"Afraid," Callie said tentatively. "You have nothing to be afraid of . . . not here. Do you?"
"There is always something to be afraid of."
Callie laughed nervously. "No—there isn't."
Natalie smiled, her eyes gleaming mischievously. "Didn't you play scaring games when you were little?"
"Oh, well, that doesn't count. That isn't real . . ." Callie jumped, scrambling off the bed as Natalie let out a bloodcurdling shriek.
"Tell me that wasn't real! You were scared." Natalie giggled. "You nearly jumped out of your skin."
Anna pounded up the stairs. Breathlessly she came into the room. "What's happened? Are you all right? I heard someone scream . . ."
Natalie laughed. "Oh, poor Anna! I'm sorry. Callie and I were trying to scare each other. You should have seen her! I thought surely she'd climb straight up the wall."
Anna laughed weakly. "Well, you girls scared me. No more. Please."
Callie's heart was still pounding wildly. She fussed with the knickknacks on her dresser, trying to rid herself of the terrible jumpy feeling.
As soon as Anna returned downstairs, Callie turned to Natalie. "Why did you do that! You screeched like a horrible old barn owl! I still feel all creepy and crawly."
"I told you there was always something to be afraid of." Natalie got up, went to Callie, and took her hand. "I'm sorry. Sit down and I'll fix your hair for you. The
brushing will be soothing and I might tell you a secret"
Callie hesitated, then sat down, pulling the pins from her long honey-colored hair. "What land of secret? No more spooky stuff?"
Natalie began to brush in slow, gentle strokes. "A good secret But since you are such a doubter, I don t know that I'll tell you."
Slowly Callie relaxed, liking the easy pull of the brush. "Natalie! Now you have me bursting to know. If I ask you to tell me you are likely to shriek in my ear and frighten me to death, and if I don't ask it is likely to be something wonderful."
Natalie giggled. "What a dilemma you have, new little sister."
"Oh, tell me. Please, tell me now."
"Nooo . . ." Natalie said slowly, laughter in her voice. '1 don't think I'd better. It's not really my secret to tell."
Callie twisted in her chair. "Whose then? Tell me! You're such an awful tease!"
"All right. I'll tell you that much. It's Peter's secret • . . and Stephen's."
"Peter's?" Callie said softly, then fell silent.
Natalie peered around at her. "What? No more questions?"
"No. It's not your secret to telL I don't want to know anyway."
"Oh, what a nit! I think you are the most frightened little rabbit I've ever seen. Why are you afraid of Peter?"
"I am not frightened! I just don't care to know."
"You are too, frightened. Everyone knows you avoid Peter. Whatever will you do when he comes for you on Sunday?"
"What do you mean? Why—c-comes for me? Where is he taking me?"
"Wouldn't you like to know. Maybe to the dungeons."
"Natalie! This isn't funny. Tell me!"
"Sit still. I can't do your hair if you keep twisting around. You're getting all tangles."
"I don't want you to fix my hair. Tell me—what is Peter going to do?"
"I told you, it's a secret, and anyway you said you weren't interested."
"Natalie, please . . ." Callie stood up and faced her. "Tell me. I must know."
Natalie stamped her foot. "I take it all back! Every word! You are not my sister. Look what you've done. You've ruined it. I hope Peter does something awful to you that you'll never forget! I worked hard on your hair and now look!" At the door Natalie stopped and looked back. "Don't blame me for the way you look, and don't ask me to help you untangle it!"
Natalie stormed down the hall, slapping the brush against her thigh. Callie stood in the doorway indecisively. Part of her wanted to run after Natalie, yet she knew she would only annoy her further. She sat back down, picked up her book, glanced at the page, then tossed the book aside. She wrapped a scarf around her wild hair, ran down the stairs, grabbed her coat from the hall tree, and hurried out into the cold freshness of the farmyard.
