“Is that it, Abby? Are you afraid that you’ll marry him and then he’ll bolt, like Boone did?”
It was the first time there had been any sign that Prudence knew that Boone wasn’t coming back, that he’d left her and Gwendolyn and Michael for good.
“Because this is different, Abby. Papa didn’t find you and Armand—” Her face was crimson, and Abby wanted to spare her sister from having to relate the details that she hadn’t known until now. So Boone had had to marry Pru, and he’d made the best of it for as long as he could. It was harder to hate him for leaving when his reason for staying hadn’t been true love to begin with.
“Girrrls! We’re running laaate!” Her mother’s song, the Sunday morning song that was as familiar to them as any hymn they sang in church, wended its way up the stairwell and into the room Abby shared with Patience.
Slowly she got up from the bed. Keeping her balance got trickier every day. Her vision got narrower and her hands shook more. But it was Sunday, and God and church offered a good deal more comfort than bed.
“Pick me out something cheerful,” she told Patience, who had a wonderful sense of fashion—a blessing, since without that she would have no sense at all. “I’ll be back.”
And then she moved unsteadily down the hallway, lost whatever morsels were left in her stomach after last night’s heaves, relieved herself, washed, and recovered.
With her sisters dressing her and getting her ready, the three were downstairs and at the table after only two more choruses of “We’re going to be late and your father will be fuming.” Her father didn’t take his own family’s tardiness well, and Abby much preferred hearing “Hosanna in the highest” over her mother’s “late-late-late” hymn.
“Don’t you all look so pretty?” her mother exclaimed just as Emily and Ansel and Suellen appeared at the back door with Emily’s wonderful loaves of bread with the red eggs baked into them. “And look who’s here!”
Her mother opened the door and Suellen came skipping in, greeted by Gwendolyn and Michael, who pulled her away to see the palm leaves that their grandpa had gotten for next Sunday’s services.
If Abby felt awful, it was nothing compared to the way Emily looked to her, at her. It was, of course, to be expected. That was why, wasn’t it, she was keeping her awful secret to herself? So that she didn’t have to see the pain in everyone’s eyes, the sadness that she could do nothing to erase?
So maybe the truth was that she wasn’t being noble after all. Maybe she was just sparing herself that extra burden of guilt, and if that was really what it was about, well, she figured it wasn’t so awful to indulge herself in this one tiny cushion against a whole sea of hopelessness.
“Dr. Hendon left Eden’s Grove today,” Emily announced, pretending that her news wasn’t meant just for Abby’s ears, for Abby’s heart.
“Didn’t look easy for him to go,” Ansel added, and in a heartbeat Abby knew that Emily had told her husband. Just as well, she told herself. Emily was in no condition to bear the burden of Abby’s secret alone. “I think he left a good chunk of his heart here,” he added.
“Is he off to search for gold, then?” Abby asked in as light a voice as she could muster. Seth was gone. All the relief she had expected to flood over her—and nothing happened. All the joy for him, for his escape, that she had expected to feel—and she felt none of it.
“If he knew where he was going, he wouldn’t say yesterday,” Emily answered.
“Ella Welsh was headed for Kansas City, from what I heard,” Ansel said, while the family bustled around Abby, all getting ready to head over to the grange hall for one of the last Sunday services that would be held there, if her father was right about how soon the church would be finished.
“But he wasn’t going there with her,” Emily added quickly.
“Oh, no, I didn’t mean to say he was,” Ansel was quick to say, so Abby was pretty sure they were on the same train. Well, the man had a right to seek comfort where he could find it, she supposed.
Of course—un-Christian though it was, especially on a Sunday—she did hope and pray that all of Ella Welsh’s teeth fell out while that floozy was on that train with Dr. Seth Hendon.
One teeny, tiny piece of her even wished that Seth found out—right in the midst of his flirtation with Miss Welsh—that Abby was dying. Oh, she didn’t mean that! Not for a second. Not when she thought of the pain in his eyes when he’d offered to stay in Eden’s Grove for her.
