A Desperate Hope

by Elizabeth Camden

  “Not in the least. I’d die of boredom if I couldn’t tap into a juicy message now and then.” He looked pointedly at the card in her hand. “Do you wish to send a response?”

  Now that she knew Kasper paid unseemly attention to every message, she’d be a little more careful about what she sent. “No. I’d better get down to business.”

  She passed the daisies to a hotel maid to put in a vase, then found Willard. Over the next hour, the innkeeper accompanied her as they walked every room of the impressive building. He pointed out countless special features, from the imported banister to the hand-carved moldings in the rooms and hallways. The innkeeper grew sadder with each room. As he showed her the double-glazed windows in the third-story hall, he suddenly paused, a troubled look on his face as he gazed at the volunteers working in the village green below.

  “I didn’t expect saying good-bye to be so hard,” he said, his voice laden with pain.

  “So you will be leaving?” she asked.

  He nodded. “I’m not a gambler. I love this town, but I fear for every person who pins their hopes on this scheme. They would be safer taking the state payout and moving somewhere else.”

  “I agree.”

  Willard threw up his hands in frustration. “Then why are you helping them? Why raise their hopes with a bond that will give them the fuel to dig themselves deeper into debt?”

  It was a valid question, but as she looked at the dozens of volunteers on the village green laboring to get the railway built, the answer was obvious. She was coming to admire the risk-takers who were brave enough to reach for the stars.

  “The people who need safety will take the payout and move somewhere else, but the risk-takers will follow Alex. I can no more stop them than I can stop the sun from rising tomorrow morning. It would be insanity to even try.”

  As much as she craved safety, others longed for the chance to grapple with whirlwinds. It was simply the way God had made them, and the world needed both sorts to succeed. Tonight she would go home to the safe haven provided by Bruce, but a piece of her envied those who followed Alex.

  Alex hefted another shovelful of dirt from the trench that would someday support the foundation of Reverend Carmichael’s house. Land preparation for the new town was going slower than predicted. Thirty men worked on preparing roads, while teams of four worked on foundations for individual homes. Each foundation required a three-foot trench along the perimeter, and the foundations were proving to be more work than anticipated. Everyone was dirty, exhausted, and demoralized by the snail’s pace of their progress. The gloves Alex wore no longer protected the oozing blisters he had on both hands.

  “We need real equipment,” Oscar Ott muttered from a few yards away. “Stupid garden spade. This isn’t what professionals use to build anything.”

  Alex glowered as he hefted another load of dirt. Their equipment had been donated by the residents of Duval Springs. It had taken two full days to prepare a foundation for Mrs. Trudeau’s tiny saltbox house, and every other structure they planned on moving was significantly larger.

  “How long is it going to take to dig a basement for my house?” Oscar grumbled loudly enough for everyone to hear. “I ought to run for mayor. I’d have made arrangements for proper equipment. An excavator. A steamroller. I’d have a couple dozen professionals shipped in from the city to do all this grunt work.”

  “And you’d have blown the budget in less than a week,” an old apple grower said. “Quit complaining and get back to work.”

  Oscar straightened, spreading his arms wide. “I’m not complaining! Did anyone hear me complain? I’m just trying to be helpful by pointing out how this operation could be improved.”

  Alex hated to admit it, but Oscar was right. As he walked back to town at the end of the day, his back ached and the blisters on his hand began to bleed. They needed to triple their speed to stay on schedule, and donated household equipment wasn’t up to the task.

  He headed into the tavern for a mug of cider and an hour of sulking. He’d lost Eloise to some city slicker, he was failing the town, and for once in his life, Oscar Ott had the better of him.

  His gloomy stream of thoughts was cut off by rowdy laughter as a gang of quarrymen stumbled into the tavern led by a grinning Boomer McKenzie.

  “We quit!” Boomer proclaimed. “We waltzed into Bruce Garrett’s creepy fortress and told him what we really think about his lousy quarry. And we did it in style. Have a look at that!” Boomer slammed down a section of the Kingston Daily Freeman, folded into quarters to display a large advertisement.

