Chapter 2
His voice echoed through the yard.
I didn't move.
I looked at his twisted, furious expression and felt nothing but calm.
"Frank, hear me out," I said, my tone steady.
"You're looking for a son-in-law, and I came. If it doesn't work, fine, but we haven't even finished talking. Why rush to throw me out?"
Frank froze.
He probably never expected someone like me, a poor nobody, to speak to him like that.
Linda snapped back to her senses and jabbed a finger at me.
"You've got some nerve. You humiliate Sophia right in front of us, and now you pretend you've done nothing wrong. What are you trying to do?"
Sophia cried even harder, looking at Frank through her tears.
"Dad, make him leave. I'd rather die than marry someone like him."
I didn't look at them. My eyes stayed on Frank.
"I didn't humiliate anyone," I said. "It's true, Sophia is beautiful, but looks aren't everything when you're building a life.
"I know I'm poor. I know I'm marrying into your family.
"All I want is a woman who's steady and willing to work, someone I can spend my life with in peace."
Out in the yard, Emily slowly lowered the sack from her shoulder.
She looked at me. The confusion was still there, but now there was something else in her eyes, something hard to name.
Frank stared at me like I was something strange.
He searched my face for any sign I was joking, but found nothing.
I meant every word.
"Crazy. He's really gone crazy," Frank muttered, sinking back into his chair.
Maggie picked up her pipe, leaned in close to him, and spoke in a low voice.
"Frank, hear me out.
"The man might be a bit off, but look at him. He's strong, built for work.
"And Emily is already twenty-two. Every match you've tried has been turned down.
"Now one's come to you on his own."
She spoke quietly, but I heard every word.
Frank's expression began to shift.
Emily had always been a sore spot for him.
Everyone around knew the Warrens' eldest daughter was quiet and good for nothing but labor.
She had been sitting at home year after year, and it weighed on him.
Linda seemed to realize the same thing. Her muttering faded.
She glanced at Emily in the yard, then back at me, her expression hard to read.
An uneasy silence filled the room.
Only Sophia's soft sobbing broke it.
After a long while, Frank spoke again, his voice hoarse.
"James, I'll ask you one more time. Are you sure you want to marry Emily?"
"I'm sure."
I didn't hesitate.
"Fine!" Frank slapped his thigh, as if he had made up his mind.
"If you're set on making a fool of yourself, I won't stop you."
He looked at me, a trace of cruel satisfaction in his eyes.
"But since you chose her, everything we discussed before is off the table. No money, no new house.
"Sophia is my treasure. I had planned to give her some money, get her a full set of new furniture, and clear out the east room for your wedding.
"Now you get none of it."
Sophia stopped crying. She looked at me with a smug smile, as if she was waiting for me to regret it.
I smiled instead.
"Frank, I never planned to take anything from your family.
"I don't want your money, and I don't need a new house."
I paused, then pointed toward the corner of the yard, at the small shack by the pigsty, patched together with mud and straw.
It used to be a place to store tools and odds and ends, long abandoned.
"Give me that shack, and the bit of land next to it.
"Emily and I will live there."
Everyone followed my finger.
Calling it a place to live was generous.
It leaked when it rained, let the wind through in winter, barely better than a ruin.
Frank's eyes widened.
He thought he was being harsh, but I had gone further.
"You want to live there?"
"Yes." I nodded.
Trade a daughter no one wanted for a free laborer, and save money and a house on top of that.
No matter how he looked at it, Frank came out ahead.
Sure enough, the anger in his eyes faded, replaced by a kind of pity and calculation, as if he were looking at a fool.
"Fine."
He ground the word out through clenched teeth.
"That pigsty is yours."
He looked at Emily in the yard as if he were dumping a burden.
"Emily, get over here. From today on, this idiot is your husband. You two can live by that pigsty. Stay out of my sight."
Emily's whole body jolted.
She lifted her head, her lips moved, but no sound came out.
Tears gathered in her eyes.