Runaway Heart

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Runaway Heart Page 5

by Jane Peart


  As the minutes passed and there was still no sign of Blaine, Holly experienced a whole gamut of emotions, reciting to herself all the reasons why he hadn't come. The grayness of the day was disheartening as well. Then to her dismay a few drops of rain began to fall. Startled, she stepped back under the eaves of the narrow church porch. But soon they increased in rapidity and force, and before long it was raining hard.

  Well! What now! The church doors had been locked; there was not a soul in sight. Should she wait here any longer or, horror of horrors, walk back to Hetty's house and face her derisive scorn?

  Resolutely, Holly decided that would probably be easier than being stranded here indefinitely. She had a dainty parasol with her, which was no bigger than an upside-down thimble and was only carried as a fashion accessory. For some reason she had brought it with her this morning, thinking it would shield her from the sun as the day had promised to be fair. With a sigh of resignation she slipped it from her wrist, where it hung by a wide ribbon, unfurled it, and, picking up her skirt, went down the church steps, out of the churchyard, and started along the road toward the Thorntons'.

  Immediately the skies opened up, and a strong wind sent leaves scuttling from the trees and the rain tugging her tiny umbrella. Holly could feel it spattering the back of her jacket and moaned at the damage it must be doing to her best velour bonnet.

  Over the insidious patter of the rain on the small circle of silk she was barely managing to hold over her head, Holly heard her name shouted, "Miss Lambeth!"

  A moment of indecision. Having recognized Dr. Stevens' voice, should she walk haughtily on, soundly snubbing him in order to show him that one didn't stand up Holly Lambeth and get away with it, or should expediency take precedence here and avoid ruining her best outfit and shoes?

  She whirled around and saw the little buggy weaving and wobbling down the lane with a red-faced doctor driving it with one hand and wildly waving the other. He reined up beside her, jumped out, and, thrusting a huge black umbrella over her, stammered out a profuse apology. "Tom Haskins' boy jumped on a haystack and onto a pitchfork, Miss Lambeth, and sparing you the details—I had to rush out to their farm, take care of him. I hope you'll forgive me and I'm sorry about the rain—"

  At his evident genuine distress, Holly couldn't help melting. At the same time the rain seemed suddenly to diminish and turn into a gentle patter. As they stood there, unexpected sunshine seemed to push through the clouds and envelope the abject doctor in a beatific light.

  "Am I forgiven?" he asked.

  The alternative being an ignominious return to Hetty's house, Holly chose to be magnanimous.

  "Well, of course, you're not responsible for the rain, Dr. Stevens, and certainly such an emergency has to be met, so, yes, of course."

  "We could still take a drive, if you like," he suggested tentatively.

  The rest of the afternoon proved fair enough with pale sunshine alternating with sporadic showers. But Holly hardly minded. It turned out to be the pleasantest afternoon she had yet spent in Riverbend.

  She found Blaine Stevens to be charming and intelligent and also blessed with a lively sense of humor. He was not only interesting but easy to talk to as well. They found that, although they were from different regions of the country, both had come from small towns, close families. They shared common interests in books and music and enjoyed the beauties of nature.

  It was late afternoon when they started back toward town and, without warning, Blaine reined up sharply in the middle of the road. Pointing, he said in an awed voice, "Look, Miss Lambeth, a rainbow!"

  Before them a delicate arch of yellow, lavender, green, blue, and orange formed a bridge in the pale blue sky against the purple hills.

  "How beautiful!" Holly sighed.

  They both sat motionless for a long while until the glorious vision faded away. Without a word, Blaine gave the reins a flick and they drove on silently, still caught in the beauty of the moment they had shared.

  "I would say a day that ends with a rainbow has to be a good omen for a friendship, wouldn't you, Miss Lambeth?" he asked her as they reached town and turned down the road to the Thorntons' house.

  "I agree, Dr. Stevens, it would certainly seem so," replied Holly thinking that seeing Blaine again presented a very pleasant prospect.

  By the time they reached the Thorntons' it had started raining again. Blaine said, "Although there's a chance we still might have some good weather, this is what I'm afraid you've got to expect, Miss Lambeth, as we head into an Oregon winter."

