A Lily Among Thorns(119)

Mrs. Hathaway sighed. “I just want my children to be happy.”

“And you think I can make him happy?” An edge of skepticism made its way into Serena’s voice despite her best efforts.

Mrs. Hathaway gave her a sharp look. “You don’t?”

“I’m not—I’m not the sort of woman who makes people happy,” she said, but it was starting to sound unconvincing even to her, as if the idea were a dress she had outgrown.

Mrs. Hathaway pursed her lips. “You don’t seem to have made yourself very happy, certainly.” She watched Serena, then said, “You know, I ran away from home too when I was a girl.”

“Yes, to get married.”

“True. I don’t say I approve of the choice you made. If Mr. Hathaway hadn’t married me, I would have gone back home. But—well, perhaps it’s rude of me to tell you this, but I never thought your father would be very easy to live with.”

Of course Mrs. Hathaway had known her father. They were all the same age. “Did you—did you know my mother?” she asked, her heart beating faster. She didn’t know what she wanted to hear.

Mrs. Hathaway hesitated. “Yes. I—well, she was a very pretty, charming girl. You reminded me of her when we first met. But I don’t suppose she could have stood up to him.”

Serena blinked back tears, suddenly, for the pretty, charming girl her mother had been—even if Mrs. Hathaway obviously hadn’t liked her. Of course Serena’s girlish airs and graces, when she used them, were clumsily copied from her mother, who had thought they would protect her and had found out her mistake.

“But what I meant to say is that I do understand what made you do it,” Mrs. Hathaway said. “I know what it’s like to be raised as a gently bred girl and to feel as if your family is smothering you with a pillow and telling you it’s for your own good. I told them to go hang, too, and then I cried myself to sleep when my parents wouldn’t speak to me anymore.” She laughed. “I was a great trial to him, but Mr. Hathaway was very patient.” She reached across the table and put her hand on Serena’s arm. “Can you not bring yourself to confide in me?”

To her surprise, Serena wanted to. That was how she’d felt, at home. It had been such a relief to break the rules. She’d never heard anyone say it out loud before. But she looked at Mrs. Hathaway, comfortable and motherly with the late afternoon sun streaming through the kitchen windows and turning her butter-colored hair to honey and her hazel eyes a warm gray, and the words dried up in her throat. “No, ma’am,” she said with some difficulty. “I’d like to, but—”

“All right, then.” Mrs. Hathaway squeezed her arm. “I’ve been awfully selfish, thinking only of my son, but of course you must follow your own heart. Don’t let him wear you down—Solomon can be awfully persistent when he wants something. When he was seven and wanted his first chemistry set, he talked about it for six weeks straight until we sent away to London for it. And then when he decided nothing would do but Cambridge, we heard of nothing else for a good half a year until I gave in and asked my brother if he would send him when he was ready. My brother-in-law didn’t want to hire him either. Thought he was born for better things, I suppose.” Mrs. Hathaway pressed her lips together for a moment. “But Solomon talked him round. He’s always known what he wanted, that boy.”

Serena stared at the heap of spoons. Did Solomon really know what he wanted? Because if he did, then—

Serena had believed that she would make Solomon and herself miserable, and that he would let her. But—he wasn’t letting her, was he? He was breaking it off. All this time, she had called him naive and deluded for loving her. But maybe Mrs. Hathaway was right—he merely saw things as they were and knew what he wanted.

She had thought of herself as different from other women; she had thought of Mrs. Hathaway as practically another species. But they were the same, really. Or they could be. The difference between them was that, like Solomon, Mrs. Hathaway dared to try to be happy.

That wasn’t naiveté, it was confidence and courage, and Serena had refused to see it because then she would have to face her own fear and self-doubt, her own inability to believe she could have what she wanted—or having it, that she could be worthy of it.

What had Solomon said? That sometimes love wasn’t worth what one had to sacrifice for it? Serena was suddenly afraid that all the things she had refused to sacrifice might not be worth what she had lost, what she still stood to lose. She had moped all this time about being ruined, but here she was, ruining herself. Turning herself into a hermit and a coward.