A Sound Among the Trees (25 page)

“What are those, then?” she asked.

Caroline stroked the top letter. Marielle could see that the envelope was different. No postmark. No address. Just one word.
Eleanor
.

“These are the letters to Eleanor she never sent. She wrote them but she never sent them. No one ever saw these letters. They were here in this trunk in that little hiding place when I opened it. They had been there a hundred years, Marielle.”

Caroline extended the second stack to her. “Take them. Take them up to your room and read them.”

Marielle reached for them, her hands shaking a little. “Are you saying no one even knows about these letters except you?”

“And now you. I want you to go upstairs and read them.”

Marielle sat staring at the letters in her hands, unable to move, overcome by what she held. “Why are you doing this?” She looked up at Caroline.

“You need to know the truth.”

Marielle slowly rose to her feet. “What about the studio?”

Caroline closed the lid to the trunk and stood up. “I’ll take care of cleaning out the studio. I’d like to do it alone, actually. It would mean a lot to me if I could.”

“Adelaide will wonder why I’m not helping you when I said I would.”

“I’ll tell my mother I sent you away so that I could wrestle with my old ghosts in the studio alone. She’ll understand that.” Caroline handed Marielle the cloth that had been around the letters. “Do not show the letters to Adelaide just yet. I want to talk to you when you’re finished reading them. And then I have something I need for you to do. After that, I will show them to her myself. I promise.”

Marielle wrapped the cloth around the letters and said nothing. She thought of Sara’s journals hidden in her room, more words unseen and hidden. Holly Oak was a veritable depository for buried truth. She looked at Caroline. It was on the tip of her tongue to tell her that she, like Caroline, had also found something a young author had hidden from view, when it suddenly occurred to her she hadn’t considered that the studio would soon be empty and she hadn’t made a decision about the journals. It was too late to put them back.

“Go on,” Caroline said. “If my mother is awake, she will wonder where we are.”

Marielle tucked the bundle under her arm and headed for the cellar stairs. As she climbed them she decided that when she was done reading Susannah’s letters, she’d show the journals to Caroline. It seemed to be a good day for the unveiling of secrets.

She’d let Caroline decide what should be done with them.

Behind her she heard the click of a light switch and Caroline on the stairs behind her. Marielle emerged into the warm air of a July morning. Low-lying clouds were giving way to a sticky sun. Caroline clambered out after her, and she closed the cellar doors.

“Carson will wonder why you broke the lock,” Marielle said, looking at the shattered hinges.

Caroline started to walk away. “Carson shouldn’t worry about what doesn’t belong to him. Come find me when you’re done.”

Marielle watched as Caroline strode purposefully across the patio and then to the old slaves’ quarters. She pushed the bundle of letters farther under her arm, walked to the kitchen door, and opened it quietly. The house was still bathed in quiet. She stepped into the main part of the house, listening for sounds of movement on the stairs or in the parlor. She heard nothing. Hopefully Adelaide was still in her bedroom and Marielle could make it upstairs with her package, unseen.

Marielle walked across the entry and took the stairs quickly, pausing only a second to look at young Susannah as she turned at the landing. She made her way to her bedroom, Susannah’s bedroom, and closed the door quietly.

She stood for a moment, her back against the closed door. She closed her eyes and felt the wood against her back, solid and true. Marielle’s earlier curiosity about the letters should have made her feel eager now that she held them—and others—in her hands. But as she opened her eyes, she felt like she was about to sit down and have an intimate conversation with the very ghost everyone at Holly Oak seemed to fear, in one way or another. And yet she was not afraid.

Marielle walked slowly to the bed and spread out the letters that had been mailed, making sure they were in order by postmark. The other letters she hoped were dated inside. She kicked off her wet shoes, pulled the band from her ponytail, climbed onto her bed, and arranged the pillows to support her in a sitting position. Then she reached for the first letter, opened it carefully, and began to read.

The Letter

12 April 1860
Holly Oak, Fredericksburg, Virginia

Dear Eleanor
,

Thank you, dear cousin, for the lovely parasol you sent for my birthday. It is the loveliest shade of rose, and I am very grateful to you for sending it. Such a happy color. I have not thought of happy things in such a long time, but the moment I opened your parcel, I imagined myself walking down the streets of Paris like we’ve always dreamed about, and this thought made me smile. Thank you, thank you, dearest cousin
.

I do not feel any different today at sixteen than I did yesterday at fifteen even though my grandmother and grandfather made a fuss over me at breakfast. We ate outdoors in the garden, which Grandfather loves to do and Grandmother does not. A fly rested upon my juice glass for only a moment, but she insisted Tessie throw it out and bring me a fresh glass at once. I could see in Tessie’s eyes that she’d gladly drink that juice—it was only a fly, only for a second—and I wanted to tell her she could have it, but Grandmother doesn’t like it when I talk to Tessie, so I didn’t. My grandparents gave me a lovely hat that came all the way from New Orleans. And an amethyst brooch
.

Mama came out onto the garden, but it was almost as if the April beauty was too much for her. She merely kissed me on my
cheek. Then she went up to her room, and I did not see her again until nightfall, when she bade me good night after supper and disappeared upstairs. I wanted to ask her again when we shall be able to come to see you, as she promised we would, but I can never seem to gather up enough courage to ask her
.