Chapter 9
Callie didn't think about the mysterious secret for Sunday. She didn't allow herself to do so. Natalie's teasing had upset her badly enough despite her knowing that teasing was all that it was. Tearfully, Callie longed for the days when she had never felt afraid. They seemed so long ago. Being afraid had always meant the tantalizing wonder if witches truly rode the night sky on All Hallow's Eve, or listening to the scary imaginings of Mrs. Pettibone or her father. Never in her fourteen years had she experienced this nameless kind of fear, which seemed to magnify itself. Before her father's death, Callie remembered only pleasant days filled with security and well-being. Now all of that was gone. Its replacement had been fear. Vague, anonymous, insidious—creeping up on her from the most ordinary places and occurrences. It had become a habit with her, a habit she didn't know how to overcome.
She closed her mind against Sunday, against the habit of fear. She kept herself busy through Thursday, Friday, and Saturday helping May with the cheese
making and Anna in the sewing room and doing odd chores for Meg in the house and for Stephen in the brewhouse. What little time there was left on the short wintery days she spent with Natalie, sometimes in the stables playing with the puppies, sometimes allowing Natalie to teach her to ride a horse. She wasn't overly fond of the beasts, who loved to nip at her boots when she mounted, and whose friendly, nuzzling searches for sugar treats tended to be rough and direct. But mastering the horse and herself astride the animal required all her concentration, leaving little time for her overwrought and morbid imagination to draw visions of a catastrophe awaiting her on Sunday.
When finally Sunday arrived, it had all the markings of an ordinary day. The household ^wakened and stirred at the normal time. The wintery March sky was leaden and heavy with unfallen rain, or perhaps snow judging from the frigid coldness of her room.
Breakfast odors wafted up the staircase tempting her to get up and dress. At the table James wasted no time in saying the morning prayers, and the nine of them ate in near silence until Meg began to fuss, urging them to hurry or they would be late for church.
All through the service and the lengthy sermon Cal-lie kept her eyes squeezed shut, her hands clasped so tightly in prayer her knuckles hurt and her bloodless fingers were numb. She prayed to the Savior, to the Precious Blood, to His Holy Mother and the Archangels, to keep her safe. And she prayed to some nameless, personal Savior that the Father would have time to hear her pleas.
It appeared that He did, for when they returned home from church, it was already time for supper. Darkness and early bed would not be far behind, and then, with blessed sleep, the Sunday would be gone, laid to rest alongside other dead days.
Shortly after they had eaten, the family retired to the parlor. Natalie played the harpsichord, and James let his head fall back against his chair, a smile on his face as he was soothed by the sound of his daughter's music. Callie hardly noticed that Peter hadn't joined them. He often didn't, having matters of his own to attend to. But she did note that Stephen wasn't there. She had become quite close to him, counting on his willing and gentle company, basking in the affection he gave so easily and so often. She wished he were there now for she was enjoying Natalie's music and knew that he would have silently shared that pleasure with her.
The door opened, letting a cold, damp wind blow across them. Natalie looked up, her fingers poised above the keys. She smiled broadly, then played a gay little fanfare.
"Everybody put your coats on," Peter said. "Everything is ready."
Meg and James exchanged amused glances. Frank sighed, as if going along with something he thought so much silliness. Anna and Rosalind went to fetch the many coats and scarves. Natalie glowed, her soft laugh an added merriment. Only Callie remained in her seat, frozen.
Smil
ing, Stephen came over to her, her coat in his hands. "Come on, Callie."
"I don't want to."
"It's a surprise for you. Come along. I'll be with you."
She shook her head woodenly. "It's raining."
"Please—for me. I promise I'll stay right with you. You'll be glad you came."
Before she could answer, the rest of the family, standing by the door, chorused that she should hurry.
Still she held back, embarrassed but too frightened
to act brave. Then she wished she had, for Peter separated himself from the others. "Go on ahead. I'll bring Callie. Go on, Stephen."
Stephen handed Peter her coat and scarf. The door closed leaving her alone with Peter.
"Put your coat on, Callie/'
She did as she was told, thankful he didn't touch her or try to help her.
