by L. S. Young
“What’s happened?”
She leaned forward, her lips trembling, and whispered, “I’m going to have a baby.”
I stared. “Whose is it?”
“His, of course!” she cried.
“Ida, you know how I love you, but you do get around.”
“Don’t look at me like that! Don’t forget that I know all of your secrets too, or most of them. I’ve been Ida’d to within an inch of my life! Mama and Papa haven’t a clue, of course, but Mabel has figured it out, and she’s been lecturing me and swelling with indignation and murmuring under her breath until I can’t bear it.”
Mabel, Tansy’s mother and Ida’s former nanny, was still a fixture at their estate, and far more maternal to Ida than her own mother was.
“I cried all morning,” she continued. “Just look at my eyes and nose.” Her eyes and nose were indeed red and swollen, but it did very little to diminish her beauty.
“Do you mind my asking how you’re having a child by my brother when he’s been home barely two weeks?”
“Landra, I don’t go to Tallahassee just to buy hats, my dear.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re certain this is what you want?” I asked.
“No, it’s not what I want! I’ve never wanted a baby. But it is Eric’s baby, and if it means he’ll come back to me . . . I’ve loved Eric since we were children.”
I raised an eyebrow. “To be frank, you have on odd way of showing romantic affection.” I loved Ida, but Eric was my brother, and I had never thought he should trust her as far as he could throw her.
“Don’t be mean. It’s not like when that fellow got me in trouble and then denied it. If Eric refuses to marry me, I think I’ll die.”
I had to struggle not to roll my eyes again at Ida’s flamboyant statements. Her lips were trembling, and for once, I felt her distress was somewhat justified. “I don’t think I’m the person you ought to be speaking to about this,” I said. “Eric is in the next room. I shall go and fetch him for you.”
All of the blood drained from her face at this, and she leaped to her feet. “Don’t!” she pleaded. “I don’t know what I’ll say to him!”
“Say what you said to me, but leave out the italics.”
I left amidst her protests and returned a moment later with Eric. He entered the room before me with a lofty air and refused to look at his visitor. From the look on her face when she saw him, I thought she would faint, but she only sank back down onto the cot, twisting her handkerchief with her hands.
“Ida has something she wishes to discuss with you,” I said, and shut the door on them.
Walking away, I heard her cry out tearfully, “Oh, Eric!”
I didn’t hear his reply, and to this day I don’t know what words were spoken in that room, but they emerged an hour later as two very different people. Eric was quietly triumphant, and Ida’s face was shining with the most genuine gladness I had ever seen on it.
“Congratulate me, sister, I’m to be married,” said Eric.
“Are you?” I replied.
“Next week at the courthouse,” said Ida, “before Edith leaves. It shall be very small and quiet, because it’s so close on the funeral. I’m awfully sorry we can’t put it off.”
“Obviously that is not to be helped.”
“No,” said Eric, the corner of his mouth lifting.
Once Ida had gone, he went for a walk, and when at length he did not return, I went in search of him. I found him sitting in the treehouse with his legs hanging over the side of the platform. I hiked my skirts to the knee to climb the ladder, and he gave me a hand up.
We sat in silence for some time, watching the sunset.
“Are you sure it’s what you want?” I asked finally, “to wed Ida?”
He nodded, his brow furrowed.
“I know you’ve loved her for years, but I feel you don’t truly know her. Of course she’s rich and her father will probably build you a grand house, but there must be a mighty high price to pay to marry Ida.”
“There’s always a high price to pay in love, one way or another. I do know Ida. She’s told me things no one else knows about her, not even you.”
I turned to him in surprise but did not press him.
“That reminds me.” He reached into his pocket and held out a golden ring, set with a row of pearls.
I took it gingerly between my thumb and pointer finger. “Mama’s wedding ring? But I already have her garnet. Besides, I thought Colleen was to be buried in it.”
He shook his head. “She left it to me. For my wife.”
I laughed, understanding. “Ida didn’t want it, did she?”
“She called it ‘sweet and quaint.’ She wants a big diamond.”
“That bitch.”
“Landra!”
“I don’t care! How dare she? This ring is worth a thousand diamonds.” I put it on my right forefinger and held my hands out before me, surveying how it looked with my emerald wedding ring and Mama’s garnet. “I’m running out of fingers.”
Eric smiled, a genuine smile this time, not a smirk. “Good. You deserve to have something fine.”
Edith departed for Concord the day after Erica and Ida’s wedding. As Eric was away on his honeymoon, Will and I drove her to the depot. I kept looking over my shoulder at her during the drive to see if she was comfortable. She sat quietly in the back of the wagon with her hands folded over a book. Beside her was a small trunk that had been Colleen’s. It was filled with her small collection of beloved books and a meager wardrobe of hand-me-downs, homemade skirts, aprons, and shirtwaists. I had given her Colleen’s gloves, jewelry, and combs as well, as she was the eldest daughter. Owning my mother’s things had always meant a great deal to me. A satchel containing a lunch and her boarding pass was tucked at her feet, and the bow of her brown bonnet was tied beneath her chin with impeccable neatness. She kept smoothing her braids as the wind mussed them. Beneath her bonnet, her hair was parted in the middle and plaited as always.
