Sam looked over my shoulder and gave a hard laugh. “Suddenly, it all makes sense.” He let go of the sled and turned away.
“Sam,” I called after him.
But he didn’t look back.
14
I tossed throughout the night, my head full of Rowan leaving a basket on my doorstep. And Sam stalking away. And Father’s secret life.
I awoke later than I’d hoped, dressed and ate quickly, then bundled myself and headed across town. I knew the general direction of Grover Street, in the low-lying river district—a part of town I usually avoided, where the buildings were shabby and smelled of rot. I wandered a bit and finally found a small, yellow house with red shutters. I knocked and waited, my breath steaming in front of me.
A boy of about eight with jam smeared above his lip opened the door, then darted back into the house. “Ma! Someone’s here!”
A woman of about thirty years appeared a moment later, wiping her hands on a dishrag. She halted when she saw me, her expression darkening. “He’s too cowardly to tell me himself? He sent you to do his dirty work?”
I blinked, startled. “No. I mean—he isn’t here? He hasn’t been home in more than a week, and I thought … I thought he might be here.”
She frowned, suddenly less certain, then opened the door wider. “You might as well come in.”
I entered a small, sparsely furnished room. The boy with the jam watched from the doorway, along with a younger boy. “Go play in your room,” the woman told them, and they scampered away. She motioned me toward the only upholstered chair in the room and sat on a wooden chair herself. She was younger than I’d expected. Attractive, but not beautiful, with a scattering of freckles and a limp bun of brown hair. She studied me with obvious dislike. “Well, at least he finally told you about me.”
“Actually … a friend told me. I’m sorry, but I don’t even know your name.”
Her scowl deepened. “Molly Gillis. He said he would tell you. I told him, don’t bother coming back until you do. And when he didn’t come back, I knew you disapproved. That you don’t think I’m good enough.”
“No, that isn’t it at all. I wouldn’t have disapproved. At least—I want him to be happy.”
Her eyes shifted. “Then why didn’t he come for Christmas? He said he wanted to marry me, and that’s the last I saw of him.”
I tried to hide my shock. Father had mentioned getting a woman to help me; I’d thought he meant a servant.
“I went to Hale Glass,” Molly said. “But they said he hasn’t shown up in two weeks. I thought he must have gotten a new job and didn’t bother to tell me. I was going to walk to your place today and give him a piece of my mind.”
“He isn’t there either.” I hesitated, unsure of how much to say. If Father wanted to marry Molly Gillis, he’d probably confided in her, which meant she might know something useful. “The last time I saw him, I told him something that upset him. He left the house, and I haven’t seen him since.”
“What did you tell him? Something about me?”
“No, about my mother. I told him … I told him that she might have been innocent.”
Molly’s eyebrows rose. “You knew? He thought you’d forgotten.”
It took me a moment to fully understand what she’d said—then my heart leaped. My mother was innocent. Molly Gillis had just confirmed it. I struggled to hide my amazement, not wanting her to guess my own ignorance—not wanting her to become cautious.
“So … so my father told you what happened that night?”
Her expression softened a little. “You were only six. He never blamed you. He knew it was an accident.”
A clammy chill spread through me.
“He blamed himself for not checking the gun before he set it down. It must have been cocked, ready to fire. Your fingers weren’t big enough to pull the trigger on an old pistol like that. It was just a terrible accident. He didn’t even know you were there until you picked it up.”
My lungs stopped breathing. My heart stopped beating.
I closed my eyes.
And saw a black pistol with a golden bird on its side, lying on the ground. Mama is crying, and I want to give it to her. I reach down, but it’s heavier than I expect—and roars in my hand, sending a shocking jolt up my arm and a bullet the other way. Mr. Blackshaw stumbles, his eyes wide and startled … looking at me … looking at me because I’m holding the gun.
I pressed my hands against my mouth to hold back a scream.
“You didn’t know,” Molly whispered.
I kept my eyes squeezed shut. Drew a breath through my clamped mouth.
