Ten Thousand Charms (25 page)

The afternoons were busy, too. Of course there were dishes to be cleaned and put away. The floors were swept. There seemed to be an endless supply of things to wash or repair. John William worked on creating the larger corral necessary to accommodate his horses. Gloria returned to the garden, finding a new love among its tidy rows of promise. It also
allowed her, with just the slightest turn of her head, to watch John William work.

The babies flourished. Gloria and Maureen took the canvas cover from the wagon and spread it on the ground for Danny and Kate to lie on while the women worked outside. They rolled from one end to the other, and frequently either Maureen or Gloria would have to rush to rescue someone in danger of rolling straight through the onions. At mealtime, the babies sat on laps around the table and experimented with whatever the adults were eating. Maureen soaked cubes of bread in milk and sugar, much to Kate's gummy delight. They also had tastes of cooked carrots and soft cooked noodles. Gloria's heart skipped a beat with each little mashed bite. The day would come when they wouldn't need her at all.

Then there were the evenings. The hours after supper and before bed were Gloria's favorite of the day. Supper was usually a light fare—perhaps soup or stew that had been bubbling through the late afternoon—which made a quick and easy cleanup. Then everyone settled into the parlor. The lamps on the mantel and small table made a cozy glow in the room. Maureen taught Gloria a simple stitch, and soon she set herself to making what she hoped would be a scarf. John William sat on the floor, his long legs stretched in front of him, and played with the children, letting each take a turn grasping his fingers and stretching to early, tentative steps.

And the conversations, the stories. The little parlor brimmed with laughter and thoughtful silences as, hour by hour, Maureen and Gloria and John William shared their lives with each other. This is where Gloria learned that John William grew up in Illinois. His father, an immigrant from Scotland, married a lovely Irish girl who died when John William was just five years old. He was a hired field hand who never owned his own farm. He drank heavily, much to the shame of his family, and John William's first fights were an attempt to defend his family's honor.

He told Maureen about his days as a boxer, about the death of two men at his hands, about prison. Gloria sensed his acute
shame as he told the story, and she longed to reach out and comfort him. But as he told of his “salvation,” his voice took on a tone of triumphant joy, and Maureen muttered a tearful, “Praise God.” Gloria felt a little like an outsider, like someone who didn't quite understand the language of the room.

At some point, after the babies were fed for the final time and sleepy, the long day's work wore on everyone. There were yawns and stretches and declarations of being asleep before the head hit the pillow Every night, starting that first night, John William bent low to kiss Maureen's soft cheek, then stood and nodded good night to Gloria before going outside to check on the livestock one last time. Gloria and Maureen went into their room where, over the course of changing into nightgowns and brushing and braiding hair, the conversation continued to flow

When Gloria finally sank into the softness of Maureen's feathered pillow, she lingered awake but silent, respectful of the prayers of the friend beside her. She listened until she heard John William come back in and latch the door. She waited for the soft thump of the second boot, the rustle of straw. She tried to wait for the familiar buzz of his snore, but often fell asleep before she heard it, wondering if he were praying, too.

One evening there was a dazzling sunset that washed the farm in brilliant color. Gloria stood at the kitchen window, mesmerized, her hands wiping dishes. Behind her, John William sat at the table, jotting down rows of numbers that had something to do with the amount of seed needed to expand next year's crop. Maureen was out in the yard keeping the babies amused until Gloria was finished tidying up.

“She really loves the children,” Gloria said, looking over her shoulder at John William.

“Mm hmm.”

“You shouldn't tip that chair back like that, you know. You'll crack your skull.”

“Mm hmm.”

Gloria sighed and returned to the task at hand. She remembered a conversation with the girls back at Jewell's, about the deep satisfaction of doing dishes. Right now, she thought she'd really rather be outside playing with the babies, but that stemmed more from the frustration of being ignored.

“You know,” she said, amused with the prospect of annoying John William with her talk, “when I was at Jewell's, we had a thought about doing dishes. I said that 1 actually liked doing them because it was like getting a fresh start to the day. Then Biddy— I'm not sure you remember her; she was so young and so…sad.”

Gloria allowed her voice to trail, wondering if John William would follow it. When he didn't, she simply picked up a cup and resumed.

“Well, Biddy said that she thought what would be even better than that would be having your own home and doing your own dishes.” She smiled a little at the memory, and sent a wish that Biddy was sharing some of the happiness that she was now. “Then Sadie—I know you remember Sadie—she said.

Again she left a silent little trail, but this time she simply remembered what Sadie had said, and decided she didn't want to share after all. She set the cup to drain on the countertop and rummaged through the soapy water in search of another.

“What did Sadie say?” His voice was quiet, distracted.

“It's not important. You know Sadie.”

“No, tell me.” She could tell he was looking up from his papers. Looking at her.

“Well, she said…” Gloria straightened her shoulders and assumed the tall woman's posture and worked her voice around an exaggerated German accent. “Washing in your own home would be
gut,
but what would be
best
would be to have the man of the house…”

“Yes?”

She dropped the accent. “To have the man of the house come up behind you—now remember, this was Sadie talking—come
up behind you, give you a little nuzzle on your neck and say Tut, tut love, you look tired. Why don't you go lie down and let me finish up?'”

She'd stayed true to Sadie's words and immediately felt stupid for it. She could have said anything, made up any clever quip, but her mind was not as sharp and witty as her old friend's was, and the silence that followed was unbearable.

