Chapter Twenty-six
Kate surveyed the damage in front of her and worried that there was no hope of saving it. She was standing inside her old badger hole, trying to assess the destruction done by the ravages of the past winter.
Part of the roof had caved in, and as a result, a pile of mud had mounded on the little table where she used to work on her baskets. With a heavy sigh, she picked up a stray piece of wood that had been formerly wedged into place to brace the earthen ceiling and tossed it outside.
“Throwing things at me now?”
Edmund! She had not seen him since that day he had broken it off with Mary.
He still did morning and evening chores at the Kerwyns, but he did not eat dinner with them, nor did he come into the house at all.
Several times, Kate was tempted to go out to the barn to speak with him, but she wasn’t exactly sure what to say.
Congratulate him on breaking with Mary? Offer him comfort?
Neither seemed right, and the fact that he did not seek her out told her much.
Well, she could live with that. She could live with not having him so long as he was not tied to someone unworthy of him.
“Thought I’d find you up here.” He held his hat and flashed her a crooked smile. His face was ruddy from walking up the hill, and the wind blew the locks of his brown hair, longer than she had ever seen it before. It suited him, Kate decided.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“Looking for you.” He smiled again, but his eyes were sad, pensive.
She wanted to say that he could have talked to her anytime he liked this past week by simply walking into the farmhouse or catching her while she worked in the garden, but she refrained.
He peered beyond her into the earthen shelter. “I don’t know, Kate. This one might be past repairing. You might think about finding a new one.” He glanced back at her. “You aren’t really thinking of moving back up here, though, are you?”
“No, not really.” She let out a little sigh.
“But I was hoping to use it as a workshop. A place of my own where I can leave out my materials without them getting in the way or Minnie messing them up.” In truth, she was itching to get back to her creative endeavors.
She had accepted the fact—happily accepted, she emphasized to herself—that she would be her parents’ housekeeper and her mother’s nurse forever, but she longed to have something that was still her own.
“Are you sad that your real family aren’t the artists or the Indians you wanted them to be?” he asked softly, leaning against the doorframe.
She was surprised by the question. No one had asked her that.
Nettie and Minnie wanted gossipy stories and her father had asked if they had been kind, but everyone had mostly been preoccupied with Mrs. Kerwyn being ill, and now they were preoccupied with Louisa running off.
Her mother had eventually inquired about her experience but only in the most general of terms. Discerning that her mother was uncomfortable, threatened almost, by the subject, Kate had kept most of the details to herself.
“The Kerwyns are my real family.” Kate stepped past him out into the open air. The day was windy, but gloriously warm. She began to aimlessly walk along the path that led down to the creek.
“Okay, then, your original family.” Edmund slowly followed.
“Maybe a little.” She picked up a thin stick.
Every now and again, she whispered the names of her siblings to herself—Joe, Tom, Tim, Ann, Jean, Emma—hoping that some—any—memory would surface, but none ever did.
“But I really only got to know one of them. Who knows what my other siblings are like? Or what my parents were like. Maybe someone had a propensity for creativity but didn’t have an opportunity to express it. ”
She thought of her poor mama, bearing seven children in a mining camp in a strange country and then dying.
She wondered where her grave was. She mourned her death, of course, but she also mourned the fact that she had never really known her.
Her heart went out to this young woman, whoever she had been. Maria. Mama.
“Kate, I’m sorry.”
“You needn’t be. I’m happy that I ended up with the Kerwyns. I was lucky. I have to remember that.” They had reached the edge of the creek now, which was full and rushing swiftly due to the recently melted snow.
“No, I mean I’m sorry I hurt you.”
She turned, and her heart picked up a beat when she saw those sad, pensive eyes again.
“I’m sorry about the whole incident with Mary Crawford.
I . . .” He picked up a rock and tossed it into the rushing water.
“I guess I just sort of lost my head.” He picked up another and again tossed it.
“You were right about them the whole time, and I was wrong. But worse, I put you in a very difficult position. I’m sorry. ”
He looked at her so pitifully that she was tempted to put her hand to his cheek and comfort him. But she instead studied the creek.
“Well, anyway, I just wanted to say that. Get it off my chest. And also to tell you that I’m leaving.”
For a moment, she was afraid he meant that he was returning to Chicago. “Leaving? Where?”
“I’ve joined up,” he said quietly.
“Joined up?” Her heart sank. “Oh, Edmund. Does . . . does Dad know?”
“Not yet. But I have to do it, Kate.”
“Yes. Yes, I know,” she said, though her mind was trying to make sense of it.
She herself had always defended his decision to follow in his father’s footsteps, but now that it was upon them, she felt panicky.
What if there actually was a war? What if he was killed?
“When do you leave?” she asked hoarsely.
“In three days.”
