She smiled at the look of stunned disbelief on his face. She knew it was a match for the look on her own, once she’d realized.
“The baby will arrive around mid-September, in the fall,” she said.
“This changes everything, Awena.” He took her hands and held them fiercely in his. “We are no longer sitting here swapping philosophical musings and theories about the origins of religion. This is—I don’t know how to put it. It’s a practical matter. This is beyond me, beyond you, even. You do see—we have to marry?”
“Why do we have to do anything, Max? If I’m honest, I don’t know what to do, other than to have this baby, which has its own plans and schedule. But rushing into marriage doesn’t seem like an option at any time. Not now—especially now. You do see, don’t you?”
Max was staggered, and completely thrown back on himself. Every emotion went through his mind, but the overriding one was joy. Complete, undiluted joy was the base coat on top of which anxiety, excitement, astonishment, and worry were making their marks. He didn’t know it then, but that would be the state of his emotions for many years to come.
No, he didn’t see, but again he was afraid to push her—more afraid now than before.
“In the meantime,” she added, “we don’t know what may happen. None of us knows. So let’s be happy while we can. Just … we just have to leave it alone for now. We both have to think. All right?”
And many hours later, with nothing settled in either of their minds, they made their way hand in hand up the darkling stairs, and so to bed.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
My fictional story of Gabrielle’s mother and grandmother is true in its essence. The tale Gabby relates to Max is a composite of the ordeals of 230 women captured in the roundup of French resisters during World War II. As their sufferings are impossible to describe or summarize in any meaningful way, I have struggled to do justice to their lives and honor the enormity of their courage by telling you Gabby’s story here.
The nonfiction book A Train in Winter: An Extraordinary Story of Women, Friendship and Resistance in Occupied France (2011), researched and reported in heartbreaking detail by Caroline Moorehead, provides the depth and scope my fictional tale will not allow. As I cannot begin to convey the remarkable individual stories of these women, I highly recommend to you Ms. Moorehead’s moving and important tribute.
ALSO BY G. M. MALLIET
A Fatal Winter
Wicked Autumn
Death at the Alma Mater
Death and the Lit Chick
Death of a Cozy Writer
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
G. M. Malliet is the winner of the Agatha Award for Death of a Cozy Writer. She attended Oxford University, holds a graduate degree from the University of Cambridge, and lives in Virginia near Washington, D.C.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
A THOMAS DUNNE BOOK FOR MINOTAUR BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.
PAGAN SPRING. Copyright © 2013 by G. M. Malliet. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.thomasdunnebooks.com
www.minotaurbooks.com
Cover design by David Baldeosingh Rotstein
Cover illustration by Rob Wood/Wood Ronsaville Harlin, Inc.
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-02140-3 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-02139-7 (e-book)
e-ISBN 9781250021397
First Edition: October 2013
Pagan Spring: A Mystery (A Max Tudor Novel) Page 28
