Chapter 5 (during 10.09 Excitable Chap)
William had been quiet since his returned home. She was unable to engage him in conversation during dinner, and once the table had been cleared, he wordlessly turned to tinker with his ultraviolet torch. Deciding to leave him be for a while, in case he needed solitude to work through whatever was on his mind, Julia indulged in a bath. This served to relax and wash away her own day.
So close to bedtime, she dressed only in a dressing gown, primarily for comfort. But if she could entice her husband into a spot of canoodling, she would not be complaining.
Although give her husband's continued silence, romance was looking less and less likely.
"Is there something troubling you, William?" she eventually asked. She decided she'd given him enough space, so the next step would be to make gentle enquiries.
"No." He sounded almost petulant, and uncommon look on her husband. Perhaps engaging him conversation would work, she decided.
"I heard James Pendrick dropped by the station today."
"He did." Another short answer. It seemed he was still unwilling.
"You should have brought him home."
"Oh, I think he's out with the inspector."
That was surprising news. Julia frowned, looking up from the book she'd opened. "The inspector?" She could not imagine a more unlikely pairing.
He muttered an assent. "The two of them seem to have struck up a friendship since spending time together in St. Louis at the World's Fair."
"So that's what's troubling you?"
When William responded with little more than a shrug and lapsed back into silence, Julia continued to gaze at him, a gentle smile playing on her features at his almost childlike attitude. Yet the more she thought about it, the more she understood his demeanour. Despite a rocky start, William and James Pendrick had developed a friendship of sorts, based on respect for each other's inventive minds. While her husband enjoyed a good camaraderie with some of his colleagues, he lacked companionship outside of the station house. She could well imagine that he might perceive Pendrick to be replacing him for the inspector.
When he continued to tinker with his torch in silence, she released a soft sigh and rose. She put aside the book she'd been reading, and picked up a larger, more well-worn tome, pausing to select a suitable passage. Then, she came up behind him, book held open in one hand, the fingers of her other hand beginning soothing movements, gliding over his shoulders and running through the hair at the back of his head.
She began in soft, gentle tones, "I would not wish / Any companion in the world but you, / Nor can imagination form a shape, / Besides yourself, to like of." She repeated the lines a couple more times, hoping to convey their meaning to him, and her sincerity that the words applied to her feelings for him.
Although he was stiff and unyielding at the start, with each caress of her hand, with each line that she spoke, he softened, eventually leaning against her. Clad only in a dressing gown, there was no corset between them to prevent him from feeling her true form. Her abdomen pushed gently against his shoulder as she breathed and spoke.
Finishing, she moved away to lay down the heavy book. Feeling regret at her absence, he scooted his chair back from the table, grasped her hand and encourage her to perch on his knee. He wrapped his arms around her waist, rested his head on her shoulder, once again taking comfort in her softness and warmth.
"Thank you, Julia." Her care warmed him, yet, stuck as always with verbalising his feelings, he resorted to their book to convey how she soothed his hurt. Pulling it towards him, and soon found the sonnet he sought. "When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, / I all alone beweep my outcast state," he began.
As usual when he read, she closed her eyes to let his words wash over her, choosing not to follow the text with her eyes, lest she skip ahead and ruin the moment.
"For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings / That then I scorn to change my state with kings." He finished with a gentle kiss to her collarbone.
Her heart full, almost chocked with the gratitude he laid on her, she could do nothing but hug him tight for several moments. Yet while their own relationship had been strengthened, she knew she needed to address her husband's concerns, but he once again buried his emotions. "You know, William, that you and James Pendrick have too much in common to drift apart completely," she stated gently, restarting the soothing motion of her fingers in his hair. "You both have such brilliant, inventive minds that you'll be drawn back together eventually."
He sighed heavily, his breath hot against her clavicle. "That seems unlikely, given that he and the inspector barely acknowledged my presence at the pub. I wouldn't be surprised if they never realised that I left."
Julia smiled softly at her husband's sullen and wounded tone. Attempting to prove again that at least she enjoyed his company, she hugged him closer, placing a kiss to his head. "I'm not going to excuse James Pendrick and the inspector, William," she began slowly, carefully. Her psychiatrist's mind couldn't help but assess the situation, and she thought she could understand to an extent, although she could not condone the hurt that they'd caused William. "But I think I can explain their behaviour. They experienced something quite exciting together, and now they're back home in Toronto, where life isn't quite so exciting for them. It's only natural that they would seek each other out, to relive that thrill, as it were."
