by Linda Hilton
“No, Winnie’s busy at the house. I hadn’t given much thought to lunch. I’m sure Mr. Burton would be very happy to have some of your stew, and I know I would. That includes some of that fresh bread I warned you about, doesn’t it?”
He was teasing, very gently, but his smile soon brought hers out of hiding.
“If I get myself back to work, some fresh butter for it as well,” she laughed.
Her laughter did not last, however, for as soon as she had left his kitchen, her thoughts and fears returned. By the time she reached her own porch, her forehead was creased with worry.
If Morgan knew about her and Ted, then Hans must have told him. No one else could have. Katharine knew, of course, and Wilhelm, but they were as sworn to secrecy as Julie herself, for the same reasons. Willy had never been told, but Hans knew, and Hans, as Julie had learned, was cruel enough to expose her. Cruel enough, her conscience tried to reason, but why would he do it? She could come up with no reason and finally forced herself to accept Morgan’s curiosity about Willy’s birth as nothing more than what he had said.
The dough was ready for the oven, and when she had set the loaves in to bake, Julie took the last of the laundry outside. She took down what was dry and hung up what was wet, but she could not get the nagging fear out of her mind.
Morgan knew something. Or at least he held some very strong suspicions. Julie hadn’t missed his hesitation or his caution in the way he phrased his few queries. He was clearly looking for something other than just her mother’s medical history. Was it something about Julie herself? And why would he care?
Del Morgan still mourned his wife and still loved her as he had when she was alive. As for that kiss Saturday night, it was nothing but an overflow of good feeling at having saved a man’s life. If he had wanted B but she refused to follow that line of thought.
Katharine, who had not been in the kitchen when Julie returned from Morgan’s, now sat at the table with a cup of fresh tea. And the mail. She must have walked to the post office, something she had not done, not alone, in the last nine years.
“A letter from Uncle Max, in German of course,” Katharine said. “Godey’s, with at least three dresses I want.”
Julie shrugged. She had more important things to worry about than a letter from her father’s uncle and a fashion magazine. She quickly forgot them both and tended to her chores. There was butter to churn from the cream Hans had brought her yesterday, and ironing, which she hated only slightly less than scrubbing floors. Beds needed to be made, though Katharine had already done the dusting.
When Julie sat down at the table to begin churning, Katharine had resumed her page by page perusal of the new Godey’s. The pages flipped in accompaniment to the rhythm of the churn.
“You ought to begin thinking about your wedding dress,” Katharine remarked lazily. “If you want something elaborate, you’d best start soon. Working for Dr. Morgan doesn’t leave you much time to sew.”
“I wasn’t planning to have an extravagant gown, Mama. The weather will still be warm, so I thought perhaps just a simple summer dress in white muslin, with some lace maybe.”
“That would be nice. I’m sure Hans won’t mind. He’ll be happy just to see the long wait over.”
“Yes, I’m sure he will,” Julie agreed, thinking of the woman from Nellie’s. Then she remembered why she had gone to see Morgan in the morning.
Katharine continued to chatter, about dresses and accessories, about hats and shoes and gloves, about lace and ribbons and all the things a mother should discuss with a daughter about to become a bride. But Julie hardly heard. She didn’t want to hear. The more her mother talked about the coming event, the more Julie wanted to call it off. She could not help reliving that horrible scene of a man striking a woman and dragging her away. Julie felt almost as if she had been the one slapped in the alley and so rudely possessed. So strong was the anger she felt rising within her that she found relief when Wilhelm walked up the steps for lunch.
After the meal was over, she washed the dishes with Willy’s help, then finished the beds and excused herself to join Morgan. She did not notice, in her haste, how her mother smiled when she watched her daughter snatch off her apron, smooth back a few loose strands of hair, and dash out the front door. It was a smile of almost complete satisfaction, of self-congratulation, of triumph.
*
Thaddeus Burton sat propped up in bed, his chest and belly covered by a voluminous nightshirt. Morgan settled a legged tray over the man’s lap and then Julie placed the plate of stew and several slices of bread on the invalid’s table.
