by Pamela Morsi
The shouting from outside and the sounds of the fighting ceased. When after a moment there was no cry for help, Hannah sighed heavily. No one was seriously injured, no permanent damage done. Only her shame would linger.
"Thank God, it's over," she said aloud.
"I doubt seriously, Hannah," Violet stated sternly, "if it is over."
"What do you mean?"
"What I mean is, that while I do blame that man out there for enticing you, he did not come and steal you out of this house. You went out to him, of your own free will. Even though you think that you love him, that's not cause to break the commandments."
Hannah's mind was in turmoil. Of course the whole territory would assume that she had carnally sinned. But she could outlive that. It would just take time. She'd heard stories about women who had fallen from grace. Some even had illegitimate children as permanent reminders. But it was said that if a woman confessed and lived an exemplary life thereafter, eventually she would be tolerated by the community.
She blushed, thinking of how long it would take for the community to forget the scene they had witnessed this morning. She remembered pleading with her father and claiming she was out there for love. Oh, how embarrassing that was. People would think that she had been swept off her feet by that smooth talker and his charm. She hated for anyone to believe that of her. She'd rather they thought she was wanton than gullible.
But how much worse was the real truth. She was out there to trick a man who couldn't bring himself to propose. She couldn't get a man any way but by her trickery, and even as she had been trying to lie herself into a marriage, she had managed to embroil an innocent party into a scandal.
With all the conviction that any jaded sinner ever had, she suddenly knew that she could not, would not, ever tell the truth about what she was doing in the wellhouse. Far better for everyone concerned to think that she was a foolish, credulous old-maid with flexible morals, than the deceitful conniver she really was.
Straightening her back and raising her chin, Hannah said, "I have nothing to say about what happened last night. I'm a grown woman, responsible only to God for my sins, and I do not have to confess them to you."
Myrtie's eyes were as big as saucers.
"We'll see what your father has to say about that," her stepmother replied.
"He can say whatever he wants, Violet, but I don't intend to discuss it with him, or you, or anyone."
Reverend Bunch walked in through the door and sat down at the table. His step was weary and sweat was running in rivulets down the side of his face. He wiped at it half-heartedly as his wife came quickly to his side.
"Get me some salve, Myrtie," he said tiredly.
"Are you hurt?" Violet's face was lined with worry.
"Just my knuckles," he said. "He didn't even swing at me." He glanced at Hannah. "But I like to broke my hand on his jaw."
"Is he all right?" Hannah asked.
"Well, I suspect he'll be all right. He's got a busy day ahead of him, he'll have to be building a church all day and he's got a wedding to attend this evening."
"Wedding?"
He rolled his eyes in disbelief. "You said you wanted my blessing. Well, you've got it and I think, honey, that you're going to need it." Her father reached up and took Hannah's hand. He gestured for her to take a seat beside him at the kitchen table. He continued to hold her hand as he gazed into her eyes with fatherly love and apprehension.
"Child, he's not the kind of man I would have chosen for you. But you made this choice yourself."
Shaking his head, he looked up to heaven as if for guidance.
"It has always been a mystery to me why good, decent women always seem to fall in love with the wildest living men around. I guess maybe it's the need to reform them. I'm not sure, though, how much reforming you can do on Henry Lee Watson. You two will have to get along the best that you can."
Hannah felt a sense of rising panic as disbelief turned into a waking nightmare.
"Papa, I can't marry this man! I hardly know him, and we just are not suited."
Reverend Bunch looked genuinely confused.
"Hannah, what do you mean? Only a few minutes ago you were begging to marry him."
"I know, Papa, but now that I've had a moment to think about it, well, I've reconsidered." Hannah floundered, wondering how to explain without explaining. She was willing to pay for her mistake, but the price being asked was too high. "At the time, well ... it might have seemed like a lasting sort of thing, but I'm sure, now, that it was just, well ... it was a moment of, well . . . it was just the lust of the flesh.' "
Violet and Myrtie both gasped. A strange noise emanated from her father's throat that sounded somewhat like a moan of pain.
