The Bridal Veil

by Alexis Harrington

  A paradise, he’d promised her. A fool’s paradise, more like it. She’d buried her only boy on the trip out, after he fell out of the wagon and got run over by the wheels. One of the iron rims had cut his arm clean off. She never forgave Wendell for that, and she never let him forget it, either, by God. She’d put all of her hope in Belinda after that. Belinda would find a good husband and not end up being just a farmer’s wife.

  Then Belinda had married Luke Becker. And now she was gone too. Cora sighed heavily.

  But she still had Rose, who was the spitting image of her mama. She left her own room and went to finish her dusting chore in Rose’s bedroom. It looked as if a cyclone had been through here, with socks and underwear falling out of the dresser drawers and the good Lord knew what-all under the bed. One side of the pink gingham curtains was pulled askew, as if Rose had been trying to see to the pasture where her sheep grazed. Cora indulged her, though, because she knew that Rose loved her, even if they were trying to weaken the girl’s loyalty.

  She set the broom against the wall and went to the bed to pull the covers into place. How one small girl could make such a whirlwind out of a bed—and, God, now what was she sleeping with? She heard a crinkle of paper and searched the quilt and top sheet until she ferreted out a rolled tube of brown wrapping. Pulling it open like a scroll, she saw more of Rose’s silly scribbling. How could Mrs. Becker believe that this was a worthy pursuit, this waste of time? It didn’t teach the girl a thing about how to get a cow milked, or supper cooked, or floors mopped. Bah.

  Holding the brown paper at arm’s length, Cora studied the sketched figures more carefully. The drawing began on the left side of the roll and seemed to progress like the traveling pan-o-rama that came through town one time. That one had shown the story of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination, an amazing and gruesome display.

  She stretched her arms a bit more, trying to identify the pictures. Oh, that was better. There were Belinda, Luke, and Rose, all together in front of the farmhouse. Then she’d drawn in a picture of Fairdale Cemetery with Belinda’s headstone, complete with a tree and flowers. That gave way to a drawing of Luke, Rose, and Cora at the farm. She smiled at the image of the girl holding only her hand and not Luke’s. Then Cora’s smile faded. There was an unmistakable rendering of the boat dock in town, and a tall, skinny woman in a black dress. In the next image, only partly finished, Rose was holding Emily’s hand.

  With her jaws clamped, Cora rolled the paper into a tight tube and jammed it behind Rose’s feather pillow.

  ~~*~*~*~~

  That evening after dinner, Luke lingered at the table, trying to decide if he would take his whiskey bottle with him when he went to the barn. The lamb he’d brought home from Chester’s had turned sickly, and he’d put both of the sheep in a back stall where it was warm and dry. Since Rose was out there now, sitting with them, Luke figured he’d better leave the bottle here.

  He saw Emily pass through the hallway, her shawl around her shoulders. The front door opened and closed. He couldn’t imagine what she’d want to do out there on the porch, except it was probably far enough away to escape the stink of the boiled cabbage that Cora had served for dinner. Luke grew the stuff, but he didn’t like it at all. At least not the way that Cora cooked it.

  He wanted to follow Emily and reassure her somehow. He’d sensed a coolness in her. She hadn’t been any less polite or proper. He didn’t believe that her notions of gentility would let her behave otherwise. But something about her was different. If the aloofness was there, he was responsible for it. He might have hurt her, and in doing so, had hurt himself too.

  Luke had allowed Cora to shame him into retreating to his memory of Belinda, which had become more of a curse than a bitter-sweetness. Trying to force himself to ignore Emily, to forget the feel of her soft lips under his own was stupid and destructive—it made him miserable and discontented, and served no good purpose. At night he lay in his cold bed, married but not, knowing that she was on the other side of the wall, and wondered if she was thinking about him, too. Or he’d wake up in the darkness, sweaty and restless, dreaming of a blond woman with a willowy grace and long legs, which she wrapped around his waist as he took her with heat and tenderness. Luke had never been shy around women but the image in his head brought heat to his face even as it heated his groin.

