Secret Hearts

by J. L. Jarvis

  “Important things?”

  “They know people—rich and powerful people. Imagine going to parties with the Carnegies, Fricks and Mellons. And his house? Beth—it’s so beautiful!”

  “You’ve been to his house on the lake?”

  “Well, no. I’ve seen it from—well, you know I go up to the lake sometimes on my bicycle.”

  Beth regarded Maggie and measured her words. “It’s a different world they live in. Those grand houses up there on the lake are just summer cottages to them. They might come here for light diversions, but they always go back to their mansions and money. They’re society folks, and their sort don’t mix with people like us.”

  “He does. I don’t understand why, but he likes me. And I like him—everything about him—not just his money or his fine clothes. He’s smart and handsome. He likes the same books I do. He’s serious about life. And I think he’s serious about me.”

  Beth watched Maggie sip her coffee and look out the window at the promising day. “Be careful, Maggie.”

  Chapter 7

  Allison discovered a note slipped inside one of her packages. She rushed to her bureau and took out her letter opener. Carefully, she slid it into the envelope and opened it neatly, then sank into her chair and began to read.

  A,

  Your heart is in no less peril than mine. I confess that I love you. There, I’ve said it. But love is two-edged. We live on the perimeter of each other’s lives—lives which can never be shared. I will watch and admire you. I will ache to steal away with you and pull you into my arms. But I will not. I will stay near you and love you, and never be with you. There can be no other way. I ask you now to do as I, myself, will do. Hide this love in your heart like a tucked away treasure that time will forget. We cannot speak of it again.

  Your D

  Silently came the tears, which gave way to sobbing that threatened to shake her fragile heart loose from its moorings. When her tears were spent, she hid the letter in the back of her desk and crept out into the night.

  Her caped silhouette was only a shadow beneath the new moon as she glided along the boardwalk and circled around behind the cottages. She heard approaching footsteps and clutched the hood around her face while the wind caught her cape like a sailcloth. The force of the wind slowed her. The sound of his voice stopped her. It resonated deeply as though it came from within her.

  “Allison.”

  She found him in the darkness and clung to him fiercely.

  “We can’t stay out here.”

  “Hide me in your arms,” she whispered.

  He led her into the shadowy woods. With gentle hands he held her face and looked at her with the full force of his sorrowful passion.

  Her voice was a broken whisper. “Say it. Please. I just want to hear it.”

  He held her head against his shoulder. “I love you.”

  “And I love you.”

  “Allison.” He shook his head as he tightened his arms about her.

  She lifted her chin as he smoothed her hair from her brow, and he was undone. Softly, he brushed his lips to hers, and then he pressed his mouth to hers.

  His love reached down into her soul. She relished each kiss and caress, fearful only of its ending. They let loose their longing and clung to each other, no longer alone.

  Through the town square they walked. Maggie seldom found pleasure in Sunday walks, but Andrew seemed so interested in becoming part of her world that she indulged him. This was what her people did on a leisurely Sunday afternoon. She welcomed him into her world with pride, although she had yet to meet any of his family or friends.

  Maggie asked him, “If you weren’t with me right now, what would you be doing?”

  Andrew looked at her quizzically. After a bit, he answered with a charming grin, “Wishing I were with you.”

  Maggie smiled, yet wasn't so flattered that she fully accepted his answer. She merely chose to save her doubts for another time. As they walked, she wondered. He had never tried to draw her into his world. She had never been to the lake with him. If he took her there, she feared she wouldn't fit in. Her lack of a proper wardrobe was the least of it, she imagined. Perhaps Andrew was sparing her such embarrassment. No, it was too early for questions. For now, Maggie was where she wanted to be, walking along on Andrew’s arm, nodding to people on porches and smiling at children she recognized from the library. She had never before noticed how the sound of voices and horses and child’s play could blend into something reminiscent of happiness. Was this how she had felt as a child? The recollection was dim.

