CHAPTER THREE #3
Constance started a little; she was so used to speaking with people who knew them well, she'd forgotten that Isabel would have no idea.
"The accident," she said. "He was run down in the street by a horse and cart.
His back was broken, or near to, and his healing has been incomplete.
His hands shake too badly for him to wield a needle as he did before, and he tires easily.
A fever set in the week after the accident, and it lingered for some time - that only made matters worse.
But he's as healed in body as he's going to be.
" She sighed. "Truth be told, he's worsening matters for himself.
The physician we called said that he must be up and moving about, teaching himself to be in the world again.
But he won't do it. He thinks it useless, so long as he has no assurance of being the man he was before.
So he won't do as the physician tells him, and it makes his infirmities worse, and then he grows angry because he is infirm .
. ." She shook her head. "Forgive me. You did not come to hear our troubles. "
"I don't mind," Isabel said, her voice soft. "I can - they are familiar to me."
Constance looked at her. Her look was as guarded as ever, but there was something vulnerable in it as well. "Your husband?"
Isabel nodded. "He - his chest was ever weak, even when we were wed.
Every catarrh would lay him low for weeks.
There were times when he was confined to bed, and he did not take it well.
And his last year . . ." A thread had come loose on her cloak; she twisted it this way and that around her forefinger.
"He was slow to accept that he would not recover this time.
And when he did, he was - curdled, as you say.
There were a great many unkind words said.
" She attempted a smile, but it was thin.
"But then, he was ever prone to unkind words. I learned not to mind it."
"A hard lesson," Constance said. She was sifting through all conversations she'd had with Isabel to date - all two of them - and thinking of how easily she seemed to flinch, how she shied away from doing anything that might indebt her to someone else, the way she'd reacted when Jack entered the room the week prior.
It did not answer all of her questions, but she was getting a sense of what had shaped the enigma sitting before her.
"A woman ought to be sure of kind words, in her own home. "
Isabel shrugged. Undoubtedly she intended it to look artless, but she could not quite disguise the tension in her body. "Ought to, perhaps. But few are."
"I don't believe that," Constance said. Perhaps it was an unwise argument to make - if this was what Isabel had told herself to endure her marriage, why challenge her convictions?
But she could not help herself from going on, regardless.
"Perhaps I am naive, but I think most marriages are harmonious, if not loving. There are more kind men than not."
"Oh, are there?" Isabel quirked an eyebrow at her. "Did you marry one?"
Her words - and their dry tone - startled a laugh out of Constance, who leaned back in her chair. "He is not at his best just now," she allowed. "Certainly, you did not meet him on a good day. But he can be better than what he is now. We all have our sour seasons."
"Mmm." Isabel went on worrying at the loose thread, but she said nothing more. At her feet, Walter grew bored with the rattle, and pitched it across the room with a squeal, then grasped his mother's skirts with both hands and pulled to get her attention. "Bremmy, Mama."
"Not now." Isabel passed a hand over her son's head.
"Wait until we're home." Her reply fell on deaf ears, for Walter only whined and clambered to his feet, attempting to scale her legs and climb into her lap.
His mother bent to pick him up, but this did not satisfy him, and he went on whining.
It was a tone Constance recognized from her nieces and nephews: he was not quite at the point of throwing a tantrum, but he was working himself up to one.
"What is it he wants?" she asked.
"Bread and milk," Isabel said. She was trying to rock him, but he was squirming too much for it to have any effect.
"I give it to him when he's hungry between meals.
But you've had breakfast already -" This was directed to Walter, "-and you'll spoil your supper.
Besides, I've no food with me, so you'll have to wait.
" It was a well-reasoned argument that did nothing to settle Walter, who was now flailing all four limbs and fussing at an ever-increasing volume.
It was not yet mid-afternoon; supper, Constance assumed, was hours in the making. She got up from her chair. "I've no milk," she said, "but there's bread and butter. Will that serve?"
