The Awakening Read online

  She stepped toward him. “Hank,” she whispered.

  He nearly jumped away from her. “Go on, Amanda, get out of here.”

  Reluctantly, she turned and went into the dark, silent house. Once inside, she got into her nightgown, snuggled in her empty bed and wished he were with her. When she went to sleep she didn’t realize that it had been hours since she’d thought of Taylor.

  Now, awake, she wanted to stay in bed and think about every moment of last night.

  But it wasn’t to be. After a brief knock, Mrs. Gunston barged into Amanda’s room. Her face showed her anger, but this morning Amanda felt too good to care.

  “Two A.M.,” Mrs. Gunston said. “You were out until two o’clock in the morning, and I don’t imagine I’m the only one who heard you come in. It’s disgraceful. I doubt that Master Taylor will want you after this.”

  “You think not?” Amanda said languidly.

  “Look at you, you’re a sight to behold. Lazing about in bed half the day, your hair down like that. I know what’s going on. I’m not blind. It’s that Dr. Montgomery. You’re like all the women in this town, chasing after a pretty face. Everyone in town knows he’s been seeing one of those Eiler girls. To men like him girls are just conquests to be made. And what has he got from you, missy? Anything he wants? Did he buy you that dress? Did you give him what he wants for the price of a dress? You—”

  “You are fired, Mrs. Gunston,” Amanda said, not even raising her voice.

  “You can’t fire me. I work for Mr. Driscoll.”

  “Who works for my father and therefore, in essence, works for me. I repeat, you are fired. I will instruct Taylor to give you two weeks’ severance pay, but you are to be gone by this evening.”

  “But you can’t—” Mrs. Gunston said, but her voice had lost its power. She turned on her heel and left the room.

  “Bravo!”

  Amanda looked up to see her mother standing in the doorway and grinning broadly. “Aren’t you going to be late for work, dear?” Grace said as she shut her daughter’s bedroom door, and Amanda could hear her whistling in the hall.

  Amanda got out of bed and hurriedly rushed through dressing. She didn’t want to miss one minute of work. She supposed she should feel awful about firing Mrs. Gunston, and perhaps she should worry about repercussions from her father and Taylor, but all she felt was pleased that she’d gotten rid of the tyrannical old witch.

  She hurried down the stairs and rushed into the dining room. All that dancing last night had made her ravenous. She stopped abruptly when she saw Taylor sitting at the table, a newspaper in front of him. It seemed like years since she’d seen him, but the moment she did see him she became Amanda-the-student again. Her back seemed to remember that steel brace he’d made her wear and she held herself rigid.

  “Good morning,” she said in a cool, remote voice, with no enthusiasm or laughter in it.

  Taylor put his paper down and looked at her as she seated herself beside him. The maid appeared with a poached egg and a dry piece of toast. Taylor waved it away. “Bring Miss Caulden bacon and scrambled eggs and biscuits with butter and honey. Tea or coffee?” he asked Amanda.

  “T-tea,” she managed to say.

  When the maid was gone, Taylor looked at Amanda. “I believe we need to talk.”

  For some reason, Amanda felt a forboding about what was coming. She wanted to postpone hearing what he had to say. “I need to get to the Union Hall. The people will be arriving and I need to talk to them. By our calculation there are sixteen languages spoken. I really don’t know too many of them, but sometimes we can find one person who speaks a language I do know and we can tell the person about the union. Sometimes it’s almost humorous. It will take as many as five of us to reach a man who speaks, say, some Chinese dialect. It’s really very interesting, and I’m needed—”

  Taylor put his hand over hers. “Amanda, I love you.”

  “Oh,” Amanda said. “Oh.”

  He removed his hand when the maid placed the heaping plate of food before her. Amanda began to eat, but the flavor of the food made her think of Dr. Montgomery. Usually, when she was eating delicious food, she was with him. Dry, tasteless food was what she ate when she was with Taylor.

  Taylor started talking again when they were alone. “I don’t think I’ve done very well in changing from being your teacher to being a suitor. There are things in life that are difficult for me, and one of them is expressing my feelings.”

  She could see how difficult this was for him, and part of her wanted to tell him not to express himself. She wished she could get away and go to the Union Hall, then to the carnival tonight. Please, she prayed, don’t let anything ruin the carnival tonight.

  “I was awake all night,” he said. “I heard you come in.”

  Who didn’t? she thought.

  “I don’t know and I don’t want to be told what kept you out so late last night, but I can’t help but feel that some of it is my fault. I don’t know if you realize that the reason I have kept you under such strict discipline is because I have been afraid of losing you. I know you believe the ranch has a great deal to do with why I asked you to marry me and, to be honest, financial security is important to me, but I asked you to marry me because I love you.”

  He looked at her, and his dark eyes that Amanda had always feared were full of hurt and pain. “You have given me back my faith in women, Amanda. My mother—” He stopped and turned his head away.

  Her eyes widened. Amanda knew nothing about his family. “Your mother?” she asked softly.

  He looked back at her, and Amanda thought perhaps she saw tears in his eyes. She put her hand over his.

  “My mother betrayed me, and I thought all women were like her, but you’re not, Amanda. You’re good and kind, and I…I have treated you abominably.”

  “No you haven’t,” she protested, squeezing his hand. “You have taught me so much. I am probably the best educated female in America.”

  He gave her a grateful little smile. “Then you don’t hate me?”

  “Hate you? Of course not. We’re engaged to be married, remember?” She started to hold up her ring to show him, but she’d left it upstairs again.

  His smile broadened. “Amanda, I’m going to be honest with you. I don’t really know much about courting, but I’m going to try. From now on you’re not my pupil and I’m not your teacher. No more schedules; no more lessons. We’ll just do what other engaged couples do. Amanda, I want us to be happy.”

  So why aren’t I happy? Amanda thought. Why do I want to run into my room and cry for about four years? “Th-that sounds wonderful,” she said.

  “You don’t look very happy,” he said teasingly. “Maybe you need some proof.” He turned in his chair and patted his knee. “Come sit on my lap.”

  Horror was the only word to describe what Amanda felt at his suggestion.

  “Don’t look so shocked, Amanda. It’s a perfectly proper thing for an engaged couple to do.”

  Stiffly, she stood, and he reached out his hands and pulled her onto his lap.

  “Now, doesn’t that feel nice? Amanda, you really are beautiful.” His hands went up her arms and he began trying to pull her toward him to kiss her.

  Images were going through Amanda’s head: She was sitting on Hank’s lap in the cleaning closet. “I guess I would kiss him,” she’d said. “No,” Hank had answered, “start subtly. Kiss my neck, unbutton my shirt, put your hands in my hair.”

  Taylor kissed her, but nothing about the kiss made her relax at all.

  He pulled away and looked amused. “I can see it’s going to take some time. Amanda, I know that you’d probably prefer to be in your room studying, but there’s more to life than books. After we’re married, there are certain duties a wife performs for her husband. Not duties, exactly, but I do believe you could come to enjoy what happens between a man and a woman.”

  Amanda sat rigidly on his lap and remembered Hank saying, “Taste me.” “I believe I coul