by Bess McBride
He penned several letters, addressed them and slipped them into envelopes. Desirous of taking immediate action, he slipped into his jacket, donned his hat and picked up the letters to take them down to the post office in town.
Luke opened the door and scanned the hall. All was quiet. He slipped out of his room, escaped down the stairs and exited the house without detection or further conversation with well-meaning residents.
The post office was just a short distance away, and Luke was thankful for the brisk walk. The school loomed ever present on the hill above the town, and he ignored it. With any luck, he would soon leave his post there. No, he corrected himself, not with luck. Necessity for order drove him away from the school where he thought he had found a home.
He entered the small shack that housed the post office and handed the letters to the postmistress, Miss Lula Hankins.
“Good morning, Mr. Damon,” she said with a flirtatious bat of her eyelashes.
Miss Hankins always greeted him that way, and he gave her a kindly smile. He did not know much about Miss Hankins, whether or not she had family, but he would have been a blind fool not to note that she had a soft spot for him.
His smile turned into a frown when he remembered Emily, and he froze. Was Miss Hankins a time traveler? He leaned in to stare at her, as if he could detect such a detail with a visual inspection.
“Mr. Damon, do I have something on my nose?”
Miss Hankins rubbed at her pert nose and patted her dark hair.
“No, not at all, Miss Hankins,” Luke said, retreating and standing straight. “Has the post left today?”
“Yes, it has. Your letters will go out tomorrow morning. I see you are sending letters to the Tacoma School Board. Mr. Damon! You are not thinking of leaving us, are you?”
“Certainly not!” Luke lied. “I am merely consulting.”
Her button-brown eyes blinked. “Oh, good! I hope you are happy here in Kaskade.”
“Very happy,” he mumbled, dropping his eyes to the letters in her hand. He would be much happier if she would drop them in a bin or box or satchel—wherever letters that nosy postmistresses handled must go.
“You are not at school today?”
Luke had never thought of Kaskade as so small as to be suffocating before that day, but he was beginning to think a much larger, impersonal city might be just the thing he needed.
“No, I had some business to take care of today.”
“I see! Did you know we have a newcomer to Kaskade? I saw her with Mrs. Cook today. I was delivering a registered letter to Dr. Cook’s house when they arrived from I don’t know where. Mrs. Cook introduced her to me as a Miss Emily Alexander and said she has just arrived in Kaskade. I think she is going to stay with Mrs. Cook. Perhaps she is a friend. We do have a goodly amount of single ladies in Kaskade, do we not? Where do they all come from?”
Luke braced his hands on the counter to steady himself. Could he not escape discussion of the euphemism “newcomer” to Kaskade even long enough to write and mail a few letters? It was all he could do not to bark out “time traveling phenomenon” to the chatty Miss Hankins.
“I have no idea. How very interesting,” he lied. “You will mail those letters for me?”
“Yes, of course,” she said, turning and dropping them into a box. “There, done!”
Luke breathed a sigh of relief. Good. Better. Best. He would find employment elsewhere and seek accommodations in Tacoma just as soon as he found a position. The future seemed orderly and logical once again. He left the post office and walked back to the boardinghouse, turning an uncompromising eye on the small town he once enjoyed.
Chapter Eight
A week later, Emily finally saw Luke at the mercantile. She and Leigh had just finished visiting the dressmaker next door for a final fitting on several shirtwaists, skirts and dresses that Leigh had ordered made for her.
Luke was on the point of exiting the mercantile when they encountered him at the door as they prepared to enter.
“Luke!” Leigh exclaimed. “How nice to see you!”
“And you too,” he said with an incline of his head.
Emily’s throat tightened when she saw that he still avoided looking at her. Over the week when Luke didn’t come to ask about her, when she couldn’t very well call him or stop by to see what she could do to mend her relationship with the first person she had ever seen in the twentieth century—she had fretted and fussed internally.
She had heard Leigh and Jeremiah speaking about him in the dining room one morning when she had entered late, but they stopped upon her arrival and said no more.
