Chapter 20 – April 1910 – I don't know what I want him to say to me

He didn't stay for the communion.

Noah had rested a hand on her leg as the front rows stood to receive the sacrament, calling her attention back to him. She didn't know what he said. Something about a picnic after, maybe. She hadn't heard all of it. In the meantime, Henry had slipped out the doors without another word, leaving her on the other side.

The abrupt exit was like a blast of ice, waking her from the fevered haze that had overtaken her. Rationally she understood why Henry, a man of questionable faith and uncertain baptism, would not participate in the communion rite. But the thrumming echoes of what she had done left no room for rationality. Maybe she had read the situation all wrong. Maybe she had caught him by surprise. The dominant hold Henry had over her thoughts and reactions made it seem impossible that he could not have known her heart before now. But perhaps he had thought so well of her that he had reasoned the signs of her unfaithful desires away.

The more hopeful interpretation was that he had not trusted himself to stay. They were, after all, in a church, in front of an entire congregation that included her husband and son. It made her queasy now to think how carried away she'd gotten, how her hunger to touch him had erased all sense. Her confession had been made, but she had risked them both in the process.

The fear that should have stopped her hand before chilled her in the wake of it now. Whatever was going through Henry's mind at that moment – whether he returned her feelings or did not or could not allow himself to – there could be nothing but devastation ahead. A line had been crossed and on the other side of it was a hostile reality. She had willingly given herself to the flames, and one way or another they were about to consume her.

ooo

"He had some nerve, standing out there like he'd personally opened the place. Gowen couldn't have even picked the church out on a map before today."

"He thinks being king at the mine makes him king of the whole town."

"Unbelievable. Absolutely unbelievable."

Noah and Peter had unloaded with vitriol the second they were out of range of the other families. It stunned Abigail to hear the animosity that seemed already to be assumed between them.

"Did you see him sneak out of there too?"

"Hold on," she cut in, trying to shake her mounting apprehension. "Where is all this coming from?"

The men pursed their lips and directed hard stares at the ground. Noah was fuming, but Peter looked for all the world like the five-year-old she'd caught with a stolen treat behind his back.

They had never talked about what happened at the Tug of War. Noah had come home drunk from the Games while she was half-asleep and she thought he had muttered something about dirt on Henry's hands. She hadn't paid it much mind then, since it had come in between other ramblings about Patrick's shoes and buying a claim and limericks about girls named Sally. Indeed, she had written it off at the time to the potent effects of too much competition and too much whiskey, but now she wasn't so sure.

The silence dragged on. Abigail swallowed hard, guilt running hot in her throat.

"We don't see eye to eye is all," Noah finally answered. "These big-time directors who've never gotten so much as a piece of soot in their beards… they're lookin' out for nothing but their bank accounts."

Abigail bit her tongue. She was not about to defend Henry to her family, not now.

"I owe you an apology, honestly," Noah was saying. "He's just another Terence Walker, like you told me he would be."

Again she did not correct him. What would she even say if she could? For all the confidences and intimacies they had shared, the details of Henry's past and present desires remained in short supply. She felt that more keenly than ever now, having stupidly laid herself at his mercy.

Forcing a smile onto her face, she said brightly, "Oh, well… Walker, Gowen, Chambers – why waste a beautiful day on them? Weren't you saying something about a picnic?"

Noah's posture visibly eased. With a softer look than had passed between them in a long while, he pulled her against him, pressing a kiss into her hair.

ooo

As the days passed and nothing happened, her fears of being confronted by condemnation or divine retribution began to fade. For better or worse, she began to minimize what she had done. Removed from the intensity of their closeness, she could rationalize it as no more than the friendly touch she might offer to a girlfriend, something that could be explained away to anyone. An impulse born from the habit of comfort and proximity. A thoughtless twitch of her fingers.

But Henry didn't show up to church the next week. Or the week after that.

She put this aside too. He had only been at that first service because it was the first. If he was avoiding her, she wouldn't know it, because she was avoiding him too. The best possible outcome was that he had thought nothing of it at all. That she had read too much into his words, that there was no mutual dilemma here for them to wrestle with, and that all of this would soon pass.

Just as after the Miner's Games, she had been saved from her worst impulses by his rejection or his apathy, whichever one it was. She thanked God for this latest mercy and endeavored once more to push the whole thing from her mind before she made another terrible mistake.

If there was anything to be said for it, any balm to be found, it was that she had his answer now. She tried to take comfort in this, forcing it into some semblance of closure. Only once in a while did her sadness come to the surface – an unbidden stab of disappointment that the answer had been no.

ooo

Eventually she would resume a routine that did not take Henry Gowen's movements into account, but that sort of confidence would not come as soon as today, and so she waited until 3:00 to go by the café. She was better then anyway, when the melancholy of the morning, after her family left, had faded into the background of the chores of the day. By the afternoon a sense of normalcy had been rebuilt, and an anticipation of the men's arrival home.

