Cheryl Reavis (14 page)

He put the book aside, and he had to literally force Caroline to let him arrange her and the bed for her labor. She kept trying to push him away, then clung to him as another
contraction began, her fingers digging painfully into his arms.

She abruptly let go, her body limp; the next pain came almost immediately. This time he gave her his hands to grip. The rain fell outside the slightly open window; the wind drove it into the room from time to time. He made no move to close the window because the room felt oppressively hot and humid to him. But Caroline still shivered, her teeth chattering in her need to get warm and in her fear.

Of course she would be afraid, he thought. She had been with Ann at the last, and in this very house.

Leah returned with a kettle of hot water and towels, ones Beata would shriek over when she knew how they had been used. He took them and the kettle out of Leah’s hands and poured some hot water into the washbowl, wetting one of the towels so that he could wipe Caroline’s face. She let him without protest until another pain came. She was in agony, and he knew of nothing to do to help her. There was no doctor to send for. The German community had always relied on its own people for these things, its own women for the birth of a child. He could only let Caroline writhe and drag on his hands, watch her bite down on her bottom lip until it bled.

“The horse came back—I put it in the barn. And I found some tea,” Leah whispered, her face as worried as he felt. “I think Beata hid it for a rainy day.” She gave a slight smile, because both the weather and the events certainly qualified. The smile faded. “I’ll go get it.”

“Mary Louise?” he asked when she reached the door.

“Still asleep. I think she must be worn out. Who knows how much wandering around she did before she found her way home.”

But there was no time to get the tea.

“No, please!
Please—!”
Caroline suddenly cried, her body curling upward, her hands clutching her knees.

Frederich and Leah both turned to her, but she no longer needed their help. Her body sagged back against the bed; her eyes closed. She said nothing, asked nothing. Her eyes opened again and held his, the question she couldn’t bear to voice there for him to see.

This time she didn’t fight him when he moved the quilts. The child had come—too soon, as she had feared. But there was no baby’s cry, no sound in the room at all but her ragged breathing and the rain.

W
hy am I still here?

The question came to her every time she opened her eyes. She hadn’t meant to survive, certainly hadn’t wanted to. She had been ill enough to die. She knew that. She remembered very well the fever and the pain in her chest that had followed the baby’s birth. The hushed voices. There had been some kind of committee meeting to decide what exactly ailed her. Johann had been in the room. And Mr. Steigermann. And Beata. A fever, from lying too long in the rain before Frederich found her, they decided, not knowing how badly she wanted to leave this world.

But, regardless of her desires, she was unquestionably… alive.

She turned her head at a small noise. Frederich sat in the only chair in the room, sound asleep. He was close enough for her to reach out and touch him if she wanted.

She didn’t want to. Instead, she watched him sleeping, surprised at how young and vulnerable he looked. He had hurt the back of his left hand on something since she had last noticed—a while past, she decided, because she could see that the cuts were healing. And he was missing a button on his shirt—another fault of hers, of course. No new shirts. No buttons on the old ones. Her illness must have been grave indeed for him to keep a bedside vigil for such a
worthless wife. He had kept no such vigil for Ann.

But Ann had died so quickly.

So quickly.

The worthless and shameful Caroline was still here. There must be little rejoicing in the German community at that. She couldn’t fathom why God, who surely must want to punish her, could have let this golden opportunity slip by.

Ah, but he was punishing her, she suddenly thought. He had duly noted her sins, found her guilty and sentenced her to remain
here.

She gave a wavering sigh and let the sorrow she had been trying to keep at bay wash over her.

My baby!

Frederich was awake immediately. He leaned forward and rested his big callused hand on her forehead without her leave, his familiarity much more disconcerting than his newfound concern.

“Gut,”
he said, more to himself than to her.

She closed her eyes. When she opened them, he was waiting.

“The fever is leaving, Caroline. The fever is leaving—and you are not, no matter how much you want it. I am going to bring Lise and Mary Louise in to see you now.”

“No,” she protested, surprised at how weak her voice sounded.

“Yes,” he answered. “They have worried enough. They will see you are awake with their own eyes.”

He left then and returned almost immediately with the girls. But he didn’t let them come into the room. He stood in the doorway and lifted Mary Louise up so that she could see.

“Blow your Aunt Caroline a kiss,” he said to her. He took Lise by the hand, because both girls had grown suddenly bashful. They hesitated, hiding their faces against Frederich for a moment before they did as he asked.

Caroline forced herself to look at them, trying hard not to cry.

“We’re glad you’re better, Aunt Caroline,” Lise offered after a moment. She glanced at her father to see if she’d spoken out of turn. “I’ve got another loose tooth—want to see it?” she added, apparently deciding that she had not. She opened her mouth wide and wiggled a remaining front tooth with her tongue.

