Redeeming-Love-By-Francine-Rivers

F R A N C I N E R I V E R S
Michael pulled the team off the road. “Fetch those children and have
them sit in the back of the wagon,” he said to Angel as he got down. She
went for them. The oldest girl looked but a few years younger than she. Her
dark hair was plastered about a pale face dominated by wide brown eyes.
When she smiled, she was pretty.
“You’ll all be dryer if you sit in the back of the wagon,” Angel said. “We
have another blanket.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” the girl said, taking up the invitation immediately
as she hurried the children to the wagon’s shelter. Full of trepidation, Angel
climbed up into the back with them. She handed the girl a blanket, and she
draped it around her shoulders while tucking the four smaller children in
close to her like a mother hen.
She smiled at Angel. “We’re the Altmans. I’m Miriam. This is Jacob—”
she looked at the tallest boy, whose eyes and hair were like hers—“he’s ten.
And Andrew—”
“I’m eight!” the boy volunteered somberly.
Miriam smiled again. “This is Leah,” she said, snuggling the bigger girl
close and then kissing the smallest, “and Ruth.”
Angel looked at the cold, wet group huddled together beneath a single
blanket. “Hosea,” she said self-consciously. “I’m…Mrs. Hosea.”
“Thank the Lord you came when you did,” Miriam said. “Papa was having
trouble with that wheel, and Mama is just about done in.” She took the
blanket off herself and settled it around the four children. “Would you watch
over the children, Mrs. Hosea? Mama’s been ill for the past three hundred
miles, and she shouldn’t be out in the rain.”
She jumped down from the wagon before Angel could protest. Angel
looked at the children again and saw they were all staring at her with wide,
curious eyes. A few moments later, Miriam returned with her mother. She
was a worn, dark-haired woman with stooped shoulders and shadowed
eyes. The children closed around her protectively.
“Mama,” Miriam said, an arm around her, “this is Mrs. Hosea. This is my
mother.”
The woman smiled warmly and nodded. “Elizabeth,” she said with a
smile. “God bless you, Mrs. Hosea.” Tears gathered in the tired eyes, but she
233