Chapter 6

Oh, how he rued keeping his mouth shut yesterday when Helen declared their marriage should remain as it was and disappeared into her room for the evening. Granted, he was exhausted, and for a small space of time, he’d let himself believe his natural reticence was a good excuse for not barging into her room immediately to straighten things out.

But after a second day of talking with Professor Larson about women, relationships, and God’s expectations of him, he’d come home planning to talk about something easy, like starting a new hobby together, not dealing with a woman’s emotions. But he’d been wrong not doing the hard thing that needed to be done.

Why had he told her people didn’t change? What a dolt he was.

Though he still didn’t trust Jeffrey, he couldn’t begrudge Helen wanting to give her nephew a second chance. So what he needed to do was help the young man want to change—just as he now desired to do for Helen’s sake.

He drew up his shoulders as Don and Margaret Abernathy’s house came into view. He was grateful Mr. Ferguson had known where his wife ran off to this morning. Why did Helen care to impress her sister’s family anyway? They treated her poorly—more so than he had last night. He sighed and slumped in his seat.

“So I take it the flowers didn’t work last night?”

He started at Mr. Ferguson’s inquiry. Had the man ever initiated a conversation with him before? Was he so prickly no one dared? “No, unfortunately the wife is allergic.”

Mr. Ferguson clicked his tongue. “Sorry for the bad advice.”

“Not bad advice. You couldn’t have known, but I should have.”

His driver stopped the team, and Neil slid down from the buggy, careful to feel for the curb he couldn’t quite see.

“Good luck,” his driver called, but then all of a sudden Mr. Ferguson was at his side, grasping his elbow.

Neil sighed. “I suppose I was kidding myself to think I could do this without my cane. I don’t mean to make more work for you.”

“Nothing to be ashamed of, sir.” Once Neil made the sidewalk, Mr. Ferguson let go. “Better to accept help with dignity than fight off a friend.”

A friend? Did Mr. Ferguson consider them friends? Maybe he did, considering how many years the man had worked for him. “And if anyone needs help, it’s me.”

“Do you need me to escort you all the way to the door then?” Mr. Ferguson stepped nearer.

Neil chuckled. “No, I was talking about needing help with the wife.”

“Don’t we all?” He tipped his hat. “As I said, good luck.”

Neil squeezed his driver’s shoulder then made his way up the sidewalk, sliding his feet in case there were uneven cracks to trip him. At the door, the housekeeper answered and escorted him down a dark hall toward the clinking of silverware.

“Neil?” Helen’s voice sounded from his left.

He turned to look, but the chairs where her voice had come from were in front of a row of windows letting in the rays of the afternoon sun.

He squinted and moved forward, hoping to catch a chair’s back to aid him in walking toward her. “I hope it’s not too much of an inconvenience for me to join you for lunch. I missed you.”

“None, Mr. Oliver.” Margaret answered from somewhere to his right, a bit of perturbance in her voice despite the answer. “Mrs. Wall can put out another place setting. We’ve just hired a cook. I hope she’ll impress us all.”

Neil nodded across the table after locating redheaded Margaret sitting in a bright green dress. “Obliged.”

Helen stood up on his left and pulled out a chair. “You can sit here.”

“Thanks.” He reached for her hand resting on the back of the chair and squeezed it before she moved away to sit.

“Pleasure to have you with us, Mr. Oliver.” The deep male voice on the far right was languid and a bit gravelly, most likely the elder Mr. Abernathy.

“Thanks for letting me barge in. I heard from my secretary, Mr. Yates, that Helen gave you a deal on the property young Mr. Abernathy sold to me years ago.” Actually, Mr. Yates had told him Helen had tried to figure a way out of selling it at her verbally stated price but hadn’t succeeded. “Half off is a great price.”

With his eyes now adjusted to the bright room, he could tell young Jeffrey wasn’t at the table as he’d hoped. “I’m hoping Jeffrey isn’t intending to turn around and sell the property for the profit his aunt could have made herself. I hope he’ll honor her trust in him by living up to the potential she sees.”

“Well, I’d just—” Helen’s wobbly voice stopped, and she cleared her throat.

Mr. Abernathy set down his paper. “I don’t believe there were stipulations on what he could do with the property to get that price.”

“No, but I trust no one in this family would purposely take advantage of my wife, considering I’d never have business dealings with the family or anyone associated with them again if they did so.”

Silence from the end of the table was likely Helen’s brother-in-law calculating how many of his clients dealt directly with businesses under the Oliver name.

“I also came to offer Jeffrey any guidance with the property he might desire. It’s in much better shape now than when I bought it from him and will make him a good return if it’s handled correctly.”

