There and Now

She tried to keep her voice even and her manner calm. “I told you. I’m Elisabeth McCartney.”

“All right, Elisabeth McCartney—what are you doing here, dressed in that crazy getup, and why were you wearing my wife’s necklace?”

“I was—well, I don’t know what I’m doing here, actually. Maybe I’m dreaming, maybe I’m a hologram or an astral projection….”

His dark eyebrows drew together for a moment. “A what?”

She sighed. “Either I’m dreaming or you are. Or maybe both of us. In any case, I think I need Aunt Verity’s necklace to get back where I belong.”

“Then it looks like you won’t be going anywhere for a while. And I, for one, am not dreaming.”

Elisabeth gazed into his hard, autocratic face. Doubtless, the pop-psychology gurus would have something disturbing to say about the irrefutable appeal this man held for her. “You’re probably right. I don’t see how you could possibly have the sensitivity to dream. Alan Alda, you definitely aren’t. It must be me.”

“Papa, is Elisabeth still here?”

The doctor’s eyes scoured Elisabeth, then softened slightly. “Yes, Punkin, she’s still here.”

“She was going to bring me some warm milk,” Trista persisted.

Jonathan glowered at Elisabeth for a moment, then gestured toward the pitcher. She stumbled out of her chair and proceeded to the wall of cupboards where, with some effort, she located a store of mugs and a small pan.

She poured milk into the kettle, shaking so hard, it was a wonder she didn’t spill the stuff all over the floor, and set it on the stove to heat. She glanced toward the doctor’s coat, hanging nearby on a peg, and gauged her chances of getting the necklace without his noticing.

They didn’t seem good.

“If you want that milk to heat, you’ll have to stoke up the fire,” he said.

Elisabeth stiffened. The stove had all kinds of lids and doors, but she had no idea how to reach in and “stoke” the flames to life. And she really didn’t want to bend over in her nightshirt. “Maybe you could do that,” she said.

He took a chunk of wood from a crude box beside the stove, opened a little door in the front and shoved it inside. Then he reached for a poker that rested against the wall and jabbed at the embers and the wood until a snapping blaze flared up.

Elisabeth, feeling as stirred and warm as the coals at the base of the rejuvenated fire, lifted her chin to let him know she wasn’t impressed and waited for the milk to heat.

Dr. Fortner regarded Elisabeth steadily. “I’m sure you’re some kind of lunatic,” he said reasonably, “though I’ll be damned if I can figure out how you ended up in Pine River. In any case, you’ll have to spend the night. I’ll turn you over to the marshal in the morning.”

Elisabeth was past wondering when this nightmare was going to end. “You’d actually keep me here all night? I’m a lunatic, remember? I could take an ax and chop you to bits while you sleep. Or put lye down your well.”

By way of an answer, he strode across the room, snatched the pan from the stove and poured the milk into a mug. Then, after setting the kettle in the sink, he grasped Elisabeth’s elbow in one hand and the cup in the other and started toward the stairs, stopping only to blow out the lamp.

The suitcoat, Elisabeth noticed, was left behind, on its peg next to the door.

He hustled Elisabeth through the darkness and up the steep, narrow, enclosed staircase ahead of him. Her knees trembled with a weird sort of excitement as she hustled along. “I’m not crazy, you know,” she insisted, sounding a little breathless.

He opened the door to Trista’s room and carried the milk inside, only to find his daughter sleeping soundly, a big, yellow-haired rag doll clutched in her arms.

A fond smile touched Jonathan Fortner’s sensual mouth, and he bent to kiss the child lightly on the forehead. Then, after setting the unneeded milk on the bedstand, he motioned for Elisabeth to precede him into the hallway.

The fact that she’d originally entered the Twilight Zone from that door was not lost on Elisabeth. She rushed eagerly through it, certain she’d awaken on the other side in her own bed.

Instead, she found herself in a hallway that was familiar and yet startlingly different from the one she knew. There was a painted china lamp burning on a table, and grim photographs stuck out from the walls, their wire hangers visible. The patterned runner on the floor was one Elisabeth had never seen before.

“It must have been the beef casserole,” she said.

