Mary Connealy (68 page)

He glared over his shoulder at the boys’ rooms, slammed the door, turned on her, and hissed, “What is that all about? Is what John said true?”

She backed away from him. “Daniel, it’s not important.”

“So it is true.” Daniel, speaking under his breath, advanced on her. “You had a father who worked you half to death. Rugs, Grace? He means a carpet mill, doesn’t he? I know what they’re like. The children who work in them are treated like slaves.”

“Don’t make more of it than it was.” Grace backed up until she bumped up against the wall and had to stop.

“What else don’t I know, Grace?” Daniel wished he had a voice for Grace like the one he used on his boys. She was the most stubborn woman he’d ever met. “You’ve never told me why you were hiding in my wagon. You’ve never told me about being adopted. You’ve never told me your age. Are there any more secrets you’d like to get out in the open”—Daniel leaned down until his nose almost touched hers—“before I learn them from the boys?”

Daniel saw the second Grace’s temper caught fire. “And just when was I supposed to tell you about this, Daniel? At the beginning when you were accusing me of—”

Daniel clamped his hand over her mouth and pressed her head firmly against the cabin wall. “Keep it down,” he growled. “The boys can hear every word you say.” He lifted his hand from her lips and rubbed his palm on his jeans.

Grace glanced at the door, then did her best to whisper and yell at the same time. “You know the vile things you accused me of. And then after the avalanche you were mad all the time. And you avoid me as much as you can by working all the hours God made in a day. And ever since…” Grace’s voice lowered even more, and her cheeks flamed red.

Daniel knew exactly “ever since” what.

“You won’t even speak to me. Just when was I supposed to tell you all about myself? You’ve never asked because you don’t want to know. You just want to stay away from me, and when you can’t, you want to hurt me because you regret being saddled with a wife.”

Grace stuck her nose right up to his. “And now I know just what you were accusing me of. And I think…I think…” Grace’s mouth wobbled. Her eyes filled with tears.

Not tears. Dear Lord, why did you make women cry? It’s not fair
.

“I didn’t even know a man and woman could…could…do such together. And to think I’d be with a man that way who wasn’t my husband…”

Her tears overflowed her eyes. Her throat clogged until she couldn’t go on. She tried to slide sideways to get out from between him and the wall.

He stopped her.

She covered her face with both hands, and her shoulders shuddered with suppressed sobs.

“I know. Everything you say is the truth. I’ve never asked you anything.” He fell silent, his hands drawing her close, her face buried in her hands between them. He’d do anything to make her quit sobbing. He’d do anything to keep her safe. He wondered if there was a baby as the result of their night together, but he was terrified to ask.

Grace’s shoulders finally quit shaking, and she looked up. “What?”

He leaned close and whispered, “Are you carrying my child?”

Grace dropped her hands. In the darkened bedroom, moonlight streamed in through the cracks in the shuttered window. Her tears ran unchecked down her face.

“Quit crying. I can’t abide a woman’s tears.” He tightened his grip on her shoulder.

“How could I know such a thing?” she whispered. “I wasn’t even aware that…well, what I mean is, I’ve never had a mother to explain things. And…for a child to begin…I’ve never given it a thought.”

“You’ll know because your…” Daniel fell silent. He had to force the words past his throat. “Y-your…uh…lady’s time—” He lapsed into silence.

She gasped. “I’ll not discuss such with you, sir.” She tried to step away from him.

He held on doggedly, his eyes closed tight so he wouldn’t have to look at her while he discussed such an embarrassing subject. “A lady’s time…doesn’t…come when a woman is with child. Has yours come?”

“It doesn’t?”

Daniel shook his head.

“But that will take months to know.”

“No, it doesn’t. It only takes a month.”

“Why is that?” Grace asked, her eyes wide with confusion.

Nearly in physical pain from the topic, Daniel growled, “Because it comes every month, so if it doesn’t come that month, then you know.”

