Where The Heart Lives (2 page)

She stopped. Miss Lindsay stood
near, her golden gaze like fire: hot, burning. She reached out and touched
Lucy’s forehead with one finger, just between the eyes, and whispered, “What
did you hear?”

“Voices,” Lucy replied,
compelled by those eyes, that searing touch. “Many voices.”

“Mary,” said Henry, in a broken
voice. “Tell me what she said.”

Lucy looked at him, and finally
could see again the man from the road, lost and dull. She was sorry about that,
and said, gently, “The woman asked me to help her. And then…then she
said…someone was coming.”

She’s
coming
, echoed that urgent voice, inside her head. Lucy felt a chill
race through her body. Miss Lindsay flinched, and moved away. She turned her
head until her hair shifted and Lucy could not see her eyes.

“You’ll do,” said the woman
softly. “Yes, if you like, I’ll hire you.”

“If she wants to stay,” said
Henry, also turning away, his voice rough, shoulders bowed. His hand was in his
coat pocket, clutching the mirror. A wedding ring glinted on his finger.

Lucy stared at them, helpless,
unsure what to do. Her gaze finally fell on the one person who had said nothing
at all—the young man, who was calm and steady, who watched her with that same
straightforward regard. Lucy imagined a clear pure tone when she looked at him,
and it was an unexpected comfort.

“I’ll stay,” she found herself
saying—two words that could have been a leap off a cliff for the falling
sensation she felt on uttering them. It was dangerous, something was not right;
there were ghosts in the woods and spirits unseen, and here, here, these people
knew of such things. And she was joining them, would cook and clean for them.

But it was better than going
home.

Lucy imagined a whisper on the
wind. Miss Lindsay briefly closed her eyes, then held out her hand and gave the
girl a long piercing look.

“Come,” she said, in a voice
gentler than her eyes. “I’ll show you the house.”

And that was that.

***

Nothing happened that first
week, except for the fact that afterward, Lucy’s life felt irrevocably changed.
The sensation crept on her slowly, nudged along by little things that she had
never had a chance to experience: reading as a leisure activity, for starters
(Miss Lindsay insisted on it, in the evenings); or being treated as a thinking
person, something more than a girl or daughter or sister or future wife. Something
beyond drudge. An equal, perhaps.

It was a fine house, much
larger than anything Lucy was accustomed to, with a second floor and an actual
parlor and fireplace just for sitting and warming the feet. There were books
shelved against the walls, more than she had ever seen—a library of them, all
around—as well as journals and odd paintings, and stacks of newspapers bound
with string. Most of those were crumbling and yellow; Lucy was careful as she
cleaned around them, gazing as she did upon faded images of President Lincoln,
as well as cramped headlines about the War, some fifty years past.

Lucy had her own room with a
lock on the door, just off the kitchen. Miss Lindsay slept upstairs, as did her
brother, Henry. The young man, Barnabus, kept his bed and belongings in the
work shed off the garden. He was like her—there for odd jobs—although unlike
her, he was treated more like family, though Miss Lindsay explained that he was
not. Or rather, not by blood.

“A child of the forest,” the
woman called him, that first night. “Found in the woods as a boy, living wild
as the coyotes and foxes. Folks brought him here. It was that or the circus,
with those men. So I raised him. Taught him. Oh, he’s a good one, that
Barnabus. Talk to him as you like—he’s as smart as you and I—but don’t expect a
word from his mouth. He can’t speak. Not like us. The forest stole his voice.”

Given what Lucy had
experienced, she thought that might be the literal—if not fantastical—truth. And
it disturbed her greatly. She did not know what to make of it. The forest was
dangerous—she knew that in her heart—and while it went unspoken that she should
not walk near the tree line, ever, the others did so all the time.

No one ever explained the
threat she felt so keenly. She tried asking, but Miss Lindsay always managed to
change the subject—so smoothly, Lucy hardly realized what she was doing until
it was too late and she was off scrubbing a floor or cooking or weeding, and
thinking hard about why she was here, and how Miss Lindsay had managed, yet
again, to deflect a question about a situation that Lucy found dangerous and
frightening and undeniably odd.

