The Stolen Marriage

by Diane Chamberlain

  13

  I was exhausted when I arrived home on Saturday. Even with the roomette, I’d barely been able to sleep on the train as I tried to think of how I would tell my mother my plans. There were no words to soften the blow. In each imagined scenario, I saw her hurt and her anger. I certainly wouldn’t tell her about the baby. I would simply have to find a way to make her understand that I was going to marry Henry Kraft no matter what she said.

  I’d hoped she would be out, but as soon as I let myself in the front door, I heard water running in the kitchen and knew she was home. I left my suitcase by the stairs and walked into the room. She stood at the sink washing snap beans from our small victory garden. The sound of the running water must have masked my footsteps because she didn’t turn around and, for a moment, I simply observed her. She wore her blue floral housedress, a navy blue apron tied at her waist, and her silver-streaked black hair was in a bun at the nape of her neck. I loved her so much. She was my only family. She thought she knew what her future held—what both our futures held—and I was going to destroy her hopes and dreams.

  “I’m home,” I said, walking into the room. I set my handbag on the table. “Can I help?”

  She glanced up from her task at the sink and turned off the water above the colander. “Oh my,” she said, drying her hands on a dishtowel. “You look like you haven’t slept in days! How is your friend? Is she still very ill? I don’t believe you told me her name.”

  I’d never told her the name of my imaginary friend, and I wasn’t about to make one up now. Now was the time for the truth. At least, for part of it.

  “Mom,” I said, “can you sit for a moment? I have some news.”

  She looked instantly worried. Her round brown eyes, so much like my own, were hooded with concern. Draping the dishtowel over the faucet, she came to sit kitty-corner from me at the table. “Are you all right, honey?” she asked. “You look so pale.”

  “I’m fine.” I folded my hands in my lap. “But I wasn’t being honest about why I went away,” I said. “I didn’t have a sick friend. I went to see a man I met when I was in Washington with Gina a few months ago.” Her brow furrowed and I rushed on. “I’ve fallen in love with him and plan to marry him,” I said.

  She stared at me in disbelief. “What are you talking about?” she asked. “Have you gone mad?”

  I shook my head. “I know it seems crazy,” I said. “I just … I fell for him.”

  She said nothing, her eyes wide and her mouth slightly open as though she’d forgotten how to blink. How to swallow.

  “I know it’s a shock,” I went on quickly. “And I’ve had a hard time figuring out what to do about it, but…” My voice faded away. I wasn’t sure what more to say.

  “What about Vincent?” Her voice took on an hysterical edge when she said his name.

  “I realized that Vincent is more like a brother to me than a—”

  “What?” She slapped the table with her open palm. “Tell me you’re joking. You’re pulling my leg, right?”

  “No, Mom. I’m very serious. I’m sorry. I know you—”

  “What does this man do that makes him so special?” she said. “He’s better than a doctor?”

  “It has nothing to do with his occupation.” My voice sounded far calmer than I felt.

  “Vincent, who has loved you with all his heart since he was a boy?” she continued. “You’d give him up for someone you’ve known a couple of months?”

  “I can’t help how I feel,” I said. “I’m very attracted to him. To this … new man.” At that moment, I thought of how I felt in Vincent’s arms. How I longed for him to kiss me. To touch me. I’d felt little of that with Henry. I doubted I ever would. “He’ll be a good provider,” I said, as though that was the thing I cared most about. “He owns a furniture company in North Carolina.”

  “North Carolina! Is that where you’ve been the past few days?”

  I nodded. “Yes. And I’ll have to move there, since that’s where his business—”

  “You’ll leave me here all alone?” She pushed back her chair with an angry scrape as she got to her feet. “North Carolina!” she said again.

  “I’m not leaving you.” I looked up at her. “I’ll always be your daughter and I’ll visit as often as I can. And you can visit me. You can meet Henry. I’m sure you’ll—”

  “I won’t allow it!” she barked. “I will not allow you to throw away the boy you’ve always loved for this—” Her face suddenly paled and she grabbed the back of the chair she’d been sitting in. I stood up quickly, reaching for her arm, afraid she was about to pass out. That had happened a couple of times when her diabetes was out of control, but she drew away from me as if repelled by my touch. Her eyes were wide, her expression stricken. “You’re pregnant!” she said, the words exploding from her mouth.

