A Rose Blooms Twice Read online

  A Rose Blooms Twice

  by Vikki Kestell

  Rose Brownlee must choose whether she will bow to conventional wisdom or, like Abraham, follow where God leads her . . . even to a country she does not know.

  Set in the American prairie of the late 1800s, this story of loss, disillusionment, rebirth, and love will inspire, challenge, and encourage you.

  A Prairie Heritage, Book 1. Read the exciting sequel to A Rose Blooms Twice, Joy on This Mountain.

  Visit Vikki on her Facebook page.

  Now Available!

  Joy on This Mountain

  by Vikki Kestell

  The little town of Corinth, Colorado, lies in the gateway to the majestic Rocky Mountains just west of Denver . . . just far enough from the city to avoid close scrutiny, but close enough to be accessible. Few know of the wickedness hidden in the small town, so picturesquely set in the foothills of the mighty mountains.

  Joy on This Mountain is the long-awaited sequel to A Rose Blooms Twice. The legacy of Jan and Rose has far-reaching and unexpected consequences.

  A Prairie Heritage, Book 2. Spoiler alert! You may not want to read this book until you have read its prequel, A Rose Blooms Twice.

  A Rose Blooms Twice

  © 2012 Vikki Kestell

  Revised February 2013

  All Rights Reserved

  Scriptures quotations taken from

  The King James Version (KJV)

  Public Domain.

  the Amplified® Bible (AMP)

  Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987

  by The Lockman Foundation (www.Lockman.org).

  Used by permission.

  The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad;

  the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the rose

  and the autumn crocus.

  (Isaiah 35:1, AMP)

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  About the Author

  Pronounciation Guide

  Chapter 1

  Rose glanced up and saw James watching her. Their eyes met and held, and Rose’s world was in that look. While the carriage jounced and swayed, they smiled, tired and content.

  James’ birthday party had been wonderful. Rose glanced fondly in the fading light from James’ relaxed and satisfied face to each of the children. Jeffrey was teasing his younger sister, Glory, her chubby six-year-old cheeks dimpled in laughter, while baby Clara bounced on her daddy’s knee singing “Ride a pony! Ride a pony!” softly. Jeff and Glory burst out in strains of “Happy Birthday to You” making James chuckle in appreciation. Clara crowed a late “To Yew!” after every line, and they all laughed.

  Rose shivered a little as the temperature outside sank a few more degrees. Bundled in warm clothes nearly to their eyes, the children didn’t seem to notice the cold. Only a few minutes ago, while Vincent, their driver, had waited patiently just outside the door, Rose had bustled Glory into her coat and warm hat, making sure she had her mittens. James had held baby Clara until Glory’s last button was done.

  “Goodbye, Mother. Thank you for the party; it was perfect as usual, just like its hostess,” James had declared, winking and grinning rakishly.

  Rose’s mother had acknowledged the compliment graciously. “You know how much pleasure it gave me, James! And don’t be flirting. What will your children think? Well, you had better be going. It will do none of you any good to be out in this miserable cold very long. Goodbye, dears.”

  She had kissed Rose, her son-in-law, and then each of the children. “My kittens,” she liked to call them. Jeffrey, who had often complained to his father that, “if Grandma had to call him a baby name, it should at least be puppy,” had been ready and fidgeting some minutes.

  As they had crossed from the doorway to the carriage, the wind had whipped them mercilessly until they were tucked safely into the coach and Vincent had the horses pulling them down the drive.

  Yes, everything had gone well. Mother had been a lovely hostess, as usual insisting on being allowed to prepare the celebration for James’ thirty-eighth birthday party.

  How very odd that he can be that age, Rose thought. He was only twenty-five when we married, and yet he seems no older at all!

  “But you are thirty-two,” an inner voice whispered, “and no longer a fresh-faced girl.” The thought irritated her, and she pushed it aside. Thirteen years of marriage and three children had made a difference, yes, but she was still young. Not willow slender anymore, true, but “round in all the right places” according to James, and his was the only opinion she minded. Only what looked back in her mirror distressed her. The golden blonde hair that had framed her blushing cheeks as a girl was dull ash now, stylishly coiled and curled around her head, yes, but her cheeks, too, had lost their glow. The overall result was a rather colorless, even sallow, one. Oh, if only her brows and lashes had darkened, too, but the solemn gray eyes were the only real color in her face. Mercifully, the children all took after their father, each with honey-brown curls and James’ gentle hazel eyes and bright cheeks. “Such frivolous concerns,” she chided herself. “A good life is too precious for fretting over what cannot be changed—and is inconsequential. No triviality could ever mar the perfect joy of having a wonderful family and a happy home.”

  Her musings turned back to the party. Even Roger and Julia had been civil, almost pleasant tonight, for a change. That had been nice. James’ younger brother had always seemed to resent that James, the older son, had inherited the Brownlee family home some years ago. It would be Jeffrey’s one day too, Rose remembered fondly. Altogether, with her brother, Tom, and Abigail, his lovely bride, it had been a memorable evening.

