"Duncan?" she asked, her voice sounding higher and more timid than usual.
"I can't stand this," he observed abruptly, reaching out and yanking the chain that turned on the bedside lamp. The room was filled with light, and Jane pushed herself up on one elbow.
"I'd better leave," she said. "This isn't going to work. I can't sleep, you can't sleep, and it wasn't a very good idea. It's my fault."
"Don't be so quick to take the blame," Duncan said. "I agreed to the arrangement."
"I should have known better," she said, making as if to get up, but he reached for her and pulled her to him. She let herself be drawn toward him, resting against his chest.
"That's better," he said comfortably. The sounds from next door quieted, and Jane sighed. It was so pleasant to be close to Duncan this way, she thought, nestling into the warm curve of his body.
"I think what was wrong was that we were both trying too hard not to touch each other," Duncan said. "We both want to, but we're afraid that one thing will lead to another and that we wouldn't be able to stop."
"Exactly," said Jane, drawing the word out to its full length and growing drowsier as she said it.
"So let's not try too hard. I promise that nothing is going to happen until you want it to," he went on.
She shifted in his arms, intending to tell him to turn out the light, but suddenly they heard the rhythmic squeak of bedsprings from the room next door. Her eyes flew open.
Duncan groaned. So did someone on the other side of the wall, in a slightly different tone.
"Oh no, not that," Duncan said in disgust.
Jane started to laugh. She muffled her laughter against Duncan's chest, and the hair on his chest tickled her nose. Soon he was laughing, too, and they couldn't stop, no matter how hard they tried.
Finally the sounds next door subsided—and so did their laughter.
Jane ventured a look at Duncan. His face was red, but his eyes were bright.
"Duncan, I love you," she said.
"And I love you. Now can we please get some sleep?"
"Turn out the light," she said, and when he did she swiveled her head and kissed him.
That night she slept fitfully, her back against his, bracing herself against him the way she would against a strong, solid tree trunk.
Chapter 14
Waking up the next morning with Duncan beside her should have been heartening. Jane should have felt supported and strengthened by their declaration of love, but in truth all it did was worry her. If her past life required it, how would she find the strength to leave him? She loved him, and she should have been happy. Instead she lay beside him in the gray morning light, not merely listening to his breathing but feeling him breathe. That was the difference between friendship and love—with friendship, you merely listened. With love, you felt.
She didn't want to feel this love, not on this particular morning when she was so tired and worn out by the uncertainty of her life. She would have liked to be free of it and relieved of the doubt, fear and vulnerability. Instead she must get up and smile at Duncan and be the receptacle for the caring and compassion that he heaped upon her, unable for the sake of their love to express her negative thoughts. This morning all she could feel was the awesome responsibility of love.
After breakfast she sat on the bed in the motel room while Duncan called Detective Schmidt and learned that he had been able to uncover no news about a van in relation to Jane's appearance in the ditch.
"Ollie Jones seems to be the only person around town who saw a blue van that night," Schmidt offered in an apologetic tone.
"But I remember a blue van, too!" Jane said when Duncan related the conversation to her. "Doesn't that count for something?" She was so disappointed. She'd been sure that the blue van was an important clue.
Duncan shook his head. "I guess not, Jane. I'm sorry." They both knew that her brief memory of the blue van meant nothing unless Jane somehow managed to recall something more about it.
Jane nibbled on a thumbnail and stared into space. A blue van. What did it have to do with anything, anyway? What did it mean? Who had been in the van with her? She reached into the far recesses of memory and came up with—zip—zilch—nothing.
Duncan interrupted her thoughts. "Well, Jane," he said. "It looks like we're stymied. What do you want to do now?"
"I'm packed," Jane said abruptly. "Let's leave Tyree."
"Is that what you really want to do?"
"Why not?" she replied, her tone sharp.
He wavered for a moment, not sure if leaving was a good idea. Jane seemed very much on edge this morning, but, considering the circumstances, he supposed that this wasn't surprising. "I guess there's no reason to stay," he admitted. "It's just that I was hoping we'd learn more while we were here."