“Can you come out and play?” Mary Louise asked.

Caroline managed a smile. “Soon,” she whispered without meaning it. With considerable effort, she returned their blown kisses.

Frederich’s eyes held hers for a moment, and if he wanted to say something, he didn’t. He set Mary Louise down instead.

“Go let Beata give you your supper,” he told them, sending the girls on their way.

He stood for a moment, making sure they had gone, then came into the room and sat down on the side of the bed—yet another familiarity Caroline found disconcerting. And he didn’t
say
anything. He simply waited, as if his being here was something she required of him.

Sit here and wait until I can think of something you can do for me.

But there was nothing he could do for her, nothing anyone could do for her. She didn’t want to be here, and if she must, then she just wanted to be left alone.

“You are hungry?” he asked.

She shook her head and looked away.

“Sleep then,” he said. “Tomorrow you will get up for a little while.”

She had no intention of sleeping or of getting up, but she did both, not at Frederich’s insistence but at Leah’s. Leah wanted Caroline to get out of bed, to bathe and to dress, to eat—and she wouldn’t be put off by anything Caroline said
or did. She simply offered the one threat that couldn’t be ignored.

“If you don’t, I will go get Frederich.”

Caroline found the entire process of returning to the living exhausting, but less so than fighting Leah Steigermann’s iron will. At Leah’s insistence, she even visited briefly with Lise and Mary Louise, dutifully drinking the beef tea and toasted bread they so precariously brought her.

But she couldn’t keep from crying. They were so dear and loving and she should be grateful to still be with them. She wasn’t grateful, and in spite of all she could do, the tears coursed down her cheeks. Lise took her cue from Leah, ignoring the silent weeping, feeding Caroline bits of bread she had to force down and holding her cup. It only made the crying worse.

“We’ll go now,” Lise said, when Mary Louise was about to make some observation.

“But she needs peppermint,” Mary Louise whispered.

“Then we have to find Papa and tell him,” Lise whispered back. “We’ve got to hurry,” she said to Caroline, all but carrying Mary Louise out the door.

“They love you very much,” Leah said after they’d gone. “You’re very lucky—”

“I don’t feel lucky,” Caroline said, sniffing heavily. She was so tired of being Leah Steigermann’s charity case. If her brother disowned her, if her child died, Leah came to the rescue—and she didn’t want to be rescued.

“Caroline, you would be dead if it weren’t for Frederich—”

“I don’t thank him for it.”

“Well, you should. He fed you when no one else could— or would for that matter. I don’t know how many nights he stayed up with you—trying to keep you from hurting yourself when the fever was so high you didn’t know where you were—trying to get your fever down. You almost
died,
don’t you know that?”

Caroline said nothing. She wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand.

“And people think
I
am spoiled and selfish,” Leah said. “I’m going now—but I’ll be back. And, yes, I know you want to be left alone. But I’ll be back
anyway,
because Frederich wants it. You know what the saddest thing is, Caroline? I know you don’t thank Frederich for saving your life, but the saddest thing—the
saddest
thing—is that he knows it, too.”

“He should have let me go. It would have solved all his problems.”

“No. It would have solved all of
yours.
His children— your nieces—love you. Did you think he would just sit and do nothing and let their hearts be broken again? You have a reason to be here, Caroline.”

Caroline gave a sharp sigh and turned away. Her hands were trembling. She wanted to lie down; she wanted to run as far and as fast as she could. When she looked back again, Leah had gone. She abruptly put her face into her hands.

For the nieces.

She did love them. She loved them with all her heart. She had been willing to endure her marriage to Frederich for their sakes. Why couldn’t she find any of that determination now?

She lifted her head after a moment to listen—Frederich’s heavy tread coming up the stairs.

Give her time.

Johann’s sage advice. Johann, who had never lived his life around a woman.

Frederich forced himself not to stop at Caroline’s door, nor did he seek her out the next day or the next. He let more than a week pass because he had thought—hoped—that if he left her alone for a time, she would want to rejoin the family again. But she still kept herself apart from them, hiding in her room, speaking to no one. If she came downstairs
at all, it was in the night after all of them had gone to bed. She was eating; his children reported that news to him. She must be getting physically stronger. He could hear her walking back and forth overhead sometimes.

But he missed her, as his children missed her.

No. He missed her as a man missed the woman who was important to him. How was it that he had gotten so used to talking to her—when it seemed as if they had never talked at all? And how many times a day did he have to stop himself from going and asking her what she thought about this or that? The price of corn. The war news. The livestock. Things he should have talked about with other men—with Steigermann, or heaven forbid, Avery.

