Sonoma Rose: An Elm Creek Quilts Novel (14 page)

Mrs. Diegel, the young widow who had moved to the valley from Los Angeles to assume responsibility for the hotel when her father’s health failed, certainly knew about their romance, but she was as discreet with her employees’ affairs as she was with her guests’. She never failed to greet Lars cordially when he showed up at the office with a sack lunch or a basket of fresh
apricots, but she never queried Rosa about him, except to note when they had returned late from an outing and to ask her to stay late to make up for it.

Perhaps Mrs. Diegel thought Lars was only one of several suitors, because he was not the only young man to visit Rosa at the hotel. John Barclay, whom she had rarely seen since he finished school four years ahead of her, had begun stopping by at least once a week to invite her to lunch or for a glass of lemonade after work. “I’m not a frivolous man, Rosa,” he told her once, as if anyone would accuse him of that particular fault. Sometimes she found herself wishing that Lars could be half as diligent and steadfast as his friend and frequent rival without losing his passion and sense of fun. Sometimes, too, when she was angry with Lars for his drinking, she wished she could forget about him and fall in love with someone like John instead—or John himself. He certainly seemed fond of her. But although she cared about John, enjoyed his company, and cherished their friendship, she loved only Lars, and she longed for the day he would quit drinking, her mother would abandon her prejudices, and they could marry.

But that day seemed ever more elusive. She was twenty and Lars twenty-two, and he was tired of the need for secrecy and had become increasingly impatient with her interminable delays. Twice they broke off their engagement only to reconcile within the week. His drunkenness became more frequent and more ugly. When he was sober he was all that she wanted in a husband—a loyal, honest, kind, and loving man. When he drank, they argued and she despaired. How could she build a home and raise a family with someone so unreliable, so unpredictable? How could she live without the man she loved with all her heart?

One afternoon, after a rare pleasant lunch with Lars that
had concluded with a long kiss good-bye over her desk, her mother suddenly appeared in her office doorway. “Mamá,” Rosa exclaimed, bolting out of her chair and greeting her with a kiss on the cheek. Lars had left only moments before; her mother must have passed him on her way through the lobby. What had she thought? What had she guessed? Rosa felt her knees trembling as she offered her mother a chair. “What a surprise! Is everything all right?”

Her mother regarded her sternly. “No, in fact, something is very wrong.” When Rosa sank into her own chair with the desk between them, stricken, her mother’s expression softened. “I didn’t mean to worry you, but
mija
, I am very troubled by your secrecy. I know—your father and I know—that you are in love. We think we know why you’ve been hiding this from us, but the time has come for you to tell the truth.”

Shaking, scarcely able to breathe, Rosa clenched her hands together in her lap. “How long have you known?”

Her mother put her head to one side and regarded her as if to say they had known for a very long time. “We waited as long as we could, hoping you would tell us on your own.”

Rosa hesitated, bewildered by her mother’s calm demeanor. “You aren’t angry?”

“Because you have deceived us, yes, very. Because you have fallen in love, no. Never.” Her mother smiled tenderly. “You’re a beautiful, loving young woman, Rosa. If you’ve found the love of a good man, we’re happy for you. We want to share in your happiness.”

“I—” Rosa could not believe what she was hearing. “I didn’t think you would approve. And I love him, but—I’m still not sure. He’s a good man, but—it’s just so hard to know what to do. There are things about him I wish he would change. I pray
for him to change. Can I really love him if I want him to be different?”

“Oh, Rosa.” Her mother rose and came behind the desk to embrace her. “Why did you keep your troubles to yourself for so long? I’m your mother. You can always talk to me about anything. You know I will always love you.”

“And I will always love you.” Rosa’s vision blurred with unshed tears. “And I will always love him. I know I will. But that doesn’t mean I should marry him.”

Her mother straightened, her brow furrowing. “Has he asked you to marry him?”

Rosa nodded.

“He should not have done that without speaking to your father.”

“You’re right. I know that. But it’s—well, you know how things are.” Tentatively, Rosa added, “I’m surprised you’re taking it so well yourself.”

“There’s no need for secrecy any longer,” her mother assured her. “Invite John to join us for Sunday dinner. We need to get to know the man who wants to marry our daughter.”

