MB02 - A Noble Groom (22 page)

But even as the question sifted through her, she knew the answer. She was deathly scared of losing Carl. He’d been lying on the bed unconscious all day, and his fever had only grown worse. And with each passing hour she’d grown more frantic with the need to save him.

“We all should have a good cry from time to time.” Frau Pastor wiped her cheeks, and Annalisa was surprised to see the woman’s tears.

“You’re a kind woman, Frau Pastor.”

The woman clucked sadly. “I had the feeling he wouldn’t stay, and that he would break your heart when he left.”

Annalisa froze. What was Frau Pastor talking about?

“He was such a good man, and I could see you were beginning to care for him,” she continued, “but there was something about him that was different. He always seemed a bit restless.”

Did she think Carl had run off?

“Maybe it’s for the best, dearie.” Frau Pastor reached for her hand and patted it.

“But Carl hasn’t left yet.”

“Oh my!” Frau Pastor took a step back, holding on to her wide-brimmed hat as if her surprise at Annalisa’s words would blow it from her head.

“He’s inside on the bed.” Once the words were out, Annalisa realized how inappropriate her situation was—she, a widow, alone with an unmarried man lying on her bed.

Frau Pastor’s eyebrows shot up, this time nearly knocking her hat off.

“He’s sick,” Annalisa rushed to explain, “with typhoid fever.”

“Oh, dearie . . .”

“I was so busy trying to help him that I forgot to put up the white flag.”

“I suppose it’s too late to attempt to move him somewhere else, isn’t it?”

“Ja.” Even if they could move him, who else would want to take care of him and risk the exposure?

Frau Pastor’s expression spoke of the gravity of the situation. “I don’t want your reputation as a godly young woman to be compromised.”

“When he’s well enough to be moved, I’ll try to take him to Vater’s.”

If he lived . . .

But neither of them said the words.

“I saw your father in the field on the way here. He said your mother is busy taking care of Eleanor and Uri, who are both very sick. I don’t think she could handle Carl too.”

Annalisa nodded and tried to swallow the worry that rose swiftly at the thought of her brother and sister lying ill.

Gretchen came skipping out of the barn with Snowdrop on her heels. “Guten tag, Frau Pastor.”

Annalisa had made Gretchen play outside in the yard for the afternoon, wanting to honor Carl’s wish to keep her safe, even though the seclusion wouldn’t do much good at this point. She’d been able to watch her daughter while still tending to Carl, but it hadn’t been easy.

“I’ll take Gretchen home with me,” Frau Pastor said as if reading Annalisa’s thoughts. “Even though she’s been exposed, I’ll take care of her. You’ll have all you can handle trying to save Carl and manage the farm by yourself.”

Annalisa knew she ought to protest. But if there was even the slightest chance she could spare Gretchen the illness, she had no choice but to send her away.

“Besides, Herr Pastor and I would enjoy having a little girl stay with us since our own grandbabies are all so far away.”

With reluctance Annalisa gathered a few meager clothing items for Gretchen. She hugged her good-bye, lifted her into the back of the wagon, and watched her ride away. The sad eyes peeking over the edge of the wagon watched her too. Annalisa’s chest hurt until she could hardly breathe.

She was doing what was best. But why was the right thing sometimes the hardest?

Snowdrop’s head popped up in the back of the wagon next to Gretchen’s. The puppy licked the girl’s face. Gretchen put her arm around the dog, drew him into an embrace, and kissed his head.

At least Frau Pastor had insisted on letting Gretchen bring Snowdrop. Her daughter would find some comfort in him.

As the wagon rolled out of sight, Annalisa fought against a sob that pushed for release.

“Gott?” she whispered. Was Gott there? Or would He be too busy with more important people than her?

She bent, picked a blade of grass, and twirled it in her fingers. Hadn’t Carl said Gott clothed every piece of grass?

If He cared about something as small and unimportant as grass, wouldn’t He care about Gretchen?

“Gott,” she started again, “won’t you keep my liebchen safe?” The sob swelled again and hurt her chest. “Bitte.”

When she could no longer hear the rattle of the wagon, she let the blade of grass fall back to the ground, and with heavy steps she returned to the cabin and Carl’s side.

Over the next week, the fever raged with an intensity that made Carl delirious. When he wasn’t unconscious and prostrate, he thrashed in agitated agony.

For Annalisa, the days and nights blended, broken only by her attempts to care for the animals in between tending Carl. She had little time for anything else, and as much as she missed Gretchen, she was grateful the girl was somewhere safe.

She wanted to curse the unusually hot May that made the cabin unbearable. Each day she watched the sky for signs that the needed rain was coming to cool the air and drench the garden and crops that weren’t growing as they should.

Even with the door and window wide open, Annalisa slumped in overheated exhaustion in the chair, which she’d pulled next to the bed.

She fanned Carl with the edge of her apron and for a few
seconds turned the fan upon herself. The tepid air was heavy with the sweet syrupy scent of the birch-bark mixture she’d concocted to fight his fever. She’d also tried boneset tea and yarrow. But nothing had eased his suffering.

“What more can I do?” She leaned forward and pressed her palm against his forehead, hoping for cooler skin. But he was as hot and clammy as he’d been since the first day he’d fallen ill.

Except now his breathing was shallow and his face pale.

She slid her hand to his cheek, to the dark stubble that had formed over the past week. “Don’t go,” she whispered as she’d already done a dozen times that day. “If you wake up, I promise I’ll make buttermilk biscuits to go with the dandelion jelly. I promise you’ll love them. Herr Pastor says my biscuits are the best he’s ever tasted.”

Carl’s closed eyelids didn’t flicker.

