"A plate of apples, an open fire, and 'a jolly goode booke whereon to looke' are a fair substitute for heaven," vows Barney, looking around their living room with deep satisfaction. "Anyone can have the streets of gold. Let's have another whack at Carman."
Valancy nods in eager agreement as she reaches for another apple and leans against him on the sofa. Good Luck, not one to lose an opportunity for cuddles, jumps immediately into her lap while Banjo stretches to an impossible length in front of the fireplace.
Do you know what it is to be vagrant born?
A waif is only a waif. And so,
For another idle hour I sit,
In large content while the fire burns low.
I gossip here to my crony heart
Of the day just over, and count it one
Of the royal elemental days,
Though its dreams were few and its deeds were none.
Outside, the winter; inside, the warmth
And a sweet oblivion of turmoil. Why?
All for a gentle girlish hand
With its warm and lingering good-bye.
Barney thinks that he understands that poem in all the new ways now. He's been a fan of Carman's poetry for years, with his love of nature and a soul of a vagabond equal to Barney's, but he never before had a companion. It's only now that all those verses about experiencing the beauty of the world together genuinely move him. Frankly, until he married Valancy he never believed it was something which would ever happen to him.
And yet the poem's last line leaves a sour note in his mouth.
He hates thinking of goodbyes while he is with Valancy and he usually manages not to, but sometimes such thoughts just creep up on him, always unwelcome. He's increasingly aware that he doesn't want to say goodbye to her. Alas, there is nothing to be done against this, he knows – there is nothing in the world he can do to prevent it – so the only thing he can do is to push this terrible awareness as far out of his mind as possible and enjoy the present with her.
He looks down on her in her cream, soft sweater which she knitted for herself, cuddled against his shoulder and munching contentedly on one of Abel's russet apples, while the fire plays a game of light and shadows on her face, and thinks ruefully that once again she proves herself much stronger than he can ever be. Barney would like to think that he'd accept the prospect of his own death with half as much equanimity as Valancy, but he knows himself too well. As soon as he had gotten over the despair of the initial years after discovering Ethel's duplicity, his passion for life not only returned in full, but grew, as did his tenacity. He's sure that he'd fight and rage against the prospect, dwell obsessively on every moment lived in the light of – or in spite of – the inevitable. And yet he can spy no such struggle in Valancy. His Moonlight doesn't shy away from her illness and the grisly future awaiting her – no, she accepted it fully, with her eyes opened – and then pushed it out of her mind to collect every drop of joy she can find in the limited time left to her. He can't help thinking of the way she looked and spoke when she proposed marriage to him, so fearless and matter-of-fact and so damn level-headed against his floundering.
His silence must have been too long, cause she raises her dark eyes to him and frowns her brows questioningly.
"Is something bothering you, Barney?"
Quite a lot, if he was to be honest, but he made a promise to her and he intends to keep it.
"Nothing worth mentioning out loud," he answers lightly and bends down to kiss her. His heart beats faster when she melts into his embrace as her arms lift to pull him closer. "Mostly how right Carman was about 'sweet oblivion of turmoil' and 'a girlish hand'," he takes one of her small, slender hands to his lips to highlight the point, "being the reason for it."
What's the point in pondering the inevitable when the fire is so pleasantly warm, the bearskin in front of it so invitingly soft and Valancy's intoxicating body so pliant and eager in his arms? As he kisses her deeply, his hands sneaking under her sweater in search of the smooth skin, Barney allows himself once again to lose himself in the present.
The future, inevitable as it is, is not yet here.
xxx
They are lying on the bearskin in front of the fire now, their bodies naked, intertwined and not cold in the slightest. Barney's hands keep caressing Valancy's slight body as if they can't get enough of it, for all his pleasant, lazy satiation. How could he have ever found her plain? Granted, she is no classic beauty, but looking at all the places in the geography of Valancy his hands are busy mapping, all he sees are one beauty spot after another. The slender arch of her foot, the aristocratic, dainty shape of her ankle, the modest swell of her hip and the delightful dip of her waist. This last place just begs to be kissed and he does, adding a playful, delicate bite at the end, which makes Valancy giggle in her throaty, low voice which wakes up something wild and irrational in him every time he hears it.
"Whyever have you done it?" she asks, but her eyes are dancing with mirth and fondness, so he doesn't feel guilty or truly rebuked.
"It's too kissable to resist," he murmurs in answer, his lips travelling upwards through her chest. He smirks with satisfaction when he feels it rise in a sharply drawn breath at his caress. "Just as this adorable dent between your collarbones." His lips greedily make sure she knows which one he means.
