Where Heaven Begins

by Rosanne Bittner

  “That’s fine. I won’t even charge you.”

  “I deeply appreciate that, Mr. Wheeler.”

  The man patted her arm and left. Elizabeth bolted both doors and stood there a moment, clinging to the bottle of horse liniment, and in resignation leaning her forehead against the door, eyes closed in prayer.

  “Lord, for some reason You have placed this burden on me. And so I accept it. And if I am the one who has to…touch Mr. Brady’s bare chest, please understand that it’s necessary to save his life and not a sinful act. Please work through my hands to heal this man who has done so much for me.”

  Steeling her resolve, she turned to face Clint, who lay hanging over the side of the cot coughing up more blood. It seemed incredible to think a man could drown lying in bed!

  “Heaven help me,” she whispered. She walked over to take the lid from the kettle of water on top of the potbelly stove, then loosened the cork on the horse liniment and set it into the water to warm it up.

  While waiting for the horse liniment to warm, Elizabeth took a towel from a stack of several on a shelf and hung it over the elbow of the stove pipe to warm. She knelt beside Clint. His face was flushed with fever, and his rattled breathing was interspersed with groans. He appeared barely cognizant of her presence. God had given her a job to do, and do it she must.

  She took a deep breath and grasped hold of one of Clint’s hands, closing her eyes.

  “Heavenly Father,” she prayed, “help me to look upon this man as Your child and not a stranger. Use my hands to help heal, and help me say the right words to him when he recovers. Guide me in every way, Lord Jesus, and please let Clint Brady live. More than that, I pray that somehow he finds his way back to You and can stop living the life he lives now. Thank You, Jesus. Amen.”

  With that, she rose and leaned closer, touching Clint’s shoulder. “Clint, try to roll onto your back so I can put some liniment on you.”

  He did not respond.

  “Clint? I need your help here.” She pushed at his shoulder, and he groaned. “Clint, roll onto your back.”

  “Jenny?” he moaned.

  Who was Jenny? His dead wife? Did he think she was Jenny? “Yes,” she answered. “Roll over, Clint.”

  Finally he moved to lie flat on his back. Taking a deep breath for courage, Elizabeth pulled open his shirt, which had only two buttons left on it because of the way Dr. Williams had jerked it open. She turned and took the liniment from the kettle and poured some into the palm of her right hand, her eyebrows arching in reaction to the strong scent. If not for the mild scent of lemon, the concoction would literally stink, and she wondered that the strong aroma did not stir Clint fully awake.

  She smeared the oily substance onto Clint’s chest. She worked it along his ribs and around under him as far as she could get with him still on his back. By then she’d used up the first dose and poured more into her palm to smear over his upper chest, all the way to his neck. Hard as she tried to ignore it, she could not help thinking what a big, strong, brave man he was, or noticing how hard-muscled he was. Nor could she avoid the odd curiosity touching his bare skin aroused in her thoughts.

  She suddenly drew away, ashamed for wondering. “God, forgive me,” she whispered, turning to take the warmed towel from the stove pipe. She laid it over Clint’s chest and pulled his shirt closed as best she could, then covered him. She washed her hands of the liniment and then poured fresh water into a bowl and wet a washrag with it. As she washed Clint’s face with the cool rag, she realized he was already growing quite a stubble of a beard. Should she try to shave him? Surely he had a razor in his gear, but she’d never shaved anything in her life, and she feared cutting him. With any luck he would be well enough to shave himself in a day or two.

  She rinsed the rag and wrung it out again, folding it and laying it across his forehead. Then she took hold of his hand again. “You’re going to be all right, Clint,” she said softly. “I’ll not leave you until you’re completely well.”

  To her surprise, he squeezed her hand. “Jenny?” he said again. “I’m so…sorry.”

  Elizabeth frowned, a thousand questions running through her mind. “For what?” she asked daringly, hoping to learn something more about this man’s past.

  “Couldn’t…help,” he muttered.