The stagnant fear and desperation that had been pooling in her stomach bubbled up. She let her fingers make a trail down his cheek to his chin and back up the other cheek.

She wouldn’t have taken such liberties if he’d been awake, but since he would never know, she’d lost her embarrassment at touching him. It seemed almost natural to let her fingers linger in the scratchiness of his cheeks or in the waves of his hair.

“Wake up.” Her fingers hovered above his lips, taking little comfort in the air that came out with each labored breath.

He was dying.

As much as she wanted to deny the truth, she knew it was only a matter of time before his fever-ravaged body would succumb to the weakness and fatigue and stop working altogether.

A cramp wound through her middle and pulled tight. She rubbed her hand over the hardness of her belly and tried to ease the discomfort the occasional contractions brought.

Although the cramping had been steadily growing, it was still
too early for the baby to come. In fact, she couldn’t let the baby make an appearance until she was able to take down the white flag. She needed the midwife, and her mother, and her sister.

Even as she thought of her family, fear gripped her as hard as one of her contractions. Had Uri and Eleanor survived the typhoid? And what about Mutter and Vater? She hadn’t heard any more news.

Had they come all the way to America and worked this hard only to lose their lives to a fever?

Carl gave a soft moan and shifted.

She quickly brought her hand to his forehead again, knowing it was futile to hope the fever had broken. Yet she wasn’t ready to let go of him. Not yet.

She groaned and lowered herself to her knees on the floor. Was she falling in love with this man? She’d seen Gretchen’s love for Carl blossom, but had hers been growing too?

She reached for his hand and clasped it between both of hers. After the past several years of deciding that true love didn’t exist, that it was only a thing of fairy tales, how had she allowed herself to start hoping again?

A fresh tremor of fear rumbled through her. What had come over her? Why had she so foolishly allowed herself to care about this man? He’d made it clear that he wasn’t a farmer, that he was only staying until her groom came, that he’d rather move to Chicago and teach there. The truth was, he’d always been open with her about his intentions. He’d never led her to believe any falsehoods about who he was or what he wanted. And even though he was kind to her, he was probably treating her the way he did all women—with basic consideration.

She ought to have been more careful in guarding her heart. She’d known she would only cause herself grief if she allowed him inside.

She bent her head against her hands intertwined with his listless one. She brushed her wet cheek against the back of his hand, closing her eyes, relishing the tenderness of the contact. Then she brought her lips to his hand and let them linger, tasting the salt of her tears.

Kissing his hand was the boldest thing she’d done yet, but during his last breaths what did it matter if she threw away propriety and caution? She would likely never get another chance to kiss him.

She trailed her lips around to his palm and placed one long, last kiss there. Then she laid her cheek into his hand, imagining that he was cupping her face, caressing her skin.

And she tried to ignore the whispers that taunted her, telling her that whether he lived or died, she would lose him anyway.

Chapter
12

Carl’s eyelids were heavy, and he couldn’t get them to open. He tried raising his head, but it didn’t budge, as if someone had put a load of bricks on his forehead.

His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth, and he was thirstier than he could ever remember being in his life, even when he’d lain injured on the battlefield.

He shifted and his entire body protested, with pain shooting through his legs and arms. Had he died and gone to hell? Was he suffering the torments of the everlasting fires?

He groaned, and the pathetic noise sounded like it belonged to one of his dying comrades. He tried opening his eyes again. This time he managed to pry them into slits.

The blurry light was enough for the flood of memories to come crashing back over him—the morning he’d awoken to an agonizing headache, how he’d tried to ignore the growing faintness and heat that had spread over his body, and how he’d determined to plant the corn.

He’d hoped that if he ignored the symptoms, they’d just
go away. But he must have collapsed. As much as he’d wanted to stand strong and fight the fever, it had knocked him down anyway.

Someone had obviously dragged him to a bed.

Annalisa?

His muscles tensed. What had happened to Annalisa and Gretchen?

He forced open his eyes all the way and blinked hard, trying to bring the room into focus. Desperation pummeled him fully awake. He had to find them and make sure they hadn’t caught the disease too.

With all the strength he could muster, he turned his head until his gaze landed on the chair next to the bed. It was empty.

He almost groaned again, but then he felt a flutter against his hand.

He shifted and found Annalisa kneeling next to the bed, her face resting against his hand, her eyelids closed in slumber. The dark circles in the fair skin under her eyes and the weary lines across her forehead attested to her exhaustion. But from what he could tell, she wasn’t ill. Yet . . .

How long had he been sick?

He glanced around the cabin, trying to gauge the passing of time. A wave of dizziness overtook him, and a moan escaped from his parched lips.

She gave a soft sigh against his hand, and an instant later the tender warmth of her lips pressed against his palm. She let the fullness of her mouth linger with a familiarity that she’d never shown before.

The sweetness of the touch sent a shiver up his arm. Suddenly all he could think about was pulling her into his arms. The need to be near her, to hold her, to touch her overwhelmed him. He wanted to make sure she was all right.

But his arms wouldn’t work, even though he willed them to reach for her and draw her near.

She nuzzled her nose against his wrist. He lifted his finger and caressed her cheek, letting the cool smoothness of her skin soothe him.

She gave a gasp and sat up.

“Good morning.” His whisper was hoarse.

With another sharp intake of breath she dropped his hand and shifted her eyes, but not before he caught the mortification in them. “I didn’t know you were awake.”

“With that kind of nursing, maybe I should go back to sleep.”

She lowered her head. Her hair hung in loose waves around her face. It was free from the usual braid and shimmered in the sunlight that cascaded through the open window.

“How are you feeling?” She peeked at him, her eyes big and clear and full of the sky at dawn.