Promise of Tomorrow (10 page)

Eighteen

May 30, 1889

Jack breathed in the taste of freedom. Memorial Day meant a holiday. It meant festivities and banners and a nice tribute to the veterans of the Civil War. As he emerged from his shack and waved a hand at his landlady, who was busy herding her grandchildren indoors, he rubbed at the spot above his eyes where a dull ache had started to build after his restless night.

The fact that Robert had received
his
promotion burned in his mind. His anger flared and tasted hot on his tongue. After all he had done for Fulton, the man gave the position to Robert. Jack grunted and squeezed his eyes shut. Robert would continue to rub it in his face, he had no doubt, but he would have to take it. If he protested too loudly, Fulton just might fire him, and if he got fired, there would be no way he could ever afford to get married. Besides, he still had his plans.

Jack opened his eyes. Fulton's willingness to finance Jack's foray into inventing a better method of turning iron ore into steel still meant he had confidence in Jack's ability. And if the plans were accepted, it could mean a promotion to something far above Robert's new position. The very idea made Jack want to laugh. Oh, to see the expression on Robert's face then. And Alaina would be so proud of him.

In his mind, he could see the twinkle of pride in Alaina's dark eyes. He imagined her mane of hair, pulled back into ringlets, and her petite form gowned in the latest fashion. His heart pounded, and he lengthened his stride.

As he passed over the Little Conemaugh, he took note of the swollen, raging waters and how the water rose far above its normal level. He stabbed a glance at the pouting sky and made a mental note to take the train up to South Fork and check on the dam for himself.

Water stood knee-deep in some of the streets. He wondered what James Quinn of Foster and Quinn, a general store, thought of all the rain. He was one of the few citizens Jack knew who worried over the dam breaking.

“Hallo!”

Jack stopped in a deep puddle and waved as a hack pulled up beside him, the animal's back dark with water and sweat. “Ben, doing the business today, right?”

“Sure enough.” Ben halted his horse right beside Jack. “The ladies especially aren't wanting to get their feet wet.”

“I'd think on a day like this most would want to stay dry. The wet only adds to the chill in the bones.”

“Ah, but there's something about Memorial Day that lightens the spirit.” His grin turned knowing. “Steady stream heading to the depot. If you hop in, I'll get you there before she leaves.”

Jack studied his friend's expression and wide grin and felt the first squeeze of dread. “Before she leaves?”

Ben's smile wilted. “Why, sure.” The man glanced over Jack's shoulder and scratched his chin with the edge of the reins in his hands. “Took her, her momma, and the children over there for the ten fifteen to Pittsburgh. Want a ride?”

“Pittsburgh?” He tried to make sense of the news being dumped on him. Tried to understand why Alaina would be headed to Pittsburgh. Or maybe. . . “Her mother must be headed out to visit.”

Ben raised his eyebrows. “From the chatter and the way she was dressed, Alaina's the one traveling.”

Jack took a giant step forward and swung himself into the hack. “Hurry then.”
The jerk of forward motion slammed Jack against the seat. He closed his eyes, unable to understand Alaina's trip to Pittsburgh or her lack of communication on the matter. What about Sam and Missy? He dared not jump to conclusions without talking to her.

A church clock struck the hour of ten as the horse pulled up in front of the B&O station.

Jack pressed a coin into Ben's hand and spun toward the station. People lined the platform. A pile of trunks and boxes waited to be loaded.

He scanned the crowds until his eyes focused on two familiar faces. Sam and Missy each held one of Charlotte Morrison's hands. When Alaina's mother caught his gaze, her lips pressed together.

But the woman who stood up beside Missy, her back to him, hair pulled back in ringlets and wearing a gown of rich material cut in the latest style, was what set Jack's heart to beating. It was as if the mental image he'd had of her on his walk to Johnstown had materialized.

Alaina's mother nodded his direction.

Jack took a step closer.

Alaina turned, her eyes solemn, but the soberness faded into something else as he drew nearer.

He searched her face, the burgundy of her eyes, and tried to put meaning to the question he didn't know how to form.

“Jack.” She lifted a hand and he caught it and brought it to his chest.

“Jack!” Missy's mouth curved into a smile.

He lifted his hand in a wave and forced a grin, all he could muster, then faced Alaina. “Ben told me you were here. Pittsburgh?”

“She's going to see the school like I've told her she should from the first,” Charlotte offered.

Alaina turned. “Momma, please.”

“Give my girl a chance. Some space. That's all I ask.” Charlotte's no-nonsense tone held a note of desperation.

Jack felt dumbstruck by her words and the strange reality of Alaina's obvious decision to leave.

