Emma Barry (8 page)

Instead, Margaret answered her question, “As do I.” Even as she said the words, she realized how true they were.

“You spoke of caring for Theodore, but not loving him.” Margaret was unsure how to reply. The truth would hardly help her cause.

After a pointed tip of her head, Sarah offered commentary. “He loves you. Well nigh drunk with it, he is. Guard his heart, for he has given it to you.”

In this at least, Margaret could be firm. “I would
never
hurt your son.”

The older woman shook her head. “That remains to be seen.” Margaret had the distinct impression she had been dismissed.

“Shall I show you the house?”

They rose together and proceeded on a tour. The Ward residence seemed to go on and on: the breakfast room, the sitting room, the parlor, the dining room, the large foyer … Could one family possibly use all this space? How was it all to be cleaned? Maybe she and Sarah could lose one another during the day rather than resolving their mutual distrust?

Upstairs, every door opened onto another bedroom. Six in all! Margaret blushed deeply when Sarah opened the door to the room she would share with Theo. Helpfully, the older woman did not offer any further commentary other than to say, “The master suite.” Even in that title, however, Sarah made herself clear: this was Theo’s room. He might share it with Margaret, but she had no real place here.

“I have never kept a house,” Margaret confessed when they returned to the breakfast room. “I’m nervous.”

“You’re up to the task, I’m sure,” Sarah replied. Her voice was so dry it nearly cracked.

Before she could formulate a reply to this latest barb, Theo interrupted. He entered the room beaming with absolutely no self-consciousness. Margaret’s heart constricted.

“Well, Mother, have you shown my wife our humble abode?” he called, his lanky arm slipping about the older woman’s waist and giving her a squeeze.

“Everything but the yard.”

“I will rectify that oversight. Margaret, get your bonnet.”

Once they were outside, he swept her into an embrace. She wriggled her arms onto his chest and put some space between them. “Theo, control yourself.”

“No. In the street before my office, yes, but not in my own home. Not when I have only three weeks left with you.”

He intended to be at this a while, she could tell. He claimed her mouth firmly, and his ardor melted her protestations. He was an impossible man, but whatever objections she had had could not be located in his arms. Did she really have less than a month with him?

Once she was good and committed to the endeavor, he wove his fingers in her coiffure to anchor her against him. Sometime later, he said against her mouth, “How were things with Mother?”

“We’ll do,” she whispered.

She could feel his grin. “Glad to hear it. How much longer do you want to remain at McDonough House?”

“A few more nights at least.”

He laughed and she could feel it in every part of her body.

“Whatever my wife requires.”

“Theo, I have one request.”

“Only one?”

“You must promise me you will try to come home from this war. For me. For … S — your mother.”

He cupped her face and looked into her eyes. “My darling girl, I will return to you. I could not have achieved you finally only to lose you again. Whatever it takes, whatever the cost, I will return to you.”

“You cannot promise that — only that you will
try
.”

He sighed. “I will move the foundation of the earth before I fail to return to you. Now forget about the neighbors and kiss me.”

“Sydney Carton has every advantage, Ward, so why would he be content to disappear into Charles Darnay’s life?” Josiah cackled.

One week after his wedding, Theo was basking in the light spread by the warm family scene. Josiah had come for dinner and now they were all gathered in the parlor debating the merits of Mr. Dickens’ latest,
A Tale of Two Cities
, and enjoying coffee.

“Unhappiness!” Theo answered, attempting to explain Carton to the assembly, who seemed determined to misunderstand the character. “You’re of a naturally jovial disposition, Josiah, so I know it is a mystery to you, but to those of us who are more — ”

“Melancholic?” Mother offered. She’d spent much of the past week needling Margaret and him about their relationship. There were veiled references to their failed engagement and his subsequent depression. Questions about the future no one could answer. Scorn and derision for Margaret’s skills as a housekeeper. Luckily his wife was adept at turning the other cheek.

“Complex,” he offered as a substitute adjective. “To people like me, it makes sense. Carton may appear to have all the ingredients for contentment, but that doesn’t mean he feels it.”

