What else was a game? The story of his impressment, perhaps? Maybe he was a traitor. Maybe he was even betrothed to Miss Eden and all that was a lie too.
How idiotic to take the man at his word. As he’d said, they barely knew each other. He’d been spot on.
“I need time,” Lily blurted. “Time to think.”
Everett reached into his trouser pocket and produced his timepiece. “I can allow you a couple of hours, certainly. That’s only fair.”
“I was thinking more along the lines of a couple of months.” Years, even.
“No, it’s time you decide.” Everett glanced around. “I’ve never cared for the color of this room. It’s neither green nor blue.” His beady eyes fixed on her. “Your father, bless him, was a man of great indecision. He happily settled for compromise.”
“And you think he should have been more puritan—like you?”
“Exactly.” He ran his finger across the surface of the sideboard, inspected it, and blew off the make-believe dust. Lily had managed to keep up with the housework. “I’ve purchased slaves, a cook, and a maid.” Again, his gaze adhered to Lily. “Marry me, and you’ll want for nothing.”
“Except love.”
He appeared genuinely hurt. “You still don’t think I care for you? Why, I held you in my arms the day you were born. I watched you grow from an adorable little girl into a lovely young lady. I think you were ten years old when I first thought of marrying you.”
Lily’s stomach twisted. “Ten? I was but a child.”
“A precocious, adorable child.” His hands clasped behind his back, he ambled to the next piece of furniture. “You thought the world of me.”
“You were Papa’s friend. I trusted you.”
“But you don’t now? Not since you met Captain Albright?”
“He has nothing to do with it. It was Aunt Hilda who mistrusted you first, and when you sold off a parcel of land without even the courtesy of an explanation, I felt entirely disrespected, as if my feelings about the matter didn’t count.” Was every man alike? Mac didn’t respect her either. He’d yelled at her and comforted his mules.
Another rumble of thunder, and Lily felt like her head might explode. She placed her palm against her forehead. “I’m afraid I’m in need of a rest.”
“First your answer, Lily dear. Marry me, or forget about a rest and start packing. I intend to move into my manor shortly.”
“And that is how you show me your … love? Show me that you care?” Lily stomped toward the doorway and Everett caught her wrist.
“Your answer, please.”
She halted. “Very well.” Shoulders back, she faced him. “I would rather die than marry you, and I will start packing immediately.”
Pulling free of Everett’s grasp, she ran up the steps. She entered her bedroom and slammed the door behind her. Infernal oaf! With one side of his mouth he professed to care, and with the other he evicted her from the only home she’d ever known.
With blinding tears, Lily threw open her wardrobe doors and found her valise. She set it open on her neatly made bed. She’d never felt so alone. No rascally brothers to stand in Mr. Everett’s way. No wisdom from Aunt Hilda.
Oh, Lord, I’m so angry … and so very afraid.
She opened her eyes and blinked back her tears when a movement near the window caught her eye. She crossed the room, intending to discover its identity. There. A shadowy figure moving about the wreckage next door. Mac’s barn had been built on a slight incline, which made peering at it from her upper window an easy task. Did the darkly clad form belong to Mac?
She watched sadly as the form disappeared from her vantage point.
Perhaps Mac hadn’t left town. Why was she suddenly filled with hope? He’d made it clear he didn’t want her.
But shouldn’t she demand some answers first? The least Mac could do was listen while she gave him a piece of her mind.
Lily tiptoed down the stairs and rounded the balustrade. Through the hallway then the kitchen, she snuck out the door and sprinted across the meadow. Any snake she encountered had just better watch himself. She was angry enough to bite back!
She slowed at the stone bridge, careful not to slip and topple into the swollen creek from two days of hard rain earlier in the week. Reaching the barnyard, she gasped at the devastation. It pained her to see Mac’s cozy cabin reduced to ash. His proud-standing barn, folded into itself beneath the heat of the flames.
“Miss Lily?”
She started and whirled to her right. Mr. Rogan stood there. His sad expression mirrored hers. “I thought you’d left.”
