Читать книгу Wild Rose - Ruth Axtell Morren - Страница 9

Caleb swung the scythe back and forth across the lawn at the side of the house. It had taken him the whole morning to learn to wield it properly, but now he began to see some progress on the grass that reached his knees and gave the house a derelict appearance. Just like its owner, his mind echoed. He glanced down at his work clothes—denim trousers and rough cotton shirt, its sleeves rolled up on his forearms, revealing the undervest beneath—what would his father say of him now?

Nothing that he hadn’t heard his whole life.

Caleb abandoned that line of thought and concentrated on his strokes. He hadn’t had such a workout since he’d climbed the ratlines of a ship. He turned to look with pleasure at the swath behind him, ignoring for the moment the much larger portion that remained to be cut.

Just then, he saw his neighbor coming down the road toward his property. Caleb wiped his brow with his bandanna, wondering what the strange Miss Patterson was coming to see him about now. He hadn’t spoken to her in over a week. Occasionally he’d glimpsed her at her tasks, up beyond the field and trees that separated their two properties or out on her boat, but she’d made no more silent ventures into his territory since the day she’d helped him prepare the soil for planting.

The two of them had worked hard that day. Caleb chuckled, remembering how he’d felt when she first appeared at his door. He’d about forgotten her promise of seedlings.

Working in a field in the full sun was not a remedy he’d recommend to anyone after the amount of alcohol he’d consumed the evening before. But he didn’t let on about his physical condition, though he suspected her sharp black eyes didn’t miss much.

He watched his neighbor open his gate now and wondered what sage advice Miss Patterson was going to offer him on this occasion. At least he knew her name properly. He’d found out the last time he’d been to the village.

She was making her way toward him with her purposeful stride. Did she ever wander aimlessly?

She’d probably take one look at his garden and make a dour prophecy of doom. At least the seedlings had survived his inexperienced planting; several rows of seeds and the quartered potatoes with their eyes had sprouted as well. Except for that one row of beans, everything had looked promising to him this morning. Now he wasn’t so sure. His plants began to take on a thin and sparse appearance as he tried to picture them through Miss Patterson’s experienced eyes.

“Morning.” She wasted no excess words in greeting.

Caleb leaned against the scythe and touched his hand to his hat brim. “Good morning to you, Miss Patterson.” She gave him a sharp glance, as if his words held some double meaning. He returned her look blandly. “What can I do for you?”

“Came to see how the seedlings were doing.”

“Just getting around to worrying about their fate?”

She flushed at that and looked away from him. “I been busy. Couldn’t make it back the other day.”

“You were under no obligation. I am grateful enough for all your help.”

“Still, it wasn’t right. I should’a finished what I begun.”

“Shall we have a look?” He invited her to go before him with a gesture of his hand.

Giving an abrupt nod, she turned and led the way to his garden, saying along the way, “You can set out seeds every week for another couple o’ weeks. That’ll give you crops right through the summer and into the first frost.”

When she got to the plot, she walked the length of it, silently inspecting the inch-high rows of peas, the tiny pairs of leaves on the sprouted radish and beet seeds, the feathery carrot tops, the pale gray-green of the cabbage and turnip sprouts. She nodded at the taller seedlings she’d given him to transplant from her own supply, which showed a few new leaves. Caleb hadn’t felt so nervous since holding out his slate for his tutor’s scrutiny.

“You water ’em when they’re dry?”

“Yes, miss.”

She gave him another glance, then bent down to pull out a thin weed Caleb could have sworn hadn’t been there that morning. “Hoe around the bigger plants after it rains?”

“I will now.”

Then she came to the pole beans. She squatted down beside them and took one little stem between her thumb and forefinger. It was thick and green, but where its two first leaves should have been was a shriveled, brown stump. Before Caleb could offer any explanation, any denial that he’d treated these seeds with any less care than the others, she pronounced her verdict.

“Cutworms.”

The word conjured up an image of a pair of shears going through all his rows, hacking the tender plants to shreds.

“We’ll have to replant ’em. This time we’ll sprinkle some wood ashes all along the rows. If that don’t do it, I’ll mix up a mess of cornmeal and molasses. That should keep ’em off. Lucky they haven’t gotten to your other plants.” She stood once more, thrusting her hands into her back pockets. “Everything else is coming up fine. You did a good job planting,” she acknowledged.

