Alma Katsu - The Taker

“Forgive me for coming to see you unannounced, but I had to speak to you alone,” I said, looking over my shoulder to be sure her husband wasn’t close by. “I will speak plainly, as there is no time for niceties. I think you know what I have come to discuss with you. Jonathan shared with me-”

She crossed her arms and gave me a steely look. “He told you, did he? He had to boast to someone that he has made me with child?”

“Nothing of the sort! If you think he is pleased that you are going to have a baby-”

“ His baby,” she insisted. “And I know he’s not pleased.”

I saw my opening. I’d been thinking about what I would say to Sophia from the moment Jonathan had ridden away from me the day before. Jonathan had come to me because he needed someone who could be ruthless with Sophia on his behalf. Someone who could make clear to her the weakness of her position. Sophia would know that I understood what she faced; there would be less room for conjecture and appeal to emotion. I wasn’t doing this because I hated Sophia, I assured myself, nor because I resented that she’d usurped my place in Jonathan’s life. No, I knew Sophia for what she was. I was saving Jonathan from this wily harridan’s trap.

“With all due respect, I must ask you what proof you have that the baby is Jonathan’s? We have only your word, and…” I trailed off, letting my implication linger in the air.

“What are you, Jonathan’s solicitor now?” Her face reddened when I didn’t rise to the bait. “Aye, you’re right, it could be either Jeremiah’s or Jonathan’s, but I know it’s Jonathan’s. I know .” Her hands wrapped around her belly though she showed no sign of pregnancy.

“You expect Jonathan to ruin his life on your assurances -”

“Ruin his life?” she shrieked. “What about my life?”

“Yes, what about your life,” I said, drawing myself up as tall as I could. “Have you thought what will happen if you publicly accuse Jonathan of fathering your baby? All you will accomplish is to let it be known that you are a loose woman-”

Sophia chuffed, spinning on her heel away from me, as though she couldn’t bear to hear another word.

“-and he will deny the affair. Deny that he could be the father of the child. And who will believe you, Sophia? Who would believe that Jonathan St. Andrew would choose to dally with you when he can have his pick of any woman in the village?”

“Jonathan will deny me?” she asked, incredulous. “Don’t waste your breath, Lanore. You’ll not convince me that my Jonathan would ever deny me.”

My Jonathan, she’d said. My cheeks burned, my heart hammered. I do not know where I found the nerve to say the evil things to Sophia that I said next. It was as though another person was hidden inside me, one with qualities I’d never dreamed I possessed, and this hidden person had been summoned from inside me as easily as a genie is conjured from a lamp. I was blind with rage; all I knew was that Sophia was threatening Jonathan, threatening to ruin his future, and I would never let anyone harm him. He wasn’t her Jonathan, he was mine. I’d claimed him years ago in the vestibule of the church, and foolish as it may seem, I felt that possessiveness rise in me, fierce and primordial. “You’ll make yourself a laughingstock-the homeliest woman in St. Andrew claiming that the most eligible man in town is the father of her child, not the oaf who is her husband. The oaf she despises.”

“But it is his child,” she said, defiant. “Jonathan knows that. Does he not care what would happen to his own flesh and blood?”

That gave me pause; I felt a guilty twinge. “Do yourself a favor, Sophia, and forget your mad scheme. You have a husband-tell him the child is his. He’ll be glad for the news. I’m sure Jeremiah has wished for children.”

“He has-for children of his own ,” she hissed. “I cannot lie to Jeremiah about the child’s lineage.”

“Why not? You’ve lied to him about your fidelity, no doubt,” I said ruthlessly. Her hatred was so palpable at that moment, I thought she might strike at me like a snake.

The time had come to drive the stake through her heart. I looked her up and down with hooded eyes. “You know, the punishment for adultery for the female partner, if she is married, is death. That is still the position of the church. Consider this, if you insist on going through with your decision. You will seal your own fate.” It was a hollow threat: no woman would be put to death for being an adulteress in St. Andrew, nor in any frontier town where women of childbearing years were scarce. The punishment for Jonathan, if the townspeople decided by some wild chance that he was guilty, would be to pay the bastardy tax and perhaps be ostracized by some of the town’s most pious for a short while. Without a doubt, Sophia would bear most of the burden.

Sophia whirled around in circles as though searching for unseen tormentors. “Jonathan!” she cried, though not loudly enough for her husband to hear her. “How could you treat me like this? I expected you to behave honorably… I thought that was the kind of man you were… Instead, you visit upon me this viper”-she shot me another venomous look through teary eyes-“to do your evil work for you. Don’t think I don’t know why you do this,” she hissed, pointing a finger at me. “Everyone in town knows you’re in love with him but that he will not have you. It’s jealousy, I say. Jonathan would never send you to deal with me in this way.”

I had prepared myself to be cool. I backed a few steps away from her as though she was mad or dangerous. “Of course he told me to see you-otherwise, how would I know you are with child? He has despaired of being able to make you see reason and has asked me to speak to you, as a woman. And as a woman, I tell you: I know what you are up to. You are using this misfortune to better your lot, to trade in your husband for someone with means. Perhaps there is not even a baby. You look the same as always to me. As for my relationship with Jonathan, we have a special friendship, pure and chaste and stronger than that of brother and sister, not that I would expect you to understand it,” I said, haughtily. “You don’t seem to be able to comprehend a relationship with a man that doesn’t involve lifting your skirts. Think hard on it, Sophia Jacobs. It is your dilemma and the outcome is in your hands. Choose the easiest path. Give Jeremiah a child. And do not approach Jonathan again: he doesn’t wish to see you,” I said firmly, then left the barn. On the path home, I trembled with fear and with triumph, burning from spent nerves despite the cold air. I had summoned all my courage to defend Jonathan and had done so with a single-mindedness I didn’t know I possessed. I had rarely ever raised my voice and had never forced my position so vehemently on anyone. To know I had such an inner power was frightening, and yet also thrilling. I walked home through the woods, light-headed and flushed, confident that I could do anything.

It was the noise that woke me the next morning, a musket fired, ball and powder. A musket shot at this hour meant trouble: a fire at a neighbor’s house, a raiding party, a terrible accident. This shot came from the direction of the Jacobses’ farm; I knew it as soon as I heard it.

I pulled the blanket over my head, pretending to be asleep, listening to the murmurs coming from my parents’ bed below. I heard my father rise and dress, and go out the door. My mother followed, probably wrapping a quilt around her shoulders as she went about the tasks she did every morning, stoking the fire and starting a pot of water to boil. I swung around to sit upright, reluctant to put the soles of my feet on the cold plank floor and start what seemed heralded to be a strange and ill-fortuned day.