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- Herausgeber: Bookbinder Press
- Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
- Serie: American Hearts
- Sprache: Englisch
A mysterious letter unlocks forbidden love.
Maggie MacLaren longs to leave her hometown, even if she must quell her attraction to rugged steelworker Jake O’Neill. He is handsome and solid, like the ordinary life all around her. When refined Andrew Adair walks into Maggie’s library, he sweeps her into his world of wealth and power, where dreams seem possible.
High above the town, reclusive young widow Allison Kimball finds a love letter tucked into her carpetbag. So begins a series of secret epistles and midnight trysts with a man she’s forbidden to love. When tragic flood waters come crashing down on the town, only courage will help love survive.
Originally published as Watermarks.
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Seitenzahl: 438
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2011
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For more information, visit jljarvis.com.
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SECRET HEARTS
AN AMERICAN HEARTS ROMANCE
J.L. JARVIS
SECRET HEARTS
Copyright © 1999 J.L. Jarvis
All Rights Reserved
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.
Originally published as Watermarks
ISBN (paperback) 978-1-9427670-2-2
ISBN (ebook) 978-0-9858554-4-4
Published by Bookbinder Press
www.bookbinderpress.com
CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Author’s Note
Thank You!
Book News
The American Hearts Trilogy
About the Author
1
Summer 1888 - Johnstown, Pennsylvania
He was there, but she didn't see him. Like a watermark on paper, it would have been so clear if she had looked, but her eyes were on the lake. Maggie MacLaren sat on a fence at the edge of the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club, like an indigenous specimen perched in repose. A young woman, barely nineteen, she wore comfortable brown shoes caked with dirt, a sensible gabardine skirt, and a crisp shirtwaist fastened at the neck with a cameo pin she had purchased from Woolworth’s. Honey brown curls hung untended over forehead and cheek as she gripped the rail with her fingers. Miles from the rumble of the iron mill below, she could see clearly enough to envision a life far from billowing smoke.
The windless surroundings soothed her senses as she observed the ladies across the lake. Skimming along the boardwalk under sheltering parasols, their movements were facile, their days uncomplicated. Up here in the mountains, above the masses, they were buoyed by power flowing from wealth. Maggie longed to be one of those ladies whose brows were as smooth and translucent as lake water.
As she drew in a cool breath and exhaled her cares as if they were vapor, a man crept up behind her.
“This is private property, Miss.” He grabbed hold of her waist with strong hands that were far too familiar.
Maggie started and nearly fell in the process. “Get your hands off me!” She struggled, then, turning, she saw him.
“Jake.”
“Afternoon, Maggie!” He touched his cap with mock formality. His smile lit that familiar spark in his eyes. She believed she could hide its effect upon her, unaware her eyes bore its reflection.
“You can let go now,” she said.
“I’m just trying to protect you.”
“From what?”
“From falling.”
“But you made me lose my balance.”
“Maggie, nobody makes you do anything.”
Maggie scowled, but Jake’s grin was impervious.
“Look at you—sitting on that fence rail like you’re posing for target practice.”
“And what concern is it of yours?”
“You could have been shot.”
“Shot.” Maggie nodded skeptically.
“Didn’t you see the sign?”
She glanced toward the sign, which in fresh paint indeed stated, “TRESPASSERS WILL BE SHOT.”
“Who would shoot me?” she said, donning a smile artificially demure.
“Oh, I wouldn’t trust any of those rich city boys with a shotgun in their hands. They might take you for a loon.”
“Or you for a boar.”
Jake stepped toward her. “Now, Maggie darlin’—”
“Don’t Maggie darlin’ me.” She pushed herself from the fence and stood up to face him.
His grin lost its mischief. A breeze stirred up scents of sweet grass and soil.
Her eyes softened. “What?” Maggie asked, looking lost.
His smile faded. “I didn’t say anything.” He was standing too close.
“But you wanted to.” She studied his face. It was hard, with marked planes at sharp angles—a working man’s face, roughened ahead of his years by unexpressed anger and melancholy, which he thought he kept hidden. The air stilled as if to allow an inviolable silence to hover.
“I was just wondering.” His eyes searched hers for some understanding.
“Don’t,” she said softly.
“I can’t help it.” Jake watched her as she looked anywhere but at him, at the metal gray creek, and the sky it mirrored. “Those clouds don’t look good. You’ll be caught in the rain.”
Inner warmth tempered her aspect. “I won’t dissolve.”
“I know.” A fence and a lifetime lay between them. She could get beyond neither.
Maggie turned to pick up her bicycle. Walking beside it, she steered it toward the road.
Jake hopped over the fence and caught hold of the handlebars. “I could sure use a ride.”
His usual mirth had returned. It set Maggie at ease. “A ride? How did you get up here?”
“Will dropped me off,” he said, walking beside her.
“I’ll be sure to stop by and tell him you’re up here,” said Maggie. She tugged at her bike, but Jake kept a firm grip with hands bronzed by work at the open-hearth of the Cambria Iron Works.
“He’s at work. Now, you wouldn’t make me walk, Maggie,” he said with that cajoling way of his that so bothered and charmed her.
She stopped and stared. “Well, I don’t see how you intend—”
He stepped around and stood blocking her path with his unwieldy physique, too strong to be stylish. Unable to see past his shoulders, she looked up at his smile, although she knew better. She had lost. She shook her head, lifting her hands in an invitational shrug, and let Jake take the bike.
