The Endearment

by LaVyrle Spencer

  “He was a young man then, Anna's age?”

  “No, he was at least as old as Barbara.”

  “Once the frog is cleaned out, you must check the hoof wall for cracks.” Karl picked up his cutter, bending, couching the big hoof in his lap. “But even so, when your mother was gone, this Saul remained your friend?”

  “I told you, he was no friend. He never used to like us underfoot when he came to see Barbara. She'd usually send us packing whenever Saul was around.”

  “Once the hoof is trimmed, it must be made level with the rasp.” Karl picked up his rasp. “But that day Saul offered to let you drive his fancy bay and fancy shay, eh?”

  “Yup! I took 'er for a sprint around the commons. She was a high-stepper and you shoulda seen the blokes stare. There I came—Barbara's Brat—behind that pretty little bay. It was somethin', Karl, I tell you!”

  Barbara's Brat? thought Karl. But he didn't want to interrupt the first insight into James' Boston life. Instead of questioning the queer phrase, Karl only agreed, “Ya, I bet it was something. Now you watch here and see how I shape this hoof so Bill will balance on it right. What did Anna think of riding behind that high-stepper?”

  “Oh, she wasn't along.”

  “No? Poor Anna missed out on a treat like that?”

  “She acted nervous and said she didn't trust that bay. Said he was too spirited for her taste and sent me off by myself.”

  “Anna should have had more sense than to let you take that horse out alone if it was so spirited.”

  “She figured I'd be okay, I guess. She said it was too good of a chance for me to miss, so I oughta go without her. That time she stayed behind even though Saul was there.”

  The rasp croaked quietly as Karl shaped the hoof. “Anna, what did she think of this man, Saul?”

  “She never liked him much.”

  “But he took to Anna, huh?”

  “Oh, Karl, are you jealous? That's funny. You don't have to be jealous of Saul. Why, Anna used to run and hide when he came around. She said he gave her the willies.” James smiled at Karl's concerned expression, knowing he had no cause to frown so. Anna had never even liked any man before Karl. Of this James was sure.

  But Karl was not relieved. He forced a smile and laughed for James' benefit, but the sound was strangely unfamiliar, coming from high in his throat. He tried to picture Anna standing with a man who gave her the willies, a man from whom she had always hidden, while James drove away in the fancy rig. Once he had pictured it, he tried not to.

  To all outward appearances, he seemed absorbed in the hoof, studying it critically while he asked, “I guess he was a pretty rich man, this Saul, huh? That was some fancy rig he owned.”

  “I guess. He wore fancy clothes most of the time, too.”

  A hot, sick feeling crept through Karl.

  “Here, boy, you try trimming this next hoof and I will watch to see you do it right.” But it was not the boy working the hoof that Karl saw. It was Anna, standing beside some dandy named Saul while James drove away.

  Karl seemed withdrawn that night. When Anna asked him how James had done at hoof-trimming, he gazed at her vacantly until she had to ask him a second time.

  They all went to the pond, as usual, but Karl was not his usual playful self. He swam with singular intense vigor, driving himself back and forth across the deep end of the water, leaving Anna and James to cavort in the shallows if they wanted to. By now Anna could swim out above her head. But when she did and tried to coax Karl into a corner against the beaver dam, he told her to leave him alone tonight; he wasn't in the mood for playing.

  In bed later, he muttered something to the same effect, saying he'd had a hard day. He sighed and rolled over, facing away from her. Immediately, she hugged him from behind, settling her lap around his posterior. But he did not take her hand for a long, long time. He only took it when she reached to fondle him, squeezing it then so tightly she had to pull her fingers out of his grip with a sharp sound of complaint. The ointment on the prairie dig was all over his hand and he got up to find a rag and wipe it off his skin, making an unmistakable sound of irritation at the bother.