  Tom and Abbie had made a happy announcement tonight, too. They would be blessed with a baby in late summer! Rose smiled in anticipation. She would be Aunt Rose! That would be sweet. And a cousin for the children! Roger and Julia didn’t have children. “They wouldn’t much fit our lifestyle,” Julia had mockingly mentioned once.

  “Mummy, I’m sleepy,” Glory whispered.

  “Come lay your head on my lap, love,” Rose whispered back. Jeffrey and Glory traded sides in the coach; Clara stayed on Daddy’s lap but cuddled now rather than bounced. Outside, the frigid January wind blew, and Rose was glad that Vincent was well sheltered in the driver’s box. She pulled her own long, heavy cloak tightly about her and stroked a curl of Glory’s lovely honey hair peeping out from her bonnet. It really was too inclement to be out, but January 6 only came once a year, and James rarely unbent from his heavy work schedule except for a holiday.

  They seemed to be alone on the dark country road. In addition to the freezing temperatures this evening, the bitter wind had driven and beaten the wet snow into icy drifts and glazed the road.

  “Only a half-hour more, son,” James encouraged Jeffrey. The boy began nodding sleepily in the corner by his father.

  They entered their quiet town with its c
obbled streets. The river was just ahead, and the Brownlee family home a few miles beyond. The team’s hooves rang hollowly as they mounted the bridge. Below, the river was choked with heaving, black ice floes. Only last week an unseasonable thaw, accompanied by a warm wind from the south, had caused the river to break up. Now with the cold settling back in, the rushing water would soon freeze over again.

  The carriage was slow going up the bridge’s incline because of the unsure footing for the horses, but they labored sturdily. Across the bridge they trotted now, another lone carriage passing them in the other direction.

  Rose looked up and saw James watching her again. He smiled, and she warmed to his look.

  The horses were going down the other side of the arched bridge now, and Vincent was calling to them, reining them in, for the ice was treacherous on the downside incline.

  Without warning a horse screamed and the carriage lurched. One of the horses had fallen on the slick cobbles! James threw open the door just as the back end of the coach began to swing, making a wide, sliding arc across the breadth of the bridge. Vincent was shouting, panic in his voice. The carriage slammed against the stout railing at the bridge’s edge with an ominous cracking.

  Inside the carriage, unable to see what was happening, the children were shrieking, and Glory fell to the floor. James, holding precariously to the door saw what was now inevitable—the railing was shattered, near to letting go, and the carriage was suspended over the seething torrent, only moments from disaster. Vincent was standing in the box futilely whipping the team, but the one horse still standing had no traction, and the far one was splayed on the ice, thrashing in terrified panic.

  Clara was grasping at her daddy’s legs, and James stumbled over Glory on the floor. Hoarse with fear, he jerked Rose to her feet and to the doorway. “Jump!” he begged. They were hanging so deceptively near the levy.

  Rose was frozen in terror, unable to look away from the pain, pity, and hopelessness on his face. James wrenched himself free from Clara’s grasp and, with one superhuman effort, bodily vaulted Rose from the coach.

  As she was falling, falling, she could never later be sure if what she remembered was what she actually saw or if the horrible sounds printed their own pictures forever in her mind.

  The railing gave way abruptly, and the carriage slid over the bridge’s edge, pulling with it the screaming team. She landed on the ice-strewn rocks of the levee at the water’s edge. Rose heard something inside herself snap and felt the painful stabs of icy water soaking her through as the current sucked and pulled.

  Then she heard and felt nothing at all.

  Chapter 2

  Out of the black cave she fought her way. Surely daylight was ahead? But it kept moving away. Every time she thought she was at the opening it was farther beyond. Tired, so tired of trying.

  Sleep instead.

  It hurt to move. Her whole body was on fire, her head too heavy to lift. No, not fire, ice. Ice! No, no, no, they were falling in the river, freezing, numb . . . How can it be so hot in the river! Is the water burning? No, no . . . so cold . . .

  She was in her room. Yes, this was her bed . . . no . . . yes! But her room at home, that is, at Mother’s where she grew up . . . silly, you’re not grown up; you’re just a girl. You had a bad dream. A dream about James and being married and . . . falling? So tired still . . .

  “Mrs. Brownlee. Mrs. Brownlee, do you hear me? It’s Doctor Cray. Please try to open your eyes for me, Mrs. Brownlee?”

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Blake, not yet, I’m afraid. But we’ll know soon at any rate. If the fever has done . . . damage . . . well, we’ll just hope for the best, shall we?”

  “Rosie, don’t leave us . . . please try to come back! You don’t know how much we love you . . . I love you, Sis . . . oh, Rose, it’s Tom! Do you hear me?”

  Tom. So tired, so heavy. Rest. Rest in the darkness.

  Rose forced open her eyes. The light in the room was dim, either early morning or twilight, she couldn’t tell. No one was in the room with her, it seemed; no, someone’s regular breathing was coming from . . . the chair by the fireplace? She tried to turn to see but was too weak to do more than raise a few inches and fall back exhausted. All around her chest ached horridly.

  “Mother?” she whispered weakly.

  Well, later maybe.

  The next time she awoke it was daylight. She lifted a hand feebly and groaned.

  “Ma’am, she’s awake. Ma’am!”

