I almost argued with her. Almost told her about the two tiny voices I heard echoing in the halls of this house at night. Perhaps they were here to complain, to demand to be heard.
I felt shaky thinking about it. I wanted nothing more than to get out of that barn, cook the pigeons, and be done with it. The sooner I got it over with, the quicker I could get on with my chores, finish my day, and escape the madness of this house and make the short walk down to the pub to see Liam.
“Your father has invited your aunts for dinner. I need to set the table and air out the rugs. I don’t have time for this right now,” I said, hoping she would let me leave without argument.
Lizzie shook her head quietly and said, “The rugs can wait.” Her fingers grazed over the handle of the bloody hatchet before moving on to Mr. Borden’s collection of handsaws. “And as for my stepmother’s eager sisters, I have no intention of sharing a meal with them.”
My eyes scanned the rest of the tools she’d assembled. There were dozens of them, from shovels, to axes, to hacksaws. I couldn’t imagine what Mr. Borden used them for. I’d never once seen him do anything even remotely handy, but they’d been hanging in this barn for as long as I’d been employed here.
“Did you know this is my Uncle John’s?” she asked as she held up a cleaver.
I nodded. I knew Mr. Morse had apprenticed as a butcher, still made use of his skills out on the Borden farm in Swansea. Why he had them stored here—in Mr. Borden’s barn—was beyond me.
“Uncle John wouldn’t have made such a mess. He would’ve killed them quick and proper.”
I wasn’t sure what proper was, but I didn’t doubt Mr. Morse’s skill; I had witnessed it firsthand when he brought back a salted lamb or pig from the Borden farm for me to cook.
“Now these are Daddy’s tools from when he built coffins,” she said, ignoring the question in my eyes as she yanked an old quilt off a trunk. I coughed at the cloud of dust she sent my way and backed up in search of clean air. I’d never opened these trunks. I’d been warned by Mr. Borden himself that what lay within was personal and not for the simple, pilfering mind of an Irish maid.
Lizzie took a hacksaw to the lock. She broke it clean off in one swing, then pried open the lid, the old leather squeaking as it protested the intrusion. One by one she pulled out the cloth-wrapped tools and laid them out on the ground as if setting out silver to be polished. My eyes were drawn to the dull, serrated teeth of a bone saw, and I reached out, oddly curious as to how and when it had been used.
Lizzie’s mouth twitched at the edges, and she picked it up, held it out to me like a present. “Go ahead, touch it.”
I did; I ran my fingers across the rusted steel. It was unusually cold for having been tucked down in that dark trunk and stored away in a barn that was hotter than the devil’s lair.
“You know what he uses them for, right?” she asked.
I shook my head, nearly positive I didn’t want to know.
“More than once, he’s created a coffin that didn’t quite fit. You know, measured wrong so that the box was too short for the body to be laid to rest inside.”
Lizzie picked up the saw and slowly ran it across the tips of her fingers. I watched as her skin pulled, indenting as bits of the blade dug into her pale skin. Never once did it slice through, not even a tiny nick or spot of blood. It was almost as if she handled them often, knew which spots were still razor sharp and how much pressure not to apply.
“‘Waste not, want not,’ Father always said.”
I’d never heard him say that, but Abigail Borden said it to me plenty of times. Every night as I cleaned up after supper she would repeat it, reminding me to save whatever was left for tomorrow’s midday meal. But I had no idea what eating two-day-old oysters had to do with coffins and bodies that were too long to fit.
“What are you saying, Lizzie?”
“I’m saying that he refused to throw away the coffins, wouldn’t even consider using the wood for the fire. Rather, he made the dead fit, cut off their feet if he had to, in order to get them inside.”
I paled at her words. So it was true.
“Have . . . have you actually seen him do that?” My voice trembled, my heart hammering away as I imagined it—Mr. Borden’s sweaty, suit-clad body sawing away at the limbs of some poor, deceased soul.
“I didn’t have to see him do it to know it’s true,” Lizzie huffed, swiping a stray tendril of sweaty hair from her forehead. “He’s admitted to it, even bragged about it to Uncle John.”