“Here.” He straddled the bicycle, and lifted Maggie with ease to a seat on the handlebars.
Maggie let out a shriek and a laugh, and then hung on for dear life as they coasted down the mountain far too quickly.
“What about your fish?” she said, turning slightly back toward him.
“My fish? Oh, my fish, well—”
“You didn’t catch any, did you?”
“You’d better keep your skirt away from that wheel.”
She abruptly looked down and grabbed her skirt, already soiled by the spokes brushing past it. Her sudden movement threw the bicycle off balance. The front wheel wobbled, nearly tossing Maggie to the ground. With strong arms and good reflexes, Jake kept them from falling.
“I’m sorry,” she said, looking back to him and once more nearly causing them to fall.
“There’s something wrong with that front end,” he said, pausing as his eyes lowered long enough to take in the round hips on the handlebars. “It doesn’t balance proper.”
“—ly.”
“What?” Jake looked up, startled.
“Doesn’t balance proper—ly.” As soon as she spoke, she regretted her words. He hid his discomfiture well, but she sensed it. She began to apologize, but it only made things worse.
As they neared the town, the factory smoke rose to meet the dark clouds. A few drops of moisture fell on their faces, and then a few more, until the sky opened up to deluge the pair.
“It’s raining,” said Jake.
“Oh really?” Maggie looked back at Jake, causing the bicycle to swerve again, but this time Jake was ready.
He leaned forward. His lips touched Maggie’s ear as he said, “Look, darlin’, you just have to stop looking at me or we’ll end up sprawled all over the road together. And then what would people say?”
“They’d say, ‘Next time don’t follow the path of the horses.’”
But people did talk. There had been rumors among the wide open-eyed ladies in town. But Maggie ignored them. If she wanted to marry Jake, she would—Irish Catholic or not, and the women at the Presbyterian Church could go hang. She would marry whomever she chose, but it just so happened it wouldn't be Jacob O’Neill.
As they neared the town, they were on level ground, no longer coasting with ease down the mountain. Maggie listened to Jake’s deep and rhythmic breathing.
“If it’s too much for you, we could switch places for a while,” said Maggie, as they pulled into her yard.
She hopped off and dashed up the steps, while Jake hoisted the bicycle next to his shoulder and followed. They laughed to look at each other’s rain pasted foreheads as, side-by-side, they leaned their backs against the clapboard house and caught their breath under shelter of the covered front porch. Jake flashed a smile, then reached over and took Maggie’s hand. They looked straight ahead and watched the rain pour over the eaves.
His hand fit about hers, and the bulk of his shoulders pressed against her with each inhalation. As it slowed, she stole a glance. His hair hung from his forehead in sections of dripping brown strands. He wiped moisture from his stippled cheekbones and uneven nose, and then glanced at Maggie with troubling eyes. They deepened from an overcast hue to twilight gray. She could lose herself beneath such a sky.
He said, “I’ll be by tomorrow to take a look at that wheel. It’s not pointing straight—ly.”
She avoided his eyes. She wanted to smile. “It was fine until you got on it,” she said.
He cocked his head and furrowed his brow. “Must be the load was too heavy in front.”
With a sharp look, she released his hand and pushed it away.
“Now, Maggie,” he said through his laughter. “You know I’m just joking.”
In an instant, Jake’s humor changed to concern. Turning her face, Maggie saw through the sheer curtain the silhouette of Beth, her older sister, at work in the kitchen.
“Maggie?”
She refused to acknowledge him.
Jake stepped around to face her. “Darlin’, I was only joking—”
“So was I!” she said, looking at him with sparks of mischief in her eyes.
Jake took an impulsive step forward. “Maggie…”
She stepped back and bumped against the door. The rebound brought her closer to Jake.
“Is that you, Maggie?” Beth called from inside.
She eased back toward the door, while he slowly advanced with a vengeful grin. Defiant but amused, Maggie knew she had triumphed—until she saw in his eyes something true.
“Maggie.” Jake broke the silence that filled the air between them. His face warmed and invited.
Maggie looked past the yard, through the rain in the darkness. The leaves shivered. “We really shouldn’t tease,” she said, looking downward.
“Who’s that you’re talking to?” Maggie didn't hear Beth’s footsteps on the hardwood floor.
The door opened and threw Maggie off balance. Jake reached out to steady her, but she grabbed hold of the door frame and righted herself. He took a step back.
“Jake? How are you?” Beth’s voice broke through.
He lowered his arms.
Maggie slipped past, went inside, and tried hard to look poised, but, failing, diverted her attention to her sister.
Beth ushered Jake into the kitchen. “Look at you! I’ll get some towels and put on some coffee.”
It was dry, filled with firelight and a faint scent of yeast. But the warmth of the room came from Beth. By twenty-seven, life with Hank Garvey had drained her of freshness. Yet her kindness imparted a subtle beauty, like an abalone shell on the shore of a rough sea.
“On second thought, you two need to get out of those wet clothes. Jake, you come with me. We’ll find some of Hank’s clothes for you, then we’ll warm you up with some coffee. Go on upstairs, Maggie. You’ll catch your death.”
When Maggie returned, she found Jake seated at the round oak table, wearing an outgrown pair of Hank’s waist overalls and a cable knit sweater. While he filled out the shoulders and arms with a body as hard as the steel he fashioned, the remainder of the sweater hung loosely, the ribbing having been stretched beyond hope by Hank’s bloated belly.
