The Matrimony Plan by Christine Johnson Page B

She only had a few hours to wash off the doggy smell, dry her hair and put together the perfect outfit to attract a Newport man.
    And she had to pray that Robert hadn’t yet heard what had happened at the parsonage that afternoon.
    That evening, Gabriel couldn’t concentrate. The day had passed without a word from Kensington or any of the Church Council. He’d like to assume his position was secure, but there were still three days before Sunday. He could receive notice at any moment.
    He sat at the rolltop desk in the study and leafed through the Bible looking for the proper verse, but the words swam before his eyes. The meaning muddled in his mind. His sermon, full of fire that morning, stagnated.
    He couldn’t get Felicity out of his mind: her green eyes, her ebony hair, her tall and slender shape. He scrawled poetic lines in the margins of his sermon like an infatuated schoolboy.
    How ludicrous. She’d run away the moment he drew close. Her father had practically threatened him. Gabriel didn’t relish seeing what the man did with those nine guns. He pitied the poor buffalo, king of the African plain, taken down by a small bullet. Gabriel had witnessed his share of the cruel unfairness in this world. That was one reason he came to the ministry, and one reason he chose to pastor in a small town. Justice should prevail.
    But what justice is there in denying a child the companionship of a pet? He’d glimpsed Felicity’s painful longing when she talked about her brother’s dog. She must have had a lonely childhood. The age gap would have kept brother andsister from playing together. Add to that an emotionally distant mother, and it was natural she’d both yearn for affection and fear it wouldn’t last.
    He rubbed his face. “Gabe, you’re getting soft.”
    That’s what Dad would say. Mom would reach over and pat his father on the sleeve with a “now Edmund.” The scold would inevitably accompany a peck of affection. How Gabriel longed for such a partnership, so in step with each other that one look or word communicated everything. But he’d fallen for a woman who hid her feelings behind snobbery.
    Dad would know what to do. Though Edmund Meeks was nearly forty years older, Gabriel missed him. Those years had given him a wealth of wisdom not found in younger fathers. Dad had never been one to fuss about money or social standing or what people thought. He’d have found the Kensingtons absurd and shared a good laugh. He’d know exactly how to crack the shell around Felicity’s heart.
    Gabriel sighed. His entrance into the ministry was the only thing that had puzzled his father.
    “It’s a hard life, son,” Dad had said. “Lots of heartache and strife and disillusionment. Don’t think you can escape it. Every human flaw in greater society can be found in a church. In my opinion, you’d get more satisfaction working with Mr. Isaacs and the orphans.”
    At the time, that seemed hard to believe. Gabriel had chafed with frustration over increasing regulation of orphan placement. The older children were hard to place, and many ran away to a life on the streets. More than once Mr. Isaacs had pulled a girl from prostitution or a boy from thieving only to lose them again to the same vices.
    If only Gabriel could find a place with hearts big enough to take in those children, a place like his parents’ home. At first he’d agreed with Dad that his place was with the orphans, but then he’d heard the call to minister in Pearlman.
    He couldn’t explain it; he just knew he had to go. He imagined the apostles James and John had faced similar disbelief when they told their father they were abandoning fishing to follow an itinerant preacher. Dad let him go, but Gabriel knew he worried for him.
    “I’ll be all right, Dad,” he whispered aloud.
    The quiet parsonage didn’t answer. Even Slinky yawned.
    Gabriel glanced down at the dog, which had settled patiently at his feet. “I don’t suppose you can help with my