  It was a double-bordered announcement saying that the following men would no longer be indentured laborers to the Bone-Crusher. A dozen men had put their name to the advertisement.

  A few months ago Alex would have laughed and congratulated each man, but not now. Leading the town’s move forced him to become a different person, one who was less impulsive and more likely to ask for favors rather than burn bridges.

  “Maybe he can hire a bunch of Russian scabs to replace you,” Hercules joked. “Although that didn’t work out so well the last time he tried it.”

  One of the jubilant men danced a little jig. “No more driving a steamroller and choking on the dust! No more risking my life with that excavator.”

  “Or that crane!” Boomer added.

  The newspaper passed from hand to hand as hoots of laughter filled the tavern, but Alex couldn’t join in the hilarity.

  A steamroller, a crane, and an excavator. Rich men like Bruce Garrett had earthmoving machinery, while Alex had to rely on the muscle power of the townspeople to get their land leveled, basements dug, and buildings moved. They’d spent a week getting the land at the Hollister place perfectly graded for the future town square. Garrett’s steamroller could have done it in a day.

  Alex said nothing as Hercules grabbed the old chair hanging on the tavern wall, plunked it down, and ushered Boomer into it. That chair had once been sat on by George Washington when he moved through the valley on a slushy December night during the dark days of the revolution. It was taken down only for special occasions such as this. The celebrating continued unabashed, but Alex watched the quarrymen from a distance.

  Those men were professionals. If he could get earthmoving equipment, they would know how to use it to speed up operations in the new town. A slow smile curved his mouth. Money from the municipal bond would be flowing into the town soon. There was no allocation in the budget for heavy equipment, but he would figure out a way around that. Eloise would be auditing their expenditures, and she was a stickler about rules, but he’d figure something out. He was going to get these men the equipment they needed, even if Eloise tried to stand in his way.

  Eloise sat at a dining table in the hotel, finalizing her schedule for next week’s appraisal appointments. As soon as Claude and the others arrived, they would head back up to Bruce’s house. She startled in surprise when a chair pulled out and Alex plopped down opposite her with a mischievous smile.

  “Good evening, Eloise. Can you tell me when the bond money is going to come through?”

  She went on immediate alert. Alex knew exactly when that money was due, and his charming smile was meant to disarm her. Whatever he wanted, she wasn’t going to budge.

  “The first installment will arrive in two weeks.”

  “Can I get an advance?”

  “What for?”

  The answer was exactly what she expected. It was a struggle to remain calm as he discussed taking a hatchet to the budget before the first payment had even arrived. It was unthinkable.

  “That budget is your bible,” she explained. “Investors are making a loan based on the budget the town voted on. As the auditor, I can’t permit any deviation, and expensive earthmoving equipment isn’t in the budget.”

  “Come on, Eloise, don’t turn into an annoying pencil pusher on me,” he wheedled. “We can build a new town, but not without that equipment.”

  “Too bad. Buying an excavator wi
ll break your budget, and you need to trust me on this.” She’d been managing Bruce’s accounts for years and knew exactly how much an excavator cost to buy and maintain. “Alex, I’ve spent the last eight years as an accountant. I’ve worked for a shoelace factory, a fish cannery, and a limestone quarry. None of them were as ambitious as building a new town, and they still inevitably had cost overruns. You can’t afford an excavator.”

  He pierced her with an exasperated stare. “Balancing the books for a shoelace factory has nothing to do with inspiring people to fight for a cause. You think I don’t know how hard it’s going to get? I do. That’s why I intend to deliver what these people need to keep them fighting through mudslides and snowstorms and setbacks. Inspiring people to imagine the future is entirely different from managing an accounting ledger.”

  “Those accounting ledgers are your lifeblood!” She must have raised her voice because people at the neighboring tables swiveled to peer at them, but she needed to make Alex understand. “I know they don’t look glamorous, but they supply the food in your mouth and the clothes on your back. Dreamers build castles in the air, but you need boring accountants to buy the bricks for the foundation. Go ahead and poke fun at my tedious job, but you dreamers would never survive without boring pencil pushers to keep your fantasies afloat.”