Her voice rose to a wail. “I thought you knew! What you said—I thought you knew!”
I gave a jerky shake of my head. Lowered my hands and forced my eyes open.
Molly stared at me, horrified. “Joseph will be so angry. He didn’t want you to know. He didn’t want you to remember.”
I swallowed and managed to find my voice. “I want to remember.”
“He’s so proud of you, going to that school. He thought it would ruin your life if you knew.”
“What else did he tell you?” I asked hoarsely.
The dishrag twisted in Molly’s hands. “He only talked about it once. He wanted you to forget.”
“He thinks I’m still a child, but I need to understand what happened.”
“He won’t want me telling you.”
“So—you’re allowed to know, but not me?” My temper sparked. “I’m the one who saw my mother hanging at the gallows! I deserve to know what happened!”
Molly paled.
“Why did she confess? To protect me? They wouldn’t have hanged a six-year-old! He should have stopped her!”
“He tried!” Molly cried. “She wouldn’t listen to reason. That’s how she was, he said, never listening to him. She didn’t respect him as a husband.”
It felt wrong, listening to Molly describe my mother that way. But I hungered for more. “What else did he say?”
“She was always moody. Melancholy for years, barely getting out of bed. Then, happy as a lark, saying she was divorcing him and marrying Nigel Blackshaw.”
“Divorcing him?” I remembered my mother meeting Mr. Blackshaw in the woods. “Was that why he came to our house that night? They were running away together?”
Molly bit her lower lip, suddenly wary. “I shouldn’t tell you these things. She was your mother.”
“I barely remember her,” I insisted, trying to hide my clawing need.
“Well, she was a troubled soul. Terribly spoiled and useless with chores.” Molly warmed to the tale, suddenly eager to reveal the worst in Joseph’s first wife. “She left iron marks on his shirts and burned everything she cooked. Bought expensive cuts of meat, then cried when he scolded her.”
I felt a pang of sympathy for Isabella Barron, raised in affluence, then thrust into the role of humble housewife. “She didn’t know how to do those things. Her father lost his money.”
“Maybe so, but that doesn’t excuse her behavior. The way she tricked him. Their marriage was doomed from the start.” Molly’s mouth tightened, holding something back.
I waited, hardly daring to breathe.
And she couldn’t resist. “She only pretended to love him because she needed a husband. Joseph wasn’t your real father. But you came early—big and healthy—and when he accused her, she admitted it.”
The story hovered over me … then slowly settled, fitting too easily to be false. I bore no resemblance to my Italian father. And there were those moments when I saw the flicker of resentment in his eyes, before a kinder expression took hold. I’d thought it was because I looked like my mother. But maybe I also resembled someone else.
“Who was my real father?” I asked.
Molly shrugged, unconcerned with this detail. “I don’t know. He couldn’t have been decent, or he would have married her. Joseph thought Isabella was nice, because she offered to help him learn English. But she was just loo
king for an easy target—someone new to the country, eager to settle. She flirted and he fell for it. Then she made his life miserable.”
My head throbbed. I didn’t want to believe any of it, but it rang true to my memories. There’d never been laughter between them, only terse words.
“So … my father wanted her to hang? That’s why he didn’t tell anyone that she was innocent?”
“Of course not!” Molly cried, indignant. “Joseph told the sheriff everything, but Isabella just said he was lying to protect her. His English wasn’t so good back then. He went to New York City to get his cousin, a lawyer, but when he got back, it was too late. Just three days, and they’d already hanged her.”
“But afterward,” I insisted. “He could have cleared her name.”
“What was the point? He couldn’t save her. He kept quiet for your sake, Valentine, so no one would know what you’d done—especially you.”
Frustration knotted inside me. “But I’m the one who did it! He should have cleared her name!”
“You wish you’d grown up knowing that you did something like that—and everyone else knowing? You think they’d let you go to that fancy school if they knew you killed Nigel Blackshaw?”