The bell at the top of the cracked beige door tinkled as she walked in. "Afternoon, Emily!"

"Oh, hello, Abigail! It's lovely to see you here."

Emily Valentine appeared to have been startled out of her seat at one of the café tables, but nevertheless greeted her with a genuine smile.

"I'm glad to have reason to come by," she returned the warmth. "Might you still have one of your chocolate cakes left?"

"You'll get the one and only I made today," Emily answered, heading back into the kitchen to retrieve it.

"Oh, that's lucky. Working on some new recipes?"

No response came, and she assumed that Emily had not heard her as she was bustling about in the prep space. It was only small talk, not worth repeating. Emily Valentine didn't much like small talk anyway.

Abigail looked around the café while the dessert was being boxed up. Virgil was nowhere to be seen, perhaps out on some errand or upstairs with their young daughters. Left behind at Emily's makeshift workstation was a stack of handwritten customer checks, a large notepad, and a pencil. Balls of discarded papers were scattered around the table surface, one of their number abandoned to a bleaker existence beneath the opposite chair.

Emily returned shortly with the cake, packaged in a familiar white box tied with red and white string that gave Abigail a sense of comfort.

"Special occasion?" Emily asked.

"Oh no, I just want to treat the boys tonight. They deserve it. Things at the mine have been tough lately."

Emily's eyebrows lifted and she rolled her eyes to the side. Whatever remark she would make about "things at the mine, " however, remained unspoken. "How is your son doing? Almost a year now," she noted instead.

Abigail paused, her fist curled around the coins she had been plucking from her purse. "Good, I think. I'm not sure I know," she said with a breathy laugh.

"That's to be expected when they get older."

She held the coins out and Emily met her with an open hand. "He's actually been going on the supply runs for the mine fairly often, out to Hamilton and Cape Fullerton," Abigail continued. "I used to get so nervous about him traveling, worrying about what kind of place he was eating in or if he would have to set up camp, if he would get lost somewhere he shouldn't be… even dreading something might happen to all the company property he was responsible for. But now…"

Abigail trailed off, realizing her words had wandered too far. Emily knew her mind though. "Now you think it's better than where he could be," she finished for her.

The Valentines had only the two small children, and Virgil had never been a miner. But Emily's brother, Abigail remembered now, had lost his arm in a mine collapse on Vancouver Island. Abigail's guard loosened with the recollection, a sense of kinship pulling her closer to the other woman.

"Yes," she confided. "Sometimes I pray that seeing what else is out there will get him out of the mine for good. He's even mentioned staying an extra day travelling next time he goes, if Mr. Gowen will grant it. I shouldn't want him to leave, and it's not Coal Valley I regret, but… I don't know. Don't we do all of this so our children will have choices?" She shook her head, somehow unsure of the right answer.

A wistfulness descended over Emily's eyes, but she said nothing. Reaching behind the glass display case, she took out three of that morning's blueberry muffins and packaged them into a brown bag, crushing its paper edges as she had her rejected accountings. With a decisive thump, she dropped the bag on top of the white box.

"Take breakfast too."

"Emily –"

"I have too many and they're only going to go to the Haverhills' pigs," Emily insisted, pushing the pile towards her and leaving no room for argument.

"Well, that's very nice of you. Completely unnecessary, but very nice."

"You say that like I'm never nice," Emily teased.

Abigail's left dimple punctuated a playful smirk, her face growing pink with amusement and just a bit of chagrin. How did she keep forgetting how good it felt to be with friends? How did she always manage to underestimate how amazing and strong and compassionate other women were?

"Thank you, Emily. And Noah and Peter thank you too, possibly just as noisily as the pigs," she joked. "I'll come by again soon," she promised.

She shut the door behind her and turned out to face the still-high sun. She'd only made it to the porch steps when she saw him, the familiar broad figure walking brusquely in her direction.

Her imagination had traveled across all of fate's branches since that day in the church, dozens of scenarios staging themselves inside her mind for what might happen the next time she saw him. Not one of them had prepared her for the actual sight of him. The shame of him. Fantasized starts of conversation, once so carefully rendered, vanished into the quicksand of her panic. She could do nothing, say nothing.

And Henry, his stride unbroken as he charged up the porch steps, said only one word - "Abigail" – before blowing past her with barely a nod. The café's bell clattered violently behind her, signaling the end of him.