“You look acceptable to meet your Aunt Elaine,” I assured her, “not fancy, but neat.”
She wore a pair of hand-crocheted mitts and a cast-off dress of Ida’s that had once been mine: a navy gingham that suited her light blond hair and brought out the blue in her eyes. It had been twice turned, and there were patches in the elbows and a strip of fabric around the bottom that had replaced the worn hem. I had no doubt Colleen’s sister would soon dispose of her mismatched wardrobe and have her fitted for sensible school clothes, but I did not say as much.
When we reached the depot, I handed her a few coins.
“You have the lunch I packed you, and it’s not much, but this should buy you an extra meal on the train,” I said.
“Oh, Eric gave me money.”
“Well, add that to it. It won’t hurt. And take these handkerchiefs I’ve embroidered with your initials. They were to be your Christmas present.”
“Thank you.” Edith tugged at one of her braids, staring down the tracks.
“No doubt you will find New England very different, but you shall prosper there,” I said.
“Yes. You said my Aunt Elaine and Uncle Frederick have a fine library?”
“They live in the old family home, and Colleen often spoke of the extensive book collection housed in the library, going back several generations.”
Edith nodded, her brows knitting in a moment of intense anticipation, before smoothing again into tranquility. I studied her face, which was still with reserve, belying the tumult of upheaval that must have festered within her. There had never been much in Edith for me to relate to. At last, I kissed her cheek, and she embraced me in return.
“Goodbye then,” she said as the train came slowly chugging into view, its column of black smoke trailing behind. “Per
haps I shan’t see you again. Thank you, for the learning of my letters when I was small. It has meant a great deal to me.”
“You’re welcome,” I said, laughing at her spare goodbye. She thanked William in turn for the ride to the depot, and he helped her onto the train.
Following Colleen’s death and the departure of his eldest offspring by her, Daddy shocked our entire family and most of Willowbend by taking up with a woman who lived down by the river and operated an establishment no man of integrity would frequent. It was part saloon, part makeshift brothel, frequented by drinkers and lowlifes who went there to swill moonshine, cheat one another at cards, and pay a dime for a favor from one of the girls. Most shocking of all, however, was when he showed up in the middle of dinner two days before the twins were to leave for Colorado, sober and freshly barbered. He instructed me to take out and brush his Sunday suit.
“What for?” I asked. “Are you and that bad woman to be married?”
He narrowed an eye at me. “Hell, no. I’m going to Colorado with the young ‘uns.”
Ephraim leaped up from his seat at the table and whooped, but I stayed him with a hand.
“With what money?” asked Will, a sensible enough inquiry, I thought.
“Won it in poker.”
“Poker!” I spat the word with disgust. This from a man who had repeatedly instructed me on the evils of dancing and cards (neither of which had kept me from a ball or a round of faro during my stay at the Monday estate).
“You are a raving hypocrite, and I think perhaps you’ve lost your marbles, as well,” I said.
He ignored me. “My Sunday go-to-meeting clothes must be ironed and brushed, and then I must pack. We’re headed West!”
“What about the farm?” asked Lily, aghast. “And Granny?”
He shrugged. “Been left untended before and shall be again. As for Ma, she’ll make out all right.”
“All right!” I cried. “She’s old. Someone must check on her daily. Where is Lily to go? She cannot live here alone with Effie.”
“Let her live with you and Will. Or better, Eric and Ida. She can’t make a spinster forever with all the folk they’ll be among.”
Lily and I shared a look of mutual despair. Daddy truly had gone round the bend. Over the next few days, we made futile attempts to convince him to stay, but to no avail. He was bound and determined to board the train with the twins, and so he did. He kissed me, Lily, and Effie goodbye in turn, but I was not sorry to see him go after the ordeal he had caused. Telegraphing Aunt Sally to inform her of his arrival—in spite of his insistence that he surprise her—ironing out the details of what should be done with the house, and so on. Lily at last decided she would stay there with the baby and have Granny come to live with her. I helped her shut up any rooms that would go unused and covered the furniture.
Granny insisted she would sleep in the small room that had been Edith’s, so that left the parlor, the master bedroom, and the kitchen for their use. I tried convincing our hired hands to stay on, but they did not relish the idea of working a farm without a farmer. In the end, the two newest went without a word.
Only Laramie, the hand who had been with us since I was in my teens, took work at another farm and promised to stay part time to help. Will sold off the majority of the livestock, leaving only a heifer and a few chickens for Lily to manage, with what help I could spare her. She planned to tend the vegetable garden, and the rest must go to seed. Thus, I thought, came the end of the Pines as I had known it, surrounded by cotton and tobacco and the smell of beasts. It would return to scrub pine and wildness, until it could be cleared again.