I recoiled, watching in horror as she pulled out the larger of the two saws. “See the teeth on this one? See how they’re farther apart? This is the one he uses to get through the bone. The smaller one slides through the muscle easier.”
“And this.” She crossed the barn to a metal table that was shoved into the corner. She dragged it over to where I stood, mice droppings falling to the ground below. “This was the table he used to size them on. You know, figure out exactly how big the coffin should be, then make adjustments if necessary.”
“Here?” I nearly gagged at that thought, wondering exactly how many dead souls had graced this house.
Lizzie laughed, somehow reading my thoughts. It was cold and empty, a bitter sound that left me feeling unsettled. “Not here, you silly child, and not in years.”
I didn’t take kindly to being called a silly child, or to being laughed at for that matter. “Why are you telling me this?”
Lizzie stopped, the tiny grin on her face disappearing, twisting into something akin to pity . . . or guilt. She reached out to touch me, and I flinched, angry and confused. “I wasn’t trying to scare you, Bridget,” she started, her voice soft and soothing, crooning almost like she did to her pigeons when she was trying to coax them into her hand to eat. “I want you to be safe. If you’re going to survive in this house, you’ve got to know who you’re truly living with. Nothing is sacred to my father, Bridget. Nothing.”
Shuddering, I inched back away from the saw, away from the horrible metal that had dug into the skin and bones of countless dead people. It was too much. The blood, the gleaming metal teeth of the saw, Mr. Borden’s cold eyes, and Lizzie’s peculiar behavior. I took three steps back, turned around to make sure she wasn’t following me, then ran back to the house, back to the kitchen full of hacked-up pigeons and walls that seemed to vibrate with unspoken cruelty.
Chapter 10
I hung my work skirts on the back of the door, taking care to smooth out any wrinkles I could with the palm of my hand. Not that it really mattered; the sticky air of my room would do as good a job as any iron. I didn’t have a lot of clothes—three dresses and two pairs of stockings, to be exact—but I put on the nicest of the three and headed out, hoping that Liam wouldn’t see me for the poor, plain Irish girl I was.
The flat Liam shared with his five brothers was where everyone tended to meet. They all worked together at the Borden Mill; all but the youngest, that is. Seamus was employed at the iron works, making nails. Rumor had it he’d applied at the mill too late, missed getting one of the last jobs they were handing out, but I didn’t buy it. I always assumed he wanted some space. If you ask me, Seamus purposely took up a job where Liam wasn’t always looking over his shoulder, reminding him to mind his place. I couldn’t blame him, not when I knew how it felt to be under a watchful eye twenty-four hours a day. Still, even if Seamus didn’t see it now, he would have been better off at the mill with his brothers. Fewer people seemed to get hurt there.
If I closed my eyes, I could almost imagine Liam there, his nimble fingers working with the fine thread that would eventually become sheeting. I’d never been in there myself, and he claimed I never would. Something about not wanting me to breathe the foul air. But I knew the truth. He didn’t want me to see what he’d become. How the son of a landowner in County Cork was now spinning thread for pennies an hour.
I groaned at the pinch in my aging corset, wishing I’d get around to saving the money I needed to buy a new one. Lizzie had
offered to get me one herself. When I refused, she’d tried to give me one of hers, even offered to help me alter it to fit my smaller frame. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I’d seen her corsets when I did the laundry. They were no better than mine.
The once white cloth of her undergarments was yellow, stained from the murky water of the wash. The bones of her corset were so sharp they shouldn’t touch the hide of a barnyard animal, let alone a woman of Miss Borden’s station. She’d asked her father for a new one a few times, requests he never gave in to. First, he’d laugh, then he’d yell, and then he’d stop talking to her altogether. It was a cycle I’d witnessed so many times I had it memorized, yet Lizzie had never learned how to make it play out differently.
I sighed, recalling an incident no more than a month back when Lizzie and Mr. Borden’s raised voices echoed off the walls.
“Who’s going to be seeing your corset, Lizzie?” Mr. Borden yelled, a telltale sign that she was pushing him to his limits.
“No one,” Lizzie snapped back. “Doesn’t mean I don’t deserve better than this, that I should have to suffer through the day only to go to bed with aches that never seem to dull.”
