by Pamela Morsi
"I haven't had chicken pox either," Claire announced in horror.
George shook his head. "Then Gertrude should keep you away from here."
"Keep her away from here?"
"We don't want her to become ill, too. You may think that you are immune, but how can you be sure that she is?" he said emphatically. "I don't think Pru could handle two patients at once."
Claire firmed her jaw furiously and glared up the stairway with malice. "If that Lester Barkley gives me the chicken pox, I swear I will pull out every hair on his head and stuff them all down his throat."
"Claire!" Gertrude admonished her. "Your brother is ill. I'm sure he wouldn't wish his troubles upon you."
"Oh, yes, he would," she insisted. "Lester the Pester is the bane of my existence."
"Little brothers are just like that," Gertrude assured her as she cast an eye at her own little brother leaning heavily against the door frame. In his exhaustion he looked so much like her George of long ago.
As if he could read her thoughts, he grinned at her. "This is no time to settle old debts, Gerty," he said. "I'll do what I can to help Pru and you two must stay away from the contagion, if possible."
"That's no problem for me," Claire assured him.
"I really don't think there is that much danger," Gertrude assured him.
George nodded. "Still, I'd hate for you two to come down with it. You two stay somewhere else for a day or two. Just until the little scamp is over the worst of it."
"I hardly think that is necessary," Gertrude assured him. "We'll simply keep out of Lester's room and all will be fine."
"No, I think it better for you to stay away," George said firmly. "Just gather up some clothing and go. I'm sure you can stay with the Wentworths."
Gertrude was horrified. "I do not wish to stay with the Wentworths," she stated emphatically.
He shrugged. "Well, you can stay at the Boston Hotel if you like, but you should not stay here."
"I don't think I'd want to do that either," Gertrude answered.
"Well," Claire blurted in. "You two can argue this without me. Right now I've got to go see about Teddy."
'Teddy?"
"He was injured at the football game."
George's expression reflected concern. "Badly?"
"We don't know. Mikol—ah, Mr. Stefanski had to carry him off the field," she said. Just saying the words aloud caused her lip to tremble. Determinedly she stiffened it. This was no time for emotional displays.
"That doesn't sound good at all," George said.
"The other boys on the team were saying that he'd hurt his knee," she told him. "The doctor went with him, so nobody really knows a thing."
"Did we win the game?" George asked.
Gertrude stared at him mutely for a moment. Her mind was a blank. She couldn't remember how the game turned out.
"Oh, yes," Claire piped in excitedly. "And it was just terrific. Teddy's run set up the touchdown."
"Yes, that's right," Gertrude agreed, sighing with relief that her memory hadn't deserted her completely. "I was so proud."
Claire became impatient once more. "I can't stay here worrying about Lester Barkley," she said with acidic haughtiness. “Teddy is hurt. I have to go to him."
Her words were crisp and stated with high drama. She took the first three steps of the stairway. Stopping, she turned at the landing. She looked back down at the adults still standing in the foyer. Her expression was somehow accusing. "Of course, you both understand that, don't you," she said. "You realize why I must go."
Her near-angry expression was full of meaning that escaped both of the persons for which it was intended. She stared at them long and hard as if she expected some sort of reply, some sort of explanation.
Gertrude and George could only answer her with two puzzled glances. Her face screwed up in frustration and her tone was accusing as she headed up the stairs.
"Come help me change, Aunt Gertrude," she said. "I want to see Teddy."
Gertrude realized that she wanted to see him, too. Just to assure herself that he was all right, she insisted to herself. But even more than that, she wanted to see Mikolai. She wanted to assure herself that Mikolai was all right, too.
"I'll need to go with you, of course," she said, surprising both her brother and Claire. "You can't go to a gentleman's house without a chaperone."
Chapter Thirty-Three
CLAIRE'S KNOCK UPON the front door of the bright red brick Stefanski house was forthright and persistent. Gertrude held back, somewhat uncertain. She loved Mikolai Stefanski. She wanted to be there. But she was not altogether sure of her welcome. Her concern heightened when Doc Ponder, not Mikolai, opened the door.
