No matter where she chose to write at the springs, within the hour, she had to go back to her family’s house, back to her promise. Her daily routine was fixed in a perpetual state of chore and challenge while rearing her siblings, so she clung to Aric and Adeline’s story as if God had given it to her to replace the freedom she’d lost when her mother died. Writing was her escape, her serenity, her expression of life and love and God’s redemptive plan, but at her father’s request and Olivia’s suggestion, she would soon allow a stranger into her private world.
Henry Roberts wasn’t really a stranger; they’d lived near each other since their families had settled in this uncharted land. But she’d kept busy at home and he’d spent his years in the print shop, so they hadn’t interacted often. She had spoken to him more in the past three weeks than she had in the entire eight years they’d been neighbors. What little she’d learned about him hadn’t eased her mind about him reading her story.
It wasn’t that she feared he would break her trust by telling someone about her story, thereby ruining her inner retreat, but that he might judge her writing inadequate, or as he’d put it, unworthy of ink.
She raised her skirt and sat on the slippery rock, plunging her feet into the refreshing water flowing past. Leaning her palms behind her, she raised her face to the canopy of trees that blocked the afternoon sun. Just as its warm rays could freckle skin this time of year but thaw ice in winter, so Henry Roberts had proven to be a complex mixture of harm and help. His defensive arrogance during their quarrels had melted when they danced, showing he did possess pleasantness—though not much sentiment—beneath his impatient surface.
Their dance had sparked something not in her heart but in her imagination. She would never admit to him how he’d ignited her story, energizing it to near completion. All that was left was deciding on the ending—for she favored a happy one—then the dreaded edits and revisions.
But she didn’t have to think about editing right now, or any of her responsibilities. She had half an hour before she needed to be back in the kitchen preparing her family’s dinner.
The gentle flow of clear water around her feet and the breeze that rustled gray leaf trees overhead lulled her to close her eyes. Water drops pattered the rocks near the fall, and songbirds called to each other from the limbs above. As she drew in a long breath of the rich, earthy air, her shoulders relaxed. The water soothed her skin, swirling between her toes and over her ankles. The sound of it lapping at the rock beneath her cleansed her mind. As she hummed a contented sigh, the murmur of men’s voices jostled her from her peace.
Her eyelids sprang open.
She scanned the waterfall to her left, the opposite edge of the pool, and the stream leaving the pool to her right, but saw no one. She drew her feet out of the water and stood, shaking out her skirt to cover her bare legs.
The voices grew louder as laughing men approached through the forest. Stretching her neck, she peered around the tall tussock grass. A blur of dark pants and light shirts moved beyond the thicket as the men grew closer on the path. Soon, their faces came into view.
Mr. Roberts, Simon, and Henry stopped short when they saw her. The ends of fishing poles wobbled overhead from their abrupt halt. Their grins faded as their amused time together was jarred by her presence. The men exchanged an uncertain glance.
Mr. Matthew Roberts touched his wide-brimmed hat in greeting. “Afternoon, Miss Vestal,” the older man said, his kind smile puffing his chop-shaped side whiskers.
She slid her wet feet into her shoes, which had warmed in a shard of sunlight that broke through the canopy. “Good afternoon, Mr. Roberts. Simon. Henry.”
Simon nodded politely then looked at his father, as if waiting for a cue to whether they should stay even though their destination was occupied. Henry stood a pace behind his father and brother with the top half of his face obscured by the rim of his gray felt hat and the clean-shaven bottom half stoic. The thin shadow between his lips was set in an unreadable straight line.
She eyed Henry for a moment. Why hadn’t he responded when she said hello? Since the dance, she’d only seen him at church in passing. Perhaps he didn’t feel friendly toward her despite what she thought was growth in their friendship. His gaze was fixed on her. He didn’t nod or smile or speak.
Trying not to be offended, she lifted her satchel’s strap from the ground before any more could be said. “I was just leaving.” She returned Mr. Roberts’s warm smile. “Enjoy your fishing, gentlemen.”
Henry stepped out of his father’s shadow. “Allow me to walk you home.”
Both of the other men snapped their faces toward Henry. Mr. Roberts glanced between Henry and Hannah for one confused moment before understanding dawned in his eyes. He cleared his throat. “No need to leave on our account, Miss Vestal. The fishing’s usually no good up here. Simon and I were headed downstream.”
Henry gave his father an incredulous look, but Mr. Roberts ignored it and took Henry’s pole from him. “Catch up to us when you can, son.” He walked on, leading Simon along the stream.
Hannah watched their backs until they were out of sight. She half hoped they would come back so she wouldn’t be left alone with Henry and half hoped Henry would ask her to dance to the music of the waterfall.
Henry stood silently rubbing his scarred palm with the thumb of the other hand, studying her. “Were you really leaving?”
“To accommodate you all.”
“So I thought. We disturbed your solitude.” He stepped closer. Fallen twigs and flattened grass crackled underfoot. He pointed at the forest path where it descended the slope. “From up there, you looked perfectly content. I spotted you before you heard Simon and my father’s jollity. I’ve never seen you look so… content.”
