Tomorrow's Garden (27 page)

Lawrence raised his face to let the weak January sun warm it. “I’m not a Ranger any longer.” If he were, perhaps he would not have this strange feeling deep inside him. Perhaps the wind, which continued to intensify, would not feel as if it were bringing ill fortune along with dried leaves. Perhaps he would not harbor the fear that he was too late for something important.

“You may not be a Ranger,” Zach countered, “but you did what you promised. You caught the rustlers. Thanks to you, Priscilla and I will sleep better knowing those two are behind bars.”

“It feels good to have that done,” Lawrence admitted. But the exhilaration of apprehending the bandits had faded, leaving emptiness in its place, emptiness and the strange sensation that he should not have lingered in Golden. He had fulfilled the terms of his contract; the problems he’d been hired to resolve were gone. Jake was close to working off his debt. Lawrence could pack his bags and go anywhere that caught his fancy, and yet the prospect that had once buoyed him now left him feeling flat. He didn’t want to leave Ladreville. It wasn’t only the Kirk family that had made it their home. He had too. The quaint little town that had once appealed to him solely because it was where Priscilla lived now had a different, far stronger allure: Harriet.

As his mind pronounced her name, a sense of urgency filled Lawrence. He couldn’t explain it. All he knew was that Harriet needed him. Now.

20

“Now, children, class is in session and you need to pay attention.” Harriet accompanied her words with a frown, hoping that a slightly forbidding expression would accomplish what admonitions had not. When they’d returned from the noontime break, two of the children had brought new toys for the others to admire, and they were still talking about Eva’s baby doll and Pierre Berthoud’s dominoes, both of which had been stashed in the cloakroom. “We’re going to study geography next. It’s a very important subject.”

Perhaps it was important to Harriet, but her pupils appeared more interested in the toys. Taking a deep breath, Harriet drew herself up to her full height. “I want utter silence.” Though her command was greeted with groans, the children complied, and within seconds the class had returned to normalcy. The wind might be howling outside, but her pupils were quiet.

Harriet smiled as she pulled down one of the two wall maps. This one, a companion to the larger one of the United States, featured Texas. “Who can show me where the capital is?”

Half the hands went up. When Heidi Gottlieb had successfully located Austin, Harriet asked the class to find Ladreville. As she’d expected, every hand rose.

“Miss Kirk, will you show us where you used to live?” Anna Singer posed the question after Mary returned to her seat, her head held high with pride that she had found Ladreville.

“Certainly.” Harriet pointed to the tiny spot that marked her hometown. “Fortune is only half the size of Ladreville, so the print is very small.” The mapmakers apparently subscribed to the theory that the type font should indicate each town’s population. While there might be some benefit to that approach, it had its drawbacks.

“We can’t see it from here,” Eva complained, citing the primary drawback.

“Then you may all come closer.” Harriet beckoned the class to approach the map. When they were clustered around it and had exclaimed over the distance Harriet and her family had traveled, she asked the students to trace the state’s major rivers, starting with the Medina.

“Me! Me! Pick me!”

Harriet tried not to smile at her pupils’ enthusiasm. “All right—”

Crack! Whoosh!
The sounds came without warning, chasing every thought from her brain. Only fear remained. The shattering glass, the ominous crackle of flames. Was there anything more terrifying? And then there were the smells, the pungent odors of kerosene and smoke. The school was on fire.

Dimly Harriet registered the sight of a broken bottle, shards of window glass, burning liquid and flames. Her heart began to pound, and her head felt oddly light, as if it were disconnected from the rest of her.
Please, Lord, no.
This couldn’t be happening. Not another fire.

The deep recesses of her brain shrieked with horror as she realized that someone had hurled a lit bottle of kerosene through the window and that, propelled by the strong winds that had risen this morning, the fire was spreading at an almost incredible rate, fueled by the books and papers and the dry wood of the school itself.
No, no, it couldn’t be.
But it was. The floor had begun to burn, creating a band of fire between the class and the door, while flames licked at the edge of the desks. Was this what it was like the day Mother and Father died? Did they see the flames? Did they smell the smoke? Harriet shook herself mentally, tamping down the fear that threatened to paralyze her. What had happened to her parents was unimportant today. All that mattered was getting the children to safety.

