She stared at him, speechless. She no longer thought of herself as pretty. When she looked in a mirror she saw an ex-prostitute who’d known for years she was fat, who had shorn her hair to an unfashionably short boyish cap of blond curls to get rid of the last of the gray, who wore high-collared plain dresses and could not get the man she loved to propose marriage.
When Birtle Matheson looked at her he saw a woman whose white-blond hair puffed around her face in the unspoiled, slightly curled fashion of a child’s. He saw a woman who had been eating her own terrible cooking for four months and had trimmed to an attractive silhouette. He saw clear skin, clear eyes, and clear amazement that he should find her attractive, the latter which attracted him even as much as her considerable physical attributes.
“A simple walk,” he reiterated.
They went on a walk, heading away from town, following the creek for a while, then heading into the woods, over hills and along tributaries swollen with melted snows, where wild creatures were nesting in the banks and willow branches had turned brilliant red in preparation for leafing. They spoke about the town, its people, the haunting Christmas triangle concert, about Sarah and Noah and their rocky beginning, about nature, the possibility of there being trout in the mountain streams. They sat on a sandstone outcropping in the pleasant afternoon sun and watched a water ouzel walk underwater as it fed. Birtle said, “Tell me about this Mr. Bay-singer who accompanied you to church this morning.”
She told him, “Robert is our friend from back home. I’ve loved him since I was a girl.”
Birtle remained silent a long time. Somewhere in the trees behind them a chipmunk clucked. “All right,” he said at length. “Now I know what I’m up against.”
Meanwhile, Noah and Sarah were busy at the house they would share as husband and wife. In the yard, Noah knelt, running a brush through the black stovepipe while a black-billed magpie looked on and cocked his head in curiosity, then rose in a flash of white to a better vantage point. Above him, Sarah finished washing an upstairs window, lifted it and knelt with her elbows propped on the low ledge, looking down on Noah. She was dressed in a brown muslin skirt, a white blouse with the sleeves rolled up and a bibbed apron.
Noah sat back on his heels and looked up. “All done?” he asked.
“With the windows. But I’d like to turn the mattress over.”
“Hold on till I finish this and I’ll be right there.”
He went back to work while she remained at the sill in the warm sun, watching the magpie, who was soon joined by another; smelling spring lifting from the warming earth; glancing off toward Elizabethtown where the willow trees looked swollen with buds. She turned her gaze on Noah, watching his russet head bent over his work, his shoulders flexing as he plied the brush and lifted the pipe to peer inside. He set it down, got to his feet and washed his hands in an enamel bucket, dried them on a rag from his hind pocket and entered the back door.
She heard him come up the stairs and rose from her knees.
“Here I am,” he said, coming around the corner into the room. “Let’s turn that mattress.” He wedged between the bed and the wall and together they flipped the mattress end over end.
“Feels heavy as a bag of oats,” he said.
“Cotton batting,” she explained, leaning over to whack at the rope marks on the blue and white ticking.
He circled the foot of the bed and stood behind her. “We’ll need sheets and blankets.”
“I’ll take care of that.” She whacked the mattress again.
“And pillows.”
Whack! Whack! “I’ll take care of those, too.”
He glanced down at her backside while she thumped the mattress and made her skirts stir. “And a coverlet.”
She glanced back over her shoulder and quickly straightened. “Noah,” she reprimanded.
He looked up and grinned. “On the other hand, who needs sheets and blankets and pillows.”
She was on her back beneath him so fast the mattress bounced. Dust motes rose around them. Outside, the magpies chattered quietly while inside all was still. His eyes, above hers, were dark with mischief that slowly faded, replaced by a certain kindling as he braced on his elbows and considered her facial features in turn—eyes, nose... mouth.
“Noah, we—”
“For once, Sarah, don’t say it. I know what the rules are.”
