The Revenant (20 page)

Chapter 28

E
VERY DAY THAT WEEK
I spent my mornings in the loft. When I wasn’t dreaming of Eli, I sorted through my bottled-up frustrations—things I would have shared with Olivia if she’d been near and didn’t loathe me for being a liar.

What would she make of my nightmares? The more I considered the matter from her point of view, the clearer it became. In those moments before I’d lost consciousness, when I was so close to death, I’d seen a dark-haired boy. Cale Hawkins. Somehow he’d reached out to me, and his spirit had guided what happened in the river. His rage—the violence unleashed on Fannie and Lucy, the very same rage that shattered my window—had somehow possessed my own body. But that rage had cooled when the river claimed the doctor, leaving me with nothing but the blurry visions of my dreams.

Once I’d imagined Olivia explaining it that way, my nightmares came less frequently, and when they did come, they weren’t quite so terrifying.

I often thought of writing to her, though I doubted Crenshaw would pass my letter along. I could see her keeping it from Olivia lest it prove upsetting—she would consider it part of her duty to protect the staff after a harrowing incident. I couldn’t blame her, really.

Even if the letter did reach Olivia, what would it say? How could I explain? If there’d been paper in the house, I would have written down my thoughts to see if they looked as pathetic as I feared. But Mother did not keep stores of paper for idle scribbling, so I tested the words aloud in the loft when the kittens were sleeping.

“Dearest Olivia,” I always started. And then something would catch in my throat. But that day I was determined to get the jumbled thoughts out of my head. “Dearest Olivia, I hope you are well. I miss you.” I paused, grappling for the right words. “By now you probably know I am not Angeline McClure, and that I was only pretending to be a teacher. I lied because … well, because I had a terrible home life and lying was the only way to escape it.”

I could see Olivia reading that letter, gasping at the thought of my parents beating me until my only choice was to lie, steal, and run away. That would not do. The last thing I wanted was to mislead her with yet another half-truth.

“Olivia, I lied because my mother was forcing me to leave school and come home to work on the farm. The very idea of such drudgery was unbearable. My papa would have turned in his grave—”

“Willemeeeeeena!”

I jumped at the high-pitched voice. After catching my breath, I scrambled across to the wide loft window and peered over the edge. Freddy and Hal were looking up at me, stubby little figures with wide eyes and red cheeks.

“What?”

Hal tilted his head. “Who you talkin’ to?”

“Nobody. What do you want?”

“Has the kitties opened their eyes yet?” Freddy asked, bouncing with excitement. “We wanna play with ’em and Mama says we can’t till they open their eyes.”

“The kittens are still too little. I’m afraid you’ll hurt them. Now go on back to the house.”

Both boys hung their heads. Then Freddy bounced again. “Can we come up there and just
look
at ’em? We’ll be good, I promise.”

“No, Freddy! I want to be alone right now.”

“But
why
?”

“Because you annoy me. Now go on home.”

Freddy looked at Hal. “What’s annoy?”

Hal shrugged and kicked at the dirt.

I scrambled back to my spot in the hay, hoping they’d give up and return to the house. But after several false starts, I could not pick up the thread of my letter to Olivia. Nor could I settle into romantic thoughts of Eli again. The peace of the morning had been rudely interrupted, and I could sit still no longer.

I decided to walk the property. It seemed the only way to stay ahead of the thoughts that haunted me.

That night I stood once more at the sink with Mother, drying dishes as we did every night. My hands were busy, but my mind was far away.

I’d fully intended not to be the first to speak. And I’d held to that. But that night I couldn’t keep the deep sigh of self-pity trapped inside any longer. When the mournful breath rushed out of my mouth, Mother finally looked at me.

“Are you ready to tell me why you felt it necessary to run away, Willemina?”

As if I could explain in a way
she
could understand! A year ago the thought of going home had made me physically ill. It broke my heart to be in the house without Papa, and I couldn’t bear to see Mama smile lovingly at Toomey or his boys.

“You betrayed Father.” I kept my eyes on the plate in my hands.

“By remarrying?”

“You barely mourned him, Mother!” I stacked the dried plate on the table with the others and stared at her. “If you’d loved him, you’d have mourned at least a year, if not more. But, no, you were married again in a month and carrying the twins not long after that. It makes me wonder …”

Her face was grim. “What?”

The suspicion that had wedged itself into my heart years ago now ached to be pulled out and laid bare. I’d never voiced it, but I was a different person now. A stronger person, willing to face the darkness rather than run. Taking a deep breath, I looked her squarely in the eye. “It made me wonder if you and Toomey did not wait for Papa to die.”

