Secret Hearts

by J. L. Jarvis

  Bottles rattled and chimed from a passing milk wagon. Two horses plodded along with a coal wagon in tow. Johnstown charmed her with its quaintness, now that she knew she was leaving. A number of practical questions arose with the daylight. She and Andrew had not discussed where they would live after the wedding. Still, Maggie knew that Andrew would see to such matters. There would be no more worries. Money made life easy. They would marry and everything would fall into place.

  On her way to the stairs, Maggie stopped to look in on Robin. Robin wasn't one to hop cheerily out of bed in the morning. She generally needed some coaxing. Maggie walked over to her bed. “Robin,” she said in soft sing-songy tones as she touched the girl’s cheek. Maggie’s face turned ashen. “Oh, Robin.” She touched the girl’s forehead and cried out, “Beth!”

  “Mama?” whined Robin with a raspy little voice.

  “She’s coming, honey,” said Maggie as she heard Beth’s footsteps running up the stairs.

  “Oh, my Lord, she’s burning up!” Beth exclaimed as she touched the child’s forehead and cheeks with a mother’s hand. Robin’s neck was swollen.

  Maggie was on her way down the stairs. She pulled on her coat as she told Beth, “I’ll get the doctor.” All the while, she thought through where the nearest telephone was, and whether it would be quicker just to go to the doctor’s house. If Robin had the fever, there were bound to be others with it. They, too, would seek the doctor’s services. She would need to leave a message. She wrote a note to take with her, just in case.

  Late in the day, the doctor arrived to find Robin’s face covered in a rash, except for a pale area surrounding her mouth. His diagnosis confirmed their fears. “Scarlet fever,” he said.

  As Beth took care of her daughter, she couldn't ignore the rising fear within her, but she turned from it and did what had to be done for her daughter. Then she kept herself busy to avoid the waiting that brought on the worries and fears.

  Hours passed before Maggie convinced Beth to go downstairs for some tea and, Maggie hoped, a moment of rest. Maggie sat in the rocking chair beside Robin. She observed her niece’s fitful sleep, frustrated that there was nothing she could do to ease her suffering. So many times before, she had looked at Robin and wondered at the precious peace of a child’s sleeping face but not now. There was no peace, only sickness that threatened to take a young life, and it frightened Maggie. Sleep seemed one step closer to death. She shuddered as she walked over to the window to distance herself from such thoughts.

  Maggie looked out at the night sky. The rippled imperfections of the window glass made the world appear frightening. The moon seemed to wave as though mocking her. Tree branches were gnarled. There were no shadows except those that loomed over Robin.

  “Not this child. You will not take this child,” Maggie said with stark defiance until she could no longer see through her tears. “Please?”

  In the kitchen below, Beth sat facing the fire, her tepid teacup on the table beside her. With a sigh, she lowered her head into her hands and wept.

  “God, I’m not strong enough,” she whispered, as she got up to care for her little girl.

  Throughout the evening, Robin hovered in a world of troubled dreams as her temperature soared. Maggie brought tea and compresses to soothe the child’s throat and neck, while Beth sat at Robin’s bedside giving her daughter comfort and assurance that she herself didn't possess. There was too much waiting and too little to be done.

  Maggie found herself pausing from fatigue, reluctant to face her own silent thoughts. She turned from the window and caught a glimpse of Beth. Through Beth’s tears and clenched jaw, her face brandished the mettle of maternal love. It was a force. The sight dwarfed the strength of Maggie’s own feelings for Andrew. She watched her sister and prayed that Beth’s love, and her faith, would be powerful enough to thwart death’s pull on her child. Beth smoothed some matted hair from Robin’s forehead, and lay her head down on the bed beside her. Maggie watched Beth’s weary shoulders relax as she drifted into an involuntary respite. She crept out of the room, leaving Beth to her sleep. There was nothing more to be done.

  Maggie eased the front porch door open then closed it behind her. She shut her eyes to allow the cool outside air to soothe her tired face. A sigh escaped unheeded as she slumped into the nearest chair and welcomed the numbness that overtook her. She lapsed into thoughts of Andrew and the marriage that must now be postponed.

