Guilt by Association (13 page)

Allowing himself one huge stretch, he jumped out of bed and padded into the bathroom, wondering if Karen was up yet. He had an idea that the two of them could go out for a while this afternoon, maybe even have a picnic somewhere. With the sun shining down on them, and the food between them, and her peculiar family nowhere in sight, they would be able to talk.

He dressed quickly after his shower, in clean khakis and a T-shirt, slipped the little velvet box into his pocket, and made his way downstairs.

“There you are,” Beverly accosted him before he had even
crossed the foyer. “My word, you must have been exhausted. We tried to be quiet. I hope we didn’t disturb you.”

“I didn’t hear a thing,” Peter said truthfully. “‘I guess the drive down took more out of me than I realized.”

“Well, you look bright as a new penny now.”

“Where’s Karen?” he asked.

“Oh, she’ll be along soon, I’m sure,” Beverly told him airily. “It takes her a while to get going in the morning, you know,
ever since the accident. But there’s coffee in the kitchen, and Winola will fix whatever you want for breakfast.”

“Hello there, Mr. Peter,” Winola cried when she saw him, displaying a big grin and a deep Mississippi drawl. “My lands, how good you look. Miss Karen sure is a lucky girl.”

Peter chuckled. “From your mouth to her ears, Winola.”

The maid began to laugh. “Yessir, Mr. Peter, I’ll tell her. You can be sure of that.”

“Do you think I could have a gulp of that coffee?” he asked, sniffing the aromatic air.

“Why, you surely can.” The maid snatched up a cup and filled it in a flash.

The coffee tasted as good as it smelled and Peter drank it down with relish.

“That’s not enough,” Winola told him. “You’s a growing boy, you got to put something substantial under them ribs.”

“What do you suggest?” he asked with a grin.

The maid grinned back. “How about some of my sour-cream eggs and a plateful of bacon?” she suggested.

“You remembered.”

It was what he had asked for every morning during his last visit, in January, when Karen was in the hospital and he was so worried, and Winola wouldn’t let him out of the house without eating.

“Now you just set yourself down, Mr. Peter,” she instructed. “Breakfast’ll be ready in no time.”

“Winola,” he said as he watched her scramble up the eggs and sour cream and blend in her own combination of herbs and spices,
“I need your help.”

“Yes, Mr. Peter?”

“I want to take Karen out today, on a picnic, and I was thinking, if it was all prepared, she couldn’t say no, could she?”

They had shared a number of picnics in the past—lazy spring afternoons on the banks of Cayuga Lake, and crisp colorful autumn days down at Cascadilla Park. All fun times, filled with laughter and warmth and closeness. He wanted to recapture that with her, if he could.

“Say no more, Mr. Peter,” Winola cried, her black eyes shining. “The basket’s in the closet, and I’ll have it filled before you can finish your eggs. It’ll do Miss Karen a world of good to get out of this house for a change.”

The eggs had been devoured and the picnic basket packed by the time Karen appeared, pushing open the kitchen door with the tip of her crutch.

“Good morning,” she said. “Did you sleep well?”

“Like a log,” he told her.

She was wearing white slacks and a lemon-yellow blouse and her dark hair was tied up with a yellow ribbon. She had that fresh-scrubbed look he remembered so well, and he felt his heart do a cartwheel as she smiled at him.

“It looks like Winola’s been taking good care of you.”

“You bet,” he confirmed.

“How about something for you, Miss Karen?” Winola asked.

“Just some juice, Winola, please,” Karen replied.

“That’s not enough,” Winola complained.

Karen grimaced. “If Winola had her way, I’d weigh four hundred pounds and be a circus freak,” she told Peter.

“You don’t eat enough to keep a sparrow singing,” Winola muttered, wagging her head.

“Why eat if I’m not hungry?” Karen asked, earning only a scowl in response. “Okay, I’ll clean my plate at lunch.”

Winola grinned suddenly at Peter. “Well now, I expect that’d be all right,” she conceded.

“What’s going on?” Karen asked, looking suspiciously from one to the other. Winola never gave in so easily.

“A surprise,” Peter said.

“What surprise?”

“Winola has been kind enough to pack us a fantastic lunch, and I’d like to invite you on a picnic.”

