We Hear the Dead

by Dianne K. Salerni

  I dressed in one of my new mourning gowns for his visit, knowing that the significance of my “widow’s weeds” would not escape his shrewd notice. Mrs. Walters and I received him in the parlor alone, as I had decided that the complication of Mother’s or Kate’s presence was unnecessary. Kate was unhappy to be excluded, but I knew she would not refrain from sharpening her tongue on the man who had treated me so shabbily. And Mother would be bewildered and hurt by the derision of the Kane family representative.

  Mr. Kane greeted us perfunctorily and seated himself, crossing his legs with a mannerism that so resembled Elisha it caused a painful stab in my heart. Then he looked up with his cold, hooded eyes and the similarity, thankfully, disappeared. To no one’s surprise, he began by announcing he was unable to deliver the money bequeathed to me in Elisha’s will.

  “My brother did not have five thousand dollars when he passed away,” Robert Kane explained. “He was entirely dependent on my father’s allowance for his living expenses. I am afraid that the money bestowed upon you in his last-minute codicil does not exist.”

  “What about his book?” I asked.

  “The book has not yet been published. If there were any cash advances, they have all been spent.”

  “Dr. Kane must have believed the money would come from somewhere,” I said reasonably. “He was hardly likely to change his will on the morning of his departure to bequeath a sum of money he did not have.”

  “Perhaps he did it to satisfy some person’s demand,” Kane said blandly, “not believing the will would ever be put into effect. I do not think he expected to die on that trip, Miss Fox.”

  “Your implication is clear, Mr. Kane,” Mrs. Walters broke in, “although completely wrong.”

  For just a moment, Kane looked as surprised as if a mouse in the corner of the room had decided to speak. Mrs. Walters flushed nervously, but pushed up her spectacles and looked at him defiantly. She had resented Mr. Kane ever since he made me sign that document denying my engagement, and she had a few pent-up opinions to express.

  “Miss Fox never made any demands on Dr. Kane, although he had raised and dashed her hopes repeatedly. You may not have known how sick he was when he left here last October, but I can assure you that he did. He was worried and frightened enough to arrange an impromptu marriage on the eve of his departure. He then took the sensible precaution of providing for his new wife in the event that the worst came to pass.”

  Recovering from his consternation at this unexpected outburst, Kane composed his features into their normal expressionless mask and said, “Ah, yes, this so-called marriage ceremony, done without benefit of magistrate, minister, or document. Did you witness it, Mrs. Walters?” He reached into his coat pocket and removed a small daybook, opening it with a gesture very like his brother. Again I closed my eyes and tried not to dwell upon their close resemblance.

  “I am afraid I did not witness it, Mr. Kane,” Mrs. Walters confessed. “I had already retired for the evening. But I heard all about it the next morning.”

  “From my brother?” he asked, making note in his book.

  “No, from Miss Fox, and then later from her mother and sister.”

  “Miss Fox’s mother and sister are the only witnesses, then,” he confirmed. At Mrs. Walters’s affirmation, he turned suddenly to me and asked, “Was the marriage consummated following this ceremony?”

  I was shocked into breathlessness by the effrontery of his question and could barely speak to object. “That is certainly not a matter for discussion!”

  “No, I am afraid it has a certain legal significance,” he persisted. “Did you behave as his wife?”

  Flushing with mortification, I cast my eyes down in the semblance of modesty while I frantically considered my answer. To say no might lessen the legality of the marriage, but to say yes would damage my reputation if the marriage was struck down. Appearance was more important than truth here, and only I knew the truth anyway, now that Elisha was gone.

  Robert Kane waited patiently for my answer, no doubt enjoying my delicate dilemma. Thankfully, I was saved from a reply by an unlikely source.

