Twilight's Burning

by Diane Guest

  Twilight's Burning

  By

  Diane Guest

  Contents

  FOREWORD

  PROLOGUE

  EDWIN: SEPTEMBER 29, 1871

  SUSANNAH: SEPTEMBER 29, 1871

  PEABODY FALLS, MASSACHUSETTS, 1854

  SYLVANUS: SEPTEMBER 29, 1871

  MATTHEW: SEPTEMBER 29, 1871

  SEPTEMBER 30, 1871

  OCTOBER 1, 1871

  OCTOBER 2, 1871

  OCTOBER 3, 1871

  OCTOBER 4, 1871

  OCTOBER 5, 1871

  OCTOBER 6, 1871

  OCTOBER 7, 1871

  OCTOBER 8, 1871

  OCTOBER 9, 1871

  EPILOGUE

  Susannah leaned her head back against the wing of the chair and despite her resolution to put Sylvanus out of her mind, she was unable to control her heart. Please let him love me, she thought, and closed her eyes. She stopped fighting with herself and gave in to what she knew to be the truth. I need him to love me, she thought. I don't want to be mature and responsible and virtuous. I don't care about right or wrong. I love him and I just want him to love me back.

  TWILIGHT'S BURNING—A sweeping romance of hearts blazing with love

  ISBN-10: 0441832881

  TWILIGHT'S BURNING

  Copyright © 1982 by Diane Guest

  An ACE Original

  A Bernard Geis Associates, Inc. Book

  First ACE Printing: August 1982

  FOREWORD

  On October 8, 1871, the most deadly forest fire in the history of the United States erupted on the shores of Green Bay and roared in a two-pronged assault through Wisconsin and Michigan, killing more than twelve hundred people and destroying over 1,200,000 acres of forest.

  The tragedy has been all but forgotten in the annals of history, overshadowed as it was by the fire that destroyed Chicago on the same day. Nonetheless, it ranks as the most destructive fire in our history in terms of human loss.

  The characters in this novel never existed, but the horror that destroyed them did.

  PROLOGUE

  A light wind blew through the trees at the edge of the swamp, but the air did not seem to move.

  Bog-fires smoldered deep under the ground— hidden, patient, burning tangled roots, bone-dry peat, leaves, moss, even the soil itself. They went unnoticed, except for an occasional wisp of thin blue smoke that drifted lazily in the hot, dry air.

  It hadn't rained all summer. In fact, it was so dry that if you struck a match, some said it would have set the sky on fire. True, there had been a whisper of rain in early September, but it had done more to raise people's hopes than it had for the parched earth that supported them. Worse, it had made them careless, made them think less about the danger of fire.

  The drought had swallowed up wells, denuded pastures. Crops had burned up in the fields long before harvest. Day after day, the sun had burned its mindless way across the sky, sucking up the moisture from the air, the trees, the forest floor. No one could remember a time quite like it.

  Normally, even in the dry heat that signaled summer's end, the swamp was alive with sound. Now the swamp lay silent, dying of thirst. Indians searching for the cranberries that supplied some meager sustenance found nothing but wizened, stunted fruit. In the deep marshes where the wild rice normally grew in abundance, they found scarcely enough water to quench their thirst.

  And they blamed the white man, who had come with his ax and slashed the giant pines and killed much of the forest, leaving behind a weeping land of barren sand hills, graveyards of stumps, great piles of slash, and mounds of tinder-dry sawdust heaped to the sky.

  All winter through the bitter cold, the loggers chopped their way through the ancient timber, sparing no tree, sending the corpses on sleds down the icy roads that had been sprinkled with water, to the frozen river-banks at the edge, of the forest.

  In the spring, when the water flowed free from ice, logs by the hundreds choked the rivers leading to the sawmills, and loggers by the hundreds came out of the woods and fell upon the towns, looking for women, booze, and a good fight—maybe with a dirty Indian, or better yet, a half-breed.