She didn’t give him much chance to enjoy the sense of victory that filled him.

“If you notice anything else eating the leaves, let me know.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he answered automatically.

Again she narrowed her eyes at him, as if suspicious of his tone. When she didn’t say anything more, Caleb tried to think of something to add. For some reason, he didn’t want her to leave just yet. Up to now, he’d avoided all company.

But he was intrigued. Perhaps it was because she seemed as content to leave him alone as he was to be left alone. Or perhaps it was the fact that she’d defended him that day in the store.

He still wanted to know why.

When she started walking away from the garden patch, he spoke up. “I’m thinking of buying a boat. Know anything of Winslow’s Shipyard?”

She nodded. “Don’t think much of old man Winslow, but young Silas’ll build you a good craft. He’s got a gift.”

“A gift?”

“It’s in his hands.” She looked briefly down at her own dirt-stained ones. “Anything he builds is light, easy to handle, seaworthy. He won’t charge you much for a small vessel. What are you looking at?”

“Nothing too big. Something I can handle myself. I noticed your little craft. She serves you well. Where do you take her?”

He couldn’t tell whether she was pleased or not by the compliment. “Up and down the coast. She’s just a double-ender, but that’s all I need.” She nodded. “Silas built her for me. In his spare time.” She made a sound of disgust. “Winslow wouldn’t let him waste his time on a little peapod for the likes o’ me. Farmers usually build their own. Folks use ’em for fishing and some lobstering.”

“I’ll have to see him. I don’t believe I’ve ever met him, although Phelps Shipping has commissioned the Winslow Yard for schooners.”

“Silas has been with Winslow for a long time. Ever since he was a boy. Apprenticed with him. He isn’t from these parts. Comes from one of the islands—Swans or Frenchboro.”

Another pause. Silence filled the space between them like a physical presence. Caleb still didn’t want her to leave. Maybe it was just boredom. He felt as if he had all the time in the world on his hands.

“You wouldn’t have any extra seeds?” he asked on impulse.

“Seeds? Oh, sure, I’ll see what I have.”

“Mind if I come along?” Now, why had he said that?

But she just shrugged. “Suit yourself. I have a little bit o’ everything.”

Caleb walked beside her across the lawn, but as they neared the gate, he heard the sound of a wagon coming down the road toward them. He shaded his eyes against the sun, trying to see who would be coming out to the Point.

It was old Jim, the man who’d driven him out the first day, with another man beside him. Caleb felt his gut tighten as soon as he recognized Nate, his former first mate, now a captain on a Phelps bark.

What did Nate want? Was he bringing a message from Boston? Caleb steeled his features to betray nothing, but he couldn’t silence his heart as it began to hammer in anticipation.

He stood, bracing himself to face the man who was like a brother to him. The only one who’d believed in him throughout. If anyone knew him, it was Nate. If it hadn’t been for his friendship on Caleb’s first voyage, he didn’t think he would have survived the trip in the forecastle of one of his father’s square-riggers.

How would Caleb stand up to the coming encounter? Could he really convince his friend all was well with him at Haven’s End?

As the horse and wagon ambled slowly forward, Caleb glanced over at Miss Patterson. She stood, silently watching the two men, nodding a greeting to Jim when he drew up.

Nate thanked the driver and descended, retrieving his bag from the back.

Before Caleb had a chance to introduce her, Miss Patterson muttered, “Be seeing ya,” and walked off.

Caleb’s glance flickered briefly to her, but he made no move to stop her, his attention centered on Nate.

The two men stood watching the horse and driver depart. When they were alone, Caleb turned to Nate. “What are you doing here?”

Nate removed his blue cap and scratched his head. “I’m glad I wasn’t expecting a warm greeting, otherwise my feelings might be hurt.”

Caleb looked hard at his friend. “I thought I made it clear I didn’t want you or anyone else feeling obliged to come and check up on me.”

Nate ignored the remark. “How was your journey?” he asked himself, then answered, “The seas weren’t too rough.”

Caleb crossed his arms and remained silent.

