by Judith Pella
Regardless of the answer to those questions, there would easily be enough room for Caitlan here. Why, even if Li remained with them for a while, Kiernan would heal, and then Caitlan could take his bedroom downstairs. If Jordana and Brenton came with her, as was the plan, then Victoria could just shuffle everyone around in whatever manner necessary. Jordana and Caitlan could share a room, as she knew they already did in Omaha. Brenton could always sleep in the front room. She smiled, working out all the details in her mind. She could very nearly see them sitting down to a meal together, happy, content, blessed. Oh, God, let it be so, she prayed, hugging her arms to her body. Please let it be so.
18
Kiernan stared out the window of his new bedroom. The rope bed had been donated by one of his friends, and in spite of the feather mattress, he found it impossible to get comfortable. Everything hurt and felt swollen or bruised. How could it be that he should still feel so bad after so much time had passed? He tried not to show his discomfort, hoping to keep Victoria from worrying more than she already was, but it was hard. All he wanted was to be healed and back on his feet, and instead, he was living in a borrowed bed.
Of course, most of the furnishings in the house had been donated. Charlie had put the word out to their mutual friends with the railroad, and the donations had rolled in. In fact, the house itself was Charlie’s donation, given as a means of support by the Central Pacific. Charlie wouldn’t even consider the discussion of rent, and that only made Kiernan feel worse. He had become what he had once feared the most—a charity case.
His wife had to bathe him and help him with meals. She had to work with Li to raise enough money to put food on the table. Charlie and the other Central Pacific board members were doing what they could to see to the other comforts of life.
It would have been better had I simply died, Kiernan lamented, using his good right hand to pound the mattress.
Such thoughts only served to make his head hurt, but in truth, the pain was always with him. Sometimes the pressure was so intense that he worried it would actually rupture something. He didn’t tell Victoria. He couldn’t cause her further worry. Besides, she was happy with the new house, and as mean-spirited and ill-tempered as he’d been, he couldn’t take that away from her.
It was a lovely house, Kiernan had to admit. He would have loved to have furnished Victoria with something this nice all on his own, but that was nothing more than a dream. Scowling, he turned away from the window and reached under the black eye patch to rub his sore eye. It had been nearly a month since the accident, and still his sight had not returned in full. The eye was extremely sensitive to light, and his left arm was still useless. His body hurt, and his mind refused to keep a steady memory of thoughts. He could remember working on the railroad and all the details of his job, but he couldn’t remember the accident. Nor could he always remember the weeks just after the accident. Of course, the first two weeks, he’d barely been conscious at all. The doctor had kept him so sedated that he only knew what others told him. And often he forgot about that.
In the last week or so, he had no such excuse. He had been insufferable to live with, and Victoria had borne it all admirably. She never complained or looked hurt when he made harsh, ugly comments. She never even got mad when he demanded she leave California and go home to her parents. This made his recovery even harder. He longed to get up from the bed, to comfort her and promise that everything would be good for them, but he couldn’t. He’d lost all hope that it could ever be that way. In fact, he’d decided that if he should manage to fully recover, he would resign from the Central Pacific and take her back east himself. Of course, there was a war going on back there, and that might not allow for the pleasant life of comfort she’d known as a girl, but it would have to be better than what she had known here in California.
A light knocking sounded at his door, and before he could answer, Charlie Crocker opened the door and grinned at him. “Say, you’re looking a whole lot better.”
Kiernan sighed. He couldn’t very well growl at the man to get out. After all, he owned the place. “Good day to ya, Charlie.”
Crocker pulled up a chair and tossed his hat to the end of the bed. “So how are you feeling?”
“I’ve been better,” Kiernan replied.
“Oh, that’s to be certain,” Charlie said with a chuckle. “But you’ll recover soon.”
“I wouldn’t be expectin’ so much, Charlie,” Kiernan replied with a heavy sigh. “Me body and mind tend to disagree as to who’s in charge.”
