A Reluctant Melody - Will she risk losing everything … including her heart?

by Ardoin, Sandra

  “Believe it or not, I’m sorry for it.”

  Joanna had finally settled the question of redemption in her own mind. No one was beyond it until their final day in this world. “I’m the last one to throw stones. Now that I’m able to look at life from God’s perspective, it saddens me to realize that Liam wasted his years and a chance for a happy family.”

  Rose swiped her eyes with the back of her hand and began to roll out the biscuit dough. “He was a horrible husband, but I just can’t think of anyone who wanted to kill him.”

  Joanna had kept private the brief fear that Rose had ended her marriage through drastic means. After all, widows received sympathy and divorced women scorn. No sooner than the idea occurred to her, she had rejected it.

  She pulled the biscuit cutter from a drawer. “We had no idea he committed the robberies. Sheriff Myers might be right in thinking he had an accomplice. It’s possible they had a falling out.”

  “But wouldn’t that person have taken the stolen items Liam carried with him?”

  “Not if he didn’t know they were there.”

  Distracted by the discussion, Rose flattened the dough until it stretched so thin it threatened to tear in spots. “I don’t even know where he was staying, and the sheriff won’t say whether they’ve found anything else. He must have kept his ill-gotten gain somewhere.”

  “Maybe he’d already sold most of what he stole.”

  “People keep too many secrets in this world.” Rose stopped mashing the dough with the rolling pin and stared at Joanna. “It’s time to tell Kit, Jo.”

  Joanna didn’t even blink at the quick transition in the conversation. The subject had been uppermost in her mind for days. At home, she would work up the courage, only to have it vanish when she saw him.

  “I know. Ever since the questioning by the authorities, I’ve wanted to tell him.”

  “Then why haven’t you, Joanna?”

  She whipped around, and her mouth went dry at the sight of Kit.

  He stood in the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room—face flushed and eyes cold as a frozen pond. The cords in his neck rippled. “Why haven’t you told me you lied when I asked if you’d ever had a child? That you lied when you said Annie was not my daughter?”

  Oh, Lord, I waited too long.

  “Let’s walk in the garden, Kit, and I’ll tell you everything.” Her legs wobbling, Joanna departed out the back door, then clasped her clammy hands in front of her and moaned a silent prayer for the words to help him understand … and not reject her a second time.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Kit followed Joanna to the center of the garden and into the most concealed section. She stopped in front of an iron bench under a maple tree surrounded by shoulder-high evergreen hedges and blue hydrangeas past their bloom.

  After a quiet moment, she sat on the far edge of the bench. Her cautious gaze invited him to occupy the other end. Instead, he tramped back and forth in front of her, powerless to constrain his resentment with inactivity.

  “I didn’t lie to you about Annie, Kit. She is the child of Rose and her first husband. He died five months before the girl was born.”

  Kit halted his march and glared at her. “She’s the proper age, and she has my eyes and hair.”

  “No, she has her father’s eyes and hair. Rose keeps his photograph if you’d like to see for yourself. Annie is the spitting image of him.”

  Doubt clouded Kit’s mind. The anonymous letter insisted he had a child, but if Annie wasn’t his, then why did Joanna look guilty? Why the need to tell him anything?

  “When you questioned me, I never actually said I hadn’t given birth. You were right, though. I lied by keeping the truth from you.”

  Now that she stood on the brink of telling Kit everything he wished to know, he almost shouted that he no longer wanted to hear it. Once the words traveled between them, it was probable nothing would be the same. Despite the anguish and disillusionment, he dreaded the change.

  The foliage rustled. Jelly broke through into the secluded space and wrapped her body around Kit’s legs. The cat had doubled in size since he had given it to Annie.

  Annie. The child wasn’t his daughter. Was he relieved or disappointed? Right now, too many emotions clawed at him for dominance.

  Strange. He’d grown used to the idea that she might be his, yet there was always the prospect of error to fall back on. It was harder to come to terms with the truth.

