Waking Lucy

by Lorin Grace

  Emma set the bucket down and wiped her hands on her apron before retrieving the ball of yarn. She sat in the chair next to Lucy’s.

  “I think God recognizes more than man gives Him credit for. What do you know of my marriage?”

  “Mr. Wilson drove you home in the sleigh the night you announced your engagement. The sleigh got stuck, and the horse was lame. So you said your vows verba de praesenti.”

  “Yes, under the lightly falling snow. There was a break in the clouds to the west, and we could see one star.” Emma smiled, her gaze far away. “Reverend Woods claims our marriage is wrong. You’ve visited our house and seen us together. Do you think we don’t have a real marriage?”

  Lucy worried her lip and toyed with the yarn ball. She’d heard lectures from the pulpit about marriages needing to be performed in public. Her Puritan ancestors had created laws requiring marriage over 150 years ago. Not that the laws were always followed, as Emma had proved. The Reverend claimed unwitnessed marriages often led to heartbreak. More than one girl had exchanged secret vows to later find herself heavy with child and the man she’d claimed for a husband denying all. Lucy’s marriage had been witnessed, but not by the bride!

  “If I recall, you were at Sunday supper when Reverend Woods learned my Thomas and I hadn’t said our vows before his predecessor. I don’t think I ever saw a man of the cloth so red in the face.” Emma giggled.

  Lucy did too. “Then he spat his soup across the table. Poor Thomas Jr. and Samuel got it full in the face.”

  The image of both boys with soup dripping down their face sent both women into fits of laughter until Lucy started to cough. Emma hurried to bring her a cup of herb tea.

  When Lucy could breathe normally again, Emma continued. “I think every sermon he gave for a month had to do with marriages being performed by clergy. My Thomas declared our marriage witnessed by God and took great delight in telling the good reverend on numerous occasions that we felt no need to repeat our vows before him, even after we’d paid the fine and the marriage was recorded. We refused to pay the fornication fine since all of our children have names and homes. Magistrate Garrett never pressed that matter.” Emma deepened her voice and mimicked the reverend. “Thomas Wilson, you should be ashamed to have flaunted both the laws of Massachusetts and God, living in sin for two decades. What kind of example have you set?”

  She lowered her voice a smidge deeper, matching her husband’s. “Well, Reverend. I suppose we have set a good loving one. I’ve been faithful to her every day of our marriage. I don’t come home drunk or beat my wife or children. Few men in your congregation can make those claims.” Emma took a deep breath and continued in her own voice. “I then told him, ‘Since we were lost in a snowstorm, we could have been in New York or New Hampshire. They were not so picky before the war. I’ve never been good with directions. Common-law marriages are legal there.’ I don’t think he believed me. Besides, I think you still needed a license and a witness in New Hampshire back then.”

  The sputtering reverend had opened and closed his jaw several times before he’d stormed out of the house and hadn’t accepted another invitation to dinner until two years ago when Junior was married.

  They giggled until tears formed at the corners of their eyes.

  “You need to understand, we’d planned to make our vows in the spring. We’d even posted our intentions. Not saying our vows in front of witnesses had nothing to do with rebelling against God, as Reverend Woods is fond to lament. Our vows had everything to do with our situation. We both knew that by the time someone found us, I would be considered ruined, and Thomas would be forced to marry me as soon as the magistrate could be found. But the magistrate had been away for more than a fortnight.”

  A dreamy look filled Emma’s face, and she released a sigh. “Getting married under the disapproving glares of our fathers didn’t seem pleasant, so we simply said our vows under the open sky. We had quite a bit of talking to do when help did arrive the next afternoon, but my Thomas stood firm in declaring we were married, and we moved into the little cabin on his farm before nightfall. By spring, Thomas Jr. was on his way, and no one saw any point in bothering the itinerant preacher for vows. The magistrate, who was Mrs. Garrett’s father, came back ill from Boston. So everything just was left unofficial. Agreeing to marriage vows in front of witnesses would not change the reality of our marriage.”

