The knock came at half past ten in the morning, sharp and insistent. Valerie sat frozen at her mother's escritoire, where she had been pretending to write thank you notes. The pen trembled in her fingers, leaving an unseemly blot across the cream coloured paper.
"Valerie," Florence called from the kitchen. "There's someone at the door."
She could hear her mother's footsteps in the hallway. Through the lace curtains, Valerie caught a glimpse of a tall figure on the porch.
The voices that drifted through the thin walls made her stomach clench.
"Mrs. Whitfield? I'm looking for your daughter. For Valerie."
Bennett's voice, though she had never heard it sound so formal.
"I'm afraid Valerie isn't receiving visitors at present. She's been quite unwell."
"I know about her condition, Mrs. Whitfield. I'm her husband."
The silence that followed was so complete Valerie could hear the mantel clock ticking.
"Her what?"
Florence's voice climbed toward hysteria. Valerie found herself rising from the chair without conscious thought.
"We were married in January, on Mistawis Island. I've come to take her home."
Take her home. As if their cabin still belonged to her.
She could hear Constance's sharp intake of breath from the parlour doorway.
"That's impossible," Florence said. "My daughter would never..."
"Mrs. Whitfield, may I come in? We have a great deal to discuss."
Footsteps in the hallway now. Valerie backed toward the window.
"Valerie?" Bennett's voice, closer now. "I know you're here. Your trunk arrived yesterday, but you didn't."
The trunk. She had forgotten about the trunk.
"She's resting," Florence said quickly. "The journey was very difficult, in her condition..."
"What condition would that be?"
Something in Bennett's tone made Valerie's breath catch. There was no concern in his voice. Instead, she heard anger, carefully leashed but unmistakable.
"Her heart condition, of course. Surely she told you about her limited time..."
"She told me many things, Mrs. Whitfield. Not all of them true."
The accusation hung in the air. Valerie sank into the chair beside the window. He knew. Somehow, he had discovered the truth.
The parlour door opened.
He stood framed in the doorway exactly as she remembered. But something was different about his expression. A hardness around his eyes that she had never seen before. He wore travelling clothes, well cut but dusty.
"Hello, Valerie."
The simple greeting nearly undid her.
"Bennett." The word scraped against her throat. "You shouldn't have come."
"Shouldn't I?" He stepped into the room but made no move to come closer. "My wife disappeared without explanation three weeks ago. I think I have some right to wonder what happened."
Wife. The word sat strangely between them. Behind Bennett, she could see her mother hovering in the doorway with Constance peering over her shoulder.
"I left you a letter," she said, though her voice came out barely above a whisper.
"Did you?" Bennett's mouth quirked in something that wasn't quite a smile. "I must have missed it."
She had never sent it. She had kept it hidden in her old writing desk.
"I can explain..."
"Can you?"
He moved closer, close enough that she could smell the familiar scent of pine and woodsmoke that clung to his clothes.
"Valerie, did you know Dr. Trent's diagnosis was false when you came to the island?"
"No, but..."
"Did you know when we were married?"
"No, but that doesn't matter..."
"Doesn't it?" His hand covered hers where it rested on the chair's arm. "You came to me believing you had months to live. You married me believing you would soon leave me widowed. How exactly is that deception?"
She stared at him, trying to process what he was saying. "But I should have told you as soon as I found out. I should have explained..."
"Should," he repeated, and there was that slight smile she remembered. "That word again."
Florence rose from her chair. "I don't understand any of this. If Valerie isn't dying, if this entire situation has been based on some sort of medical confusion, then surely..."
"Surely what, Mrs. Whitfield?"
Bennett didn't look away from Valerie's face.
"Surely you can see that this changes everything," Florence said. "If there was no medical necessity..."
"There was love," Bennett said. "Is that not necessity enough?"
Florence made a sound like she had swallowed something wrong. Constance dropped her teacup. The crash was loud in the small parlour, tea spreading across the rug in a brown stain.
Nobody moved to clean it up.
"Bennett," Valerie said. Her voice didn't sound like her own.
"Wait." He held up a hand. "Before you say anything else." He reached into his jacket and pulled out a leather portfolio. "You're not the only one who's been keeping secrets."
He opened it on the small table beside the window. Papers. Dozens of them. She could see numbers, columns, what looked like legal documents.
"These are royalty statements," he said. "For books published under the name Bernard Redfield."
The name hit her like cold water. Bernard Redfield. The nature writer whose books she had read in secret, borrowed from the lending library and hidden under her mattress. The prose that had made her feel less alone in her mother's suffocating house.
"That's not possible."
"It's a pen name. Adopted after some... difficulties with people who wanted my family's money more than they wanted me."
"Your family's money." Florence's voice was faint. She had sat down heavily in the nearest chair.
"The Redfield pharmaceutical patents. Heart medications, among other things." He looked at Valerie. "The irony isn't lost on me."
She couldn't process this. The man she had married. The books she had loved. The fortune he apparently possessed.
"You're Bernard Redfield," she said stupidly.
"Yes."
"And you're rich."
"Yes."
"And you married me even though I..." She stopped. Even though I lied to you. Even though I was never dying. Even though everything I told you was based on a doctor's mistake.
"Valerie." He crossed the room and took her hands. His palms were warm. Real. "I married you because when you talked about Byron being tiresome, you were the first honest thing I'd heard in years. I married you because you made jam with berry stains on your fingers and you laughed like you'd never laughed before. I married you because you saw me. Not my name or my money or what I could give you. Me."
"But the diagnosis..."
"Was wrong. You know that now. I know that now." He tightened his grip on her hands. "Does it matter?"
Behind them, Constance was dabbing uselessly at the tea stain with her handkerchief. Florence hadn't moved from her chair. Through the window, Valerie could see Mrs. Peterson's dog relieving itself against the front gate.
"I don't know," she said honestly. "I don't know if it matters or not."
Bennett smiled. It was a small smile, uncertain at the edges.
"That's the first honest thing you've said since I got here."
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