"Myrtie! You must have chores to do!" her father said sternly, and the younger girl quickly left the kitchen.
Hannah's father was now red-faced and seemed to be taking several deep breaths, as if to calm himself. His speech was especially slow, as if he were making a desperate attempt to make himself understood.
"I understand, Hannah, how you could have second thoughts about your actions. I believe that I am certainly understanding of weakness of the flesh, but I'm afraid it's a little late for undoing the past. In my book, young lady, when you met him in that wellhouse, that was the same as agreeing to marry him. And he knew it too, didn't even try to argue about it. I suggest that you do the same!"
Henry Lee Watson shored up the trim in the new Plainview Church. Normally it was work he enjoyed but today he concentrated on it grimly, hoping to free his mind from the morning's disaster.
The men working around him followed his direction as they had the day before. But yesterday there had been a camaraderie, an easy friendliness. Today that was missing. He understood. They thought he had seduced the preacher's daughter. How funny that was. If they really knew him at all they would never have believed it of him. He had a reputation with the ladies, but pretty prostitutes or willing widows were his style. Respectable young women meant trouble.
His face was still tender and puffy from the blows he'd taken this morning. The pain only served as a reminder of how easily he'd been caught in such a simple little trap.
And he would never have done anything to anger Farnam Bunch. He considered the preacher a fair and honorable man, a man whom he could respect. There hadn't been many of those in his life. And that was why the circumstances of the morning had resolved themselves in the way they had.
Imagine that girl of the preacher's sneaking outside to sleep with him in the wellhouse! She knew she'd be caught; he was sure of that. She'd known, too, that her father would come out there, she'd known they'd be trapped, and it was just what she wanted. He shook his head in disgust. He knew women were partial to him, he'd seen it all over the territory. He was good in the blankets and built to please, but it had never occurred to him that a woman like Miss Hannah would even be interested.
He'd been outrunning calf-eyed young girls and buxom widows for a lot of years now, and not one of them had even come close to catching him. Who could have imagined that some starchy spinster would compromise herself for him. And why? She had never seemed to show much interest in him, not like that saucy little sister of hers. In fact, he had the distinct impression that she didn't like him much.
He remembered hearing her pleading with her father, claiming to love him. Poor, foolish girl. What was he going to do with her? He certainly didn't need a wife. Farmers needed wives. They lived little two-by-two existences. Every farmer had to have a woman to work and raise up more hands. That was their way, but Henry Lee didn't see how it could work in his life.
Had it been anyone else's daughter, he might have taken off and the devil take the hindmost. But for Reverend Farnam he had to do the right thing. Was marrying the foolish woman really the right thing to do?
Agreeing to marry her seemed like the only thing he could offer, and the only thing that these farmers would accept. If he expected to continue to do business among these men, he had to
live by their code, accept their way of doing things. And that didn't allow for deflowering well-brought-up young women.
And she had looked so pitiful. It was as if she couldn't quite believe that she had done it. She must have been afraid that he would expose her. He could have told her daddy what she had done, but chances were, no one would have believed him anyway.
He smiled ruefully, it was kind of hard for him to believe himself. He hadn't been with a woman in a month of Sundays. He'd been making plans to go to Ingalls next week to see if that little redhead still worked at Edith's place.
If he had known that Hannah Bunch was lying there, he could have made her lie into truth! No, he shook his head, the last thing that would interest him was a straight-laced farm girl who'd want to keep her clothes on, and her eyes shut. But, damn it, in a few hours he'd be married to one!
“No, absolutely not!" Hannah declared. “I will not wear mother's white wedding dress. I don't want you baking a wedding cake. I am not getting married to Henry Lee Watson and that is final!"
