Breathe: A Novel of Colorado (6 page)

She looked about her private room-one of only six available at the
sanatorium. "Only the finest for a St. Clair," Dominic had said proudly
when she'd seen him the day before. In all reality, it was little more than a
nun's convent room, stark and small. But her window faced northward,
to the Front Range, the mountains that spread out from Pikes Peak like
the ruffled skirt of a lady. On the wall was a simple cross. The bed was made up in standard-issue white cotton sheets and woolen blankets.
And it was a relief not to have to share quarters with another.

Odessa lifted her chin, still listening intently. Silence, utter
silence. A chill ran across her arm, and then another down her back.
Her eyes went to the dying embers in her corner fireplace, little more
than ashes now. It wasn't the frost of her window that caused her
chill. It was death. She knew this shadow, the feel of this particular
quiet, creeping up on her sunset in the deepest woods.

She swallowed hard. Still no movement, no sounds. You imagined it all, Odessa. Its in your head

But it wasn't.

She had to find out.

She placed her feet on the smooth-planked floor, strengthened
from her days in bed and on the porch and Nurse Packard's gently
administered teas and broth. Holding on to the table, she rose on
shaking legs and stood for a minute until her vision steadied. She
hadn't been anywhere unassisted. Wasn't it time she tried?

She moved forward, reaching for the doorjamb, and looked one
way and then the other. No one in view. She could hear the sounds
of coughing fits, but they were downstairs or on the other side of the
building. Nothing from next door. Shuffling forward, she rounded
the corner, still clinging to the wall, until she stood in the doorframe
of the next room. She realized dimly she was in little more than
a night shift, far from the proper attire of a lady about to meet a
stranger, but that thought quickly left her mind.

There was no light in this room, only the gray cast of moonlight
from the window. His lamp had burned out or been snuffed.

Her eyes slowly adjusted. She could make out an old man with a white beard. Sam O'Toole. A gentleman's hat and cane on the bedpost at his feet. She crept a foot closer. He was under the covers, but
his head was at an odd angle.

"Pardon me, Mr. O'Toole," Odessa whispered. She waited a
moment for a response, then forced herself to take a step forward,
reaching for his bedside table. A tickle edged her throat, and she
willed herself not to cough. "S-Sam?"

She took one more step, until the man's head was in silhouette
against the moonlit window. His chin was up, his mouth gaping
wide. The pillow was on the floor beside him. Odessa knew that
look, that expression of terror. He had tried, tried with every effort
in him to take one more breath.

And he had failed.

She dimly recognized that she was wheezing, panicking. But as her
eyes went to the dead man before her, and the pillow on the floor, and
the sounds she had heard-his pitiful cry, the soft, muffled rustlings of
bedsheets as if someone had been atop him-she spun around, every
corner now holding deeper, more ominous shadows. What if What if
the White Death hadn't taken him? What if he had been-?

Odessa went down hard to her knees. Her hand cast about, trying to find a hold that would keep her from the cold floor, left to die
beside the old, dead man.

As if she were ten paces away, she could hear the glass bell as it
crashed to the wood and splintered into a hundred pieces. From far
away she felt the shards cut her cheeks as she slid across the floor,
spinning as if in a whirlpool....

Dominic paced the floor at the foot of his sister's bed. Moira sat
perched beside Odessa, holding her hand, tears slipping down her
face. Dr. Morton stood on the other side of his patient's bed, looking
over her paperwork from under a furrowed brow.

"We're fortunate that-"

"Fortunate!" Dominic exploded, covering the few steps between
them in a breath. "I left my sister here yesterday, better than I'd seen
her in a month, and come back to find her unconscious again and her
face cut up! What happened?"

"As discussed, Mr. St. Clair, it appears she tried to get up out of
bed unaided, knocked a glass bell to the ground, and then fainted
upon it."

"Why was she up? In the middle of the night?" Dominic spat.

"Sometimes our patients get disoriented, particularly when they
first arrive."

"I want a nurse with her, day and night," he said.

"Mr. St. Clair, we hardly have the nurses to cover-"

"Day and night, until she's significantly improved." He stood
close enough to the doctor's chart to push against it.

The doctor raised his chin and glanced from Dominic to Odessa
and back again. "Very well, Mr. St. Clair. We can see if we might
borrow a private nurse from among ranks of the nuns of St. Francis. For three days, until we see Miss St. Clair through the worst of this.
Then we shall reassess. We will, of course, add the cost to your bill."
With that, he turned and left them alone.

"I should stay with her," Moira said, picking up Odessas limp
hand and stroking it. "At least for a night or two."

"It's a good idea," Dominic said. He paused, took a breath, and
seemed to relax, considering it. "You could stay with her at night, rest
at the hotel during the day."

Moira nodded and stared at her sister. "But is this to be our life
in Colorado? Always hovering over Dess? We leave her for a day and
look what happens! How did Papa think we could possibly open a
bookshop?"

Dominic sighed. "It won't always be like this. In a few days,
Odessa will be better and begin to regain her strength. This sanatorium has a 90 percent success rate in getting even their worst patients
up and on their feet and back into their own homes."

"Within three to six months," Moira said.

