by Karen White
He pulled me into his arms and pressed me against the front door so that I felt the entire hard length of his body against mine, and I shivered despite the heat that seemed to resonate through every limb. Those same limbs no longer seemed able to support me, and I reached my arms around Jack’s neck, allowing him to press me into the door so I wouldn’t fall.
His lips were hard and insistent and I found myself opening to him, losing myself in the strength and warmth that was Jack. I closed my eyes, tasting rain and skin and Jack, seeing behind my eyelids a kaleidoscope of colors I hadn’t known existed.
Then, inexplicably, he stopped and pulled back, his eyes dark and unreadable. We were both breathing heavily and I was perilously close to asking him to do it again.
“And that, Melanie Middleton, wasn’t an almost kiss.That was the real thing.” He turned the doorknob, and pushed open the door, revealing Sophie, Chad, and both of my parents standing in the foyer—suddenly trying to pretend they’d been doing anything other than listening.
Like Rhett Butler dumping Scarlett O’Hara at Ashley’s birthday party, Jack made a formal bow—which managed not to look ridiculous even though he was dripping wet—said his good-byes, and left without another word.
CHAPTER 23
I woke up hearing someone calling my name, the smell of gunpowder, and the sound of clinking metal floating in the air like an afterthought.
“Wilhelm?” I called out softly.
My door crept open as an icy finger of air stole into the room.
I slid out of bed, careful not to disturb General Lee, and walked out into the hallway, my sock-clad feet padding softly on the wooden floor.
I saw a shimmer of light at the bottom of the stairs, and paused as I watched Wilhelm’s progression toward the kitchen. I ducked back into my room to retrieve the flashlight I now kept on my nightstand and then, without giving myself time to rethink my actions, I hurried down the stairs, following him into the darkened kitchen.
“Wilhelm?” I shivered, the pervading chill in the room permeating the flannel of my nightgown. I turned my flashlight on and scanned the kitchen, taking in the closed door to the back staircase and the gaping hole behind the fireplace.
Cautiously, I moved forward, shining my flashlight into the secret room. I caught a flash of curling gold hair under a Hessian’s tricorn hat, then climbed into the fireplace and through the small opening, shining my flashlight on the beamed ceiling on the carved words.
“Gefangener des Herzens,” I said. I looked sideways at Wilhelm and saw that he was smiling. “What’s so funny?’
Your accent. It is really quite bad.
I almost made the mistake of looking directly at him, but managed to sigh heavily. “Prisoner of the heart,” I said. “What does it mean?”
That is not why I brought you in here.
I kept my eyes focused on the beam. “Then why? I’ve already looked in the chest. It’s empty.”
You have not looked everywhere.
“I don’t know what you mean. Where haven’t I looked?”
He walked slowly to the corner of the room, his boots thudding softly against the dirt floor. Here.You have not looked here.
I moved my flashlight to the corner, the light shining through him, and illuminating nothing but brick wall and dirt floor. “There’s nothing there,” I said, feeling impatient.
Look harder.
I stepped closer, moving the flashlight in an arc, catching more of the bricks and dirt and his shiny black boots but nothing else. Frustrated, I repeated, “There’s nothing here.”
“Wilhelm.”
I moved the flashlight back to the opening, watching as my mother crawled through it. From the corner of my eye, I spotted the soldier placing his hat against his chest and bowing. Ginnette.
She came to stand next to me. “Did you ask him what he meant by ‘prisoner of the heart’?” Her warm hand found mine and I realized she wasn’t wearing her gloves. In unison we both turned toward him and for the first time in my life, I saw him in solid form; I could see the blue of his eyes and the pink, ridged scar on his temple. I could even see the repaired hole on his jacket sleeve and the cleft in his chin. My mother squeezed my hand and I knew she noticed, too.
Our gazes met and he seemed as surprised as me that he was still there. And then he looked at my mother and his expression softened. It has been too long.