"Goose," she says dismissively, "I'm not at all beautiful," and there is no way he's going to allow her to keep believing it, even though he knows he's not going to succeed fully in one conversation.
He'll be telling her as often as necessary for the truth to sink in.
"Not beautiful as you define beauty, maybe," he says, his own voice low and his lips against her little, shapely ear – another beauty spot he loves. "But infinitely desirable. Sometimes I simply can't get enough of you."
She gasps slightly when his lips make a slow, leisurely journey from her ear to her jaw and then down her neck.
"I can see that!" she says with a breathless little laugh, her hands sneaking into his hair. "I'd assume you just got your fill."
He raises his head to grin wolfishly at her.
"Never!" he vows, but the impossibility of this vow wipes his grin off. He searches desperately for a distraction before Valancy notices. His gaze falls on the decorations she's started to put around the shack for Christmas and realises that he's hardly given any thought to the holiday.
"What would you like for Christmas, Moonlight?" he asks, ceasing his teasing and laying his head on his bent arm to be able to see her face properly as she answers. He knows how reluctant she is to ask for anything of him, silly as it is when he wants to give her anything he can.
"Something frivolous and unnecessary," said Valancy, who had got a pair of galoshes last Christmas and two long-sleeved, woollen undervests the year before. And so on back. "Pretty just for the sake of being pretty."
She lifts her hand so the firelight can play on the shiny metal of her engraved wedding ring and Barney realises that he has never seen her wear any other jewellery – she doesn't have any. An obvious idea forms immediately in his mind.
Isn't jewellery a usual gift for one's wife anyway?
xxx
As it turns out, finding the right jewellery for a gift is not a simple matter. Barney frowns as he peruses the goods in Mr Carson's shop in Port Lawrence. There are plenty of beaded necklaces, shiny bracelets and colourful rings, but nothing which would truly suit his Moonlight. He knows she would probably be happy with any of those things, but this is not something he has in mind for her.
Valancy deserves a real treasure – a thing of true beauty and value – at least once in her life.
He leaves the shop, frustrated, and his eyes fall on the train station at the end of the street.
Well, if there's nothing in Port Lawrence good enough to satisfy his determined wish to truly spoil his wife this Christmas he'll just need to broaden his search.
xxx
He goes to Toronto the very next morning. Valancy, keeping her word as always, doesn't enquire where he's going. Not that she has much opportunity to, since she's still asleep when he leaves the Blue Castle long before the late hour of winter dawn. She often sleeps in in the mornings, since she often stays up late at night, not that he cares. He's perfectly capable of cooking himself his own breakfast of bacon and eggs, and usually shuts himself up in Bluebeard's Chamber till supper time afterwards unless the weather is too good to resist exploring the woods in all their frozen white glory. He waits for Valancy to wake up and join him in such a case though; sharing the beauty with her makes the experience so much richer that it is well worth the short wait.
But this morning he boards the first train to Toronto, dressed in one of John Foster's suits under his winter coat, with two cheque books in his pockets. One belongs to Barney Snaith and is a link to the bank account filled by John Foster's earnings, the other… Well, the other is linked to an account with a much bigger amount of money.
Much, much bigger.
He swore to never spend a cent of it and he hasn't, not even one in over a decade, but somehow he barely hesitated before he put it in his pocket today. As much as he still considers the money tainted, it feels different when he thinks of spending it on her. The money is useless to him anyway, even if he did intend to spend it on himself – and he doesn't – but spending it on Valancy just seems right.
She deserves the best he can afford and with Bernie Redfern's money he can afford plenty.
He doesn't probe any of those thoughts or actions too deeply, doesn't dwell on the significance of using this money, untouched for so many years, for something as silly as a Christmas gift. He just knows he wants to fulfil Valancy's dream of owning something beautiful and that he's not going halfway on it, not when next Christmas… not when it's going to be likely his only chance to do so. If whatever he eventually finds requires the Redfern fortune to afford, so be it.
Valancy is worth that and more. So much more.
xxx
He gets off the train in Toronto four hours later and gets a cab which he orders to go to Aynsley's. He walks into the luxurious store with a confidence of a person brought up among daily exposure to such opulence, which ensures that he is treated accordingly by the staff, who immediately spot the signs of somebody with appropriately deep pockets.
"I'm Bernard Redfern," he says, the words feeling alien on his lips after over a decade of avoiding them like a plague, "and I'm looking for a Christmas gift for my wife."
