Ruth’s breath caught.
Outside, the wind stirred the cottonwoods beside the house. Their leaves whispered against one another, and somewhere downstairs a loose shutter tapped twice against its frame.
She set the suitcase on the floor.
“Is that what you think of me?” she asked. “That I am foolish?”
“No.”
“That I am too young to know what I want?”
“No, Ruth.”
“Then tell me what you are afraid of.”
Jonah’s eyes lifted to hers.
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Then he said, “I’m afraid you’ll wake up one morning and realize you married a man who has nothing left to offer you but a house full of ghosts.”
Ruth’s anger quieted, though it did not disappear.
“Your wife?”
He nodded.
“Anne?”
“Yes.”
The name seemed to alter the room. It was the first time Jonah had spoken it aloud in her presence since the wedding ceremony.
Ruth glanced toward the small table beside the bed. A framed photograph stood there, half turned toward the wall. She had noticed it earlier but had not dared examine it. Now she could see the profile of a woman with dark hair, a gentle smile, and a baby held against her shoulder.
Anne Mercer.
Jonah’s first wife. Clara’s mother. The woman whose absence had shaped the household Ruth had entered.
“I knew she was part of your life,” Ruth said. “I never expected you to forget her.”
“I wouldn’t ask that of you.”
“Then don’t ask me to pretend she never existed.”
His expression tightened, as if she had touched a wound he had carefully hidden.
“I don’t know how to speak of her without feeling I’ve betrayed her.”
Ruth looked at the photograph.
“Perhaps you have mistaken remembering her for remaining faithful to her.”
Jonah’s gaze snapped toward her.
She had not planned to say it. The words had come from somewhere beneath her fear, from a certainty she had not known she possessed.
He stared at her for a long moment.
“You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“Perhaps not. But I know that a dead woman cannot be harmed by your happiness.”
His face went still.
Ruth wished she could soften the statement, but she would not withdraw it.
Jonah turned the hat in his hands. The lamplight caught the edge of his wedding ring, a plain gold band that looked new against his roughened fingers.
“Anne was a good woman,” he said.
“I believe you.”
“She loved Clara more than anything.”
“I believe that, too.”
“She loved me.”
Ruth felt a small, sharp ache. She had known this, of course. But hearing it spoken aloud was different from imagining it.
“And you loved her,” she said.
“Yes.”
“Then I am not asking you to deny that.”