Beth watched Jake’s deep-set eyes follow Maggie into the room. Maggie pulled her damp curls from beneath her cardigan, and then left them to fall where they would on her shoulders. Then she wrapped the brown worsted wool around her with folded arms and a shudder. She looked best in plain clothing. Her features were almost too large for her face, so that feminine frills on her looked frenetic, as though hopelessly trying to vie for attention. There was depth in her countenance, and yet she appeared unconcerned with herself.
Maggie glanced at Beth, hesitated, and then asked, “Where’s Hank?”
“Out.”
Maggie knew where “out” was. After Beth and Maggie’s parents had died, Beth and Hank moved into the MacLaren home along with two-year-old Robin. Soon the pattern was set. By now, Hank would have stopped on his way home from work, for a beer at a saloon. There were dozens to choose from. “A beer” seldom meant one. He would come home late tonight, a volatile bundle of conflicting emotions that would likely erupt for no obvious reason.
Jake observed the women’s exchange with tacit concern. He had seen Hank in action and could muster little tolerance and less respect for the man.
“More coffee?” Beth asked.
Jake finished a gulp. “No, I shouldn’t.” He glanced toward the door. “But you do make the best coffee in the valley.”
Beth grinned. “Save your flattery, Jake. One day you’ll need it for—” She caught herself. “—For some lucky girl.”
“On second thought, one more cup wouldn’t hurt,” he said, standing to walk to the stove.
Beth caught Maggie’s eye with a look both knowing and questioning.
“Robin’s awfully quiet,” Maggie said, hoping to deflect Beth’s attention.
“She’s probably playing with her dolls.” Beth cocked her head to listen, and then set down her coffee cup. “It is awfully quiet. I’d better go check on her.”
Maggie pushed her chair back from the table. “I can go, Beth. Why don’t you sit down?”
“No, you stay here,” Beth said with maternal demeanor. Maggie obeyed. Beth was six years older than Maggie and had been like a parent for quite some time. Other than Robin, Beth was all she had left in the way of family. Maggie adored her.
Jake watched Beth leave the kitchen. He waited until he heard the stairs creak under Beth’s feet, then leaned closer toward Maggie and said quietly, “Why do you suppose she married him?”
Maggie looked toward the stairs and shook her head. “There’s no use trying to figure that one out. Believe me, I’ve tried. He used to be handsome, but she’s smarter than that.”
“I guess it’s none of my business, but marriage doesn’t seem to be good to her.”
A cynical smile bloomed on Maggie’s face. “But that’s not the point, is it? For better or worse. We all assume we’ll get the better, but Beth got the worse.” Jake followed her eyes to Beth’s wedding rings, which lay on the windowsill above the sink.
“It’s enough to keep you from marrying,” said Jake.
“Marriage is enough to keep me from marrying,” said Maggie. Her eyes flickered then darkened. She stared at her hands with a distant expression.
Jake watched her, mired in unresolved thoughts of his own. His feelings were close to the surface, like a buoy too heavily weighted beneath and pushed down from above, yet intractably fighting for air; but Jake’s will was stronger—or maybe his pride.
“Uncle Jake!” Robin came running down the stairs and into his arms.
Jake scooped the five-year-old up and onto his lap. “And how’s my best girl?”
She looked down and grinned coyly.
“Fine.”
“Are you now? And how is Miss Dolly?”
“Special Dolly is fine. We were having tea.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry I haven’t any tea to offer. Do you suppose Special Dolly would care for some coffee?”
Robin gave the matter a moment of doubtful thought until she caught sight of a plate of oatmeal cookies Beth was just setting down on the counter. “I think she’d rather have a cookie.”
“All that cookie for this little doll? She’ll grow too fat for her clothes. Unless…do they make corsets for dollies?”
“Uncle Jake!” She was shocked but not too much to laugh.
“No, I think you’ll have to eat this,” he said, holding a cookie before her.
Robin reached, but he pulled it back.
“Are you sure you’ve got room…in this tummy?”
Robin burst into a series of giggles as Jake tickled her until she escaped under the table. A moment later, a small hand reached up, snatched the cookie, and vanished under the table.
Beth opened a cupboard and pulled out some plates as she said, “Jake, you’re staying for dinner. I guess Hank’s going to be late, so it will just be the four of us.”
Jake hesitated, and then shook his head. “I really ought to start for home.”
“You live next door,” Beth reminded, as she set the table with an extra place for him.
Robin popped her head out from under the table. “Please, Uncle Jake?”
Maggie opened a drawer and gathered some flatware while she listened intently. Jake glanced at Robin, then looked at Beth and laughed.
“I might as well wait till the rain lets up. Besides, I’d hate to disappoint my best girl,” he said as he winked at Robin and brushed a cookie crumb from her cheek.
Beth made certain that the only place left at the table for Maggie was a seat beside Jake. As Maggie was sitting, Beth busied herself spooning into Jake’s bowl some Hungarian goulash of beef chunks, tomatoes and whatever vegetables were on hand, seasoned generously with paprika. She asked Jake to bless the meal, then bowed her head and breathed in the peace that filled the room. She used to feel sad to be so relieved by Hank’s absence. But now she felt calm, as though emotions like happiness and sorrow were no longer available to her.
Afterward, Jake helped Maggie finish the dishes while Beth put Robin to bed. He was rarely found idle when there was work to be done. It was his way, and Maggie was used to it.
