by Jane Steen
“Well—“ I hesitated, wondering whether I should ask Martin what he was doing that day. But of course his plans would have to include Lucetta, and she had not yet made an appearance.
“Or are you sick of seeing the prairie?” Judah offered his own interpretation of my hesitation.
“Of course not,” I laughed. “My ankles are a little sore. Oh, I probably shouldn’t mention those,” I added, recollecting that Judah was, after all, a gentleman. One did not mention one’s lower limbs to a gentleman, even if he had hoisted you astride a horse the day before.
Judah threw back his head in a rare burst of laughter, his glossy curls catching the light. “We won’t walk far,” he promised over his shoulder as he turned to hurry through the door. “Not today.”
32
Interrogatory
“We have punished Thea,” Catherine said quietly.
We were standing, arms linked, on the balcony leading from the library. Below us in the yard, the Lombardis’ cart stood ready, their mule’s long ears twitching as Teddy and his father finished loading the last few parcels.
I looked at Catherine, but her expression was closed. Evidently, she didn’t wish to tell me what Thea’s punishment had been. I decided not to ask her.
“In any event, Sarah seems to have recovered from the shock,” I said. “Perhaps it’s better this way. I would have had to tell her sooner or later, I suppose.”
“Perhaps.” Catherine let go of my arm and turned to face me. “If you were already married to Mr. Poulton, for example, you’d have no need to tell her. She’s very small; she may forget what Thea told her. Better to let her think she has a father and spare her the shame.”
I bit my lip. Catherine looked much smarter than she had on arrival, being dressed in one of the gowns I had sewn for her; but her responsibilities seemed to be settling back over her as the time of departure neared. Her tone was more severe than was quite comfortable for me.
“And yet you want me to think twice before I say yes to Judah,” I said, a little reproachfully.
“I do.” Catherine gazed out into the yard. Martin had joined the Lombardi men while we had been speaking, and the three of them were engaged in a conversation that occasioned much hilarity.
“It’s a pity it could not have been Mr. Rutherford,” she said. “He’s a good man, and like you in many ways—hardworking and kind, ambitious without being ruthless. And his affection for you runs deep. But it’s too late for that.” She sighed, responding with a wave to Teddy’s shout that they were all ready. Martin turned, saw me, and tipped his hat with a hesitant smile, then turned back to Pastor Lombardi.
“Martin was ready to marry me, once.” I resolutely turned my back on the sight of Martin. “To save me from my stepfather. But I wouldn’t countenance such an arrangement; and, as you say, it’s too late now.”
Dismissing the thought, I felt my brow furrow as I wrestled with the implications of Catherine’s words. “Is it your opinion that I must marry? That if it’s not Judah, I must go husband-hunting for Sarah’s sake?”
“As I’ve told you, I can’t express an opinion on Mr. Poulton until I know him better.” Catherine’s voice had taken on a more acid edge than usual. “And he’s a hard one to get to know. But yes, if you want my completely honest opinion, the options in front of you—if you have Sarah’s well-being in mind—are to marry him, marry someone else, or move away to where nobody knows you and construct a more convincing web of lies about your dead husband. And I supply that last solution as a practical, not a moral, one. You’re an eminently practical woman, Nell.”
Once again, her tone made me uncomfortable, and my expression no doubt reflected my unease. Catherine hugged me fiercely and kissed me on the cheek.
“Forgive me,” she said. “Thea’s behavior has put me out of sorts, and I can’t seem to find my Christian charity this morning.” A ghost of a smile flickered on her lips. “I hope you know that whatever your choices, I love you as a daughter. Come to us at Christmas.”
“I will.”
I hugged her back, but my limbs felt strange and heavy as I watched her cross the library with rapid steps, hurrying to find the younger children so they could leave for the long journey home. I had refused to reveal Jack’s name to my mother and stepfather because I didn’t wish to sacrifice myself to a loveless marriage. Would I have to make that sacrifice after all?