"The surprise is for you. Stephen and I wanted you to have something special . . ." He seemed unsure of himself, but he went on. "I know—at least I suppose— things have not been easy for you, and I'm sorry for that. I'm sorry I frightened you so badly—I don't understand it. But I was hoping . . . well, perhaps our surprise will tell you what I wish for you. If I could change things for you, I would. Now come along. The others are waiting in the rain."
Callie had hardly heard him. When he took her arm it felt like wood, unresponsive and stiff. She walked at his side like a puppet, her eyes wide, fixed and staring. She was barely sensible. Whatever fears she had, they were not based on reality. They went far beyond that, and Callie lived in a tormented world of dreadful imagination. He might have been walking her to the gallows for all the anticipation she showed for the surprise. He felt tired and old, beaten and remorseful. He should have left her alone. Only a fool would have thought otherwise. A stupid gesture, such as the one he and Stephen had made with their surprise, couldn't give back to Callie the youthful zest for life she had somehow lost. He had been a naive idiot to think it could. Something had frozen the girl deep at her core. Only time could heal it, he thought, then mentally shook himself for the idiocy of that thought too. Time healed nothing.
Time hadn't healed the hunger of the laborer. Time
hadn't healed men's lust for profit Time hadn't healed the depraved need to exploit the helpless. Time hadn't healed the wounds lust and abuse had left on Rosalind. Only goodness healed. Only goodness would heal Rosalind. Only goodness would heal Callie, and that he didn't know how to give, for it was God's gift
At the front door he told her to close her eyes. Again she obeyed. A puppet Sadly Peter wondered what kind of fear and despair could make a human being obey anything on command. Stumbling, but rigidly obedient, she walked across the slippery, muddy yard, forced to cling to his arm with cold deathlike hands.
"Callie, there's no need to be so frightened. My brother and I built you a bower—a place filled with the warmth and color of May. Open your eyes, Callie, and see that even now in the rain and the cold there is still a place of beauty. There is always such a place." He felt like a fool. His words sounded stilted and pedantic, yet he kept talking, almost desperately, wishing somehow that it was possible to make a world for her as it should be.
Callie opened her eyes. Before her in the drizzling rain stood the May house, a small structure built in the cold and the wind, covered with boughs of green and bedecked with hundreds of Natalie's dried flowers. Muted by the mist, marigolds and pinks mingled with delicate blue-and-violet cornflowers. The flowers of the field nestled snugly against their more sophisticated brethren of the garden.
She took a step farther into the May house, no longer aware of the Bereans. Inside it smelled of the earth, a moist, rich smell. Then she smelled the pine and the heady scent of newly moistened dried rose petals. Bathed in the misting rain the dried flowers came alive again. On their petals stood tiny crystal
droplets, brilliant and clean. The flowers, as dried up as Callie, softened in the moisture, their colors once more natural, their pliancy renewed for this brief moment. The March grayness disappeared in Callie's mind. She no longer noticed the cold or the wintery wind that stirred the pine boughs and occasionally threatened to dislodge the flowers from the May house walls. Inside of her spring began, its special warmth flowing through her, thawing, living.
She saw things as she hadn't been able to for months. Entwined in the branches was the Bereans' welcome. Their love was secured there as were the flowers. Caring had gone into the cold hours Stephen and Peter had spent building it after they had completed a long day's work. And Natalie's pride, her flowers, were there, given freely. In the May house she finally saw the Bereans clearly—all of them, even Peter.
Slowly the enormity of what James and Meg offered her came clear. They wanted her. The Bereans had opened their arms to her from the start. The strangeness had not been in them, it had been in her. It was she who had prayed to God to protect her from them—from Peter—and He had answered her through a loving act by the man she had feared.
The tears streamed down her face. It seemed to her that in her May house the sun shone as brightly as it might any May morning. It shone everywhere but in the one spot where she.stood. She had so much to atone for.
She turned suddenly, her face wet with tears, to look at Peter. He stood at the entrance to the May house, concerned, his face lined with doubt.