  “No cohabitation is necessary for the marriage to be legal,” Mrs. Walters piped up. Elisha’s brother turned his head and stared at her as if the mouse in the room had now climbed up his trouser leg and bitten his finger. My brave little friend was flushed bright pink, her hands twisted together with nervousness, but she cleared her throat and continued. “I inquired last week with a lawyer who attends my church.” She glanced at me and drew strength from my grateful smile. “He told me that Dr. Kane knew what he was doing. The common-law ceremony is still recognized in this state, and Miss Fox’s mother and sister are perfectly legal witnesses.”

  “Legal, perhaps,” sniffed Mr. Kane, “but not necessarily believable. The problem is credibility. My brother never expressed to his family any intention of marrying Miss Fox, nor gave any indication that he had already done so, and I was with him up until his very death.”

  It was a hurtful statement, perhaps meant to bait me. I wanted to rail at him and vent my anguish. I would have been there too, had you not thwarted me at every turn, forbidden our match, and diverted my communication in Havana! But I knew that it was a useless protest and had steeled myself against it before his arrival. A true lady might be forgiven for losing her temper; a woman who had risen up through the lower classes to present herself as a lady did not have that luxury.

  Instead, with great self-control, I replied evenly, “I think you will find he stated his intentions to your aunt, Miss Eliza Leiper. And she is under the distinct impression that he informed his parents as well.”

  Mr. Kane simply regarded me impassively. “I am very sorry, Miss Fox, but I cannot corroborate that. Perhaps you do not know that my aunt passed away suddenly over a month ago.”

  That was shocking enough to get a reaction out of me, no matter how I had hardened my heart to this man. I gasped out loud and pressed my fingers to my lips in distress. Miss Leiper, dead? While I lay in my bed and languished in my grief, she had died? For a long moment, I was too distraught to speak. Poor Miss Leiper, that dear lady!

  “The Pattersons,” I whispered finally, my last hope for a friendly welcome among this cold and forbidding family.

  “The Pattersons,” he echoed. “The Pattersons never believed my brother would marry you. It seems they knew him a good deal better than you did. I am afraid that Elisha was known in his youth as something of a ladies’ man…”

  My heart was thudding painfully in my breast, but I carefully modulated my voice to a firm evenness. “You will not twist my memory of him, Mr. Kane. I am already familiar with your talent for distorting the truth, and I was also warned by your aunt that you were a ‘detestable’ man.” Here I leaned slightly forward and kept my tone as sweet as honey. “When I repeated that to Elisha, he laughed and agreed.”

  There may have been a flicker, just a fleeting moment, where his eyes widened in reaction, and I felt rewarded for my small and petty tit for tat. I continued while I felt an advantage. “Besides, Mr. Kane, I have dozens of letters in which your brother discusses our engagement and our intended marriage. There is even one that addresses me as his wife. So do not pretend that you knew his mind better than I did.”

  We glared at each other in hearty dislike for a second or two, and then Kane cleared his throat and returned to his professional demeanor. “Returning to the matter at hand, I am afraid that you will be disappointed in your expectations, Miss Fox. I am unable to honor my brother’s bequest to you, but I can offer you a small settlement from my own funds—five hundred dollars—under the condition that you hand over all of Dr. Kane’s correspondence and retract this fanciful tale of a common-law marriage.”

  I should not have been surprised. He had tried to acquire them once before. Still, I shook my head in disbelief. “You cannot have Elisha’s letters. They are all I have
left of him.”

  “Come now, Miss Fox, that is not true. I can see from here that you have a diamond bracelet, purchased at great expense with my father’s money, and a locket that once belonged to my grandmother. I am sure you can get a pretty penny for the bracelet, although I would request that you consult me before selling the locket. I would give you more than a pawnshop, seeing as it is a treasured family heirloom.”

  I placed a hand protectively over the locket, staring at him in wide-eyed shock. “I think it is time you left,” I whispered.

  He rose but made no move toward the door. Closing his little daybook and slipping it back inside his coat, he said, “You have no hold on our family, Miss Fox. We do not recognize any contract of marriage between you and my late brother. If you take your claims to the courts or to the press, or if you try to make public my brother’s letters, we shall take legal action against you.”

