Read Online Winter's Child by Margaret Coel - Free Book Online Page B

giving yourself to a bad heart. As soon as she decided Shannon had a good heart, Elena would take her in and love her like an orphaned child.
    â€œWe’ve prepared a sumptuous lunch in your honor.” The bishop waved at the stove, where grilled cheese sandwiches browned in the frying pan. Father John glanced over at Elena, who looked up and rolled her eyes. “I am pleased to say I am learning to prepare new dishes today. Cooking is not hard if one applies himself. Do sit down.” The bishop made a courtly gesture of pulling a chair from the table. “Make yourself at home, because this is your home for as long as you like.”
    Shannon smiled and shrugged and thanked the old man, then settled herself on the chair. Father John took his usual chair across the table. “I hope the cooks will join us,” he said.
    â€œYes, yes. Naturally.” The bishop scooped the sandwiches onto a platter, which he set in the middle of the table, while Elena moved over to the stove and began ladling soup into bowls. One by one,the bishop delivered the bowls. Finally he dropped onto the chair next to Shannon. Fingers of steam curled above the thick red soup.
    Elena took her usual place across from the bishop. “Eat up,” she said, scooting her chair into the table. Since Father John had been on the reservation, Arapahos had been placing food in front of him and telling him to eat up. Just like in the Old Time, he knew, when no one was sent away from an Arapaho village hungry. You never knew, heading onto the plains, when you might find food again.
    Shannon had dipped her spoon into the soup when Bishop Harry said, “Let us pray.” Father John bowed his head, conscious of a sense of contentment flooding over him. Shannon O’Malley, not much more than a girl, carrying with her a connection to his family, to his own past, and to an essential part of himself that, he realized, he sometimes forgot to remember. He had settled in here, at a remote mission on a remote Indian reservation that many of his classmates in the Jesuit seminary, bound for teaching positions at Georgetown or Marquette or some other university, would have considered the dead-end of a career, where priests like Bishop Harry Coughlin went to recuperate from the frailties of old age.
    â€œWe thank you, Lord, for blessing us with the presence of Shannon O’Malley, and for allowing us to share this meal together.”
    â€œAmen,” Elena said. “Dig in.”
    Shannon took a sip of soup and told Elena how delicious it was. “I would love to know how to make it.”
    â€œOne cooking student is all I can manage at the moment.” Elena stirred her own soup and stared at the bishop.
    â€œA very fine teacher you are, I may add,” the bishop said. “I had no idea toasted cheese sandwiches could require so much effort. Why, you must watch them like a hawk or one may burn.”
    â€œOr two.” Elena reached over and pushed the plate ofsandwiches in Shannon’s direction. A first step, Father John was thinking, in accepting her.
    The bishop helped himself to a sandwich and shoved the plate toward Father John. “I understand you are researching the lives of white sisters held captive by the Plains Indians.”
    â€œThere were a number of captives between 1860 and 1880.” Shannon’s voice sparkled with excitement as she moved into familiar territory. “I’m interested in how those who survived viewed their captivity. In what way did it influence or change their lives? I’m especially interested in Elizabeth Fletcher, who was never rescued. She lived here on the reservation.”
    â€œLizzie Brokenhorn.” Elena spoke softly, as if the name had triggered a memory.
    Shannon gave a smile of acknowledgement, which Elena ignored. “She lived as an Arapaho. Married an Arapaho man when she was only fifteen.”
    â€œJohn Brokenhorn,” Elena said.
    Father John