The Endless Forest
Page 91

After a moment she nodded, and then she pulled away gently and went back to trying to make some semblance of order out of her clothing. He was waiting for her to say something, but everything that came to mind was monstrously unladylike. She drew in a shuddering breath and stood.
“I need to tell you the rest of the story. About Teddy and his mother.” She made herself meet his eye, because this must be done and be done properly, if they were really to continue as they had started.
He nodded, his expression neutral. “Go on, then.”
“I haven’t been able to talk to anybody about this,” she said. “But I think you should know.”
“You trying to scare me off?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Go on, then,” Daniel said with a calm smile.
She tried to put the story together in some rational order. Mrs. Peyton’s parlor, the heavy velvet and damask draperies always drawn to protect the furniture. Mrs. Peyton herself, still in mourning though her husband was six years gone. Her mouth pressed and pursed until it was ringed with a rigid white line, her whole frame trembling with anger.
The words she had used. Wanton. Unworthy. A look of hatred so plain it must have been very close to the surface all the time Martha had known her. The many kind things she had said and done—it seemed none of that had been sincere.
I hope you are not breeding, my girl. If you are, my son will not own you or it. The wages of sin will be yours alone to bear.
She stood up for herself, because Teddy did not. Standing in a shadowy corner, bent forward as if to study the pattern in the carpet, he said nothing.
I have never allowed your son such liberties. She said it firmly, and promised herself that she would not cry or faint or show these people anything but calm. Mrs. Peyton had pushed her to the limit of her endurance.
Liar, she called her. And worse. Far worse.
But Martha held her ground. Swallowed down her own outrage and anger and terrible sadness and held her head high.
Martha told Daniel all of it, sitting just far enough away that he wouldn’t touch her. All the noxious memories of that last interview came pouring out of her.
Like mother, like daughter. And: No wonder you pretend that she doesn’t exist. No wonder you lie with so little effort.
“But I didn’t,” Martha told Daniel. “I’ve never been able to tell a lie. Not because I’m an especially good person. I simply have no talent for it.”
While Mrs. Peyton talked Martha kept her gaze fixed on the hall table heaped with wedding presents, all topped by a silver bowl overflowing with calling cards and notes. The wedding of the season.
She finished. “She called me degenerate.”
That word had struck harder than anything that came before, because it was not new to her. It was the word she had chosen, after many years of careful thought, to assign to her mother. And Mrs. Peyton hung it around Martha’s own neck, tied it with knots that might never be undone.
Daniel was shaking his head. “No,” he said. His tone calm and sure. “That word does not apply to you.”
“How can you know?” She wiped her wet cheeks with the back of her hand. “Wasn’t this—” She gestured at the settle with its flattened cushions. “Doesn’t this prove her point?”
He took her chin between his fingers and tipped her face up to him. “It’s a gift you give to me,” he said.
“One you don’t want?”
“Of course I want it. I want you. But I’ve pushed this hard. Maybe I’ve just overwhelmed you. Maybe tomorrow you’d wake up and know you made a mistake. I wanted to give you time to think it through before we—before we took this last step.”
“Is that what it is?” Martha drew in a deep breath. “Is that what you call it, a last step?”
His eyes scanned her face, and then he lowered his head and kissed her. “And the first too. You have to know, Martha. I’m not one to jump to conclusions. I know my mind, and I know that I want you more than I want anything else in this life.” He drew in a sharp breath.
“Except for the use of your arm,” she said. “You can say that. You must be thinking it. Anyone would.”
“Except,” he said slowly, “for the use of my arm. That’s something else we need to talk about. But not right now.”
Right now he used his good arm to bring her up against him, and Martha went gladly.
Chapter XXXI
Birdie was up first on Sunday morning, even before her father. She dressed as quietly as she could and made her way downstairs into the silent kitchen, where she got right to work.
She brought in water, stirred the fire in the hearth and got a good blaze going, cut what was left of yesterday’s bread, and fetched butter and the last of last summer’s plum preserves from the cellar. When her father came downstairs the table was set and Birdie was just setting out a platter of cold bacon and cheese.
He didn’t look particularly surprised to see her. Late last night he would have heard Curiosity’s story from Ma, and he was quicker than most men when it came to figuring out moods.
“I want to go down to the village so I’ll be there when Hannah and the others come over the bridge,” she said. “I’ve done all my chores. I would have started the porridge too, but I can’t reach the big kettle. Can I go?”
Her da could look right through her, it seemed to Birdie. After a minute he said, “No farther than the bridge.”