The Caged Graves (23 page)

It had taken seventeen stitches to repair John Thomas's face, but common opinion reckoned that a little less handsomeness wouldn't hurt him. He'd also been hit pretty hard in the head, which might account for how little he remembered of the attack and why he couldn't tell them a single thing about the men who'd done it.

Piper and the twins were unable to provide an adequate description of the men who'd frightened them in the woods three weeks ago. After furious debate, they agreed that one was “very ugly” and the other was “not
as
ugly.”

No one got any sleep that night, and by afternoon of the next day Beulah suggested that Verity go upstairs and lie down. Too weary and heartsick to argue, she climbed the stairs and undressed. As she took down her hair, she eyed her mother's trunk.

So now she knew. Her mother had been suffering from nothing more serious than pregnancy. Someone had brought her a special treat or homemade remedy for nausea. And her mother, kind soul that she was, had shared it with poor Asenath, a girl too ignorant to be sure she even
was
pregnant and who tried to ward off evil with little bags of herbs and flowers. In fact, Verity realized, the poison might even have come from Asenath herself. She might have mistaken one of her charm ingredients for something that belonged in a soup.

Hadley Jones was right. It had been a tragic accident.

Verity lay back on her bed. Thinking about
him
made her miserable. Remembering her inexcusable behavior, she was embarrassed; she'd been raised better than that. And what was she going to do about Nate? She lifted her hand to examine, for perhaps the five thousandth time, the ring on her finger.

Last night Nate had fed Barrett Browning's poem to her like medicine on a spoon—not reciting it by rote, but quoting from it forcefully, ardently.

He knew what that poem meant, and she didn't.

She didn't know if she was in love with either one of them. Attracted to both of them in different ways, yes—but how, at seventeen, was she supposed to recognize love? Wasn't it supposed to be obvious? Shouldn't she feel it in every breath and heartbeat?

Her last coherent thought, before she drifted into sleep, was that she wished her mother were alive to explain it to her.

 

Darkness had fallen by the time she awoke. Propping herself up, she stared into the early-evening gloom. Across the room her mother's diaries lay stacked on her dressing table. She'd half expected to find them open again—but no, it was her own memory guiding her this time, not some spirit she didn't believe in anyway.

Rising from the bed, she selected the notebook she wanted and riffled through the pages until she located August and the death of Rebecca Clayton.

It was just as she remembered.

Except for the day of Rebecca's death, Asenath did not visit her family home. She lay in bed at the Thomas house for days, refusing to get up—all because she'd seen six black crows and believed more people were going to die.

How, then, could she have eaten the honey cakes that poisoned the rest of her family?

THE MANHUNT proved fruitless. John Thomas's assailants were nowhere to be found. Popular opinion divided on whether they'd vanished into the Shades or merely hopped a train out of town.

A deputation of Catawissa men went so far as to search the Poole land. “They wouldn't take our word that we didn't have them,” Beulah remarked bitterly. Verity looked away, embarrassed and ashamed. It wasn't her place to apologize for other people's unjust actions, but she felt as if she ought to.

Three days passed without a visit or any word from Nate, and Verity experienced a deeper sense of loss each day he did not come. There was no sign of Mrs. McClure, either, who'd been planning to show Verity all the fabric swatches she'd ordered from Philadelphia. Verity understood this to mean that wedding plans had come to a halt.

She still wore Nate's ring. On the day after the Fourth of July, she had taken it off and placed it inside one of her mother's wooden boxes for safekeeping. An hour later she ran back to get it, sobbing. She didn't want to give up Nate . . . but she couldn't stop thinking about Hadley Jones, either.

Nate only wanted three words from her, but she wouldn't say them unless she was certain they were true.

 

On the fourth day of Verity's misery, Hattie came calling. Verity received her warily, wondering if she had brought a message from her brother, but it seemed to be an ordinary social call.

