by Darci Hannah
We both struggled with the buttons of his breeches, our fingers clumsy with the frenetic need that drove us; all the while his lips were hungrily kissing my own. I gasped, he moaned, and when he was finally free to help satiate the raging fire that consumed us, the blasted bell began to toll.
William ignored it.
Finding my lips again he kissed and nibbled me in a wild attempt to regain the frenzy that drove us, but all the while the damned bell kept on ringing, growing louder and more urgent. I was annoyed. I was angered. It was so cruelly unfair! Yet try as he might to distract me, the bell had thrust its way between us, reminding us that we were not free to pursue our selfish needs.
“William, darling … your bell,” I croaked, stupid with pleasure and highly discomposed. “Your goddamn untimely bell is tolling!”
He stilled beneath my hands. A heartfelt “Goddamn it!” exploded from his lips, and then, shockingly, he resumed his work on my nipple. William Campbell, paradigm light-keeper, was ignoring the harbinger of his calling. The thought was endearing—and it was all my fault! How would I ever explain it to Kate?
“William. Please …” I uttered in a pitiful moan. “You know you have to go.”
“I know,” he breathed heavily, and laid his head helplessly on my swollen bosom. “And God help me, but for once I dinna want to. For once I want to stay here. I want to stay here with ye, Sara. I want nothing to do with that goddamned tower!”
This heated admission made me smile, it was so unlike him, and gently, pushing his heavy head off my chest, I made him look me in the eye. “Go. Robbie needs you. He’s tired, and I’m not going anywhere. Go to your watch, William; keep your eyes sharp, and come to me when you’re through … that is, if you still want to,” I added, putting a hand on the huge ball that was my midriff, the only thing still modestly covered. “I’m as large as a cow and likely not what you dream of at all.”
“But you are what I dream of!” he uttered passionately, and pulled me into his arms again. “Don’t ye know it? Ye, my dear, are the very thing that torments me!” He flashed an ironic grin. “And now, when I have you here … and you finally ready and very willing to reward me for all the hell you’ve put me through … and might I add ye were doing amazingly too. I’ve forgiven ye everything … and then some.” He raised a brow to make his point, causing me to smile in return. “Now the goddamned bell pulls me back!” And with a touchingly deprecatory grunt, combined with eyes that glowed with unsated wolfish hunger, he eased himself away from me. The bell kept tolling. “Stay here, just like that, my canny, wee, beautiful hare,” he commanded gently, teasingly. He hastily fastened his clothes and left me with one last tingling kiss, stating: “And God willing, when I return we shall finish what we’ve started here.”
• • •
I must have fallen right to sleep, for a feeling of warmth and serenity surrounded me so completely, and for the first time since arriving at the lighthouse I was at peace. I dreamed of William Campbell. I dreamed of running my fingers through his thick dark curls. I ached to caress the new-sprung stubble of his jaw. I was positively bursting to feel his hard body against mine. But mostly I hungered for his mesmerizing eyes. And in my dream, only in my dream, we finished what we had started.
But somewhere out there another waited, and in the dark of night, carried on the wings of a storm, he came. My blissful dreams subtly turned harsh and painful. The warm caresses of the lighthouse keeper turned to a deathlike cold, while the pale blue-green eyes that had once haunted me shiftily morphed into those of another. Vibrant and chilling, the blue gaze cut into me, and the face of Thomas Crichton obscured all other thoughts. It was a nightmare, painful in its reality, heartrending in its purity.
I could hear the wind driving against the ship he sailed with unrelenting force, the sails being ripped into ribbons on their yards before my eyes, while the father of my child called to me, pleading, swearing anew his undying love. The ship was wrecking, breaking around him in a black and violent sea. He was going down, and men were drowning. The bell was tolling for them, calling into their nightmare without mercy as they struggled to stay alive. And while the wind drove the ship onto the rocks, driving the waves and rain into them without mercy, I could take no more of it; I screamed.
I was still screaming when I sat up in bed, drenched with cold sweat. It was all a dream, I realized, but the wind and rain were not. Neither was the continuous tolling of the bell that had invaded my nightmare.
