From This Moment (24 page)

“Evelyn.”

“Don’t.” He was going to try to reopen old wounds and fight battles that were long over. Perhaps he had a hide thick enough to endure another beating, but she had no appetite for it.

“We said vows, Evelyn.”

“Yes, and you broke them. Please, Clyde. I’m very tired, and there’s no point in resurrecting this argument.”

She turned to head toward the stairs, but his hand curled around her elbow. When she tugged, he tightened his grip.

“You said you can’t have more children, but that doesn’t mean we can’t adopt. For pity’s sake, I’ve seen the pictures of your housekeeper’s children on your desk as though they are your own. If you want children, we can have them.”

She wrenched her arm away. “And would these hypothetical children have a father? Or will you dash off to the Rockies or South America or to whatever engineering project grabs your fancy? You weren’t even here when our son was born.”

“If I’d known the baby would come early, I would have tried to get home,” he said. “I came back as soon as I learned it had died.”

“
He
. His name was Christopher, and he was a real baby, not an
it
. And if you can’t—”

“I took that job in Wyoming because you wanted me to. Did you think it was fun for me, all those months in the middle of nowhere? The snow was blinding, and it was so cold the skin on my face blistered and peeled, but I didn’t give up because the pay was good and you needed money to feel secure. I did it for
you
, Evelyn.”

She retreated. He’d always accused her of being obsessed with money but she wasn’t—she was obsessed with feeling
safe
. Clyde and his barrel of problems had no place in the strong, independent world she’d built for herself.

But a piece of her would always love him. She sighed. “Neither of our lives has turned out the way we hoped. Every time I see a hummingbird, it makes me sad. I survived our breaking apart once before. I don’t think I could endure it again.”

She didn’t wait for him to reply as she headed up the stairs.

12

R
omulus rose early to haul the bins of envelopes to the post office. Tremont Street was completely excavated for the subway construction, making it impossible to pull a carriage close to the building, so several trips lugging heavy bins the three blocks to the post office was his only option. To his surprise, Stella was at the building and offered to lend a hand. She wore one of her prison-garb dresses, smiling and ready to help haul bins alongside him.

They were tired and sweaty after the first trip, and it would take six more before all were delivered. While riding the elevator down the second time, he looked over to admire her. Her face was flushed with good health. With her sleeves rolled up, she looked strong and ready to tackle the world.

“You look like the peasant women from Millet’s painting
The Gleaners
. Strong. Salt of the earth.”

The Gleaners
was an infamous painting in France because it glorified the nobility of women laboring in the fields, but Stella beamed. The elevator doors opened, and they both leaned over to heft up the next bins.

“I like a little manual labor,” Stella said as she walked beside him. “I feel like one of those female penguins who spends months lugging stones across the ice to build a suitable nest. It’s good to feel strong.”

He smiled reluctantly. He loved that she could so effortlessly trot out animal science trivia, but it terrified him, too. Flirting with women was one of his favorite pastimes, but rarely was he moved by it.

Stella moved him, and it wasn’t a good feeling. And yet he couldn’t resist flirting with her the rest of the morning as they made trip after trip to the post office, loving every moment of it. When the last bin had been delivered, Stella sagged with tired, happy satisfaction.

“I’m going back to Evelyn’s house for a long soak in her bathtub,” she said with a weary smile, and he silently groaned. The last thing he needed distracting his mind was images of Stella in her bath. He kept his eyes trained on her as she sashayed down the street toward the streetcar stop. Even in that drab muslin outfit, she mesmerized him. He stood in the street and gawked like a schoolboy until she disappeared from view.

Which was insane. He had work piling up at the office and needed to get back to it.

“Is it done?” Evelyn asked the moment he walked through the door.

“Done,” he confirmed. His back ached and hands hurt. His wallet was six hundred dollars lighter after paying the postage fees. The supply room needed restocking, but they’d squeaked in under the deadline to notify their subscribers of the halt in production.

“I’m not even sure I know what to do with my time,” Evelyn said.

That was a first. Normally, Evelyn’s day was consumed with
balancing accounts and getting the articles assigned, edited, and typeset.

“We probably need to make an appointment with the bank,” he said. “We may need a short-term loan to cover operating expenses before we get back into production.”

Evelyn nodded and made note of it in her journal. “And what about the series on electricity? Shall we find alternative stories in case—”

A tremendous
boom
sounded from the street below, so loud it hurt his ears. The windows rattled, and screams rose from the street. Everyone in the office leapt up, looking wildly about.

He dashed to the windows. A cloud of smoke and dust swirled in the street near the intersection of Tremont and Boylston. The pedestrian bridge had collapsed, storefront windows had shattered, and wagons were overturned. Electric wires and wooden planking from the overpass dangled over the gaping hole blown into the street.

Romulus tugged open the window to get a better view of the catastrophe. Before he could get a good look, Evelyn scooted in front of him, leaning out to see the full horror of what lay below.

“Oh no . . . Clyde,” she whispered.

He swallowed hard. It was impossible to see into the trench; it was still obscured by a cloud of dust hanging in the air, but tongues of fire flickered in the dusty cloud of smoke.

“I’m going down,” Evelyn said.

