“Beautiful, isn’t it? The world is at its best at twilight, day still stands visible and the shadows of the night are merely tinting the ground. It’s a hazy magical moment, an instant of quiet perfection, of balance between light and dark,” Alex said, clasping her hands around a mug of chamomile tea. “When I die, I want it to be at twilight,” she added in a whisper, so low Matthew had to strain his ears to hear her.
“Not yet, aye?” He wanted to take her hand, but didn’t know if he dared. Instead he stood, said something about seeing to the beasts and walked outside.
“You must help your man,” Sandy said as he prepared to leave. “Matthew is being eaten alive by guilt; guilt that it was for his sake she came running, guilt that he made a scene over the horse, guilt that he has failed you. And he fears that you won’t forgive him.”
“Forgive him?” Alex sneezed, blew her nose and tucked the handkerchief back up her sleeve.
Sandy gave her a penetrating look. “You blame him just as much as he blames himself.” He bowed in her direction and stepped outside into the night where Matthew was waiting to walk with him part of the way.
Alex stood in the doorway and watched them leave, and in her depths something was telling her he was right; she did blame Matthew, and that wasn’t fair.
The next morning Matthew was gone when Alex woke, and when he came in for breakfast he had a harried look in his face that stopped her from initiating any kind of conversation. He had fields to plant, and he was taking Mark and Ian along to help. Alex nodded and promised to send Sarah up with dinner to the fields.
Late in the afternoon both boys tumbled back inside, dirty and tired but with the contented expression of someone who had worked hard all day and knew himself to deserve his rest.
“And your father?” Alex asked in passing, flipping yet another pancake into the air.
“He said he would be in later,” Mark said through his full mouth. “He said to tell you not to wait up.”
“Ah,” Alex said.
It was yet another beautiful evening when Alex walked out in search of her husband. She’d made an effort, changing to a clean bodice and combing her hair into the soft bun she knew he liked. She was nervous, wiping her palms down her skirts, and when she finally found him, in the stables, she stood for a long time in the shadows watching him. There was a slight curve to his shoulders and she felt a twinge of shame at having lumbered him with all the blame, leaving him to carry this staggering burden alone.
He was talking to Ham – at least that was what she thought at first – but once she began to listen, she heard that he was talking to himself of his wee lass, his Rachel. Her heart went out to him; Rachel was the child that always made him smile, the girl born as a confirmation that he had made it out, safe and alive, after his time as a slave on that accursed plantation, Suffolk Rose.
Her hand on his back made him jump. He tried to wipe his eyes, but she took hold of his chin, forcing him round to face her. She used her sleeve to blot his face, rested her hands on his cheeks, his hair. Her fingers smoothed their way across his brow, they touched his lips, his eyes.
“It wasn’t your fault,” she said, hearing just how much her voice wobbled. “Of course it wasn’t. Forgive me if I’ve been letting you feel that it was.”
He fell back against the wall of the stall and for the first time since Rachel died they stood with their arms around each other and cried for the child they’d lost, the girl who had been given such a brief allotted time on Earth.
“Bath,” she said once they had stopped crying. “Bath and food.”
“Food first, I think,” he said, patting himself on his rumbling stomach.
They walked hand in hand back to the kitchen. He sat by the table and talked while she made him pancake after pancake. Of small things mainly, like how he’d found an abandoned fox pup on the furthest rye field, and how Ian had made him and Mark laugh by showing off Aragorn’s antics. He told her that he’d seen an osprey, a huge bird floating high above the river, and at her doubtful expression huffily went on to explain that they were not that far from the sea, were they? It was relaxing, this rambling chit-chat, and when she took him by the hand and led him off towards the laundry shed it was almost like it used to be.
“Alex! Ow! Those are my balls. They’re supposed to remain attached to my body.” He clamped his thighs round her hand. “I’ll wash myself there, why don’t you busy yourself with my feet?” He stuck out a large foot and wiggled his toes. She snorted but moved over to scrub his extremities.
