by Deborah Hale
“I don’t reckon I c-c-can last much longer, Harris.”
“Ye mustn’t give up, lass. Mind about Mr. Douglas and yer wedding.”
This was the second time he’d urged her to think about Roderick, and for some reason it irked Jenny. She knew perfectly well she should be thinking about her future husband and the life that awaited her in Miramichi—if only she could hold on until daybreak. If they were not her greatest motive for living, what else could be?
Hard as she tried to focus on thoughts of her wedding, every notion in her head turned obstinately back to Harris Chisholm. From all she had learned of him in the past six weeks, Jenny knew with utter certainty that her death would haunt him. Unmerited feelings of responsibility and guilt would consume him. That was no fit way to repay the enormous debt she owed him.
“Aye,” she murmured drowsily. “I’ll do my best to hang on, Harris. For ye.”
Fighting the deadly lassitude that grew heavier and more strength-sapping with each passing moment, Harris held Jenny closer. In a futile effort to stanch the ebb of her energy, he rubbed her back and arms with increasing vigor. All the while, two brief, whispered words echoed in his thoughts and fired his desperate effort to save her.
“For ye.”
It was no dream of handsome, wealthy, powerful Roderick Douglas that stirred Jenny and roused her failing will to live. It was her feelings for him. Scarred, poor and insignificant, he still had the power to lure her back from the siren song of peaceful oblivion.
“For me, Jenny. That’s right. Hang on for me. I can’t lose ye, Jenny. Not now. I’ve been waiting all my life for ye, though I never knew it. Stay with me, lass. Jenny? Jenny!”
The pull of death was too strong. Harris could almost feel it sucking her life away. Like a giant whirlpool, dragging her into the depths of eternity. Grasping helplessly for anything that might rouse her, he lifted Jenny as high as his waning strength would allow.
And he kissed her.
Not the way he’d kissed her in his cabin on the St. Bride, a lifetime ago. Then he had taken a kiss from her. Wresting by force what he knew she would never surrender willingly. Taking some perverse satisfaction from her reluctance, for it made him the master.
This time he gave Jenny a kiss, buoyed by the improbable hope that she might want it after all. At first her lips felt cool and slack to the touch, but Harris paid no mind. He molded his mouth to hers, making it an instrument of supplication and enticement. Nuzzling, caressing, satiating, he used his lips and tongue to beseech and beguile her back to life.
What effect it had on Jenny, Harris could not tell at first. But the embers of his own strength rekindled. His heart beat faster, sending feverish blood pulsing through his veins with renewed potency.
Then he felt it.
The gentlest flutter of her tongue. A subtle movement of her lips. The pressure of his kiss, oh so delicately reciprocated. Somehow he had changed roles from the fairy godfather to the prince, with vistas of “happily ever after” opening before him.
So intent was he upon Jenny, and nursing this flicker of life within her, that Harris scarcely heard oars rhythmically hitting the water. The muted sound of voices did rouse him, however, though he could not understand the words.
Wrenching his attention from Jenny, he glanced around to find that dawn had stolen upon them. The rain had eased to little more than a drizzle, and the wind had died. Though it was still not fully light, Harris could make out the shoreline, no more than a hundred yards away. Then he saw the boat—a long canoe, approaching from the distant opposite shore.
Mustering the last crumbs of his strength, he held Jenny with his good arm and raised the wounded one in the air.
“Here! Help!” he called in a voice so weak and raspy he hardly recognized it.
A voice from the boat exclaimed, but Harris could not make out what. Confident they’d been spotted, he let his arm fall.
As the canoe drew close, Harris saw two rugged men wielding the paddles.
“Lord-a-mercy,” cried one. “These must be the folks that washed overboard of the wreck.”
With what little grasp of consciousness he still possessed, Harris wondered how they could ever haul him and Jenny aboard without upsetting their precariously balanced craft. It proved no easy feat, their efforts hampered by Harris’s ebbing strength and Jenny’s deadweight. The men were obviously masters of their strange vessel, for in time they prevailed.
“Lay down with your missus and hang on to her,” advised the older-looking of the two men.