He hung up the dish towel but stood there reluctantly staring. Abruptly, he turned and looked at Maggie as though he had something to say but thought better of it.
Maggie waited.
Jake hesitated, then bolted for the door and took hold of the knob. He impulsively turned back. “There’s a concert in the park Saturday.”
With a puzzled laugh, Maggie said, “There’s a concert in the park every Saturday.”
“Well, I guess I haven’t been to one in a while, and—”
“Jake…”
“Come with me, Maggie.” He held both her shoulders.
“It sounds nice, but…” She stared at the topstitching on his shirt and its collar. Her eyes darted up to the planes of his cheeks, which were flushed, and his eyes were bright as the firelight across the room.
Jake’s eyes darted to the wall, then lowered. Then he smiled at Maggie—it was nearly a wink—and gave her shoulders a pat as though it didn’t matter. He turned back toward the door.
Maggie wanted to say something else—but instead what came out was, “It’s just that—I don’t really care for band concerts.”
Jake nodded. “I didn’t know that.” He studied the window as a drizzle of moisture slid down the pane.
“It’s not that—”
“No—I know,” he replied.
The power to break a man’s heart was too weighty. Maggie wished she could shed it.
Beth walked in to find Jake poised by the door. “You’re not leaving us, are you?”
Jake walked over to her with open arms and gave her a big hug. “Thank you for dinner, Beth.”
“You know you’re welcome anytime. And thank you for watching out for Maggie. Somebody’s got to.” She hooked her arm in his and patted his hand.
Maggie fired an impatient look toward Beth.
Jake paused at the doorway. “Goodnight, Beth.” He gave a nod over his shoulder. “Maggie.”
“Goodnight,” Beth said, and Maggie echoed.
She would have reached out to touch him, but as close as he was, it was still too far. He closed the screen door behind him and walked down the steps and across the yard.
Maggie watched him and saw all the coal and the steel that she longed to leave behind. He was part of this town and would remain so for the rest of his life, while Maggie had spent the best part of her life wanting something more. If she let Jake in her heart, he would never leave it, and she would never leave Johnstown. From within and without, her heart and her hometown both tried to ensnare her.
Through the window, she watched Jake easily hoist himself over the back fence and sprint across the yard to his house. “It’s better this way,” she thought, as she turned her back and leaned against the door.
* * *
The slam of a door disrupted the night stillness. Maggie sat up in bed. Something toppled over. A chair?
“Damn it!” Hank’s growl grated against the still dark morning air.
Maggie flopped back down and pulled the covers around her.
A chair scraped against the wood floor. Something fell to the floor and shattered—not china but a heavier glass or a jar, which Hank damned to hell for eluding his grasp.
Silence followed for several long moments, until a thud sounded against a downstairs wall. Or was it the landing?
Maggie lay in bed, alert, without moving. Minutes passed. Stumbling steps of a lumbering body advanced up the stairs. Beth and Hank’s bedroom door opened roughly and closed. And then it was still until stertorous noises all but rattled the wall.
Maggie rolled over and wished she could sleep.
Andrew opened the door to Adair Cottage, cottage being a misleading term for the family’s summer residence at Lake Conemaugh. It was, in truth, a lavishly furnished three story Victorian home with several outbuildings. For a moneyed family from Pittsburgh’s East End, however, the accommodations were considerably more rustic than those to which they were accustomed. Still, there may have been no more beautiful place so close to Pittsburgh, and certainly no more prestigious society than the members of the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club. A two-hour train ride from Pittsburgh, it rested upon the mountain in a perch overlooking the valley below. The manmade Lake Conemaugh was the perfect setting for the Pittsburgh elite to find summer respite from the trials and tribulations of wealth.
Andrew walked inside and glanced about. “Allison? It’s not out there.”
Allison stood at her bedroom window and observed the world from her sanctuary, like a dove in an open cage. Her eyes held a resignation begotten from grief. While some acquire wisdom over time, others obtain it through suffering. She had never sought to be wise at twenty-seven.
As she turned from the window to answer her brother, the sun cast a halo of fire about her upswept hair, framing her face with a reddish blond aura. In color and nature, she was translucent and fragile as porcelain.
“Oh. I must have left it on the train.” She walked out to the hallway. Leaning over the banister, she said, “Weren’t you on your way into town?”
“Yes, and I’m leaving right now.”
“Please.”
Andrew stopped and looked up with the impatience of a brother.
“The train’s gone by now.”
“I know. But perhaps there’s a bookstore.”
“With your kind of books? I don’t know.”
“Well, there’s a library, isn’t there?” She smiled imploringly.
“Yes.” Andrew wasn't known for his thoughtful acts, but she asked so little of him. He exhaled deeply. “What do you want?”
“I don’t know. Thomas Hardy, perhaps? There’s a new one, The Woodlanders, although I can’t imagine they’d have it.”
“They’re all the same, aren’t they? Just a lot of flora and fauna, and unrequited love amid the hayricks.”
“For you, perhaps,” Allison said toward the swinging door below. She returned to her room, where she had spent so much of her time in recent years. Whether here or at home, she seldom endeavored to go out on her own. Her husband’s death three years earlier had left her disenchanted with life, unwilling to venture back into society.
She closed the bedroom door behind her. Her carpetbag, still unpacked, lay on the bed where she had left it earlier in the day. With a languid sigh, she began to empty its contents.