“You must let it scab,” she said when he stood. She patted him carefully over his chest. “No more picking at it, have you got any idea how much work it is to get blood stains out?” She gave him a faint smile. “What? You think I hadn’t noticed?”
He mumbled something about not being all that sure.
Alex shook her head at him, and pointed him in the direction of the closest bench.
“I spoke to Sandy,” Matthew said into the blanket as she massaged his back.
“No! And there was me thinking that you spent hours and hours together in absolute silence.” She dug her fingers into the trigger points along his right shoulder blade, making him hiss and tense before he relaxed back down. “I spoke to him too,” she said, pouring some more oil into her hands before attacking his buttocks.
“Aah!” he groaned. “Are you sure it’s supposed to hurt?”
“Wimp, lie back down or I’ll show you hurt, okay?”
“Okay, okay.”
She smiled; all her family used ‘okay’.
“So what did he say?” she asked, once Matthew began to grunt in appreciation rather than pain.
“He said you were right to think of your family first, on account of you being but a weak woman,” he said, laughing when she pinched him at the weak woman part. He flipped over, and at her nudging spread his thighs so that she could explore him there, now with a far softer hand. He raised his hand to her cheek, one finger barely touching her.
“He said I should do as you asked, on account of God not liking it when we needlessly put our lives at risk.”
Alex sent a silent thanks to Sandy.
“I’d already decided,” Matthew went on. “I didn’t like it that you threatened me with the collapse of our marriage, but I knew you were right. I was asking too much of you, I was forgetting that you love me as much as I love you, and when I considered what I’d think if it were you risking your life…” He broke eye contact, staring at the wall instead. “Well, I wouldn’t like it. Not at all.” He lay in silence for some time before peeking at her.
“You can go back to your work, wife, I have no more to say, aye?” With a grunt he rolled over on his front.
Alex took her time, a slow stoking to the heat she felt building in him. By the time she was done, he could have been a giant cat, so relaxed was he under her touch. She rested her cheek on his back, smiling at the responding contented hum.
“Are you asleep?” she murmured, knowing perfectly well he wasn’t, not with how his buttocks tensed when she slid her hand over them.
“Asleep? I think not.” Matthew rose on his elbow. “Come here, you,” he said huskily. Garment after garment dropped to the floor, strong hands slid up her naked limbs. His warm mouth on hers, his hair tickling her face, and she shifted closer to him, squishing her breasts to his chest, gluing her skin to his. They almost fell off the bench when he rolled them over, which made her gasp, him laugh. And there at last; his thighs between hers, his belly pressed to hers. She had no idea how many days it had been since last time, only that it had been far too long. Her body needed him, wanted him, loved him … She caressed his shoulders, letting her hands slide down his arms. Her man, his skin velvety to her touch, his muscles bunching under her fingers. Her man, his eyes burning into hers, his mouth hovering over hers. Some moments of absolute stillness, of relishing the size and warmth of him, and then he moved his hips. So did she, meeting his every thrust with one of her own. Deeper,
harder, faster – she dug her fingers into his back.
“Alex! No, lass, I can’t…”
She gripped him hard, using arms and legs to hold him deep inside of her.
“I… aah… oh God, woman!” He came, his penis so deep inside of her it must have been standing at the door of her womb. He pulled out and lay down beside her, his chest still heaving. His hand groped for hers, closing with strength on it. She squeezed back, listening to the sound of her pulse, loud and reverberating inside her head.
“We agreed, no? Still too soon,” he said once he had gotten his breath back.
Alex shook her head furiously. “No.” She wanted to be entirely possessed, have her body taken over by his seed and find her way back to life, burst through this bubble of numbness and loss that Rachel’s death had imprisoned her in. She wanted – needed – him to fuck her senseless, leave her exhausted and sweaty and with not one single coherent thought in her head. She sat up and looked down at him.
“Make me pregnant,” she said. “Please, Matthew.” She traced her hand down his flat stomach, and her fingers were soft on his sex, caressing his balls, the sensitive skin behind them, the present stickiness of his cock. His hands strayed up to her breasts, to her neck, his hold closed on her nape, guiding her mouth down to his.
