The woman nodded. Her face was very pale. "You have been good to me, Abigail. I'll not forget this. I'll repay you."
"Hush. I need nothing. Save your strength."
"It comes," she gasped, her head thrashing on the pillow. "Again it comes. For the love of God, why does it pain me so? It never has before." She took Abigail's hands in a bone-crushing grip.
"You've never birthed twins before. Push, Jane."
"Now. I feel him, now, Abigail."
Reclaiming her hands, she pushed the woman's thighs apart, and saw that it was true. A dark head hovered at the edge of the womb. "He's here," she said softly. "Push once more and your child will be born."
With a mighty effort, Jane pushed and in a surge of blood and birth water, the infant, a male, smaller than his sister, fell into Abigail's hands.
Immediately, she knew that something was wrong. The child was limp and strangely blue. Quickly, using her finger, she cleared the baby's mouth, turned him over and whacked him firmly on the back, hoping for the thin, reassuring cry that signified life. Still, there was nothing.
Jane sat up. "What is it? Why does he not cry?" She wrung her hands. "If one is to die, why can it not be the girl? Samuel so wanted a boy."
Abigail ignored her. Quickly, she sat down. Laying the infant on her lap, she began to knead the tiny chest, no bigger than Margaret's palm. Still nothing. Panic rose in her chest. Bending close to the baby's mouth, she forced it open and blew in a stream of air.
"My babe," Jane sobbed from the bed. "Is my babe dead?"
Abigail continued to knead and blow, keeping up the pressure and the steady bursts of air.
The door opened. Judith's head appeared. "Mama?" Margaret followed her, ducking her head under her sister's arm to stand inside the room.
"Not now," their mother said sharply. "You have no place here. Go until I call for you."
Judith would have obeyed, but Margaret did not. Stepping close to her mother, she stared down at the gray-skinned infant. Curious, Judith followed her, Together they watched their mother, their eyes moving from her laboring hands to her pursed lips, to no avail.
Suddenly, Margaret reached out and took the infant's foot in her hand. Abigail was too preoccupied to protest. Was that a flutter she felt beneath her fingers? A grain of hope began to grow within her. She renewed her efforts.
Margaret kept her grip on the child's foot.
Slowly, the baby's color changed. Beginning at the point where Margaret's fingers touched his skin, a faint pink glow began to travel up his limbs to his belly and chest, filling his cheeks and head. Then, unbelievably, he began to cough.
Tears of relief ran down Abigail's cheeks. The child would live after all. She turned to look at Jane Jacobs, words of congratulations leaping to her lips.
She was staring at Margaret, a look of horror on her face. "Who is this child," she whispered, "who can raise the dead to life again?"
Abigail's heart heaved. Think, her mind screamed, think and speak easily. "She did no such thing, Jane Jacobs. She is a child. What happened here today was foresworn. 'T'was God's own plan."
"No. It was you," Jane accused her. "You are the one."
Abigail held out the child. "Here. Take your son. Be grateful. You have daughters enough."
Jane shrank back. "I will not. He carries Satan's mark."
Abigail frowned. "He is an innocent child, your own son. How can you refuse him?"
"I'll not touch him. Take him away."
Rage exploded in Abigail's forehead. "I would barter with Satan himself for the life of my son. What kind of mother are you?"
Before she could respond, the door opened again and Goodman Jacobs peered into the room. "Is it over?" he asked. "I heard a babe's cry."
His wife pointed a shaking finger at Abigail. "She does the devil's work. Our boy was dead. She brought him back to life."
"Your wife bore two children this day," Abigail said wearily. "A boy and a girl. The boy wasn't breathing. I forced air into his lungs. Jane claims 't'was witchcraft that saved him." She shook her head. "T'was nothing more than common sense."
The man frowned. He looked from his wife to the cradle beside the bed, to the newborn, now swaddled, in Abigail's arms. "A boy did you say?"
"Aye," replied Abigail, "your son."
