That was the morning Clara Hutchkins came back. She came without her friends this time, which should have made it better and somehow made it worse. She stood in front of Margaret's table and she looked at the space where the dried cherry pie had been and she said, "I see you're taking special orders now." "I didn't take an order," Margaret said. "I made a pie for Nathan Brooks."
Clara said for his daughter, Margaret said she's 10. Clara was quiet for a moment. She had a way of being quiet that was not restful. You know, she said, I've been patient about this because I assumed it would run its course. A man like Nathan grieving, maybe he finds comfort in routine, but it's been 2 months now and people are starting to talk, and I think someone ought to say clearly.
She paused. Let it sit. He's not going to marry you, Margaret. The market noise continued around them. Somewhere to the left, a child was crying about something.
The wind pulled at the cloth on the table. I'm not selling marriage, Mrs. Hutchkins. Margaret said, "I'm selling pie. Don't be clever with me," Clara said. And for just a moment, the pleasant surface cracked, and something harder showed through underneath.
"You're a sensible woman. You know how this town works. A man with Nathan's name and Nathan's land chooses a wife who reflects well on him. That is simply how it is. I'm telling you this as a kindness."
Margaret looked at her. She looked at her for long enough that Clara shifted slightly, almost imperceptibly on her feet. "Thank you for the kindness," Margaret said. The blackberry is $2 if you change your mind. Clara left without another word.
Margaret stood behind her table and breathed slowly through her nose and waited for the tightness in her throat to ease. It took a while. She sold a peach pie to a farmer from up near the Henderson place and a cinnamon apple to the Methodist minister's wife. And by the time the morning was half over, she had studied herself out and was almost all right. But something had snagged in her chest and wouldn't shake loose.
Not because Clara was wrong exactly. Clara wasn't wrong about how Willow Creek worked. She wasn't wrong about the arithmetic of it. A man with land and a name and a woman with a pie table and a faded dress. Margaret had never been confused about that arithmetic.