  Joanna closed her eyes, and her mouth stirred in another mute and obvious prayer. She opened her eyes to reveal a calm determination. “After you left Philadelphia, I was devastated and frightened. For weeks, I dreamed you would return and ask to marry me. Then three months passed without a word from you, and it was clear I was expecting a child.

  “No matter what you think of me, Kit, I had never before …” She choked on a sob that twisted his insides. “I loved you.”

  Excuses, comfort, resentment, fury, pleading for forgiveness—it all spun inside Kit’s head until he was dizzy, but words failed him at a time when they both needed them most.

  She cleared her throat. “As my condition grew more noticeable, Papa found out. He demanded I leave his house and, for several days, I wandered the streets. Then I met Rose and we struck up a friendship.” The sobs had evaporated, and Joanna’s voice grew stronger. “Since our babies were due around the same time, we helped one another. If it weren’t for Rose, I’m not sure what would have happened to me.”

  Kit sank onto the bench, half turned away, and unable to look at her for fear she’d see his wretchedness. The cat jumped onto the seat between them.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Dry laughter bounced off his back. “How? You moved away from Philadelphia and told no one where you were going.”

  And if she had told him, what good would it have done? At that time, he couldn’t take care of himself. How would he have managed to care for a wife and infant?

  Still … He twisted to face her. “I had a right to know.”

  “You gave up your rights when you discarded me like rotting trash.” Joanna stood. “You weren’t by my side to suffer the rejection and shame. You weren’t cast onto the street by a smug and pious man who proclaimed you condemned to everlasting darkness. You didn’t bear the physical pain of childbirth.”

  Several seconds passed when all Kit heard were noisy gulps as she strained to silence sobs that foretold his greatest crime.

  “You didn’t crumple in grief by your son’s graveside.” The last words slipped out in a hoarse whisper.

  With the sudden slam of a judge’s gavel, the final indictment sank in and the world stopped for Kit. No breeze. No birdsong. No breath. He’d always known he was too like his father. Now he had to wonder if he were worse.

  When he finally collected himself, Kit’s voice emerged in a murmur as he asked, “What happened?”

  “It was a difficult birth. He only lived a matter of hours.” Joanna hung her head. “I used to believe it was God’s judgment.”

  Kit tried to rise. Reach out. Console her. Wrap her in an embrace and share the sorrow she endured even now. His arms hung limp. His treatment of her had been no less destructive than Liam’s treatment of Rose.

  “What was his name?” An absurd time to ask that question, but it was all Kit could work past his lips.

  “Aaron Jacob.”

  He tried to picture the newborn in his mind. For a short time, he’d had a son. Aaron Jacob Barnes. No. Aaron Jacob Cranston. Had the boy lived, his son would never have been known by his rightful surname.

  With more bluntness than enthusiasm, Joanna said, “I met Clayton when he visited Philadelphia. We married within six weeks.”

  “And there were no more children?” Had the grueling birth of their son left her unable to bear more? Was that additional blame to be laid at his feet?

  Joanna turned her head to the side, but not so far as to see him. “Once he learned he’d married a woman whose inn
ocence had been lost, Clayton didn’t want me either.”

  Clayton Stewart didn’t want her either.

  Jelly yowled. Rather than being a cry for attention, Kit heard it as a denunciation of his role in Joanna’s broken marriage.

  “There’s more you should know.”

  What more could there be? She’d wounded him already. Did she now plan to finish him with more reasons to feel disgraced?

  “I didn’t agree to pay off Liam solely for the sake of Rose. He threatened to tell you what I was too ashamed to confess.”

  Blackmail? Kit raked a hand through his hair. She agreed to pay for silence rather than tell him of their child? How she must have hated him, and with good reason. Right now, he hated himself.

  “We’re different people today, Kit. I believe God has forgiven me, and I hope you can do the same.”