  Emma paused, a tender smile on her face, then placed her hand on Lucy’s knee. “You may not feel married, but Samuel did pledge in front of witnesses, and Reverend Woods took your mumbling as consent. Ideally, you should have been completely coherent, but necessity dictated some variation. Like his father, Samuel is not going to abandon the vows he took.”

  “But we can’t be. I thought I was dreaming.”

  “If you had known, would you have said yes?”

  Lucy fiddled with the yarn and needles in her lap. A hundred times in her dreams she’d said her vows only to wake up unkissed and alone. If she had been able to stand next to him, or worse, been cradled in his arms because she was too weak to stand and he’d given her that crooked grin, she would have been helpless to refuse him anything. Just as Emma would have been considered ruined on that snowy night long ago, people would assume she was ruined if he had continued to stay without marriage. She knew she wasn’t truly ruined. Samuel was not the kind to have taken advantage of her like that. However, he’d bathed her and changed her shift. There was no way she would be considered not ruined if she turned him away now. Every housewife in New England knew exactly what type of care he’d rendered. A single man caring for a woman that way would have sent her Puritan grandmothers into fits and fainting spells.

  Of course she would have said yes, but only if she was sure Samuel wanted her to.

  Her hands stilled. “I don’t see what that has to do with it. I was unconscious. It doesn’t change anything.”

  “Whether or not your vows are real has less to do with what was said in thirty seconds in front of a minister and more to do with how you live in the next thirty years as husband and wife.”

  Lucy wanted to argue, but she had no ammunition. Mama had been married twice in front of a minister, the words identical both times. But the marriages were as different as day and night. She opened, then closed her mouth.

  Emma reached over and clasped her new daughter-in-law’s hand. “As far as the Reverend Woods and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts are concerned, you are married. I do not deny that yours was an unconventional wedding. What type of marriage you have from here on out is up to you. There is no reason you can’t say your vows between you and Samuel with God and the stars to witness it if you need to say them to feel married.”

  Lucy crushed her knitting together in her lap. “Emma! Why are you forcing your son to do this? I thought you would have not wanted him forced to marry, especially after you and Mr. Wilson didn’t allow anyone to force you with yours.”

  Emma twisted the silver band on her finger, a gift on her first anniversary. “Samuel was not forced into this. He chose it.”

  “What type of choice was it? Leave me here with Sarah? Risk your becoming ill? At five years, Sarah could not care for me. Only a monstrous man would allow us to die. Samuel would never leave me to die. And you haven’t been well. In no way would he put your life in jeopardy. Yours or mine. He had no choice!” Lucy ranted with renewed strength.

  “I would have stayed, and told him so.”

  “But he had already been exposed. You know he wouldn’t risk exposing you, too. Doctors and others care for ill people all the time, but they don’t have to marry them. Sarah was here, and I was far too sick to be compromised. He doesn’t need to be tied down by me. Now that I am better, he can leave.”

  “Can he?”

  “Yes.” Lucy folded her arms in front of her chest.

  “You can take care of
yourself?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sarah?”

  “Yes.”

  “The farm?”

  “There isn’t much to do at the moment.” Lucy squirmed. She knew she couldn’t care for the livestock yet.

  “I don’t think you are being completely honest.” Emma gave her the look all mothers gave their children for lying. “You have had to rest at least twice since you started to knit that scarf.” Emma gestured at the knitting lying in Lucy’s lap. “I doubt you can even cross the room and stir the stew yourself. Let alone knead bread. You are recovering, but not quickly. You still need help. The question you need an answer to is, does he want to leave?”

