A warm breeze blew through the orchard and reminded her of a scene in her story. The boldness she’d felt while writing filled her mind and brought with it the desire to reread her story. She should see if there was any truth to Henry’s assessment.
Popping up from the stoop, she hurried into the house, through the kitchen, and into her bedroom. She sat at her desk and opened its drawer. There her manuscript hid, wrinkled and abandoned. She smoothed out the creases on the cover page and began reading.
Chapter Twenty-three
Henry pinched a copper sort between his thumb and forefinger while he wiped it clean. His scarred hand ached, begging him to be done with work for the day. One by one he set the cleaned sorts neatly in their place in the letter cabinet. His work would be over for the day when he said so, not when the pain took hold.
Gabe stepped into the doorway of the print shop, holding a covered glass jar filled with black soot. “From Olivia.”
“Excellent.” Henry lifted his chin at the worktable. “Set it there.”
“She said this would be the last jar of soot she can collect for a while since school is starting next week.”
Henry glanced outside at the late summer sunset. The long hours he’d spent in the print shop had made the months blur. “So soon.”
“She’s having the younger children start class two weeks before the others this year. Thinks it will help them settle into the routine.”
Henry wasn’t in the mood to talk, let alone talk about other people’s children. He would never have a family, never have children. He wouldn’t need to know about sending them to school, only what books to print and how many copies. He pointed at the jar of soot. “Give your bride my thanks.”
Gabe nodded and set down the jar. He rounded the worktable and began reading the uncut pages drying on the line. “Already at Ephesians?” He flashed a smile over his thick shoulder. “You might finish this project in time after all.”
“Might.”
“What will you work on next?”
He had planned to print Hannah’s story if she fixed its flaws and had it ready. But in the six weeks since the fire, she hadn’t come around the print shop and had barely given him a glance when he saw her at church. She didn’t want his services after their argument, didn’t want him at all. He tried to shrug off the hurt, but nothing helped. “The elders will tell me what to print. If the village is contributing to my support, I’ll work on whatever is needed.”
“Olivia is eager for you to print more story books,” Gabe said as he lifted the lantern from the worktable and held it near the wet pages for a closer look. The bright oil-burning flame washed the page. “Not reprints of the books from America though. She was hoping for new stories to teach from. Perhaps something by a new writer here in Good Springs.”
Henry wasn’t taking the bait and talking about Hannah’s writing. He continued cleaning the sorts despite the stiffness in his hand.
Gabe returned the lantern to its place and leaned down, propping his elbows on the worktable. “My father and I were at the Vestals’ yesterday. Have you ever seen the pottery wheel Mrs. Vestal brought from Virginia?”
Henry glanced up. “Only when we were unloading the ship.”
“Wade wants to learn to make pottery, even found some good clay to use. But Susanna never showed anyone how to work the pottery wheel. We all gave it a try, kicking the fly wheel and squeezing the clay.” Gabe chuckled. “Wade got more frustrated with us by the minute. He didn’t say anything. Mr. Vestal tried to mold the clay and keep the wheel spinning just right. I tried. Father tried. Finally, Wade got fed up with us flinging balls of clay across the barn. His cheeks were as red as that apple,” he said pointing to the fruit Henry kept in a bowl on the shelf.
Henry put the last cleaned sort in the letter cabinet and closed the drawer with the heel of his hand. “What did Wade do?”
“Nothing. He stormed off and kicked a clump of clay on his way out of the barn.”
Henry wiped his fingertips with the cloth. “It could happen to any of us.”
“What could?”
“Die without teaching someone else what we know, leaving no instruction of our life’s work.” The notion stirred him. “We should do something about it before anyone else passes away and takes their profession with them.”
“What can we do?”
“I must think about it. Our purpose in coming to unsettled land was to form a more civilized society, but if knowledge is lost, quality of life will regress for future generations.”