She pulled her hands from the water and wiped them on her apron, a gesture made almost violent by her anger. “Let me tell you something about your beloved papa, Willie.” Her voice was cutting. “He was a drunk and a spendthrift. He drank himself into an early grave and left me with a heavily mortgaged farm. I had nothing. No family to turn to. I thought we’d have to leave the farm and go beg on the streets of Columbia. But Gabriel Toomey, who’d always been a good neighbor, took pity on me. He helped with the harvest and shared his food. He was a good friend to us—an honest, steady man who knew how to save rather than spend.”

“But Toomey is such a …”

Her mouth tightened. “Such a what?”

“He’s an oaf, Mother! Slow and uncouth. I couldn’t see why you’d befriend him, let alone
marry
him.”

She laughed bitterly. “I was so taken in by your father’s dandy ways—a man of the theater who wished to retire to the country and play lord of the manor. I had no idea how little he knew about farming, and how little time it would take him to go through the money it’d taken my parents
years
to save. He missed the stage, you see. He didn’t find peace out here. Instead, he longed for the attention he received as a performer.”

“How could you blame him?”

“I didn’t blame him for missing the stage! I blamed him for taking advantage of me. And for making me suffer for
his
disappointment.”

At those words I turned to walk away, out of that crypt of a house, but she grabbed my arm with her damp hand. Her fingers were strong as talons.

“No!” she hissed. “You will stay and listen.”

“Mother!”

She held my gaze, waiting for me to be still. Then she took a deep breath. “Your father told me he wanted a quiet life in the country, and that is why I married him. The first few years were fine, especially after you were born, because you distracted me from seeing the truth about him. But by the time you were in school, I was begging for food on credit from the grocery. I was milking the cow and feeding the chickens and working in that garden where nothing ever grew because the birds would always get to it first. I was doing it all by myself. And do you know what your father was doing? Sitting in his study, drinking his whiskey and planning the first season of his Columbia Theater.”

Her words were cruel blows, but my heart resisted them. Papa was a noble and loving man, and it burned me up with anger to hear him cast as the villain. My fondest memories were of sitting in his study while he talked to me about the theater. When he told stories from the past or shared his dreams for the future, it made me feel older, wiser—as though I
mattered
.

“Your bitterness sucked the life out of Papa,” I finally replied, meeting Mother’s eyes directly. “You never could find it in your heart to believe in him or his dreams, and that drove him to ruin!”

She stared at me, her face white with anger. When she finally eased her grip, I tore away and stumbled from the room, ignoring Toomey’s growl of exasperation as I pushed past him. A high-pitched wail sounded from the kitchen as baby Christabel began to cry. I barely managed to make it upstairs before my own tears came.

Chapter 29

M
OTHER AVOIDED ME
for the next few days, which was just fine. If Papa had been a drunk, she drove him to it—I was certain of that. Such a fretful, frowning woman would send any man straight to the bottle. Steering well clear of her, I did my chores as usual and spent the rest of my time in the hayloft.

But one day when I was washing the sweat and filth from my arms after slopping the pigs, I turned to find two pairs of eyes staring at me. Freddy and Hal stood by the trough, their freckles prominent against their pale skin. Freddy twisted his hands together, opening and closing his mouth as though to speak, but no sound came out. His cheeks flushed with color, and he looked to Hal for help.

Hal swallowed. “May we please see the kitties now, if it’s not too much trouble?” His voice was barely audible. Both boys were wide-eyed with hope, but Freddy flinched when I stepped toward them.

My heart seemed to contract and soften at the same time.

“I think the kittens are ready for you now. But you must be very gentle.”

I helped them up the ladder, surprised by the agility of their stubby limbs.

“Walk slowly, now,” I said when we’d reached the loft, “and don’t make too much noise.”

“We know,” Hal said softly.

The kittens had finished their morning meal and lay curled up together, their soft bodies curiously interwoven. I stroked the mama’s head while the boys knelt over the kitties, crooning in delight.

“Be gentle,” whispered Freddy.

“
You
be gentle,” replied Hal.

They both managed better than I expected. When I saw how softly they handled the kittens, I allowed them each to take one into his lap. Already accustomed to being held, the kittens snuggled comfortably against the boys’ warm bellies. Freddy giggled as his kitten stretched on its back to reveal the white fluff of its tummy. Hal seemed more entranced by how wide his kitten could open its mouth when it yawned.

Freddy glanced up at me. “Can we take them back to the house?”

Hal frowned. “No, silly! They gotta stay with their mama.” He turned to me. “Right, Willie?”

“That’s right, Hal,” I murmured.

Freddy stroked his kitten’s ear. “But Christabel wants to see them.”

“She’s just a baby!” Hal cried.

I laughed. “Sharing the kittens with Christabel is a sweet idea, Freddy, but they’re still too young, and Christabel is barely able to sit up on her own. She’ll appreciate them more when she’s older.”

“By then they won’t be wee kitties anymore!” Freddy’s lower lip trembled.

“I expect Mama Cat will have more babies in the future.”

