Mission of Hope (18 page)

Nora ran her hand along the book. “Annette loved him.” It was an odd thing to say, but she felt that someone ought to at least make it clear that Annette was not duped or kidnapped or stolen in the night. “He loved her—or she believed he loved her.”

Mama reached out and smoothed Nora's hair, much as she had done when she was a small child. On the floor, at their feet, it did feel as if she'd become small again. “It isn't a fairy story, Nora. This would never have ended well. Only pain and heartache and much worse would have come to Annette. She must have known how dreadful it was to keep it even from you.” Mama's eyes looked from the book to Nora. “You can't keep it, you know. And you must never speak of it.” The warning in Mama's eyes made Nora clutch at the diary involuntarily. “I suppose it's up to Julia and Lawrence, but I wouldn't fault her if she chose to burn it.”

“Burn it?”

“It's far better if no one else knows.” Papa seemed to actually agree with Mama on this terrible suggestion. He looked at Nora. “Reverend Mansfield might make an example of Annette if he learned of it, and how could you put your aunt and uncle through something like that? Haven't they been through enough without adding such disgrace to their pain?”

A startling panic grabbed at Nora. “No one will know. I'll hide it. I can't bear to lose another piece of her.”

Mama looked at her as if she were a petulant child. “I think you meant to hide it now, and we all see what
has happened. Surely you won't put your needs before Annette's own mother and father's?”

Papa reached down and took the book gently from Nora. It took an enormous amount of willpower not to snatch it back out of his hands and run from the room. Everything seemed to be crumbling around her, and just at the time when things seemed to be springing to life. Any chance of Mama and Papa's ever approving of Quinn slipped through her fingers as she knelt on the parlor floor. “Perhaps,” Papa said in a quiet, managerial tone, “this is best decided in a while. Everyone has a lot to think about.”

Nora leaned back against the divan, feeling drained. If only you knew how much there is to think about, Papa.

“What was that you were holding when you came down this morning?” Mama's voice held a forced brightness, as if she were packing up all this unpleasantness to stuff away in a closet and wanted something nice to take its place.

“Sugar,” Nora said, still too stunned to evade the truth.

“Oh, my. Received a trinket from our dashing major, have you?”

Of course Mama would think the flowers and sugar came from Major Simon. He'd made a spectacle of himself bringing sugar when he came to dinner—Mama was beside herself at having a “true cup of tea” after dinner. Nora didn't answer. She had no idea what to say, especially in light of all that happened.

“Now, don't make Nora blush,” Papa said, smiling. It was clear from the look that passed between him and Mama how pleased they were at the major's attentions.
And yet how was she acting any different than Annette, sneaking around, whispering affections behind closed doors? “Perhaps you should come on the mail run with me this afternoon after all. I'm sure I could send word to Major Simon to meet us, and I'm equally sure he'd prefer to hear your gratitude in person.”

Any chance at seeing Quinn—however small—was a treasure. She needed his help to figure out what to do next.

Or did she? Was she simply letting some insipid passion pull her off the sensible course? She had never been one to second-guess things, had always thought of her decisiveness as a quality, not a fault. She'd loved it when Annette called her bold.

And where had Annette's even greater boldness—which Nora had always admired—gotten her? The urge to see Quinn now vied with an equally strong mistrust of her instincts. The result was a frustrating paralysis.

Papa laid his hand on her shoulder. “Come now, you mustn't let Annette's misfortune weigh down your own future.” It was the oddest thing to feel his offer of comfort, knowing he had no idea of the true reason for her upset. Like having two conversations at once. Now Papa was encouraging her to visit the camp?

Not the camp. The major.