“That child,” said Martin as we watched the Lombardis’ cart jolt over the ruts on the trail, “is trouble.”
“Sarah?” I asked.
I was distracted, focused on the small bright spot that was my daughter’s hair bobbing along the trail in the wake of the cart. She had promised faithfully she would come straight back, and Tess was in hot pursuit, but the sight of her running away from me still made me feel cold inside.
Martin’s soft chuckle recalled me to his presence. “Thea,” he answered. “I gather she received some kind of punishment.”
I glanced up at him, noting the small changes in his face that were more apparent in the strong morning light. Faint lines at the corner of his eyes and mouth suggested that his sense of humor had not abandoned him, and indeed those laughter lines gathered now as his smile broadened. But a small, straight line between his brows was evidence of worry and the burden of responsibilities. The tired look I had noticed earlier didn’t leave him even when he smiled.
“Teddy was right though,” I said and saw Martin’s brow contract in puzzlement. I seemed to be aware of every line of his features, and that disconcerted me. Would this fascination fade as I became more accustomed to him again? I drew a deep breath, determined to resume my normal, workaday frame of mind, and crossed my arms against the faint chill of the morning wind.
“Teddy said punishing Thea would only anger her, and she wouldn’t admit she had done anything wrong. I’m afraid he’s right. Did you see how she looked at me? As if I’d taken a switch to her myself.” I hugged my arms tighter to my body, remembering the chill I had felt under Thea’s steady glare.
“What she did was wrong,” Martin said, and I could see his eyes had darkened to the storm-gray color that betrayed his anger.
It appeared that Tess had finally caught up with Sarah. They were turning back from pursuing the cart, which was now only a speck in the distance.
“They’ll be all right,” Martin said. My face was averted from him as I scanned the prairie, my hands shading my eyes, but I had the unnerving impression he was staring at me. Quite possibly, I had changed too. Was he noticing the signs of age on me? I was twenty-two now after all—well out of my first youth.
“I must do some work,” I said, trying to shake myself out of my inactivity. Tess and Sarah were definitely heading back toward the seminary, but knowing the two of them, the journey would be a long one, interspersed with romps in the dry grass and the picking of interesting seed heads and such flowers as might remain at this time of year. “I didn’t do a thing yesterday, and for the last three weeks I’ve been sewing clothes for the Lombardis. I’m worried about them, Martin.”
I turned toward the small door that led to the area by the kitchen, threading my way past two of the women servants carrying clanking buckets. They greeted me cheerily and looked curiously at Martin, who followed close behind me. He raised his hat to them and spoke a genial greeting, which earned him broad smiles and nods of approval.
We emerged opposite the row of stout oak-paneled doors that denoted the rooms of the wealthier students. I thought, as I often did, of Reiner, now somewhere in Saint Louis. I felt a pang of sadness for the pleasant young man who had, for a while at least, been genuinely attached to me. I wished I had been able to return that attachment.
“You’re very quiet.” Martin’s voice echoed in the corridor. Wednesday morning’s classes were in session, the public areas of the building deserted.
“I was thinking of a friend,” I admitted, pushing open my workroom door. “One who’s no longer here.”
“A frie
nd you were fond of?” Martin’s tone was light.
“Yes, to a certain degree,” I admitted, opening a window to let in the morning air. The northern exposure of my workroom allowed no beams of sunlight in to fade my fabrics, but on a fine day like today, the high windows let in a bright, even light. It winked in my scissors, left carelessly on a chair, and brightened the dull yellow of the nankeen spread out on my cutting table. Fretting about Sarah the day before, I hadn’t tidied up as I usually did.
“Was he fond of you?”
I felt myself redden. “He was. He asked me to marry him. But I wasn’t sufficiently attached to him for that.”
“And not a hint in your letters? Merciful heavens, Mrs. Lillington, you are quite the dark horse.” Martin’s tone was light and the maiden-auntish “Merciful heavens” was a definite invitation to playfulness, but there was a note of cynicism that was new to him.