  Joanna scooped up the cat and walked away, leaving Kit alone in the garden with his tormented thoughts and despondency over the loss of a child he’d never known.

  If he had stayed in Philadelphia, married Joanna, and seen to her health and well-being, would the baby have lived?

  A short time later, Kit gave his legs free rein to transport him down the street while he replayed the events of the afternoon over and over. He should have paid more attention to where he was going because before he knew it, his legs had carried him to the Moondog Saloon.

  As he stood outside, his mouth watered for what awaited him through that door. Over the music and laughter from inside the building, he heard Ben’s familiar whisper in his ear. “Be strong.”

  But Ben was back in Pittsburgh. He wasn’t here to provide the counsel Kit needed to fight against this all-consuming enticement that seized on his misery.

  Kit reached for the door knob and paused only a moment before turning it. Inside, a piano player tapped out a lively tune, which most of the noisy customers ignored. Both businessmen and laborers lounged against the long bar running down one wall or filled chairs at scattered tables before going home at the end of a long day. Smoke drifted through the air from cigars and cigarettes, and the acrid clouds irritated Kit’s throat.

  He wound through the room to an empty table in the far corner that was, for the most part, clear of the haze. After slumping into a chair, he rubbed a hand over his face in an effort to clear the fog in his mind.

  He shouldn’t be here. What if he did the unthinkable? What if someone he knew saw him do it? Yet his conscience failed to will his body to rise and walk back out the door.

  After a furtive glance around, Kit chuckled. What difference would it make? Once the temperance women found out he’d crossed that threshold, he’d lose his ministry in Banesville.

  Who sent the letter to Mrs. Brockhurst? It created a perception of familiarity in his mind, but clarity hid around the corner and out of sight.

  Then there was Liam’s death. Cox believed Kit was responsible, and if the sheriff gave his theory credence, Kit could lose far more than a ministry to inebriates.

  The alcohol called to him. The walls closed in on him.

  “Be strong.”

  Kit’s fingers tapped the wood of the table. The rhythm competed with the strident tune coming from the piano. All around him glasses clinked and thumped. He was nothing but a failure who couldn’t overcome his weaknesses. New creation? Didn’t his being here prove the opposite?

  My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.

  Kit closed his eyes and shut out everything in the room—the smells, the noise, the scratched, sticky surface of the wood under his fingers—everything meant to convince him to give up and become the old creature in need of a drink to empower him.

  Just as in the days when he first struggled to overcome his dependence on alcohol, Ben’s voice resonated in Kit’s head. “Where does your strength come from, Kit?”

  He wasn’t sure anymore.

  ***

  Joanna crept closer to the Moondog Saloon. Reluctant to meet any of the drunken inhabitants traipsing in and out, she rounded the corner and tiptoed to a dirty side window.

  Peeking through glass spotted and stained with drink and who knew what else, she recognized four of the town’s leading citizens. Smoke filled the air. How did the patrons even breathe? The piano player tapped out “Oh, Dem Golden Slippers,” a tune suitable to heighten already drink-enlivened moods.

  With her cheek pressed against the warmth of the pane, she craned her head left and then right. Areas were cut off from her vision, but … There, in a dim corner of the room, Kit sagged in a hard wooden chair. He had no drink in hand or on the table.

  The bulk of the breath that stuck fast in Joanna’s lungs when Kit walked inside the building whooshed out of her and, despite the warmth of the early evening, fogged the glass. He simply stared into the space in front of him. As he had told her, no decent woman entered a saloon, and she was a decent woman now. She waited to see what he would do next but prepared to intercede if necessary.

  Confessing her secret had cleansed her conscience immediately. If Kit rejected her a second time, she’d be heartbroken, yet free of a burden weighing her down for years.

  Intent on expressing her release with a cheerful polka or schottische, Joanna had gone straight from the garden to the music room, but rather than sit at the piano, she peered out the window until Kit lumbered through the yard. The hunched posture and plodding movements had shouted his grief and preoccupation with the news she’d revealed.

