenant will claim it for his own quarters and eject you and your pupils,” Katie told her as she scrubbed.

      “Over my dead body!” Susanna