Remembrance

by Spaeth, Janet

  What was the matter with the world anyway? It seemed to get crazier every day. People couldn’t stop fighting, and it escalated from arguing about the cost of an apple to major conflicts like the war that split the country in two just two decades ago.

  If everybody would just learn the basic rules of conduct for life, things would go much easier. They weren’t difficult.

  The world was getting wilder, and it wasn’t just the young people who were out of control. Older people were, too. One had only to look at Edward and Hyacinth to see a shining example of that. His parents raised him to know the rules and to obey them, and now, God rest their souls, their influence lived on.

  He liked rules. They contained behavior, kept unruliness in check, and were, all in all, a superb way of ordering one’s life.

  But even he wasn’t as bound by them as Mrs. Adams was. If she had her way, single people would spend each day in contemplation and prayer, with only two hours on Sunday for relaxation.

  How was a fellow to court a girl with those rules?

  Silas froze. Undo that thought. Scratch it out.

  He didn’t mean he would court a girl. Oh, not at all! He had better things to do than that. Professor Barkley addressed this repeatedly, so much so that Silas could quote him word for word. But just to be sure, he picked up the Patented Five Year Plan for Success and reread it: A romantic entanglement is just that, an entanglement. It becomes a knot that cannot be loosened. Beware of such a thing. Look instead for a friendship, a good, deep friendship that runs as pure and true as an underground stream. That is to be valued. The Good Book says, “A friend loveth at all times.”

  The Bible had always been a reliable set of rules. You couldn’t top the Ten Commandments for clear regulations on how to live. Those commandments, added to Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength summed up an outline for an ethical life.

  Ethical and uncomplicated. Unfortunately they weren’t the same. If everyone lived by the rules, life would be so much easier than it was now.

  For one thing, his uncle wouldn’t be marrying someone he’d wooed across the country, someone with the improbable name of Hyacinth. What kind of name was Hyacinth anyway? What was wrong with a good solid name like Mary or Catherine or Sarah?

  Or Eliza. He knew he was in dangerous territory with her. He was old enough to realize what was going on. He’d had girlfriends before, when he’d been a raw teenage boy. But now, it was different. He thought of her entirely too much, and lately he’d been revisiting their first meeting, when she had fallen into his arms, smelling of blueberries and soap.

  She’d felt much too good in his arms. It would be easy to let his heart lead him right to her, to let himself go ahead and fall in love with her, but there was something in the way.

  For one thing, he had too many unanswered questions about her life before she came here. Of course, he hadn’t actually asked any of these questions, he had to admit, but maybe the time had come to do so.

  He should make a list.

  He padded over to the small table and found a pen and a piece of paper, and he sat down.

  First order of business, he told himself, in making any list was to label it neatly. And so he did. Questions for Miss Eliza Davis.

  Already he felt better. He did like lists.

  He continued, buoyed by knowing that this would help. He wrote the first question.

  1.Why did you leave St. Paul?

  She’d already told him a bit, but he needed more information. Moving, as he well knew, wasn’t a process to be undertaken lightly. It was dreadful, all the sorting and packing, and then the actual move itself, followed by more unpacking and resorting. Nobody did it unless there was no other option. Eliza hadn’t brought much with her—just that large carpetbag—but as far as he knew, maybe she didn’t have any furniture to bring with her. Plus there was the awkward matter of the scoundrel that she’d had some kind of encounter with. He’d like to know more about that.

  2.Why did you come back to Remembrance?

  Again, she’d told him somewhat superficially, but he wanted more detail. She’d left here when she was a child. What were her memories of Remembrance that drew her back? He smiled, satisfied that this was an extraordinarily good question.

  3.Do you intend to stay in Remembrance? Why?

  That was actually two questions, but they needed each other.

  4.What makes you happiest? What has made you cry? What do you need? Do you like me?

  The last question slipped in, and he caught it before he wrote it down.

  He carefully folded the paper and put it in his Bible. He’d take another look at it tomorrow.