  I sucked in my breath. I would have to lie, but I waited a second too long before opening my mouth to answer her, and she raised her hands to her face in horror.

  “That’s it, isn’t it? It was this man … this furniture man … Oh dear God in heaven!” She crossed herself and sank once more onto the chair. “What have you done!”

  “I’m sorry, Mom,” I said, sitting down again. I leaned across the table, reaching for her hand, but she drew it away as if repulsed by my touch. “I’m ashamed of myself,” I said. “It was terrible of me, I know, but it happened and I…” I shook my head, unsure what else to say.

  “You are a horrible person, Tess DeMello.” Her nostrils flared and she looked at me as if I were a despicable stranger. She pressed her fists to her temples. “How could you let this happen?” she asked. “Your poor father!” She leaned across the corner of the table to slap my arm. “He’s looking down at you right now, so ashamed!” She raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Dear Lord in heaven, what did I do wrong?”

  “Mom.” I grabbed her hand, but she yanked it away from me. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” I said. “You’re a wonderful mother. I’m the one who—”

  “How could you do this to Vincent? To me? To Mimi and Pop? How could you do it to yourself, you stupid, stupid girl!”

  In all my life, I’d never heard her talk to me this way. I’d never heard her talk to anyone this way. I straightened my spine. “I’m going to marry Henry, Mother,” I said firmly. “I have to think about the baby now, and I want him or her to have a name and a future.”

  “My daughter.” She rocked on the chair as though she hadn’t heard me. “I can’t believe my daughter would do something like this. You’ll go to hell. You know that don’t you?”

  “Mother, I—”

  “You belong with Vincent.” Her voice took on a pleading tone. “You always have. My sweet boy. My Vincent.” Tears spilled from her eyes and trailed down her cheeks. I couldn’t bear that I was the cause of them. “What are you going to tell him?” she asked. “He left to do volunteer work, the biggest heart any man ever had, and you cheat on him like a whore.”

  I began to cry myself, unable to keep up my resolute façade any longer, because she was right. Vincent was so good and I was going to hurt him terribly. “I know I made a mistake,” I said. “I’m trying to find a way to live with it. I’m going to write to Vincent and tell him I fell in love with someone else. Please don’t tell him about the baby, Mom.” I pleaded again, my hand on her arm. “Please. It would kill him.”

  “It would kill you for him to know what a tramp you’ve become, isn’t that it?”

  “No, I—”

  “Don’t worry,” she said, picking up my hand from her arm and dropping it to the table as if it were a piece of rotten fruit. “I certainly won’t tell Vincent. How could I? How could I admit to him … to anyone … that my daughter is a tramp?” She shook her head, looking suddenly exhausted and far older than her forty-eight years. “Can’t you just go away to a home for unwed mothers?” she pleaded. “Maria Lucarelli’s girl did that. You could have the baby with the nuns. They’ll find it a home. We can ask Fathe
r Longo where you should go.” Her voice grew more hopeful with each sentence. “We’ll make up some reason you had to go away for a while. Vincent won’t need to know. You don’t have to marry this other man. You belong with Vincent. You know that, don’t you?”

  I shook my head. “I’m not going to the nuns, Mom. I want this baby. It’s not as though I’m fifteen years old.”

  She lowered her face into her hands and made a sound deep in her throat, a keening as if she were in mourning. “I don’t know you,” she wailed. “I don’t know the girl who could do something like this.” She lifted her tear-streaked face. “You need to leave my house,” she said, her voice determined. “Now. Today.”

  “What? Mother, I just got home. I’m not going anywhere until I—”

  “You’re a disgrace to me,” she said. “I want you gone. Out of this house. You’re so in love with this man? Go to him, then. Just go.” She stood up and walked over to the sink. She turned on the water again and began washing the beans.

  “Mom?” I said, getting slowly to my feet. I hung back, suddenly afraid to approach her. “Mother?”

