Too Soon for Flowers (28 page)

A
CROSS THE STONE
bridge, inside the Blue Boar Tavern, the landlord drew enough ale to fill a pewter tankard. He took it to a table, where he set it down in front of a bearded, buckskinned man of the West, who sat on a long bench. The man raised the container and in an instant downed half of its contents.

“Fine stuff,” he commented after a belch, watching Phineas Wise with a twinkle in his eye. The tavern keeper smiled to think of the profit he’d make on this traveler, before the evening was out. For Phineas knew the value of each shilling that came his way, which was why he maintained an unadorned but snug room ready for all comers, while upstairs, three dusty rooms with canvas cots (a frugal idea suggested by a gentleman in the Hindu trade) added a crowning bit of glory to the establishment. At least, no one had expired there for several years, Mr. Wise was pleased to say.

“Another?” he asked when the vessel had been drained.

“What else?” the frontiersman asked with a laugh. “For your friends there, too,” he cried with good humor, pointing at two old men who sat in the only high-backed chairs in the place, each smoking a long clay pipe. “Your health, sir,” called the one known as Flint after they had been served, while his constant companion, Mr. Tyndall (who also answered to Tinder) raised his pipe in a salute.

“The nights are not very cold in this season,” Flint went on, “but a measure of ale is always appreciated, for health’s sake.”

The Westerner, hoping for some amusement, moved closer still, and introduced himself as Jason Clarke, of Pittsfield.

“A Berkshire man?” asked Flint conversationally.

“Indeed, sir. A mountain man, if you will.”

“And how do you like coming into civilization?”

“Is that what this place is? It seems rather rough to me, and something of a backwater. Pittsfield, you know, has now over a thousand souls.”

“A thousand! Fancy that. What do they all do, to make it so populous?”

“Farm, mostly. And marry to produce offspring.”

“Here—have a pipe. I keep a spare or two, in case I break one tapping it on the hearth. And some tobacco.”

“Many thanks. I will take back what I said of roughness, for you seem to understand civilized behavior.”

Old Tinder polished his nose with a handkerchief before replying. “Civilized, we may be. But you’d be amazed by what else goes on in such a smallish place—involving men and women, both, caught in the throes of will and woe!”

“How is this?” asked the Berkshire man with increased interest.

Then, Tinder began to tell a tragic tale of a deceased maiden of uncommon beauty—her dead physician with a taste for rum and a knowledge of magical potions, whose soul was likely to be anywhere but in Heaven—and a young suitor, barely a man, who had gone to live as a hermit in the forest, where he would surely die all matted and foul, and alone.

Meanwhile, other men walked through the portal into the tavern’s musty gloom. One in particular stood at the threshold for a long moment, before his eyes made out Phineas Wise going into the small scullery in back. Leaving as he had entered, the newcomer made his way around the building, then went in again through the scullery door.

At his entrance, Phineas Wise looked up from his simmering stew in surprise, for few ever thought to invade his culinary privacy from that angle. Then his eyes opened even wider, for there stood the lad he had been expecting, yet hardly hoped to find.

“Will Sloan!” he exclaimed.

“Hello, Mr. Wise,” said the boy in a weary voice. “I’m glad to see you.”

“Will, where in God’s name have you been?”

“In the woods.”

“For four days?”

“I had to! But then, I got so damned hungry I had to come back in—can I have some of that?”

Constable Phineas Wise studied the boy’s flushed face before he picked up a deep plate and filled it. Will sat down onto a bench beside the wall, and the landlord gave him the stew and found a spoon, wiping it first on his apron. The boy then began to eat with the appetite of a wolf.

“About all I could find,” he managed to say as he gobbled, “not having my fowler, was mushrooms and pine
buds, and a few cattails down by the river. I wondered about the mushrooms, though at first I didn’t much care if they killed me or not! But then I decided I’d best save myself, after all.”

Wise pondered the boy’s high color as he listened to this rambling talk. Clearly, Will was unwell. But was it the result of four days’ exposure, with little food? Or could it be the smallpox?

“Will, did you go in to her? Did you touch her, boy?”

“Phoebe?” asked Will Sloan, looking up with another shiver.

“You do know that she’s—?”