He leaned down and kissed her once, lightly, an unhurried sample and warning before lifting his head to meet her eyes briefly. Dipping down again, he toyed with her lips, nipping first one, then the other, leaving touches of dampness and the faint whisk of his mustache before settling, eventually, at an angle, kissing her with deliberate voluptuousness.
In time he raised his head and let their gazes meet while his fingertips grazed her neck and they considered where this could lead. Where it must not lead. Her lips were open and wet and she was breathing fast. The next kiss was unrestrained, his mouth wide and his arms surrounding her as he rolled them to their sides. He kissed her as if there were no rules. Kissed her the way young swains have been kissing their maidens in springtime since there has been a springtime. Kissed her until they felt like the buds on the willows outside.
It became an ardent battle, each of them fighting for a fuller, wetter, warmer fit. With their mouths locked, he found her breast within her blouse and apron bib. He caressed and reshaped it, raising a pleasured sound in her throat. He pressed a knee high within her skirts and went on petting her until petting would no longer suffice. The ropes gave a single creak as he fit their bodies together and held her with an arm across her spine. They stopped kissing and lay entwined, breathing on one another’s faces in labored puffs.
Finally they fell apart, distancing themselves enough to regain composure.
“Oh Noah,” she whispered, “you make it so difficult.”
“Do I?”
“Oh yes.”
“It’s never seemed difficult for you before.”
“It’s difficult today.”
He smiled and touched her chin. “That’s what I’ve been waiting to hear.”
They lay awhile, enjoying each other’s eyes, the warmth of the sun as it crept another inch up their bodies, the simple linking of their hands between them. Once she touched his mustache. Once he tucked a strand of hair back from her temple.
Finally they fell to their backs, hands upthrown, and studied their ceiling.
He rolled his head to look at her. “I’d better get that stovepipe back inside,” he said.
“And I’d better get some sheets on this bed.”
They smiled and he sat up and tugged her after him.
The Reverend Birtle Matheson’s immediate pursuit of Addie Merritt had the town buzzing. Everywhere Robert Bay-singer went, he heard murmurings behind his back or was asked outright questions about it: “Is it true he’s sparking her? What’s between you and Addie? Folks figured the two of you for a pair after you took her out of Rose’s. Doesn’t seem right, a minister and a soiled dove.”
His hackles rose at each new comment he heard. He grew irascible with the world. At the stamp mill the men remarked grouchily that the boss must’ve breathed too much mercury vapor and it had poisoned his system. Robert even snapped at Noah one noon when they were eating dinner at Teddy Ruckner’s together and Noah mentioned, “I heard Matheson’s planning some kind of spring fair to raise funds for hymnals and pews.”
Robert thumped a fist on the table and barked, “Goddammit, Noah, do I have to hear that man’s name everywhere I go?”
Taken aback, Noah replied cautiously, “Sorry, Robert. It was just an innocent remark.”
“Well, don’t make any more innocent remarks, not about Matheson! He’s nothing but a goddamned lecher!”
Noah waited a while, ate a hunk of venison chop, drank some coffee, cut another piece of meat, watched Robert chew his as if it wasn’t dead yet.
At length Noah took another swallow of coffee and asked, “How long since you’v
e seen Addie?”
“What business is it of yours?”
“How long?”
Robert glared at Noah and said, “Three and a half weeks.”
“Three and a half weeks.” Noah paused. “You gotten any smarter?”
Robert’s eyes flashed to his friend’s. He threw down his fork. He pointed a finger. “Listen, Campbell, I don’t need any lip from you!”
Noah affected an expression of righteous astonishment. “You need it from somebody! Everybody in town is talking about how you’re growling at them when they so much as say hello on the street. Half the men at the mill are ready to quit because you’ve been such a damned bear to live with. I’m ready to kick your ass clear up to your armpits. Don’t you know what’s wrong with you, Robert? You’re in love with Addie.”
Robert stared at him.
