A Fall in Time (Train Through Time Series Book 5)

by Bess McBride

  “Yes, I do see your point, Miss Reed.” He pressed his lips together and looked toward the door. “I think it best I pay for your fare and compartment to Grand Forks.” He held up a hand when Sara opened her mouth to object. “I insist. It is not a problem, nor do I think the conductor will object too strenuously. He may consider it irregular, but the company will be handsomely recompensed.”

  He moved to the doorway but turned back.

  “Sleep well, Miss Reed. The porter will turn down the bed and bring you coffee in the morning. Perhaps we could have breakfast together?”

  Sara, dumbfounded at his rather generous offer, nodded.

  “I don’t know what to say. Thank you.”

  He inclined his head.

  “Not at all,” he said. “Shall I instruct the porter to awaken you at seven o’clock?”

  Sara nodded again.

  “Very well. I will pick you up at 7:30 for breakfast. Good night, Miss Reed. Lock the door behind me. Open it only for the porter.”

  He stepped out, and Sara moved to the door and locked it. Her legs, shaking as they had been, gave out, and she sagged against the door.

  What on earth had happened to her? How could she possibly have awakened from a short doze to find herself on a train in nineteen hundred? The last thing she remembered was sitting in her seat reading a book. She’d been so sleepy though, having gotten up early for work at the cafeteria, that she must have fallen asleep almost as soon as the train left the station.

  She didn’t need to see proof that she was in another time. Matthew was proof. His clothing, the immaculate styling of his hair with a cute little part on the side, the longish sideburns, even the derby he carried with him. And if Matthew wasn’t proof, the men and women she’d seen in the other car told her that unless she was on a film set and no one had yelled “cut” at her presence, then she had traveled in time.

  She remembered the sensation of the train’s whistle “calling” to her—the reason she had booked the trip. She never expected though that the train, rather than take her east, would drag her back in time to the turn of the twentieth century. She had no affinity for nineteen hundred that she could think of, no dreams of living in the past other than a redo of her elementary and high school years. She had no ancestors she thought she needed to visit, no wrongs to rectify, and no particular historical expertise in the era.

  If anything, she would have traveled only far enough into the past to know her mother as a child, before her congenital heart defect made her life difficult. But certainly not over one hundred years.

  Why had this happened to her? Had it happened to others? Did other people travel through time? Why hadn’t she heard anything about it before?

  Sara’s knees buckled, and she slumped to the floor, pulling her knees to her chest. Had she lost her mind? Had she gone crazy? Perhaps her mother’s early death had driven her over the edge—always a possibility.

  She stared down at her black yoga pants and pulled at the stretchy material, letting it snap back against her leg. She repeated the motion. What on earth was she going to do in Grand Forks, North Dakota? It was early November. Snow would definitely be setting in soon, if it hadn’t already. The nights were already cool in Spokane. For that matter, what would she do in Spokane in nineteen hundred?

  Chapter Five

  “No, sir, I’m sorry, but we have no empty first-class sleeping compartments. All are spoken for. Is there a problem with your compartment?” the conductor asked.

  Matthew regarded the tall, thin, middle-aged man. A generous gray mustache dominated his face. Pale blue eyes watched him curiously.

  “No, not at all. Unbeknownst to me, my...sister came aboard the train in Spokane as a surprise. I did not realize she was on the train until we left. But she is onboard, and I must pay her fare. I am certain you understand.”

  Even to Matthew’s ears, his story sounded unlikely. He composed his face into a grave expression and stared at the conductor.

  “That is very irregular, sir. You must know from your frequent travels that stowing away is not permissible, Mr. Webster.”

  Matthew stiffened, unused to be addressed in such a tone, but he thought better of a retort and opted to accept the censure.

  “Yes, I know, Conductor, and I have chastised my sister for her ill-conceived prank. You do understand though why I need another compartment.”

  “Are you unwilling to share your compartment with your sister, sir? There are two berths in that compartment.”

