In the Shadow of Blackbirds

by Cat Winters

  (DID SHE JUST FIND HIM DEAD??)

  I returned to my aunt with my notes. “See? I think he died somewhere between October nineteenth and twenty-first—somewhere between my Saturday morning sitting and the Monday morning we picked up the photograph.”

  Her eyes scanned the paper forced into her lap, and her lips whitened. She shook her head. “What are you implying?”

  “Remember the state Julius was in when we picked up my photograph early that morning? He seemed dazed and upset, and I asked you if he was on opium. Then their mother screamed Stephen’s name upstairs, and she hasn’t been seen again.”

  “Julius … he’s not a murderer. He can’t be. He wouldn’t kill his brother or his mother.” She shoved the paper off her lap. “He even cried at Stephen’s funeral—remember?”

  “Were they tears of sorrow or guilt?”

  “Why would he risk finding his brother’s spirit at a séance if there was a chance Stephen would call him a murderer?”

  “But Stephen doesn’t know who killed him.” I picked up my diagram from the floor. “The war and reality seem to have blurred together into a jumbled mess in his head. All he talks about are bird creatures attacking him.”

  “Don’t talk to me about birds, Mary Shelley,” she warned with a stony glare.

  “I need to go to his house.”

  “No!” She grabbed my arm. “Even if I get the flu and drop dead, promise me you won’t ever go over to Julius’s. Promise you won’t let him pour his honey into your ears.”

  “You’re not going to drop dead from the flu, Aunt Eva.”

  “Promise me.”

  I squished my lips together. “I don’t think I can promise that. Julius is probably one of the only people who knows what really happened to Stephen.”

  Lines of concern wrinkled her forehead, making her look older. “But while you’re helping Stephen, who’s going to help you? Why don’t you ever think about saving yourself?”

  “My mother saved other people. I thought you wanted me to be like her.”

  “Your mother was a trained physician. You’re a sixteen-year-old girl.” She pointed to the window. “Listen to the world out there. Do you hear all the sirens? It’s not safe to go anywhere. You stay inside this house.”

  “Then Stephen will be staying inside with me. I’ve got to find out how he died.”

  “No, you don’t.” She erupted into another mess of soggy tears. “You don’t need to do anything but listen to me for once in your life. Take all his belongings out of your room, throw them into the backyard—”

  “No!”

  “I feel like the only adult left in this world right now, and I don’t know what else to do. Please just stay in this house and rid yourself of anything that has to do with that boy.” She began to sob so hard that her face turned a disconcerting shade of purple.

  I rubbed my face and steadied my breath. “All right. I’ll stay inside for now to make you happy. Please stop crying so much. You’re going to make yourself sick.” I dropped my arms to my sides and watched her wipe her eyes and leaking nose with a handkerchief pulled from beneath her covers. “If we’re not going anywhere, can I please make us a breakfast that doesn’t involve onions?”

  She hiccupped. “Take a bath first. You look and smell awful. Unless you think that boy will show up in the tub with you—”

  “He’s not going to show up in the tub, for pity’s sake.” My skin sizzled with a blush. “You stay here and calm down, and I’ll go get washed up. Everything will be fine.”

  •••••

  AUNT EVA’S FEAR OF STEPHEN SHOWING UP IN MY BATH got me thinking.

  If I tipped the back of my head against the porcelain-enameled rim of the tub and let my body go limp in the sudsy water, would my mind grow drowsy enough to see him? Would he get too close again and fill the house with his terror? Or could I lure him for just a breath of a moment?

  He had come to me in the daylight before—when his whispers burned at my ear at his funeral and when his photograph dropped to my floor just the previous afternoon. If I pushed away the commotion of the sirens outside and let myself sink downward, downward, downward …

  My arms relaxed over the tub’s curved lip.

  My chin tilted upward. My head lightened. The center of the earth dragged me toward it, as if I were riding in an unlit elevator on a rushed descent.

  Down.

  Down.

  Down.

  The world above me faded to white. Pain seized my head. Something exploded across the clouds, and the sky turned a deep red. I rose toward the bloodstained surface. Voices cried out in panic below.

