Fire, The (47 page)

Sadie nodded.

"My father told me when I was a girl. I'd always wondered what it looked like. Now I know. It's beautiful."

Kevin gazed at the woman who shared his table and tried to reconcile her appearance with every memory he had of her. Even now, he found it difficult to do.

He had taken Sadie to the family retreat on Saturday with his parents' blessing. Shelly, in particular, had wanted him to have the opportunity to rediscover a woman he clearly and deeply loved. She was not one to let personal morality interfere with her son's happiness.

Shelly had offered just one suggestion. She had advised Kevin to move slowly. She had said that people rarely made good decisions in haste and warned that the worst thing he could do would be to use Sadie to fill the gaping hole in his heart.

Kevin knew she was right. He knew he should take his time, act prudently, and make decisions based on his long-term interests. He also knew that was the last thing he wanted to do. When they had arrived at the vacation house around five, he had wanted to do nothing but take her into a bedroom and shower her with affection that had been pent-up far too long.

Sadie had been even more eager to get to the house. Long gone was the girl who had once worried about appearances and propriety. She was a woman who had traveled alone more than a hundred years through time to be with one person. She wasn't about to let the social mores of any time deny or even delay the fulfillment of that singular goal.

Kevin reached across the table and grabbed her hand.

"I missed you. Even when I was with Sarah, I thought about you. I hoped that you were safe and happy and doing the things I'd asked you to do."

"I never wanted to leave, but I understood why I had to," Sadie said. "You picked someone else."

"I did. There was a reason too. Sarah and I had more in common. We had similar backgrounds and interests. We were the same age. We saw the world the same way. That didn't mean I didn't love you. I think I've loved you since the day I read that perfumed letter. You've always had a way of making me crazy with even the smallest gestures."

Sadie smiled.

"I looked up 'gaga' in the dictionary, by the way. I never realized I made you overexcited and irrational. I may have to think about that awhile."

"You do that," Kevin said with a chuckle. "In the meantime, I want to know the story of how you got here."

Sadie looked at Kevin and then looked away as she started to get misty.

"I was with Andy at the paper when we got word that a teacher had died in the fire. When we learned that it was Sarah, I cried. I cried like I had never cried before. I felt so guilty. I had wanted her to go away so that I could be with you, but I never wished any harm to her. You have to believe that. She was my friend too."

"I know."

Sadie took a moment to dry her eyes. When she finally returned to Kevin, she looked at him more thoughtfully but also more tentatively. It was clear she wanted to know more about Sarah but didn't know how or when to ask.

"It must have been awful at the hospital."

"It was."

"Was anyone there besides you?"

"The Marshalls were there. So were a neighbor and the doctor. Otherwise, it was just me."

"Did you have a chance to notify her family?"

"Can we talk about something else?"

Sadie nodded.

"We can. I'm sorry."

"There's no need to apologize, Sadie. You're curious. That's natural. It's just that Sarah's still a sore subject. The only reason I might seem even remotely normal now is because you're here. You're just what I needed," he said. "You're just what I need, period."

"Thank you."

Kevin sipped his coffee.

"Let's get back to your story. What happened after you heard the news?"

"When I'd heard that Sarah had died, I wrote to Maude and asked her what had happened to you. She didn't know much because she had gone to Coeur d'Alene that weekend to visit friends. She knew only that you hadn't been injured in the fire and had apparently left town on August 22 – after Sarah's graveside ceremony. No one knew where you had gone, but I had a pretty good idea. I remembered what I had read in Mr. Johnson's book."

"Did you tell anyone about the diary?"

Sadie shook her head.

"No. Not at first. I was afraid people would laugh at me if I told them what I thought. Then I finally spoke to Andy. I thought he would laugh, too, but he didn't. He knew I was right. He said you had once told him that you were a time traveler from 2013. He encouraged me to find you."

"So what happened next?"

Sadie met his eyes.

"I got on a train. On September 18, the day of the full moon, I returned to Wallace. I went to the rock shed on Garnet Street and put your gold coins in front of it, just like I was supposed to."