  “I got a letter from my mother yesterday—from Paris,” Andrew told Maggie as they walked toward the park.

  “Paris, France?”

  “Yes,” Andrew replied, grinning at Maggie’s childlike enthusiasm. “My parents go to Europe every summer. One of Mother’s friends lives near Paris. She’s an artist. She helps Mother select paintings for her collection.”

  “Have they seen the Eiffel Tower?” Maggie sighed, her mind wandering across the sea.

  “Yes. We’ll all be going to the Paris Exhibition to see it. When it’s finished, it will be the tallest structure in the world.”

  “Imagine going to Paris, France—or going anywhere!” Maggie envisioned such places as she had seen them in books. “What must it be like to see beauty greater than most people ever dream of?”

  Andrew gazed at her and said, “It’s like seeing you.”

  Maggie blushed.

  She wasn't sophisticated enough to be indifferent to beauty—or flattery. For this he envied her. She still found wonder in life. Andrew smiled, and then grew suddenly somber. “Maggie?”

  “Yes?” She saw in his eyes a look of urgency. He opened his mouth to speak. She waited, while he seemed to struggle for words, appearing not to realize that he had stopped walking. Maggie was acutely aware of the number of families and couples all around them, walking and talking in a haze of muted tones. She noticed another couple approaching. Reaching to take his arm, she tugged gently to guide him out of the way.

  “Andrew?”

  “Oh. Excuse me,” he offered in apology to the other pair for blocking their way.

  Andrew led Maggie off the path and under the limbs of a tree. He assumed a formal stance, which made Maggie uncomfortable. His new awkwardness worried her. She braced herself for impending heartbreak.

  “Maggie.”

  Her heart sank. He had tired of her. And why not?

  Andrew quickly glanced away. He peered off into the distance, as though making a study of how the smoke billowed from the stacks of the Iron Works and dissipated before reaching the mountains.

  “I…I’m not sure how this has happened. Since I’ve met you, at some point, I think…”

  Maggie couldn't breathe.

  “I’ve gone mad.”

  Maggie refused to let him see the turmoil he caused her. She said glibly, “I’m not accustomed to walking out with mad men.”

  He grinned uncomfortably but shook it off. He offered his arm. “Let’s keep walking.”

  Maggie stood still. “I believe I just told you, I don’t go out walking with mad men.” She grinned, and it seemed to disarm him.

  “I think you must drive all men mad.”

  Maggie peered at him. “I beg your pardon?”

  He paled. “I didn’t mean that.”

  “No?”

  “No. What I meant was—”

  Maggie was stunned, and a little confused. He was flustered.

  “I’m mad. To be with you…”

  “Oh.” The blow struck her hard. Of course, he was too good for her. Why had she thought—hoped—? Maggie quietly said, “I see. I’d like to go home.” She took his arm. When he failed to move, she said, “Please?”

  Andrew followed Maggie’s eyes to three women nearby who were looking at them. She knew them from school. They’d grown older, but they had not changed. One mumbled something to the others, and they all stared at Maggie. If she left Andrew
there and walked home alone, they would talk without mercy for days. At last, in response to her request, Andrew led her away. All she wanted was to go home and to hide in her room for a good cry.

  As they walked, he said, “I’m not usually like this.”

  “Insulting?”

  “In love.”

  Maggie stopped, or perhaps her knees gave out beneath her. For whatever reason, Andrew gripped her arm as though she needed steadying.

  She tried to sound casual. “With whom?”

  He stopped and stared at her. His mouth spread into a broad smile. “With you!”

  Maggie’s features relaxed to a blank stare.

  Andrew’s near laughter faded to stunned confusion. He glanced down, then away, uncomfortable with the silence. “I’m sorry. I thought—I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  Maggie felt as though everyone had stopped, and stood now, staring, mouths agape. But she looked about and found that people still walked by, and children still played. Horses continued on their journeys. It was only for her that time had frozen.