“No, I’s keepin’ my eye on things for Captain Mac.”
She dragged out a long sigh. “He’s gone then.”
“Gone, Miss?”
“Back to Alexandria, I suppose. To his family, whom he didn’t want me to meet, probably because he’s got a fiancée and he hid the fact from me.”
“You’s talkin’ too fast for me, miss.” Mr. Rogan scratched his head. His hair looked as bristly as Mac’s beard. “Captain Mac’s at the Hawkinses’ place. He’s doin’ lots of thinkin’ there.”
“Then why hasn’t he contacted me?” Lily’s throat ached from rising dejection. She felt abandoned by everyone she loved—Oliver, Papa, Aunt Hilda, Jonah and Jed … and now Mac.
“He prob’ly knows you love him and figures you’ll wait on him for a time.”
Was that it? Had she jumped to conclusions?
Lily’s gaze fell on the leveled cabin. The only evidence of its existence was the stone chimney. It had cost Mac time, manpower, and money—and a dream. Now it was gone. If it had been Haus am Bach, Lily would have been inconsolable also.
As it was, her home had been ripped out from under her.
Fat raindrops began to fall. “I must speak with the captain. It’s important.” But how could she heap her burden on him now? “Oh, never mind. Don’t give him the message.” Perhaps the Kaspers would allow her to stay with them temporarily. She may even be desperate enough to knock on the Clydesdales’ door.
A throaty moan wafted from somewhere behind the rubble of the barn. Lily moved in that direction.
Mr. Rogan caught her arm. “No, miss. Don’t go there.”
“Why?”
“It’s a ghost. Me and Marcus been hearing it since the fire.”
“Nonsense. The only ghost I believe in is the Holy Ghost.”
“Don’t go there, miss.”
Lily shrugged off the warning and picked her way around the debris. The moans grew louder—from beneath the foundational wall that had collapsed.
She dropped to her knees and rolled away large rocks and pieces of plank which had somehow survived the inferno. The moans continued. Lily rolled another stone away. Then another.
“Please, Mr. Rogan, help me. There’s a man pinned under here.”
He came to her aid and accomplished with little exertion what Lily had been unable to manage. The injured man’s black boots and beige trousers appeared. His fawn-colored waistcoat and black frockcoat. Finally his head. The acrid smell of burned flesh and singed hair rose up and Lily nearly gagged.
Upon closer inspection, she gasped. The man’s face was severely burned and his swollen lips barely moved. He strained to breathe. The fact the man had managed to stay alive for forty-eight hours was a tribute to his sturdy constitution.
Mr. Rogan assessed him, then looked at Lily and shook his head as if the man had no hope left.
“Help me … Lily.”
She drew back. He knew her name?
“He’s broken all over, miss,” Mr. Rogan said. “Maybe even broke his neck too.”
“Lily … Lily …” The injured man’s eyelids fluttered and familiarity gripped her.
“Oliver! Oh, merciful Father!”
“Reach into my p-pocket, Lily. Your papa’s will … I found it.”
“Papa’s will?” Hope plumed inside of her. Taking great care not to injure Oliver further, she located the document
and pulled it from his pocket. “How … where?”
“Silas Everett paid me …” Oliver’s tight voice trailed off and Lily gave his shoulder a shake.
He cried out in pain.
“There, there …” Lily gently pushed his hair off his forehead. Yes, he’d been a rake and a rogue, but she couldn’t get herself to withhold even a small measure of comfort.
“He paid me,” Oliver said as if divining her thoughts. “Find the money in my coat pocket. Give … to … my … family.”
He labored to breathe and Lily felt she had to do something. She set down the document and shot to her feet. “Stay with him, Mr. Rogan. I’ll run for help.”
She made her way over the dregs of the barn.
“Be careful, miss.”
“I will.” She walked on fallen planks that snapped beneath her weight. With her next step, she expected her foot to meet the ground, but suddenly she was falling down a dark hole as if the earth swallowed her up.