"Oh, Peter, forgive me," she said, tears bursting from her. She ran to him as she might have run to her
father when she needed his protective guidance in understanding some new and momentous feeling.
His arms closed around her. "Ahh, Callie, don't cry. It's nothing—just a May house. I shouldn't have forced you to come."
She shook her head against him. "No, no, I didn't understand ... I didn't know . . . I . . . the men at Mrs. Peach's ... I thought you were like that I'm so sorry. Oh, Peter, I'm so awful."
He patted her, then took his handkerchief from his pocket, trying to wipe her tears and blow her nose for her. All but incoherent, Callie continued to babble out the whole tale of Mrs. Peach and her infamous business.
Rosalind took several steps backward. She watched wide-eyed, listening to a story resembling her own; then she had to turn away, her hand against the pounding pulse at her throat. She felt as though her world were crumbling. Her whole life had been peopled with men and women she couldn't trust, people who used her, who left her when she needed them. Peter had been the exception. Despite her complaining and nagging, she had believed he would always be with her. He'd be the one who would never turn from her, never leave her. Now she was frightened as though he were already gone.
She looked back to her husband and Callie with sad eyes; then her jealousy began to grow. Why had she never been able to cry as Callie was now? Why couldn't she tell her innermost shameful secrets and believe someone would listen to her and like her? Why had she always to be so alone with her doubts and fears? Rosalind had never been able to bear her soul so completely. She had always known everyone would hate her and know whatever evil there was, was in her.
She turned from Peter and Callie again and ran from the May house, envying Callie and hating her at the same time.
The rest of the Bereans stood stunned, helpless and moved by the wrenching outpouring. James Berean cocked his head, indicating they should leave. Peter looked at his father, seeking guidance.
"Let her talk," James said quietly. "It's, what she needs. Just be patient, son. It's not important that it make sense to you. It does to her/' James motioned to Stephen to join him.
Stephen stood near the rear of the May house, his own blue eyes bright with tears. He looked with longing at Callie, wishing that it had been to him she had turned. Slowly he moved past his father into the rain.
James left the May house, stopping for a moment at the entrance to look at his son and the girl. He was not certain what he had witnessed, but he knew somehow that it would affect them all. He was not a fanciful man, nor was he given to premonitions, but he had never seen anything so sad, nor anyth
ing so natural, as he watched Callie and Peter clinging to one another, drawing strength and the power to heal. He felt puzzled and uncustomarily removed from reality as he walked back through the rain to the house.
Peter watched his father leave; then his attention returned to Callie. He hardly knew what to do with her. Her whole body shook with her sobs and still she continued to explain. He listened to her tell that terrible story of ill fortune, crime, and terror, and he held her tighter. He could feel the fear and horror pouring from her, and he felt angry.
He didn't know what he was angry about, or at whom to direct it, but it was there, big and strong inside him. He wanted to fight the thing or people responsible for harming her. As he did at the laborers'
meetings, he felt an urgent, surging power of idealism that made him see the simplicity of justice. Men were good. They had only to practice it. Good was simplicity itself. Yet he did not know how to give it to others. Often at the meetings he had said in his strong clear voice, "It is the abandonment of evil. It is the relinquishment of cruelty. We must not harm the farmers or any other living soul, or we can never win our battle for justice. We strive for fairness and justice for you. It cannot be gained by the perpetration of foul deeds, nor built upon the carcass of iniquity/' They listened to him. Some agreed. All believed, but none practiced it, at least not fully. The striving for a better world was always relegated to a future in which it would be easier to be Christian once the laborers had gotten what they wanted. He had heard the same thing from the farmers. All of them would like to give fair wages and would—just as soon as the government gave them what they wanted.
He rocked Callie, murmuring words of comfort in her ear, and in his belly and chest there was the aching hurt that came again and again when he knew no one would stop hurting another until he himself was no longer being hint. Who were these people depraved enough to hurt Callie? Why?
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