Edith watched the faces of neighbours and friends as these words were spoken and it occurred to her that words were the weather by which they lived their lives; words that shaped their sense of self, stuck and stayed and grew them crooked or straight, loved or unloved. Words as changeable as the clouds that hung just as heavy on the living.

Chapter Eleven

Fish and Fabric

The butcher accompanied Edith home from church in silence. He never had been a man of many words. What he wanted to say that Sunday as they walked away under the watchful eyes of the congregation was just one word, a word that described an emotion that up to this moment he hadn’t believed in. It belonged to a soppy-faced youth who trusted in happy endings. Love was not something a grown man indulged in. Yet this simple walk with Edith had for him a religious quality.

Edith’s silence, her beauty, fascinated him. Her refusal to speak only made him want her more. Perhaps he hadn’t loved her until she became silent. Her silence made her unapproachable. She reminded him of a painted Madonna. He would go down on bended knee before her and worship this ice virgin bride. And without meaning to he let out a laugh. For a thought had come to him: he had spent a lifetime saving every penny and now he was prepared to lay it all at her feet, a carpet of coins.

The priest had warned him. ‘There can’t be one rule for every other girl in the village and another for Edith. You’re the head of the village elders and should know better. Has the girl bewitched you? I hope for both your sakes this isn’t the case.’

What madness had possessed him to do such a foolish thing? Unless he put a stop to this nonsense he would have to step down from his position. He realised now that Edith had outwitted him. She had no intention of speaking up, she would wear whatever she was given without protest. It hadn’t occurred to him that she would remain stubbornly silent for so long. What if she never spoke again?

The butcher could almost hear what his dead mother would have said. Edith had put a curse on him. He’d better take care for his mother had met the devil on her way to purgatory and he was waiting for her son at the crossroads, just as he had waited for her, to take them both to hell.

He pushed the thought from his mind. He and Edith would have a child. The idea thrilled him. Her flat belly would grow round, her small breasts would fill out. He would be the first and only man she had ever lain with. This time, he told himself, I will be patient. ‘I will wait. I will change.’