The Vespertine Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Table of Contents

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Oakhaven Broken Tooth, Maine Autumn 1889

  One

  Kestrels Baltimore, Maryland Spring 1889

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Oakhaven Broken Tooth, Maine Autumn 1889

  Ten

  Kestrels Baltimore, Maryland Summer 1889

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Oakhaven Broken Tooth, Maine Autumn 1889

  Nineteen

  Acknowledgments

  The Springsweet Sample Chapter

  One

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  Copyright © 2011 by Saundra Mitchell

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  For Nick and Gwen—

  There are more things...

  Oakhaven Broken Tooth, Maine Autumn 1889

  One

  I WOKE IN OAKHAVEN, entirely ruined.

  The ballad notes of a quadrille lingered on my skin, remnants of a chaîne anglaise danced only in slumber. I heard a velvet voice against my cheek, and I burned in the dark and dreaming light of his eyes.

  Morning had come, its watery brightness stealing shadows from the corners, but still I swayed.

  Perhaps this once I could find my visions—my awful, eerie gift—without the fires of sunset. Perhaps this once I could abandon the vespers and go there on my own. To the place where I saw more than eyes could see. Where I knew more than minds could know.

  Where I could be with him.

  I had learned to do it for Zora, my sweetest friend—lost, and I was to blame! I couldn't bear to wonder about her. I knew how I'd left her—wrecked and desolate, a shell because I'd cracked her open. I should have listened when she told me to bear it alone.

  If some ethereal part of me counted sins, that part bore the darkest stain for the tragedy I brought her. Rocking until the floor kept time, I drew a breath elongated. I opened my arms to open my body.

  If I could spill everything out, if I could but empty myself of sensation and thought, I could be filled again with the sight. If this were sunset, the visions would come. Through my mind's eye, I would step inside someone else's skin.

  I'd walk on their legs, see with their eyes—whispers of all things to come. Until now I'd been too afraid to look for my older, wiser self. Today I whispered and rocked, and rolled my eyes, hoping to see anything at all.

  The need overwhelmed me, my breath rushing like wind, blood pounding in my ears—all distractions, terrible distractions. I begged through bitten lips, "Please, please, please..."

  My skirts washed around me. I made fists of my hands, nails digging into the palms. If only pain brought clarity! Locked in this hopeless attic room, I flung myself at the desk. How viciously darling of my brother. He'd jailed me with pen and paper, but no one to write to.

  I had nothing. I had no one.

  Weighted by the ornate train of my gown, I climbed up. Only on my toes could I see the world outside, the first peach and plum shades of morning in the distance. Something heavy in me turned. I flattened my hands on the glass.

  "Nathaniel, Nathaniel!" I cried, then seized by a terrible rage, I screamed. "How could you abandon me to this?"

  I beat at the windows. I imagined my fists shattering the panes, shards making ribbons of my flesh. I tasted the blood. I felt the cold that would come of letting it course from me. This was no premonition, just dread hope.

  Intention weighed my arms. I stood coiled. I meant to spring! To have it done! To end it all!

  But my craven nature restrained me. The threat of pain made me a coward. I could only slap the glass uselessly. Ashamed, I pressed my brow against the wall and wept.

  Then the attic door swung open.

  Startled, I lost my balance entirely. The desk tipped over, and my skirts dragged me down like an anchor. In a shower of writing paper and unstoppered bottles, I fell to the floor. India ink splashed in black puddles, and my hands came up smeared with it.

  August, my pale and angled brother, hauled me to my feet. His fingers bit through my sleeves, writing five hot points of pain on my flesh.

  "What's the matter with you?" he demanded.

  "Nothing at all! I am fit and bright and sober as a priest."

  With another shake, August asked, "Shall I send you to the sanitarium after all?"

  "You should!" I shouted.

  "Don't test me, Amelia," August said, his voice rising. "I will beat the devil out of you. You have my word on that."

  I couldn't help but smile. "You can't. You'd have to beat me dead. What will you do with your devil sister's body, Gus? Howwill You explain me away?"

  He answered me with a slap. It left a welt on my cheek, raised and burning, and all I could do was touch it gingerly—and laugh. Softly, but laughter all the same, for August was far more troubled by it than I.

  Gray as wash water, he cast an accusing look at his hand.

  I lay back, turning my eyes to the plastered ceiling to welcome a weary numbness. "Just poison my breakfast. You can call it a fever. Be done with me," I told him as I dropped to the bed.

  "I doted on you once." Backing toward the door, August looked everywhere but at me. "I used to pull you about in my wagon."

  "I'm much too heavy for your wagon now."

  Taking out his key, August warned me as he once more locked me in, "Stay away from the windows."

  Perhaps tomorrow, I thought, I shall be brave enough to put myself through them.

  ***

  Clattering footsteps came up the stairs, carried with the sounds of an argument well and truly started.

  "...cannot simply lock her away, August!"

  "She is ruined. I do think I can..."

  "...sent her to make friends and find a husband, you can hardly complain that she tried in earnest..."