“Mine doesn’t…come…every month.” Grace licked her lips as if her mouth had gone stone dry. “I mean, it never has. I had no idea it was supposed to.” With a sudden flare of temper, Grace added, “Every month? That will be a nuisance.”

She exasperated Daniel past his embarrassment. “You’re a woman grown, Grace. You’re supposed to have one per month.”

“Well, I’ve only had a couple of them in my whole life.”

Daniel glared at her. “How old did you say you are?”

“Seventeen.”

“I was married at seventeen. My wife was the same age. She told me it started when a woman was twelve. Every month. You’re not doing it right.”

Grace looked angry for a moment, then her mouth formed itself into a straight line and her brow wrinkled. “I’m s-sorry.” Her eyes filled with tears again. She looked down at her skinny body.

“It’s okay. I reckon you can’t help doing it wrong.” He patted her on the arm with his big clodhopper hands.

“I doubt if I’m carrying a baby. I’ve never been much good at any woman things. I can’t cook.”

“You’re getting better.”

“The potatoes were awful tonight.”

Daniel shrugged. No truer words were ever spoken. “We could go back to cooking in the belly of the stove. Then they were only black on the outside instead of all the way through.”

“I can’t sew.” She looked at her pretty but gigantic dress.

“We’ve got growing boys. You really do need to figure that one out. Maybe Sophie McClellen could help come spring. We don’t have any goods for you to sew anyway. I’ll teach you how to make moccasins if you want.”

“I’ll probably fail at this baby-having business, too.”

“It’s not a failure if you’re not expecting. It would be for the best.”

Grace shook her head. “You’ve got five children. You must love them. Of course you want more of them.”

“No, I don’t.”

Grace looked up at him, her heart in her eyes. “Why don’t you want to have babies with me?”

Daniel looked at her and ached with the loneliness of married life. “Why has God allowed such a wicked temptation to exist? He has to know how dangerous it is.”

“Dangerous? What do you mean?”

“It is if you have a child—especially my child. I seem to make them in batches. Margaret barely survived the twins. She felt sickly for months before and after they were born. We never should have risked another child. Never!” Daniel gulped and felt his Adam’s apple bob much as Adam’s must have when he swallowed that tempting fruit in the Garden of Eden.

“I was weak. I let Margaret convince me.”

“Well, Daniel, God probably made people that way.”

“No, it’s not God.” Daniel shook his head. If he could just convince her, then she’d help him resist. It would be so much easier with her help. Margaret had worked against him. “It’s the devil himself that lays this temptation down before me. I figured that out as soon as the twins were born.”

“Why would you think that? God created man. He wanted children to be born so the world could go on.”

“If he wanted the world to go on”—Daniel caught her by the upper arms and held her so tightly his hands shook—“then why did he make Margaret die?”

Grace was silent.

Daniel’s grip loosened; he knew he must be hurting her. “The Bible says, ‘And thy desire shall be to thy husband.’ It was part of the punishment of Eve. I’ve read it over a hundred times. Eve got desire for her husband and pain in childbirth. Adam got hard work and weeds in his field.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, but I would love to have your child.”

“No! I don’t want to lose you. I can’t lose you.” Then he lowered his head and captured her lips with his own.

S
he grabbed hold of him and hung on like a buffalo burr. “You’re not going anywhere.”

“I have to get out of here.”

Grace caught two handfuls of his golden hair in her fists and glared. “You are the most stubborn man who ever lived. This is why you’ve been angry at me all this time?”

Daniel couldn’t stop his hands from sliding up her sides. “You’re too thin. You have to eat more.”

She twisted his hair. “Don’t change the subject. I have always been thin. I have survived very well with no meat on my bones. Now answer me.”

Daniel closed his eyes. “Yes,” he admitted. “This is why.”

“Well, stop it.” Grace pulled his hair tighter; the pain must have gotten his attention, because his eyes popped open. “This family is going to start getting along, and that includes you and me. And every time you’re rude to me, I’m going to know why, understand?”