My heart dropped, because of course they wouldn’t—not with Mrs. Blackshaw on the board of trustees. I felt a tug of gratitude for Father. He’d kept my secret safe all these years—even from me, allowing me to grow up without the weight of that guilt.
But someone knew.
A chill ran through me. I looked at Molly. “Someone told Mr. Oliver that my mother was innocent. That’s what upset Father the night he disappeared. He said he would fix it and left the house. Do you know where he might have gone? Do you know who knows the truth?”
Molly shook her head. “No one. He made me swear to keep quiet.”
My gaze sharpened. “Did you tell Mr. Oliver?”
“I don’t even know him, except by name. I’m a Methodist.”
One of her sons started wailing in the other room, and Molly hurried away, returning a moment later with the younger boy on her hip. “I’m sorry, but there’s a mess to clean up.”
“Of course.” I stood, my gaze settling on the tearful boy in her arms. When Father returned, there might be a wedding. I would have a stepmother and two new brothers. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.
“You’ll let me know when he comes home?” Molly asked.
“I will,” I promised. But I was beginning to wonder if he ever would.
* * *
I hadn’t walked far before I started to cry. I bowed my head, unable to stop the flow of tears—or the torrent of thoughts.
My mother had confessed to a murder she didn’t commit, knowing what lay ahead. She’d sacrificed herself to protect me.
A pointless sacrifice.
My sorrow sharpened into anger. They wouldn’t have punished a child. She didn’t protect me by confessing; she abandoned me. Left me motherless, in the care of a father who knew I wasn’t his, in a town that would believe me the child of a murderer. What kind of mother did that?
A mother lost in melancholy.
Molly’s stories had stirred up memories of quiet days when Mama had stayed in bed. My stomach rumbling as I’d foraged in the kitchen. Dirty dishes on the table. Laundry left on the line in the rain. Father’s impatience as he’d ordered her to get up. But she’d only closed her eyes, blocking him out. They’d lived separate lives in the same house. Now, I understood the reason.
I was the reason.
After six years of bitter marriage, she’d planned to divorce him for Nigel Blackshaw—which explained Mr. Blackshaw coming to our house late at night, bringing his son in the carriage. Strange to think that Rowan and I would have grown up as brother and sister. But instead of running away, my mother had pointed a gun.
Why?
You deceived me, Mr. Blackshaw had accused.
Yes, she’d agreed. And now I will kill you and not shed a tear of remorse.
What had Mr. Blackshaw done to deserve such cold fury? Or had he done nothing and my mother was the villain, unhinged and irrational? Mr. Blackshaw had tried to calm her. Give me the gun, Isabella, and we’ll forget this ever happened. You’ll think more clearly in the morning. Father had eased the gun from her fingers and set it on the ground.
And I’d picked it up. I’d killed Mr. Blackshaw. I hugged my chest as I walked, looking down to hide my face.
Rowan sought a reason for his father’s death, and I was that reason.
An accident. The gun was cocked. It would have gone off in anyone’s hand.
But it went off in mine. A sob welled in my throat. I thought of Father, enduring the same sly glances and rumors as I had for eleven years—tales of his murdering wife that he knew were false. He’d kept my dark secret.
You say nothing, and I fix this.
Where did he go that night? Did he poison Mr. Oliver for my sake, then flee town?
No, I didn’t believe it. Not for so feeble a reason as my reputation. Maybe to avoid the hangman’s noose, if he’d murdered Nigel Blackshaw. But Father never killed anyone. That was me.
And someone knew. Someone who’d kept my secret for eleven years. Then, in a moment of weakness, they’d confided in Mr. Oliver—who’d told me—and I’d told Father. And when Father scolded this person for their loose tongue, he’d disappeared and Mr. Oliver had died. Who would care that much about my secret?
Father knew who they were—if I could only find him.
Joseph Deluca isn’t my father.
My heart emptied with that strange thought. With no other face to claim the title, it left me hollow. Joseph Deluca was the only father I’d ever known—and a better father than I’d ever acknowledged.