Edmund Kimball, her late husband, was reported to have died of complications from a Smallpox vaccination. Those well acquainted with his rakish habits, however, knew otherwise. He had squandered his fortune, along with his wife’s. When his money and health were all but spent, he remained in the confines of his darkened bedroom, in the refuge of laudanum dreams. Whether the drug or syphilis, in truth, caused his death was the subject of speculation. Of course everyone had the good taste not to mention such matters, except in hushed tones behind the young widow’s back, as though Allison wouldn't know she was the subject of gossip.
In the end, Powell Sutton was the only friend who continued to call on the ailing Edmund. He saw Allison through her husband’s death, the arrangements that followed, and affairs that were settled. For this, Allison was grateful. Powell seemed her only friend at a time when sideways glances and innuendo of wagging tongues were her only society. In time she found it easier to avoid the judgment or patronizing pity by remaining at home. Home, however, was no longer hers. Edmund had lost the deed to their home in a card game. Homeless and penniless, Allison moved back to her parents’ Pittsburgh home to rely on their benevolence.
There came a day when the gossip subsided, but by then, Allison had become weary of society. Social blather had drained her spirit and filled the void with disillusionment ensconced in a fragile shell of hope. Her mourning became her refuge, the widow’s weeds her armor protecting her from the rigors of societal trivialities.
Here in her room, she felt safe. Reaching into her bag to unpack, she felt about for, and then seized, a letter. Eagerly, she pulled the letter from the bag and stared at the solitary “A” on the envelope. She glanced up with lustering eyes and walked over to the door. With a quiet caress she turned the lock. Her breath whispered in shallow and uneven rhythms as she walked to her bureau and sank into the chair. She pulled down the sloping front to reveal a desk and opened a drawer, sliding its contents about until she found a letter opener deep in the back. Yet such care she took to open the missive, that one scarcely would know how it set her heart racing.
* * *
A,
Please forgive me. For so long, I have looked at you and seen sorrow’s face. I touched your hand, wishing I could remove the pain. I was wrong to think I could do either.
Your Dutchman
* * *
Allison’s hands dropped to her lap. The letter quivered in the breeze. She looked through her tears, to the mountainous rise behind the carriage house.
The night before, a young couple, close friends of the family, had shared the news that their first child was to be born in autumn. Allison was happy for them. Truly she was. Yet delight filled the room until it pressed against her sick spirit. She couldn't breathe. She faded into the background and slipped out to the porch in secluded relief. She held onto the porch rail and refused to cry.
“Allison?” The familiar voice, low and vibrant, calmed her. She discreetly wiped a tear from her eye, then looked into the night sky.
His cashmere coat sleeve brushed against her arm as he stepped closer and asked, “What are you looking for?”
Her eyes were fixed on the stars. “I’m watching the clouds in the moonlight,” she said. Moments passed in comfortable silence. “It looks like a ship, doesn’t it?”
“The Flying Dutchman,” he said, not looking at the cloud.
At first, Allison didn't reply. After furtively brushing a tear from her cheek, she let herself bask in the warmth of his voice. Then she looked into eyes that she knew would be vibrant and dark. His gaze cloaked her in velvet.
“Flying Dutchman?”
“He was a Dutch sea captain who dared to sail into the fierce headwinds of a storm near the Cape of Good Hope. He cursed the wind and swore he could master it. And for daring to go against the wind, he was condemned to sail for eternity, alone and shunned by all.”
“Perhaps it’s not such a terrible fate.”
“Allison,” he said, with tender reproach.
She looked up. She wasn't used to the sound of affection. She replied, “With solitude comes peace.” Had he heard her voice quaver?
“Or loneliness.”
The rich timbre of his voice resonated in her soul. Robust laughter erupted from the party inside. Allison glanced to where window’s glow met the night, and watched it dissipate in the darkness.
“There are worse kinds of loneliness,” she said.
“I know.”
“I believe that you do.” She dared not look at him now.
They were alike in this. Each had come to know loneliness as a mutual friend. To share it now filled her and stretched the scars until her heart ached.
She watched the moon break free of the obstructing cloud. A thought wrenched at her heart. “Is there no escape?”
He stared silently at the drifting cloud in guarded melancholy.
Once more she inquired, “For your Dutchman—will nothing free him of his curse?”
“A love that’s true.” His manner was blunt. Then he smiled and spoke as though finishing a child’s tale. “He can be released from his fate if he can find a love so true that she will be faithful unto death.”
“Faithful unto death!” Allison nearly laughed. “How easy for him—with no such obligation in return.” Her smile faded. She grabbed hold of the porch and looked away, trying to hide her crumbling composure. But her fingertips trembled and gave her away.
His hand covered hers where it gripped the rail. He knew her heart and had touched it. With the touch of his hand, he now reached out to console and to shield her. She turned her hand over. His palm pressed against hers and their fingers entwined. Her lids lowered and tightened. As though it might draw her to safety, she held fast to his hand. Then, with tentative wonder, she inclined her head to him. Apprehensive. Astonished.
“Allison!” It was her mother’s voice.
The two hands slipped apart.
* * *
“Allison!”
Allison buried the letter in the back of a drawer and turned her head to listen as the front door closed below.
Her mother called again. “Allison!”
The banister creaked at the top of the stairs as the bedroom door swung open.