“You’ve been in love with her since you were fifteen years old, and you’re so damned scared to admit it you’re willing to let Matheson sashay into town and sweep her off her feet, and never go banging on her door to call a halt to it.”
“She told me not to bother her anymore.”
“Hell yes, she did, after you acted like a horse’s ass that first Sunday Matheson was in town. Why do you think she did that?”
“How am I supposed to know? Who the hell can figure out the woman?”
“You don’t suppose she was trying to scare you into something, do you?”
“Noah, she told me point-blank she didn’t want to see me anymore.”
Noah threw up his hands. “You’re so damned ignorant. Open your eyes, man! The woman loves you!”
Robert glowered while Noah preached on.
“Why do you think she left Rose’s? Why do you think she let her hair go blond? Why do you think she started sewing curtains and joined the Ladies’ Society and became respectable again? To be worthy of you, only you’re so dim you can’t see it. Have you got any idea how much courage it took her to do any one of those things in this town? Everywhere she goes she runs into men she’s been in bed with and women who know it, but she’s willing to face them down and say, that’s over, I’m changed, I want a decent life now. So are you going to let her have it or what?”
“I think she wants it with Matheson.”
“Bullshit.” Noah threw down his napkin. “But if you’re not careful, she will, because that man’s showing her some fevered pursuit, and her head’s likely to be turned by it sooner or later. Especially given the fact that he’s the minister. Why, can you imagine what a victory it would be for a woman like Addie to marry such a man after what she was? She could thumb her nose at the entire town.”
“Addie wouldn’t thumb her nose at anybody. She’s not that kind.”
“There! You see? See how well you know her? See how you jump to her defense?”
Robert thought awhile, then shook his head. “I don’t know, Noah. She dropped me flatter than a stove lid the minute she laid eyes on him. That hurts.”
“Well, maybe it does. Maybe she hurts, too, you ever thought about that?”
When Robert refused to answer, Noah leaned forward, resting his forearms on the edge of the table. “Remember once I told you I was jealous because I thought there was something between you and Sarah? Do you remember what you said? You said it had always been Addie for you. So put your claim on her, man. What are you waiting for?”
Robert slept little that night. He thought about Noah’s words. He thought about how pretty Addie looked with her hair back to its natural color, and how slim she’d gotten since she’d left Rose’s, and how she dressed as normal as any housewife, and how she’d overcome her fear of leaving the house, and had started up a perfectly respectable business.
What man wouldn’t sit up and look twice?
Noah was right. If he didn’t move fast he was going to lose her, and the idea was unthinkable!
The following afternoon at quarter to four Robert stood before the shaving mirror in his room at the Grand Central Hotel. He had just returned from the bathhouse and Farnum’s store. Every garment on his body was brand spanking new. His beard and mustache were neatly trimmed. His hair was slick as an otter’s. He smelled like geranium vegetal.
He used a sharp-toothed comb on his beard, mustache and eyebrows. His mustache again. He dropped the comb, tugged at his waistcoat, frowned at his reflection, drew a great breath, blew it out, adjusted his new lapels, his starched wingtip collar, his gray and maroon paisley tie and finally dropped his hands to his sides.
Go ask her, Robert. Before that preacher does.
He donned his beaver bowler, left his cane but took a clump of blue flag—wild iris—out of a glass of water and left the room.
Outside it was one of those balmy days that come along maybe twice in a springtime, the kind you wish you could bottle and keep, so still a man could hear his own whiskers growing, so perfectly temperate it was hard to resist flopping down beneath a tree and looking for pictures in the clouds.
He’d chosen the time carefully—four o’clock when Sarah would still be at the newspaper office and Addie would have the bulk of her day’s work done.
On his way up the hill he rehearsed what he would say.
Hello, Addie, you look lovely today. How perfectly transparent. He’d have to do better than that.
I’ve come to apologize, Addie, and to say you’ve been brave and wonderful and I’ve been a perfect fool. No, that sounded silly.
