The Language of Paradise: A Novel (22 page)

“A man wants to spread his wings on such a day,” he said.

Gideon’s skin prickled; he was aware that the parson’s youthful self was speaking. The horse seemed to sense the phantom presence, as animals will. The muscles of its back rippled in a delicate shudder, and it began to trot before James could shake the reins.

MRS. HEDGE SENT
Sophy and Gideon out to the field to look for fiddleheads. Both of them knew that she was trying to spare them the instruction they were due and give them some time alone. “The Reverend needs to rest, whether he knows it or not,” she said. “And the ferns won’t wait. Get them in their first youth or they’ll be too tough to cook.”

Gideon was beginning to feel more like a man about to be married. As the two of them walked side by side along the road, each holding a handle of the basket, a farmer hailed them from a passing wagon and his wife waved her kerchief in their direction. The world was smiling on them for no other reason than that they were young and in love. Gideon took off his hat with a flourish and waved back.

Sophy dropped her end of the basket, snatched the hat from his fingers while he was still waving, and ran, veering away whenever he reached to reclaim it. It was like trying to catch a bubble, she was always floating out of his grasp. Her hair was coming undone, and she was laughing, holding his sober hat above her head to tease him. The farmer brought his horse to a halt so he and his wife could watch. A woman with a bundle of laundry on her back shouted encouragement.

“Enough, Sophy! We’re making a spectacle!” Gideon was vexed to be made a fool of, ashamed to be short of breath. He had been spending too much time at his desk.

“I don’t care. I hate this hat. I’m going to let the wind have it.”

But something she saw in his face stopped her running and made her come to him. Her loose hair and rosy cheeks, the dwindling light in her eyes, reminded him of the day in the sickroom when he had commanded her.

“It’s only that I like to see your hair,” she said. And then, “I thought we were playing.”

Her voice was so meek that the will to master stirred in him, as it had when he was too weak to move. He wasn’t weak anymore. He could knock the hat from her hand, grab her wrist and pull her to the ground, mock-punish her with rough kisses. Or he could do as he’d done before: speak, and she would obey. Gideon tasted the taming words on his tongue, liquorish and harsh. He swallowed them.

He took the hat from her and clapped it on his head, knowing that it sat too low on his brow, like a bumpkin’s. Let him be ridiculous, he deserved it.

“I’m no good at playing,” he said, still breathless. “Not much experience. Perhaps you will teach me.”

Sophy knelt to pick up the basket, and stood with it under her arm. “I never knew what play was until recently. My brothers thought it was amusing to torment me. Mama would find me tied to a tree or blindfolded in the pasture, long after they’d forgotten me. I was nearly grown up before I learned.”

“Who taught you?”

They were in the field before she answered. Gideon had the odd sensation of walking in the dream he’d had months before. The setting was the same, a few early flowers showing their heads, the grasses still swaying, new green interspersed with brown stalks from the winter. But in his dream his progress had been hindered, and now it was effortless. No tough vines tripped him; the vegetation was so frail that he could easily tramp it down. The expanse that had churned like a raging sea could be crossed in five minutes at a leisurely stride, and the girl who had waved at him from the opposite shore was by his side. When Sophy stopped suddenly and turned to face him, he realized they were standing on the same spot where she had danced a year ago. He felt wonder, akin to awe. If a voice were to address them from above, or issue from a clump of dead milkweed, he would not be surprised.

“Do you ever think about your father?” Sophy asked.

It was the last question Gideon was expecting. Its irrelevance punctured the sublimity of the moment. “Not often,” he said. “He had no part in raising me. Do you think of yours?”

“I don’t really believe in a father. If I had one, he’s not to be spoken of.” Sophy looked down with sudden concentration, as if fiddleheads had sprouted at her feet. “You asked who taught me to play. It was—is—my mother. My real one. She has been a presence in my life for a while now.”

“Are you saying I’m about to enter into Holy Wedlock with a haunted woman? What do you think she does for you?”

“Urges me on. Dares me. She’s far more adventuresome than I am. I don’t see her, but I know when she is there. That day you first watched me . . . I was dancing because of her.” Sophy hesitated, cautious. Until now the dance had been a silent compact between them. “If you haven’t been visited, I don’t expect you to understand.”

“There isn’t enough of my father to make a decent ghost,” Gideon said. “My mother told me he went down in a ship before I was born, and when I was little, I used to imagine ‘Lost at Sea’ cut into a stone in a churchyard, all stark and solemn, and me standing before the grave with my head bowed. I suppose that was the closest I ever came to missing him. Fathers were for other boys. I went my own way, from the beginning.” He considered telling her what his mother had said about his being hatched from an egg, but thought better of it.

“He is in you, whether you pay attention to him or not.”

And so must yours be, whether you
believe
in him or not, Gideon thought. Sophy was meeting his eyes now, her chin lifted. That stubbornness again, rearing up when she appeared most humble. When they were married, he would have to learn how to temper it.

“I have better things to do than listen to a dead man,” he said, “and so do you. We’re young, Sophy! God willing, we have years ahead of us. We should be preparing for the children we’ll have, the parents we’ll be—not wasting our precious hours fraternizing with the departed.”

Gideon realized with a chill that the words he had just spoken were not his: the pedantic, hectoring tone, the sanctimonious sentiments, belonged to Hedge. Perhaps he was the one being haunted. How often had he lamented the Reverend’s hold on him? Possession by the living was far more terrifying than the shriveled mischief of the dead.

He smiled to leaven his sharpness. “If my spectral mother-in-law chooses to make my acquaintance, I’ll treat her with every courtesy, but frankly, Sophy, I’d prefer she keep to herself. I have enough trouble with your living relatives!”