“We had a good passage. Would you like to come in? Yes, thank you kindly, I’ve had a long journey. Can I get you some refreshment? Why, yes, if it wouldn’t presume on your hospitality.”

Caleb turned on his heel, ignoring Nate’s soliloquy, and walked toward the house, knowing his friend would follow.

Once inside, Caleb left Nate in the living room and went to the kitchen to fetch him something to drink. When he returned, Nate stood with his back toward him, admiring the view from the rear windows.

“I can see why you came here.” He turned around with a smile. “Ahh! Just the thing for a parched throat.” He smacked his lips after the first long sip of the cold tea. “Wonderful.” He looked around. “Would you like to have a seat? Why, thank you.” Seeing only the one armchair in the room, he raised an eyebrow. Caleb fetched a straight-backed, wooden kitchen chair and gestured for Nate to take the armchair.

“Now, are you ready to tell me why you’ve come? Or do you need some food first?”

Nate smiled. “Perhaps a little later, if it’s not too much to ask.” He set his glass on the wooden crate beside the armchair. Then he looked straight at Caleb, his expression serious for the first time since he’d stepped down from the wagon. “Your father needs you.”

“Did he send you?” The words were out before Caleb could stop them.

“You know him better than that. He wouldn’t send for you even if he were gasping his last breath. That doesn’t change the truth. He needs you. The firm needs you. Not to mention countless others. Your mother, for one.”

When Caleb made no reply, Nate stood and raised his voice. “What is it going to take to get you back? This place is beautiful, I’ll grant you that,” he said, motioning toward the ocean view, “but what are you doing here? You don’t belong here. You belong in Boston, taking over the reins of a shipping empire, not in some tiny harbor hardly visible on a map.”

Caleb rubbed his hand against his jaw, holding his emotions in check. He’d made his decision and was not going to defend it to anyone. Not anymore. “If you don’t understand why I won’t go back, you who know me, then I can’t explain it to you.”

His friend continued in a more reasonable tone. “I know how these little villages work. The people living here don’t accept outsiders. Their families have been living here for centuries. It’s all right for summering, but to live here…You have everything waiting for you in Boston. You can’t just walk off and leave it all!”

The ship’s clock above the mantel ticked in the silence. “Are you finished?” Caleb asked, his calm tone belying his inward turmoil.

Nate scowled at him in outrage for a second. Then he grinned. “Yes, sir. Are you ready to talk?”

Caleb sighed. He’d been foolish to think he’d be able to draw a line between everything in his previous life and his reclusive existence now in Haven’s End. “None of what happened in Boston matters anymore.”

“In a pig’s eye.”

“Maybe,” Caleb conceded, “but I’m settled here now. Whatever goes on back in Boston is no concern of mine.”

“Your father is sorry for not trusting your word. He realizes he shouldn’t have condemned you out of hand on the basis of circumstantial evidence. But you know him. He’ll never be able to tell you that. But let him show you. He’ll never doubt your word, nor your loyalty, again.”

Why was it too little, too late? Caleb stood, unable to contain himself within the confines of a chair.

“It won’t work, running away.” Nate’s tone was soft, persuasive.

“It’s called renouncing,” Caleb said quietly.

“Is nothing I say going to make any difference?”

“No.” The one syllable conveyed finality. He had thought long and hard about his decision.

Nate took up his glass and tilted it, watching the circle of liquid around its edge. He met Caleb’s gaze over its rim. “I’m not giving up, you know.” Without allowing the other a chance to reply, he changed the subject as if he hadn’t just thrown down a serious challenge.

“So, what do you find to do in this place?” He looked around the sparsely furnished room and added, “What do you do when the fog rolls in?”

“I sleep.”

Nate threw back his head and laughed. He took another sip of his drink before placing it on the crate and rising to stroll the perimeters of the room. “Glad to see you didn’t renounce every last remnant of your past life,” he said, stopping by the sea chest and picking up the spyglass sitting atop it. He focused it out the window.

“At least you shall never be bored with this view before you. I envy you that.”

“How reassuring there’s something you find redeeming about my new home.”

Nate lifted his brow at the word home. He replaced the spyglass and continued his perusal of Caleb’s belongings, fingering sextant, chronometer, compass—those tools by which a captain located his position at sea.

