Eternal Deception

by Jane Steen

  Judah lifted a hand. “Oh no, not give. Mrs. Calderwood never gives anything for nothing. The land and the seminary building are hers. The denomination has a substantial interest in the property, but that should not pose too great an obstacle. I’ve been of enough service,” his lips pursed as if he were savoring a delightful memory, “that the price would be most favorable. A bagatelle to you, of course, given the extent of your wealth. But it would mean a great deal to me to own this place. I’ve worked hard for it.”

  I must have still looked puzzled because Judah placed a hand under my elbow, barely touching my sleeve.

  “That might not happen for another five years, of course.” He glanced briefly at the seminary building as he turned me to face him, and his voice became a caress. “But I wouldn’t wait five years to marry you, Nell. I would be eager to wipe out your past mistakes for you. We would present a united front to the world, and nobody could touch us.”

  Over Judah’s shoulder, I could see the windows of the seminary building reflecting the sky like blind mirrors, the row of stained-glass windows dark and blank by comparison. The great building glowed in the orange light of the afternoon sun, its gray slate roofs reflecting flame-like glints. Could I really make this place my permanent home? I wondered. And what would it be like with Judah in charge of it?

  We walked on and talked no more of love or marriage. I didn’t think we had reached an understanding—at least there was no understanding on my part—but Judah had the satisfied air of a man who had successfully overcome an important obstacle.

  He handed me into the hallway with something of a show, bowing elaborately to Mrs. Drummond, who happened just at that moment to emerge from the passage that led to the housekeeper’s rooms. She stared—hard—at the two of us, and then proceeded at a fast pace toward the kitchens, her back stiff as a board.

  “I’ll take my leave of you,” Judah said, “and make myself presentable for dinner.” And before I could reply, he was heading upstairs, his footsteps almost inaudible on the staircase.

  I was going to climb the staircase myself, but something made me look round. There was Professor Wale, coming from the short row of classrooms that occupied the space alongside the stairs. Some of those classrooms, I knew, had windows that commanded a view of the area where Judah and I had been walking. The professor had no doubt seen us.

  I hesitated at the sight of his pale scholar’s face, half-hidden by the gloom lit here and there by a beam of light filled with chalky dust. He looked old and tired, the shadows accentuating the hollows under his eyes, the deep grooves that ran from nose to mouth, the shabbiness of his academic robe. I waited for him to speak to me, but he only shook his head slowly as he passed, the dust motes whirling in the air above his cap as he made his solemn way toward the refectory.

  22

  Curiosity

  It was, in fact, two more days before Professor Wale spoke a word to me. I was idly reading the notices on the boards fastened to the paneled side of the great staircase—mostly examination results and notices of lost articles—when a voice spoke in my ear.

  “I have talked with Poulton.”

  I jumped and turned, almost colliding with the professor. “You could have announced yourself a little less dramatically.” I put a hand to my chest, feeling the rapid beat of my heart.

  Professor Wale held up his hands in a gesture of apology and smiled at me for the first time in days.

  “Pray forgive me. My mind was full of my news, and I forgot my manners.”

  I shook my head to indicate the matter was of little import. “What did he say?”

  Professor Wale’s brow wrinkled in a puzzled frown under his cap. “He denied nothing of what was in the letter. Admitted nothing either, come to think of it. He just sat there with that smug little smile on his face and listened, then told me that nothing in his past had to do with his present circumstances.”

  I felt a stab of curiosity but damped it down. If I were to hear the tale of Judah, it would not be from the professor.

  “I told him I should inform the Calderwoods of what I had learned,” the professor continued. “He said I was welcome to do so. He said that it would make no difference to his position whether the Calderwoods listened to gossip—he called it gossip—or not. I asked him if he’d repented and made amends; he assured me that the state of his soul was perfectly satisfactory. In short, he was damnably calm about the whole thing. He even put a hand on my shoulder,” the professor twitched one shoulder in memory, “and told me I had better things to worry about than him.”

  “It doesn’t sound as if—whatever it is could have been all that important.”