  She would explain it all to him at midnight, when he arrived at her doorstep to take her away. With no telephone in her home, there had been no way to reach him without leaving the house and the people who needed her. Besides which, a telephone call would have required an explanation she wasn't yet ready to offer. She couldn't trouble Beth with talk of marriage—not now. Beth had all she could manage just caring for Robin.

  Even if Maggie had been able to get to a telephone, it would have been difficult to reach Andrew without arousing suspicion. The only telephone at the lake was in the clubhouse. Who would have answered? Would they have conveyed her message? Accurately? There were no proper words to impart her message without provoking troublesome questions. Even the right words in the wrong hands could be disastrous. Their plans for marriage were better left secret, at least for the time being. Maggie wasn't so naïve as to think that the people in Andrew’s world would countenance this marriage without suspicion. While she trusted Andrew’s love, she wasn't quite willing to trust those around him.

  The only thing to do was to wait for Andrew to arrive at the appointed hour and break the news to him in person. He would be disappointed, but their lifetime together could wait. Love was strong. It would endure a delay. All that mattered was that they were in love.

  Night fell and Maggie waited for Andrew. When Robin was better, they would marry. But she did so wish that tonight they could be on the way to their wedding, and to their wedding night. Maggie shivered in the cool night air. Pulling her sweater around her, she recalled their afternoon in the sun.

  With eyes blue as the lake, he drew her to him. His passion lay close to the surface and was easily given. While hers wasn't easily won, his attention was dizzying. His desire was reckless. Maggie reveled in it. In that afternoon moment, Andrew had needed her as much as she wanted him the rest of the time.

  It was quiet now. There was no movement inside the house. Maggie curled up on the porch swing and drew a lap quilt about her. The summer night air was cool and calming. Aided by the gentle swaying of the porch swing, Maggie’s mind drifted, neither asleep nor awake, amid amorphous memories. She needed to rest if she was to help Beth tomorrow. Perhaps she would just close her worn eyes until Andrew arrived. She would hear his buggy, his footsteps. She didn't feel herself drift off to sleep.

  The wheels of a cart rolled over the cobblestones as if to mumble the coming of dawn. The subtle noise crept into Maggie’s consciousness, as she lay slumped across the porch swing. She stirred to adjust her stiffened body to a more comfortable position. She might have drifted back to sleep but for the sound of footsteps. A man cleared his throat. Through squinting eyes, Maggie tried to make out the blurred shape of legs—a man’s legs—blocking the sunlight.

  Chapter 14

  Maggie jolted to an upright position.

  “Andrew!”

  But as Maggie’s vision cleared, she recognized the heavy brogans and crumpled laborer’s trousers. Disappointment sank in. She raised her eyes as far as the creased and callused hands, and the ragged fingernails embedded with grime.

  “I just got off the night shift. I was on my way home.”

  “Jake.”

  “I saw you here.”

  “I thought you were—”

  “I know who you thought I was,” Jake said in a low voice. He looked toward the street, although there was nothing there to see but the early morning daylight filtering through a morning mist. He glanced at Maggie with steely intensity.

  “Maggie, what are you doing here?” He spoke in a quiet voice.
/>   She could hear his concern—or was it judgment? It hurt to look at him, framed as he was with the harsh and unforgiving morning light. She sat up.

  “Maggie?”

  She took a moment to sort her dreams from reality. “I’m sorry I—” But she stopped. She had no words. She was now awake enough to wonder what she must look like. She smoothed her hands over her hair and her skirt.

  He looked down at her. “What did you do, sleep out here?”

  Unable to meet his gaze, Maggie looked at the leaves of ivy entangling itself upon the porch columns. Now fully awake, she could only repeat the same words to herself. Andrew never came for her. She slept through the night, past the time of their meeting, and he never came for her.

  “Maggie?” Jake watched her uneasily. “What’s happened?”

