Montgomery - Eternity Part 6

Shyly, Tem bent to Carrie and quickly kissed her cheek. He was a bit red in the face when he did it, but he gave a self-conscious smile as though he were proud of himself, then hurried up the ladder to his bed.

When the children were out of the room, Josh didn't say a word, but left the table to stand by the fireplace and stare at the flames. Silently, Carrie cleared the table, putting the dirty dishes in the sink. She had no idea what to do to clean them, and she certainly had no desire to learn. She liked beauty, and dirty dishes had nothing to do with beauty.

Carrie turned to Josh. "Would you like to go outside?" she asked.

"Why?" Josh asked suspiciously. His arms were folded across his chest, as though he were determined that none of himself was going to escape.

"So you can shout at me, of course. I got the distinct impression that that was your number one desire when you came home today. You haven't forgotten already, have you? Or maybe you've changed your mind. Or maybe you want to yell at me in the house so our children can hear."

"My children."

"So, you do want them to hear?"

At that, Josh grabbed Carrie's upper arm and pulled her out of the house into the cool, starlit night.

She walked toward the privacy of the trees, but he didn't follow her, so she turned back to him and sighed. "All right, I'm ready."

"What you did was wrong," he began. "You've made a laughingstock of me in front of the entire town."

"Actually, I rather think the townspeople think you're the luckiest man on earth, but then they don't have the deep knowledge of my character that you believe you do."

"Character has nothing to do with this. You may as well have told everyone that I can't take care of my own family."

"You love your children as much as any person I've ever seen. You just don't seem to have any money. Personally, I'd rather have love than money."

Josh didn't know whether to wring her neck or shout at her. No matter what he said to her, she didn't seem to hear him, didn't listen, didn't understand. When he spoke again, his voice was quieter. "A man likes to think he can support his own family, that his wife-I mean, his-"

"Yes, go on. What am I to you if not your wife?"

He didn't answer her, but stood there in silence.

Carrie sighed. "All right, King Joshua, I have fulfilled task number one, not by the rules, according to you, so what is task number two? I hope there are only three tasks involved."

At that inanity, Josh looked confused.

Carrie explained. "In all the fairy tales the princess is set three tasks. This morning you gave me a list that one human could never have completed, but I managed to do it-with the help of Rumpelstiltskin, of course. Rumpelstiltskin being the entire town of Eternity. So now, sire, what is task number two?"

As understanding began to dawn on Josh, he grimaced. "It's as I thought: You think that all of this is a source for humor, something that you can tell your rich friends when you return home to Maine."

"And you think that everything in life is a reason for gloom. What is it that I have to do to prove myself to you?" She stopped. "No, wait a minute. You know something that I never did understand in the tale of Rumpelstiltskin? I couldn't understand why the young woman wanted the king. The king said that if she didn't spin the straw into gold, he'd cut her head off. How was I to believe that she lived happily ever after if she had to marry a creep like that?"

"There is no happily ever after, that's what I've been trying to tell you," Josh said heavily.

"Maybe you don't believe there is, but I do." Carrie practically shouted. "And it's what I mean to have. I apologize profusely, Mr. Greene, for having played such a dreadful trick on you as lying to you and marrying you. Since your major concern in life seems to be money, then perhaps what I spent on your house will partially make up for what I did to you. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to pack."

As she started toward the house, Josh caught her arm. "It's the middle of the night. You can't go anywhere."

"Yes I can. If you can spare your second-best horse, I mean to go into town. Surely, after the amount of money I spent in that town today, someone will give me a bed for the night. And think, sir, of the satisfaction you will have in telling your children that I have gone. You can give them a much-needed lesson in the perfidy of women."

"Carrie," Josh said, reaching out his hand to touch her.

"Oh, so you know my name. I had no idea I was so honored. I thought that Miss Montgomery was all that you knew of me, but then, for you, my name is all you've needed to know-that and my looks, of course."

When Carrie marched onto the porch of the house and flung open the door, she was greeted by two white-faced, scared-looking children who had obviously heard everything that had been said outside.

"You aren't going to leave, are you?" Dallas said in a tear-filled voice, her little face white.

With a quick glance at Josh, Carrie saw that his face had an I-told-you-so smirk on it that she wished she could knock away with a baling pin. It was at that moment that Carrie decided to tell the children the truth. She'd often thought that adults terrified children by telling them there were things they were too young to understand and that it was ignorance that frightened people, not knowledge.