"Afternoon, Claire, afternoon, Gertrude," he said.
He was carrying his leather satchel, as if he were about to leave. But he stood proprietarily in the doorway looking down his long, thin nose at the women upon the porch. "Not the best time to come calling, ladies. Who won the game?"
"We did," Claire answered. "It was terrific. How is Teddy?"
The doctor shrugged. "Knee's shattered, that's not too good," he said. "Doubt the boy will get to play again this season."
"But he will walk," Gertrude said, deliberately keeping her tone even.
"Walk? My yes, he'll walk again. Probably run, too. I told Stefanski that I'd call a specialist I know in St. Louis. See if the man can take the train up here to have a look at him. He's a strong young man. That European peasant stock usually is. Breed them strong, they do, to work in the fields, you know. The patrician families, the people of importance, have a more delicate constitution. Do you read Darwin, Gertrude? No, of course you don't. The man has a point, he certainly has a point. Not all of it, of course. He's limited in his vision." The doctor shook his head. "My own dear boys," he said sadly. "Why, I've had to use every bit of my skills just to keep them alive."
Gertrude was impatient with the doctor's theories this afternoon and interrupted him curtly. "But you think Teddy will recover soon. There will be no lasting effects from this, will there?"
"Certainly not," Doc assured her. "He'll be fine, of course. But I don't know about playing football."
"He won't be able to play football?" Claire seemed shocked at the pronouncement.
"He certainly won't play anymore this year," the doctor said. "It's a blow, a real blow. The team really needs him, especially if we are going to play for the state championship. I wish my Delfane could play. I do wish it very much. Not in the boy's nature, of course. As I explained, the Ponders came from the ruling classes. All our breeding went to leadership and intelligence. Not a brawny, gladiator type among us."
"Can I go up and see him?" Claire directed her question to her aunt, but it was the doctor who replied.
"What? Oh . . . I don't think so. That's not at all the thing, for a girl to visit a young man in his sick bed," the doctor told her. "You just go home and tend to your own business and when Teddy is well enough to come downstairs you can visit him in his parlor."
Claire's expression hardened and Gertrude could see from her stance that she was ready to do battle.
"Now, Dr. Ponder," Gertrude began carefully. "I think you don't quite understand, Claire and Teddy are very close and it is just—"
The doctor tutted disapprovingly. "It's not done, Gertrude," he said. "I don't have to ask my wife to know that. I realize that you, Gertrude, have always just proceeded however you saw fit. But you are a Barkley and folks have forgiven you your impetuousness because of that nature."
"Claire is a Barkley, too, Doctor," Gertrude said evenly.
"Oh yes, but she's a Margrove, also, and with mixing among the lower classes, why, we've already seen what kind of lack of personal restraint that can result."
Gertrude's right hand balled into a fist and she was quite ready to plant that fist firmly in the middle of the doctor's long patrician nose. Only the arrival of Mikolai at the door kept her from doing so.
"Miss Gertrude! Claire! I
'm so glad you're here!"
Mikolai stepped out onto the porch, effectively pushing the doctor out of the way. 'Teddy is looking much better."
"Oh, we are so glad," Gertrude whispered.
"The Barkley ladies tell me that we won the game," the doctor announced. The man seemed totally unaware of the level of tension he had created on the porch. "I'll bet Teddy will be glad to hear that."
"Yes," Mikolai agreed. "I'm sure that he will. Claire, why don't you run upstairs and tell him."
"But—" the doctor began, but wasn't given time to finish.
"Yes, I want to tell him," she said as she hurried past the adults into the house.
"His room is the first one to the left at the top of the stairs," Mikolai called after her.
The doctor's brow furrowed and he looked at Mikolai in reproach. "That's not quite the thing, Stefanski. Letting young people be alone that way."