Too weary to explain that Jenny was not his wife, Harris followed the order. The boatmen doffed their coats and laid them over the supine pair. Taking up their paddles again, they struck out for the far shore with urgent speed.
They spared breath for speech only once.
The boat had been making swift progress for some time when Harris heard one of the men gasp “Think they’ll make it?”
They must have thought he’d lost consciousness, as well. In truth, Harris was losing his tenuous grip on it.
The last sound he heard was the laconic reply “Him, maybe.”
Chapter Seven
The last thing Jenny remembered—or had she only dreamed it?—was the taste of Harris’s kiss. It lingered in her mouth, when she finally regained consciousness, hours later.
She did not waken all at once, but rose to full awareness by stages, as if climbing from a deep pit. Her body felt chilled to the very marrow, and by times an uncontrollable palsy shook her. Yet, in some vague way, Jenny knew she was no longer in the water. She lay wrapped in a strange cocoon that was soft and warm. She breathed air faintly pungent of sheep and new-mown hay. She heard the muted but familiar sounds of farm life—the splash of wash water, cows lowing in the distance, the chink of crockery, voices old and young.
How many hours she had lain here Jenny could not guess. She might have been content to lie for several more, her mind drifting drowsily. Except for the thought of Harris.
Through the long, cold night he’d held her, standing like a guardian angel between her and death. Long after she’d been willing to surrender, he had fought for her. She was certain Harris would have grappled for her soul with the devil himself. Now he was gone, and Jenny ached for him.
Her eyelids felt heavier than a pair of overflowing milk pails, but she managed to lift them open. At first she squinted against the bright daylight, but gradually her eyes grew accustomed to it and she was able to take in her surroundings. She found herself lying on a pile of straw in a small structure of roughly hewn wood. Sandwiched between a pair of crude blankets pieced from raw fleeces, Jenny suddenly realized that she was mother-naked.
The sound of a stifled giggle drew her gaze to the entry of the shed. The top half of a child’s head peeked around the door, rapidly disappearing again when its eyes met hers.
“Hullo?” Jenny strained to croak the word. Once it erupted from her parched throat, the rest came a little easier. “It’s all right. I’m awake.”
At first her only answer was a hesitant shuffling just outside the doorway. Then the towhead appeared again.
Jenny smiled encouragingly. Since she hadn’t the strength to rise, this child was her only possible source of news about Harris. “Ye can come in,” she called softly. “I don’t bite.”
The giggle burst forth again and soon an entire wee girl materialized. Eyes wide as saucers, she took a cautious step nearer Jenny. “Are ye the lady that drowned?”
The unexpected question made Jenny laugh. Yet tears also sprang to her eyes. “Aye,” she replied. “I came close to it at least. The last I mind, I was still in the water. I don’t ken how I got here or where this is. Can ye tell me?”
The child gave a broad grin, proudly missing a front tooth. She was a skinny little mite—her bare feet, face and forearms deeply tanned from the sun. Showing below her much-mended dress and apron, her calves were crisscrossed with angry red scratches that made Jenny wince.
“Thi
s is Richibucto,” the child announced eagerly. “Leastways, it’s Jardine’s Yard. Pa’s boat ran aground last night in the storm.”
“You’re Captain Glendenning’s daughter.” Jenny hesitated over the question that immediately leapt to mind. “Is he…? That is—did he…?”
“Aye, I’m Nellie. Pa’s fine. Just provoked about his boat being wrecked. Everyone else got to shore safely in the lifeboats, but nobody knew what had happened to ye and that man.”
“We fell overboard,” said Jenny. “At least I did.” Harris hadn’t fallen, he’d jumped in after her. “What’s become of the man who was with me?”
Her heart clenched in her chest as she awaited Nellie Glendenning’s reply.
“They took him somewhere else. Jardine’s, maybe.”
“Was he…alive?”
“Aye, but in a bad way, like ye were.”
The tension ebbed from Jenny’s body. If she had survived, surely Harris must have, too.
“Shall I run over and see if he died?” asked Nellie.
Before Jenny could find the courage to answer, a loud whisper hissed from outside the shed. “Come out of there, Nellie. You’ll wake the lass with yer jabbering.”
