Tarry This Night by Kristyn Dunnion

Author:Kristyn Dunnion
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781551527062
Publisher: Arsenal Pulp Press
Published: 2017-09-27T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 19

Morning comes and Susan is not in her cot. Ruth forces herself to sit up. She rubs her eyes until the blurry beds come into focus. There is a pain chipping at her skull, needling her scalp, making it hard to think. Her mouth is very dry. Morning. The hard fast.

Ruth should wake the children. She moves stiffly in the cold room. She shouts and claps. Nothing. Ruth swallows panic and shakes Helen by the shoulders. The girl’s eyes roll.

Then, “You’re hurting me.”

“Scared me.” Ruth straightens Helen’s nightgown and bed sheets. She lowers herself on the girl’s cot. She rubs her eyes again.

“It was wonderful,” whispers Helen. “My dress was purple and red and I had gold jewellery with stones and pearls. I sat upon a red horse, and I was in charge of everything. I had piles of gold and slaves to do my bidding.”

“The Whore of Babylon,” says Ruth. “Don’t say nothing about that to no one.”

“Is it the Devil?” Helen frowns.

“Mayhap.”

“Oh, what will I do?”

“Pray, I suppose,” says Ruth.

“I will. I’m hungry.”

“I know.”

“Will we eat today?”

Ruth shakes her head. “Hard fast,” she says.

Helen falls back to the mattress. “Can’t we just stay? Mother Rebekah does.”

“She’s sick and you’re not. Get dressed. Lots of layers. We got the Sit today, so try and keep warm. Help me wake the cousins?”

Helen shakes Rachel, and the two of them rouse Leah.

“What’s Abel doing here? He’s a boy.”

“None of your business,” says Ruth. “Wash faces and hands and get dressed. Take Abel with you.” Mothering, it seems, has come upon her with or without the bridal contract. For once she is glad there is no meal to prepare. She can’t do it all on her own. But poor Susan has been, she realizes.

After Ruth helps the children dress, she hovers near Rebekah. A foul odour blooms. No one helped her to the latrine, and Ruth can’t bear to clean this right now. She can’t think for the pain in her head. Regrettably, Rebekah will have to wait.

One note swells and fills the bunker. It rattles her ribs. She has not yet toileted or checked her blood rag. A dress. She must wear a dress or she will provoke Father’s ire again. Ruth rifles through Rebekah’s under-bed storage box. “You won’t mind,” she mutters. Rebekah’s new quilt is folded and stacked on top of her other things. Finished, at last. Ruth finds the worn blue dress and yanks it out. She drops the bodice and skirt over her regular long-sleeved shirt and trousers. It hangs long at the sleeves and hem. Sags at the chest. The waist has been let out recently, a strip added to each side, so it fits over the lumps of Ruth’s belt and knife pouch. She is not ready to give up the hunt yet. Who, other than Paul, can procure? Silas thunders about like a forest boar. He is adept at Scriptures and peddling the generator but little else.

Paul. Where in God’s light might he be? His name is a tumbling rock, a landslide, and Ruth pinches herself to stop the rush of feeling.

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