“I paid Mrs. Levy to stay open. I didn’t want to meet you out on the street as though you were a common working girl.”
“But that’s exactly what I am, Rossiter.” She debated telling him now that she wasn’t going anywhere with him, but decided she would wait until he’d seen Rory. She wanted Rory to have a chance to know his father, and she didn’t want Rossiter petulant and stubborn the first time he met his son.
“We’ve no time for tea, Rossiter. The woman who’s staying with Rory has her own children to care for, and I don’t want to keep her waiting. I haven’t said anything to Hugh about your coming. I thought it would be better if you saw your son alone for the first time.”
Rossiter set his cup down precisely in the center of the saucer and left several bills on the table. He felt immense relief that he wasn’t going to have to deal with Hugh MacDuff this evening. If the man wasn’t home, he would have Callie all to himself, and God knew how he longed to have her in his arms once again.
Callie glanced down at the money on the table. There was enough there to feed Hugh, Rory, and herself for a week.
Callie walked briskly, her hands crossed over her chest as she held each end of her shawl. It wasn’t that chilly this evening, although there was a good breeze in the air. She simply didn’t want Rossiter reaching for her hand.
“Callie, I don’t see why we couldn’t use the hansom I hired. I don’t care for walking through this neighborhood at night. God knows, it’s almost impossible to see where we’re going,” Rossiter complained, stopping to scrape the bottom of his boot in the dust. “If it wasn’t for that light in the sky, it’d be blacker than hell.”
“Rossiter, I told you, the hansom cab couldn’t go into Shantytown. The lanes are too narrow, and I doubt the driver would . . . what light?” Callie lifted her head, looking into the distance. A peculiar brightness lit the night sky, red and gold and fiery in its intensity. Suddenly a chill washed over her, freezing her in her tracks. Fire! “Oh, my God! It’s the varnish factory! Oh, my God!” Terror and panic struck her. Her throat closed, blocking off the air. She tried to calculate where she was and how great the distance to her shanty. The varnish factory was on the east side, bordering Shantytown not far from her shack. Terribly close to Rory! A fire amidst the shacks spelled disaster, since no fire company would enter the territory of squattersville.
Without another thought except for her son, Callie took off at a dead run. Rossiter found himself hard pressed to keep up with her. On and on she ran, through the crooked, narrow alleys that were quickly becoming jammed with the panic-stricken occupants of Shantytown. People were standing, mouths agape, the fire reflected in their eyes. Others were already carrying out all their worldly possessions; mothers were gathering their children.
Callie and Rossiter forced their way through the crowd. Suddenly there was the sound of several explosions, one after another. The night sky was a backdrop for fireworks as vat after vat of highly flammable varnish exploded, sending burning debris high into the air. Rory! Rory!
The pins in her hair came loose; her hair fell about her face and shoulders. She’d lost her shawl, and her heart beat faster and faster as she pushed and fought her way through a sea of faceless people. “Please, God, not my baby! Not my Rory!” she screamed as she forced her cramped legs to run faster. The bottoms of her feet were burning through the thin leather of her shoes; she swallowed great gulps of air, crying prayers, frantically pushing her way through the exodus of inhabitants.
“Callie! Wait for me! Callie! If I lose you now, I’ll never be able to find you,” Rossiter shouted.
Callie ignored him. She kept running and pushing. Shouts and curses and confusion were all about her as she flew around the path. Her eyes took in the shooting flames; the tarpaper shacks were fuel for the fire; occasional bursts proclaimed the explosion of lamp oil. In the red glow of the fire she searched out her own shanty and wanted to cry with relief when she saw the fire hadn’t reached it. “Thank you, God, thank you.”
A group of men began a bucket brigade, trying to save the shacks still untouched, but their efforts were as yet ineffectual. Women and children were running with their belongings clutched in their arms. Where were Maggie and Rory? She had to be certain they weren’t still in the shack. She had to find her baby! Shooting cinders showered in the air, cascading around Callie. She beat at the burning ashes with her hands, hardly feeling their sting. The smell of scorched yarn and singed hair, combined with the stench of the varnish, made her gag. She had to find her son.
“My God! What happened?” Rossiter demanded as he watched the men shifting buckets of water from a nearby pump down the line to douse the shacks.
