The Evening Spider by Emily Arsenault Read Free Book Online Page A

just as Matthew appeared in the doorframe.
    â€œWhat was that dreadful noise! My God, Frances! She’s bleeding!”
    â€œThere was a spider!” I screamed, wiping Martha’s face frantically. “A spider!”
    â€œAnd you dropped Martha?” Matthew demanded.
    â€œNo. She tumbled off the bed.”
    â€œTumbled off the bed! How is that possible? Give her to me.” Matthew took the baby from my arms.
    The child continued to scream, and the sound of it threatened to break my heart in two. I reached for her, but Matthew pulled away.
    â€œI must take her to Dr. Graham at once. This wound almost certainly needs stitching, and he should examine her.”
    â€œI will get dressed.”
    â€œNo. Stay here. Try to sleep.”
    â€œPlease let me hold her. It’s just the short walk down the road.”
    â€œYou obviously need some rest, Frances.”
    I followed him to the front door, begging and sobbing. He handed Martha back to me briefly while he put on his coat and shoes but then snatched her back.
    â€œPlease let me go with you!” I cried as he opened the front door. “Or else send for Dr. Graham, rather than taking the poor baby out like this.”
    As soon as I said it I wondered why he had not suggested this earlier.
    â€œYou are not well enough to accompany me,” he said, pressing his handkerchief to Martha’s head. “Try to get some rest.”
    I cried until Matthew returned. I knew that he had gone to Dr. Graham’s home—rather than sending for him—because he did not wish for the doctor to see me in my fragile state. I cried not only forthis incident but for the last. Matthew was right to be concerned about Dr. Graham.
    Dr. Graham was the only one who knew of the goblet incident—the time I’d dropped a goblet when I was with child, and the pieces had cut Matthew’s leg. Dr. Graham had surely understood that that had been an accident, but what might he think now? How many accidents can one sound-minded woman have?
    Matthew returned after an hour and tucked Martha into her cradle without a word.
    â€œHow is she?”
    â€œShe is asleep. Don’t disturb her. She is fine, but there may very well be a scar. Fortunately it is far to the side of her face.”
    â€œDid Dr. Graham—”
    â€œWhat, Frances?”
    â€œDid he ask about the details of the accident?”
    â€œOnly those that he needed to know.”
    When I awoke, I found Tessa tending to Martha downstairs in the kitchen. Matthew had evidently sent for her in the early-morning hours. He sent for Clara later that day.
    I was not certain, at the time, how many details of that evening Matthew had shared, and with whom. Clara treated me gently, but she always had, in her elder-sisterly way. You were lost in your studies, I believe. And when I saw Dr. Graham thereafter, I was afraid to meet his eye.

 
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    Chapter 15
    Haverton, Connecticut
    December 9, 2014
    I woke up a little before five—relieved that I’d gotten a few hours of sleep, but vaguely annoyed that my early waking had no apparent purpose. Lucy was not crying. What, then, had wakened me?
    Shut up, please.
    Yes. That was it. Those words had drifted into my head as I slept—a vestige of a dream that would otherwise have slipped back into my subconscious unnoticed—and woken me up.
    Shut up, please.
    I stared into the morning gloom, avoiding looking at the little green light of Lucy’s monitor. I’d never been great at getting back to sleep in the morning. By six o’clock, I gave up trying. Lucy was likely to be up within a half hour, so if I was successful, it would only end in frustration. After briefly poking my head into Lucy’s room to watch her chest rise and fall, I tiptoed down the stairs. In the kitchen, I started up some coffee.
    While the coffee machine grunted, I sat in our cold kitchen and thought about Wendy. Wendy, my freshman roommate in