Gabe nodded solemnly. “Or we will leave each other as frustrated as Wade was yesterday. I’ve always felt sorry for the Vestals since Susanna died.”
“As have I.”
“Especially Hannah.”
“She manages fine without my sympathy.”
“Is that all it was? Sympathy?”
Gabe wouldn’t keep pushing if he didn’t think it was important. They had crossed an ocean together, built a settlement together, and followed their fathers into the elder council together. Henry looked across the worktable at his closest friend. “I care for her… very much. But I ruined it.”
Gabe removed his elbows from the worktable and slowly straightened his spine like a carpenter whose muscles were tired from working all day. “What happened?”
Henry grabbed a rag and found a dusty spot on the letterpress to wipe so he wouldn’t have to look another man in the eye while he talked about his failure. “I made her angry.”
“Do you love her?”
He nodded. “But not well enough. She deserves better.”
“Better than what?”
“This.” He raised his left hand in the air with its scarred stubs pointing at the ceiling. “She deserves a whole man who can build her a house and plow the earth and—”
“You’re not a farmer. You’re a printer. You were learning to be a printer from your father long before the accident. Your choice of profession has nothing to do with missing a couple of fingers.”
“But having only half a hand affects me now. I’m working sixteen hours a day to prove my abilities to the elders so the village will support this trade—”
“Because it’s necessary to the settlement.”
“Because I cannot do all the rest by myself.”
Gabe crossed his arms. “You can fish. You can hunt. You can support yourself and a family as well as any man here.”
“But I do not have the time right now to support even myself and certainly don’t have the time to give Hannah the attention she needs.”
“Is that why you refused to print her story?”
He tossed the rag to the worktable. “How did you know?”
Gabe glanced at the open door then lowered his voice. “I knew Olivia sent Hannah to you to ask about printing it a while back. Then, you and Hannah started getting sweet. And now, the two of you aren’t speaking to each other, and Hannah told Olivia she has given up on writing. It wasn’t hard to figure out.”
“Then why did you ask me?” It wasn’t really a question, and Gabe didn’t answer.
Henry’s hand ached, his shoulders ached, and his tired eyes needed rest. He slid a wooden stool out from under the worktable then sat and blew out a weary breath. “The story needed work. It wasn’t ready to be printed. We would both regret it if I printed it as it was just to please her. I told her so. She got upset. Grabbed her things to leave and accidentally knocked burning candles onto my finished pages.”
Gabe drew his head back. “That was the fire your father told the elders about in the meeting last month? The fire that put you behind on this project?” He motioned toward the drying pages hanging beside them. “No wonder Hannah quit writing and you’re miserable.”
“I’m not…” It was no use lying to Gabe, or himself. “My father said to focus on my work for now, and he was right. I can’t stop what I’m doing and chase after a girl who won’t listen to reason.”
“Even a girl you love?”
Henry didn’t answer.
Gabe tapped his fingers on the worktable. “You know how long I had to pursue Olivia?”
How could he forget? He’d listened to Gabe moon about her through their school years and well after. “That was different. You wanted a wife and family.”
“And you don’t?”
The question set off a yearning in his soul. How could he answer a question he’d forced out of his own mind for weeks? Years? He rubbed his sore palm. “I used to. When Jonah was pursuing Marian and you were after Olivia, I thought I’d end up with Peggy. But she was too superficial. Then I was interested in Cecelia, but she was impossible to please. Now with Hannah… I want what every man wants, but I won’t spend my life pining over something I can’t have.”
“Hannah isn’t like Peggy or Cecelia.”
“You think I should pursue Hannah?”
“I think you should give her grace.” Gabe tapped a knuckle on the surface of the table. “That’s the one thing Hannah deserves that you aren’t giving her. That and patience. I’ve seen her when she brings her writing to Olivia. She’s terrified having someone read her story. She probably felt the same way bringing it to you.”
“And I crushed her.” The weight of his affection for her squeezed his chest. He looked at Gabe. “I was simply being forthright about her story. Women are impossible. How was I to know she couldn’t handle the truth?”