  Anna slept at last, but Karl dozed fitfully. Every time he drifted off, some past comment of Anna's or James' would come tearing through his mind, bringing with it an ulterior meaning. Like pieces of a puzzle, various things fit into place. But as the picture formed, always it was the vision of Anna standing beside a fancily dressed man as old as her mother, while James rode off in the man's rig.

  Guiltily, Karl opened his eyes wide in the darkness to dispel the picture that intimated something about Anna of which he should be shot for thinking! But then again would come James' words, “he gave her the willies.” Then again, “that time she stayed behind even though Saul was there.”

  By the time dawn was hovering on the horizon, Karl had finally begun the deep search of the thing he had resisted all night long: his memory of the first night Anna and he had made love. It was terrible he should even be suspecting her of such things. Still, he allowed that night to come back fully. Things he'd been too overwrought to see at the time became significant now. Most significantly, three things had been missing from Anna: pain, resistance and blood.

  Karl wondered if he was right. How could he know if she suffered pain? Perhaps she had hidden it from him. But he remembered again saying to her, “I don't want to hurt you, Anna.” What had she said? Exactly what had she said? He thought it had been something like, “It's all right, Karl.”

  Then he remembered something else she had said afterward: “Something good happened, Karl, something I didn't expect.” He laid his arm across his forehead and found he was perspiring. Another memory came, again too vividly. In the house, before they had run out to the barn, she had said, “It's so different, Karl . . .” Different from what? he wondered now. Oh God, different from what?

  When he could stand the torment no longer, he got up and went out to the barn where Belle and Bill turned inquiring eyes on him. But he did not touch them, only stood with hands in his pockets, staring ahead with unseeing eyes.

  “When're we gonna cut out the door, Karl?” Anna asked, just as gay and carefree as ever.

  “After the roof is finished,” he answered.

  “Hurry, huh?” she said piquantly, tilting her head sideways.

  Instead of his usual chuck under the chin or teasing pinch, he turned on his heel and left her staring at James for the answer as to why her husband had become so distant all of a sudden.

  James scanned his memory for anything he himself might have done to displease Karl. But there was nothing. He'd come pretty close to giving away their secret about Barbara, but he didn't really think Karl was the kind of man who'd blame them if he did find out what Barbara was. Not Karl. Karl was too good to do a thing like that. Still, James wondered about the conversation in which he'd mentioned Saul. Could Karl be jealous of Saul after all? But it couldn't be that! After all, he'd as much as told Karl that Anna couldn't stand Saul's guts. If anything, that should have put his mind at ease.

  Karl's taciturn distraction became more noticeable with each passing day. Anna tried to bring Karl out of his “drears” as she called it. But he would not be cajoled by her, or persuaded to smile. He made excuses not to make love until one night he changed his mind only to handle Anna so roughly she lay stunned by his lack of tenderness throughout the act. Crushed and hurt, she dared not ask what was bothering him again. She had asked before, but he wouldn't say anything.

  Meanwhile, Karl himself was suffering sleepless nights and torturous days. More and more evidence built in his mind against Anna. In his typical way, he said nothing to her, continuing to mull it all over until he had given her every conceivable benefit of doubt. Yet at long last, he could see it no other way than that what he suspected was true. Too many things now fit, things he had never associated before with Anna's previous life or her mother. Karl realized he could not go on this way, for even his face was beginning to
show the ravages of sleeplessness and worry. Dreading it, yet needing it, he must know the truth.

  Anna was scrubbing clothes on the washboard in the yard, wearing a pair of James' pants again. Karl could scarcely remember the dress she'd worn the day she came on the supply wagon to Long Prairie. He hadn't remembered until this morning when he'd gone to the trunk and looked while Anna was busy in the yard.

  He studied her now as she worked. Her hair was tumbling around her as she scrubbed. Oh, that whiskey hair he had dreamed of during the months alone waiting for her. He pushed the thought aside and quietly came up behind his wife.

  “Anna, who is Saul?” he asked simply. He saw her shoulders suddenly stiffen and her head snap up as her hands idled.

