Davenport House 5_For the Cause

by Marie Silk

  “Of course,” Ethan replied. “She must have never received my letters then. I feel badly for her.”

  When they arrived at the house, Ethan went straight to Abigail’s room where she lay in bed with the lights turned off. The glow from the fireplace was all that illuminated the darkness. Abigail heard his footsteps approaching the door. Her heartbeat quickened with each step and she held her breath until she could see him in the doorway. “Abigail?” he said quietly. “Are you in here?”

  “I’m in bed,” she replied.

  He walked toward the bedside table and turned on the lamp. “I can’t see you in the dark.”

  She sat up in bed and faced him mournfully, tears beginning to run down her face. Ethan hugged her to his chest. “I’m here,” he whispered. “I’m sorry that you were worried about me. I will never leave you again. I love you more than anything.”

  Abigail continued to cry into shoulder. She cried harder when she felt how thin he had become.

  Fiona walked into the room with a tray of dinner just then. She set it on the table and smiled kindly at Ethan and Abigail. “Welcome home, Mr. Ethan.”

  Abigail watched as Ethan scooped the food from the plate with his hands and stuffed it into his mouth. He wiped his face with his shirt sleeve and then realized Abigail was watching him. “I’m sorry. I suppose that wasn’t very proper.”

  “We can ask the maids to send up another tray,” she said quietly.

  Ethan nodded. “I could probably eat ten of those helpings. I’ll try to eat the next one slower.” The maids brought more food and Ethan ate it heartily. He then lay on the bed next to Abigail and fell asleep. She slipped out of the room to find Mary.

  “Mary, I can’t,” she cried. “I can’t tell him. You must tell him for me.”

  Mary was distressed. “I don’t know how I will do it either.”

  “I’ll tell him,” Clara said from the doorway. “You two have been through enough.”

  “Thank you, Clara,” Abigail said wearily. Ethan slept all through the night and well into the next morning. The girls were having tea in the drawing room when they heard the front door to the house open and close.

  “Fiona,” said Clara. “Who just went out?”

  “It was Mr. Ethan,” she answered.

  Abigail gasped. “What if he goes to visit Phillip?” The girls exchanged anxious looks and hoped that Phillip would not be home.

  Phillip was stunned when he answered the door. “Valenti!” Ethan greeted. “Good to see you still have both legs.”

  “Yes—I do—” he sputtered.

  “Mary told me the war office reported me dead,” Ethan said, shaking his head. “I guess no one knows how to react now that I’m here. That last day I saw you, I thought it would be the last day I saw anyone. I’m only glad we both made it back. Will you come to dinner tonight at the house? I’m sure the girls won’t mind.”

  Phillip would not look him in the eye. “I’m sorry, I can’t tonight.”

  “Then come tomorrow night,” Ethan shrugged.

  Phillip gave a slight nod. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  When Ethan returned to the house, the girls looked at him expectantly. “I went to see Valenti. I tried to get him to come to dinner, but he was acting strange. I guess he has other plans.”

  Abigail looked at Clara with pleading eyes. Then Abigail and Mary left the room. Ethan looked after them in confusion. “What’s going on?” he asked Clara.

  “Ethan, you should sit down,” Clara told him. “There is something you need to know.”

  Clara later went upstairs to Abigail’s room. “I told him,” she said in a tired voice. “I am going to lie down now.”

  Abigail nodded while tears stung behind her eyes. “Thank you, Clara. Is he still in the drawing room?”

  “He went for a ride.”

  “Did he say anything?”

  Clara shook her head. “He never said a word.”

  Abigail felt restless while she waited in bed, wondering what Ethan might say when he returned from his ride. She finally left the house and waited in the stable so that she could talk to him the moment he returned. The sound of horse hooves galloping in the distance made her heart race. She sat down on a haystack and held on to the sides for comfort. Ethan soon walked in and put the horse away for the night. He did not see Abigail until he turned around in front of her. She stood up quickly. “Ethan,” she breathed. “I’m terribly sorry.”