He had no notion as to how they made it back to their bedroom – or when. But when the first shards of sunlight spilled into their room she lay half-asleep in his arms, a warm, damp weight on his chest. What a night; his wife had given herself up to him, flaying herself open under his eyes, giving him everything he asked for and more. He owned her; her mouth, her breasts, her private parts – they were his. A total submission, a silent acceptance that it was he who was the possessor, while she was the possessed. He laughed at himself. Aye, he owned her, but she had him by his balls and by his heart, with small strong hands that held him just as enthralled to her as she was to him. His Alex; more than a wife, she was his other half, the part that made him whole. And in her womb grew yet another bairn – of that he was sure. Not a new Rachel, for how could anyone ever replace that mercurial bolt of life, but perhaps a lass. Please God, let it be a lass. He fell asleep with the high sound of Rachel’s laughter ringing through his brain.
It was late when he woke to find her sitting in bed beside him, stark naked and with Daniel at her breast. Daniel smiled at him, patting him with a starfish hand before going back to his meal. Once Daniel had finished Alex made as if to slip out of bed, but Matthew stopped her with a firm grip round her wrist. He picked up Daniel and opened the door, calling for Sarah to come and take the wean. Then he closed it with a small thud and stood watching her.
“All day, I think,” he said, moving towards her. “Only you and me and the bed.”
“All day?”
“Aye, one full day with you in the sunlight. We can play chess.”
She laughed out loud. “Is that what you want?”
“To begin with; I’ll make up what other things I want as the day progresses.”
“So might I,” she teased, but he set a firm finger on her mouth.
“Nay, Alex. Today you do as I say.” Her eyes looked up at him, bright blue in the morning sun.
“I do as you say,” she repeated, and all of him went heavy with warmth and desire at the tone of her voice.
Chapter 29
It was one long day spent in a total state of undress with the March sun striping the dark wood of the floor with glittering blocks of light. The chess set was quickly discarded and instead they talked, at first of the easy things like how both cows were big with calf, and had Matthew noticed that Daniel could stand – if only for a few seconds.
They moved over to talk of Ian and how much he had grown over the last few days. In a burst of generosity Alex nestled close to Matthew and told him he should be proud of his eldest son.
“My son?” Matthew looked down his nose at her. “Luke’s son, you mean.”
Alex shook her head. “Whatever his legal status, Ian is entirely your son.” She took a big breath, ignoring the image of a reproachful Mark that swam into her head. “And if you want to make that official then I’ll understand and support you.” Oh God, she swallowed, and now that I’ve said it I can never take it back.
Matthew propped himself up beside her. “And Mark?” His voice shook, and there was a sheen to his eyes that made her heart do handstands inside her chest.
“Mark will have to come to terms with it,” Alex said with an outward calm that belied the turmoil inside of her. “We’ll help him. Besides, he could do worse than having Ian as his brother.”
Matthew collapsed to lie flat on his back and began to laugh.
“What?” She had expected a fervent thank you, a series of kisses on her cheek, not that he lie on his back and laugh and laugh.
“Don’t mind me, I’m laughing because you made me happy.” He grew serious. “You always do, lass. When I’m hurting you heal me, when I’m lost in the wilderness you find me and bring me home, and now that I’ve lost a bairn you give me another, no matter what it costs you.” A long finger came up to trace her mouth, touch her cheek. He stared up at the ceiling. “Four sons…” He twisted his head to meet her eyes. “We must think this over, for Ian’s sake and Mark’s sake.”
Matthew disappeared downstairs around noon, telling Alex she would be severely punished if she as much as put a toe on the floor while he was gone. He returned balancing a tray in one hand and with Daniel hanging from his other arm.
“He’s hungry,” he said, depositing their youngest son in her lap. “He eats a lot,” Matthew marvelled some time later, watching with awe how Daniel emptied one round breast before attacking the next.
