The Signature of All Things

everything, to prove the workings of the universe to him. She could not wait for daylight, when they could speak again at breakfast. She could not wait to look upon his face. She could not wait for the time when they would never need to be separated—not even at night, not even in sleep. She lay in her own bed, trembling with anticipation and sentiment.
    What a long distance it felt, between their two rooms!
    As for Ambrose himself, as the wedding approached, he became only more serene, only more attentive. He could not have been kinder to Alma. She sometimes feared he might change his mind, but there was no sign of it. She had felt a shudder of apprehension when she handed him Henry Whittaker’s decree, but Ambrose had signed it without hesitation or complaint—indeed, without even reading it. Each night, before they went to their separate rooms, he kissed her freckled hand, right below the knuckles. He called her “my other soul, my better soul.”
    He said, “I am such a strange man, Alma. Are you certain you can endure my unusual ways?”
    “I can endure you!” she promised.
    She felt that she was in danger of igniting.
    She feared she might die of gladness.
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    T hree days before the wedding—which was to be a simple ceremony held in the drawing room at White Acre—Alma finally visited her sister Prudence. It had been many months since they had last seen each other. But it would be utterly rude of her not to invite her sister to the wedding, so Alma had written Prudence a note of explanation—that she was to be wed to a friend of Mr. George Hawkes—and then made plans for a brief visit. Furthermore, Alma had decided to follow her father’s advice, and speak to Prudence on the matter of the conjugal bed. It was not a conversation she was eagerly anticipating, but she did not wish to come into Ambrose’s arms unprepared, and she did not know whom else to ask.
    It was an early evening in mid-August when Alma arrived at the Dixon home. She found her sister in the kitchen, making a mustard poultice for her youngest boy, Walter, who was sick in bed, ill in the stomach from having eaten too much green watermelon rind. The other children were milling about the kitchen, working at various chores. The room was suffocatingly hot. There were two small black girls whom Alma had never before seen, sitting in the corner with Prudence’s thirteen-year-old daughter, Sarah; together, the three of them were carding wool. All the girls, black and white, were dressed in the humblest imaginable frocks. The children, even the black ones, approached Alma and kissed her politely, called her “auntie,” and returned to their tasks.
    Alma asked Prudence if she could help with the poultice, but Prudence refused assistance. One of the boys brought Alma a tin cup of water from the pump in the garden. The water was warm, and tasted murky and unpleasant. Alma did not want it. She sat on a long bench, and did not know where to put the cup. Nor did she know what to say. Prudence—who had received Alma’s note earlier in the week—congratulated her sister on her upcoming nuptials, but that perfunctory exchange took only a moment, and then the subject was closed. Alma admired the children, admired thecleanliness of the kitchen, admired the mustard poultice, until there was nothing left to admire. Prudence looked thin and weary, but she did not complain, nor did she share any news of her life. Alma did not ask any news. She dreaded to know details of the circumstances the family might be facing.
    After a long while, Alma roused the courage to ask, “Prudence, I wonder if I might have a private word with you.”
    If the request surprised Prudence, she did not show it. But then, Prudence’s smooth countenance had always been incapable of expressing such a base emotion as surprise.
    “Sarah,” Prudence said to the eldest girl. “Take the others outdoors.”
    The children filed out of the kitchen solemnly and obediently, like soldiers on the way to battle. Prudence did not sit, but stood with her back braced against the large wooden slab that called itself a kitchen table, her hands folded prettily against her clean apron.
    “Yes?” she asked.
    Alma searched her mind for where to begin. She could not find a sentence that did not seem vulgar or rude. Suddenly she deeply regretted having taken her father’s advice on the matter. She wished to run from this house—back to the comforts of White Acre, back to Ambrose, back to a