  He slowly walked to another place to sit down. “It’s my fault, Abigail. I should’ve listened to you when you said we should go to California. This War has taken everything from us. If you knew how many times I wished I could go back to the time you urged me to leave, before it was too late…I feared all along that I would come back to find out you no longer loved me. My worst fear has come true and I have only myself to blame.”

  “It isn’t true,” Abigail said, trembling in her seat. “I love you desperately—more than anything or anyone else in the world.”

  “How can you? You don’t know me anymore,” he said emotionally. “You would hate me if you knew the things I did over there. I thought I would come home and everything would be just the same as it was when I left. But everything’s different. Clara is married, Mary has a profession, and you—you—” Ethan wept into his hands. “We’re all different now.”

  “Ethan, I have loved you all this while,” she told him, standing near and running her hands through his hair. “I would never stop loving you because what you did in the War.”

  “It was bad,” he told her sorrowfully. “Unspeakable things that you will never know about. I deserve to go to Hell, but seeing you with another man is more punishment than I can bear. I’m leaving first thing in the morning.”

  Abigail began to sob. “Don’t leave me again! I will die if you do!”

  “Isn’t it what you want? So you can be with him?”

  “I want for you to have stayed and had children with me, and for none of us to have heard of the War! We can’t change anything that happened. But if you can forgive me, and stay with me, I will do anything I can to make you love me again.”

  “You want me to stay with you?” he asked. “What about Valenti?”

  Abigail felt her heart drop into her stomach at the mention of Phillip’s name. “You are still my husband,” she whimpered. “I will be disgraced if you leave now…even more so than I already am.”

  “Abigail,” he said hopefully, looking into her eyes. “You still want to be with me?”

  She nodded while tears streamed down her face. “It is what I’ve been saying all this while. I never could have thought about marrying again if I knew you were coming back. I was afraid when so many people around us were dying of influenza. I worried I might never have the chance again to have children. Jenny, the girl who was going to be my sister-in-law, she is gone now. The tenants of the manor house and all of the servants are gone. I was afraid to keep waiting, but I know I should have. Please, tell me that you’ll forgive me someday.”

  “There’s nothing to forgive, Abigail. You did what you thought you should. I only hope you can forgive me for the things I had to do to come back home.”

  “We can start over and move to the manor house when the Red Cross is through with it,” Abigail told him. “Perhaps, after enough time, we will forget that we ever left.”

  Ethan hugged her tightly. “I hope that we will.” They both cried as they held on to each other, and spent what felt like hours in the stable, feeling the release of grief that they carried with them all year. When the tears finally ran dry, Ethan looked into her eyes and leaned in to kiss her deeply. Abigail began to remember how much she missed the way he held her and kissed her. A long-forgotten feeling of peace settled over her while she held onto Ethan’s arm, and they made their way back into the house.

  Chapter 11

  Clara wandered aimlessly through the gardens behind the house and was startled to hear a voice call her name. “Clara? Uh—I meant to
say—Mrs. Collins.”

  She smiled as Joe Blake approached. “Good morning, Mr. Blake. How have you been?”

  “Busy,” he laughed. “But I’ve got some new lambs at the ranch and wondered if you might like to have a look.”

  “Oh—sure,” Clara blurted. She followed him to his property.

  Joe pointed beside the barn. “You can see the little ones just over there.”

  Clara gasped. “Oh, aren’t they darling! Are they terribly hard to keep?”

  Joe shrugged. “They don’t bother me one bit. Do you see one you might like?”

  “Oh, the one just beside the flowers is lovely,” she smiled.

  “I’ll be sure to remember which one he is when he goes to slaughter,” Joe said casually.

  Clara looked at him in horror. “Slaughter?”

  “Well yes, I thought you wanted him for your Easter supper. Isn’t that why you picked him out?”

  Clara put her hand to her heart. “No, it’s not why at all! I thought you meant for us to have at the estate—to admire and care for.”

