A/N: To clear up any confusion, "The Ballad" series explores an alternate timeline that I created starting with "The Ballad of a Healer and a Gunman", where Sister Ruth and Kid Cole met when they were much younger, but I always include a beginning and end scene that is related to the story and from the true timeline of the show.

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Kid looked at his pocket watch. She was supposed to have been back by now. Then he looked down at their youngest child. She wouldn't forget to feed Gideon, who was currently crying for milk.

"What if something happened to Momma?" said Mercy in a small voice as she hugged her knees and stared worriedly out at the rain through the gaping hole of the canvas cover.

"Nothing happened to your momma. People are just late sometimes. That's all." He wished he believed his own words. He had to find someone to watch the children while he went to look for her.

The problem was they'd never been to this town before and he didn't know anyone here, but he went to the safest place he could think of, which was the church named for San Miguel, the archangel. It was a small, unassuming structure with a flat roof and adobe walls.

The priest, who introduced himself as Padre Fray Andrés de Jesus Camacho, seemed the kindly sort and not only agreed to watch the children but offered to let the whole family stay in his quarters as long as they were in town.

Kid hesitated to leave the children with a stranger, priest or no priest, but it was the best he could do under the circumstances and they would be safer here than the part of town he was planning on looking. With any luck, he wouldn't be gone long.

He got the children settled inside the church with some of their favorite things and promised them he'd be right back.

The community was poor and isolated, but not too poor to have a saloon. One of the ladies at the revival had a sister who worked there and apparently wanted a Bible. Ruth had wasted no time in getting it to her though it had been getting dark and the rain had been threatening to fall.

Now it was pitch black and raining and he was worried it had been some kind of a trap. It had gone against his better judgment in letting her go, but she could be headstrong and fearless when it came to doing the Lord's work. Next time, he was going to put his foot down.

The saloon owner and the ladies insisted they hadn't seen her. And when a thorough search provided no sign of her, he had to believe them.

Back out in the now slackening rain, he looked up and down the muddy street. He was more worried than ever. He supposed he would just have to knock on every door until he found answers or Ruth and he would.

He didn't know what compelled him to go down alley near the saloon where the trash was kept when he could see there was no one there, but among the refuse, he found 2 Bibles, one was Ruth's and the other was the one she had been bent on delivering. Now he had proof something bad had happened, but he still had no answers.

He tried to qualm his fears as he picked up the sodden Bibles. He drew his gun out to no purpose as he had nothing to shoot at, however much he wished he did.

"Ruth!" he shouted, in case she could hear him, but he got no answer.

He went back out onto the street. This time his hurried pace became a full-out run as he raced to find his wife.

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"I'm the self-appointed sheriff of Socorro," the man said with a charming grin as they walked along, "Chauncey Daniels."

She smiled back though in truth it made her feel more awkward being that she couldn't participate in the name exchange.

The sheriff got the doctor before taking her to his office, which was really his home since there was no city jail.

Chauncey had hot coffee and blankets waiting on her when the exam that was conducted in the bedroom was through.

"It's amazing," the doctor said privately to Chauncey. The woman they talked about sipped on the coffee and stared into the flames as if hoping they would begin to take shape into scenes from her life. "I have never seen anything like it. I don't know if the woman is lying-"

"How dare you. If you had seen the way she looked when she said she didn't know her name, you'd know she was telling the truth."

"Perhaps. The human mind is a mysterious thing, but I do know that I am only capable of treating her body. She received a number of bruises and cuts, but otherwise she's fine. She did have a large bump on the back of her head. Maybe that had something to do with it. Maybe there's something she doesn't want to remember. She makes for an interesting case study. I hope you'll keep me notified. But as for finding out who she is, I suppose that falls to you as the sheriff."

He'd hoped the doctor would be more helpful, but as least she was okay in the physical sense.

"I'll get your mother and get her to bring some fresh clothes too. It wouldn't be seemly for her to stay here without a chaperone."

"Yeah, I guess she will have to stay here, won't she?" He didn't seem all that displeased at the prospect.

The doctor gone, he grabbed a newspaper from back east. Maybe something in it would jog her memory.

"Would you like to read it?" he asked, holding it out in front of her.

"That's kind of you, but no." She kept her hands tightly clasped around her cup.

What did you talk about with someone who had no memory of the past, he wondered. He pulled up a chair in front of hers and scanned for a conversation starter. "March 21st came and went with no event, surprise, surprise." At her confusion, he explained that a religious leader had predicted that it would be the day Christ returned and the world ended.

"No man knows the day," she answered immediately. "Only God does."

"Well, you remember that at least. That makes you smarter than this William fellow."

She gave a small, distracted smile.

"I can tell you're from the south."

She shrugged, not able to confirm or deny it.

"I'm sorry. That was insensitive of me. Of course you don't know. So you don't remember anything before the alley? Not anything about your attacker or where you were going?"

"I'm trying. I'm trying hard."

He saw her cup was empty and took it from her. "Well, don't worry. As soon as my mother gets here, I'm going to go see what I can learn. Memory or no memory, I'll find the one who did this and I'll find out who you are too."

She had no doubt he'd try, but she knew he couldn't promise that for sure. Chauncey had worked his chair closer so that their knees were touching and he had set the cup and newspaper down to reach across to hold her hands in his. He was trying to warm them and to comfort her at the same time.

She jumped when the door opened without a knock, causing the sheriff to drop her hands. It was a tall man in black, who stared at them as if they were caught doing something they shouldn't have been doing.

"And just what on earth is going on here?" he demanded in a voice that made her jump again.