Burton drew in a long, deep breath.
“Sure smell’s good, Miss Hollstrom. Been a long time since I ate this kinda food.”
He looked pale, faded like washed-out flannel, but his appetite was good, and his sense of humor intact.
“Just take it easy,” Morgan cautioned. “This’ll build up your strength and maybe we can have you up and out of bed tonight.”
“I sure hope so. I gotta get to Prescott Friday.” He took a big spoonful of stew, chewed it with the enjoyment of a man who had only eggs and soup yesterday, then smiled broadly at Julie.
“Tastes even better’n it smells. And I guess I gotta thank you along with the doc here for savin’ my hide.”
She blushed, but didn’t stammer when she told him, “I’m really just an extra pair of hands. Dr. Morgan tells me what to do, and I follow his orders. But you’re quite welcome, Mr. Burton, both for the help I rendered the other night and for the stew.”
While Burton ate, Morgan led Julie into the kitchen, where he had made fresh coffee, weaker than usual. When he offered her a cup, she took it and actually drank some.
“What are we going to do today?” she asked. “I can start cleaning the upstairs, if you like.”
“I think we can let that go another day or two. Besides, I have other tasks for you today that won’t wear you to a nub.” He had seen the laundry she had done this morning, and he knew the washing wasn’t the worst of it. “A load of supplies came in on this morning’s stage, so you can put them away for me. Do you know how to check items received against the list that I ordered?”
“Yes, but then what? Surely that won’t take all afternoon.”
“It won’t. I’m sure we’ll have a few callers, too. And you can help me put my sign back up.”
“Your sign?”
“Winnie found my old shingle last week and had it spruced up for me. I was going to surprise you, but I got busy this morning with Mr. Burton and with another small emergency.”
“Was it serious? Why didn’t you call me?” Julie asked, worried that something might have gone wrong.
Morgan bit his tongue, angry that he had let that information out. He hadn’t intended to tell her at all, which was precisely why he hadn’t sent Nellie for her when the brassy-haired madam brought in the girl with the black eye and swollen lip.
“It wasn’t anything I couldn’t handle on my own. I knew you were busy yourself.”
He felt relieved when she didn’t press him for details. Nellie had lied, saying the girl had fallen down the stairs that morning. The cut on her lip was half healed, and an eye doesn’t blacken in a matter of hours. She’d been beaten up by a customer, probably Saturday night. Nellie, knowing Morgan was busy with the shot-up stranger, must have waited until Monday.
He shouldn’t have kept the information from Julie, he told himself. She’d soon see enough of the girls. And Julie Hollstrom didn’t seem the type who needed much protection from the cruder aspects of life. Burton’s half-naked body hadn’t shocked her sensibilities. But it wasn’t the impropriety of Maude’s profession that kept Morgan from discussing the case. It was what he knew about Hans Wallenmund.
He was about to change the subject entirely when Burton called from the other room to announce he had finished his lunch and wanted some more.
Morgan stood, gesturing to Julie to remain seated and drink her coffee. He took the tray
and dishes from his patient while explaining that he didn’t want the man overdoing it yet. He promised as much as Burton could eat for supper, but one serving of lunch was enough.
“Well, you tell that Miss Hollstrom she sure is a damn fine cook.” Burton’s voice carried through the house, as though he wanted Julie to hear for herself. She smiled privately at his compliment and tried desperately, but as unsuccessfully as ever, not to blush. She soon learned that his voice boomed naturally. Even when he dropped it to what he probably called a whisper, she heard every word.
“Hey, doc, before ya go, kin I ask somethin’? I ain’t meanin’ to pry, but I couldn’t help seein’ that little girl that come in this morning with her face all banged up. Did somebody do that to her?”
Morgan, in the doorway with his back to the hall, said something too quietly for Julie to understand. She thought from the tone of his voice that he reassured his patient there was nothing to worry about, or to worry about his own injuries before someone else’s.
