By suppertime, they still hadn’t heard from John. Maggie insisted that Elspeth go home. “It’s too late to hear anything,” she said, voice breaking. “Please say you’ll continue to pray.”
“You know I will. And I’m going to have Angus radio Hugh. If ever there was a need for the folk to gather for prayer, ’tis now.”
***
Una Hunter heard the kirk bell pealing and removed her apron. She always heeded a call to kirk, not to pray, but to find out why the bell had rung. She joined the flock of folk heading for the kirk, hurrying to join the group of widows walking together. “Perhaps that Yank has taken a turn for the worse,” she told them, keeping her voice low. “Wouldn’t that be a convenient way to get him off the island?”
“I’m not certain that would be a good thing,” Dolly MacSween said. “After all, he was injured fighting those wicked Germans.”
Una bit back a sharp retort, careful not to antagonize Dolly who had lost her husband and only son in that first, terrible war.
“I don’t think our talk with Maggie has done any good,” Catriona Douglas said after looking around to make sure she couldn’t be overheard. “That patient of hers is still on Innisbraw.”
“Leave it to me,” Una said. “I’m far from finished with the likes of him.”
Once she heard the reason for the call to prayer, Una was furious. That meddling Hugh. Without Maggie’s nursing, that Yank would have to leave. She dropped to the kneeler and bowed her head with the rest of the congregation, plotting another way of get rid of that aviator in case Maggie found a way to stay.
The plan she’d hatched several nights ago was meant for later, but she might have to implement the idea. It could be dangerous, involving one of the men-folk, but the old sot she’d thought of had no scruples and constantly sought ways to make easy pieces of silver. She had no silver to spare but she did have a case of whisky she uncovered only days before when she’d been digging a hole in back of the cottage to make a wintering-over place for the potatoes someone was sure to give her. Probably spirits from the shipwrecked Polly, buried years ago in a hasty flight from the revenuers and forgotten. She’d have to make sure the old fool kept his mouth shut.
The folk took turns praying aloud, Elspeth offering the longest, most heart-felt prayer. While many of the younger men and women also offered prayers, Una clenched her hands into fists and locked her knees to keep from leaping to her feet and walking out.
***
Though her queasy stomach rebelled, Maggie fixed a pot of chicken bree and browned bannock on the griddle for supper. When she took the tray of food into Rob’s room, she found him lying in bed, staring out the window, eyes bleak. He looked so pale she would have to force him to eat.
“I’ve made us some bree and bannock.” She set the tray on the clothes-press. “I know you’re no’ hungry, but we both need to put something in our stomachs besides the tea and coffee we’ve had the day.”
He didn’t answer.
She bent over him and cupped his chin in her palm, forcing him to look at her. “You’ve worked too hard and too long to allow owt to keep you from walking. Please eat, Rob.”
He grasped her wrist with a trembling hand. “I can’t do it without you, Maggie. I’ll never walk if you’re no’ here.”
His desolate words penetrated her numbness. “Don’t say that. You are going to walk again. You told me you’re no’ a quitter, Rob, but I’m no longer certain that’s true.”
His grip on her wrist tightened. “I also told you I’m no’ a liar. Are you thinking that’s also no’ true?”
She tried to pull away.
He wouldn’t release his grip.
Good. He was angry. She didn’t like doing it, but it was a price well paid if it kept him from giving up. She stared down at him, willing herself to meet his steady gaze. “You may be right. If you can mislead me concerning your tenacity, how can I trust you to tell the truth about owt?”
His eyes darkened. “I’ve been called a lot of things, but nobody has ever called me a liar.”
She didn’t trust herself to answer. She couldn’t back down now. He had to realize he couldn’t quit even if he lost her encouragement. She swallowed and tried to still her trembling legs.
He continued to stare at her, as though delving into her soul.
She couldn’t bear it. She pulled away, fled his room, and ran outside where she collapsed onto the bench, gasping for breath.
What had she done? She knew how important he considered truthfulness. No matter how good her intentions, she had just accused him of being a liar. Heavenly Faither, help me. I’ve said such a cruel thing, and I didn’t mean it. Help me, Faither, please help me.
