THE  CAVERN  OF  DEEP  HARMONY

PART SIX:

Despite her tiredness, Eden woke up repeatedly during the night. Her dreams were wildly erratic combinations of things. Marshall had fallen down a crevice in a glacier and several polar bears were sitting on him. Miles was with her and dropped a rope ladder down into the crevice, explaining to her how she had to carry Wadsworth down the ladder on her shoulders and be careful not to sing or the bears would throw leaves at her. And that was one of the more sensible dreams. In another she was a student in a class Marshall was teaching but the room kept filling up with ice cubes. She tried to scoop them into a huge barrel but the door was broken down and Commodus came in, waded through the cubes and tried shoot Marshall. When she woke with a start from that one, she peered at the clock on the wall of the room Mike had arranged for her. Three AM. Sliding her feet into the hospital slippers, she padded quietly down the corridor. A young nurse at the station had her back turned and she flitted past unseen, pausing with her hand on Marshall's door.

She knew she shouldn't stay out in the hallway too long, so she pushed the door open.  The room was dimly lit and she saw there were two beds, but Marshall was the only occupant of the room. Well, other than Wadsworth, who blinked sleepily at her from under the bed. "You here, too, eh?" she whispered, crouching to rub his ears. His tail thumped against the metal under- structure of the bed and she stood quickly, putting her finger to her lips. "Shhhh!"

Marshall lay on his back, an IV drip in his left arm. She noted his right wrist was thickly bandaged. Bruises she'd not seen earlier had appeared now on his forearms. There was a fairly large one on his left cheekbone and she expected the rest of him bore similar marks. He still had a heating blanket tucked around him and the room itself felt quite warm. Mike had told her that his eyes had been irrigated repeatedly.  "You're going to be all right," she whispered more to herself than to him. The concept of drowning in cold mud sent a fresh shiver down her spine.

She sat down in a chair between the two beds and just watched him sleep. Wadsworth crept out from under the bed, sat right in front of her knees and rested his head in her lap. She stroked his neck. "You were wonderful, Waddy," she told him softly. "He's going to be so proud of you when he finds out what you did." 

Thinking back over the last three anniversaries of Miles' death, she had to admit this one was the most different. It had almost become the day this man sleeping in the bed two feet away had died. She wasn't sure why, couldn't form it into words, but the fact of that, that this man had almost died on the same day as Miles, would have died if she hadn't gone down into the gully,
it made her feel bonded to him somehow.  Something was, in some odd way, a bit redeemed.

She hadn't been there when Miles died, and there had been nothing she could do to save him. But today, today she had made a difference. Something newly strong had taken root inside her and she felt almost a sense of gratitude to this man for nearly dying so that she could prevent it. "I'm still tired," she explained to the dog. "Don't mind me. My mind's all warped sideways right now."

Back in her own bed, she thought about it some more. There had been an early snow the day Miles was killed and he died right there beside his squad car, snowflakes falling on his face. She'd always imagined the scene, him lying there, his curly hair golden against the snow, fresh flakes settling on his ruddy face with its scattering of freckles. Now the scene switched back and forth from her imagined memories of Miles to the ones she'd just seen with her eyes, Marshall's face coated in mud and the raindrops starting to spatter darkly on it, the mud beginning to run down his cheeks.  It all braided together in her tired brain, the day, the dyings, the faces.

In the morning there was a light tap on her door and Martha came in with a small case. Last night she'd told Harold what she'd need and Martha had packed it for her.  She'd also packed  for Marshall, only there she had to use her own judgment as to what to bring. Eden would be going back to the inn with Martha this morning, but the doctor wanted to keep Marshall at least through the day.

"They might let him out this evening. Said they'd wait and see how he was doing," Martha explained. She stepped out to the station to talk with the nurses while Eden dressed in the fawn-colored wool slacks and thick chocolate brown sweater she'd requested. Martha knew all the nurses and they were busily telling her what Mike had said about how Eden had gone down into the gully to rescue the professor.  They all smiled at her as she came up to the desk and one of the nurses handed her a bag with the clothing Eden had worn yesterday. "Here, I'll take that," Martha said firmly. "Let me see what I can do with them." 

Eden looked down the corridor toward Marshall's room, undecided if she should stop by or not. Martha saw the look and said, "Doc just went in."

Well, that settled that. She'd be able to speak with Marshall this evening at the inn. She felt almost shy about the prospect, though. Good Lord, she'd had the man's head in her lap twice, had had her arm around his middle, had held his hand. He'd even toppled over almost on top

of her. It wasn't like she'd never been near the guy before. But the thing was, she figured he probably didn't remember any of that. She rubbed the fingertips of her right hand on her palm, thinking of when she'd brushed mud from his face. Silly goose, she berated herself.  But, without thinking, her fingertips moved, touching her own cheek as she followed Martha to the main entrance.

