Touched by Fire

by Gwyneth Atlee

  Hannah spoke again. “I’m leaving when it’s safe. I don’t want to come between you two.”

  When John looked at her, Daniel thought he saw a portion of longing mixed with rancor. “You have already, Hannah, and that’s another reason why I can’t forgive you.”

  o0o

  Peering past the curtains, Hannah watched the brothers leave together, deep in conversation. When she had left the porch, she eavesdropped until their stiff hostility dissolved. After convincing herself they wouldn’t come to blows, she withdrew into her room and hoped. The brothers might have their differences, but they still loved each other. Why destroy that for a woman who’d leave Peshtigo the moment it was safe?

  She sighed and wished again she hadn’t lied to John. Then her thoughts turned to his brother. She remembered Daniel’s fingers meshing gently with her own. Her lips tingled with the memory of his kisses, and of kissing him. Daniel’s attraction to her hadn’t faltered when he’d learned she was divorced. Had her deception been unnecessary after all?

  She sighed, disgusted at herself for indulging in a schoolgirl’s fantasy. Just as Malcolm would never dream of marrying a mistress, Daniel Aldman would never marry her. What man would want a divorced woman, much less one with her past?

  Faye interrupted her thoughts. “I could use your help getting this mending over to the boarding house.”

  “On a Sunday morning?”

  “My stomach don’t mind eatin’ on the Sabbath, and as I recall from just a bit ago, yours don’t either. Have to work enough to feed that old sponge I married. Now you’re a payin’ boarder, so you don’t hafta come. I just thought a little walkin’ might do you some good.”

  Hannah retrieved a stack of folded clothing from the foot of her bed. She decided Malcolm had probably put some distance between himself and Peshtigo, at least for now. She wasn’t about to cloister herself to avoid him, so she agreed.

  As they left the small house, Hannah caught Daniel’s apprehensive mood. There had been clouds of thick smoke all along, but the huge bank to the west looked darker, the orangy reflection more intense. Somehow, today seemed different, the air still and oppressive, the village too quiet. Perhaps with all the smoke, even nature held its breath.

  At the same moment, two very different noises broke the silence. The first was a clattering of hooves and wheels as a teamster whipped his horses through the street. The second, even closer, was a shrill, familiar voice. “Miss Mercy!” cried Amelia from across the way.

  Hannah turned in time to see her break away from a slightly taller, dark-haired girl and take off running. Running directly into the laden wagon’s path.

  Without thinking, Hannah flung aside the mending and dove toward Daniel’s child. The force of their impact rolled them both. Hannah looked up in time to see a pair of coal black horses pulling up too late and wagon wheels rolling only inches past her head. Instinctively, she clutched Amelia closer.

  She heard a woman’s frantic screaming in the distance, Faye’s angry shout at the wagon’s driver closer by. But the sounds that filled her ears were the pounding of her heart and the weeping of the child crushed against her body.

  “Are you hurt?” Hannah asked her breathlessly.

  Amelia pulled away to rub her head and wailed. Hannah heard footsteps coming nearer. Faye stooped down beside her. Beyond her, Aunt Lucinda was running as fast as her thick legs could carry her.

  “Amelia! Dear Amelia! I told you not to run off after church!” Lucinda’s voice bubbled with anxious fury. Despite her tone, she grabbed the child and hugged her fiercely.

  Amelia stopped crying abruptly and wrapped her arms around her great aunt’s neck. “Mercy —Mercy saved me!”

  “Yes, she surely did,” said Faye. Then she withdrew to roundly curse the wide-eyed driver.

  Lucinda’s mouth pursed and her eyes narrowed as she looked at Hannah. “I suppose you should be thanked.”

  “That’s not necessary,” Hannah told her, standing up and brushing at her skirt. “What is necessary is that I apologize. I abused your hospitality when I withheld the truth from you. I am sorry beyond measure.”

  Lucinda withdrew a kerchief from her pocket and offered it to Hannah. “Your forehead’s bleeding. I think the two of you cracked skulls.”

  Hannah took the cloth and dabbed at the sore spot. A penny-sized red splotch marred the crisp, white linen. “My name is Hannah Lee Shelton, and my mother taught me not to lie.” She must have banged her head harder than she thought, for pent-up words flowed faster than her blood.