  She didn’t respond. I knew she wouldn’t. She was finished with this conversation. I had the terrible feeling she was finished with me.

  * * *

  In my room, I struggled to write the letter to Vincent. I cried so hard as I wrote it that I could barely catch my breath. The letter had to be cut-and-dried. A little mean. I wanted to make him angry enough to forget me. I wouldn’t mail the letter until I was ready to leave for Hickory. The last thing I wanted was for him to rush home to try to change my mind.

  Dearest Vincent,

  This letter is so hard for me to write. I’m afraid I need to break off our engagement. I met someone else while you’ve been away and I fell deeply in love with him and plan to marry him. You worried that I seemed different when you were home for Christmas and you were right. I was struggling with my feelings as I tried to figure out what to do about loving two wonderful men. Now I’ve made my decision. I’m sure it seems terribly sudden to you and you’re probably worried about my sanity, but you needn’t be. I’m fine, just heartsick at the thought of hurting you as well as your dear parents and my mother, who is terribly disappointed in me. Please don’t try to find me. Instead, move on with your life. I know it will be splendid. You are a wonderful person, dear Vincent. I will always care about you, and I pray you quickly find someone worthy of you.

  With love and admiration,

  Tess

  It was a letter full of lies and omissions, but it was the only way.

  14

  “She still won’t answer the phone?” Gina asked from beneath the pink and white quilt on her bed. She was already tucked in for the night.

  I shook my head as I sat down on the spare twin bed in her room, still in my dungarees and cardigan. I’d been at Gina’s house for two full days and nights, trying to call my mother every few hours, but she refused to answer the phone. I was hurt and angry and scared. I’d certainly known my mother would be upset. I’d known she’d be furious with me. But I never thought she would actually kick me out.

  “She’ll come around,” Gina assured me with a yawn. “She’s your mother.”

  “I don’t think she will come around, Gina.” I remembered my mother’s words: I don’t know you anymore. “I think I’ve lost her,” I said. “I’ve lost everyone I love.”

  “You still have me, honey.” She propped herself up on her elbow, her nightgown slipping over one shoulder as she leaned across the space between the beds to touch my denim-covered knee. “You’ll always have me,” she said. “I understand how she feels, though. I don’t want you to leave either, but I know you don’t have much choice. If you get lonely or scared when you’re down in North Carolina, I’m a phone call away.”

  I barely heard her, I was so lost in my gloom. “I think she actually loves Vincent more than she loves me,” I said. “Maybe she always has. She kept calling him ‘my Vincent.’ She adores him.” I leaned back against the headboard and lit my fourth or fifth cigarette of the evening. I remembered the obstetrician telling me ten cigarettes a day was fine. I seemed determined to smoke them all in a row tonight. “Are you sure it’s okay for me to stay here a while longer?” I asked.

  “It’s fine,” she said, stifling another yawn. She had to get up early to go to work in the morning and I felt guilty I was keeping her awake with my chatter. “My mother loves you,” she added, “though if it turns out you’re here for a long time, we’ll have to make up some good reason you can’t go home.”

  “I don’t know if Henry’s going to call me in four days or four weeks,” I said. “Or if he’s changed his mind altogether,” I added, giving voice to my latest worry.

  “He’ll call,” she said, as though she knew him better than I did. The truth was, neither of us knew Henry Kraft at all.

  The Monday after I’d arrived at Gina’s, I’d called the factory in Hickory and asked for him. I needed to let him know where he could reach me—that I was no longer at home—but the switchboard operator told me he wasn’t in. I left Gina’s number with the operator, then began to worry. Maybe he was having second thoughts. He’d certainly been impulsive, asking me to marry him. Had he been leading me on, humoring me while he waited for the train to take me away from Hickory? Away from him? The twenty-four hours I’d spent in Hickory were taking on an unreal quality in my mind and the craziness of his proposal was setting in. It was probably setting in for him as well. And there was that Violet Dare girl. The one who fancied herself his fiancée. Who was she? Did Henry tell her about me? How he asked me to marry him? Were they both laughing about me now?