  To Elizabeth’s amazement, a tear slipped out of Clint’s right eye and trickled down toward his ear. Pain tore through her heart at the sight. “It’s all right,” she answered, not sure if it might help. “I’m happy now. I’m safe and well.”

  “Take care of little Ethan,” he whispered.

  Ethan? There was someone else? A child? Did Clint Brady have a son? If only she knew all the facts, she would know better the right things to say to this man. “I will,” she answered. What else could she say to such a statement?

  The moment was interrupted by another round of pitiful coughing and spitting. Clint groaned, and Elizabeth adjusted the pillows under him to make sure he remained slightly elevated. She gasped when Clint suddenly clamped his arms around her and pulled her tight against him, breathing the word Jenny into her ear.

  “Don’t go,” he mumbled. “Stay…home.”

  Elizabeth was both stunned and touched. His grip was surprisingly strong, forcing her to move the rest of her body onto the side of the bed and lie bent over him, her head on his shoulder. The poor man actually thought she was his wife. If that thought might help him get better, she supposed she should stay in this position until he fell into a deeper sleep and let go of her again. He could, after all, be dying. Why not let him die thinking he was holding his wife?

  Chapter Fifteen

  A soft answer turneth away wrath: but grievous words stir up anger.

  —Proverbs 15:1

  Clint awoke to an odd smell, what seemed a mixture of lemon and alcohol and God knew what else. It created a vapor that actually made it easier to breathe, although he remembered feeling so rotten that any kind of breathing would seem a relief.

  He stirred, surprised to realize that he was not lying on a hard floor at all, but rather on something soft. He stretched and took a deep breath, realizing immediately that doing so was a bad idea. He coughed until it felt as though his very innards would come up through his throat, then noticed a bowl sitting on the floor by the bed. Having no other way to get rid of the phlegm that nearly choked him, he spat it into the bowl, then felt so weary he collapsed back onto the pillow with a groan.

  “Clint?”

  A woman spoke his name. He heard a rustling sound, and someone knelt beside him then, touching his face.

  “Well, at least it seems your fever is gone,” she said. “How do you feel? You haven’t sneezed for quite some time, and it sounded like you were breathing just fine through your nose. Everything must have settled in your chest.”

  Clint squinted at her and saw by the dim light of an oil lamp that it was none other than Elizabeth Breckenridge. “Elizabeth?”

  She smiled. “Yes. And it’s so good to see that you seem to be getting a little better.”

  He raised up on an elbow again and looked around. “Where am I?”

  She stood up. “You are in the storeroom of the hotel. Actually it’s my room—the only room the manager had when I checked in two days ago.”

  He ran a hand through his hair, then felt the stubble on his face. “How long have I been in here?”

  “For two days.” Elizabeth pulled a wooden chair close to the bed and then told Clint about how she’d found him and the horse doctor who’d treated him.

  Clint lay back down, staring at the low, sloped ceiling of the back room, trying to straighten his thoughts. “Two days?”

  “Two days. For a while there I truly feared you would die. I’ve been praying constantly for you.”

  He coughed again, but not as deeply this time. Two days. His chest ached fiercely. He felt under the blanket and discovered he was still dressed. “What about…you mean I haven’t…” Lord, his bladder was full! “Is the m
anager out there?”

  “I’m not sure. What’s wrong?”

  “What’s wrong?” He rolled his eyes. Of all people to be left in charge of taking care of him, it had to be Elizabeth Breckenridge. Why not some whore from down the street? He felt humiliated at being sick and weak in front of her, embarrassed to tell her he needed the chamber pot or a privy, ashamed at how he must look, let alone how he must smell by now. “I haven’t emptied my bladder for two days, that’s what’s wrong!” he answered, angry that he should even have to explain.

  “Oh!” Elizabeth jumped up from her chair and practically ran out the door, returning a few long minutes later with a nearly bald man sporting a red beard and wearing the typical denim pants and calico shirt of most men in the area.