  And preachers poured out of the east to save the sinners, to warn of divine wrath and a day of reckoning when the Lord would come on the wings of angels to demand an accounting of their stewardship.

  And the Indians prayed to the spirit of the Woods for retribution.

  A soft breeze blew across the floor of the swamp and the bog-fires, born as they were with an insatiable desire to multiply, surfaced for a moment, eager to be free, to run through the leaves and across the forest floor, to spread themselves to the tops of the trees and beyond.

  And then the life-giving breeze was gone and the fires died down, still patient, content to wait, to watch, knowing that if nature permitted them to stay alive long enough no measure in the world would be strong enough to stop them.

  EDWIN: SEPTEMBER 29, 1871

  Reverend Edwin Dudley Snell sat erect. Neither sound nor light had awakened him. Nor was he conscious of the sleeping woman beside him. Beads of sweat stood out faintly on his forehead. It was uncharacteristic of Edwin Snell to sweat, for he regarded it not as proof of labor of the soul, but rather labor of the body. And although he did not dismiss hard work as a necessity, it was reserved for those in far more humble state than he.

  He was not a comely man. The sharp, angular features of his Yankee forebearers had been handed down to him in the extreme, giving him a hollow-eyed, skeletal appearance. Nor had time been kind. Fifteen years without a smile had bent his face into a frozen, humorless mask.

  In the predawn darkness, he rose and moved to the wardrobe on the opposite side of the room where his clothing hung, meticulous as always. "Cleanliness is next to godliness," he always said, "and a slovenly habit is only a window through which one may view a slovenly soul." This was only one of the earliest lessons to his children, one they were loathe to forget, lest they be reminded with a sharp whack of his "teaching stick."

  He was panting, but without sound. He dressed quickly, finishing with his heavy black overcoat in spite of the suffocating heat. Edwin Snell never went abroad, winter or summer, without his heavy black overcoat.

  He left the house, crossing directly to the white clapboard Congregational Church that stood as a silent reminder of his New England heritage, and of a gentler time. He looked neither right nor left, as if confident that his mission made him invisible to anyone who might challenge his way. In actuality, he need not have feared, for the activities of the minister were not of significant import to warrant loss of his neighbors' sleep. Edwin Snell's neighbors in this small Wisconsin village worked hard. Their days were long and arduous. And the scorching, unrelenting heat of this summer of 1871 left them even more exhausted than they normally were.

  Edwin stood for an instant, framed in the doorway, a thin stick of a man, and then, once his eyes had adjusted to the darkness, he passed into the church. Moving silently, he glided down the aisle toward the high pulpit and knelt with a sudden, fluid motion, his head almost touching the floor.

  "Father, though I am insignificant in Thine eyes," he prayed, "I have tried to show them the evil of their ways. I have failed. They will not heed Thy Word nor do they fear Thy Divine Wrath." His voice shook.

  "What sign can I give to them that they may believe that I am Thy messenger? God the Father, by Whose Mighty Hand I have been made to suffer…"He paused, seemed to recall all the past injuries he had been forced to endure, "… let me, Your servant, be filled with courage to do Thy Will. Let me show them that they must walk in the path of righteousness or be forever damned to Hell's fire."

  Transfixed, he trembled as if on the brink of revelation, his breath coming now
in short gasps. He knew that he alone would be granted a glimpse of eternity.

  Then all hesitation left him and he cried out with all the uncompromising determination of John Calvin, "Father, I am Thy chosen servant. Through me, like the Christ, Thy Will be done."

  He lifted himself with renewed purpose and left the church, turning down the dust-choked road toward the landing.

  Just before he reached the sawmill he paused, some primitive instinct bringing him to his senses for an instant. Something was in the air. An acrid smell. It stung his nostrils. Must be a fire in the swamps, he thought. Nothing unusual for this time of year. He dismissed the thought as quickly as it had come and continued with all of his former resolution.

