The Heart's Haven

by Jill Barnett

  “Don’t you ‘now Maddie’ me, Christopher Howland. I’m certain you don’t use it because it’s not fit for human use.”

  Maddie pulled off her gloves and marched down the hall toward the other rooms. She shoved the kitchen door open, looked inside for a moment, and then turned back around. “How long have you lived here?”

  “Three years,” Kit answered, walking to the kitchen doorway. “Why?”

  “What’s in that crate?” Maddie pointed at a huge wooden crate that took up most of the left side of the room.

  “The range.”

  “Did you just order it?”

  “It came with the place.”

  “I see.” Maddie walked past the crate and threw her gloves onto the sinkboard. She plucked a pail off the floor and set it beneath the pump. Grabbing the black pump handle, she worked it up and down. After a few chugs, rusty red water flowed in bursts from the spigot. “Humph! At least you have water.” She scanned the room, obviously looking for something in particular. “How do you heat the water if the range is still crated?”

  “I don’t. I use the public bathhouse, and when I’m at home, I use cold water.”

  “Well, I won’t use a public bath. Lord only knows what one would catch. And,” Maddie shivered with disgust, “I refuse to bathe in cold water.” She grabbed her gloves, slapping them impatiently on her palm. Her action reminded Kit of a childhood incident with a hickory switch. Suddenly, he felt as if he were ten and about to get a licking.

  “Show me the other rooms,” she ordered, and walked out. Kit followed her out of the kitchen, knowing that his bossy aunt was going to give him hell for the condition of the remaining rooms, all six of them.

  Three hours later he had the range together and the flue pipe secured. A loud thud sounded from the room above him, and he shook his exhausted head. She was still at it. He’d given his aunt the tour she wanted and gotten his ears chewed off. She declared the downstairs study and his bedroom the only rooms that were livable, and then she commandeered his bedroom, telling Kit he could sleep on the sofa in the small downstairs study until she cleaned up the rest of the place.

  Here it was Sunday evening, and he hadn’t slept since he’d been at Rancho Sausalito on Friday night, and then it had only been for three or four hours. He was tired, his muscles ached from exhaustion, and he was starved. He went over to the pantry and began to rummage through its narrow cabinets. Then he opened the flour bin and a bottle of whiskey banged against the tin lining of the drawer. A drink wouldn’t help his stomach, although it might lessen the pain of his aunt’s presence. Kit thought that he might just take it to bed with him. Of course, with his aunt here, the bottle of whiskey would probably be the only thing he’d be taking to bed.

  In the top cabinet he found a tin of soda crackers, and he stuffed them into his mouth, two at a time. Sitting behind an empty lard container was a forgotten crock of berry jam. He grabbed it like a dying sinner grips the Good Book, then tugged at the seal. It wouldn’t budge.

  “I know there’s a knife around here somewhere,” he mumbled aloud, or at least as loud as he could with a mouthful of dry crackers. He opened and slammed shut a few drawers, still searching for the knife, and then he spotted it on the windowsill under a large, yellowish chunk of lye soap. Grabbing the knife, he cut through the waxy cloth seal on the crock, dipped the crackers into the dark jam. He’d forgotten to eat as well as sleep.

  With the cracker tin shoved under an arm and the jam in one hand, he grabbed the bottle of whiskey and went into his study. He set down his meal and eyed the torturous shape of the sofa. Unbuttoning his vest and wadding it into a tight ball, he stuffed it against the hard wooden sofa arm and then settled back, feet up and head resting on the makeshift pillow. He took a long swig of the whiskey and looked around the room.

  It wasn’t filthy, a little dusty maybe. The rich mahogany furniture was covered with a gray film. He dipped a cracker into the jam, shoved it into his mouth, and thoughtfully chewed. He knew this would happen. His aunt arrived, and his life, which was going along just fine, became complicated.

  Of course, if he were honest with himself, he would have to admit that most of his complications preceded Maddie’s arrival. Maybe he could blame his father, since everything in the letter was the beginning of Kit’s trouble. But he couldn’t blame his father or Maddie for his problems with Hallie, or for the fire, or for the loss of Jan’s shipment, but she was destroying his only refuge. He liked his messy house. Kit scanned the room. It was a man’s house.