***
Rob pulled himself up with the trapeze and twisted and turned, ignoring the pain, fighting his reluctant muscles until his legs were off the bed. The wheelchair was not far away. He’d crawl to it on his stomach if he had to. Maggie thought he was a liar. He had lashed out in anger but only to cover his anguish. How could she even think such a thing?
He had to get to her.
He gripped the bars and lowered himself until he was hanging several inches above the floor.
His hands slipped.
He grabbed for the blanket at his side.
It slid from the bed.
He tumbled to the floor, hitting his nose on the bedside table leg, and upsetting the water pitcher, before landing on his left hip.
He lay stunned, panting as blood ran from his nose. He couldn’t take a deep breath. His hip burned. He turned to face the wheelchair, gripping the floor with his fingertips to pull himself around. The boards were too slippery with water from the upset pitcher. He ground his knuckles into his smarting eyes and laid his cheek on the cold floor. What had he done?
But it didn’t matter anymore—not walking, not flying—nothing mattered. Maggie had run away from him. He would never have an opportunity to tell her he loved her.
If she thought he was a liar, it didn’t make any difference.
He would have to add her to that long list of those he had loved and lost.
***
A crash of breaking glass.
Maggie leaped from the bench, looking toward Rob’s window. What happened? She swiped her sleeve across her wet face and tore into the infirmary, running hard.
When she reached his room and saw him on the floor, she dashed forward, bending over him. “Rob!” she cried. “Och, Rob, what have you done?” She leaped up and turned on the lamp, almost collapsing when she saw the blood on his face and the floor. She pulled a blanket from the bed and covered him, gasping with relief when he turned his head and looked at her. “Don’t move,” she said. “You’re bleeding. I’m going to radio Angus for help.”
He blinked as she reached the door.
“Talk to me, Rob,” she said when she returned to his side. She brushed aside shards of broken glass and knelt beside him. “Please tell me where you’re hurting.”
He mumbled something.
She leaned closer. “Your nose is bleeding, but I’m more concerned about your back. How did you fall out of bed?” Her fingers shook as she took his pulse.
Racing.
She wanted to untangle his legs from the bedding on the floor but couldn’t move him until she had help.
“Just ... just go, Maggie,” he groaned. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”
“I don’t understand. What doesn’t matter?”
“Nowt.”
CHAPTER 23
Maggie leaned over him, dabbing at the blood on his face with her handkerchief. “Och, what have I done to you? I didn’t mean a word I said. I only wanted you to get angry so you wouldn’t quit trying to walk. I’m sorry, Rob, I didn’t mean to hurt you like that. ’Twas me lying, no’ you.”
He fumbled for her hand.
Angus and Edert pushed through the doorway. “We rode auld Jack up the hill. Didn’t want to take time to hitch up the cairt,” Angus panted. “What’s happened??
??
“Rob’s fallen out of bed. Move that table aside and use one of those blankets to brush that glass and water away so we can straighten his legs.”
It took several minutes of struggling before the three had Rob back on the bed, lying on his belly. “Should I raise John on the radio, lass?” Angus asked.
“No’ yet.” Maggie probed the healing scars on Rob’s lower back with her fingertips. “You have to tell me if this hurts,” she said to Rob.
“Left side,” he mumbled. “Hip.”
“No’ your back?”
He shook his head.
She studied a red mark on his left hip carefully. “Angus, Edert, I’m going to untuck the bottom sheet and you can help me roll him over on his back.”
The moment they had him turned, he groped for her hand. “Did you mean it? About making me angry?”
“Every word.”
***
Rob wanted to believe her. It made a kind of perverted sense that a young lass who had never known the weight of loss and loneliness would blurt out such hurtful words thinking it would help. He had to believe her or their future together was over. “Och, lass, you didn’t have to scare me to death to get me to eat,” he whispered, trying to smile.
***
“I want you to move your legs as far apart as you can.”
“Now?”
“Right now.”