  Matthew’s face blanched, and he drew in a sharp breath. “I...I think she must have her privacy.”

  “The train is very full this evening, Mr. Webster. Almost all the seats have been reserved on the train, even those in the tourist sleeper. There is one bed available, but only one, and it is in tourist class.”

  Matthew had never ridden in the tourist class in his life, but it seemed he had no other option.

  “Yes, that will do nicely. Thank you. Could you direct me to the tourist car?”

  Not only had he never ridden in tourist class, he had never even seen the car.

  “They will be turning the berths down now, sir, so we should hurry.”

  “Yes, thank you. Would you ensure that the porter awakens my sister at seven o’clock for breakfast?”

  “Yes, of course,” the conductor said. He led the way through several cars, including the dining car, until they reached the tourist sleeper. A porter, standing on a small footstool in the narrow aisle, looked up as they entered.

  “George, Mr. Webster is going to take berth fifteen.”

  “Yes, sir,” said the porter, a small, wiry, middle-aged man. He jumped down from his stool. “This way, sir.”

  “I hope you’ll be comfortable, Mr. Webster,” the conductor said with a dubious quirk of a gray eyebrow.

  “I am certain I will be very cozy, Conductor. Thank you.”

  Matthew privately wondered how he could manage, but he steeled himself. If he had worried about sleeping in the compartment with Miss Reed before, from all appearances, he was about to sleep with several women. Men and women were interspersed throughout the tourist sleeping car with no thought to gender, other than that they did not seem to share the same berth.

  He had a distinct impression of green—green carpets, green curtains, green cushions on the high-backed benches on the right side of the train, those not yet converted to beds. All furnishings appeared to share a similar degree of luxury that the first-class sleeper enjoyed. All that was lacking was space and privacy.

  Matthew followed George down the aisle, trying to avoid glancing into the small curtained alcoves that appeared to be no more than two stacked bunks behind a curtain. Where did the passengers change clothing before retiring? Where did they wash up? Shave?

  “Here you go, sir,” the porter said. He pulled aside a curtain, revealing two Spartan berths, the upper bunk suspended from the concave walls of the car by sturdy-appearing chains.

  A rather large gentleman perched on the edge of the bottom bunk, his girth suggesting he might have difficulty fitting into the narrow space. Indeed, even now, his face reddened as he attempted to swing his legs up onto his bed. The porter rushed to help, and the gentleman was safely deposited into his small alcove in a reclining position.

  “Good evening,” Matthew said politely, though he doubted his own wishes.

  “Evening,” the gentleman huffed. He nodded briefly, his graying beard bobbing once, before pulling a thick woolen blanket over his shoulder and turning away onto his side.

  Matthew eyed the upper berth, resembling something like a shelf. Two small pillows encased in white linen perched at the head—or foot—of a narrow, lumpy-appearing mattress, stored as it normally was against the overhead bulk.

  “And how might I ascend to that lofty position?” he asked George.

  “Here’s a ladder, sir,” George said, positioning a wooden ladder against the bunk.

  “And where could I wash up?”

 
“There’s a dressing room, washroom and toilet down the hall, sir,” he said.

  Matthew nodded and set his small bag on top of his bunk. He could do little to avoid disturbing his berth companion, but it seemed as if that worthy gentleman had already succumbed to sleep, for a rumbling snore could be heard.

  “Will there be anything else, sir?” George asked, his eyes darting around the car as if to ascertain what or who else needed his attention.

  “No, thank you, George.” Matthew nodded and opened his bag to retrieve his nightclothes, a dressing gown, slippers and his toiletries. He made his way down to the dressing room and changed into his pajamas, dressing gown and slippers before stepping into the tiny washroom to perform the necessaries.

  He stared at his reflection in the mirror with bemusement, wondering how exactly he found himself in a very public tourist car without the usual degree of privacy he expected when he traveled. Was he simply to traverse the aisle in his red silk dressing gown for the world to see?