“Well, the doctor seems very positive, and your little wife is quite elated.”
“’Tis the house and not me recovery that has Victoria elated.”
“I seriously doubt that,” Crocker insisted. “She told me just this morning that you were seeing shadows out of your left eye. That has to be good news.”
“Well, I suppose ’tis all how ya look at it. I used to see just fine out of the eye, so shadows now seem bad. Yet a week ago I had no sight whatsoever out of it, so I’m figurin’ that to be progress.”
“I am as well,” Charlie said.
Kiernan frowned. “I’m still not takin’ kindly to charity, Charlie. Ya should at least be lettin’ me pay ya the same amount of rent as on the other place.”
“Nonsense. You’re a valuable asset to the Central Pacific, and I want to make sure you come back to us when you are well,” Charlie said, artfully changing the subject. “I don’t know what we’re going to do without you, Kiernan. There aren’t enough skilled laborers to keep the line going. We manage to scrounge up a few hundred here and there, and by the time the first payday rolls round, they’re gone—back to the hills where their dreams of gold keep calling them. We need to figure out how to keep them on the line.”
“I’m sorry, Charlie. I wish I knew what to tell ya.” Kiernan looked at his friend, focusing his one good eye on Charlie’s intent gaze. “It still doesn’t change the fact that ya’ve placed me on charity.”
“I consider it more an act of Christian generosity. On your part, as much as mine. That little Chinese friend of your wife’s has no husband to take care of her. Her man’s gone off to the railroad camps, and who knows when or if he’ll ever return? Your missus tells me that the baby is soon to have a brother or sister. You can’t very well be turning them out in the streets, now can you?”
Kiernan shook his head. “I wouldn’t suggest that.”
“Good. Then you see why it’s important to live here. The woman and her child are cared for, as well as the fact that she can keep her laundry business going. Why, even your wife seemed quite excited about the possibilities, and I’ve already drummed up quite a bit of business for them once they actually get everything up and running.”
“I don’t like me wife workin’ like that,” Kiernan replied, feeling his anger creep up on him. “It’s me job to be seein’ after her needs. And how can I do that now? I’m tellin’ ya, Charlie, I’m nothin’ but a blind fool.”
“You’re only as blind as you want to be, Kiernan,” Charlie admonished him in a sterner tone than he had yet used. He got to his feet and took up his hat. “But to my way of thinking, sitting around here feeling sorry for yourself is twice as hard on your wife as having to work at washing clothes.”
He didn’t wait for Kiernan’s response, and it was a good thing. Kiernan sat staring at the door for several minutes after Charlie had gone. How could he go saying something like that? It was hardly fair. Kiernan hadn’t asked to be injured.
The afternoon wore on, and with the heat of the day, Kiernan drifted off into a fitful sleep. He found himself back in Baltimore living in the extraordinary opulence he had known after marrying Victoria. They dined every night at seven, and always they wore their very best clothes and entertained other people who wore their very best. James and Carolina Baldwin, Victoria’s parents, were well-known and quite respected in the city. People vied for positions at their table—each outdoing the other in order to be able to sit at the right
hand of his father-in-law. Kiernan thought it all rather funny. The only time his people had ever fought over a place at the table was in order to be seated closer to the food.
He awoke from the aroma of succulent roast lamb and mint jelly, to the smells of side pork frying. The dream left him feeling more defeated than he’d felt before. It tortured him to remember Victoria pampered and spoiled in her silks and satins, her skin so soft and cared for, her thick black hair piled high on her head and adorned with ribbons and pearls. How could he have taken her from that life? How could he have given her this world in good conscience?