"You must have been scared," Kevin said.

"I was terrified. I didn't know where that thing would send me. I knew only that I had to try to find you. I so wanted to find you."

Kevin kissed her hand and smiled.

"So how
did
you find me? I was long gone by then."

"When I opened the drawer of your nightstand to look at the book, I saw a card from a man named Joel Smith. I didn't know then if the information on the card was important, but I wrote it down anyway and kept it. When I got to this time, I found a telephone I could use and called Mr. Smith."

"You called him? Just like that?"

Sadie nodded.

"I got right through too. I didn't even have to speak to an operator."

Kevin smiled.

"What did you tell him?"

"I told him that I was your friend and that I wanted to find you. He asked if I was a stalker, and I said I didn't think so."

Kevin bit his lip as he tried to stifle a laugh. He had the only woman in the world completely untainted by the cynicism of the modern age. He knew right then that he would never let her go.

"So he just gave you my home address?"

Sadie nodded again.

"He thought it over for a minute and finally gave it to me. He said he didn't usually give out the addresses of students but said he had to make an exception in your case."

"Did he give you a reason?"

"He did. He said Kevin Johnson is a guy who needs a lucky break."

Sadie met Kevin's eyes.

"I guess that's me."

Kevin grabbed both of her hands and smiled as he thought about the twists and turns of fate. He leaned across the table and gave her a long, soft kiss.

"Yeah, you are. You most certainly are."

CHAPTER 80: KEVIN

Wallace, Idaho – Sunday, August 20, 2017

Kevin didn't even try to resist the siren song. The moment he drove over Lookout Pass, he glanced at Sadie and asked where she wanted to go first – not where she wanted to go but rather where she wanted to go first. He could see from her eyes that she, too, had already settled on the general destination.

"Let's just go to the cemetery," she said.

"Are you sure you don't want to stop for lunch?"

"I'm sure. Let's pay our respects and leave. I don't want to stay long."

"OK."

Kevin wasn't particularly fond of the graveyard either, but he knew it was the one place they had to go. If you wanted to commune with ghosts, then you went to where they were plentiful.

He knew as well as anyone, of course, that you didn't need to visit a cemetery to see ghosts in this part of the country. They haunted every town, tree, and trail from St. Regis, Montana, to St. Maries, Idaho, and many points beyond. They haunted the death sites of the eighty-seven people who had perished in the fire and the homes and businesses of those who had survived it.

Kevin hadn't returned to Wallace since June 29, 2013, the day his parents had turned Roger Johnson's property over to a real estate agent. He had no interest in returning to a town that reminded him of a painful past, even if the town also reminded him of a pleasant present. Four years after laying Sarah and the fire to rest, he saw no good reason to dig them up.

Kevin knew full well, however, that you couldn't solve a problem by avoiding it. You solved it by addressing it head on. If he could exorcise a few demons by visiting a cemetery in Wallace, then why not give it a whirl?

He brushed cookie crumbs off a shirt he had bought on Friday in Glacier National Park and shifted down as he approached a town that looked smaller and quieter than the one he had left. Though Wallace was the "Center of the Universe," according to a manhole cover on Sixth and Bank, it wasn't the booming community it had been at the time of the fire.

That didn't mean it wasn't important. It was important as hell to the people in the car, but it was now a part of their past – a past they had come to bury. Taking Sadie's words to heart, Kevin pulled off Interstate 90 at Exit 62 and drove directly to the cemetery on the north side of town. If they stopped for lunch in the next hour, it would be in Kellogg or Coeur d'Alene.

The tour of graves began in the old part of the cemetery, a section reserved for residents who had died before 1925. Sadie had asked to go there first, not because it was convenient or shaded but rather because it seemed like an appropriate place to start. Given the significance of at least two graves in the section, he couldn't argue otherwise.

Kevin stared at the markers embedded in the lawn and thought about the people buried beneath them. He wondered whether Henry and Claire Hawkins, nineteenth-century pioneers, would have liked the man who had married their daughter. He wondered whether he would have liked
them
. He decided he probably would have. If children were a reflection of their parents, then Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins would have probably been all right.