  “Make public the letters…” I repeated incredulously. “Is that what you think of me? Those are personal and deeply private letters, Mr. Kane. I would not sell them to anyone…least of all you. You mistake me for…for someone like yourself, a hard-hearted and vile individual with no human feeling at all!”

  I rose from my chair and pierced him with an imperious glare. “You shame yourself, sir, in this callous betrayal of your brother’s wishes. I am Elisha’s wife…in the eyes of God and the law. You cannot unmake that sacred bond. Not by wishing it away, and not by intimidation!”

  His mouth twisted in an ironic smirk. He turned and bowed politely to Mrs. Walters, who was huffing indignantly at him, then replaced his hat on his head and started for the door. He strode past me as though I were a house servant unworthy of notice, without acknowledgment or farewell.

  Mrs. Walters was up and out of her seat in the blink of an eye. “Oh, Maggie,” she gasped, taking my two hands in her own, “what a horrid man! I hope I did not speak out of turn…”

  “No, Ellen,” I assured her, giving her a grateful hug even though I was trembling with belated reaction from head to toe. “You were wonderful!”

  “Forgive me, dear,” she said, “for I know how much you loved Dr. Kane, but his brother is a nasty piece of work! And from his behavior I would conclude that the rest of his family is not much better!”

  “I was warned as much,” I murmured, clasping my cold hands to my bosom and gripping Elisha’s locket.

  Yes, I had been amply warned.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Maggie

  I did not lack for advice. Everyone had some sort of opinion on what I should do next. It seemed that in the whole of my life, there had always been someone telling me what to do. At last, I had reached the end of my tolerance for it.

  Mrs. Walters asked her lawyer acquaintance from church to call upon me and offer his professional counsel. He kindly waived his consulting fee in exchange for a slice of Mrs. Walters’s chiffon cake and a cup of tea. I do not know what he thought of his side of the bargain, but for my part, I found his advice singularly unappetizing.

  “I think you should take Mr. Kane’s offer,” he said, with no hesitation or preamble. “Mind you, the Kanes can do better than five hundred dollars. I would not accept less than twenty percent of the original legacy. Nor would I turn the letters over directly to Mr. Kane. Rather, you should place them in trust with a person or bank agreed upon by both parties.”

  “But you said the marriage contract was legally binding,” I objected.

  The lawyer raised a finger. “That is true, but you would have to prove it actually occurred. The executor of Dr. Kane’s estate is not going to acknowledge the marriage, because you might then claim more than the original five-thousand-dollar legacy. There may be nothing in the estate at present, but when Dr. Kane’s book is published, I think you can anticipate that its value will substantially appreciate. I fear that the Kanes would be willing to spend rather more money than you have at your disposal to prevent you from gaining control of that estate.”

  “Oh, Mr. Blake,” exclaimed Mrs. Walters, “that seems so unjust! If she is entitled to more…”

  The gentleman shook his head regretfully. “I cannot recommend that a young woman in Miss Fox’s circumstances attempt to best a family like the Kanes in court. It would be of no great difficulty for them to drag the case on for years, until Miss Fox’s resources are expired. Consider as well that the marriage may be legally binding but not socially acceptable. There are many people who equate the term ‘common-law wife’ with ‘mistress,’ if you will excuse my use of that vulgar term. In my opinion, good ladies, it would be in Miss Fox’s best interests to strike an agreement with the Kanes over the inheritance and drop the matter of the marriage, lest she damage her future prospects. When given a choice between money and the good opinion of society, a lady must always choose her reputation.”

  Ah, better poor than dishonored. Not a surprising bit of advice, coming from a man and given to a woman!

  ***

  Honestly, I did not know what path my life should take. I was cast adrift among equally dismal futures. My father wrote and asked me to return to Hydesville now that my prospects for marriage had been disappointed, no doubt hoping I would spend my spinsterhood keeping house for him. Mother wanted me to forget my “Quaker marriage,” as she called it, and find some respectable Methodist husband—although I could not see myself as anyone but Elisha’s wife, today, tomorrow, or ever.

