Wild Rose (52 page)

“I’m always glad to see that Charles is having fun,” she said. “Your little girls are so good with him.”

“He good boy,” Mrs. Wozny said, not seeming to pay attention to her own words. “Now,” she said, breathing out heavily through her nose, her voice louder, engaged. “I think you go away soon.”

“Me?” Sophie stared at Mrs. Wozny. The woman stared back at her, unflinching. She tossed her head meaningfully in the direction of the Tremblay house up the street beyond where they sat together. Sophie blinked again, then said, angrily, briskly, “I have always meant to go. Opportunities here are too limited.”

Mrs. Wozny nodded slowly. “In summer they will build here a school.”

Sophie stood, no coffee having yet appeared, so that she felt it safe to leave. “I must go. If Olga would bring Charles back when they are finished playing, I would be very glad.” As she opened the door, she thought to add, her voice softening, “And never forget how grateful I am for the good care you have taken of my boy.”

Mrs. Wozny nodded as if this were only to be expected.

Sophie suddenly wanted to kiss her on her broad forehead, but instead, went out, shutting the door quietly behind her.

~

Harry came in the morning
, while Charles was still eating his breakfast porridge and she had only just finished her
toilette
, dressed, but not yet fastened her hair that lay thick and glossy on her shoulders. It was no use not to answer the door; whoever was there would soon push it open and call in through the crack as if no privacy were required in such a world as theirs. What was there to hide anyway? But when she called, “Come in,” pretending blitheness, and saw Harry’s face, one hand went up to her chest, and the other touched Charles’ shoulder as if to reassure him, when it was she who needed reassurance.

“I’m back,” he said, his tone light. “But I bet you knew that.”

“Indeed I did,” she said, turning to Charles who had asked for nothing, to hide her pleasure. Then, recovering herself, she walked gracefully, like the convent-bred girl she was, the four steps to where he stood just inside the door, putting out her hand to him, but he used it to pull her to him, close enough to brush her forehead with his lips, that was all, then raised one hand to touch a lock of her hair lying on her shoulder, pulling it back quickly as if he hadn’t meant to do that. “I am happy to see you,” she told him. “Is your house in satisfactory condition? Have you come for your rent? Do sit, and I will make you breakfast.”

“Had breakfast,” he told her, although he sat down. “Just for a minute,” he said. “I’m thinking of getting out to my land, see how the shack is and all that. Not sure if I can make it with a loaded wagon. Too much mud.” She saw the prairie, bright, blue and green, sparkling with minute white daisies and yellow golden beans. It seemed she could smell it, and for a second thought her heart would break, that its cracking would be audible to him. “I’ll have to take you out there one of these days,” he added. “I’m guessing you miss it.”

“Especially in the spring,” she said, swallowing, touching her throat. She didn’t dare sit too close to him and chose the far end of the table with Charles between them.

“Hello, little man,” he said. “Did you miss your Uncle Harry?” She felt his awkwardness, the falseness of his tone and words to her son. So he was uncomfortable too. She had poured them both coffee and lifted her cup to sip from it.

“You didn’t write,” she said, her tone low, not looking at him. She was fingering the envelope in which she had been keeping his rent and pushed it across the table to him. He pushed it back to her, without remark.

“I couldn’t,” he said. “We worked long hours, we were stuffed into a boarding house attic, six men in one room. There wasn’t any time. I’m sorry.” She nodded. “Didn’t know what to say anyway.”

Now it felt safe to look at him. He seemed to her pale, but then he had been working indoors all winter, it was said to be too cold in Winnipeg to work outside much then, and his shirt was one she recognized, faded though, and torn on one sleeve where the cuff buttoned.

“I think you need some sprucing up,” she said. He laughed and ducked his head. “How was it?” she asked, and at last in his reply he sounded like the old Harry.

“Tough,” he said. “No denying it, but it was work and I made good money, all in all. Nobody to spend it on. And I’m no drinker. That’s why I’m not taking your money. You kept my place clean and looked after. I just moved right back in.” She chose to ignore this, but didn’t touch the envelope that now sat between them.