D
olores Park buzzed with talk of the latest Midnight Messenger visit. One sack of goods—well, actually two, for Quinn had to make a second run with all those cumbersome tins of vegetables—had launched a fast and ever-exaggerating chain of gossip. As he stood in a bread line for unofficial camp residents after several hours' work cleaning bricks this morning (gratefully, a seated task; his feet throbbed), Quinn heard the pair of men behind him boast that the Midnight Messenger had brought an entire ham to a shack in Dolores Park. The truth had been slightly less heroic—a can of some sort of luncheon meat—but it made Quinn smile just the same. He smiled for a good half an hour, until it came to him that perhaps he ought to worry about what kinds of requests would turn up today. Someone had even come from another unofficial camp several blocks away, pinning a handful of requests to the Dolores Park message posts.

Major Simon had advised Quinn to only pull a handful of requests on an irregular schedule, but he'd long since begun augmenting his army-supplied runs with
Messenger deliveries of his own procurement. There was just so much need.

“Beware expectations,” the major had warned. “When unmet, they can be dangerous things.”

“Kind of odd when you think of it,” the man behind Quinn said. “We got us a whole army what's supposed to be lookin' out for our needs, and turns out one fella in a dark suit bests 'em all.”

That made Quinn raise an eyebrow and listen harder.

“How do you know the Midnight Messenger wears a dark suit?” the other asked suspiciously. Evidently, he suspected his partner knew more than he was letting on.

“I hear tell. Besides, what do you expect someone called the Midnight Messenger to wear? Pink?” He lowered his voice. “I heard he's a big fella. Over six feet.”

Quinn hunched.

“With long, flowing dark hair, like one of those pirate types.”

Quinn straightened up again, laughing at his own prideful caution.

“I reckon he works for the army,” the second man suggested. “So's they can cut corners and all.”

“Or spy on us,” the other countered. “He's got to be a sneaky one if no one's caught up with him yet.” Quinn bent down, pretending to have something wrong with his shoe, so that he could angle his face just enough to catch a glimpse of the pair. He thought he recognized the voices, but the faces were unfamiliar. Never mind, he knew which aisle they lived in by the can of meat he'd delivered there.

“Of course, if he works for the army, no one's
gonna
catch up with him, are they?”

“I hope they don't. My wife needs a tin of powder for her stomach troubles, and I don't hardly think an army that won't give us flour will give us medicine for my Laura.” The man grunted. “I'm fixing to put a message up on the post. I figure it's the postmaster who's got something to do with it. He don't ever cross to our side of the street, but his pretty daughter does. I seen her write things down once.”

“I heard someone tell that Major Simon fella to expect the postmaster and his daughter at today's mail run. Could be you're right, Mack.”

Only sheer strength of will squelched Quinn's urge to turn and look at the pair. Who was sending word to Simon that Nora was coming? And why? Had her father suddenly decided to encourage Nora's visits to Dolores Park? Or had Major Simon stepped up his efforts regarding Nora?

Nothing, not the longest bread line in history, not even the throbbing of his tired feet, would keep Quinn from today's mail run. He forced patience into his fidgety body as the line inched along by reciting, “Mack and Laura, stomach powder, same row as the ham.”

 

Nora looked upset. She smiled pleasantly, casting her eyes out over the crowd with every piece of mail, but Quinn held back, suddenly unsure if her quick, searching glances sought him or Major Simon. He'd thought she'd be beaming after the flowers and sugar. After their declarations in Bauers's study. He'd felt like nothing would come between them after they'd spent that time together. Himself, he'd been walking on air for
the hours since she kissed his hands. Now, he felt sore, exhausted, and naggingly uncertain. What he wanted, what he
needed,
was to speak with her. He thought of the pirates, the buccaneers the men in the bread line had likened to the Midnight Messenger. If I were a pirate, I would steal her away, he thought. Take her to some foreign shore where no one cared what cut of coat a man wore or who his parents were. Or weren't.