They talked about the events of the Fourth. Hattie asked about John Thomas's injuries, and Verity was able to report that her uncle's recovery seemed certain, although he had no memory of the event.

She'd almost begun to relax when Hattie placed her teacup on the serving table and said, “I know you and Nate have had a spat.”

Verity swallowed hard, feeling her tea go down her throat like a lump of unchewed bread.

Hattie waved her hand. “He didn't ask me to come. But I thought . . . well, I always had two older sisters to advise me on matters like this, and you don't have anyone. Is it too forward of me to offer myself for the position?”

Verity surveyed the young woman opposite. She had indeed longed for a confidante, but she couldn't possibly confess her muddled feelings for Hadley Jones to Nate's sister.

Decisively, Hattie rose and moved to sit next to Verity. “You realize it's customary for a bride-to-be to feel nervous, don't you?” she asked. “And irritable . . . and thinking she's made a mistake.”

“Oh!” Verity gasped, startled to hear her own thoughts expressed out loud. “Hattie, I'm so
very
fond of him, but he's angry with me right now, and I hardly blame him. I don't know what to do.”

“Nate suffers from the misconception that he's always right. He just needs a firm hand, and you mustn't let nerves frighten you away.” Hattie clucked regretfully. “When William went away to war, I cried every single day, afraid he would never come back to me. And when he did come back—why, I cried even harder, because then I had to redeem my promise and marry him!”

Verity couldn't suppress her smile at that.

Hattie smiled back. “And Carrie! Oh, my! Carrie and Timothy had a row so terrible a few weeks before their wedding, we thought they might call the whole thing off!” She leaned closer and said in her loud whisper, “Nobody knows what they fought about, but everybody knows how they made amends. Little Timmy was born only seven months after the wedding.”

Verity inhaled so sharply, she sucked down a mouthful of tea. Surely Hattie wasn't suggesting . . .

The older girl's eyes twinkled as she patted her coughing hostess on the back. “All's well that ends well. And men are such simple things, really. So easy to please.”

 

Hattie was wrong. Men were perplexing and complicated.

A letter arrived that afternoon. Beulah handed it to Verity with a raised eyebrow. The handwriting on the envelope was unfamiliar, but Verity knew immediately whose it was. With a guilty glance at the housekeeper, she took it upstairs to read.

 

Dear Miss Boone,

First of all, I owe you an apology for my conduct the other night. No gentleman would have taken advantage of your emotional state, nor any proper physician, either. I'm afraid I've made a poor showing at both occupations.

I know that my second statement will make me out to be a cad of the lowest sort. After repeatedly making my interest known to you, even though your affections were otherwise engaged, I must tell you now that I can offer you no future. For a time I hoped to make my home and my living here in Catawissa, and I would have been proud to do so with a woman like you at my side. However, circumstances have changed, and I find myself in a position of uncertainty. I have no doubt you will make a happy life with Mr. McClure and remember me with derision for this abrupt change of face. I can only say that I will, in turn, remember you as the one bright moment in a difficult time.

Sincerely and regretfully,

Hadley Jones

 

So now he didn't want her. She'd made a fool of herself and compromised her values over someone of fickle temperament. She ought to have expected this, because what good man, after all, would have pursued another man's intended bride?

Verity took the letter downstairs and, while Beulah was occupied outside, burned it in the stove. Somehow, as she watched it disintegrate to ash, she couldn't muster any anger toward Hadley Jones.

Instead, she felt a strange, nagging worry for him.

 

The next morning Nate drove by the house in his family's carriage. Verity leaped to her feet, dumping Lucky out of her lap, and burst out through the front door. He was already past the house by the time she got outside, and tears of disappointment welled in her eyes.

But he'd seen her, apparently, and even as he reached the point where she thought he wasn't going to stop, he did. When the carriage came to a halt, she walked down the steps and across the grass to meet him.

