The Dowry of Miss Lydia Clark by Lawana Blackwell

Author:Lawana Blackwell [Blackwell, Lawana]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781441203045
Publisher: Baker Books
Published: 1999-01-01T08:00:00+00:00

That evening after a supper of saveloy sausage and cabbage was served by a sullen Mrs. Winters, Harold took up a lantern and walked down to the cottage at the end of the lane. He gave the door a rap and then let himself in the parlor. “Anybody here?” he called only out of courtesy because light had flowed from the windows.

“We’re in here, Harold,” his brother-in-law called from the kitchen.

He walked into the room, where Seth and Mercy sat at the table. Seth gave him a nod and went back to penciling something into a ledger book, and Mercy, who was hemming a shirt, smiled. “Would you care for some chocolate biscuits?”

That was one good thing about coming here—his sister didn’t mind folks helping themselves in her kitchen. Mrs. Winters, on the other hand, ranted as if the food came out of her wages. He scooped up a handful of biscuits from the crockery jar in the cupboard, heaped them on the table in front of an empty chair, then poured a cup of tea from the pot on the back of the stove. “Anybody else?” he thought to ask.

With cups already before them, his sister and Seth declined. Harold pulled out the chair and crunched his way through a half dozen biscuits while the two continued with their tasks. “Amanda and Thomas asleep?” he finally asked, unsure of how to begin. The last time he had come for advice, he was confident that Miss Clark would be eager for him to court her. It was hard on his pride to admit she might not be as fond of him as he had thought.

“They are,” Mercy replied.

Harold crunched down on another biscuit. “Children need their sleep.”

“That’s true.”

“And apples too. Mr. Trumble says that if a body was to eat one every day, he’d never need Doctor Rhodes.”

“Indeed? Well, it’s good that we have apple trees then, isn’t it?”

“That’s just what I told Mr. Trumble,” Harold nodded. “I said, ‘It’s a good thing we have apple trees by the creek.’ I didn’t mention your trees exactly, but if they’re good for one body, they oughter be good for everybody…right?”

Setting her sewing down upon the table, his sister studied his face. Even Seth looked up, marking his place in the ledger with a finger. “Is there something wrong, Harold?” Mercy asked.

He raked his fingers through his hair, then wiped the excess Sir Lancelot’s Fine Grooming Pomade on the edge of the tablecloth. “It’s that Miss Clark. I tried all the things you told me to do, and they ain’t workin’.”

“Hmm. Then you’ve been to church?”

“Well, no. She’s said nothing about it though, so that can’t be what’s wrong. But I gave her flowers—two times—and asked her advice like you said.”

“Maybe it’s time to give up,” Seth advised while making another mark in the book.

“Give up?”

“Sh-h-h,” Mercy scolded. “The children.”

“Sorry.” Harold ate another biscuit. “There’s got to be something else that would make her want to marry me.” And he was sure if he sat there long enough, the answer would come to him.

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