“The train is coming, Alaina,” Charlotte murmured and shrank back with Sam and Missy. “Don't take long.”

❧

She was a coward. She knew that now, facing Jack, seeing the anguish on his face.

Her mother had encouraged her to leave as soon as possible, and now she understood why. When she sat to write a letter to Jack, her mother insisted she hurry and pack. When she had paused from work with the intention of asking Victor Heiser if he'd carry the letter to Jack, Charlotte waved the idea away. “You've no time for that. He's had no time for you.” And she'd allowed her mother to have sway over her.

But now, facing Jack, she knew she should have sought him out as her heart had told her to. “I've got to go, Jack. I've got to see what's out there for me.”

“The college?”

“Momma has always wanted me to go. To see for myself. You know that.”

“But what about us?”

Tears burned her eyes. Frustration mingled with love, but the frustration took firmer hold on her emotions. “Us?” She stared down at their joined hands and felt the well of all the forgotten plans and the excuses that followed. “I don't know. There never seemed to be any us. Just you and your determination to get rich. To invent whatever it is you—”

“Is it so wrong to want more for you than what you have now?”

It was the same old argument. She knew she would never get him to see that she needed
him
more than she needed
wealth
, and for the first time she recognized that she could not change him. She could not alter his drive. Only God could do that.

Her mother had been right all along. Marrying a man with such fierce focus meant she would be ignored. Was being ignored. In his bid to become rich, he'd become as fierce as his father, not in temper but in attitude.

The train came pounding into the station, leaving them suspended in pained silence as the vibration and noise drowned out any attempts at words.

His thumb stroked along the back of her hand. His tender touch impaled her heart and brought a wave of fresh tears to her eyes. He became a distorted image. When she raised her free hand to wipe the wetness from her cheeks, Jack produced a handkerchief in a swift motion.

The train settled into place, and people began to churn into action around them.

Alaina couldn't speak.

“Please don't leave,” Jack whispered.

“I've got to do this.” She wanted to say, “For me,” but recognized how it seemed to reek of selfishness. Was she being selfish? Wasn't he? Marriage meant unselfish commitment. Not this. She had to release him.

“I lost the promotion. Is that why you're leaving?”

“No.”

“You didn't know, then?”

Her lower lip trembled. “Robert told me.”

“We'll make something work out.”

“Why didn't you come over last night?”

“I did. You weren't home. I thought you might be out with Robert.”

Stung by the veiled accusation, she caught her trembling lip between her teeth.

His free hand captured hers and he squeezed. “When you come back, we'll set a date. I can still work at Cambria, and if my plans go through. . .” The words tumbled from him like the raging waters of the Little Conemaugh. “Maybe we'll have enough money.”

She shook her head, and his hands squeezed harder.

His eyes pleaded. “A trip away will help settle your mind. It'll be good for you to get away. They say distance makes love stronger.”

“I can't—” Her voice caught on a sob. “Jack, please. Listen to me.”

“The plans will work, and I'll have enough to marry you. We'll set the date for the end of June. If Fulton doesn't think the idea will take, then I'll work on another.”

“Jack, listen!”

“All aboard!” the conductor called out.

“It's time, Alaina.” Her mother hovered at her elbow like an anxious bird. “Your bag is aboard.”

“Mother, please.” Her tears fell freely now, and she faced Jack again.

His eyes held a wet sheen that beckoned her own tears.

Charlotte retreated as the conductor shouted out another call.

“I've tried, Jack.” She licked her lips and tasted salt. “I've tried, but I can't do this. I can't marry you.”

His chest rose sharply, and he pulled her into his arms, where the scent of his damp shirt filled her nostrils and made her close her eyes against the desire to take back what she'd just said.

“Alaina, don't leave me,” he whispered in her ear. “Don't leave me.”

“People are more important than things, Jack.”

“You are important to me.”

“When you think of me.”

“But I do, Alaina. All the time. I do it for—”

She couldn't bear to hear him say it yet again. She wrenched herself from his grasp just as the conductor gave his last warning and the train whistle rent the air.

Jack reached to grab one of her hands, but she took a retreating step out of his reach. She took another step, shaking her head, unable to meet her mother's gaze, only able to see the rawness of emotion slashing sorrow into the angles of Jack's face.

She pressed a hand to her mouth and finally turned toward the train to run the final steps. The train started forward as she slid into her seat, alternately waving to her mother and grieving over the slumped shoulders and bowed head of the man she still loved. Her breath fogged the glass, and she resisted the urge to write the words “I'm so sorry, Jack” in the dew, but she felt them deep in her heart and soul.

Nineteen

“You're a fool, Jack Kelly. A young, arrogant fool.”