  Whether out of curiosity or compulsion, Joanna followed at a discreet distance. She had expected him to stop along the way, which would allow her to join him as though she, too, had needed to walk off their discussion. He continued into town. At present, she stood outside this abominable place, unable to do more than spy on him and pray.

  When she wasn’t dodging possible sightings of her from the men inside, Joanna shifted from one foot to the other. How much longer did he plan to sit there?

  All of a sudden, a waiter loomed over him with a tray of drinks, and her stomach tightened. She retreated from the window and pressed her back against the outer wall of the building. The old guilt roared back with a vengeance.

  She should have found a better way to break the news to him—one that wouldn’t have driven him to repeat his destructive past.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  In those first trying weeks of seeking sobriety, Kit had memorized numerous verses of scripture that directed God’s people to be strong. In this most urgent hour, a number of them rolled through his mind.

  Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong. … Be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. … Finally, brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might.

  He whispered, “Amen.”

  “Friend, you musta mistook this building for a church. Order or get your carcass out.”

  Kit opened his eyes. A barrel-chested man stood before him. He wore a dirty apron around his ample waist. A scowl darkened his features, but the tray in his hand captured Kit’s interest. Glasses covered it, both full and empty—beer, whiskey—liquid to tempt him to snatch one and down it.

  “You look like you need this more’n that fella yonder.” The barman held out a glass half-filled with the golden pull of whiskey.

  Kit stared at the drink in the barman’s hand. With a will of its own, his arm stretched toward the offering.

  God, help me to be strong and courageous.

  His head told him to take the drink. His heart pleaded with him to remember the poverty of his past before Christ freed him from drunkenness. He moistened his lips and curled his fingers.

  Then a peculiar thing happened. The drink Kit remembered as smooth, warm, and satisfying, turned as sour as vinegar in his imagination. He withdrew his hand and pushed away from the table. Unlike his father, he could own up to his responsibilities like a man. God gave him that power.

  He slapped the barman on the back. “I’ll happily take my carcass elsewhere, si
r.”

  Though his troubles with Joanna and the sorrow still lingered, he had beaten the craving and self-pity. With God’s help, he had come through this experience stronger in confidence and faith. And with God’s help, he would remain strong.

  Kit left the Moondog Saloon to find that a navy sky had replaced the sinking sun, but he had somewhere to go before turning for home. In the midst of his ordeal, he’d received the clarity he’d sought with regard to the letter sent to Mrs. Brockhurst.

  As Kit started down the street, a woman flew around the corner of the building. He stopped before they collided, and then reached out for her. “Jo? What are you doing here?”

  She drew back and studied him with rounded eyes before they filled with her tears. “I saw you take the drink.”

  His glance slid to the window on the side of the building.

  “Why, Kit? You have so many men depending on you. What about Mr. O’Connor? What would he think if he knew what you’ve done? Mr. Cox is a coarse and shady man, but this won’t help him change. And Annie adores everything about you. It’s all my fault. I—”

  Kit captured Joanna by both arms and backed her around the corner, away from prying eyes along the street. His grip loosened to give her the opportunity to pull away, to rebuff the passion that fueled his purpose, but her gaze locked on his. Gone was the fear he had seen in her eyes before. In its place, her eagerness equaled his own as her arms twined around his neck. She smelled of rosewater and fresh, night air. Her hair, soft and wavy, tangled in his fingers.

  Their kiss rose and fell with intensity and gentleness. It unleashed every facet of the emotions Kit buried the night he stole her from his brother. He longed for a lifetime with Joanna, and he wanted her to feel it.

  As one, they broke apart to claim a crucial breath. Though he didn’t deserve her, God allowed Kit this second chance, and he wasn’t about to ruin it.

  “Now …”—he inhaled a lungful of necessary air—“did I imbibe?”

  Joanna tasted her lips and lowered her lashes. She clutched him around the waist. “Don’t ever scare me like that again.”