A soft smile illuminated her face. “Tell us, Wilhelm. Why are you a prisoner of the heart?”
I cannot tell you. It is my shame.
I stepped toward him, still holding my mother’s hand. “We could never pass judgment on you. You’re our protector, and you’ve saved me more than once. I can only feel gratitude toward you.”
Because you do not know.
“What was her name?” my mother asked. “The girl who held your heart captive.”
Look harder. In the corner.
“We will. But first we need to know her name.”
I could feel his spirit wanting to leave, but my mother and I held him in place, unwilling to let him go until we had an answer.
“Tell us her name, Wilhelm. Is it the girl who wrote the journal?”
He smiled. Meredith. No. It was not Meredith. I saved her when she was a baby.
“Then who was she?” I asked.
“If you tell us, we can help you find forgiveness. Help you move on from this place,” my mother added.
His eyes emptied of light. I am destined to protect the women in your family. Meredith showed me how. And now it is my penance.
“For what?” I asked.
His sigh echoed in the cold, empty room, settling in our ears and our hearts. For my betrayal. For allowing her to die.
“How did she die?” I asked.
She drowned. I did not know she was on the ship. I did not know to save her.
“Who?” My mother’s voice was barely a whisper.
Catherine.
We exchanged glances and when we looked back at Wilhelm, he was gone.
“Who is Catherine?” Ginnette asked.
I closed my eyes, trying to see the Prioleau family tree in my mind, knowing that Catherine was one of the names on the earlier part of the tree. I’d studied it so many times that I nearly had it memorized. “She was Joshua’s daughter. I remember her because she died so young, nineteen or twenty, I think. And also because it was on my birthday, July fifteenth. She lived here right after the Prioleaus purchased the house in 1781. Right around the time the British troops abandoned the city, which lends credence to Rebecca’s assumption that Wilhelm chose to stay behind in Charleston. Maybe he was in love with Catherine and he willingly remained for her.”
“He wouldn’t have been a prisoner if he stayed here willingly. Maybe Wilhelm was here in secret and her father found out, or he knew all along, and forced Wilhelm to stay as an unpaid worker in return for keeping him hidden, and for room and board. And Wilhelm did it, but only because he loved Catherine.”
“But she died. Because of him,” I said slowly. “She was on a ship that sank, and he was there but didn’t save her because he didn’t know she was on it.” They were wreckers, Mellie. Your illustrious ancestors started out as wreckers. Jack’s words taunted me, but I couldn’t—wouldn’t—jump to conclusions without some kind of proof.
Our gazes met for a moment and I watched as her eyes widened. “We both saw him, and he was solid. He was stronger and we were giving him that strength because we were together and wanting him here. We’re an amazing team, Mellie.”
Before I could decide if I agreed or should resent what she said, she tugged on my hand. “Come on, let’s go.”
“To where?”
“To turn on the lights. I don’t want to be stuck in here in the dark just in case you know who decides to pay us a visit. I doubt that she will because we’re both here, but I’d like to be safe. I don’t think Wilhelm would be able to return so soon; it would have taken most of his strength to appear that solid for as lon
g as he did.”
She stopped to allow me to exit through the opening first, then followed me. I waited with my eyes focused on the closed door leading to the back stairs until she flipped on the light. Our gazes locked again. “How did you know I was down here?” I asked.
She shrugged. “Mother’s intuition, I suppose. I awoke and knew somehow that you weren’t in your room. I went downstairs and followed the sound of your voice.”
As she spoke, I looked around at the mess in the kitchen, the workers’ tools strewn over the floor as they awaited my decision as to what to do next. My gaze rested on a shovel that lay on the floor with the pile of removed bricks.
I walked over to it and picked it up. “We need to go back in there.”
“What for?”
“Wilhelm keeps telling me that there’s something in that room. And tonight, when he first brought me in there, before we asked him about Catherine, he told me that I need to look harder. He kept indicating the far right corner. Maybe there’s something buried under the dirt.”