“I went in, and she was lying there so strange—I
had
to know, didn’t I? How did it happen, Mr. Wise? How could it? Was it the smallpox? Have I got it now, too? Am I going to die, d’you think? I don’t want to die, but if I do, I suppose I’ll see Phoebe, won’t I? She’d still be mine, wouldn’t she?
Wouldn’t
she?” he demanded.

“You’re too stubborn to go just yet, Will, I’d guess,” Phineas Wise replied brusquely, wondering what to do with this new trouble. Could the boy talk so easily of the afterlife, if he had lately taken a life himself? And yet, he did seem uncertain of his reception there. “Some say you did more than touch her, son.”

“How could I? She told me we couldn’t do anything—” Suddenly, Will’s look of confusion changed to one of anger. “You mean, they think I
killed
her? Is that what they think?” He flushed a bright red, his eyes blazing.

“It seems she died peaceful enough, Will, but with no other sign; after you ran away—”

“Peaceful? But it wasn’t like that—it was awful! I had to run—I had to! Only I couldn’t go home after I’d touched her, I knew that for certain.”

“Then why didn’t you go to your mother? She was right there.”

“Because I thought—”

Abruptly, Will buried his head into his hands. His shoulders began to heave, as one harsh sob followed another. The earlier fierceness gone, Will Sloan seemed no more than a frightened child.

Phineas Wise’s heart softened. “All right, then, go to Mrs. Willett’s house, right now. At least you were smart enough to stay away from your brothers and sisters, I’ll give you that.”

Will looked up. Then, his tearstained face solemn, he nodded. “I didn’t want to hurt anybody!”

“Promise me you’ll stay there at Mrs. Willett’s. I’m telling you officially, now. As village constable. And don’t let any of my guests see you go, if you can help it. Did you greet anybody when you came in?”

The boy shook his head.

“Good. It’ll be best for you to stay out of everybody’s way, at least until we get a few things straight.”

“Where is Phoebe?” Will asked suddenly.

“She’s in the churchyard, where you can visit her later. Right now, you go to your mother, and stay there.”

Will Sloan departed, without a further word.

The boy
was
ill, thought Phineas, and perhaps he should not have sent him to the waiting smallpox in a weakened state—but what else could be done, with no physician anywhere near? And if it
was
the pox, he himself might yet be sorry he had even spoken to Will Sloan! What would Hannah do, though, if the boy should die of it, after all? That was more than Phineas wanted to imagine.

He reentered the main room of his tavern to see his customers still chewing over the week’s events, now gone beyond news to become lore. Instead of taking the pair of deaths as a threat, most seemed to talk of the story almost as if it had occurred somewhere else. Perhaps that was not
surprising, for few had known much about either of the two unfortunates.

Maybe, thought Phineas Wise, it was all about to blow over, without blowing up. Maybe luck would be with them. Maybe time would put an end to all that had been disrupting the peace in Bracebridge, before anyone else should sicken … or die.

ALONE BUT FOR
the shadows in the quiet kitchen, Hannah Sloan sat staring at a fading fire, happy to let the light fall so that she might not be drawn from her memories. Yet as the remains of two hearth logs settled with a flurry of sparks, she was startled back to the present by the sound of something new. It seemed like scratching. In a moment, her heart was in her throat, for it was a sign her children had used when they were small, and found themselves on the wrong side of a door.

Hannah looked to the window behind her. This time, her heart nearly stopped, for through the glass she saw a sad, familiar face. A hand to her mouth, Hannah rushed at the door and hauled it open on creaking hinges. Will stood there quietly, his head low. His mother grabbed at a hand and pulled the boy inside, crushing him swiftly to her breast. Then, almost as abruptly, she thrust him out at arm’s length to study, before she gave him a clout that sent him sprawling to the floor.

“What was that for?” he shouted, scrambling to his feet in the hope of avoiding another attack.

“Come here,” Hannah ordered. This time she reached for both hands and caught them before the young man, whose ears still rang, could run away.

“Sit.” She pushed him down, pulling another chair close so that he had little chance to retreat. “Will,” his mother said softly. “Whatever have you done?”

Before Will Sloan could answer the door to Lem’s
small retreat opened, and the two young friends were noisily reunited.

“Where’ve you been!”

“Me? Where d’you suppose?”

“Was it terrible?”

“Part of it surely was!”