  Silas extinguished the lamp, knelt beside the bed, said his prayers of thanksgiving—Professor Barkley noted that one must always acknowledge all gifts—and moved on to his prayers of intercession. As always, the Robbins family was front and center. He didn’t understand why God had done what He had done, but the Lord was sovereign and to be trusted.

  His prayers for Eliza meandered off track into prayers that were more for him than her. She needed to stay—he needed her to stay. She needed to feel safe—he needed to reassure her. She needed to be loved—and he loved her.

  If he hadn’t been so tired, he might have fought the last one. But it sat right in his mind, a thought as warm and comfortable as hot cocoa. He let it stay.

  He closed with requesting blessings on those near and far—he’d long ago figured that ought to cover everyone and everything—and got into bed.

  A list. He had made a list. He smiled. This was the way to proceed. A list.

  Eight

  “I hope that’s all right with you,” Hyacinth said to Eliza as they sat in the parlor of the boardinghouse. “It just came to me that it would work out for both of us, and you know how I am. My mind thinks it, and my mouth says it.”

  Eliza reached over and squeezed Hyacinth’s hand. “You have no idea how much I appreciate it. When Mrs. Adams said she was closing the boardinghouse in two weeks, I thought I might end up homeless.”

  “Don’t worry about that. I’d never let it happen.” Hyacinth’s eyes twinkled dangerously. “There’s a young man in Remembrance who seems quite taken with you, and I’d like to see the two of you together.”

  Heat shot up Eliza’s neck and into her face, and she knew she was blushing. “I don’t think so.”

  “It would be wonderful. We could have a double wedding, and—”

  “Oh, stop it!” Eliza interjected, laughing. “We’re just friends.”

  Hyacinth nodded. “You are, and that’s the best way to start a lifelong relationship. You need the basis of friendship—you need to like each other as well as love each other.”

  “Is that the way your marriage was?” Eliza asked softly.

  “It was. He was my best friend, and I knew I could trust him with my heart. So I did.”

  “It must have been very hard when he died.”

  Tears filled Hyacinth’s eyes. “Even now, it still hurts so bad that there are times I think I can’t bear it. And when he died, and our son was so young, I didn’t know how I could go on another day.”

  “But you did.”

  “I did. I had to. Thomas, our son, had to. We had to go on living even when my husband couldn’t.”

  “You must be proud of your son.”

  “I am. When his father died, he took up the farm work. He was probably old enough by most people’s standards—he was twelve—but he was my little boy. I wish you could have seen him, standing behind that big plow, trying to guide it through the packed earth while the patient horses walked just a bit slower, as if they knew that it wasn’t Matthew behind the plow, but Thomas.” Her eyes glowed with the memory.

  “Might I ask another question?” Eliza ventured.

  “You can ask. Until I hear the question, I don’t know if I’ll answer.”

  “What does your son think of you marrying Edward?”

>   “He has some hesitation, which I understand.” Hyacinth smoothed the fabric of her dress over her lap, and a slight smile curved her lips. “Of course, no one is good enough for me in his mind. But he wants me to be happy, and he understands that, even though this hasn’t been the most conventional courtship, it works for us.”

  A movement outside the window of the parlor caught Eliza’s attention. “Silas is here.” She clapped her hand over her mouth. “I wonder if he’s expecting me to go to the Robbins house today.”

  “I want to go over there again,” Hyacinth said. “Analia needs someone to brush her hair and fix it for her. And so does Mary Robbins. I’m not an expert at it, but I do like doing it.”

  “That would be wonderful! I know Analia really enjoyed your ‘lady time.’ Mary’s asked about you, too. Plus you’d get to see what’s happening with the material you purchased. You’d be very welcome there.”

  “If Silas agrees. Honestly, sometimes I just don’t know about that one.”

  As soon as Silas entered the parlor, with Mrs. Adams watchfully behind him, Hyacinth asked if she might go over.

  “Absolutely,” he said. “I was just there, as a matter of fact. The boys are having a heyday making swords out of leftover pieces of wood from the banister we replaced, and the poor little girl is stuck with a book in the corner, looking a bit overwhelmed. I don’t think she’s very interested in swords, and I suspect she’d like some female company.”