“They’ve all done, that’s why they’ve all been so fat. A good start, I suppose.” But it hadn’t helped in one case, she sighed, smoothing Daniel’s dark locks flat against his head. “He’ll never know her, to him she will only be a story. And with time Jacob will forget her too, recalling only some small nuggets of what was a complete little human being.”
“But to us she will always be real.” Matthew’s hand rested on hers. “Our wild child, the lass that had us shaking our heads in exasperation while our hearts burst with pride.”
“Not always,” Alex muttered, wiping away a tear. “Not when she locked Jacob in the privy, or when she tried to feed the pigs with my sausages.” She handed him Daniel to hold. “Promise me we’ll talk about her, that we’ll invite her into our conversations and keep her alive for her brothers as well.” She let her hand drift over Matthew’s hair. Just like Rachel’s, as his eyes were just like Rachel’s. “Let’s not kill her with our silence.”
Matthew just nodded and buried his nose into Daniel’s soft warmth.
Alex sneaked out of bed to find her papers and a stub of coal. She had stitched together a couple of sheets of paper into a rudimentary sketch book, and in it she drew small images of her family, filling each valuable scrap of paper to bursting before beginning on a new, pristine page. But today she folded up a glaring white square and committed to paper her man fast asleep on their bed with his son by his side.
Beside them she drew Rachel, a wild, laughing angel, her braids leaping, her eyes slitted against the afternoon sun. From her back sprouted small wings and Alex smiled through her tears, because if any one of her children would really appreciate being able to fly, it would be this one. She could almost find it in herself to forgive God for taking her. Well; no, she couldn’t.
“But you can’t blame God!” Matthew sounded astounded.
“Why not? Especially as a Presbyterian, who else is there to blame? He has it all preordained, right?”
“It’s not quite that simple, we must all strive. And aye, God may have preordained, but his grace and mercy is boundless, so surely at times he changes his mind.”
“Huh, last minute seats at a football game.”
Matthew gave her a confused look.
“A child shouldn’t die,” Alex said.
“It’s wrong.”
“Bairns die all the time. They die at birth and of sickness. They die in war and in famine and they die by misadventure…” He looked away briefly. “You must bow to it and trust he knows best.” He pillowed his head on her lap. “I hope he does.”
For the coming hour they had a heated argument regarding God and free choice, tolerance and predestination, with Matthew trying to convince her that predestination and mercy could go hand in hand, while she kept on throwing him examples of the opposite. Judas – had he ever had a choice? Luke – was he but a victim of a preordained existence?
“So what do you believe in then? If you don’t believe in God?” He sounded mulish, a deep wrinkle between his brows.
“I never said I didn’t believe in God,” Alex corrected. “I just said that my God is less harsh, more tolerant.”
Outside it was dark again, and to her surprise she was tired, despite having spent the whole day doing absolutely nothing. She finished brushing her hair, braided it, and joined him in bed, her face very close to his.
“Mostly, I believe in you,” she said, smiling at how embarrassed he looked. “In you, and in us.” She yawned and extended her hand to him, spreading her fingers to braid them with his. She drifted off into sleep, but when he tried to disengage himself she tightened her hold, pulling their combined hands to rest between her breasts.
“I love you,” she whispered.
“I adore you,” he whispered back, making her smile.
There were days when Alex woke and it took time for her to remember that things had permanently changed; Rachel was no more.
There were moments during the day when Matthew would stop what he was doing, certain that he’d heard his daughter’s demanding voice, only to recall that she was gone.
Every time the soldiers rode in both Matthew and Alex stiffened with remembered anguish – and they did, frequently, but now always led by the lieutenant, never by Howard. The heart had clearly gone out of the soldiers, but they did as they were told, inspecting time and time again every shed, every nook and cranny. They stuck swords into the heaped hay of the barn, they stamped through the attic, peered into the space under the privy even though it would take a very desperate man – preferably with no sense of smell – to hide there. And all of them detoured round the spot where Rachel had died, frowning at their callow lieutenant when he brought his horse too close.
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