The Shape of Mercy

by Susan Meissner

  I closed my eyes. “Stigma.”

  “Stigma, sí. She let him go. She turned him down. And then she never found another man who loved her like he did. The gardener’s son had done nothing wrong. Nothing. But he was Japanese. Now that is a sad story.”

  We stood at my car, but neither one of us got in.

  “After the war, did she see him again?” I asked, though I think I knew already Abigail hadn’t.

  “I don’t know. My mama didn’t think so. Abigail was alone in that house with her father for twenty years before she met Edward. I think she had given up on marriage. Then Edward came along and, ay yi yi, nothing but trouble.”

  “So Abigail doesn’t know what became of the gardener’s son?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Such a wasted life. No wonder reading the diary was too painful for Abigail. Mercy’s life had been wasted too, but in a completely different way.

  “What was his name?” I asked. “Do you know?”

  “How come you want to know?” I shrugged.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Give me your cell phone.”

  I handed it to her across the car. Esperanza punched in a few numbers and a few seconds later began speaking in rapid Spanish. I understood only a few words. Mama, Abigail, novio. Boyfriend. She hung up and handed the phone back to me.

  “Mama remembered his name. It was Tomoharu Kimura. Miss Abigail called him Tom.”

  A few minutes later, we were at Abigail’s front door, letting ourselves in.

  “I’ll go see if she is sleeping. You wait, okay?” Esperanza took the stairs.

  I wandered into the library and saw that Abigail had removed the box that held the diary. She must have put it away.

  The laptop was gone too.

  That surprised me. The transcription hadn’t been proofed yet. I had only just finished it. It was probably littered with typos and grammatical mistakes.

  A tiny sliver of fear worked its way through my body as I stood there looking at the empty writing desk. No diary. No laptop.

  And no thumb drive.

  Abigail what have you done?

  I heard hurried footsteps on the stairs. A moment later, Esperanza appeared at the doorway to the library and confirmed what I suddenly knew was true.

  Abigail had gone.

  She had taken the laptop and the diary.

  And left not so much as a sticky note telling us where she had gone.

  Thirty-Four

  There was nothing I could do but go to class the next day and see if Esperanza called to tell me Abigail had returned.

  She didn’t call.

  I felt like I had been robbed. The diary wasn’t mine, and technically I had finished the work I was hired to do. Abigail owed me a bit of money, but that was all. She didn’t owe me anything else.

  Except perhaps a new thumb drive.

  It shouldn’t have mattered that she’d disappeared with the laptop and the diary and left no way of reaching her. Esperanza said Abigail didn’t carry a cell phone and she didn’t drive. Wherever she had gone, she had called a taxi to take her there, and we had no reason to call the police. She was a grown woman in a right state of mind, and she could do what she wanted.

  But it did matter. It mattered to me.

  I saw Professor Turrell on campus late Monday afternoon, and I told him what had happened to the thumb drive. He found Abigail’s sudden disappearance with the diary, its transcription, and my thumb drive troubling. He asked me to tell him what Mercy wrote in the last entry before she died. I had read that entry many times. Fragments of those sentences flitted about my memory and I repeated them back to him.

  There is no escaping what awaits me. God knows I will hang.

  But I fear the anguish. I am afraid for Prudence.

  John Peter …

  One thing remains that I can do, even in chains.

  The ink is nearly gone. Is there enough?

  Professor Turrell asked who John Peter was, and I told him how John Peter came under suspicion because he defended Mercy after her arrest. I described how she wrote the incriminating letter, how she fiddled with the mole on her arm during her examination, and how she had silently convinced the magistrates she had bewitched John Peter. She convinced them John Peter was innocent by persuading them of her own guilt.

  “What do you suppose she wrote?” Professor Turrell asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe a letter of forgiveness to her accusers? Prudence Dawes, especially.”