Theo turned to his wife, who was pouring and smiling to herself. “I’m certain you understand, Margaret.”

“I most certainly do not,” she replied, picking up a sugar cube with a pair of tongs and dropping it into his cup. “Sydney Carton is intelligent, honorable, wealthy, attractive. If he was unhappy with his life, why can he not change it?”

Amusement shimmered over her features. Obviously a lot was at stake beyond the power of Mr. Dickens’ characters. Everyone seemed to think he was a stand-in for Carton. Beyond their mutual training in the law, he didn’t see it.

“You’re all impossible,” Theo said good-naturedly, slamming his hands down on the arms of his chair. “Carton sacrifices himself for Lucie’s happiness. Twice. Is that not admirable? Should we not celebrate that?”

Mother was digging in her workbasket for her embroidery, and Josiah was too busy laughing at him to respond.

“It’s the
why
of the story, Theo. Should we not question it?” Margaret said as she handed him his cup.

“Self-sacrifice is a widely celebrated virtue,” he insisted. The assembly was openly amused by him now. “It’s as if you aren’t listening to me at all.”

“No, it’s as if you aren’t listening to
us
,” Josiah responded in such a tone as to suggest
as usual
.

Margaret nodded and turned again to Theo. “Why doesn’t Carton propose to Lucie? Why doesn’t he court her? He
moons
over her, wandering around her house at night. Doesn’t Lucie deserve to make a choice?”

Theo set his cup on a side table and took Margaret’s hand. He felt better when he was touching her. “He doesn’t feel worthy of her,” he said. “Besides, there is the little matter of Charles Darnay.”

“Maybe Darnay’s bland perfection is boring to Lucie. What is it that Carton doesn’t have to recommend him? He claims to love her — ”

Theo shook his head. “That, actually, I doubt. Can a man love where his devotion is not returned?” Even as he spoke the words, there was a pull in his stomach. He hadn’t told Margaret he loved her, but every day as they fell into a routine he would abandon all too soon, he felt it. That meant she must feel it too. He was waiting for the right moment to confess it all, hoping against rationality she might do so first.

Mother interjected at that. “You don’t believe in unrequited love, Theo?”

“Not as such,” he explained. “That seems like indulgence and idolatry, not love. The poets have that one wrong.”

Mother’s eyes flashed. Perhaps she had made the connection between the present conversation and the drama playing out within his marriage. But if she did, she wisely said nothing.

Margaret sighed. “Without love, I find Carton more confusing still.”

Theo bent over her hand and brushed his mouth over it, tracing the words he could not voice onto her skin.

“See, when you’re losing an argument, you turn toward affection as an escape,” Margaret chided, squeezing his fingers. “It won’t work. Admit Sydney Carton makes sense only if we accept Mr. Dickens’ somewhat bizarre motivation for him.”

“Never,” Theo responded with a small laugh. Mother and Josiah groaned, but Margaret only shook her head with a smile.

Realizing this conversation had ceased to be productive, he asked his wife, “Will you play?”

“Only if you will turn the pages.”

Margaret sat at the spinet and began to pick out some lovely tune while Josiah and Mother chatted. Theo moved some wisps of hair that had escaped their confines over his wife’s ear and then turned the page of her music. No one could accuse him of not being content at this moment. There was none of Sydney Carton’s melancholy complexity in him.

“Are you well?” he said.

Margaret made a quiet noise in her throat in assent. It was an unspoken agreement that they did not speak of the war or of current events. There was little news in any case, only much speculation. But for the sake of his domestic tranquility, Theo would rather discuss literature, music, and his wife’s beauty than anything that might cause real conflict. They had fought enough.

Theo turned another page and closed his eyes, trying to imprint the moment in his memory so he could take it out for inspection in the future.

“Are
you
well?” Margaret whispered.

“Blissful.”

• • •

Margaret’s fingers moved over the keys of the instrument by rote, her training too strong to fail her now. Inside, she was a rushing tumult of discordant emotions and memories. The Ward parlor still felt like a foreign place. All these warm people who liked and were connected to one another — who seemed to think she was part of the family too. She didn’t know how to respond.