Splash. Icy-cold water enveloped her, stunned her momentarily, but she resurfaced with a gasp and a coughing fit followed. She reached for something to cling to, but her fingers only met stone and brick.
Papa’s well. Lily had forgotten it even existed.
“Miss Lily!” Mr. Rogan’s dark face appeared high above her. “Miss Lily.”
“Run for help. Please. The water is so cold, I won’t be able to tread for long. And Oliver needs a doctor.”
“The man’s dead, Miss.”
Lily’s heart ached for Oliver’s parents, who had now lost their son a second time.
“Hang on, miss. I’m goin’ to get help straightaway.”
Already numbness weighed Lily’s limbs. Ironic, if there were to be two upcoming burials. Oliver’s … and hers. But hadn’t she said she’d rather die than marry Everett?
It would seem God had heard and this was His reply.
Mac ran as hard and fast as his legs allowed. He could kick himself for not better marking off that well. He also should have guessed that Lily would come looking for him. He’d planned to see her today and beg her forgiveness. He’d gone back on his promise and hurt her in a fit of anger, although not physically. Still, he’d injured her, all the same. For the better part of the day, he’d suffered through enough of Issie’s tongue-lashings. He got the message.
He reached the well, Rogan beside him. He would have brought James, but couldn’t take the time to get him from his forge in town. He’d managed to find a coil of thick rope in James’s barn, however.
“Lily!” Mac threw broken planks out of his way and lay on his belly to the edge of the well. Please, God, let her be alive. “Lily, answer me!”
“I’m here.”
“I’m going to throw you a rope.” Mac tied a loop in one end. “Slip it over your head and under your arms.”
Her coughing spurt signaled that she’d taken in water. “Mac? Help me, please.”
She sounded winded. This wasn’t going to work.
Mac squeezed his eyes closed momentarily as he searched his mind for an alternative plan. “Rogan …”
The man was no longer at his side, but leading one of the mules up from the corral.
“Lookin’ like you’d better scale down there and rescue your golden-haired miss. Me and this here mule’ll lower you down and pull you back up.”
Mac inspected the rope. It would hold his weight. He peeled off his frockcoat and slipped the knotted portion around his hips so he fit like a swing. Rogan harnessed the mule and affixed the rope to its bridle.
“Lily, I’m coming. Hold on.”
“I can’t …”
“Float on your back and sing to me. I’m coming down to get you.”
“I’m too tired to sing.”
“Come on. Sing, Lily.” Mac sat on the edge of the well and gave a nod to Rogan. The rope went taut and Mac began his descent.
“Sing, Lily.”
“The Lord is my shepherd…” Lily’s voice sounded weak. “I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures.” A pause. She gulped a breath.
Mac’s swing dropped in another couple of feet.
“In pastures green he leadeth me beside the waters still.”
The well was as dark as tar with little light shining in from above. “Sing that again, Lily.”
Mac descended the last several feet so quickly, he was nearly unseated. His backside hit the water. He reached out his hand. “Lily!” Blast it! Where was she?
His fingers met strands of wet hair. He plunged his hand into the frigid water and grabbed onto a handful of material and pulled for all his life.
Lily resurfaced.
The swing dropped him the rest of the way into the well. “Stop!” He prayed Rogan heard him as he gathered Lily’s limp body against him.
She choked and he breathed easier. “I’ve got her. Pull us up, Rogan. Up!”
The rope jerked. Mac held Lily in his arms and fastened his hands around their lifeline. As they ascended, he positioned his feet on the brick lining of the well, as if walking upward, while Rogan and the mule did the hoisting.
Lily began to cry. Her arms circled him.
“Stay still, my darling. We’re almost there.”
“I’ve been so heartless and … foolish.”
“You’re not the one who has been heartless.”
At long last, Mac could see daylight, could hear the rain falling softly. One last, but mighty tug, and he and Lily spilled from the well. Mac released her while the mule dragged him several more feet. His arm scraped over scattered debris.
“Stop!” Mac pulled off the rope and crawled to where Lily lay face up to the gentle rain.
“I was afraid you wouldn’t come.”
