A Simple Shaker Murder (5 page)

“I'll tell you what, Mairin. There's someone I want you to meet. She's a very good friend of mine, but she is too frail to come to the dining room, so why don't the two of us join her for lunch in her retiring room?”

Mairin's face went blank again.

“I know you'll like her,” Rose said. “Her name is Agatha, Agatha Vandenberg, and she was very kind to me when I was your age. We'll go find some candied angelica root and bring it along to share with her, shall we?”

Mairin gave her single solemn nod, and Rose led her to the pantry. Intent as she was on food, Mairin also seemed fascinated with the kitchen. She paused to stare at the row of shiny copper-bottomed pots hanging from pegs spaced along a narrow strip of wood that encircled the kitchen wall at just above
head level. Rose was glad to see her show some curiosity in her surroundings.

Rose cut a healthy slice from one of the sugar-coated boiled angelica roots laid out to dry on cookie sheets. She wrapped it in a kitchen cloth and decided to carry it herself after seeing Mairin's avid gaze follow every movement. After telling Gertrude where they would be for the noon meal, Rose led Mairin out through the empty dining room and into the hallway. A few retiring rooms were located on the ground floor and reserved for the aged and infirm. Agatha now lived in one of them.

“Rose, what a double treat you've brought me,” Agatha said when Rose introduced Mairin and showed Agatha the angelica root. “Candy and a new friend, both.” She reached out a thin, trembling hand and touched Mairin's arm. To Rose's surprise, Mairin did not pull away. She studied Agatha's fine-boned face with as much interest as she had given the copper-bottomed pans.

Mairin sucked on her lower Up for a moment, then smiled a slow, soft smile. “You are a pretty lady,” she said, in her low, lyrical voice.

Rose was stunned. She had never known anyone so full of surprises.

Agatha laughed with delight, a sound Rose had not heard since before her last stroke. “Thank you, child. You see with your heart. My own eyes have grown dim with age, but I can tell that you have quite lovely and unusual eyes. Did you get them from your mama or your papa?”

“Both,” Mairin said. “Mama had brown eyes, and papa's were green. They're both dead.”

Rose had to sit down. Agatha had always been able to speak directly to the soul, but lately Rose had to wonder if she was beginning her final angelic journey. Her powers seemed to intensify as her body weakened.

“It is very sad when your mama and papa die so young,” Agatha said. “Mine died when I was three, and poor Rose
really doesn't remember hers, either. How old were you, Mairin?”

“Five. But I remember them both.”

‘Tell me about them.”

Mairin pulled a small rocking chair over near Agatha and climbed into it. Her feet dangled above the ground, so she tucked them underneath her. Agatha handed her a soft, brown blanket from the arm of her own rocker. Mairin wrapped herself into it up to her neck. For the first time, she looked almost like a normal child.

“My mama was beautiful,” she said. “Her skin was darker than mine, and she sang a lot, especially when she was drinking. Papa was from Ireland. He drank a lot, too, and sometimes he and Mama beat on each other, and then Papa would beat on me. He always said he didn't mean to hurt us.” Mairin's tone was nonchalant.

Agatha's smile had disappeared. “How did your mama die?”

Mairin's face once again went blank. “One day they were beating on each other, and Papa threw Mama against the stove. She fell down and didn't get up.”

“You were there?”

Mairin nodded. “I was hiding behind the door, and I could see through the crack.”

“What happened then?”

“Papa got his gun and shot himself through his mouth.” Mairin's voice was lightly conversational. Nothing in her manner invited expressions of understanding or sympathy. It was as if she were recounting a bucolic scene she'd witnessed on a recent train ride. She snuggled down in her blanket, seemingly unaware of the silence that followed her revelation.

“Child, who took care of you after you lost your parents?” Agatha asked.

