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It galled him that the boardinghouse kept their children fed and clothed, the boardinghouse and the millinery Caty oversaw when she wasn’t cooking and scrubbing and mending, and she didn’t mind it, she didn’t mind it at all, if only Elias would stop dreaming and help just once in a while. She’d been telling him for weeks now the front door stuck, but he was too busy paying good money to stick advertisements in the paper for a waterwheel no one wanted.

It’s not money wasted when it makes our fortunes, he’d snapped, but the only fortune Caty saw was the amount they were spending on wood to heat the house through the winter. The cost had risen to sixteen dollars the cord, thanks in no small part to Ezra Weeks buying up every available log to make pipes for the Manhattan Well. That horrible, horrible well.

Was he now to enter into business with that Croucher, the man who had been spreading their shame throughout the city? The man who’d rather wear silk and beg his bread than dress in wool and pay for an honest meal?

“I don’t like that man,” Caty said doggedly. “I don’t trust him. He wears finery but he’s always late paying his rent.”

“What does thee know of it—of anything?” said Elias dismissively, and turned the key in the lock.

It was all too much. Caty followed him into the bedroom, the children’s trundles pushed neatly under the bed. She followed him as he yanked his cloak off the hook in the corner. “Did he tell thee—that Croucher? Did he tell thee he saw Elma and Levi together while I was in the country?”

She could see Elias’s hands clench, his knuckles very white against the dark wool. That was it, wasn’t it? Caty didn’t know whether to be angry or relieved. It was why he couldn’t meet her eyes. He’d known. He’d known and he’d done nothing.

When she’d been in the country a month, he’d sent her a letter, begging her to come back to the city. At the time, she’d felt a perverse satisfaction over it, that he’d realized he couldn’t manage without her, that he was finally seeing all the work she did, unnoticed, unthanked. She’d decided to make him stew, to see just how much she was worth, and stayed another two weeks in the country before coming back.

Not just to make him stew, of course. The children were so happy in Cornwall with her mother, and her mother was so happy with the children. But letting Elias miss her was part of it too.

Caty took the edges of Elias’s cloak, drawing them together over his chest for him. “Was that why thee wanted me to come back?”

Elias’s eyes slid away from hers as Caty fixed his cloak at his neck. “It was thy place to be at my side.”

Caty’s hands stilled on the careful bow she was tying. “He told thee. Or thee saw.”

“What does it matter—now?” She could feel the vibration in his chest as the words tore out, raw and horrible.

“It matters because—” Because she might have stopped it. Because Elias never told her anything anymore. Because they had stood up in the presence of God and their families and pledged to be loving and faithful so long as they both should live. Because she was meant to be his helpmeet, living in the Light of the Lord, and one couldn’t very well be a helpmeet when one’s husband never told one anything.

This wasn’t what they had promised each other ten years ago in the new meetinghouse, the bees buzzing happily in the flowers her mother had planted outside, the scent of sawdust still fresh in the air, the nails Caty herself had carried over from the smithy at New Windsor gleaming brightly, holding the whole together. She’d thought her marriage would be as solid as the new meetinghouse, as pure and bright, nailed together with true respect and affection.

Her voice low and unsteady, Caty said, “Does thou rate me so low that thou cannot share thy troubles?”

His finger brushed her cheek, the barest trace of a touch. Like when they were courting and he would cup her face in his hands, looking down at her as if she were all the riches of the world and his hope for salvation.

Caty leaned her cheek into his palm. “I might have shared thy burden. If I had known. . . .”

Elias’s hand dropped, his expression turning ugly. “What thee means is that thee would have answered the problem better. Does thee think thyself so subtle? Thee make no secret thee think me a poor excuse of a man.”

“Elias—I never—”

“Didn’t thee? When was the last time thee shared my bed?”

“We’ve four children in the room with us!”

“Thee ran off to thy mother at the first opportunity—”

“—to spare the children from the fever—”

“Thee judges me, flaunting thy industry. ‘Oh, Elias, look how many hats!’ Hats! I might have brought fresh water to the city! And thee taunt me with hats!”

“Might doesn’t put bread on the table.” Caty clapped her hand over her mouth but it was too late; the words were out.

Elias’s lips twisted into a sneer. “There’s the truth of it. Straight from thine own lips.”

“Elias—wait. Please. We can leave—go back to Cornwall—” Back to the fields of her youth, to the meetinghouse where they’d been married, to the smell of snow and bread baking and green things ready to grow. Her mother would be there to help with the children; the children would have their cousins, her brother’s children. Elias could tinker with his inventions to his heart’s content, Caty wouldn’t care so long as they were home again, away from this horrible place. “Think how happy we might be there. Back in the Cornwall meeting . . .”

“And have thee telling everyone of my failure. No. We’ll stay where we are.”

“And have thee giving our hard-earned coin to Richard Croucher?” Caty shouted after him.