Page 42 of Charlotte

“If you happened to have an opinion about the shelf before you go, we would receive it with gratitude.”

“And restraint,” Cornelia added.

Delly made a sound that suggested restraint was rarely useful in carpentry.

Peterson looked at the wall again.

A battle took place behind his beard. Lottie could almost see the order of it. Refusal first. Then obligation. Then the sort of care he seemed to resent in himself because it kept dragging him toward other people’s needs.

At last, he set his hat on the end of the table.

“Show me the boards.”

Lottie did not smile.

She deserved credit for that.

The boards had been left near the back wall. Peterson examined them in silence, crouching slowly beside the stack. He used his left hand first, running his palm along the edge, then braced one board with his boot and tested the straightness. When he reached for the second board, his right hand came out of his coat.

Only for a moment.

Only enough for two scarred fingers and the shortened stubs beside them to steady the wood.

Lottie saw the hand.

So did Delly.

Peterson must have felt the looking because the hand disappeared almost at once.

Lottie wanted to tell him she had not flinched. Wanted to say the hand did not frighten her, or trouble her, or make her pity him.

It would only prove she had noticed in the first place, and perhaps noticing was the one thing he was trying hardest to survive. So, she looked at the boards.

“That one has a bow,” she said, pointing to the piece he had just rejected.

Peterson glanced up.

“So it does.”

“Will it matter?”

“For a shelf? Aye.”

“Because of the weight?”

“And damp.” He took up another board. “Books are heavier than folks think.”

“I have always thought so.”

“You brought three trunks. I believe you.”

The dryness in his voice made her smile.

This time, he saw it.

For one small second, he did not look away.

Warmth moved between them, quiet and quick, so light another person might have missed it. Lottie did not. She would have recognized kindness from him anywhere now, even dressed as grumbling.