"I supposeā¦" He was silent for a while, mulling over her rationalisation. "Their experience together wasn't that exciting. The inspector didn't even explore the battery exhibits!" He spoke with such exaggerated incredulity that Julia knew he was poking a little fun at himself, and she was glad to see him cheering.
"Well, William. I believe there is an exposition in Oregon next year. I suggest that we visit it together. And we can visit as many battery exhibits as your heart desires."
And so it was that William and Julia travelled to Oregon the following year. The journey by rail was long, to say the least. Yet after William's wrongful arrest and Julia's kidnapping still fresh in their minds, they were mostly relieved to have the chance to be together at leisure. Had things turned out differently, Julia imagined they might have taken a similar journey as fugitives, travelling to the other side of the continent to lay low while William's colleagues remained in Toronto, working to clear his name.
Thankful that they were free from danger and free to do as they pleased, they chose to enjoy what could have been an arduous journey. From their private compartment (Julia had purchased the tickets, knowing William would baulk at the price of such luxury), they marvelled together at the unfamiliar scenery passing outside the window. At night, they lay together with the curtains open, gazing at the stars in an otherwise darkened landscape. William read scientific journals, while Julia wrote a medical article of her own, cursing often as the train jolted and ruined her cursive script. And of course their tome of Shakespeare's works, now so special to them, had been brought along. They took turns murmuring sonnets and their favourite passages to each other, while the rhythm of the train provided a soothing background cadence.
Finally, they arrived in Portland, and after a night in a hotel to refresh, they arose early to proceed eagerly to the exposition. The grand, sweeping colonnade just through the entrance drew a gasp of delight from Julia, and speechless silence from William. But unable to resist the attractions any longer, they strode hand in hand between the towering columns.
True to her word, Julia accompanied William to the exposition's many electricity exhibits. Whilst she did not find the topic as scintillating as her husband, she smiled to see him light up with fascination and enthuse over the array of household appliances, electric lights and telephony systems. That evening, he spent hours furiously scribbling and drawing what he'd learned, and adding his own ideas for inventions. Occasionally, he roused, as if remembering his wife's presence in the hotel suite, and proposed an addition to their future home, before returning to his papers.
He also drew her to the Forestry Building, relating tales of his lumberjack days as they toured the sixty-foot-high building. It was such an uncommon occurrence for him to be so open about his past, that Julia was content to listen quietly and learn more about her husband.
In fair turn around, Julia chose the topic of their following day: medical advancements, marvelling over the displays of medical supplies, and paying rapt attention to the developments in anaesthesia and to the artificial limbs exhibited by Marks of New York. Later in the week she also persuaded him to join her in attending a speech by the American Woman Suffrage Association, clapping and cheering along with many of the other women in attendance. Like William had a couple of night's before, Julia, thoroughly fired up by the words she'd heard, spent the first part of their evening writing notes and ideas to take back to the suffrage cause back in Toronto.
The stereopticon lectures provided them with mutual enjoyment. Taking advantage of the darkened auditorium, their hands clasped the other's, while they gasped and awed at the larger-than-life images projected before them.
"That was magnificent, William!" Julia exclaimed as they stepped out of the darkened theatre, squinting into the early afternoon brightness, made worse by the sunshine glinting off of Guild's Lake. "Although I am famished. Are you ready for a late lunch?"
He agreed, and they found a food stand, taking their repast to a shaded spot by the lake, and settling on a bench together to feast.
"I must say, Julia." He murmured later pausing the kisses they were sharing, a quirk of a smile on his lips. "Much as I enjoy James Pendrick's company, I'm glad I'm here with you."
She hummed in response, snuggling against his side. "I dare say we've had a much more enjoyable experience than Mr Pendrick did with the inspector."
A/N: Thank you so much for reading!
The lines Julia read are from 'The Tempest', Act III, Scene I. William read Sonnet XXIX.
The majority of the information about the exposition came from the 'Official Guide to the Lewis & Clark Exposition', published in 1905, published online.