His name is recognised, of course, even though it is not his native city – but well, there is a garish advertisement for his father's cursed dopes just on the other side of the street – and he's immediately presented with a wide choice of diamonds, sapphires and rubies set in gold and platinum. All bright, ostentatious, very expensive and fit for a queen.
But none which suits his Moonlight in the slightest.
His frown is immediately and rightly assessed by the store manager who orders his assistants to bring more subdued and elegant pieces. Now Barney frowns in earnest, in all truth spoilt for choice. He can easily imagine this diamond resting in the hollow of Valancy's throat – those emerald earrings hanging from her shapely, slightly pointy ears – this sapphire necklace matching her evening gown – but still, he remains undecided.
Then he sees a long string of pearls and knows he's found the one.
There's not a moment of hesitation or doubt when he reaches for Bernie Redfern's cheque book.
xxx
The sight of the lit windows of his home winking at him in the snow in welcome never fails to take his breath away with its novelty and the warmth spreading through his chest. His steps are hurried in his eagerness as he climbs the stone steps from the jetty and unlocks the door to Valancy's open arms and a beaming smile.
"You're back!" she exclaims happily as she jumps into his arms and stands up on her toes to rich his lips for a kiss. He bends down, meeting her lips with his own, feeling giddy at the weight of the elegant box in his pocket. For the first time in forever he can't wait for Christmas morning.
Then they have an evening of reading and talk. They talk about everything in this world and a good many things in other worlds. They laugh over their own jokes until the Blue Castles re-echoes.
"You do laugh beautifully," Barney tells her. "It makes me want to laugh just to hear you laugh. There's a trick about your laugh—as if there were so much more fun back of it that you wouldn't let out. Did you laugh like that before you came to Mistawis, Moonlight?"
"I never laughed at all—really. I used to giggle foolishly when I felt I was expected to. But now—the laugh just comes."
Barney just hugs her tighter in response, wishing impossibly for her laughter to never cease.
xxx
On Christmas' Eve Abel comes, bearing the gift of a huge, fatty goose for their Christmas dinner.
"It's quite honestly obtained," he vows with a roguish wink at Barney who just rolls his eyes and hopes Abel speaks the truth. But then Abel's handsome, strong face softens minutely as he adds gruffly, "Not many people to spoil left for me."
Barney's heart clenches at this painful admission, but before he can open his mouth, Valancy beats him to it.
"You will join us for dinner tomorrow, won't you? We won't be able to eat such a huge bird alone."
Abel laughs.
"Somehow I think you underestimate your husband's appetite, Mrs Snaith," he says, his eyes twinkling. "But sadly, I must refuse. Agatha, curse her, made me promise to take her to see our cousins up back, the whole damn lot of them. I'll be crawled over by half a dozen brats before I'll manage to find a seat."
He grumbles as he says it, but Barney can see that he doesn't mind that prospect half as much as he wants to make it appear. Barney's own lips twitch as he imagines his friend beset by rambunctious children. He sends mental thanks to Agatha Baker for having the foresight and the guts to drag Abel away from his house for the first Christmas without Cissy.
"I'll reluctantly accept your previous commitment," says Valancy with mock imperiousness, but the hand she lays on Abel's arm is gentle and caring. "But only if you promise to come and visit us in the new year. We haven't seen you near enough this autumn."
Abel shrugs uncomfortably – they all know why he wasn't feeling very social – but solemnly promises to visit.
"Can't spend all winter days with that old hag," he says, but his tone has a curiously fond note when he mentions his cousin. "She's enough to drive a man to drink."
xxx
On Christmas morning Barney wakes up first, as usual. Normally, he takes at least a few more minutes – or sometimes hours, if he feels like it – to snuggle close to Valancy and observe her dear sleeping face. Valancy's mind, always lively, is no less active in her sleep; he can see her dreams reflected in the minute changes of her features. This pastime somehow never gets old or less fascinating, and neither does the feeling of her warm body next to his. After half a year of marriage, Barney is no less greedy for the physical closeness it gives him. He's never thought of himself as a cuddler – would have scoffed at the idea that he ever could be one – but that's what he undeniably is, as his current position attests to. He's just never had a chance to discover it before.
Thankfully, Valancy doesn't mind it, either asleep or awake. He sometimes reflects that she must be as touch starved as himself, if not more – he can't imagine Mrs Frederick Stirling indulging her daughter in something as human as a hug, even when she was little – and of course she loves Barney which probably makes his touch even more welcome to her. Whatever the reason, he knows that it is wanted, and six months in still basks in this marvellous, incredible knowledge.