  Still, he could not have imagined Miss Reed in his position. Her clothing alone would have elicited shocked regard, if not comment.

  He returned to his berth only to discover that a tall gentleman, assisting his equally tall wife into an upper berth, had appropriated the ladder. The porter had vanished.

  Matthew set his clothing and toiletries on his bunk and waited patiently. The gentleman did not return the ladder but climbed into his own bed and pulled the curtain.

  With a sigh of what he considered to be infinite patience, Matthew reacquired the ladder and climbed into his berth. He stored his clothing and toiletries inside his case and stowed the whole onto a small rack provided.

  He drew the curtain shut, lowered himself down onto the mattress to lie on his back, and pulled the blanket up to his chest. His companion snored without relief, as did several other passengers from the sound of the symphony echoing throughout the car.

  The train rumbled along the tracks, the normal swaying of the car now intensified by the elevated position of his bed. He hoped he wouldn’t fall out of the bunk. There was no barrier to prevent it.

  Sleep seemed highly unlikely. The combination of the noise of his sleeping companions, uncertainty about his precarious position on the upper berth, and questions about Miss Reed could only serve to thwart a good night’s rest.

  Where on earth was the woman really from? Miss Reed was different from any young lady he had ever known, and now that he was apart from her, distanced from the beseeching look in her brown eyes, he found he could not truly believe her tale of stowing away on the train to visit a sick grandmother in North Dakota. Perhaps some elements of her story were true, but in general, the premise for her predicament smacked of fiction.

  Matthew thought Miss Reed must indeed be destitute, and he had no doubt that she did need help, but he was unsure what he could do for her other than what he already had. He would have to wait until they reached Grand Forks to assuage his curiosity. He knew from experience that the train would not reach Grand Forks until approximately eleven o’clock the next morning. Until then, he must satisfy himself that she had a comfortable bed and food in her stomach.

  He realized that he had not thought of Emily over the past few hours as much as he thought he might. He had thought his journey, close on the heels of her rejection, might be excruciatingly long and tedious, given his misery, but it seemed as if Miss Reed’s mysterious appearance and predicament had forestalled his despondency, an unexpected state of affairs for which he must be grateful.

  Emily, adventurous even as a child, would have enjoyed the mystery that was Miss Reed. She would have had little qualm in delving deeper into Miss Reed’s story—questioning and probing even to the point of rudeness. Emily’s parents had been indulgent, rarely attempting to constrain their only child. Matthew’s parents, though quietly decrying the amount of freedom Emily enjoyed, said nothing, knowing their only son was besotted with his next-door neighbor and childhood playmate.

  Though he had informed his parents he would soon be asking for Emily’s hand in marriage, he had not the heart to tell them she had rejected him. There had been little time at any rate, as that was not the sort of information one simply left in a note, and his early train departure prevented him from seeing them in person that morning.

  But Emily would never know Miss Reed, would never know the mystery he now encountered. Their friendship was forever altered by his proposal and her rejection, and he wondered if he would ever feel comfortable confiding in her again. It was to Emily he had told most of his secrets, save one. He had not told her of his dream to be married to her, to have a family and a home of his own. Though he could well afford to maintain his own house, he still resided in the Webster family residence in Seattle until such time as he married.

  He realized now, too late, that Emily had never discussed marriage, or children either. It seemed that all the ladies of his acquaintance spoke of the virtues of the married state and motherhood, and if unmarried, young women had not hidden their desire to become brides.

  How was it that he and Emily had never discussed the matter before? He sighed heavily. He knew only a portion of the answer. For his part, he had assumed marriage with Emily to be a certainty, the natural course of his life. Blindly, he saw now, he had never thought to question his beliefs.

  The jostling of the train finally lulled him to sleep. It was not Emily’s face that haunted his dreams though, but the words Miss Reed had echoed when she returned to his compartment.

  “I don’t know what’s happening,” she had whispered with a stricken expression. “I don’t know where I am. Please help me.”

