What the Heart Keeps

by Rosalind Laker

  Afterwards they bathed in the lake, since the boat had drifted into shallow water, and he cleared a space amid the charred debris that floated there. They returned to the boat to dress. She put on her one surviving stocking. He fastened the buttons down the back of her dress, kissing her spine between each one as if he would have turned the clock back if it had been possible. She could not pin up her hair, for the pins lay somewhere amid the ashes of a burnt-out cabin, but she tidied it as best she could. Lastly she tied it back with a piece of cord that Peter found for her among some fishing tackle in the bow.

  They sat holding hands in the boat. She was quiet and preoccupied. Questions and explanations lay ahead of her when it was safe to go ashore. Not for a moment did she expect to find herself pregnant as a result of their mutual passion, for although they had made love with complete freedom and abandonment she had come to the conclusion long ago, over the many months of her marriage, that she was barren. Neither rape nor her husband’s love-making had brought her to fruition. She saw it as another of fate’s quirks that was beyond explanation. Slowly she turned her head to face Peter and spoke emotionally.

  “You do realise that if Alan will have me back after this night with you, that I must go, don’t you?”

  “Then nothing has changed?” His face became agonized and yet curiously he was not surprised. Somehow he had known how it would be.

  “Nothing, except that we have memories to cherish until we are together again.”

  “If you leave me, you’ll never come back.” He saw she was about to make some vehement protest and he shook his head quickly. “You will mean to, I know that. But if the child has the slightest need of you he will always come first. Since you think of him as your own, that’s not unnatural, because you love with conscience, Lisa, my sweet. That’s the way you are and how you’ll always be. You see, we must accept that the boy may ail, or suffer an accident, or simply continue to look to you for maternal love and support. Whatever the reason, you’ll not feel free of your duties until he is as near fully grown as makes no difference.”

  “You are saying I must make a choice once and for all. There can be no compromise.” Her voice faltered on the clarification.

  “I have a life to live, and it would grind me to dust if I was forced to wait year after year and then you never came.” He spoke determinedly. “I could wait for a definite date of reunion, but that’s all. Give me that date.”

  She was very pale, her eyes full of pain. “You know I can’t.” He twisted his mouth bleakly. “You could if you wished, but you realise only too well that what I have foretold is true.” “I’ll love you always!” The words tore from her heart.

  “I’ll never stop loving you, but I can’t live in limbo. I must be with you or without you.”

  She looked as if she might die. “Am I never to see you again?” “The decision is yours.”

  She turned her gaze away from the starkness of his expression, unable to bear what she was doing to him and yet powerless to retract, for he had spoken the truth and there was no querying the facts. She started violently when the sombre silence between them was suddenly broken by a male voice hailing them across the water from the south shore.

  “Hi, folks! You okay?”

  Neither she nor Peter had noticed the newcomer’s approach through the charred fern and verdue as he dodged among the trees propped at curious angles. She recognised him instantly as Mcpherson, the old lumberman she had driven past the previous day. He had come to a halt with arms akimbo, his jaws moving rhythmically on the tobacco he chewed as Peter answered him.

  “Yes! I’ll row the boat over. Is the terrain safe?”

  “The ground is still smoulderin’ in places. Do you have boots? No? I brung a spare pair with me hopin’ I’d find Mrs. Fernley safe and sound where you are right now. You can wear ‘em and she can ride the horse.”

  He turned to plod on along the water’s edge, the spare boots tied by string over his shoulder, to reach the horse, which whinnied and tossed its head nervously. He caught the bridle and dived about in one of his capacious pockets to find something edible, which the horse accepted greedily when he held it out. There was nuzzling for more as he clapped the horse’s neck and spoke calm words of reassurance.

  Peter set the oars in the rollocks and rowed the boat to the south shore, the bow knocking aside branches and other floating deadwood. As it beached, he sprang out and turned to lift her onto land. As he held her close to his body for no more than a matter of seconds, they looked deep into each other’s eyes and all their shared feelings were mirrored there.