"Then give him to me." He removed the child from Abigail's arms and peered curiously into the tiny squalling face. Long seconds passed and then he smiled. "If the Lord sees fit to send us a son after a houseful of girls, I'll not give credit to the devil." He looked sternly at his wife. "Calm yourself, Jane, and rest. You've had a difficult time of it. All will be well when you are up and about." He grinned. "T'is not everyday a man can boast for having twins."
Abigail breathed a sigh of relief. For now, they were safe. Jane Jacob's accusations would go no further than this room. It was the misery of her labor that caused it. How absurd for the woman to believe that anyone, even a witch, could bring the dead back to life.
Chapter 25
Somehow, Maggie made it home. Susannah hadn't wanted her to leave but she'd insisted. There was too much to take in. She needed time alone, to think about the events as Susannah had explained them.
Maggie had no memory of the drive home, of inserting her key in the lock, feeding the cat, exchanging her shoes for slippers, lighting the fire, wrapping an afghan around her shoulders and crawling into her favorite corner of the couch. She kept clear of the spinning wheel and forced herself to focus her thoughts.
In a way, she'd asked for this by contacting Susannah in the first place. No one who wanted to remain on the outside would do what she'd done: give up her life, relocate to Salem, the soul and memory of the spirit world in America, set up a shop that dealt in ancient remedies, contact a witch to direct her journey into the past. The nature and clarity of her visions had given her a heads up that her findings would breach the supernatural. Maggie had always known that it might turn out like this, that something radical and shocking would come out of her search.
Now, when it appeared that the answers to her questions were unveiling themselves, she refused to accept where the journey led. The truth of the matter was, she was terrified. The very idea that she had been thrown into this world by chance, that she belonged to another one, long gone, but still existing, a contradiction in itself, was impossible for her mind to accept. How could she? This was the twenty-first century, a world based on the scientific principles of medicine, astronomy, physics, relativity and so much more. The suspicions, the religious dogma, the wives' tales, the lack of hygiene, the subjugation of women, the mystical smoke and mirrors of the world in which Susannah claimed she and Maggie belonged were too freakish to imagine. No one in her right mind would go back to such a place, even if it was possible. Not that she believed for a minute that it was. Dreams were one thing, but the transfer of matter to the fifth dimension was quite another.
She didn't actually disbelieve Susannah Davies. Too many circumstances lined up to be completely coincidental. Maybe the woman was a descendent, a look alike, of Abigail March. Maybe she was Maggie's birth mother and had given her up to Annie. Maybe she was just unbalanced and confused. Maggie shivered. She couldn't think of anyone less confused than Susannah. There were ways of verifying stories, of course. Maggie was good at research. She wasn't going to simply accept someone's irrational ramblings as the truth. Meanwhile, there was Holly to consider. She had to rid her mind of Abigail March and replace it with Holly.
The bell to her residence sounded in the hallway. Maggie ignored it. She couldn't face anyone just now. It rang again and then again. After the third ring, the caller knocked firmly and then called out. "Maggie, it's Penny Hillyard. If you're home, please answer the door." Her voice cracked.
Maggie, always a soft touch when it came to human misery, hurried to the door and opened it. Penny stumbled into her arms. "Oh, Maggie," she sobbed. "I can't bear it. I just can't."
"Hush," Maggie whispered, holding the woman close.
"You poor thing. I'm so sorry, Penny. Come in and sit down. I'll brew a fresh pot of tea and you can cry all you want."
Moments later, Penny, wrapped in Maggie's afghan and sustained with a cup of rose hips tea, was relaying the events of the last few hours. "He said it wasn't my fault, but it really is. I'm the one who dropped her off early without checking to see if Scott was home."
Maggie frowned. "What are you talking about?"
"I dropped Holly at home early. She came back out and waved, our signal to let me know everything is ok. Scott's always home, even when I'm late. I wouldn't leave her if he wasn't."
"I don't see how you can blame yourself for that." Maggie pitched her voice at its most reasonable. "Why do you think Holly would give you the all clear when her dad wasn't home?"
