Quiet Dell: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page B

spring, after Cornelius visited; she’d no wish to involve the neighbors and their gossiping. She and Cornelius would protect their privacy and minimize the upset to the children. She glanced out the casement windows to the right of the long room. “Such snow,” she told Charles. “So good that you arrived yesterday.”
    He held his wineglass to hers. “ Salud, Anna. To the storm. It’s lovely, because everyone we love is here.”
    Not everyone, Anna knew. But soon, in April, she hoped, when spring allowed easy travel and she could see to real estate decisions. Snow whipped against the house, drifting in the yard. Grethe had lit the gas sconces and the room glowed like a refuge.
    “Anna,” Charles was saying, “this is the perfect time and place to say what I have been wanting to say to you.”
    “Of course, then,” Anna said. “What have you to say to me? Shall I drink my wine down first?”
    He looked at her with shining eyes and seemed to contemplate the question. “Umm, yes, have a bit more wine. And don’t forget this drop.” He put a finger gently to the corner of her mouth and drew it across her lips.
    She smiled into his face. He’d seemed to her a handsome younger brother when they first met. Now he was her counterpart and adviser, and so attentive and courtly today. She felt as though they were playing a scene together, a scene in which she was young and whole and knew nothing, and he was her well-intentioned suitor.
    Holding her gaze, he took her hands. “Anna, there is no one I can or would love as I love you. You are right to think of change, but the change should be ours. Let us be together, Anna, always and completely.”
    “Charles, what are you proposing?”
    “I’m proposing marriage, Anna. Marry me and let me take care of you. You are my family and I am yours. If I can’t be a father to your children, I can be their friend and guardian and constant support, and love them as my own.”
    “Charles—” She could not answer. He’d thought on this, to help them, and was quite serious, and would be deeply wounded.
    He took her response as encouragement. “I’m doing very well, and will do even better when this wretched Depression ends. There is no need to sell the house. Let me support and help you as one who loves you, as your husband, Anna, devoted only to you. Let us truly be a family.”
    She leaned toward him, her heart pounding. “But, Charles. Wait, please—”
    “Yes, Anna? Yes?” He put his face gently against hers.
    Her temple fit against his smooth, warm cheek, and she felt the tense, strong line of his jaw. Fleetingly, she thought, If only he was different. But he was not. “Oh, Charles,” she whispered, “what you suggest entails such sacrifice. I cannot let you.”
    He whispered in kind, in a rush of emotion. “That is over, Anna, that is over. It has not made me happy and it is over.” He pulled away to look at her. “Understand that I dedicate myself to you and the children completely; I will not deceive you or myself, ever, ever again. I pledge my fidelity and my means and my life.” He saw that she was crying, looking at him as though stricken. “I will make you happy, Anna. I love you completely. I can be a husband to you, in every way. Let me.”
    Anna gripped his arm. The room, the very air, seemed to pull her backward as though into a deep well. “Heinrich once denied himself, and sacrificed his true desire at my request, completely and for always, and then he died, Charles, he died. But for me, oh, I know he would have lived—”
    “Anna, what are you saying? It was an accident, a motorcar—”
    “A streetcar, Charles, in the Loop. Yes, in the snow. There was a great deal of snow, on the tracks and everywhere, and the crowd—” She stood suddenly.
    “Shhhh, Anna, be quiet, be quiet and try to breathe.”
    They were in the kitchen. He was holding her in his arms at the sink and bathing her face with cold water, icy water that tasted of salt. He