It wasn’t fair. He’d tried to be a good man. He’d tried to be a good Christian. Why should his world fall apart when other men, men who cared little or nothing for God, thrived in their evil ways? And it wasn’t just small, isolated incidents. He’d seen it over and over again. Con men who swindled and gambled and robbed the innocent of their funds. Despicable characters like Christopher Thorndike who’d tried to entice Victoria to leave her marriage. Word had it that Thorndike made his fortune on the backs of the Chinese. Robbing them blind of their artifacts and possessions, giving them little more than a pittance of their worth. Not to mention that Thorndike’s name was very closely associated with the opium dens and Chinese houses of prostitution—though such a tie was never proven. Yet Thorndike lived in a beautiful mansion and dressed and ate like a king. Where was God’s righteousness in that?
Sometimes Kiernan wondered if earthly life wasn’t of little concern to God. Of course God would concern himself over His people, but did He truly bother to get in on the little details of the day? Did God really care whether Kiernan O’Connor wore silk waistcoats and dined on poached salmon? After all, if he believed that good came from God’s hand, was he not obligated to believe that bad was also passed on that way?
But Kiernan remembered a sermon from not so very long ago. The pastor had spoken of God’s desire that all come willingly to the cross. That salvation was a free gift to those who desired it, but it wasn’t a gift that had come without cost to the giver.
“We must remember,” the man had preached, “that Christ paid with His life for that which costs us nothing. Why do you then raise protests when troubled times come into your life? If God allowed His own Son—a part of himself—to suffer and labor a death that we can only imagine with dread, why do you find it surprising that you too must suffer? Jesus told us there would be trouble—read the Word—it’s all there.”
Kiernan had read as much of the Bible as his limited skills allowed. It was there. Stories of good men who were persecuted by evil men. Accounts of trials and tribulations that God ultimately had victory over. He thought of Job and the way the devil had heaped trial after trial upon him, and all with God’s knowledge. How was that right? Was God not supposed to keep evil from His children? It was almost as if God waited on pins and needles to see if Job would curse Him and die. Yet He had to have known what Job’s choice would be. God told Satan that Job was a perfect and upright man, one who feared Him and eschewed evil. And while Kiernan would never pretend that he was perfect and upright, he did fear the Lord and refrained from evil.
Then a thought came to mind—a thought he’d continued to bury since leaving Maryland with Victoria. He wasn’t all that good about refraining from evil. He’d forced his wife to live a lie in order to save his pride. He’d kept Victoria from telling her parents that he’d lost her money, and the lie ate at him like nothing he had ever known. The only way he avoided dealing with it was to press it down deep into the darkest recesses of his mind.
His da had once told him, “A man is only as good as his word. If yar known for yar lies, then no man will respect ya.”
Kiernan shook his head and closed his eye. He was running from the truth, hiding out a continent away so that he wouldn’t lose face with Victoria’s parents, yet he’d already lost self-respect. His thoughts tried to go to prayer, but he felt such an overwhelming shame that he avoided even speaking the words.
A verse from the Psalms came to mind. “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts . . .” Oh, it was certain God knew his thoughts. Thoughts of misery and pity and guilt for his actions. “. . . And see if there be any wicked way in me . . .” But could Kiernan really bear the truth? Could he look down deep in his own heart and let God show him the ugly, hidden places? “. . . and lead me in the way everlasting.”
Kiernan felt a lump form in his throat. “I’m not worth the effort,” he whispered. “I’ve lied, and in my hardened heart I’ve been unmerciful to me wife. I’ve been spiteful and angry, demanding and heartless. Why would yarself be wastin’ effort on me?” he questioned God.
“Kiernan?” It was Victoria. Her sweet voice called to him from the opposite side of the door. Timidly she opened it and questioned again. “Kiernan?”
“Aye.”
“I heard your voice. Did you call for me?”
He shook his head, not yet ready to confess his dealings with God.
Smiling at him, she came to sit beside him. “I’ve been thinking about something, and I wondered what you wanted me to do.”
He looked at her, frowning at the sight of her. She appeared so tired, and it was all his fault. He’d caused her no end of grief. “What’s troublin’ yar mind?” He kept his voice low and gentle.