  He took another swig. He didn’t have to worry about where he put his feet. He’d even rented out the upstairs rooms to some seamen he’d known, and no one ever complained. And hell, the public bathhouse was great. He could bathe and get a haircut and a shave, all for twenty-five cents. He didn’t have to heat the water, or lug it back and forth, or dump out the tub . . . or uncrate the massive iron range. He’d managed to get along fine. He didn’t need household help, not that it mattered, because help was impossible to find in this city. The lure of gold was still fresh, so no one was willing to work for the small salary received by servants. Why should they? Most people unrealistically saw gold mining as a way to make a fast fortune.

  He had gotten along just fine until Maddie came, and now he felt like a little boy who’d forgotten to pick up his messy toys.

  Toys. Kit sat up, suddenly remembering the twins. He set the whiskey bottle down and walked over to his desk. Pulling open the bottom drawer, he dumped its contents on the floor and rummaged through the pile of papers. A dirty brown bag sat buried under some old contracts, and inside were his old clay marbles.

  Kit went back to the sofa. He untied the drawstrings and poured some of the marbles into his hand. The first three to fall out had been his favorites, his blood alleys. He had used them as taws, shooter marbles, and he’d always won with them.

  It was amazing how a couple of decades years hadn’t changed them. They were pale pink and still had the same dark red veins marbling through them, and they were just as special now as when he’d won them from his older brother. Thomas had been so angry. It must have been hell for Tom to lose them to a brother who was three years younger. Now that Kit looked back on it, Tom’s pride was probably more wounded than anything else.

  The cool, pink marbles rolled over Kit’s palm and something twisted, deep within him. He’d always thought he’d give these to his own sons. He picked up the whiskey bottle and started to drink, but then stopped. What good would it do to get drunk? That wouldn’t change things. He set the bottle down and fingered the marbles, imagining briefly what it would have been like to teach his own son to play ringtaw.

  His hand closed tightly around the marbles; there would be no son because there would be no marriage. He’d made that mistake once, and he wouldn’t make it again. He could never give his heart to another woman because he didn’t think there was a woman alive who could love him with equal depth. For Kit, love was his weakness, the tool to his destruction, because when he loved, he loved hard and so, so deep, and Jo’s betrayal of that love had almost killed him.

  He put the marbles back into the bag and tightened the strings. He’d take these to Knut and Gunnar and teach them to play the games he would have taught his own flesh and blood. Maybe this guardianship was a Godsend. He could purge this rising need for fatherhood that had been flickering through his thoughts lately. It was unsettling, this odd nesting spirit that he just couldn’t seem to shake.

  Kit lay back and closed his eyes. Soon his breathing was deep and even and he was drifting off . . . One arm was bent, hand resting behind his neck, and the other cradled a old brown bag filled with a young boy’s memories.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Hallie spent the next morning ordering her family about the Sea Haven, since she had decided that keeping them busy would also keep them out of trouble. Dagny was in charge o
f supplies and had been busy organizing the foodstuffs that were delivered to the ship the evening before. Hallie coerced the twins into believing that they were doing her an invaluable service by removing all the nails, in small handfuls, from a huge barrel in the fo’c’sle to an empty barrel in the afterhouse. Since the fo’c’sle was in the bow of the ship and the afterhouse in the stern, Hallie knew that her morning would be unhampered by the boys chattering. Liv, naturally, was another matter.

  When Hallie sent her to help Dagny, it had only taken about a half an hour before Dagny was chasing Liv around the deck, trying to get an expensive bag of raisins out of the nine-year-old’s hands before she ate them all. Next, Liv was to remove all the ship’s bedding and take it topside to air. When Hallie checked on her, Liv was leaning over the edge of a whaleboat, with a long spade hook, trying to catch the blankets that were fast sinking into the salty depths of the bay. Finally, Hallie sent her to pick up the trail of nails that ran from bow to stern.

