Mission of Hope. Allie Pleiter

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СКАЧАТЬ must she live that horrible morning over and over when she closed her eyes? Nora moaned and leaned back against her pallet in the parlor of her aunt’s Lafayette Park home where she’d been camped since the earthquake. She was soaked with sweat, and although it was nearly dawn, she felt as if she had not slept at all. Still, she couldn’t let that stop her. Today was too important a day. Nora swung her legs over the edge of the cot and raked her fingers through her hair. “I’m going to the rally,” she said to her mother. “I think Papa needs me.”

      Chapter One

      It was her. It had to be. It was the eyes that made him certain, even from this distance.

      Quinn Freeman stared harder at the young woman—not much more than twenty from the look of it—sitting uncomfortably onstage. She was trying to pay attention to the long rally speeches honoring the city’s recovery, but not quite succeeding. And the speeches were surely long. Politicians fought banks who fought insurance companies and everyone nursed a grudge over how things had been handled. The most eloquent speech on God’s green earth couldn’t explain how one man was still alive while another’s life had come to an end. The uncertainty of everything made for chaos.

      Still, she was here. By some astounding act of God, she was here. And what a sight she was. Even in the gray light of this cloudy morning, she looked clean and pretty, and he hadn’t seen anything clean and pretty in days.

      It was the eyes, really, that captured his attention. Round and wide, framed with golden lashes. Even in the brown tint of the charred photo he’d found, he’d somehow known they were an unusual color. Something between a blue and a violet, now that he saw them. The color of the irises Ma was fond of in one of the city gardens.

      Quinn fished into his pocket for the battered locket he’d found last week as he walked home from yet another insufferably long bread line. He’d seen it glint in the corner of a rubble pile just south of Nob Hill, a tiny sparkle in a pile of black and brown timber. Usually, Quinn was looking up; he was always looking up at the buildings—or parts of buildings—still standing, admiring how they’d survived with so much rubble marking where others had fallen. It wasn’t as if bits of lives couldn’t still be found all over the city—even months out as it was, Quinn was forever picking up one shoe or a bit of a cup or a chipped doorknob.

      This was different. There was something amazing about the fact that the locket was still shut, and that despite the soot and dents, there were still two tiny photographs inside. Two young women about his own age. Sisters? Cousins? He kept the charm in his pocket, making up a dozen stories as he worked or walked or waited, because everything now took hours longer than it had before. Yes, it was dirty and dented and the chain was broken, but the faces inside had survived an earthquake and a fire. And now he knew the people had, as well. Or at least one of them. Quinn just couldn’t ignore the hope in that.

      Reverend Bauers never called anything a coincidence. No one was ever “lucky” to Reverend Bauers—they were “called” or “blessed.” Quinn had survived the earthquake and the fire. His mother had, too. But he was beginning to wonder if he’d survive the next two months. A few months ago he’d been just another grunt down at the printing press, scratching out a living, trying to hang on to his big dreams. Then the world shook and fell over. He’d survived, but why had God kept him alive while scores of others died?

      “God does not deal in luck or happenstance,” Bauers always said to Quinn when something went their way or a need miraculously became met. “He directs, He provides and He is very fond of surprising His children.” The saying rang in Quinn’s ears when he saw the familiar face on the stage this morning. And he knew, even before he pulled the locket from his pocket and squinted as he held it up to her profile, that it was her. Well, Lord, I’m surprised, I’ll grant You that.

      When that pretty woman saw him hold up the locket, her eyes wide with amazement, he made the decision right there and then to do whatever it took to return the locket to her, to bring one thing home.

      The man fished something out of his pocket and held it up, comparing it to the face—her face—before him.

      Annette’s locket. With the elongated heart shape that was so unusual, the one Annette had picked out for her birthday last year, it just had to be. He had Annette’s locket!

      It took forever for the rally to end. The moment she could, Nora swept off her chair in search of the fastest way into the crowd. He couldn’t have missed her intent given how hard he seemed to be staring at her. Surely he would wait, perhaps even make his way toward the stage.

      The crowd milled exasperatingly thick, and Nora began to fear the man would be lost to her forever—and that last piece of Annette with him. Nora pushed as fiercely as she dared through the clusters of people, dodging around shoulders and darting through gaps.

      She could not find him. Her throat tight and one hand holding her hat to the mass of blond waves that was her unruly hair, she turned in circles, straining to see over one large man’s shoulders and finding no one.

      “This is you, isn’t it?” came a voice from behind her, and she turned with such a start that she nearly knocked the man over. He held up the locket. Nora let out a small gasp—it was so battered now that she saw it up close. The delicate gold heart was dented on one side, black soot scars still clinging to the fancy engraving and the broken chain.

      Soot. A fire seemed such a terrible, awful way to die. Nora clutched at the locket with both hands, her grief not allowing any thought for manners. The two halves of the dented heart had already been opened, revealing the remains of a pair of tiny photographs—one of her, the other of Annette. Nora put her finger to the image of Annette and thought she would cry. “Yes,” she said unsteadily, “that’s me, and that’s my cousin, Annette. However did you get this?”

      The man pushed back his hat, and a shock of straw-colored hair splashed across his forehead. “I found it last week. I’ve been looking for either one of you since then, but I didn’t really think I’d find you. I just about fell over when you walked onto the stage this morning, Miss…Longstreet, was it? The postmaster’s daughter?”

      Nora suddenly remembered her manners. “Nora Longstreet. I’m so very pleased to meet you. And so very pleased to have this back…although it isn’t…actually mine.” She felt her throat tighten up, and paused for a moment. “It’s Annette’s, and she isn’t…she’s isn’t here. Anymore.” She pulled in a shaky breath. “She died…in it.”

      “I’m sorry. Seems like everybody lost someone, doesn’t it?” He tipped the corner of his hat. “Quinn Freeman.”

      “Thank you for finding this, Mr. Freeman. It means a great deal to me.”

      Quinn tucked his hands in his pockets. He wore a simple white shirt, brown pants that had seen considerable wear and scuffed shoes, but someone had taken care to make sure they were all still clean and in the best repair possible given the circumstances. “I’m sure she would have wanted you to have it, seeing as it’s you in there and all.”

      “I’m sure my father would be happy to give you some kind of reward for returning it. Come meet him, why don’t you?”

      Quinn smiled—a slanted, humble grin that confirmed the charm his eyes conveyed—and shrugged. “I couldn’t take anything for it. I’m just glad it found its way home. Too many people lost too much not to see something back where it belongs.”

      Nora ran her thumb across the scratched surface of the locket. “Surely I can give you some reward for your kindness.”

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