At the large oak desk of the Johnstown Public Library sat Maggie MacLaren. Her chin on her hands, her gaze wandered to a window and followed the sun. It shone in like limelight upon a gray-haired man with a bushy gray moustache while he perused the daily paper. A pair of unseen feet shuffled across the wooden floor until it creaked in protest and surrendered to silence. Cutting through the stillness, a newspaper page turned with a crackle then settled with a soft rustle. Thoughts echoed through Maggie’s head like an incessant series of freshwater droplets in a torpid pond.
“Why does Mr. Higginbotham wear the same shirt day after day?”
A wooden pencil rolled off her desk and dropped onto the floor. She stooped to retrieve it.
“I wonder if he’s ever washed it.
“Did I say that out loud?” She stood and looked about the surface of her desk with growing concern.
Hollow footsteps rounded the corner of a stack of books. Maggie glanced up and smiled politely at a plump woman who handed her a worn book with an unremarkable cover. She stamped the book and sent the kindly woman on her way with a few cordial but empty remarks. As the heavy door abraded against its frame and closed, Maggie continued to stare, with a sigh.
“I think I can hear the dust falling—individually. Dust!”
Energized by her sudden inspiration, Maggie arose to dust books, more for her need than for theirs. She brushed the feather duster along the shelf, stopping occasionally to reflect on a book as though recalling an old friend, and an enemy or two, from long ago. Maggie had many friends here. When both parents died, she couldn't attend college. But she continued to read. By the time she was eighteen, she had read every work of fiction in the library. No one was surprised when she was offered the position of librarian—no one, that is, except Maggie. It appeared that the pieces of her life were falling together in a neatly ordered pattern, one not of her own design.
Her gaze fell to a book whose spine looked frayed and limp. As she slid the fragile book from its shelf to examine it for damage, the heavy doors of the library swung open and closed with a resounding echo.
She lifted her head toward the vexatious noise and looked through a gap in the stacks to see who was responsible. Her posture straightened. She moved her eyes closer until she had practically shelved her face with the books. There, standing at the entrance, was a man. A young one. And handsome and as tall as most men around here—but leaner, and elegant. There were no bulky broad shoulders to pucker the seams—not on this man—for he was a fine gentleman. He must be a visitor from the South Fork Dam, she decided. Otherwise, why would someone so, well, rich come to Johnstown, let alone her library? She admired him, from his bronze hair to his fine leather Oxfords, as he strode across the room. He looked so aristocratic, standing there at the desk, so tall, so—
The desk. He’s standing at the desk. My desk? Maggie MacLaren, nineteen is far too old to behave like this! She chastised herself under her breath as she smoothed her hair and started to walk back to her desk. She took two steps and stopped short. Spinning around, she gaped at her hands. One hand held the tattered duster and the other held the worn book. There she stood staring, unable to think what to do with such objects. She stuffed the rag and the book into an empty spot on a shelf, took a deep breath and continued on her way, smoothing her skirt and feigning nonchalance.
By the time she reached the desk, she had regained her composure and was indeed quite proud of herself for having done so. Then he pivoted toward her and smiled. In that instant her senses quickened while her brain went numb. Words echoed through her ears to her mind, scrambled and unintelligible. She tried to focus through the shimmering brilliance of his eyes, but her thoughts raced on without her. “Blue…Sapphire blue…Deep blue…Deep watery blue. What a marvel…novel…”
“…Novels?”
He had spoken. He was waiting.
“Pardon me?” asked Maggie.
“Novels? Thomas Hardy novels. Where can I find them?”
The gentleman was asking her, Maggie MacLaren, a question.
He frowned. “I beg your pardon. You are the librarian, aren’t you?”
She forced a charming smile with panicky eyes, while she desperately tried to maintain her tenuous hold on any vestige of poise. She could tell it was her turn to speak by the way he was looking, well, staring at her. And waiting.
“Yes, I am.” She praised herself for having replied—and in a complete sentence. Someday she would look back on this—and still not laugh.
The gentleman was smiling at her. His eyes sparkled like evanescent bubbles of champagne, which only proved his sophistication, since the men of Johnstown typically sparkled like bubbles of beer, or rather froth—and that most often from the mouth.
“Thomas Hardy? Do you have any of his novels?” He was awfully patient, but he was beginning to look concerned.
“I’m sorry. I’m afraid I had something on my mind,” she said. You, she thought. “They’re right over here.” She was beginning to make sense. She hoped. She led him to the fiction section. “Here they are.”
“I don’t suppose you have The Woodlanders,” he said.
“No.” She had let him down. “I’m afraid not.”
He looked over the available books with a hint of a frown, and eventually chose A Laodicean. “I suppose this will do,” he said with a perfunctory manner which Maggie found enchanting.
“Now that is a devout Hardy fan,” she thought, as her eyes settled upon his shaved cheekbone and angular jaw.
With an extended arm, Andrew Adair signaled for her to proceed back to the desk.
“Do you have a library card?” she asked, knowing full well he did not. She helped him fill out the form, then issued a card and stamped his book.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Adair,” she said as she finished.
“Good afternoon, Miss—”
Maggie eyes rounded and softened.
“Miss—?”
“Oh!” Maggie smiled but not on the inside. “MacLaren.”
“Miss MacLaren.”
She watched his full lips caress her name. He made it sound mellifluous. On sweet echoes it wafted through her ear and her mind and on out the other ear. Her name on his lips; his lips on her—
“And if one were to call you by your Christian name, Miss MacLaren, what would that be?”
She was so charmed by his attention it barely seemed presumptuous of him to have asked. A blush burned her cheeks. He waited.