He pulled her to him and stood. The muscles in his arms quivered, but he managed to lift her. “Let’s get you somewhere warm and dry.”
“Wait. My father’s will.”
Rogan headed toward the ruins, promising to fetch it and bring it to them next door.
Mac strode toward the stone bridge.
“I’m afraid we’re both homeless.” Lily dropped her head onto Mac’s shoulder.
“Oh?” Mac kept right on walking. “We’ll just see about that.”
So my, um, my chess playing has paid off rather handsomely.”
Lily shivered, even though she sat by a warm fire blazing in the parlor’s hearth. It had been hours since Mac rescued her from the frigid depths of Papa’s well, but she still felt chilled. The doctor said she’d escaped any permanent damage, especially if she didn’t catch her death in the next several days. The fact she survived at all strengthened Lily’s faith in God—and in Mac.
“Let me get this straight. You won custody of Jonah and Jed and Captain O’Malley’s ship too? In a chess match? You?”
“Me.” Mac sipped his coffee. “It’s the boys I wanted, so I told ol’ Madman O’Malley to keep the Sarabella. Now he insists I won her fair and square. He knows what a reputation of welching on a bet will do to even the most respected of gamblers.” A devious glint entered Mac’s dark eyes. “Knowing my seafaring days are over, Prescott has offered to purchase the ship from me. It’s already on its way to the West Indies, and I’ll split the profits with Albright and Osborn Shipping. Meanwhile, my parents are on their way to Middletown.”
“So you can rebuild?”
Mac pushed out his lower lip and gave his shoulders a quick up and down. “Remodel, perhaps.” His gaze touched each wall of the room.
“You mean … you’ll be happy here at Haus am Bach?”
“I will. Your happiness means everything to me, Lily. Yes, I could rebuild, but why should I? Everything I want is here.”
Tears clouded her vision. “But it’s too late. Mr. Everett owns the manor. I saw the deed late this afternoon. His name is on it.”
“Could be because he’d stepped in as executor of your father’s estate and the boys’ guardian.” Mac stood and walked to where he’d tossed his overcoat. He retrieved document
s from its pocket. “Your father’s will. As promised, Rogan delivered it.”
Lily took the parchment and unfolded the pages. They smelled like smoke, causing her heart to break for all Mac had lost … and for Oliver too.
“How in the world did Oliver get his hands on Papa’s will?”
“While the doctor was here, I spoke with the authorities. They speculate that Ashton ransacked my cabin before torching it.” Mac reclaimed his chair near Lily’s. “My guess is the will was hidden somewhere in your father’s writing desk.”
“Of course! The secret drawer.” Lily hadn’t thought to search it. Like the well, she’d forgotten it existed.
“Silas Everett has been taken into custody. If he paid Ashton to start the fire, he’s equally as guilty, not to mention partly responsible for Ashton’s death.”
Sorrow accumulated in her eyes. “What Oliver did was deplorable, but he was trying to help his family survive.”
“There are plenty of other ways, all above the law.”
“True.” Lily focused on Papa’s will. “Mac, it states here that I’m to inherit forty thousand pounds and Haus am Bach.” She almost choked. “Upon my marriage.”
“To Everett?”
“To whomever. That is, of course, if Papa didn’t gamble his money away.”
“We’ll check into the matter. However, my guess is the money is there, unless Everett stole it. A formal investigation will be launched.”
Lily went back to reading the document. “The land is to be divided among my brothers and me, but not until they reach the age of sixteen.” She looked up and frowned. “Everett sent them off because they were in the way of his sordid plans.”
“So was I.” Mac sipped his coffee, then set the cup and saucer on the side table. “That’s why Everett paid Ashton to burn down my barn and cabin. He knew I couldn’t afford to rebuild, which meant I wouldn’t have anything to offer you. He figured I’d return to Alexandria a failure. He was almost correct.”
Mac stood, closed the distance between them, and knelt beside her chair. “I never want you to see me as a failure.”
My Heart Belongs in the Shenandoah Valley Page 26