Tilting at Windmills
PRAISE FOR JOSEPH PITTMAN AND TILTING AT WINDMILLS
“Pittman presents a more unique poetry, characters of a different sort of promise and conflict, plus a plot that flows with gentle literary allusion.”
—
Romantic Times
“TILTING AT WINDMILLS
is a poignant romance of heartbreak and second chances . . . Joseph Pittman’s
TILTING AT WINDMILLS
is a beautifully written romance that tugs at the heartstrings. In-depth characterization, a poignant tale of love, and an old windmill make
TILTING AT WINDMILLS
a must-read.”
“Pittman’s portrait of small-town life is romantic, yet the strong and realistic characters who populate the town are the novel’s great strength.”
—
The Denver Post
Books by Joseph Pittman:
A Christmas Wish
Tilting At Windm ills
When the World Was Small
Legend’s End
California Scheming:
A Todd Gleason Crime Novel
London Frog:
A Todd Gleason Crime Novel
TILTING AT WINDMILLS
JOSEPH PITTMAN
KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com
All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.
Table of Contents
PRAISE FOR JOSEPH PITTMAN AND TILTING AT WINDMILLS
Books by Joseph Pittman:
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
PROLOGUE
PART ONE -
M
ARCH
O
NE
T
WO
T
HREE
PART TWO -
A
PRIL
F
OUR
F
IVE
S
IX
PART THREE -
M
AY
- J
UNE
S
EVEN
E
IGHT
N
INE
T
EN
PART FOUR -
J
ULY
- A
UGUST
E
LEVEN
T
WELVE
T
HIRTEEN
E
PILOGUE
Teaser chapter
Copyright Page
For my parents,
G
ERARD
AND
R
OSEMARY
P
ITTMAN
Fortune is guiding our affairs better than we ourselves could have wished.
—C
ERVANTES,
D
ON
Q
UIXOTE
PROLOGUE
S
easons came and seasons went until countless years had passed and the men who had crafted her, labored in the hot sun to build the magnificent windmill, were like the wind itself, blown into the past, into the memories we coin as history. As for the windmill, it was allowed to fall into disrepair for too long a time, and the once-heralded landmark—a classic token of a lost era—became nothing more than an eyesore to a generation that no longer embraced its ancestry. There was talk, and not just once, of tearing down the old windmill.
Until she came along. The woman who loved the windmill and restored it to its former beauty and grace. At last, the wind would again pass through its sails, a familiar friend returned to define an otherwise lost landscape. She thought it sacrilegious to deprive the windmill of its true purpose, and by restoring its spirit to the building, she breathed vibrant new life into the community around it. She could never know, though, never imagine, that her love for the creaky old structure would inspire a sense of mutual caring and nurturing—even love—among the townsfolk. But it would, even in the face of awful tragedy and sorrow. The windmill would generate an invisible power of healing—and would bring together two most unlikely souls.
T
he sound was the hollowness of artificial life. The smell was the antiseptic odor of life held in the balance. The staccato beep of the heart machine, the lingering hiss of the breathing apparatus. No, she wasn’t gone, but neither was she fully here. Rather, she lay dreaming in her own private world. Her eyes were closed, her mouth, too—around a small tube.
Seated beside her, he thought he could detect a smile. In reality, the plastic tubing had caused an upswing of her lip, a false sign of consciousness. Otherwise, her features were devoid of animation; she had little color, too. What did register was an inner warmth, and that passed through her hands, her strong but somehow delicate fingers, to his. Entwined forever, like their lives.
It was after midnight and even though visiting hours were long over, he remained, not ready to leave her side. He was waiting for a sign. For all the words he’d spoken, aloud, silently, those tender expressions of love he had whispered into her ear, she had failed to respond. He assumed, and perhaps not wrongly, that she did not detect his presence.
“Hang in there. Please.”
It was not the plea of the desperate or the wallowing of the guilty. He spoke merely with a sense of hope.
“Mr. Duncan? Maybe you need some rest.”
He was about to protest to the duty nurse who had appeared. But doesn’t everyone put up an argument, only to eventually relent? He was too tired to argue. So with a simple kiss to the still woman’s forehead, mindful of the bandages and bruises, he left the room. He was not yet ready to leave the hospital; the wound was still too new and answers too few. He was about to ask the nurse to page her doctor when the doctor appeared around the corner. He held a chart and was closely examining it.
“Dr. Savage?” he asked.
The kind man, an elderly soul with a comforting sawbones appearance and a stethoscope dangling, proplike, around his neck, stopped, offered a smile.
“Still here, I see.” Then, with a gentle touch of hand to shoulder, he repeated the nurse’s instructions.
“Get yourself some rest. There’s nothing you can do now. Little we can do, except monitor her progress. The surgery went well, yes, but it’s too early for predictions. She’s not ready to wake; her body knows what’s best right now.” He paused, as though thinking of what else to offer, something positive. “There’s a little girl?”
He nodded, and understood. Excusing himself with thanks that sounded as hollow as her breathing had, he left the hospital and drove the twenty miles along blackened roads back to the farmhouse, where he hoped he was needed.
There was that word again. Hope.
A
s it turned out, he was needed.
Cynthia, her closest neighbor and friend, had stayed with Janey, the aforementioned little girl, who was now in bed but wary of sleep, of the dark, even at this late hour.
He entered the dimly lit room and was grateful that it fit his mood and hid his emotions. Easing down on the soft mattress, smoothing the rainbow-patterned quilt, he stared at the curious and sweet seven-year-old. He gently brushed her blond hair out of her eyes, smiled when it fell back in protest. It was a bit wild and unruly, not unlike this precious little girl. Snuggled deep into her bed, she appeared the picture of calm. He knew, though, she was scared.
“How’s Momma?”
What to say? “She’s doing what you should be doing.”
“You mean sleeping.”
He nodded.
“I want to see her. I didn’t get my good-night kiss,” she said with the barest hint of a pout. She wasn’t a pouter by trade.
“Just so happens, I brought a kiss home from your mom,” Brian said, and bent down to kiss the girl on her forehead. He imagined his lips as a conduit, keeping alive the unbreakable connection between mother and child.
The soft touch brought a comforting smile to the little girl’s lips. “I’m not very tired. Will you tell me a story?”
“Sure,” he said, knowing she was beyond tired and that once he began the story, she’d slip into dreamland, where, hopefully, the violent memories of today would fail to reach her. “What kind of story?”