  “Hmph.” Professor Wale tugged his cap down so that it settled more firmly on his head. “He’s pulled my fangs, and no mistake. All that work to find that pompous English lawyer—and I still don’t know whether I should speak to Cam Calderwood or chuck the infernal thing in the fire.”

  He glared at me in a theatrical manner, the shadows under his eyes deeper than ever. “And as for you—I wish you had more curiosity and fewer principles. But I can scarcely saddle you with a burden you refuse to carry.”

  “Oh, I’m not lacking in curiosity.”

  A group of students passed us; I smiled and wished them a good morning. They rewarded my greeting with a shower of “ma’ams” and tipped hats. They left a feral smell behind them to which I had, by now, become quite accustomed.

  “Well,” the professor continued, “should you wish to seek elucidation, the letter will remain in its hiding place, and you may remove it whenever you wish.”

  I nodded. “I think I’m rather hoping Ju—Mr. Poulton will tell me about whatever it is, himself. When the time is right.”

  “Before you marry, I hope.”

  “We have no plans to marry at present. So I have plenty of time.”

  A rueful smile appeared on the professor’s face. “So thinks every man until he looks up from his preoccupations one day and finds that time has slipped through his fingers. I swear to you, Mrs. Lillington, that they have been shortening every year of this last decade by two weeks without telling me, so quickly do the days seem to flash by.” My laugh brought a light to his eyes now rarely seen.

  “Here we are indeed, nearly at Thanksgiving,” the professor continued. “And I understand you’re not to spend it with us.”

  “No, we’re not.” I couldn’t hide my smile of anticipation. “Tess, Sarah, and I are going across the plains to the Lombardi mission. Tess and I have decided that Sarah is old enough not to make the trip a misery, and we’re all looking forward to the change. It’ll do Sarah good to see some other children.”

  We left the Lombardi mission two days after Thanksgiving, by which time I had revised my ideas about the benefits of introducing Sarah to other children. It was enlightening to watch my daughter attempt to fit the existence of the homesteaders’ small children into a world that, by every evidence, had hitherto revolved around her. And she had immediately caught a cold, which meant we had to keep her away from Lucy, who suffered badly from wheezing and bronchitis.

  It had not been a cheering visit despite all the efforts of Catherine and her husband. The loss of their capital during the financial panic had left them entirely dependent on the stipend paid to the pastor by his denomination and the gifts brought to the mission by grateful farmers and their wives. As the homesteads were spread around a vast area, the population was not large, and the Lombardis also fed a shifting crew of itinerant cowpokes and half-breeds—who seemed otherwise to exist on air—in return for a few hours’ work at the mission.

  They were all thin, and the shabbiness of their clothing made me bite my lip and wish I had loaded up the cart with bolts of cloth. In the end, I secured Catherine’s promise to visit the seminary with the children for the express purpose of sewing them a new wardrobe. Persuading the woman who had once been my benefactor to accept my help had been a bitter struggle.

  Sarah had antagonized Thea by her re
fusal to accept orders from a twelve-year-old. Since Thea assisted her mother with the mission’s small school, such a loss of authority hit her hard. To make matters worse, Sarah decided to lavish her adoration on Teddy and clung to him like a limpet when we said our good-byes.

  “When is Teddy coming to the seminary?” she asked as the pastor’s wagon creaked and jolted along the dirt trail. “Why didn’t he come back with us?”

  “He’s needed at the mission,” I pointed out.

  “Why doesn’t he come and be a student? The other boys don’t have to work.”

  I glanced toward the front of the wagon, where the pastor sat on the bench next to a stringy plainsman named Zeke, who smelled like a dead fish. “Teddy will attend the seminary later, perhaps.”

  The idea of trying to persuade Judah to make a non-paying place for Teddy flitted across my mind, but I had my doubts about the likelihood of success.

  “When are we going to get there?” Sarah clambered to her feet and hung on to the back flap of the wagon. We had been heading east for a few hours, and the dying sunset’s brilliant tones lit up the inside of our traveling conveyance and struck sparks of fire from Sarah’s hair.

  “It’ll be dark by the time we do. Do you need to use the pot again?” Sarah was bouncing vigorously up and down on her toes.

