Once Upon a Remembrance

  "Are you saying you don't recall faces or that you have some kind of amnesia?"

  He shrugged it off. "An accident several months ago, but it is of little consequence. I am recalling more as time progresses."

  Isabeau was taken aback. "I'm sorry -- you look perfectly healthy."

  "Cap'n," Malry interrupted loudly, "it's probably past time to get back." He dusted the back of the Captain's jacket. "Are you all right? Mayhaps we should seek out the physician before the ride home."

  They exchanged a meaningful glance, but she had no idea what it was about.

  "I am fine. Come." The Captain retrieved his hat from the ground and hit it against his knee. "Let's go to Hawk’s Den. I offer you a roof over your head, somewhere you can clean up. This has been a long day all around. I could use my bed."

  Isabeau followed, looking at the broad back, the long legs encased in dusty black boots. That momentary hint of his vulnerability when he'd talked about the amnesia had touched something inside her. To think he suffered lack of memory made her tender heart feel for him.

  He turned to her, his dark brows raised in inquiry. Had she said something of her thoughts out loud?

  "Now you must tell me your name," she said abruptly, not caring how rude that sounded. She had to know. Surely he was Pierce Morgan. It was time the joke ended.

  "I am Hawk Morgan." With a flourish, he executed a bow, a sardonic smile on his mouth.

  A wave of ice passed through Isabeau and settled in her chest. Memory reasserted itself with blazing clarity.

  Hawk Morgan. The man in the family Bible. The man who was to die.

   

  Chapter Three

  Malry rode in the carriage with Isabeau. At any other time she would have enjoyed the ride, but there were too many questions crowding her mind. The tiny interior lamps were lit but she could not see Malry very well as he reclined within the shadows. Isabeau was grimly amused. When Hawk had told Malry to ride in the carriage, the seaman had grumbled and fussed for a good fifteen minutes. The Captain -- Hawk Morgan she reminded herself, rode ahead of them on horseback.

  Isabeau sat near the window so she could watch him. He rode with his back straight, eyes unswervingly ahead, his aloofness like a cloak.

  Resting her head against the leather cushions, she mulled over the all-too-coincidental events. A man by the name of Hawk Morgan appears, suitably dressed in clothes very obviously from an earlier era. His name had been one of the last she had seen before -- before what? Had she fainted, was her body unconscious at Hawk's Den? What the hell was going on? Was she in some kind of time warp? Maybe someone was playing a trick on her. She wasn’t appreciating any of it. And besides all that, this entire day was scaring the hell out of her. Her thoughts kept circling back to her mother's story. Her father's story.

  Isabeau looked at the man on the opposite seat. When she’d earlier climbed into the carriage she had seen Malry pull Hawk aside. Malry's urgency had not been lost on her. Unabashed, she had listened to their conversation. Malry insisted she had literally flown past him and then knocked the two men out of harm's way.

  Until that moment Isabeau had hardly remembered surging forward…apparently her sudden rush of adrenaline had surprised Malry. She had seen what was about to happen and he had not. Although her mother had never tried to make her conceal her premonitions, Isabeau had instinctively never shared them with anyone else, and knew it was a survival mechanism on her part. She and her mother were different, and her mother had always assured her that difference was a gift.

  When they reached Hawk’s Den, she would be able to more clearly determine what was going on. All of this would be over, and things would return to normal. She needed to see Leif to reassure herself she wasn’t going crazy.

  "So," Malry's jeering voice broke the silence. "What will be your story when we reach Hawk’s Den, eh?" Planting his booted feet on either side of hers, he braced himself as the carriage jolted over the ruts in the road. "I can surely see the drama that surrounds you."

  She regarded him now with amusement. "I’ve told you the truth Mr. Malry. Someone brought me to that ship and is responsible for all of this. I don't know," she said slowly, "maybe I've slipped through some kind of black hole or time warp."

  "What a curious thing to say," he remarked.

  Isabeau sighed, getting the feeling she would get no information from him other then what he wished to tell her. "How long have you sailed with Hawk?"

  "I served with Cap'n Hawk Morgan many a year," he finally said. "He is one of the best on the sea. An honorable man."

  "Many years?" She scoffed. "He's not that old."