  “Mary Shelley.”

  I jolted upright with a frantic splash of water. Fresh air rushed into my lungs, and my slippery fingers clutched the sides of the tub to regain my bearings.

  “Gracie is here, Mary Shelley,” called my aunt through the door. “Can you be out and dressed in a few minutes?”

  “Gracie?” I slicked back my wet hair. “Stephen’s cousin Gracie?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did she say why she came?”

  “I told her she can’t have what she came for, but she wanted to talk to you just the same.”

  “What did she come for?”

  My aunt didn’t respond.

  “I said, what did she come for, Aunt Eva?”

  “A séance. To find Stephen.”

  I leapt out of the tub with a loud cascade of water and grabbed my towel. “Let me just get dressed. I’ll be right there.”

  I PADDED OUT TO THE LIVING ROOM ON BARE FEET AND twisted my hair into a braid to avoid dripping all over my navy-blue dress with the sailor-style collar. I had worn the same garment the first time I met Gracie, I realized, when she had bustled about Julius’s studio, changing phonograph records to smother the sounds of Stephen upstairs.

  Gracie watched me approach with round, inquisitive eyes—the look of a captured owl. She sat, shoulders stiff, in the middle of Aunt Eva’s sofa, her flu mask lowered to her throat, hands clasped in her lap as if they had been locked together with a key.

  My aunt looked equally rigid and uncomfortable in the rocking chair across from her.

  “Hello, Gracie.” I parked myself beside our guest, which made the girl stiffen even further. “It’s good to see you again.”

  “It’s good to see you, too.” Gracie dropped her gaze. “I’ve wanted to come over here ever since I heard about what happened at that séance the other night. Grant heard about what happened from Julius, actually, and then Grant told me. I haven’t been working in the studio lately.”

  “Why not?” I asked.

  That nasty, curdled taste of spoiled milk I remembered from the funeral spread across my tongue.

  “I haven’t …” Gracie sniffed. “I haven’t wanted to go back to that house since Stephen …”

  I sat up straight with the realization that she may have just confirmed my suspicion that Stephen died in that house. “But Grant still works there?” I asked.

  “He says he has to. When our mother died, he quit his job at a restaurant downtown. He said we both needed to work at Julius’s studio to be with family and to earn decent money. Our father is off in the navy, you see, so it’s just the two of us right now.”

  Aunt Eva rocked in her chair with soft creaks of wood. “Don’t you live on Coronado as well?”

  Gracie shook her head and grinned, embarrassed. “We’re the poor relations. Our father used to be the swim instructor at the Hotel del Coronado—that’s how he met our mother. She used to go swimming in the hotel’s pool when the Emberses wintered in that big house over there. Mama didn’t get to inherit the house, because she was the female heir. Stephen’s dad got it, so we’ve always lived right here in San Diego.”

  I squirmed at the idea of Stephen being part of the rich side of the family. “I don’t think Stephen ever felt comfortable living on the island,” I said. “He told me he was heading to war to avoid becoming corrupted by his surro
undings. He probably would have preferred switching houses with you.”

  “Many people would give their right arm to live in such a beautiful community,” said Aunt Eva.

  “I’ve seen men with missing arms,” I muttered. “I’m sure they’d choose intact bodies over ocean views any day.”

  My aunt frowned and changed the subject. “Would you like some breakfast, Gracie? Mary Shelley and I haven’t yet had ours.”

  Gracie shrugged. “I guess breakfast would be nice. But what I really want is a séance.”

  Aunt Eva stopped rocking.

  Gracie looked at me from the corners of her eyes. “Like I said, I’ve wanted to visit you ever since I learned you spoke with Stephen at that séance.” She fidgeted with her interlocked fingers. “That’s not true, actually. I’ve wanted to come ever since Grant and Julius dragged you away from Stephen’s casket.”

  “Oh?” I squirmed again. “Why didn’t you come sooner?”

  “I’ve been nervous. I didn’t want to bother you.”

  “You’re not bothering me.” I pressed my fingers over the back of her clammy hand. “I’m glad you came.”