She watched him slide his legs apart. “Any pain?”
“No.”
“Then lift your right leg, slowly, slowly. Aye, like that. Does it hurt any more than usual?”
“The same.”
“Then your left, verra slowly.” He had landed on his left hip when he fell. Her breath froze as he raised and lowered the leg.
Was his face paler? She pressed her trembling knees against the bed. “How much did that hurt? And don’t make light of it. The absolute truth.”
“Same deep ache as always.”
Breathing deeply, she hugged Angus and Edert. “I can’t thank ye enough for coming so quickly and all your help. He can’t have injured himself badly if he can do leg-lifts.”
“Och, then the guid Lord answered our prayers, isn’t that right, lad?” Angus said with a broad grin.
Edert mumbled something unintelligible, his shy smile answer enough.
“Thank ye,” Rob said as the two left the room.
Maggie washed the blood from Rob’s face, relieved at the colour returning to his cheeks.
“You bumped your nose on something when you fell,” she said, helping him into clean pyjamas.
“Sorry I made such a muddle of the bed covers.”
“Och, ’tis easily remedied.” She pulled the top sheet from the bed, tucked in a fresh one, and finished with two clean blankets.
He took her hand as she raised the last blanket to his chest. “And I broke your pitcher. Hope it wasn’t a family heirloom.”
She sat beside him, smiling. “Well, if it was, we had a far larger family than I ever imagined. There’s one exactly like it in all the patient’s rooms.”
“I’m ready for a bowl of that bree.”
His hand no longer trembled and her stomach felt hollow. “So am I. Be back in a tick.” While it heated, she sat beside him on the bed. “I only wanted you no’ to give up.” She rested a hand on his forearm. “I’m afraid it got out of hand and I didn’t know what to say to undo my hurtful words.”
“Och, you know what a clumsy oaf I am. ’Tisn’t your fault I act before I think.”
“But everybody at Edenoaks said you never do anything without planning every move.”
“Something personal is different. I told you once I always put my foot in my mouth, only this time I forgot how high this bed is and ended up shoving my whole body in.”
His attempt at levity could never erase his words as he lay on the floor, body twisted, face bloody. “Nowt matters anymore.”
“The bree is surely hot by now,” she choked, escaping to the kitchen for another cry, praying for forgiveness the entire time.
They each ate a bowl of bree and a piece of bannock before she swept up the broken glass, stacked the bowls, and took them into the kitchen. She didn’t wash them. That could wait for morning.
***
Rob’s hip had a light bruise the next morning, and a small red mark rode the bridge of his nose. “I’m fine, only a little stiff.”
Maggie watched him do his exercises before rubbing his back and legs with lotion, kneading each muscle carefully.
***
They spent two more fruitless days staring at the radio, willing John to call. Their only messages were words of encouragement from Hugh and a few of the other islanders.
Next morning, Rob slumped in his chair in John’s office. Would this waiting never end? Losing Maggie now could mean the end to everything that made life worth living. He felt like a waist-gunner about to take off for his twenty-fifth and final bombing strike. Would he survive to step out the fuselage door at the hardstands, or be carried out with a blanket over his face—
“I know we’ve each prayed about this,” Maggie said, breaking into his dark thoughts, “but we’ve never prayed together.” She scooted her chair closer and reached for his hand.
He clutched her fingers like a drowning man grabbing a lifeline.
“Our precious Heavenly Faither, we come to You with fearful hearts. Please forgive our lack of faith to trust in Your plan for our lives.” Her words flowed with ease, as if she were having a conversation with a dear friend. “Give us Your peace, Lord. And above all, we pray for Your perfect will.” She squeezed Rob’s hand.
His turn. He had not prayed aloud since childhood and hesitated, stumbling over his words, overly conscious of Maggie’s presence. By the time he offered a hoarse “Amen,” he was ashamed. Such a long way to go and so much to learn before he could consider himself worthy of God’s attention.
***
Their call sign came over the radio. John McGrath’s voice.
Maggie snatched up the mike.