Ginnette pursed her lips, unsure. “Can we wait until daylight?”
“Could you sleep knowing that a possible answer to the thousands of questions we keep asking ourselves is just as far as a quick dig in the floor?”
She took a deep breath. “You’re right.” She moved toward the opening and flipped on her flashlight. “I’ll hold the light while you dig.”
For the second time that night, I climbed through the opening. While my mother held the flashlight, I began digging in the hard, compacted earth. It was made more difficult by the fact that I couldn’t stand completely upright, and by the back pain I experienced from the first jarring blow of trying to dig the shovel vertically into hard ground.
Getting the hang of it, I began to scrape the ground with the shovel, lifting off one thin layer of dirt at a time. My mother suggested calling Jack for help, but my reaction was the same as hers when I suggested we call my father instead. So I slowly dug a shallow hole in the corner of the hidden room until my neck and lower back were nearly numb.
I was unaware of the passage of time, but when I didn’t think I could take one more pass at the impacted earth, the tip of the shovel nicked something solid. I glanced at the glare of light behind which I knew my mother watched. “Come closer and shine it down here.”
She did as I asked and we both knelt on the cold dirt, staring down at whatever it was that I’d hit.
“It looks like bone china. Maybe a handle of some sort.”
I nodded. “I was about to say the same thing. But I’m afraid I’ll break it if I continue digging it out with the shovel.” I sat back on my haunches, dropping the shovel and rubbing my face. “I’m going to go grab one of the hammers and one of your grapefruit spoons. I can use the claw back of the hammer to dig around the perimeter of the china piece, while you use the grapefruit spoon for the close-up work.”
She frowned. “Sophie was just telling me how valuable the family silver I found in the attic is. I wonder what she’d say.”
“I wasn’t planning on telling her,” I said, raising my eyebrows meaningfully. Standing again, but remembering to keep my neck bent, I said, “I’ll be right back.”
My mother stood at the opening waiting for me to grab the items, and then we returned to the shallow hole in the corner. We placed both of our flashlights on the ground, their beams illuminating our workspace. We worked for almost an hour, digging out a spoonful at a time, uncovering a delicate china teacup. By the time we realized we’d loosened the dirt around it enough to be able to pull it out from its prison, our anticipation was almost palpable.
Sinking back on my haunches, I turned to my mother. “I suppose you don’t want to be the one to touch it first.”
She shook her head. “Not yet, anyway.”
I nodded, then slowly sank both of my hands into the shallow hole and lifted out the blue-and-white china teacup. Looking over our discovery to my mother, I smiled. “It’s intact. I think it might be Delft.”
She leaned over to see it better. “Hold it down here, Mellie, so I can shine my flashlight into the bottom. I think there’s something written on the inside of the cup.”
I lowered the cup so that it rested on the ground, but kept my hands on it to steady it. Our heads nearly touched as she shone the arc of light into the cup, allowing us to see the bottom.
An imprint of an old-fashioned triple-masted schooner, once used as fast-moving cargo ships, filled the bottom of the cup. Printed in a semicircle under the picture of the ship were the words “Ida Belle.”
Our gazes met over the cup. “What do you think this means?” I asked.
“All I can say for sure is that this was most likely from a china set made for and probably used aboard a ship called the Ida Belle. And it means something to Wilhelm, and he wants us to know what it is.” She paused for a moment. “We can summon him, Mellie. And ask him.”
I shook my head. “He’ll fight it. He’s ashamed to tell us, but he’s given us enough clues to figure it out ourselves. And it will take too much of our strength to summon him now.”
“You feel it, too?”
I nodded. “Ever since we started digging, I feel as if she’s been watching us, feeding us hatred. She’s waiting. Waiting to make her move. We need to be ready.”
“Yes.” I watched as a shudder racked her body. “It’s cold in here. Let’s take the teacup and get some sleep. I’ll leave the connected door open between our rooms.”