He still looked angry, she thought, trying to read his face as he came toward her. She knew what she
ought to
say to him, but when she was close enough to speak, she found herself unable to. She grabbed his coat with both hands and pressed her tearful face against the front of his shirt. After a moment, Nate put his arms around her. With her cheek against his chest, she could hear his heart beating almost as fast as hers, the familiar feel and scent of him a comfort to her.

Just tell him what he wants to hear,
she told herself.

But she couldn't. There was something shameful about saying it now, right after Hadley Jones had rejected her—as if she loved him because he was the only choice left.

Nate deserved better than that.

When Verity didn't speak, Nate loosened his hold on her and stepped back. She let go of him reluctantly, wiping her tears with the back of her hand.

“There's been a telegram from Tamaqua,” he said, without addressing the unspoken rift between them. “They think they have our men.”

That was good news, even if she was more worried about the ruins of her engagement than about capturing the men who had assaulted her uncle.

“I'm taking Mr.Thomas on the train to see if he can identify them,” Nate went on. “He's not recovered enough to go by himself.”

“But Uncle John says he never saw them.”

Nate lowered his voice. “Nobody believes that, Verity. This is somehow related to his gambling. He's in trouble with these fellows, and he doesn't want to admit it. But I'm taking Piper and the twins as well. They saw both men, in daylight. Perhaps your uncle will come to his senses when he sees these men in custody.”

Verity wrapped both arms around herself nervously. “I hope it's the right men.”

He nodded. “I do too. But just in case, don't go anywhere alone.”

“I promise,” she said. She wished it were as easy to promise him everything he wanted. She was abruptly struck by the desire to tell him everything she felt, all her contradictory worries, tangled emotions, and lingering doubts. Perhaps the only way to understand her feelings for him was to express them out loud.

But Nate was already walking away, headed back to the carriage. He glanced back at her, and she was certain his eyes passed over the ring on her hand.

“We'll talk when I get back,” he said gruffly.

Verity stood there, rooted to the ground, and watched him leave without kissing her goodbye, without even looking back a second time.

Nate didn't want her anymore either.

VERITY SPENT the day in tears. She'd gone from two suitors to none, and still she was befuddled in her mind and heart. One moment she trembled from head to toe at the thought of Nate McClure asking her to return his ring; the next she considered marching into town to confront Hadley Jones and demand an explanation.

When she answered the door to Liza in the late afternoon, she was in no mood to be polite. “What do you want?” she asked abruptly, glancing briefly at Johnny, who stood sullenly behind his sister.

Liza lifted her head like an animal scenting something interesting on the wind. Clearly she had noticed Verity's swollen eyes and blotchy skin. “Reverend White sent a note telling us to take down the bunting in the cemetery. He said we've left it too long already, and it'll get ruined in the rain tonight.”

Verity looked at the sky. It didn't look like rain to her.

Liza put her hands on her hips. “Mother told Johnny and me to do it, but you helped put them up, so you ought to do your fair share taking them down.”

“Asking nicely was all you needed to do, Liza. Let me get a basket, and I'll go with you.” Spending the afternoon in the graveyard suited Verity's mood perfectly.

The White house was shut up tightly, Verity noted, with curtains all drawn and windows closed in spite of the hot day. She assumed, rather sourly, that Mrs. White didn't want to accidentally catch sight of them and feel obligated to assist.

Liza went first to their grandparents' graves, carefully folding up each decorative drape. Johnny looked as unhappy as boys usually did when asked to do girls' work. He wandered aimlessly through the grounds, ripping bunting from the headstones and throwing it over his shoulder. Verity attended to the caged graves, and then, because she knew nobody else would, she took time with the Clayton graves—first outside the cemetery and then inside.

“You needn't bother.” Liza had come up behind her while she was pulling weeds from around Rebecca Clayton's headstone. “Nobody cares.”

“I care.” Verity yanked handfuls of clover out and flung them aside. “Even if there's no longer a body buried here, the memorial stone can still look nice.”