Hello, Addie. I’ve come to see if you’ll go for a walk with me. (She must love walks; she’d been taking enough of them with that preacher!) But he didn’t want to run the risk of being interrupted by people, so a walk wouldn’t do.
Hello, Addie. I’ve brought you some wild irises. The men found them up in the creek this morning.
The door was wide open when he approached it, with sunlight angling across the floor inside. He could smell supper cooking but not a sound came from inside. He knocked and waited with his heart in his throat.
He heard chair legs scrape and in moments her footsteps approaching on the pine floor.
After all the rehearsal, upon seeing her again the prepared words fled.
She appeared before him wearing a blue and white striped skirt and solid blue shirtwaist with a high white collar and deep starched cuffs, also of white. Over this she wore a white bibbed apron tied at the back, with some fancy stitching across the bib and pocket. On her right middle finger she had a silver thimble; Her white-blond hair curled softly around her face, only a finger-length long. Her face was thinner and her curves had returned, accented by the waistband of the apron and the gentle swell of the bib above. She stopped on the threshold and stood very still.
“Hello, Robert,” she said quietly.
He removed his hat. “H——” He cleared his throat and tried again. “Hello, Addie.” The words sounded wheezy and unnatural.
She waited without fidgeting. Her skin was very fair. It was easy to see the faint blush that rose to her cheeks. Ruler came padding from somewhere and sat down in the sun to look up at the two of them.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“I came to see you,” he replied stupidly.
“Yes, I see that. Is there something you wanted?” She was so calm, so quiet-spoken.
“Yes, to apologize, first of all.”
“There’s no need to apologize.”
“The last time I saw you I was very upset. I was rude to the minister and sharp with you. I’m sorry.”
“You’re forgiven.”
He stood in the spring sun, she in the shadow of the doorframe with the sun slicing across her right shoulder and down her skirts. Seconds ticked by and neither of them said anything.
Finally she glanced down. “Are those for me?”
“Oh... yes!” He handed her the flowers. The stems were crushed. His palm was green. “From up in the stream above the mill. They grow wild up there.”
“Thank you. They’re very beautiful.” She lowered her face to smell t
hem while he watched the sun glance over her shining hair for a second. When she lifted her head her upper body again retreated to full shadow. “I should put them in water. Come in, Robert.” She turned and walked sedately away.
He followed, feeling callow and earnest and wistful, past two patches of sunlight that fell through her curtained windows, into the kitchen, where her stitchwork was lying on the bare table beside a pincushion and a cup half-filled with coffee. Ruler watched them go, then padded slowly after them and took up a post near the range. Addie poured a dipperful of water into a clear glass and put the irises in it and brought them to the table.
“Sit down, Robert. Can I get you some coffee?”
“No. No coffee.”
He sat and she sat, at right angles. He laid his hat on the table beside her closework. A fly came in and landed on the edge of her cup and she waved it away, again with the collect-edness he found so terrifying. After a vast silence he asked, “How have you been, Addie?”
Their eyes met. “Fine... just fine. Busy. I’ve gotten a lot of orders.”
“Good.”
“Yes, it is. Better than I ever imagined. Would you mind if I keep sewing while we talk?”
“No, go right ahead.”
She picked up her work, draped it across her lap and began stitching. So calm, so remote, so indifferent it made a lump form in his throat. She was treating him exactly the way he’d treated her since she’d lived in this house. How stupid he’d been!
“You look very good.”
Her eyes flashed up, returned to her work. Stitch. Stitch.
Good? She looked incredible. She made the flowers look garish, the sunlight wan. He couldn’t peel his gaze off her.
“Are you still seeing the minister?”
“I have been, yes.”
“Do you have feelings for him?”
She gave him another glance, the duration of one stitch, then dropped her eyes. “I consider that private, Robert.”
“What I mean to say is...”
Stitch. Stitch. Her needle went on tunneling.
“What I mean to say is, do you have any feelings for me?”