  She slumped back into her chair, crossing her arms over her chest. Almost everyone in the dining room was eavesdropping, and she shouldn’t have lost her temper. Normally she plastered a brave face over hurt feelings, but she was proud of being an accountant, even if the rest of the world thought it dull.

  “I’m sorry I called you a pencil pusher,” he finally said.

  She sniffed. “But I am a pencil pusher. You just never learned to appreciate people like me. You’ll have your money in two weeks. And Alex—I’ll be watching how you spend it. Don’t you dare try to buy an excavator.”

  He rocked back in his chair, a speculative look on his face. She didn’t like it. He had another card up his sleeve, and she braced herself.

  “You’re right,” he said. “I shouldn’t buy an excavator. Why buy one when I can borrow one instead? How about you get me a meeting with Bruce Garrett so I can convince him what a good idea it would be to loan us the equipment?”

  “Bruce! Now I know you’ve lost your mind.”

  “He’s got earthmoving equipment. Boomer McKenzie says the northwest corner of his quarry has just been blasted and cleared, so he won’t need his heavy equipment for another three months. It will cost him nothing to loan it to us and earn him a lot of goodwill from the town. I can see that he gets it.”

  “Bruce doesn’t care about goodwill. He wants an explosives expert, and if you read the Kingston Daily Freeman, you know that Boomer has parted ways with the quarry.”

  Alex shifted, rubbing his jaw. “Yeah, taking out that ad wasn’t the smartest thing. Look, if Garrett needs Boomer back on the job, I’ll make it happen. We need that equipment, and all I need from you is to get me a meeting with Garrett. And you’ve got to admit, it makes more sense than buying it all.”

  Alex would rather pry out his own teeth than ask Bruce for a favor, but the fact that he was willing to do it was a sign of maturity. It also made a lot of sense, if they had a prayer of getting this town moved in time.

  “I’ll try,” she said cautiously. But she wasn’t a miracle worker, and getting Bruce to loan them that equipment would require one.

  Chapter

  Fifteen

  Alex sat on a hard bench in the foyer of Bruce Garrett’s house. Eloise had succeeded in getting him an appointment to discuss the loan of the equipment, and Alex arrived on time for the six o’clock meeting but had been informed that Mr. Garrett was at dinner and would see him after he finished.

  That was two hours ago, and from the sound of laughter down the hall, dinner was still in full swing. It grated on Alex. It wasn’t the fact that he hadn’t eaten yet and the scent of simmering meat was so tempting it made his mouth water. It wasn’t even that Garrett had ordered him here at a time when he knew Alex would be forced to wait before being ritually humiliated by pleading for the loan of his equipment.

  It was the sight of Emil Lebenov sitting on the bench directly opposite him that made his temper simmer. Emil was one of the thugs who had beat him up all those years ago. Some of Garrett’s bodyguards had just been carrying out business, but Emil seemed to have enjoyed it. Even now, as he whittled a chunk of wood in his beefy hands, he had a creepy half-smile on his face as he kept Alex pinned on the hard bench.

  A half hour later, the door of the dining room opened, and the footman approached.

  “Mr. Garrett will see you now.”

  Instead of a private meeting in Garrett’s study, the footman led Alex into the dining room. Apparently the lord of the castle wanted an audience while Alex groveled, but Alex needed this equipment and would do whatever was necessary to get it.

  A long dining table dominated the center of the room, laden with platters of food and dozens of flickering candles. Members of the demolition team sat at the table with Garrett at the head, but all Alex could see was Eloise, sitting at Garrett’s right hand. Dressed in silk with her hair mounded atop her head, she looked like a duchess. But he couldn’t let her distract him.

  He squared his shoulders and met Garrett’s gaze from the far end of the table. “Thank you for seeing me.”

  Garrett took a long sip of coffee before wiping his mouth. “What do you want?”

  “I have reason to believe you might be willing to loan some of your equipment to the town. Your steamroller and new Otis excavator.”