  His gaze strayed to Cora’s broad back and the knot of faded red hair on her head. She stood at the sink pouring a kettle of boiling water over the washed dinner dishes. Watching her, resentment welled up in him, as bitter and dark as gall. She’d probably be content—at least as content as that woman could be—to keep the three of them, Rose, Luke, and herself, here, frozen in place until they died, one by one. He pictured their headstones, all lined up next to each other at Fairdale Cemetery, and a chill flew down his back. Cora was a peevish old bag, but she wasn’t in charge here. He was.

  Goddamn it, he’d told Rose that life was for the living. It was time that he started following his own advice. He pushed his chair away from the table.

  “Where are you off to now?” Cora demanded.

  “I’m going to find my wife,” he said. Her pinched expression gave him great satisfaction. He pulled open the back door and bounded down the steps.

  When he came around the house, he found Emily sitting on an old stool on the side porch. He’d have to see about getting her a better chair, and maybe one for himself. It might be nice to sit out here on summer evenings and watch the twilight come on. The low evening sun fell on her fine features and made them as warmly luminous as an eggshell held before a candle. She was a very handsome woman, and she seemed more so with every passing day, he realized.

  Her gaze dropped to him as he approached the bottom step. “Would you mind some company?” he asked.

  “Um, no, not at all. Please—sit.” She wasn’t very convincing. She rounded her shoulders and glanced away. He sat on the step below her feet and leaned against the newel post. The pointed toes of her black shoes peeked out from beneath her black hem. “Is Rose still in the barn?”

  “I think so. She’s been nursing that lamb as if she were its mother.” He tipped back his head to watch a pair of geese fly over, honking as they went. It was quiet here, and the smell of spring and new hope filled his head and soothed his spirit.

  “I hope the poor little thing survives.”

  He shrugged. “It’s not really a pet. Rose understands that animals die.”

  “But she’s lost so much—I mean, her mother and all.”

  Even now, the pale ghost of Belinda’s memory insinuated itself between them. Would it ever rest in peace? “Yes, I suppose she has.”

  Between twiddling with the ends of her shawl, Emily folded and unfolded her hands in her lap. From what he’d noticed about her, she didn’t usually fidget like this. “Mr. Becker—I mean, Luke—”

  He waited. She seemed to be struggling with a big request. God, he hoped she wasn’t going to ask for more cash. After he’d bought the silk and given her money to order Rose’s dress patterns and material, there just wasn’t enough right now. He wouldn’t see good income again until harvest.

  “This is rather awkward, and ordinarily I would not ask such a question—” Color filled her cheeks and she entwined her fingers again.

  Awkward. Damn, it had to be about money, he thought. In his experience, that was always an awkward subject. He and Belinda had often disagreed about money, usually after she’d been talking to Cora. Emily was reasonable, though. She had to understand his circumstances. If she didn’t, he’d be obliged to explain what a farmer’s year—

  “Forgive me for asking, but how did the first Mrs. Becker pass away?”

  If she had kicked him in the chest with her pointy-toed shoes, he couldn’t have been more surprised. The call of frogs croaking down by the stream seemed as loud as thunder. “I thought you knew. Didn’t Cora tell you?”

  “Well, no, not exactly. And you’ve never mentioned it.” Now her face was the color of t
he blood-red sunset.

  No he hadn’t. Because he didn’t talk about it. “It was pneumonia.”

  “Pneumonia?” The tone of her question asked for more.

  But he didn’t want to go into the details that had led to Belinda’s fever—he couldn’t. He never discussed them. He was ashamed of himself and had borne the guilt these three years. Belinda shouldn’t have died. The night that led her to her grave began a relentless string of shouldn’t-haves.

  “Yes, ma’am.” He folded his arms across his chest and stared at her. He wasn’t about to admit his sin to Emily, who seemed to have never done anything wrong in her life.

  Emily started fiddling with her shawl again. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. It’s just that—”

  He waited for her to continue but she didn’t.

  “Just that what?”

  “I—we know so little about each other.” She sounded almost wistful.

  He uncrossed his arms. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. I’ll bet I know even less about you than you do about me. After all, you had a chance to read about me.”