"I want both of you to sit down and I want to tell you everything," she said.

Just as she thought he would, Josh began to protest, but she turned on him in fury. "Whether you like it or not, I am legally part of this family."

The children sat at the table solemn and quiet while Carrie told them everything about how and why she came to be at their house.

"You loved us from the picture?" Dallas asked.

"Yes," Carrie answered. "I did. But now I have to leave, because your father is afraid that if I stay here longer, when I do leave, I will hurt you very much, and he doesn't want that to happen."

"Will you leave us?" Tem asked in a very adult voice, but there was a child's fear underlying the voice.

"If your father and I don't love each other, then I guess I'll have to. I'm afraid that I played a rather nasty trick on your father, and he's very angry about it."

Tears welled in Dallas's eyes. "Don't be angry, Papa."

Taking the child onto her lap, Carrie held her in her arms. "Don't blame your father. He's probably right. I might get bored living here in this little town. You see, where I live I'm used to parties and dancing and laughter." She was lying, but she knew it was for a good cause. She couldn't bear to leave and make the children think her departure was their father's fault. It was better that they dislike her than their father.

As Dallas clung to Carrie, Josh looked away. A five-year-old little girl was still a baby, for all that Dallas sometimes acted very grown-up.

"You can stay with us for the week, and we won't cry when you leave," Tem said, for once not looking at his father for approval.

Everyone turned to the boy.

"I don't think-" Josh began.

"She can stay!" Tem shouted, and it was easy to see that he was on the verge of tears, all his self-control about to break.

It was Carrie who at last spoke. "Temmie," she said, gently. "I am genuinely flattered that you've come to like me so much, but I know what you're thinking, that maybe I'll stay. I can a.s.sure that I will not. The only way I'd stay would be if I fell in love with your father, and I can promise you that will not happen. I rather stupidly thought that I knew what your father was like from looking at his photograph, but I didn't. Your father is a judgmental, pigheaded, know-it-all who has no sense of humor whatsoever, and I could never possibly love anyone like him."

Josh was looking at Carrie in horror as she delivered this p.r.o.nouncement of him, while the children were staring at their father as though considering her opinion.

"Papa used to laugh," Tem said seriously. "But since Mother-"

"That's enough," Josh said sharply, cutting his son off.

"Stay," Dallas said, begging. "Please stay. It's so nice when you're here."

As Carrie held the child, she had to blink back her own tears. Perhaps it was the children she had come to love from the photo, for they were just as she'd hoped they'd be. She knew that if she'd come to love them this much in two days, it would be unbearable if she stayed a whole week and then had to leave them. "I think it's better that I leave now," Carrie said softly.

"We will vote," Tem said, but looking at his father for permission.

Josh took a moment, but he nodded his consent. Carrie was sure that the vote was going to be a tie, two for her leaving, two for her staying, but when Tem asked who was for Carrie staying as long as she could, both children put up their hands, then, slowly, so did Josh.

Carrie looked at him. "I want my children to be happy," Josh said softly in explanation, "even if it is only for a matter of days."

Carrie sighed, for she felt that she was making a mistake. She already loved these children, and she was going to love them more in the next few days. She didn't know how she was going to be able to leave them in just a few days' time.

"Sometimes the stage is late," Tem said, hope in his voice.

Smiling, Carrie reached across the table and took his hand in hers. Yes, she thought, who knew what could happen in a week? "All right," she said at last. "I will stay for as long as I can."

Chapter Seven.

"How do people fall in love?" Dallas asked her brother.

It was early morning in the loft, and since Carrie had arrived, Josh had tried each night to fit himself into Dallas's narrow bed, but he complained that Dallas wiggled too much. This morning he had risen early and gone down to chop wood for the new stove so Carrie could cook breakfast. Dallas had heard her father mumble that the idea of Carrie cooking was a joke, but she hadn't heard her father laughing.

"I don't know," Tem said, but he'd given the idea some thought. "I think the man gives the woman flowers and they hold hands, then they get married. I don't know what else."

"Could we ask someone? Aunt Alice maybe."

"I don't think Uncle Hiram knows about love," Tem said, and Dallas nodded in agreement. One couldn't very well put love and Uncle Hiram in the same thought.