  The sawmill lay silent. For sixteen hours each day under the single-gabled roof, the furnace belched out steam to drive the shaft, and the screaming circular saw devoured the white pine logs fed to it by sweating men who rode the heavy carriage back and forth on the iron rails. An affront to the senses, both smell and sound. Now, dead quiet.

  Edwin walked around the towering pile of sawdust, and entered. Inside, the mill was pitch dark. Striking a match, he reached above the door with no difficulty— he was a tall man—and lifted the kerosene lamp off its peg. He lit it, proud of himself for having made note of its exact location the day before. It would not have suited his purpose to create any commotion stumbling around in the dark.

  He crossed directly to the furnace and opened the heavy iron door. The coals from the fire of the day before were still glowing. If he hurried, he could be finished before they came to begin another day of the Devil's work. He stoked the smoldering coals and with careful deliberation built up the fire. Then came the slow, hissing sound of steam rising to drive the shaft, to turn the saw. He could see the cold glint of the metal as it began to rotate, slowly at first, then with an ever increasing speed, until the jagged teeth became a liquid blur.

  Edwin Snell knelt in the dust beside the saw. He could feel a current of air on his face, generated by the whirling, metal disc. He lifted his eyes, and, in a voice filled with all the torment of the crucified Christ, cried out to a stern and demanding God, "This I do, that I may be worthy in the sight of Thy Divine Majesty." Then he raised his arm and, with a gagging, whooping gasp, slammed it down against the screaming razor-edge of the saw. He fell away, unconscious, blood spurting from the stump just below his elbow.

  SUSANNAH: SEPTEMBER 29, 1871

  Susannah knew he was gone long before she saw the emptiness beside her. Edwin had for many months now indulged himself in the habit of rising before dawn, hiding himself away in that god-forsaken emptiness of a church.

  She turned her head on the pillow and looked just long enough to give proof that she was alone. She was not aware that she had been holding her breath, not until she felt the relief of exhalation and the pounding of her heart. Don't, Susannah, she told herself. If you cry now, you'll never stop. Besides, it's too hot.

  She got out of bed and crossed to the open window. Still no rain, she thought, and shivered in spite of the oppressive heat. Looking out across the clearing beyond the house, toward the south, she could see a thin haze, fingers of smoke that lay motionless at the edge of the great pine forest that circle the town. She was not concerned. Fires were common in the forest this time of year. There wasn't much to be done about them. Every year it was the same. Still, I wish it would rain, she thought. Maybe it would clear the goddamn air around here.

  Susannah Snell never uttered a blasphemy aloud. But to herself she swore often, and with a feeling of great satisfaction. God didn't care, and He was the only one who could hear. It helped to swear. It was her way of getting back. Outwardly, she conformed to all expectations. She was, after all, a Wesley. And more than that, she was the wife of the Reverend Edwin Dudley Snell. But inwardly, Susannah did not share her husband's dismal view of God, even though her own upbringing had been one of strictest Calvinism. "God must have a sense of humor," she once told her children, "lest how has he restrained himself from destroying us all?"

  She turned from the window and began to brush her hair. At thirty-five, her hair was still the color of liquid honey. True, some gray had begun to show at her temples, and she frowned at her reflection, wishing her hair style could be rearranged to hide what she called "the scourge of the pure of heart."

  "Only the very best families get gray hair," she once told her cousin Abby. "It's a sign of purity and true gentility." Laughing, they both decided then and there that if a life of sin would forestall the signs of old age, they were both prepared to make the sacrifice.

  Her figure was slender, fragile-looking. It was only the surprising fullness of her breasts that gave proof to the actual condition of her health. She was strong as an ox. Her eyes were gray, and her voice—soft, throaty, controlled—rarely betrayed the emotion that sometimes threatened to choke the very life out of her.

  Her mouth was overgenerous but no one ever noticed once they saw the flashing smile—so spontaneous, so genuine—revealing strong, white teeth. "You'd fetch a fair price on the auction block with that mouthful of teeth, Susannah," her brother Ethan told her once, another lifetime ago. "Don't open your mouth around my horse. You'll turn him green with envy." With a shriek she had fallen upon him in a tumble of skirts and petticoats.