  “Here’s the boots.” Mcpherson had come up to them, leading the horse, and he chucked the caulked and spiked footwear of the logging trade that he had once followed onto the ground at Peter’s feet. He turned to Lisa. “I’m sure glad to find you safe, ma’am. That fire came up like a match to tinder. It’s lucky the wind kept in the direction that it did. The sawmill and the settlement escaped completely.”

  “What of your home, Mr. Mcpherson?” she asked.

  He spat a stream of tobacco juice before replying. “By-passed, ma’am. They used to call me Lucky Mack in my loggin’ days. Some sparks ignited the roof, but I was keepin’ it damp with buckets of water and no damage was done that can’t be repaired.”

  “It was kind of you to come looking for me. How did you know I’d been trapped by the fire?”

  “An hour ago I sighted your burnt-out automobile. Come on. We’d best be goin’. I reckon there’ll be search parties out for you any place near the water. That’s always the hope folks follow when someone is missin’ after a fire.” He stooped to make a step for her with his linked hands and she mounted the horse, pulling up her skirt to sit astride its bare back, for Peter had had no time to saddle up in their flight from the fire. Quickly she clutched at the mane for a fast hold, for she did not know how to ride. It was still her hope that Alan and Minnie had been spared anxieties about her.

  Progress was slow. Whole areas of smouldering earth had to be avoided and there was the constant danger of collapsing trees. The tobacco juice that Mcpherson emitted from the side of his mouth at fairly regular intervals occasionally caused the ground to hiss. The whole time smoky dust and thick ash flew up all around them, getting in their eyes and settling on their skin and clothes. Her muslin dress became dark-streaked and small pieces of falling twigs caught in her hair. They eventually came to the road and there at the side she saw the twisted mass of metal that had been her transport to the lake.

  Gradually evidence of the fire thinned out to scorched bark and singed foliage. Finally greenery took over with a sweet coolness and fresher air. Peter called a halt to remove the uncomfortable caulk boots, which had been two sizes too small for him, and put on his own shoes. Mcpherson took the boots from him and prepared to take his leave, but Peter stayed him with a question.

  “Do you know a trail to get Mrs. Fernley back to her own home without going through Dekova’s Place?”

  Mcpherson’s face did not change its expression although he shifted the quid in his mouth. He knew full well what lay behind those words. If the couple had met by chance in the forest and found a mutual shelter in the boat, it would have come out naturally in the conversation. But that had not happened and the way in which they looked at each other would have told any simpleton that they were lovers. “I reckon I do.”

  “Then would you take her there? That is, if she has not changed her mind about coming with me.” Peter gazed up into Lisa’s eyes and she gazed down into his in a final sharing of love. Hers became brilliant with tears, but slowly she shook her head. As she reached out a hand to him he enfolded it in both of his own.

  “Goodbye, Peter.”

  “Farewell, Lisa.” He kissed her fingers and then released them.

  Mcpherson guided the horse around and in through the trees away from the road. She tried to keep herself from looking back, but finally she could no longer resist and turned for one last glimpse of him. But
he had gone, unable to endure the sight of her passing out of his life.

  It was a long and roundabout route that they followed. Neither she nor Mcpherson spoke, she too choked for idle conversation, he silent because he preferred it. Eventually they came onto the path that ran between the sawmill and the settlement.

  “I’ll get down here, Mr. Mcpherson,” she said, “and walk the rest of the way.”

  He helped her dismount. “What about the horse?”

  “Would you return it to the stables behind the farrier’s? Mr. Hagen will be there.”

  “Okay.”

  “Thank you again.”

  He continued to regard her as phlegmatically as if he had done no more than sell her one of his kitchen buckets. “You’re welcome, ma’am.”