  “Get some sleep, honey,” Gina said with a yawn. “You need it. Your baby needs it. You can resume worrying in the morning.”

  I stubbed out my cigarette and stood up from the bed, heading for the bathroom where I’d left my nightgown and toothbrush. I would go to bed as Gina had advised, but I doubted very much that I’d be able to sleep.

  * * *

  A phone rang. In the darkness, I lifted the receiver to my ear.

  “Hello?” I said.

  “This is Violet Dare,” a woman hissed in an angry whisper. “What the hell do you think you’re doing with Henry?”

  “Tess?”

  I opened my eyes, groggy and confused. I looked over at Gina, thinking she’d spoken, but she was burrowed under her covers sound asleep.

  “Tess, wake up.”

  I sat up and saw Gina’s mother standing in the doorway, illuminated by the streetlight outside the bedroom window. Her hair was tied up in rags beneath a hairnet. I stared at her blankly, still lost in my dream.

  “Your fiancé is on the phone,” Mrs. Farinola said, then added, “He says it’s urgent, honey.”

  Vincent? Calling me at Gina’s in the middle of the night? My mother must have gotten in touch with him. Talk some sense into her, she’d tell him. I only hoped she hadn’t told him about the baby.

  I got out of bed, pulling on my robe and stepping into my slippers, and followed Mrs. Farinola to the kitchen. My brain still felt muddy with sleep and I half expected Violet Dare to be on the line when I lifted the receiver to my ear.

  “Vincent?”

  “Thank God you’re there,” he said. I hadn’t heard his voice in a week and a half and the sound of it filled me with heartbreaking love. “We didn’t know where you were,” he said, “and it finally occurred to me to try Gina’s.”

  I was confused. If he’d called my house, wouldn’t my mother have told him I was at Gina’s? “I’ve been here a couple of—”

  “It’s your mother, Tess,” he interrupted. “Mom hadn’t heard from her in a few days and she went over there and found her on the floor in the living room.”

  My mind snapped into focus, my heartbeat suddenly pounding in my throat. “Oh no,” I said. “She fell?”

  He hesitated. “She passed away, honey,” he said finally. “I’m so—”

  �
��What?” I nearly screamed the word. I felt Mrs. Farinola’s hand on my shoulder as if to hold me up, and I knew Vincent must have already told her why he was calling. “How could she … pass away?”

  “They think it was either another stroke, or possibly a seizure from the diabetes. Either way, she hit her head on the coffee table. Mom is devastated that she didn’t go over there sooner. They think it happened two days ago. Have you been at Gina’s all this time?”

  Two days ago! I couldn’t answer him. Tears slipped down my cheeks and over my trembling fingers where I held the receiver. “I … yes,” I finally managed to say. I couldn’t tell him my mother kicked me out. “I should go home. Right now.” I looked through the kitchen window into the dark night. “But the bus doesn’t run till morn—”

  “I’ll drive you home,” Mrs. Farinola said quickly.

  “I’m so sorry, sweetheart,” Vincent said. “There’s no need for you to rush home in the middle of the night. She’s … she’s not there, honey. She’s at the funeral home. Cito’s. They’re waiting till we could find you to make arrangements.”

  Cito’s. Oh my God. That made it all so real. I lowered myself onto one of the kitchen chairs.

  “I’ve been trying to find a train home,” Vincent continued, “but they’re all booked up and I’m out of gasoline coupons because of my job, plus we’re so short staffed right now, that I…” His voice drifted off for a moment. “I’m driving all over town during the day, making house calls,” he continued. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to get home, Tess. They’re moving troops around right now, and the trains are full. I’m sorry. I hate to leave you alone to deal with this. Go see Father Longo tomorrow. He’ll help you with arrangements. And my parents will help. You know they’ll always be there for you. I’ll do my best to get on a train, all right?”

  I barely heard him as he spoke. Mom. “I just can’t believe it,” I said. I remembered my last conversation with her. The argument. The anguish in her face. The shame and disbelief. I stood up abruptly. “I need to get home,” I said. I had the irrational feeling that I would walk in the house and find her sitting in her favorite chair in the living room, the floor lamp illuminating a magazine in her lap.