  Flattening myself against the door, I pressed my ear to it to listen. Strange hope battered my chest. August's tenderhearted wife intended to set me free. Loose in the house, I could devise a hundred methods to dispatch myself, ones painless enough to conquer my cowardice.

  "Enough!" Lizzy stamped a foot, and I felt the floor vibrate with it.

  Rushing back to the bed, I fixed my eyes on the ink-stained floor. My heart fluttered with shame. Here came a little brown bird of a girl, pleasantly ordinary in every way, to my defense without knowing the sort of chaos I could cause.

  They whispered a moment more, and then the key ground in the lock. When the door swung open, Lizzy opened her arms to me.

  "Amelia Grace," she said. "Welcome home."

  We had always been cordial but never fond. This once, Lizzy embraced me tenderly.

  "I am glad to come to it," I murmured.

  Lizzy folded her hands serenely and turned to August. "Shall we to breakfast? Jennie's still away, but can't we cobble something together?"<
br />
  My stomach twisted, and I marveled at my body's will against my mind. These hands would not break glass; this belly would not go hungry. Perhaps the truth was that I was weak and simple-minded, easy to beguile. I wondered if that meant all my feelings were false. Would every passion I'd known fade away with time and sensibility?

  Finally, I said, "I believe we can."

  "Splendid," Lizzy said. She put a hand on August's arm, steering him with a great deal more subtlety than he had steered me the night before. "While we meddle in the kitchen, could you see to it that Amelia's room near mine is put right?"

  Oh, I could see the refusal on August's tongue; he stuck it out, just the tip, then bit down to end his inward struggle. Forcing a smile, he offered me a slanted look. "Of course, dear wife."

  "I should change," I said. Ink stained my gown and my hands. My hair hung in lank, weedy stripes over my shoulders.

  "We're all family here." Lizzy smiled pleasantly, first at me, then at August.

  Without speaking to me, without even once straying toward a glance, August took his leave.

  ***

  Lizzy considered a knotty loaf of bread, touching the knife to it several times before deciding where to cut. I waited quietly beside her, playing with the cage on the long-handled bread toaster.

  "One for the bag," she said, tossing the heel into a muslin bag set aside for bread pudding. Then she made two more cuts and offered me thick, even slices on the flat of her knife. "And two for you."

  Perched on a little stool, I turned the toaster in my hands. My face stung with the heat rolling out, the flames drawing a fine sheen of sweat to my face.

  Still slicing, Lizzy swayed, the satin of her tea gown whispering with the motion. There was a great deal to be said for keeping a tidy appearance. Though Lizzy's curls were unremarkably dun and her features simply regular, she had a delicate air.

  None would handle her roughly nor pull the pins from her hair. Certainly none would leave ragged the edges of her Irish lace. She wore respectability like earbobs, a subtle touch noticed by all who knew her.

  I spun the toaster's handle again and tried to find my voice. "You're good to have me downstairs."

  "You're family."

  "It would please August if I weren't," I said. It was shockingly wrong to hint at the reason for my return, and yet how could I not? "I never intended..."

  Softly, Lizzy said, "I believe you're making charcoal."

  Jerking the toaster from the stove, I shook it to put out the flames. "I'm sorry!"

  I scrambled for a cloth to wrap around my hand and yet managed to burn myself all the same. When I went to apologize again, nothing came out but a plaintive sob, and suddenly I found myself cosseted in Lizzy's arms again.

  "You should know," she said, patting my back in a matter-of-fact kind of way, "that there's still life left in a ruined girl."

  "You're kind," I said, and mostly meant it. "But it's not so. I intended to be good, Lizzy. I meant to make myself a good match and a wholesome friend, but..."

  "But what?" she asked.

  I lifted my face to her, brokenly certain. "But now I'm not fit for anything but haunting my brother's house."

  "You'd make a fine lady clerk or teacher," Lizzy said. She took a step back, squaring me with her hands on my shoulders. "If that's what you'd choose. But believe me when I tell you, little sister. Time rubs away most stains, and it is with utmost certainty that I assure you..."

  For a long moment, she said nothing. Then her voice went low as she confided, "There are good men who won't care that the package is dented, should its contents delight them."

  Did she mean she'd been ... I took a breath when she nodded, confirming it. I should've been shocked to find out Lizzy had ever sinned, let alone sinned so much as to ruin her. I should have been shocked, but I wasn't. Instead, numbness soothed me, a balm for my ragged heart that still yearned for a monster.

  Squeezing Lizzy's hand, I swore, "It would be a wasted soul to find you anything but delightful."

  "Well then," Lizzy said brightly. "Shall we attempt our toast and jam again?"

  Kestrels Baltimore, Maryland Spring 1889

  Two

  UNLIKE THE SEEMLY, segregated docks in New York City, Baltimore's northwest harbor was a fantastic place to step into an adventure.

  Though my cousin Mrs. Stewart did her utmost to keep me from oggling at the sailors and shoremen, only a hood would have hidden them from me completely.

  What marvels they were, some fine in uniforms from the best and worst steam lines, a Cunarder cap there, and the crisp, familiar white and red of the White Star Line on down the way. But the coal men and crabbers I found the most fascinating, for I had landed in Maryland on an unseasonably warm day.