  “I’ll take you home.” Andrew was unaccustomed to such uneasiness. He touched her elbow lightly. “Maggie?”

  Maggie wasn't ready. Perhaps she was the one who was mad. She wasn't ready to speak it. It was so soon. Her feelings were fragile. In love? She was in awe. And she ached—but whether it was for Andrew or for love, she wasn’t sure. She didn’t think that she’d have to be sure, not yet. But she knew he was different from anyone she’d known. In love. With her. She had dreamed of it. And yet, now, she looked into his eyes and lost sight of herself.

  She stammered. “I’m…I…have similar feelings.”

  He looked puzzled. “Similar feelings?” He searched her eyes.

  Maggie gave a slight nod. She couldn't seem to speak. “Of love,” she said, sounding as though pleading for mercy.

  Constrained by the openness of this public place, they stood at arm’s length. Andrew took her hand in his and held it between his palms. They stood staring at their hands. People walked by. Children played. Horses continued on their journeys.

  Jake sat on the front porch swing and idly played his fiddle so softly a passerby would have to have strained to discern the melody. “O’Neill men are fiddlers,” his father used to tell him. “When the mines drag you down, the music will bring you back.” Jake thought of the many nights he had sat, as a child, by the fire listening to his father play the plaintive tunes from back home in County Donegal. The old airs had always brought Jake peace, but not today—not today, nor any day since Andrew Adair had walked into Maggie’s life.

  Jake reflected upon matters that he would have handled differently over the past twenty years or so. He thought through everything—including one little grammar school incident, which still made him laugh—but he couldn't shake from his mind the anger he felt over losing his Maggie. Only she wasn't his Maggie anymore. She belonged to someone else, someone who could give her a better life than Jake could ever hope to give her. Did he love her enough to let someone else give her happiness? It didn’t matter. He would let her go because he had to, and because he didn't have her to begin with. He could hold her only in his heart.

  A strident twang broke into his rumination. He looked at the violin, from which a broken string dangled uselessly. He quietly let out a bitter laugh.

  Leaning back in the porch swing, Jake propped his legs on the porch rail. He was weary from pain and drowsy from drink. Memories of the past and failed future hopes tortured his mind. Passing footsteps and horses’ hooves soothed him, until they were accompanied by Maggie’s voice. He wouldn't look. But he did.

  In the gray of dusk, Maggie and Andrew seemed to sparkle with a light that hurt Jake’s eyes. Jake closed his eyes and wished he had not seen Maggie’s joy.

  Maggie closed the door and walked into the kitchen. Beth looked up from her business at the stove long enough to see Maggie’s flushed cheeks and shimmering eyes.

  “Maggie?” Having once been in love herself, Beth recognized the signs.

  “Hmm?” Maggie responded with a secretive smile.

  “Be careful. Don’t let your heart outrun your reason.”

  “He loves me, Beth.” She waited for a response, but none came. “He loves me.” She seized her sister’s hand. “Oh, please be happy for me, Beth!”

  “I am.” Beth smiled, concealing her apprehension.

  The door slammed. Beth flinched. Robin stopped singing and sat in the corner, her doll lying idly at her side. With trembling fingers, Beth scooped up pencils and paper and scurried to put them away. Hank rarely came straight home from the mill. His tromping footsteps halted. Beth looked up as she closed the broom closet door behind her.

  “Where’s dinner?” He dragged the chair out and landed in it, staring at Beth with oafish regality.

  Robin looked up.

  “It won’t be a minute,” said Beth.

  Robin returned to her play.

  “I’m hungry now.” Hank flattened his hands on the table before him.

  Beth busied herself with meal preparations. With an artificial lilt, she said, “You’re home early today.”

  “Early? I put in a full day’s work and you’re telling me I’m too early to expect my dinner on my table?”

  “I didn’t say you were too early.”

  “What have you been doing? You’re here all day, like some lady of leisure, and you can’t find time to make a damn dinner?”