“Time we got over to the church,” she said, watching her mother frantically finish taking one more cross off the baking sheet before they left. “Leave them, Mama. We’ve got to get going.”
“What if we starched them?” her mother asked, holding up one of the small crosses she’d been crocheting since last Easter so that there would be plenty to give out at services. “There are already the palm leaves for next Sunday’s services … what if we starched all these for Easter and then Jed could—”
“Could what?” Ansel asked sarcastically. “Throw them from the sky when he gets that ridiculous contraption to fly? You don’t actually believe he’s going to—”
“Miracles can happen,” Emily said. “That’s what Easter is all about, isn’t it?”
“If I were praying for a miracle,” Ansel said, taking his wife’s arm, but staring hard at Abby, “that wouldn’t be what I was praying for.”
“I brought some biscuits,” Ella Welsh said, reaching into the basket on her lap and offering a shortcake to Seth.
“No, thank you,” he said, shaking his head and looking out at the landscape, the rolling hills coming to life before his eyes.
“Why’d you leave, then?” Ella asked him as if he’d actually uttered what was inside his head and his heart.
“No reason to stay.” He folded his arms over his chest and threw his head back against the seat, as if he might nap despite the early hour and the presence of a traveling companion.
“Men are idiots,” Ella said, pulling her biscuit apart and popping a piece into her mouth. “Present company very definitely included.”
“People in general are idiots,” Seth said, checking his watch to find that they hadn’t been out of Eden’s Grove an hour and he was already worrying about Johnnie Youtt and Annesta Spencer, the church choir leader who seemed to be coming down with more than a cold when he’d seen her two days ago. And Emily Merganser too, who should have been the picture of health, glowing the way she had when she’d been carrying Suellen, but who’d instead looked pale and drawn. And the fact that Ephraim had had to see her twice worried Seth considerably.
Only Abby didn’t worry him. He didn’t even waste a thought on her. She was out of his head, expunged from his mind, gone from his heart. Yup, not a thought for the beautiful woman with the ready laugh and the quick wit. Not a second spent on remembering the way her eyes danced, the way she skipped across his threshold, the way she’d wound her way into his heart.
Nope, not a thought for the life they could have had together, doting on each other, raising a houseful of little Abidances who would light up the day like so many suns.
“I can’t argue with you there,” Ella said. “But by degree, men are far worse. It’s a matter of intent. A woman has a good reason for being an idiot—love, family, hopes, dreams—they all make her do things any rational person can see won’t work. But she can’t help trying because she’s got this ideal in her head.”
“And what makes men worse than that?” Seth asked, agreeing sadly with her assessment of women and the things they would do to stop a dream from dying.
“Simple. Men don’t have any hope. Oh, they have plans, they have schemes, they have arrangements. But they don’t have that belief that—”
“That love can conquer all? Don’t tell me you’ve been reading that ‘Dear Miss Winnie’ column, too. I’d have never pegged you for—”
“For what? A romantic? A believer? Miss Winnie understands something that you never will—because you’re a man. She knows that
every woman believes that the key to happiness is the same key that opens her front door—she said that, you know.”
“She’s obviously never met some of the patients I’ve had to treat after their husband’s have gotten a little too drunk, a little too impatient, a little too angry.”
“Sometimes a woman gives the wrong man the key, but a smart woman knows in her heart that all she has control over is her tiny piece of the world and that if she wants to be happy—”
“That’s ridiculous. There’s a much bigger world out there than a man and his wife. There’s a war in Cuba, men are dying. There’s poverty and hunger and—”
“And is that why you’re so unhappy today, Dr. Hen-don?” she asked, one perfectly plucked eyebrow raised as she assessed him boldly. “Is that why you want to bolt from this train at the very next stop? To enlist?”
“I was thinking about it,” he said, sticking out his chin. He didn’t add As you were saying it, I thought of it.
