A Wreath of Snow Read Online Free PDF Page A

A well-dressed gentleman motioned him inside, clearly unconcerned with Gordon’s disheveled appearance. “Have you a report for us?”
    “We’ve need of a doctor in second class,” Gordon said without preamble. “Two women, one slightly injured, the other more so, I fear.” He looked at the anxious faces of the three passengers. “Do you know what’s happened?”
    “We rather hoped you might tell us,” an elderly gentleman confided. “In the meantime, Dr. Johnstone here could see to the ladies.”
    A bright-eyed fellow, no older than twenty-five, was already buttoning his coat and reaching for the brown medical bag at his feet. The leather sides were unscratched, and the brass buckles gleamed in the lamplight.
    “A Mrs. Reid and a Miss Campbell,” Gordon told him. “You’ll want to see what’s needed in third class as well.”
    Johnstone left at once, his eagerness to be of service palpable.
    “I’m headed for the engine,” Gordon told the rest of them.Seconds later he was covered in fresh snow as he stumbled past another first-class compartment and then the tender heaped with coal. When he reached the cab, neither the engineer nor the fireman was at his station. Moving to the front of the train, he found the men and discovered the problem as well: the front half of the engine was buried in a massive snowdrift.
    A faint shaft of light from the fireman’s lantern made the grim situation clear. The locomotive had entered a deep cutting where the high sides served to trap the snowfall. Strong northerly winds had done the rest, creating a shoulder-high wall of snow that was invisible in the storm.
    Gordon shouted into the wind, “Can it be cleared, sir?”
    “Too soon to tell.” The engineer grunted as he heaved aside another shovelful. “I’ve faced drifts like this before. But not in many years. And not on Christmas Eve, when we’re shorthanded.”
    Gordon looked about for the conductor. “Where’s McGregor?”
    “Third class,” the fireman answered, “looking for laborers to dig us out. A signalman has already left on foot, taking word back to Stirling.” He eyed Gordon over his wire-rimmed glasses. “Will you help us, sir?”
    Gordon knew his dress boots weren’t fit for the task, his calfskin gloves were too thin, and the woolen scarf he’d mistakenly left on the morning train would be sorely missed.
    He reached for a shovel poking out of the drift. “Show me where to start.”
    The combination of wet, heavy snow and bitterly cold winds made for rough going. When help arrived from the other carriages, there weren’t enough shovels, so men dug with metal trays, with coal buckets, with anything they could find to move the snow. The lanterns scattered about were of little use other than to show the men how much had yet to be accomplished.
    Gordon lost all sense of time as he thrust his shovel into the snow again and again, his back protesting, the muscles in his arms and shoulders straining with every load. If they could clear enough snow, they might yet reach Edinburgh that night. Miss Campbell and he could go their separate ways. The past would remain undisturbed and his shame with it.
    But his conscience refused to be silenced.
You wanted to apologize twelve years ago. Why not do so tonight?
    The very idea made his face grow hot, causing him to feel the sting of the wind even more acutely. What would he say to the woman after all this time? How would he begin?
My name is Gordon Shaw. A dozen years ago I did an unforgivable thing …
    But wasn’t that what he wanted? Forgiveness?
    Gordon heaved a fresh pile of snow into the air, wishing he might dispense with the weight of his guilt half so easily. No words, however sincere, could undo what had happened thatnight. Confessing his sins now would only open old wounds. Had he not done enough damage?
    Fueled by frustration, he jammed his shovel into the snowdrift. What was the point of asking someone’s forgiveness if it changed