“Then why did you sell it?” Margaret asked.

“With my failing eyesight, I thought it best to trim down my holdings. Make them easier for Helen to handle.”

“I’m surprised you’re giving my sister-in-law so much say.” Mr. Abernathy grunted when Margaret handed him the plate of rolls.

“Why would I marry a woman I didn’t trust to speak for me?”

“Yes, why would a man marry a woman he didn’t trust with anything beyond pin money?” Margaret’s biting tone turned the table silent again.

Neil accepted the plate of rolls and hoped he could butter one without making a mess. But since he couldn’t see any butter on the table, he’d rather live without it than embarrass himself by asking for something that was likely right in front of him. He might have to become more vulnerable for his wife’s sake, but looking weak in front of the Abernathys wouldn’t be wise at the moment. “Do you have enough pin money, Helen? I do hope you allocated yourself some when I asked you to talk the budget over with Mr. Yates. I forgot women had such a thing.”

“I didn’t bother. Mr. Yates showed me the overly generous percentage you allocated for my wardrobe and entertainment, which is essentially the same thing.”

“Oh.” He thanked the person who set down his plate of roasted meat and searched for his fork but couldn’t find it.

Helen handed him silverware rolled up in a napkin of the same color as the tablecloth.

“So, Mr. Abernathy, I’ve been working on my conversational skills for my lovely wife’s benefit and found out my driver used to ice skate, and his son collects bugs. Do you have any interesting hobbies to help keep our conversation from veering back to business, which will likely bore us all? And since Helen’s the only one who’s ever shown an interest in my love of theology, I don’t want to bore you with that, either.”

The heavenly smell of the pork made him want to forget dinner conversation altogether, but he’d force himself to keep up the conversation and try to mention how lucky he was to steal Helen from them as often as possible—even if his meal grew cold to do so.

Helen closed the door to her sister’s house and smiled at Neil standing on the front step rubbing the sides of his head. For hours the man had not only kept up congenial conversation, but he’d praised her more throughout lunch than she’d ever heard Don praise Margaret. Last night she’d skulked off to her room thinking she’d never be more to him than a glorified assistant, but the shy smile he’d directed her way as he talked about her this afternoon made her believe he actually did feel something for her, though he likely couldn’t voice it.

The poor man had a hard enough time talking about the weather, how had she believed he’d be able to talk about feelings when they were so much more intimate and complicated than sunshine and rain?

“I think I got a headache from talking too much.” Neil moved his mouth back and forth as if stretching his face. “My jaw’s even sore.”

She rolled her eyes and took a step toward him, put her hands on each side of his stubbly jaw and gave him a kiss on both cheeks. “Better?”

“No.” He looked over his shoulder to where Mr. Ferguson waited for them at the carriage, but pulled her closer anyway. “More might help though. But in the direction of my lips.”

She stepped back before their driver noticed them, and threw her glance to the ground. He might not be able to talk about what went on inside him, but it seemed a kiss or two did wonders for his boldness. Could Mr. Ferguson see the blush crawling up her neck from that far away? “I don’t think kissing in front of the driver is entirely appropriate behavior.”

“You started it.” Neil winked then waved a dismissive hand at Mr. Ferguson. “We’ll walk home.”

She frowned at him. “It’s at least twenty blocks.”

“That’s all right.” He held out his hand to her as their ride drove away. “You can keep me from stumbling.”

She gave him her arm and watched the buggy disappear around the corner.

“And we can talk.”

She turned to frown at him again. “I thought your jaw was sore.”

“It is, but I don’t mind making it sorer if you’ll promise to try to make it feel better again when we get home. The more it hurts, the more kissing required.”

The blush indeed filled her face this time. Maybe it was a good thing Mr. Ferguson had left if Neil was going to tease her over the kisses she’d impulsively given him.

She’d never heard him tease anyone before, and marveled that he’d even consider wasting words to do so.

Of course, with the look he was giving her right now, perhaps there was absolutely no teasing going on at all.

Swallowing hard, she started guiding them forward so she could look elsewhere and avoid melting into a pool of blush. “What more could you possibly want to talk about? You’ve already discussed the weather, the church’s fall picnic, and my sister’s need for new curtains in the parlor.”

He put his free hand to his brow. “Ah yes, I definitely earned another kiss and maybe a neck massage for having to discuss your sister’s curtains.”

“You didn’t have to discuss anything. You technically weren’t invited.” She waved at a lady from church walking on the other side of the road. “I never would have thought you’d want to dine with them anyway.”

