The Endless Forest
Page 179

“An occupational hazard.” Whether she meant the ink or the need for spectacles wasn’t clear, and she clearly had no intention of pursuing the subject. Instead she reached back to a basket of clean laundry and hooked a fresh handkerchief out for him.
He said, “I’m on my way down to the village to see how they’re getting along with the fire pits. I’m hoping there won’t be any fistfights tonight.”
“Now that’s a fib,” Elizabeth said. “You look forward to the ruckus all year.”
It was true that he looked forward to the Fourth of July celebration. The food was good and plentiful, there were contests and games and dancing. In the evening, Joshua Hench would set up his twice-a-year fireworks display.
“You saying you don’t like the Fourth?”
“I love the Fourth,” Elizabeth said. “And you know it. I just wish it weren’t so very hot. I keep thinking of the July I was eight months gone with Robbie, when I thought I would suffocate in that heat.”
She sometimes talked of the children they had lost so early, and in such warm tones that anyone who didn’t know her would think she had got past the pain. The fact that the lost ones were on her mind meant that she was more worried about Jennet and Lily than she could even admit to herself. To Nathaniel it seemed that all the women were on edge these last few days, and he wondered, fleetingly, if there was something amiss they had decided to keep among themselves. If he asked her straight out she would tell him, but then again he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.
Instead he said, “Why don’t you come down with me? I’m guessing the little people will have all kinds of mischief going, and I know folks will be asking after you. Curiosity will have some harsh words for me if I leave you here.”
“It just seems unfair that Hannah should have to stay behind.”
“Hannah,” he reminded her, “is a doctor, and if she thinks she needs to stay with Jennet and Lily, that’s up to her.”
He watched her turn the idea over in her mind. She said, “I could send one of the children up to check on them now and then.”
“Exactly,” Nathaniel said. “Fetch your sunbonnet, Boots, and let’s get going.”
In the deep shade of the parlor Hannah stood at the window and watched her father and stepmother start out for the party in the village.
“He did it,” she said. “I didn’t think he would, this year. But she’s going.”
“Well, good,” Lily said. “Good for Da.”
Hannah sat down in the rocker Simon had fitted with a system of ropes and pulleys. She put one foot on a small board that pivoted as she rocked, and in response a thin rectangle of perforated wood hung overhead began to swing back and forth, sending a current of cool air through the room.
“Och,” Jennet said, putting her face up to catch the breeze. “Don’t stop.”
“I think Simon could sell these contraptions from Florida to Quebec,” Hannah said.
Lily stretched and yawned. “He is clever, my good husband. Is it possible that I need another nap?”
“Take it while you can get it,” Hannah said.
It was a luxury to have husbands and parents and children elsewhere, so that they could rest in each other’s company. Even the LeBlanc girls had the day off, so that there was no one to overhear them and carry tales to the village. To Hannah it was worth a hundred firework displays.
For a long time they talked on and off, each of them slipping away into sleep for a few minutes, half rousing, falling back into slumber. When the baby roused from his nap Hannah fetched him to the parlor and nursed him in the pleasant breeze from the fan, and then they passed him around and entertained him until the heat made him sleepy again. Hannah took him back to the infant cot that had a permanent place in her stepmother’s kitchen and saw him settled.
Then she put together a tray and they sat around it in the parlor—Lily still on her divan, Hannah and Jennet on chairs—eating boiled eggs with salt and butter and new bread. There was a jug of water she had retrieved from the springhouse, and cold mint tea.
“In the village they’re eating pork cut off the spit,” said Jennet. “But the very thought makes my stomach turn.” She ran a hand over the great swell of her belly.
“That’s the heat,” Hannah said. “And a child ready to come into the world.”
“It could hardly be more impatient than I am,” said Jennet. She closed her eyes and without opening them she said, “What does it mean, do you think, that I’m so much more tired this time than the last, with the girls?”
“No doubt it’s a boy,” said Hannah. “Already set on mischief.”
“And for Lily?” Jennet asked. “Another boy?”
“Oh, a girl,” said Lily. “Ma won’t have it any other way, though she wouldn’t admit it. I hope she’s right, though if it’s to be my one and only—well, it seems that Simon should have a son to carry on the family name.”
“Listen to her,” Jennet said. “Have ye been keeping count of the Ballentynes at Carryck? Simon’s brithers have been putting out sons one after the other. Like rabbits. And beyond that, why should you not have a daughter to carry on your mither’s line? Is that no just as important?”
“She’s right,” Hannah said. “And beyond that, I don’t see why this should be your one and only. You may have one a year for the next ten years, now that you’ve got the hang of it.”