Jack sluiced a hand over his wet head and glared at his friend. “I came for some measure of comfort, and I get condemnation?”

Frank sat up in bed, propped by no fewer than four pillows, and pursed his lips. “Being near death helps give one new insight. You've treated that girl like a new hat. You don't give it the time of day unless it's a special holiday. Then you're glad to wear it.”

He bit back the angry defense of his actions and said the words that had echoed through his mind ever since Alaina had disappeared onto the train. “I loved her.”

He had wandered for hours, barely acknowledging the greetings from store owners and the barber. Not even the jokes about the high water or the sight of a man in a boat paddling down one road freed him from the chains of his remorse and grief. He loved her.

“Aye, boy-o, you loved her. As much as a pigheaded scrap of a man can love anyone.”

His head snapped up. “You—”

Frank raised his hand and poked a finger into Jack's chest. Even from the hospital bed, Jack felt the sheer strength of the man in that one gesture. And something else. He saw the fury. “Wake up! How many times did you promise her you'd see her and not show up?”

Jack firmed his jaw. “She knew I had to work on my plans and—”

“How long you been feeding yourself that line, boy? How long you been ignoring what's important? Where's your faith, man? God Himself tells us to love a woman more than we love ourselves.”

“I know that verse. It's for the married.”

“And you were planning on treating her good only then?”

“You know what I mean.”

Frank rose up. “It doesn't matter now, does it? You ignored her in favor of gain, and now you've lost everything.”

With great effort, Jack stamped back the tirade of words that perched on his tongue.

Frank must have seen his struggle, only he didn't hold back. “Your money will keep you warm. But will it give you the companionship and love that a woman can give? Wake
up
, Jack!”

“I can see”—he sucked in a ragged breath—“that I made a mistake seeking you out. I thought you might help bolster a fella in his time of need.”

“You thought I'd give you sympathy and soothe your pride. Pride isn't meant to be soothed, boy. It's meant to be repented of.”

“I grew up poor, Frank. Remember? No one could ever be more humbled by that than me.”

“It's become a pride to you to gain riches and overcome your past. You want what you didn't think you had as a boy and what you now think is owed you.” Frank rubbed the back of his neck, and Jack caught the wince of pain that the simple movement caused him. “How many times has Alaina told you she doesn't need to be the wife of a rich man?”

Jack froze. Had he talked to Alaina? He ran his fingers along the rim of his damp hat, regarding the roughness of the material.

Alaina's face filled his mind. Her pleading words echoed to him.
“I don't need to be rich, Jack.”
He pounded his hat back on his head and spun. “I'll leave you to your own company then.”

“Jack.”

He spun around as Frank relaxed back, deep into the pillows, and closed his eyes. “Do us all a favor and keep your eye on that dam. Heard there's more rain on the way. That thing's not going to hold forever.”

❧

As the train picked up speed, Alaina struggled against the burn in her throat and the even worse hole where her heart had been. She rested her forehead against the window and prayed for strength and wisdom. . .and Jack. Always for Jack.

Releasing him had been the hardest thing. On so many levels she knew it was the answer, the right thing to do, but the pain consumed her like fire.

The conductor asked for her ticket just as the tears began staining her cheeks all over again. His kindly face smiled down at her. “If there's anything you need, ma'am. . .”

“Thank you,” she croaked out, but the show of sympathy unraveled what little composure she'd managed to hold on to. Turning back to the window, she buried her face in her hands and let loose the torrent in a series of soft sobs that made her grateful the train didn't travel with a full car of passengers.

She seemed to move in a haze, partially aware of her mother's sister meeting her and the ride to the small, but richly furnished home. Her aunt's stream of chatter, so contrary to her mother's quiet nature, relieved her of the need to keep a constant dialogue going, and though sunshine spilled down in Pittsburgh, Alaina felt grateful for the warmth of the new, heavy dress material.

When her Aunt Joanne, or Aunt Jo as she preferred, took her on a hackney ride up Eighth Street to the college, the immenseness of the building overwhelmed her senses.

“I'm so excited to have you move here and attend,” her aunt chattered on. “You've kept up your studies? Knowing your mother, I'm sure you have.” The older woman twisted on her seat and shaded her eyes to squint at the building. A deep sigh escaped her. “Oh, how lovely. Brings a thrill to my heart every time I think of women in higher education. We'll give those men something to think about, right, dear?”

Her aunt seldom required a response, and Alaina allowed her to continue the one-sided conversation. She needed to say something. Wanted to say quite a lot, really, but not about college or Latin or anything else related to life outside of Johnstown. It felt too much like acknowledging a life without Jack.

Oh, God, what have I done? Am I in Your will now, here, or in Johnstown?