He grabbed her, hauling her back from the door. “It’s a gas explosion. It’s not safe down there.”

“I don’t care. If Clyde is in that trench, I need to get him out.”

A black cloud billowed up from the trench, followed by a hiss of white steam. A horse lay thrashing on its side, its panicked screams audible even from up here.

As they watched, a second explosion blew a wagon into
the air. It was on fire before it landed, and the windows of the Boston Athletic Club shattered and came crashing to the ground. Evelyn sagged and would have fallen had Romulus not grabbed her.

The electric lights in the room flickered and went out.

“Stay here,” he warned. “The gas lines may still be blowing.”

“Clyde,” Evelyn said faintly again. “Dear God, please keep him safe. Please don’t let him burn.”

He wished he could comfort her, but he didn’t know any more than she. Even now, his best friend could be burning to death. He clenched the windowsill so hard his hands hurt. Last night Clyde had stood at this very window and listened to the music of Brahms, savoring every note. It was impossible to believe he could be dead today.

Men began staggering out of the pit, bystanders leaning over to haul them up and out. A bit of his strangling fear loosened. If survivors were coming out of the trench, there was no reason to believe Clyde couldn’t be among them. He peered down at the men in an effort to spot Clyde, but they all had soot-blackened faces and were impossible to identify.

Roy Tanner burst into the office. “Is there anything I can do?” he asked.

“Just go down to the power room and make sure there is no danger of electrical fire.” Romulus didn’t expect it, but at this point, it was impossible to know what they were dealing with.

By the time he looked back at the window, Evelyn had fled the room.

He had better go down after her. If he couldn’t save Clyde, at least he could help get the wreckage cleared away so the firemen could do their work.

The air was thick with dust and smoke, coating the back of Evelyn’s throat and making it hard to breathe, but the stench of gas was worse. The sulfuric smell hung in the air as she plowed forward, her handkerchief clutched over her nose and mouth. Glass and gravel crunched beneath her feet, and the shouting of men added to her sense of panic. The clang of fire engines could be heard in the distance, and people began hauling away lumber from the collapsed overpass. The fire engines couldn’t get through with the road this badly blocked.

A group of men hunkered down on the street, struggling to lift a man from the trench. His face was streaked with sweat, but he appeared uninjured as he got his feet beneath him.

“Clyde Brixton,” she shouted at the man. “Have you seen Clyde Brixton?”

The man shook his head and gestured toward Boylston Street. “He usually works farther down near the electrical switches. I haven’t seen him today.”

She whirled and headed south toward Boylston, where the dust and confusion were even worse. Along the sidewalks, men held rags to bleeding wounds, and she paused only long enough to see if she recognized Clyde among them. Each time another man emerged from the trench, she asked the question. “I’m looking for my husband. Have you seen Clyde Brixton?”

Each time the men shook their heads. At last, she reached a grassy area near Avery Street where a dozen men were stretched out on their backs, passersby doing their best to render aid. She walked across the grass, looking each man in the face, growing more desperate by the minute.

Two men half guided, half dragged a third man whose face was streaked with blood and dirt. She studied him only long enough to know he wasn’t Clyde, but then she saw the other man propping him up. “Clyde!” she burst out in relief. His face
was darkened with soot, but those impossibly blue eyes were as clear as ever. He grimaced as he lowered the injured man to the bench, but he was alive and standing upright, and everything was going to be okay. Relief nearly sapped the strength from her legs as she staggered toward him, calling his name.

He must be in pain, for he cradled the side of his head with one hand as he lumbered toward a lamppost, bracing his hand against it.

“Clyde!” she shouted again, but the street was loud with the clanging of fire engines and the panicked yells of men. She reached out to touch his shoulder and nearly wept with relief when he recognized her and flashed a dazzling, heart-stopping grin, his teeth white against his sooty face.

“Are you all right?” she asked. “Do you need anything?”

He looked at her strangely, his eyes puzzled as he shook his head. He kept glancing between her mouth and her eyes, appearing more agitated and confused by the moment.

“Where are you hurt?” she asked.

He shook his head. “I can’t hear you!” he yelled. “Say it again.”

Oh dear God, have mercy
. She swallowed hard, cleared her throat, and spoke as loudly and clearly as possible. “Where are you hurt?”

His confusion faded as fear tinged his face. She was frightened, too, for in all the terrible scenarios she’d obsessed over while wandering through the street, she had never imagined this.

Clyde was completely deaf.

Romulus stood in the corner of the examining room, keeping a close eye on his two best friends in the world as a doctor examined Clyde.

The hospital was crowded, noisy, and filled with panicked people. They had waited three hours on a hard bench in the hallway as the critically injured people were treated first, then finally they’d been shown into this small examination room. Clyde sat on the patient’s cot, looking pale and stoic as the doctor examined his ears.

In order to get a proper view of the middle ear, the doctor wanted Clyde to go through a series of simple commands, such as swallowing and taking a deep breath. Clyde didn’t understand their pantomiming, and Evelyn’s hands shook too badly to write, so Romulus wrote the commands and Clyde followed the instructions as the doctor studied both ears. A rubber tube and balloon was used to blow a puff of air into the ear canal while the doctor studied the reaction.