“I’m sure,” she said sarcastically. She waited a beat or two and then stated, “You never married.”
“I never joined the army or rode bareback either, and I’m inclined to try those first.”
“And then will you be headed back to Eden’s Grove, when you’ve gotten the itch out of your skin and the wanderlust out of your belly? Then will you head back with your tail between your legs looking for that girl to soothe the ruffles you’ve put in your feathers, the kinks you’ve put in your soul, and the bumps you’ve put in your life?”
He could have pretended he didn’t know what girl Ella meant. He could have denied until doomsday the notion that there was anything between himself and Abidance Merganser.
And Ella Welsh wouldn’t have believed it.
Not any more than he would have himself.
“Our church,” her father said, and added the most wistful sigh. “Our church is days away from completion. So many times I have asked you to stop and consider God’s miracles—those over which we have no control—the rain, the budding of a flower, a hiccup.
“Now I ask you to consider the miracles that man has made. I mean those that man has helped God to accomplish. Or that God has helped man to accomplish—”
Ansel coughed loudly, encouraging his father to just get to the point. His father had a way of killing the bush he was beating around and then dragging it behind him until it was nothing but splinters.
“That church,” his father said, raising up his arm so that the sleeve of his robe hung down like an angel’s wing as he pointed across the street, “is a monument to the Lord. Well, all churches are monuments to the Lord, of course, but our church—the cooperation, the zeal, the commitment—it leaves me speechless, so all I can say is that I am proud of every member of this congregation for not doing what they were supposed to be doing so that they could do this, instead.”
The choir seemed to take their cue from the lull in his father’s talk and began singing “Jesus Keeps Me Near the Cross” with a zeal usually reserved for the last song—when they’d clearly rather be getting back to their cooking and on with their day.
And while they sang, Emily slipped her hand into Ansel’s and squeezed it tightly. Her strength surprised him. Oh, not the strength of her hand, but the strength of her resolve. And the strength she loaned him to face his sister and pretend that this was just another Sunday, and not one of a precious few that were left to her.
Abby stood on Emily’s other side, her voice pure and clear as she sang. He fought the urge to reach across his wife and pull his sister to him, to shout at the Lord that He had no right to take her from them, not Abby, not the girl that half of Eden’s Grove called Miss Sunshine and the other half called Missy Smiles. Not the imp who made some of her typesetting mistakes on purpose, he was sure.
The children’s choir, including Gwendolyn, sang “The Lord Is My Shepherd” and he saw Abby’s toe tapping along with most of the others in the makeshift pew. “Let’s make a picnic after church,” he whispered to Emily. “A grand affair.”
Emily nodded and whispered to Abby that they were planning a picnic for the afternoon. With one of her dazzling smiles, Abby leaned forward and nodded at him. She arched her brows in question, asking silently about the rest of the family, knowing that he’d rather be on the moon than spend a Sunday afternoon with his brother or his father.
But it wasn’t his Sunday, and so he put his hand out, palm up, as if to say it was up to her.
“The cherubs will now come forward,” his father announced. “And will sing ‘Stand Up, Sit Down.’”
Ansel gave Suellen a little push out into the aisle, and bore Michael’s feet treading upon his toes as the boy scampered across him to join his cousin. Annesta Spencer, the choir leader, collected the children and herded them to the front of the room, where she raised her hands and the babies stood at attention. At least Suellen did. Michael sat on the floor, and Eric Youtt pulled someone’s braid and Miss Spencer had to stamp her feet a few times before the children were ready to sing. And then, like a choir of angels, their little voices rang out, and he turned to look at Emily and share a moment of pride.
But Emily wasn’t looking back at him, or at Suellen in her pretty pink dress with the oversized bow. She had her arm around Abby and the two were whispering. He felt shut out, and a fire burned in his belly that his own sister had chosen not him but his wife to confide in, to share her fears and—
Emily was giggling. There was no doubting it. Something that Abby had said was so funny that Emily was covering her mouth with her hand to hide her laughter.