She’d been too humiliated to raise his name. Quite obviously she had done something tacky or uncouth or unpleasant for him to turn his back on her. He had promised not to abandon her, and though she was in good hands with Leigh and Jeremiah, she had hoped he would honor the essence of the promise. Stopping by once or twice just to say hello or to ease out of the commitment he’d made would have made sense, would have been easier on her.
He managed to meet Leigh’s eyes, knowing she was a time traveler. He seemed to have had no problem with Katherine, even knowing that she too had traveled through time. What was so odd about Emily that he couldn’t even look at her? It was as if he disliked her.
She ran her hands down her cranberry sateen skirt as if her appearance was the thing that bothered him. Granted, she had shown up in formfitting yoga pants. It hadn’t been her fault, and she would have grabbed a skirt if she’d known she was going to be thrown a couple hundred years into the past. Maybe he found her unladylike given that it was 1909 and all. She was sure Katherine and Leigh had shown up in unsuitable clothing for the period, but Luke hadn’t seen them when they were doing their twenty-first-century-transition-to-twentieth-century thing.
“Hello, Luke,” she pressed, forcing him to glance at her.
“You look well, Emily,” he said in a horribly polite tone before dropping his gaze to the boardwalk.
“We would like to invite you for supper, Luke,” Leigh surprised them all by saying.
Emily was certain that was a spontaneous invitation.
“I won’t take no for an answer. Six o’clock,” Leigh demanded. She took Emily’s arm, and they passed Luke and stepped into the mercantile. Leigh’s hand was shaking, and she stopped just inside, her back ramrod straight.
“I’m not putting up with this,” she muttered, staring straight ahead at nothing in particular as far as Emily could tell.
“With what?” Emily asked.
“His continued rude behavior to you. I don’t know what his problem is, but he’d better get over it.”
Emily’s cheeks burned. She looked around the mercantile, hoping no one stared at them. Of course, everyone did—not because they could hear Leigh’s mutters, but probably because Emily was new in town. Leigh still held her arm, so she couldn’t turn and absorb herself in the displays in the dark-wood glass-topped cabinets or matching shelves.
“Maybe he just doesn’t like me, Leigh,” she whispered. “I don’t know what I said or did when I first woke up here, but I was pretty feisty. Maybe he doesn’t think I can really pull off this turn-of-the-century-lady thing. Quite clearly I repulse him.”
Leigh pulled her over toward a shelf to look down at some material, out of hearing from the other patrons of the store.
“That’s not true at all! You look great! I doubt you did anything that I didn’t do or wouldn’t have done. I’d like to chat about this more, but I can’t just leave the store once I walk in. This town is so small, that kind of thing would be noticed. Let’s just mill around, and I’ll make the necessary intros, and we’ll figure this Luke thing out tonight. I dare him to stand me up, to stand Jeremiah up. He won’t.”
Emily swallowed hard and stared at the bright materials on the shelf. Her eyes watered a bit, and she blinked. A small part of her brain wondered at the difference between Carl and Luke. One controlled her every movement. The other couldn’t st
and to be around her. Oddly, she found the latter more attractive. She blinked again. Surely she wasn’t obsessing about Luke because he seemed unapproachable, right? She hoped she wasn’t that shallow.
“I suppose I have to be there?” she asked with a wry twist of her mouth.
Leigh looked at Emily as if she were serious, and Emily shook her head.
“I’m kidding! Although I’m going to die if Luke shows up at the door saying, ‘Look, I really don’t like this woman. I found her, I delivered her, and I’m done with her. Bye!’”
Leigh’s lips twitched. “That’s not going to happen! Besides, he’s just one man.” Leigh paused and scrunched her nose. “Although there aren’t a lot of eligible men here in town. Lots of loggers, but...” Leigh shrugged and shook her head.
Emily quirked an eyebrow. “I don’t need a man, Leigh. I just got out of a horrible relationship, and I traveled two hundred years to do it.”
“So you have nothing to lose.”
