Lily Fairchild. Don Gutteridge

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      Lily was cleaning out the stalls of Benjamin and the Guernsey, as well as that of Gert, the little Jersey they’d acquired from Bill. Both cows had been bred to an itinerant bull who showed up at their gate one day with his master in tow, but it appeared as if only the Jersey was about to bear the fruits of that brief, awesome encounter. Lily poked at the mess in front of her. At least in January there was little smell, and the frozen manure and straw could be forked rather than shovelled. Bridie and Bill were in the woodlot, sawing the stiff pine logs into portable lengths and finding the packed snow and solid earth a convenient, almost hospitable, environment in which to labour. Chester, walking unaided now, would be keeping himself useful by replenishing the wood in both stove and fireplace.

      As Lily heaved a forkful of manure onto the sled, she felt a twinge in her lower abdomen. She stood stock-still as the wavelets of pain worked themselves ashore, then leaned on her fork, catching her breath and waiting for worse. Something fibrous and alien cramped in her, seeking expulsion. I’m going to faint, she thought, but the sharp air in her lungs brought her upright again. Well, she thought, I’ll have to tell Aunt Bridie now. The question is no longer when, but how much?

      Lily waited until Bill had tucked Chester into his robes and set off in the cutter with him for a leisurely ride through the oak ridge to Little Lake, where the town’s best mingled with the township hopefuls on the ice-pond.

      Not having spent long enough in polite society to become practiced in its subtle arts, Lily could think of no indirect way to convey her news. “I got somethin’ I have to tell you,” she said when they had settled at opposite ends of a half-finished quilt.

      “I figured so. You ain’t stopped fidgetin’ since this morning. A body’d think you’d contracted St. Vitus’ Dance or somethin’.”

      “I’m pregnant,” Lily said. “Four months and three days.”

      Whatever revelation Bridie had braced herself for, this was not it. “That’s not possible! What on earth do you know of such things?”

      Then, following the succinct disclosure of certain irrefutable biological facts: “My lord, child! Do you know what you’ve done? Do you have any idea what this means for you?”

      Lily said she assumed she was going to be a mother, in June.

      Bridie sighed in exasperation, but quickly softened. “Are you feelin’ all right?”

      “I’m fine.”

      “Don’t you go shovellin’ manure now, you promise me?”

      “I can’t work in the barn any more. I’m sorry.”

      “I knew I never should’ve let you go with that woman. I told you the city ways’d destroy you, didn’t I? But I don’t blame you, child, I really don’t. I put the blame onto the shoulders of Alice Templeton, I do. And the man responsible, of course. Who wasthe scoundrel, then?”

      As simply as she could, Lily suggested that no one had seduced or deceived her.

      “You can’t tell me a girl of your age an’ your innocence wasn’t abused by some blackguard who likely lied to get his way. You forget, child, I lived in Toronto an’ London, I went out to service with no family to back me up. There’s nothin’ you can tell me about ‘gentlemen’ I don’t already know twice over. An’ I trusted that woman, calls herself a Christian to watch out for you, to protect you from this, this–.”

      Lily refused to divulge the name of the father.

      “Every girl who’s ever been in your position – an’ I saw plenty in Toronto – has said the same thing, at first,” Bridie said with surprising gentleness. “But there’s no other way out of the mess, lass. He’ll have to make amends. We’ve got the law, such as it is, on our side. You are still a minor after all. If you can stand him, then he must marry you. If not, then other arrangements can be made.”

      “I won’t tell, ever,” Lily said. “No one’d believe me anyways.”

      “Not the Mayor?” Bridie went white.

      “Not anybody you know.

      “He’s gone, Auntie,” Lily said firmly. Then: “I don’t want to see him again.”

      Bridie knew better than to try to change her mind, but she had to at least prepare Lily for the consequences.

      “Look me straight in the eye. You are an unmarried girl, and in another month your belly will swell up for all the world to see. An’ when it’s seen, the tongues of the town will start waggin’. They’ll say that your Uncle is the father or old Bill or worse, they’ll say you’ve been seen down by the railroad shacks just like Violet, hangin’ round them navvies an’ deservin’ everythin’ you get from your sinnin’.”

      Lily had no reply.

      “Now you know I don’t give a sweet fig for the opinion of such people, but will youever get used to them church ladies thinkin’ an’ callin’ your child a bastard an’ keepin’ it out of school an’ makin’ it an outcast. What I’m tellin’ you is as long as we stay right here on this plot of land, our lives are our own, but as soon as we step off, they belong to those people out there.”

      For a moment Bridie looked weary, beyond recovery. “We are women, Lily, an’ poor; the world’s not ours to make.”

      Lily didn’t argue the point, but waited a moment to let Bridie know she respected all that she’d said. Then, simply, “I want to have the baby here. At home.”

      Bridie studied the girl’s face closely and recognized the innocent naivete and resolute strength that had coalesced early in her own life and led to rebellion, flight, and independence. She could do nothing less than support this young woman in her determination.

      “We’llkeep the babe,” she said. “No one, not even Bill will know it’s yours. We’ll move you into the kitchen for the winter, make you some large housedresses, keep Chester in the dark as long as we can. An’ after it’s born, we’ll say the child belongs to my cousin, an’ I’ll…go off to London an’ pretend to come back with it an’–”

      Auntie’s eyes glinted with intrigue.

      “Oh, Lily, we’ll manage,” she said. “We always have.”

      Two days later as Lily was preparing a mustard plaster for the cold Chester had caught while visiting the ice-pond, the patient whispered to her: “Love, if you have anythin’ you need to tell your Uncle, go right ahead. You can trust me. And if I need to, I can handle your Auntie.” The last remark was qualified somewhat by a spasm of coughing, but the import of his commentary was clear. That evening when Bridie shuffled in wearily from the woodlot, Chester was sworn to secrecy and taken into the conspiracy. He beamed for days.

      The plot went well throughout the winter. The ruse of having Lily work exclusively indoors was quite plausible and Bill simply had no curiosity in the matter. Ever since Violet had been taken away, he had become even more taciturn and withdrawn, though his work for Bridie was accomplished with a conscientious concern. Occasionally he would consent to take Sunday dinner with them, but most of the time he ate on the job or took Bridie’s offerings back to his hermitage. Two or three times that winter they heard the discordant strains of the mouth-organ seeking some elusive harmonies, and would know that he had ‘fallen СКАЧАТЬ