Daniel nodded. On a sigh he said, “But what if you have a baby? What if you die? I can’t stand to—”

“Daniel?” Grace yanked his hair until he quit talking.

“What?”

Grace drew his head toward her. “I’m counting that kind of talk as rude.”

A woman leaned heavily on her husband, pale and thin, shaking, near collapse. She was weeping into her hands. The husband, as sad as his wife, supported her. Hannah could see that he fought his own tears.

“The doctor says we don’t dare to try again, Virginia.”

“I don’t mind, Phillip.” The sight of Virginia, her eyes red and teary, made Hannah wonder what could leave someone so devastated. “I’ll be all right.”

“No, I almost lost you this time. I won’t do that. No babies, Virginia—no!”

Hannah’s breath caught in her throat. All this grief over a child? All she knew about children was that people threw them away. Oh, to be wanted like this. Tears welled in her own eyes at the bittersweet dream.

She studied the couple, looking at how neat and clean their clothes were, no worn seams or faded fabric. They weren’t dressed like wealthy people, but their cheeks weren’t hollow and their eyes, though sad, weren’t sunken with hunger. She wasn’t even aware of standing or moving until the man nearly bumped into her.

She preferred to look more closely at a family before she approached them, but she felt God nudging her, telling her to speak. She had time to wait until the doctor was done checking Libby’s ankle; then her little sister would stay overnight. God had brought Hannah to this office at this moment.

With her voice trembling, Hannah said, “I am trying to raise three boys I found living on the street. They are good boys, smart, polite, and honest, but I can barely afford to feed them. They aren’t babies, and I know people want babies….”

The look in the woman’s eyes, the dizzying swing from despair to hope and longing, almost broke Hannah’s heart. Her chest heaved with a sob, but she kept it inside. She would live on the kindness in this woman’s eyes for years.

The man looked down at his wife. “Children who have lived on the street might be difficult, Ginnie. I don’t know….”

“Would it hurt to meet them, Phillip?”

Hannah, with all the skills of a master beggar, manipulator, and liar, said, “If you don’t want them as your children, maybe you could put them to work. They are fourteen, eight, and six. They could live in your barn, and they’d want nothing but food. They’re used to the cold. The rags they wear are all they need.”

Hannah didn’t mention Libby. No one would want a mute child who limped. Just finding someone to take the boys would be a miracle. Yes, they would lose Trevor’s three dollars a month—the only money they had—but she wouldn’t ask God for more.

“They’re hungry, Phillip.” Virginia’s hand clutched at her husband’s arm until Hannah thought either her hand or his arm would break. “I want to meet them. So do you—you know it.”

Phillip held his wife’s gaze for a long moment; then a smile broke out. He turned to Hannah. “Yes, we do want to meet them.”

She left the couple waiting near their shed, not wanting them to see how the family lived. Then Hannah went to her brothers.

Trevor sat on the floor next to the trash barrel, reading a book to Nolan and Bruce. Elation raised her spirits as she looked at the three of them.

“How is she?” Trevor closed the book. All three boys looked at her. Libby would be home tomorrow and in need of constant care.

Hannah pulled her scarf off her head, her arms almost too heavy to lift. “The doctor said she’d be okay.”

Hannah looked at Trevor. She saw the answer to her question in his eyes. No letter from Grace. She slumped into the only chair they owned.

Nolan looked at her with wide, worried eyes. “I got the bread, Hannah. Mr. Daily let me have it, and I was real careful to hide from his grumpy wife.”

Despite her best efforts to protect the children from grim reality, they knew how bad things were.

Hannah smiled at her brothers. Trevor had been killing himself working for a pittance at the carpet mill. Nolan, growing fast, hungry all the time, such a bright boy, hated going to school when he could be earning money. Little Bruce should have had baby fat still; instead, he was lean and far too quiet. And he had a gift for thieving that would only get more pronounced if he kept living on the street.