  My blouse clung to my flesh in those rare places my corset didn't confine, but these men all adock had no such troubles. Half of them had stripped to the skin, muslin shirts hanging from their belts, suspenders crossing bared chests and broad shoulders.

  "Move along," Mrs. Stewart said, herding me with her parasol against my bustle. In spite of her hurry, I gazed my fill.

  Young men, thin as whippets, ranged before us. They tipped hats and called hello in a way that said they knew they had no business greeting ladies this way. Some had accents, melodious hints of countries I'd read about but never seen. Others spoke with the same down-home tones Mrs. Stewart did.

  "Out of the way," she threatened when one blue-eyed tease of a lad, this one at least fully dressed and no more than ten, fell into step beside us.

  "It's trouble on the docks for ladies alone," he said, pulling his hat off and pressing it to his chest. He implored me, as if I had any say in the matter of my direction. "Beg you let me see your way to your carriage."

  "We have not one penny for you, young man. Good day."

  Mrs. Stewart not only led visiting cousins by the rod of her parasol, but she drove off churls with it, too. She threat ened with its lace and silk, and the boy melted into the crowd again. When he did, Mrs. Stewart made a triumphant sound, then looked to me.

  "Have no doubt of it, Miss van den Broek, Baltimore is everything brash and forward." She hooked my elbow and steered me neatly around a broken board. "We'll make you a good match yet, but we won't find it here—mind your step."

  "Fair enough," I said softly, laughing when a fruit vendor, an Araber, tossed up a pale green trio of apples to juggle.

  A single yearning "Oh" escaped my lips.

  My trip from Broken Tooth to Baltimore had lasted barely three days, but it had left me oversalted and undersweetened. The perfume from those apples burned my nose, sharpening my appetite with raw hunger.

  I had no pocket money of my own. The price for keeping me was folded in a thick leather folio, tucked safely in Mrs. Stewart's coat. There was enough for a few gowns and necessaries. I'd need those to make proper friendships, hopefully a marriageable match, this summer—there was nothing more necessary than that, as far as my brother was concerned. Apples, however tempting, could hardly be considered so important.

  Mrs. Stewart glanced at me, then traded a coin for an apple before hurrying me into the cobbled brick street. "Save it 'til we're on the road," she said.

  Of course, I wouldn't thwart her; I clung to my apple and followed gratefully, until we came to a roundabout and an unattended victoria.

  Though the leather seats shone a bit, worn in places from use, it was a glorious little car. The bonnet top was folded back, its wheel spokes painted gaily red—this carriage was worlds more delightful than the funereal rockaway carriage August kept at home.

  Mrs. Stewart put her foot in one of the front spokes, looking over her shoulder at me. "In You go."

  A flutter filled my chest, watching her hitch her skirts daintily and climb into the driver's seat. Trailing my gloved hand along the hitched horse's flank, I asked, "You'll be driving, ma'am?"

  "We're no relation to the Commodore," she said, and of course intended to remind me that though I
was a van, mine was den Broek and not der Bilt. "I'll drive or we'll swelter all day here. If it's all the same to you, I'd prefer suffocating at home."

  "Where is Mr. Stewart?" I inquired, still lingering.

  With brisk, gloved hands at the reins, Mrs. Stewart looked down at me. "At his office, I expect. The law's as much a calling as the cloth."

  "I see," I said.

  "Come on now. Lizzy told me you weren't the precious sort. Even if you are, I'm the driver you've got."

  Chastened, I blushed and moved to climb in the carriage. But at once, I stopped.

  I'm not entirely sure what possessed me. Maybe the loneliness of the cab, or the novelty of a lady driver, or just the wild air of the Inner Harbor in my lungs, but I asked, "Is there room up front, Mrs. Stewart?"

  Mrs. Stewart answered my question with a distinct slide to the right. I folded my skirts as I'd seen her do and stepped up. From this perch, I could see the whole of Baltimore—it was a magnificent view.

  "Have that apple now," Mrs. Stewart said, seamlessly urging the horse into traffic. "Caesar here will want the core."

  My teeth cut into the fruit's firm and fragrant skin, and I tasted something entirely new as Mrs. Stewart drove us away from the harbor side.

  Narrow row houses shone with white marble steps; the streets swelled with splashes of color—riotous silk gowns and cheerful vests cut in shades of earth and grass and sky. Children darted in front of our wheels, but miraculously survived their own derring-do, girls and boys alike. So many songs slipped into my ears—the call of Arabers, the shouts of newspaper boys, and delightfully, oddly, someone playing a pianoforte.

  Somehow this struck me all as a daydream, a mythological fantasia too great to be real. All my life I'd lived on our cliff, looking down on a fishing village so small, I could raise my thumb to cover it. A season in town had been beyond my imagination. This great chaos and cry, smelling of sea and smoke and open ground—this was a city. My heart beat with it. My thoughts roared with it!

  With another crisp bite of apple, I tasted—perhaps for the first time—the true sweetness of possibility.