  "That's what I've heard."

  "I hope you're not easily depressed by weather?"

  "Oh, I don't think so," Holly assured him as he walked with her up to the door under the shelter of his big umbrella.

  But Holly was wrong. That Sunday began a week of incessant rain.

  "Doesn't it ever stop?" Holly asked the third morning as she stood at the kitchen window staring out at the steady drizzle.

  Confined to the house where she was either ignored by Hetty or annoyed by her, Holly spent most of her time in the bedroom she shared with the children. She decided to finish taking her things out of her trunk, which for some reason she had left partially packed.

  As she brushed and hung up her clothes with clove-studded orange balls to prevent the chance of mildew from all the dampness Hetty had warned her about, Aurelia crept in and deposited herself on the bed to watch.

  "What's this, Holly?" the little girl asked smoothing the thick, velvet cover of Holly's photograph album.

  "Would you like to see?" Holly asked and sat down beside her and opened it for the child to look through the pages of pictures.

  "That's my house in Willow Springs," Holly told her with a tiny lump in her throat as she placed her finger on a photo of the Lambeth homestead. "And there's my Grandma Vinny and Grampa Granville sitting on the porch, and there's my mama and papa, and that's our collie, Tamas, lying on the steps . . . ," and Holly began to turn the pages slowly pointing out each picture and telling Aurelia who was in it.

  Then they came upon the page with Jim Mercer's picture, his handsome face trying to look brave and stalwart in his West Point cadet uniform, the cape folded back, the glittering double row of brass buttons, the epaulets and shoulder cord, the gauntleted hand on the saber hilt.

  "Ohhhh-ummm," breathed Aurelia, "Is this a prince?"

  In spite of the sudden clutch in her heart, Holly had to laugh.

  "No, honey, not a prince—but he is a soldier, a lieutenant in the United States Army." She went on, "His name is Jim Mercer, and I was supposed to marry him."

  "You were?" Aurelia sounded awed.

  "Yes."

  "Then why didn't you?"

  "Because I was a very vain and foolish young lady," Holly told her. "He married someone else instead."

  "Oh, Holly, I'm sorry!" Aurelia looked at her with sorrowful eyes.

  Holly gave her a hug. "Oh, honey, that's sweet of you, but it was my own fault."

  "Did he marry a princess?" Aurelia was still interested in the story, sad as it was.

  "Not exactly. She was a colonel's daughter, and I guess a sort of princess," Holly said. "Let's turn the page."

  On the next page there was a full-length picture of Holly in the lovely ball gown she had worn at her coming out party. She had camellias in her hair and was holding a bouquet in a frilled lace ruff.

  "Oh, Holly, that's you, isn't it? And you do look like a princess. Tell me about the dress—," Aurelia begged.

  "Well—," began Holly, "it was sky blue and had a tulle over-skirt caught up with tiny blue velvet bows and—"

  They were both so occupied that they didn't hear the short knock, if there was one. Suddenly the bedroom door burst open. She stood on the threshold; her voice was shrill. "Aurelia, get down off that bed this instant. You know I don't like you lolling around wasting time."

  Startled and still holding the album, Holly stared at her cousin.

  "But Mama, Holly's showin
g me pictures of the town you both grew up in and pictures of Great-Gramma and your mama and Holly's party and—"

  "That's enough, Aurelia, go on out to the kitchen. You've got chores to do."

  As the little girl slid obediently down from the bed, her eyes glistened as she bit her lower lip to keep back the unshed tears.

  Holly rushed to defend her. "Hetty, it was my fault, I was just showing her pictures of Willow Springs and—"

  Hetty went white. "I said I don't want you filling my child's head with a lot of nonsense—"

  "Hetty, I was showing her pictures of our grandparents, your parents—surely you shouldn't mind—"

  "Since when did you give a fig what anyone minds?" demanded Hetty. Then she went out and shut the door.

  After Hetty left, Holly sat rigidly on the edge of the bed. Outside, the rain drummed relentlessly. Appalled by Hetty's reaction, Holly asked herself why Hetty should object to this harmless pastime?