Isabel's head jerked up when she spoke. "You needn't," she said, "you've offered us so much already, and -"
"And if I don't, he'll be howling in a minute." Constance gestured towards Walter, who was growing red in the face. "It's a kindness to us both if I feed him now."
Isabel looked from Constance to her son.
"Thank you," she said, almost too softly to be heard over Walter.
A tantrum seemed positively imminent now, so Constance made short work of buttering a piece of bread and handing it to Walter.
He paused mid-cry to take in the offering, then let go of his mother and grabbed the bread with both hands, cramming as much of it into his mouth as he could fit in one go.
"Slow down," Isabel said, "you'll make yourself sick.
" But there was laughter in her voice, and her face had gone soft as she looked at him.
She split the bread in half and took one half away while he chewed on the other half, cheeks bulging.
He looked like a squirrel hoarding acorns in its mouth, and Constance put a hand over her own mouth to smother a smile.
"Thank you," Isabel said, finally looking away from Walter.
"I really don't know how I may - oh!" She twisted to one side, rummaging behind her in a pile of cloth that Constance had only dimly registered when she came in.
"I came intending to return your kirtle to you, and I - I hope you've no objection, as you said you had no use for it.
So I thought -" She was blushing, Constance noted with some surprise.
"That I might add some value to it. I do beg your pardon if it was poorly done of me. "
Constance felt her eyebrows knit together as she took the garment from Isabel. "You cannot but add value, for God knows it had none b- "
She trailed off as she unfolded the dress and caught sight of what Isabel had added to it.
A delicate tracery of leaves and vines wound around the neckline, linked so neatly that she could not tell where it began or ended.
A matching design made a belt of sorts around the waist, and when she lifted the kirtle for a better look, she saw that yet another ringed the bottom hem and the cuffs.
The leaves were formed of several strands of green thread, with a single strand of gold running through that made the design sparkle whenever it caught the light just right.
If the wearer was standing in direct sunlight, she would shine like a jewel.
"You made this?" she said. Her voice was tinged with disbelief, and when she saw Isabel's eyebrows rise fractionally, she could have kicked herself.
"I mean to say - it's beautiful. I'd no idea you were a tradeswoman.
" She passed a hand over the stitches: they were so small and fine, she could hardly feel them.
"I'm surprised our paths haven't crossed before.
There are few enough tailors in Linden."
"I'm not." When Constance looked at Isabel, she noticed she was drumming her fingers against her knee.
"A tradeswoman, I mean. My husband would never -" She drew in a sharp breath.
"My husband was a cloth merchant. I kept house.
He would not have had me out plying a trade.
I had a great deal of time on my hands and cloth and thread to spare, so .
. ." She shrugged. "I practiced often. It made for pretty clothes and draperies for the house.
And I always did enjoy needlework, so it was - a way to pass the time.
I left off awhile after I had Walter, but when I looked at the dress, I thought I might make some improvements. "
"Improvements," Constance repeated faintly. "You say you are no tradeswoman, but I will tell you this - I can name any number of women in Linden who would pay ten pounds for this, at least."
Isabel reddened, looking away. "Nonsense. It's only a bit of fancy work."
"Fancy work?" Constance repeated. "I cannot imagine what you would call sumptuous, if you consider this merely 'fancy.' I've never seen the like of it before."
She was speaking truthfully: she really hadn't seen work of the skill and quality that now lay before her.
She'd seen embroidery, of course - Peter had occasionally tried his hand at it, and there were many women in Linden who set themselves to the task of embellishing their plain dresses with a needle and thread - but it wasn't common, and certainly not something she or Peter had ever been able to offer.
She herself was hopeless at it, and while Peter had mastered the basics, embroidery was no fit pastime for a man, so he hadn't been able to advertise it.
And, so far as she knew, there were no embroiderers by trade working in Linden at all - only women who sold their work where they could.
Anyone who was this skilled with their needle could support themselves easily on just a handful of garments a year.
"Yes, well," Isabel mumbled. "My husband did not wish to have it added to his clothing. He feared running afoul of sumptuary laws - besides, he found it ugly."