Penny shook her head. "I don't know."
Maggie thought. Her mind, honed by experience, created and discarded scenarios. In the end she was left with only one. "Holly wanted you to leave so she could do something or go somewhere she wasn't allowed."
Penny swallowed. "Do you think so? It doesn't sound like Holly."
"Think hard, Penny. Did she mention something, anything that you wouldn't allow her to do?"
"That would be Scott's department, not mine. I'm not much for refusing Holly. She's the one who disapproves of me."
Maggie barely heard her. There was something forming in her mind, something she couldn't quite put together.
"The police detective said you were a clairvoyant," Penny continued. "He said he asked you to help and you refused. I didn't believe him. Why would you not want to help Holly?"
Maggie gave up on her illusive thought and turned all her attention on Penny. "I suppose you could call me a clairvoyant," she said carefully, "and I did work for several police departments. As for helping, it's a little more complicated than just wanting to."
"I don't understand."
"Where Holly is concerned, I don't see anything."
"Why not?"
"I'm not sure. It's not something I can control. I'd like nothing more than to help you find Holly, but that isn't the way it works."
"Tell me how it works."
Maggie sighed and leaned back into the cushions, closing her eyes. Maybe this was her fate. Maybe she should give up resisting what always seemed to pull her back in.
"It's like this—" The doorbell rang again. Grateful for the reprieve, Maggie hurried to answer it. Lillian Hillyard stood on the steps, her face lined with pain. "Hello, Maggie," she said softly. "I've come to prevail upon you—, no, I'm begging you to help my granddaughter."
Maggie reached out and drew Lillian into the house and then into her arms. "Penny is here," she said. "I was just explaining the process." She stepped back. "Come into the living room. I'll pour you a cup of tea and make something more substantial if you can eat at all."
"Hi, Lilly." Penny patted the sofa beside her. "I guess we both ended up in the same place."
Lilly sat down and dropped her head into her hands. "All I could think about was to come here. I was home, pacing and pacing. I couldn't concentrate. Then that nice Detective Costello came back and told me about Maggie." She looked up, her eyes blurred with tears. "I couldn't believe you would refuse to help."
Maggie shook her head. "He misunderstood. I'm not refusing to help. It's that I can't help. The mind is much more complicated than a computer. I can't just log on and everything becomes clear. I can't see Holly's abductor. I can't feel anything from Holly at all."
"What does that mean?" Penny whispered.
"I don't know."
"Is Holly—" Lilly couldn't finish.
"It doesn't mean that at all," replied Maggie. She sat down, her arms tight around her knees. "Listen to me, please. I'd do anything to find Holly. You have to believe that. But there are complications. I'm in the middle of something that's preventing me from accessing the part of my brain that makes it possible for me to profile abductors. I'm trying to remedy that. I don't know if I can, or even if that something is the reason I'm frozen. Maybe I'm blank because I gave up everything to come here, sort of a mental retribution. I know it sounds ridiculous, but if you think about it, the very nature of what I do, what I did, is ridiculous for most people. What I need right now is privacy and your patience." She made a mental note to call Mike Costello and tell him what she thought of his professionalism and his strong-arm tactics. She smiled at Lilly, a lined version of her granddaughter. "Now, would you like a cup of tea and something to eat?"
Lilly nodded. "Tea, please. I couldn't eat anything."
When they were together again, Maggie asked the question they'd all managed to avoid. "How is Scott holding up?"
"He's a mess," Penny replied promptly
"How does he feel about using my help?"
Penny hesitated.
Maggie prodded her. "Am I right in assuming he's against it?"
"I told him I would ask you. He said to do whatever I wanted. Scott can be very stubborn, Maggie. Please don't think he would hold it against you."
