Lure by Deborah Kerbel Page A

keep my voice low so Father wouldn’t overhear me. “I had thought my apprenticeship could wait until I was fourteen.”
    Her fingers twisted and writhed in her lap while her eyes begged for understanding. “John, please …” was all she could say. I jumped up from the settee and began pacing back and forth across the floor, each step in time with the hammer of my heart.
    “Can’t you speak to him about this?” I begged, my voice rising with desperation. “Can’t you make him change his mind?”
    My mother’s head wobbled slightly, as if her neck were suddenly too weak to support its weight. “I can try speaking to him again, John. But, as you know, your cousin William is to begin his apprenticeship this year and your father believes that it would be easier to teach both of you at the same time. I must confess — it doesn’t help matters that your father’s mood seems to be unusually sour today. He will be difficult to persuade.”
    I hung my head to hide the spasm of pain that was gripping my face. Every year on my birthday, Father’s mood grew darker than his coal-stained fingernails. I can only surmise that it was because the day reminded him of how unlucky he was. The day the Lord above had chosen to curse him with a weak son.
    The floorboards creaked beneath my shoes as I increased my pace. Rising from the settee, Mother followed behind me as I marched across the floor, still wringing her hands with guilt. I could hear the swish of the crinoline underneath her calico skirt as she struggled to keep up with my steps. At that age, I wasn’t yet old enough to be embarrassed by the thought of a woman’s skirts. As it turned out, I never would be.
    “Please speak with him, Mother. I would sooner run away from home than give up my studies to work in the forge,” I said, my voice trembling with anger.
    “I’ll do my best, John. But you know how your father feels about school.”
    “I don’t understand! What’s wrong with him that he cannot see the value in book-learning?” I asked, my voice rising with the heat of my anger. “Why can’t I stay on and study to become a teacher, like Mr. Brown?”
    My teacher was the smartest man I’d ever met. While most people needed their slate to figure out numbers, Mr. Brown could do any math equation in his head in a matter of seconds. Some of the older students and I would often stay inside at lunchtime to test him. Mr. Brown hasn’t gotten one math problem wrong yet. I don’t think he ever will! And he’s read over three hundred books in his life, which means he’s probably read every book that has ever been written (for back then, I couldn’t imagine more than three hundred books in the world). My secret dream was to read just as many books myself — although it would have to be in secret. At least until the day I moved out of my father’s house.
    Naturally, at the time I had no way of knowing that day would never arrive.
    My mother reached out and touched my shoulder. So tiny a woman was she; the weight of her hand was no heavier than a grasshopper upon my skin. By the age of twelve I’d already surpassed her height. And I was by no means a large child.
    “Hush, my love,” she warned, “… he’s just upstairs. What if he hears you?”
    We both knew how it would enrage Father to know about my secret ambitions. If I’d been born a girl, becoming a teacher wouldn’t have been a problem. But Robert McCallum considered books to be idle and womanish, and male teachers effeminate and weak. There was no chance that he would sanction a career in book-learning for me. No, he would do whatever he had to do to ensure that his only son learned his trade and took over the forge. A hammer, an anvil, and a coal fire were the tools of my future. Books were not.
    Dear God in heaven, I suddenly hated him with so much force that I could barely form a complete thought. My eyes came to rest on Father’s pipe, sitting in its usual place on the mantle. It took every