Lilac Spring

by Ruth Axtell Morren

  Cherish bit her lip, her self-assurance dropping another few notches. “I’m sorry.” Why couldn’t she say those two simple words to Silas?

  Her aunt thrust the shirt at her. “No use moping about it. You’ll just have to sew him a new one.”

  Cherish took the garment back from her, seeing it in a whole new light. “Yes, I shall, shan’t I?” She smiled at it. She would make him a new shirt and with it, apologize for that awful remark she had made. Although he hadn’t referred to it, she felt it lying between them like a leaded keel.

  “Can you show me how to use your new sewing machine?” she asked her aunt.

  “Certainly. You’ll have it sewn up in a jiffy with that.”

  Nodding, Cherish picked up another shirt and went to the stove to grab a hot iron.

  After a week of steady work in the boat shop, Cherish and Silas had cut out the mold, a temporary structure made up of pine boards, over which the hull would take shape. Unlike the schooner down below on the stocks, this smaller boat was built upside down. They were now shaping the frame around the keel, stem and sternpost they had built over the mold.

  Silas straightened from the cedar rib he was planing down to the correct width and rubbed the back of his neck. He expelled a gust of breath as his glance went over to Cherish, who crouched over their original loft, the full-sized working drawing of the hull. It was a network of complicated lines, curves, initials and numbers.

  He wondered how much a man was supposed to take and still keep his distance. Everywhere he turned, Cherish was there. It seemed a dozen times in the afternoon, at least, her hand would touch his, or her arm reached across his, and always that innocent look in her eye, which made him wonder whether she was aware at all of the havoc she was causing with his senses.

  “I think some of those ribs are ready now,” he said when she stood from the loft. “They’ve been sitting in the steam oven a good while. They should be soft enough to bend.”

  “All right. Let’s get them out.”

  He put on some mitts and opened the specially built oven to extract the narrow wooden strips that would become the vertical rib frames of the hull.

  It was hot work, keeping the stove under it going at full blast, to supply the steam necessary for the metal box where the wood strips were set.

  “Watch out for the steam when you first open the door. It can be very hot.”

  “The planks seem just right, as soft as putty,” Cherish said as the two laid the strip over the mold, bending it to conform to its curve and clamping it down.

  “We’ll let it dry and harden before taking it off again to plane. Come on, let’s get another one.”

  After she had assisted him with two of them, she told him she could do one by herself.

  He went back to planing one of the dry ones he’d shaped to the frame the day before.

  He had to admit that Cherish was the best worker he’d ever had. He’d decided from the outset he’d treat her just like any man who worked alongside him, and she’d proved her worth. She did everything he did, everything he asked. She’d even made some good suggestions.

  But how much of her proximity was he supposed to endure before he did something foolish?

  “Ouch!”

  He swiveled at the sound of her voice. She was standing at the oven door, holding her fingers up to her mouth. Silas hurried over to her.

  “What happened?”

  She smiled ruefully from around her fingers. “Burned myself on the steam.”

  “I warned you about it.”

  “So you did.”

  “Come on, let’s pour some cold water on those fingers.”

  He led her outside to the hand pump. He began pumping on the handle, and as soon as the water began to flow out, he took her hand and held it under the stream of icy water.

  “Feel better?”

  “Much,” she said with a smile.

  He looked down at her slim hand lying in his. It was turning red with the cold. He glanced back to see her watching him gratefully. When she looked at him like that, he wanted nothing more than to kiss her.

  Why couldn’t he forget that night? Why couldn’t he forget the feel of her mouth under his?

  “You’re always patching me up.”

  He shrugged, letting go of the pump handle and her hand at the same time.

  “I’m sorry for what I said to you at the lake.”

  He pretended he didn’t understand. “What was that?” he asked casually, already beginning to turn away toward the door.

  She cleared her throat. “Calling you an underdog.”

  Slowly he turned around, his hand on the doorknob. She hadn’t moved from the pump. When he said nothing, she continued. “It was mean. I don’t know what got into me.”

  “Forget it,” he answered lightly. “It was the truth, wasn’t it?”

  He opened the door and motioned for her to go ahead of him.

  She stood her ground. “Of course it wasn’t!”

  “I am nothing but your father’s hired hand.”

  “You are not! You’re the finest worker he has, the best shipwright in all Haven’s End and Hatsfield and—and—beyond.”

  Not wanting to let her praise move him, he reentered the boat shop. He walked to the oven, hearing Cherish quickly walking after him. He removed the soft wood strip Cherish had been about to get when she’d gotten burned. He took it over to the mold and began laying it down over it.

  Cherish came to stand beside him, holding the bottom end in place while he bent the rib to the contours of the mold.

  “How do your fingers feel? Are you up to this?” he asked, glancing down at her.

  “They’re fine. Just a dull smoldering. It’ll pass soon enough. My fingers should be used to this, after all the ironing and baking I’ve done this week.”

  “Got burned?”

  “I’ll say.”