Mikolai's reply was a long, hard look. "My son just had his knee twisted and torn, Doc," he said quietly. "I don't think he'll be attempting to take liberties with Miss Claire."
"Well, no, of course not," the doctor agreed. "But I did hear about that little peccadillo at the victory dance. Considering the history of that young lady and the way things look . . ."
Stefanski's heavy brow drew together in an expression that Gertrude thought might be kindred to the wrath of God. Although the doctor was a good two inches taller, Mikolai seemed suddenly to tower over him as an uncomfortable silence reigned upon the porch for a long moment.
"In my family and in my house, Doctor," he stated with terse, stern politeness, "I have always been more concerned with the way things are, rather than the way that they look."
The doctor's eyes were wide. Mikolai's stance was threatening. Instinctively Gertrude stepped between the two men.
"I'm here as Claire's chaperone, of course," she announced with a light reassuring smile.
Just moments earlier she had wanted to bloody the good doctor's nose. But she did not want Mikolai to do it. She hoped that her manner would dissolve the tension that swirled around them.
"So I suppose I had better get at my job. So good to see you, Doc," she said, effectively dismissing the man. "You will call Mr. Stefanski as soon as you hear from the specialist in St. Louis, won't you?"
Gertrude half led, half dragged Mikolai back into his own house and shut the door in the doctor's face. Still stiff and shaking, Mikolai stared through the round glass of the door and watched as Doc Ponder made his way down the steps and out to the trolley stop. His jaw was set hard and he continued to look as if he was ready to do some bodily damage upon someone.
"That sorry excuse for a doctor is the worst gossip in this town," he said, seething.
"Let it go, darling," Gertrude whispered to him. "The foolish man is not worth the effort."
Mikolai turned away from the door to look into Gertrude's eyes. His icy hard expression melted in the warmth of her eyes and he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her to his chest.
"Oh, Gertrude, I'm so glad you're here," he whispered.
She needed to hear those words from him. She pressed her body tightly against him. She felt his need for her. Not just the physical need that would be expected. She could feel his heart calling out to her. His emotional need for her at that moment far exceeded any fleshly desire. As he held her close, he garnered strength from their embrace. And as quickly and certainly as he gleaned it from her, he gave it back.
"I wanted to come to you on the field," she confessed. "I was anxious for you."
He removed her hat from her head and tossed it to the floor. Lovingly he stroked the short, dark curls that lay tousled around her face.
"I was scared," he said quietly. "I was so scared. I needed just to hold you, Gertrude. I needed to hold you so very much."
She needed it, too. She needed to be with him, to help him, to love him. She had thought she might not be welcome. She scoffed at her own foolishness now. His arms were her sanctuary. She felt the lightness of it. His arms were exactly where she should be.
Sighing heavily, he leaned back against the wall. He was weary in mind and body and it was as if he could no longer stand up on his own. He would not release his hold upon her, and brought her enfolded in his arms to rest against him and the solid security of the sturdy wall of brick that he had constructed. She felt the warm strength of his embrace and the cool, slick softness of his silk vest beneath her cheek.
He reached down to take her chin between his fingers and raised her face to his lips. "Gertrude, my sweet Gertrude," he murmured before they were both lost in a kiss that was more possessive than passionate.
Her heart beat with wild excitement at the dominance of his mouth upon her own. Their kisses in the secret little room had been poetry and preludes. This melding of lips was different. It was as if he were trying to mark her with his touch, brand her with his own stern, unyielding will. She sighed against him, compliant—even complicit—in his bid of ownership. She reveled in it.
His hands caressed her, coaxed her, but not in a way that was meant to entice. He explored her like a sentimental traveler who had been across these plains and valleys many times. He knew the geography very well, and called the land his own.
It was easy, so easy to give herself over, totally, to make herself a part of him, to make him a part of her. It was so easy. Fear crept in.
"Mikolai, the children," she said as she pulled away. "If Claire were to come down those stairs, think how this would look to her."
