Page 44

I barely register her words, thoughts of fire, of Moses, of Mr. Barrett, racing like clouds through my mind. “No, I don’t think so,” I say, trying to make my tone light and inconsequential and, to my ears at least, failing miserably.
Mrs. Tidewell lets out a sigh of relief. “I figured it was nonsense when I heard as much. Still hope for Abby then.”
I get the sense that whatever little friendship we just shared on the bench is already slipping away, and I’m once again an object of contempt. That’s more than fine with me. I need to get away from this gossipy woman and her insincerity. I stand quickly, the blood rushing from my head.
“Yes,” I say faintly. “Mrs. Tidewell, you must excuse me. I’m afraid I’ve just had a terrible headache come on. I think I must go home at once.”
19
I CAN’T GOhome right away though, because Catherine isn’t back yet. With my mind faraway and my legs shaking, I nearly miss the step as I climb in the carriage, and Joe has to catch me by the elbow to help me inside. I sit there, frozen, wrapped in thoughts as constricting and tangled as a spider’s web.
Why didn’t Mr. Barrett tell me? That night when he pulled me from the pond, he saw the trembling, smoldering wick of my soul, the truest, most vulnerable part of me. And whether I shared it willingly or not, it doesn’t matter, because I am at a disadvantage for being so transparent while he remains opaque and unknowable. Sometimes I feel as if we are standing on opposites sides of a great chasm, and I must watch helplessly as the gaping space between us widens.
I don’t know how long I sit like that biting my lips and letting my thoughts run away from me. I nearly jump out of my skin when the door opens again and Catherine appears, plopping herself unceremoniously across from me without a word. I take a deep breath.
As Joe closes the door behind her I catch his eye, silently trying to convey just how important it is that he doesn’t say anything to Mother. Good, dependable Joe who has been with us so long and must himself understand the importance of keeping Catherine out of trouble. He holds my gaze and gives me a short nod before gently latching the door and climbing up to the driver’s seat.
Catherine doesn’t say anything, just slowly peels off her gloves and folds her hands in her lap as she gazes out the window.
“Well,” I say crossly, “should I be congratulating you?” If she was going to act so brazenly and put our family’s reputation at risk again then she better at least have gotten a proposal out of him.
Catherine’s cool gaze slides away from the window and lands on me. She shifts a little in her seat, the faintest pink rising along her neck and at the tip of her ears. “He didn’t propose.”
I swallow back my disappointment and my urge to take her by the shoulders and shake the details out of her. Keeping my voice as level as I can, I ask, “Do you think he will soon?”
She heaves a sigh as if I had her chained up in a dungeon and was interrogating her for a crime she didn’t commit. “If youmustknow, he was rather detached. After I made it clear that we wouldn’t be doing anything besides talking he became disagreeable and left. If only I weren’t starting to show already,” she adds, more to herself than me. As if in chorus to this lament, the carriage jostles over a rut in the road, the wheels groaning and her hand instinctively flies to her stomach.
Catherine ignores my silence, though she must feel the angry charge in the air. Instead she takes up the bolt of fabric and runs her hand over it, frowning as if she had completely forgotten about the original purpose of the trip. “Was that Mrs. Tidewell I saw talking to you? What did she want?”
So she did see Mrs. Tidewell, and still went off with Mr. Pierce right in front of her eyes. I take a deep breath, willing myself not to lose my temper. “Nothing. It was nothing important. Just some passing gossip.” Not completely untrue, but Catherine immediately catches the hesitation in my voice.
“You’re a terrible liar,” she says. The pink has all but faded from her neck and she gives a little shrug. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”
I don’t think I’ve ever missed Emeline more than I have in this moment. I want to pull her up into my lap and forget my worries as I braid her hair and listen to her tell stories. She was always my shoulder to cry on, even if she didn’t know or understand what I was crying about. It’s not the day at the pond that makes me miss her the most, with its confusion, anger and helplessness. No, it’s these tiny, empty slivers of life, pockets of time, into which she had fit so perfectly and is now so conspicuously absent that leave me rattled and aching.
The words slip out against my better judgment. “She was telling me about how Mr. Barrett lost his mother and little brother. And to think, this whole time we’ve known him he’s never said a word about it.” I can’t stop the heavy, shuddering sigh that runs through me. “Poor John.”
Catherine unrolls the satin, her eye instantly locking on the minuscule stain from when I dropped it in the street. “Hmm? Oh, yes, the fire. I heard about that.”
My skin prickles hot. “You did? When?”
Her gaze sharpens as she realizes she has my attention now. “Mr. Barrett told me, though I can’t for the life of me remember when exactly.”
Mr. Barrett confided in Catherine, not me. Just the other day he sat in my bedroom and told me how sorry he was about Emeline, and never mentioned that he knew what it was like to lose a beloved sibling. What is it about me that he feels he can’t place his trust in me? What makes Catherine such a good confidante?
Catherine is still watching me with interest. “What, are you upset that he didn’t tell you? Don’t be small about it, Lydia. He lost his whole family and all you care about is that he told me instead of you.”
“No,” I say stubbornly. “I don’t care that he told you.”
“Mmm.” She shrugs and continues working her fingernail over the spot of mud.
She’s right of course. He lost his mother and brother in the most gruesome way possible, grew up destitute with a hard father, and then had to struggle and scrape to pay off debts that were not his own. How can I grudge him such a trivial matter as whom he decides to tell about his past?
But I still can’t shake the image of Catherine and Mr. Barrett standing close together at the far end of the hall, speaking in whispers, stealing a few moments together while I lay convalescing in my room. It’s the only time he could have told her.
God, how I wish Mr. Pierce had proposed. Because now, the next time Catherine and Mr. Barrett run into each other in the hall, what’s to keep her from throwing herself completely at him again?
* * *