I jumped up and pulled a robe around me, suddenly realizing that a squall had hit the Cape. The bell was tolling far too long and too fervently for it to be the mere changing of a watch. Something was happening, something very wrong. And the dream came flooding back. I had no idea how long I had been asleep, but it was still sometime in the wee hours of the night, for William had not returned to me as he had promised he would. I ran out of my room. In the hall I could hear the men’s voices shouting in the courtyard. But when I had reached the door to the cottage, and flung it open, only Robbie was still standing there. William had ridden off. I pulled on an oilskin coat, sea boots and a weather hat, and bounded into the courtyard to see what was wrong. Kate, I noticed, was following closely behind me.
“What’s happening, Robbie?” I yelled to the man who was also making ready to mount his horse. He spun around.
“There’s a ship in peril down the coast, Sara. She’s just off Kervaig, holding ground with an anchor, but she willna be able to hold for much longer. She’s starting to break up. Willy’s off to gather the men. I’m to meet him at Kervaig Bay with lifelines ready!” And indeed Robbie had been busy securing thick, coiled ropes and a few unlit lanterns to his saddle.
“There’s a ship lying at anchor off the bay?” I questioned, yelling to be heard above the wind while having the distinct feeling that I knew the very ship he was talking about. He gave a curt nod. “I believe Mr. Campbell knows that the men have already gathered there?” Again came the nod. “Then you must go to him, Robbie; ride as swiftly as you can! There’s not a moment to lose!”
“You stay here, Sara, you and Kate!” he shouted, looking over my shoulder to his wife. “Keep watch and make sure the bell keeps tolling, aye.”
“We’ve got it, Robbie,” I assured loudly. “And Godspeed to you now.” He paused just long enough in his duty to deliver his wife a mighty hug and tender kiss, and then he turned and mounted up. Both Kate and I watched speechless as he rode away in the driving rain, not removing our gaze from him until he had cleared the lighthouse grounds. Once he was out of sight, I turned to her.
“You need to get up to the observation room and keep watch. I cannot do it. You need to keep the bell going. And the lantern needs to be wound every two hours. Can you do that?”
“Yes, I will. But what of you, Sara, will you be all right down here?”
“Of course,” I replied. And with a glibness she was known to overlook I added, “I shall just wait here, in the cottage, until I hear otherwise.”
“Very good,” she replied, and fighting the gale force winds and driving rain, she went directly to the tower. I too went directly to my task.
I had grown so large that the going was not easy. Compounding my great girth with the wind, rain and darkness, it was perhaps a miracle I could find my way at all. But I was driven by determination. The MacKay croft was only a few miles away. The men would bring the survivors there, and Mary would need all the help she could get tending to them. That was my drive. I would not let my friend down. And at the back of my mind stirred the belief that Thomas Crichton would be among them. I needed to get to Kervaig Bay in time!
This thought propelled me into the rain-soaked darkness, heading down the rutted road that would take me through the parve; and it was with me still as I rounded the point that overlooked the jetty. But when I actually happened to glance down into the cove I had every intention of passing, I saw a sight that drove all thoughts from me. For there, floating in the sheltered waters, impervious to the rag
ing squall, was the mysterious little skiff of Mr. Seawell’s. My heart nearly stopped beating when I recognized it. And without another thought to my previous task, or the reason I was out wandering the open moors in the bosom of a storm to begin with, I turned and gingerly began picking my way through the rivulets and ruts that made up the treacherous descent to the lighthouse jetty.
Miraculously, and with great effort on my own part, I made it to the bottom, noticing with some amazement that the weather down here was vastly different from the driving rain above. It was calm, the waters still, the rain no more than a light misty nuisance. And although my vision was slightly obscured by this foggy darkness, it did nothing to diminish the awe of seeing the ghostly outline of that familiar boat sitting at the end of the pier.
I walked forward, drawn by some unseen power to reach it, my eyes never leaving the little skiff—a beautifully made boat with rigging that seemed to glow with an unearthly brilliance. I was about to put my foot on the dock when I happened to notice the figure of a man standing at the far end.