  “No.”

  “Then sit down, darling. You’ll fall over.”

  “No, I won’t.”

  I sighed and tried to make myself more comfortable. Our wagon was only covered as far forward as the bench, leaving the front hoop bare. As the eastern sky had grown quite dark, the pastor had lit his lamp, so I could see the shapes of the two men up front. An explosive sound with which I had, by now, become familiar informed me that Zeke had spat tobacco juice neatly under the horses’ hooves again. Zeke had accompanied us because he needed to travel to Wichita, and this would “get him a fur piece” along the way.

  Their conversation had ranged over wheat and rabbits, rattlesnakes, the grasshopper plague that had done so much damage to the crops in the summer, politics in Abilene and the Indian wars far to the west. Pastor Lombardi had been obliged to curb some of Zeke’s more colorful stories at intervals by hissing “The women! The women!” For the moment though, both men were silent. We had been going since before dawn with occasional stops to rest the horses and provide for our own bodily comfort, and we were all exhausted—all, it seemed, except the jiggling child in my immediate vicinity. I groaned and looked with envy at Tess, who had long since rolled herself into a blanket and fallen asleep.

  “Momma!”

  “What is it, dear?” I had just started to drift off to sleep.

  “I need the pot.”

  I groaned again and, after a few moments’ undignified scrambling, located the necessary object and helped Sarah to ensconce herself on it. I held up the blanket I employed to protect my daughter’s privacy and prepared for the onslaught on my ears.

  It wasn’t long in coming.

  “Darewing young MAAAN onna tra-PEEEEZE . . . Gerrrr-atest of FEEEEEASE . . . Onna tra-PEEEEEEZE . . .”

  I was beginning to wish that the daring young man had never thought to take to the flying trapeze. Sarah, who did not normally eat much, had consumed five whole biscuits, about a pound of leftover wild turkey, and most of our water. These evidences of the beneficial effects of fresh air and travel had led to many command performances of the daring young man, with occasional variations on the theme of “HooRAH! Hooooo-RAH! Jooooooooo-beeeee-leeeee.” Zeke, a Union veteran, had taught Sarah “Marching Through Georgia” during our midday meal.

  It had been Thea who suggested to Sarah that singing as she did her business would cover the noises inherent in using an enameled pot. Why had that been the one instruction Sarah had taken to heart?

  It had become quite dark outside. “Are we close to the seminary, Pastor, do you think?” I had to raise my voice to make myself heard above the song.

  “Kin see the seminary by its lights,” Zeke answered laconically. “Fur way off though. Like seein’ through the wrong end of a spyglass.”

  I sighed with relief, especially when I felt the wagon turn. We must have met the trail that led from Springwood to the seminary, having bypassed the town itself. Soon we’d be in our own beds, with an end to this interminable rocking and jolting.

  The song came to an end, and I watched as Sarah dealt with the restoration of her clothing before dropping the blanket and picking up the pot. I would have to empty it off the back of the wagon—I wasn’t going to ask the men to stop this late in the journey.

  “I’m hungry, Momma.”

  “We’ve eaten all the food. But we’ll be back at the seminary soon, and I’m sure we can find something.”

  I crawled over the boards, managing with difficulty to keep my balance while tugging at my skirts and petticoats with one hand and making sure not to tip the pot.

  Sarah sighed and put her blanket down next to Tess, turning around and around like a dog to find a comfortable spot. I experienced the certainty that every mother of a young child knows—that after staying awake for the entire journey, Sarah would be fast asleep upon arrival, and I would have to carry her up flight after flight of stairs.

  I at last managed to hang out of the back of the wagon, the canvas cover and its drawstring catching at my hair. The pastor had lit a second lamp, and the swaying light picked out strange shadows in the humps and hollows of dried grass along the trailside, illuminating—

  I let out a shriek and dropped the pot, which hit the ground with a dull chinking sound. Sarah started up in fear, shouting, “Momma!”