  Lucinda’s brow furrowed, no doubt with a dozen snide remarks. But she said nothing, instead stroking Amelia’s flaxen hair with a trembling hand.

  “There’s no excuse for what I did,” Hannah continued. “I deceived your family, and I hurt you all. But I want you to know it was done in desperation and not because such things come easily to me.”

  Lucinda nodded. “I liked you. We all did. That’s why it hurt so much.”

  Amelia turned and stared at her with huge blue eyes. “Your name is Hannah? That’s the lie?”

  Hannah nodded and leaned forward to kiss her head. “Yes, an awful lie.”

  Aunt Lucinda seemed to have recovered from her shock. She set Amelia down, but continued staring into Hannah’s face. “If you’re asking for forgiveness, don’t expe —”

  Amelia interrupted. “—But Aunt Lucinda, the preacher said in church we should forgive! He says no sin is too big.”

  “Don’t interrupt, child. Let me have a minute with Miss Mer —Miss Shelton. Go back to play with Camille, and if you don’t look before you cross that street, I’m going to tan your hide!”

  With a pouty look, Amelia followed her great aunt’s instruction.

  Before Lucinda could speak, Faye interrupted. “This fine young man —” She gestured to the teamster, a fellow in his late teens whose face still glowed red from the tongue-lashing Faye dished out. “—has kindly offered to help me pick up the mending and deliver it to compensate us for his recklessness.”

  “I’m real sorry, ma’am. My pap told me to get this ware delivered in a hurry, but I’d never want to hurt a soul. I just hope he don’t hear, or he’ll beat me somethin’ awful.” The boy wrung his hat in nervous supplication.

  Hannah nodded stiffly. “Have a care next time.”

  “Or we’ll have the law on you!” threatened Aunt Lucinda.

  He helped Faye into the wagon with her mending, and the two rattled down the street.

  “She’s a worker,” Faye called over her shoulder to Lucinda. “Don’t you be too harsh with her.”

  Lucinda shook her head. “Imagine that woman, driving off with a strange man. What will the ladies say when they see this?”

  “I think she’s had a difficult life,” said Hannah, feeling some allegiance to Faye.

  Lucinda shrugged and started walking in the direction of her home. “It’s no excuse, for you or her. We’ve all had troubles, haven’t we? I lost my husband years ago, and I never had the comfort of a single child of my own. It nearly broke my heart.”

  Hannah followed her, but stared down near her feet. “I know. Dear Lord, how I know. It’s silly,” she said, “but the other women seem to flaunt their babies. And people make such awful comments all the time. ‘Just how long have you been married?’ and ‘Any news this month?’ Then, after while, they use the cruelest word. They call you barren, and they tell you you must face it, for your own good, they always say.”

  “You are married, Hannah?” Lucinda voice iced over.

  Hannah shook her head. “Once. He divorced me when his mistress gave him the son I couldn’t.”

  “I see. A divorcée. And I am sure John’s letters mentioned he would want a family.”

  “Yes.” Tears blurred Hannah’s vision. Why was she continuing to walk with Aunt Lucinda? What in heaven’s name did she expect? Saving Amelia’s life could hardly buy her absolution for her crimes. But still, she followed, hoping desperately for some sign
of acceptance, or at least of understanding.

  Lucinda stopped and faced her. “Then why? Why, Hannah? Were you a schemer, trying to steal his property?”

  She shook her head. “Of course not. I —I only thought how good I am with animals. I’d help him run his farm. Maybe we would do well, and someday he might love me. Maybe then the children wouldn’t matter all so much.”

  “How could you? How could you rob a good man of his chance at family?”

  She shrugged. “I didn’t know John then. I only knew I couldn’t survive on my own. My only offers of employment were —” She felt blood rising to her neck and face.

  “—quite unladylike.”

  “What about your family? Surely, you could turn to them.”

  “My parents are both dead, and my former husband even managed to spread enough lies to keep my family’s farm. As for my other relatives, they were in no hurry to claim a divorced woman.”