Rosa stared at her mother, as numb as if the air around her had frozen solid. As if from a very great distance, she heard herself say, “Invite…John?”

“Yes, and without delay,” her mother replied.

Rosa could not take a breath or find the words for a reply. John. Her parents thought she loved John.

John courted Rosa for two years. Once a month he came to Sunday dinner at the Diaz home, and every other Saturday he took Rosa out on a date—a picnic, a dance at the Arboles Lodge, or a day at Lake Sherwood with friends, outings from which one of
his oldest friends, Lars, was conspicuously absent. The longer Rosa misled her parents and John, the more difficult it became to extricate herself from the tangled threads of her lie. One morning in the hushed gray hour before dawn, her mother met her at the door when she returned home after a night at the cabin with Lars. “Why don’t you just marry him?” her mother implored, distressed and bewildered. Shaken, Rosa apologized for upsetting her mother, but she would not promise to stop slipping away at night. She knew she was moving inexorably closer to the day when she must elope with Lars or lose him forever, but as long as her mother believed Rosa went to John when she stole away from home under the cover of darkness, Rosa could defer that irrevocable choice.

And then, unexpectedly, the choice overtook her.

Her brother, Carlos, had finished school, and thanks to Rosa’s recommendation to Mrs. Diegel, he had obtained a job as a handyman at the Grand Union Hotel. He had inherited their father’s friendly, cheerful disposition as well as his gift for storytelling. One day in late July, Lars brought Rosa a basket of apricots fresh from the orchard, and to her relief, he did not remind her of her long-unfulfilled promise to come to the ranch for harvest someday. She savored the sweetness of one perfect apricot alone in her office and carried the rest home to share with her family. But her joy vanished the moment she entered the house and met her mother, who went impossibly motionless at the sight of the ripe fruit.

“Where did you get those?” her mother finally asked quietly, her dark eyes fixed on the basket.

“Mrs. Diegel gave them to me,” Rosa said lightly, setting the basket on the kitchen counter too quickly, as if the woven slats
had burned her palms. “She didn’t want them, so she gave them to me.”

A cold silence descended. Rosa was afraid to turn around and meet her mother’s gaze, but she felt her accusing stare boring into her back.

“You will never see him again,” her mother said in the same quiet voice.

Rosa whirled around to face her. “Mamá?”

“Marry John or don’t marry him, but you will never see Lars Jorgensen again.”

Shocked and dismayed, Rosa tried in vain to defend Lars, to defend herself for loving him, but her mother was resolute. Sick at heart, Rosa fled to her room, accidentally overturning the basket of apricots in passing.

Much later, Carlos knocked on her door and called softly to her, and when she allowed him to enter, he stepped cautiously into the room, white-faced and apologetic. He had not meant to divulge her secret; he had not even known she and Lars were in love. He had come home from work earlier than Rosa, as he often did, and when he told their mother about his day, he remarked that the Jorgensens’ apricot harvest must have gone well, because he had seen Lars carrying a basket of the fresh, ripe fruit into the hotel office. He had joked that Lars had probably given it to Mrs. Diegel to pay off his bar tab. He never could have imagined that barely an hour later, Rosa would walk through the front door with that same basket in her hands.

Rosa did not blame him for unwittingly divulging her secret—but now they were all complicit in keeping the secret from their father.

Through August and September, Rosa managed to see Lars
only twice, by leaving work early to meet him at the cabin. “Come away with me,” Lars urged moments before they parted, taking her hands and clasping them to his heart. “We’ll get married, and once it’s done, everyone will just have to get used to the idea. Your parents will forgive you eventually. You know they will.”

Rosa wanted desperately to believe him, but he was hungover from another drinking binge and she could not bear the thought of exchanging marriage vows with him so haggard and shaking and ill. “If you can go two weeks without a drink,” she said, “I swear I’ll marry you the next day.”

Elated, Lars vowed that not a drop of alcohol would touch his lips until they toasted each other with champagne on their wedding night. Since it was unlikely that she would be able to meet him each day to verify his sobriety, they agreed that he would light a lantern in the oak grove every night he kept his promise.