  She flushed, and he was sorry. He hadn’t meant that the way it sounded. It was only the truth. “I mean, I never had any letters from you.”

  “Oh, yes, I see.”

  He leaned against the railing again and considered her. “What would you tell me about yourself if you were going to write to me?”

  “What?”

  “Well, if you had answered my advertisement for a bride, what kind of letter would you have sent to me?”

  “You already know that I’m a teacher and that I worked in a girl’s school. What else is there”

  “Shoot, there’s a lot more. Describe yourself to me. What do you look like?”

  She ducked her chin and stared at her lap. She was silent so long he wondered if she was going to answer. At last she said, “I see no need to be cruel, Mr. Becker.” She took a deep breath. “I apologize again if my question was too personal.”

  God, now he really felt like a heel. “You don’t know, do you?”

  “Know what?”

  “How pretty you are.”

  Her head came up at this and she looked at him with wet eyes that pleaded for mercy. “I know that you are lying.” Her low voice shook. Now he really did feel as if he’d been kicked in the chest, right over his heart.

  He scooted closer and took her cold hands in his. He wasn’t going to say that she was the most beautiful creature he’d ever seen, because that would sound like a lie. “No, I’m speaking the truth. You’re a fine-looking woman. Hasn’t anyone ever told you that?”

  She tried to pull her hands away but he held them fast. “Of course not! Alyssa was beautiful but—”

  “Tell me what you look like,” he insisted quietly.

  “Why are you doing this?” Her voice held a tortured edge. “It’s no secret that I am plain! I’ve never pretended that I’m not. I am too tall and I am plain. My hair is too light—”

  “What color are your eyes?”

  “They’re green.”

  “Like the clover.”

  Her brows rose slightly.

  “What color is your hair?”

  “I told you, it’s too light.”

  He shook his head. “Naw, that’s not a good description, teacher. It’s blond. Like ripe wheat, like a palomino in the sun. Like high grass at the end of summer.”

  She stared at him, tears overflowing the rims of her eyes. But she was intrigued, he could see that.

  “I’m tall,” she ventured in a small voice, as if waiting to see what good he could find in that fact.

  “Yes, you are,” he agreed. “And graceful like a birch tree in the breeze.”

  “But plain.”

  “Nope, sorry. That just isn’t so.”

  “Yes, it is. I’ve seen it reflected in others people’s faces when they look at me. And I’ve heard it more often than you can imagine.”

  “From who?”

  “From Fran Eakins and Clara Thurmon, to name two. And from my stepfather, from my mother—”

  Clara and Fran, that didn’t surprise him. But her own mother? “Your mother told you that?”

  “Yes. ‘I’ve never had to worry about you, Emily,’ she said, ‘you’re a sensible female. There’s no shame in being plain. Pretty women are decorative, but plain ones get the work done.’ ”

  Damn but if that didn’t sound like something Cora would say. “That may be, but you are pretty to me. And you can’t change my mind.” Her hands squeezed his ever so lightly, as if involuntarily.

  Even though his background was about as different from Emily’s as it could get, he’d never given much thought his looks or how it might feel to be thought of as homely. Women had always been attracted to him, so he’d never pondered the problem. He remembered homely kids around town, though. They’d either been bullied and teased, or ignored completely. He suspected that Emily had probably been the target of the same kind of treatment and it bothered him. This graceful female could use some compliments.

  “Where did you grow up?”

  “In Chicago—”

  He smiled. “I know that. Did you live in a big house or a little one?”

  Emily couldn’t believe this. No one had ever asked so many questions about her. She dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief. She wasn’t certain what Luke’s motives were, but as unaccustomed as she was to personal attention, she basked in it like a cat in an afternoon sunbeam.

  So she told him about her father, Captain Adam Gray, lost in a storm on the lake, and about being adopted by Robert Cannon when he married her widowed mother. “He was a successful businessman and owned several warehouses. We lived in a nice neighborhood.” This was an understatement. The Cannons had lived on Washington Boulevard, a street of elegant homes with servants in every one. “Then Chicago caught fire in 1871.” She paused a moment. “And that was the beginning of our end.”