There were still stars in his eyes, but she could not see them. He gave his answer like a rough caress against her throat. "Have I not already said today that in my house we care about what is, not about how it looks?”
His statement soothed her, but her fear kept her wary, deliberately wary.
"I am happy to be your mistress, Mikolai, but I would just as well that Claire did not know it," she told him.
Her words were like cold water upon him and he pulled away from her. Looking down into her eyes, his expression was troubled, almost hurt.
"My 'mistress'? I hate that word," he said. "It is a coarse word. That word . . . that word is not what you are to me, Gertrude."
She couldn't like it either. Its connotation of cold sin and unfeeling illicitness robbed her of her dignity and degraded her most tender feelings.
"There is no other word," she said evenly. "It is the truth, Mikolai. I will not deny it."
He stroked her temple as if to soften the lines of determination that he found there.
"I went into this with my eyes open," she continued. "I will not be squeamish about the language now."
He folded her into his arms once more, protectively. "There must be a better word for what you are to me," Mikolai insisted. "There has to be a better word."
She shook her head. "No, in English there is not," she said.
He held her tightly, protectively. The hard shell of her brave stance felt to be crumbling within the tenderness of his embrace. "Maybe in Polish they have a gentler term."
He looked down at her for a long moment. Slowly, with warmth of genuine feeling, a smile spread across his face. "Yes," he said. "In Polish there is a word, a better word." He ran one long, loving finger down the side of her face and across the soft tenderness of her lower lip. "It speaks my feelings better than this crude English."
"What is it?" she asked him.
"Zona."
"Zona," Gertrude tried the word upon her tongue. It did rest gently upon the ear without any of the coldness of the English term. "I like the sound of it. It means mistress?"
He hesitated. "It means ... it means what you are to me."
His eyes glowed with feeling and she trembled in his arms. "Then call me that," she said, burying her face in the smooth silk of his vest once more.
"Yes, I will call you my zona," he said.
"Have you ever called other women that?" she asked him, not able to meet his eyes.
His brows furrowed
slightly. "Yes, once, only once, and very long ago, I called a woman my zona." He took her hand and brought it to his lips. "But," he said, "I never felt for her the things that I feel for you. I never really knew this word until I knew you."
Chapter Thirty-Four
‘TEDDY?” CLAIRE’S VOICE was anxious as she slipped into the darkly masculine room at the top of the stairs.
"Claire?" His voice sounded tired, but nothing more sinister.
'Teddy, are you all right?" she asked. The high-rising sleigh-style mahogany bed was almost waist-high to her. He lay sprawled across it, only the top of his nightshirt visible above the crisp muslin sheets.
"Yes, I think so," he answered, rubbing his eyes sleepily. "Doc gave me some powders for the pain."
She nodded gravely. "Do they make you feel better?"
"No, not really better." His tone was groggy and more than a little bit irritable. "I'm just almost too sleepy to care about how it hurts."
"It hurts pretty bad, I guess," she said softly.
"Pretty bad," he agreed.
"Worse than when I hit you in the shin with the croquet mallet?"
He gave a light chuckle.
A smile had been all that she had hoped for.
"I don't know if it was worse," he said. "I didn't get any pain powders that time."
She rolled her eyes dramatically. But she was glad that he was well enough to feel like teasing back. "Do you need to sleep?" she asked. "Do you want me to go?"
"No, no, Claire," he said. "I don't think I can sleep with this knee throbbing like it is. You're my best friend, I guess. I'm glad that you came."
"I had to come. And I'm more than your best friend, you're my brother, remember," she said.
"You aren't likely to let me forget," he said. "Open those drapes, will you? Old Doc Ponder seems to think I'll rest better if this room is as dark as the grave."
"It is pretty gloomy in here," she admitted.
'Too gloomy for me," he said. "It's gray enough outside without hiding the light of day completely."
Claire hurried to the window and threw back the heavy damask draperies. The late-afternoon sun was puny, but at least the drizzle had stopped.