“Go see her again,” he said gruffly. “Go take that tonic and find out what happens.”
Agnes looked up at the good husband she knew with all her soul would be a good father, and saw that his bright blue eyes were wet, too. “But the Brauns…”
“Hang the Brauns.” He put a big, callused hand on either side of her face. “I know you. If you don’t do this, you will spend the rest of your life wondering. Witch or not, I think that woman does care about you. So let her help you, if you want her to. Just promise me one thing.”
“Anything.”
Oskar touched the thin band of gold on her right hand. “Promise me on my mother’s wedding ring that when you’ve gone to her three more times and are done taking the tonic, you will never see her again.” The fear and worry had returned to his face. “Whether or not it works, give me your word you will end the friendship when she’s through. Please, Agnes.”
She looked at the ring he had put on her finger ten years ago. “Mathilda’s price for helping me was my friendship,” she said slowly. “You’re asking me to use her. And lie to her.”
“You know what my life was like back in Mannheim. My father committed the sin of not marrying my mother, but I got all the punishment.” He shook his head. “I can’t let that happen to the children we might have. I can’t see them suffer like I did. You heard the Brauns: We’ll be shunned if we associate with the witch, and I don’t want to risk our lives here.”
Agnes stared at him, her chest tight with shock. “I don’t know if I can promise you that, Oskar. How can I live with knowing that I tricked a good woman—and I do believe she is good—into helping me? What kind of example would that be for our children, if we had any?”
Oskar bowed his head.
She exhaled. “Let me think about it some more. It’s late, and we should get to bed.”
But after tossing and turning for hours, Agnes still didn’t know what to do. If she did what Oskar asked, she would break Mathilda’s heart. If she accepted Mathilda’s deal, she would risk turning Hanau against them. And if she did neither, it would be just as Oskar had said: She would spend the rest of her life wondering.
After breakfast, Oskar went out to tend to the animals, and Agnes watched him from the window. She didn’t know anyone who had a better heart than her husband, and his suggestion that she betray Mathilda had truly shocked her. Yet it would accomplish everything they desired: They might get their baby and stay in good standing.
Only Mathilda would suffer.
Agnes’s eyes turned upward to the hill on which her neighbor might have been gardening, petting her cat, or sitting by the fire. If I lied to her, she thought, her situation wouldn’t be much different from what it is now. Mathilda would still have her cottage, with that garden and that cat and that fire. She would go on sewing and cooking and walking all the way to Hainburg to buy what she needed. She would just do it all without Agnes.
“No, I can’t,” Agnes said aloud, as the temptation grew and grew. “I can’t do that to her.”
But even as she dove into her daily tasks, trying to distract herself, a small voice insisted on lingering at the edges of her mind. It whispered, You can.
The next evening, Agnes went back up the hill. There was no moon and no sound except the lonely cry of an owl and the crunch of her boots on the snow. Oskar had stayed home, afraid that other neighbors might come calling, and had sent her off with a hug and a kiss. They hadn’t said another word about his request, but it had hung in the air between them like a thick curtain. And now, panting slightly as she climbed the slope to Mathilda’s open gate, Agnes still hadn’t made a decision. I’ll know when I see her, she told herself.
Whatever she decided, she would be open and honest and businesslike with Mathilda, not emotional. But her resolve faded the minute she came to the woman’s cottage, which shimmered in the cold with a kindly light. And when Mathilda appeared at the door, her face full of gratitude and relief that Agnes had come back, it was impossible not to feel emotional.
“I’m glad you’re here,” she said, hugging Agnes. “I’ve been cooking all day. Come in.”
Inside, a fire blazed in the hearth and Mathilda’s ginger cat blinked in recognition as Agnes took a seat at the table. A floral smell tinged the air from a vase of snowdrops resting on a thick, leather-bound book on the mantel. The pure white flowers contrasted well with the purple velvet that protected the painting on the wall. One corner of the fabric had slipped, and Agnes noticed what looked like an ornate gold frame. The young woman must be even wealthier than she and Oskar had thought.
“My husband’s still getting over his cold,” Agnes said, as Mathilda stirred the pot over the fire, her cheeks glowing from the flames. “He’s sorry to miss another good dinner of yours.”
Mathilda gave her a wry smile. “You don’t need to lie. I know Oskar would rather swim in the freezing river than come again, and it’s all right. All that matters to me is that you’re here.”
Agnes searched for some apology, but all that came out was “You’re my friend.”
“And you’re mine,” Mathilda said, her eyes shining as she poured them two mugs of piping-hot ginger tea. Her long, wavy dark hair had been tied back with a frost-blue ribbon and cascaded over the shoulder of her dark green wool dress. She wrapped her hands around her drink, her eyes soft. “I know what people think of me. And contrary to what they believe, I have had friends before. I’ve even fallen in love, once. But it didn’t work out.”
“Why not?” Agnes asked gently.
The young woman fixed her with a steady gaze. “Because to love me is to choose a life of isolation. I was born to stand apart, and few people want to do that.” She looked into her tea, searching for words. “Humans are social creatures. They want to be accepted by others, and if that means going along with what most people think, then that’s what they’ll do. I think Oskar is like that, and he isn’t wrong to be. It’s the safe path.”
“He had a hard childhood.” Agnes felt the need to explain. “We left much grief behind in Mannheim.”
“I don’t blame him. If I were Oskar, I wouldn’t befriend me, either. But I don’t get to be him, or you, or anyone else, however much I want to be.” A shadow passed over Mathilda’s face. “I almost didn’t write to say thank you when you first baked me cookies. I thought, I can’t subject this poor woman to that. But I’m glad I did, and I found such a kind person who doesn’t let other people’s opinions scare her.”
Agnes’s gut twinged with guilt, remembering the lie she had told the Brauns.
“So will you let me help you?” Mathilda asked, her face bright. “Will you allow me to make the tonic for you, and see what comes of it?”
Here was the moment Agnes had felt certain would reveal what she ought to do. But no answer, no decision appeared—only a hope so sharp it felt like hunger. “You sounded so certain the other night. Can you really do all that? And how? How is it that physicians and apothecaries Oskar and I have seen over the years couldn’t help us, and you can?”