  It did not take her long to reach the row of whitewashed houses at the edge of the sawmill. To her dismay she saw neighbours gathered at the gate of her house and she darted back quickly into the shelter of the bushes by the path, unable to face their inquisitive stares and questions at the present time. Almost blindly she stumbled back the way she had come for some distance before leaving the path to lean back against a tree out of sight of anyone who might pass by. In her mind’s eye she followed the progress of Mcpherson with the horse. By now he would be handing it back to Peter. When it was rested and fed and re-saddled, Peter would ride it out of Dekova’s Place and away to take up the threads of his life again as if their reunion had never been. Yet they had loved each other too much and too long ever to be free of memory, no matter how many years went by.

  Such was her stunned and unhappy state that when the sound of a horse approaching from the settlement reached her ears she thought, on a flash of hope, that Peter was taking a detour by way of the sawmill to catch sight of her once more. Swiftly she ran out onto the path and saw it was Alan in the saddle of his own horse, his face and clothes as smudged with ashes and black dust as her own, his expression haggard and wrenched by despair.

  “Alan!”

  He stared at her almost in disbelief. Then he gave a great shout and flung himself from the saddle to snatch her into his arms, crushing her to him with such force that she was breathless and could not speak. To her sorrow she realised he had thought her lost in the fire and it was as if she had come back from the dead.

  When he drew back from her it was to shake his head as if the miracle of her being safe and sound was still beyond his comprehension. “When I was unable to trace you at any farm or more distant neighbour, I began to fear you had been caught by the fire along one of the isolated skid-roads before reaching your destination.” The strain of all he had been through continued to give his face a taut, stretched look, his eyes showing that he had had no sleep for twenty-four hours. “I’ve been with the search parties. I was returning home to see if any word had been left there.”

  “I drove to the lake.”

  “So far?” He was surprised.

  “That’s where I left the automobile and it’s a burned wreck now. I survived in a boat on the water. Mr. Mcpherson found me and brought me back on a horse. There’s more to tell. Much more. But I want to get home first, only the neighbours are outside there.”

  “Everybody has been anxious about you. Don’t worry. I’ll keep them at bay.”

  With his arm around her and leading the horse, he brought her from the path. Risto, sighting them going past, ran out of his parents’ house to oblige Alan by taking the horse to lead it to the sawmill stables.

  “Great to see you safe, Mrs. Fernley,” he said to her.

  She managed a smile. Alan gave Risto instructions that the sawmill whistle should be sounded in a long, single blast to let the search parties know that Lisa had been found — seven blasts being the signal for disaster. Then he hurried her along, staving off with a hand held up the women who came running from all directions.

  “If you please, ladies. My wife has had a narrow escape from the fire and I’d be grateful if you’d let me get her home to rest.”

  Minnie, sighting Lisa’s return from an upper window, came flying down the staircase as the front door opened. “Lisa! There’s a burn on your cheek! Your hair is singed! Oh, oh, oh!”

  Later, when Lisa was alone in the bedroom, she looked in the mirror at her reflection and studied the line of the burn which had been treated with some salve. The burn was not severe and would heal quickly, but with her fair skin it was almost certain that a faint discoloration would always remain there and she would need a little paint and powder to hide it. Only she would ever know what had preceded it, for Alan had drawn his own conclusions about her disappearance and had asked for no explanations. He had simply assumed that, upset about his news of a return to England, she had made the excuse of visiting to Minnie in order to have some time to herself in the open air. He actually said that he quite understood how she would have wanted to escape the house to think things out and come to terms with the change in their lives that leaving the States would mean to them. After all, Minnie had quoted to him her remark of having a problem to sort out.

  She felt no shame in failing to contradict his conclusions. Since she and Peter had parted forever, she saw no reason to condemn Alan to unnecessary misery and jealousy by a heartless confession that would do no good at all. If circumstances had demanded it, she would not have shirked the issue, but she had been spared that by Alan himself. He would not lose by it. She had made her choice. After the respite that would be allowed her for the shock of the fire, she would continue to be the wife and partner he had always expected her to be. That was her debt and she would settle it.

  Turning from the mirror, her carapace of calm resolution cracked without warning. “Peter!” she screamed out on an agonised note, throwing herself across the bed.