I picked up one end of the nankeen and snapped it to shake off a few loose threads, then smoothed the cloth back over the table and reached for my basket of pattern pieces.
“You didn’t inform me about your own wedding until it had already happened,” I pointed out. “Besides, I didn’t want to marry him, so what was there to tell?”
“I’m sure the corridors of the seminary are littered with rejected swains.” Martin laughed, but it wasn’t a pleasant laugh. “Mr. Poulton, perhaps?”
I affected not to hear him and went in search of my pincushion, which had ended up on the sewing machine. “I really do have a lot of work, Martin.”
Martin pulled up a chair and sat down, stretching his long legs out before him.
“So Mr. Poulton is not rejected, then? I thought he was trying to get that point across to me at breakfast. Conceited sort of fellow, isn’t he?”
There was nothing I could say to that remark, so I said nothing, concentrating on pinning the pattern pieces at the correct angle. Through the open window, the sound of faraway laughter reached me in tiny spurts, borne by the west wind that occasionally rattled the frame as it pushed against the glass. Behind me, I could hear the soft creak of the chair as Martin shifted position, the gentle rasping sound of his hands sliding into his pockets. A fly buzzed around my head, and I swatted it away, watching it zigzag toward the window, bouncing off a pane of glass as it made good its escape outdoors.
I breathed in the warm hay scent of the prairie in autumn, trying to enjoy what normally would have been a peaceful morning’s work. But my peace was being torn down, minute by minute, by the silence gathering between me and Martin like the calm that precedes the onrushing storm.
We both ran out of patience at the same moment. My hand faltered, its normal easy dexterity replaced by a heaviness that seemed to start at my shoulders. I turned to see that Martin had straightened up in his chair, all pretense at relaxation abandoned.
“Good,” he said, but his eyes were hard. “I rather hoped I wouldn’t have to conduct this conversation with the back of your head. I’ll ask you straight—has Poulton asked you to marry him, and have you said yes?”
I slammed down the scissors, which I had unaccountably picked up, and moved to the window. The north side of the building had little to commend it, offering only a view of a particularly flat and uninteresting piece of prairie and the young trees that marked the seminary’s boundary. I leaned against the window frame and crossed my arms, glaring at Martin.
“Since you’re evidently not going to let me work until you’ve interrogated me, then yes, Judah has asked me to marry him, and no, I haven’t yet said yes. But I haven’t said no either. He’s going to ask me again around the New Year, and by that time I intend to have an answer for him.”
“Do you love him?” Martin asked and then shook his head so that a lock of white-blond hair fell over his forehead. He pushed it back impatiently. “No, forget I said that. If you loved him—passionately—you would have married him long ago. You have a deep well of devoted love in you, Nellie. Once it fastens itself to a person, I don’t imagine either an ocean or a century would be sufficient to part you from them.”
“You might be right,” I said, wishing we were not having this conversation. “But there’s more to marriage than just love—isn’t there?”
“Indeed.” Martin rose and came to join me at the window, his face bleak as he stared out at the undulating line of trees, from which a few parched brown leaves would occasionally fall. His profile, with its high, beaky nose and slightly full lower lip, was as familiar to me as my own face, and yet unfamiliar.
“I don’t like him.” Martin shoved his hands back into his pockets and turned his head toward me, his expression serious. “I don’t think he loves you at all. I don’t think he even wants you, not as a man wants a woman. I would understand him better if he did. Oh, I know he’s all smiles and pretty gestures,” he continued as I opened my mouth to retort, “and I’ll bet he’s not above kisses and caresses too, when you’re alone.”
I reddened, and he laughed, a short, cynical sound that twisted one side of his mouth upward. “It’s easy to offer such—compliments—to a lovely young woman.” The arm nearest me jerked convulsively, as if his hand were trying to lift upward, but he only shoved the hand deeper into his pocket, his face hardening. “But that’s not love, Nellie, that’s seduction. And it’s usually a means to an end.”