Mairin shrugged one thin shoulder. “Oh, I went here and there,” she said. “An aunt for a while, but then I had to leave. Other folks after that.” Her eyes wandered over to Agatha's lamp table, where the candied angelica root lay wrapped in its cloth.

At that moment, a knock on the partly opened door announced the arrival of a kitchen sister with lunch. Rose set the tray on a small, pine desk. She cut portions from a vegetable potpie and delivered them to Agatha and Mairin before settling at the desk with the last portion for herself. The steam warmed her face, and she paused to breathe in the rich scent of herbs and pie crust before saying a silent grace.

As she munched her first bite, she glanced at Mairin to find her leaning close to her plate and shoveling the last bits of potpie into her already full mouth. Agatha watched, too, her own food untouched. She turned to Rose, sadness and understanding in her cloudy blue eyes.

“You know,” Agatha said, “I find I'm not terribly hungry just now. Would you care to help me eat my portion, Mairin?”

The girl slid off her chair, holding her blanket over her shoulders, and sat on her knees in front of Agatha's rocker.

“Why don't you bring over your spoon?” Agatha said. “I'll keep the plate on my lap so it won't spill, and we'll share the food. How does that sound? I'll take a bite, and then I'll hold the plate so you can have a bite.” Agatha was weakened, especially on her right side, from a series of strokes. She had learned to eat with her left hand because her right was unreliable. Now, however, she picked up her spoon with her shaky right hand. Slowly she scooped up a small bite of pie and tried to lift it to her mouth. Halfway up, her hand began to tremble and dropped back to the plate.

Mairin's eyes flashed with feral impatience. Her shoulders tightened and her hands clenched and unclenched as if she could barely keep from grabbing the plate from Agatha and pouring the food in her own mouth. Rose held her breath.

Agatha smiled gently. “I'm so sorry, child. You see, I've been very sick, and sometimes it is hard for me to manage to eat. I get very hungry, as you can imagine. I wonder if you would help me?”

With amazement, Rose watched Mairin's face as Agatha spoke. Greed turned to confusion, and in an instant, when Agatha said how hungry she got, Mairin's expression dissolved
into pain. She rose up on her knees and took the spoon from Agatha's shaking hand. Aiming carefully, she placed the spoon at Agatha's lips and waited for her to chew and swallow. Agatha nodded to encourage the child to take her own portion, but instead of picking up her own spoon, Mairin scooped up another bite and brought it to Agatha's mouth. Agatha was so surprised that she took several moments to accept the food.

“You are very kind, my dear,” Agatha said, when she had swallowed. “But do be sure to take some for yourself. Go ahead, have a bite.”

Mairin took her own spoon and ate a small bite, chewing carefully. Rose couldn't help grinning. With persistent effort, perhaps they could do more than pry information out of Mairin. Perhaps they could nurture her soul.

A
FTER THE NOON MEAL,
R
OSE DROPPED
M
AIRIN OFF WITH
Charlotte to spend the afternoon at school, then made her way to the Sisters' Shop, just next door. Isabel was expecting her. From the sparkle in her hazel eyes when Rose had asked to chat about Celia's visit to the Sisters' Shop, Isabel had a lot to tell.

Bright sunlight warmed the fall afternoon. Rose longed for some outdoor work and would have assigned herself to help mulch the tender perennial herbs for the winter but for the nagging thought that Hugh Griffiths' death might not have been by his own hand and that little Mairin was a witness. The child was gradually warming to her, and especially to Agatha, but it could take too long for her to trust enough to confide in them. Until then, she was alone with her secrets, and she might be in danger.

The door to the Sisters' Shop was ajar to allow air to circulate. Rose slipped inside and went directly to the room where the sisters dyed and spun their fine wools. In the days when more than two hundred Believers had lived and worked in North Homage, wool dying had been done outdoors in the spring, so that a full crew of sisters could weave all winter. But now their numbers were so depleted—a few dozen, at best, and many grown aged and weak. Other Shaker communities had given up making their own wool and purchased cloth from the world. Elder Wilhelm wanted the North Homage
Shakers to retain as much self-sufficiency as possible, to strengthen their spirit, and Rose had to admit that she was glad to see the textile industry preserved, even in such a tiny way.

