Are you deaf as well as stupid?” Tarbush yelled, moving so close that Harper could smell his fetid breath and see decay festering on the far right molar in the man’s mouth.
Harper took a step back, more for relief from the stench than for protection. “No, Mr. Tarbush. I am neither deaf nor stupid. I am simply looking for a job, and I have the skills you need to—”
“Skills? Don’t talk to me about skills, boy! I got eyes, ain’t I? Any fool can see that you ain’t got the strength to do a man’s job.” He closed the gap between them, keeping his gaze focused on the good side of Harper’s face. “My answer is no, and that’s final. Now get along with you. Go back to wherever you came from.” Tarbush’s mouth twisted in a leering grin. “Maybe come Halloween, you can find yourself a job—at least for one night. And you won’t even have to buy a mask.”
Harper turned to go. His heart lay like a dead weight in his chest, but mentally he reprimanded himself for the hope that had brought yet another disappointment. Tarbush might be stubborn and ignorant and foulmouthed, but the truth was, he wasn’t much different from the dozen other employers Harper had approached over the past two weeks. Some were less offensive, to be sure, but their answer was always the same: No.
In fact, Harper had to admit that he preferred Tarbush’s crude candor to the thinly veiled disgust of the more polite ones. At least with Tarbush he knew where he stood. The man couldn’t stand to look at him, couldn’t believe that a fellow as scarred and broken as Harper Wainwright might have something of value to offer to his construction business—or to society in general. Freak, Tarbush had called him. Nobody’s gonna hire a freak.
Harper limped along Main Street toward Jefferson Davis Avenue, where Noble House stood. As soon as the big two-story house came into view, his spirits began to lift. Here, at least, he didn’t have to cover his face. Here he didn’t have to apologize for who—or what—he was. Here he had meaningful work, even if it only bought him room and board.
And here he had the blessing of Miss Amethyst Noble’s company.
Harper thrust the pleasurable thought from his mind. Amethyst was a lady, and no real lady would give a second thought to the likes of him. She was always nice to him, of course, pleasant and hospitable and even friendly. But he couldn’t let his heart run away with his head. He would only be setting himself up for more disappointment, and he had experienced quite enough of that emotion since returning from the war. Besides, what did he have to offer her? A broken body? A wounded soul? A future filled with constant ridicule?
Harper let his mind drift back to the year before his enlistment, when his thoughts were consumed with the affections of another woman. Dorothea, his beloved, his betrothed. The fairest flower of the Mississippi Delta. He had adored her, written love poems to her, sent her letters every day from the front. And she had responded in kind, proclaiming her love for him and her eager acceptance of his proposal of marriage.
When he had been released from the hospital and discharged, Harper had gone directly to her, hoping against hope that she could find the inner resources to deal with the difficulties that lay ahead for them. Love, he had been told, could overcome the worst of challenges. Love conquered all. Love gazed with full acceptance at the inner soul, not at the outer appearance.
It had taken only the briefest of moments for Harper to realize that all the world’s platitudes about the power of love were so much drivel. One glance at Dorothea’s face told him everything—the way she averted her eyes from his twisted features, the way she tittered with that high, nervous laugh when she couldn’t think of anything to say, the way she resolutely steered the conversation away from any discussion of their impending wedding.
In the end, he had given her the easy way out. Rather than making her face her feelings, he had lied, telling her that he himself had second thoughts about rushing into marriage.
They had parted with the promise that once Harper was settled and had a job, he would write to her, and they would begin afresh to explore their relationship and see where it led. But neither of them, Harper knew, had any intention of keeping that promise.
The problem with a broken heart, he discovered, was that it didn’t break cleanly, with a nice even edge that could be glued together so that the seam barely showed. It splintered like crystal stemware into a million tiny shards—sharp fragments that could never be reassembled, invisible slivers that cut you even when you couldn’t see them. Rather than take on the impossible task of fitting them back together again, it was better just to sweep up the pieces and toss the lot into the trash.
That’s what Harper had done—or so he thought, until he came face to face with Amethyst Noble. From deep in the recesses of his soul, his discarded heart began to beat again—faintly at first, and then with more assertiveness. Despite his best intentions, he couldn’t seem to control the way his pulse accelerated when she came near. His stomach fluttered, and his blood pounded in his ears. And all the while his mind was shouting, No!
This inward battle was, he knew, far more dangerous than any enemy fire he had faced at the front. And the potential for being hurt—even maimed for life—was greater, too. He could live with his physical disabilities, could look himself in the mirror every morning and see a man rather than a monster. As long as he kept his emotions closely guarded, he might be able to live a relatively fulfilled existence. But if he gave his heart free rein, he was bound to end up as scarred on the inside as he was on the outside. He had taken a chance on love once, and it turned out to be a thorny, pain-ridden path culminating in a devastating dead end. He wasn’t about to go down that road again.
He paused at the sidewalk leading up to Noble House and gazed at the big white planter house. Two weeks, and already he thought of it as home. His place of safety and refuge, a healing sanctuary for his soul. . . .
“Freak!”
The shout behind him drew Harper’s attention, and he turned. Three little boys, not more than eight or ten years old, stood on the other side of Jefferson Davis Avenue pointing and yelling in high-pitched voices.
“Freak! Freak! Freak!”
Instinctively Harper brought his hand up to the scarred right side of his face. He took a step toward the children and motioned for them to come closer.
“I’m not a freak,” he said in a low voice, hoping to calm them. “I was scarred in the war, you see, and—” He lowered his hand and reached out toward them.
Three sets of eyes grew round as saucers, and an expression of horror twisted the grimy little face of the oldest one.
“You ARE a freak!” the boy yelled. “You’re mean and nasty and EVIL!”
“What’s your name, son?” Maybe Harper could reason with this child, find a way to make him listen.
The lad puffed out his chest with obvious pride. “Billy Tarbush,” he answered with a sneer. “What’s yours? Scarface?”
Harper winced inwardly as the disheartening truth registered in his mind. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw the boy reach down and scoop up a handful of rocks from the side of the road.
“No, wait—” he began.
But it was too late. The Tarbush boy sent a stone flying in Harper’s direction, and the younger ones, taking their cue from the leader, followed suit. “Freak!” they hollered. “Get out of town, you freak!”
A jagged rock found its mark, hitting just under Harper’s left eye. He recoiled from the blow and felt a warm wetness oozing down his cheek. But when he put his fingers to the wound, he was surprised to find the blood mixed with his own tears.
“Go home, boys,” he murmured sadly as he turned and moved out of range of their missiles.
That old poet was right, he thought as he walked slowly up the sidewalk. Stone walls do not a prison make. A broken body and a burned face could incarcerate as well as the stoutest iron bars.
Exhaling a ragged sigh, Harper pushed back the tears and wiped the blood from his cheek. This was his lot in life, his cage. He hadn’t done anything to deserve such imprisonment, but none of that mattered now. Win or lose, he had no choice but to play with the hand fate had dealt him. If he kept to himself and shored up the vulnerable places of his soul, he’d be all right.
Even a freak could learn to be strong.