  She turned her face away from me. “Last night I dreamed you died of the flu.”

  “Oh,” Aunt Eva and I said in unison.

  “I’m sorry if that’s a terrible thing to dream, but I realized I should come before it’s too late. I know you and Stephen were close—he told me stories about you ever since he used to come down to visit as a child. I … need to speak to him.”

  My heart beat faster. “What did you want to say to him?”

  “I want to tell him …” Her eyes brimmed with tears. “I just want to say … I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?”

  “I—I want to tell him I miss him.”

  I looked to Aunt Eva, who scowled and shook her head.

  “My aunt is uncomfortable with the idea of me summoning him.” I stroked Gracie’s wrist. “Maybe you should join us in the kitchen for some breakfast, like she said, and we could chat for a while. I’ll tell you the types of things Stephen has been saying to me, and you can help me figure out what’s troubling him.”

  Gracie lifted her head. “He’s troubled?”

  I scraped my teeth against my bottom lip. “Yes. Very much so.”

  “Contact him for me, please!” She squeezed my hand. “Please let me speak to him. What if you do get this flu? How am I going to communicate with him then?”

  Aunt Eva rose from her chair. “Let’s go have some breakfast—”

  “No—look at me.” Gracie pulled off her wig and revealed a startling bald head with a downy covering of new white hair. “Look what the flu did to me. I’m one of the survivors, and look what it did. Grant thought I was dead one night, and he even laid a sheet over me and called an undertaker. I’m one of the lucky ones, and look what I’m like. When this flu gets you, I might never get a chance to talk to my poor cousin.”

  “Come into the kitchen.” I stood and pulled Gracie to her feet. “We’ll contact him out there.”

  Aunt Eva blanched. “No!”

  “Keep all the knives and scissors hidden.” I brushed past her. “Open the windows so the neighbors can hear you scream if something goes wrong, but let me help him.”

  “I don’t want him in this house.”

  “Then let us put him to rest, Aunt Eva, so he can leave. You can talk to him yourself if you’d like, or go hide in your room, but this needs to be done.”

  Gracie tugged her wig back over her head, and I led our guest back to the pea-soup-green kitchen, where the little circular table would make a fine spot for a séance.

  “Do we need candles?” asked Gracie.

  “That doesn’t seem to matter.” I pulled out a chair for Stephen’s cousin and lowered myself into a seat that faced away from the windows. I didn’t want to see any crows or blackbirds perched on the orange trees out there … or even banished Oberon, trying to find his way back in.

  To my utter shock, Aunt Eva rushed into the room and slipped into one of the two remaining chairs. “Do it quickly. I swear, if anyone gets hurt—”

  “He doesn’t want to hurt any people. Everyone will be safe.”

  “Should we hold hands?” asked Gracie.

  “Not yet.” I placed my palms on the table. “I’d actually like to start by asking you some questions, Gracie.”

  “Me?” Gracie recoiled. “What types of questions?”

  “Be kind, Mary Shelley,” warned Aunt Eva. “Remember what I said about prying into other people’s business.”

  “I know. But I need answers.” I peered straight into Gracie’s pale brown eyes. “Tell me the truth—does Julius seem like an honest person to you?”

  Gracie flinched, and an avalanche of curdled milk sloshed down my throat. I gagged on the stomach-souring awfulness and braced my hands against the table to keep from retching.

  Aunt Eva reached out to me. “What’s wrong?”

  I gulped down the guilt-soaked flavor with a grimace. “I’m fine. Just a moment …”

  “Are you going to get sick?” asked Aunt Eva.

  “I’m fine.” I cleared my throat with a deep, uncomfortable sound. “Um … all right … let me be more specific, Gracie. When you helped Julius at his studio, did you ever see him cheat?”

  Gracie shook her head, and the sour taste softened. “I didn’t ever go into Julius’s darkroom with him, but I was there when Mr. Darning came to investigate him one time.”

  “What did Mr. Darning do?” I asked.

