One Simple Wish: A Novella

One Simple Wish

JOAN JOHNSTON

Copyright 2015 by Joan Mertens Johnston, Inc.

ISBN 978-0-9912507-1-4

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Joan Mertens Johnston, Inc.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

Smashwords Edition

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Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Excerpts by Joan Johnston

Sinful

Shameless

Surrender

Chapter One

Remember, Harmony, we can’t tell anyone. It has to be our secret.

But why, Mama?

Alyssa Moreland put an arm around her six-year-old daughter’s shoulder and brushed aside the child’s shaggy blond bands. How could she explain to one so innocent how cruel the world could be to a bastard child?

Alyssa felt a sense of desperation. Moving a thousand miles from Philadelphia wasn’t going to accomplish a thing if she couldn’t convince Harmony of the importance of keeping their past a secret.

The stagecoach was sultry, and everything inside was covered with a layer of fine dust. At least they’d the coach to themselves. Alyssa took out her handkerchief, dabbed it on her tongue to wet it, and began wiping Harmony’s angelic face clean.

We’re starting a brand-new life in Texas, sweetheart, just you and me. I’ll be calling myself Mrs. Moreland, so people will want to know why my husband—your father—isn’t with us.

But I never had a father, Harmony protested.

Alyssa’s lips curved in a sad smile. Everyone has a father, sweetheart. I just wasn’t married to him when you were conceived.

Not me, Harmony said with certainty. Marjorie Rose said I came from the pumpkin patch.

Nevertheless, if someone asks about your father, what should you say?

"My papa got sick with new-moan-ya and died."

And where did we used to live?

In a brothel.

Alyssa froze. She stared, stricken, into her daughter’s enormous blue eyes. She cupped Harmony’s chin and tilted her daughter’s face up to hers. "You must never, never repeat that to anyone. If someone asks where we used to live, you may tell them in Philadelphia."

The little girl’s blue eyes misted with tears. I’ll try to remember, Mama.

Alyssa pulled Harmony close. She rocked the little girl in her arms. I know this must seem very confusing, she whispered.

I miss Marjorie Rose, Mama. And I miss Lulu and Sophie and Coralie and Winnie and Olinda and Marybeth and—

I know, sweetheart. I do, too.

Why couldn’t we say goodbye to them, Mama?

There simply wasn’t time. More lies. Would she ever be able to stop telling lies? We can write to them once we get settled in Fredericksburg.

Alyssa had carefully chosen the small Texas town nestled in the Hill Country west of Austin as the perfect place to start over. It was off the beaten path and had a population that consisted primarily of farmers of German descent. She’d heard the hill country was beautiful in the spring, with wildflowers that covered the fields with blankets of purple and orange. And there were lots of trees—pecan and cypress and live oak.

You’re going to love living in Fredericksburg, Alyssa promised her daughter.

But why did we have to leave our home in Philadelphia? Harmony asked.

I didn’t want you to be sold to some man for his pleasure before you were old enough to know a different life was possible. I didn’t want you to live the life of a whore. I have only one wish, sweetheart. One simple wish. That you grow up a normal, happy little girl.

Alyssa knew that having her wish come true depended on keeping their secrets. No one must ever find out the truth about Harmony. Or about her mother.

We left our home in Philadelphia to find a better life, sweetheart. Alyssa clutched her daughter close and whispered, And we will.

* * * * *

As a widower and an eligible bachelor, Karl Eberhardt had so many invitations to supper that he seldom had to eat at Ellie Cooperman’s boardinghouse, where he lived. So he wasn’t there when Mrs. Alyssa Moreland and her daughter, Harmony, presented themselves at the dinner table for the first time. Karl would have met them at breakfast the next morning except Herman Bingaman’s mare was having problems foaling. As the town blacksmith, Karl was the closest thing Fredericksburg had to a horse doctor.

He might have met them at the noon meal, only Karl was so far behind in his work at the forge that he decided to send his apprentice, Mrs. Cooperman’s fourteen-year-old son, Jack, to the boardinghouse for sandwiches and work on through the afternoon. He’d plows to sharpen, wheels to repair, and hasps, hinges, and hammers to make.

Karl checked as soon as he arrived at his shop to make sure Jack had built the kind of fire he needed to do his work. He nodded imperceptibly in approval of the clear, concentrated flame, and the lack of a strong sulfur smell. A good fire, he pronounced.

Jack grinned. I cleaned the fire pot first, just like you taught me. And I used wet coal and lots of it.

Karl clapped the gangly youth on the shoulder. You did well, Jack. You’ll make a fine blacksmith someday.

Have you met Mrs. Moreland and her daughter? Jack asked as he worked the bellows.

Not yet, Karl said.

Ma says she’s a real lady.

Karl smiled skeptically. How can she tell?

Jack looked surprised that his mother’s evaluation of Mrs. Moreland had been questioned. Why, ’cause of her manners, of course. Delicate, they was. And her daughter’s, too.

Karl checked the wheel rim he’d stuck into the fire. Color was all-important. If the iron got beyond a red heat while it was being shaped, he would have to cut it off and start again. How old is the daughter? Karl asked, more to make conversation than because he was interested.

Six, Jack said. But she’s as pretty as her ma is beautiful.

Beautiful, is she? Karl held the iron over the anvil with tongs and began to drop the bundle as his elbow parted company with his ribs, and the flat peen hammer came up over his head in full, regularly spaced strokes.

Yes, beautiful, Jack insisted. Blond hair up in a fancy do and cornflower blue eyes. She’s kind of shy, though.

What makes you say that? Karl was ready to harden the iron, so he stuck it back into the fire and waited for it to turn a cherry red.

Her voice, for one thing.

Oh?

It was kinda soft. You had to listen real hard to hear her. And her eyes, for another thing.

Oh?

Jack put another scoopful of wet coal on the fire. She never stares right at you, just kinda peeks up at you from under her lashes.

And this makes her a lady? Karl asked, arching a dark brow.

Well, she was dressed like a lady, too, Jack said. Ma said she’d never seen the like of it. All them frills and furbelows. Anyhow, Mrs. Moreland plans to open a dress shop here in town. Today she’s off hunting herself a place of business to rent.

The iron had reached exactly the desired color. Karl took it out of the fire with his tongs and cooled it in lukewarm water, watching for the moment when the metal was tempered. He pointed it out to Jack so the boy would learn to recognize it for himself.

The iron must cool slowly, Karl instructed. That will make it hard.

They worked the rest of the afternoon without a break. Karl insisted his shop be kept neat, so Jack was kept busy returning tools to the worktable near the forge. But there was no way to keep a blacksmith’s shop really clean. Karl whitewashed the walls once a year, but the inevitable soot and dust quickly layered everything and everybody.

Even if the soot and dust hadn’t been a problem, Karl had burned enough shirts with