My Darling Melissa (39 page)

Her room was not so modest as Gillian had led her to expect; it was situated in a rear corner of the topmost floor, and the ceiling slanted at a steep angle, but there was a view of the water and a private bath. Of course, in summer the room would be suffocatingly hot, but Melissa decided not to do any advance worrying on that score. She had plenty of other things on her mind.

She had an early dinner in the corner of the huge kitchen downstairs, wanting a chance to watch the chef in action, then retired to her room for a bath. When she’d dried herself and gotten into a nightgown she crawled into her narrow bed with a notebook and a pen, her ink bottle resting on the nightstand.

The story she was writing was nearing its spectacular end, and Melissa felt a certain grief at the inevitable parting that would separate her from her beloved characters for all time. She worked diligently, from her heart, until the hour was late and she could not keep her attention focused. She set aside her work, went to sleep, and dreamed that she and Quinn lived in a tiny cabin in the woods. She had babies hanging from her skirts and sticking out of her apron pockets, and her husband got drunk and beat her with one of her own notebooks.

In the morning Melissa took special care to look her best. She wore a cornflower-blue dress that set off her eyes, and she brushed her hair until it was as soft and glossy as sable.
Then, weaving in a blue ribbon as she went, she plaited it into a single braid to trail down her back.

She went to the kitchen, but the sight and smell of frying eggs drove her right out again, so Melissa ended up meeting Keith’s train with an empty stomach and a pounding heart.

His smile was gentle as he stepped out onto the platform at the depot. “Hello, brat,” he said, and his very presence put a lot of her fears to rest.

Melissa stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “I’ve been so worried!” she scolded, but she couldn’t be angry with him. She’d vented all those feelings on Quinn the day before. “Is the family all right?”

Keith touched her cheek. “The family is fine, sweetheart,” he said. The spring sunshine glittered in his longish, dark gold hair, and his eyes, exactly the color of Melissa’s, swept her up in a look of affectionate reluctance. He was about to speak again when his attention shifted to someone standing behind Melissa.

He put out his hand and said, “Hello, Quinn.”

Melissa stiffened, then looked back over her shoulder and glared at Mr. Rafferty, silently warning him not to blurt out that the two of them weren’t married until she’d had a chance to break the news gently. After all, Keith was a preacher, and it wouldn’t be right to shock him.

Quinn chuckled as though she’d said something extraordinarily funny and returned Keith’s handshake. “Welcome,” he said quietly, and then he turned and led the way down the platform steps, onto the sidewalk, and on toward his house. He was deliberately giving the impression that he and Melissa had come to meet the train together, she getting a little ahead of him in her eagerness to see her brother.

Melissa did nothing to correct the misunderstanding, though she knew she wouldn’t be able to lie to Keith about her circumstances and hoped that Quinn didn’t expect that of her. She would cross her bridges as she came to them.

They had all reached Quinn’s house, where Becky and Helga had set out a splendid brunch in the dining room. Keith looked at the food in polite despair, obviously, whatever he had come to say had affected his appetite.

Melissa’s was no better. She helped herself to a cup of tea and left the scones and croissants and sliced fruit untouched on the sideboard.

“What is it?” she finally demanded of her brother, too nervous to wait in suspense any longer. When Quinn’s hand closed around hers underneath the table she made no attempt to pull free.

Keith sat back in his chair with a heavy sigh. “Someone has probably written and told you that we had a rash of chicken pox in the family a while back,” he began.

Melissa nodded, frightened again. “Fancy told me,” she said.

After a moment’s reflection Keith went on, speaking very softly. “Jeff developed a high fever, and we almost lost him. While he was out of his head he told me something that he and Adam have been keeping from the rest of us for a long time.”

Biting her lower lip and fidgeting in her chair, Melissa held tight to Quinn’s hand. Strength and balance seemed to be flowing into her through his fingers. “Go on,” she whispered.