The hair on the back of my neck prickled, yet still I advanced. Tentatively, I placed a foot on the wooden dock and felt the jolt of a thousand tiny hatpins prickling my skin at once. It was the same familiar tingling I had felt before, only this was far more intense. Still, the figure stood at the end of the pier with his back to me. I took a few steps closer, my curiosity driving me—any other sane creature would have known better, any other creature would have run away. But I was not any other creature, nor, perhaps, was I entirely sane. And throwing all caution to the wind I uttered aloud the name: “Mr. Seawell? Mr. Alexander Seawell?”
At the sound of his name the dark figure began to turn, and slowly, very slowly, he stood facing me. The breath caught in my throat; it was so unbelievable. My heart lurched with a startlingly painful beat and I found I was unable to move or utter a sound. For there, at the end of the pier, stood Thomas Crichton.
“Dear God,” I uttered helplessly, my hand covering my mouth as the hot sting of tears began, and then they flowed unchecked in great salty rivulets. “Oh, dear almighty God!” But that was all I could utter, for the power of speech had now left me entirely.
I watched in this state of speechless wonder as the man I had loved so completely, and with such wild abandon, slowly came toward me, looking brilliant, looking godlike with his golden-bronzed image. He looked as handsome as he ever had, as handsome as the first day I had laid eyes on him—long ago in my father’s garden. My insides were in knots, the baby in my womb seemed to drop exceedingly low in my body from the shock of it and I was finally able to speak the name—“Thomas …”
“Why?” came the heart-rending voice that sounded as if he had uttered the words next to my ear. “Why did ye no’ wait for me, Sara?”
“What?” I uttered in an equally pained reply. “But … but I did wait for you, Thomas. Oh, God, but I did! I waited for hours … for days … for months. By God, Thomas, after all this time, after all you put me through, I am still waiting!” And even I could hear the hurt and anger in those words.
His was a look of puzzlement. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I was waylaid and thrust out to sea. But I wrote ye letters—many letters telling ye that I’d come for ye as soon as I was able, but ye returned them all, Sara, unopened. Why?”
Although his voice was oddly calm during this speech, mine was not and I was nearing hysterics. “Letters, Thomas? I never received any letters from you! And God as my witness, I would have never returned them!”
He continued to advance, moving ever toward me with a look on his face that broke my heart. “I told ye once, Sara, my love, that I would move heaven and earth so that we could be together. Have ye forgotten it already? Have ye lost all faith in me, lass, believing that I would no’ do it?”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Thomas Crichton, the man I had given my heart to those many months ago, the man I had sworn to love forever, had returned. And for once I was utterly speechless.
“Well, at long last here I am, my love, my heart,” he said softly, standing directly before me with a look so bittersweet that it made all the torment and heartache I had ever suffered for this man seem pale and insubstantial by comparison. And then he uttered the words written so plainly on his face: “I have been to hell and back for you.”
The way he said it, the conviction in his voice, made me believe that he had. And then, holding me in his compelling gaze as the odd prickling consumed my flesh, he continued. “I have suffered greatly for my devotion to ye, Sara, causing me to make a deal with the owner of that boat. He knew you were here, ye see, but I didn’t know it, not until I was made to deliver that first package to you. I wanted to come to you then, but I needed to fulfill my end of the bargain or I was told I’d never see ye again. I could not take that chance. It was pure torment knowing ye were here yet I forbidden to do anything about it—delivering another man’s mail forbye, a man by the name of Alexander Seawell.”
“What?” I uttered, feeling the world sway beneath my feet. “You were here, all along?”
“In a matter of speaking. But today I have fulfilled my obligation to the auld sailor. I have done all he’s asked of me, and he has released me from this hell I’ve been made to suffer. He has let me come to you, Sara, and yet I find you calling to him.”
“No, Thomas …” I cried, feeling sick and confused at the thought. “I had no idea. I swear!”
“Were ye expecting Mr. Seawell?”
