Where Heaven Begins. Rosanne Bittner
high-button shoes, her stockings, and her camisole. Her money fell out. She gasped and quickly gathered it up, looking around for a place to put it, then turned and shoved it under the feather mattress of Clint’s narrow bed.
She then removed her wet drawers. “Oh, dear Lord!” she lamented. She was completely naked, but how else was she to dry off and get warm? Still, she was in a man’s cabin, about to crawl into a man’s bed! How humiliating!
She hurriedly put on the shirt he’d given her, which was far too big. It fell past her knees, but as far as she was concerned, it still didn’t cover her legs enough. Elizabeth looked around again, noticing Clint’s six-gun hanging over the back of a wooden chair, looking so intimidating and dangerous. She noticed a towel lying beside a bowl and pitcher, and she grabbed it up to dry her hair as best she could, taking out the few pins left in it.
Suddenly she felt nauseated and dizzy. She crawled under the covers, pulling them over herself and settled into the pillow, relishing the warmth of the room, the comfort of the first bed she’d slept in for over a week. She could smell Clint’s scent in the pillow, a very pleasant, manly scent, much nicer than the smells below deck. The room itself smelled of cigarettes, leather and wood smoke.
She watched the red coals of the stove, and thought what a blessing fire could be.
“Thank You, Jesus,” she whispered, “for fire, for saving me…for Clint Brady.” Oh, how wonderful felt the warmth of that potbelly stove! She thought about hearing her mother’s voice. “Thank you, Mama,” she whispered.
Chapter Ten
Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.
—St. Matthew 10:31
Elizabeth stirred, for a brief moment remembering lying in bed at home in San Francisco, the smell of bacon cooking downstairs, knowing her mother was in the kitchen preparing breakfast. She loved those moments, the peace, the feeling of love and safety.
In seconds she came fully awake, realizing she was not in her own bed at home at all and gradually remembering where she really was. She lay still a moment, blinking open her eyes to see through the porthole in the steel door of the cabin. It was light out. How long had she slept? She turned over, at first watching a small fire in the potbelly stove, then realizing through the bit of light that came through the porthole that a man was sitting on the floor near the stove, quietly smoking. He had long legs and wore denim pants.
It was only then that she became fully aware of where she was and what had happened. She jerked the blankets to her neck. She put a hand to her hair, realizing it was entirely undone.
“Good morning,” came Clint’s low voice.
Elizabeth thought a moment. Morning? The accident had happened midmorning. Had she slept such a short while? “I…good morning,” she answered, feeling embarrassed and awkward. “What time is it?”
He took a long drag on his cigarette, then reached over and flicked it through the slats of the wood burner. “About nine-thirty.”
Elizabeth frowned. Nine-thirty? “But…it was later than that when I fell overboard.”
“Yup.” Clint sneezed before continuing. “About twenty-two hours ago.”
“What! You mean it’s the next day?”
“Yes, ma’am. You’ve had a right good sleep.”
Astounded, Elizabeth put her hand to her mouth. “I don’t believe it!”
Clint stretched, sneezed again, excused himself. “Well, it’s true. We’ve been stranded here since the accident. They’re hoping to load some of the passengers onto the next ship that comes by, then more on the next and so forth, till we’re all off and on our way to Skagway. We ought to be able to get off later today and make Skagway by tomorrow morning.”
Elizabeth rolled to her back and stared at the ceiling. “Oh, I’m so embarrassed, and so sorry! Where on earth did you sleep last night?”
“Outside under the stars. Doesn’t bother me much. I’ve spent plenty of nights sleeping on the hard ground with a saddle for a pillow. I just now came in to get warm.”
Elizabeth struggled to untangle her thoughts. She pulled the blankets clear up to her nose. “This is terrible. I’m so sorry, and so embarrassed.”
“You already said that, and I have no idea why you think that way.”
“But I’ve put you out…and what must the other men think, me sleeping here in your cabin.”
He sneezed yet again, then cleared his throat. “They can think what they want. Besides, most of them are only concerned with how soon they can get on another ship and get themselves to Skagway. They’re all pretty upset that they’ve had a setback, all anxious to get to their gold. I can tell you right now that most of them won’t find any. I can think of a lot of ways to make good money a lot faster and with less discomfort.”
By killing wanted men? She wanted to ask.
Clint leaned forward and rubbed at the back of his neck, squinting slightly as though in pain. Then he sneezed again.
“Are you catching a cold, Mr. Brady?”
He reached toward a saddle bag and pulled out a handkerchief. “I’ll be all right.”
She watched him quietly a moment. “You could get very sick, after what you did yesterday. Those men and I owe you a lot, me especially. That’s the second time you’ve helped me.” Her throat swelled with a sudden urge to cry. “I was so sure I was going to die. How can I ever, ever thank you enough?”
He shrugged. “I just reacted. I used to be a pretty good swimmer.” He leaned his head back against the wall.
“I think I remember you saying something about Lake Michigan to someone. Is that where you learned to swim?”
He waited a moment to answer. “I was a kid,” he finally told her. “I grew up near Chicago. Then my folks got tired of city life and moved to Nebraska to farm. My mother died when I was seventeen, my father the next year, which left me on my own. I didn’t much like the humidity and the mosquitoes in that part of the country, so I headed for California. I’d heard others talk about how nice it was there.”
Elizabeth listened to the sound of heated wood snapping and popping in the stove. It relaxed her. “My parents came west from Illinois, too, only farther south from Chicago. I never got to see the Great Lakes. Are they as big and beautiful as I’ve heard?”
He drew a deep breath. “From what I can remember. It’s been years. I do remember that Lake Michigan was so big that you couldn’t see the other side of it. Big ships, much bigger than this steamer, would dock in Chicago, bringing goods from practically all over the world, mostly from Europe and, of course, from places like Boston and New York City.” He rubbed at his eyes. “But that was a long time ago. Chicago is probably all changed and a heck of a lot bigger by now.”
“I’m sorry about your parents. It must have been hard for you. It sounds like you had no brothers or sisters.”
“Neither one.” The air hung quiet for a moment. “I still miss them sometimes. They were good Christian people.” He sneezed again and kept rubbing at his eyes.
Elizabeth was surprised at his reference to “good Christian people.” This man apparently had had a Christian upbringing. What on earth had turned him to the life he led now? Youthful curiosity left her dying to ask, but good manners meant not prying into other people’s business, especially not a man she suspected gave such information only when good and ready.
“I’m sorry you’re not feeling well,” she told him. “If you will leave for a while I’ll get dressed, you can have your bed back.” Privately she thought how wonderful it would feel to stay in the bed all day. “And again I’m sorry to take it from you for so long. I must have been far more exhausted than I thought.