She dreamed of the woman at
night, the woman in the wood, and listened to her pleas for help beneath a wail
of wind and whispers, endless and cold and pained. Sometimes she sensed another
voice beneath the other—
Mary,
Mary
, she would hear Henry cry—and something else, bells and the pound
of hooves, and music playing high and wild like a storm of thunder and fiddle
strikes.

And sometimes in her dream she
would open her eyes and Miss Lindsay would be sitting by her bed, with that
cool hand pressed against her forehead and her golden eyes shining with unearthly
light. And in those moments of fantasy Lucy would think of her mother, and stop
feeling afraid, and slip into softer, gentler, dreams: buttercups and horses,
and afternoons by the river with her feet in the sun-riddled water. Sometimes
Barnabus was there, holding her hand. She liked that, though it scared her too.
In a different way.

There were several surprises
that first week, the biggest one being that Miss Lindsay had a cemetery on her
land, only a short walk away along a narrow wagon track. Her family was buried
there, but mostly other folk—from town, the surrounding areas—anyone who did
not have the money to be planted in one of the church plots near the bigger
towns. Miss Lindsay called it a service to the public, and several times Lucy
saw strangers exit the trail through the forest bearing gifts of cloth and
food. Payment served.

Folks never lingered, though. They
visited the graveyard, then left quick, hardly looking around, as though afraid
of what they would see. Lucy wondered how they managed to make it through the
forest unmolested, and said as much to Henry, whom she found one afternoon in a
rare moment of responsiveness—sitting in the sun, reading a book by someone
with a long, rather familiar, name. Shakes Spear, or something of the kind.

She settled down beside him
with a pile of mending in her lap. Barnabus was nearby, chopping wood. His
shirt was off, draped over a low tree branch.

“The forest has a mind of its
own,” Henry replied, after some deep thought. He gazed at the tree line, and
his eyes began to glaze over, lost. Lucy pricked him—accidentally, of course—with
her needle. He flinched, frowning, but his expression cleared.

“You were saying?” Lucy
prodded.

“A mind, a spirit. This the
forest primeval,” murmured Henry, “darkened by shadows of earth.” He looked at
her. “Longfellow. Do you know him?”

“We never met,” she said, and
then blushed when she realized that was not at all what he meant.

Henry smiled kindly, though,
idly tapping the book in his hands. Lucy, in part to hide her embarrassment—but
mostly because she was suddenly quite motivated to educate herself—pointed and
said, “What are you reading?”

“The Bard.” Henry handed her
the book. “Specifically,
Romeo
and Juliet
. A great and tragic love story.”

Lucy made a small sound,
savoring the smooth feel of the slender red volume in her hands. “Seems like
tragic is the only kind of love there is.”

Henry tilted his head. “Broken
heart?”

She frowned. “Oh, no. Not me,
sir. Never been in love. Just…I’ve seen things, that’s all.”

“And I suppose you’ve heard of
me
,” he said with a hint of
darkness in his voice. Lucy felt a moment’s panic, but then she looked at him
and found his eyes thoughtful, distant—but not lost. Not angry.

“I heard something from
someone,” Lucy said slowly. “First time I saw you on the road, coming here.”

“You saw me?” Henry looked
surprised. “Ah. Well.”

“You were…distracted,” Lucy
told him, not wanting him to feel bad. “Staring at the forest.”

A rueful smile touched his
mouth. “That happens.”

Lucy hesitated. “Because of the
woman? Mary?”

She knew it was a mistake the
moment that name left her mouth. Too much said, too fast. Henry’s expression
crumpled, then hardened; shadows gathered beneath his eyes, which seemed to
change color, glittering like amber caught in sunlight. Lucy had to look away,
and found Barnabus watching them with a frown. He put down his ax and began
walking toward them.

“I’m sorry,” Lucy said to
Henry. “Please, I’m –”

He cut her off, leaning close. “You
saw her. In the forest. What did she look like?”

Barnabus reached them. He sat
beside Lucy, the corner of his knee brushing her thigh. He was big and warm and
safe, and she was glad for his presence.

“She was beautiful,” Lucy said
simply, and then, softer: “She was your wife.”

“My wife,” echoed Henry,
staring at his hands. “She is still my wife.”

