“Hard to say. A day. Maybe three.”
Mrs. Bain sighed. “Do we have everything we need, Lulu?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Lulu chirped. “We’re set up for a month’s worth of blizzards.”
Still, Mrs. Bain wrung her hands. “It will be hard not being able to go outside, though.”
From the chair where she mended a seam in one of Charlotte’s dresses, Margaret said nothing. It was the day after she ran from August’s house. Saturday.
Unlike prior Saturdays, she was sure there would be no sleigh ride that afternoon, and not merely because of the impending blizzard.
Her eyes burned, and she lowered her face so the other women would not see her tears. She had been so certain August was different from everyone else. He cared about her. Treated her with respect.
But, in the end, he’d wanted his share of her bloody past.
Margaret opened her eyes wider so they would dry faster. No crying. He was not worth it, and she was not that weak.
“I’m going to fetch the children,” Mrs. Bain announced. “They are playing at the Montgomerys’.”
The kitchen door closed, and Margaret could feel Lulu’s gaze on her.
“A spat with your sweetheart?” Lulu asked.
Margaret sighed. Even exhaling hurt. “I really do not wish to talk about it, Lulu.”
“I might be able to give you some advice. I have a few years on you, in case you haven’t noticed.”
Margaret smiled a bit at that. “Thank you, but I do not think so. I am done with men. I should have never entertained the idea of them again. I knew better.”
Lulu grimaced, but she did not look like she would argue.
“I know at least a part of you agrees with me,” Margaret said sadly.
Lulu placed her hands on her hips and looked at Margaret across the length of the kitchen. “Clearly, I am without a husband myself. And not because I planned on having it that way.”
Margaret frowned. “I am sorry.”
Lulu shook her head. “That’s the way it is sometimes, isn’t it? I fell in love with one lad years ago, when I was too young to know better.”
“And... and what happened?” Margaret asked timidly. She knew she had no right to know, but her interest had been piqued.
“He told me he would marry me, and then he ran off and married another girl. A richer one.”
Pain rippled through Margaret. For a brief moment, it was as if she experienced Lulu’s heartache firsthand.
“I am sorry, Lulu.”
Lulu shrugged. “What can I do about it?”
Margaret’s throat burned. “I thought August cared for me, but I think he cared for my story more.”
“I thought you said you didn’t want to talk about it.”
Margaret laughed ruefully. “I suppose you pulled it out of me.”
“You don’t talk about your past.”
“No,” Margaret agreed, unsure of where Lulu was going with this.
Lulu nodded. “I don’t either, usually. You’re the first person I’ve told about that boy in decades.”
“Where was that, Lulu?”
“Back in New York.” Lulu started peeling potatoes, the thick brown skins falling into a heap on the cutting board.
“May I ask when?”
Lulu shrugged. “Long, long time ago.”
Margaret smoothed Charlotte’s dress and folded it up into a nice, tight square. Had Lulu had a romance since the boy she almost married? Margaret imagined not.
Was this Margaret’s future, then? One of working as a servant, never knowing the company of a husband? A month ago, that was the fate she had accepted, but then August happened, and everything changed.
Now that kind of life seemed unacceptable. Lulu’s life was decent, and the woman seemed happy enough, but Margaret did not want to end up like her.
Not that she had any choice. Twenty-five years old and she had never met a man she could trust. The odds of suddenly finding one she could did not look good.
Putting her needle in its cushion, she picked up her sewing basket. “I’ll go put Miss Charlotte’s dress away,” she mumbled.
On the second floor, she shut the dress away in Charlotte’s wardrobe and peeked out the window. The bedroom faced west, giving a good view of the mountains. In the left side of the pane, the sky was thick with clouds.
Margaret shuddered. There had been a day long blizzard in December, and the howling combined with the white veil it cast over the town had nearly driven her mad. She hoped that if another blizzard was coming, it would be short lived.
Would August be all right in it? Did he and Zeke have everything they needed?
Margaret turned away from the window. She mustn’t think about August anymore. She was on her own again. Time to get used to it.
In the hallway, she heard Lulu’s footsteps on the servant’s stairs. “Margaret,” she called.
Margaret met her halfway down the stairs. “Yes?”
“Muffin went out a minute ago. Best find her and bring her in. Cats and dogs won’t be able to survive in a snowstorm like the ones we get here.”
Margaret nodded and hurried down the stairs. Muffin had been coming and going outside on her own, though she never strayed outside of the yard. Once the cat realized her new home provided regular meals and warm stoves to sleep in front of, she’d lost all desire to go outside except to relieve herself.