“A picnic?” Karen echoed. “What do you mean? You want to have lunch in the garden?”

“No,” Peter told her. “I was thinking more of going out somewhere, maybe to a park.”

“Oh, I don’t go out,” Karen declared.

Peter looked bewildered. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, I don’t go out,” Karen repeated.

“Why not?”

It wasn’t an unreasonable question and perhaps she even should have expected it, under the circumstances. But it took her by surprise and left her momentarily flushed and flustered.

“I just don’t,” she said lamely.

“Well, maybe you could make an exception,” he pressed. “We used to have a lot of fun on picnics.”

“A picnic? What a wonderful idea,” Beverly cried, pushing through the door with an armful of fresh-cut roses and catching the end of the exchange. “It’s a gorgeous day outside and I can’t think of a better thing for the two of you to do.”

“Mother,” Karen warned.

“Nonsense,” Beverly retorted. “You’ve been cooped up in this house for weeks now. If you don’t get out soon, you’ll forget what the rest of the world looks like.”

“What a ridiculous thing to say,” Karen objected. “I go to the city twice a week for my physical therapy, don’t I?”

“And that’s all you do, isn’t it?” her mother countered. “Go to the hospital and come right back home again. A change of scene would do you good.”

“I’ll be right beside you,” Peter tried to reassure her. “I won’t let anything happen. If you’re still nervous about cars,
we won’t walk in the street.”

Karen began to breathe hard and her hands, gripping her crutches, grew clammy. She was furious with her mother for interfering.

“I can’t,” she whispered.

“Of course you can,” Peter urged.

“But I look so dreadful,” she cried, “what if we run into someone I know?”

“What if you do?” Beverly countered. “You smile very politely and tell whoever it is that you’re recovering from an accident.
What’s so hard about that?”

Karen stared at her mother stubbornly. “It’s too soon,” she muttered.

“You’ll be with me,” Peter said soothingly. “You don’t have to talk to anyone else if you don’t want to. I can talk for you.”

“You can’t spend the rest of your life hiding away in this house, you know,” her mother added.

“I’m not hiding,” Karen snapped irritably, because that was exactly what she was doing. It was humiliating to have to have this discussion in front of Peter, who couldn’t possibly understand what was wrong, and watch him trying so hard to make it right. “I’ll go out when I’m ready,” she declared with as much dignity as she could muster.

“And when will that be?” her mother, as tenacious as any bulldog, inquired.

“When I’m ready,” came the reply.

Beverly threw up her hands in frustration. “Take her on that picnic, Peter,” she instructed. “Even if you have to carry her,
kicking and screaming.”

Peter didn’t have to carry her. He simply promised to bring her back home the moment she asked. They drove out to Step-pingstone Park, a pretty little stretch of green lawn that rolled right down to the edge of Long Island Sound. Only a handful of people idled there on a Monday, mostly nannies with small children who paid no attention to the girl on crutches, and Karen recognized none of them.

There were several rough wood picnic tables scattered about, but Peter spread a blanket on the grass and he and Karen sat down on either side of Winola’s basket.

“I’m starved,” Karen announced. “Shall we see what Winola’s packed for us?”

Without waiting for a reply, she dug into the big wicker hamper with all the fervor of a shipwreck survivor who hadn’t eaten for a week.

“And to think,” Peter observed dryly, “it was scarcely an hour ago that you weren’t the least bit hungry.”

“It must be all this fresh air,” Karen retorted, a piece of cold chicken in one hand, a forkful of potato salad in the other.
In fact, it
was
a beautiful day and she
was
hungry, and who could be serious over a drumstick and a dill pickle?

Peter couldn’t help smiling. He had been right to bring her here. Already there was new color in her cheeks and a sparkle in her eye, and she seemed almost her old self again. He ached to be closer to her, the urge to reach out and take her in his arms was almost overwhelming, but something stopped him, a little voice that told him to tread slowly.

Between bites, Karen busied herself with the other goodies Winola had provided. She had laid out plates and napkins and forks and poured two cups of lemonade, like a little girl at a tea party, before she realized that Peter was just sitting there,
watching her.

“What are you staring at?” she demanded.

“The most beautiful girl in the world,” he replied.

