Page 5 of The Autumn Wife
That his mind strayed in that direction was proof that he’d been too long without a woman. Best to avoid entanglements of any kind, when in twelve weeks and a day he would settle old scores and atone for the trouble he'd left behind.
Suddenly, the door to the schoolhouse creaked open on leather hinges. He glanced over to see two nuns stride out into the blaze of the July day.
Unfolding to his full height, he bowed to the holy women. Madame Tremblay splashed the bloody linen into the bowl before she stepped up beside him—an arm’s length away and then some. How ill at ease she was with him.
“Madame Tremblay,” the leading nun said, “it’s kind of you to step in and help the injured. Not all visitors are so eager to play the good Samaritan.”
“Of course,” the lady replied in a warmer voice than she had used with him. “Mother Superior, I assume?”
The nun nodded and gestured toward him. “Is this our hero?”
The nun gave Theo a thorough perusal. He braced himself for the look that always came after—the scornful dismissal of a man of no consequence—but when the nun’s gaze returned to his face, he saw only curiosity and gratitude in those blue eyes.
“Forgive my rudeness,” Mother Superior said, “but I do not recognize you. I had expected—well,hoped—that the responsible party to today’s heroics might be one of the workers on my project.”
Herproject?
In his experience, it was always the local bishop or a head monk who financed and planned religious building projects, even for convents. Frontier life required such a shattering of norms, he supposed—and the Reverend Mother had clearly risen to the challenge. Though he’d noticed a few flaws in mortaring—the fault of the workers—and a lack of safety—the fault of the building overseer—the building site itself was highly organized. Bluestone had been set aside in neat rows for sills and lintels. The best Pointe-aux-Trembles limestone was being crushed to make mortar. Taking everything in, he had lingered on the roadside, gawping with envy at the working masons, losing himself in memories of better days when he’d been tasked to raise castles and cathedrals under his bare hands.
“Monsieur?” the Reverend Mother prodded. “Your name?”
“Theo Martin,” he stated, bending his neck. “I happened to be passing by when I witnessed the accident—the near accident.”
“Well, I’m very glad the Holy Spirit nudged you in the right direction. There have been too many injuries on this project. The prayers of my congregation are powerful, but”—she shook her white-capped head—“those workers could help the angels a little, by paying more attention to safety.”
“Reverend Mother.” The boy Etienne shoved off the wooden bench and took a swaggering step to his mother’s side. “The mason who dropped the stone wasn’t wearing a leather bib. And the stone was too heavy to carry without it.”
“Is that so?” A smile twitched at the corners of the nun’s lips. “And who is this well-informed young gentleman?”
Theo didn’t have to turn his head to sense Madame Tremblay stiffening like a lioness beside her cub.
He did wonder why, though.
The lady said, “This is Etienne Tremblay, the boy who was saved. He’s my”—her voice caught on a breath—“he’s my son.”
“Oh?” The nun blinked. “My dear lady, unless the angel Gabriel appeared to you as a child, this young man must be adopted.”
“A stepson,” Theo offered. The hot sun glanced off the golden surface of her hair, nearly blinding him.But not so much that he didn’t notice the tendons standing out in the lady’s throat.
What worried her so much?
“I saw everything,” Etienne blurted, rising to his toes. “I was supposed to wait here, on the bench. But I…” The boy cast a glance toward the bustling worksite. “I was curious about the construction.”
“That’s where I saw him,” Theo added as Madame Tremblay bit her lower lip hard. A lady in distress had always been his weakness. “I witnessed one of the masons carrying a stone that was too large to be hauled up a ladder that was too rickety to use, especially for such weight.”
The Reverend Mother bent her head back. “And what do you know of such things?”
Everything.
“I grew up in a village of stonemasons, and was apprenticed from a young age.” He flexed his empty hands, aching to hold a trowel. “I spent years in Paris building cathedrals.”
“Wait…” The nun leaned in, setting the cross at her neck swinging. “You’re amason?”
“Yes, or at least I was, back in France.” His shoulders straightened with a pride he couldn’t afford to have or show off. “I’m a master mason.”
The boastful words launched out of him, propelled not only by the realization that this nun was in charge of the chapel-building project, but also by the awareness of the lovely woman standing by his side. The woman who’d tended him out of decencyand politeness, but who’d done so with visible wariness. Probably because she saw him as only a dirty laborer. How fine it would be for such a woman to see him as the better man, the craftsman he had been, back when he was deserving of respect.
Respect was the very first thing he’d lost.