“I was…I thought you might have found a bride.”

“No such luck,” he answered. “Mrs. Emery is the only one who’ll have me.” She was angry with him for saying that, and kept silent. “Look, I’ve come for a reason. I’m taking a buggy up to Garden City and thought you might like to come along –
catch a ride with me, I mean,” he said. “I don’t suppose you’ve been out of this place all winter.” She was silent, trying to think at so unexpected and welcome a suggestion. And a chance to see if she could fit into Garden City, a town she didn’t know. She hesitated.

“Would I take Charles?”

“Up to you. We’d be gone three days or so, it takes a day or more just to get there. Maybe four days we’d be gone.” She thought, too long to leave Charles, he would be frightened, he’s never been without me. As she thought about it, her breath began to come quickly, she could see the prairie opening out before them, the trail leading on toward civilization, a big town, houses, stores. Churches. Excitement filled her that she tried to dampen down. People would think she and Harry were up to no good.

“I’m taking Richard Sloan with me too. He’s visiting the Oswalds and needs a lift back.” She didn’t know who Richard Sloan was. Harry said, “He came here looking for spring work. Got some with the Johnsons, has to go back for his gear. It’s way too soon to get on the land.” Whoever Richard Sloan was, his presence would stop the gossip, or at least, some of it. She considered, or pretended to, trying her best to suppress the bubble of happiness forming in her chest. She lowered her head, remarked thoughtfully, “I’d have to close my business – unless Mrs. Wozny would take it over for me when I’m gone. When would we leave?”

“A couple of days,” he said. “I’ve got to organize a few things first.”

“Oh, Lord,” she said, “the gossip.”

“Here we go again,” he said, but he was smiling. “Everybody knows you’ve got nobody to look out for you. And anyway, if they think we’re a couple, so what?” She thought to herself, that ‘so what’ was not so small a thing, but her desire to get away, to get back out into the world was so strong that even she couldn’t care enough to stop her from going. She was grateful to him for not mentioning Marguerite, or maybe he hadn’t heard about her return.

Then a wave of longing came over her, amazing her, as if all the endless winter she had suppressed it, denied it, not allowed it near her, and now her lover sat before her, and all she wanted was his mouth on hers, to have him inside her again, to feel her skin against his. She lifted a hand and put it over her mouth, its coolness surprising her when she was so hot, so very hot all over, and put it down again.

“Yes,” she said. “Yes, Charlie and I will go with you.” She had never before called her baby ‘Charlie,’ although everyone else did, and she was taken aback by this, too.

~

It was even said that the weather was better
in Garden City, despite the fact that it was further north than Bone Pile. But it lay in the lee of a range of high hills that protected the town from the worst and when the warm snow-eating winds blew in from the mountains a couple of hundred miles to the west they reached all the way to Garden City and warmed it enough to melt the snow even in the dead of winter, where Bone Pile was frigid from November into April and sometimes May usually without a single break. She thought of Garden City and a new life there; she thought, once, of Calgary having heard how it
was booming, lots of business to be done there, all kinds of people about. Strangers, who wouldn’t know her history. No Marguerite just a few doors down from where she sat, and the thought of this, even in this context, sickening her. She wouldn’t allow herself to think of Mrs. Emery, except now and then when she would find herself remembering how they had worked together and been friends. Her shoulders would stiffen, she would lower her head, and put all her energy into kneading her bread or sweeping her floor, or would suddenly be over-attentive to Charles and his game so that he would cast her an exasperated glance and push away her hand that touched one of his paper horses.

Tomorrow she must see if Mrs. Wozny would run her business for her while she went to Garden City, she told herself as, Charles long asleep in his cot, she in her dressing gown, she pulled the pins from her hair. There was a soft, quick knock on the door. Startled, she spun about, trying to think if she had remembered to wedge the table knife into the door frame so that no one could push it open, there being no bar for the door here as there had been at Harry’s house.

