Darkness

Rosy

Ben has escorted Sarah home by the time that Gregor gets back from his long day. Nadine has gotten supper ready for us, and is just waiting with me for Gregor to return before she goes home. I told Jake that he could go ahead and eat with Ben and Sarah before they left. He’s like my brother Jack, a growing boy, and seems always to have a hearty appetite.

When Gregor gets home, I expect him to be exhausted, but he seems happy and energized. He pulls me to him as always, and we hold each other for a wonderful couple of minutes.

“Is Vernon already down?” he asks.

“Yes, he seemed tired so I went ahead and put him in the cradle, and he went right off to sleep. Sorry, I know you like to see him before he goes to bed.”

“Don’t apologize, darling,” he says, smoothing my hair back and kissing my forehead, “I’ll see him in the morning. Or who knows, maybe if he went to sleep early he’ll wake up in the night and I can take care of him.”

“Are you hungry?” I ask him. He shrugs, but walks with me into the kitchen. I’m sure he can smell the stew that Nadine left simmering in a pot on the stove.

Jake pops his head out from his little room behind the kitchen. “Hey Gregor,” he says, “how is the cabin going for Moses?”

Gregor grins. “Really good. We got even further along today than I expected. We should definitely get it done on schedule. Another three days should do the trick.”

Jake nods, rubbing his eyes. I think he was just waiting for Gregor to get home before he fell asleep. Wolk probably tells Gregor this, for he says, “Good night, Jake, we’ll see you in the morning.”

When the door to his little room closes behind him, I tell Gregor, “Have a seat,” and he settles down at the little kitchen table. We like being in here when it is just the two of us, rather than in the more formal dining room. I move to the stove to ladle some stew into bowls for us. I bring over some of Nadine’s delicious freshly baked bread to the table as well.

I sit close to him, rather than across the table. I haven’t seen him all day, so I don’t want to have the table between us. He smiles and nods. I don’t even bother asking any more if Wolk has told him what I’m thinking. I pretty much assume he always does that.

Gregor takes a bite of Nadine’s stew, and closes his eyes for a moment, savoring the rich flavors. “Nadine is really a marvelous cook,” he says. “This is wonderful. If I don’t see her tomorrow, will you do me a favor and thank her for me?”

I smile. “Of course.” I tuck in to my stew and there is silence for a couple of minutes. He eats more than usual. I’m curious, since I know that half the time he really isn’t very hungry, and it doesn’t seem to bother him to go without eating very much. “Are you just enjoying the flavor of the stew? Or did you work so hard today that you are extra hungry?”

He laughs softly. “Both, I think. I am very hungry. I worked harder today than I have since…” he stops and reconsiders, and I think he was about to say since he was whipped. He goes on, “Than I have for a couple of months. I guess I worked up an appetite.”

I smile and shake my head as I dip a hunk of bread into my bowl of stew. “What?” he asks, seeing me smile.

“Oh, I’m just thinking that you have never really gotten out of the habit of keeping secrets,” I say lightly, teasing him a little.

I’m almost sorry I did it, though, because his face grows very serious, almost sad. “It’s all right, Gregor, you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” I say quickly.

But he sighs, and leans back in his seat, and says, “I sometimes forget how much you understand, darling. I’m sorry if I still seem to be keeping secrets. I really do try not to. And it isn’t really a secret, it’s just something that has….” He trails off.

I put my hand on top of his. “I know it’s hard for you to talk about some things, sugar. Maybe you can’t find the words sometimes?”

He nods, looking abashed. “Well,” I say, “I think I already know what you were about to say.”

A glimmer of amusement comes to his face. “Oh?” he asks. “Am I that transparent?”

I smile. “You’re a husband, and I’m a wife. We wives have our ways.”

“All right then, Wife, what was I going to say?”

Good, I’ve cheered him back up. He just looks amused and intrigued now.

“You were going to say that you haven’t worked that hard since the day you were whipped,” I say, not beating around the bush. He doesn’t like to talk about that day, but it happened and I don’t think it does him any favors to refuse to acknowledge it. His eyes widen, but I’m not done yet. “I think that you have been holding back, because some of the fellows on the crew are a little scared of you still after what happened.”

He breathes out with a whoof. “Um, yes, exactly. Wives have their ways, eh? Are you sure there isn’t some hidden Guardian that you talk to that I have never known about?”

It makes me laugh a little. “I’ll never tell.” He looks shocked, and I say, “Of course not, silly. I just watch. And I hear all the gossip around town. People talk about you, you know.”

He snorts. “I can imagine.”

“So,” I say, “I guess today you decided to go ahead and work with the men again, just like you used to?”

He smiles happily and picks back up his fork to have another bite of stew. “Yes, I did.”

“How’d that work out?”

“Really well. As far as I can tell everyone felt just fine about it by the end of the day. I think maybe I should have just been doing it all along, rather than avoiding them.”

I nod. “It’s better to just take things straight on, rather than hiding from them,” I say.

He chuckles. “Wise advice.”

“So will you all work together again tomorrow?”

“Well, not all of us,” he says with a sigh. “Samuel has more yellow fever patients, and several men are going to stay in town to help with them. I told Samuel that he could use the boarding house extension as a sick ward since it is completed, but it is standing empty until the steamboat gets back. So some of the men will stay to transport patients and help to tend them.”

“I heard about the new patients,” I tell him. “Mother told me that people were talking about it at the mercantile today.”

He nods, gets a thoughtful look on his face, then says, “May I ask your advice, darling? I should take advantage of your wisdom more often, as you are such an observant wife.” He smiles softly at me.

“Of course,” I say, flattered.

“I’m trying to decide whether I should be one of the men who stays in town to help with the patients, rather than going to Homochitto tomorrow. I’d hate to miss the cabin building, but I also would hate to be all the way out there without knowing what is going on in town. If any of the patients are really ill, I could help them by touching them, but Wolk would be too far away to know about it while we are out at Homochitto.”

I think about it. “How far is too far?” I ask.

“He can hear about two miles away,” he says. “Homochitto is about twice that distance.”

“But he can hear Misty at Homochitto,” I point out. “I know that you ask how Ayola is doing all the time, and he finds out from her Guardian. Is it because you are both Seers?”

“Well, not exactly,” he says. “It’s because they are both sharing that shield that protects Ayola and I from other Guardians being able to hear our thoughts. That makes them able to talk to each other no matter how far apart they are. They could even talk while I was in Pittsburgh.”

“But no other Guardians can do it?”

He looks at me with a funny expression. “What do you mean?”

“Well, I just think that if you need to know what is going on in Natchez, but you’re at Homochitto, it’d be awfully convenient if Wolk could just ask my Guardian. I’m sure Harriet would tell him anything he wanted to know.”

His eyes widen, and he looks over to the side of the room, which I have figured out means that he is talking to Wolk. He is quiet for a long moment. Then he looks back over at me, with an expression of wonder, and says slowly, “We think it might work. And Harriet said she’d be willing to try. But to bring the Guardian of someone who is not a Seer under the shield might be … strange for you.”

“How so?”

“I don’t have any idea, honestly. None of us have ever tried anything like this before. Is it all right with you if we do it?”

“With me? Why would you even need to ask that? It’s not like I can hear Harriet. I don’t think it could possibly make any difference to me.”

“Well, she’s your Guardian. If she is going to do something truly bizarre I think she’d like to have your permission.”

I snort out with laughter, and shrug. “Sure. Give it a go.”