Kevin had waited just two months to propose marriage, popping the question on October 31, 2013, at a costume party in Albuquerque. He had put off the matter until the time was right and finally decided that the right time was shortly after Sadie, dressed as a pint-sized Pocahontas, politely lectured a physics professor, a U.S. Navy veteran, on the dimensions and capabilities of pre-World War I battleships. Kevin had dropped to a knee in Superman attire and asked Sadie to be his wife before more than forty vampires, werewolves, zombies, and mummies.

Sadie had responded with hugs, kisses, and an unqualified yes. She'd been more than ready to legitimize their "sinful arrangement," even if it meant getting married in a Las Vegas chapel in November and not in a Unionville church in June. She had told Kevin that she didn't want to answer questions about her past from guests at the kind of wedding the Johnsons had wanted.

Kevin had supported not only that request but also her interest in continuing her education. He had encouraged her to get her GED at the first opportunity, test out in as many courses as possible, and enroll in an online college that she had found particularly appealing.

Sadie had proved to be as proficient in digital-age accounting as she had been in abacus-era figuring. She had earned a bachelor's degree in three years and landed more than a dozen job offers before accepting one from a firm that had allowed her to work mostly from home.

Sadie had considered that requirement non-negotiable. She had wanted to work, yes, but she had also wanted to manage the day-to-day affairs of her most important client: the now 32-month-old firecracker she called her daughter. She considered producing, nurturing, and educating the child her greatest achievement.

Born on December 10, 2014, Sarah Louise Johnson looked like her mother and acted like her father, or at least the way her father had acted as a toddler. She had already discovered the joy of problem solving, whether pushing chairs toward counters to grab plates full of cookies or slapping pull-up diapers on Max, the family's year-old Dachshund.

There was never a debate about what to name the girl. Sadie had insisted from the start that the first daughter be named after the woman who still held a place in Kevin's heart. She had wanted to honor her friend in a way that was both symbolic and substantive. She had told Kevin that she would not compete with the memory of a former rival but would instead embrace it.

Kevin thought about that rival as he guided his family to a headstone he had purchased but never seen. The artisan who had created the marker had carved not only Sarah's "married" name in the marble but also a rose and an apple – enduring symbols of a beautiful educator who would never be forgotten, at least by those who had loved her and were still around to cherish her memory.

The family stared at the grave for a moment and then did what they could to make the site more appealing. Kevin wiped the stone with a wet cloth and removed dirt and debris that had accumulated in the recesses. Sadie and Sarah cleared leaves that had gathered near the base.

Then Sadie did something else. She handed Sarah to Kevin and walked about twenty yards to the car. When she returned, she carried a vase of fresh flowers that Kevin had purchased for her on a whim as they had left West Glacier and begun the twelve-hour drive home. She placed the vase in front of the stone, pulled out a single daisy, and returned to her family.

Sadie gazed at the marker another moment before turning to face Sarah and dropping to a knee. She looked her pig-tailed daughter in the eyes, put the flower in her hands, and asked the toddler to gently place the daisy on the grave of her namesake.

Sarah did as instructed and more. She walked to the three-foot-high stone, touched it with both hands, and gave it a hug and a kiss, drawing even more moisture from her parents' eyes.

From the old graves the Johnsons moved to the new, or at least what qualified as new in a cemetery that had ceased accommodating the dead in 1982. Of particular interest were the resting places of Maude Parker Duvalier, Preston Pierce, Josephine White Remington, and her husband Thomas. All stood within a short stretch of each other in a section by the main cemetery road. Kevin knew the fates of all of them, thanks to research he had done in the fall of 2013.

Maude had died on September 2, 1945 – the day World War II had come to an end on the deck of the
USS Missouri
in Tokyo Bay. She had never remarried but had remained active in local affairs, serving on several public boards and once running for mayor. She had also become a philanthropist of the first order, funding scholarships for girls and donating Marcus Duvalier's books, maps, and periodicals to a Carnegie library that had opened in Wallace in 1911.