  Lucinda’s mouth screwed up in an unreadable expression. “Every other thing you’ve said has been a lie. Why should I believe you now?”

  “Because I have nothing to gain. I want nothing more from you, not even your forgiveness. What the preacher said in church was wrong. There are some sins too great.”

  “Then why talk to me at all?”

  Hannah shrugged. “Maybe I need to make some sort of peace before I go.”

  “John thinks you might be tempting Daniel.” The old woman pinned her gaze.

  Hannah’s heart fluttered. Despite herself, she smiled weakly. “He has it backwards. Daniel’s tempting me, even though he knows the truth.”

  “That boy’s liked you from the start, if this old head’s not full of sawdust. But then again, Daniel might kiss a copperhead, if it suited him. You just stay away from him, you hear?”

  “I intend to. I won’t be here long anyway.” said Hannah. She stopped and turned back in the direction of the Barlow house. “I’m glad we could talk.”

  “You’re brave. I’ll grant you that. And I thank you for saving Amelia. I’ll tell my nephews what you did.” Without another word or gesture, Lucinda turned and walked away, toward her own house.

  Hannah looked after the old woman and wondered what she’d gained. Not forgiveness, certainly, but something. Acknowledgment? Maybe even a shred of understanding? As Hannah watched her disappear into the distance, she realized she’d doubtless never get another chance to make amends. Whether it occurred because of Amelia’s rescue or in honor of the Sabbath, whatever crumb Lucinda offered her would have to be enough.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Hannah sat on her bed, trying to mend the dress Malcolm had torn. She sighed. The damage was beyond her mending skills, yet she couldn’t spare the dress. With the needle poised in mid-air, she froze, remembering his threat. I’m not through with you.

  The shaking started in her hands, then worked its way into her shoulders, and before she knew it, she was weeping silently. If she knew him at all, Malcolm would be back. She’d wounded his precious Shelton pride, pride in a family name that had once commanded great respect in the town his great-grandfather established.

  At one time, Malcolm’s family owned half the land in the Shelton Creek area. They’d farmed at first, but eventually they built a prosperous mill, and Malcolm’s father had opened his own hotel. But Malcolm had been the last male Shelton among a glut of sisters. His father reminded him again and again that their name must, at all costs, be preserved.

  Hannah partly blamed the old man for the dissolution of her marriage. Charles Shelton’s ghost whispered demands in Malcolm’s ear for sons, and his death had left the Shelton clan an incredible surprise. The grand hotel had been a bust. His other investments had lost money. The proud name was all they had left. It had been enough to marry off all seven sisters, and it had been enough to help Malcolm achieve a captain’s post in the Union army. But in the end, it hadn’t been enough to satisfy him. In the end, he listened too much to that ghost.

  She tried to imagine what it must feel like, as the last male Shelton, to be blamed for his wife’s murder. Malcolm had dealt well enough with the imagined indignity of being cuckolded, but that was because he’d orchestrated every step. How had it been when she had turned the tables and used the gossip that destroyed her to lash out at him as well? Where she’d been deeply shamed and wounded, Malcolm would work himself into a righteous rage. By turning him away from Peshtigo last night, by exposing him to even more humiliation, she had changed his rage from righteous into murderous.

  If he caught her again, he’d kill her. She knew it as well as she knew herself. And he would catch her, if it took him his whole life and all the money he had left. His pride would demand nothing less.

  She peered out a window filmed by ash. God help her leave here quickly, if the whole town didn’t go up in a blaze. It might have been the clouded glass, but the smoke appeared darker than ever. It looked as if, in running from her past, she had fled to Hell itself.

  o0o

  The moment John and Daniel walked into Lucinda’s kitchen, Amelia excitedly climbed into her father’s arms. “Miss Mercy’s name is Hannah, and she saved my life today!”

  Lucinda helped them sort out her story, and later, when Amelia went into the yard to play with her new kitten, their aunt told both her nephews more. “I can’t tell if the woman was in earnest, but she apologized. She says she doesn’t expect us to accept, but she was desperate.” Her gaze settled on Daniel.

  He nodded. “She told me about it. John didn’t want to hear.”

  John shook his head in disgust. “What does it matter what she says? She admits she lied.”

