The Mistaken Widow. Cheryl St.John
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struggled with pulling the wool socks on her cold feet.
“Isn’t he somethin’? I met him in New York when I was designing costumes for a play he wrote. He’s taking me to meet his family in Ohio. I doubt they’re going to like me, though.” Claire turned back and took Sarah’s wet clothing.
“Why wouldn’t they like you?”
“Let’s just say I’m not cut from the same cloth as the Hallidays. They’re rich. Stephen’s father started an iron foundry years ago, and now they send stoves and such all over the country—even to Europe.”
Halliday Iron? Sarah remembered seeing that imprint on the cast-iron stove the cook used in her father’s Boston home.
“My daddy was a factory worker in New York before he died when I was little. My mama and I hung on any old way we could. Not exactly blue bloods, you know.”
“I’m sure they’ll like you anyway,” Sarah said, placing more hope than certitude into the thought. She knew exactly what the upper crust thought of those they considered lower class. She knew how important social strictures and appearances were to well-to-do men and women like her father. Stephen, however, didn’t seem like Morris Thornton or his snobbish acquaintances.
Claire rambled on, and Sarah fought to keep her eyelids from drooping. Finally Stephen returned, bringing Sarah a tray of steaming meat and vegetables and a cold glass of milk. Her stomach rumbled at the smell, and she was so grateful she could have cried.
“We’ll be in the dining car,” he said. “You eat and rest. I’ll bring Claire back later, then I’ll find a game of cards to keep me occupied the rest of the night.”
His generosity at giving up his berth for the night warmed Sarah more than Claire’s wrapper and his wool socks. Her thanks were inadequate, but all she had to give. She ate the delicious food, better than anything she’d tasted since leaving home several months ago and, ruminating her stroke of luck, made herself as comfortable as possible on the narrow bunk.
Thankfully, neither Stephen nor Claire had mentioned the fact that Sarah was quite obviously pregnant, nor had they asked any prying questions or expected an explanation. That was why she’d begun this dreadful journey in the first place. Rumor said people were less strict the farther west one traveled. In the newly developing country of cattle ranches and mines and railroads, people weren’t asked nosy questions about their backgrounds.
She had no idea how far she would have to travel before she found work and a place to stay, but she had no choice.
Every week the Boston Daily printed dozens of announcements for women wanted. Western men needed wives; Sarah knew how to plan a dinner party and set a formal table, but her experiences with men hadn’t given her a great desire to marry one and suffer his temperament.
Establishments needed cooks and waitresses, but her skill involved planning a menu and instructing servants. Teachers were in short supply, though, and she’d been to school. She prayed she’d find a place where she and her baby would fit in. Perhaps Indiana or Illinois would be far enough. Sarah squeezed her eyes closed and tried not to cry over the pain in her back and the fear of being alone and solely responsible for another life.
Sarah placed her hand over her extended abdomen and fought tears. Yes, she was a foolish girl, just as her father had accused. Yes, she’d been rebellious and gone against his wishes, ignoring the young men he’d chosen for her, and accepting an offer from one less appropriate.
Gaylen Carlisle, without intentions of marriage or fidelity, had seduced her, then abruptly left for the Continent when she’d voiced her fear of pregnancy.
Sarah had waited until she could no longer hide her condition before she confessed her transgression to her father. Outraged, he had immediately tossed her out of his home before she could cause him further embarrassment.
She’d found a room over a butcher’s shop until last week, when her funds ran frighteningly low. Due to her father’s intervention, no one in Boston had been willing to give her a job or take her in. She’d sold a necklace, one of the pieces of her mother’s jewelry that she’d inherited, and tried to make her way toward a new life. One thing after another had waylaid her, until this last, and worst, predicament.
The nagging pain in Sarah’s back snaked around to her abdomen, and she nearly groaned aloud. But the rhythmic rocking of the train as it chugged its way westward combined with the soothing warmth of the dry clothing and bedcovers as well as the contentment of having food in her stomach. Exhaustion overcame discomfort, and she drifted into a sound sleep.
A sudden jarring movement and the deafening sound of scraping metal woke her. Disoriented, Sarah had no way of knowing how much time had passed, but the compartment remained dark. A sense of vertigo overtook her, and the motion of the railcar was all wrong. She clamped her teeth together, and with a scream, she was flung from the bunk toward the opposite wall.
The last coherent thought that crossed her mind was fear for her baby.
Sarah’s leg throbbed with an intensity that overrode the pain in her back and told her she was still alive. The coppery smell of blood was strong, and overhead, incessant rain pounded against metal. Her pulse throbbed violently in her head and leg. She wanted to cry, but she wouldn’t. She wanted to pray, but she couldn’t Gratefully, she succumbed to the pain and blackness.
Sometime later the stringent smells of antiseptic and starch burned her nostrils. Her leg still hurt, but it wasn’t the same torment as before. Now she could feel her head, too, and it pounded with every beat of her heart. She cracked open an eye and peered at the painfully bright sunlight streaming through the small window into the drab green room. She opened her mouth, and a dry croak came out.
“Lie still, dear. You’ve taken a nasty bump. Doctor says you mustn’t move.”
“Whe-where am—”
“Shush now. Don’t fret yourself. Rest your eyes.”
Sarah closed her eyes as the woman instructed. A nurse. She was in a hospital. A crisp sheet covered her, cool fabric draped her skin. Her leg wouldn’t move. She tested her hands, opening and closing, and lifted one arm at a time, barely off the mattress.
She opened her eyes again, and her right hand moved instinctively, protectively, to her belly.
Her flat belly!
“Oh, my—.” Sarah tried to raise her head from the pillow.
“No, no, lie back,” the nurse soothed.
“My baby! Where’s my baby?” The motion and those words sucked all her energy and, dizzy, she collapsed back against the hard bed.
“Your baby’s just fine,” the woman said.
The woman’s face swam in a flesh-toned blur that blended into the ceiling. Fine? Her baby was fine?
“Whe-ere?” she managed.
“We’re taking good care of him until you feel better. Rest now, so you’ll heal and can take care of him yourself.”
Sarah closed her eyes against the acute pain throbbing in her head. He? She had a baby boy? A single tear slipped from beneath her lashes and trickled across her temple.
The next time Sarah wakened, it took her a few minutes to remember where she was and what had happened. She’d been on a train. Something awful had happened, and now she lay in the hospital. She had a son.
She struggled to a sitting position, and pulled the covers away to reveal her swollen and bandaged left leg. Grimacing, she ran her fingertips over the bandage on her head.
“What are you doing? You shouldn’t be sitting up!” The admonishment came from the doorway, and a uniformed