Mike came to the hospital about an hour later, bringing Wadsworth's harness with him. It, too, had gotten coated in mud yesterday and he'd spent some while cleaning it. He walked up to the nurses' station. "Hey, Betsy, ok if I drop this off in Sinclair's room? He may need it if he goes home today."

Wadsworth, who had slunk way back under the bed when Doctor Peterson had been there earlier, watched with guarded eyes as the door opened and another man came in.  He remembered this one, though, and his tail thumped.

"So that's where you are!" Mike laughed softly. "It's ok, boy, you can come out. I brought your gear."

"His harness?" a slightly raw voice came from the bed.

"Yeah. It was all muddy. I sorta cleaned it a bit."

Marshall was sitting propped up on his pillow, his left arm in a sling. He extended his right hand in the direction the man's voice had come from. "Marshall Sinclair," he said.

"Mike, Mike Johnson. I'm one of the EMT's brought you in yesterday."

"Good," Marshall replied. "I was hoping to get a chance to thank you. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your getting me out of that gully."

"Out of...? You've got that one wrong. You were more'n halfway back to the inn before we got to you."

"But...I couldn't...."

"You don't remember the little gal?"

"Little gal?"

"Yeah, stayin' at the inn.  Wadsworth here went and got her.  Took her right to you."

"A...girl?"

Mike laughed. "Ok, a woman then. From what I hear tell she was out looking at the leaves and, as she says, Wadsworth kidnapped her."

"But...."

"I know what you mean. Don't see how she did it myself, but she got you loose and out of that damn ditch all by herself.. Saved your life."

"How...?" Marshall began but Mike's beeper went off.

"Gotta go," he said. "You got a great dog there," he added as he went out the door.

Marshall lay quietly after Mike left, trying to get his mind to go over yesterday step by step. He remembered walking down the wide path, the scents the sounds that were triggering lines for his book. Then Wadsworth had stopped, had tried to block him, but he'd taken one more step, trying to feel with his foot what lay ahead. It was when his weight shifted forward that the edge had crumbled.  He'd fallen. His shoulder had crashed into something and he'd turned in the air. There was mud everywhere and he couldn't seem to move very well. He moved his right arm. Yes, it'd been pinned. He remembered trying to pull his hand free. And pain, searing through his shoulder and back. That would be the left shoulder. Then what?  Everything seemed to converge into the mud and the pain, get all fuzzy and somehow lost. Damn! What had happened then?

More pain. He was choking. And someone was pushing on him, moving him. Could that have been this girl...woman...the EMT mentioned? Nothing was fitting together. He'd gotten out of the gully...was way down the trail before the EMTs got to him. That had to be a fair distance.  He didn't remember any of it.  Had it rained? He did seem to recollect rain hitting his face. He lay back, trying to recall what he could about the rain. Cold. That was the main thing. He remembered cold so deep even his liver felt cold. And fingers. What? Fingers? Yes, fingers on his face, touching, moving. What were they doing?  There had been some scent, some out-of-place scent. He couldn't remember what it was, only that it didn't fit there in the cold rain. He shivered again there in his warm bed, just thinking about the cold.

He slept much of the day and nurses came in and out, checking his temperature, adjusting things. About four, Peterson came back, said that he could go to the inn but that he needed to keep his left arm in a sling for awhile, would probably need some therapy to get it back in working order. Told him to rest a lot, not push it, and definitely not to go on any long walks in the woods. A male nurse came in and helped him dress. He grinned a little when he figured out what clothes Martha had chosen for him. 

Harold drove out and picked him up. Wadsworth sat happily in the back seat, glad to be away from all the scents in the hospital. They rode in silence for a bit then Marshall asked, "The woman who found me, she's staying at the inn?"

"Yep, checked in that morning after you'd already set out."

"Will she still be there? I mean now, is she still staying there?"

"Yep. Came up from Pittsburgh, just like you."

He raised his eyebrows, finding that interesting. "Can you...?"

"Eden," Harold supplied. "Eden McLaughlin. Widow. Works on one of the Pittsburgh papers. Can't remember which one."

Marshall chewed silently on that bit of information for a moment. Here he'd been thinking of her as a girl but she was probably an older woman. All the more amazing that she could get him out of the gully. "I'd like to thank her," he said finally.

Eden was sitting on a couch in the living room when she heard the door of Harold's car slam. She knew he'd gone to pick Marshall up. Setting aside the book she was reading, she watched the front door, suddenly nervous. What would he think when he saw her sitting there? Would he remember her at all?  Because of the mud, he'd never really looked at her and the last time she'd seen him, he'd been asleep. She blew out a long breath, feeling silly. Then Harold entered, holding the door for Marshall, who was walking behind him. Marshall came into the room dressed almost in the classic uniform of a lit professor, brown slacks, a tweed jacket with suede elbow patches. He had on a pair of very dark sunglasses and his left arm was in a sling. But it was the way he was holding Wadsworth's harness as he walked.  It was all so unmistakable. She bit her lower lip, amazed at her own denseness. 

Of course! Wadsworth was a Seeing Eye dog.

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