Mail Order Sweetheart. Christine Johnson

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       Chapter Three

      “There’s a passenger ship in trouble,” Mrs. Calloway announced to Fiona as she hurried through the dining room on her way to the kitchen. “We’re going to need every bed in the place made up and every spare blanket brought over to the lighthouse.”

      A passenger ship! Fiona’s heart leaped into her throat. Mary Clare. What if her niece was on that ship? She pushed aside the newspapers, husband-hunting forgotten, and raced to the entry hall. In a second, she donned her cloak.

      “Where are you going?” the boardinghouse proprietress asked.

      “I have to do something to help.” Fiona couldn’t bring herself to mention the fear that was building in her chest. A seven-year-old girl. A sinking ship. Icy water. What if?

      “You can help right here. We need to carry blankets to the lighthouse.”

      The lighthouse would do. From there she could see what was happening and learn what would be done. If the passengers were brought ashore, she could then bring Mary Clare here and warm her up.

      “What about the rooms?” Fiona headed for the staircase without removing her cloak. “We’ll need to warm the beds and have something hot for them to drink.”

      “All taken care of, dear. Louise has already begun preparing the rooms, and Pearl and Amanda are on their way. Come with me to the linen closet, and we’ll grab the extra blankets.”

      Fiona took a deep breath. There wasn’t anything she could do right now. Mrs. Calloway had said the ship was in trouble, not that it had sunk. “The ship is still afloat, then?”

      “Aye, bobbing like a cork, I understand.”

      Fiona breathed out a shaky sigh of relief. “Is it a large ship?” Maybe if it was very small, Mary Clare wouldn’t be aboard. Lillibeth had said something about a group of orphans.

      “From what I hear, it’s like the one you came in on.”

      Oh, dear. There had been scores of passengers on the Milwaukee. If rescued, where would they go? Mary Clare could join her, but the rest? “We’ll never have room for everyone.”

      “We’ll squeeze them in. Some can sleep in the parlor or on the dining-room chairs.”

      As Fiona followed Mrs. Calloway upstairs, she recalled all too clearly the crowded conditions when she was growing up. Parents, two grandmothers, seven siblings—one with a husband—and a baby all squeezed into the tiny tenement apartment. She and three sisters and the grandmothers shared a single bed—three facing one direction and three the other. She’d been kicked in the back and shoulders numerous times, but the boys had it tougher. They’d line up the wooden chairs for beds—three chairs per bed. Ma and Pa gave up their bedroom to her oldest sister’s family, while they slept atop the kitchen table.

      Mrs. Calloway was suggesting the same sort of discomfort, except this would be temporary. Fiona hadn’t known relief until she began getting paid to sing and moved to a boardinghouse room of her own. It had felt like the height of luxury, and she would never go back.

      At the linen shelves, Mrs. Calloway grabbed a stack of blankets and handed them to Fiona. “Is that too much, dear?”

      “I can carry more.” Fiona had always been strong. As a girl, she’d prided herself on the ability to lift more than boys her age. Contrary to common belief, she did not shirk manual labor.

      Mrs. Calloway added a few. “No more, or you won’t be able to see in front of you. Come now, let’s get these downstairs and then head over to the lighthouse.”

      After Mrs. Calloway donned her outerwear, they trudged through town. The wind howled off the lake, filling the streets with sand and whipping those particles through the air so they stung every inch of exposed skin. Fiona lowered her head against the wind. Thankfully she’d thought to pull the hood of her cloak over her head, or her hair would be filled with grit.

      The drifts of sand made progress through town difficult, but fear for Mary Clare drove Fiona on. Climbing the dune taxed her limits. She gasped for breath and had to pause several times while Mrs. Calloway plodded on, apparently oblivious to the exertion. Maybe Fiona wasn’t as strong as she’d thought. The years on the stage had apparently taken their toll.

      She pressed onward.

      At the top of the dune, the lighthouse flashed a signal in a repeating pattern, but her attention landed on the men standing near the lighthouse entrance. One form was unmistakable. Sawyer. Relief flooded her. She’d never known a stronger man. He could do anything. He would save Mary Clare.

      “Sawyer!” The wind shoved her cry back at her.

      He would never hear. She must wait until she reached him.

      Mrs. Calloway had gained the top of the dune and was talking to an older man bundled in oilskins. Fiona didn’t recognize him. Then again, it was dark except for the flashes of light from the tower above. Sawyer joined them, and the older man handed him what looked like a large coil of rope.

      Fiona СКАЧАТЬ