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I stopped pacing and sat beside Annie again. She had a pile of blouses on the bed, and I handed them to her to put in her suitcase. “I have tuberculosis, and John’s having a child with another—well, I can’t call her a lady—that person,” Annie said.
“Annie, you know you’re the only woman in my world. Do you remember when I was eight? You were teaching me words and geography. You gave me an orange surrounded by raisins to show me the place of the sun and the planets.”
“Are you trying to cheer me up?”
“You wanted me to know about the sun’s heat. So you took me on a long walk—we walked all morning to see that furnace.”
“I took you over half of creation, Helen. That was my job.”
“The closer we got to that enormous furnace—it burned, what? Two tons of coal an hour? The closer we got …”
“The more you recoiled from it. You stopped, three blocks away, and your dress was drenched with sweat from its heat. It was a blue pinafore, the fall of 1899.”
We both paused.
“I know the real reason you took me to see that furnace. It wasn’t to feel heat like the sun’s.”
“No, no, it wasn’t.”
“It was Mother and Father fighting that day in the house, wasn’t it?”
“They were fighting. They were—”
“I felt the china shatter. I picked up the broken shards.”
“Your father said you were a drain on the family. That your mother was not herself anymore.” Annie paused. “He wanted back the young woman he’d married.”
I sat right against Annie. Our legs brushed; her shoe touched mine.
“He didn’t want a child who saddened her.”
“No.”
“He didn’t want sickness.”
“Not all the time.”
Annie put her head down on the suitcase, and I stroked her hair. Once, twice, three times I stroked that rough hair, and then she took my hand in hers and held it, like old times. Finally she said, “The strange thing was, I found your father’s eyeglasses two weeks later, high atop the bookcase out back. Did you have anything to do with that, Helen?”
“I hid them there.”
“What on earth for? They were covered with coal dust. Your mother had to use kerosene to get them clean.”
“She’d been crying, and I knew it was because of me. So I hid his glasses. If he couldn’t find her next time, he couldn’t throw things.”
“You didn’t need to be exposed to that.”
“You wanted to keep me from suffering.”
“Yes.”
“So you took me to see that furnace, to get me out of the house.”
“I’ll never forget that monstrous heat. That day you said, ‘Did the sun fall?’”
“That’s what I imagined.”
“That’s what I feel like now. My husband has left me, had a baby. I have damned tuberculosis and am going away. I don’t know if I’m coming back.”
“If you go, who will take care of me in the future?”
She patted the suitcase, and I felt the ssnnaap as she fastened it shut.
“I’m contagious,” she said. “Starting now, it’s best to keep your distance.”
I felt dizzy.
“If there is a future,” Annie said, “it’s something I can’t see.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
Ssssssuuuuuup sssssuuuuup. Lying in bed that night I felt the thump-ca-thump of a car coming up the driveway; I drowsed again and was awakened by the ping of rock against my bedroom window. Peter, agile but afraid of heights, had climbed the rickety rose trellis on the side of the house. When I slid open the window he climbed in. The rose thorns had torn at his sleeves.
“I heard about Annie. John called to rant and rave about her taking his things.”
“You talked to John?”
“He’s really steamed. Said she had no right.” But then Peter must have felt my hand stiffen, because he stopped. “Helen, they had the baby two days ago. Now the house is all torn up and he …”
I stood still.
“I should stop, shouldn’t I?”
I said nothing.
“No, I shouldn’t have started. Helen, I’m sorry. It turns out Annie called John this afternoon—”
“She told him about the TB before she told me?”
“You were … tied up.”
“Oh.” A wash of pleasure ran through me.
“She said she was sick, he had to come home, to take care of you like he used to.”
“She did? What did he say?”
“He said he has a baby now, and can’t leave. But Helen, you’ve got me.”
“I’ve got you. But Mother threatened to take me to Alabama if Annie was sick.”