“All right, boys and girls.” By some miracle, her voice did not tremble. A quick assessment told her there was only one way to save the children. “We’ve practiced this many times.” Harriet moved to the far wall and began to push the desks aside, forming a pathway. Though smoke swirled and fouled the air, the flames had not reached that wall. If the children moved now, they could escape.

“Quickly, quickly.” She barked the orders. “No running. Don’t fall. Take nothing. We’ll meet across the street.” Harriet herded her pupils from the schoolhouse, keeping her voice firm and confident, refusing to give in to the terror that even now sent shudders through her. She had never heard of fire spreading so quickly.

Save the children. Please, save the children.
There was no point in trying to quench the flames with the cloakroom’s single bucket of water. Unless help arrived immediately, the schoolhouse would be destroyed. That mattered not a whit. It could be replaced; the children could not.

Less than a minute later, Harriet stood on the opposite side of Hochstrasse, counting heads. Her prayer had been answered, for they were all here, shivering from the cold wind that even now was blowing the smoke across the river. That was why no one had come to help. The east wind had kept the smoke from spreading through the town and alerting the citizens to the school’s plight.

Harriet looked at the children. Though several were coughing from the smoke, no one had been injured.
Thank you
. She wrapped her arms around two girls who seemed the most distressed, trying to comfort them.

“You’re safe,” she murmured. “The school doesn’t matter.” As she stroked their backs, their trembling subsided.

“Can we go home?” Jean Fayette asked.

Harriet nodded. There was no reason to remain here. “Tell your parents I’ll speak to each of them tonight.”

Across the street, smoke billowed from the schoolhouse, and flames licked hungrily at the roof. With the wind fanning the fire, it would take only minutes for the building to be consumed, but the children were safe. Sam and Daniel, resilient as only children could be, were punching each others’ arms in some incomprehensible ritual.

As the group dispersed, Mary ran to Harriet’s side, tears streaming down her face. “She’s gone. Eva’s gone.”

“It’s all right, sweetie. Everyone’s going home.”

“No!” Mary shook her head violently. “Not home. She wanted her doll.”

Horror shot through Harriet, chilling her blood at the same time that her hands began to perspire. Take nothing, she had told the children. That meant Eva’s doll was in the school. Surely she hadn’t gone back into the inferno. But Mary seemed to believe she had. As the image of her parents’ lifeless forms flashed before her, Harriet began to tremble. Not again. She couldn’t lose another loved one. She stared at the burning building, her knees so weak with fear that they threatened to collapse. There was no choice. If there was even the slightest chance that Eva was inside, Harriet had to bring her out.

“Wait here.” She gripped Mary’s arm as she issued the orders. “No matter what happens, do not follow me.” One child in that raging fire was too many.

As she ran toward it, Harriet assessed the building that only a few minutes ago had been a simple schoolhouse. The walls were burning, and the roof appeared on the verge of collapsing. How would she get Eva out of there? Was Isabelle’s beloved stepdaughter even alive? Harriet had heard that smoke was more dangerous than the flames themselves and that children were more vulnerable than adults.

Though every fiber of her being protested, Harriet raced up the steps, trying to ignore the roaring of the flames and the trembling of her limbs. She could do this. She had to. A little girl’s life was at stake.

“Eva!” she shouted as she entered the schoolhouse. The heat was greater than she had expected, fogging her spectacles the way a hot oven did. “Where are you?” There was no answer.

Harriet pushed her spectacles onto her head in a desperate attempt to see. The doll was in the cloakroom. Surely that was where she would find the child. “Eva, where are you?” The smoke was so thick Harriet could barely see outlines of the walls. How could a little girl have survived it? But she had to be alive. Surely God would not be so cruel as to take Gunther’s daughter.