  Staring out the window, where the rain beat monotonously against the panes, Holly felt trapped. A prisoner! She must find a means of escape. But how?

  She looked down at the album she was still holding in her lap, turned the rest of the pages stiffly, the images of the people, the events, the places that had made up her life before, reminding her of what she had left. Willow Springs and all the gaiety and sunny memories it evoked had disappeared in the rain and fog of Oregon. To tell herself it would be only a year didn't help. A year could seem like forever.

  At the end of the week the heavy rain had slowed to a steady drizzle. For days Holly's sense of desperation had deepened. Finally, she felt she could not possibly stand being cooped up in the house with Hetty's punishing coldness and intractable hostility any longer.

  The children were both napping, and Hetty, tight-lipped, was mending. Without explaining, Holly flung on her warm cape and, defying the weather, went out for a walk.

  By the time she reached town, it had stopped raining. Wet leaves plastered the board walkways, and puddles were everywhere, making navigating the streets hazardous. But Holly didn't care. It was so good to be out, with the cool wind in her face, the feeling of being free surging through her.

  At the Riverbend Monitor Adam Corcoran sat with his long legs and booted feet up on the editor's desk. Leaning back in the swivel oak chair, he stared gloomily out the window onto Main Street. He was alone in the office. It was Friday, and the weekly edition of the paper had been "put to bed" yesterday. Old Tom was probably parting with most of his paycheck over at the Nugget, and young Mike had gone squirrel hunting.

  Ad squinted his eyes and surveyed the street scene in front of him. Not much going on this noon. Not that there ever was in this isolated "neck of the woods." It was a far cry from San Francisco with its busy streets crowded with all sorts of colorfully dressed people on the go, filled with purpose and activity. Only a few short months ago, he had been part of it. Blazes, he missed it!

  My own blasted fault, Ad thought grimly. Maybe he should have curbed his instinct about O'Herir, reined in that powerful reportorial drive, but it was too much a part of him. He had caught the scent, and the hunt had been on, and Ad had had to follow it. His dogged probing and investigative reporting of the shenanigans of a popular and powerful politician had landed him here. A series of articles delineating the number of payoffs and kickbacks had cost him his job.

  With a rush of adrenaline, Ad remembered the intense excitement of working on the big-city daily newspaper from which he'd been fired. The firing came from the top, the ownership, management. It had been final. There had been no recourse. Privately his editor, sorry to lose one of his best men, told him to "lie low" for a couple of months, maybe only until the next election, and he'd see if he could get him his job back.

  Ad hadn't wanted to leave San Francisco; he loved the city, the life he lived there. His job was one he enjoyed, had worked hard to get, but after he was fired, no other newspaper would hire him. At least until the flurry his series had caused died down.

  So Ad had been forced to leave the city and seek employment elsewhere. Eventually he landed the editorship of this small weekly, off the beaten track, in this remote part of Oregon, a town only a few years past its "gold rush" days, now settling in as a community of farm families, timber fellers, small lumber mills, a twenty-minute stop on the stagecoach line.

  A temporary "stop-gap," he reassured himself when he came nearly seven months ago. But the dreary exile had dragged on, and from what he heard from friends in San Francisco, the situation there was still chancy. The politician he had been investigating was reelected and it looked as if it would be a long time before Ad could safely return and expect to be reinstated.

  He keenly missed the camaraderie of his fellow reporters; he missed San Francisco, the theaters and fine restaurants, the amusing conversation of attractive women, and the sophisticated pleasures a city offered.

  In Riverbend there wasn't much for a man like Ad, little to stimulate him intellectually, few people well-read enough to argue or debate with him on many subjects he liked to explore, little to do for a man who had never enjoyed hunting or fishing. Nights were spent reading until, bored with himself, he flung the book aside and sauntered over to the Golden Slipper in search of company, only to stay too long and drink too much. He'd had no feminine companionship for months, unless you counted the poor, painted saloon girls with whom the miners in from the hills and the ranch hands in from nearby spreads drank, danced, and had a few laughs. But it wasn't Ad's style and he often left feeling depressed and deeply lonely. Something he'd never experienced before.

