“Absolutely he should.” But what was the chance of that? Civilization in these parts was too new to sport sheriffs. Even if it weren’t, who was to say a court would intervene? The law gave a man the right to inflict corporal punishment on those in his household, to treat the very people he should have wanted to protect as his property, playthings, slaves. “Mr. Linton—”
“Is a monster.” She kicked at a clump of dirt. “His family would be better off without him.”
“The whole world would be better off without him.”
She nodded shortly and tackled a pocket of mangy green with grim determination. “I’m not ready to talk about that nightmare. Not sure if I’ll ever be.” The roots came loose with a ripping sound. She tossed the weed aside. Like one anxious to change the subject, she asked briskly, “What about you? Tell me. I want to hear the story.”
While we worked, I shared it, starting with that long-ago January afternoon of spinning when Matthew’s habit of whistling the family’s meager funds down the wind came to full light, plodding hot-faced through my reactions, the ugly outbursts and consequences that urged my flight and transformation, and, more easily, touching on the journey’s escapades that culminated in Daniel discovering me hammered to the ground.
At the end of the recital, she shook her head, bemused.
I poked at the ground with the shovel’s blade. “You must think I’m a loose screw, dressing up like a boy and diving into so much ridiculousness.”
“After such an adventure?” A disbelieving sound escaped her. “Only imagine if you’d stayed in Middleton and gone along with the usual routine: baking, ironing, knitting, washing, sewing. You never would have known what it was like to get away from so many spools and reels and knots of flax. You never would have tasted freedom. Heavens, Harriet, I don’t wonder at all you came up with this masquerade. The real miracle is that we don’t all chop off our hair and call ourselves Freddy.”
I chewed on my lower lip. Then, abruptly: “You know, I’ll be returning to that world eventually.”
“With Daniel?”
“Do you think I’m making a mistake?” I didn’t. Not anymore. Daniel was proving to be unusually flexible in his thinking. I expected our marriage to be unusual as well. But I wondered what she thought.
“Only you can decide that”—she shrugged—“but I have to admit, back in Middleton I was jealous of what you had with Mr. Long.” When I stared in surprise, she added hurriedly, “Not that I wanted him for myself. I simply wished for that kind of affection—the way he cared for you.”
“Despite my nature?” Headstrong, outspoken, rash … the list could go on and on.
“Oh, no. That’s just it. He loves you because of your nature.” She sighed. “A rare thing, that.”
This sank in, and I recognized its truth with a nod. Perhaps our brand of love was special. Yet how bittersweet to acknowledge its uniqueness. We should all be loved for who we are.
*
Rachel stirred the contents of the boiling kettle, then stepped coolly to the side as Phineas and I neared with buckets of sap.
Phineas made a face. “I don’t carry any diseases, Miss Welds.”
The look she gave him suggested that, in her opinion, his entire person was an unsavory contagion.
I sighed. They were fighting. Again. “Watch out now.” With my foot I nudged Ephraim away before adding my sap to the kettle. I cast aside the bucket, slid another log onto the fire, then swiped my dusty hands on my trousers. “Last night’s unrequested Bible lesson was your mistake, Phin. You shouldn’t have started in on how all evil in the world stems from Eve’s transgression in the Garden.”
A smile trembled on his lips. “It’s not exactly a new theory, and truly, it doesn’t say much for Adam, succumbing so—”
Rachel gave him her back. “The children are going to miss you.”
The snub made me smile. “I’ll miss them, too.” And Marian’s hospitality and Rachel’s friendship and even (most of) Phineas’s jokes. But the missing wouldn’t keep me from Daniel.
It was Thursday. Though the party was the next day and we probably should have been inside preparing for the event, Phin reckoned the afternoon might be our last chance for sugaring. “Wind’s turning southerly,” he’d said this morning.
One thing I wouldn’t miss was the perpetual squabbling. To escape another round, I wandered across the yard to the woodpile, where the children were stacking kindling and playing at cabin building.
Behind me, Rachel called, “How many children should we have, Freddy?”
I tripped as I turned.
Phineas shot me an evil grin and repeated my former proclamation about this matter: “As many as God wills.”
Rachel sniffed. “Then I hope God gives us many, many children.”
Phineas shuddered with exaggerated revulsion.
I couldn’t repress my own shiver. This was something Daniel and I had yet to discuss. I didn’t want to give birth to a tribe. Thanks to the intriguing information Phineas had imparted on our journey, I knew how to prevent such a fate. Two children would suffice for me.
Marian appeared in the doorway and gave the combatants an exasperated look.
I regained my smile. No matter how irate Marian appeared, it was hard to be intimidated by a woman absolutely round with child.
“Try to be cheerful, friends,” she ordered. “We have a gathering to look forward to.” Then, hopefully: “I have an idea! Let’s practice some music. Phin, you want to warm up your fiddle tonight after supper, give us a taste of tomorrow’s tunes?”
“No.” He settled the neck yoke across his shoulders. The empty buckets swung on the ends like silent bells. “I don’t perform for bedlamites.”
“Bedlamites?” Rachel glared at him.
“Anyone wishing for a whole litter of irritating babies is insane.”
Thinking I might halt Rachel’s answering cut, I asked quickly, “How about some music, Miss Welds? Why don’t you sing for us before bedtime?” Singing I knew she loved to do.
“Sorry but no.” She turned up her nose at Phineas’s departing back and resumed stirring the boiling sap. Loudly: “I don’t sing for misanthropes.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
There was certainly no questioning the effectiveness of Phineas and his sister’s ability to spread word of their gathering. After cramming the morning hours with food preparations, we had just enough time to scrub and dress the children, then scrub and dress ourselves, before neighbors (if neighbors they could be called, living as far away as some of them did) began to arrive. They came on foot, on mule, by wagon, and one, two, even three to a horse. Undoubtedly, they crossed streams, circled swamps, and threaded through the woods according to the markings on the trees.
I couldn’t have provided a background fact for a single one—which guest sprang from prosperous New England stock and which one had entered this wilderness with nothing but an ax to his name. It didn’t matter. The guests were consistently young (for who else but the robust and unfettered would be brash and able enough to take on this frontier?) and thrilled for the occasion to gather. They greeted us, veritable strangers, like long-lost friends. Too much solitude in the disparate nooks of the forest had made them ready for companionship.
Marian’s oldest two climbed into the oak Phineas had left standing close to the house for shade, and they heralded new arrivals with shouts. The men brought whiskey, the women food, probably more than they could spare. And as soon as Daniel, Gid, and the Welds brothers arrived, Phineas rosined his bow, tuned his instrument, and started the music.