Sand Island Diaries by Lael R. Neill

Author:Lael R. Neill [Neill, Lael R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Scarred Hero/Heroine
Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
Published: 2014-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 9

The train slowed at the outskirts of Elk Gap. Elizabeth, gazing out the rain-streaked window into the cold, bleak October day, felt deep relief. The long journey had finally come to an end. It did not matter if the small town looked like the meanest backwater she could ever imagine. It would provide a refuge when she needed it most.

She could see the train station for perhaps a mile before the engineer blew for the stop. It appeared deserted, as did the main street itself. Her heart hit the soles of her shoes as it became evident her mother had not made any arrangements for her. Instead, she had been dumped on her cousin’s door, a foundling left on the church steps, discarded like an incriminating piece of garbage.

When the train finally stopped, she let the conductor give her a hand down the steps, then waited for the porters to unload her camel-backed steamer trunk. She came around the end of the building, looking about her at the scene her cousin Jenny had described, the same scene that had launched her on the path to her medical career, and the love of her life. Hard on the heels of the thought came the one she lived with every waking moment: there would be no love of her life, for Paul had become an impossibility. To boot, he was probably so close to her he could appear at any moment. What would she do if she saw him?

As she looked across the street toward a three-story white board-and-batten building sporting a sign reading “Mrs. Hammill’s Boarding House,” a tall figure in a distinctive Northwest Mounted Police uniform stepped out onto the porch and glanced across at the train station. Her heart gave a huge hitch in her chest, and for a moment her breath failed and her vision faded. She took hold of a convenient post in case she fainted, or her lurching stomach rebelled even further. But then she recognized the insignia on the sleeve of Shane’s tunic. Though relieved, she felt she was not yet ready to face her cousin by marriage. She bowed her head, hiding her face.

She watched as Shane looked down the street, then waved at someone. Following his line of sight, she saw another tall figure in a Red Serge posting toward her on a big chestnut horse. The shock of recognizing the sergeant’s stripes on Paul’s sleeves translated itself into a sheet of lightning before her eyes and a sudden constricting pain flashing through her chest. She clutched at her post with gloved fingers growing rapidly strengthless. Then her vision grayed out around the edges, and as the scene spiraled into a small dot before her eyes, she sank to the board sidewalk, an unconscious bundle of fur coat and widow’s weeds.

The next thing of which she became aware was a voice persistently calling her name. A hand firmly patting her cheek had some connection with the voice that now encouraged her to wake up.

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