  Beth kept her eyes focused on her tasks, while Maggie pulled some flatware from the drawer and set it on the table. A pot lid rattled against the pot. Beth held the knob with a wadded up towel and lifted the lid as froth spilled over the edge.

  She pulled a roasted chicken from the oven, but it wasn't nearly ready. Beth was well on the way to serving a full meal of meat, potatoes and steamed vegetables, lacking only fifteen or twenty minutes for the chicken to cook through. Until then, she would try to remain busy so as not to provoke Hank to anger. She picked up the broom and began to sweep in a gentle and quiet rhythm. She worked her way to the back door but decided to leave the dust pile rather than draw attention by opening and closing the door.

  Hank thrust his paper onto the table and walked outside to wash up. Beth prayed that the water would cool his temper. A movement in the distance caught her attention. Far beyond the back fence, at the edge of the trees, sat a solitary drifter on a tree stump. Perhaps not. As she examined him further, he seemed too well dressed to be a drifter, although it was difficult to tell from such a distance. He held something in his hands. It looked like it could be one of those cameras she’d seen in the newspaper advertisements. She watched him stop, then move to another position and pause again, aiming his camera toward the mountain.

  “Hey!” The muscles in Beth’s neck tensed at the familiar bark of Hank’s voice as he strode inside, but she managed to appear unaffected.

  “Dinner’s not ready yet?”

  “I’m sorry, Hank. The chicken just needs to cook a few more minutes.”

  “Is it too much to ask—?”

  “No, Hank.”

  He muttered, “You’re so goddamn useless.”

  Beth opened the closet to put the broom away, and out fell the sketch she had been working on when he’d arrived home. She hastened to push it back into its hiding place, but Hank was too quick. He snatched it from her hands and held it out to scrutinize.

  “Well, look here.”

  He held up a rather detailed rendering of the view from the backyard, with Robin playing in the foreground.

  “You’ve got all the time in the world for scribbling on a paper, but you can’t manage to put a damned meal on a table!”

  Beth cringed. This wasn't the first time Hank had voiced a low opinion of her artistic inclinations. He had nothing against art. There was nothing wrong with Beth’s little pictures. But art wasn't for people like Beth. In fact, anything that did not contribute to Hank’s home and Hank’s comfort was of no use.

&nb
sp; “It’s a waste of money,” he said, his words endless echoes from which Beth had learned to remove herself.

  “And it’s a waste of your time and my money.”

  “Hank, please.” Beth stepped slowly toward him. With great pleasure, Hank dodged out of the way and bolted for the door, where he stood blocking the opening, the drawing suspended from his hand over a watery puddle.

  “Hank,” she whispered in weak protest.

  “No dinner, no picture.”

  Grease sputtered in the oven as Beth stood motionless.

  “You want it?”

  Beth said nothing.

  He turned and shouted out the door. “What am I bid for this fine work of art?”

  Hank’s voice echoed into the hills.

  “How about you, Beth? What’s this worth to you?”

  She wouldn't play his games, for they couldn't be won.

  He released the paper and watched it float to the ground. Before the last corner came to rest on the mud, Hank snickered and returned to his seat. Beth walked over to the oven and pulled out the chicken. She decided it was done enough on the outside. She sliced it and served it, along with the rest of the meal, much to Hank’s eventual satisfaction.

  “Now that’s all I want—just some meat and potatoes,” he said as he pushed his chair back from the table. “Good food and a clean house, that’s all a man needs from a wife,” he said with a magnanimous smile. “Well, almost all.” Hank reached out and grabbed her hips and pulled her to him. “That’s my girl.”

  Beth forced a smile, and then Hank slapped her on the behind and sent her on her way.

  Hank dispensed with the food on his plate with his usual haste. Beth cast a furtive glance toward Hank as she scraped some food onto a plate and carried it to the back door.

  “What’s that? I work hard to buy food to put on the table. What’re you doing?”

  Beth’s voice was soft and calm. “It’s table scraps; food we don’t eat.”