  “There he is,” Elizabeth told the man, before quickly shutting the door.

  “Name’s Victor Macklevoy,” the man told him. “The lady grabbed my arm out in the lobby and told me you need to get to the privy out back. She told me to come help you out so’s you don’t fall down on the way.” He chuckled and held out his arm. “Let’s go.”

  Furious with humiliation, Clint refused the man’s arm. “I can do this alone, thank you. All she had to do was tell me where the blasted outhouse is!” He wrapped a blanket around his shoulders and reached for his boots, grumbling profanities as he yanked them on. “Appreciate the help, mister, but you can go on about your business.”

  Fighting dizziness and determined not to lean on someone else, he managed to get himself outside to take care of things. Going back inside, he vowed to wash and change and get out of Elizabeth’s room.

  “Of all people to be taking care of me,” he muttered. Pain seared through his chest again, and by the time he reached the bed he realized with great frustration that indeed he was too weak even to wash himself, let alone change his clothes and leave. It felt as if a volcano was erupting inside him, and his muscles felt like mush. He’d never been sick a day in his life! How did this happen, and why now?

  He knew why. Because he was so involved in feelings for Miss High-and-Mighty-Perfect Breckenridge that he’d dived into that cold water to save her. If he’d had any sense at all he would have let her drown! He’d thought he was rid of her, and now here he was lying in her bed and totally dependent on her to take care of him until he could find enough strength to get out of here.

  Someone knocked on the door. “Clint?”

  “Heaven help me,” he groaned quietly. “It’s okay,” he said louder.

  Elizabeth came inside, great concern in her pretty green eyes. “You must still be so weak.”

  “I’m all right,” he grumped. He curled back into the blankets. “Tell the manager that as soon as a room is free, he’s to give it to you. I can get by okay on my own now.”

  “You most certainly cannot! I will go out and see about bringing back something for you to eat. You’ll need food to get your strength back, and lots more rest.”

  “Aren’t you supposed to be headed for Dawson?”

  She sat down in the nearby chair again. “Yes. But after everything you’ve done for me, do you really think I could have left you, as sick as you were?”

  He closed his eyes in exasperation. “Why not? You could have got me that doctor and then left two days ago.”

  “With you coughing so badly that I thought you’d choke to death? Let alone the fact that you were so hot I half expected you to burst into flames! You were, and still are, I might remind you, a very sick man. I kept that liniment warm and kept putting it on you. It truly does seem to have helped.”

  He thought a moment. Elizabeth had put the liniment on his bare chest? Just a few days ago she was mortified that he’d dared even to take off his shirt in front of her. Their gazes met, and she seemed to have read his thoughts. She quickly looked away, getting up from the chair and pretending to fuss with some towels.

  “What do you feel like eating?” she asked. “There is a little diner just across the street and a short way down. I tried to get you to eat, but it’s been impossible to do anything more than get some water down your throat. You must be famished.” She went to a coat stand and took down a cape, putting it around her shoulders, then finally faced him again.

  He turned on his back and stared at the ceiling again. “I wish you would just get a room for yourself and leave me alone.”

  “You know that I can’t do that. I have a responsibility—”

  “Will you quit with all that? We’re even-up now. Thanks for getting me some help. And, yes, if you want, you can get me something that will stick to my ribs, something like biscuits and gravy, I guess. And I could stand a couple of shots of whiskey.”

  The room hung silent for a moment. “Very well. I’ll get you the biscuits and gravy…and some hot tea,” she answered. She went out the back door.

  “Hot tea,” Clint mimicked. He thought about it a moment. The prim and proper Miss Breckenridge had probably never tasted whiskey or even touched a bottle of it. He rolled his eyes at the thought of drinking tea after coming out of the worst sickness a man could suffer!

  He sat up again, then wrapped himself in one of the blankets and stood up. This was a storeroom. It was a good bet there was some whiskey around here somewhere. He searched through several of the shelves, struggling not to fall down he was so weak and dizzy. Being careful not to disturb the manager’s neat stacking of supplies, he finally caught sight of a couple of brown bottles. He pulled one out from the shelf and uncorked it, taking a sniff.