Lucy stared. “I thought…I
thought your wife was dead. What I saw…just a ghost.” The ghost of a woman lost
in the forest; the walking, speaking, dead; an illusion of life. Nothing else
made sense. Even the forest, a forest that had almost captured her—a terrible
dream full of ghosts, spirits.

Barnabus went still. Henry
exhaled very slowly. Lucy felt a whisper of air against her neck, a chill that
went down her spine. Miss Lindsay was behind her. She could feel the woman,
even though she could not see or hear her. Lucy always knew when she was close.

Miss Lindsay said, “Perhaps
you’d like to walk with me,” and Lucy rose on unsteady legs, and joined the
woman as she turned and strode away toward the cemetery.

“I’m sorry,” Lucy said.

Miss Lindsay raised a fine,
dark brow. “Curiosity is no crime. And you have a right to know.”

“No.” She shook her head. “I’m
just the house girl. You didn’t hire me for –”

“Stop.” Miss Lindsay quit
walking and gave her a hard look. “Close your eyes.”

Her demand was unexpected, odd.
Lucy almost refused, but after a moment, Miss Lindsay’s gaze softened and she
said, “Come, I will not hurt you. Just do as I say. Close your eyes.”

So Lucy closed them, and
waited. Miss Lindsay gave her no more instructions, which was curious enough in
itself, though the girl did not break the silence between them. The darkness
inside her mind was suddenly fraught with color, images dancing; not memories,
but something new, unexpected. Like a daydream, only as real as the grass
beneath her feet.

She saw a thunderstorm, night;
felt herself standing in a doorway, staring at the rain. A warm hand touched
her waist.

And then that touch disappeared
and she stood in the forest, within the twilight of the trees, and the woman
was once again in front of her—
Mary—
hands
outstretched, weeping.

Gone, again, gone. Other
visions flashed—feathers and crows, golden glowing eyes—but it was too quick
and odd to make sense. Except for one: Henry, younger, standing beneath a bough
of flowers, holding hands with the woman from the wood.

Mary. Smiling. Staring into his
eyes like he was where her heart lived.

Then, later: Henry and Mary,
riding away in a buggy. Henry and Mary, kissing. Henry and Mary, in the dark,
his hands shaking against the clasps of her wedding gown, the white of the
cloth glowing beneath the dappled moon. On a blanket, in the forest.

Lucy saw a shadow behind them,
something separate and unnatural, creeping across the forest floor. She tried
to shout a warning, but her throat swelled, breath rattling, and all she could
do was watch in horror as that slither of night spread like poison through the
moonlight, closer and closer—until it nudged Mary’s foot.

And swallowed the rest of her. One
moment in Henry’s arms—in the next, gone. Gone, screaming. Henry, screaming.

Lucy, screaming. Snapping back
into the world. Curled on her side in the thick grass. Arms around her. A large
tanned hand clutched her own and Miss Lindsay crouched close, fingers pressed
against Lucy’s forehead.

“You’re safe,” said the woman,
but that was not it at all. Henry and Mary were not safe. Henry and Mary had
been torn apart and Lucy could not bear to think about it. Not for them, not
for herself—not when she suddenly could remember so clearly the night her own
mother had disappeared, swallowed up by the world. Her choice to go—but with
the same pain left behind.

“Ah,” breathed Miss Lindsay,
and her fingers slid sideways to caress Lucy’s cheek. “Poor child.”

Lucy took a deep breath and
struggled to sit up. The world spun. The arms around her tightened—
Barnabus—
and she closed her
eyes, slipping back into darkness.

***

She woke in her bed. A candle
burned. Outside, strong winds rattled the house; rain pattered against the roof
and window. Miss Lindsay sat in a chair. Her hands were folded in her lap and
she wore a man’s robe that smelled of cigar smoke.

Lucy tried to speak, found her
voice hoarse, hardly her own. “What happened?”

A sad smile edged Miss
Lindsay’s mouth. “Impatience. I pushed you too fast.”

The girl hesitated. “Was it
real, then? What I saw?”

Only after she spoke did she
realize the foolishness of that statement; Miss Lindsay could not possibly know
what she had seen. But the older woman denied nothing, nor did she look at Lucy
as though her mind was lost.

“Real enough,” she replied
softly, and then, even quieter: “Did you understand what you saw?”