Fire Along the Sky
Page 161

He made a sound that meant neither that he agreed nor that he disagreed, but only that he was listening. He was hoping that would satisfy her, but from the sharp look Elizabeth threw his way Nathaniel knew she would not let him off so easy.
Sunday night they had known the ice storm would keep Lily in the village. Simon, who was supposed to bring her home to Lake in the Clouds, would see her safely to Curiosity, where she would spend the night.
Lying in the dark in their bed and listening to the trees groan under the sudden burden of ice, they had lain awake thinking of Lily in one room and Simon in the next.
“Curiosity is there,” Nathaniel had said. “And the little girls.” And still Elizabeth had been awake for a long time, and Nathaniel with her.
Finally he turned to her and said, “And if they are together, Boots, well then. We've got to let her go.”
“I know,” she said. “I know that. Curiosity made me see that.”
“What then?” he asked, smoothing a stray hair away from her face.
“She's so young,” Elizabeth said.
“Something she'll outgrow,” Nathaniel had said, hoping to catch at least a glimmer of her smile in the dark.
“Too soon,” Elizabeth said. “And far away from us.”
There it was, the worst of it. They might keep Simon Ballentyne here for the summer, but in the fall he would take their daughter away.
“You'll have to give in on Canada,” Nathaniel said.
Elizabeth pushed out a laugh. “I suppose I will. It's that or never see our Lily's children.” And then, in a more serious tone she said, “I must make the most of these months. At least I have the summer.” She said: “I think she has a better chance of being happy with him than she would with most men. He is not put off by her talent.”
“And you ain't worried about the connection to Moncrieff,” Nathaniel said. It was a question, and it wasn't. She turned to him in the dark, suddenly.
“Are you?”
Nathaniel let his mind travel back over the years to the idea of Angus Moncrieff. No matter how he concentrated, he couldn't call up the man's face.
“I don't see anything of his uncles in him,” Nathaniel said.
Elizabeth bedded her cheek on his shoulder, glad of his warmth and his calm and the fact that when her own hard-won rationalism threatened to desert her, she could count on Nathaniel's.
“Nor do I,” she said. And hoped it was the truth.
Monday morning, the worst of the ice already gone, they had picked their way down the mountain over fallen branches and trees snapped in half by the ice to find that Lily had not gone to Curiosity, but had slept in the meetinghouse.
She did not look at either of them directly when she said this, and Nathaniel had an idea of why not. So did Elizabeth, from the color that came into her cheeks and the way her forehead drew down to build a crease between her brows.
“There was no walking anywhere,” Lily had explained, her face turned away from them. “And there was enough firewood.”
Nathaniel could almost see Elizabeth's mind working, the way she weighed words and phrases and rearranged them until they suited her perfectly. If he had his way, Nathaniel would have left the question unasked, but Elizabeth could not. Last night she had resolved to let Lily and Simon work things out between themselves, but her curiosity was ungovernable at this moment.
Lily saw it coming too; in any other circumstances it might have made Nathaniel laugh, the silent battle between mother and daughter. I am going to ask, Elizabeth's expression said, and Lily's: Not if I can think of a way to distract you.
And she had just the ammunition she needed. Lily told them about the courier waiting in the trading post and handed over the letters, and that was the end of uncomfortable questions about exactly who had spent the night in the meetinghouse.
But now the courier was off, and Lily was home at Lake in the Clouds, and here was Simon Ballentyne, coming straight at them.
Nathaniel said, “Ice storm kept you off the mountain Sunday, I suppose.”
Beside him Elizabeth let out a little sigh. She might confront Lily, but she would leave Simon to Nathaniel.
“Aye,” Simon began.
Elizabeth, flustered, did the unthinkable: she interrupted him.
“What good fortune to see you just now,” she said, too brightly. “Nathaniel, Simon wants to talk to you about the foundation of the new school. Why don't you two go on, I have some errands to do and then I'll be along.”
Simon hid his surprise long enough to agree that, yes, he had a few questions if Nathaniel had the time.
Nathaniel, who knew that Elizabeth had no errands, made a face at his wife when Simon turned his back.
“Coward,” he mouthed at her. She blushed prettily and wrinkled her nose at him, but she went off anyway, leaving him alone with the man who had got into the habit of ravishing their daughter.
Simon looked both confused and guilty, but he nodded. “Weel, then,” he said. “It won't take long.”
Elizabeth went into the trading post, where the usual group of men were lounging around the stove, caught up in an argument about ice storms. Even for the trading post it was a particularly loud argument, but Elizabeth was glad to be overlooked. She went to Anna, who stood behind the counter, and asked to see buttons. It was the first thing that came to mind.
Anna leaned across, her comfortable bosom pressed into the worn wood of the countertop, and whispered.
“Don't worry, I ain't about to say a word to nobody about who slept where after the ice storm.”