Maggie stared into the fire. She would definitely think it, and she would be right. Scott wouldn't thank her for a number of things, one of which was holding back the true nature of her previous profession. His feelings about the metaphysical were made abundantly clear the first time he stepped inside her kitchen. The possibility of moving forward together would be forever buried if she played a part in the investigation. Maggie liked Scott Hillyard. She was attracted to him and she respected him. Even more than that, during their morning runs, they had reached out with tentative antennas of friendship. It was the latter she was most afraid of losing and lose it she would. There wasn't a prayer of a chance otherwise. But, if she could help Holly, the result would be worth the cost. It couldn't be any other way. She'd made countless such decisions in the last fifteen years, usually at the price of social isolation. This would be the first time she'd become personally involved. Her smile didn't reach her eyes. "Scott is a friend. Naturally, I would like him on board, but if he isn't, I won't let that interfere. Meanwhile, I have to work at breaking through this fog."
Lilly stood. "You said you needed privacy. Penny and I will leave you alone. Let us know if we can do anything to help."
* * *
On the harbor side of town, Susannah Davies had come to a final, agonizing decision. Until Maggie's past had played itself through, there would be no progress, not in her original purpose, to find and return her daughter to the world in which she was born, nor in the case of Holly Hillyard. Susannah knew she took a terrible risk. For every action there is a reaction. Time had moved on without Margaret March. The slightest decision made, the people she would have touched, the children she might have had did not exist. By returning her to the past, Susannah would alter the course of history. It was a dreadful responsibility, but to do otherwise would be a fate too terrible to contemplate. It would mean Maggie was forever lost to her, a missing part of her life, never to be recovered, as final and irrevocable as death. She couldn't bear it. Something had to be done. She would cast a spell. If nothing came of it, no one would be the wiser.
Setting the green crystal on the table, she gathered her ingredients: witchhazel, five-finger grass, a bay leaf, a small package of black Sculpey clay, one piece each of gold, silver and black ribbon, a small round cookie cutter, a toothpick and a mortar and pestle. She chanted as she worked:
Into this stone, before her eyes
Bless my child, charge her power to rise
Send her home to find her fate
Show her the way before 'T'is too late
With her mortar and pestle she ground the witchhazel into the five-finger grass and bay leaf, focusing her mind on protection and safe travel. Kneeding the herbs and gel into the clay, she formed it into a small ball. Then she rolled it out and cut out a circle with the cookie cutter, a circle for the wheels of travel. With the toothpick she inscribed the day of departure, the final day of the portal, on one side. She left the other side blank.
There would be no returning. Instead, she carved a sigil out of the runes of Raido, Teiwaz and Laguz, symbols to protect Maggie on land, air and sea. Carefully, she poked a hole in the top of the talisman, placed it in her preheated oven and began braiding the pieces of ribbon together, chanting under her breath:
On Maggie's journey and in her travels
This will protect her and won't unravel
Danger and harm from her doth turn
From the date of departure, never mind her return
She was finished. There was nothing more to be done.
* * *
Later, after Maggie closed and locked the door behind her visitors, she leaned against the frame, deep in thought. Something had surfaced in her memory, a hazy shape, still unformed. Closing her eyes, she concentrated. The color green flooded her senses, a pale celery green, backlit with shards of ivory. The shape materialized and took form, the edges sharpening into facets. Bingo. Her eyes opened. It was the crystal, the one she'd found in the box of Annie's cremains, the one she'd zipped into her handbag and completely forgotten for all this time.
Maggie ran up the stairs into the spare room, and opened the armoire. Pushing aside the belts and scarves, she found the purse she was looking for. With trembling fingers, she unzipped the pocket and pulled out the crystal. It was warm to the touch, growing warmer by the second. The shape began to pulse and change in her hand, forming star-like points. Voices, unintelligible whispers, rose from the center, becoming louder, chanting louder and louder. Incredibly, she knew the voice, she heard the words:
Into this stone, before her eyes
Bless my child, charge her power to rise
Send her home to find her fate
Show her the way before 'T'is too late
"No," she said firmly, resisting the pull. "I'm not going there. I belong here. I'm needed here." The chanting intensified. Show her the way before 'T'is too late. Show her the way...
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