  “He marked his initials on blank photographic plates to make sure Julius wasn’t switching them with used ones. And Julius passed all his tests, which seemed to puzzle Mr. Darning. There were reporters there and everything. Oh, and look.” She popped open a silver locket dangling around her neck below her flu mask. “Here’s a photo Julius took of me and my mother’s spirit.”

  I leaned in close, but I saw only a fuzzy streak of light behind a somber image of Gracie, who was seated in front of Julius’s black background curtain. “I just see a blur.”

  “That’s probably her.”

  “Oh.” I sank back in my chair and furrowed my brow. “So. He seems an honest man to you, then?”

  Gracie snapped the locket shut. “I don’t know about that.” She bowed her head. “He wasn’t always nice to Stephen.”

  “What did you see him do to Stephen?”

  “I know …,” said Gracie, scratching the back of her neck. “He sometimes stole Stephen’s photographs off the wall and burned them.”

  Aunt Eva’s jaw dropped. “He burned his brother’s photographs?”

  Gracie nodded. “Stephen was worried that all of his work would be gone by the time he returned from the war, so he packed up most of his pictures and negatives and hid them about a week before he left.”

  I leaned forward. “Do you know where he put them?”

  She shook her head. “He wouldn’t even tell his mother what he was doing with them. He was probably afraid she’d slip and mention their whereabouts to Julius. She thought he might have purchased a safe-deposit box in a bank or a post office and stored them there.”

  “Why did Julius destroy Stephen’s photographs?” asked Aunt Eva.

  Gracie’s eyes moistened again. “My cousins always fought like a pack of wild dogs, and their fights turned vicious after Stephen’s father passed away. Aunt Eleanor considered asking Julius to move out, but she always favored him a little, even if she never said so out loud. She and Julius escaped her terrible drunk of a first husband together. She always felt sorry for him starting life with a bully for a father.”

  I traced my fingernail along a scratch in the tabletop and pondered the missing photos. “Stephen gave me two of his pictures before he left for training … but the rest must have already been stored away. He never mentioned anything about hiding the others, but we didn’t have all that much time together … I don’t think that’s why he’s troubled. I don’t know …” I looked
to Gracie. “I met one of his friends from his battalion at the Red Cross House yesterday.”

  Gracie hunched her back the same way her brother had when I questioned him about Stephen’s condition.

  “What that friend told me about Stephen’s last days in France was upsetting and confusing to hear,” I continued. “May I mention what I heard?”

  She gave a nod that was more a quiver of her round chin.

  “He said Stephen didn’t die in battle.” I hesitated a moment, for the air was thickening. “He said he lost his mind over there in the trenches. The army tried to help him in a field hospital, but he just got worse. They had to send him home.” A searing pain clogged my lungs, but I breathed through it and forced myself to keep talking. “Did you know about his discharge?”

  Gracie’s lips shook. Her eyes watered until a flood of tears ran down her cheeks. “We were supposed to keep it a secret.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “All the Emberses’ friends boasted about their boys receiving medals, or they could at least say their sons died in combat, fighting for liberty.” She sniffed. “None of their young men were sent home in shame. Aunt Eleanor … she worried Stephen would be viewed as a coward … and a traitor. She even blamed herself for the way she raised him. Stephen was always so quiet and artistic. I can’t even imagine a gun”—Gracie squeezed her face into a pained expression as the flow of tears streamed harder—“in that boy’s hands.”

  I held on to her wrist. “He made it back to Coronado, didn’t he?”

  She sniffled and attempted to steady her voice. “His mother had to fetch him from a hospital on the East Coast. A nurse went with her. They found him sitting in a bed, not speaking, shaking, just staring with eyes that looked like he was watching Death breathe in his face.”

  I winced.

  “They brought him home sedated,” she continued, “and hid him up in his room. Aunt Eleanor investigated the nearest asylums, but she said they all used barbaric water treatments. Patients were chained to beds. The doctors wanted to sterilize them all so they couldn’t transfer their madness to future generations.” She stopped and wiped her eyes with a handkerchief tucked inside the black sash of her dress. “Aunt Eleanor insisted on keeping him at home, waiting until he came out of his shock enough to go to some of the places offering to help recuperating servicemen.”