At the bookcase he examined Caleb’s pitiful collection of books, which filled only half a shelf. Leafing through Becher’s Navigation, he said, “Arabella has set a date for her marriage.”

The news hit Caleb like an unexpected blow to the gut. His muscles hadn’t had a chance to tense and form a wall rigid enough to withstand the assault.

Well, it was done. He should have known it was coming. Now he could get on with his life, knowing this chapter was irrevocably closed. What life? a part of his mind countered, taunting him with the emptiness of his days.

As if in reply to a question, Nate continued. “August twenty-fifth. Three o’clock. At the Congregational Church. Reception to follow at the home of the bride’s parents.”

Once again, the only sound in the room was that of the clock. “There’s still time to do something about it. She continues in ignorance of Ellery’s role.”

Caleb turned to look beyond his back lawn, beyond the cove, to the sea. Cloud cover gave the ocean a silvery green appearance. A small whitecap here and there signaled the stiff breeze blowing in from the Atlantic. A few islands lay directly in front of his cove, outcroppings of rock more than real landmasses. The larger one was flat, like an old man lying half submerged by water.

He watched a wave curl against one side of its forbidding gray rock, then slip back down into the ocean in defeat. His soul felt like that rock. Assaulted. Barren. Alone.

Knowing Nate waited for him to say something, he asked, “Why shouldn’t Arabella continue in ignorance about Ellery? What went on in the firm has nothing to do with her.”

Nate slammed the heavy tome shut and turned to Caleb. “Nothing to do with her that the man she’s planning to marry is the man who did everything in his power to make you look guilty? Nothing to do with her that the man who could have cleared you with one word was silent throughout the whole ordeal? And that you’ve done nothing to make her see the truth? Caleb, why do you insist on continuing the martyrdom? Wasn’t it bad enough when you had no choice? Now you’ve got your father behind you.”

Caleb tightened his hands into fists against the windowsill. Hadn’t he had the same discussions in his head over and over?

“Arabella made her decision.”

“She made a mistake.” Nate’s voice softened. “We all make mistakes. Is that a reason for condemning her to a lifetime shackled to a weak, envious, backstabbing—”

Caleb turned toward the room once more.

“You forget, Ellery is my cousin.” When Nate made a sound of disagreement, Caleb held up a hand. “I made the decision to leave.” He looked steadily at Nate, reminding him of his promise not to interfere. “My decision was final. What Ellery chooses to tell Arabella, or anyone else, is no longer my concern. It’s not the reason I left Boston. You and I both know why I did that.”

Nate replaced the book on the shelf. The care he took in putting it back exactly where he’d taken it told Caleb that his friend was using the time to compose himself. When he faced Caleb once again, his tone was calm.

“You’re still letting your father rule you. Even way up here, where you can’t see him or hear him, he continues to be a tyrant over you. I just wonder how long it’s going to take you to figure that out.”

Caleb awoke and looked up at the whitewashed ceiling, orienting himself. His mind was permeated with a feeling of anticipation, and he had to think a minute, wondering at its origin.

Nate had stayed until the day before, when he’d left on a schooner to Eastport, where he’d catch the overnight steamer to Boston. Caleb spent the two days of his visit showing him around. They had hiked and explored the coastline the same way they’d done as young sailors exploring the various ports of call.

Caleb stretched, reaching his arms up behind him, wondering at the sense of purpose he’d awakened with. He lay back on his pillow, the sunlight streaming in through the bare panes, until it came to him. The seeds!

Like an interrupted conversation that needed to be picked up where it had broken off, Caleb felt the need to follow through on his last encounter with Miss Patterson. She’d offered him seeds, and he was going to see about getting them.

Caleb threw back his sheet and blanket and jumped up from his bed, glad he no longer had to pretend that everything was all right, or weigh each word to make sure his faithful friend wouldn’t pounce on it, ready to use it as ammunition for Caleb’s return to Boston.

Glancing outside, he saw the sun shimmering off the blue Atlantic. Suddenly he felt a desire to plunge into it. He needed the cold, clear water to wash his mind of all the debate Nate’s visit had threatened to resurrect.