“What?” he asked Emily. “What’s so funny?”
“Jed tried using some of the palm leaves for fuel,” Emily whispered at him. “He figured if they raised the Lord …”
“They didn’t—” he started, but Abby winked at him and patted Emily’s back as if the only care she had in the world was making Emily smile.
She’d taken the news about Seth’s leaving awfully well, almost as if it didn’t even matter to her. Maybe he hadn’t had a right to, but he’d poked about in the boxes that Seth had left for her and found the present he’d mentioned. And now, seeing her smile, seeing her laugh, he wondered if he should leave well enough alone, or if he should hand over to her the box of things Seth had wanted her to have.
KANSAS CITY WAS BIGGER, BOLDER, BRASSIER, and louder than Seth had anticipated. He’d checked into the K. C. Park Hotel with Ella, still amused that she’d told the clerk that she was recently widowed and that Seth was her dear brother, come to help her get settled in a new life. The clerk had given them adjoining rooms, and Ella had opened her door in invitation, making Seth wonder just what kind of “new life” Ella was planning on.
“Now, you aren’t planning on being faithful to a woman that dumped your sorry ass, are you?” Ella asked, standing in the doorway that divided their rooms.
He put his trunk up on the stand and opened it, ignoring Ella’s question.
“You have been with a woman, haven’t you?” Ella asked. “Wasn’t there something between you and the widow Draper?”
“I’ve been with women,” Seth said, shaking his head at Ella as she unfastened several buttons on her traveling suit. He’d been with women, and he’d been with Abidance, and the first had had nothing to do with the other. Now he had the uneasy feeling that lying with Abby had changed all that, that the relief he’d found before, the physical release from too much caring, was going to be out of his reach. “I thought you were starting fresh here, Ella.”
“Just don’t want to get stale,” she said with a wink. “Once we check out of here I’m gonna have to be on my best behavior if I want to find just the right kind of man to share my life with.” She slipped out of her jacket and began unbuttoning her shirtwaist.
Ella Welsh was well endowed, and Seth thought it should have raised some interest to have her sashaying about losing pieces of her clothing as she went.
“You sure your equipment is still in working order?” she
asked, eyeing his crotch, which showed no evidence of the interest he knew he should be feeling.
Every night since he’d been with Abby he’d been aware of his working parts, and cold showers, dull books, and even his anger hadn’t dimmed the want he felt. So where was that desire now? Ella Welsh wasn’t just built like an hourglass, she had dancing eyes and a warm smile. Sure, she sagged here and there, but Seth had more gray hairs than she had wrinkles. And if her bottom had spread, so had his middle.
“Is that a flicker of interest I see?” Ella asked. “Or did you pack your tongue depressors in your pocket?”
“Where’d you learn to talk like that?” Seth asked, sitting down on the bed and working at his bootlaces.
“You don’t like it?” she asked, suddenly timid in her chemise and skirts. “Joe—”
“Is that the kind of man you’re looking to hook up with?” he asked, his tone reminding her that Joe Panner had never married her, never given her the respectability she talked about on the train.
“What’d she say?” she asked.
At first he thought she meant Abidance, and the thought of anyone knowing that Abby had allowed him to take her outside of marriage so burned his gut that he couldn’t even look at Ella.
“The widow woman. If I’m going to be a widow, I ought to know the right thing to say.” Her skirt puddled around her feet and she stepped daintily out of it. He kept his gaze glued to the floor.
“You don’t really imagine that I would tell you such things, do you?” Seth asked. Helen Draper’s words were no less privileged than Abby’s, though they’d meant little to him, just as they’d meant little to her.
“All right, what does a respectable woman say then?” she asked, and he saw several layers of petticoat fall.
“No.”
“She says that?” Ella asked. “Or are you saying that?”
Stephanie Mittman Page 23