But he doesn't bask in that long today of all days, he's too eager to go and fetch his gift for her from its hiding place in Bluebeard's Chamber. Really, he's being quite silly about it, but somehow this realisation fails to slow down his steps. He wants to see Valancy's face when she opens the box.
He feels even more silly when he comes back to the bedroom and of course finds her still asleep. Sheepish, he shakes his head at himself and goes to remake the fire and feed the cats. Valancy relishes the freedom to be a night owl after twenty nine years of strictly regulated bedtime and wake ups and he's not going to take it away from her just because he's too impatient to offer her his gift.
Thankfully for his patience, Valancy wakes up not long after, blinking sleepily but with a ready smile for him when she notices him sitting next to her on the bed. Barney smiles as well, positively giddy.
"Santa dropped something for you," he says playfully, handing her the white box tied with a red silk ribbon as soon as she sits up.
Valancy's face lits up as she tentatively reaches for the bow. Her gasp of delighted surprise when she lifts the lid and discovers the pearls is everything Barney hoped for.
"Oh, Barney, they are the most beautiful thing I've ever seen!" she exclaims quietly, her fingers caressing the shiny milky drops. She raises her eyes to him, filled with incredulity. "I wanted a string of pearls all my life – how on earth have you known this?"
"I haven't," answers Barney, delighted beyond measure that he got it right. "But when I looked at all the other jewels at the shop, this thing seemed to have your name on it."
Valancy looks at the necklace again.
"They look like congealed moonshine," she says with awe and then takes them out of the box, handing them to him with a smile. "Could you help me put them on? I suppose they will look silly with a nightgown, but I'm too impatient to wear them to wait until I dress!"
Barney obliges her, his fingers caressing her slender neck as he fastens the clasp. She immediately jumps off the bed and admires herself in the small mirror hanging over the dresser. In Barney's opinion she doesn't look silly at all in the pearls and her beribboned nightgown; if anything, she looks enchanting.
He frowns when he sees her bite her lip, her face getting a bit worried.
"They're so pretty," she repeats. "Too good, really. Barney, are you sure…"
She stops herself, but he can guess where her thoughts wandered and he hastens to reassure her. The last thing he wants is for her to worry about the cost of the thing, even though she clearly doesn't suspect at all its real value.
"It's alright," he says gently. "I wouldn't have bought it for you if I couldn't afford it."
She gives him a searching look, clearly not utterly convinced, but soon nods and caresses the necklace again.
"Thank you," she says sincerely. "It's the first pretty thing I've ever had and I know I will enjoy wearing it. I can hardly stand the thought of taking them off."
Barney smiles so wide he thinks it might hurt his cheeks.
"That's what I bought it for," he says, adding with a shrug, "you can sleep in them if you wish."
His mind eagerly suggests that the prospect of Valancy wearing nothing but the pearls in bed is far from unpleasant. His thoughts must be plain on his face, because Valancy gives him a playfully chiding look and reaches into her drawer of their shared dresser, taking out a soft package.
"I got something for you as well," she says, throwing it deftly into his lap. "I hope you'll forgive the poor workmanship – I made it myself."
Barney opens the tissue paper and gapes for a moment. Inside is a shirt – a very nice shirt, expertly made from white, crisp linen, with mother-of-pearl buttons. It rivals, if not surpasses, anything in his John Foster's wardrobe.
"You made it?" he asks Valancy in a choked, incredulous voice.
"I did," she answers, slightly bashful. "I know you won't wear it very often – you hardly need something so fancy in the woods! – but I wanted you to have at least one nice shirt of your own. I hope it's alright?" she asks, twirling her pearls a little nervously.
"Of course I do!" Barney answers and gets up to exchange his pyjama shirt for the dress one. He shakes his head when he finds its fit perfect. "I'll be able to take you out dancing without borrowing one. I take this is your hidden agenda?"
Valancy laughs, her fingers abandoning the pearls to straighten his collar instead.
"Who knows," she says with this playful grin of hers which she must know he loves. "Either that or I fulfilled my long held dream of sewing a shirt for my noble knight, as even queens used to do in the old days. It is a bonus though," she adds, her touch turning into a caress down his chest, "that you look terribly handsome in it."
"Your gift is fully appreciated," says Barney, his voice turning husky for some reason, "even if your taste in men is clearly questionable."