He must have spotted her sitting on the rock and dangling her feet in the water without her knowing anyone was near. Her cheeks warmed. She turned her face to the waterfall and threaded the satchel strap between her fingers. “This is my favorite place in the settlement.”
“Mine too.” His voice grew closer as he crossed the path to stand beside her. He took off his hat. “If I ever wanted to build a house in the Land, it would be here.”
“Please don’t. This place shouldn’t belong to any one man.”
The tree shadows covered him, making his reddish hair seem brown, but the light reflecting off the water brightened his irises to a haunting crystalline blue. The clarity of his eyes and the intensity of his gaze caught her by surprise. If she looked long enough, she might see his soul.
And she wanted to.
The thought shook her more than his captivating stare. How could she be attracted to this man who doubted he would enjoy her writing? To this man who had judged her story unworthy of ink before reading a word of it?
Try as she might, no recollection of his off-putting behavior made the awakening feelings go away. Standing there beside the water with sunlight flitting through the canopy, she forgot about her story and her responsibilities and her grief. All that existed was Henry Roberts and his unrelenting gaze.
“I wouldn’t,” he said at last.
“Wouldn’t what?”
“Build a house here. Try to claim this land.” He opened a palm toward the waterfall and broke his stare with a satisfied grin. “You’re right: the springs belong to the village. No one will build a house here, not as long as my father and I are on the council. I only meant that if it were possible to live here, it would be delightful.”
“Oh,” she said on a thoughtless breath, still shaken by the deluge of feelings pumping out of her heart. “Delightful, indeed.”
He combed his fingers through his hair, pushing it away from his face. “How is the water?”
“Perfect.”
He lifted his feet one at a time and removed his shoes and socks. “Since you don’t have to leave, do you mind if I join you?” he asked as he rolled his trouser cuffs up to his knees.
His sudden joviality intrigued her, and seeing as
how he was preparing to hang his feet in the water rather than walk her home, she gave heed to his confidence. Part of her wanted to balk at his presumption and leave him there alone, but her feet were already out of her shoes. She returned to the edge of the gurgling pool and sat.
Henry lowered himself to the slippery rock beside her. He sighed. “It would make a lovely back yard though, wouldn’t it?”
She considered what it might be like if her family’s house had been built here instead of a half-mile away. “For a while, but eventually, I’d need some place to go to get away from everything. I suppose if my family lived here, I’d escape to somewhere else.”
He pointed to the shadow behind the waterfall. “There is a little cave back there.”
“Yes, it has sheltered me many times.” Though she felt him face her, she kept her eyes forward and watched a dragonfly hover over the water’s rippling surface. “I come here to write on Sunday afternoons but only if the girls are occupied and father doesn’t need me at home.”
He glanced at her satchel, which was on the ground behind them. “If this place is your inspiration, then I look forward to reading your story.”
The kindness in his voice made her breath catch, but the weight of his words—that he would read hers—caused a ping of regret. She had to remember why she was pushing herself to finish her story and subjecting her private world to outside scrutiny. “It’s all for my father. He will be so pleased if I can present him with a bound copy of the story for his birthday. My mother would have been proud too. Perhaps it’s more for her.”
“It’s an excellent way to honor her memory.”
The conversation had taken a sadder tone than she intended, but sitting beside him on the stone by the babbling water, she could say anything to him. “I honor her every day by taking care of my family. I try to, at least. Lately, I’ve been writing so much at night that I’m sleepwalking through my days. I’ve never been happier with my writing, but I feel like I’m failing at my promise.”
Henry was close enough his arm brushed hers. “What promise?”
She had never told anyone about her last conversation with her mother, except David. Shortly after their mother’s death, she’d found her brother crying in the barn. He was only twelve at the time, and she’d tried to comfort him by assuring him she would take care of him and all their siblings just as she’d promised Mother. David had often used that conversation against her, throwing it in her face anytime she was doing something besides cooking and cleaning.
Could she trust Henry and tell him?
She studied his profile. He was six years her senior, and would one day take his father’s place as a village elder. Though stern in his logic, he’d proven tenderness when she spoke of her mother. Still, she’d never confided in a man outside her family before. She fixed her eyes on the water and let her vision blur. “When my mother was dying, she told me it was up to me as the oldest to take care of our home and my brothers and sisters. She made me promise her I would put our family first. She said to keep writing my stories but put them first.”
“That’s an unfair burden to put on a young woman.”
“What choice did she have out here in this isolated settlement? She was dying and leaving behind six children—two of them toddlers—and I was the closest thing to a mother they had. I’ve raised them thus far. David and Wade don’t need me much anymore—just cooking and cleaning and mending. Doris needs me in a different way now that she’s thirteen. I still have years to go with the twins.”
He didn’t speak, and she liked his silence. The quiet togetherness suited her. After a moment, he leaned his palms on the mossy ground behind him. “Then what will you do… when they are grown?”
A surprised chuckle escaped her throat. “I’ll be too old to care.”
“Certainly not.”
