What the Dead Want (10 page)

I apologize again for not being able to slip out. Now that my parents are watching my every move it is difficult for me to meet you in the wood. Know that as soon as it is possible I will come again. Obviously I have not said anything of our work to
anyone—even Valerie, though I'm sure she suspects. And my parents, despite their wrath, have the discretion and fear not to speak about our endeavors.

I wonder if George might be helpful to you.
I feel that there is something hidden about him—is it a hidden sympathy? Surely he has the means to aid people in need if directed in some way to do so. I have never discussed these matters with him myself, though perhaps you might. The three of us together could get so much more done. And my parents suspect him of nothing.

Yours,

Fidelia

Gretchen delicately put the letter back in the envelope. It was like she could almost hear Fidelia's voice.

“Gretchen!” Hope called from out on the porch. “You coming?”

“Yeah, just a sec,” Gretchen said, and headed out the door, her head and heart full of a family she never knew she had, whose secrets she was now determined to solve. She heard her aunt's voice ringing in her ears:
Mona . . . she was here. She's closer than you think
.

L
IKE THE
N
IKON AND THE DARKROOM, THE
CAR WAS
something to behold. The few things that were truly Aunt Esther's and not tied to the house were perfect. And her Ford Triumph was no exception.

The car had the long, sharp art deco lines of its period. Bright chrome stripes and triangular backseat windows. Cat's-eye brake lights. Double headlights. A shining sleek-looking grille. A white interior that had miraculously managed, over the decades, to stay white. Along its sides there were wide white panels, but otherwise the color was dinner-mint green. The color of the chalky candies some diners still kept in glass bowls by the register.

Somewhere Gretchen had seen a photograph of Grace Kelly wearing a silk scarf on her head, driving exactly this car down a stretch of mountain road above a beach.

“Wow,” she said. The incredible vintage chic of it was amazing. Simon would lose his mind when he saw this car. Oh, Simon, she thought, she had to try calling him again as soon as she could.

“It's pretty awesome,” Hope said. “I've been taking it out for the last week—just driving around the hills.”

“How old are you?” Gretchen asked Hope.

“Fourteen,” Hope said, and shrugged. “I
didn't say I was
legally
driving it around the hills.” There was another old car up on cinder blocks at the back of the barn, this one a small convertible. “It's a Citroën,” Hope said. “My dad and I were working on it before he passed. He'd wanted it to be totally restored by the time I was old enough to drive. I've almost got it there.”

Apart from the car being a beautiful thing, Gretchen was relieved it was there. They could leave if there was an emergency. And they could also use it to transport things from the Axton mansion.

She had never really thought about anyone except paid mechanics fixing cars. It never occurred to her that some people might want to do it for fun.

“Does Hawk work on the car too?”

“
Hawk?
” Hope laughed. “That boy can't screw in a light bulb without help. Part of the reason I learned to drive is so I can take him to music lessons. He's got a long walk in the winter.”

“Guitar lessons?”

“Everything,” Hope said. “Cello, clarinet . . . banjo.” She grinned when she said it. “He's going away to music school next year.”

“What will you do when he leaves? Will you still live here?”

“Now that Esther's gone, I don't know. I want to stay in school here. I don't want to move.”

“Not even with all the . . .”

“The accidents?” Hope laughed. “There's about one day a year all that stuff seems like something to be worried about. I'm not scared of accidents. If an anvil falls on my head, it's because my time has come.”

Gretchen rubbed her shoulder. It felt bruised and tender but was scabbing over. “Last night,” Gretchen said, “I saw the girls you were talking about.”

“Celia and Rebecca,” Hope said. “Were they playing with a rope?”

“You've seen them too?” Gretchen asked.

“
I've
seen pictures of them.” She shrugged. “I believe in these things because of Hawk. Because I trust him.
Because I know the world is full of things we don't understand. But honestly, my mind's not entirely made up on what's causing all this stuff. Science used to seem like magic, people once believed lightning was God's wrath. We can call them ghosts and accidents but we may never really know what any of this is about.”

Gretchen touched the bite mark at her side, and thought of the pictures she'd taken last night—the ones to prove to herself later it was all nothing but a hallucination. It was clear Hope was the practical part of the Green siblings. Just talking to her made Gretchen feel more grounded.

“Listen,” Gretchen said. “I think we should take the car back over to Esther's and gather some of her things, before . . .” She was about to say “before they take over” but had no idea what that really meant. Or why she suddenly felt so sure she knew what she was talking about. She felt like she had in the morning after she'd found the rope—a little light-headed and then suddenly very determined.

“Sure,” Hope said. “Let's do it!”

“If you're going over to the house,” Hawk said, startling them as he stood in the doorway, “be careful of Celia and Rebecca.”

Gretchen could tell he'd experienced firsthand some of the things she'd seen. She shuddered thinking about their horrible little hands. About the rope she found in her
suitcase, the pain of those razor-sharp little teeth in her side.

“Why are they so angry?” Gretchen asked. “What do they want?”

“No one,” Hope said, “can know what the dead want.”

