“Money can be part of your patrimony, too,” Quigley said, which only proved he did not completely understand the folk of Quebec.
“It would be an act of Christian charity, for the sake of the people of Rivière-du-Loup and the surrounding countryside,” Bishop Pascal said. “And, unlike most acts of charity, my son, it would not only be good for your soul but would bring money into your pocket rather than having it flow out.”
“And not just money,” Colonel Quigley added. “You know the hospital makes its own electricity. As part of the bargain, we would have the hospital make electricity for this farm as well.”
They were eager to make a deal. They were showing how eager they were. Against a canny peasant like Lucien Galtier, they were begging to be skinned. He knew now, he would sell the land. Marie would skin him if he let the chance to get electricity escape. But he intended to make the bishop and the colonel sweat first. “It is my patrimony,” he growled. “One day, my grandson’s grandson will grow wheat on that land.”
Colonel Quigley rolled his eyes. “Damn stubborn frog,” he muttered under his breath in English. Galtier smiled. He didn’t think he was supposed to hear, or to understand if he did.
Too bad,
he thought. He
was
a damn stubborn frog, and they would have to make the best of it.
“My son, have you not seen in these past few years how things can change, and change unexpectedly and quickly?” Bishop Pascal asked. “Would you not like to see this change be for the better?”
“By better, your Grace, you mean doing as you wish.” Galtier did not want to lose the chance he had here. Gruffly, grudgingly, he said, “Very well. Let us speak of this further, since you insist. Come inside. We may as well sit down.”
When he brought them into the farmhouse, Marie fussed over them, as he’d known she would. Once she had them settled with tea and buns, she asked, “How is it that we have such distinguished visitors?”
Before either visitor could speak, Lucien kept right on growling: “They seek to purchase some of our patrimony. Along with money, they even offer electricity.” He curled his lip, as if to show how little he cared for electricity. “They do not comprehend the importance of a man’s patrimony.”
“Mme. Galtier, I am sure you can make your husband see reason here,” Colonel Quigley said.
“I leave these matters to him. He is the man, after all,” Marie said primly. A single flashing glance toward Galtier sent quite another message, but neither Quigley nor Bishop Pascal saw it. After that glance, Marie retreated to the kitchen.
In tones of gentle reason, Bishop Pascal said, “You have not even inquired what the Republic and the United States—we will share the expense, our two countries—might pay for your parcel of land.”
“You haven’t said what you want for it, either,” Quigley said.
“I have not said I would take any amount of money for it,” Galtier replied. “But, if you must, you may name a price.” Quigley had invited him to set his own price when he’d started getting rent for the land on which the hospital stood. He’d named the highest price he dared, and Quigley had paid without a blink. Lucien knew he could have gone higher, but not how much. This time…If Quigley mentioned any sum less than five hundred dollars, maybe he really wouldn’t sell the piece of property.
“The United States are prepared to pay you one thousand dollars for that tract, M. Galtier,” Colonel Quigley said.
“And the Republic of Quebec will add one thousand dollars to that sum,” Bishop Pascal put in.
Galtier’s ears rang. Two thousand dollars? And electricity? “You are not serious,” he said, meaning he could not believe they would pay so much.
Thanks to his bold front, Bishop Pascal and Quigley thought he meant they weren’t offering enough. The American looked sour, the bishop piously resigned. Colonel Quigley said, “Oh, very well, then. Fifteen hundred from us, another fifteen hundred from the Republic, and not a dime more.”
Three thousand dollars? Lucien could buy a motorcar. He could buy a tractor. He would be a man to reckon with for miles around. He smiled at his guests. “Two thousand dollars from the United States, another two from the Republic, and not a dime less.”
Colonel Quigley and Bishop Pascal both looked alarmed. Galtier felt alarmed—had he pushed it too far? The bishop and Quigley put their heads together. After a couple of minutes, Bishop Pascal said, “In the interest of concord, we will split the difference with you—one thousand seven hundred and fifty dollars from Quebec and a like amount from the United States. Is it agreeable to you?”
“And electricity?” Galtier demanded.
“And electricity,” Colonel Quigley said. “I told you that beforehand.”
“It is better to have everything certain than to leave anything in doubt.” Galtier sighed with reluctance he did not feel. “Very well. Let it be as you say. For one thousand seven hundred and fifty dollars from each of your governments—and electricity—I will sell this land, but only, mind you, in the interest of concord, as the holy bishop says.”