  Garrett took his time as he poured himself another cup of coffee. Silence descended as he stirred in cream and sugar. A bead of perspiration trickled down Alex’s back, but he remained motionless.

  Garrett’s demeanor appeared relaxed, but contempt simmered in his voice. “Why would I would loan thousands of dollars of equipment to a passel of ingrates?”

  This wasn’t going to be easy. Alex wished Eloise weren’t here to witness his humiliation. Garrett was going to make Alex lick his boots, but he couldn’t let his pride get in the way.

  “The gesture would go a long way toward easing relations between the town and your business. Boomer even agreed to come back to work if you extended such a gesture of goodwill.”

  Garrett toyed with his coffee cup, slowly rotating it in his hands. “I’m surprised Boomer would be willing to slide up the mountain to kiss my ring.”

  Alex didn’t move a muscle. He’d heard that phrase before, but it took a moment to remember that Boomer had said it that first night of planning during the schoolhouse meeting. Someone in that room had carried a detailed report of the conversation to Garrett. There were hundreds of people at that meeting, but knowing a snitch was among them was disconcerting.

  Alex swallowed hard and blocked twelve years of hostility from his voice. “I know how generous the loan of the equipment is, and I will take personal responsibility for the equipment.”

  Garrett quirked a brow. “Personal responsibility? You’d be willing to sign a document to assume personal responsibility for the equipment?”

  He opened his mouth to agree, but Eloise cut him off.

  “Alex, don’t,” she said, a note of warning in her voice. Her admonition surprised him, but it stunned Garrett, who looked at her as though his lapdog had just bitten his hand.

  “Why shouldn’t he?” he demanded of Eloise. “If I am to send a fortune in earthmoving equipment into hostile territory, I need a guarantee my investment will be secure. If the mayor of the town can’t insure it, who can?”

  “Don’t do it, Alex,” Eloise continued. “This could ruin you. Last week a steam shovel at the Timberland camp had its chain cut. It was sabotage, and it’s getting worse.” She turned her attention back to Garrett. “Until we know who is responsible for the ongoing sabotage, it’s not fair to make Alex assume responsibility for the equipment.”

  Garrett was unmo
ved as he looked at Alex. “Well?” he asked silkily. “Can you keep your men in line and guarantee the safety of my equipment?”

  Alex hesitated. He hadn’t heard about this latest incident of sabotage at the new Timberland work camp, but that was hostility against the reservoir. No one in Duval Springs would undermine their own cause in moving the town.

  “I’ll sign for it,” he said, trying to ignore the pained resignation on Eloise’s face.

  A hint of a smile curved Garrett’s mouth. “Send a note to my attorney to arrange a meeting,” he said to one of the servants. “Although why I should waste my time with this ridiculous crusade is beyond me. You have no idea what you’re up against.”

  It was true. He was no engineer or builder, but he had an army of people ready to figure out a way to make it happen. “I have nine hundred people who have agreed to supply labor.”

  “No,” Garrett countered. “Your nine hundred people includes old men, women, and children. You need able-bodied men and a skilled workforce. You need engineers, surveyors, and builders. Your town can’t even find someone qualified to teach your grammar school classes.”

  If Alex worried about the magnitude of the task, it would stop them in their tracks. This war needed to be waged one battle at a time. “I will find a way,” he vowed. “We’ve got the most important element on our side. We’ve got hope, and hope can build bridges and tame storms and fuel our muscles until we drag ourselves across the finish line. We aren’t quitters.”

  “I can help.” Eloise’s voice stunned him.

  “What?” The outburst came from Alex and Garrett simultaneously, but Eloise was already on her feet, sending him a tentative smile.

  “I’m good at math,” she said, looking a little surprised at her own audacity. “If you need someone to calculate building loads or costs, or whatever . . . I can help.”

  “I can too.” This was Enzo, the young Italian demolition expert, who leaned back in his chair with an expression of admiration and surprise. “I like this idea of moving a town. I’ve never done it, but if you need an engineer, I can help. In fact—”