Not a month after Daddy’s departure, I was hoeing in the tobacco field with Will when I spied Lily approaching with Effie on her hip. She was waving her bonnet over her head that I might see her. I wiped my brow, put down my hoe, and lifted Card from where he had been napping in the shade of the great oak. Ezra was running wild somewhere, playing. I didn’t bother to call him.
“Come to call?” I asked, surprised. “So early?”
“Yes,” she panted, out of breath. “I’m sorry, I had to speak to you.”
“Are you well?”
“Oh yes, everything is fine.”
“Let’s go in, then.”
We went into the kitchen where I made us a pitcher of ginger water with cold water from the well.
“Don’t bother with refreshments,” said Lily, as she saw me taking day-old tea cakes from a basket. “I mustn’t stay too long.”
I covered the teacakes and seated myself across from her with Card in my lap. Effie toddled over to me with her hands out, and I pulled her into my lap as well, bouncing my knees.
“Well, then,” I said.
“I’ve come to tell you that Laramie and I are to be married.”
“Laramie? Jenkins?”
“Yes.”
“Married?”
“Yes! Is it so shocking?”
“I certainly never had an indication of it before! Is it a marriage of convenience?”
“Yes, in a way. We’ve come to realize it isn’t proper for us to be alone at the Pines together so many days a week. Tongues will wag. However, he’d like to stay on, and I’ve taken a liking to him the past month. Truth is, I don’t know what I’d have done without him.”
“So he plans to marry you and work the land full time?”
“He’d like to. He said he’ll stay on as tenant and hire other hands, even. But we wanted your input first. Your permission.”
“Heavens, it isn’t my land!”
“No, but Daddy’s opinion doesn’t matter. Of course we’ll write and ask him, but I don’t think he’ll care either way. You were the one who made all of the arrangements when he up and left.” Effie struggled in my arms, and I put her down. She toddled back to Lily.
I nodded. “So you won’t make a spinster after all, in spite of Granny’s proclamations. Well, I wish you many years of happiness! He’s certainly handsome.” I raised a brow meaningfully.
She giggled. “We always said so, didn’t we? I had no notion of marrying him back then, but I’m glad to now.”
One afternoon, I was bathing Ezra and Card together. I had placed the washtub in a patch of sunlight in the nursery, and I had been singing to them. The children were splashing one another, and I laughed at their antics instead of scolding them.
William passed by, leaned in the doorway, and said, “You look happier than I’ve seen you in months. You seem pleased, perhaps because Ezra has come to stay.”
He ventured into the room and crouched down, smiling at the boys. “Ginger tykes. They do favor, don’t they?”
“I suppose. Ezra is not so redheaded. His curls are copper.”
“All the same. Something in the eyes. Card is certainly going to be sturdy, though. Ezra’s just a cat’s tail.”
I began to pour warm water over the boys’ soapy bodies, ignoring their cries of protest at the end of their bath and Will’s comment, but I glanced up and caught him giving me a searching look.
As I was helping Ezra dress and Card was rolling around on a towel, Ezra kissed my cheek and said, “Uncle Will thinks I favor Card.”
“He does indeed.” I pulled his shirt over his head and watched as he buttoned the front.
“Card is your baby. Is it because I’m your baby too?”
“What?” I said sharply, holding him away from me. “Where did you hear such a thing?”
“Mama Leen told me.”
“Colleen was very ill in the end.” I turned him around and fastened his suspenders. “People can say strange things when they’re ill.”
“She said I was going to live with you because she was going to heaven and that you were my real mudder. She said that’s why I was so sad when you got wifed.”
“Married, darling, not wifed.” I ran a comb through his wet curls, tugging gently at the snarls.
“You were sad, too. She said you cried for days.”
“I did. I love all of my brothers and sisters, but I love you most of all.”
I turned him around again, and he stood before me, his brown eyes staring calmly at me, a bit confused. “She said you nursed me when I was a baby, and I remember.”
My hands were shaking, and I clenched them together, angry with myself at being unnerved by a mere child. “I took care of you because she was very ill after you were born, but it’s not as you think.”
“You are my mudder? Because you took care of me?”
My eyes filled with tears, and I buried my face in his shoulder.
“Yes. Yes, I am your mother. I am now. I’ll always take care of you. Go and play now, darling. Play nicely with Card.”
“Is Card my brother now?”
“Stop asking questions. You’ve given me a headache.”
I sat in the rocking chair by the window and watched them build towers with blocks and tousle over their few toys. I did nothing to restrain them because I was weeping uncontrollably. Something had released a floodgate within my heart, filling me with joy and sorrow, and I knew that, whatever the cost, I could never seal it again.
Chapter 18
Unexpected Callers
Not two months after Colleen’s death, Henry came to call. I was in full mourning, and although this was more of a formality on my part, I nearly did not answer the door. William had taken the children for the afternoon, and I had been on the verge of lying down for a nap. However, curiosity won out. Henry had come to the front door, perhaps the first person to do so since I moved into the house, and I let him into the foyer and led him toward the sitting room.
“I am sorry I’ve no footman to answer the door, nor any fine parlor to receive you in,” I said, taking his hat and gesturing to my threadbare furniture.