  He grinned. "Aye. Not old, not old at all."

  Finding his amusement less than satisfying, Isabeau probed further. "He's captain of that ship?"

  Nodding, Malry settled once more against the worn leather cushions, rudely closing his eyes. "Aye, that ship and others. The Cap'n be a righteous man by all accounts. Anyone who tries to cheat him should be warned ‘tis pure folly. I always have his back." The words were delivered precisely. She'd have to be dense not to understand.

  "I have to say this is the first time I've ever been perceived as a threat."

  "You have nothing to fret about if you are as you say. So tell me, lady, why have you landed in our fair country?"

  "I don’t know how I got aboard that ship."

  Malry leaned forward, his frown indicating he didn’t believe her.

  Isabeau leaned her head back against the plush cushioned seat. Dusk masked much of their surroundings, yet she experienced a sense of familiarity. She turned her head to watch the road. Well-rutted roads. No pavement. No cars. None of the familiar trappings of the present time. A small ache settled in her ribs. She knew with certainty there was no Hawk Morgan in her modern world. He was an ancestor of her present day Pierce Morgan.

  A match flared and she turned her head to see Malry light another small lantern inside the coach.

  "We’ll be there soon," he said, settling back in his seat, scratching the balding spot on his grizzled head.

  She wondered what part he played if this was a charade.

  A mere ten minutes passed and the carriage began to slow. As it came to a swaying standstill, Isabeau quickly swung open the door and paused on the top iron step to look around.

  Gas lamps were lit on either side of the large entrance way of Hawk's Den, but their glow gave only a hint of the stately magnificence of the house that she remembered from her earlier arrival.

  Isabeau breathed deeply of the near-dusk night. Mingled scents touched her nostrils, all of them sweet. Her heart felt light as she dropped to the ground and hastened up the familiar front walk.

  "Mighty familiar, aren't you, lady?" Malry demanded roughly.

  Isabeau turned to confront him. "What's your problem?" She decided it was time to end his dominion over her. "You've been throwing your weight around since I got here."

  Chuckling, Malry studied her as he twisted a sliver of wood between his teeth. After a moment he nodded his head toward the left side of the house. "No young lady dressed such as yourself should enter the front entrance."

  Isabeau watched the carriage roll around to the back of the house. She didn't see Hawk. She assumed he'd ridden directly to wherever the horses were stabled. Curiously, she followed Malry around the house and through a door at the rear. "You’re playing this out for all it’s worth," she muttered.

  The door opened into the kitchen. Directing her to a large, scrubbed wooden table, Malry gruffly ordered her to have something to eat and then he disappeared.

  An abundance of food in various bowls and earthenware tubs was set out by a large woman who merely introduced herself as Cook.

  "Where is Mrs. Cummins?"

  The woman, dressed in a dark, long sleeve dress with bands on the wrist cuffs and a large coarse apron tied around her ample waist, merely gave her a blank stare as she began to set out biscuits and meat.

  Since her stomach had been
rumbling in empty protest for some time now, Isabeau ate. Although she didn’t recognize some of the food, everything was delicious. Once Cook saw her begin to eat, she left.

  Never a big eater, Isabeau managed to consume twice as much as she ordinarily would have eaten. Pushing her stool back, she looked around the kitchen, finding it clean but relatively primitive by modern standards.

  There were no modern appliances, no microwave or electric range, merely a large gaping hole, brick lined, which she assumed was used for cooking. A huge fireplace sported a swinging iron arm from which hung a massive black cauldron. A sink like porcelain basin was presided over by an iron hand pump, the handle well-worn. Bemused, Isabeau wondered at the antiquity of the kitchen.

  She found a large bowl of lukewarm water on the scarred wood counter. She scrubbed her plate clean and then realized in the corner was a small kitchen sink.

  She revisited in her mind everything she’d seen since waking on the ship.

  "Is my mind playing tricks on me?" An uneasy prickling ran along her neck. She looked up to see Hawk standing in the doorway.

  In the act of placing her rinsed plate on the counter, she instead hit the counter edge. Clumsily, she tried to catch the plate, but it clattered onto the wooden floor.

