Library

Chapter 18

C HAPTER 18

You can't depend upon your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.

—Mark Twain

The next morning, Marigold was still discomfited enough by her conversation with Sophronia to want the crowded, civilized comfort of the town.

"Wilbert," Marigold called before he could disappear from the kitchen. "I thought I might revisit the station at Pride's Crossing to inquire about my things that have not yet been sent on as I asked." And learn the schedule for trains back to Boston. "And with your escort, we could"—she lowered her voice, lest she be overheard—"visit the library to do some of that research we talked about. We might also check in at the Grange Hall," she suggested, "to inquire about the going price per head? Or the price of wool this year?"

If she had another reason for wanting Wilbert to accompany her, she would keep that to herself. It takes some getting used to for some folks. She hated that she was still one of the some .

"Pa don't like us leaving. Or taking the boat." Wilbert rubbed his shaved chin as if he missed the bristles. "And I'll admit I don't much like going to town. And they don't much like us. Never have." He squinted across the water. "It is a fearful long way to go."

"Less than two miles," Marigold reasoned. "And all the more reason to go and give them a good impression, looking as spiffy as you do." She was justifiably proud of the transformation of her cousin from the unkempt lurcher of their first meeting to the washed, combed, and cleanly dressed specimen who stood before her. "You may take confidence in your appearance."

Wilbert's cheeks turned so rosy a red that Marigold was momentarily alarmed that he might have gotten the wrong impression, but he agreed without any further sign of consternation. "I reckon I might could look into the Grange Hall."

Marigold was happy to find the row across Salem Sound was becoming more familiar and less daunting with every trip. But she still could not stop herself from searching the water for that remembered flash of red on the evening tide.

And thinking of drowning … "Do you like to swim, Wilbert?" She had thought herself a very proficient swimmer, especially once Isabella had designed her a swim costume without burdensome skirts. But she had never tried to swim in such cold water. "Perhaps when it's warmer or more placid in the summer?"

"Nah. I can't—none of us can," he admitted. "Pa always forbid us even wading into the water. Says it's not natural."

Perhaps that was why Cleon had been so edgy while she was clambering along the rocky foreshore? Had he assumed she wouldn't know how to swim either? It was another curiosity to add to the cabinet of curiosities that was life in the Hatchet house.

They crossed the sound without incident, stowed the dory on West Beach, and started the walk up the narrow lanes into Pride's Crossing, but while Marigold felt herself becoming more relaxed the closer they came to civilization, her cousin grew more agitated. "Would you like to accompany me into the library, Wilbert? Or would you prefer to head on towards the Grange Hall?"

"Sure, you go ahead and do that." Wilbert touched his hand to his hat before he slumped hastily off toward the plain clapboard Grange Hall down the street.

Marigold checked her own reflection in a window, making sure she could be seen as a stylish, impeccably mannered representative of her temporary clan before she passed through the doors of the library. "Miss Morgan," Marigold greeted the librarian. "How nice to see you again."

"Miss Manners! I am happy to see you looking so well and back at the library." The young woman hid her surprise by adjusting her spectacles. "What might I help you with this morning?"

"Some general reading materials on local agriculture, if you please."

"Arable or pasturage?"

Marigold had to smile at the preciseness of mind on display. "Both, I thank you, although I will admit to some greater interest in livestock."

"Any particular type or breed of livestock?

Until Wilbert had made up his mind, Marigold felt that risking her query about sheep might be trying poor Miss Morgan's local loyalties unfairly. "Just general information, although I am also interested in agricultural groups. I wondered if there were any publications from such any such local groups that would address best husbandry or stock management practices?"

"We carry the Farm Alliance's National Economist , as well as the Rural and Family Farm Paper out of Springfield."

"Those should do nicely. I appreciate your expertise, Miss Morgan."

"Thank you." Amelia Morgan's cheeks turned a charming rose. "I'll bring the latest issues to the reading room for you in just a moment."

"Thank you. I should also like to check out any primers you might have, both reading and writing, as well as mathematical."

That Miss Morgan was confounded by such a request was evident in the frown etched above her spectacles, but she did not demur—a very nice set of primers was delivered to Marigold's table.