“Use your eyes, Rossiter,” she said shortly. “I have to find Rory. Make yourself useful for once in your life. Help the men, for God’s sake!”
“Get back!” a burly Irishman was shouting to be heard above the clamor. “Everyone get back! We can’t work here. Get a bucket, man, and get in line.”
Callie rubbed at her burning eyes, choking on the thick, black smoke. The wind had shifted and was blowing the worst of the fumes into the squatter’s field. “Do as the man says, Rossiter. Oh, God, there’s Hugh. Hugh, here I am! What happened? Where’s Maggie and Rory? Hugh, answer me, don’t be pulling one of your drunken stupors now. Where’s Rory?” Her frantic tone and wild eyes were all Hugh needed to push him to the edge of sobriety.
“I just got here, Callie. I saw the commotion from Malone’s Tavern. Don’t you be worrying, Callie, I’ll get the little fella. Wait here for me.”
“No, no, I’ll come with you. I want to come with you.” Callie and Hugh pushed past the men in the bucket brigade down the lane to their shanty. Thank the Lord the flames hadn’t reached the shack yet. The smoke here was worse, thick and black. They fought their way past the shouting melee of people, then Callie stumbled and fell, nearly being trampled by feet. “Hugh Hugh!”
“Trust me, lass. I’ll get the boy!”
“Hurry, Hugh! Hurry!”
Cat-green eyes squinted through the smoke and cinders. A tall, lean figure heard the woman’s cry, saw her fall to the ground in danger of being trampled. He had come to Shantytown on business and was about to leave when the varnish factory exploded. Handing his bucket to the next man in line, he rushed to the fallen woman to help her to her feet. Through her tears and the smoke, Callie could hardly discern the figure helping her. As she swept her hair back from her face, she heard him gasp, “Callie!”
“Byrch!” She clutched furiously at his shirt sleeves. “Byrch, my son is in there!” she choked out, pointing. Her intake of breath brought a volume of smoke into her lungs, leaving her coughing and sputtering.
“Where, Callie, where? Show me!”
“In there, the third shanty. Hugh went in after Rory, but he’s drunk. My baby, my baby!”
Byrch Kenyon’s eyes narrowed with pity. Good Lord, that couldn’t be Rossiter Powers standing about helplessly, could it? He didn’t have time to think. He shook away Callie’s fierce grip on his arms and went to Rossiter. “Your coat, man! Give me your coat!”
Dumbfounded, Rossiter stood staring, filled with the shock of the bedlam surrounding him. Without explanation, Byrch literally tore the coat from him, stopping only to soak it in one of the buckets being passed down the line. Wrapping it over his head, he headed for the shack after MacDuff.
“Byrch! Maggie’s in there! Byrch! Look under the little bed! Under Rory’s bed!”
Byrch rushed past a man stooped just outside the shanty door, gasping for air. Inside, in the stagnant black smoke, instinct led him to the little narrow bed on the far side of the room. His hand searched for the baby. Finding no sign, he remembered Callie’s words. Dropping to his knees, he felt the blanket pad beneath the bed and made contact with warm, soft flesh. Dropping the coat from his head, he shielded the baby with his own body, racing for the door, his lungs hungry for air. Outside in the light from the fire, cinders and ash falling around h
im, Byrch knew the life was gone from the small body in his arms. His eyes searched for Callie and found her as she bent over a man lying on the ground. He was near enough to hear them. Unashamedly he listened, all the while his heart was breaking.
“I’ve failed you again, lass. I couldn’t find the tyke, but I brought Maggie out!”
“Shhh. I know you did, Hugh. I know you tried.” Just before Byrch had entered the shanty, Hugh had carried out Maggie, who was choking and sputtering now as others attended to her. “It’s all right now,” Callie told Hugh confidently, certain Byrch would find Rory and bring him out. She worried about Hugh now, who coughed and sputtered and clutched at his chest, grimacing in pain. When the seizure seemed to have passed, Callie lifted Hugh’s soot-blackened head and held him to her breast.
His words were painfully spoken. “Say you forgive me, Callie. I loved you, Callie girl. First as a father and then the way a man loves a woman.” The words were a strain; he kept grasping at his heart.