  Now Hallie was back in her father’s quarters, changing her bandage and trying desperately to think of some way to keep Kit Howland from selling their home. As she rubbed the salve into the crusty burn, she thought of his words. He had said he’d be back today, and she honestly didn’t know what she’d do. Her quick jibe about the gun was an empty threat. She snapped the tin cap back on the salve jar. She should absolutely hate and that man. He laughed at her and teased her, and most of all, he betrayed her beloved father’s trust. Hallie unfolded the linen sheet she’d been using for bandages. Da wouldn’t have given Kit the ship if he’d thought Kit would destroy it. The only thing Da loved more than the Sea Haven was his family. It was up to her to make sure that the ship remained intact and safe from Kit’s money-grubbing plans.

  Picking up each end of the sheet, she began tearing bandage-sized strips. Yesterday, when she should have found some way to throw his traitorous hide off the ship, she’d ended up in his arms, all melting and mushy. How could her heart betray her like that? She should have fought him, root hog or die. Instead, when his aunt assumed she was Kit’s wife, her heart swelled, and she had to hide her smile.

  Last night she had fallen asleep imagining what it would be like to be Mrs. Christopher Howland. She had even practiced kissing, on her dry pillow. What a silly fool! Hallie stood and ripped strips of linen while she paced. What she needed to do was to concentrate on all his bad traits.

  First, he was insensitive, so she’d hidden from him for two whole years. She flung a shredded strip onto the bandage pile. Second, he made fun of her in public—she grabbed the cloth in her fists and pulled as hard as she could—and he called her a girl. Hallie-girl. For some reason that didn’t truly upset her. Three more cloth strips landed on the growing pile. It annoyed her that he been surprised she knew about the landfill, as if understanding what was going on in the town was too complicated for her . . . and her pretty head. Hallie gritted her teeth and ripped off a five-foot-long piece.

  She glanced at the leftover swatch of sheet and tossed it on the mound of bandages. She was stupid to fall for someone like that. But how did you change your heart’s desire?

  He was unpredictable, and that was a terrible trait. Hallie plopped down on the bunk, plucked a piece of sheet off the pile, and wrapped it around her burned leg, from the tender area to just above her knee. She knotted the cloth as she recalled Kit inspecting the twins’ faces, obviously looking for some way to tell the boys apart. And that was another thing. Instead of helping her, he just barged right in and took over, as if she weren’t capable of handling the twins.

  She’d been doing it for three years, and where was he? Hallie pulled her dark stocking over the bandage and stepped into her bloomers, mumbling about Kit’s lack of sensitivity. He wouldn’t know the first thing about handling small, orphaned children. Why, if his aunt’s arrival hadn’t distracted him, he probably would have done something awful to the twins.

  Then she realized she hadn’t heard a peep out those two imps in quite a while, so just to be safe, she left the cabin and went to check on them. All the way to the bow she thought of all the horrible, heartless things Kit could have done to the boys. The thoughts stoked her anger, which she hoped would help kill her feelings for him. Oh, how did one fall out of love?

  She rounded the corner of the tryworks and stopped cold.

  “I got your toe!” Knut yelled, jumping up and down with excitement.

  Kit reached out and tousled Knut’s blond head. “You sure did. But it’s called a taw, not a toe.” He picked up a pink marble that rolled nearby and dropped it into Knut’s open palm.

  “Now,” Kit instructed, smoothing Knut’s spiky blond hair, “it’s your brother’s turn.”

  From where Hallie stood, she could see Kit as he bent over and patiently helped Gunnar position his pudgy little fingers on a marble. With a flick of Gunnar’s little thumb, propelled by Kit’s strong one, a pink marble shot into a group of brown and yellow ones, sending three of them out of the chalk circle.

  “I got three! See? Did you see?” Gunnar grabbed the marbles and held them, cupped like fallen stars in his small hand.

  If Hallie had honestly hated Kit, at that very moment her hate would have turned into love. As it was, her love became something so powerful that she put her hand over her heart as she watched.