“A new corset would cost at least one dol—”
He went to argue, no doubt to tell her how frivolous she was being, when she held up her hand for him to stop. “Money you well have.”
I’d heard this argument a thousand times, the whole bit about Lizzie being denied luxuries the daughter of someone with her father’s wealth should enjoy. It used to bother me at first; I’d thought she was ungrateful, but not anymore. Not after listening to John Morse and Mr. Borden go over the rental incomes of his properties. Not after serving them tea as they went on about the farm’s profit or the interest the bank was paying on his savings. Mr. Borden could well afford a new corset for Lizzie; he simply didn’t want to.
“You have seven corsets, Lizzie. That’s five more than your mother had at your age, and dare I say, six more than you need.”
I watched Lizzie cringe at the mere mention of her mother, knew right then and there that any chance Mr. Borden had of backing her down peacefully was gone.
“Your precious Abigail has more corsets than she knows what to do with, but heaven forbid I have a new one.”
That was a lie, and I knew it. I took care of Mrs. Borden’s wash every Thursday afternoon. She had two corsets and they were in worse shape than Lizzie’s.
Mr. Borden laughed, a deep, sarcastic sound that reverberated off the parlor walls. Apparently he knew Lizzie’s words for the childish lie that they were. “Abigail is none of your concern. You need to focus on your charity work and preparing your Sunday school lessons. Worry more about making yourself useful around this house and stop dwelling on what you have or don’t have.”
An angry Lizzie I could tolerate. Even her yelling and carrying on like a spoiled child was easy to take. It was times like these, when she pushed all her emotions aside and spoke with a lethal calmness that made me nervous, made me fearful she was plotting something. Something that would have this house in disarray for weeks and me escaping to the dark attic until it passed.
I turned to leave, uncomfortable with the silence bleeding into the room and the tension in the air between her and Mr. Borden.
“That woman is not my mother,” Lizzie said, and both Mr. Borden and I turned around, following Lizzie’s line of sight to the back staircase. Lizzie knew Abigail Borden was standing there, had watched her stepmother pale at her words and then continued on anyway with absolutely no regard for her feelings. “Yet you treat her and her sisters with more affection than you do your own blood. You buy them houses to live in rent-free. But a corset for me, your very own daughter . . . that proves too expensive.”
Lizzie stormed from the parlor, the front door slamming behind her as she left. No doubt she was going to find Alice, complain to her one friend about how miserly her father was. What she missed was the sheen in Mrs. Borden’s eyes, the coins she had tucked in her hand, and the subtle way she tried to hide them in her dress pocket before Mr. Borden saw.
It wasn’t until the following Tuesday that I finally learned what Lizzie had planned. Mr. Borden was summoned to the Knox & Charlton Five and Ten Cent Store. Lizzie had gone in for a corset, put the new one on under her dress, and tried to hide her old one amongst the racks. When questioned, she dared the sales clerk to remove her dress and check for himself . . . a task that no sane man within ten miles of here would even attempt. Mr. Borden paid for the corset, even gave the clerk a little something extra to keep his mouth shut, but the news had made its way through the Hill and mills alike before the end of the day.
Embarrassment aside, Lizzie had won. She’d gotten her new corset at her father’s expense.
Chapter 11
The house was quiet as I slipped down the stairwell, every creak making me hold my breath for a moment before moving on. The last thing I wanted was to come across Mr. Borden on the way out. Especially after the pigeons. Something about the way his eyes lit on me lately made me anxious. They were dull, lifeless, like the very flame that ignited him when he was angry with Lizzie could also drain him down to nothing. Whatever demons he was fighting now, I didn’t want them directed at me.
The entrance to Liam’s flat was dim, the smoke-filled space so crowded I wasn’t sure I’d be able to make my way up the stairs to the third floor without toppling into somebody. One of the Dillon boys—a red-headed lad no more than fifteen years old—was already staggering around out front, drunker than a skunk. That was no surprise; the whiskey was always flowing here.
“Bridget!” A squeal pierced through the noise, and I swiveled on my heel, grateful to see Minnie barreling through the crowd. True, she lived and worked next door to me, but lately it seemed as if our paths only crossed here at Liam’s. I missed our talks; she was my one true link to my past.