“God will surely bless you, my son,” Bishop Pascal said, beaming.
“Do you think so?” Lucien said interestedly. “That would be good, too.”
Bishop Pascal didn’t know what to make of that. He scratched his head. Colonel Quigley knew exactly what to make of it. He looked even more sour than he had while they were dickering.
Why should he care?
Galtier thought.
It isn’t his money.
However sour Quigley looked, the bargain was sealed. The money would be Galtier’s—soon, he hoped.
Edna Semphroch came back into the coffeehouse. Nellie Jacobs gave her daughter an unhappy look, even though midafternoon business was slow. Truth to tell, business had never got back to what it was during the war, when Confederate officers from the force occupying Washington had kept the place hopping morning, noon, and night. Nellie didn’t miss the Rebs, not even a little bit, but she did miss their cash.
“Took you long enough, didn’t it?” Nellie said sourly. “I reckon I could have looked at every skirt between here and St. Louis in the stretch of time you’ve been gone. And you didn’t even buy anything. Can’t you make up your mind?” People who joked about women’s indecision had never met Nellie.
“Nope, didn’t buy anything,” Edna agreed. She eyed her mother with an odd mix of amusement and apprehension. “Didn’t even go looking at skirts, as a matter of fact.”
Nellie had no fancy education. She was, most ways, shrewd rather than really clever. But when Edna said something like that, her mother didn’t need a road map to figure out what she’d say next. “You’ve been sneaking around behind my back,” Nellie said, and could have sounded no more outraged if she’d been reading a philandering husband the riot act.
She would have had an easier time accepting a philandering husband. Men got it where they could. That was part—too large a part, as far as she was concerned—of how they were made. Women, though…She’d known for a long time that Edna burned hot. Her daughter had seemed calmer the past couple of years, so Nellie had dared hope she’d got it out of her system. No such luck, evidently.
“I’ve been trying to have a life, Ma,” Edna said. “God knows you don’t make it easy for a girl.” But the unbearably smug look on her face said she’d had her desire fulfilled—and had something else filled full, too, more than likely.
“You little hussy,” Nellie hissed. She wished Clara, who was taking a nap upstairs, would pick that moment to wake up. Otherwise, she’d be locked in a fight with her older daughter of the sort they’d had during the war, the sort they hadn’t had since Nellie married Hal Jacobs.
Again, no such luck. Edna tossed her head. “Hussy? Huh! Takes one to know one, I guess.” Had Nellie had a knife in her hand, she might have used it. Fortunately, she’d been washing cups and saucers. Edna ignored her furious squawk. Edna seemed inclined to ignore just about everything. She went on, “But none of that matters, anyhow. He asked me to marry him today.”
“Did he think about asking you to get an abortion instead?” Wounded, Nellie wanted to hit back any way she could.
Her daughter shook her head. “I ain’t in a family way, Ma. And I ought to know, too, I felt so lousy last week.” She laughed. “Turned out you were the one who ended up in a family way. I still think that’s the funniest thing in the whole wide world.”
If she’d had to find out for sure she wasn’t pregnant, she’d been doing things that left doubt in her mind. “At least I was married,” Nellie said.
“And I’m going to be,” Edna said. “Whether you like it or not, I’m going to be. I ain’t getting any younger, you know. I’m sick and tired of you watching me the way Teddy Roosevelt watched the damn Rebs.”
Edna
wasn’t
getting any younger, Nellie realized. She was closer to thirty than twenty, as Nellie was closer to fifty than forty. Even better than three years of marriage to Hal Jacobs hadn’t come close to making Nellie understand why a woman would marry for the sake of bedroom pleasures; for her, bedroom pleasures were at most rare accidents that brought as much embarrassment as release. But Edna wasn’t like that, however much Nellie wished her daughter were.
“Who is this fellow?” After Nellie asked the question, she realized it should have been the first one out of her mouth.
Her daughter seemed surprised she’d asked it at all. In less snippy tones than she’d been using, Edna answered, “His name is Grimes, Ma, Merle Grimes. He’s right my age, and he’s a clerk for the Reconstruction Authority.”
“If he’s right your age, how come he hasn’t got a wife already?” Nellie asked, wondering if in fact he had one Edna didn’t know about.