The child spun around. “I didn’t wake her,” she called. “Her eyes were open and she told me to come in. Ask her for yerself.”
Brisk footsteps drew nearer. Stooping to pass through the sawed-off hole that served for a door, a woman entered. She was a slight creature, as ill fed as her child. Her face had a pinched, weary look Jenny knew all too well. Furrows of worry etched deep in her forehead and exhaustion had left dark smudges beneath her eyes. Jenny felt a pang of guilt for adding another burden to this woman’s obvious load.
“So ye are going to live, lass.” Mrs. Glendenning sounded surprised, but her thin face blossomed into a warm smile. Like her daughter’s, it was marred by the absence of several teeth. “I’m glad. My Angus would have taken it hard if ye hadn’t.”
“Thank ye for taking me in, ma’am.” Jenny longed to ask the woman about Harris. Mrs. Glendenning might know more than her daughter. Before she could form the words, however, everything in the shed began to spin. Letting her eyes fall shut, Jenny groaned.
“Go easy now, lass. It’ll take you a few days to get your strength back. Nellie, come with me and we’ll get Miss Lennox a bit of hot broth. Rest, lass. Time enough to talk later. If I was ye, I’d say my prayers, though, and thank the good Lord for sparing ye.”
Jenny murmured her agreement. She could not even open her eyes to watch them go. Heeding Mrs. Glendenning’s advice, she surrendered to the inexorable tug of sleep. As she sank back into the peaceful depths of unconsciousness, Jenny also followed the woman’s admonition to pray.
It was not a prayer of thanksgiving she addressed wordlessly to heaven, but an urgent petition.
“Please, God. Let Harris be all right.”
Surprised by his own resiliency, Harris had recovered enough strength that evening to venture a short walk with his host. He’d rather have gone to Glendennings’ to check on Jenny. However, the captain had assured him she was well on the road to recovery and spent most of her time sleeping.
Instead, Harris stood on the wharf at Jardine’s Yard, watching the battered St. Bride limp into harbor. A crew of workers winched the barque up on dry dock for repairs.
“She has a few rents in her hull,” said the grave, quiet man beside him. “I’ll wager the keel’s sound, though. Patched up, she’ll do well enough for coastal runs.”
Harris looked at Robert Jardine, builder of the St. Bride. “How long do ye ken before she’s fit to sail again?”
Jardine ran a hand over his bald pate, pondering the question. “If we had a full crew to work, we could have her seaworthy again in jig time. The trouble is, it’s hay season. There’s scarcely a pair of hands to spare in the whole county. I ken the folks in Chatham will just have to wait for this load of goods—at least what cargo isn’t waterlogged. I can’t see the St. Bride making that run for a good six weeks or better.”
“Six weeks.” Harris tried to keep the eagerness from his voice. He failed miserably.
Robert Jardine cast him a sidelong, questioning look. “So ye’re in no hurry to be on yer way? I reckoned ye might want to get where ye’re going and settle in before winter hits.”
Harris shrugged. “I didn’t have a special destination in mind, so one place is as good as another.” Somewhere he might not be an outsider, as he had been in Dalbeattie. He’d enjoyed the enforced camaraderie of the ocean voyage. If only he could find a similar sense of belonging somewhere in the New World.
He relished the thought of six more weeks with Jenny. Six weeks of late summer. No longer confined aboard ship, but free to wander this strange new land. From what he’d seen, Harris knew it was expansive enough to afford them stolen moments of privacy.
Just then, he was tempted to bless all storms and sandbars, for they had conspired to grant him the gift of time. Time to win Jenny’s heart.
“If ye’ve no place else in mind,” said the shipbuilder, “ye could do worse than bide here. It’s a land of opportunity for a man like ye, Chisholm. Right now, there’s but two kinds of folk in the colony. Ones like me and my brother, who have a bit of capital and a notion to make our fortunes.”
He nodded toward the crew straining on ropes to pull the barque free of the water. “Then there are the fellows with strong backs, no education to speak of, and not a penny to their names. They only want a bit of land to farm and call their own.”
