Excerpt from Home to the Brazos

This photograph was taken about ten years ago at the Oaks Crossing of the Brazos River, looking upstream.  The photographer, my husband Raf Seibert, took it from the west side of the river.  This was an old stagecoach crossing and a very historic area.  It is also one of the settings for my book, Home to the Brazos.  Here is an excerpt from the beginning of Chapter 14.

     Only six hours later Bill was up and dressing for church.  He remembered that when he was a boy they never ate breakfast until after Mass, and he decided to try that again.  Just after he woke up, Mattie had called to remind him, and he asked her if he could pick her up on the way.
    “On the way,” she laughed.  “If you call coming clear down to Oaks Crossing ‘on the way’, come right ahead.”
    Smiling, Bill got in his truck.  He saw no one around, so he guessed they were all out looking for whatever or whoever it was that shot the gun last night.
    As he passed Mose and Lena’s house, Lena came into the yard and waved to him.  He noticed she was already dressed.  He supposed she was getting ready to attend the Methodist Church up in Palo Pinto, the one with the nice woman preacher.
    It took only about fifteen minutes for Bill to get to Pleasant Valley Road to turn off down to the west side of Oaks Crossing.  He noticed the road was paved now, something that had obviously happened in the last ten years, since before that you always drove with a rooster tail of dust in your wake.
    It took another five or six minutes for Bill to get down to the Brazos River.