Pulling her coat around herself, Margaret went out the side door. The Bains’ home sat on the outside of town, its backyard facing the open valley. Margaret looked in the direction she’d seen the clouds collecting in and found them considerably closer.
Margaret’s heart jumped into her throat. How could clouds move that fast?
“Muffin,” she called. “Where are you?”
She glanced around the backyard, but the gray kitten was nowhere in sight. Margaret’s chest tightened.
“Muffin?” she asked, louder this time.
Margaret searched in both side yards, then the front, her mouth going drier with each step. Where was the kitten? She usually came right to the back door after relieving herself and waited to be let in. Had she sensed the storm and run off to hide somewhere?
“Muffin!” Margaret cried, running to the neighbor’s yard. Where on earth could the cat have gone?
Margaret opened her throat to call for the cat again, but her voice cracked. Her vision blurred. The wind picked up, cutting into Margaret’s face like a hundred tiny knives.
She couldn’t lose the cat. She’d grown used to Muffin sleeping on the end of her bed. Used to finding her curled up in front of the sitting room’s fireplace. Used to her purring filling the kitchen. The cat was all she had.
With a shock, Margaret stood stock still in front of the house. Did an animal really matter that much to her? How mad that was. Had she really alienated herself so much from other people that she now could only find companionship in an animal?
Margaret’s whole body went numb, and the blizzard howled, barreling toward the town with the force of a hundred trains.
Chapter 15
15. August
Chapter fifteen
August stared into his coffee cup, its black depths sucking him in. The back door opened, bringing with it a gust of wind. He felt Zeke’s eyes on him, but he did not look up.
“Are you going to drink that, or merely look at it all day?” Zeke asked.
“Don’t know,” August mumbled, his mouth dry as sand.
Zeke sighed and set the armful of firewood against the wall.
August pushed his coffee away. It reminded him too much of Margaret. Everything reminded him too much of Margaret.
“Is there more to be brought in?” August asked.
Zeke nodded at the firewood lining the kitchen’s walls. “What do you think?”
August took in the firewood. Zeke must have brought in half of their reserve, for they easily had enough for a week.
“Blizzards don’t last that long
,” August said.
Zeke pulled his gloves off and blew on his chilled hands. “Best to be prepared.” He frowned. “Look. There’s a blizzard coming. Consider this a convenient opportunity to take time alone. After the storm, perhaps Margaret will be open to talking. I highly doubt she’ll avoid you forever.”
“I wish I could agree with you,” August grumbled. “But I worry that is precisely what will happen. Margaret is...”
More closed off than he had thought. Out of necessity, she’d constructed a steel wall around her heart. August had sought to tear it down within a few weeks. His failure should have come as no surprise.
His limbs heavy, he got to work building up the stove, and Zeke dragged the mattresses off their beds and pulled them into the kitchen. They’d learned from years past that a blizzard brought temperatures that made it nearly impossible to keep a whole home warm. If they ate, lived, and slept in the same closed-off space, they could burn extra wood in that area and stay warmer.
The fire crackling merrily, August went into the front room to gather his books. He wished he had some work to do during the blizzard to keep his mind occupied, but novels would have to suffice.
In the chilly front room, he went for the shelves housing their book collections, but a gray cat in the street stopped him. Sucking in a breath, August went to the window. Was that...?
“Heavens,” August said out loud.
“What? What is it?” Zeke appeared in the doorway.
“It’s Muffin. Margaret’s cat. She’s outside.”
The cat walked in the middle of the empty street, its shoulders tucked low to the ground. The wind ruffled its fur, and the first flakes spun to the ground. Everyone else, knowing what was coming, had taken shelter.
What was the kitten doing out? There was no way it would be able to survive through a blizzard.
“I have to get it.” August rushed to grab his coat and hat. His gloves were stuffed into the pockets, and he fumbled to pull them out as he went for the front door.
“Hold on.” Zeke blocked the door. “You are not serious. There is a blizzard coming. It will hit any minute.”
“And I’ll take shelter before then,” August promised him.
“But what if you can’t? You know how fast it can hit, August. It’s clear one second and right on top of you the next.”
“I know the steps across the street. It’s twenty-five. If I go any farther than that, I’ll have passed town.”
They’d measured the width of the street several years before, just in case one of them should ever find themselves caught in a blizzard. Lost in a blinding whiteness, they could use the measurement to gain a rough idea of where they were. A certain number of steps too many and a man could safely assume he’d walked past town and needed to turn around.
Hopefully.
“It’s not a good idea,” Zeke said.
August set his hands on Zeke’s shoulders. “I will take shelter before the blizzard. Somewhere.”