“Well, like I said, I was just wonderin’. I know I look like a big mean bugger, but there ain’t nothin’ makes me madder’n seein’ a girl, even one like her, git beat up by a man. If you say she just fell, well, I’ll believe you. She sure looked terrible, though.”
A thousand explanations for Thaddeus Burton’s words came to Julie, but she rejected them all. Maybe she hadn’t had on a green dress this morning, but the patient with the small emergency must have been the girl Hans hit outside the general store Saturday night. Recalling the incident, Julie doubted a single slap had done the damage Burton had seen; Hans must have beaten her later, in the privacy of her room at Nellie’s establishment. Julie felt that pain herself, and the helpless horror of the girl forced to submit.
Morgan carried the tray to the kitchen and set it on the table.
“Do you want to do these dishes now, before they dry, or let them go for a while?” he asked.
“I’ll just run them home. I left the dishwater for them anyway.”
But as she stacked the silverware on the plate and reached for the cup, Julie’s fingers trembled. Burton’s big voice, so full of concern, echoed in her ears, and her eyes could see nothing but those shadowed figures in the pale yellow light of Simon McCrory’s lantern. The cup, containing a mouthful of stale coffee, slipped from her hand and shattered on the floor.
Julie’s nerves shattered with it. She gave a little cry of surprise, then fell to her knees. She picked up the scattered pieces of pottery, keeping her head down to avoid Morgan’s seeing her uncontrollable tears until she could stop them—somehow.
“How clumsy of me!” she managed to laugh as Morgan handed her a towel to blot up the spill. She rattled the remnants of the cup in her hand to cover the sound of a sniffle.
Oh, God, she had been crying. He saw the droplets on her lashes now. But the brave face she presented to him told him she did not want her weakness acknowledged by anyone but herself.
In her normal tone of voice she said, “I couldn’t help but hear what Mr. Burton said about the little girl. Was she hurt badly?”
Thaddeus had indeed said “little girl,” though both he and Morgan knew he hadn’t meant a child. The physician was relieved to find such a convenient falsehood come to his rescue. He took the fragments of coffee cup from Julie’s hand and dumped them into the nail keg by the back door, then helped her to her feet again. There was a stain of coffee at the knee of her skirt.
“She’ll be fine, Julie. I said it was a small thing. She cut her lip and blackened her eye, that’s all.”
Julie didn’t seem very relieved. Her brow remained puckered, and her eyes, though they didn’t turn away from him, seemed still to be asking questions.
Something told him he needed to bring her back to reality from some curiously distant thoughts. “Aren’t you going to take these dishes to wash them?” he asked gently.
“In a few minutes. Please, Dr, Morgan, I need to talk to you. I know you’ll tell me I should ask questions like these of my mother, but I can’t. She wouldn’t give me answers; she’d just tell me…well, she wouldn’t give me the kind of answers you can. You’re a doctor.”
The rambling gave away her nervousness. She sat at the table and linked her fingers around her coffee cup, barely half full. Morgan, afraid he’d be called to task for his lie, busied himself refilling his own and then stood discreetly against the oak cupboard, three or four feet away from the table.
Pieces of a very unattractive jigsaw puzzle began to come together in his mind. The girl’s apparent dislike for men, her parents’ insistence that she be made to look as unattractive as possible, her constant burden of guilt and responsibility, her almost hysterical concern for Willy when he was hurt, her lack of the usual modesty when Peg Baxter delivered. And now her breakdown over the discovery that one of Nellie’s soiled doves had been beaten up by a customer. Morgan didn’t delude himself any longer. Julie had heard Burton’s comments and interpreted them correctly. Morgan would only be hurting her further himself if he continued to lie.
“I’ll do my best, Julie. Ask me anything you like. I’ll give you the most honest answer I can, and if I don’t know the answer, I’ll tell you so.”
She swallowed some coffee, then looked at him.
“Can Mr. Burton hear us?” she whispered.