“That’s ridiculous.” Anger rose up through me, hot and acid. “You barely know him—“
“I’ve seen enough.” Martin’s mouth tightened, reflecting my fury. “And I understand the power of seduction too, Nell, better than you realize.”
He moved a couple of inches closer to me, staring into my face. “You’re vulnerable, and without a protector for all intents and purposes. The Lombardis are too far away, and they have their own problems. What’s more, you’re rich. He knows that, doesn’t he?” His lips twitched as another thought plainly crossed his mind. “But the Calderwoods don’t—now that’s interesting.”
I pushed at Martin’s chest with the flat of my hands, trying to shove him away. My shoulder was up against the window frame, and I couldn’t step backward. To my surprise, I couldn’t budge him. He was far more solid than I remembered, and it was like pushing against a large animal that was looming over me.
He was looming over me, and I wasn’t sure what I thought about that. For a moment, I considered kicking him in the shins, but I wasn’t sure what I thought about that either. So I did nothing, my hands resting on the rough silk of his waistcoat, aware of the warmth of his body and the strong thump of his heartbeat.
“You’re letting your imagination get the better of you,” I said, realizing as I did so how like Mama I sounded. “Really, Martin, you sound like a dime novel. Why should Judah have any motive for wanting to marry me except—wanting to marry me? Perhaps he’s simply reached the age and position in life when a man wishes to marry, and I—I’m not entirely devoid of charms, am I?”
I bit my lip, wishing I had not let that last question out. It negated the brisk, no-nonsense tone of the first part of my speech and sounded childish and desperate. I felt a flush heat my cheekbones but refused to lower my eyes, looking steadily into Martin’s face.
The silence that stretched between us was broken by a giggle from somewhere to my right. Martin’s face changed, and he stepped back, breaking the contact between us. I moved so I could see out of the window and waved at Sarah and Tess, who were heading toward us, clutching the anticipated bundles of grass and flowers.
“We’re going round the back to find a vase,” Tess called, a little breathless.
“Hurry up—we have a lot of work to do.”
I shut the window and glared at Martin, who had the expression of a man just waking from a dream. “Hadn’t you better go find out what’s happened to your wife?”
“Yes.” Martin turned on his heel, buttoning his jacket as he did so. He moved around the table to retrieve his hat and turned back to me. “But I haven’t said my last word on this subject.”
/> “I have.” I could feel my face assuming its most stubborn expression. “Shall we meet up again later, at a more suitable time for Lucetta? I’d like to get to know her better.”
My shoulders slumped, and I put as much sincerity into my voice as I could summon. “Martin, this visit isn’t going to be much fun if we keep arguing. I really have looked forward to seeing you, you know.”
“I know.” Martin opened the door, his hat in the other hand, and turned again. “You’re not entirely devoid of charms,” he said brusquely, and with that, he was gone.
33
Society
“What are you going to find to do here for three whole weeks?”
Judah passed the plate of tiny sandwiches to Lucetta with his usual charming smile. She didn’t exactly smile back, but there was something flirtatious about the twinkle in her eyes.
I should know, I thought. I’d been a most irrepressible flirt some six or seven years ago—heavens, was it really that long?—and was well acquainted with the uses to which a pair of fine eyes could be put. Lucetta’s were lovely—large, and that deep brown that looks black in some lights but soft velvet brown in others. They were thickly fringed with black lashes, and the few lines around them did not detract from their beauty.
She wore an afternoon dress in jade-green silk, trimmed with gold fringing, and with a bodice and train in navy overlaid with gold guipure lace. It shimmered as she moved, catching the light from the chandelier above us.
I had changed my dress, of course, as soon as Judah had informed me of our invitation to take tea in the Calderwoods’ parlor. My pretty gold faille was high fashion in Springwood, but next to Lucetta’s magnificence, I felt like a dove keeping company with a peacock.
Opposite us, Martin sat next to Dr. Calderwood with an impenetrable expression of polite interest on his face that could have disguised anything from boredom to outright hilarity.