  “You should have told me. I’d have taken the frame out.”

  They worked silently some minutes more before Cherish spoke again. “Are you still saving for your own shipyard?”

  His eyes met hers. What did she think, that he would be her father’s lackey forever?

  As if reading his thoughts, she asked, “How long do you think before you’ll…you’ll have enough?”

  He surveyed the bent wood critically. “Hard to say. It’ll be one of these days.”

  “We’d miss you,” she said softly.

  “Maybe you could come work for me,” he quipped. “Try being my lackey for a change.”

  Her laughter gurgled up at him, touching his nerve endings like a teasing feather.

  “I’d like to come work for you.”

  He looked at her, not expecting such a ready reply.

  Then she smiled impishly. “But only if you make me a full and equal partner.”

  “Oh, yeah?” He turned away and began walking to the oven again. “Well, I won’t have to make any decision right away. At the rate I’m going, it’ll be a long time before I have enough to tell your father goodbye.”

  “I’m glad. I mean, I’m glad we can still work together.”

  Her words made him stop midway to the oven. But he refused to acknowledge their effect. Her words at the lake still rankled. He continued walking.

  Cherish was at her wit’s end. What more must she do for Silas to see her as a full-grown woman? Although he was polite and helpful, she sensed a widening gap between the two of them. Working in the boat shop, going to choir practice, sitting together in church, instead of drawing them closer, only seemed to increase the distance.

  She couldn’t believe the rift had been caused merely by a few careless remarks, which she’d apologized for. She knew Silas; he wasn’t one to hold a grudge this way. He certainly didn’t seem angry or hurt, just aloof. Friendly but aloof. What was wrong with him? she asked herself for the hundredth time.

  She craned her neck around, easing the ache that was forming from bending over the plane on the workbench. She brushed asid
e the curls of wood in its wake.

  She brought Silas treats she baked. She had finished his shirt, but had ended up stacking it in with the rest of his laundry instead of presenting it to him. She’d decided it would be more fun to be a secret giver.

  Even though it was a plain white shirt like all his others, she’d placed her own sign upon it by monogramming his initials on the corner of the front pocket. That was how she knew he was wearing it today.

  She hid a smile as she carried over the bent frame, hardened to its original firmness over the mold. The mold and emerging hull sat over a ladderback, a horizontal wood foundation upon which everything rested, insuring a perfectly level surface for the upside-down hull.

  She laid the bent frame over the mold at its proper position. The boat was beginning to look like a skeleton, with the cedar frames descending vertically from the keel.

  Silas helped her clamp the frame back on the mold.

  She observed the lock of thick golden hair that fell across his forehead as he bent forward.

  “Only three more to go,” she said. “Then we begin planking, right?”

  “Uh-huh,” he answered without looking up. The shirt stretched taut across his shoulders. She was proud of that shirt. It couldn’t have been better made if it had been sewn in a factory or by a skilled seamstress.

  She had decided that morning she’d try a bolder approach. Now her heart hammered against her chest as she wondered whether this was the moment to begin.

  She wet her lips. “Silas?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Did you ever think what it would be like to kiss me?”

  He said nothing at first, but his motion on the clamp stopped. He straightened, but continued looking at the wood rib. “What do you mean?” he asked slowly.

  “Remember that night? How your lips touched mine?” Could he have forgotten?

  She was beginning to regret her boldness, when he finally said “Yes” in a low tone.

  She swallowed, determined to say her piece. “Hasn’t that made you think what it would be like if we really kissed?”

  His fingers fiddled with the clamp screw.

  Deciding she had gone too far to back away, she admitted, “It has made me think of it.”

  She was standing so close to him she could trace the outline of his jaw if she but raised her hand. “I liked the feel of your lips. They were soft and warm.”

  “Cherish!” His gray eyes registered shock at her words.

  “What?”

  “Your father!”

  “What about him?”

  “What would he think about this conversation?”

  “He’s not here. Besides, what is so wrong with our kissing each other? We’ve known each other forever.”

  He made a strangling sort of laugh and jabbed a hand through his hair, pushing away the golden thatch. “You think your father would consider those good reasons to kiss you?”

  She touched the monogram on his chest pocket. She outlined the letters with her fingertip. SvdZ

  Then she flattened her hand and felt the pumping of his heart through the thin material.

  “Don’t!” His voice was lower now, like a whispered supplication.

  “What?” she asked, not understanding his reaction. “You act as if you’re scared of me.”

  He stepped away from her without replying.

  Had she been too daring? she wondered as he walked away.

  “Cherish.” He stood at the worktable all the way across the room.

  “Yes?” she asked hopefully.

  “I—” He cleared his throat and began again. “I hope you don’t behave like this with all the young men of your acquaintance.”

  Her mouth fell open.

  “Others might misunderstand. You’re used to being pretty independent. No doubt you’ve gotten a lot of other ideas, having traveled, and all that. But you know, people here in Haven’s End are still pretty conventional.”