He sighed. “I’m not sure I’m right to tell you about this—believe me, Adam and I debated it. He thinks it’s better to let sleeping dogs lie, that what happened doesn’t have any bearing on your life now.” He paused, scanning the ceiling as if in search of some wisdom written there. “In my opinion, you have the right to know the truth, just as I did. Whether to tell Mama or not is something none of us has been able to decide.”

“Keith!” Melissa blurted out in agony. Quinn’s thumb made a comforting circle on the back of her hand.

Keith closed his eyes for a moment. When he finally spoke again his words rocked Melissa to her very soul. “Papa didn’t die when he and Adam had that accident on the water, Melissa. He was alive for five years after that.”

The room seemed to dip and sway violently, like a wagon careening straight down a mountainside. “No,” Melissa whispered. “No—it can’t be true.”

Quinn shoved back his chair to rise and stand behind
Melissa’s, his hands resting strong and solid on her shoulders. She’d told him about her father and the boating accident that had taken place when she was thirteen. And the awesome, numbing grief she’d suffered afterward.

Keith got out of his chair and sat on his haunches in front of Melissa, his hands holding both of hers in a tight, warm grip. “Sweetheart, Papa was sick. Really sick.”

Moisture welled in Melissa’s eyes. “We would have taken care of him, Mama and I!”

Her brother smoothed away a stray tear with one thumb. “I know that, brat, and so did Papa. There were reasons for what he did—good ones.”

Melissa was beginning to recover a little from the initial shock. “Where was he, Keith? Where was Papa all that time?”

“Remember how Adam used to make those mysterious trips up the mountain all the time when Banner first came to Port Hastings? Papa lived up there in a cabin.”

Quinn’s grasp on Melissa’s shoulders was sustaining her. “Why?” she whispered. “Just tell me why Papa hid from us—tell me why Adam kept such a secret!”

“Papa had leprosy, Melissa,” Keith said, and now there were tears in his eyes, too. “He was afraid the rest of us would contract the disease, and so was Adam.”

Melissa’s hand trembled as she reached out for a napkin and dried her eyes. A wild hope possessed her. “Maybe Jeff just dreamed all this. You said he had a high fever!”

Keith shook his head. “I went straight to Adam, and he admitted everything.”

“You’re not angry!” Melissa breathed, marveling. She wanted to find Adam and scream at him for keeping her papa from her when she’d loved him so much and needed him so badly. “I can’t believe you just accepted this! Adam and Jeff had no right to withhold a secret like that from us!”

Keith went back to his chair and sank into it with a sigh. “I was angry, Melissa,” he said quietly. “But once I’d thought it through, I understood. I know you will, too, when you get over the feelings you’re having now.”

Melissa thought of the mourning she’d done, the conversations
she’d had with her father after his “death,” believing him to be something of a guardian angel looking after her. She threw back her head and screamed in fury and pain, then burst into ragged sobs. Never in all her life had she felt so betrayed. Or so alone.

Quinn drew back, sensing that she didn’t want to be touched, and when she leapt from her chair and fled the room he did not follow her.

Quinn felt almost as sorry for his brother-in-law as he did for Melissa. It had been a hard thing for Keith to come and tell his sister a story like that when it was obvious that he’d barely recovered from the shock himself.

“She’ll be all right once she’s had some time to arrange all this in her mind,” Quinn said, taking a cheroot from the pocket of his flannel shirt. He struck a match and drew the aromatic smoke into his lungs.

Keith nodded. “I know.” He smiled bleakly. “Melissa looks as fragile as a violet, but she’s tougher than your average coal miner.”

Quinn chuckled ruefully. “Amen,” he said.

“I know it’s early, and I’m a preacher,” Keith began with a sheepish grin, “but I could use a shot of whiskey.”

Quinn brought a bottle and two glasses from a cabinet next to the sideboard. “I’ve been doing a little drinking myself since I met Calico,” he confessed.

Keith laughed at that. “Does it help?”

“No,” Quinn responded without hesitation. “Nothing helps. And it just so happens that Melissa and I have a secret of our own.”

