Time After Time (186 page)

“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.

Chapter VIII

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.

“Leave it, please,” he instructed. She looked up him with tears in her eyes, and he tried to pull her up into his arms.

She shrugged off his ministrations. “We haven’t time, Theo.”

“Any activity that doesn’t give me time to hold you isn’t worth doing.”

She rose unassisted and crossed to the armoire to find a shawl saying over her shoulder, “Does that include your war?”

“Margaret, you’ve been cold all afternoon.”

She wouldn’t turn to look at him as she replied, “I don’t think so.”

“I know you’re upset.”

Her back tensed. “No.”

That’s it. Show me my stubborn girl. I haven’t seen her in a while.

Theo pursed his lips. “Can we discuss this, please?”

“No, we cannot. I don’t want to fight. We haven’t the time. We have to go or else we’ll miss the big send-off.”

The farewell meeting for Middletown’s contribution to the Connecticut Fifth was held at McDonough House, site of the infamous dance that had set the events of the past month in motion. Theo sat with the company at the front of the room while a parade of speakers extolled the company on their valor, honor, and sacrifice. Speaker after speaker was called, and soon the event stretched on toward two hours in length.

The crowd, which filled every available seat and spilled into the hallways, cheered and cried appropriately with the speakers. Theo was happy for his men to receive such veneration. They would head to war knowing their community loved and supported them.

But searching the crowd for Margaret and Mother, the air escaped from his lungs in a disappointed hiss when at last he found them. Margaret’s hands were clenched in her lap in tight fists, as if she were a little warrior. Mother’s arms were twisted over her chest, a barricade against a distasteful tide.

After a group of children sang “The Star Spangled Banner” both Margaret and Mother clapped, but the motions were chopped and despondent. When the mayor encouraged the boys to end the thing before the harvest, they exchanged a look. While he knew he should be pleased — they were communicating! — his heart felt heavy. In pursuing his dreams, in changing his life, he was doing most grievous harm to the women he loved. There was simply no way to reconcile his love with his duty.

They walked home in silence, Theo, Margaret, Mother, and Mrs. Ruskin. When they arrived, he tried to prevent Margaret from ascending the stairs.

“Sit with me in the garden a while, please.”

“I’m sorry, but I won’t. I’m tired.” She bade them goodnight and went up alone. The fall of her feet sounded hollow echoes all the way up the staircase. At last he heard the door click and he turned toward Mother.

“Theodore, I would have a word with you,” she said, signaling for him to follow. He felt like a child again, called to account for some transgression.

She crossed into the parlor and lit a second lamp, yet the space still seemed dark.

He said as he entered after her, “It was a nice event, I thought.”

“Oh, yes,” Mother replied. He wasn’t sure she had processed his statement, for surely she didn’t agree.

Theo felt as if he were treading lightly, so he waited for her to speak.

“I know,” she said after a pause, “you feel as if this deployment is an accomplishment. That your life up to this point was disappointing in some way, and you have changed things in an agreeable manner.”

He lowered himself onto the settee warily. “Mother, that’s a vast over-simplification.”

“But you’re happy to be going to war?” she asked plainly.

He couldn’t lie to her. “Yes.”

She blinked several times reflecting on this, and when she spoke again, her voice was like a spring wound too tightly. “I sat there tonight, and I listened to man after man talk about honor and duty. If you die, it will be your life that is forfeit. It’s your sacrifice. But don’t ever forget you had a choice. Margaret and I were given no such thing. Every day without you, perhaps for the rest of our lives, is a sacrifice too.”

He took her hands in his and rubbed the backs with his fingers tenderly. “I know that, and if there were any other way to contribute — ”

“This is not a conversation,” she snapped, drawing away from him. That was one of her favorite lines. She had kept him silent for years with that one. In this case, she’d earned it.

She continued, “Knowing, then, as you do, you had better conduct yourself in such a way as to be commensurate with our offering for the cause.” He nodded.

Finally, Mother took a deep breath and finished, wagging a finger at him. “She’s a good woman, Theodore. Better than I gave her credit for being.” She pursed her lips, unhappy to be making the concession. “Don’t make her a widow.”

He smiled sadly and kissed her cheek. “Good-night, Mother.”

Upstairs, Margaret had already undressed and was lying in their bed with her face turned toward the wall. He slipped out of his uniform as quietly as possible and then into the bed next to her.

He glided his arms around her waist and pulled himself against her. While she allowed the advance, the muscles in her neck and back were rigid and cold. Theo felt as if he’d smacked his face on a wall and come up ringing.

He nuzzled her shoulder. “We must talk about what’s wrong.”

“Oh, must we?” Her voice was muffled by the pillow, but the sarcasm in her tone came out clearly.

“Yes. I’ll be gone soon.”

She raised her head and said primly, “Then I don’t want to spend our remaining time arguing.”

“You quarreled with me for half an hour the other day about the fate of Sydney Carton.”

Back into the bed she fell. “That was different.”

“Then don’t fight with me.” He attempted to roll her over, but she resisted. “Be with me as my wife.”

As he kissed the back of her hair she shook her head. “I can’t. It hurts too much.”

He sat up, alarmed. “Are you injured?”

“No, you ninny.” He could feel her laughter through his hands, which stroked her back. It was short, chopped, and forced. More a bark than a laugh. “Hurts in my chest, in my head. All over, really.”

He sighed. “You won’t talk to me. You won’t argue with me. You won’t make love to me. What else do we have?”

“Nothing. That’s all we are.” Her chest deflated.

If she thought that, she was a fool. He considered rolling her over, pinning her down and explaining in detail everything that was wrong with her statement, but somehow he knew he couldn’t push. Neither, however, could he leave things at that.

He leaned over again and nipped her ear. “In a few short weeks, I’ll be on a battlefield somewhere. Is this how you want to spend our next-to-last night together?” It was manipulative, but better than the alternative.

Margaret finally rolled over and fixed her gold-brown eyes on him. “Why did you do it to me, Theo? I was … happy enough. Why did you claim me just to leave me?”

“Pure selfishness.”

At this, she allowed a few notes of her true, musical laughter to fall from her mouth. It was, however, the truth. He had no other explanation. It had been damn selfish. He settled beside her and nestled her into him. “Sleep now, Margaret. I promise I will be here when you wake.”

“And the next day?” she whispered.

“Aye.”

“And the day after that?”

“Now who’s being selfish?”

She snuggled into his shoulder, giving into him at long last.

Sleep came for her quickly. She had worn herself out hating this war. Theo stayed awake for a long time trying to memorize the moment. Margaret’s soft breathing, the swish of the wind through the trees outside, and the soft creak of the house at night. How long would it be before these sounds were his again?

Chapter IX