“No!” I cried, then added truthfully, “Well, yes, I suppose. I told him to come … but only because I thought you were dead.”
“Dead?” he repeated, and then added with that disarming grin of his, the one I loved so, the one I carried with me in my heart: “Death could never part us, love, providing ye still loved me. Do ye still love me?”
“Oh yes,” I cried as anguish and joy collided in one debilitating burst of tears. “Oh yes, Thomas, my love, I do! Very much. I’ve never stopped. Even when I thought you had abandoned me. Even when everyone else said you had. I never gave up. By God, I would have given my life just to know you still cared!”
This admission, this true and heartfelt admission, pleased him and his face broke into that glorious smile, with eyes dancing and that inner glow perfectly exploding from his very essence. It was as if the sun, in this dark and foggy little cove, had finally appeared, and it warmed me, radiated through me—giving me that burst of life-sustaining bliss that told me all would be well again. And then he came to me, the man with the face that would always melt my heart.
He opened his arms, ready to embrace me, beckoning me to join him, and into these I gladly went. But just as his warm, familiar arms should have come around me, holding me and the child I carried in his protective embrace, there came a rush of cold air. The frigid burst shot straight through my body, chilling me to the marrow of my bones and traveling all the way to the pit of my womb. And with this cold rush of air there came a feeling of heartrending loss, and of panic, and of horridly chilling surprise. I spun around and saw him standing behind me with a look on his face that matched the shock on my own. “NO!” I shouted when I saw that his glorious golden body was fading. “OH GOD NO! THOMAS NO!!”
“SARA!” he cried with all the urgent desperation I felt. I saw that his eyes were registering the same shock and horror I felt, and he reached out for me as I reached for him, both of us unwilling to believe it—the sickening cruelty of what was happening. I tried to touch him, to pull him back, to grasp and hold on to that essence uniquely his own: what made him Thomas Crichton, the man that I loved. But then, understanding touching his beautiful eyes at last, he uttered almost disbelievingly: “I’m … I’m dead.”
“Thomas, NO!” I cried as great wracking sobs began taking hold of me.
An odd sort of smile crossed his face then, and I felt his warmth, and a wash of what could only be pure, radiating love. “Oh, Sara, how I love ye. Oh, how I wish I could spend the rest of my days with ye a
nd our bairn.” His eyes, like living pools of regret, rested on the great swell of my belly as he spoke. I knew then that he had felt the child I carried. “But I’ve gone and died, lass,” he said, as if explaining this to himself as much as to me. “Please …” His voice was soft and plaintive as his body, so young and heartbreakingly beautiful, began to fade. “Please do not be angry, love. Never ye fret for me. I died, Sara, and it was your love that kept me from seeing it.”
“THOMAS! THOMAS, PLEASE COME BACK! DON’T LEAVE ME!” It was a last, desperate plea, bursting from my body with a violent force that brought me to my knees. I fell onto the hard wood of the pier, crying uncontrollably, convulsing with so much pain and heartache that I felt I too would die. He was gone. After hoping all these months that he would come, he was now finally and eternally gone. I could not bear that thought. I could not bear it! I wanted to die and go with him.
And then I felt again that unworldly tingle.
I felt, rather than saw, the light, for my tears were so blinding. I felt it directly over me, and when I looked up I was startled to see a man standing over me. He was an older man, a kindly-looking man dressed for the sea. His sudden presence should have startled me, but it didn’t. I wiped the tears from my eyes, however useless it was. Yet even through my tears I could see a radiance about this man, and a beauty so pure that he could have been Thomas’ father. But this man, this new apparition before me, I knew was not of this world. The thought did not frighten me. I was far beyond feeling anything, let alone fright. “Are you Mr. Seawell?” I asked him.
“No,” he said kindly. “Mr. Seawell is not born in your time. But when he does come here someday, as he will, he will be touched by the love both you and Thomas share.”
“I don’t understand. If you are not him, who are you, then?” I demanded, angered and confused; which I felt it my right after the heartache I was made to suffer.