Grabbing a towel, he headed outside in his drawers and undervest across the remaining knee-high grass of his back lawn, down the rickety wooden stairs to the beach below. He flung the towel onto the round stones, stripped off the undervest, and began walking toward the surf. Immediately, he had to slacken his pace, his feet finding it hard going over the stones. They were as round and smooth as ostrich eggs, originally a slate hue but now bleached almost white by the sun.

When he first entered the water, the cold almost made him turn back, and as he went deeper, his ankles and feet grew numb. The rubbery rockweed covering the stones beneath the surf made walking precarious. When the water reached his thighs, Caleb braced himself for the impact and plunged in.

He swam straight out against the tide, then, turning, he veered to the side, swimming parallel to the shore, up and back, until his body recovered from the shock of the icy water and the exertion made him impervious to the cold.

He emerged from the water, feeling a release from the past. Thoughts of Arabella’s impending wedding could no longer threaten the equilibrium he’d achieved for himself.

Equilibrium? Since when? Certainly not since coming to Haven’s End, when he’d tried to drown his sorrows in drink. As he rubbed himself vigorously with the towel, he tried to pinpoint the moment he’d begun feeling a semblance of peace.

Since beginning the garden.

A gust of breeze raised the gooseflesh on his skin, so he turned his feet away from the cove and back toward the stairs.

After shaving and dressing, he headed up the road to his neighbor’s. She’d disappeared the day Nate had arrived, and Caleb hadn’t seen her since.

He proceeded in a leisurely way up the slope toward her place. A row of hackmatack trees, their sparse needle-clad branches interlocking, created a windbreak between his land and hers. A thicket of low-growing wild rosebushes clustered along the edge of the road, but they had not yet blossomed. The sound of the wind was constant, offering today a soft, steady sifting through the fir trees.

Miss Patterson’s front yard was edged by a crumbling stone wall, which was almost buried in wild rose and blackberry vines. Beyond this barrier, the yard was neat, the grass short and green, with a profusion of flowers blossoming around the well and at a window box. The house itself was a small, weathered shingle-box, surely not containing more than one room.

The first thing that greeted Caleb was the loud bark of a dog. As soon as he’d stepped onto the path of crushed, bleached white clamshells that led to the front door, his neighbor’s large, black dog bounded toward him. He was a black Labrador with enough other traits to deny any purity in his lineage. An old wound crumpled one ear, and an ugly pink scar disfigured the fur of one of its haunches.

Stopping a mere foot or so from Caleb, the dog kept up his barking. Caleb stood still, speaking to the dog in soft tones. Each time Caleb attempted to take a step forward, the dog dodged in front of him, his black eyes trained on Caleb.

Geneva walked around the side of the house, an empty pail swinging from each hand, heading toward the well. She stopped short at seeing Captain Caleb. What was he doing here? And Jake!

Recovering, she rushed toward the dog. “Down, Jake. That’s enough! I said hush!” When the dog continued barking and running back and forth, Geneva turned to Caleb. “Don’t pay him no mind. He won’t hurt you.”

The captain looked dubious. “Are you sure he knows that?”

“He just acts fierce. You won’t hurt the captain, will you, boy?” She bent over and rubbed Jake’s neck, seeking to ease the tension she felt in his muscles.

Caleb took a few cautious steps toward Jake and held out his hand for the dog’s inspection. “Your mistress is right. I won’t hurt you.” Jake would have none of it, but continued his incessant barking.

“He don’t take easily to strangers,” she explained, wanting so much for Jake to take to the captain. Her fingers continued running down the dog’s black hair in long, soothing strokes. “He had some bad times ’fore I got him, and he’s still not over them—are you, Jake?” She bent her head over her pet.

She could feel the captain watching the rhythm of her fingers down the dog’s haunches and she struggled to maintain their steadiness.

“Did his owner neglect him?” he asked gently.

Relieved that his focus was on the dog, she answered with a short laugh. “He probably wishes he had. No, his owner liked to take a stick to him and beat him ’til he could hardly stand.” She gave him a sharp look. “The man liked to drink.”

He didn’t react to her pointed reference, but said, “You ran off the other day.”

With a final pat, she straightened and picked up her buckets. “I didn’t ‘run off.’” She threw the words over her shoulder as she walked toward the well. “You had company. Figured the best thing I could do was stay out of your way.”