Silently, Tem got out of bed, put his dirty work clothes back on, then helped Dallas into her plain, worn brown dress before they went down the ladder together.

Both of the children stood out of the way as Carrie and their father went about preparing breakfast. Tem knew that Dallas was much too young to understand what was going on, besides, she was too busy spending her time running her fingers over the roses on the wall to pay attention to much else, but Tem was all too aware of everything that went on between his father and Carrie.

Carrie and his father sniped and spat at each other like a dog and cat. Josh said that Carrie couldn't cook, that for all that she could buy a stove with her father's money, she didn't know what to do with it. Then Carrie said that if Josh had any decency, he'd teach her how to cook.

Tem nearly groaned at that, for as far as he could tell, his father was the worst cook on the face of the earth. Before Carrie came, if it hadn't been for the women in town and Aunt Alice taking pity on the children, who kept growing thinner by the day, they might have starved. Their father once set eggs on to boil, then went out to feed the horses. When he came back, he discovered that he'd cracked the eggs when dropping them into the pot and the insides of the egg had come out. They'd had white goo for breakfast.

Now Carrie was asking Josh to give her cooking lessons. Tem expected his father to tell the truth, that he knew as much about cooking as Carrie did, but Josh didn't tell the truth. Instead, he told Carrie that he didn't ask her how to farm and she shouldn't ask him how to do her job. Josh said that according to the letter she sent she knew all there was to know about cooking. In fact, Josh was thinking about bringing home a live goat and Carrie was to slaughter it and do all the rest to it. Tem knew that his father had no idea what else was done to a goat to make it ready to be put on the table, but it didn't sound that way. It sounded as though his father knew all there was to know about goats and everything else on the farm. Carrie got very angry and told Josh he was an idiot and she would be glad to see the last of him. Josh said that he was also thinking about buying rabbits so his wife could cook them, too.

In the end they had oatmeal and bacon and eggs for breakfast. The oatmeal was only half-cooked, some of it still dry flakes. The bacon was half-burned, half-raw, and the eggs were cooked so solid in the center that Tem knew he could have used the yolks for ice hockey pucks.

Both the children sat at the table, dabbing at their food, while Josh told Carrie in detail everything that was wrong with the meal. He said that the children couldn't even eat it. At that Tem kicked Dallas, and the two of them started eating as though they were dying of hunger and the food was delicious. When Dallas started to complain that her oatmeal tasted bad, Tem put three tablespoons of sugar on top of it and that stopped her complaints.

After breakfast-the longest meal of Tem's life-Josh put on his hat and said that the children had to get ready to go with him to the fields. Dallas made a long face and said that she wanted to stay with Carrie, that Carrie was going to leave and she wanted to see her. Tem could see that this hurt his father, so Tem said loudly that he wanted to stay with his father, that he was looking forward to hoeing turnips and pulling bugs off the corn.

With an angry look, Josh said that Tem was to stay with Carrie too. Tem protested, but Josh said that he didn't want or need his son with him, then he slammed out of the house.

"What a jolly, cheerful fellow," Carrie said. "What a joy he is to have around."

Dallas said, "When Mother-"

Tem kicked her so she'd shut her mouth. Their father had talked a great deal about not telling anyone anything about the past, but it was sometimes hard for a baby like Dallas to remember. Tem knew that his father hadn't always been as he was now, that there had been a time when their father had been very happy. Tem remembered when he used to run to his father's outstretched arms, and he remembered his father laughing and taking his children to fairs and the circus and to see plays. He remembered the way his father used to talk to their mother. In fact, Tem remembered the way his father had seemed to talk to all women. Their mother used to say that Josh was a real ladies' man, that he charmed them all-but Tem didn't think Carrie found their father "charming."

Josh didn't talk to Carrie in the way he usually talked to women. He talked to her as though he hated her. But, for some reason, Tem wasn't sure that his father did actually hate Carrie. First of all, how could he? Tem was sure that, next to his mother, Carrie was the prettiest woman on earth. And second, she was funny and she was exciting and she made people smile. How could anyone hate Carrie?

And, also, there was the way his father acted when he got too close to Carrie. Three times this morning Tem was sure he'd seen his father's face turn red when she leaned over him or walked close to him. And every time Josh's face turned red, he said something mean to Carrie. He even said bad things about her little dog.