As if by some silent consensus, the three of them hopped into the car. Hope and Hawk got in the front, and then Hope pulled out of the barn and onto the low-shouldered road.

“Our mother was writing about the fire at Calvary Church for years,” she told Gretchen. “She spent a lot of time interviewing Esther, looking through her family archive. She said late one night on the anniversary she felt the whole congregation there. Sad, confused, scared, angry. Wandering around. She never saw them—just like me, she never saw a ghost—but on that day she said she felt their presence. The undeniable weight of history, she called it.”

“It's 'cause you choose not to see them,” Hawk said to his sister.

“Choice has nothing to do with it,” Hope said, raising her voice just a bit.

Gretchen had to agree—she certainly had no choice in the matter when she saw Celia and Rebecca the night before, or when she and Hawk had watched the crowd of
people out by the trees. She wanted to tell Hope and Hawk about the other creatures but her throat felt tight when she thought of them—of the thing near the darkroom, of her aunt's face contorted in pain after drinking the chemicals. Her words in the moments before,
Mona . . . she was here.

The countryside flew past as they drove, the woods dark and cool flanking the road. Hope had gone completely quiet, but looked more determined than ever. Hawk looked dreamily out at the forest. Gretchen thought of the people who must have hidden there, trying to make their way to the church. As she thought of Fidelia's description of bringing people to safety, she reached up and touched the ivory hair clip. And suddenly had an urge to sharpen it, to make the tines as deadly and useful as a knife. What a badass that woman must have been.

Just like Esther, who had stayed alive for almost one hundred years even though she clearly thought about killing herself every day for the last forty. There had to be a reason Esther did what she did—planned it like this.

On a hunch Gretchen asked, “When is the anniversary?”

Hope looked at her brother in the rearview mirror, and then he cleared his throat.

“The day after tomorrow,” he said.

Dear James,

I agree. The irony is awful. I know you feel strange using the money from Axton Cotton to build the church. And yes, I agree with everything you have written. But think of the people we have helped. Without your parents' money—without the transports coming out of Georgia—we'd never have been able to bring Jack and his family here to safety. We are fighting great powers and at the moment must do it by any means necessary!

My parents of course see something else in the church. The other night when I came into the parlor after I'd finished my sewing my mother said, “That would be a lovely, simple church for you to get married in.” I let her words pass over me.

I wanted to tell you: When I saw George last week he looked tousled and sullen and was not quite himself. We sat for a long time on the porch. I believe it is hard for him sometimes, especially now that he's taken on nearly all of the management of Axton Cotton. He is rich indeed but I think he still sees himself standing in your shadow.

There was another fire, outside the town in Honeoye. And there have been gatherings of the WCP. People say it's because Honeoye is such a backward place, so full of racists, and it's true, but I know those evil sentiments are everywhere. Just as sentiments like ours are everywhere.

I have heard the WCP riding and have gone out on the porch to see them. Awful cowards so full of hate. Like ignorant
children out of control. It strikes fear in my heart—and also rage. I try to keep the anger back but sometimes it is overwhelming. Valerie said every time it happens she expects them to ride right up to her house.

Later I was talking of these things with George. He took me on a walk to the church and we looked at the site and talked to the men who were building it. He knew them all of course, and they were so friendly, and amusing.

On the way home we talked about the fires in the town and in Honeoye and he asked me, How can you know what's really going on? How can you tell, Fidelia? How can you tell from the outside what a person believes, or the kinds of things they've done?

Yours,

Fidelia

H
OPE PULLED THE CAR UP TO THE ONCE-
MAJESTIC PORCH
of the Axton mansion. She and Gretchen and Hawk had driven the short distance with the windows down and the sweet smell of summer surrounded them. Now, outside the house, the heavy cloying smell of roses was almost overpowering.

“Wait,” Gretchen said. “Before we go in, I want to see the church.”

“There's nothing there,” Hope said. “Or there is, but only Hawk can really see it.”

Gretchen raised her eyebrows.

“Who knows,” Hope went on. “Maybe you can see it too.”

“How?”

“You saw those things last night,” he said quietly.

“No, but
how
can I see them?”

“You're sensitive. Most people think time is a straight line. But it's not. Some of us can see things that were here before—or things that aren't here yet. It's like a vibration in music. There are waves and ripples in time.”

Hope smirked. “Don't think it's all mystical,” she said. “There's usually a perfectly rational explanation for phenomena, we just don't understand it yet.”

“You sound like Mom,” Hawk said.

This made her smile softly. “We might not know why people are sensitive like Hawk,” she said to Gretchen, her smile growing more playful. “But it doesn't make him special.”

At this Hope punched her brother in the arm. He gave a short tug to the end of her hair and she swatted his hand away.

The cool pine smell of the forest wafted out around them. All that remained of the church was a cracked flagstone walkway leading nowhere. The grass had grown over the site, and apart from a scattered bloom of dandelions,
there was nothing different at all from where the church had stood and the surrounding land. If Gretchen could see through time, she couldn't do it there.