"So was I," Jane said. She had begun to take on the air that he recognized as her stubborn look, the one where she got a mulish glint in her eyes like Quixote when he got his dander up. If she hadn't been so strung out this morning, he would have taken her in his arms and attempted to kiss the mood away.
Later, he promised himself as he gathered up his shaving gear and tucked it into a corner of his suitcase. Later.
"Let me get that," Duncan was quick to say when they stepped outside the motel carrying their luggage, but as usual, Jane refused his help, marching ahead of him across the icy parking lot with an air of determination.
From where he stood, he spotted the slick patch of ice, and he cried out at almost the same time as she stepped on it. And then, heart in mouth, he watched helplessly as her feet flew out from under her and she lost her balance, landing on her back.
Heedless of his own safety on the icy asphalt, Duncan set off at a run and reached her in a matter of seconds, his pulse pounding in his ears. He thought he would never forget his fear as he stared down at her motionless body.
Jane, he thought, and bent swiftly to touch her, to wipe the spot of dirt from her pale cheek, praying that she was not hurt.
A man who had seen her fall rushed across the street.
"Everything okay?" he asked anxiously.
Jane forced herself up on her elbows. She felt nothing; her whole body was numb. And then feeling began to seep into her limbs, bringing with it a huge buzzing that filled her ears, and she couldn't hear what anyone in the small gathering crowd was saying. She had eyes only for Duncan, whose stricken face expressed all his love and caring. Her head—how it hurt!—but she had to let Duncan know that she was all right, and so she tried to speak, tried to get the words out, but none would come.
"She's had the wind knocked out of her," she heard someone say, and with that she realized that the buzzing in her ears was receding. Her elbow ached, and she'd probably have a big bruise there. She thought she was fine otherwise.
Duncan's hand was supporting the back of her neck, brushing her cheek, and when at last she could speak, she said with more confidence than she felt, "I'm okay. Really," and warmed to the relief in Duncan's eyes.
"Can you get up?" he asked, and she surprised him by sitting up and taking hold of his arm, hanging on to it as someone gave her a boost from the back.
"I'm all right," she repeated, and the man who had run across the street left, and the woman who had stopped her car nearby got back into it and drove away, spewing plumes of exhaust in her wake.
They were alone in the parking lot, Duncan's arm encircling her waist. She leaned on him for a moment, glad to have him for a protector.
"Do you want to check back into the motel? You may be sore later," Duncan said. He was still concerned and he detected a kind of glazed look about her.
"I'm ready to leave Tyree," she said, summoning the strength to speak firmly. "I may have a bruise or two, but there's no serious damage. Honestly," she added when she saw how disbelieving he looked.
Duncan reluctantly settled Jane in the passenger seat of the car. She leaned her head back against the headrest while Duncan was stowing their suitcases in the trunk. What an awf
ul fall it had been! She had hit the back of her head on the pavement. She was sure that the fall wouldn't have happened had it not been for her ragged nerves and too little sleep.
Duncan shot her a worried look when he slid in behind the steering wheel.
She smiled weakly. "Duncan, don't look at me like that," she chided. "If I wasn't feeling ready to travel, I'd tell you."
"You still seem a little dazed," he said.
"You would, too, if you'd fallen as hard as I did. Besides, I think I bit my tongue," she said, but she didn't mention the headache that was burgeoning right behind her eyes. She couldn't recall having headaches since she'd arrived at the ranch, and she hoped that the fall hadn't precipitated their return.
To set Duncan's mind at ease, she tried to carry on a conversation as they left Tyree.
"I wonder if we really accomplished anything here," she said softly as Duncan accelerated on the open highway.
"It was a start," he told her, and she was pleased that he seemed willing to forget the fall she'd just taken in the parking lot.
Her head didn't stop hurting all day. If anything, the pain was aggravated by their many stops as they related Jane's story and left Duncan's business card in several gas stations and convenience stores. Jane surreptitiously took two aspirin, but they afforded little relief. She refrained from mentioning the pain in her head to Duncan, knowing that it would only worry him. Instead, she tried to concentrate on their task.