  I yelled again, scrambling toward the front of the wagon. Zeke was pulling on the reins, muttering, “Slow up, slow up now,” as the pastor twisted around to face me. I grabbed the bench and hauled myself up, nearly tipping the two men backward until Zeke threw himself forward as a counterbalance.

  “What is it?” The pastor’s voice competed with Sarah’s shrill, tired whine and Tess’s startled exclamations as she awoke.

  I took several deep breaths, trying to control the trembling in my lower limbs. “I saw—it was—“ I swallowed awry and coughed for a few seconds. “A man. A face. Lying in the grass.”

  Pastor Lombardi put one of his big hands over mine. Despite the cold air, he felt warm, solid, and comforting.

  “A trick of the light, Nell. We didn’t see anything.”

  “I was much closer to the ground than you are. And the light picked out the face perfectly.” So perfectly that I had recognized it, but I didn’t want to say. I wanted to be sure. “It’s sort of half-hidden between two big clumps of grass.”

  “Very well.” The wagon had stopped, and the pastor reached for the rifle that hung by its shoulder strap on a hook sunk into the bench. I felt Zeke shove the brake forward, and then the bench swayed on its springs as the two men clambered down, each to his side.

  “Hold on to Sarah.” I gave my daughter a brief hug and consigned her to Tess. “I think there’s been an accident of some kind,” I said in Tess’s ear. “Don’t let her look.”

  But I needn’t have worried. Sarah was rubbing her eyes and burrowing her face into Tess’s soft bosom, making small sounds of sleepy annoyance.

  I pushed at the canvas at the back of the wagon, cursing my skirt and petticoats. How was I going to get down without help?

  A shout from Zeke made me stick my head out farther, and the canvas caught at my hairpins, dragging some loose. I saw movement—had I been mistaken and he had only fainted?

  The pastor’s rifle barked, and Sarah gave a small yelp. In the combination of lamplight and starlight, I saw three or four pale shapes loping off through the grass—coyotes.

  I curled my hands around the gate flap in frustration. The men had taken the lamps and I could see them swaying about forty yards off, silhouetting Zeke and the pastor as they stood deep in discussion.

  I stamped my foot and marched to the front of the wagon, where the horses stood pea
cefully nosing into what grass they could find. I sat on the flare board, grabbed the uncovered hoop to help me balance, lowered myself until my foot encountered the gear, and launched myself forward. I landed in an ungainly sprawl on the lumpy grass, the memory of my fall from the sleigh vivid as the slender stems whipped at my bare wrists.

  Righting myself, I headed toward the lights. I was suddenly aware of the vast emptiness all around us. I could see a faint glimmer that must be the seminary, but it seemed a great distance away. In the still night, my breath formed a thick cloud of moisture, and I shivered.

  The men’s voices drifted to me as I approached.

  “. . . with the rifle. We can’t expect two women and a child to wait on the prairie.”

  “I kud light a fire, I s’pose. Got to find me a few stalks an’ all, an’ tear up a circle so’s I don’t burn up the blamed prairie and the corpus with it. If it’s got to be me as waits.” Zeke sounded sulky but resigned. “Lonely work standin’ sentry over a corpus, Pastor. With wolves an’ Injuns and haints an’ all. Supposin’ the redskins what shot him come back?”

  “Now then, Zeke.” The pastor’s voice was firm. “A Christian man’s got no business thinking about ghosts. And who says it was Indians who shot him?”

  “Who says it ain’t?”

  My foot hit something with a dull clang, and Zeke, who had taken possession of the rifle, raised it to his shoulder.

  “It’s me,” I said quickly.

  “What the he—what the Sam Hill you doin’ out the wagon, Miz Lillington?”

  The object my foot had encountered turned out to be the pot. With a sigh of resignation, I hooked a fastidious finger into the handle and lifted it. We might be here for a while.

  “It’s Professor Wale, isn’t it?” My voice wasn’t steady.

  “Ain’t acquainted,” Zeke replied. “Whoever it was, he’s dead right enough. Clean shot, right through the back o’ his noddle.” He indicated a spot on the back of his skull, his dead-fish smell wafting over me as the breeze shifted. “Fresh, too. Them ki-yotes only got in a bite or two.”