  “Of course I don’t behave like this with anyone else!” She could feel her face redden with shame that he should even think such a thing.

  “I’m glad to hear it. I just want to caution you. You’re a young girl. I’m a bit older and I know…I know how men are. I just don’t want you to find yourself in a situation where the man might not be as honorable—”

  “There’s nothing wrong with how I spoke to you. You’re my best friend.”

  “But that doesn’t mean we can—can—Maybe where you’ve been young ladies are permitted to flirt—”

  “You think I was flirting with you just now?”

  He picked up a screwdriver from the workbench and turned it around and around in his hands. “Well, I don’t know. I don’t know what girls do when they flirt.”

  She began to laugh, relieved that he had misunderstood her.

  He frowned at her. “What is so funny?”

  “You! You thought I was flirting.”

  “Well, weren’t you?”

  She just laughed some more. “Poor Silas. What would you do outside Haven’s End, where young ladies do practice the art of flirting?”

  “The ‘art’ of flirting?”

  “Mmm-hmm,” she answered airily, feeling on surer ground. “It’s quite an art form.”

  “Tell me,” he answered, his frown deepening.

  “Well, I heard a lot of talk from other young ladies. Some of them have even stolen kisses from young gentlemen—at dances, behind the potted plants, or on a darkened balcony.”

  “And you’ve followed suit?”

  “Certainly not! I never flirt!”

  “What would you call what went on just now?”

  “I just told you. There’s nothing wrong with our kissing.”

  He let out a frustrated breath. “You can’t just go around talking like that to a man. He’ll take it the wrong way, think you’re a flirt or a—a loose woman or something.”

  “Silas van der Zee, I don’t understand you!” She put her hands on her hips. “Ever since that night, I’ve sensed something between the two of us. I thought you felt it, too. But instead you’ve been acting so—so strange. What is wrong with you?”

  He stood still, his face set, giving away nothing.

  “Ohh! I give up! You’re insufferable. I have never seen such an unfeeling, conceited, pompous…” Before he could hear the rest, she marched to the door and slammed it behind her.

  Chapter Nine

  “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

  For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.”

  Cherish read the verses prescribed by her daily devotional and frowned. They made her uneasy as she thought of the previous day’s scene in the boathouse with Silas.

  “Flesh” came too uncomfortably close to describing what she’d been feeling standing so near Silas, feeling his heartbeat under the palm of her hand.

  The verses sounded rather harsh and uncompromising. God is not mocked. The words had a finality to them, and she felt as if God had been looking at her antics around Silas for the past few weeks, every time she’d deliberately come close to him, let her hand or arm or body brush his “accidentally.”

  Cherish knelt beside her bed and asked the Lord to help her receive His Word. Am I wrong to love Silas the way I do? It seems I’m so in love with him one moment and about as angry as one person can be toward another the next.

  She flipped her Bible back to First Corinthians and read the chapter on charity. “Charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked…beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.”

  Her behavior seemed all the more shameful in light of God’s love.

  As she knelt quietly, waiting for direction, she thought of how far her life had come from those early days of fervor when she’d first asked the Lord into
her heart.

  Somewhere, somehow she’d become dry and hadn’t really known it until now. Was it because she’d been too busy living life to notice?

  She searched through her Bible some more. “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.” Those words made her feel better. They encouraged her to believe in her love for Silas.

  “As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men….”

  She pondered the exhortation. Maybe in the past few years she’d forgotten about the Lord’s work. Well, perhaps she could begin again.

  A timid face came to her mind. Maybe she should make a real effort this time to befriend the girl.

  She reclasped her hands and bowed her head. Dear Lord, help me to be a friend to Annalise. Help me to show her Your love….

  Making good on her promise, she asked her father if she could invite Annalise for a few days, this time by herself without Warren.

  “Are you sure you don’t want her brother along?” he asked. “He’s a very nice young man.”

  “I’m sure, Papa. Don’t fret. There’ll be other opportunities to socialize with Mr. Townsend. I’d like to get to know Annalise better.”

  “Very well. I’m going into Hatsfield later, so I’ll be sure to extend your invitation.”

  Now Cherish stood in the boat shop, waiting for Silas, not sure how to behave around him when she saw him. She’d decided she’d better rein in her feelings. Clearly he wasn’t ready to think of her as anything but little Cherry.

  She sighed and took up the sandpaper again, focusing on the boat frame.

  The door banged open. Silas walked in carrying a load of lumber planks.

  At the sight of them she momentarily forgot everything but the boat.

  “We’re going to begin the planking!” she said, dropping the sandpaper and approaching him.

  He glanced at her sharply before laying the lumber down on the floor. “Yes. This is some well-seasoned wood that’s been drying all winter. We’ll start with the battens first, then lay the garboard strake.”

  Silas didn’t indicate by either a look or a word that he even remembered their conversation of the day before. This both annoyed and embarrassed Cherish. Was he truly so unmoved by her, when his very proximity made every nerve ending on her body tingle?