Read Waltzing In Ragtime Online
Authors: Eileen Charbonneau
Waltzing In Ragtime (28 page)
Matthew took on his mother’s work, the things that left her hands calloused, her face weathered — mending fences, tending the corn and apricot trees. It gave her more time for weaving, now their only cash source besides the apricots.Matthew accompanied his grandmother when people were sick or families birthing, content again to be her apprentice, to watch her write her learnings in the burnt-edged book. He taught himself from it, and from his grandmother’s years of experience. They talked deep into the night, while his mother took advantage of the cool air to bake bread and his daughter sat snug in his arms.
He loved his mother’s doting, his grandmother’s gruff wisdom, both their forgiveness. Best he loved his daughter’s growing limbs, her able mind. Possum began reading a few simple words of his newspapers and books at her place in his lap. He borrowed readers from the friars at the mission school. She watched the words glide by, absorbed the woodcut pictures as he told her the stories.
By day she was still her mother’s water child, racing him to the ocean every afternoon when his chores were done. Her broad-shouldered strength allowed her to swim rings around him, to stay under the water deep and long, so long that Matthew scolded her
about it at the dinner table. Her eyes grew wide and indignant.
about it at the dinner table. Her eyes grew wide and indignant.
“But I will not get drownded, Daddy!”
“‘Drown,’” her grandmother corrected. “It’s ‘I will not drown.’”
“I’m not so sure about you, Mana.”
Vita raised her eyes to heaven. Matthew faced his daughter. “What makes you so sure about yourself, Possum?” he asked.
“The way I was born. In the sac.”
He frowned at his mother. “Who told her that story?”
“First I’ve heard of it.”
“Is it true? Did she come into the world that way, Matthew?” Annie asked.
“Yes. But I don’t remember telling you. Did I, Possum?”
The little girl tilted her head. “Maybe. Maybe I dreamed it.”
“Dreamed it?”
“Sure. You dream, don’t you, Daddy?”
“Yes. I … dream.”
His mother smiled. “Now who’s two peas in a pod?”
Matthew did his best to scowl. “You’re raising a child who won’t mind her elders.”
His mother shrugged her graceful shoulders. “It’s all I know.”
“House of anarchy,” Annie Smithers agreed.
Possum’s small fingers patted Matthew’s cheek. They drifted to his hair. He still marveled at every display of affection. “Why do I have no gold here, or sky in my eyes?” she asked.
“All the colors play in your hair, your eyes.”
“Do you love her still, my mama?” She pronounced the word carefully. Not “mana,” but “mama.”
“Yes.” He saw Seal Woman bringing home the bundle that contained their new daughter, walking slowly, but so straight, tall. He saw her hands tell the lucky birth, promise that she was giving him a child who would never drown the way she herself, impossibly, did so soon after. Matthew allowed the memory of the birthday linger. He’d never done that before, he realized. What did it mean?
“Will you take me to the snow mountains this time, Daddy?”
He saw Olana now, raising the red wineglass shyly, without airs. Strong arms, like his wife’s. “I’m not going back, little one,” he said, and saw the glass shattering. He shook the image away.
“You go, when the rains come.”
“Not this year. I told you.”
She looked at him sideways. “Promise?”
“I promise.”
The scent. A strange scent. What was it?
“Wake up.”
“Darius?”
“Bridegroom, my darling. Your bridegroom at last.”
The panic rose in a bitter bile to her throat. Did she think this night would never come? “Are you feeling well enough —”
“Now you inquire after my health? When you no longer can play Florence Nightingale to the crew of the
Mariposa?”
Mariposa?”
“You wouldn’t allow me near you on the ship.”
“You found diversions soon enough! Including the captain’s bed.”
“Darius, you — you’re joking.”
“I am in deadly earnest.”
“Then you’ve been drinking.”
He laughed. Cold. Hard. Brittle. “Not from anything you would pour, Lucretia.”
“That’s not the least bit amusing.”
“I agree. Marriage is such a deadly serious business, isn’t it, Mrs. Moore? Here we’ve been husband and wife for six weeks without my being well enough to claim my conjugal rights, thanks to your manipulations.”
“I did not cause the storm at sea that made you ill. And I am glad for your recovery. But if you no longer care for me, could we not behave in a more civilized manner toward each other? Darius, we’ve both made a mistake. Shall we discuss an annulment?”
“No longer care?” he said, his voice arch, but as calm as water
in the pond of the stone garden behind their rented house. “I never cared for you, Mrs. Moore.”
in the pond of the stone garden behind their rented house. “I never cared for you, Mrs. Moore.”
She fought the lump forming in her throat. Good God, did he drag her halfway around the world to tell her that? Out. It didn’t matter how. Or what price. She needed to get out of this marriage.
“I see. But my freedom will cost my father.”
“No, no. Not your father, Mrs. Moore. I’ve had your father exactly where I’ve wanted him for years. This has nothing to do with freedom. I wish to ruin you.”
“Ruin?”
“Make you worthless. No longer … respectable? If it’s not too late. If it is, I will kill you.”
“Darius, why are you saying such awful things?”
