Chapter 7

CHAPTER7

Ellie was attempting to identify a specimen of aster in the pine woods just past Belleview’s citrus groves when the memory of Lewis’s incomparable smile made her slap her hand over her heart and straighten. What in the world was wrong with her? She’d been doing this all day. She’d specifically cried off on Ada’s bicycle ride with Cora to avoid seeing him or any reminder of him, yet his face kept popping up in every flower and pinecone. You’d think she was sixteen and he was the first boy who’d smiled at her.

She stuck her nose back in her field guide. Yes, most assuredly, climbing aster vine.

If she wanted to set her story in the tropics, she really must get her facts straight.

Facts, not schoolgirl imaginings—such as the notion that Lewis had not minded when she’d grabbed his arm during the ghost story the steamboat captain told last night. Ada and Jesse had begged them to stay for the last boat, to send Cora back with her nurse so they could join in the bonfire on the beach.

The Roman punch—a mixture of raspberry syrup, lemon and orange juice, Curacao, brandy, and Jamaican rum—had flowed as freely as the songs and tall tales. The captain had ended the evening by riveting them all with the true story of a young bride who had fallen to her death from her third-story window after the hotel’s grand opening ball, still wearing her bridal gown and diamond necklace. The woman’s apparition was said to appear to modern guests. Ellie had clung to Lewis before she realized what she was doing. But when she’d apologized and started to pull away, he’d caught her arm and held it through his.

Fact—he’d done so in the general spirit of camaraderie, not attraction. Because men like him did not flirt with plain and penniless spinsters.

Ellie hiked back up the creek bed, breathing deeply of the scents of pine and saltwater. She had to pause once or twice to disengage her skirts from the saw palmettos and to create rough sketches of bottlebrush, holly, and jacarandas. She’d just made her way back to the path when she spied it—an indigo bunting. She stopped and opened her field guide.

The shrill ring of a bicycle bell made her leap to the shoulder of the trail. “For Pete’s sake!”

The oblivious adventurers had scared the bird to a higher branch of a farther tree. And then arms wrapped around Ellie’s waist, almost toppling her into the ditch.

“I was hoping we’d find you!” She looked down into shining brown eyes. “Cora? You startled me.” Ellie glanced behind her. “And Ada and…Jesse?” He wasn’t supposed to be here. Ada had assured Lewis the bicycle outing would be girl time.

Jesse lifted his cap from his head. “Just so happened I was passing by when these lovely ladies were renting their wheels. I didn’t feel comfortable, them setting out on their own.”

“You’ll get no agreement from Ellie.” Ada swiped her hair back under her jaunty hat. “She’s the model for female independence and the only woman I know who’d choose traipsing around alone in the Florida wilds to any amusement a resort can offer.”

Jesse frowned. “It really isn’t safe, Miss Ellie.”

“Pawsh.” Ellie waved her hand. It might not be safe for Ada. It was perfectly safe for her, though they were kind to pretend otherwise.

“What are you doing out here?” Cora wanted to know.

“Research for my book.” She looked over her shoulder and pointed. “See up there? It’s the bird I want to write about, the indigo bunting.”

Cora squinted in the direction she indicated, then snorted. “That’s not indigo. Indigo is blue. That bird is brown.”

“Right. It could be a male or a female. The males turn bright blue in the summer.”

“And the girl bird stays brown?”

Ellie nodded.

“Well, that’s hardly fair.”

Ellie couldn’t agree more. “Would you like to see if we can get closer?”

“Oh, yes, Miss Ellie.” Cora pushed her bicycle to Ada so she could take hold of the handlebars.

Ada pursed her lips. “We’re supposed to be on a ride, not bird watching.”

“Just for a moment, please, Miss Ada?”

Cora’s pleading tone made Ada toss her head but comply. She whispered to Jesse as Ellie and Cora crept closer to the bunting.

“I can’t believe that bird changes colors,” Cora hissed.

Ellie showed her the depiction that proved it would be so, then moved her finger to the listing below. “If you think that’s amazing, look at these painted buntings.”

Cora pointed to the male pictured. “It looks like a rainbow—yellow, green, blue, and orange!”

Ellie held her finger to her lips to remind the girl to keep her voice down, then whispered back. “Even the female is green on top with a yellow breast.”

“So only the female indigo bunting is always just brown.”

“That’s right. Darker brown on top than on bottom.” Two tones of dull.

Cora frowned. “Why didn’t God make her pretty?” She gazed up at the bird on the branch above them. Suddenly, it broke forth with sweet-sweet-chew-chew-sweet-sweet. Cora’s face lit up. “Oh, but her song is beautiful!”

“Do you think this would be a good species to use in my story, then?”