“I suppose I’ll have more time to write. Although, since David will inherit my family’s home and orchard, he will probably keep me cooking and cleaning all day to earn my keep.”
“Unless he marries.”
“Ah, yes. Then he and his happy bride will banish me to the cellar.”
Henry grinned and lifted a sarcastic eyebrow. “A cellar would make a fine home.”
She smiled, happily playing along. “Yes, quiet and cozy. It would be the perfect place to write.”
He raised a finger as if making a point. “And since you’re so good at making candles, you would have plenty of light down there.”
“I suppose so.” She swished her feet in the water, upsetting a turtle that was sunning itself on a nearby rock. “See, my spinsterhood won’t be so bad. How about you?”
His smile grew. “Oh, I’d make a frightful spinster.”
They both laughed. She nudged him, liking that he was close enough to touch. “No, I meant: what will you do now that your father has given you the print shop and Simon will take over the farm? Where will you live?”
“Perhaps Simon will offer me the cellar.” He glanced at her and when she didn’t laugh, his smile faded too. “I might ask Gabe to help me add a room onto the print shop. I don’t need much space.”
“What if you have a family someday?”
He lifted his palms from the ground and stared at the bumps on his left hand where he’d lost two fingers. “That’s not something I’ll ever have to worry about. I haven’t had…” He kept looking at his hands and rubbed his palm, but he didn’t finish his sentence.
Though she wasn’t sure what he’d stopped himself from saying, she knew the feeling behind his unspoken words. “I’ll never have to worry about it either.”
Whatever thought had come to his mind had locked him away in some dark place. She wished she had said nothing about him someday having a family. Surely there was something she could say to lure him back to the present. Nothing came to mind. She watched him rub his scarred palm. “Does it hurt?”
“Sometimes. Not now.”
“You were rubbing it like it was sore.”
He drew an outline of his missing fingers. “Phantom itching. Sometimes rubbing my palm makes it stop.” He folded his hands and looked out over the water. “Sometimes nothing makes it stop.”
She remembered back to when he’d injured his hand while helping raise the new barn on his family’s property a few years ago. Both of the Doctors Ashton had worked through the night to save as much of his hand as possible. Then the fever had set in, and everyone feared he would die of infection. “You are stronger than all of us. At one point, you weren’t expected to live through the night, and then there you were, sitting in the church the next Sunday morning.”
His back straightened. “It wasn’t by my strength.”
“Right, God healed you. Even still, I remember being amazed by your recovery.”
“It was God, yes, but through the medicine He has surrounded us with.”
“What do you mean?”
He turned his gaze to her. “If I am to tell you, I must swear you to secrecy.”
A quick thrill tightened her belly. “Secrecy?”
He nodded, his expression more serious than she’d ever seen.
She matched his gaze. “All right. I won’t tell anyone. What medicine?”
He motioned to the trees overhead. “Tea made from the gray leaf tree.”
“Tea?”
“Jonah made tea for me from the gray leaf. It saved Marian’s life once, but it put her in a coma, so the senior Doctor Ashton forbade Jonah ever to give it to a patient again. When Jonah knew I would die from the infection, he told me about the gray leaf tea and the potential danger.” His eyes darkened. “At that point, I didn’t care if I lived or died. I hoped the gray leaf would put me to sleep and I’d never awaken. But I did. Two days later. The infection was gone, and my wounds were healed.”
Amazement dropped Hannah’s mouth open. When Henry looked at her, she promptly closed it. “What was it like… the gray leaf medicine?”
“Blissful. It removed my pain. For a short time it m
ade me forget I’d ever been hurt. And it sped my recovery by one hundred times.”
She thought about her mother’s illness. “Do you think it might have helped my mother?”
“There is no way of knowing. I’m certain Doctor Ashton did everything he could for your mother.”
“I’m sure he did,” she said, but still wondered.
“He truly believes the gray leaf medicine is more poison than cure. That is why he’s forbidden Jonah from using it.”
“What did your parents say?”
“They don’t know it’s what cured me. No one does other than Jonah and Marian… and now you.”
Struck by the sweetness of him sharing his secret, she inched her arm over until it pressed against him. The breeze rustled the gray leaf tree limbs overhead. She looked up with a new appreciation of the remarkable tree that grew all around them but nowhere else on earth.
They sat quietly for a moment while shadows played across the water and their legs and the rocks. Without a word he scooped her hand into his and held it lightly. They both watched their joined hands. He let out a long breath, and when he spoke his voice was barely louder than the water that flowed by. “Hannah, I’ve thought about you every moment since the dance.”
Despite the warmth in the air, all the muscles in her body froze. He hadn’t stopped thinking about her in nearly two weeks? Was he in love with her? She too had felt something between them that night under the oval moon and even now sitting together by the stream with their feet dangling in the water. But was it love?
All at once the emerging feelings in her heart gurgled to the surface like the springs bubbling nearby. Henry Roberts hadn’t simply inspired her to write, he’d awakened her heart. Was that what had fueled her writing these past few days? Her attraction to Henry Roberts?
The Uncharted Beginnings Series Box Set Page 51