“Stuffing her face,” Karen added, knowing with a twinge of sadness that he wasn’t really seeing her as she was now, but remembering her as she used to be. “So, how come you’re not eating?”

“Half a dozen sour-cream eggs,” he explained.

Karen chuckled. “You know, one of the first things I wanted when they finally unwired my jaw was a plateful of Winola’s eggs.”

“You’d better get her recipe,” Peter advised, “before she takes it to the grave.”

Karen stopped with a blueberry muffin halfway to her mouth. “It wouldn’t do any good,” she said. “I can’t cook.”

“Surely, you jest,” he cried, clutching his chest. “I thought acid indigestion was part of every bride’s dowry.”

She chuckled. “I can sew, I can knit, I can play the piano. But put me in the kitchen and I have two left hands.”

“But man cannot live by peanut butter and jelly alone,” he cried.

“Certainly not,” she agreed.

“Have you considered taking a culinary course?”

“Actually, I expect the man I marry to hire a chef,” she teased, as she so often had in other, happier moments.

“Not only the wench can’t cook,” he huffed, “she thinks I’m a Rockefeller. Well, my pride is clearly at stake here, not to mention my stomach. You leave me no choice but to call off the engagement.”

“Call it off?” Karen cried. “How can it be off before it was even on?” She had almost forgotten how much fun it was to be with him.

“A mere oversight,” he said blithely.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the velvet box, placing it gently on the blanket in front of her.

Karen stared at the small square shape. “Is that what I think it is?” she asked, suddenly sober.

“Open it and see.”

One hand slid cautiously toward the box, then stopped. “I thought you wanted to put things on hold for a while,” she whispered.

“Only because I thought
you
wanted to,” he replied.

She sat there, not moving, barely even breathing. It was about to come true, that one desperate dream she had clung to during all the bleak months of disillusion and despair. All she had to do was reach out and open the box.

“Before I look at this,” she said, “we have to talk.”

“I’m not pressuring you,” he hastened to assure her. “I know you need time. This is for when you’re ready. It’s just so you know that, as far as I’m concerned, nothing’s changed.”

She looked at him with anxious eyes. “Wait,” she warned. “There’s something I have to tell you first.”

“I love you, I want to marry you, and I’m all ears,” he said with a grin.

He wasn’t making this very easy, Karen thought with a sigh.

“My mother should have told you months ago,” she began, “but I guess she thought this was something best left between the two of us. The doctor didn’t even tell
me
until just before I left the hospital. But it’s something you have to know now because … well… it could make a difference.”

“Nothing’s going to change my mind,” he asserted with a confident smile.

Karen remembered the way Dr. Waschkowski had explained about her lung, likening it to a balloon that deflated when it was punctured. She felt as though she were about to do some puncturing of her own.

“Peter, I won’t be able to have children.”

It took him a moment to absorb her words, and he kept his face blank because he didn’t want her to see how shocked he was,
how disappointed.

“You mean, because of the accident?” he asked.

Karen nodded, her eyes sliding off his. “I’m sorry.”

“Sweetheart, don’t blame yourself,” he exclaimed. “It’s not your fault.”

“Maybe not,” she whispered, “but I feel like it is.”

He didn’t hold her responsible. How could he? It wasn’t Karen who had so cruelly robbed him of the sons and daughters he had hoped to have, but some drunken driver who, in all likelihood, would never know and never care. Peter realized bitterly that the accident wasn’t going to go away quite as simply as he had anticipated. Already, the shape of their lives was irrevocably altered.

“Did you really think that would make any difference between us?” he asked.

“Well, I wasn’t sure,” she said honestly. “I know how much you want children.”

“And you were afraid to tell me.”

“A little, I guess.”

“Sure I want children,” he told her honestly. “But not having them isn’t the worst thing I can think of. The worst thing
is you being afraid to tell me about it. It makes me think you don’t trust me.”

“Of course I do,” she cried. “And I wanted to tell you, as soon as I found out.” I wanted to tell you everything, she thought,
but my mother wouldn’t let me. “I just didn’t think it was the kind of thing to discuss over the telephone.”

“I suppose I can understand that,” he conceded. “But let’s make a promise—one we’ll never, ever break, okay?”

“What kind of promise?” she heard herself ask.