  He had made no close friends here. At first he'd received a few Sunday dinner invitations from some of the families, but he soon found if you didn't attend church regularly or fit neatly into the category of prospective husband for marriageable daughters, the invitations stopped coming.

  After he'd written a few editorials that were considered "downright radical," Ad was thought too controversial for most of the town folk. But since there was no one else to print the weather reports, the cattle stock prices, the church socials and bake sales, announce the births, accept the eulogies to go along with the obituaries, publish the preacher's weekly sermons or the times of the Town Council meetings, Ad was tolerated as a "necessary evil" for Riverbend.

  He liked Blaine Stevens, but as the only doctor in the vicinity the man was so conscientious about his patients, he rarely had any time to call his own. There was always a baby to deliver, a child with colic, or an old woman, alone and ill, he had to ride out to see. Ad also liked Ned Thornton, but he was totally henpecked, and that kind of nonsense disgusted Ad. A confirmed bachelor, Ad was thankful he had escaped a similar fate, having survived several near-lapses and thus far successfully dodged matrimony.

  But thinking of Ned brought instantly to mind the young woman Ned had introduced as his cousin. Hollis Lambeth. Unconsciously, Ad shook his head. How such a lovely creature had appeared so unexpectedly in Riverbend, of all places, went beyond Ad's powers of imagination. It was as if she had been dropped from Mt. Olympus.

  Ad closed his eyes for a moment, willing her image back onto the screen of his mind. Tall, slender, with creamy skin and wide, heavily lashed eyes. Dressed simply in a peacock-blue suit, everything about her was neat and trim. She looked unrumpled, without too many flounces and furbelows that can make a woman traveler look frumpy. She wore little jewelry, no dangling earrings, only a small fob watch pinned to her jacket lapel. She wore dark-blue kid gloves, and a tiny, pert bonnet with a veil barely covering the cinnamon-brown hair. A veil and gloves were two things you didn't often see on Riverbend ladies. There was a coolness about her, a reserve, that Ad immediately admired.

  What was she doing here visiting a couple like Ned and Hetty? And why had she come to a place with so little to offer in the way of social life a young lady of her apparent grace should enjoy? Ad's investigative reporter instincts stirred. There was some mystery about this new arrival. What it was triggered
his curiosity.

  As if he had willed his thoughts into reality, he looked out the window and saw Holly coming up on the other side of the street opposite the Monitor building. Ad swung his feet down and leaned forward to watch her. Unconsciously he smiled. She had such a graceful walk, erect yet natural, not mincing nor stiff. Still there was something purposeful in her stride. Where was she going? Where was she headed?

  He saw her pause at the corner, close her umbrella, look for a long time down either side of the street. Would it be too obvious if he strolled out and met her apparently by chance?

  But Ad was a man who figured one should always take whatever opportunity Fate graciously presented. This seemed to be one that had landed happily right in his lap. Ad decided to seize the moment. He swiveled his chair around, slipped on his jacket coat, grabbed his hat, and made it out the door just as Holly came directly across the road.

  Chapter 5

  In a few long strides Ad crossed the road and approached Holly casually as if he had been leisurely sauntering down the street and had come upon her quite accidentally. Giving no hint of the mad dash he had made from his office into the street, he swept off his hat. "Good afternoon, Miss Lambeth."

  Holly stopped short. She had been so engrossed in her own troubling thoughts that hearing her name startled her. Adam Corcoran's greeting took her quite by surprise and brought color like twin blushing roses into her cheeks.

  "Good day, Mr. Corcoran," she replied, acknowledging with a nod that they had been previously introduced, then started to move on.

  But Adam was standing right in front of her, making that impossible. To sweep past him would have been rude, and, after all, he was a friend of Ned's. Besides, it seemed clear he intended to exchange more than merely a polite greeting as he asked, "I hope you're having a pleasant stay in Riverbend, Miss Lambeth?"

  Innate honesty tempted Holly to blurt out a truthful "No!" But her ingrained good manners and social grace compelled her to give the obligatory although somewhat ambiguous response. "Indeed, thank you, Mr. Corcoran. I am finding it most interesting."

 

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