  Lucy sighed and glanced at the ceiling hung with dried herbs and vegetables. She couldn’t answer as to what Samuel wanted. He’d said he wanted to stay. As for the rest, Emma was right, and she knew it. Alone she could survive, but not with Sarah and the farm. She wasn’t even fully dressed. She’d donned her long wool stockings yesterday when Samuel went outside and then her heavy petticoats this morning. The effort tired her so that she had not put on her stays; rather, she’d completed dressing in an old, shapeless overdress.

  “Lucy, there is no shame in accepting help.”

  Tears filled Lucy’s eyes. “I don’t mind the help. But he is stuck with me for the rest of his life. One week should not ruin the rest of his life.”

  Emma rose and started to scrub the table. Several minutes passed before she asked the next question. “Do you not like him? I thought you were quite fond of my son. You were engaged and had your intentions posted. I know something went awry with those plans. But did your feelings die?”

  “I did… I do like him. But you know what happened with mother. Mr. Simms didn’t go one day without reminding her how she ruined his life by trapping him.”

  Emma stopped scrubbing and turned to face Lucy. “That isn’t what happened.”

  Lucy studied Emma, her eyebrows pinched in confusion.

  “I know you heard Mr. Simms accusations and worse for years, but did it ever occur to you that his story wasn’t the only version?

  Lucy stared at Emma.

  “There is much more to the story.” Emma paused for several moments, then shook her head. “I promise I will tell you all as soon as you are well enough to walk to the road. But for now, will you trust me when I tell you that Mr. Simms was not trapped into any marriage, as he so often said?”

  Lucy nodded, wide-eyed. What story could Emma possibly have to tell? She opened her mouth to ask a question, but Emma shook her head.

  “Not today, but as soon as you can walk far enough to prove you are well, I will tell you everything I know.”

  Lucy nodded and sunk back into the chair.

  “Take a nap, dear, while I finish setting the house to rights. When you wake up, we can give you a bath and wash your hair. A good bath will make you feel so much better.” Emma gathered the knitting and set it in the basket, then assisted Lucy to her room. Emma closed the door slowly and almost missed Lucy’s murmured, “No need. Samuel did.”

  Samuel found himself with his father in the workshop. Thomas was chiseling a dovetail joint into the new chest he’d been fashioning. He blew the sawdust out of the joint and experimentally pieced the sides together.

  “Make yourself useful, son. Those boards need to be planed for the lid.” Thomas gestured to a stack of wood balanced on sawhorses.

  Samuel placed a board in the clamps. He checked the angle and sharpness of the blade and glided the plane over the surface. Curls of wood spiraled to the floor. He ran his hand over the smooth board. Few things felt as good as a board cleaned of bumps and slivers and the release of the new-wood smell. He’d missed this in Boston, creating an entirely new object from what had once been a tree. He removed the board from the clamp and eyed it to see if his work was straight. After his third board, his father started talking.

  “See how well these sides fit?” Thomas held two sides of the chest together over his workbench, slipping them together like a puzzle. “Just like a good marriage. It takes more work to make dovetail joints, but they’re stronger than tongue and groove or any other way of joining this corner.”

  “Both boards carry equal responsibilities; they don’t need extra help from nails or glue to stay tight. Some carpenters don’t care how long the drawers or chest will last. They just want it to look nice now, not giving a thought to ten, twenty, or even fifty years from now. Remember the stool Junior made?”

  Samuel winced and suppressed the urge to rub his backside even as he laughed. He had been the one to sit on the wiggly stool when it went crashing to the floor.

  “It seemed sturdy enough, but it lacked the strength it would’ve had, had he taken the time to listen and do things right.” Thomas took a mallet and tapped the joint into place.

  Samuel recalled the lessons learned from the crushed chair. Thomas Jr. hadn’t followed Pa’s instructions, insisting he could build a chair his own way. He had even taken the time to carve an apple in the seat back. Samuel teased that the unskilled carving looked like a wormy apple. He should have known not to sit on it.

  “Son, I hope you and Lucy can have a dovetail marriage. It is going to take a lot of work. Lucy isn’t any piece of wood. No, she is like this maple burl.” Thomas moved from his workbench to pick up a chunk of misshapen wood.