We have been here in Fredericksburg for three months. Sometimes it seems like we only just arrived and will soon be going back to Washington after a lovely visit and Papa will be waiting for us. Sometimes it seems like we’ve always been here and I have been missing him in silence for years and years. Grandmother doesn’t want to talk about my papa because she says it is too hard for Mama to hear me mention him
.

Holly Oak is a pretty house on a lovely street in town, and it has many rooms, six of which are bedrooms; I have probably told you that before. You can see a bit of the Rappahannock River from my bedroom window and the steeples of the churches from the third floor. I am sleeping in the corner bedroom, where there is a lovely curve in the wall like a bell. I feel a little like I am in a room for a princess with that round wall on one side. There is a lovely garden on the south side of the house with roses and tulip trees and hedges of forsythia. And many trees. Grandmother said when my mother was my age she would have garden parties and there would be dancing and all kinds of cakes and young men in suits. I have not made very many new friends yet. Grandmother says she wishes she could’ve had a birthday party for me but that would’ve been too much for Mama. Mama isn’t ready for parties yet. Not even ones that aren’t for her
.

Aunt Eliza is coming home from Philadelphia next month. She has been going to a tailoring school there. Or something like that. I am not sure I understand why she is there. Grandmother knows how to sew. She taught my mother to sew, and she is teaching me. Why could she not also teach Eliza? I asked Mama this. She took a long
time answering, as if she had to remember she has a sister named Eliza. Mama said sometimes a person with a will like Eliza’s needs to be taught by someone other than her mother. Eliza is only seven years older than me. And she is not yet married, which is very strange because she is very pretty. Last summer, when we were all here together, Papa said something about how pretty she was and how she must have her pick of beaus. She just frowned at him as though he had told her she was plain and lucky if any old goat would have her
.

Grandfather spends most of his time at the farm with the sheep or at the mill. My grandparents own a woolen mill; did you know that? And Grandmother has a little haberdashery here in town. It was her father’s store. It smells like my Papa in there with all the men’s hats and gloves and scarves. Mother worked there when she was my age. I want to work there too. Grandmother said perhaps in the fall, after the summer months. Perhaps after I have come back from visiting you in Maine!

I miss you, Eleanor. And Cousin John. And Aunt and Uncle. And Grandmother Towsley. And do you have any news of Will? Is he well? Do you ever get letters from John? I hear cadets at West Point do not have time to write letters home. I do hope that is not true
.

Yours most lovingly
,

Susannah Towsley

20 September 1860

Holly Oak, Fredericksburg, Virginia

Dearest Eleanor
,

It is with great sadness that I tell you we shall not be coming to Maine after all. The summer has ended, and Mama will not speak
of us coming to visit. She speaks of nothing. Grandmother told me it would be too hard for her to visit my Papa’s family so soon after his death and to kindly leave her to her grief. You cannot rush a widow’s grief. She said someday I will understand this. I said, what if I am never a widow? She asked me if I wished to marry someday, and I said yes, of course I wish to be married someday. And she said if a woman marries, she will be widow. She is destined to be a widow. The husband always dies first
.

I do not believe her. But it would not have been polite to say so
.

I would come on the train myself, but Grandmother and Grandfather both said it is too far for me to travel alone. There is too much happening between here and there. I asked if perhaps I could bring Tessie with me, and Grandfather said Tessie is an ignorant child and it was foolish to think a simple Negro could provide me protection on such a long trip. Tessie is not ignorant nor a child. She is three years older than I am and we’ve had many discussions in the garden when she is supposed to be merely seeing to my lemonade. Tessie’s mother and father live in North Carolina. So do her brothers. She hasn’t seen them since she was eleven, when Grandfather bought her and brought her here to Holly Oak. Yesterday I asked her why she hasn’t been to visit them, and she said, “When you’re a slave it’s best to reckon you have no family to visit. It’s best to reckon you have nothing.”

“Don’t you miss them?” I asked. And she looked away from me, toward the river. “Every day,” she said
.

I told her that when I am older perhaps I could take her on the train to see her family. Surely when I am older my grandparents will let me travel with Tessie. I see Southern women traveling all the time with their Negro slaves. North Carolina isn’t that far. Aunt Eliza came out onto the garden at that very moment and told me, right in front of Tessie, that Grandfather would never let me take Tessie to see her family. I asked her why not? “Ask him yourself,” she said in that
way she has. I can’t explain it. It is like she is being sweet and mean at the same time. But not mean to me, exactly. And not sweet to me either. You see? I cannot explain it
.

Tessie turned and left us without a word, and I watched her walk down to the slaves’ quarters at the far end of the garden. She always says, “Will there be anything else, Miss Susannah?” when she leaves me, but she didn’t that time. I thought perhaps I’d made her sad, asking about her family. So then of course I felt sad. I asked Eliza if I should go after Tessie and apologize. “Apologize for what?” Eliza said to me. “I made her sad,” I answered. Then Eliza turned to go too. “You’re not the one who has made her sad. And your mother wants you.” She started to go back into house. I picked up my writing things to follow. “But if Grandfather hadn’t bought her, wouldn’t someone else have bought her?” I asked. And Eliza turned back to me, and her gaze on me was cool like a funeral mist falling on my skin. “Yes, Susannah, someone else would’ve.” Her skirts swished as she walked back into the house ahead of me
.