Then she heard the sound of two chair legs landing on the smooth wood floor and the scrape of them as he backed the chair away. She sensed rather than heard him unfold his long body from behind the table, felt the footsteps that brought him up behind her.

His breath was warm on the back of her. neck, but perhaps she felt it only because her own had stopped. He was leaning in closer, so close that if she were to turn her head, his whiskers would graze her face.

She didn't turn her head. He turned it for her. He brought his hand around her to rest on her chin and turned her face to look straight into his.

“Well now, darlin',” he said, that warm smile on his face. “I don't think you look a bit tired.” He brought the tip of his nose to briefly nuzzle the tip of hers, then took the last corn muffin from the platter about to be washed and went outside to play

ou can't make me go,” she said that morning even as she carried the blanket and food for the church dinner out to the wagon.

“You're going,” he said, amused by her protest.
“What about the babies?”
“They're fine with me,” said Maureen. “Kate oughtn't go out with this sniffle anyway. Besides,” she added with a wink, “might be nice for the two of you to have a little time alone.”

The morning crackled with the timid chill of early September, a chill that would disappear long before noon. The sun climbed higher with each turn of the wagon's wheels, sending a golden light across acres and acres of ripened wheat ready for harvest. His wheat. His harvest. Or it would be some year. He had enough cash to meet half of Maureen's asking price for the farm; the other half he would pay in labor—taking no share of the profits—until a fair price had been paid. He still wasn't sure who profited from the deal more: Maureen for the opportunity to stay with the life she so dearly loved, or him for having a soft buffer to come between him and Gloria.

“I won't know what to do.”

“I'll show you.”

Land rolled all around them, soft sloping fields bordered by towering trees. They passed freshly cleared land of new homesteads, drove through cold gurgling streams. Morning dew muffled the horses’ hooves and discouraged dust.

“I won't know what to say.”

“Say no thin'.”

A series of structures dotted the horizon. Middleton. A new, limited general store. A livery stable. A post office. A church.

It wasn't until he reached up to help her down from the wagon that John William realized Gloria's protests were born not of stubbornness but of fear. She was firmly on the ground, but she kept a grip on his arm as if to save her very life.

“They won't like me.”

“They don't know you.”

“But I don't belong—”

“Everybody belongs in God's house.” He tried to adjust his tone from one of chastisement to reassurance, but her frozen expression told him he hadn't soothed her at all. One arm wanted to fold her to him and bring shelter from whatever unkindness she anticipated, the other wanted to yank her through the doorway. Luckily, the warm, welcoming voice of Josephine Logan kept him from doing either.

“Gloria? Oh, Gloria, I'm so glad you could join us this morning.”

“G'mornin’ Mrs. Logan,” John William said, touching his fingers to his hat.

“Mr. MacGregan,” Josephine said. She gave an eager look around before asking, “Where are the babies?”

“At home," Gloria said, with more than a little resentment in her voice. “Mrs. Brewster is watching them this morning. Kate had a bit of a sniffle.”

“So you are staying at the Brewster place,” Josephine said. “How kind of her to stay behind this morning.”

“Oh, yes," Gloria said, her voice dripping sweetness. “She is kindness itself.”

Just then Reverend Thomas Fuller stood on the top step and called out, “Come and worship! Let us gather in worship!” and the crowd began to move toward the door.

John William cradled Gloria's elbow and steered her inside.
He took them to the last row of seats, right up against the back wall, and settled in with Gloria sitting on the aisle.

“You may leave any time you wish,” he whispered in her ear.

Gloria turned and said, without whispering, ‘I know that.’

“But I'd like you to stay!”

When the congregation stood to sing, Gloria stood with them, stoic and silent by his side. John William always loved to sing; he rather vainly enjoyed the admiring looks given over the shoulders of the people in front of him. Gloria had told him once that he had a very nice voice, and when he asked her to sing, she'd laughed and said, “The only songs I know would make your ears turn to fire.” He'd caught her humming to the children and trilling nonsense verses countless times. But now she made no sound. He held the hymnbook between them, ran his finger along the lines of text, but she just stared at a point on the floor somewhere, and he remembered she couldn't read.

The songs were followed by a time of prayer. At Maureen's, they'd developed the habit of joining hands, so John William reached for her, only to realize that both her hands were folded into her crossed arms. He brought his hand back, allowed one to clutch the other, and bowed his head.

Reverend Fuller was five minutes into his sermon when Adele walked in.

“I'm sorry, father,” she said quietly as she passed in front of the pulpit and made her way down the aisle. The smile on her face said she was completely aware of every eye on her. Her wide silk skirt brushed against the pews as she made her way to the back, to the very back where John William and Gloria sat.

“May I sit here?” she said.

John William nodded and slid down the bench.

“I guess she didn't hear me,” Adele whispered. At least that's what John William thought she said, for she was sitting to his right, the side with his badly damaged ear. Soon the smell of
Adele Fuller's lavender water engulfed Gloria's clean, soapy scent. Her silk-clad arm brushed against his as she opened her Bible. When he turned his good ear toward the pulpit in order to hear the sermon, his peripheral vision captured the lace ruffle that rose and fell with her breath. So he scooted over one more inch, faced straight ahead, and allowed the preacher's words to disappear.