“Yes. That very one. We’ll call her Brownie. Let’s draw her.”

Ellie opened her notebook and extracted her pencil. “I’ll do my best.”

Cora raised an eyebrow as she studied Ellie’s renderings of the local flora on the facing page. “Did you do those?”

“Yes. They’re not very good. I’ll have to hire an illustrator, but between my sketches and the field guide, that should give him something to work from.”

“You already have someone to draw pictures in your book?”

“Well…no.” She hadn’t thought that far ahead.

“I can do it!” Cora held out her hands.

Ellie hesitated, then relinquished her drawing materials. Couldn’t be much worse than her own scribblings. Cora squatted down, and her pencil moved rapidly over the paper. Back on the path, Ada let out a sigh gusty enough to blow the bunting away. Ellie held up her finger.

A moment later, Cora stood back up and returned her notebook and pencil. Ellie’s jaw dropped. She’d expected a child’s heavy, simplistic strokes. Instead, lightly drawn lines realistically captured the bird’s soft feathers and bright eye.

“It would be much better if I had my colored pencils.”

“Cora…this is amazing.”

The girl beamed. “Drawing is my favorite thing, even more than reading. Grandmother says I do it way too much.”

“I hardly think so. Would…would you be willing to make some sketches for me of birds and flowers and trees and such?”

“For your book?” Cora’s exclamation succeeded where Ada’s sigh had failed in sending the bird skyward, and Ellie led Cora back toward the path.

“Well, yes.”

Cora grabbed her hand and swung it. “You mean, I could work with you?”

“Possibly. We could plan specific drawings once I write the whole story, but for now, I could give you my notes and my field guide and see what you come up with. Would your uncle allow that?”

“You bet, he will!” Cora spun under Ellie’s arm, then did a little dance on the sandy path.

Ada pushed Cora’s bicycle toward her. “What’s all this about?”

“Miss Ellie’s going to let me illustrate her book!”

“Oh, she is, is she?” A speculative gleam lit Ada’s eyes as she surveyed Ellie.

Ellie refused to meet her gaze. “We’ll see. But for now, you should finish your ride. I’ll meet you back at the hotel.”

Cora mounted her seat and placed her feet on the pedals. “Let’s go slowly so you can walk along with us. Maybe we’ll see some other birds.”

“Oh, goody.” Ada rolled her eyes.

They completed a start-and-stop half mile with Cora pointing out every bird and flower that might possibly be of interest. As they approached the place where the bicycle path crossed the carriage road, Cora rode ahead, Jesse and Ada giggling side by side, and Ellie trailing, finishing some notes. Under the last of the shade, Jesse and Ada drew up for him to right her hat.

“Miss Ellie! I see a painted bunting!” Cora pointed ahead as she called over her shoulder. She stood up on her pedals.

“Wait, Cora!”

The girl darted out of sight, but the scream and the screech of metal that followed made Ellie drop her notebook and race forward faster than Jesse and Ada could leap off their bicycles. The bright Florida sun shone cheerily on a heart-stopping scene—Cora’s bicycle bent in half by the fender of a red Roadster, her limp form in the arms of a strange man on the far side of the road, and his leg bent at an unnatural angle.

* * *

Lewis pulled the sheet up to Cora’s chin as Nurse McMullan departed with the medicine bottle and empty tumbler. “That should help you sleep, darling.”

Cora grasped his hand. “I keep seeing the automobile coming at me, Poppy.”

“I know, my sweet.” He fought to keep his tone soothing even as anger simmered. Why had Jesse intruded on Ada’s ride with Cora, distracting her? He couldn’t decide which to blame.

According to Ellie, the Hastings shared no such hesitations. The moment word of the accident reached them, their wrath had fallen on Jesse’s head. Ellie had described Ada’s weeping and theatrics as Florence declared she was not to see the young man again.

“We can just be thankful God placed that young gardener there at the right moment.” He’d been watchful where Ada had not. And it had cost him dearly.

Cora blinked at him, owlish in the first throes of the mild sedative. “Did God want him to get hurt instead of me?”

Lewis frowned. Every day, something reminded him how much he lacked parenting skills. But he wasn’t supposed to be a parent. His sister was supposed to be here. Instead, she’d been used and discarded like so much trash. “God didn’t want anyone to get hurt. He lets people make choices, and sometimes we make bad ones.”

“Was it because he was a servant? That’s why he got hurt instead of me?”

“No. No!” Lewis smoothed her hair. The nature of her questioning reached into his chest and plucked up unease. Where did she get such ideas? “He got hurt because he was brave. He protected someone more vulnerable than himself.”

“Vulner…able…”

Lewis kissed Cora’s forehead as her eyelids sagged. “Stop thinking, little brain.”