She didn’t ask or make it a suggestion, because she seemed to know that I’d want it opened just as much as I would be too embarrassed to acknowledge it. “All right,” I said, walking past her with the teacup held gingerly in my hands. “If it makes you feel better.”
She didn’t say anything but I thought I saw her smile as I stepped through the opening into the kitchen, feeling her close behind me.
The doorbell rang the next morning around eight o’clock. I’d already been up and dressed, organized my closet, and done an unsuccessful Internet search for the Ida Belle, so I rushed down the stairs to reach the door before it awakened my mother.
My father stood on the front step with a bouquet of pink roses and something else tucked under his arm. “Good morning, Melanie. I brought something for you, and I figured I should bring something for your mother, too.”
“Hi, Daddy.” I opened the door and allowed him into the foyer. “Mother’s still sleeping. Follow me to the kitchen and we’ll put those flowers in a vase next to the others.” I raised an eyebrow, seeing if he’d caught my sarcasm. Since he’d begun to re-landscape the yard and garden, the house never seemed to lack for flowers—pink roses in particular. I had deliberately tried not to pay attention to the amount of time my parents spent together, but I couldn’t help but notice that my mother seemed to spend a lot of time at restaurants around town discussing the garden with my father.
He handed me the flowers and I took them to the sink to cut off the stem bottoms before making room for them in the overflowing vase on the table. He walked over to the fireplace and peered inside. “Your mother told me about this room. Shame you didn’t find anything useful after all the trouble.”
“Actually, we did. Mother and I did a little digging last night and found a teacup, apparently from a ship called the Ida Belle. Haven’t had any luck discovering anything about it, yet, but I’ve only just started.”
“You should give Jack a call.”
I felt the color rushing to my cheeks, remembering the previous night and all its witnesses. “I don’t think he really wants to talk to me.”
He raised his eyebrows and stared pointedly at me. “You might be right, Peanut. He sure didn’t seem to be wanting to do a lot of talking last night.”
I held my hand up. “Stop, okay? You’re not really the relationship expert, are you? Besides, I don’t know what that was about. All I know is that he’s really angry with me and hasn’t been answering my phone calls. Last night was just an aberration.”
“Is that what they’re calling it nowadays?” He walked toward me, pulling out whatever it was that he’d been carrying under his arm. “Anyway, he came over this morning and gave me this to give to you.”
He held out Meredith’s journal and after a moment’s hesitation, I took it. “He gave you this? Where did he get it?”
“Apparently from Rebecca’s condo.”
“She gave it to him?”
“Not exactly.” He cleared his throat, embarrassed. “Rebecca wasn’t there.”
“He broke into her apartment?” I found that hard to believe, even for Jack.
My father began to studiously examine the roses behind me. “Actually, he had a key so he let himself in.”
I licked my lips, wondering if there was anything I could say to that and decided that there really wasn’t. I looked down at the journal. “So Rebecca did take it. Did Jack tell you why?”
My dad shook his head. “No. But he did mark a couple of pages that he wanted to make sure you’d read.” He reached over and flipped the journal open where a small slip of paper had been stuck and I began to read.
W showed me the secret room behind the wall in the kitchen pantry. I had to wait until R went for a stroll with C because she cannot know about it. Everything that is special to me, my cat for instance, my favorite book, or my prettiest dress, she finds a way to destroy. So I have stopped sharing things with her, even this discovery of a secret room in a house she has lived in all of her life. I am glad she cannot see W, because then she would find some way to make him go away and I would be all alone.
W kept telling me to look harder, to find what he wants me to find, but all that I saw in the room was an empty sea captain’s chest. I think W is purposefully obtuse, wanting me to figure it out on my own. He says it is because of his shame, that he cannot stand to disappoint me by telling me what he did. He will only confess that what is in the room will be the thing that will illuminate the truth, and maybe even free him from his prison. But I need to solve this for myself—if only I could. I am so confused; W told me that he saved my life and that in return, I could save his.