“It’s me, Sophie.” She recognized at once that it was Harry, and rushed to let him in before he was seen. As soon as she slid out the knife he pushed his way in, closing the door carefully, silently behind him. She wanted to, but couldn’t speak, stood before him, one hand still raised shoulder high with the dull knife in it. He took it from her, and set it behind her on the table. As if the gesture had wakened her from her dream, she spun quickly, picked it up, and while he waited, thrust it back where it had been. He lifted his hand and brushed it gently under her hair where it lay loose down her back.

He would have taken her into the bedroom, but she refused, “Not with Charlie there,” she whispered, and so they lay together on the horsehair sofa, prickly, lumpy and hard. She had thought she would refuse him when he came – had she really thought that? – but once he touched her, she was as eager as he, could give no thought to what the town would think, or to whether by this acquiescing she was implicitly agreeing to more than she meant to. It was all skin against skin, sensation after sensation, their mutual eagerness ending the act in moments. She felt for an instant in the aftermath that she loved him, then frightened by this, not sure why, not caring why, shut off such a feeling as one she dare not allow herself. How could she know what was real and what was not when it came to love?

She lay, though, with her head on his arm and their bodies pressed against each other on the narrow sofa, and asked, “When are we going?” He was silent for a moment longer than she thought he should be, and in that too-long instant her heart sank. When he finally answered her she was not surprised.

“I went to see Mrs. Emery today. She needs some help moving. Campion knew of a small house in Garden City. I said I’d help her move. Those sons of hers –”

“I can help too,” Sophie said, not adding, if she will let me.

“No, but you see,” he said, and hesitated. “I mean that I will take what furniture she is bringing with her in my wagon to Garden City. Sloan will help me, in return for the ride. And Charlotte is coming too, although I don’t know how she’ll manage on such a long trip. But, she’s determined.”

Sophie began to struggle to a sitting position although he tried half-heartedly to hold her back.

“You mean that there will be no room for Sloan, Charlotte, you, Charles and me.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Maybe we could go together later on.” She was surprised to find herself blinking, holding back tears, was grateful that in this dark room he couldn’t see this.

“I was so looking forward to it,” she said.

“As soon as I get back I’ll take you and the boy out to my land for the day if you like. We could start setting things to right there for seeding.” But Sophie didn’t reply, already wondering if she could rent her own buggy and horse from the livery barn and drive herself and Charles to Garden City, the notion of getting away for a few days having been implanted, had taken such a hold on her. But she didn’t know the way, she was thinking, and, how safe would it be for her alone? Maybe she could find somebody to go with her. If only the railroad would give the village a branch line, but everyone says they wouldn’t come down here, or at least, not for years. But if it did she could go so easily.

“When we do go out to my place we can have more time together,” he said, buttoning his shirt, pulling on his pants. “Nobody watching us.” He paused in his dressing to look at her as she half-lay, half-sat on the couch, her feet against his back. When he turned his head toward her moonlight coming in from the single window lit his face and she saw a gentleness in it that moved her, so that she could speak again, and put out a hand to touch his arm.

“I think I would like that.” Although it crossed her mind to wonder how long they could go on this way with the secrecy, the constant danger of being found out, and the shame that, for her, would surely follow. What would be next? He would ask her to marry him, she supposed, but he was standing, reaching for his boots, pulling a chair out at the table so he could sit to pull them on.

When he had gone, she couldn’t sleep, her chest heavy with disappointment, her desire to leave Bone Pile and never see it again growing stronger by the minute. If she could have gotten the buggy and the horse that moment she would have left then and there, not even bothering to pack, leaving behind everything but Charles. She saw the town waking in the morning to find her gone, her cabin door wide open to the elements and the animals. When she was nineteen, she thought, that is what she would have done. No matter what hardship such a leaving would have cost her it would have seemed worth it to her, she would never even have looked back, and she couldn’t help but remember how she and Pierre had left their village forever, she impatient and upset not from the leaving, but only because it hadn’t been fast enough. Now, she didn’t even seriously consider such an action. When the time came, she would go, and in the proper way, with dignity, she told herself.
When the time comes?
When would that be? When she got together enough money, and groaned again because lying in the dark with Harry gone she could only think that it would be years before she managed to save as much as she needed to move them to Garden City without putting herself or her child at risk.