  "Cry 'Uncle,' Ethan, or I shall bite you with these very teeth. I swear I will." And Ethan had done as he was told, vowing between whoops of laughter that no mere mortal could survive such an attack.

  When she was a child, she had spent many long hours in front of the mirror trying to suck her lips under her teeth, biting them mercilessly, in hopes that they might shrink. Even as an adult, she never thought herself to be overly attractive. But she was.

  All in all, there was an obvious harmony about Susannah, a fairness, a sense of humor, a loyalty, that couldn't be mistaken. She just missed being genuinely good, and that small flaw saved her, made her likeable. She was a far cry from the lusty, full-blown logger's dream-girl so sought after in these Wisconsin woods, but no one could deny that she was a woman not easily forgotten.

  She pulled her hair into a tight knot behind her head, poured some water into the basin on the washstand, and splashed it on her face. At least this heat is good for something, she thought. It makes washing in the morning more bearable.

  There was a knock on the door, and a girl's voice asked, "Mrs. Snell? Shall I put the water on for your tea?" Susannah had once sworn that if it were not for her morning tea, she would have long ago departed this life.

  "Yes, Jenny. That's an angel."

  Jenny deWeert, fifteen years old, was the same age as Susannah's daughter, Hester. She had come to Penobscot Landing out of the forest with her father when she was twelve. Hendrik deWeert had come to Wisconsin after the end of the war with no more than an ax on his shoulder and the clothes on his back. That's all he had, that is, if you were to discount his wife and three small children. He spoke no English, and after he had spent what little money he had on a few meager provisions, he had disappeared into the forest. No one really had known exactly where he was going, nor did they much care. People like Hendrik drifted through Penobscot Landing every day.

  Every so often he would appear at the hardware store carrying a load of hand-split shingles for sale, but no one saw much of him, nor did they make any effort to. One morning, Hendrik deWeert had appeared on. the steps of the free school that Susannah ran with her cousin Abby.

  "Good morning to you, Mr. deWeert," Susannah said. After a minute of awkward silence, it suddenly occurred to Susannah that he did not speak English. She smiled, thinking how damnably uncomfortable she felt, unable to even ask what it was he wanted. Then she saw the child standing behind him, still and solemn except for the hands twisting and untwisting the fabric of her shabby skirt. She was obviously frightened and Susannah resisted the impulse to gather the child in her arms.

  The man spoke a few low words in what Susannah thought to be a French dialect, and gave
her a crumpled note, obviously written by someone else. "I want," it read, "my Jenny deWeert to learn English. She is good. Works hard for a place to eat and sleep."

  Susannah looked down at the child for a moment. It was not unusual for immigrant settlers to offer their children as servants in exchange for some small education, but Susannah had always found it impossible to imagine how anyone could abandon his child no matter what good might come of it. You are too selfish, she told herself. Sometimes it takes a greater love to do something like this.

  She held out her hand. Without a sound the child came to her, and the man turned and led his cow-drawn cart away down the road. The child gave no sign of emotion except for a tightening of her grip on Susannah's hand.

  That was three years ago. Susannah sighed aloud. It was time to be thinking about taking Jenny out to see her family again. More than a year had passed since the last trip, and a wave of nausea passed over Susannah when she remembered it.

  They had started out early that morning, a hot one, almost like this.

  "Hurry along, girls. Hester, you go help Jenny." Susannah hitched up the horses, aware that Edwin stood watching from the upstairs window. She smiled to herself. He was adamantly opposed to this trip; had he made his objections known in simple terms, she might have obliged him and made other arrangements for Jenny to visit her family. But Edwin had persisted in sermonizing to her, warning her of the dangers of pride and willfulness. Susannah had turned a deaf ear. It was times like this that she took perverse pleasure in defying him.

  Hester came alongside and held the horses. "Father doesn't approve of us going, does he?"

  "No."

  "Why?"