"Oh, I'm perfectly happy with my bargain," says Valancy and pulls Barney down for a kiss.
Who is Barney to refuse her if she wants one? Her lips are soft and warm against his and he thinks hazily that he never had a better Christmas morning in his life.
xxx
They have a lovely Christmas. They decorated the Blue Castle with pine boughs, and Valancy made delightful little tinsel stars and hung them up amid the greenery. She cooks a dinner to which Barney does full justice, while Good Luck and Banjo pick the bones.
"A land that can produce a goose like that is an admirable land," vows Barney. He's wearing his new shirt and Valancy her moonlight dress and her pearls. Barney's shack has never witnessed such elegance before. "Canada forever!" And they drink to the Union Jack a bottle of dandelion wine that Cousin Georgiana had given Valancy along with the bedspread. They grin at each other when Valancy repeats Cousin Georigiana's solemn words:
"One never knows when one may need a little stimulant."
"I dread to think what she had in mind," says Barney with theatrical shudder.
"Undoubtedly whatever horrors she imagined as coming with marrying such a shady character as you," answers Valancy with a grin and lifts her glass in another toast. "To scandalous marriages!"
Barney laughs out loud as their glasses clink.
xxx
New Year. The old, shabby, inglorious outlived calendar comes down. The new one goes up. January is a month of storms. It snows for three weeks on end. The thermometer goes miles below zero and stays there. But, as Barney and Valancy point out to each other, there are no mosquitoes. And the roar and crackle of their big fire drowns the howls of the north wind. Good Luck and Banjo wax fat and develop resplendent coats of thick, silky fur. Nip and Tuck are gone.
"But they'll come back in spring," promises Barney.
There is no monotony. Sometimes they have dramatic little private spats that never even think of becoming quarrels. They spend long, happy hours reading, either out loud or silently, next to each other, each lost within their own book. To his surprise, Barney finds himself cutting short the time he spends hidden in Bluebeard's Chamber – he still writes, he can't not write, but somehow the thought of spending most of the day separated from Valancy, if only by one locked door, grows less and less tolerable. Yet, despite shortening his writing hours, he's no less productive. The words seem to flow from his pen, one sentence after another. He finds himself inspired in all new ways and he knows very well to whose company and conversations he owes credit for it. He feels on fire when he writes, heady with the need to put his thoughts on paper, and yet his favourite moment of a day is when he puts his pen away and leaves his study behind to rejoin his wife in their cosy living room.
Sometimes Roaring Abel drops in, as promised – for an evening or a whole day – with his old tartan cap and his long red beard coated with snow. He generally brings his fiddle and plays for them, to the delight of all except Banjo, who goes temporarily insane and retreats under the bed. Sometimes Abel and Barney talk while Valancy makes candy for them; sometimes they sit and smoke in silence à la Tennyson and Carlyle, until the Blue Castle reeks and Valancy flees to the open. Sometimes they play checkers fiercely and silently the whole night through. Sometimes they all eat the russet apples Abel had brought, while the jolly old clock ticks the delightful minutes away.
One such cold January evening Barney looks at Abel and Valancy, laughing as they sing together, Abel playing his violin and Valancy clapping along, and suddenly he sees the other scene, so painfully similar, with Cissy dancing to Abel's music with Gem in her arms. For a moment, his brain is seized by a devastating realisation that he won't be able to keep those people with him for long any more than he could keep Cissy and Gem. Valancy is unlikely to live to see the next winter and Abel, for all that he is hearty and strong like a horse, is old. It's all too likely that in the not so distant future Barney is going to be utterly alone again, with all his friends dead.
He exhales furiously and clenches his fists to push those thoughts out of his mind. That future is not here yet – his constant mantra – and he won't allow it to spoil the present. Right now, Valancy and Abel are still here, even if Cissy and Gem aren't; he won't waste time he can have with them to mourn what's coming. He went through this with Cissy for years, he should have enough practice in locking the grief safely away until he actually loses the person he's grieving. He's not going to waste a damn second on being morose.
As if hearing his thoughts, Abel winks at him and starts to play a waltz. Barney sends him a grateful smile and gets up to bow lowly to Valancy.
"My lady," he says solemnly, "will you give me the honour of sharing this dance with me?"
Valancy laughs and offers him her hand with equal solemnity and quite a dash of imperiousness, delighted with his game.
"I will, my fair knight. Just this once."
"Then I'll have to make sure that this dance lasts forever," he says in a low, intimate voice which makes her utter a little gasp, and twirls her deftly around the Blue Castle's living room.