“Hush, hush, save your strength—”
“No, no, I’ve got to tell you. I can’t be going to my Maker with this on my conscience. I failed you, in so many ways.” He was attacked with a fit of coughing.
A sob caught in Callie’s throat. She held Hugh, her tears mingling with his. His voice grew weaker as he struggled to say the words he had held so long in check. “Say you don’t hate me, lass. Say you forgive.”
“There’s nothing to forgive, Hugh. I married you, for better or worse. I didn’t know how you felt, I swear I didn’t know. It’s you who must forgive me.”
Hugh shook his head, clenching his teeth against the pain. When he regained his breath, he looked at her. The love he’d never been able to express was shining in his eyes. “I’m that sorry, Callie m’love. I promised to put the world at your feet, and instead I’ve brought it down about your head. Believe me when I tell you I’ve loved the bairn. I wanted to think of him as me own. It’s a fine laddie; he’ll be good and strong . . . like his mother.”
“Yes, Hugh, yes. I always knew somehow that you loved Rory.” Hugh was making a supreme effort to speak; Callie leaned closer, putting his mouth to her ear.
“Callie lass, when you put the flowers on Mary’s grave . . . could ye be seein’ fit to put some on mine?”
“Yes, yes,” Callie cried, rocking him in her arms, tears streaming down her cheeks. But Hugh couldn’t hear her any longer. He was gone. Callie sobbed violently, filled with pity for Hugh and remorse that she hadn’t seen his love for her, that she hadn’t tried to bring out the test in this man. How could she not have known how he loved her? How? The truth that would have made Hugh free in life made Callie a prisoner of remorse in his death.
“Callie.” It was Byrch calling her name. He stood a small distance away, Rory’s golden head held in the crook of his arm. Gently Callie laid Hugh’s grizzled gray head onto the ground, looking about wildly for something with which to cover him.
“Callie,” Byrch called again.
“Thank you, Byrch, for bringing my son out to me. Poor darling, look how he’s sleeping, even in all this bedlam. Come to Mama, Rory,” she said, reaching for her child.
Byrch backed off a step. “Callie.”
“I’ll take him now, he’s not that heavy. I want to get him away from this place . . .”
There was a hoarseness Callie didn’t recognize in Byrch’s voice. Fear leaped into her eyes as she looked down at her beloved son. With her hands stretched out before her as though to ward off the terrible truth, she retreated backward. “Oh, no! No. No. I won’t believe . . . Rooorrryyy!” A safe, black void reached up for her, and she slipped into it, gratefully.
“Rossiter! Rossiter!” Byrch barked, seeing the young man standing there, watching the scene played out before him, stricken and unmoving. “Rossiter, come take this child.” Byrch thrust little Rory’s body into his arms, completely unaware that the boy was Rossiter’s son.
Rossiter had watched Callie’s strength crumble, and he only wished for escape, but his feet were leaden, and he was incapable of movement. He longed for the familiar security of his mother and wished for Anne Powers’s cool, unruffled detachment. He felt a terrible loss for the son he had never known, and he wanted to be comforted. The child was placed in his arms, his first and only contact with his son. He stared down at the tiny, peaceful face that so resembled his own. He needed someone to tell him what to do. The tiny body was such a heavy burden. A burden too heavy for him to bear.
Byrch bent over Callie, lifting her into his arms, reviving her. How had she come to Shantytown? How had she come to marry the Powers’s handyman? And the babe, dear God, the babe!
When Callie opened her eyes, she came to immediate cognizance. “I thought Rory was just sleeping. It was the smoke, wasn’t it?”
Byrch nodded, helping her to her feet. His face was a reflection of her misery as he watched her walk to Rossiter and take her son into her arms. Tender fingers brushed back the babe’s golden curls; a mother’s kiss was placed on the tiny rosebud mouth. But when she lifted her eyes, there was the fury of hell in them as she accused Rossiter. “You put this child in my body and then you deserted me. You took my innocence, my love, and you went away without so much as a wave of your hand. And then, when you needed someone to love you, to fall in worship at your feet, you came looking for me! You’re a rotter, a spoiler, and the only good thing you ever did in your life was to create a son like Rory!” She turned to Hugh’s lifeless form. “You tried to save me, but you couldn’t. And when I saved myself, you hated me for it!”.
