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Chapter One

THE PAGES OF A SMALL tospaper, circa AD1870 ( in that particular ses, typeset on both sides Or four pages Or, possibly, if so really spectacular (ie, completion of The First Transcontinental Railroad in Pro really terrible (ie, the Fisk-Gould Scandal, which caused a financial panic on September 24, also known as Black Friday, of the saht be expanded to six

The infor a really spectacular or a really terrible event, if it were happening at soram An eyewitness, such as to fire, flood, or some other natural or ht even leave the scene long enough to send dispatches via rail vehicle, or stagecoach It certainly wouldn’t do if both the East Coast and the West Coast simultaneously broke off the continent to fall into space, leaving all those in the nation’s center completely unaware

Hannah Burton hadn’t quite decided the nature of her job—or its actual title—at the Turnabout Gazette, since circumstances varied from day to day

Twice, she had attended Sunday services at the Rock of the Lord Pentecostal Church to witness, and write a char article about, the baptis to do with the cold water being poured over their heads and were determined to scream a protest

She had written the (albeit) very brief, but respectful, obituary of one Cole Forrester, with the few facts available at her fingertips

A single attendance at the recent town council ain In fact, she had gained a new respect for her brother-by- hotheads soavel and some hotheaded bellows of his own And all over the o dry for the Sabbath

“Why, you would have assu over election of the next president,” shelater to Ben when, a series of fisticuffs having been narrowly averted, he was escorting her to her roo house

He had grinned “Now, requirin’ the Sabbath to be dry is a thirsty issue, Hannah You don’t wanna come b’tween a man and his liquor”

“Huh It seeht to stock pile a few bottles in his own private cabinet, instead of wrangling in public like a bunch of wild steers”

“True All true But, y’ see, closing down the bars is somethin’ the women folk would like The men, however, wanna keep ’em all open”

Her eyes widened “The battle of the sexes—over booze? But why?

“Soet out with other fellers so’s they can puff out their chests in manly pride Even on Sunday But we ain’t near finished with this issue yet, b’lieve et it settled We’re slow movers, here in Turnabout”

Reporting on weddings gave her pure delight And she’d had two immediately, only one week apart, for both sisters How poor Camellia had survived all the hullabaloo was certainly a wonder

So Molly and her sheriff were nicely settled in his house (although the grand piano, requiring the efforts of several strong men to move it, was still tied up in limbo, in Ben’s barn) With an odd-jobber at her beck and call, Molly ishing around happily, up to her elbows in paint and plaster dust, changing this and changing that Her dearly beloved had already bowed to the inevitable and arranged with a carpenter to add that requestedthe side, next to the small parlor

It is always best, Molly had whimsically reflected, to strike while the iron is hot Before the blooiven Paul’s complete infatuation with his equally infatuated bride, she felt that blooood many years

As for Letty, she and her new husband, Ben’s brother Reese, had celebrated with their own beautiful cereown for her—other than her Sunday best, a marvelous concoction of turquoise silk, bustled with flounces and trimmed in black lace She was far too relieved and overjoyed by her husband’s fortuitous escape to crave fancy furbelows

I the festivities, Mr and Mrs Barclay had moved into a small vacant rental whi

le they considered options for building a ho with her studies and her assistance to Doctor Havers (soeneral populace), in between household duties and honey

Hannah was enjoying her assigned task of pursuing details for these articles she wrote Such a legiti—and, as more, the subjects practically pinned her down to bubble over with facts and details, al pressed

Meanwhile, back to the question: as she? Society reporter? News hound? Political spy? Advertising eneral work?

She shared some of her duties with another erandeur of his name, spent only a few hours in the newspaper office once or twice a week Mainly he set type; soed the current pot of coffee sludge for fresh or ee; on rare occasions he ran errands From there on, rumor had it, he divided his free hours between the Firewater Saloon and the Prairie Lot

Both Corny and Hannah did serve at the pleasure of the editor and owner, a bespectacled, graying man named Oliver Crane, whose reputation for shortness of temper rivaled that of Ben Forrester

“Do I want to aret Fuller, of the New York Tribune?” Hannah, elbows propped upon the only desk, conveniently situated by the ondered aloud

“How the blue blazes d’ you expect me to know?”