Sister Isabel oversaw the dying, spinning, and weaving, sometimes doing one of the tasks alone, while Sister Sarah watched over the sewing room on the second floor. Other sisters were assigned to help when they could be spared from the daily tasks of cooking and laundry. So here it was November, and there was still wool to be dyed.

Isabel leaned over a large pot, holding a wet clump of yarn of a light brownish hue. She grinned at Rose. “Be sure to tell Wilhelm about this,” she said. “It will please him.”

“Brown yarn?”

“Nay, not just any brown yarn,” Isabel said. “This is true butternut dye, like the sisters used so many years ago. Thought I'd experiment and see if I could make some. Collected the bark myself late spring, but I didn't get to it until now, so I had to use it dry instead of fresh. But it doesn't look bad, I'd say.” She hung the yarn on a peg to dry thoroughly and wiped her hands on her apron. “This is my second batch. The first came out a bit dark, so Sarah had the idea of using it to make Shaker sister dolls to sell in Languor come Christmas time. She's already made half a dozen. Andrew said he'd place them with some shops.”

“That's a lovely idea,” Rose said.

“But that's not why you're here.” Isabel gathered up an armful of undyed yarn. “Let me just get another batch going, then we'll have a talk,” she said.

Rose understood the need to keep the work moving, so she occupied herself by admiring the skeins of dyed yarns hanging around the room. Isabel had been busy. Wilhelm would, indeed, be pleased to see the old Shaker dyes and dyeing methods resurrected with such skill. It pleased Rose, too, yet she couldn't help but wonder if they were going the right direction. Certainly there was something about reviving the old ways that gave Rose and other Believers a strong sense of
being apart from the world, but wasn't it truly their faith that set them apart? Surely they could maintain that faith and still adapt to the world around them. They had always been leaders in the adoption and even the invention of new labor-saving devices—anything that would make the work quicker and leave more time for worship. Wilhelm believed that life had gotten too luxurious; was he right?

“There!” said Isabel. “We'll let that cook a spell. I'm ready to sit How about you?”

In answer, Rose lifted a ladder-back chair from two wall pegs, where it hung upside down to keep its seat free of dust. She handed the chair to Isabel, then lifted another for herself.

“I'm glad you're here, Rose,” Isabel said. “I'd thought I should tell you about Celia Griffiths' little visit with us this morning, but I didn't want to gossip. I was mighty disturbed, I don't mind telling you. That woman has some odd notions in her head.”

“Like what?”

“Well, she seemed quite put out when she dropped into the Sisters' Shop and saw us all doing what she called ‘female tasks.' She wondered why there weren't any brethren in here weaving and sewing, and she was nasty about it. Sarah tried to explain it to her—Sarah's so gentle, you know—that we work and eat and live separately from the brethren, so we divide up tasks in a reasonable way, but Celia just laughed. I pointed out that we do help the brethren in the fields during the harvest, and she said, ‘Oh, so you do men's work, but they refuse to help with your work!' Honestly. I wanted to ask her to leave, but that would have been rude.” Isabel jumped up to check on her soaking yarn, gave it a stir with a long stick, and sat down again.

“All that was irritating, but there was even more. That's when I began to worry.” Isabel's smooth forehead creased. “I suppose I could be making too much of it, but . . .”

“Tell me,” Rose said.

“She started talking about her own group, those New-Owenites, or whatever they call themselves. I wasn't sure I
was understanding her right, but it sounded like they marry, but they don't really believe in marriage, or something like that. But they believe in having children and educating them very carefully so the boys and the girls are equal. I said that we believe boys and girls are equal, too, but she said we obviously didn't, and that our not marrying was unnatural and would kill us!”