Gabe shrugged. “If I knew the answers, it wouldn’t have taken me seven years to get Olivia to marry me.” He grinned as he stood to leave. “And women aren’t impossible. Not the good ones… girls like Hannah. If you love her, sacrifice your pride for her.”
It was fine for Gabe to make it sound simple; he was happily married. Henry had been honest with Hannah and it separated them. And he wouldn’t lie. He pushed himself off the stool and paced the floor between the press and the worktable. “What am I to do now?”
Gabe slapped on his hat as he walked to the door. “You’ll think of something.”
Chapter Twenty-four
Hannah squinted from the afternoon sunlight as she stepped out of the schoolhouse. With her chin raised, she strode down the sandy road toward the print shop. It took a month of late nights, but she’d rewritten her story, filling it with both romantic satisfaction and realistic loss. “Thank you, Lord,” she whispered toward the sky.
Adeline had found her true love, but she would never see her family or homeland again. Aric was crowned king, but his father drank himself to death before they could be reconciled. Despite their losses, they could face the future because of what they had learned through hardship, because of their faith in God, and because they had each other.
Olivia’s favorable opinion still rang in her ears. The depth of your characters made me feel like I knew them in real life.
Hannah not only knew them, she’d seen them through their darkest moments. Creating their journeys had helped her on her own.
She closed her satchel’s leather flap. Thanks to her father for trading with Mr. Roberts for paper and to Olivia for a final proofreading, Hannah held two handwritten copies of Between Two Moons, a story of worlds colliding as two hearts became one. She would wrap one copy for her father’s upcoming birthday. The other copy was for Henry—whether he wanted it or not.
On the road ahead, Mr. Owens stopped his buckboard and climbed down to check a wheel. He crouched by the side and stuck his head under the wagon, muttering all the while.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Owens,” Hannah said as she bypassed him in the grass.
Mr. Owens’s muffled response came from beneath the wagon, but he didn’t draw his head out to see who had spoken to him.
Hannah marched on, determined to deliver the manuscript to Henry and leave the print shop before another argument broke out. If he tried to harpoon her verbally, it would be a one-sided argument though, as she would have none of it.
Flecks of quartz glistened in the stone library’s stalwart facade as Hannah passed. So much work had already gone into the settlement’s library. Mr. Owens and his sons had spent months cutting and fitting the stone. Gabe and his father had built the walls and shelves inside. And Henry had been charged with filling those shelves with books. Since Hannah hoped to one day visit the library and read stories of love and adventure, she should do her best to make amends with the administrator.
She gripped her satchel’s strap as she passed the front of the print shop and stood in the doorway. Her nervous feet paused at the threshold. Henry’s back faced the door. He was spinning a handle down a crank on the press. She waited until he finished the process before she stepped inside. “Henry.”
He released the handle and spun on his heel. “Hannah.” His fingers combed his hair and straightened his collar, but his feet didn’t advance toward her. “What can I do for you?” A vulnerable catch in his voice betrayed his attempt at professionalism.
She briefly considered making up some other reason for being there. Perhaps saying she needed paper for the twins. No. She came here with a purpose and wasn’t backing down now. She opened her satchel and withdrew his copy of the story. “I brought you this. It’s my revised and edited story. Olivia says it’s better than any story she has read.”
Henry opened his mouth to speak, so she raised a halting hand before he could refuse her offering. “I don’t expect you to print it or bind it. I want you to have it in case you might like to read it someday.”
As he accepted the twine-bound stack of pages, she rubbed her empty hands together and kept talking, not leaving him a chance to speak. “You were right about the ending. There are no happily ever afters in real love. It’s messy and complex because life is messy and complex. Falling in love is more rare than fiction would have us believe, and that kind of love isn’t what sustains a relationship. True love isn’t a romantic fairy tale. I understand that now.”
