Keeping Secrets by Joan Lowery Nixon Page A

are.”
    Carrying his rifle in the crook of one arm, Danny grinned and put his other arm around Peg’s shoulders. As they walked back toward the house he squinted up at the sun and said, “It should be near to three o’clock. Miss Hennessey will come to get you before long.”
    Peg leaned close to him, frantic that the time was almost up. “I’ll be back soon,” she said. “Miss Hennessey will invite me to travel with her again when she comes to visit her sister. She promised.”
    “Good!” Giving her shoulder a squeeze, Danny said, “Because of the Union patrols, Buchanan County’s been quiet lately. While you were on the road you probably met up with a patrol, didn’t you?”
    “One,” Peg said and turned her face so that Danny couldn’t see her eyes. “Miss Hennessey had a letter of safe passage given to her by our provost marshal, so the sergeant let us through.”
    I can’t tell Danny the rest of what happened
, Peg thought.
He wouldn’t understand.
With a start she realized that she had built a wall, too—a wall that she wouldn’t allow Danny to break through.
    “We’ve heard that the patrols have been hard onsome of the people who resisted when Missouri was put under martial law,” Danny said, “but they keep down the bushwhackers—at least, they have locally. I hear there are still plenty of skirmishes in southern Missouri, especially in the border counties.”
    There was so much pride in Danny’s voice as he spoke of the Union patrols that Peg was glad she hadn’t told him about the soldier who had stolen Miss Hennessey’s money. She doubted that Danny would even believe it had happened.
    Peg scarcely had time to brush the grass and tangles from her hair and securely tie on her sunbonnet before Miss Hennessey arrived.
    They left with a carton containing two jars of Ennie’s special sweet cucumber pickles, a sack of fresh eggs, and a fat loaf cake.
    “Give these to your dear mother with my greatest affection,” Ennie told Peg, who tried not to grin. Peg had no doubt that Ennie really did like Ma, but wasn’t that only because Alfrid had married Ennie, instead of following the plan Peg and Danny had once worked out to bring Ma west as Alfrid’s bride?
    On the return trip Miss Hennessey seemed happier and more relaxed. “It did me a world of good to see my sister again,” she told Peg. “Nellie hasn’t changed a bit. She’s always so cheerful, no matter how difficult things may be.”
    “You mean like not having any livestock?” Peg blurted out.
    “I told you their stay in this area will be short.”
    Embarrassed, Peg’s face grew hot. “I know. It’s just that, well, on a farm I expected a dog to run out to meet us, and one didn’t, so then I listened, and I couldn’t hear chickens, and …”
    As Peg’s voice trailed away Miss Hennessey nodded.“You’re very observant and you’re right. Louis once had a fine house and good stock, but he has no plans to farm again—at least not until the war is over.”
    “Was his livestock stolen?”
    “Yes, and his house burned.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “I’m sorry, too, but I’m grateful that their lives were spared.”
    “Where were they when this happened?”
    “In southern Missouri, near the Arkansas border.”
    “Bushwhackers?”
    “Yes. One of the rebel gangs.” A note of bitterness crept into Miss Hennessey’s voice. “In Missouri it’s hard to be pro-Union, and it’s hard to be pro-southern. If it’s not the bushwhackers, it’s the military patrols.”
    Peg squirmed on the buggy seat, wishing it were softer. “Why don’t your sister and her husband leave Missouri?”
    “They will, some day.” She sighed before she answered, “I’ll go, too. Maybe to California … I’ve always wanted to see San Francisco.”
    As the horse and buggy clopped and clattered around a bend, through the trees Peg caught a quick glimpse of Union blue. “A patrol!” she whispered. “Just up ahead.”
    “Thank you,” Miss