Surprisingly, the people to whom they spoke had often heard about Jane and knew of her initial search for her identity during the time when she was a patient in the hospital in Tyree, but they were able to shed no light on the mysterious circumstances of her appearance in Carlton Jones's ditch.
Sometimes when they'd had a chance to study Duncan's business card for a moment, they expressed more interest in the llamas than they did in Jane.
"I'd better talk to Rooney about hauling a bunch of llamas to southern Illinois," Duncan joked after they'd left a store where the woman behind the counter had become overly enthusiastic about llamas but paid scant attention to Jane and her plight. "I bet we could sell quite a few around here."
"You haven't phoned Rooney since we left the ranch, have you?"
"No, and I haven't heard from him either. He said he wouldn't bother me so I could concentrate on our search, but I'll call him tonight," he said.
That night found them staying in a motel in a small town not far from the Indiana state line, and after dinner, during which they each unsuccessfully tried to bolster the other's hopes, Duncan called Rooney.
Jane, still fighting her headache, tugged at his sleeve. "Don't forget to ask about Mary Kate," she urged in a whisper.
Duncan surprised her by asking after Mary Kate as soon as Rooney answered the phone, and as he listened to Rooney's reply, his expression immediately become more serious. "She did?" he asked sharply. "Are they all right?"
Sensing something amiss, Jane sat up straight. It sounded as though Mary Kate was in trouble again.
"Well, it doesn't surprise me that Dearling stayed around. She's a tame one. Yeah, it's a good thing none of them wandered over by the highway. Okay, I'll call you again soon. Right. Goodbye, Rooney."
"What has Mary Kate done?" Jane asked with a certain sense of foreboding.
Duncan looked angry. "She left the gate open on the pen beside the barn and the breeding females got out. Fortunately, Rooney's managed to round up all of them. That Mary Kate! Why can't she behave herself?"
"She can't help it," Jane sighed. "Anyway, the latch on the gate isn't particularly reliable."
"It's reliable enough for the rest of us. Mary Kate is the only one who seems to have trouble with it," Duncan said with exasperation.
"Mary Kate might be in need of attention right now. With both of us gone, Rooney is busy running the ranch. Mary Kate didn't want me to leave in the first place, and now she's probably very lonely."
"Lonely or not, she has no business letting my llamas out. Above and beyond what could happen to them, her carelessness could have cost us thousands of dollars. Many of my breeding females are pregnant, and their offspring are potentially worth quite a lot of money. Mary Kate had better thank her lucky stars that nothing happened to those llamas."
"I'm sorry, Duncan. I'm glad they're all right."
"So am I. Rooney says he's going to devise a severe punishment for Mary Kate."
Jane's heart sank. In her mind she pictured Mary Kate's defiant face the last time Rooney had imposed punishment by restricting contact with her beloved Dearling. She knew that it was only right that Mary Kate face the consequences of her irresponsible action, but nevertheless her heart ached for the child.
Both Jane and Duncan were exhausted by their busy day, and the troubles at Placid Valley Ranch weighed heavily upon both of them. The bruises she had suffered in her fall kept Jane from falling asleep until late, and when she woke up, she still had a nagging headache.
Although neither of them had slept well, they struck out early that morning, determined to pay a visit to a newspaper in nearby Terre Haute that had published a story about Jane when she had still been a patient at Tyree Township Hospital. Jane hoped that the sympathetic reporter who had written the story might be interested in writing a follow-up, and they both thought that any publicity would aid their search.
They had stopped for gas in a Terre Haute suburb and Jane got out of the car to stretch her arms and arch her stiff back. As she was about to get back in, she was almost blinded by the glint of bright sun on the chrome bumper of a car in front of theirs. At first she held up her hand to shield her eyes, but she felt such a sharp pain in her head that she decided to look for a water fountain so that she could take two more aspirin.