  Anna felt as if a giant fist had unexpectedly smashed into her stomach. She realized she was clutching the top of the washboard, and forced her hands to move again, dropping her eyes to the tub.

  “Saul?” she inquired in what she hoped was a casual tone.

  “Who is he?”

  “He was a . . . a friend of Barbara's.”

  “James says he had an eye for you.”

  “J . . . James said that?” Anna's chin was tucked hard against her chest. She had become too intent upon washing.

  Karl stepped to her side and grasped her elbow, making her turn so he could see her face.

  It was deep scarlet and her chin quivered beneath slightly open lips. Her horrified gaze trembled down to the top button on Karl's shirt, but was drawn inexorably up to his haunted eyes.

  “Did he?” Karl asked, his voice strange, hurt.

  “I said he was a friend of Barbara's, not mine.”

  “What kind of a friend?” His thumb dug into her soft skin.

  “Just a friend,” she said, jerking her arm free and turning back to the washbench.

  Karl tried to make her look at him by leaning partially in front of her, but she stubbornly kept her eyes cast down and had plunged into her washing once more with frantic energy.

  “A friend who sent you and James away when he wanted to be alone with your mother?”

  The old pain clutched her stomach muscles. “Did James say that?”

  “Ya, James said that!”

  Damn you, James! How could you? Anna's teeth grasped the soft skin of her inner bottom lip to keep it from quivering.

  “He also said you were afraid of this Saul . . . that he gave you the willies.”

  “He did! He made my skin crawl every time I looked at him.” She was scrubbing violently now, her insides repulsed by sordid memories Karl's questions were dredging up.

  “And so you sent James away for a ride in his fancy carriage and stayed behind with this man who made your skin crawl? Why?”

  She didn't know what to say. What could she say? Please, help me . . . James . . . somebody, help me make him understand.

  But Karl understood only too well. In a steely voice he went on. “Tell me why a rich man with a fine high-strutting bay horse and red leather shay would let a lad of thirteen take his rig out for a ride after never letting the boy so much as stable the horse before.”

  Her eyelids had begun to tremble. “How should I know?”

  “Would you know, then, why this boy's sister would not jump at the chance to ride along when she knew it would mean avoiding the man who makes her skin crawl?”

  “Please, Karl . . .” Her eyelids slid closed. But this time he forced her to face him fully.

  “Anna, rich men like that do not court seamstresses and their orphaned daughters for no reason.”

  “He was not courting me!” Anna's eyes flew open and she met his defensively. In Karl's face she read the truth—that he felt as sick about this as she did.

  He spoke resignedly. “I did not think he was courting you—a man the age of your mother, this mother who you call nothing but Barbara. Why did you not call her 'mother' like other children call their mothers?”

  She would not answer.

  “Was it because she was not a simple seamstress? Was it because she did not care to have men like this Saul know she had two children? Was it because it would be bad for her business if they knew?”

  Anna's eyelids closed. She could not look into the honest face of Karl Lindstrom while he guessed her guilt.

  “Was she a seamstress, Anna, or was that a lie, too?”

  When she did not answer he went on. “Where did you get the money for James' passage and those new clothes of his?”

  Her cheeks were afire and her stomach hurt so bad she was afraid she would retch on the spot.

  Karl grasped her cheeks in the vise of one huge hand. “What kind of dresses are those you refuse to wear before me?”

  As the tears slid from Anna's closed eyes and rolled to wet Karl's fingers where they grasped her cheek, the last and most horrifying truth was revealed. For by now it was evident these questions were already answered. Because they were answered, they need not even be asked.

  Still, Karl tried one more halting beginning. “The first night you and I made love, Anna . . .” But he could not make himself go the full distance of discovering what he did not want to discover. His voice fell still. He dropped his hand from her face, turned away from her and strode across the clearing to the barn, where James was today working on Belle's hooves.

  When Karl burst in, James looked up, expecting perhaps a word of praise. Instead, Karl said grimly, “Boy, I need the truth out of you.”

