Chapter Text
When the train pulled in at Fremont Junction, Gloria and I climbed down off the train. She was wrestling with our luggage while I held Rachel in my arms.
“Sandy?” my little girl asked, once more.
“We’re going to see Sandy soon, Rachel. I promise,” I said. At last it was finally true.
I looked around the platform anxiously, but I didn’t see anyone I recognized. “Let me put you down, sweetheart. You’re getting so big, you’re getting too heavy for mama.”
Just then, I saw a familiar figure at the end of the platform. “Jeremy!” I exclaimed. “I thought you’d have had to head home by now, what with the practice and the new baby and all. It’s so good to see you.” I gazed fondly at the tall, lean form and aquiline features of my former law partner. Before I’d thought about it, I put up my hand to mess up his curly dark hair.
Jeremy smiled at the sisterly familiarity, and bent down to kiss me on the cheek. “Ella, there’s more going on here than I told you in my telegram.” He stopped to reach down and give his hand to the little girl, who was saying, “Unca Jermy, Unca Jermy!" excitedly.
Hello, Rachel. Who's your friend?"
"Glory," said Rachel proudly.
I smilled. “This is Gloria. She was working at the Western Star, helping us with our investigation. I invited her to help with Rachel, for the time being.”
The former saloon girl had so transformed herself, in her plain dark high necked dress, and with her auburn hair neatly plaited and put up, that I was certain Jeremy wouldn’t have suspected what she’d been. Well, not if he hadn’t known from my letters that there was only one capacity in which the Western Star had employed women. She looked like an old maid school teacher, albeit a very pretty one.
But I was too worried to continue with polite introductions. “What’s the matter? Has Heyes taken a turn for the worse?”
“He’s weak, but he’ll recover. But, Ella, he’s the only one who will.”
“What? Is Sandy?”
“We don’t know. Something horrible happened to her, in the hands of the kidnappers.” He couldn’t quite bring himself to name the act of rape, but somehow I knew what he meant. “She’s retreated inside herself to the point where she didn’t even recognize Jed Curry. Her father’s taken her away, hoping the healers among his people can help her.”
I bowed my head at this. “No. No. It’s not fair. Nobody should suffer as much as she has. She’s going to be all right, isn’t she?”
“We think that she will be, in time. But Jed agreed to let Raintree handle it, and since he’s her intended and all, we thought . . .”
I felt a sudden surge of irrational anger. “I was her legal guardian before her marriage to Ray,” I snapped. “I should have been consulted.”
Jeremy put a hand on my arm, obviously trying to calm me. “But Curry knows how highly you think of Albert Raintree and his people. He assumed you would approve. And anyway, you'd already left San Francisco. We didn't know how to reach you."
I nodded, realizing my anger was unreasonable. "And . . . what else?”
“Well, I got off the easiest. Jed’s all right, just pretty devastated at what’s happened with Sandy. He’s spending most of his time nursing Heyes. And Sven had a flesh wound, but that’s already half healed. But Rick . . .”
“What about Rick?” I could feel all the blood drain from my face, and when I caught sight of myself in one of the station windows, I was pale as death itself.
“Rick . . . Ella, Rick is dead. So is Stan.”
“No,” I said. “No.” The shock barely registered, for a moment, and then it came flooding in. Rick always used to joke that he was too mean to die. But now he was gone and all I could think about was what a kind, decent man he was, underneath the arrogant surface. And what a huge void his passing was going to leave in so many lives. Especially mine. I’d lost my first love, Billy, and I’d lost both my parents. My sister Rosa was alive and well, but we were largely estranged from one another. Rick was a friend, a professional rival. But he was also one of the most important people in my little world, which was rocked to its foundations at his passing.
I gave Rachel’s hand to Gloria, and flung myself against Jeremy. I stood there crying, holding onto him for dear life, right there on the train platform. And after awhile, I dried my tears, because I wanted to get to Heyes, wanted to see him with my own eyes and touch him with my own hands. All this loss, Rick dead, Stan dead, Sandy gone away for some indefinite time, maybe forever. But Heyes would survive, thank God. I felt a huge, overwhelming wave of love, and I knew that a world without him was incomprehensible.
*****
Wave after wave of warm air seemed to pass over him. He was floating somewhere, in a place beyond time, beyond his own body. Then the door opened, and he had the sensation of something light.
A small, dark form hurtled itself at him. “Daddy!” it cried, and he realized it was Rachel.
He forced himself back up to the surface. “Since when can she do that?” he asked.
“Since before you left home -- remember? You asked me the same thing just a couple of weeks ago. She’s been getting more and more mobile, lately,” said a female voice, from somewhere to his right. He tried to focus on her, but all he could see was something light -- her hair -- and something dark -- her dress.
“Ella?” he asked.
“I’m right here.” She sat down at his side, leaned over to kiss his forehead. “You’ve got a lot of healing to do, but they tell me you’re going to be just fine.” She reached over and removed the small, warm weight from his side. “Come on, Rachel. Daddy needs to rest. Go with Gloria, and she’ll sing to you.”
“Glory?” asked Rachel. “Daddy’s taking his nap.”
When they’d gone, Ella said, “Goodness. Your silver tongue must be rubbing off. That’s the most words she’s ever strung together. At least . . . the most that were in any language I could recognize.”
“Ella?” he asked. “You’re here? You’re not going anywhere?”
“I’m here. For good,” she said softly, and took his hand.
But Heyes was already sinking back in to his laudanum-tinged dreams. He looked up at them -- the two golden heads bowing over him. A pair of angels, to guard him while he slept.
Nah. Just the Kid and Ella. Still, if he were going to choose from among all the ordinary, flawed mortals in the world to guard him while he slept -- that’s who he’d pick.