Strangely enough, the boys weren’t so loathsome when they were quiet. Toys and games brought out their savagery—I’d seen plenty of evidence for that—but these tiny kittens prompted tenderness. Freddy and Hal might turn out human, after all, even with Toomey as their father.

When I heard growls erupting from their bellies, I knew it was nearing time for the midday meal. So I helped them down the ladder, and together we made our way back to the house.

Toomey stood by the side door. His face broke into a grin when the boys ran toward him, and he listened patiently as they chattered in unison about holding the kittens. After he’d shooed them in the house, he turned to me.

“Thanks for that. They’ve been talking about those creatures for days.”

I shrugged.

His expression sobered. “Willie, you really should put things right with your mother. None of us can be happy until the two of you are civil again.”

A strange and unwelcome longing tugged at my heart, but I hardened myself against it. “I’ve suddenly lost my appetite,” I said.

His eyes were sad as he watched me turn away toward the orchard.

Everyone left me alone after that. The boys did not ask to see the kittens again. Mother avoided my gaze, and Toomey made no further attempts to coax me toward reconciliation. As long as I did my morning and evening chores, no one complained when I avoided the house for hours on end.

Problem was, that left me plenty of time to think—and remember.

When I was very little, we had farmhands for the heavy work. Mother worked in the house—cooking, cleaning, and sewing—and I fancied myself her helper. She watched patiently as I coated myself with flour in the kitchen or accidentally trampled the laundry while helping fold it. She even asked Papa to make me a small broom so I could work with her when she swept. And she’d taken ever so much time to teach me my first simple stitches.

Not that she always had me working. When she hung out the laundry, I danced and collected dandelions. When I bruised a knee with too much rough play, she would sing the pain away. At night, she read fairy tales to me by candlelight. On Sundays after church, she and Papa would take turns leading the fat pony as I rode around the paddock.

When had things changed, and why? All I knew was that Papa began to spend less time overseeing the farm, preferring instead to keep to his study. The fat pony was sold, much to my dismay. The hired help came less often, until the day they stopped coming at all. Weeds began to grow in the garden and the animals sickened and sometimes died.

When Mama took over the farm chores, I was left to play in Papa’s study. That room, hazy with sweet-smelling pipe smoke, became a refuge from Mama’s wan face and scolding words. I whiled away the hours paging through books or listening to Papa recount his former triumphs on the stage. While the rest of the house collected dust and cobwebs, the study grew ever more enchanting, for it was a place to indulge in fancies without fear of reproach.

As I lay in the hayloft, looking back at those times with the inner eye of experience, a troubling thought struck me. When I was eleven years old, Papa and I became a team. Our sport? How best to evade Mother and all the duties she seemed determined to thrust upon us. We wanted nothing to do with someone who was forever tired and sour in disposition.

How could she let us be so selfish?

That night as I dried the dishes, I smothered my pride and spoke to Mother.

“Why didn’t you tell Papa you needed help?”

She flinched at the sound of my voice. “What did you say?”

“Back when you worked all the time with the animals and in the garden. Why didn’t you make Papa help you?”

“I couldn’t
make
your father do anything,” she said, still staring at the pan she washed. “I did ask him. I begged, in fact. And he promised again and again to help.” She lifted the pan to scrub at the crevices.

“And?” I prompted.

“Sometimes he would put the bottle aside and work for a day or two. But he never could stick with it. There was always an excuse, for he was forever in the middle of some grand project. Before long, he’d be drunk again with his friends.”

“Maybe he could only stand your critical gaze for so long,” I said.

She grimaced, handing me the pan to dry. “Willie, I know you think I’m punishing you for your father’s failings, but I’m not.”

“I only wanted to finish school! It certainly seemed like a punishment when you told me I’d have to come home.”

“It was supposed to be a temporary change. I fully intended for you to finish your schooling.” She forcefully splashed the last pan into the water. “I never expected you to do something so foolish as run away.”

“I took good care of myself, Mother. And I made sure to send money to make up for the lost labor. Why couldn’t you just let me go? Why did you have to send Toomey to bring me home?”

Finally, she turned to look at me. “I wanted you home because I missed you and feared you might come to harm. And as it turns out, I was right to worry! We nearly lost you to that river. You
think
you can take care of yourself, but you are too much like your father in doing so—lying, cutting corners, hurting others.”

I winced.

“Your father spoiled you rotten, Willemina,” she continued. “It’s time you learned about
honest
work and sticking to it even when the going gets tough.”

I chewed my lip for a minute, stewing over this. “Will I ever be able to go back to school?”

She sighed and rubbed her forehead with the back of her hand. “We’ll see. I know you have savings, but you’ll need to set aside more if you’re to pay tuition. Perhaps not this fall, but next.”

“More than a year? That’s an eternity! I’ll be an old woman by then.”

“In a year you might begin to learn patience.”