After weeks of not speaking to him, being in his presence felt like going home and like being a stranger in a foreign land all at once. If she could say what she needed to say and leave quickly, he wouldn’t have the chance to reject her again. She closed her satchel and took a step back. “Anyway, I am sorry for setting your pages ablaze. I didn’t mean to. You had every right to be angry with me. I came to apologize for my behavior and also to thank you… for everything.”
Her voice tightened on a swell of emotion. She should have turned and walked away, but every moment she’d spent with him flashed before her mind. The inspiration that sparked the night he’d danced her across the grass beside the schoolhouse. The surprise of his lips against hers when he’d kissed her on that sunny afternoon at the springs. The feeling of being special when he’d sat by her in church. The comfort of being safe in his arms after he’d saved her from the flood. She could only muster a fraction of her volume as she continued speaking. “You inspired me more than you will ever know, Henry Roberts. And I thank you.”
His eyes widened, bringing light to his pale blue irises. “Hannah, I…” He looked down at the manuscript in his hands and pressed his lips together.
She couldn’t tell if she’d shocked him or embarrassed him. He had never been wordless before. Maybe he was put off by her candor. Or embarrassed for her humility. He shouldn’t be; she’d put away her pride and embraced the life God had given her—talents and responsibilities and obstacles and all.
Her feet scuffled backward to the door and her hand managed a polite wave. “I won’t take any more of your time. Good day.”
Mr. Owens squeezed around her in the doorway. “Excuse me, young lady.” He held up a thin wedge of wood. “Henry, have you got a mallet I can borrow?”
“Of course, Mr. Owens,” Henry answered.
Hannah turned to leave, but Henry said her name. She stopped and looked back, hoping for a bent knee and pronouncement of love. “Yes?”
Holding the manuscript in his good hand, he pointed at it with the other. “Thank you.”
She gave a short nod and left with the image of Henry holding h
er pages. She’d said what she came to say, and he hadn’t argued. It gave her hope they could be civil toward one another, maybe even be friends again someday. But did he care enough to read her story?
Chapter Twenty-five
As soon as Henry helped to fix Mr. Owens’s wagon wheel, he sat at the worktable in his quiet print shop and untied the twine on Hannah’s manuscript. Written in ink, the measured scrolls of her delicate handwriting conveyed strength and intelligence.
Henry remembered when she’d first asked him to print the story. He’d found her illogical and doubted she could finish writing it, though deep down he’d hoped she would so they could spend more time together. Then, when she’d finished it, he’d found it incompetent and had ruined their relationship before it had the strength to withstand its first storm.
He couldn’t change the past, and wasn’t sure how he would if he could, but if the closest he would get to her was to read her writing, he would absorb every word.
The afternoon slipped into evening as he turned the pages, unable to peel himself from the adventurous world Hannah created. He was immersed in life as a prince who was fighting to find his way in the world. With each chapter he wanted the maiden to want him more, but what she needed most was to complete her own journey victoriously.
Hannah Vestal continued to be full of surprises, and each one made Henry love her more.
As the sun set, Henry’s stomach grumbled, wanting dinner. Not even hunger could stop him from reading—nay, living—the adventure alongside Prince Aric as he fought insurmountable battles, both on the field and in his heart. There was something familiar about the prince and it drew Henry deep into the story. Needing more light, he reached for the oil lantern and turned the dial, increasing its flame.
Hannah had been right in that she empowered her story with emotion, but he hadn’t expected it to affect him, to stir him, to give him the desires of the characters. But it did.
While crickets and toads filled the warm air outside the print shop with their nighttime song, Henry turned to the last page in Hannah’s story. Alas, the prince had found Adeline. She was not helpless in the prison where she’d been in the original ending, but was tending to wounded soldiers in a makeshift hospital tent she’d erected outside the castle gates. She didn’t fling herself into the prince’s arm this time. Instead, she asked him to help her lift a patient from a gurney. Together, Aric and Adeline faced the future with hope.
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