“No, I closed the doors, and he’ll be asleep soon anyway. I gave him a light sedative in his coffee, and he was yawning before he finished your lunch.” That seemed to reassure her, but Morgan went one step further. “And whatever you tell me I’ll keep in strictest confidence. You needn’t worry that I’ll tell anyone, not even your parents.”
“I didn’t think you would.”
How trusting her eyes were then, as wide as they had been before in fear but open now and believing as they met his. She didn’t smile, but for almost the first time since he had met her, Morgan thought she looked hopeful.
Chapter Seventeen
“I meant to tell you last week, but we were so busy,” Julie began. The words came slowly, calmly, with no hint of strong emotion.
“Tell me what?”
Her hesitation prepared him for confirmation of his suspicions but not for what she said.
“My father has given his permission for Hans to marry me.” She added quickly, “No date has been set for the wedding, because Papa wants to wait to see how Mama responds to your treatment. He seems pleased with her progress so far, but of course it’s really too early to tell much, isn’t it?”
“Much too soon.” It was a prayer as much as an agreement as he struggled not to reveal his reaction.
“I’m sure the wedding won’t be scheduled sooner than October, when Hans is finished with his harvest. Do you suppose you’ll be able to tell about Mama by then? That’s three months away.”
Morgan remained wary. Not once had Julie referred to the wedding as hers or even “ours.” And there was no excitement in her proclamation. How could a woman, even one as sensible and reserved as Julie Hollstrom, not shout the news to the world?
“I imagine we can make a fairly accurate guess about your mother’s progress by then, but I can’t promise anything at this point.”
“No, of course not. Anyway, I wanted to tell you about this before I started asking questions you might think improper for a single woman.”
“Nothing is improper except ignorance, Julie.” Against his better judgment, Morgan left his post by the cupboard and came to sit with her. “I don’t suppose your mother ever told you what we euphemistically call ‘the facts of life.’ It’s nothing to be ashamed of, or frightened of.”
It’s beautiful, it’s sweet, it’s wonderful, it’s glorious, he wanted to tell her as all the old feelings rushed back at him. When it’s right, when a man and a woman love each other, there is nothing more exquisitely delightful in the whole world.
But that wasn’t the kind of answer he could give Julie Hollstrom. He had the feeling it wasn’t the kind of answer she wanted to hear.
She tossed the wrinkled corner of checkered cloth away and swallowed her shyness. With a directness that threw him slightly off his guard, she met his eyes steadily.
“I want the truth, Dr, Morgan,” she said. “I saw Hans and that girl from Nellie’s Saturday night. He slapped her and dragged her down the alley. No, don’t try to tell me I was mistaken. I confronted him yesterday after church, and he didn’t deny it, so don’t you.”
That surprised Morgan almost as much as Julie’s stern defiance. He hadn’t expected Wallenmund to own up to his sins so readily. Then again, maybe Hans didn’t consider his actions very sinful.
“He said that what he did with that girl was something he needed to be a man. Is that true? Do men really ‘need’ women that way?”
Of all the questions he had expected her to ask, this was not among them.
She looked so innocent, waiting for his reply, and yet when he searched her eyes he found the fear that still lurked. He was certain, however, that at least at this moment she was not afraid of him. She did indeed trust him, and he felt a stir of pride at that. He had done little enough to deserve it, but he would do his best to keep it.
He also knew that what he was about to tell her could not help but hurt. If she had come for reassurance, she would not get it from him, for he could not give it. He was going to call the man she had agreed to marry ignorant at best, a liar at worst.
The truth hurts, he had been told so many times, but lies destroy. He would not see Julie Hollstrom destroyed.
“Some men do have needs, Julie, just the way Hans told you. But some of us consider the physical relationship we have with a woman to be a very special thing.” Strange phrases started into his head even as he tried to keep his concentration on a calm, sane, respectable answer to her question. “Men sometimes get this proprietary feeling about their women, and you know as well as I that an adulterous woman is rarely tolerated by her husband, while a woman is expected to ignore her husband’s indiscretions.”