  Afterwards she believed it to have been the moment when Peter had ridden out of Dekova’s Place, never to return. The stables were up for rent again the next day. There were no means of checking the hour of his departure, but the conviction remained. Certainly she never again gave way to a similar lapse. Work was her antidote for not letting love thoughts take hold. She packed china and bed-linen into trunks and boxes, threw out unnecessary items that had been hoarded without purpose, and made sure that none of Harry’s favourite toys would be overlooked when the day came to close and lock the lids.

  Minnie also occupied her attention. The girl was pining already at the prospect of being parted from Risto, who was similarly downcast. They were making promises to write, and Alan had taken photographs of them for each to exchange with the other as a keepsake. There had been no more movie shows since the night of the forest fire, which had coincided within a matter of days with the last of the film bookings she had made. At the time she had expected Alan to make his own arrangements, never realising that all would be at an end. With no cinematograph duties to perform, Risto saw less of Minnie, being kept busy in the saloon or waiting at table. This reduction of their time together, coming when every minute counted, was an additional hardship for them. More than once Lisa came across them kissing and cuddling and whispering together and she was full of compassion for them. Minnie became a little more distrait with every passing day, but when the eve of departure finally arrived she spent it alone with Risto, who had managed to get the time off from the hotel. She was pale and courageous when she re-entered the house. Lisa regarded her sympathetically.

  “What time are we to be up in the morning?” the girl asked tremulously.

  Alan answered her. “Early, I’m afraid. We catch the train at eight o’clock.”

  Lisa went across to her. “I’ll give you a call at six.”

  Minnie nodded and flung her arms about Lisa to hug her emotionally. Then she tore away up to her room, her head bowed in weeping. Her door slammed and the locking of it showed that she wished to be quite alone after the poignant parting that had taken place that evening.

  Lisa was up at dawn and Alan came down soon afterwards. At six o’clock, with breakfast on the table, she went upst
airs to tap on Minnie’s door. “Time to get up,” she called. There was no reply. She tapped harder and there was still no response. Then she tried the handle and the door swung open. The bed had not been slept in and the valise, previously packed in readiness for the long transcontinental train journey from Seattle to New York, was gone. On the chest of drawers an envelope stood propped against a candlestick. Lisa picked it up and saw it was addressed to her. She read it through. Slowly she went downstairs to break the news to Alan.

  “Minnie and Risto have eloped,” she said quietly, sitting down and handing him the letter.

  His reaction was as she had expected. “Good God! I must go after her. She’s too young to know her own mind! We’ll postpone everything.”

  “No.” Lisa spoke firmly. “What does her age matter if she’s truly in love as I believe her to be. Risto will look after her.”

  “But she says they’re going to California to try their luck in the movies!”

  “They’re both talented. I think they stand a good chance of getting work.”

  He frowned at her incredulously. “Are you prepared to leave here today without lifting a finger to bring her back?”

  “Yes.” She stood up. “I’ll waken Harry now. We mustn’t miss that train into Seattle.”

  As she went upstairs again, she recalled that she had been only seventeen when she and Peter had fallen in love. Not for anything in the world would she attempt to separate Minnie from Risto. In her heart she wished them joy.

  Eleven

  Three months later Peter received an urgent telegram from his brother to meet him at an appointed hour. The place selected was the lobby of a Seattle hotel that faced the giant totem pole in Pioneer Square. Contrary to Peter’s expectations, Jon arrived sober, clean-shaven and well clad in new clothes. He wore, somewhat surprisingly, a dashing hard-topped hat, which Lisa in her English way would have called a bowler. Peter almost sighed aloud as yet again she slipped unbidden into his thoughts when he least expected it. At times of low spirits, an almost permanent condition since she had made her terrible decision to end everything with him, he doubted that he would ever be free of her. Neither drink nor other female company had had any effect. In the past, when she had haunted him, there had always been a grain of hope. Now there was none. He considered it ironic that it should be he himself and not his brother who was somewhat the worse for drink at this hotel meeting.