  The boys had no man to play with them. Da had been working too hard in the past years to take time. The joy on their faces, the way they looked up at Kit with awe . . . She felt such an ache that she had to reach out and grab the mizzen for support. When Knut threw himself into Kit’s broad chest and hugged him for all he was worth, she felt the rising burn of her silly tears. Just before she turned away, through her blurred vision, she saw two little towheads snuggle on the broad shoulders of the man she knew she could never hate.

  A week later Kit paced the cabin of the Wanderer. “What the hell am I supposed to do?”

  Lee propped his feet on his desk. “You could bunk here. Let your aunt do whatever she wants to do to your place.”

  Kit ran his hand through his hair for the third time in two minutes. It didn’t help him think. “No, I can’t. She’s my mother’s sister, and no matter how much she irritates me, I just can’t up and move out. And Maddie would follow me.”

  He walked over to Lee’s desk and slumped into an empty chair. He looked at the stack of papers and logs piled on the desktop. Charts were rolled loosely and strewn from one end of the desk to the other, and Lee’s booted feet rested on the open spine of a copy of Barry Lyndon. Two amber-crusted glasses sat next to a brandy decanter, and a coffee mug ringed with cold coffee weighed down the recent consignment contracts for Lee’s cargo.

  Kit pulled out his tobacco pouch and filled his pipe. “Of course, I could bring Maddie over here. One look at this place and she’d be in hog heaven. Someone new to harp over.”

  Lee pulled his feet off the desk and sat up. “Oh no. I don’t want that cleaning dervish on my ship. No use trying to pawn her off on me. She’s your aunt.”

  “Thanks for reminding me. I really needed to be told that, since she begins every sentence with, ‘Any nephew of mine . . .’” Kit mimicked her screechy falsetto.

  “Just tell her you’ve got some business to tend and that you’ll be gone for a few days. You could stay here, be out from under her and she’d never be the wiser.”

  “I need to check on Jan’s family, and Maddie has always had an uncanny ability to tell when I’m stretching the truth. No.” Kit shook his head and chewed his pipe thoughtfully. “I need to find something to keep her busy, busy enough to leave me alone.”

  “Then she needs another lost cause,” Lee said. “You could suggest she join the movement to clean up the city. Even the authorities have had little success. That’s a cause that should keep her busy.”

  “And get her killed, too. She might be bossy and domineering, but despite the
trouble she causes, I do deeply care about her. It was Maddie who taught me how to fish. Those sneaky brothers of mine ran off without me because they didn’t want some little kid tagging along. So Maddie took me fishing.” Kit smiled at the memory. “We came home with twice as many fish each as Thomas, Nathan, and Benjamin had all together. She’s a spry one, and just like my mother, when she gets an idea in her head, she doesn’t give up until she’s had her way. Considering her strong views on women, I’d say she would set her sights on cleaning up the bawdyhouses in Frenchtown. Then what would you do whenever you came to port?”

  “Same thing I’m doing now,” Lee retorted. “Which reminds me, I’ve an appointment this afternoon with a certain senorita. You’ll have to think of a way to keep your aunt busy on your own. I can’t think of anything, unless you want to loan Maddie to Hallie. I’m sure she could use the help handling those twins. I had one helluva time keeping up with them the other night. All those questions those two ask would keep your aunt busy.”

  Kit turned to him. “Now that’s perfect.” He stood and traversed the room again. “I’ll send them—the twins, Hallie, and the girls—to live at my place with Maddie. I can use one problem to solve another. I’ll stay with you until I can find another place.” Kit stopped and spun around to face Lee. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before.”

  “How are you going to get Hallie off that ship?” Lee asked, his voice filled with skepticism.

  “I’m thinking . . .” Kit stuck the pipe back in his mouth and considered his alternatives. He could try to order Hallie off the ship, or carry her off bodily, but in the past week he had learned something. He had gone back to the ship the day after his aunt arrived. Before he’s looked for Hallie, he’d given the boys his old marbles and taught them how to play. Later, when he found her, Kit had a one-sided conversation with a locked cabin door.