  To the untrained eye, the knotted mass appeared destined for firewood, but Samuel knew the wood was as strong as it was beautiful and rare. Mallets and beadles created of the wood made some of the finest tools. Bowls carved from it rarely cracked.

  “Your girl reminds me a lot of this wood. Workable in some places and hard and challenging in others, like your ma, I suppose.” Thomas studied the wood a moment, running his hand over the rough surface. “What would happen if you planed this wood using the same pressure you are using on the oak?” Thomas waved to Samuel’s work.

  “I’d end up gouging and chipping it.”

  Thomas nodded as he put the burl wood down and returned to his bench. “You’d ruin it. Some men might blame the wood. God made the tree. Wouldn’t be its fault some fool of a man didn’t know how to work it right. It takes more patience than your average wood. This chunk will make a beautiful little piece someday, something for a lady—a box for her trinkets or sewing, or a mortar and pestle.”

  Thomas returned to piecing together the chest he was making.

  Samuel laid the planed boards side by side, moving them around to create a design with the exposed grains. He planed a couple more spots before he deemed them ready for his father’s inspection and for gluing and clamping them together.

  “Fine work, son. Always were good with your hands. Best woodworker of all my boys so far.” Thomas nodded his approval and returned to his work.

  Samuel was somewhat surprised when his father started in on the lecture again.

  “Did you want to marry her?”

  “Sure, Pa, I wouldn’t—”

  Thomas cut Samuel off. “Thought so. Marriage is a lot of work, you know. Some young bucks think it is all in the courting and figure once they get hitched they’re all set, that they never have to work at winning her again. Those boys are fools.” Thomas shook the chisel in his hand for emphasis. “I’m sure your fancy medical school taught you everything about making babies, but I doubt they taught you about making a wife.”

  Samuel’s face warmed. One couldn’t grow up on a farm and not understand the rudiments of procreation. Medical school delved into more of the internal workings of the process. Samuel was sure he was more versed on the subject than his father.

  This was not a talk he wanted to have with his father. He couldn’t ever look at Ma’s mended rocker without rehearsing Pa’s lecture on sharing. He’d avoided the inlaid lamp table for months after the “Being a man doesn’
t mean you chase skirts” lecture. He hoped this chest was to be sold to someone he didn’t know. But with his luck, it would be a wedding gift, and the trunk would sit at the foot of his bed.

  “Not going to embarrass us both by discussing that part of marriage. I suspect you know the fancy names and all. I am sure they don’t tell you most of making a baby doesn’t happen in the bedroom.”

  Samuel’s color deepened and he ducked his head as he worked on the wood.

  “Starts with the ears.”

  Samuel looked up, surprised.

  “Didn’t teach you that, did they? You need to listen to your wife; not only to what she says but what she doesn’t say. Yup, women are just like burl wood. You can think everything is going along smoothly, then bump, there is a knot that needs to be worked out. Could be a simple thing, like letting her get a nap because it is tough work carrying a babe around in her belly. Or it could be a hard one where you got to use your ears a whole bunch and keep your mouth shut.

  “A wife is meant to be at your side, like Adam and Eve. Some men only want a woman who’ll cook and wash their clothes or warm their bed and they miss out on the joy of having a woman as a companion and friend.” Thomas returned his attention to the board he was working on. “Burl wood—work it slow and easy or it will chip. Yup, your Lucy will make a fine wife if you treat her right.”

  Double lecture day in the shop. Lecture on marriage from a chest and treat Lucy right from the maple burl. Samuel took a minute to process that Pa was giving the “treat my daughter right” talk he would have gotten had he been able to ask for Lucy’s hand. James Marden would be pleased.

  Thomas held up the four-sided body of the chest, each side locked into the next, all perfectly square and solid, no glue added into the joints. “A dovetail marriage, son, is what you want to build.”