  Several sets of footsteps hurried to the bed. Anxious faces peered down at her. Mother. Tom. Who was that man? Dr. Somebody she thought she remembered, and someone else standing away from the bed.

  “Mother?”

  “Yes! Yes dear, I’m right here!”

  “Rosie, I’m here too—it’s Tom, y’know!”

  “Oh. . . . What? I’m sorry . . . I don’t understand.”

  “Mrs. Blake, Mr. Blake, be so kind as to move back and let me examine our patient. Yes, madam, don’t be alarmed. I believe you are going to be all right, but see here, you’ve been ill. Do you understand what I am saying?”

  Rose nodded, and the doctor went on.

  “You’ve been ill, and you’ve had a great shock. We must be quite careful of you right now or bear the consequences. Now, I am Doctor Cray—do you remember me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Very good. Your mother and brother and a nurse are here with you also. It is enough that they are here—do not talk to them today for you must rest. I will come again this evening, and then we will see how you are. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes,” she answered again, because “no” was too heavy, and she was so tired.

  “That is good; now sleep again. You are safe, and in time will be sound also, thank God.”

  “Yes, thank God!” Rose’s mother added earnestly. Tom sat by Rose’s bed and held her hand until sleep overcame her again.

  Four days later they judged it wise to speak the truth to her. Her waking periods were closer to normal now, but reality was still a faint dream just beyond grasping, a truth that needed to be confronted. Mrs. Blake called Pastor Greenstreet to be with them. Tom and Dr. Cray completed the group, and together they stood around the bed. Tom felt it his duty to do the speaking, to help her the best he could through this ordeal.

  “Sis? Rose, we want . . . need to tell you about your illness.”

  “Yes, Tom,” she replied softly. “I can’t seem to get it right in my mind. I’m so confused—tell me, what am I so afraid of?”

  Tom began cautiously. “They found you, Sis, lying on the rocks at the bottom of the levee.”

  Rose looked bewildered.

  “Well, you’d fallen there, see, and, well, Dr. Cray says you’d broken your ribs and hit your head mostly. The blow to your head made a bad cut, but anyway you were unconscious and then, see, you’d been lying half in, half out of the cold water and all, so you became ill with fever. We thought we were losing you, Rose! But you’ve gotten better, bit by bit; now you’ll be able to get up soon.”

  A small frown puckered her forehead. “How long have I been sick, Tommy?” Her voice was almost childlike in its dreamy confusion.

  Tom glanced at Dr. Cray for guidance. He nodded.

  “It’s been about three weeks, Sis. Since January 6?”

  Puzzlement replaced the frown. Something nagged at the back of her mind. What?

  “Rocks, Tommy? I don’t understand where.”

  He took a deep breath and his voice quavered, “The rocks on the levee . . . by the river. By the . . . by the bridge. Close to your house?”

  “My house? Bridge?”

  Tom rushed on, looking down at the counterpane. “You see, Vincent crawled up to the road, and some folks saw him. He was nearly frozen because he was soaking wet, but we would never have found you in time if he hadn’t gotten out. Of the river . . . Rose, do you remember falling in the river?”

  Tears were streaming down his honest face, and Rose stared at him bewildered. Ri
ver? What would anyone be doing in a river in January? January 6. Oh! James’ birthday, of course! His birthday party and . . . the river . . .

  Tom held her through the storm. Over again and again she saw the carriage sliding and falling, sliding and falling, James throwing her out . . . sliding . . . falling . . . Clara! Glory! Oh, God! My little boy! Oh, mercy, please God!

  James, don’t be dead . . .

  Chapter 3

  Over the weeks of her recovery, her memory became sharper—jagged tearing edges that wounded her with each recollection. Vincent had leapt from his box as the carriage struck the water and struggled in the ice-strewn water the few feet to shore. Bleeding and freezing, he’d climbed to the road atop the levee and flagged down a passing coach. They’d found Rose, as Tom had said, crumpled on the river-washed rocks. No trace of the carriage was found. Next day the river had frozen over again, and hope of finding James or the children died cruelly under the ice. No compassionate way existed to explain that sometime in the spring, when the water warmed, the bodies would surface, possibly far downstream, if at all.

  Rose had been brought to her mother’s home to be cared for, and when they began to hope for a speedy recovery from her injuries, fever had set in. For days the battle had raged: delirium, alternating chills, and periods of unbearable heat that devoured her strength.

  That was when Roger Brownlee had presented himself to Mrs. Blake and Tom “to carry out a simple bit of business,” he said by way of explanation. His attorney accompanied him, and they waited on Rose’s mother and brother in the parlor.

  “I realize how serious Rose’s condition is—that she may very well not recover even. And we are deeply concerned for her of course, being my poor brother’s wife—”

  “My sister will recover, I assure you, sir!” interrupted Tom fiercely, “and I would have expected you to show proper consideration to us all at this time. What possible bit of business is so urgent that it cannot wait for a more propitious moment?” Tom’s blue eyes sparked angrily at the man’s effrontery. Tom had never cared for James Brownlee’s younger brother. Tom had judged Roger Brownlee as lacking in moral character and natural affection the first moment they’d met.