I would make it up to him. I would welcome Molly and her boys.
If he ever returned and gave me the chance.
I passed the church and entered the graveyard. The old headstones looked grimy and formidable against the pristine snow. I passed the dead who felt like friends—beloved daughter, Mary Frances, who’d died at age seven, buried next to her mother; Robert Grebe, 1811, with his towering stone obelisk—and continued to the back corner, near the woods. I stepped over the old rock wall that marked the end of hallowed ground and entered the small, neglected graveyard of criminals and heathens. Here, the headstones were small and roughly cut, their etchings worn away, the names forgotten.
Except one.
I sank in front of the gleaming marble headstone of Isabella Barron Deluca and rested my head against the cold stone. This was the first time I’d ever visited her grave. She’d sacrificed her life for me, and I’d turned my back on her. Even the good memories, I’d tainted with resentment.
And there were good memories: Mama laughing as I chased the chickens across the yard; sitting on her lap as I sewed my first stitches; Mama singing a silly song as we walked through the woods, our hands clasped.
A black carriage rattled to a stop on the road at the edge of the graveyard. I glanced up, wiping my eyes, my privacy stolen. I expected someone to emerge and visit a grave, but no one stirred.
And apprehension tingled up my spine. Inside, I could see the shadow of someone watching me. But the carriage was smaller than the Blackshaws’, and I didn’t recognize the driver.
Slowly, I rose. To get home, I must use the road, which meant walking near the carriage. I stepped over the old rock wall and crossed the church graveyard, angling toward the corner. But the carriage door opened, and a tall man with iron-gray hair emerged—and I recognized the scowling, chiseled face of Judge Stoker.
“Good afternoon, Valentine,” he said in a low growl.
I remained a few steps away, my heart racing. “Good afternoon.”
“I’m sorry to disturb you, but I saw you at your mother’s grave and decided it was time we spoke.”
“About what?” I asked warily. If Judge Stoker knew he’d hanged an innocent woman, he wouldn’t want anyone to find out. He might care e
nough to poison someone.
“Nothing to be shouted in the street. Come, we’ll speak in here.” He patted the carriage door with a large hand.
I wavered, unsure. I had no reason to suspect Judge Stoker except my own wild imagination. He was a man of law. If anything, he could help me find the truth.
So, I summoned my courage and moved forward, stepping up into the dark, cramped space.
15
I’d never been inside a carriage, and it was smaller and darker than I’d imagined, the seat narrower. The carriage shook as Judge Stoker sat across from me.
“I was glad to see you at the Honor Tea,” he said in his thick, gravelly voice. “Congratulations on your award.”
He’d probably heard about Lucy’s cheating accusations. “I deserved it. I work hard at my schoolwork.”
His thick eyebrows rose. “I do not doubt it.” He studied me in the shaft of light coming through the carriage window. “Tell me, Valentine, do they teach you about the scales of justice at that school of yours?”
The carriage was too small, the air too thick with tobacco.
“I don’t think so.”
“Well,” he growled. “I have devoted my life to them. But that doesn’t free me of their obligation. I must pay my requital to their stability, just like everyone else.”
My heart beat heavily. I didn’t understand his words.
“For more than a decade, I have watched over you, Valentine.”
My thoughts shifted. “Watched … over me?”
“I knew you were worth salvaging, even when you were nothing but a dirty scamp of a girl with wild hair and muddy feet. I saw intelligence in you, and the strength of a survivor. So, I decided to help you. And, you have not disappointed me. Indeed, you have exceeded my every expectation.”
The truth settled inside me like a cold stone. “You are my benefactor.”
“Yes. As a trustee, I ensured your admittance at Drake four years ago, and I have paid your tuition. It has been, without question, the most worthwhile money I have ever spent.”
I thought of the many times I’d seen Judge Stoker in town, always fierce and scowling, never indicating in any way that he noticed or cared about me. “Why?” I asked.
Girl at the Grave Page 10