Her stomach lurched. “So soon?”
“Yes, unfortunately. They don’t give you much time.” He smiled ruefully. “I guess it’s in case you change your mind. But I’m not changing my mind this time.”
“No, of course not.” Kate quickly wiped a tear with the back of her hand, angry that it had even appeared at all.
“There’s something else, though.”
Kate was afraid to hear whatever news could be worse than this.
“I . . .” He picked up another rock, a small one. He didn’t toss it but instead rubbed it between his hands. “I’ve been thinking a lot about that conversation we had in the truck on the way back from Shullsburg.”
“Which one?” she murmured, though she was pretty sure she knew.
Edmund dropped the rock. “Kate, did you really once think there might have been something between us?” He searched her eyes.
“Because I know I thought it. For years and years, I’ve felt it.
But you seemed to think of me as a brother, so I .
. . I tried to think of you that way, too.
As a sister, but . . .” He rubbed his hand through his hair.
“And then when Mary came along, I thought maybe it was a sign from God that I was supposed to be with her. It seemed so easy and obvious. I could see that it upset you, though, which is why I pushed so hard for you to love Henry—to ease my conscience, I guess.”
Kate remained silent, her heart truly pounding now.
“But it obviously wasn’t love on her part. And it’s become clear to me that it wasn’t love on my part, either. I’m ashamed of myself, Kate. I’ve been such a fool, and I can’t believe you haven’t shunned me for my stupidity.”
Kate smiled a tiny smile. “Well, I thought about it.”
“Kate,” he said, taking her hand, “I’m sorry that I hurt you. Sorry that I hurt the only woman I’ve really ever loved. Can you forgive me?”
Kate was dangerously close to tears. She scrunched her face to stop them and could only nod. She had only recently come to understand that she was truly loved by the Kerwyns, but now Edmund was telling her the same thing. That he loved her. That he had always loved her.
He gently kissed the hand he held. “Will you marry me?” he asked softly.
Kate let out a little gasp. “Marry you?”
“I know I don’t deserve you, Kate,” he said hurriedly. “But with you I know I can learn to be a better man. Perhaps you can grow to love me. I mean, in the way that I love you.”
Two tears rolled down Kate’s cheeks. “I don’t need to grow to love you,” she said with a little laugh. “I already do.”
Edmund’s face broke into a crooked smile. “So, you’ll marry me?”
“Yes.” She smiled. “Yes, I’ll marry you, Edmund.”
Edmund released her hand and wrapped his arms tightly around her.
He kissed the top of her head and then pulled away to kiss her forehead, her cheeks, and then finally, her lips, gently, tentatively at first, and then deeply.
Again and again, he kissed her, and she eagerly returned his them, feeling a longing inside her swell up.
Breathlessly, he broke their embrace and leaned his forehead against hers. “I love you, Kate Kerwyn. Or whatever your name is.”
She laughed. “I love you, too, Edmund Bertram.”
He kissed her again, and Kate allowed herself to succumb to the love rushing through her before an errant thought broke the moment of bliss. She pulled away. “Oh, but Edmund, you can’t leave now!”
“ ’Fraid I have to.” He kissed her lips again and then her cheek, her neck . . .
“Then I’m going with you.”
He straightened, a rueful smile on his lips. “You can’t.”
“I could if we were married,” Kate urged, her mind whirling.
“True,” Edmund said slowly. “Except we’re not.”
“We could do it quickly. Before you go. I . . . I could use Louisa’s wedding dress! Save it from going to waste. We’d have to do it at the courthouse—Fr. Eggert would never do it this quickly. You don’t mind, do you?”
Edmund looked at her lovingly and tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear.
“Kate, I’d marry you anywhere, anytime. On top of this hill, if you wanted.
Right now. But I don’t want you to follow me.
No, listen!” he said, cutting off her response.
“I nearly lost you once because of my own stupidity. I don’t want to lose you again.
More than likely, I’ll be sent overseas.
I couldn’t bear to think of you alone in some small apartment on the barracks.
Stay here with your family, where you can take care of each other until I get back. ”
“But what if you don’t come back, Edmund?”
“I will. I promise. But you have to promise me, too. Will you?” He looked at her steadily.
A million protests raged through her mind, but as she stared into Edmund’s warm brown eyes, she was calmed.
What he was saying made sense, especially given her mother’s current weakened state.
It really might be the final blow if Kate left now.
And this way, she would also be near to Jenny, who, as it turned out, had written her a letter back, telling her, in very crooked handwriting, that she missed her. And loved her.
“Yes,” she said faintly, letting out a long breath. “I’ll wait for you.”
“That’s my girl.” He put his strong arm around her and held her tightly. “Come on, Possum,” he said, his dimples showing, “let’s go tell your mom and dad.”