  Maggie could not rise above her disappointment to conjure an explanation. She looked up at Jake and saw his sense of duty, not recognizing it as love. Was he not going to gloat? His concern somehow made it hurt more. Maggie felt like a fool. Jake’s tenderness reached through to the source of her anguish and opened the wound. She averted her eyes from the blinding comfort of Jake’s presence. Don’t cry. Maggie, do not let him see you cry. Why couldn’t the ground just open up and allow her to sink into its depth? She closed her eyes and despaired. She had trusted Andrew with her heart. How could she have loved him so easily?

  Jake crouched down and peered into her eyes. When she did not respond, he took her hand in his and just held it.

  “Maggie!” Beth’s voice rang through the front door.

  Maggie jumped to her feet. “Robin?” The immediacy of Beth’s voice rose to the fore as Maggie looked at Jake and regained her reason. She reached out and took hold of his arm, and said urgently, “I’ve got to go. Robin’s got scarlet fever.” She finished the sentence as the door closed behind her.

  Jake listened to the door close and fought the urge to follow. Since when had he been so awkward a presence in Maggie’s life? Since that rich bastard Andrew from the mountain came along. And now Maggie’s heart was broken. Jake turned and headed for home. Only once did he pause to glance back toward Maggie’s house with dark eyes. But he turned away, gave a nod to the iceman, and went home. He wouldn't look again.

  Beth finished putting some tea and toast on a tray. She was about to pick up the tray, when Maggie snatched it from her and carried it toward the stairs as she called out strict orders for Beth to go outside for some fresh air and rest. “It will invigorate you,” she said.

  Beth looked at Maggie doubtfully but was too weary not to comply. She found her way to a chair on the front porch, into which she sank with little thought for appearances. A sigh escaped before she knew it, as she allowed her eyes to close for an instant. “Why is it so hard?” she heard herself say, and the need to weep rose, until she had to stand and return to work for fear of giving into it. There was no time for tears.

  She didn't see Maeve O’Neill approaching behind her, and was startled to hear her voice so nearby. “I’ve brought you some soup. When Robin’s up to eating it will do her good.”

  She held a large pot of soup with folded up dishrags. Strings of gray hair blew against her round face.

  Beth looked at her friend with expressionless eyes.

  “Oh, Maeve.”

  “Jake told me that Robin was sick with the fever.”

  Beth nodded wearily, with no clear response.

  Maeve studied Beth with compassion. “Why don’t I take this soup into the kitchen while you sit right there? You look like you could use some rest.”

  Beth began to protest.

  “Sit!”

  Maeve returned several minutes later to find Beth peacefully asleep on the shady porch chair. She smiled at Maggie, who stood in the doorway.

  “Maeve…” Maggie searched for words, and shook her head helplessly as she offered up her best expression of appreciation, which Maeve dismissed with a wave of her hand. “You’re a good and dear friend.” Maggie’s throat ached as she tried to suppress the tears that filled her eyes. She leaned back against the doorframe and held the door ajar.

  With a warm farewell, Maeve stepped down from the porch, and then hesitated. She pivoted around to regard Maggie for a moment, then—as an afterthought—said, “It was Jake who sent me over. He was worried about you.”

  “Was he?” Maggie tried to smile but struggled to swallow instead.

  Maeve nodded gently.

  Jake was worried about her. Andrew was not. Maggie wondered if her thoughts were advertised on her face. If Maeve weren't Jake’s mother, she might have poured out her heartache in exchange for some motherly advice. Instead, she looked down at the loose doorknob, which Hank had promised to fix weeks ago, and thanked Maeve for the soup. “And tell Jake I said thank you,” she called after Maeve. The elder woman stopped halfway between their two houses and looked back, poised to speak. Two young O’Neill children rushed to their mother with some unresolved conflict. Maggie waved her on with a forced smile, then slowly stepped inside and headed up the stairs to check on Robin.

  When news of the scarlet fever outbreak reached the club, its members closed down early for the season. People packed and closed cottages.