“Miss MacLaren?”
“Uh—it’s Maggie MacLaren. Well, MacLaren’s my surname.” She laughed helplessly. “Of course, I’m not Maggie MacLaren MacLaren.” She laughed and sighed. “Just Maggie MacLaren.” Maggie’s voice trailed off in the direction of her inner self-loathing.
“Well then, goodbye, Miss Maggie MacLaren.”
“Goodbye, Mr. Andrew. Adair. Mr. Adair.”
Mercifully, he turned and left. Maggie watched him and whispered, “Goodbye.”
Jake O’Neill walked in, with his blue jeans and brogans and homespun shirt, and he saw Maggie’s face—with its glazed expression. He craned his neck to take a more critical look at the young man who was leaving. After a passing glance at the well-tailored clothing, he continued toward Maggie with a self-assured gait.
“I have to stop home before work and I thought we could walk together,” he was saying.
Maggie’s lashes dropped to the desk where her thoughts seemed to hover.
“As I was saying,” Jake continued, “Maggie?”
He watched her and waited. His eyes lit with mischief. “You dropped something.”
“Oh?” Maggie glanced halfway toward him.
“Down there,” he said with a nod.
She glanced about dreamily.
“Right there.”
She looked down.
“You’ve nearly got it.”
“Got what?” She leaned lower. “What did I drop?”
“Your jaw,” said Jake.
She rose with eyes glaring, face flushed.
“Jake.”
“Maggie? Did you hear anything I said when I got here?”
“Of course I did.”
“What?”
“You said you’re going to work.”
He paused for a moment to study Maggie’s face. “Yes…but I have to go home first—Maggie, who was that man?”
“A new library patron.”
“What were you talking about?”
“Talking about?” She and Jake had always talked about everything. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Books.”
“Oh.” Jake nodded.
Maggie looked at his neck, too thick for his collar, and saw a workingman’s brawn. She didn't notice him tensing his jaw and broad shoulders.
“Why don’t you lock up and I’ll walk you home.”
Maggie sailed through the stacks, shelving a handful of books and checking to make sure no one remained in the building.
From behind brooding eyes, Jake watched her round a corner, and then glanced toward the library card application that lay on the desk. He scrutinized the handwriting on the card, and then tossed it back down. He knew Maggie too well. He couldn't compete, nor could Maggie prevail, against the lure of wealth. While Jake believed Maggie was above being impressed by money alone, he knew its accompanying education and sophistication would overwhelm her and overshadow him. He looked up and watched Maggie hurrying to complete her mundane tasks with balletic grace. Maggie wouldn't see the remote longing that lay concealed beneath the surface of Jake’s brow, for he wouldn't destroy their friendship by revealing such feelings. This was, perhaps, how they had remained so close over the years.
There was a time when Jake had wanted nothing to do with Maggie MacLaren. He was seven. When Beth went to work as a domestic, both mothers agreed that Jake and his brother would see little Maggie to and from school. At first, the six-year-old trailed behind Jake and Will, not quite managing to keep up with their deliberately speedy pace. Yet she never complained or asked them to slow down. She trailed along as fast as she could, with her lunch pail rattling to the rhythm of her rapid steps. She scampered along in silence until her foot caught on an exposed tree root and she tripped forward and onto her face. Eight-year-old Will looked back long enough to make sure she was alive, then walked on. But Jake stopped. Maggie might have been an annoying little kid, but he couldn't leave her this way. He went back and helped her to her feet. She swiped the dust from her face and swallowed the blood from her lip. Then, without waiting for Jake, she marched on ahead until she reached the school.
By the time Maggie no longer needed to be walked to school, she and Jake were best friends, fighting one another but defending against others who dared do likewise. Jake revealed to Maggie a serious side that no one else knew, and Maggie trusted Jake enough to share her dreams.
The day after Jake turned fourteen, he walked out of the school building, past Maggie and around the corner, where he waited in the alley between the General Store and the Bootery. Maggie rounded the same corner and hesitated in front of the alley long enough for Jake to emerge and take her books from her. This way they could walk home together without the tiresome school yard teasing. They reached Maggie’s house first and stopped at the front walk, as they always did. Maggie turned to walk away, as she always did. This time, however, Jake reached out and grasped her arm.
“Maggie.” Jake stood his ground. Maggie stopped. He said nothing for a moment. His eyes were fixed. His brow was creased. He struggled so but seemed unable to speak.
“Just say it. You’re scaring me.” Maggie had never seen Jake behave like this.
After a moment, he looked her in the eye and blurted it out. “I won’t be walking you home from school anymore.”
“Oh.” She tried to hide her dismay with annoyance. “Well it’s not as if I need walking h—”
“I’m quitting school. I’m going to work.”
Now Maggie was angry. “No.”
“I have to. My family needs the money. It’s my turn to go to work.”
“But you can’t!”
“I’m fourteen.”
“But what about our plans? We were going to go to college together, and—”
“Wake up, Maggie! This isn’t one of your library novels. Open your eyes. This is what life is! This is who I am! Damn it all, who do you think you are?” As soon as he heard his own angry words, he regretted their harshness.
She turned away and said nothing.
Jake reached out to put a hand on Maggie’s shoulder but thought better of it. He lowered his hand.
“They were just dreams.” He couldn’t let her see tears cloud his eyes, so he turned from her and walked away.
She listened to his retreating footsteps.