  Joe laughed again. “I suppose you could have him for that, if you wish. Don’t you eat lamb for Easter supper?”

  “I suppose we do,” Clara admitted. “But never after I’ve already seen it alive and remarked how darling it is!”

  Joe tried not to laugh, but he could not help himself. “I sure miss talking to you, Mrs. Collins.”

  Clara hesitated. “Why don’t you come to the house for Easter dinner? We always have plenty of food.”

  “I’d be glad to,” Joe replied. “I’ll tell the cows to stay put this time so I don’t miss out on your invitation again.”

  “Very well, Mr. Blake.” Clara began walking away.

  “But aren’t you going to have roast lamb?” he asked.

  She called back over her shoulder, “I’m on my way to tell the cook that we will have anything but lamb!”

  Inside the house, Abigail slowly woke from a deep sleep. She smiled when she saw Ethan next to her. She watched him sleep, all the while convincing herself that he was truly there with her, and it was not only a dream. She then noticed the sunlight streaming in through the windows. “Oh dear, we must have overslept. It must be noon already!”

  Ethan groaned and put his arm around her. “Let’s just lay here the rest of the week.”

  Abigail squirmed from his grasp. “You’re holding me too tight,” she finally sputtered.

  He let go immediately. “I’m sorry. Are you alright?”

  “Yes,” she giggled nervously. “I just couldn’t breathe. I am going to wash up and ask the maids to send food up.”

  “Good. I’m starving,” he laughed.

  “Mrs. Malone will fatten you up in no time,” said Abigail. “She says you are a fine hero and she has promised to give you extra helpings of everything.”

  “Then she is my heroine,” he said wryly, then looked into her eyes. “But you are my one and only. I am glad we have nowhere to be today.”

  “I may have to leave to help Mary at any moment,” Abigail told him.

  “What does Mary need help with?”

  Abigail smiled. “I suppose I forgot to tell you that I deliver babies now, with Mary.”

  Ethan looked impressed. “You do?”

  “Yes, I have caught several already. It is the most joyous feeling!”

  “You look happy, Abigail.”

  “It’s because you are here with me. And you look just the same as you did when you left. There are some men who must wear masks to hide their wounds. Your face looks just as it ever did, and I love it,” she said, kissing his cheek.

  “What if I had to cover my face? Do you suppose you would still love me?”

  “Of course I would. No matter what you look like on the outside, you are still the same on the inside.” Abigail kissed him again and left the room.

  Ethan lay down on the bed and muttered, “If only that were true.”

  Abigail soon returned with a tray of food that Ethan ate heartily. “Now, I must go change, for I am to go with Mary to check on an expecting mother.”

  Ethan nodded. “I’ll see what I can do to help out around the estate. I will manage the horses now that I’m here.”

  Sam drove Abigail and Mary to the house they had promised to visit that day. When Abigail was going to knock on the door, Mary grabbed her arm to stop her. She pointed to the red ribbon that had been tied on the frame. Abigail felt a sinking feeling and they stopped to put on their gauze masks before they knocked on the door. There was no answer.

  “Should we go in?” Abigail questioned.

  “I don’t know,” Mary answered. “Let us look in through the windows.” The girls circled the house and looked in through the windows they could reach on their tiptoes.

  “Do you see anyone?” Abigail called.

  Mary walked toward Abigail and hung her head. “We must leave. Death has come to the house, and it spared no one. I saw them through the window.”

  Abigail repressed the urge to cry and climbed back into the car with Sam. Everyone was quiet on the drive back to the house.

  At the pasture of Davenport Estate, Ethan was leading one of the horses into the stable so he could check its shoes. He was startled to see Donnie standing there. “Hello,” Ethan said.

  “Who are you?” Donnie asked.

  “I’m Ethan and this is my horse, Silver,” he replied.

  Donnie shook his head. “You must be mistaken. That’s my mama’s horse. She let me ride on his back before.”

  “Donnie!” called Phillip’s voice, sounding distressed. Phillip walked into the stable and froze when he saw Ethan there.