  Andrew opened his bedroom door, allowing a beam of morning light to shine through and light his path down the stairs. When he reached the foot of the stairs, he sent a maid up to retrieve his bags and greeted his mother with a perfunctory peck on the cheek.

  “Well, it’s about time,” said his mother.

  “If we don’t hurry, we’ll miss the morning train,” said Charles.

  “We certainly wouldn’t want to stay here amid all the sickening…sickness,” Andrew said sardonically.

  Lillian Adair stopped and looked at her son. She wore her propriety like an heirloom broach, comfortable with it, yet aware of its weight. “Scarlet fever is a tragic disease which afflicts countless unfortunate souls, but we are under no obligation to bring it into our home.”

  “Of course not, Mother.”

  Lillian’s attention was sought by one of the servants who hurried in to consult with her on an urgent packing matter. Andrew looked absently toward the vacant doorway she left behind.

  Allison rounded the foot of the stairs and caught sight of her brother. Tentatively, she approached him. “Deep in thought?”

  Andrew looked at his sister with a wry grin. “Deep thought is something I try to avoid.”

  She smiled. “No. You don’t want to risk getting in over your head.”

  “Precisely.”

  Refusing to be sidetracked, Allison took a moment to measure her words. “Is it your girl?”

  A trace of a smile passed across Andrew’s face before, without looking at her, he nodded.

  Allison placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. She opened her mouth to speak but was interrupted by approaching footsteps and the metallic whine of an opening door. Lillian Adair paused in the doorway to instruct a servant on some packing procedures. Allison squeezed Andrew’s shoulder, and then proceeded outside, for her packing was finished. Andrew reached his room as Lillian entered with a scurrying servant girl in tow.

  Seated in the phaeton, Allison waited while Mr. Adair gave Samuel some last minute information about the renovations being made to the cottage in their absence. After leaving them at the train station, Samuel would return to the cottage to oversee the installation of indoor plumbing in the cottage, much to Mrs. Adair’s relief. Rustic beauty was lovely as long as it was accompanied by all of the modern conveniences.

  Samuel made some final adjustments to secure the luggage, and then climbed into the phaeton. With Samuel driving, the Adairs embarked upon their trip to the train station. “It’s a shame Mr. Sutton couldn’t join us on the train,” said Mrs. Adair.

  Samuel looked straight ahead. Allison said nothing but noticed Samuel’s clenched jaw.

  “He’s a bit of a rascal, but he’s so entertaining—” Mrs. Adair stopped mid-sentence and looked at her
daughter. “Allison? You look pale. Are you feeling alright?”

  “I’m fine, Mother,” replied Allison, looking straight ahead.

  As they pulled up to the train station, Andrew glanced about, and then turned to his parents. “I’m going to take the next train. There’s something I must do.”

  Lillian looked at Andrew with alarm.

  Charles spoke clearly and calmly. “And what would that be?”

  Andrew stared down at the road, then past his father toward town. “I need to have a word with Miss MacLaren.”

  “You’ll do no such thing,” said his father.

  “I can’t just leave without saying good-bye. It would be rude,” he added as an afterthought, knowing the importance of social etiquette to his mother.

  “You’ll send her a note from Pittsburgh,” said Lillian.

  “There, it’s settled,” said his father.

  Andrew appeared disturbed. Rather than voice it, he looked down at a small bird hopping about on the pavement.

  “Enough of this nonsense. Let’s be on our way,” said Charles.

  Andrew remained tight-lipped until the family assembled on the train platform. Quite suddenly, he stood before his father and declared, “Father, I’m staying. I’ll be on the next train.” As he walked away, his father’s voice resounded with the command to stop.

  Andrew froze in his tracks. After a long moment, he turned and faced his father in exultant defiance. After years of obedience, he had finally asserted his manhood. He savored the power his new choice had brought him—a feeling he could control his own destiny—which first energized then enervated him. At last on the brink of self-determination, he faced all the possibilities and decisions before him and suddenly found himself seized with panic. Afraid to take action, he stood there until his inaction, itself, became a decision.