The Reluctant Bridegroom Read Online Free PDF Page A

an hour she tried to raise his spirits, talking to him in low and soothing tones as he sat there with his head down.
    Finally he seemed to arouse himself. Lifting his head, he gave her a crooked grin. “You’re a good girl, Rebekah!”
    She took a deep breath and said, “Tyler—I’m going to have a baby.”
    The grin evaporated, replaced first by disbelief—then anger. Cursing, he leaped up from the table and began pacingaround the room before coming to stand over her, his face livid.
    She said nothing, holding her head high as he raved on, until she heard him say, “We’ll have to get rid of it. I know a man—”
    “No! I’ll never do that! Never!”
    He stared at her, then said bitterly, “I should never have married you, Rebekah. How could you be so stupid! We can’t take care of a baby—I may have to leave the country to make a living!”
    “It won’t be too hard, Tyler,” she said. “I can work. We’ll make it.”
    “You’ll have to write your family. They’ve got money!”
    “I’ll never do that, Tyler,” she answered softly, rising from the table. Tyler followed her around the apartment for an hour, alternately pleading and threatening, but nothing worked. At last he threw on his coat. “I’m leaving,” he said in a tight, barely controlled voice. “When I come back, you’d better have your mind made up to do something about this little surprise of yours! I won’t be tied down, Rebekah!”
    The door slammed. She went to the window to watch him leave, his back stiff and his face a grim mask of anger. He did not look back once before he turned the corner. A sudden gust of wind loosened the dead leaves from the oak outside her window, and they fell heavily to the earth. She stared at them listlessly for a long time, then turned and left the window.

CHAPTER THREE
    DISCOVERY
    On the fourth day of December New York was buried under snow. All night long, flakes large as half cents and almost as heavy dropped out of the skies; and when morning came, people had to burrow—like small animals—out of their homes through the shoulder-high drifts.
    Rebekah got up at dawn, shivered in the aching cold of the small room as she hastily drew on her robe and slippers before going to the window. There the view of the glittering world outside drew a muffled cry of admiration from her; for the grimy neighborhood, stained with smoke and cluttered with leaning outhouses and piles of trash, had been transformed into a gleaming wonderland. The trash piles were no longer jagged with broken bottles; they were smoothly rounded hills, glistening like diamond fragments reflecting the rays of the rosy morning sun. The street itself was freshly covered, without a mark on its immaculate surface. Along the eaves of every house, glittering icicles pointed downward with dagger-sharpness to the pristine glory of the snow.
    Rebekah sighed, then resolutely turned to make a fire in the tiny fireplace that served them for heat and cooking. She lit the wood shavings with a candle stub in a small lid that floated in a pan of water, adding tiny pieces of wood until a blaze began to crackle. Putting on two larger sticks, she noted that there were only five more in the woodbox—not enough to heat the room all day. Holding her stiff hands over the tiny fire, she glanced toward Tyler, sleeping soundly inthe bed, and wondered if he had enough money to buy more wood and a few groceries.
    Probably not, she thought as she rose and looked into the food box nailed to the wall. He’d have told me last night if he’d won. There were three eggs in the rough cabinet. One for me, and two for him, she decided. There was enough coffee for the day, but no bread. Have to have crackers—there’s a few left.
    The thought of their early days came to her as she put the meager breakfast together, but she resolutely pushed the memory away. Putting the kettle on the small grate over the fire, she waited until it whistled. “Tyler? Breakfast will be