And there was the way his father watched Carrie. Whenever she had her back to him, Josh was watching her. He couldn't seem to take his eyes off her. And this morning Josh had gone into the bedroom to get a clean s.h.i.+rt from out of the bureau Carrie had bought, and Tem had seen his father look inside one of the drawers and just stand there staring. Then Josh had put his hand in the drawer to touch whatever was in there. He had the very strangest look on his face, like that time he'd hurt his foot and he'd said that it didn't hurt but it actually did. After his father had left the room, Tem had sneaked in and looked in the drawer. Carrie's nightgown was in there, the one she'd worn the night before when Josh had combed her hair and she'd kissed his hand.

All and all, it was very confusing to Tem. His father seemed to hate Carrie, but then he didn't seem to hate her. He seemed to like to look at her and to listen to her stories at night, and he seemed to like to stand real close to her, so Tem couldn't understand why his father said such mean things to Carrie.

As for Carrie, Tem didn't understand her either. She said things to Josh that were just as bad as he said to her, but then he saw her pick up his father's s.h.i.+rt and sort of hug it to her. Tem thought maybe he saw tears in Carrie's eyes while she was holding it, but he wasn't sure about that.

"What shall we do today?" Carrie asked. "Would you like to go fis.h.i.+ng?"

Tem looked about the kitchen. There was a three-foot-tall stack of dirty dishes on the cabinet and the floor had mud on it and there were dirty clothes and the animals needed to be fed. He wasn't sure, but he thought that Carrie was supposed to clean things during the day. Aunt Alice was somebody's wife, and she always seemed to be cleaning things and she talked a great deal about a woman having pride in her house.

Tem cleared his throat. "I can show you how to wash dishes," he said.

Carrie smiled. "I'm sure that I could figure it out if I needed to, but I really have no desire to learn how to do dishes. Don't look so worried, Tem. They'll get cleaned. I have a woman coming from town to do them."

Tem tried again. "But aren't you supposed to wash the dishes?"

"I'm sure your father thinks so. But then I'm also sure that I could spend the entire week scrubbing, and he'd still find something wrong with me. If a person's determined to dislike you, he will. Besides, if I have only a few days with the two of you, I'd rather go fis.h.i.+ng." Carrie watched as Tem contemplated this. "Tem, it's up to you. If you want to stay here and scrub, that's what we'll do. But if you'd rather fish, then we'll do that."

"Tem," Dallas said in a whine, begging her brother to let them have a day of fun.

Tem knew that he should choose scrubbing, since it's what his father seemed to want in a wife, what he seemed to think was the most important thing a wife could do, but then he asked himself if Carrie was right. Would Josh be happy if he came back to a clean house? Last night he had come back to a house that was filled with light and walls with roses on them, yet all Josh had done was grumble, so Tem thought that maybe a clean floor wouldn't make him smile. "Fis.h.i.+ng," Tem said at last, and Dallas started jumping up and down in happiness, Choo-choo jumping with her.

Tem tried to forget the problems between his father and Carrie, but as the day wore on, he seemed to think of them more. Maybe Carrie couldn't cook, but she sure could do other things. She took the children into the barn-that's what Papa called the shed, and calling it that had made Uncle Hiram laugh-and showed them her trunks.

When she started opening them, it was like Aladdin's treasure trove, and it took her over an hour to find the fis.h.i.+ng poles-handmade in England she told the children. They didn't have to ask to know that her brothers had given her the poles.

Carrie shut the trunks, and they started off toward the stream. Tem was impressed at how well Carrie could fish. She seemed to sense where the trout were hiding, and she wasn't the least bit afraid of baiting her hook with worms. As they fished, she told the children stories of fis.h.i.+ng in the sea and about catching lobsters and other strange creatures.

"Mother fed us lobster," Dallas said, then yelled at Tem when he hit her arm.

"Are you not supposed to talk about your mother?" Carrie asked.

Dallas shook her head, while Tem glared at her in warning.

"Does the mention of your mother make your father sad?" Carrie asked.

"Not sad," Dallas began, but said no more after catching a look at Tem.

Tem covered for his big-mouth sister. "Very sad. Maybe that's why he says such mean things to you."

Carrie nodded at that. Maybe it was true that Josh didn't think anyone could replace his children's mother.