  Chapter Six

  Sara awakened to the sound of the train slowing. She pushed aside the blanket and peeked out the window of the train. Still dark, she had no idea what time it was. The train lurched, screeched, and a loud burst of steam hissed as it came to a stop in front of a station.

  Kalispell, Montana, the sign over the rather large two-story building showed. From the lamps glowing on either side of the station door, Sara could tell the building was brick.

  A group of passengers waited under the light of lampposts to board the train. If she had ever hoped to awaken from a dream, those hopes were well and truly gone. The men dressed in suits and derbies, with the occasional cowboy hat interspersed throughout, and the women wore long skirts and broad-brimmed hats.

  A commotion in the hallway galvanized her into action. Without thinking, Sara shoved her feet into her shoes, shrugged on her jacket and opened her door. Passengers nodded as they passed her, intent on following the porter to their compartments. As soon as they passed, she turned right and hurried for the exit. Finding it not in the middle as she expected, she trotted toward an open door at the end of the car.

  An unexpected blast of cold air hit her in the face as she stepped out onto a platform. In the darkness, she had missed the patches of snow along the tracks and around the edge of the train depot.

  She hurriedly descended a set of steep metal stairs and hopped onto a wooden platform. The activity at the station, given the darkness, surprised her. Porters and luggage handlers rushed around, carrying cases back and forth. Wagons with horses waited patiently while goods were transferred from the train to the wagons or vice versa. A clock showed it was about seven minutes to six—she assumed in the morning.

  She turned to look back toward the train. The conductor walked the platform, ushering passengers aboard. Hidden as she was by the bustle on the platform, he didn’t pay attention to her.

  The train itself wasn’t the sleek silver train she had boarded in Chicago but something straight out of a vintage train photograph. A large black locomotive spouted steam and was followed by a long line of dark coaches, looking a lot like forest-green Pullman cars. Great Northern was painted across the front of each one of them.

  Sara regretted her impulsive decision to get off the train. She realized now that she might not be able to reboard the train without a ticket. Ther
e was no way she could just sneak on. A porter stood by the door, helping passengers aboard, but he wasn’t the porter who had turned down the bed in Matthew’s compartment.

  She wasn’t sure what had driven her to jump off the train. A desire to escape the nightmare in which she now found herself? As if by hopping down from the train, she would find herself back in her own time? Or maybe she didn’t know what she was going to do in Grand Forks, North Dakota. Her original plan had been to stay the night near the station and return to Spokane the following day, her crazy itch for train travel scratched. But she had no better way to get back on the train in Grand Forks than she had here in Kalispell, Montana.

  A shiver took hold of her, and she eyed the doorway to the sleeper car. The last of the passengers had boarded, and the porter disappeared. A burley man pushing a cart stopped and climbed aboard to deposit what looked like stacks of newspapers just inside the doorway before descending and moving down to the next car.

  Since Matthew Webster had kindly given her his compartment, Sara knew she was better off on the train than not, no matter where it went. At least she was warm and had a bed to sleep in until she reached Grand Forks. She approached the stairs with caution but froze when the porter, the one she didn’t know, reappeared in the doorway to pick up the newspapers.

  No, she wasn’t going to be able to get back on. She could attempt to lie, saying she’d forgotten her ticket in her compartment, but it was unlikely he would believe her, given her clothing. She was fully aware that she didn’t look like the other women who had boarded the train.

  She watched the porter sort through the papers, hoping he would disappear again. She hoped the other porter would come by and that he would recognize her as a passenger. She supposed she could invoke Matthew’s name, but she couldn’t remember his last name. The visual of her stating that some tall, handsome guy named Matthew let her sleep in his compartment since she didn’t have a ticket stumped her. No, that wasn’t going to work.

  “All aboard!” the conductor called out from his position further down the line of cars. Sara gasped. She had to get aboard. Why, oh why had she gotten off the train?