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yet,” the sheriff answered.
    â€œHave you work for him?” Mrs. Morris inquired.
    â€œNo, ma’am, but I can use a boy to sweep the jail house, and there are things here and there.”
    â€œWe’ve done considerable thinking on this matter,” Mr. Morris went on. “It’s no service to provide sanctuary for a child only to turn him out later unprepared to provide for himself.”
    â€œWe’ve a counter needs tending,” Mrs. Morris added. “I hired a girl last month, but she’s needed to help me sew garments. Mitch went out and filled a spare mattress with fresh straw, and he declares he needs a body to sleep on it.”
    â€œWe got room, Sheriff,” Mitch declared. “Shoot, we’re together most days anyhow. Half the county already thinks us brothers.”
    â€œRastus, what’s your mind say to this?” Cathcart asked.
    â€œI wouldn’t want to take charity,” the boy answered.
    â€œOh, you’d earn your way, young man,” Mrs. Morris insisted. “But you’d get the Christian upbringing your mother would want, and you’d pick up a bit of cash money over room and board. And if your heart’s set on running horses or tending cattle next year, there’d be no barred door or rawhide whip to hold you back.”
    â€œWell, Rat?” Mitch asked. “Figure you can stand my snorin’?”
    â€œDone it before,” Erastus answered. “Truth is, I miss not havin’ a brother ’round.”
    â€œWhen would you want to take him?” the sheriff asked.
    â€œThis very minute,” Mrs. Morris said, rushing over and halfway choking Erastus in her generous arms. “We’ll tend him like our own, Sheriff, and see he comes to no ill.”
    â€œI don’t suppose a boy could expect better, could he, Erastus?”
    â€œNo, sir,” Erastus agreed.
    The sheriff took Erastus back to the kitchen so he could express his thanks and say farewell to Mrs. Cathcart and the children. Erastus did so, getting another motherly hug, a polite curtsy from Becky, and a whispered plea to join the swimming from Busby.
    â€œI’d stay if you wanted, you know,” Erastus whispered to the sheriff before turning toward the Morrises.
    â€œYou’re welcome there, son,” Cathcart explained. “It’s a good home with plenty o’ comforts. You’ll get along fine.”
    â€œI know I will,” Erastus said, gripping the sheriff’s hand. He then hurried to join Mitch and the family they would share thereafter.

Chapter Five
    After the horrors experienced at the Plank place, anything would have been a welcome change. And in truth the Morrises provided good food and kindly treatment. There was Mitch, too, to swap tales and share wayward thoughts. For the most part those thoughts never got past their amber scalps. Mary Morris ran a taut household, with prayers at mealtime and Bible verses read every night. Erastus had fallen into a world of starched collars and Philadelphia shoes, with little time for anything besides work, lessons, and prayer.
    â€œYou’re behind on your learning, I’m afraid,” Mrs. Morris declared the first time she glimpsed Erastus’s pitiful scrawl in her ledgers. “We’ll remedy that. I’ve got Mitchell’s old school books set aside, and I’ll tend to your ciphers myself.”
    â€œA man don’t need so much learnin’ to run down range ponies,” Erastus objected.
    â€œWell, I never heard anyone balk at a chance to better himself, Erastus Hadley. Here the Lord’s handed you a splendid opportunity, and you’d throw it away like a ball of used string.”
    Erastus bit his lip. He feared telling her how a use could always be found for a bit of string, but reading stories about princes or dragons wouldn’t sink a fence post.
    Lessons weren’t the only vexation to face the boy. He tended the