The words were spoken to the mirror, no one else seemed to be listening. She was still certain that her plan to brazen out the scandal was best, but no one, not her father, not Violet, not even Henry Lee Watson was cooperating.
Violet had pulled her mother's wedding dress from the trunk and it was airing outside at this very moment, waiting for Hannah to wear it. Her sisters-in-law were alternately laughing and arguing in the kitchen as they cooked dinner and decorated a cake for the wedding. Hannah was supposed to be packing up her things, but she saw no reason to do so. She wasn't leaving. She wasn't marrying anybody. All of this was just going to disappear.
She was sure Henry Lee Watson was playing some kind of joke. He was biding his time, maybe planning revenge. Any moment now he would either tell Papa the truth, or just grab his horse and ride away and never return. Hannah hoped he would do the latter. It would be easier to be left standing at the church than to try to explain to her father why she had sneaked out to the wellhouse last night.
She must have been out of her head to think that heaven would send her on such an errand. Folks in the Bible did plenty of strange things, but that didn't mean that people were supposed to do them nowadays. She'd been foolish and selfish, trying to force poor Will Sample to take her for a wife. Will would have done it, of course, and would have tried, no doubt, to make the best of it. But Henry Lee Watson would never stay with her. He'd be gone in a minute. What Hannah couldn't understand was why he hadn't left already!
Peeking out of her room, she was dismayed at the flurry of activity taking place in the house. Cooking for the building crew took up a lot of time, but it was obvious that the women of her family were heavily involved in planning a celebration. It amazed her that Violet, who had always seemed so unorganized, had taken charge of the wedding. She seemed to be thriving on all the details that normally Hannah would have handled.
Violet glanced up and noticed Hannah at the door. She smiled warmly and wiped her hands on her apron and came to her. Her earlier disapproval and censure seemed to be completely wiped away.
“Don't worry about a thing, Hannah," she said cheerfully. "I know it seems like it is very hurried, but we are going to have a real wedding that you'll be able to remember with pride for the rest of your life."
"Violet," Hannah said nervously, drawing her into the bedroom for a private consultation. "You have got to help me. I just cannot go through with this."
Violet sat down on the bed and patted the place beside her. When Hannah joined her, she took her hand.
"I know exactly what you are going through. When I married the late Mr. Bradford, I was so nervous beforehand that I was sick to my stomach. And even as a widow, when your father and I tied the knot my knees shook like jelly for a week before the wedding."
"I wish this were only nerves!" Hannah said, honestly. "I know that Henry Lee does not want to marry me.”
"Well, of course he does!" Violet insisted. "You just put that idea right out of your head. You're going to be a wonderful wife to him, I just know it."
"Violet, he would never have married me if Papa hadn't caught us out there."
Violet seemed to consider for a moment. "Well, maybe he wouldn't, Hannah, but you've got to remember that the Lord works in mysterious ways. There's more than one man that found himself on the way to the altar before he'd planned, but heaven has its own time and place for things, and this is your time for marrying Henry Lee."
"You don't understand," Hannah pleaded. She wanted to confide in her, but knew it was pointless.
Violet merely gave her a hug of encouragement. "Now you just get busy and get your things packed. We'll be spending most of the afternoon getting you prettied up for the wedding. You're going to dazzle poor Henry Lee so much, he'll plumb forget that this whole thing wasn't his idea."
Although the men had planned to work until they finished, eat a late meal and head on home, the wedding plans had changed the order of the day. The whole community seemed to be involved in the planning of the festivities, and speculation about the wedding and the bride and groom was on everybody's lips.
Hannah knew they were talking about her, but her family stayed around her like a net, not allowing anyone close enough for embarrassing questions. However, plenty had their comments. When the noon meal was laid out and the men came down to eat, the net began to have gaping holes in it.
"You sly thing!" Mary Beth Thompson said to her. "How long has this been going on, and you not letting on by even the slightest sign!"