“I was sorry—”

“What about you? Did you get it?”

“Not too bad.”

“I see you got some pocks, all right.”

“Not many, though they itch like fury—”

“Will,” his mother said brusquely, seeing his flush for the first time, “how long have you had this fever?”

“A day or two, I guess,” said the boy, brushing off her worried hands.

“Did you go in to Phoebe?” she demanded.

“You saw me, didn’t you?” Will returned hotly. “I saw
you
, as well! Did—did you—?”

Now the door to the front room flew open and Diana Longfellow swept in. Recognizing the look of masculine rebellion that turned her way, she placed her hands on her hips and attacked.

“So, it’s you! What have you done now?”

“What have I done? What have I done?” the boy cried out. “What’s been done to me, I should be asked! My Phoebe’s in her grave, and Mr. Wise says I have to stay here until he tells me different—here in the last house I ever wished to walk into again!”

“Hannah, put more wood on the fire,” Miss Longfellow ordered, “so we can see if he is telling the truth. Young man—”

“I’m sorry for his tone, but the boy is ill and tired,” said Hannah, protecting her son with her bulk.

“And which of us is not?” Diana responded, standing her ground. “But I have just thought of something else. Hannah, run and fetch Charlotte. Quietly! For Heaven’s
sake, don’t let my brother know what’s happening. Richard can ask his questions tomorrow. But I want to hear what’s occurred before that, and I’m sure Charlotte does, too.”

“He’ll need food—”

“I can get him that. Now hurry.”

Realizing Diana’s orders were for the best, Hannah left her boy behind and hurried out the door.

The next several minutes were spent feeding Will and Lem both from what the pantry held—cold meat and mustard, as well as bread from the Bracebridge Inn, which they washed down with cider. A second meal after Phineas Wise’s stew made Will drowsy, but he was not to rest yet, for his mother soon burst through the door with Mrs. Willett behind her.

Charlotte immediately reached out and ran her fingers along the boy’s face and hands. “There’s nothing under the skin to worry us,” she reassured Hannah. “There’s hardly been time, but he doesn’t have the look to me—although he may still come down with it later, now that he is here.”

“It would be well deserved,” Hannah sighed heavily. “But at least I’ll be able to care for him now.”

“Will,” Charlotte began in earnest, “what happened, when you last saw Phoebe?”

Asked to think again of one he’d lately adored, the boy began to whimper.

“Did you strike her?” Charlotte persisted.

“I wish I hadn’t! But I had to do it! She’d just told me—”

“Please, Will, please!” Hannah moaned, fearing now to hear something she’d long dreaded.

At his mother’s voice, Will jumped to his feet—for it was as if a voice had come back to haunt him, from beyond the grave. “That’s what Phoebe begged me,” he cried shrilly. “She told me she was afraid—but I loved her so! I
would have forgiven her, too … I already had, when I came back—”

“Forgiven her what, Will?” Diana Longfellow demanded. “What had
she
done?”

“I don’t know! There was something about her Aunt Mary, and a doctor came for a rash … and then I climbed in the window, when she told me she wouldn’t say any more! I thought I could make her, when she said she wouldn’t wed me—but she wouldn’t say why, not even when I shook her!”

“You shook her?” Lem challenged.

Will’s anger turned cold, and seemed to renew itself. “She told me I might have known something about her—about us—but since I
didn’t
, she thought everything would be fine … but it
wasn’t
, somehow! After that, she told me again she could never marry me—or anybody else, either. That’s when I slapped her, and went back out through the window. I knew if I thought about something else for a while, I’d calm down, and then I’d come back and Phoebe and I … we’d straighten everything out.”

“When
did
you come back?” Charlotte asked.

“Hours later, I guess. First I lay down, and then I fell asleep.”

After weeping away some of his discontent, Charlotte guessed. “And then,” she asked, “when you found her … ?”

“She was already—gone.” The boy stared vacantly as he recalled the scene. “There was nothing I could do. I just left her there, on the floor, and started out.”

“On the floor …?”

“And that,” Diana interjected triumphantly, “was when Hannah saw him.”

“Hannah?” asked Charlotte, startled a second time. Then she understood. Hannah had not wanted to admit she saw Will coming from Phoebe’s bedchamber that night. No wonder she had been silent, with such a secret.