Read Online Serpents in the Garden by Anna Belfrage - Free Book Online

something else but, try as she might, Alex couldn’t quite figure out what.
    “But Mr Leslie’s right,” Betty said from behind them. “My mother always says how a woman unable to conceive must look deep within and pray for forgiveness.” She flushed under their combined eyes.
    “Easy to say if you conceive with the ease of a rabbit,” Alex snorted.
    Betty’s face turned crimson.
    “I didn’t mean your mother,” Alex said hastily. “You know I’m very fond of Esther. I was thinking more along the lines of sweet Constance.”
    “Sweet?” Betty looked confused. “I don’t find her sweet.” She pressed her lips together, her eyes brimming. “She asked me if I was the little fool who had opened my legs on the basis of a worthless promise.”
    “If you plan on weeping every time someone tells you the truth, you’ll spend most of your life in tears,” Mrs Parson said to her. “It was a daft thing to do, no?”
    Betty shook her head. “No, it wasn’t.”
    “Ah, lass.” Mrs Parson sighed, not unkindly. “And what if you’d been with child? How would you have cared for it, with the father on the high seas?”
    “I can sew, or go into service,” Betty replied, without much conviction.
    “That won’t be necessary, lassie. You bide with us, aye?” Matthew patted the stool beside his chair. “You’re family now.”
    With a shy smile, Betty went and sat beside him.
    Alex smothered a smile at the tenderness in Matthew’s voice. Children and puppies, kittens and babies in general, brought out a very soft side in him, a side generally reserved for her only. She slid her eyes sideways to study him in the firelight, and it struck her, as it sometimes did, that both of them were growing older. There were permanent creases on his forehead, a deep groove from nose to the corner of his mouth, and several small wrinkles around his eyes.
    As if in response to her cataloguing, he straightened up and smiled into the fire. Just like that, he reverted to being as he’d been when she first met him, on a heat infested day in August when a bolt of thunder rent the veil of time apart and sent her hurtling through it. Her man: tall and strong, with magical hazel eyes and a long, generous mouth. Alex raised the back of her hand to his cheek, and he leaned into her touch with an almost inaudible sigh.
    *
    “It would help if you moved out of the way,” Alex said a couple of days later, prodding at the huge dog that lay across the threshold. Narcissus yawned and settled his head on his paws, the deep brown eyes never leaving Hannah who was playing with a soft doll made from leftover yarn and bits and pieces.
    Naomi grinned at Alex and went back to her kneading. “He’s very protective of her, aren’t you, little Narcissus?”
    The dog wagged his tail in response to his name.
    “Little? He’s the size of a calf!” Alex bent down to scratch his yellow head. “But he’s probably the best nursemaid I’ve ever seen. So,” Alex said, sitting down to watch Naomi work, “have you spoken to your parents?”
    Naomi snorted loudly. “You know I have.” She used the back of her forearm to wipe a strand of hair out of the way, dusted some flour over the dough, covered it, and set it to the side. “Constance has quite the tongue on her. As long as Uncle Peter isn’t around, of course – then she is silent and meek.”
    “Aye.” Mrs Parson nodded. “She’s wily, that one.”
    Agnes looked up from where she was slicing beets and frowned. “She should be silent in his presence. Mr Leslie is so much wiser than her, and he’s her husband.” She nodded vigorously, dislodging a strand of pale blond hair from under her cap.
    Naomi rolled her eyes at her. “Wiser? If he were wiser, he wouldn’t have married a girl that young. Look at the discord it’s causing in his family.” Naomi gnawed at her lip. “Poor Jenny, first she loses her mother, and now she’s lost her father.”
    “Not a major loss, if you ask me,”