For five nights Rosa woke shortly after midnight, peered out her window, and glimpsed a pinprick of light like a distant star gleaming amid the oaks. On the sixth night, she woke to the sound of the wind stirring the curtains in the moonlight, threw off the quilt, and went to the window—but saw no glimmering light in the oak grove.

She took a deep breath, rested her arms on the windowsill, and stared into the shadows beneath the boughs. It was a windy night. Perhaps the shifting leaves and branches momentarily blocked the lantern from her view, and if she was patient, it would appear.

She waited.

Perhaps, she told herself, pulling her robe over her nightgown, the wind had put out the lantern. On bare feet she crept
silently through the living room past her mother, who breathed deeply and steadily on the sofa. She eased open the front door and swiftly ran to the stand of live oaks where she had climbed upon Lars’s horse and ridden off to the cabin on hundreds of other nights—but he was not there, nor did she find a darkened lantern, its flame extinguished.

The wind whipped her hair into her face as she turned back to the house. Unable to believe that he had failed her, she stayed awake all night at the window, hoping and praying that some unforeseen emergency on the ranch had merely delayed him. But the oak grove remained shadowed and still until the sunrise illuminated the valley.

Shame or gin kept Lars away the next two nights. The third night, exhausted from disappointment and heartache, Rosa slept until dawn. When she woke, for a fleeting moment she wondered if he had come, but then she remembered that it did not matter if she saw the distant flame the next night or the next or any other. Lars had broken his promise, he had made his choice, and she could not marry him.

On the morning of the fourteenth day, he came to see her at the Grand Union Hotel, his face pale, his eyes bloodshot, his hands shaking. He swore that he would never drink again, but she didn’t believe him. She couldn’t believe him. She told him it was over, and she told him good-bye.

She knew she had broken his heart and could not forgive herself for it. She confessed her sins to the elderly priest who had known her all her life and she did the penance he assigned, prayers and good works that seemed bewilderingly inadequate to atone for all the wrong she had done. As the days passed, exhaustion, worry, and guilt plagued her, and her appetite fled. At breakfast even her favorite dishes turned her stomach when her
mother set them on the table before her, and although she would shut her office door against the aromas wafting from the hotel kitchen, her queasiness often did not dissipate until early afternoon, if at all.

Rosa was nearly eight weeks pregnant when she realized—first, with a steadily growing awareness intertwined with dread and denial, and then with a shocked dismay so intense and sudden it left her breathless—that she was carrying Lars’s child.

She did not tell him. She did not tell anyone, though she knew it was a truth she could not conceal for long. For days her thoughts darted wildly, desperately, as she tried to stay calm and sort out what to do. The shame and humiliation she would bring upon herself, she would endure as the inevitable consequence of her poor choices and the just punishment for her sin. When she thought of her innocent child, however, and her parents, and her brother—then her heart broke again and again. Though they had done nothing wrong, they would share her disgrace.

Through all the turmoil and distress, Rosa had continued to let John court her. Lars’s profound failure cast John’s best qualities into a far more favorable light. John was pleasant company, and he was reliable and diligent. He did not drink. He would be a good provider. And then, when John came to Sunday dinner a week after Rosa discovered she was pregnant, her mother happened to remark that the Barclay farm had once been part of the old Rancho Triunfo, one of the sections the Norwegian immigrant who purchased it from Rosa’s great-grandparents had sold off to his more recently arrived countrymen.

Suddenly Rosa realized how she could give her child a father, spare her family shame, and regain part of the land her mother had longed for all her life. It would mean losing Lars forever—but she had already lost him.

John had often hinted that he wanted to marry her, and always before she had replied with gentle discouragement, emphasizing how much she valued him as a friend. Now, with her circumstances entirely transformed, she responded with new warmth borne of desperation and hope. One evening she overheard her parents talking earnestly in hushed voices, and she knew John had spoken to her father. The following afternoon, John was waiting for her on the front verandah of the Grand Union Hotel as she left work. He took her hand and invited her to walk with him through the hotel’s citrus grove, and when they were alone, he knelt in the middle of the stone path, took from his coat pocket a ring that had belonged to his grandmother, and asked her to marry him. Her thoughts flew to Lars, but she reminded herself what she owed her family and her unborn child, and she told John she would marry him.