"Thank you, Miss Morgan." Marigold turned her mind to the problem of making Hatchet Farm a going concern. She spent two hours working her way through the newspapers, seeking out pertinent information on forage and the like until she felt she had enough to advise Wilbert, whom she hoped would have finished his business at the Grange Hall and made his way to library.

He had not.

But no matter. It was only a short walk to the Grange Hall—Pride's Crossing was hardly Boston—but this time Marigold took her time, peering in the windows of the tiny nickelodeon reel house and dawdling to read the advertisements in the window of the druggist, where she bought a nickel's worth of penny candy at its marble soda fountain. Seeing and being seen.

While no one was what she might call friendly, people were civil, tipping their hats or nodding their heads to her. Marigold kept her smile warm—civility and respect were a good first step. Her plan to win over the townspeople was working, albeit slowly.

"Miss Manners?" The bell over the druggist's door jangled out its warning, and Marigold turned to find the silhouette of a tall man in a straw boater hat filling the door. "Marigold?"

Something within kicked free of her chest. "Cab?"

She said his name almost involuntarily, knowing it could not be true. Knowing her rebellious heart and even more ridiculously unhelpful brain had supplied some unmet, unnamed longing she would have to deal with at some later, less public moment. For now, all she could do was feel her cheeks flame and take solace in the fact that no one in Pride's Crossing could know who on earth Cab Cox was.

"It is you!" The silhouette doffed his hat and swept it under his arm so he could step near enough to be seen. And it really was Cab, stretching out his hand to her in greeting. "Marigold." He took hold of her nerveless fingers. "I can't tell you how glad I am to see you. I couldn't believe my luck when I saw your name on those broken-down crates at the train depot and realized what it meant—that you must be nearby."

"Cab," she said again, like the veriest peabrain, for her mouth could evidently produce no other word. "What are you doing here?"

"Now, that's a long story." He gave her that charming, self-deprecating smile that had so clearly imprinted itself upon her highly susceptible brain. "I suppose I wanted a change too—a bit of adventure."

There was no way that rural, plain Pride's Crossing, where the gossips had made a meal from Marigold's purchase of a carton of outhouse paper, could be construed as an adventure for a man of Cab's experience. "Really?"

"It was what you said about striking out on your own," he explained as he tucked her hand through the crook of his arm and led her, as docile as a lamb, away from the clerk's avid earshot. "You inspired me. My uncle Endicott—Mr. George C. Endicott, who is a landowner of some reputation in these parts—"

"Indeed, the name rings a bell." The Endicott family were well-known in Massachusetts for their fortune, built upon seafaring, as well as their political and military leadership. Although Marigold had never heard of any connection to the Coxes who lived on the North Shore, it would naturally follow that Cab would be related to one of the richest families in town, while she was related to the poorest.

"It's really his wife, my aunt, who's related through my mother's side," Cab was explaining. "You know how it is with family."

Marigold only knew how it was with her family—complicated and somewhat dangerous. "Naturally."

"Well, Uncle George had been asking for some help with a difficult lawsuit," he went on. "And as I'm only a junior partner at the firm, it was felt to be an advantageous use of my time. So here I am. But to see you here too—why, that's swell. You're looking well."

"Thank you," she said, because manners were manners and one had to have standards, even if one did want to reach up and tuck one's hair back under one's hat to make sure one did indeed look well and not as if one had rowed across Salem Sound in a stiff wind. "As do you."

And he did look well. Very well. His face was more handsome and square jawed than ever, and the boater hat, which he set back upon his head, balanced the architecture of his jaw quite nicely.

"I hope you don't mind." He was still holding her hand in a caring sort of way. "I don't want you to feel I'm horning in."

Thank goodness she was wearing good kidskin gloves to cover her washtub-reddened hands. "Not in the least," she said automatically. But her feelings were a tumult of conflicting emotions—elated and uneasy all at the same time. "I'm sure there's room enough in the state of Massachusetts for the two of us to pursue our own interests."

His delight gleamed down at her. "It's wonderful, isn't it—all this bright light and brisk sea air? Nothing like this in the city."

"Yes, it is expansive "—Marigold chose the word carefully—"isn't it?"

"That's right," he confirmed. "Just what we both wanted—wide open with all sorts of interesting possibilities."

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