  Hyacinth stood up immediately. “I’ll go over now.”

  “While you’re there, Eliza and I will go check on the house where you’ll be staying to see what’s left to be done,” Silas said.

  “You mean Birdbath House?” Hyacinth asked with a wink at Eliza.

  “Birdbath House?” Silas looked at them blankly. “It’s the old Lindstrom place.”

  “The Lindstroms have been gone from Remembrance for almost seven years,” Mrs. Adams said from the doorway.

  “Then it shouldn’t be called the old Lindstrom place, should it?” Eliza asked, joining in. “It should be called the new Mason place, or the Mason-Davis place.”

  “Or Birdbath House, since it has a birdbath.” Hyacinth was buttoning her coat as she spoke.

  “But what if the birdbath falls over, or is taken off the property?” Silas asked.

  “Then it’ll be the old Birdbath House, won’t it?” Hyacinth chuckled. “Or Remembrance could give in and number the houses, and it’ll be something as prosaic as 13 Oak Street.”

  Her laughter ringing behind her, Hyacinth swept out of the boardinghouse.

  “It’s not too cold outside,” Silas said, “but it’ll be cold at the house—Birdbath House, I guess I need to start calling it, although I’ve never heard of anything quite so silly. We’ll need to check the stove and the fireplace while we’re there to make sure nothing is blocked, no nests in the stovepipe or the flue.”

  Mrs. Adams cleared her throat. “I don’t believe that a man and woman should be alone until they’re married.”

  Silas sputtered wordlessly, and Eliza took his arm and smiled at the landlady. “We’re only going to inspect and clean the house. Marriage hardly seems necessary for that.”

  Mrs. Adams stepped aside as they left, her disapproval following them out the door.

  “I shouldn’t have said that,” Eliza said. “She means well.”

  “I imagine you’ll be glad to leave there,” Silas said as they headed out into the sunny afternoon. “It must be like living under a magnifying glass. She watches everything that you do.”

  “She does have definite ideas of right and wrong,” Eliza said, loosening her muffler a bit. With the sun beaming overhead, the air seemed warm. “According to her, though, mostly everything is wrong. I appreciate the way she takes care of us, although I feel like a chicken that has hatched but the mother hen still insists on sitting on it.”

  He grinned. “What an image! I think she’d probably suffocate you.”

  “It feels like it sometimes.”

  The walk to the small house was short, and they were soon there.

  The snow had begun to melt from the roof, and a steady drip from the corner suggested that some repair might be necessary on the eaves. He opened the door for her.

  It was definitely a small house. The rooms were tiny, with barely enough space to fit the dusty couch and the single wooden chair in the front room, and the two bedrooms each contained a small bed and bureau, which took up most of the space. The kitchen was oddly shaped, running along the entire back of the house, like a long narrow corridor.

  “This was added on later,” he said before she could ask the question. “If I’d built it, I believe I might have made it a foot or two wider, but what’s done is done. I could take down this outer wall here, though, and expand this part.”

  Silas walked through the house, muttering about the changes that needed to be made.

  The scent of old wallboards and wood smoke mingled with the slightly sour smell of a house that hadn’t been aired out recently. The furniture had seen better days, to say the least. The textured tapestry of the sofa was worn in the shape of bodies that had sat in the same spot for years. Eliza ran her hand over the arm of the couch, and a tiny mouse scurried out from under the throw pillow.

  “We will bring a cat in,” Silas said, and she suppressed a smile at the little shiver of revulsion that he unsuccessfully hid. He looked for all the world as if he’d like to have fled from the room, back into the outdoors where mice crept and hid in bushes and rocks, not in the furniture.

  “Not a fan of mice, are you?” she asked.

  His laugh sounded a bit choked. “Who is? No, we’ll bring in a cat.”

  “Can I keep it?”

  “The mouse or the cat?”