“Well, my fragile self-esteem would take more of a beating than it has already.”
“Wait! Have you met Jefferson Lundrum yet?”
Emily shook her head. “No, who’s that?”
“Oh, just the most eligible bachelor in town, that’s who!”
Emily tugged at Leigh’s hand. “No, thank you. What did I just say?”
“That you just got out of a horrible relationship, and we know that Luke has some sort of thing about you...against you...whatever appropriate term I should use. Jefferson is a sweetie, he really is. Maybe you were meant for him!”
“You’re out of control, Leigh,” Emily said with a chuckle. “I’m not meant for anyone.”
“We’ll see. We’ll see.”
****
Six hours later, dressed in a Delft-blue percale one-piece dress that Leigh loaned her, Emily went downstairs just as Leigh and Jeremiah were opening the door to Luke.
“It’s very good of you to come, Luke,” Jeremiah said, taking Luke’s hat and hanging it on the hall tree. Luke looked up and saw Emily on the last stair step before lowering his gaze to greet Jeremiah and Leigh.
Emily drew in a deep breath and forced herself to walk toward them.
“Hello, Luke,” she said. She debated sticking her hand out for a handshake but decided that was probably too forward for the era. She would have only done it to taunt Luke anyway.
Over the course of the day, she had decided that in fact Luke thought she was improper, not quite right, unladylike. She had glommed onto that idea earlier and locked it in. Luke had only seen Leigh and Katherine in their turn-of-the-century personas and conservative clothing. Emily had appeared in all her glorious crassness, stretchy black pants and all, and that had upset Luke.
He would just have to learn to deal with it. As he had said, he was an educated man, a teacher. Surely he could learn to accept that women in the future dressed more casually, couldn’t he? Had she or Leigh really explained that clearly to him?
Emily gave Luke a sympathetic smile as a million thoughts ran through her head. Uppermost was the idea that she ought to be more understanding of his feelings. He would come around in time. She would reassure him that she wasn’t looking for a relationship. She just wanted to reconnect with the man who had found her, the first face she had seen in 1909.
“Good evening, everyone,” he responded. “Thank you for inviting me to dinner.”
“Thank you for coming,” Leigh said with a determined smile on her face. “Come into the parlor. Would you like some lemonade or a drink before dinner?”
“Lemonade would be nice,” Luke said. He stood back to allow Emily to precede him into the room after Leigh.
“Emily?” Leigh asked.
“Lemonade sounds good,” she said.
Leigh nodded and left the room, ostensibly on her way to the kitchen.
Emily sat down as primly and properly as she could on the edge of the sofa, folding her hands onto her lap. Luke took a wingback chair that Jeremiah indicated, while he took the other, leaving space for Leigh on the sofa when she returned.
“How is school, Luke?” Emily asked. “Is all well?”
“Yes, thank you. Everything is running smoothly.”
Silence fell on the room.
Emily racked her brain for something polite to say, but she came up empty. She plastered what she hoped was a pleasant smile on her face and looked toward the doorway, hoping that Leigh would return soon.
Fortunately she did, carrying a tray holding four glasses of lemonade. Jeremiah jumped up to help Leigh, taking the tray from her and setting it on the coffee table. Leigh handed out the lemonade and settled herself next to Emily.
“We have a few minutes before dinner,” she said.
The men nodded, and everyone turned their attention to Leigh, as if she had the magic conversation starter. She sipped her lemonade and looked over the rim of her glass at the faces in the room.
“So what have you been talking about while I was gone?”
Emily avoided shrugging her shoulders. Too casual. She chose instead to unlace her fingers and wiggle them airily. “I had just asked Luke about school, which he says goes smoothly.”
“Oh, that’s good to hear!” Leigh responded. She set her glass down on the table and surveyed everyone. “Well, listen, I thought we might clear the air a bit, if you don’t mind.”
Emily’s eyes widened. Luke stiffened. Jeremiah raised his eyebrows.
“How is that, my dear?” Jeremiah asked.