After he’d taken a sip of his whiskey Keith eyed Quinn speculatively and asked, “Oh? Like what?”

Quinn tossed back his drink and poured a second before answering. “We’re not married, and I think she’s going to have a baby.”

Keith set his glass down with a crash. “What?”

Quickly, Quinn explained the misunderstanding that had taken place in Seattle. He was careful to point out the fact
that he hadn’t known the justice of the peace was a fake any more than Melissa had.

“But she believes you tricked her?”

“She did,” Quinn answered sadly. “I don’t know if she still thinks that, because we can’t talk without fighting.”

To Quinn’s surprise, Keith smiled. “You’re either loving or doing battle,” he guessed aloud, “and there’s no in-between.”

Quinn nodded.

“It’s the passion,” Keith said with a shrug. “You and Melissa have got to learn control, that’s all. The knack of it comes with time.”

Quinn shook his head. He couldn’t imagine controlling what he felt for Melissa. It would be like trying to stop a train by stringing thread across the track.

Twenty-three

Melissa took refuge in Quinn’s study, curling up in a large chair facing the empty fireplace and covering her face with both hands.

“What’s the matter, lady?” a small voice asked when Melissa’s deep, hiccuping sobs had abated.

Melissa spread her fingers and saw a little girl of four or five sitting on the hearth, playing with a one-eyed rag doll.

“I’m Margaret,” persisted the pretty child, clearly determined to strike up a conversation. A tiny, delicate finger waggled at her. “Your name is Calico,” Margaret went on, “and the end of your nose is all red from crying.”

In spite of everything, Melissa had to smile. She dried her cheeks with the backs of her hands, heartened by the presence of the child. “My name isn’t Calico,” she said pleasantly. “It’s Melissa.”

Margaret shook her head solemnly, fragile wisps of blond hair escaping from her braids catching the sunlight as she did so. “Mr. Quinn says Calico,” she insisted, and Melissa had a suspicion that the matter was settled in her mind. “Did Mr. Quinn make you cry?”

Melissa shook her head.

“My daddy makes my mama cry all the time,” Margaret went on, getting up and drawing close to Melissa, the doll dangling at her side. “He made her nose bleed once. Mama says we don’t have to live with him anymore—we get to stay right here in this pretty house.”

Melissa’s heart twisted within her, and she forgot her own pain to put a gentle arm around the child. “I had a doll like this once,” she said, assessing the worn toy fondly. “I found her in a field, and I loved her best because she’d been lost.”

Before Margaret could make a reply Becky appeared, looking harried and very much afraid of offending. “Don’t bother Mrs. Rafferty,” the woman said, shooing the little girl away with her apron.

Melissa would have preferred for Margaret to stay, but she made no protest because it would have been wrong to interfere. Nor did she point out that she was not “Mrs. Rafferty,” for she needed the illusion of being connected to Quinn more than ever.

The room was quiet after Becky left, filled with the masculine scents of tobacco and leather and bay rum. Melissa remembered her laughing, handsome father and wept inwardly, even though no tears trickled down her cheeks or swelled in her eyes. How bitterly she coveted those five years that had been stolen from her.

She heard the door open presently and stiffened as Keith bent to kiss her on the cheek. “Ready to talk yet?” he asked.

Melissa let out a sigh and forced herself to look at her brother as he drew up a hassock and sat down facing her chair. She didn’t speak or even nod.

Keith reached out and took one of her hands. “I’m sorry, Melissa. Maybe Adam was right—maybe I should have left well enough alone. But I was afraid you’d find out on your own someday and hate us all for not telling you.”

She bit her lip. The news Keith had brought had wounded her, and badly, but the hurt was subsiding a little now. Although she had not yet absorbed the whole thing, she was beginning to understand what a dilemma Adam had faced.
She guessed that in his position she would have kept the secret, too.

“Did Quinn tell you about our wedding and—and the baby?” she ventured to ask.