“Because I can. Here. Now. After years of playing the fool. Of underestimating you on the ship. That will never happen again, little wife.”
“I must insist you leave.”
“No, no, no. You must not insist. Ever again.”
He hit her hard across the mouth. Her startled scream brought Patsy into the room.
“Miss Olana! Are you —”
“Mrs. Moore has had a nightmare. I’m here with her. Leave.”
Patsy came to Olana’s side, went into the drawer, brought out perfumed powder, dusted it along her mistress’s arms, chatting away. “It’s the very strangeness of the place causes her nightmares, sir! If she could have a little outing tomorrow, perhaps? The air, the higher air of these beautiful mountains will surely revive her.”
Olana heard her husband’s teeth grinding. She felt the cold of the sheep’s bladder being placed in her hand. Her maid had found or concocted another replacement for her maidenhead, here in Japan. “Thank you, Patsy,” she said through her tears. “You — may go.”
Darius Moore followed the servant, and locked the ebony-panelled door behind her.
“If she does that again, I will leave her and her bastard brat in this country to take their place among the beggars on the street.”
“But Darius, she was only —”
He took hold of her braid and yanked her head back into the pillows. “Shhh,” he hissed softly. “Lesson one: No more contradicting me.” He released her. She didn’t move. “There. Better. Now unbraid your hair.”
When she did his eyes softened. He took the strands between his fingers, then pressed it against his face. He turned down the lamp and disappeared in the darkness. Then he was on top of her.
“Spread your legs.”
“But Darius, I’m not ready.”
“What?”
He wound her hair around his fist and pinned her against the pillow. “What do you want? Kissing?”
“N — no. This is a mistake. Isn’t it? Darius, what is it that you want? If you’ll leave me alone —”
“No more bargaining, don’t you understand? Now. Kissing is for courtship. Say it.”
“Darius —”
“Say it!”
She did, her fear overcoming her fury.
“For naughty little wives — honor, obey. Spread.”
He turned another knot in her hair. Her throat strangled when she forced it to silence. He thrust himself inside her. Again, and again. She clawed at the bladder and finally slashed it open. An animal’s blood came between them, finally relieving the dry torment. It was more welcome than he was inside her.
He collapsed, heaving and sweating. His sweat had the scent of her mother’s room when she’d been ill for days. Opium. He rolled over, put on his dressing gown, and turned up the light. Then he yanked back the covers and ripped her gown down from her shoulders, leaving her naked and shivering. He inspected the sheets as she wept.
“Well, then. Your wild man didn’t have you first after all. You were mine to burst open, my ripe little wife. What did he do? Bugger your maid in your stead? Well. No scouring by an oriental medicine man to make you pure or kill you, then, my lovely bride. But you can thank your ranger for the hell I’m about to make of your life.”
Olana closed her eyes so he would not gain further power from the sick revulsion she felt.
“Do clean yourself. You smell like a pig,” he said before he left.
Olana lay shivering in the cold, hard silence. Darius Moore had her locked away, far from home, and responsible for her only friends left, Selby and Patsy. Olana wished she’d died of frostbite, there in Matthew Hart’s tree. He would not have mourned the silly heiress who barely knew enough to come in out of the cold. But she would have died in peace, and in his arms.
There wasn’t enough air in the room, suddenly. Vita came in from the kitchen, took his hand.
“What is it, Matthew?”
“N — nothing. Mama? Could we open a window?”
They stared at him. Every word he said took more air than it should have. He got to his feet, reeling, but walked out onto the porch, waving them back. It was no different there, though he could feel the cool night’s breezes against his skin. Then, as suddenly as it had come, it was gone. He pumped water up from the well and into his hands, over his face.
“Tighter,” Darius Moore said.
“But, sir —”
“Measure.”
Patsy anchored the ties against the corset hooks and brought the tape around her mistress’s waist.
“Eighteen and one half, sir, and if that’s not the smallest I’ve ever seen it —”
“I like round numbers. Allow me.”
“I will not, sir!”
He lifted an eyebrow and turned to his wife. “Mrs. Moore?”
“It’s all right, Patsy.”
He took the ties from the maid’s hands and pulled. Olana muffled a small cry.
“There, eighteen. Even. Mrs. Moore understands. This is business. A man of influence in a crowding market has a taste for small-waisted women. We all must do our part to compete.”
As soon as the door closed, Olana walked to the window. “What did you and Selby do today, Patsy? What did you see?”
“No. No more filling your head with stories to live in.”
Olana turned. “Don’t be angry with me —”
“You’ve gone pale and sickly! He hasn’t let you out of this bleeding house except trussed up on his arm. He’s a monster!”
“My husband is very busy. And the customs here, for a woman of my station, are different.”
“But Miss Olana, ever since we got off the ship —”
“I was selfish, on the ship. Leaving him to Wallace while I —”
“Endeared yourself to everyone aboard with your devotion to the burned sailors!”
“I did not keep a proper vigil —”
“Vigil? Paugh! When he —”
“Stop it!” Olana turned her head, breathed deeply. “I mustn’t cry. He knows it when I cry. It puffs my eyes so, and my eyes are a very valuable asset —”
“You’re sounding like him, miss!”
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