“If you’re going to eat there, I want to be with you.” His free hand came over to softly rub the back of her hand, dancing shivers up her arm. “Mr. Yates informed me this morning that you had tried to use me as an excuse to get out of the deal you gave Jeffrey. I don’t want you to do anything to make them think I don’t trust you to handle my business. Because I do trust you.”

She exhaled. As much as she wanted him to think her capable, she needed to let him know she wasn’t. “Did you see the newspaper I was looking at after dinner?”

“I saw you with a paper, but I wouldn’t attempt to read anything without my magnifying glass.”

She hadn’t meant to bring up his visual problems. “Well, I found the paper Don showed Jeffrey two days ago with the advertisement for the property I sold them.” She sighed. “It’s a five-week-old paper.”

“And that’s significant because?”

Oh, if only she wasn’t about to kill his trust in her completely. Trying to memorize the feeling of his arm around hers, she forced herself to keep speaking. “They pretended as if they’d just seen the paper when they brought up the property with me, but my brother-in-law reads his paper every day. He’d not bother to read an old one. They staged the whole thing.” She kept her eyes forward so she wouldn’t see the moment Neil realized she’d been taken. “You were right yesterday. It’s not intentions, but character that decides the future. I’m afraid I sold that property to someone who’s going to ruin it. And now you’ll have even more reason to be disappointed in me for practically giving that property away.”

“I’m not disappointed in you, Helen. Your heart’s still the same, though maybe wiser. And I was wrong about people being unable to change. Look at me. We’re walking down the street talking about something other than theology after I just forced myself to discuss the most boring things for an hour already.”

“You’ve certainly talked more this afternoon than I’ve ever heard.” She steered him away from an uneven crack in the sidewalk.

“If I can change for you, then don’t give up on Jeffrey wising up one day, and I won’t, either. I meant what I said to your brother-in-law about helping your nephew. If you make me want to change to make you happy, maybe he’ll want to do the same.”

“You’re talking more for my sake?”

“I’m trying, though I evidently need lots of practice to keep from clamming up when it gets hard. Last night I let you walk away believing I don’t want to change, because the talking I did yesterday had exhausted me. And well, I’m not used to saying what’s in my head. It’s hard to talk about … feelings.”

They both nodded at another couple passing them on the sidewalk.

But what did Neil feel for her exactly? Was it wise to push him to voice his emotions on a public street when he’d already talked more today than he likely had in a month? His praising her in front of Margaret and Don was enough to know he esteemed her greatly—and it seemed that being hoodwinked by her nephew hadn’t changed his opinion of her, since he still caressed her arm.

Had she actually married a man who would love her despite her faults when her own family had never done so?

Maybe words weren’t necessary. His attempt to produce them for her benefit was enough to prove he cared. She squeezed his hand, and he squeezed her hand back thrice.

A few steps later, he shook her hand a little. “One day, I hope you’ll squeeze my hand back four times.”

“Why’s that?”

He stumbled a bit, but she held his arm tight. He frowned at his falter, likely unhappy that it had happened right in front of a man coming up the street, but he pressed on. “When I was little, my mother realized I had trouble expressing myself, so she’d squeeze my hand three times to tell me she loved me, and I would squeeze back four to tell her I loved her, too. I could tell her how I felt without having to push the tangled words off my tongue.”

His hand still held hers tightly. He’d just squeezed it three times, hadn’t he? “Are you saying you love me?”

“Yes.” He squeezed her hand three times again.

“Wait, you’ve squeezed my hand like this before. At my sister’s just now, and I remember you deliberately trying to crush my hand to death at the wedding.”

He laughed. “Nerves made my grip harder than I intended, I suppose.”

Her throat clogged up. “But how could you have loved me then? You hardly knew me.”

“Though I hadn’t talked to you much, I knew you were the finest lady in town, and I intended to love you because the Bible told me to.” He stepped closer to her as they moved to the side to let a couple pass them. “You still are the finest lady I know, but I don’t need the Bible anymore to make me choose to love you. I just do.”

Despite her blush flaring back up again, she cleared her throat to push out the words that’d be easier to keep inside. He couldn’t see her flush anyway. “I wish you hadn’t sent Mr. Ferguson ahead.”

“Why’s that?”

God might be allowing Neil to go blind, but He was just now opening her eyes to the gift of love He’d planned for her all along. It’d been a long wait, but now that she had this man’s affections, she’d do whatever it took to return them tenfold. “What you just said deserves a couple more kisses along with the ones I already owe you, but I can’t give them to you until we get home.”

“If I talk the whole way there, how many will I get?” He took her hand and kissed the back of it after another couple passed them.

“We’ll have to see, but there’s a chance I could be persuaded to give you as many as you’d like.”

He squeezed her hand three times.

And she squeezed back four.