He made a decision while he was grooming old Koenig. Lise was sitting on the porch nearby, earnestly trying to sew a tear in one of Mary Louise’s dresses and finding the task hard going because Mary Louise still had the dress on.

“Lise, where is your Aunt Caroline?” he asked.

She looked at him in surprise. He knew where Caroline was. Everyone knew where Caroline was. But she was a tactful child. “Upstairs, Papa,” she said.

“Upstairs, Papa,” Mary Louise repeated.

“Stay here,” he said when Mary Louise would have followed him inside, even if it meant dragging Lise and the needle and thread along behind her.

“But, Papa!”

“No ‘buts.’ You stay out here with Lise.”

He went up the stairs quickly, ignoring Beata’s sniff when he passed her in the kitchen. How eloquent were Beata’s disgruntled noises. With one mere sound she could fully communicate how much she disproved of the attention he was paying to his ailing wife.

Caroline’s door was closed as usual. He didn’t knock. He was not worried about whatever state of dress or undress he might find her in. He was her husband. He had delivered her child. She had no secrets from him.

She was sitting in the chair by the window, perhaps reading, perhaps not. He approached her immediately and took the book out of her hand.

“Stand up,” he said.

“What?” she said, not certain yet whether or not she should be worried.

“Stand up,”
he repeated, taking her by both forearms and bringing her to her feet.

“Frederich, what—”

He didn’t take the time to explain. He simply lifted her up and carried her toward the door.

“Frederich, put me down,” she said as he stepped into the hall, struggling to get out of his grasp.

“You have been in this room too long,” he said.

“Frederich! Put me down!”

“No,” he said simply, and he kept walking toward the stairs.

“Frederich—Frederich, what are you doing!”

“Trying to keep from falling down the stairs and breaking both our necks,” he said. “Excuse me, Beata,” he said when he reached the bottom. “You are in the way.” He swung Caroline around so that Beata had to duck to keep from getting hit by Caroline’s feet.

Both his children looked sharply around when he stepped out on the porch.

“Papa!” Mary Louise said. “Can’t Aunt Caroline
walk?”

“Can but won’t, Mary Louise,” he said, going down the porch steps.

“Damn you, Frederich!” Caroline hissed at him. “Put me down!”

He ignored her, setting her on old Koenig’s back instead. It occurred to him that perhaps she had never sat on a bareback horse, but he was not deterred. “You and I are going for a ride,” he said, swinging up behind her. He kept a firm hand on her to keep her from jumping off.

“I don’t want to go for a ride!”

“I don’t remember asking,” he said.

“Can
we
go?” Lise asked, shading her eyes from the sun with her hand.

“Not this time,” he said. “You stay here with Beata.”

He turned the horse sharply and headed him away from the house. Caroline was sliding off, but this time it was not on purpose. She had no way to keep her seat but to hang on to the horse’s mane, or to lean against him—which was clearly out of the question. She was not wearing stays. He could feel the warmth of her skin through her dress when he set her in a less precarious position.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked as he turned Koenig down the wooded path toward the church. Her voice sounded as if she might be crying, but her back was rigid with anger.

“There are things I want to say to you.”

“What kind of things?” she cried, startling a blue jay out of a low pine tree.

He didn’t answer her, and she gave a sharp sigh.

They rode for a time in silence. It was cooler in the shade, and even in the wake of her anger, it was not entirely unpleasant, riding with her like this on a slow-moving horse, dappled in sunlight. The air was ripe with the smell of decaying leaves and pungent with smell of injured, living trees where someone had been chopping. And there was her scent—lye soap and clean, sun-dried clothes, and woman. He watched as the patches of sunlight glanced off her hair. Dark hair that wasn’t all dark after all, he noted. It was rich with highlights of red and brown and gold. She had beautiful hair, and once again he fought down the impulse to put his hand on it.

He waited until they had reached the edge of the churchyard before he spoke.

“You don’t ask me anything about the baby,” he said quietly, and she stiffened as if he had physically hurt her.
After a moment, she gave a quiet sigh and bowed her head. “Why don’t you ask me, Caroline?”

She shook her head and said nothing.

“It was what you feared,” he went on. “She came too soon, this little girl. She didn’t cry—you know that. You remember that. She didn’t breathe, Caroline. There was no chance for her. I am very sorry for that because I think she would have been very…beautiful. Steigermann—”

He stopped. He could feel her trembling.

“Go on,” she said without looking at him, her voice barely a whisper.

“Steigermann made the coffin for her. He wanted to do that—for you. Avery gave the wood—”

“Avery?”

“He gave the wood—a very fine piece for the making.”

He reined in the horse by the low stone wall and slid off. She kept her face averted when he lifted her down.