Her breath shook loose from her lungs, the sun standing as glaring witness to this utter failure of her mind and courage. She knew, somewhere in her stomach, that she ought to be angry, that she ought to throw that clanging door open behind him and demand to know what gave him the right to leave her there, embarrassed and ignored. To tell him that despite whatever he thought of her overtures, they had still shared a connection that entitled her to more respect in his refusal of them. But she didn't yet have the wherewithal to be angry with him, her heart still full of hope and a desire to reserve judgment. An explanation might be forthcoming, but it was not one she could demand in the middle of the café. It was not one she could demand at all.

ooo

Back at home she busied herself, the reliable beat of the knife on the butcher block working to drown out her self-doubt. The more the blurry meeting reran through her mind, the more she convinced herself she had overreacted. They had been exposed outside of the café, a place where he did business, and she had not even actually said hello to him. It was foolish to put so much meaning into such a quick exchange. Her uncertainty receded but would not completely relinquish its hold on her, sporadically seizing her attention like a tapping on distant glass.

Noah and Peter walked through the door, interrupting her circling thoughts. As she had done so many times now, she forced all her own preoccupations back into an ever more tangled knot and greeted them brightly.

"There are my boys! Supper will be ready in about fifteen minutes and I got us something special for dessert."

"Great. That's great, sweetheart." Noah was trying hard not to sound as exhausted as he looked, but she saw now that he had already thrown himself down into his armchair. Abandoning her sauce, she crossed the room and leaned over him, touching a hand to his cheek and then his forehead.

"You're warm. Are you feeling well?"

"Just tired. It'll pass."

She cast a questioning glance at Peter, but he pursed his lips and shook his head, leaving them alone while he went ahead to the kitchen. Lines formed between her brows and she pushed her palm against his head again.

"Noah," she urged.

"I'm fine." He grabbed her hand from his skin and kissed it, then used it to gently push her back from him. With another fretful look, she left him to take off his boots and joined Peter near the stove.

Her son was standing over the bowl of egg yolks and heavy cream that waited to the side of a simmering pot, glaring at it with a curious expression. Affection spread to her face and relaxed her as she brought a hand to his back.

"What is it, love?"

"You put some of this stuff in the bowl, right?"

"The sauce? Yes, it's called tempering."

"Can I see?"

"Alright," she said, matching his perplexed expression. She nudged him to the side as she took a small ladleful of what was going to be chicken à la king and poured it into the egg mix. Peter watched her whisk everything together quickly and continuously as she spoke.

"If you put the egg directly into the hot pot, it will cook right away. So you mix a little bit of the two together first and stir it up fast so that the egg heats up but doesn't cook. Then you pour it all back into the heat," she said, demonstrating, "and stir some more."

Peter nodded thoughtfully. Abigail waited, wondering if he would explain this sudden culinary interest.

"Do you think you could…" he paused, reconsidering his request before finally deciding. "Do you think you could write the recipe down?"

"Of course!" she said, trying desperately to rein in a grin.

"Thanks," he said, looking relieved. "I gotta do something, I'll be right back down."

Peter ran up the stairs while a wide-eyed Abigail spun to face her husband in the living room, the wooden spoon still held upright in her hand.

"Well! That was a first! Any idea where it came from?"

Noah shrugged. "Maybe he wants to move out and start cooking for himself. He should learn the laundry too. That'll help when you forget."

Her excitement rushed away, the smile dropping from her face as quickly as it had come.

Noah let out a loud sniffle and continued to stare blankly ahead into the living room.

She tried to remember that, despite his obstinance in denying it, he was worn down and hungry and likely ill. But once again, Noah had stated his judgment of her like a casual fact, an observation offered sleepily from his armchair. Once again, he'd leveraged her love for her son to chide her behavior. And once again, she couldn't help it from eating at her – couldn't help wondering if it was true. She returned the spoon to the bubbling cream, stirring slowly until the next steps of the recipe gradually came back into her head.

That night, she joined him where he already was in bed, having gone to rest shortly after supper. Pity had helped to quell her remaining resentment. She laid a comforting hand on his forehead.

"I'm fine."

"But you can't fall asleep," she noted. "You do feel a little cooler, but are you sure you shouldn't rest tomorrow?"

"Abigail, it's a runny nose at worst. I'm not staying home for that. I'm the superintendent."

"No one else can be the superintendent for one day?"

"Not really."

"Noah."

"Abigail," he said, finally looking at her. "I'm going in. End of discussion."

She gritted her teeth together, the irritation returning. "Alright," she said defiantly.

Throwing herself down to the mattress, she flapped the blankets over her and pulled them in. Regret took over from anger almost immediately. She waited, wondering if Noah would fly into his own rage, scolding her for another disappointing scene. But he was quiet. Tentatively she rolled to face him, half-expecting to see his fists and jaw clenched. Instead she saw sadness weighing down the corners of his mouth.

"I'm sorry," she said sincerely.

He turned to her with a pensive expression so clearly the original of their son's.

"I'll try to take it easy in the office. But I don't know. It's Gowen's call."

She reached down and squeezed his hand.

"Thank you."