“Aye?” Harris didn’t quite see where the conversation was headed.
“What we don’t have on the Richibucto are men like ye—who’ve an education and some experience in business. If this settlement’s to thrive, we’re going to need managers and justices of the peace.” He grimaced. “Even a politician or two.”
“I don’t fancy myself in politics.” Harris chuckled. “But running a business—aye, I can do that.”
“Say the word and ye can have a place with Jardine Brothers.”
“That’s a generous offer, sir.” Harris shook the hand of his prospective employer. “I’ll think on it and let you know in a day or so.”
“Ye may not think me so generous when ye see the state our ledgers are in,” Robert Jardine replied.
As the two men laughed over this, Harris also shook his head in wonder. Clearly this was a land where opportunities flourished like the endless expanse of forest. He drew a deep breath of air in which were mingled the briny tang of the sea and the spicy resin of pine and spruce.
It smelled like optimism.
The warm scent of fresh milk rose from the churn as Jenny worked the dasher. Like the sharp pungency of lye soap and the fermenting aroma of bread dough, it was one of the many odors of drudgery. Her arms ached and waves of dizziness still took her by times, but she could not lay about being waited on. Not while there was so much work to do and Mrs. Glendenning already worn to a shadow trying to do it.
A pair of black pigs rooted under a nearby oak tree for fallen acorns. In the distance, Jenny could hear the children squealing with glee as they harvested wild raspberries. From the house came the thin wail of the baby. A frail, fitful infant, Jenny doubted he would survive the winter.
With a shiver of apprehension, she wondered if she had made a grave mistake by coming to this wild, alien land. In such primitive conditions, a woman’s lot became harder than ever.
Jenny gazed around her at the Glendenning grant. It was one of the more prosperous, since Captain Glendenning plied a comparatively profitable trade as shipmaster for half the year. Yet it made her father’s modest upland croft look luxurious by comparison.
The family dwelling was a meanly proportioned cabin built from overlapping logs. Cracks between the logs were stuffed with moss to keep out the wind. A few rough outbuildings, like the one where Jenny had slept, housed the livestock in winter. For now they ranged at will, the oxen and milch cows grazing a bit of marshland on
the creek bank.
From what Jenny could tell, the Glendennings’ weekday clothes were sewn from heavy sailcloth that made her own plain, serviceable gingham look positively decadent. There was plenty to eat—fish, game and newly ripened vegetables. Imported foodstuffs, like flour and sugar were more strictly rationed. Jenny suspected the early spring must be a hungry season, when stored root crops began to run low and ships from abroad had not yet come.
And what of the winter?
She shivered to think of it. The long, cold, dark days without a scrap of society or cheer. The vast, impenetrable forest looming oppressively around, watchful and hungry.
“Have ye got that butter churned yet, lass?” Mrs. Glendenning appeared, toting two heavy buckets of water from the creek. “The men’ll want it for their dinner.”
“Aye, I ken it’s done.” Jenny felt the flush that had crept into her cheeks. She had taken out her worries on the hapless container of cream, dashing it with frantic vigor.
“Ye can pour off the skim into the pigs’ trough.” Mrs. Glendenning rested for a moment, her thin bosom heaving.
“The baby was crying.” Jenny struggled to keep her balance as the pigs shoved their way to the trough.
After hoisting her pails again, Mrs. Glendenning made for the cabin. “When does he stop?” she muttered, more to herself than to Jenny. “I ken he’s hungry, but he’ll just have to wait till I get the dinner made.”
“Sit down and feed him,” said Jenny. “I’ll see to dinner, or at least get it started.”
“The stew’s on and the bread’s baked.” Mrs. Glendenning made her way into the windowless cabin, with Jenny on her heels. “Ye can cut the bread and set the greens to boil, though. I wish the children would get back from picking berries. I promised Angus a pudding while he’s home.”
She wilted into a low chair that had obviously emigrated from Scotland with the family. Though not a fancy or expensive piece of furniture by any means, it stood out from the cabin’s other rough-hewn appointments. Clearly what was commonplace—even poor—by Galloway standards, passed for elegance in this pioneer settlement.