“Maggie, lass, I’m sorry it took so long to get back to you, but Leftenant Colonel Smythe refused to give me an answer until this mornin. I threatened to go over her head to Brigadier Jones-Hilton with a complaint that I could no’ be expected to do my best for our own lads if I had to work so short-handed. I’m afraid I may have made an enemy of Smythe ...” His voice faded for a moment before coming back strongly. “So I hope you haven’t packed yet. You’re to follow your original orders and remain on Innisbraw until late August. Over.”
She fumbled with the Broadcast switch, hand trembling. “Och, Faither, I can’t believe it. And I can never find the words to thank you enough. Over.”
“I’ll take a warm hug when I arrive, lass, but I’m thinking your gratitude should be to our Lord. I would have had to wait until next week, but Smythe had to postpone a meeting in London. Something about suffering a sudden bout of hives.”
“Hives!” Maggie’s bubble of elation threatened to lift her from her chair. “Och, at least it wasn’t a plague of frogs.”
McGrath’s deep laugh echoed over the airwaves. “I’ll see you Friday een, luve. Give my best to the colonel. Out.”
“I can’t wait. Thank ye again, Faither, and guid-bye. Out.”
She threw her arms around Rob’s neck, laughing and weeping, relief so palpable she wanted to shout her joy. “Hives, can you believe? Who says the Holy Spirit doesn’t have a sense of humour.”
***
Rob’s laugh bubbled up from his belly. Had God really done this? Of course He could—but had He?
No matter how the Lord arranged it, his Maggie was staying. He inhaled deeply, feeling the knot of tension in his chest dissolve. He stroked her hair with trembling hands, eyes smarting with unshed tears.
***
Though he’d been in England for over a year, Rob had a difficult time adjusting to what they called “Double Summertime” in the UK. Clocks were set two hours ahead of Greenwich Time durin
g the summer and one hour in winter, unlike the one hour President Roosevelt had established as “War Time” during the summer only in the States.
Because it was summer, and the island so far north, it never became completely dark at night and the sun rose a little after four in the morning. Knowing how he loved fresh air, Maggie never put up the blackout curtains in his room.
As Friday approached, it was not only the half-light coming in the window that kept him awake, but John McGrath’s impending arrival. Once the doctor spent a few minutes with them, he would realize how much their relationship had changed since they left the Royal Infirmary.
They teased one another constantly and Maggie was very open with her affection. She occasionally kissed his cheek or rested her hand on his arm or shoulder, and they held hands while sitting outside on cloudless evenings, watching the vivid sunsets bathing the island in a brilliant scarlet, purple, and magenta glow.
Now that Rob could admit to himself that he loved Maggie, he wanted to tell her. It became harder and harder to keep his hands to himself. He longed to unpin her hair and bury his face in its soft, fragrant, ebony glory. He wanted to kiss her hands, neck, lips—oh, how he wanted to kiss her soft, full lips.
A small niggle of worry that his progress might hit a brick wall and leave him tied to a wheelchair lay at the back of his mind. But because feeling had returned to his legs and feet, he began experiencing a newfound confidence that in time, he would not only walk again, he would fly.
Fly.
If he resigned his commission and returned to Innisbraw after the war, he would never fly again. Even his dreams haunted him now. The dream he’d had about piloting the PT-17 had opened a floodgate of memories and he often dreamed of flying. He was always alone at the controls, feet working the rudders perfectly, while he lost himself to the feeling of peace that being at one with the sky always brought.
But he could not go much longer without telling Maggie he loved her, and his indecision about returning to Innisbraw could very well break her heart—or even drive them apart.
Though he prayed repeatedly, no solution presented itself. If only he had someone to talk to. Like Colonel Hal Fielding, his flight instructor at Randolph and again in the P-47 fighter. When they first met, Hal had seemingly ignored Rob’s obvious fear of close relationships, never pushing, but always being a consistent sounding board. Over the years, they had developed a strong friendship. But that had been put on hold indefinitely when America entered the war and Rob was deployed overseas, caught up in almost daily sorties and missions. He had no idea where Hal was now. What could he do?