  Professor Turrell rubbed his hand absently across his stubbled chin. “I have a friend at Boston University who’s looking into this for me. He should be getting back to me today or tomorrow. You going to be around?”

  I told him I’d be at Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles while my dad had bypass surgery. I told him to call me.

  I drove to my parents’ house Monday night, played a game of chess with my dad before bed—which I won fair and square—and woke up at 5:00 a.m. Tuesday to go with them to the hospital. The hospital wanted my dad there by 6:00 a.m.

  Once there, my mother couldn’t sit still, and I refused to pace the room with her. Uncle Loring and Aunt Denise arrived just before Dad was taken to surgery, and Denise joined my mother in her tireless pacing of my dad’s room. Uncle Loring looked pale and uptight, and Denise told me my dad’s heart condition was brought on by hereditary causes and Loring feared he’d be next.

  Mom cried when the nurses arrived to take Dad to the operating room. Aunt Denise held her, and Dad told her he wanted lobster for dinner on Friday.

  “Without the drawn butter,” I said to him. He smiled at me. Then he grabbed for my hand, and I saw again the flicker of true fear in his eyes. He squeezed my hand and locked his eyes onto mine. He opened his mouth, and I could almost hear him start to say, If anything should happen, but I squeezed back and met his gaze.

  “Without the drawn butter,” he said.

  And then he was whisked away.

  The first two hours went by quickly, but then the novelty of courageous waiting began to wear off. Mom and Aunt Denise left to pace the entire third floor. Just as they rounded a corner and walked out of sight, I heard my uncle, who sat behind me, get to his feet and say, “You made it!”

  I turned to see who he was talking to. Standing next to him was Cole.

  And Raul.

  “So it’s going okay?” Cole asked.

  I couldn’t believe he was there. I knew Cole was close to my dad, and that of Loring’s four sons, Cole was the one most like him. There were times growing up that I was a little jealous of Cole’s fondness for my father and the return admiration my dad had for him.

  But it was my dad in surgery, not his. And it was just after ten in the morning, which meant they had flown down in Raul’s plane.

  I stood up.

  “Hello, Lauren,” Raul said. His voice was polite, as always. Today he wore a simple T-shirt.

  “Hi,” I said back.

  “So, where are we? How’s it going?” Cole looked impatiently from his dad to me.

  “Were probably past the halfway mark,” my uncle said. “It’s been three hours already. They told us it could take four to six.”

  “Okay. Good. So Raul and I have time to get some breakfast?”

  “I would think so. Cafeterias in the basement.”

  “Cool. Hey, Lars.” Cole turned to leave. “Okay. Let’s get a bite.”

  Raul turned too and then turned back. “Can we get you anything?” he asked me.

  “I’m good,” my uncle said, settling back into his chair.

  Raul kept his eyes on me.

  “No. Thanks anyway,” I said.

  He smiled and turned to follow Cole, who had already walked away and been caught in an embrace by his mother. My mom and aunt had returned from their first lap around the cardiac unit.

  I watched as Cole and Raul disappeared down the hallway.

  My mother and aunt continued to close the distance between us.
<
br />   “He is such a nice young man,” Denise said.

  “Oh, I know. So polite,” my mom replied.

  “No kidding. He could give Cole a few lessons on how to behave around people. Isn’t that true, Lauren?” Denise said to me. “Cole is so oblivious to other people.”

  “We’re talking about Raul,” my mother said.

  “Yes,” I replied.

  “He’s so sweet,” Denise said, looking at me.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “You know,” Denise continued, in a softer voice. “Cole said Raul is simply brilliant. An IQ you wouldn’t believe. And he’s not even Asian.”

  I glanced about to see if anyone had heard her, though Denise practically whispered this.

  Not even Asian.

  Yep, Raul was the most polite, rich, brilliant Hispanic man I’d ever met.

  My mom and my aunt continued their nervous stroll. I plopped down on the chair next to my uncle.

  “Want some of the paper?” he asked, holding out the business section of the LA. Times.

