Page 6 of Mail Order Mercy

“I said I would.” He carried in armload after armload until the wood box was full and rounded over the top. Then he stacked more outside the cabin wall where Dorothy could reach it without walking far through the snow.

When he finished, Dorothy stood beside the table with her hands wrapped around a tin cup. “I have coffee. It’s not much, but you’re welcome to some.”

Albert saw the small paper twist of coffee near the shelf, tied carefully as if it were worth more than gold. She had been saving it for company instead of drinking it herself. “No, thank you,” he said. “I had some at the mill.”

“You don’t have to refuse everything I offer,” Dorothy said softly.

Albert glanced at the carefully tied coffee and then at her thin hands around the cup. “And you don’t have to offer the last of what you have just to prove you still can.”

Her eyes met his then, and for a moment neither of them looked away.

Dorothy looked away first because she could not bear the kindness in his eyes. It was not pity exactly. Pity looked down. Albert looked straight at her, as if he saw the fight in her as clearly as he saw the empty shelves. That frightened her more than pity would have. Pity could be refused. Being understood was harder to turn away.

Clara looked from her mother to Albert. “Will you stay for supper?”

Dorothy’s eyes widened. “Clara, Mr. Travis is busy.”

Albert looked at the pot on the stove and knew there would not be enough. “I can stay a few minutes,” he said.

Supper was thin cornmeal mush, stretched with more water than meal. Dorothy served the children first, giving Clara and Tommy the largest portions and cooling a small spoonful at a time for Grace. Then she scraped a bit into a bowl for Albert and less into one for herself.

“I’m not very hungry,” Dorothy said when Clara looked at her bowl.

The lie tasted bitter even though she had said it for the children’s sake. Dorothy could feel the hollowness under her ribs and the weakness in her arms from nursing Grace, but she kept her spoon still. There had been a time when she and Henry had laughed over second helpings. Now she measured love in spoonfuls and gave the biggest ones away.

Albert knew a lie when hunger shaped it. He also knew better than to strip the last of Dorothy’s dignity from her in front of her children. He ate slowly, praised the meal, and talked with Tommy about sled runners until Clara stopped watching her mother’s bowl.

He noticed, too, that Dorothy waited until the children were nearly finished before lifting her own spoon. She took small bites, more concerned with whether Tommy wanted another spoonful than whether she had enough. Henry would have seen it. Henry would have put his own bowl in front of her and made a joke until she ate. Albert sat with a bowl he did not deserve and wished for one moment he could hear his friend scold him.

After supper, he thanked Dorothy as if she had set a feast before him, then stepped out into the cold with his jaw clenched so tight it ached.

Chapter Three

The morning after supper with Dorothy and the children, Albert went straight to the mercantile.

Mrs. Johnson was sweeping near the door and looked surprised to see him again so soon. “Forget something?”

“A few things,” Albert said. “Cheese. Coffee. Butter if you have it. More flour. Oats. Molasses. And something sweet.”

Mrs. Johnson paused with one hand on the shelf. “For yourself again?”

Albert met her eyes this time. “Put it on my account.”

He did not know yet how to help Dorothy accept what she needed without making her feel small. He only knew one delivery was not enough. One full wood box was not enough. One night of regret could not mend six months of absence.

Henry’s family would be warm. They would be fed. They would be cared for until Dorothy could stand without fear of the next empty shelf or cold morning.

Albert had failed his friend once. He would not fail him again.

Albert began leaving milk and eggs before dawn on Monday.

He set them on the narrow step outside Dorothy’s door and was halfway to the mill before anyone inside the cabin stirred. On Tuesday, he did the same. By Wednesday, he had just straightened from placing the covered pail beside a small basket of eggs when the door opened behind him.

Dorothy stood there with her shawl wrapped tight and her hair in a long braid over one shoulder. “Albert Travis, do you mean to sneak about my doorstep every morning like a thief who leaves things instead of taking them?”

Albert glanced at the milk, then at her. “I suppose there are worse habits.”

“I cannot repay you.” Dorothy’s voice was quiet because the children still slept, but there was nothing quiet about the pride in it. “Not for milk. Not for eggs. Not for wood. Not for all the things you have already brought.”