Dr. Fortner gave her a look and propelled her down the hall to the room next to the one she was supposed to be sleeping in. “Get some rest, Miss McCartney. And remember—if you get up and start wandering around, I’ll hear you.”

“And do what?” Elisabeth said as she pushed open the door and stepped into a shadowy room. In the real world, it would be the one she and Rue had always shared during their visits.

“And lock you in the pantry for the rest of the night,” he replied flatly.

Even though the room was almost totally dark, Elisabeth knew the doctor wasn’t kidding. He would lock her in the pantry, like a prisoner. But then, all of this was only happening in her imagination anyway.

He pulled back some covers on a bed and guided her into it, and Elisabeth went without a struggle, pursued by odd and erotic thoughts of him joining her. None of this was like her at all; Ian had always complained that she wasn’t passionate enough. She decided to simply close her eyes and put the whole crazy episode out of her mind. In the morning, she would wake up in her own bed.

“Good night,” Dr. Fortner said. The timbre of his voice was rich and deep, and he smelled of rain and horses and pipe tobacco.

Elisabeth felt a deep physical stirring, but she knew nothing was going to come of it because, unfortunately, this wasn’t that kind of dream. “Good night,” she responded in a dutiful tone.

She lay wide awake for a long time, listening. Somewhere in the room, a clock was ticking, and rain pattered against the window. She heard a door open and close, and she imagined Dr. Fortner taking off his clothes. He’d do it methodically, with a certain rough, masculine grace.

Elisabeth closed her eyes firmly, but the intriguing images remained and her body began to throb. “Good grief, woman,” she muttered, “this is a dream. Do you realize what Rue will say when she hears about this—and I know you’ll be fool enough to tell her, too—she’ll say, ‘Get a life Bethie. Better yet, get a shrink.’”

She waited for a long time, then crept out of bed, grimacing as she opened the door. Fortunately, it didn’t squeak on its hinges nor did the floorboards creak. Holding her breath, Elisabeth groped her way down the hall in the direction of the main staircase.

So much for your threats, Dr. Fortner, she thought smugly as she hurried through the large parlor and the dining room.

In the kitchen, she stubbed her toe trying to find the matches on the table and cried out in pain before she could stop herself. The fire was out in the stove and the room was cold.

Elisabeth snatched the coat from the peg and pulled it on, cowering in the shadows by the cabinets as she waited for Jonathan Fortner to storm in and follow up on his threat to lock her in the pantry.

When an estimated ten minutes had ticked past and he still hadn’t shown up, Elisabeth came out of hiding, her fingers curved around the broken necklace in the coat’s pocket. Slowly, carefully, she crept up the smaller of the two stairways and into Trista’s room.

There she stood beside the bed for a moment, seeing quite clearly now that her eyes had adjusted again, looking down at the sleeping child. Trista was beautiful and so very much alive. Tears lined Elisabeth’s lashes as she thought of all this little girl would miss by dying young.

She bent and kissed Trista’s pale forehead, then crossed the room to the other door, the one she’d unwittingly stumbled through hours before. Eyes closed tightly, fingers clutching the necklace, she turned the knob and stepped over the threshold.

For almost a full minute she just stood there in the hallway, trembling, afraid to open her eyes. It was the feel of plush carpeting under her bare feet that finally alerted her to the fact that the dream was over and she was back in the real world.

Elisabeth began to sob softly for joy and relief. And maybe because she missed a man who didn’t exist. When she’d regained some of her composure, she opened the door of her own room, stepped inside and flipped the switch. Light flooded the chamber, revealing the four-poster, the fireplace, the vanity, the Queen Anne chairs.

Suddenly, Elisabeth was desperately tired. She switched off the lights, stumbled to the bed and fell onto it face first.

When she awakened, the room was flooded with sunlight and her nose itched. Elisabeth sat up, pushing back her hair with one hand and trying to focus her eyes.

The storm was over, and she smiled. Maybe she’d take a long walk after breakfast and clear her head. That crazy dream she’d had the night before had left her with a sort of emotional hangover, and she needed fresh air.

She was passing the vanity table on her way to the bathroom when her image in the mirror stopped her where she stood. Shock washed over her as she stared, her eyes enormous, her mouth wide open.

She was wearing a man’s suitcoat.