  “No, thanks.”

  I reached into my purse and pulled out My Antonia. Abigail had recommended it.

  Half an hour later Raul and Cole came back. They took two chairs opposite my uncle and me, next to my mother and aunt. Mom and Denise were taking a break from pacing. I looked up when Cole sat down, and Raul nodded at me. He had a textbook in his hands.

  “Test day after tomorrow,” he said when he saw me looking at his book.

  “Mmm.”

  He looked at the book I held. “For a class?”

  “No. Abigail thought I’d like it.”

  “Did you finish that diary of hers?”

  “Yes. I did.”

  “Congratulations. That must feel pretty good.”

  I had no idea what to say to that. “Um. Yeah. Thanks.”

  He opened his book. Next to him, Cole slouched in his chair, folded his arms across his chest, and closed his eyes. “Somebody wake me up when it’s over,” he said, yawning.

  “I hope you’re not missing anything important by skipping class today,” my aunt said to Raul, leaning forward in her chair so she could see him.

  “Oh, I’ll be fine,” he said. “I can get the notes from a buddy of mine.”

  “Like you need to study anything,” Cole said, eyes closed.

  “Well, it was very nice of you to come down,” my mother chimed in. “I know it means a lot to Bryant to have us all here waiting and praying for him.”

  “It’s my pleasure,” Raul said.

  “So you really came all this way to bring Cole down?” It was out of my mouth before I even considered why I said it.

  Raul looked a bit surprised. “Yeah. But I don’t mind. Were only missing one class today. One important one, anyway.”

  “And it’s such nice weather for flying.” I couldn’t stop myself from saying that, either.

  Raul stared at me. “Are you okay?” he mouthed.

  Somehow he saw through me, saw that I was struggling to figure out why he was there. Thank God he couldn’t see I was fighting an attraction to him—an attraction everyone in my father’s world would applaud. Raul was rich, brilliant, and a true gentleman. He met every Durough expectation. I didn’t want to do what everyone expected me to do. I think deep down I wanted to fall in love with a poor man so I could prove to everyone it wasn’t about the money. Not for me.

  I looked to see if anyone else noticed what Raul had asked me. But Cole was already falling asleep, my uncle had his nose buried in the newspaper, and my aunt was showing my mother an article in a People magazine.

  Was I okay?

  I shrugged. “Sometimes,” I whispered.

  His grin was soft, measured. Polite.

  My cell phone began to vibrate. I took it out of my purse and looked at the screen. Professor Turrell was calling me. I excused myself and walked down the hallway to a set of windows by the elevator and away from the cardiac unit.

  “Hello, Professor,” I said.

  “Steve.”

  “What?”

  “You can just call me Steve.”

  “Oh. All right.”

  “I just got a call from that friend of mine at Boston University. He made some calls and had someone look into the jail records and other historical accounts. I finally have an answer for you.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Mercy Hayworth committed suicide.”

  Thirty-Five

  I heard what Professor Turrell said. I heard every word. But I still made him repeat it.

  “She committed suicide. She hanged herself in jail.”

  “I don’t … I just … How?” I stammered.

  “The record my friend found states she tore her apron and dress into shreds, tied the shreds together, and made a noose. She looped it over a rafter and stood on a wooden bench. When she was ready, she kicked the bench over.”

  “And no one heard her? No one tried to stop her?”

  “She did it in the middle of the night. There’s a letter in a Gloucester museum from a woman who was also arrested for witchcraft and in the Salem jail when Mercy died. She wrote to her sister after her release that one of her cellmates hanged herself. That cellmate was Mercy Hayworth. This woman wrote that she awoke when the bench hit the floor, and so did some of the other women, Mary Easty being one of them. But they couldn’t reach the noose, and they couldn’t get the bench back underneath Mercy’s feet. Not in time to save her.”

  “But she had leg chains!” I said.

  “Apparently they were long enough.”