  James looked up from the big, shaggy leg that was cradled in his lap.

  “Was your mother a seamstress?”

  The rasp hung uselessly in James' hand. His eyes were like saucers. “Nossir,” he whispered.

  “Do you know what she did to earn a living?” The question was fired like a load from a rifle.

  James swallowed. Belle's foot clacked onto the floor. “Y . . . yessir,” he whispered again, this time dropping his gaze to Karl's feet.

  Karl could not, need not ask further. How could he force this winsome lad of thirteen to identify his own mother as a prostitute, much less his sister, whom James loved so much better than he ever had the mother?

  Karl's voice gentled perceptibly. “That's all, boy. You got that hoof nice and level. I can tell from here how the hoof is the same angle as the pastern. When you are done with her, you can turn her out to forage for a while. It will be her little treat after standing so still for you.”

  “Yessir.” But the word was mumbled, James' eyes still set on the floor.

  Anna stumbled through the remainder of the day in a blur of emotions. At first she avoided Karl's eyes, but then tried to catch his glance, only to realize he would not even so much as look at her. In the close confines of the cabin his careful withdrawal cut deeply, for he gave her wide berth, cautiously avoiding even the brush of her clothing against his. She knew self-disgust at having disappointed him so utterly.

  By the time dusk fell, Anna's trepidation had spread its tentacles about her, squeezing the life from the small amount of self-confidence she'd slowly gleaned through her days as Karl's wife.

  That night when his weight finally joined hers on the cornhusks, not so much as a single crackle sounded. Karl lay rigidly upon his back. After what seemed a lifetime he crossed his arms behind his head. His elbow brushed Anna's hair, and she felt him carefully move farther away to avoid even the slightest contact.

  After lying beside his stiff form for as long as she could stand it, she realized someone must make the first move toward reconciliation. Gathering up her courage, she turned and lay her palm entreatingly along the underside of his biceps.

  As if her touch were now a vile thing, he immediately jerked away and rolled to face the outside, leaving her stricken, with thick throat and flowing eyes.

  Oh God, my God, what have I done? Karl, Karl, turn back to me. Let me show you how sorry I am. Let me feel your strong arms around me, forgiving me. Please, love, let's be like before.

  But his withdrawal was complete. She suffered it not only that nigh
t, but also during the days and nights that followed. She suffered it in resigned silence, knowing she fully deserved this misery. The days were torture, but bedtime was worse, for the dark held remembrance of their former closeness, the joy they had given and found in intimacy, the passion foregone, gone . . . gone . . .

  James knew it had been several nights since Karl and Anna had gone out for their late-night walk, so it surprised him to hear the door opening after they'd already settled into bed. Then he realized it was only Karl who'd gone out. Anna was still there. She turned over and sighed.

  Sick at heart for having started this whole thing, James thought he would maybe be able to put things straight. Maybe if he went out and explained to Karl it was none of their fault what their mother had been, maybe if he told Karl for sure how Anna had hated knowing, how she'd vowed to James she'd see he had a better life, maybe then Karl wouldn't be so bitter about it.

  James slipped into his britches and out the door. He crossed the clearing to the barn, but once inside, realized that the horses were still tethered outside where he himself had put them that afternoon. He was sure Karl would be with the horses.

  He was right. Even from here he could see the outline of Karl, standing beside one of their necks. As he approached on the silent grass, he saw it was Bill by whom the big man stood. The moon picked out the marking on Bill's forehead, and the whiteness of Karl's hair in the night. James saw how Karl had his face buried in Bill's neck, his two fists clutching the coarse mane.

  Before James could let Karl know he stood there, Karl's sobs came to him, sounding muffled against the horse and the night. Never had James seen a man cry. He didn't know men cried. He thought he himself was the only boy in the world who had ever cried. But now Karl stood before him, Karl whom he loved almost more than Anna, sobbing wretchedly, pathetically, gripping Bill's mane.