Calvin Baker - Dominion

His terms settled, Magnus stood to leave without ceremony, but confident in his position as the stronger party in the negotiations, and asked for his horse to be brought out from the stable. Before he left, however, not wanting to give offense, he thought to make a bow to Mrs. Darson and shake hands with her husband in front of her, warmly enough that they seemed like old friends who had just finished dinner instead of a business deal.

When he returned home Magnus called Caleum into the parlor and told him he was free to begin courting Libbie. Caleum, when he heard, sat up in his seat very straight. Instead of fear, which Magnus had been half expecting and half hoping to see on his face, the young man seemed self-assured and smiled at his uncle as he thanked him. “I know you don’t think I’m ready yet, sir, but I am.”

“I still think you would be better served to take your time with all of it. If she has your heart, it won’t go anywhere.”

“I’m not anxious about that,” Caleum said precociously.

Looking at him in that moment Magnus saw the same confidence Purchase had always carried with himself and was proud of his nephew that he had inherited that quality.

“All the same, it’s my business to shepherd your affairs, and I would be failing you in that if I advised otherwise.”

Caleum, ever dutiful, could see then how much his uncle had worked to be a good guardian and felt himself lucky to have such a parent in place of his own, who had abandoned him. Still, he knew his own mind and thought himself well prepared for the next phase of shepherding and guarding himself as well as a wife.

He called on Libbie at the end of the week, riding his horse through the tumult of autumn colors as first frost descended into the valley from higher up. When he came up the narrow way to their house, Libbie, who was in the parlor, saw him and left in an excited rush to prepare herself. It was no coincidence she was at the window, which had no glass, only wooden shutters, and still stood open at just that time. She had been lurking about there the entire four days since Mr. Merian had come to see her father.

When Caleum knocked at the front door, Mr. Darson himself opened it and welcomed the young man into the house. The two of them entered the parlor together, and the entire family was there. Caleum greeted each in turn, even Eli and George, though more distantly.

Similarly, George and Eli were forced to defer to Caleum when they saw their father treated him like a grown man and equal while he still treated them like boys. It did not sit well with them, but they were without power to affect the situation for the time being.

“Libbie, why don’t you show Caleum your embroidery,” Mrs. Darson recommended, after he had sat down. “Libbie is very accomplished at needlecraft and sewing.”

The girl, suddenly shy, smiled downward and sat without moving for a moment, before gathering herself to go off and fetch the things her mother suggested. She returned with a square piece of cloth she had decorated for a pillow.

When Caleum saw it, he thought it was artful indeed and complimented her on it. “It is so pretty,” he said, looking her in the face until she turned her head downward again. “It’s going to make the prettiest pillow in the whole county.” He looked at her for a response, as she continued to smile into her own lap for embarrassment of looking at him directly.

“Why don’t we all leave them so they can talk together a spell,” Mr. Darson told his sons, standing from his own seat.

Caleum stood until the family had left the room. When he and Libbie were alone, he sat down again closer to her. “How did you learn to embroider so well?” he asked, grown more awkward when they were left alone.

“It only comes to me,” she answered. “For each piece of fabric, I think what it most reminds of, then try to fashion that.”

“Well, it sure is something,” Caleum told her. “I could never do such a thing myself.”

“You yourself must make something, though,” she replied modestly. “Everybody makes something.”

“No, not me. I don’t have the eye for it.”

“Well, I bet you’ll make a good planter,” she said. “That is something that requires knowing a great deal. Maybe not everyone’s talent after all is to create, but that some people have a talent for shepherding, which is just as necessary.”

“Perhaps,” Caleum replied, impressed with her good sense. “I think the two together must complement each other handsomely.”

Libbie could not help but turn away again.

When she did so, Caleum reached out and briefly took her hand. She turned her attention directly to him after that, and they stared straight into each other’s eyes, until Mrs. Darson returned to the room. Caleum quickly stood up again when he saw her in the doorway.

“It has been very nice visiting with you, Mr. Merian,” she said, coming into the middle of the room, where she stood like an immovable pillar.

“Yes, I must get back now. May I return next week?”

“Please do,” Libbie said, then quickly looked to her mother.

“Yes, we would enjoy that,” Mrs. Darson affirmed.

Caleum was happy then as both women wished him a pleasant ride back to Stonehouses. On the way he dreamed of the home he would create with Libbie, and all the comforts and security it would contain. That will be my great talent, he told himself, to make a home like Stonehouses for my own wife and children. As he thought this he began to think of his parents. He spurred his horse then into a fast gallop, wanting to burn away the memory of rejection.

It was over ten years since he had last seen them, and he could barely recall either in his own mind, except for the gossip he sometimes heard — for the story of his parents had become notorious in those parts and was even known on the seas. He knew his love for Libbie was not like theirs but a thing patterned after itself that he was very glad for. Still, he was careful when he daydreamed of his intended that it was temperate, and not feverish as he knew devotion could sometimes be, when its heat consumed both self and host.

Caleum and Libbie’s courtship was not long, as the older people, excepting Mr. Darson, would have preferred, but barely a year in duration. The spring after he started wooing her Caleum persuaded Magnus that he was set to see things through to their formal conclusion. Magnus, wary but trusting his nephew to know his own mind by then, accepted the decision without debate and informed Solomon Darson he was free to publicize the engagement and ensuing marriage, which they agreed to have six weeks hence at the Darson place.

Magnus and Caleum spent the rest of that month taking long rides together, to survey the land and search out the best spot to put up a new house. Caleum in his heart had already set on a place about a mile from the main building, overlooking the valley, which he thought might keep Libbie from homesickness. Magnus overuled the idea, however, telling him it would not be good soil for his crops or good grazing for his animals. He led him instead around to a place on the southern side of the lake that sat up on a small rise, lower but almost identical to the one Stonehouses itself occupied.

“This is the second-best land,” he said. “You take it and never worry for dependency, on the main house or anybody else.”

“I don’t fear that so much as being apart from it,” Caleum answered, full of appreciation and gratitude for his uncle’s gesture — for he knew it was the best land but would never have presumed to try and claim it.

Magnus was pleased then that he had been given a good son and proud that they had managed a bond between them that was not only filled with warmth but also with respect and mutual understanding.