“I suddenly realized the other day that I’d not written to Caitlan to tell her of your accident. I suppose I was just so caught up in what was going on. I’d like to write to her now and let her know of your condition.”
Kiernan thought on this for a moment. “I don’t want to be worryin’ her. I’ve been doin’ little but causin’ folk grief.” He felt a strange sensation wash over him, but ignoring it, he continued. “The doctor isn’t certain of my . . .” His voice trailed off as his thoughts blurred into incoherence. What was happening to him? He swallowed hard, but even that came by sheer determination.
“Kiernan?” Her voice was calm. Apparently she didn’t realize he was struggling.
With all his strength, he looked at her and said, “Write her a letter and tell her I release her from any pledge to come to me.”
“But I don’t understand. I thought you wanted her here.”
“I do,” Kiernan said, feeling as though his tongue had suddenly grown too large for his mouth. He began to twitch and then shake all over.
Now Victoria could see there was a problem. “Kiernan!” It was the last word he heard before fading into a world of shadows and endless noise.
——
“A convulsion,” the doctor told Victoria calmly. “We see this sometimes in patients who suffer head injuries. It could mean that there’s a clot on the brain, or perhaps that the brain is merely trying to right itself, or that your husband overtaxed himself. We really know very little about these sorts of things.”
Victoria forced her attention on the doctor rather than her now sleeping husband. When she’d seen Kiernan begin to jerk and twist, his one good eye rolled up in his head, she knew something was dreadfully wrong. She’d screamed for Li and sent her to get the doctor, but then there had been nothing to do but pray.
“Next time it happens—” the doctor began.
“Next time!” Victoria barely stifled a scream. “What do you mean, next time!”
Dr. Benson gently patted her arm. “It’s highly possible that until he completely recovers from his injuries, this kind of thing will happen again and again.” He looked at her intently. “I’m sorry to say this, but it’s also quite possible he might not recover at all. I’ve seen it before in cases of brain injury and swelling. You can never be sure.”
“But he’s been doing so well,” Victoria said in a strangled tone. “It’s been almost a month since the accident.”
“Yes, yes, I know. We must have faith that he will survive, but I don’t want to get your hopes up only to have them dashed. I said nothing as long as he wasn’t suffering from convulsions. But brain seizures are not a good sign in ge
neral. We’ll simply have to watch and wait.”
Victoria bit her lower lip to keep from crying. She wanted to demand that the doctor make things right. She wanted to insist that he knit Kiernan back together and ease her worry. But of course, he could do nothing. He was just a man.
“I’ve given him something to help him sleep, but should he suffer another episode, send for me straight-away. Oh, and don’t forget to put something in his mouth to keep him from swallowing his tongue. More die from this than from the seizure itself.”
“Should we stay with him around the clock?” she asked, knowing that she had no intention of leaving her husband’s side.
Dr. Benson nodded. “It would probably be a good idea. At least for a couple of days.”
Victoria nodded. “Then that’s what we’ll do. He’ll never be alone, I promise you.” She looked to where Kiernan lay sleeping and thought of the hideous scene she’d witnessed not even an hour ago. In those horrible moments, her beloved Kiernan had changed from the man she loved to become some sort of creature—writhing and twisting, foaming at the mouth. It was unlike anything she had ever seen, or ever wanted to see again. She had thought the worst was behind them. She had thought he would recover and be well again, and now the doctor was telling her he might even die.
Waiting until Dr. Benson had gone, Victoria sank into the bedside chair and buried her face in her hands. “I simply cannot bear this, Father,” she prayed in a hushed whisper between sobs. “I cannot do this alone.”
19
August on the plains of Nebraska had heated up in more ways than one. The questionable threat of Indian attacks had rapidly become a reality. In the Platte River area in the western part of the state, rumors held that massacres of white settlers had become a routine event. Territorial citizens began streaming into Omaha for safety, bringing with them their money and other valuables—spreading fear and terror among the occupants of the city, who were afraid they could be the next ones to come under attack.