  Eliza had to grin. “The cat. Or will we be borrowing it?”

  “There are enough barn cats in this neck of woods that I think we can accommodate you with a cat of your own. For a while, it was quite the booming industry, selling mousers to the townspeople, but nowadays, the farmers are just as happy to give you a kitten or two.”

  A cat. Eliza wanted to hug herself. She loved cats, but she hadn’t had one since Tim and Hannah, the two she’d had when she lived in Remembrance. She gave them away when she left, and it broke her young girl’s heart.

  Now she’d have a cat again.

  Silas was examining the stove. “It looks like it’s been cleaned out, so I think it’ll hold a good fire for you and Hyacinth.” He looked doubtfully at the sofa. “Are you going to want to keep this furniture?”

  She shook her head. One thing she knew for sure was that if she saw one mouse, there were another ninety-nine she didn’t see. “I want to share the house with Hyacinth, not the rodents, and I suspect they’ve made their own homes in the furniture. We’ve already talked to Mrs. Adams about taking some of her furniture.”

  “Excellent idea.” He grinned impishly. “And somehow I don’t think that she allows mice in her house.”

  If the sofa was this bad, she could only imagine what shape the beds were in. The thought of mice living in the mattress beneath her would keep her from ever sleeping in this house. They’d undoubtedly burrowed their way in and made nests.

  She shuddered at the thought. Yes, a much better idea was to jettison the furnishings that were there and replace them with ones from the boardinghouse.

  “Hyacinth and I will talk to Mrs. Adams this afternoon about the furniture. Do you think you can bring in a cat as soon as possible?” A shadow darted along the corner of the room. “Preferably a hungry cat. A very big, very hungry cat.”

  “I know a fellow outside of town who’s got just the creature for you. Big ugly thing.”

  “Who, the cat or the fellow?”

  He laughed. “I meant the cat, but he’s not much to look at either. Say, why don’t you come with me? We can go now, and you can meet both of them—the man and the cat.”

  A ride in the country sounded wonderful, and soon they were
both wrapped in thick blankets in his wagon, bouncing along the still-frozen ruts of the road out of Remembrance. “You’ll like Carl,” Silas said, speaking loudly over the creaks of the wheels. “He’s a good Norwegian, a real honest sort. He doesn’t come into town much, but every once in a while he’ll show up at church or for a social or something.”

  Soon he pulled into a small farm, and a man in a thick jacket came out from the barn to greet them. “Howdy now,” he said, his voice thickly accented with a Nordic lilt. “What brings you out today?”

  “This is Eliza Davis,” Silas said, “and she needs a cat. She’s moving into the old Lindstrom place, and there are mice in it.”

  The large blond man nodded. “Uff da.” Eliza didn’t speak Norwegian, but she knew what that meant. It was the catchall phrase that roughly translated to Oh my. “Do you want to borrow Slick Tom, or do you want a kitten?”

  “Slick Tom?” Eliza asked, and Carl nodded.

  “I’ll be right back.” He disappeared into the barn and emerged a few minutes later with a gigantic yellow cat draped over his arm. “This is Slick Tom.” The cat opened its eyes sleepily at the mention of its name.

  One of Slick Tom’s ears was half gone, and his back was striped with scars, visible through his scruffy fur. She reached out and touched his head, and the cat produced a purr that must have been audible the next farmyard over.

  “He’s wonderful,” she murmured.

  “Yah, he is a good mouser,” Carl said. “I’ll send him back with you, and he’ll have the place cleared out in two days. You might want to get a kitten, too, though. All the kits are from Slick Tom, so they’ve got his talent.” He handed Slick Tom to Silas, who looked as if he’d just been given a crocodile.

  Carl grinned at Eliza. “Silas ain’t much for cats.”

  “His loss,” she said, hiding her amusement as best she could when Slick Tom stuck his gigantic head under Silas’s chin and sighed with pleasure.

  Again Carl went into the barn, and this time he came out with a gray-striped kitten. “This is a girl. She’ll be a good hunter. You can tell by the ears, you know.”