Her cheeks were flushed and her hair fell to her shoulders in wild, untamed curls. I wasn’t quite sure what she was doing, but from the rosy glow of her cheeks, I wagered she was having fun.
She pulled up next to me and locked her arm through mine. I gave her a squeeze, grateful to see a familiar face. She was the one person I’d managed to stay in contact with since we landed in New York. We’d been friends in Ireland, our bond only growing stronger when we were forced to bunk together with a dozen other unwed girls in the bowels of that ship. I’d learned quickly that an excess of time and a lack of space can either draw you close or drive you insane. For Minnie and me . . . well, it made us the best of friends.
“Have you seen Liam?” I asked.
Minnie shook her head. “No, but I’ve been outside with Seamus all night so I wouldn’t know.”
She dropped her gaze, fingering the edge of one of her dingy skirts as she waited for me to start in on her again. I studied her face, the hint of a smile still there. I knew that look, had seen it on her face multiple times in the last year. Minnie was pretty, beautiful even. Her long, slender frame and high cheekbones definitely didn’t go unnoticed by the neighborhood boys, including Seamus.
I sucked in another breath of stifling air and bit my tongue to keep from saying something I’d regret. Minnie was a year younger than me, and Seamus was blathered. There wouldn’t be a rational thought between the two of them tonight, more like an abundance of childish whims. I loved Minnie but didn’t want to see her on the next ship back to Ireland. Without money, without a solid plan, she’d lose her station in the States and have to go back to her da. A da I wasn’t sure would welcome another mouth to feed. Again.
“Liam has other brothers, Minnie. Other friends who aren’t so . . .”
Every time I’d run into Seamus he was pretty much soaked. Doubt that boy made it a few hours without taking to the bottle, and I had no idea how long he could continue supporting himself, let alone Minnie should she find herself with child.
She laughed and shook her head. I could tell her every sordid detail I’d heard Liam rattle off abo
ut his youngest brother, but it wouldn’t matter. Not me, not Liam, I doubt even Seamus himself could change her opinion of him.
A pair of strong arms were suddenly around me, yanking me from my thoughts and into the smoke-filled air. I whirled around, met Liam’s bright blue eyes, and smiled.
“I didn’t think you were coming.” He tossed me a lazy grin, one I couldn’t help but return. Even with ale on his breath and a day’s worth of sweat coating his skin, he was hard to resist.
I shrugged. Originally, I’d had no intention of coming. I planned to spend the evening in the spare bedroom mending the seams of Mrs. Borden’s dresses. But things were deathly calm in that house. Lizzie had refused to come down for dinner, had informed everyone—John Morse and Mrs. Borden’s sisters alike—that she’d no longer be taking meals with the family.
I’d served the pigeons as Mr. Borden instructed, his wife’s sisters complimenting the tenderness of the meat. The thought of it, watching them slice into Lizzie’s pets, made me sick, and I’d left the room, claiming I was feeling ill. I’d snuck back down and finished the dishes once they’d retired to the parlor. There wasn’t much in the way of leftovers, and I didn’t bother saving any. I tossed it all into the back alley and hoped a stray dog or an orphan would devour the remaining pieces. At least then I’d be rid of them for good and could put the blood and the bones and the bits of flesh out of my mind.
Eventually, Lizzie would have to come downstairs, if only for the fact that she’d hadn’t eaten before I left. I’d left her a plate—some bread and jam I had left over from breakfast—but I didn’t want to be there when she finally emerged from her self-imposed exile. Selfishly, I didn’t want to listen to her stories or have to lie and tell her it would all be okay.
“Lizzie and Mr. Borden were . . .”
“Having words?” Liam finished for me, and I nodded. “I warrant those two are always having words of some sort or another.”
“Not always,” I said, trying hard to remember the last time things seemed peaceful, when Lizzie’s wasn’t talking about how her father’s miserly ways reflected poorly on her station or challenging her father’s authority. Sure, things had been quiet today, but in the Borden house, quiet and peaceful didn’t always co-exist.
Sweet Madness Page 5