Callie began to sway on her feet. Byrch rushed to her side. “Callie, give me the boy. I’ll take care of him.” Her grief was so overwhelming, she allowed Rory to be taken from her by Byrch’s gentle hands. Yes, he would take care of Rory. Rossiter stood there, pathetically helpless, his soot-blackened hands covering his face. “Callie,” he cried, “Callie, help me!”
“Go back to your mother, Rossiter,” she said heartlessly. She had no heart—hers had died. “At least Ann Powers still has her son. Mine is lost to me.”
Rossiter believed he had never heard such venom in anyone’s voice. He dropped his hands, staring at her, mouth agape, misery stamped in his eyes. He mourned the loss of his beautiful son, the son he had never known. He reached tentatively for Callie, seeking her comfort, but seeing how impossible it was, he began to back away, finally turning tail and running from the disgust in Callie’s eyes. He was a coward, and he hated himself for it; self-loathing was a mortal wound that he believed would never, ever heal.
Callie stood beside Byrch and her son while Shantytown burned around her. Glowing cinders showered the night sky. When she looked up at Byrch, she saw mirrored there in his tiger eyes her own devastating sorrow.
Book Three
Chapter Twenty-Three
Standing beside Byrch, Callie reached out a hand to caress her son’s golden curls, engraving the contours of his sweet little head on her memory. Upswept lashes fell against Rory’s smooth pink cheeks, and the boy looked for all the world as though he were sleeping.
“Give him to me.” She reached out to take the babe in her arms. When Byrch hesitated, she looked up into his face, the agony of her loss visible in her eyes and in the grimace of her mouth. “You must give him to me,” she said softly. “I’ve got to remember the way he feels in my arms; I must see him one more time.”
Reluctantly Byrch gave Rory back to his mother, watching her cradle him into the curve of her arms, seeing the outpouring of love and devotion she held for him. Feeling as though he were witnessing a sacrament, Byrch turned his head, allowing Callie this one last moment of privacy with her child. He knew that the sight of her tearless eyes and the way her fingers brought the babe’s hand to her lips would haunt him forever.
The woman Hugh had carried out of the shanty was approaching Callie. Hesitantly the woman touched Callie’s shoulder, but there was no response. “Callie . . . oh, Callie!” She wept, but Callie did not he
ar her or notice her presence. Her every thought, her every sense, was centered upon her child. Anguished, the woman turned to Byrch. “I fell asleep in the rocker . . .” she told him, her voice breathless and heavy. “I never meant for this . . . this to happen,” Maggie sobbed, wringing her hands, her tears creating pink rivulets down her soot-darkened cheeks.
Byrch reached for Maggie’s hands to comfort her. “She doesn’t hear you,” he said softly. “This is her time with her son.”
Maggie nodded, understanding. “I just don’t want her to hate me, Although I’d never blame her if she did. I loved the babe almost like me own.”
“Hush,” Byrch whispered. “Go home to your children, to your family. Callie was grateful to Hugh for bringing you out, she said so, I heard her.”
“If only I hadn’t fallen asleep. . .”
“You were overcome by the smoke, you nearly lost your own life. Go to your children, they need you now.”
Maggie nodded, her eyes going again to Callie who stood with Rory in her arms, rocking him as though she were putting him to sleep. “God bless you, Callie,” she whispered, putting an arm about Callie’s shoulders, bending to press a last kiss to Rory’s cheek, her tears mourning a mother’s loss. Before she left, she took her shawl and tenderly covered the babe as though to protect him from the night air. Just as she turned to leave, she heard Callie whisper, “Thank you, Maggie. God bless.”
For a long moment Callie looked into Rory’s precious face before placing him down beside Hugh, laying the child in the protective crook of her husband’s arm. Tenderly she covered them both with Maggie’s shawl, hiding them from the view of others, leaving them to the private world of death.
Byrch went to Maggie Crenshaw’s husband and withdrew several bills from his pocket, making arrangements for the Crenshaws to watch over Hugh and Rory until he could send someone for the bodies. Maggie wept openly, assuring him they would see the job was done.
Cinders to Satin Page 41
