The cattle loss is a reduction, but not a catastrophe, given the spring projections you showed me in January. The barn roof, she paused, and the corner of her mouth moved slightly. The barn roof I leave in your hands. She looked at him steadily. What I will say is that this arrangement would need to change.
I've told your daughter the same thing. I cannot be your housekeeper indefinitely. Garrick sat very still. What are you saying? I'm saying I know what I want, she said.
And I believe she stopped. She looked at the thimble, at the lamp, back at him. I believe you know what you want. And I think in the spring when the cattle have sold and the bank note is settled and this winter is something we survived rather than something we're in. I think a conversation might be possible.
He held her gaze, a specific kind of conversation. Yes, he sat with that. The look on his face was not quite a smile. It was something more considered than a smile. Something that understood what was being offered and what it would require and was choosing it anyway.
All right, he said in the spring. In the spring. He looked at the thimble one more time. Then he stood with the slow deliberateness of a large man moving in a small space at midnight. He looked down at her at the table.
Miss Finch. She looked up at him. Thank you, he said, for what you told my daughter. She already knew most of it. I know.
Thank you anyway. He picked up his lamp and went to the kitchen doorway and stopped there, his back to the room, and after a moment, he said without turning. She kept the thimble in her pocket for 3 years. His voice had that roughness again, the not quite tears quality. She was 10 years old.
She was protecting something she knew you couldn't protect right then, Odora said quietly. She's been protecting things for you for a long time. He stood in the doorway with his back to her and she watched his shoulders take a slow breath and release it. Yes, he said. She has.