When Simon came to the mail cart, it only got worse. Mr. Longstreet beamed over the major, offering jovial smiles and knowing glances that lodged in Quinn's gut and simmered there. The only thing that made the whole scene bearable was the sure sense that Nora wasn't really happy to see Major Simon. Oh, she feigned it well, all smiles and downward glances, but the way she held her head and the way she flailed her hands gave it all away. When Nora was happy, her hands were calm and graceful. When she was upset, they traveled about like bees, flitting from her neck to her waist to her skirts. And he, he knew that about her like he knew a thousand other little details his heart had memorized. Because he knew
her
—the true Nora, the Nora inside what other people saw.

He lingered on his side of the street until she'd finished her pleasantries with the major. Then, as Simon and the postmaster exchanged confident looks—he disliked the sense of negotiation their glances gave him, as if Nora were a spoil of war—Nora went back to taking in the mail. Watching how she served those in line, his resolve grew stronger. She was in his life for a reason, and he in hers. All the conventions in the world couldn't alter that truth.

She looked his way, finally, catching his eye. For a
moment, there was the unchecked affection he'd seen in Bauers's study. Her eyes glowed, her lips parted just the slightest bit and he could almost hear her suck in a breath. For the tiniest moment the world fell away around them.

Then, as if a drape came down, he watched caution come over her. While she still held his gaze, it was with doubt rather than joy. Her eyes told him a sort of war was going on inside her—the possible fighting the probable. Affection and longing and fear and sadness all stuffed themselves into those few seconds.

Something had happened. He didn't know what, but he did know he couldn't let her alone. He pleaded to her with his eyes, hoping he could tell her to hang on, to give him just a moment to work something out. He held up a finger, arching his eyebrows and mouthing “wait,” then ducked around the corner to find Sam.

It took all of ten minutes to contrive a reason for Sam to bring Nora to the teeter-totter, but Quinn was pacing madly by the end of it. His imagination had come up with a dozen scenarios—each more catastrophic than the last—as to what had happened to make Nora look at him with such worry.

“What's wrong?” His effort at a conversational tone failed miserably.

“Nothing.”

Already she was lying to him. “That's not true. Something's wrong. I can see it.”

She looked up at him. “This can't work. Quinn, surely you know that. We're foolish to think it can.”

“You didn't feel that way earlier. You've never felt that way. What's happened?”

She glanced around nervously. “Annette. She kept a
journal, and I found it. She was…involved…with someone and they were going to run away together just as the earthquake…” Her hand went to the locket again. “Everyone is so upset. Her parents are furious, they're saying she's better off dead.”

“We're not them, Nora. I'll go to your parents.” The conviction roared up inside him. “I'll make them see. And if they don't…well, I won't be without you. We belong together and they'll just have to see that.”

“They won't,” she nearly wailed. “You should have heard them, Quinn. They said the most horrible, judgmental things.”

“Do you believe that? What they said?” Suddenly, he needed to know that more than anything. Needed to know if she could defy them and their thinking.

Nora looked at him with stormy, sad eyes. “It's not just them. What kind of future could we possibly expect?”

“The same future anyone's got a right to expect. To be happy. To be with someone you care about. Nora, we'll never be running off in the night, I'll tell you that right now.” He wanted to grab her hand and shake her, knock this new layer of fear off her spirit and bring her back to the courage he'd seen before. Instead, he gripped his hat and tried to hold her with his eyes. “I'm sorry about your cousin. But your parents are wrong. And we're right. I don't know how I'll convince them—how
we'll
convince them, but we will.”

“I can't see how. Not now.”

He reined in his frustration. “Not yet. Maybe you're right, and now's not the time, but soon enough
we will.
Do you trust me to work it out? Do you trust us to work it out?”

“I don't know.”

“I do.” He held her eyes, wanting desperately to hold her to his chest but knowing this wasn't the time for it. “I do know. Sure as anything. We'll find a way, Nora, you hang on to that.” He locked her in his gaze until she straightened and nodded.

Hold her in Your palm, Father,
Quinn prayed as he motioned for Sam to come walk her back.
She's my whole world now.