  "I am sure our housemaid Lenore will appreciate your diligence," Hawk remarked with a half grin. "Even though now you’ve broken the clean plate."

  "Sorry." Isabeau picked up the pieces of shattered plate and carefully placed them on the table’s surface. "I always try to be careful with the property of others."

  "What about cleanliness, washing one's body?"

  Isabeau felt a hot tide of color rush to her hairline. "Yes, I’ll take care of that right away. I have to talk to Leif. Have you spoken to him?"

  "I know of no one named Leif."

  "He was here earlier when I was here," she said stubbornly. "Mrs. Cummins let us in."

  He hesitated. "I know of no Mrs. Cummins."

  "You paused right there. Are you sure?"

  "Well no, but for a moment the name --" he broke off. "No."

  Somewhere, a clock ticked loudly.

  "The room you will have has a bathtub. It's newly renovated though, I apologize, far from complete."

  "I would love to get clean," she said, though it was not the first thought in her mind. She still questioned if this was all a game. Leif could be a great jokester upon occasion.

  What if it was real? She straightened her shoulders as an unfamiliar wave of helplessness filled her.

  "Hawk Morgan," she murmured. "You were born in the year 1863."

  He moved further into the room, standing three feet or so from her, arms folded across a broad chest. "You have information, and yet I know nothing about you."

  "I read it in your family Bible."

  The skepticism on his face spoke loud and clear.

  Slowly and deliberately, she said, "I was here in your library earlier with my friend Leif. Mrs. Cummins made dinner for us. The next thing I know I woke up on your ship." She thought again of all the strange things that had occurred since she’d woken on the ship. Her head began to hurt, pain radiating across her skull.

  "Yet you don't know how you got on the ship."

  Fingers trembling, she rubbed her temples. "I saw the Bible," she insisted. "The Morgan family Bible. Your name was in it." She remembered with clarity reading his date of death. "What year is this?"

  "1894."

  Isabeau pressed her palm to her stomach, feeling as if she'd been punched.

  "Why is it you don’t know the year, and how can it be that you saw the Bible? It is always kept in --"

  Hoarsely, she said, "The library."

  "Yes." Hawk stared at her.

  "1894," she repeated. "This isn’t a dream, is it?" The question wasn’t meant to be answered. Could a dream duplicate the lifestyle of a century ago so superbly, especially when she knew virtually nothing about 1894?

  Isabeau clenched her fists. This man was real blood and muscle, not merely part of a dream landscape.

  "Isabeau." Hawk's voice exuded patience as he broke through her jumbled thoughts. "My turn to ask questions. How did you get aboard The Lady, and why were you hiding?"

  "You wouldn’t believe the truth, even if I knew all of it. I'm having a hard time with it."

  "You're determined to be evasive."

  Isabeau's gaze snapped up to his face. "Not on purpose, I assure you."

  "But perhaps not as determined as I am to discover the reason for your sudden appearance." A certain menace permeated the room. "Have you no family?"

  "My mother." She swallowed hard. "She’s very far away."

  "Your speech." He moved closer as she inched back. "You're a Northerner?"

  Taken aback, Isabeau inclined her head. "Yes."

  "Who are you running from?"

  "You have to believe me, I have no idea how I got on your ship." She moved toward the doorway. "I must find Leif." Hope flared. "Maybe he's been time warped also."

  "Wait." He moved to block the door. "I don’t know why but I believe you when you say you don’t know how you got there. I'll not force you to stay, but I offer a roof over your head and food to eat. I owe you that after saving our lives."

  Isabeau watched him suspiciously. It seemed contrary to his earlier stance. She took a deep breath. "How can I ask you to believe what I’m experiencing, when right now I can’t begin to understand it myself?"

  "Well, let me hear it and I’ll decide."

  "I arrived at Hawk’s Den last night with my friend and boss, Leif Ericsson. We were there -- here, on assignment to photograph the house and grounds for a magazine layout. There was an electrical storm building up all day. We were in the library, and we were looking at pictures, and found the Morgan family Bible. When I read your name, the dates, I suddenly started feeling sick. The last thing I remember is reading your name and then I can’t remember anything else until I woke on the ship."

  "Are you saying while I was away you and your friend came to Hawk’s Den?"