“But they were our dreams,” she whispered to herself. She looked back over her shoulder and watched Jake walk away.
The minister wore his Sunday smile as he stood outside the door of the First Presbyterian Church and shook hands with the small congregation filing out into the sunlight to disperse for the afternoon. For a fleeting moment his rhythm was broken when Maggie brushed by with a smile and a hasty “Good morning,” and hurried down the steps and across the lawn. The Reverend quickly returned to the shaking of hands, but the deacon’s wives swarmed together to watch as Maggie tugged at her skirt to reveal an immodest split down the middle, designed so for horseback and bicycle riding. This prompted a series of low vocalizations and raising and lowering eyebrows and lids designed not to conceal the object of their concern but to mask its intent. Thus engrossed, they watched Maggie straddle her bike and ride off in the direction of the South Fork Dam as the breeze liberated long brown locks that fluttered behind in her wake.
She peddled uphill for as long as she could, then dismounted and pushed her bike along until she came within sight of the lake. It had not always been there. The lake formed when a dam was built some thirty-six years earlier. The reservoir was intended to provide water for the canal running from Johnstown to Pittsburgh. It was rendered obsolete when, not six months later, the Pennsylvania Railroad completed a run from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh and effectively ended the need for a canal. Within three years, the Pennsylvania Railroad had bought the canal system for its right of way. The South Fork Dam was included in the purchase, but since the railroad had no use for it, the dam and its lake lay neglected for the next twenty years.
The spring of 1862 brought a heavy rain, which prompted people to speculate about what would happen should the dam ever break. Break it did, but the lake was only half full and the valves had been opened to release excess pressure. As a result, very little damage occurred. From then on, the level of concern over the South Fork dam was negligible.
In 1879, the property was quietly purchased by a group of Pittsburgh’s wealthiest, who developed the area into the exclusive South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club. By then the dam was badly in need of repair, prompting the new owners to employ some creative engineering tactics. Rather than replace the damaged and missing drainage pipes, they hired local workers to remove the remaining pipes and plug up the gaps with all manner of materials, including rocks, mud, and sticks.
The new owners stocked the reservoir with bass to guarantee good fishing. Then, fearing their fish would escape through the spillway, they installed a screen. This kept them from losing fish, but the screen collected debris and clogged the spillway, thus keeping excess water from escaping as well. To make it easier to gain access to the club, the level of the dam was raised enough to lay down a 930-foot long road to cross it. This also raised the level of the lake as several mountain streams fed into the reservoir and filled it up beautifully. It was dubbed Lake Conemaugh.
By the time the club opened in 1879, its founder, Benjamin Ruff, had added to the membership such powerful individuals as Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and Andrew Mellon. There were sixty-one members in all that opening season, drawn together by at least one common interest: their wealth.
For the people in Johnstown below, any threat posed by the dam was remote. No one worried much about it, except when heavy rains came in spring. Some would speculate that this might be the year the dam would break but almost always in jest. There were intermittent scares over the years, but nothing ever came of it. People came to accept the dam and the money its new residents brought into the community.
A bursting dam was the last thing on Maggie’s mind as she got off her bike and imagined with each step what it would be like to see Andrew Adair once more. He belonged to a world beyond mills and mining and soot-stained muslin curtains. His world was rich with sailing and silk and sophistication, all of which were beyond her grasp.
Maggie climbed to a perch on a low outstretched limb of an oak tree and looked out over the shimmering metal gray water to the cottages on the opposite shore. A solitary rowboat glided across the still water, propelled by the strong and steady strokes of an oarsman.
The casual observer could see the effect which, when properly performed, appeared effortless. Stroke upon stroke, the rower pulled harder, the boat moved faster, amassing momentum. Mass times speed; it was simple and fluid and arrestingly beautiful.
Under closer scrutiny, however, one might notice the rower’s strokes, the muscles contracting and releasing in a steadily beating pattern fraught with effort born of determination. Only with deliberate exertion could mass and speed thus combine to fight against nature’s stillness. It wasn't easy for the rower, but he moved forward in an inert world, and thus obtained satisfaction through exhaustion.
Maggie saw only grace and ease. She wondered at the lives of such people, freed by wealth from all the worries and cares that so afflicted the valley folks. She couldn't see the young woman seated on the porch, looking out over the lake and into the mountains beyond.
* * *
Allison Kimball’s thoughts were far away, in a place where despair was giving way to new hope, a place long ago abandoned yet inexplicably preserved. Turning from her fearful and fragile nature, she was choosing once more to give her heart to a man. And so she sat on the porch facing the lake and lifted her pen to write.
* * *
My D,
I will not accept your apology, for you have done nothing wrong. Last night, when you touched my hand you touched my heart. I thought it had died. But I think, now, it was waiting for you. Since that moment—that touch—I’ve abandoned all rules of propriety. I will say what I feel. It’s hope—hope for that in which I had not believed, and yet longed for. We know each other too well to hide. Have I misunderstood? Tell me now, for my heart is in peril. And if I have not, then what are we to do?
A
* * *
Allison rose and looked out at the lake once more, this time with a sense of expectancy she had all but forgotten. She watched the rowboat near the shore, while the sun tucked itself behind a hovering cloud to cast a cool calm over the valley. The boat rubbed gently against the weathered dock.
* * *
Maggie descended from her perch and indulged in one last look at the glassy lake before she mounted her bicycle and coasted back down to the valley.
* * *