Her head swam, and even the cold outdoor air didn't clear it. She headed toward the gas station where Duncan was studying the snack vending machines but found herself turned around going the other way. The pain throbbed inside her head, and she couldn't see where she was going. She heard a shout and felt the breeze from the passing of a car too near, but she was confused and didn't know which way to go and turned around again, looking for Duncan.
"Lady, get out of the way!" somebody yelled. She dug her fists into her eyes because they hurt so much, and when she took her hands away, there was a pink dress in a store window, and she wanted to buy it for Mary Kate. Then she crashed headlong into a solid object and rebounded. She heard herself sobbing, and the next thing she knew, a woman was holding a cool cloth to her forehead and saying, "There, there, you'll be all right. Just a little dizzy spell, wasn't it, dear?"
Jane swallowed and felt someone squeeze her hand. She pushed aside the cloth on her forehead to see Duncan looking pale and worried. She summoned the strength to smile at him.
"Jane, you scared me half to death," he said.
"What happened?" she asked, bewildered. She had never seen this woman before, and as for the plaid couch on which she was lying and the room where she found herself—well, nothing gave her a clue. Where was she, anyway?
"This nice lady, Mrs.—"
"Alice Beasley," the woman supplied as she returned with a hot cup of tea.
"Mrs. Beasley was in the window of her shop and arranging the merchandise when you came reeling across the street in front of a car, and when a bicycle on the sidewalk almost hit you, she opened the door and brought you inside," Duncan explained.
"I couldn't see," Jane said, remembering how the reflection of the bright sun on the chrome had affected her.
"I knew something was wrong," Alice Beasley said with great certainty.
"My headache's gone," Jane said in a tone of amazement.
"You never said you had a headache," Duncan said accusingly.
"I didn't want to worry you," she said.
"You should have seen a doctor after that fall. I knew it," he said. "We need to get you to a hospital right away."
"No, Duncan, and don't be angry. I feel better now. I know it sounds sil
ly, but I'm fine." Indeed, she felt a resurgence of energy, and the cloud of depression that had hung over her that morning seemed to have disappeared.
"Now listen to me, Jane. If you've started having those headaches again, you must see a doctor," Duncan said.
"I know a good one. Dr. McKelvey. He's been my doctor for over thirty years. I'll call and make an appointment for you," Mrs. Beasley volunteered.
"That sounds like a good idea," Duncan agreed. He was torn over going to a doctor's office or to the hospital's emergency room, but he knew he had to make sure that Jane got medical attention.
"No," said Jane. "No doctor."
"Jane—"
"I'll just drink this tea and we'll be on our way. And that pink organdy dress in your window—what size is it?"
"A girl's size twelve, dear. But should you be thinking about that? Shouldn't you see how you feel in half an hour or so?" Mrs. Beasley's face wrinkled into a maze of concern.
Jane surprised them both by swinging her feet off the couch. She felt more energetic than she had in days. Weeks, even. She wasn't sure just what had happened to her, but there was no doubt in her mind that it had been beneficial.
"I want to see that dress," she said firmly.
Duncan and Mrs. Beasley exchanged looks. Finally, as though humoring an invalid, the reluctant Mrs. Beasley said, "Well, I'll take the dress out of the window, dear, but if I were you, I'd rest."
Jane paid no attention. Instead she followed Mrs. Beasley to the window and stood entranced as the store owner divested the mannequin of the pink dress.
"Wouldn't that be perfect for Mary Kate?" she asked Duncan.
Duncan, who wasn't sure that Jane was entirely well, eyed the dress doubtfully. It had large puffed sleeves, a satin sash, and dainty white lace edging above the hem. He couldn't for the life of him imagine such an exquisite dress on a child whose knees seemed to be permanently skinned, whose hair hung in limp clumps, and whose fingernails were more often than not rimmed with dirt. Anyway, did someone as careless as Mary Kate deserve such a fine present? As exasperated as he was with her irresponsible behavior, he didn't think so.
Until Spring Page 19