  One day during this time of uncertainty, I returned from a morning at church, where I failed to find an answer to my troubles, and discovered Mrs. Walters quite worried over a visitor who had come in my absence. I removed my hat and veil with a listless lack of emotion while she dithered incomprehensibly.

  “I told him I wasn’t sure it was the best thing,” she said. “You have been so much calmer, and I would not like to see you upset again! But it’s not my place to turn him away. Maybe it will do you some good, but I am quite afraid—”

  “Who is it, Ellen?” I asked, hardly caring. I walked around her before she could bring herself to express an answer and entered the parlor. It was William Morton, seated with his hat in his hand and two packages at his feet.

  Two opposite emotions gripped me at once. Dread and longing made a painful vise around my poor, afflicted heart. This man had come to tell me Elisha’s last story.

  He rose politely at my entrance and greeted me simply. “It is good to see you, Mrs. Kane.”

  I caught my breath, taken by surprise, and my eyes filled unexpectedly with tears. Mrs. Kane. He knew, of course. He was the one person Elisha would have trusted with this secret.

  Morton was distressed to see me burst into tears. He looked apprehensively at Mrs. Walters, who promptly chastised him. “I told you!”

  “No, please!” I said hastily. “I will compose myself. Be seated, Mr. Morton. I…I am glad that you have come.”

  I sat opposite him, my eye immediately drawn toward the packages. One was a small bundle of letters; the other was twelve inches square and wrapped in an old sheet.

  “The last thing I want to do is upset you, Mrs. Kane,” the young man said with a wary look at Mrs. Walters, who seated herself discreetly, as always, in the corner. “But I felt it was my duty to come…it is the last duty I can do for him, in fact.”

  I nodded and blotted at my eyes with a handkerchief. “I cannot promise that there will be no tears, Mr. Morton. But there are some things I must know. I cannot live without knowing them.”

  “His thoughts were with you to the last, I can assure you.”

  “Please…he did not think I had abandoned him?” I begged shamelessly. “I had a letter from him…it said he had received no letters and asked why I did not come to him…” I fumbled to retrieve it from my reticule. I had it with me always, unable to leave my guilt behind.

  Morton looked puzzled as he accepted the note from my hand, and his brow creased when he saw th
e coarsely shaped letters and poor spelling. “It must have been a servant at the hotel who wrote this for him,” he mused. “I did not know of it, and I was with him nearly always. His mother was also with him most of the time, but he clearly sent this out secretly.” Elisha’s secretary raised his eyes to me. “I would have spared you the pain of this if I could. Do not think he was accusing you—or that he thought you had not written. We knew your letters had gone missing. I think—the person who wrote this just did not understand what Dr. Kane was trying to say.”

  “Because he did not speak the language?”

  “Because…” the young man sighed and then went on with great reluctance. “Because the doctor suffered a stroke aboard ship en route to Havana. By the time we reached Cuba, he had lost the use of all four limbs and was able to speak only with great difficulty.”

  I cried then. I could not help it. Ellen quickly moved from her accustomed place in the corner and sat beside me, lending her strength with one arm about my shoulders. But Morton was committed now to telling the tale and struggled onward, as if climbing through drifts in the Arctic. There was little good to it: a rough Atlantic crossing, damp weather and the soot of London, doctors consulting and disagreeing while Elisha became ever weaker. Switzerland was swapped for Cuba, and my husband boarded this second ship on a stretcher, too ill to walk. Still, he directed Morton to write none of this to me, not wishing to worry or alarm me.

  “He was convinced even then that he would recover,” Morton said. “He planned to send for you in Cuba, hoping that he would have regained some of his strength by the time you arrived. He directed me to find a seaside hotel, but everything changed after his stroke. I ordered a telegram sent to you by way of the American consulate on our arrival. It was lost—or canceled, I suppose. I did not know that you had been left uninformed until you telegraphed me.