“She’s probably booking you passage on the SS Savannah as we speak. But if she does take you south, don’t worry. I’ll take you off the boat in Georgia. I’ve got a minister friend in Florida who will marry us. I’ll take you there and we’ll wed.” I felt a click as a light in the hallway went on, signaling someone afoot. He spelled even faster, “But your mother’s not taking you anywhere. Our license is ready in two weeks, anyone at Boston City Hall can marry us. You, me, two weeks from now. Are you in?”
“I’m ready.” As he started to climb down the trellis, footsteps neared in the hallway. I leaned over and kissed him and he pulled away.
Stay with me. Stay.
The next morning I plummeted out of a dream of Annie, myself, and John Albert Macy living in the Wrentham house like a family. Then I remembered it was the day to go to Boston and hastily got dressed. The sudden thump of Peter’s car bumping up the gravel drive at six a.m. made me find my way quickly down the hall, and as I reached the first floor and the front door closed behind me, I knew I had won.
No one could stop me now.
I leaned against the window the first half-hour of the long train ride to Boston, even when Peter tried to tug me out of my seat by the window to come with him to the sleeper car at the far end of the train. “You need rest,” he said. But it wasn’t rest I was after: I needed balm for my bruised heart. I had the urge to race through getting my marriage license in Boston, skip the rally on Boston Common, and get back to Annie.
“Why so blue? Come on,” Peter said, pulling me away from the window. “Annie’s a fighter. She’ll be back in Boston in a month, she’ll shake this thing.” Peter suddenly stood up. “I’m still learning this secretary trade. I got us the tickets to Boston but I forgot to bring food. Coffee? Rolls? The club car’s open.”
I reached for my bag and pulled out my wallet.
“No, Helen. We’re going to get our marriage license. For God’s sake, I can pay for a couple of sweet rolls.”
“You’re my sweet ro
ll.”
“Sweet I’m not.”
“Right. You’re actually quite tart.”
“You’re the tart,” he laughed, and I felt him nuzzle my bare neck. A flood of memories came to me from the cherry tobacco scent of him opening me, opening.
I leaned back in my seat, remembering how Peter had pushed my cream-colored skirt to the floor. Peter’s hand drifted to the inside of my thigh.
“We’re in public.” I pushed his hand, reluctantly, away.
“We’ll have a good trip back.” I felt his warm hand on my back. “I’ve booked us a sleeper. So let’s get some food and eat. You’re going to need your strength.”
The train windows vibrated, and cold air scented of granite, water, and steel swooshed into the car, telling me we passed over a bridge, a river swirling far below. I tried to act calm when Peter slid back into the seat next to me; the metal tray he held out was cool to my fingers. “I’ve brought breakfast. Just toast and coffee. Now open up.” He handed me a cup of coffee.
“Swallow, missy. Open up and swallow.”
The coffee’s warmth flooded through me, and when I took a bite of toast I tasted the bittersweet tang of marmalade.
“That’s my girl. Eats like a horse, even under stress.”
“Peter.”
“Well, it’s true, isn’t it? Didn’t you tell me you’ve never been sick a day in your life?”
“Yes, except the day I went blind and deaf.” I brushed my hair behind my ears.
“Sorry. It’s just that, well, you’re so damned robust.”
“Annie’s always been the susceptible one.”
“Helen, you’re not going to like this, but John doesn’t even think Annie has tuberculosis. He says he knows Annie, and he’s seen her with these coughs before. Doctors misdiagnose things all the time. Helen, I know you’re worried—who wouldn’t be? But keep your eye on the ball, here. It’s possible she’s just sick—run down—and that a few months in the tropics will …” He paused.
“Will what?”
“Well, let’s just say that a little time in the sun might help her get ready for whatever comes next.”
I thought at that moment that no matter how healthy Annie might be when she returned to Wrentham she’d still have to come home to the reality of John’s mistress and their newborn baby, but the fact that I’d married Peter behind her back would be the biggest betrayal of all.
