The Innocent by Ann H. Gabhart Page B

other than their like dress.
    Sister Muriel stepped out to the fence to flag down the wagon. The Shaker man pulled back on the reins to stop his horses.
    “Are you on the way to the town, Brother?”
    “Yea, have you a need for something there?” the man answered.
    “Nay. We have a dog that needs to be carried to the town,” Sister Muriel said.
    Carlyn opened her mouth to protest when the memory of the sheriff asking to pet Asher popped into her mind. Another answer, perhaps. Not the one she would most like, for it made her heart hurt to think of giving up Asher, but the dog would be safe with the sheriff. If he would take him in. More need of prayer.
    The brother studied the dog for a moment. Then he climbed down from the wagon and rummaged under the seat until he found a rope. “Best tie this around his neck.” He made a loop in one end of the rope and handed it across the fence toward Carlyn.
    “He’s never been tied.” Carlyn took it with reluctance.
    The brother looked straight at her. “I doubt he’d stay in the wagon without a rope to hold him there.”
    “I’ll go with him,” Carlyn said.
    “Do you mean to find new answers in the town, my sister?” Sister Muriel asked.
    “Only for my dog. The sheriff there. I met him last week. He might know of a place for Asher.”
    The two women looked doubtful, but Brother Thomas spoke up. “Sheriff Brodie is a good man for one of the world. The young sister may be right to count on his help.”
    “And then what?” Eldress Lilith’s eyes bore into Carlyn.
    Carlyn pulled in a deep breath and faced her future. “Then I’ll return and find a place here if you have one for me.”
    “We turn no sister in need away,” Sister Muriel said. “Brother Thomas can bring you to me after you are rid of the dog.”
    Brother Thomas nodded toward the rope. “Best put it around his neck, young sister, to be sure nothing along the road entices him away from us. A squirrel. Another dog. Dogs are prone to be off on a chase, and I must be about my errands with no time for running down dogs.”
    The three Shakers stared at her with impassive faces that expected her to do as they said. With a murmur of apology to Asher, she slipped the loop over the dog’s head. If the Shakers heard her, they gave no indication.
    Then the brother pointed at the gun. “You will have no need of a weapon.”
    “I have needed it in the past.” Carlyn’s hand tightened on the gun. Curt Whitlow lived in town.
    “But you are beginning a new life now. One where, engaged in your duty, you will have nothing to fear.” Brother Thomas gently lifted the gun away from her and propped it against the fence. “Sister Muriel will have a brother fetch the gun.”
    “But—” Carlyn looked at the gun, “I’m not a Shaker yet.”
    The brother paid her words no mind as he turned back to the wagon. “Climb in and call your dog up after you. He might use his teeth on me if I try to put him there.”
    After Asher jumped up in the wagon, Carlyn settled on a box toward the front of the wagon. Asher leaned against her, trembling at the strangeness of it all. Or perhaps because he sensed her own tremble. She was losing everything. Even her carpetbag. She’d left it there on the ground beside the two Shaker sisters.
    As the wagon began moving, Carlyn wanted to ask Brother Thomas to stop so she could retrieve it. Perhaps in the town another way would open to her. But she didn’t call out. She needed to accept the answer already given.
    She leaned close to the dog and spoke to him in whispers Brother Thomas couldn’t hear over the creaking of the wagon wheels. “You will make Sheriff Brodie a wonderful dog.” She would not let herself think about the sheriff turning the dog away. “You remember him. You wagged your tail when he rubbed your head. It will be good.” She stroked down his head and back. “It will. You’ll have food. I’ll have food and a roof. Each day it is given unto us that which we