  Luke sat back and listened, without interrupting or showing boredom, while she described the loss of Robert’s business assets—he’d never believed in insurance—that eventually forced them to sell the elegant home, and move to successively poorer neighborhoods.

  “My stepfather never seemed to come to grips with his losses. After my mother died, he sank into melancholy, and became more and more apathetic. I think his one remaining hope was that Alyssa would make a good marriage match and rescue the family from its despair. He had no expectations of me except that I support us with my teaching job while he waited. He died before that happened. Alyssa and I were the only ones left.” She threaded her empty fingers together and looked out toward the stands of dark firs that bordered the property. “And of course, now there’s just . . . me.”

  Emily leveled her gaze on Luke, smoke-eyed and handsome. She’d lived her entire life under the admonition of what will people think? True feelings were never discussed, manners and deportment were paramount to all else. Hurts and disappointments were hidden behind masks of outward serenity. No one, it was believed, wanted to hear about another’s problems or misfortunes, and it was considered bad form to discuss your own. Even when the Cannons had tumbled down to rented rooms on one of Chicago’s back streets, gentility had been more important than anything else. She sometimes thought that Robert and Letty Cannon had died of shame, rather than the weak hearts the doctors had ascribed to them. They had tried to pretend that nothing was different. But ultimately she believed that they couldn’t cope with the loss of the world they’d become so accustomed to, or with the possibility of what their former friends must have thought of them after that loss.

  Certainly Emily found nothing wrong with being kind, self-reliant, and forbearing. But a lifetime of pretending that everything was just fine—well, it was lonely. In all of her years she’d had only Alyssa to confide in, and even then, her sister had never understood what it was like to be seen as gawky and not well-favored.

  How extraordinary, then, that she felt comfortable telling all of t
his to Luke, who sat at her feet and gave her his full attention. And how wonderful. She saw his gaze drop to her lips and down the front of her bodice. It returned to her mouth and hovered there. A spark of excited anticipation kindled within her.

  “Daddy!” Rose’s voice broke the spell between them and Luke turned to watch his daughter run toward them from the barn. Her face was flushed with excitement and she pulled on Luke’s arm, trying to get him to his feet. “Daddy, come and look at Cotton, please? I think he’s better.”

  “Cotton?” Emily asked.

  “That’s what I named the lamb. He looks like a puff of cotton.” Rose beamed like a buttercup, and Emily felt her heart swell with joy.

  Luke stood and stretched his back. “Well, let’s go see how he’s doing.” He turned to look at Emily and smiled. “I’m glad we had a chance to talk. I’d like to make a habit of it.”

  Emily smiled too, and watched Rose drag her father across the yard, making him laugh as he went. As she watched them disappear into the barn, her smile faded. If Belinda had died of pneumonia, why did Cora claim that Luke was responsible for her death?

  CHAPTER TEN

  The next afternoon, Emily was sitting by the window in her room hemming the sleeves of her new dress when she heard a ruckus among the birds in the oak outside. She glanced up, expecting to see that a cat or some other predator had encroached upon a nest, threatening a bird family living in the branches. Instead, through the new leaves she saw a pair of goldfinches, their wings fluttering wildly as the brightly-plumed male covered the plainer female in a mating that took only the blink of an eye.

  Everywhere around the farm she’d seen the same life-affirming ritual repeated with other animals. Well, it was spring, after all. She bent her head to her task to take a small bite of fabric with her needle, then looked up again. Her hands stilled in her lap as a rush of realization and regret flowed over her. Perhaps that why Luke had suddenly become so attentive to her. He had been widowed for three years, and even though he’d told her that there would be no traditional romance between them, she was a handy female living right under his own roof. And that’s all there was to it. Man was supposed to be superior to animals and have dominion over them, but the truth was, all of human and animal kind were part of the same earth, with its ancient rhythms and cycles and primal urges. It wasn’t a very flattering thought, but regardless of Luke’s compliments yesterday, she knew that she was not attractive. She swallowed. Maybe spring fever had made him see her with a rosy glow that she didn’t really possess. Wait until summer or fall came along.