Her eyes flashed open, and she smiled. “Grandmother says I’m just like you.”

“Pity you, then.” He chuckled as he rose and adjusted the covers.

But she whimpered as he turned off the light, even though sunshine still illuminated the edges of the curtains. “I want Ellie.”

Did she know that very person was waiting in the attached sitting room? He could hear her pacing and praying. At least, he assumed that was what her muttering was. “You need to sleep. You’ve had a shock.”

“Please…I want Ellie first. She’s going to give me her notes. I want them here when I wake up.”

“I can get them for you.”

“Ellie…”

If he could’ve resisted the pitiful tone, the hand outstretched on the coverlet would’ve undone him, anyway. How had his niece gotten so attached to the older Miss Hastings so quickly?

With a sigh, Lewis went to the door and opened it. Her ridiculously large netted hat askew, Ellie whirled and affixed him with her bright aquamarine eyes.

He offered a faint smile. “We’ve given her something to help her sleep, but she’s asking for you. She said something about…notes?”

Ellie snatched up a couple of small volumes from the end table and rushed toward him. But she paused on the threshold, whispering. “Are you certain she’s all right?”

“Nurse McMullan inspected her from head to toe and swears she is no worse for wear. The woman has actual nursing training. It seems the young gardener took the brunt of the fall.”

She shuddered. “And the impact. Do you think he will be okay?”

Why was she asking him? She’d been there—he hadn’t. He’d only almost lost his heart and his lunch when a porter summoned him to the carriage porch. There he’d taken a sobbing Cora into his arms as they loaded the stoic-faced hero onto a stretcher and into a delivery vehicle for the ride to Ocala or Orlando. “If he survives the drive. His leg was broken pretty badly.”

Ellie shook her head. “There should be a hospital closer.” She brushed past him and went to bend over the small form on the twin bed. “How are you feeling, my sweet?”

“Sleepy. Did you see the in-igo buntin’?”

Ellie clasped Cora’s hand as Lewis drew closer. “I didn’t even look. I was so worried about you.”

“I’m worried about the nice man who saved me.”

“Me too. Shall we say a prayer for him?”

Cora nodded, and Ellie bowed her head and asked God to protect and heal the brave servant who’d sacrificed himself to keep Cora from harm. After the prayer, Ellie smiled at his niece. “You know that is what God does for us. He loves us so much that He sent his son, Jesus, to die in our place.”

“Poppy told me about that.”

Lewis caught his breath as Ellie glanced back at him, her eyes shining. That she cared enough about his niece to take this opening to share her faith—that she shared his faith—washed him in warmth. He balled his hands in his pockets.

“We’ll talk more after you’ve rested. For now, here are the notes.” Ellie laid the small volumes on Cora’s bedside table. “Brownie will be waiting for you to bring her to life.”

Cora smiled before closing her eyes.

Ellie squeezed her hand, then straightened.

Lewis escorted her from the room and quietly closed the door.

Inches away, she turned to him, blinking back tears. “I can’t help feeling this is my fault. If I hadn’t offered for her to do the drawings for my book, she never would’ve darted across the road to see that silly bird.”

“Is that what happened?” Lewis had been wracking his brain trying to figure out what would make his normally obedient niece race ahead of her guardians.

Ellie hung her head. “I’m afraid so. I’m very bad with children, Lewis.”

She’d just said his name. It wrapped around his heart and squeezed. He lifted her chin with his finger and almost laughed at her furrowed brow. “No worse than I am. And from what I’ve witnessed, not bad at all. I’ve never seen Cora take to anyone the way she’s taken to you.”

“Maybe that’s because I know what it feels like to be alone.” Her statement breathless, she searched his eyes.

“As do I.”

“You do?”

He shifted. “I have my parents, and now Cora, but I’ve had my share of heartache.”

She swallowed, and her throat worked as though another of her pointed questions worked its way up, but she came out with, “You’re not angry at me, then?”

He shook his head. “Cora told me you were walking well behind. It wasn’t your responsibility to watch her.”

“But I should—”

Lewis placed his finger over her lips, and her eyes widened. “Thank you for coming by and waiting, Ellie. I’m deeply touched that you care about my niece.”

When he withdrew his finger, she stepped away, lowering her lashes. “Then you won’t mind if she helps me with the book?”

“I think it will be just what she needs.”

A nervous little laugh escaped as Ellie pulled on her gloves. “Then I suppose we will be seeing more of each other, even though we no longer need to chaperone Ada and Jesse.”

“I’m very sorry for them but not at all disappointed that our acquaintance is not at an end.”

Was he wrong, or did her answering look reveal a shared relief before she nodded and hurried out of the room?