She set the pails down on the wet slats and began pumping the handle. When she’d filled each, she took them up and headed back around the house.

“Here, let me.” The captain reached her, ignoring Jake’s immediate menacing bark, to grab one of the pails.

Surprised at the gesture, she didn’t let go of the handle, but gave it a tug toward herself, sloshing water over the side of the rim. Jake immediately stood beside them, giving the captain a low-throated growl.

“Hush, Jake.” Geneva took the bucket from the captain’s loosened fingers. “Don’t worry, Cap’n, I got it. I’m just taking it to the garden. It hasn’t rained in a few days. Soil’s getting dry.” She heard the sentences coming out one atop the other in an effort to overcome her confusion at his gentlemanly gesture. Why did he treat her like a lady? Didn’t he see she was more like a man than a woman?

When she realized he hadn’t followed her, she had to swallow a sense of disappointment. She began watering her plants and was startled again at the sound of a whistle behind her.

The captain stood staring at her garden, a bucket in his hand. “Everything looks twice as high as in my garden.”

She shrugged, hiding her pleasure. “Yours will catch up.”

“Where do you want the water?” He held up the bucket.

She blinked. “You don’t have to help me with this.”

“You’ve helped me. And I’m sure to need your help again.”

For a moment she looked at him, then finally turned away. “Suit yourself.”

He took the bucket down another row of plants, watching and listening as she explained which way she watered what, taking care not to wet the leaves of some plants, not worrying about sloshing others, and crouching low to inspect the underside of a leaf here and there, looking for hungry caterpillars.

“By the way,” he said when they’d each emptied their last bucketful, “you said something about seeds the other day. Do you still have any to spare?”

“You still want ’em?” she asked doubtfully.

The captain nodded. “You told me to plant something every week, didn’t you?”

“Yep. I just figured since then—” She shook her head, falling silent.

“You figured what?”

She could feel a flush covering her cheeks. “Nothin’—you having company and all.”

“Nate? He just stayed three nights.”

She turned away, saying with a shrug, “Thought you’d be heading back to Boston by now.”

Leaving him, she headed toward the lean-to attached to her house. She unlatched the door and entered its shadowy interior. Firewood lined most of the walls, floor to ceiling. The air was redolent with the spicy scent of drying spruce and balsam. She turned to the shelf holding gardening implements and took down a jar. From it she extracted a folded paper. Inside it were minute specks. She refolded the paper and handed it to the captain, who had followed her into the shed.

“You can bring me back what you don’t use.”

He nodded absently and took the paper. “What did you mean—you thought I would be returning to Boston the first chance I got?”

She continued uncorking jars and extracting folded packets of paper. “It’s where you’re from. Didn’t think you’d stick it out here if you didn’t have to.”

The captain thrust out his hand to stop the motion of her hand on a jar. “I chose to come here. I didn’t have to. Do you understand the difference?”

She raised startled eyes to him. For a second their gazes met and held. The sunlight sliced through the open doorway, cutting a path across her face, leaving her feeling exposed, yet helpless to look away. His eyes traveled across her face, almost as if he were seeing her for the first time.

“I jus’ thought—I mean—I didn’t think anyone’d come here to live. Not from Boston, anyway. Ain’t none of my business, anyhow.”

His hand still held her wrist. She jerked it away, and he immediately let it go.

He looked at the seed papers in his other hand. “How do I tell what is what?”

Again he’d caught her off guard. “Uh, I jus’ know by looking at ’em.” She unfolded one and said, “This here’s lettuce. It’ll grow quick. You should get enough through the summer if you plant some now, and then again in a week or so.”

“I should write the names of each on the papers.”

She bit her lip. “Uh, sure. I don’t have a pencil with me.”

He took one from his breast pocket. “Here.”

She looked at the pencil distrustfully. “You write. I—I’ll tell you what they are.”

“Good enough.” He unfolded the first paper and showed her. Then he refolded it and wrote the name she gave him on the paper. They continued until they’d labeled all the packets, though she gave him only the seeds she thought he should plant.

When they finished, he thanked her and left. She watched him walk back down the path to the road. Shame engulfed her.

What a fool she felt, not even being able to do so simple a task as write down the names of the seeds.