Vital Secrets Read Online Free PDF

biscuits. The chores had been completed: cows milked, fed, and watered; stalls mucked out; hens relieved of their night’s labour; kindling chopped; and the day’s supply of firewood lugged indoors. Marc tried not to look abashed when he was greeted by the household as if he were the prodigal son being treated to the fatted calf.
    â€œSit down, lad, and dig in,” Hatch said as he settled into his captain’s chair, then took Mary by the hand to stop herfussing with Marc’s plate and utensils, and eased her down to her own place next to him. Susie arrived promptly with a steaming platter of food.
    â€œI apologize for sleeping so late,” Marc said.
    â€œNonsense,” Hatch said. “You’ve got a difficult day ahead of you, eh?”
    Marc acknowledged the reference to the task at hand with a tight smile.
    â€œHow is the babe this morning?” Marc asked Mary.
    â€œHe’s as healthy as his papa,” Mary said.
    Suddenly Marc felt his heart lurch. Seeing Erastus Hatch, so long a widower and so lonely just a year ago, happy and at ease here in his home made Marc realize how badly he wanted to change his own life, and how much depended on what might happen or not happen in the next few hours. He decided that he would need to take a long walk and consider carefully what he might possibly say to Beth that would make a difference. He knew also that he needed an hour or so to regain the courage he had imagined for himself when he had played out the reconciliation scene with Beth at least a hundred times since last summer.
    Hatch was halfway through his request for more bacon when he was interrupted by the sound of the back door opening and closing. Susie Huggan set down a plate and hurried to answer the door. Seconds later she reappeared with a big grin on her face.
    â€œIt’s our neighbour,” she cried, “and she’s brung us a basketof duck’s eggs!” Susie stepped aside to reveal both the visitor and her gift.
    It was Beth Smallman. She glanced at the figures seated around the table, and stopped when she came to Marc.
    The basket fell to the floor, and the duck eggs with it.

THREE

    â€œ s o, you’re in our neighbourhood again—scoutin’ hogs and whatnot?” Beth said with that touch of colloquial teasing in her voice that Marc found irresistible. She was alluding to his visit the year before and to his rather inept attempt to pass himself off as an assistant quartermaster. The “whatnot” suggested that she knew full well the true purpose of his abrupt arrival this time.
    â€œAnd duck’s eggs,” Marc said, “when they’re not broken.”
    â€œThings’ve changed a lot here since last June.”
    â€œLittle Eustace, you mean, and Winnifred and Thomas?”
    â€œI think you know what I mean,” Beth said.
    They were walking slowly northward along the snow-packedpath that linked the miller’s house with the Smallmans’. It meandered its way more or less beside the frozen creek on their left and the cleared ground on their right. The snow was so deep that no stubble showed through from the fall’s meagre harvest. Only uprooted, charred stumps marked the crude outlines of pasture and wheat field.
    â€œFewer pigs and more radicals?” Marc said, struggling to keep the tone of the conversation light. It felt so good just hearing Beth’s voice once again that he found himself torn between wanting the dialogue to continue at any cost and the fear that one wrong turn in its progress would kill it outright. And her physical presence here beside him—their footsteps in lazy unison, the breeze crisp and clean in their faces, the sound of their voices the only sound anywhere, the delicate frost of her breathing mingled with his own—left him so intoxicated that he was sure to blurt out some foolishness or other. He was tempted to reach over and take her elbow, as a proper gentleman