“Meadowsweet,” Charlotte echoed, both relieved to remember what the plant was (notsilverweed) and mortified she’d been unable to do so on her own. “Yes. I couldn’t think what...”
It would help with the pain. Whether it would help with the brain fog was less certain.
She fell asleep in the armchair, warm with meadowsweet tea. When she awoke, sometime early that afternoon, the plant creature had abandoned its spot by the stove and wrapped around the branches overhead. Elspeth was coming in from outside, stamping snow from her boots and burrowed deep into her cloak and the borrowed fur. She shook them out and hung them on the pegs by the door to dry.
“Built up some shelter for the animals. Ain’t snowing now, but you never know. How you feeling?”
Charlotte settled deeper into the chair. The tea had burned away the worst of the pain.
“My headache’s gone. And I think I can think now.”
Elspeth kicked off her boots and knelt before her with a soft groan. Her hands were freezing, her hair damp. Her eyes were bruised like Charlotte’s so often were, like she was exhausted.
“You ought to warm up,” Charlotte said. “Is there any tea left?”
“So much pain earlier you couldn’t remember a plant, but it’s me you’re worried about.” Shaking her head, Elspeth peered into Charlotte’s face. “You look better. Think the rest done you good.”
“I will learn nothing from this.”
Elspeth’s mouth twitched. She squeezed Charlotte’s hands and turned, stiffly, to build up the fire. Water dripped from her braid into her collar. Orange light flickered on her face and arms, outlined her figure through her shirt. Charlotte looked away, thinking of how she’d frozen Elspeth out the other day for suggesting they were the same. The way Elspeth had taken care of her since, though Charlotte had been frequently unpleasant.
“There was this woman,” she blurted, in a low voice. Elspeth paused in sticking another log into the stove. “Ages ago, a couple of years after John’s death. That is... I’d known for a long time that I...”
Her hands fisted in her apron. She’d never told anyone about this, not even Arthur.
“Her husband was a local boy. He’d moved to Glenwhistle looking for work, and he’d married her and brought her back to show off to his family. She was...”
She’d had a laugh that went through Charlotte like music and a smile that left her desperate to do what she could to see it again. Only Charlotte’s sense of propriety had kept her from making a fool of herself.
“Well, I—I wanted her.” Charlotte licked her lips. Admitting it felt like a crime. “I didn’t do anything about it—of course I didn’t, she was married, and even if she hadn’t been—”
She hadn’t been sure which was worse: that she’d wanted amarriedwoman or that she’d wanted a marriedwoman.She’d thought the woman smiled at her more than at others, clasped her hand too long during the sign of peace, but she’d told herself she was imagining it.
“After Mass one day,” she said, “she asked if she might speak with me in private. About a medical issue, I assumed, but she took me around the side of the church and—”
The moment they were alone, the woman had pressed Charlotte up against the building. Starving for the intimacy she’d shared with John, taken with this beautiful girl, at once elated and terrified that she might want what Charlotte wanted, Charlotte had touched her face. The woman had taken her other hand and laid it on her bosom.
Elspeth turned to gaze at her. “She kiss you?”
Charlotte shook her head. “Her husband came around the corner looking for her.”
Elspeth whistled, long and low. “What happened?”
“Nothing, thank God.” Charlotte twisted her hands in her lap. “I was terrified, but she didn’t bat an eye. She told him she had asked me to look at a rather concerning birthmark, and I managed to gabble something about it being nothing to worry about, and she thanked me and took his arm and went home. They left for Glenwhistle the next day. I never saw her again.”
“Lucky for you.” Elspeth looked away; Charlotte was relieved. “Lucky nothing happened, I mean. Last time a man caught me with his wife, I got a black eye for it. Didn’t even know she was married.”
Charlotte flushed; she had immediately wondered what, exactly, Elspeth had been caught doing with the man’s wife.
Elspeth closed the stove door, adjusted the damper, and dropped into her armchair. “Why’re you telling me this now?”
Charlotte let out a breath. “Because... I think I should. Because you’ve been good to me—taken care of me, like you said. The other day, when you said we were the same, I was afraid... No one knows this about me. I’ve never... I’ve been very careful. So when you said we were the same... I was afraid of what you might say.”
It seemed foolish to have been scared, now. Of course she was afraid of what the villagers might say, but Elspeth wasdifferent. Elspeth had wanted to know what had happened. Elspeth had responded with her own story, or a piece of one.
“I know I hurt you,” Charlotte said, “responding how I did. And you’ve been kind to me anyway. So I... I wanted you to know. You deserve the truth.”
Elspeth was silent for so long that Charlotte’s palms itched. She rubbed them against her apron. Maybe she’d made a mistake.