 

Nora walked back across the street clutching Sam's hand. It was the mirror image of the first time they'd walked together. That first trip, Sam had grasped her hand tightly, all his fear clenching his fingertips as he led her to his father's shack. Now, she felt as if Sam led her through her fear back to her father's cart. She was grateful for the tiny escort—her mind was in such a tumble she didn't know how she'd have found her way alone.

She had fooled herself that it would sort itself out. That she would see Quinn and suddenly know her course. Instead, her heart tottered like the toy Quinn had built—one second thinking the safety of Major Simon and her parents' approval was so wise, the other second falling into a rush of emotion when she looked into Quinn's eyes. When he looked at her so fiercely, with such a command to trust him, she felt what surely must be passion. An overwhelming, powerful sense of need and “rightness” that let her believe they had a future. That the two of them had been uniquely paired in all the world, uniquely completing each life to the betterment of the other.

And a life with Major Simon? The most she could say was that it felt stiflingly arranged.

Why did life suddenly have such urgency anyway? Why, if she had gone on unpaired for this many years, did her heart and her parents suddenly demand upheaval?

The ground has shaken things up enough, Lord,
she prayed as she gave Sam a hug goodbye and walked up to the mail cart.
Must You shake up my whole soul in the process?

“Major Simon left something for you while you were gone,” Papa said, as he offered his hand to let his daughter up onto the mail cart. He smiled with undiluted pleasure as he pointed to a small package on the bench of the cart. It opened to reveal a stack of cloth in various bright colors, small samples of yarn, a few bits of lace and a handful of buttons. Along with a small package of lemon drops. She read the accompanying note:

Reverend Bauers told me you needed more supplies to make dolls. I hope these will help. The lemon drops are for the dollmaker, from her admiring major.—A

 

“Why are we meeting here?” Quinn looked at the desolate corner of the scrapyard where Major Simon had asked him to meet. Even for their unusually discreet relationship, this seemed a bit much.

Simon picked up a tangled piece of steel and spun it to catch the orange sunset. “Because I have an important question to ask you. A sort of unofficial question on a rather unconventional matter. Not exactly army protocol.”

Quinn didn't think anything he and Major Simon did fit within army protocol. “And what's that?”

“Are you ready for things to get complicated?”

Sitting down on a barrel, Quinn had to laugh. “They already are.”

“True.” The major stuck the shaft of steel upright in the dusty ground and sat down on a second barrel. “I suppose I mean, are you ready for things to get
quite
complicated?”

“Why?” Quinn replied. “What is going on?”

“I don't have to tell you,” Simon began, “that a whole lot of people are watching how relief efforts get handled around here. If things go well, it could not only mean help for many people, but things could go well for me, personally. And,” he added, looking straight at Quinn, “you as well. If we go about it in the right way.”

“Our way isn't perfect, but it works.”

“It could work better, I think. But like most good things in life, it's going to be a bit risky and I daresay unconventional.” He shifted his weight on the barrel and gazed at the sun as it began to dip into the water. “Do you know how the great fire was eventually put out? Why we used all that dynamite?”

Quinn knew the basic concepts. “To burn things ahead of the fire so it didn't have enough fuel to move on. Starved it rather than drown it, I heard one man say.”

“Exactly. We fought fire with fire. I'm proposing, Freeman, that we do the same here. Only the fire I'm fighting now is grift. Corruption. People abusing the relief system for their own good. It's making my job harder and your job more necessary. I wouldn't need the Messenger if things got
where
they were supposed to
when
they were supposed to. I'd like for the army to be out of the relief business, but not if it means the
marketeers are all that's left. Despite my best efforts, relief is ending up in greedy hands.”

Quinn thought Simon didn't need the Messenger as much as the people in the tent cities needed the Messenger, but he got the major's idea. “I don't want the marketeers to win either, Major. It's not right. All the generosity we've seen shouldn't be ending up in the places it is.”