  Images of Mercy swinging from a prison rafter from the remnants of her apron—the apron in which she hid her diary until she gave it away—invaded my mind. I wanted to sweep them away, wash them away, but they wouldn’t leave. I leaned my head against the window.

  “Why did she do that?” I whispered to no one.

  But Professor Turrell heard me and assumed I was asking him. “Well, she could’ve decided to just get it over with by herself instead of being subjected to the spectacle of a public execution.”

  “I just don’t … This isn’t how I pictured it.”

  “She was probably distraught. Perhaps suicide seemed the easier way to go. Or maybe she wanted to deny her accusers the satisfaction of seeing her executed.”

  I sighed, letting my forehead rest against the cool glass. No. Mercy’s last act had something to do with ink and everything to do with selflessness. That was Mercy’s way.

  She wrote something to someone in her last hours. She had a plan. She hadn’t been distraught.

  I am ready.

  Professor Turrell interrupted my thoughts. “Listen, my editor wants to see the diary. He wants your transcription, too. By this time next year you could have a book on the front table at Barnes & Noble. I can tell you right now mine won’t be there. It will be in the back with all the other boring business books.”

  “I don’t have it.”

  “I know you don’t, but you should try to get it back. The diary should be published. It’s a great story.”

  “It’s a tragic story.”

  “Which is what makes it great. You’re a lit major. You know exactly what I mean. I think it’s kind of poetic what she did, and I’m only an econ prof.”

  “Poetic.”

  “Or something like that.”

  Two tears slipped from my eyes and slid down my cheeks. I had been moved by Mercy. I was baffled by her and awed by her. She had changed nothing and changed everything.

  And Abigail had told the truth all along.

  She told me Mercy died a needless death. That she had been unjustly tried, convicted, and sentenced. That the verdict had been execution by hanging.

  And that Mercy died by hanging on September 22, 1692.

  All true.

  “Look, I’ve got class,” Professor Turrell said when I said nothing. “If you want, call me when you get your thumb drive back. My editor said he’d come talk to Abigail in person if the diary is gen
uine.”

  “I already told you it’s genuine.”

  “He needs to see it. He wants to see it.”

  “If I hear from her, I’ll call you.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “Tell your Boston friend thanks.”

  “Will do.”

  We said good-bye. I shut my phone and turned my body so that the back of my head rested against the window. I wanted to reach across the ages. I wanted to fold time in two, slide myself into that jail cell, and bring Mercy back with me, alive. I wanted to know what it was like to see the world the way Mercy saw it. I closed my eyes for a moment, and when I opened them, I looked over at my family at the far end of the corridor. They were all absorbed in their own thoughts.

  Except Raul. His book lay open on his lap, but he was staring at me.

  I met his gaze for only a moment. Then I turned toward the elevators, the cafeteria, and momentary anonymity.

  Raul followed me to the elevator doors. When I lifted my finger from the down button, he was at my side.

  “You okay?” His polite tone was laced with concern.

  “Yeah.” Our eyes met for a second, and I looked away.

  “I’m sure your dad’s going to pull through this just fine. He’s relatively young, in great physical shape, and this is a really good hospital.”

  I felt my face warm. I didn’t know how to tell him I wasn’t thinking about my dad at all. It was demoralizing enough just realizing it.

  His hand reached out and I felt his fingers gently land on my shoulder. “You don’t believe me?” He bent his head to catch my gaze.

  “No. I mean, yes, I do believe you. I just.”

  Raul waited. His thumb caressed the skin below the bones of my shoulder. I shivered.

  “I just …”

  I couldn’t tell him my anxious thoughts were tumbling around in the seventeenth century instead of in the present, where my dad lay in an operating room, his chest splayed open.

  Raul moved his hand away quickly, like he had read my thoughts and was ashamed of me. I looked up, startled to see that the elevator doors were open and had probably been open for several seconds. Raul held them for me. I forgot where I’d been headed.