  Donnie looked back and forth between the men who stared at each other in a deafening silence. At last, Phillip turned his gaze to Donnie who stood between them. “I told you not to wander from the house,” he scolded.

  “But I came to see my Uncle Sam. Why can’t I come to the stable?”

  Phillip grabbed Donnie’s hand and led him out as quickly as he could. As they were leaving, Ethan could hear the boy continue to ask his father questions. “Where is our mother? Why hasn’t she come back yet?”

  Ethan felt sick to his stomach, and went back into the house to lay in bed.

  When Abigail and Mary returned to the house, they were glad to see that William had come home for the night. “How was your appointment?” he asked the girls.

  “There was a ribbon on the door when we got there,” Mary told him. Then she looked at the floor in sorrow.

  “I see,” William responded. “I’m sorry you had to see that, Mary.”

  “Will this plague ever be over?” she asked emotionally.

  “It’s what all of us are praying for,” he replied. He held her close, and the both of them went upstairs.

  “Fiona,” said Abigail. “Have you seen Ethan?”

  “I think he is sleeping again, Miss,” she answered.

  Abigail peeked into the dark bedroom, and was just about to close the door when she heard Ethan’s voice. “I’m not asleep, Abigail.”

  She then walked into the room and explained what happened at the house visit. Ethan was quiet for a long time. “Are you alright?” Abigail finally asked.

  “It was a bad day,” he answered vaguely. “Sometimes I feel guilty for coming back…like I’m ruining things for everyone. Are you sure you still want me?”

  “Of course I do. Why are you worried?”

  “I’m sorry. I worry about a lot of things. Is dinner ready?”

  “Just about,” she answered with a smile. They went downstairs to dinner where Ethan took great effort to eat like a gentleman once more.

  Late that night, after everyone had retired to bed, Abigail burst into the bedroom where Mary and William slept. “I need help,” she cried. “Ethan is shouting at me and I don’t understand! I’m afraid!”

  William leapt out of bed and hurried to the bedroom with Abigail. He turned on the light switch to find Ethan standing in the ro
om, shouting in a threatening manner. His eyes appeared wild and were staring at an invisible enemy.

  “What’s happening?” Abigail cried, hiding behind William as Ethan swung his fists through the air.

  “Don’t watch, Abigail,” William told her. She covered her eyes and heard a great thud, but the shouting stopped. When she opened her eyes, she saw Ethan flat on his back on the floor.

  “Is he alright?” she whimpered.

  William rubbed his fist. “He’ll have a headache in the morning. Go sleep with Mary tonight. I’m going to stay in here with him in case he starts again.”

  “Was it a nightmare?”

  “Seems that way. Will you be alright with Mary?”

  She nodded weakly and walked back to Mary’s room, but could not stop trembling even after she lay down to go to sleep.

  The next morning, Ethan woke up disoriented on the floor. He saw William sitting on a chair nearby. “Where is Abigail?” he asked.

  “She stayed with Mary,” William answered. “You were shouting and threatening her last night.”

  “Oh no,” he exhaled. “I don’t remember anything!”

  “I didn’t expect you would. But you were shouting threats and I had to punch you out before you hurt Abigail or yourself.”

  “What did I say?”

  “You were saying in German—that you would kill everyone.”

  Ethan buried his face in his hands. “Abigail must think I’m a savage.”

  “She was frightened and came to wake me. I think it best that you not sleep in the same room anymore.”

  “I was hoping that I got better. They said I was threatening the nurses in the hospital camp, and I don’t remember a thing. They tied me to the bed and said it was so I didn’t hurt anyone. They said I was messed up in the head. I never could believe it before, but if you say that I did it…it must be true. What’s happening to me?”

  “I thought they would have told you at the hospital. They call it shell shock. I’ve seen it plenty since the soldiers started returning.”

  “How do I get rid of it?”

  William looked at him helplessly. “I don’t know the answer to that, Ethan. It may help to find something that relaxes you. Perhaps if you have a project to work on…but it may be something you have for life.”