Hannah just stared at her, not having the vaguest idea of what to say. Mary Beth was still young and attractive enough to be eager to spread the worst kind of stories about courting couples. Whatever Hannah said, it would be twisted and retold to make Hannah seem more foolish than she already was.
She was rescued by an unexpected source.
"Now, Mary Beth, we had to keep it a secret."
Hannah tried to keep her mouth from dropping in surprise as Henry Lee walked up behind her and placed his arm gently around her shoulders. "Miss Hannah wanted to be married in that church and wouldn't let me say a word to her daddy until it was nearly finished. She was afraid he'd take a shotgun to me." Leaning down conspiratorially to Mary Beth, he added, "and I guess she was right!"
Mary Beth giggled, totally bedazzled by his teasing words, and around them everyone within hearing distance joined into the laughter.
After that Henry Lee did not stray an inch from his betrothed and his unfailing politeness and obvious deference was slowly winning over the churchgoers. Everyone seemed gradually to become delighted with the wedding and the apparently happy couple.
Hannah couldn't understand it. Surely no one believed that they had actually been seeing each other. Why did a few silly words from this man make things all right again? And why was he saying them? If he didn't go ahead and leave soon, they would actually have to go through with it.
Henry Lee filled two plates and insisted that Hannah come and sit with him to eat.
"No, I really must help out," she pleaded, not wanting to be in close proximity to him any longer than absolutely necessary.
"Nonsense, you are the bride."
Had he given the word an unusual emphasis? She saw in his eyes a strange mixture of admiration and pity.
"Come and sit down, nobody expects the bride to wait on us, do you, boys?"
"Come and sit a spell, Miss Hannah," a grizzled farmer told her. "There're plenty of women here to help that ain't getting married this afternoon."
With Henry Lee at her elbow carrying the plates, Hannah made her way to the swing that her father had put up in the grape arbor. The grapes didn't thrive, but the arbor was the coolest, most pleasant place to sit in the yard. As the men came over and seated themselves around the couple, Hannah couldn't decide if she was glad of their presence or resentful of the lack of privacy.
She felt foolish and out of place. All around her were men she had known all her life, bu
t she had hardly ever spoken to any of them. Now she was too ashamed to look at them.
Henry Lee kept up a running conversation about the church, and the other men, and the crops, as if to discourage talk of the wedding. Just talking and visiting seemed to come easy to him. He put the men at ease.
However, not everyone's curiosity could be redirected.
"Where're you two going on your honeymoon?" Clarence Hopkins asked, drawing out the word to nearly three times its normal length.
Henry Lee looked the man square in the eyes. "Well, Miss Hannah and I are somewhat partial to the wellhouse."
Hoots and howls followed this statement, Hannah noticed that even her father was genuinely laughing. Personally, she was mortified.
Henry Lee reached over and raised up her chin. "You see this, gentlemen? My daddy always told me when you're thinking to marry a woman, it should be one who still knows how to blush."
Chapter Three
She would be the wallflower bride of the charmer of the territory, Hannah thought miserably as she stood in her room dressed in her mother's wedding gown. Once white, the dress was now faded into a color reminiscent of frosty cream. The high collar and tight sleeves identified it as a dress from another generation and the detail of fifty-two buttons down the back clearly showed that it was sewn for a wedding very different from this one.
Surely he'll make his getaway soon, she told herself hopefully. But she no longer quite believed it.
Myrtie had bounced back from her earlier shock and was lying on Hannah's bed practically giddy with excitement.
“To think of you and Henry Lee Watson," Myrtie sighed. "I just would never, oh, Hannah, he is so handsome!"
"Myrtie, really, you mustn't say that!"
"Oh, you know I wouldn't say it to anyone else. But he's going to be my brother-in-law after all." She sighed again. "All the girls talk about him. He's so handsome and such a cutup. They say that he goes to every party in the territory. Just think, you'll be going to parties all the time."