Gideon raised his eyes heavenward and pulled his hat down even lower, so the brim nearly touched his nose. He was gratified to see Sophy break into a grin. He had done well in his first attempt at marital diplomacy; he was growing into the role of husband even before he occupied it.

He put one arm around her waist, took her hand and held it up. “My mother gave me a dance lesson once. I was ten or eleven, she wanted me to have the social graces. But she was displeased with me for riding on her shoes and never offered again. Will you give me another chance, Sophy? The fiddleheads will accompany us.”

Gideon whirled her in a wide circle, then another, heady with delight that she was following him. She was so light in his arms that her feet left the ground when he spun her. Her hair had fallen to her waist and whipped like a banner. Each time the road hove into view, he saw that they were observed, first one, then several passersby pausing in their daily business to gawk. The two of them were making a spectacle, and he did not care.

CHAPTER 18

____

PRACTICE

“
W
HO EVER HEARD OF REHEARSING A WEDDING? PAGANS
may marry as often as they like, but good Christians are joined only once, and for most of us, that is enough. Cite me chapter and verse if I am wrong, Mr. Hedge.”

The parson had introduced the subject in an understated manner, but was having a hard time convincing his wife, who had stationed herself in front of the kitchen fireplace with her arms folded across her chest, a fortress of refusal.

“My dear, I’m speaking of the choreography, not the vows. If this were a wedding alone, or even an ordination, no preparation would be needed. But the congruence of events, the number of people involved . . .” Hedge flapped his hands helplessly. He looked to Gideon and Sophy with pleading in his eyes.

Gideon considered whether he had witnessed the crumbling of yet another brick in the parson’s foundation. Until this moment, Hedge had never been known to leave a sentence unfinished. His character, his profession, the whole bent of his being, was declarative.

“We could do with some practice ourselves,” he said. “It will give us courage, won’t it, Sophy?”

“And how do you intend to get the Reverend to the church with the horse and wagon gone?” Mrs. Hedge asked. “A wheelbarrow? Now that would be an inspiriting sight. The pastor carted to meetinghouse like a load of dung. There are those in the parish who would grieve to see the shepherd of their souls brought so low—and a few I could name who’d rejoice. If I didn’t know you for a man of sound mind, Mr. Hedge, I’d conclude you had taken leave of your senses.” She pronounced the last with weary finality, as if she had arrived at her destination after a long and trying journey.

Hedge met her gaze. “Lost my mind, have I? You should not be surprised, Fanny. I’ve endured many losses since the Lord chose to make me a cripple. To be ministered to when I am used to ministering. To be restricted to the compass of my bed when my influence once was felt throughout the county. To calculate my every motion and pay the price in pain. My life has become a continual warfare with my natural feelings. Each day I am forced to commit pious violence upon my pride just to get by. Do you understand, woman? Pious violence!”

Each successive phrase had been spoken with a tighter tension, a slightly escalated volume. All three of the listeners were familiar with the technique from the parson’s sermons. As one, they braced themselves for the cannonade to come. But Hedge’s voice dropped.

“If I have any dignity left,” he said, barely audible, “a ride in a wheelbarrow would not diminish it.”

IN THE END
, Micah was able to borrow a cart and an old workhorse from a neighbor. He and Gideon hoisted the Reverend up the step and into his seat, where Sophy waited with his crutches. Mrs. Hedge insisted that they wrap blankets around his back and legs to cushion him. The wedding was a week away, and they were all on edge. Although the horse’s plodding step came near to disguising the fact, they were going forward.

Hedge started to chatter as soon as they were underway. “In ordinary circumstances, I would never keep anything from my dear wife, but I thought it prudent not to mention the surprise awaiting us at church. She will know eventually, of course, but why burden her, when the world rests on her shoulders? Her pleasure will only be increased if we are discreet now.”

“You can’t mean that James is back, Papa,” Sophy said. “Mama had better know that right away.”

“Do you think I would withhold such news? Don’t be foolish.”

Gideon was sorry to see Sophy cringe, but he had to admit that Hedge’s rebuke was justified. James had been due to return two days before, yet not so much as a word had come from him or Reuben. Mrs. Hedge was convinced that some dreadful fate had overtaken him in the city. “He’s too trusting, that one,” she kept saying. “He never was hard like his brother. What if he’s thrown himself in the river for the sake of that prinking thing?” The parson insisted that James was only pleading his case with the young lady, but his calm had begun to fray as the great day approached. James had been assigned the plum role of escorting Sophy down the aisle.

Within sight of the church, the horse perked up its ears. Music was in the air, faint but distinct, riding lightly on the wind that carried it. It charmed them like panpipes, drawing them on, growing fuller and sweeter as they approached. No one spoke until they arrived at the meetinghouse door.

“It can’t be,” Sophy said, though there was no doubt that the melody was issuing from the same white-shingled building where she had spent most Sundays of her life.

“Handel,” said Reverend Hedge, as if the selection of music, and not the astonishing fact of it, required explanation. Since the church’s founding, a small choir had supplied the only music other than hymns ever heard within its walls, singing psalms a capella with a tuneless rigor that did not offend the plainness of their faith. Instruments of any kind were considered to be the devil’s distractions. Let the High Church have its booming organs, the Catholics their voluptuous Masses. First Congregational would make do with the human voice harmonizing the Word—well or badly, it hardly mattered. The Reverend had subscribed to this view himself.

Now he feigned surprise at their amazement. “What is a procession without music? I think you’ll agree that our valiant little choir is not equal to the task. I didn’t know where to turn, but the Lord provided.”

As Gideon and Micah helped him from the cart, he told them the story. One of the retired masters at seminary had a nephew staying with him, a gifted violoncellist, trained abroad, but reduced to giving lessons for a pittance until a suitable position turned up. The young man was eager—hungry even—to play the music he loved for an audience.