"I'd be happy if she was living with us in three months." He
strode to the bed and took her other hand. "That's what we're hoping
for Odessa. It was just-just a hard go of it, getting her here from the
East. She needs some time. You know our Dess. She'll be fine."

He studied her pale skin, her shallow, labored breaths and wondered if he believed his own words. He tucked her cold hand under
the blanket and turned away, sudden hot tears in his eyes. He ran his
fingers through his thick hair and closed his eyes, feeling a weariness
enter his very bones.

What if he failed at doing what their father had asked of himto see to his sisters' well-being? What if Odessa died here, while he could do nothing but watch? His hands clenched and he punched
the air in frustration.

"Nic?"

Dominic blinked slowly and turned to face Moira. She gazed at him
with those big sea-green eyes, a common trait among all the St. Clair
children. Her face was oval shaped, like their mother's, whereas Nic and
Odessa had inherited the longer, patrician nose and sculpted cheekbones
of their father. She looked so much like their mother, with her porcelain
skin and rosebud mouth, the same look of consternation on her face
that he remembered receiving from his mother after he had gotten into
a fight with Robby Smits from down the hill, even though he knew how
she disliked his scuffles with the other boys. "What is it, Moira?"

"I ... I like it here. I do. But sometimes, I feel ..." She looked
down at Odessas sheets. Long lashes made her look more like a china
doll than a flesh-and-blood woman.

"Homesick?"

She nodded and sniffled and Dominic stifled a sigh. Her tears
made him feel angry, helpless. He wanted to flee. Return his sisters
to their father's doorstep and walk away. But Father had asked him to
do this for him. For a year. For a year, he could handle it. Reluctantly,
he placed a hand of comfort on her shoulder. "All right, Moira. That's
enough now. We don't have time for tears."

"Tears aren't on a schedule you can control, Nic."

He pulled his hand away. "It's time to grow up, Moira. A grown
woman knows there's a time and place for such things."

"Go away, Nic, and leave me be."

"Think about someone else for once, Moira. Think about me or
Dess."

"I am!" She glanced up at him, green eyes flashing. She jumped
up and pulled her shawl more closely around her. "Forget my offer to
stay with Dess tonight. You have it all under control! Hire the nurse.
Let Papa see the charge, wonder if he's made a mistake, leaving you
to make the decisions about her care."

She strode past him toward the door, but he caught her arm.
"That's a foul thing to say, Moira."

"No more foul than your thoughts," she said, wrenching her arm
away and staring up into his eyes. "I'm simply more brave in giving voice
to the truth than you are." With that, she turned and left the room.

Roaring in frustration, Dominic grabbed the oil lamp and imagined sending it crashing against the far wall. It felt good to hold the
weight of it in his hand. It would be even better to hurl it across the
room, watch it splinter and fly apart, see the oil spread into a dollop
and slowly ease down the pine wall. But it would only take the edge
off his anguish. It wouldn't take away its source.

He paced back and forth, hands on his head, staring at Odessa.
"Come on, Dess. Come back to us. I need you."

Bryce heard the man pacing on the floor above him and to the right.
Somewhere near Odessa St. Clair's room. Or even Sam's, God rest
his soul. Maybe even in it. For the first time since his arrival, he
wished he had chosen an upstairs, private room rather than take a
bed in the communal quarters. He'd been looking to save the money,
but now he wanted nothing more than to duck his head out in the
hallway and see what was transpiring above him. He heard a woman's
light, hurried step and a man's heavy-footed stride down the hall.

They were odd sounds, urgent sounds. And considering Odessa had
remained unconscious since finding Sam the night before ...

He eyed the patient next to him, a young miner named Jared
from Illinois, who shared a look of concern. Bryce threw back the
covers and sat up, waiting a moment to make sure he'd not start a
coughing fit. The same action a month ago might've ended with him
passing out.

Then he moved out, listening hard for more noise coming from
upstairs. But the wide stairs that began at the entrance of the sanatorium and split to take people up to two different wings in grand
fashion remained empty. Taking a long, slow breath, he eyed the stairs
with some consternation. He hadn't ever been up them; Odessa had
been carried down to the sunporch they had shared on the west side
of the house. Thoughts of the long hill between the stables and the
cabin, ofTabito having to carry him up and to the wagon, as helpless
as a baby, assailed his mind. But he shoved them back, choosing to
think only of Odessa St. Clair and what might be unfolding above.

Where the devil was everyone? He wiped the sweat from his lip
and began the climb up the steps, feeling as if he were climbing the
Peak instead of a flight of stairs. Halfway up, the stairway curved,
and he could see a bit down the hall, with Nurse Packard and a maid
moving in and out. A younger doctor, in training under Doctor
Morton, looked in with a vague disinterest in his eyes, then turned
to move down the hall.

So Odessa was safe. But there was a lot of commotion emanating
from her room. He knew the occupants of every private room-that
was, up until old Sam had died the night before-and had guessed at
which one might be Odessa's. With little to do but read and eat and sleep, he had spent a good amount of time thinking of such things,
mapping out the place, imagining the movements of everyone present, counting the days until he could join the others on the daily
rides into the foothills and canyons. He felt like an old woman in a
small village, overly interested in the comings and goings of all. But
it was so oppressively dull, what was a man to do?