Zeke pursed his lips, but August gently moved his friend out of the way.
“Trust me,” August said. Then, realizing there was more to it than that, added, “Trust God.”
August worried he’d wasted too much time inside and Muffin would be gone, but the kitten was across the street, in front of the Phelans’ shuttered house. She seemed to recognize August, because as he approached she straightened up.
“Come on,” August told her, scooping her up and tucking her into his jacket. “It’s too cold out here.”
Straightening, he looked around himself. Harsh winds struck his face, but the blizzard was not as close as he’d suspected. In fact, the clouds were still miles out of town. Which meant he had time to get Muffin to the Bains.
He remembered the fond way Margaret spoke of the cat. Muffin had clearly stolen her heart. Surely, she would be terribly upset if she thought the kitten perished in the blizzard.
Holding Muffin under his jacket, he jogged down the street and for the Bains’. He passed a couple men who also scurried for their destinations, but other than that the streets were empty.
The Bains’ house appeared, a beacon at the end of August’s journey. After returning Muffin, would he be able to make it back to his home in time? He did not want Zeke to worry.
Although, if he was honest with himself, being trapped in a house with Margaret would not be so bad. Perhaps it would encourage her to talk to him.
August’s boots sank into the snow, and his calves strained with the exertion of running through it. A block away from the Bains’, a howling pierced his ears.
Stopping, he turned and looked down the street. The blizzard clouds had moved impossibly fast. Those ‘miles’ outside of town, August now saw, meant nothing. The blizzard was not coming. It was already here.
God, help me, August prayed, and that was all he had time for before the white monster encapsulated him.
Chapter 16
16. Margaret
Chapter sixteen
The blizzard howled like a banshee, pounding the house and shaking its boards. Margaret closed her eyes, and circles of red light pulsed there.
Muffin was gone.
She was only a cat, but she had quickly become the greatest comfort in Margaret’s life. Pathetic, yes, but true. With August gone, Margaret had found solace just that morning in holding the cat close and inhaling her warmth.
And now she did not even have that.
“Where is Muffin, Mother?” Charlotte asked, standing at the sitting room window and pressing her nose to the glass.
“Don’t worry,” Mrs. Bain said from her spot in the rocking chair in front of the fire. “She will be back. Animals are smart. They know where to hide during storms.”
Mrs. Bain’s smile flickered, and she and Mr. Bain shared a look. Everyone knew Muffin would die in the blizzard, but let the children believe for a while longer.
Margaret turned away, tears like hot needles pricking her eyes. She got busy dusting. She would clean the house top to bottom and then do it all over again. Anything to keep herself distracted.
A faint knocking sound made her pause. Margaret set the statuette she’d been cleaning back on the shelf. Had she imagined the knocking? It had sounded so far away. And no one would be out in a blizzard.
She glanced over her shoulder, at the Bain’s. Mr. Bain read a book, Mrs. Bain rocked and stared into the fire with a frown on, Horace played with blocks on the mat, and Charlotte still hovered by the window. In the kitchen, Lulu prepared supper.
No one else had heard the knocking. Margaret had to have been losing her mind.
Thud, thud.
Margaret gasped and almost dropped her duster.
“I declare,” Mrs. Bain said, standing. “Is someone at the door?”
“They must have gotten lost in the storm,” Mr. Bain said. “Margaret...”
But Margaret was already rushing into the hall and for the front door. She flung the door open, and the wind and snow blew in, and, with them, a man.
His head was bent down, and snow covered his shoulders and hat. Margaret pushed the door shut behind him, the short exposure to the blizzard making her shiver. She latched the door, as if that would keep the awful storm out.
“Goodness,” Mrs. Bain was saying. “Are you all right?”
“Come in here,” Mr. Bain said. “Take that coat off and come to the fire.”
“What’s happening, Papa?” Charlotte cried, running into the hallway.
Horace leaned in the doorway, watching everything with big eyes.
The man began shrugging off his coat, and Margaret stood behind him to help him off with it. He removed his hat, revealing thick, auburn hair, and Margaret froze.
August.
“Thank you,” he said.
Margaret’s hands shook, and she stood there, dumbly holding the coat. August’s back was turned to her, and he’d yet to look into her face. What was he doing here? Had he purposefully come to the Bains? Or was he only seeking refuge at the
first house he’d come to?
Suddenly, Charlotte screamed. “Muffin!” she yelled.
“Muffin!” Horace cried.
The children ran to August and jumped up and down. Muffin was in Charlotte’s arms, the girl rubbing her face against the cat’s head.
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