“Well, Luke appears to be uncomfortable in Emily’s presence,” Leigh responded.
Luke’s hand flew to his mouth as he coughed. Emily’s cheeks blazed. Even Jeremiah shifted in his seat.
“I was just wondering if we could do anything to fix that, if you had any unresolved questions, Luke,” Leigh said. Having opened the subject, even Leigh looked a bit uneasy.
Emily saw a muscle pulse in Luke’s firm jaw, indicating he was probably gritting his teeth. He finally opened his mouth to speak, and Emily held her breath.
“I believe I asked all the questions I might have when I brought Emily here to your home, Leigh. I have no further questions. I apologize if I seemed uncomfortable. I do not mean to appear so.”
Luke eyed Leigh steadily, seeming not so much tense as offended.
“That is settled then,” Jeremiah said. “I do hope that we can all be friends.”
“Of course,” Luke said, nodding. He didn’t smile, and he didn’t look at Emily. She had spent the past year under Carl’s ever-present eye. She should have appreciated being ignored.
Leigh opened her mouth as if to say something, then closed it. Jeremiah looked toward the door, as if hoping Mrs. Jackson would announce dinner.
When Leigh next spoke, it appeared she had taken a different approach. “So they were gearing up for some elections when you left, weren’t they, Emily? Who are the contenders for president?”
Emily’s eyes bulged. Politics? She hadn’t kept up, but a few names rolled off her tongue.
“Oh, that’s a lot of women! How about that?” Leigh said with a broad smile.
“I beg your pardon?” Luke asked. “Ladies running for president? Is that possible?”
“Yes, of course!” Emily said, largely apolitical but suddenly ripe with an opinion. “How long have countries around the world had female rulers? Since forever!”
“Yes, I believe Emily has something there,” Jeremiah said with a chuckle.
“But a woman as president! Why, women don’t have the right to vote!”
“Ah! But they will, Luke. In about 1920, if I’m not mistaken.” Emily smiled. Though she hadn’t paid attention to who was who in politics lately, the women’s suffragette movement had always fascinated her. “The Nineteenth Amendment to the constitution.”
“Nineteen?” Luke repeated. “How is that possible?”
“Progress, Luke. I believe it is called progress,” Jeremiah echoed.
“I cannot fathom a woman as president,”
Luke said with a shake of his head. He turned to Emily, startling her.
“Tell me more about the twenty-first century.”
“Me?” she asked.
“Yes, if you please.”
Emily couldn’t believe what she did next. She put a hand to the spot just below her collarbone in an accidental parody of a simpering Victorian lady. “Oh, I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“Perhaps you could start with the clothing you wore upon your...arrival. What do you call it? Do all women dress in that fashion? Do the women who are running for president dress in that fashion?”
Emily started to giggle, and before she could stop herself, she started laughing. Leigh joined her. Even Jeremiah smiled.
“I’m sorry. I’m not laughing at you. The pants are called yoga pants, but I don’t do yoga. I just wear them because they’re comfortable. The shirt is a T-shirt. I think you all wear them or will wear them. They’re for comfort, often for exercise, never for running for president. Not all women wear them.”
Luke’s cheeks colored. “I do not mind levity on my account. How many presidents have there been by your time?”
Emily’s eyes widened, and she looked to Leigh, who supplied the answer.
“Forty-five.”
“What else can you tell me about the future?” Luke asked.
“Dinner is ready,” Mrs. Jackson said from the doorway.
Jeremiah rose. “We can continue this at dinner.”
“Yes, let’s do. I have many questions.”
Jeremiah signaled the women should leave the parlor first, and the men brought up the rear. Leigh threw Emily a sideways glance, a triumphant grin on her face.
Chapter Nine
Luke listened intently as Emily and Leigh described the innovations of the twenty-first century—transportation on machines that flew through the air, women in congress, travel to the moon and beyond in ships. Even Jeremiah contributed with his secondhand knowledge of future advances in medicine and unfathomable machines of knowledge, which he described as com-pu-ters.
