Pieces of Dreams Read Online Free

father at all. His greatest fault, he sometimes thought, was that he wasn't Caleb. Caleb had been the good twin, a fine son, steady, hard-working, obedient, good with animals, especially horses. In short, he had been everything that Conrad was not.
    Conrad had cordially disliked anything that ate grain back then, still did if the truth were known. As his father owned a livery stable and acted as the town blacksmith, that had been the ultimate sin.
    The old man had expected his sons, both of them, to follow in his footsteps. Caleb had seemed content for it to be so; Conrad couldn't stomach it. The punishment for that rebellion had been unremitting. He had escaped it finally by stowing away on a river steamer heading down to New Orleans. There, he had found a ship that would take him on as a seaman.
    And the sea had embraced him with its siren arms and treated him well. He had learned a lot about himself from it, had grown up with it. Over the years, the roving, deep sea life had taken a strong hold on him, one almost impossible to break even for a visit home.
    He had managed to pull away this time because he felt the tug of something stronger, some need he didn't fully understand but had been forced to heed.
    It had begun when news of Caleb's engagement to Melly had reached him, by means of a water-stained letter left waiting in a letter box in a distant port until he picked it up. Not long afterward, he had come across the bolt of pearl-colored silk in a tiny shop in Hong Kong. He had held the heavy, fluid material in his hands, captivated by its smooth texture. In that instant, he had seen Melly's face, seen her with his twin who had looked so much like himself, might even have been himself. He had bought and shipped the silk as a wedding present, but the damage had been done.
    Nights without end, he had stayed awake in his bunk thinking of Good Hope, of the simple life in the little river town, of Caleb and Melly and all the good, decent people he had known as he was growing up. Mr. McDougall at the mercantile who handed out licorice whips when he wasn't drinking. The fire-and-brimstone preacher who harried his flock like a sheepdog, keeping the strays in line. Gandy Jack, down at the riverfront saloon just across from the livery, who used to give him two-bits now and then for sweeping out the place. And especially Melly's Aunt Dora, who, with no children of her own, had taken pleasure in feeding half-grown boys who were always starving.
    His restlessness had ended when he had decided to start homeward. His ship, the Queen of the Sea , had needed to go into dry-dock to have the barnacles scraped off her bottom anyway; a ship needed to be clean to compete in the China trade where every ounce of extra weight meant slower time, therefore less money for the captain. He had left his ship in Baltimore while he continued on to Good Hope by steamer.
    Now he was here, and Melly had kissed him. Funny, but it had not seemed like a mistake. Rather, it had felt like a home-coming.
    << >>
     
    Melly could not stop staring at Conrad. He looked so familiar: the broad forehead and thick, gold-dusted brows, the straight line of his nose, and rugged planes of his face. She knew precisely the way his hair grew in a wheat-straw whorl of a cowlick on the back of his head, and the angle where the strong column of his neck merged with his wide shoulders. He was so very like Caleb.
     Yet he was also different. His eyes were a more brilliant blue, his hair bleached a shade lighter by an equatorial sun; his skin carried a darker, golden-oak glaze for the same reason. The way his firm lips shifted into a smile was not the same, nor were the lines that bracketed his eyes. He had seen more, done more, felt more, and the experiences had etched themselves into his features in ways that baffled and intrigued her.
    Caleb's fingers tightened on her hand where he still held it. She glanced at him, and saw what appeared to be a warning in his eyes. She gave