The only home Margaret had ever known belonged to her sister Emily, who had married a Virginia doctor after her stint at the seminary. With seven children now, not to mention a pack of dogs and her husband’s family, it felt less like a home than a wild, over-stuffed boarding house. Margaret had always felt like an interloper there. A dependent guest who had to provide entertainment and instruction in order to justify her inclusion. The message was unspoken but clear: she might be welcome, particularly if she would help with the children, but she did not belong.

She had always wondered what it might be like to have a relationship in which nothing was required of her. In which affection and respect were guaranteed. Theo seemed to like her in spite of herself, even when she told him difficult truths. Sarah’s chill was melting. Josiah was kind and fatherly. Mrs. Ruskin … had to come around eventually. Was this the home for which she had waited for so long?

She sounded the final chord and scattered applause broke out. Theo was sifting through a pile of music and old newspapers on a side table.

“I’m looking for that piece you were playing the other morning. It was lovely.”

“Surely I must not bore you all again,” Margaret said.

Theo slapped the music in front of her. “But we insist,” he responded. “Please?” Gone entirely was the hesitant, differential man she had thrown over. He had blossomed before her eyes.

“Where were you two years ago?” she whispered as she commenced playing.

He seemed not to have heard her. His fingers skimmed up her spine, and she felt the tension in her chest that had plagued her since their wedding. She knew to Theo it was exactly this easy. Drop Margaret into this scene, march off to war, and return to a happy, unified home. She knew better, however. She had been left often enough. These people were not her family. This could end as abruptly as it had begun. Even Theo …

Her hands faltered and struck a discordant chord.

“Beg pardon,” Margaret called out, she hoped cheerfully, before resuming her playing, newly steeled against confusing emotion.

It had been more than three weeks since Margaret had become his wife. In that time, Theo had known happiness he had hitherto thought unachievable in this life. He had never realized how seamlessly he had moved into the role of his deceased father and uncle. He had taken over his uncle’s practice, taken up his father’s role as head of the household, and allowed the choices and responsibilities of dead men to smother him by the time he was twenty-five.

It had been unconsciously done. Neither Mother nor Josiah had meant to negate him, but no one had asked what he thought or how he felt or what he wanted. And he had let them. But now, with the army and with Margaret, he had chosen.

His wife was a passionate woman, and he worshipped her. Whether she graced his arm as they walked to church or argued with him about books at the dinner table or flushed in his arms at night, everything in his life was better with her in it. Even her relationship with Mother was more cordial than he had dared to hope.

Still, he had yet to tell Margaret that he loved her. She had been firm about her own absence of feelings before they wed, but there was no doubt in his mind that he did. And thus she must reciprocate. He saw it in her face when he made love to her at night. When she prepared his coffee at breakfast. When her face filled with joy when he returned home in the evening. She would be his in every sense of the term very soon.

He had concluded his work at the firm two weeks prior and was now drilling with his company every day. He, James, and Henry were leading about one hundred enlisted men, mostly from Middletown and the small surrounding villages and farms. Much remained to learn about soldiering, but their progress was marked, and their departure stood only two days away now.

While he was loath to hurt Margaret and Mother, soldiering was powerful in ways he hadn’t anticipated. He felt true kinship with his men. Steeled by the rightness of their cause, Theo was not anxious about the outcome of the war or the terrors of battle. They would be victorious. He didn’t imagine it would be easy or brief, but they would win. He knew it.

As he straightened his uniform jacket, Theo remembered the first day he had come home in it. Mother had walked to the window pale and stony. Margaret had stormed from the room and refused to discuss it afterward. Outwardly both Margaret and Mother had immersed themselves in the war effort, but at home, both wanted to hear nothing about company business.

He glanced in the small looking glass over the dressing table and fussed with his sleeves once again. He wasn’t used to the sight of himself in blue, either. When Margaret entered the room, she knelt and began polishing a spot off his boot with her handkerchief.