Harriet slid her spectacles back onto her nose; it was no use. She could see nothing, nor could she hear. The roar of the fire drowned out all other sounds. Touch was all she had left.

Crouching down, she searched the floor, her hands patting each inch as she looked for Eva. The child was not in the cloakroom, but neither was the doll. The bucket of water lay on its side, its life-giving liquid spilled onto the floor, leaving a faintly damp spot. Was that good or bad? Her head pounding from the smoke, Harriet tried to make sense of what she’d learned. The bucket must have been overturned recently, or the floor would be dry. Surely that meant Eva had been here. Had she found her doll and become confused, going into the schoolroom rather than leaving? It was the only answer.

The flames were closer now, the crackling and creaking louder. In a matter of seconds the roof would collapse. Harriet knew that. She also knew that she could not leave without Gunther and Isabelle’s daughter.
Help me
, she prayed.
Dear Lord, help me find Eva.
There was no answer.

He smelled the smoke long before he saw the source. The winter wind carried it for miles, filling his nostrils with the acrid odor, and with each mile, Lawrence’s worry grew. This was not normal smoke. There was too much of it for it to be the plumes that rose from Ladreville’s houses. That smoke dissipated quickly. This was different. Something was burning, something large, something that was not supposed to be on fire. Deep inside, he knew that, just as he knew that the smoke was the reason Harriet needed him. She feared fire the way he did water. Simply the sight of flames and the smell of smoke worried her. What would happen if she were close to the fire? What would happen if . . . Lawrence refused to complete the thought. Harriet was still alive. She had to be, and he had to reach her. Whatever was happening, he needed to comfort her.

Let me get there in time
, Lawrence prayed as he bent low, urging Snip to a gallop. Zach had gone the opposite direction, planning to stop at the Bar C and tell Clay that the rustlers had been apprehended. Lawrence was alone now, racing toward Ladreville.
Let me help her. Please.

The smoke was thicker here, leaving no doubt that it came from the town itself and not a neighboring ranch. He felt his pulse accelerate and his heart fill with dread. As Snip descended the bank into the Medina, Lawrence shuddered at the sight before him.
Dear God
,
no. Not the school.

Trying desperately to block the ominous sounds of flames consuming wood, Harriet crawled as quickly as she could, making her way into the schoolroom, calling for Eva, choking each time she took a breath. Was this how Mother and Father had felt? Had they known this horrible sensation of being unable to breathe, yet needing air so desperately that they opened their mouths again and again?

She stretched out her arms, searching for a small body. Overhead, the beams groaned and shifted. It wouldn’t be long. If she didn’t find Eva soon, they’d both be trapped. They’d both be . . . Her mind recoiled, refusing to pronounce the final word.
Help me
,
Lord
.
Don’t let Eva die.
The rafters creaked; the flames crackled. The end was near. Harriet knew it would soon be over. Dimly, she remembered the prayer Pastor Sempert had offered as he’d sought to understand why Sterling Russell was to be the next shepherd for his flock.
Thy will be done.

Her mouth too parched to pronounce the words, Harriet prayed silently. Over and over she repeated the words as she crawled through the schoolroom.
Thy will be done.
And then, though the flames roared and the smoke thickened, her fears disappeared, replaced by the greatest calm she had ever known. Was this what death was like? But if she was dead, why would she still smell smoke?

She continued crawling, searching for Eva, until she felt a soft, still form. Unable to see, Harriet traced the body, stopping when her hands touched Eva’s face. She had found her. The little girl lay on the floor, her doll clutched in her arms.
Let her be alive
, Harriet prayed.

There was another ominous creak, and with a flash of sparks, one of the roof rafters tumbled to the ground. Flames spiraled ever closer. Another foot. She could make it another foot, she told herself as she dragged Eva into the cloakroom. Just another few feet, and they’d be at the doorway.
Pull. Harder.
You can open the door.
And somehow she did.