Free A Heart for Home by Lauraine Snelling Page A

some of our new workers are family men, that will really stretch the space. We’ll have to add another classroom, and we’ll need another teacher, who will need a house.”
    Thorliff clapped Joshua on the shoulder. “Thanks for taking over a crew like you have. We appreciate it. See you in the morning. Oh, and let me know what you decide. I’ll probably send the order in a day or two.”
    Joshua looked after him and headed for the boardinghouse. More decisions to make. Sometimes he wished he were back on the traveling crew that dug wells and erected windmills. Less pressure and less people. He had run the first crew with Trygve and Gilbert. Built the wagon too. Life on the road like that had been good. But when Thorliff asked him to leave that and head the construction crew, he’d agreed. The pay was better, but mostly, he’d be near Astrid. Until he blew up at her over the Indian question. But still, his greatest wish was for Astrid to overlook his failings and agree to become his wife. Maybe he should just walk away from all this and go down to South Dakota and talk with her. If he had an address he would write a letter, but as far as he knew, they might be back before a letter could reach them – if he even could find an address. Sometimes the mountain called despair pitched too steeply to continue to climb. Why, oh why, had he allowed his temper to take over?

7
    R OSEBUD I NDIAN R ESERVATION
S OUTH D AKOTA
    Why did two weeks feel like an eternity?
    Astrid gazed around the infirmary, where three children sat listening to Shy Fawn tell a story while Gray Smoke kept changing the wet cloths on the latest measles victim. Along with her measles patients, she had two people with eye problems and one with an ear infection, along with the brave, who was improving, but they still struggled to keep his coughing under control.
    She’d asked her father to build a slanted board so He Who Walks Tall could sit up a bit and breathe more easily. When that helped, he built two more and padded them with hides. An older woman was using one, and the other was shared among several of the others. If only she could hold the adults over a steaming kettle as she did the children. Once they were strong enough to stand, she demonstrated what to do, and they did it.
    Her attention kept returning to He Who Walks Tall, whose pallet was separated from the others. Haakan had taken over caring for him to free up the two women who’d worked so tirelessly. What good nurses they would make for Dr. Red Hawk when he returned. If only she could take them with her to Blessing and give them some real training in medical procedures, like dressing wounds, listening to hearts and lungs, and assisting in surgeries. She also wished she could learn what they knew. If only they had an interpreter. If only she had learned the language from Metiz. She turned at the hacking cough that had awakened the brave.
    Going out to the kettle simmering on the edge of the fire pit, she dipped out some soup and carried the gourd back to him. “Drink this. It seems to help.”
    He reached for the gourd.
    “I’m grateful you understand me.”
    Dark eyes studied her over the rim of the drinking gourd. Red Hawk all over again. When the man gave an abrupt nod, she smiled and nodded back. “Good. I am hoping you can help me.”
    His eyes changed, as if shutters had slammed down over windows.
    So much for that idea. “Do you know Red Hawk?”
    A nod and more drinking. He cleared his throat and drank again.
    “Are you related to him?”
    Another nod.
    “I wondered, because you so strongly remind me of him.” Please, Lord, let him be willing to help us. “A brother?” She’d have missed the shake of his head had she not been watching him, albeit as unobtrusively as possible. “Cousin?”
    “Yes.”
    Why would hearing just one spoken word feel like she’d received a medal? “Red Hawk will be a good doctor to his people. He is the one who asked us to come. He wrote a