But Edna said, “He had one, but she died of the Spanish influenza a couple-three years ago. He showed me a snapshot once. I asked him to. She looked a little like me, I think, only her hair was darker.”
That took some of the wind out of Nellie’s sails. When she asked “What did you tell him about Lieutenant Kincaid?” she didn’t sound mean at all.
“I’ve told him I was engaged during the war, but my fiancé got killed,” Edna said. “I didn’t tell Merle he was a Reb, and I’ll thank you not to, neither.”
“All right,” Nellie said, and Edna looked surprised. Nellie guessed Merle Grimes would eventually find out, and there would be trouble on account of it. Too many people knew about the late Nicholas H. Kincaid for the secret to keep. His death at what would have been Edna’s wedding had even made the newspapers, though a clerk for the U.S. government wouldn’t have been in Washington then.
Bill Reach and me, we can keep a secret,
Nellie thought.
If anybody else knew…
But no one else did, not Edna, not Hal, no one. No one ever would.
“He’s a nice man, Ma,” Edna said. “He’s a
good
man. You’ll like him when you meet him, swear to God you will.”
If he was such a nice man, if he was such a good man, what was he doing sticking it into Edna before he put a ring on her finger? Nellie started to ask that very question, but caught herself. For one thing, it would make Edna mad. For another, this Grimes had offered to put a ring on her finger. Nellie found a different question to ask: “How did you meet him?”
Edna giggled. “The first couple times were right here in the coffeehouse. I don’t reckon you’d recall him”—which was certainly true—“but he was here, all right. He doesn’t live too far away. We ran into each other at the greengrocer’s one time, and then again a week later. After that, one thing sort of led to another.”
I’ll bet it did,
Nellie thought. But, regardless of whether she thought Edna was a fool, she couldn’t deny Edna was also a grown woman. “All right,” Nellie said again. “If he wants to marry you, if you want to marry him, the only thing I can say is, I hope you don’t end up sorry on account of it.”
“I don’t think we will, Ma,” Edna said. A few years before, she’d been unshakably certain she and Confederate Lieutenant Kincaid would live happily ever after. Maybe she really was growing up as well as grown—even if she did have more trouble keeping her legs together than she should have. Edna was thinking about such things, too, but in a different way, for she asked, “Wouldn’t you like to have a little grandbaby?”
“With Clara around, it feels like I’ve already got one,” Nellie said. “If you had a baby, the biggest difference would be that I wouldn’t have to keep an eye on the kid every single second of the day and night. I hope you’ll be happy, Edna. I wish you didn’t think you had to sneak around to meet somebody, and to see him.”
Edna didn’t answer that, which was probably just as well. Nellie had done everything but shove her daughter into a chastity belt to keep her from meeting and seeing anybody. Nellie had been sure—was still sure—she’d done the right thing, but Edna’d finally managed to get around her. Now she had to make the best of it.
Her husband was very little help. “High time she gets married, if that is what she wants,” Hal said. “If she is unhappy afterwards, she will have no one to blame but herself. But I hope and pray she will not be unhappy.”
“So do I,” Nellie said. “If she is, though, I bet she blames me.”
“We will see what we will see when we meet the young man,” Hal said. “He may turn out to be very nice.” Nellie was inclined to doubt that on general principles—hardly any young men, in her estimation, were very nice—and on specifics—had this Merle Grimes been very nice, he wouldn’t have yanked Edna’s drawers down till after they were married, and not too often then, either. By that standard, Hal Jacobs was very nice.
After Edna’s announcement, Nellie didn’t want to let her leave the coffeehouse for any reason whatever. With Edna a woman grown, that wasn’t easy. It was, in fact, impossible. And one day, about a week after Edna’s bombshell, she did go out. When she came back, she came back arm in arm with a man. “Ma,” she said proudly, “this here’s my intended. Merle, this is my mother. She’s Nellie Jacobs now; like I told you, my pa’s been dead a long time.”
“I’m very pleased to meet you at last, Mrs. Jacobs,” Grimes said.
“Pleased to meet you, too,” Nellie said grudgingly. She’d intended to limit herself to a simple
hello
. But Grimes wasn’t what she’d expected. For one thing, he walked with a cane, and wore the ribbon for the Purple Heart in a buttonhole. For another, he didn’t look like a practiced seducer. He seemed serious and quiet; his long, rather horsy face and gold-framed spectacles might have belonged to a lawyer, not a clerk.