  "Yes -- well, no, not really. When we arrived here it was later." Her shoulders slumped. "Much later." She swallowed. "Another century later." She had a sinking suspicion Leif wasn’t here.

  "She speaks the truth!" A woman’s high-pitched voice startled Isabeau. An elderly woman moved from behind Hawk as he pivoted on his heel and stepped out of the doorway.

  "Aunt, you have arrived back. I was not expecting you until tomorrow."

  A small woman moved through the doorway, then entered the kitchen in a whirlwind. She wore a long skirt and white blouse with ribbon edging and frilly lace. She was thin almost to the point of emaciation, but what really startled Isabeau was the wildly unkempt hair and overall untidy appearance of the woman he called Aunt. Isabeau quickly noted her blouse buttons were off by one hole and part of her blouse partially hung out from her skirt waistband.

  "I am no child to be put to bed when others deem it necessary." Hawk’s aunt crossed the kitchen to stand before Isabeau. The woman reminded Isabeau of a child with her bright, inquiring eyes.

  Her eyes were an inordinately pale, washed-out blue. The woman suddenly moved back against the wall, her glance darting swiftly between Isabeau and Hawk. Those light eyes settled on Isabeau, her mouth puckering in consternation as she extended one thin hand as if to ward off someone. Straggly hair flew wildly as she turned her head from side to side with obvious agitation.

  "She's come!" The woman hissed, her voice sending a chill along Isabeau's shoulders as she turned to Hawk. "Told you so, did I not? Now there's two of you -- oh, what a dither. Two of you!" Her voice rose to a high-pitched wail.

  Isabeau darted a glance at Hawk. His face appeared to lose all color at the old woman's words. "What does she mean?" she asked. "There's two of us?"

  "Aunt, calm yourself." His voice soothed. "Everything will be fine." He threw Isabeau a glance, then held the older woman’s hands, quieting her as he placed a comforting arm about
her frail shoulders. "Where is Maize? She will be worried by your absence."

  "Hawk." As he guided the old woman from the kitchen, Isabeau heard the woman’s distraught whispers. "I cannot be responsible with two of you in the same household -- it is unnatural -- I know tragedy must be averted, but God's truth, I didn't mean to bring her here."

  Isabeau followed them. She had to know what the old woman was talking about. It was obvious, despite her distress, she knew something of what was going on.

  Hawk's voice remained gentle. "This young lady is in need of a place to stay. She seeks her friend she arrived with. Come now Aunt, you have never been upset by the children who seek shelter at Hawk's Den, please calm yourself now."

  Isabeau began to follow them but he turned back and shook his head. She stopped, frustrated, knowing the old lady had answers that she needed.

  They moved from the kitchen, out of earshot, their voices an indistinct murmur to Isabeau's straining ears. She could not help but feel pity at the condition of the confused woman. Could there be truth in her ramblings?

  "Come with me, Miss."

  Isabeau started in fright as a second woman’s voice spoke from the shadows. To her fanciful imagination, the woman materialized from out of nowhere, holding a lamp. About fifty years of age, she was dressed in a simple white nightdress with a long, dark shawl thrown around her shoulders, as if she'd been to bed and risen quickly. On her head she wore a plain white cap with a narrow ruffle.

  "I am Maize, maternal aunt to Hawk. He is quieting Belva, poor soul. I would show you to your room." She looked Isabeau over unsmilingly, lowering the lamp, and turned away, clearly expecting to be followed. "Come with me, please."

  Isabeau followed the woman, her mind wrestling anew with her situation.

  "I am going to need clean clothes."

  The older woman looked over her shoulder, a slight smile curving her lips. "Of course, Isabeau." She hesitated. "May I call you by name?"

  "Certainly."

  "I help care for Belva."

  Isabeau hesitated, then told herself she was justified in prying. "You care for her?"

  The woman nodded solemnly, her voice dropping. "Poor dear's been sick for some time, almost half the year. She was very agitated tonight. She hasn't had a spell this bad in several months."

  "It’s because I’m here?" Isabeau chewed her lip. "Doesn't it strike you as strange that she talks about me coming here, and she's obviously upset by it, thinking she's responsible?"