  “Worse yet,” said Lucinda, “she’s a divorced woman. She said her husband left her because she couldn’t bear him children.”

  “Why would she think any man would want a barren woman?” John asked.

  Daniel grimaced when he noticed his aunt flinch. Couldn’t the clod see he was insulting her as well?

  “Your uncle didn’t let that drive him from me.” Lucinda drew herself up proudly, her back stiff and ramrod straight.

  John blushed deeply. Served him right, thought Daniel.

  “You’re not like Hannah, Aunt Lucinda,” John reached out for her, but she pulled away. “You’re no liar, and you’d never cheat a soul.”

  “Perhaps I would have turned out differently if my Henry had been so despicable.”

  Daniel felt hope flare, but he was cautious. “You’re not saying you’d forgive Hannah?”

  Lucinda shrugged. “No, but she did save Amelia’s life. She could have been killed jumping in front of those horses.”

  “Maybe Hannah feels guilty. So she should,” John said.

  “She does love that child. Amelia loves her too.” Lucinda glanced toward Daniel.

  His throat grew tight. “Then, you could patch things up?”

  “Aunt Lucinda!” John interrupted. “You can’t encourage this — this affair! This is lunacy! The woman is divorced! And Daniel is your nephew!”

  “And I love you both like the sons I never bore. Of course I’m not suggesting Daniel run off and marry a divorcée. I’m merely thinking that perhaps she’s not such an evil creature, just misguided.”

  John threw up his hands. “Both of you have been beguiled! This woman lied to us. She swindled me. She may still be lying, for all we know.”

  “Why would she bother?” Daniel asked. “What could she hope to gain?”

  “Our sympathy, of course. And eventually you.” John glared at Daniel.

  He thought about their argument last night, the way she still insisted she was leaving. Daniel shook his head. “You’re wrong. If there’s one thing in this world I know she doesn’t want, it’s me.”

  o0o

  Cut off by darkness and a wall of smoke, Malcolm Shelton had circled back. He rode slumped over his mount’s neck, worn down by exhaustion, rage, and pain. The half-drunk loggers did more than run him out of town. They’d pelted him with anything available, f
rom sticks and stones to a patent medicine bottle that raised a swollen lump along his jaw. He was tempted to try to ride through the smoke. Those shanty boys would kill him if they caught him back in town. But in the end, he felt he had to risk it, or risk choking in Hell’s antechamber, not far from Peshtigo.

  Cautiously, he returned to the cottage where he’d taken Hannah and retrieved his pants and shoes. From there, he managed to find a livery stable still open for his horse. The old man working there took pity on him, believing his story about an attack by ruffians, and gave him lodging in his own house for the night.

  That bit of charity, charity bestowed upon a Shelton, Malcolm added to Hannah Lee’s account. As he tried to sleep, images rattled through his head like freight trains: the hardness in Hannah’s face as she held the gun on him, the way she’d sent him bare-assed into the night, the sight of her half-naked body, every delicious curve seeming to cry out for plunder.

  He wanted her. The more he thought about her pleas for him to stop and her resistance to his intrusions, the more he knew he had to have her. But not as a lover. That gentle path no longer held his interest. Instead, he wanted her beaten, thrown over, a body to slam into again . . . again . . . again.

  And then there would be blood. Blood as thick as that he’d seen in their hometown, when she faked her own murder in order to destroy the Shelton name.

  He slept late the next day. As he bent over the wash basin, scrubbing the grime from his face, the old man from the livery stable knocked. “Ain’t much of a cook, but what I got, I’ll gladly share.”

  Malcolm nodded stiffly, gratefully. He must eat and rest, regain his vanquished strength. And then, Sunday or not, he would find a man to sell him a new gun.

  o0o

  Though the day grew late as she finished myriad chores, Faye killed a hen well past its prime in honor of the Sabbath. She’d done what she could with the scrawny fowl, but the bits of meat served with her dumplings were still stringy. Hannah discreetly shredded hers with a knife so none would get caught in her throat. Still, the creamy gravy and dumplings tasted delicious after days of eating burnt-bottom beef dodger and boiled cabbage with potatoes.