  He grinned. “Now here’s what I need!” he said. With that he took a long swallow. “Best medicine in the world for what ails a man.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  They mount up to the heavens, they go down again to the depths: their soul is melted because of trouble. They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wit’s end.

  —Psalms 107:26 & 27

  Elizabeth lifted her skirts slightly as she hurriedly made her way across the street on wooden planks that had been put down to create pathways at frequent intervals all along the muddy thoroughfare of Skagway. Getting across safely was yet another feat. There was a constant flow of traffic, people, horses, wagons, dogs and sleds.

  “Looks like it’s blowin’ up a good one in the passes,” she heard a man comment. She glanced at him, then looked in the direction he was looking. Snow was visible in the higher mountains, which reminded her that it was becoming dangerously late for making it to Dawson.

  Once she got some food for Clint, she really needed to get out today and find someone with whom she could travel safely…and leave soon. Clint was too sick for it, and he’d already made it clear that he did not intend to take her any farther himself. Besides, now he was too sick to leave any time soon.

  She made her way past men of such diverse looks and clothing that she wondered if there might be a sampling of every human male on earth right here in Skagway. Some wore neat suits and top hats and were clean-shaven; others sported the bristle of a few days without a shave while yet more sported full-grown beards and mustaches. Many wore soiled, tattered clothing; while most wore the common clothing of the everyday prospector: dark woolen pants, plaid shirts, vests and jackets, woolen caps with ear flaps, most wearing leather boots, some wearing shoes with steel cleats, and some wearing simple canvas shoes. Most were courteous, a few made unmentionable remarks that she ignored, and nearly all eyed her curiously.

  She entered the restaurant, where tables full of men stared as she walked through to the back to ask a very tired-looking waitress for some food to take to “a sick friend.”

  The waitress, whom Elizabeth had never seen before in the establishment, looked her over disdainfully. “Lady, can’t you see how busy I am serving the customers out there? You want special service? Go talk to the owner.” She nodded toward a gray-haired man who was giving orders to a cook.

  Determined not to be intimidated by the rude waitress, Elizabeth walked up to the owner with the same request.


  “It’ll cost you a dollar,” the man grumped.

  “A dollar! That’s outrageous!”

  The man grinned through yellow teeth. “Honey, it ain’t outrageous in Skagway! You think I was dumb enough to come here for gold?” He leaned closer, his breath atrocious. “I’m makin’ my money off all the rest that’s come here for gold! A man’s got to eat, don’t he?” He chuckled and straightened. “Besides, yer askin’ for somethin’ extra. Now, do you want what you asked for, or not?”

  Elizabeth reminded herself that even this repulsive man who was literally stealing from everyone in his restaurant was a child of God. “Fine,” she answered, digging into her skirt pocket. She handed him two fifty-cent pieces. “Please hurry. My friend has been very sick and hasn’t eaten in two or three days.”

  The man shrugged and shouted an order to another cook. Both cooks were women who looked quite harried and overworked. The owner looked at Elizabeth again. “You make sure I get back my dishes and the tray,” he told her. “I’ll come lookin’ for ya’ if ya’ don’t.” He grinned. “You wouldn’t be holed up at some whorehouse, would you?”

  Elizabeth stiffened. “I’m at Wheeler’s Hotel,” she answered curtly. “And you needn’t worry. You’ll get your tray back, although for a whole dollar, I should get to keep it!”

  Regretting her sharp tongue, she stood back and waited, noticing filth on the floor and hoping that after being so sick, Clint would not end up dying from eating the food she brought back to him. Minutes later one of the cooks arranged the food on a plate and set it on a tray, covering it with a towel. She then poured coffee into a pewter pot and set the pot and a tin cup on the tray. “Here you go, ma’am,” the woman told her.