She watched Hawk intently, wondering what he was seeing in that space beyond the walkway, then shot several pictures of the cracked flagstone and Hawk, his hands in his pockets, looking straight at her with that wry smile.

“Weren't you scared living out here after your parents died?” she asked him. From inside the woods she could hear a twig snap, an animal scampering.

“We were just so messed up at first. You know how it is. You can't really think right. But there wasn't much of a choice in the matter. We didn't have anybody except our parents.”

“Nobody?”

“Nah, me and Hope are the last of our family line—just like you.”

“What about friends?”

“That we got,” he said. “The folks at Shadow Grove were really good to us. And your aunt . . . I guess Esther was the one who made us feel safe. I spent just about every day with her.” His voice broke as he said it, then he laughed remembering her. “That lady was something, I swear. I never thought she'd really leave us.”

He cleared his throat and wiped his face. Gretchen felt
awful that she'd only known Esther on the last day of her life. She squeezed his hand and suddenly she wanted to put her arms around him. He took a quick breath in at her touch, then looked right at her. “Thanks,” he said. His eyes shining brightly in hers made her feel like they'd done this all before, the walk, the trees in the distance, the empty spaces. She held his hand for the rest of their walk through the old foundation—and that felt just as easy and natural. But also like she was walking along in someone else's skin, like he was leading her somewhere to start a better life. The feeling made no sense, and after they had passed through what would have been the foundation of the church, it left her entirely.

Something shuffled along inside the woods again and this time it sounded bigger than a squirrel or chipmunk.

Hawk's lip twitched, his eyes were bright and glassy, and then he turned away, his face haunted by something in the distance none of them could see.

In the daylight the house looked more of an empty relic, a long-abandoned mansion sinking into the land. The climbing rose thicket loomed taller and more precarious than ever.

As soon as they opened the door the musty overwhelming smell of moldering papers and dried flowers
greeted them, but there was another smell too—something metallic and something like fresh dirt. They could hear a low murmuring buzzing sound, the contained energy of a swarm.

Oh no, Gretchen thought. The wasps.

“Okay,” Hawk said, his face stricken. Gretchen began to feel worried about him, and her sense that he was frailer than his sister came back to her.

“I don't remember it being this bad even three days ago,” he said.

“Or even three hours ago,” Gretchen said. “C'mon, there are more boxes to carry down from the library. Let's go.”

Hawk reached the top step and then tripped and fell forward, catching himself and twisting his wrist.

They heard the sound of whispering, then laughing.

“Goddamn it,” Hawk said, grabbing at his ankle to see what had knocked him down. In the dim light, Gretchen could see just the tattered ends of two little dresses moving quickly past them and turning the corner. But Hawk seemed to see them clearly and he looked grave. “The rope,” he whispered.

They heard scampering feet running down the hall in the direction of the mirror; sunlight streamed in through the windows, cutting bright squares into the darkness, and dust swirled in the beams of light. They could make out the sound of some unintelligible chant. The sibilant words like leaves rustling against one another.

Sufferus. Sufferus. Sufferus totaste oftheeinour life's last agony
.

Celia and Rebecca were nowhere in sight but the halls and stairwell were again filled with people as they had been last night just after Esther killed herself. It was as if they were gathering for some big event. Men in suspenders and button-down shirts, women in light calico dresses. An icy breeze blew through the house. And through it all they could hear the spectral little girls' whispered chants punctuated by laughter, as if the songs were really cruel jokes.

“Now it looks like almost everyone is here,” Hawk said.

“Who?” Hope asked, stumbling up the stairs behind them. “Who's here?”

“What you can't see won't hurt you,” Hawk said.

“Yeah, like viruses, or toxic fumes,” Hope said. “What's going on? Tell me.”

Descending the steps was a man with torn and bloody clothes, followed by other men and women barefoot. They looked as confused to be there as Gretchen felt seeing them. She grabbed Hope's hand, to steady herself.

Hawk, Hope, and Gretchen ran toward the library.
Esther's words rang in Gretchen's head—
When they realize I'm gone they'll take the house
. But she barely had time to think more about it.

Just outside the library door Celia and Rebecca stood before the mirror in their dingy matching dresses playing with a doll, smiling and whispering to one another. They were wearing necklaces made of human hair. When Gretchen and the Green siblings approached, their heads snapped up in unison and they stared. A large rust-colored beetle crawled across Celia's face, then another crawled out from the sleeve of her dress. She shook it off, and smiled as if it had given her an idea. Then Rebecca skipped merrily over to the vase where the wasps had built their nest. She stood there smiling at them, laughed in delight, and knocked the vase over.

Glass burst and flew in all directions and the paper-thin nest was torn and crushed. Slick-looking black-and-yellow wasps rose into the hallway in an immense swarm, their insect voices like a cacophony of angry, tight-lipped whispers. They filled the hall in a dense cloud, landing on Gretchen and Hope and Hawk, crawling on them. Hope dashed into the library but Hawk and Gretchen were in the center of the swarm; they slapped at their arms and legs and faces where the insects had landed, while the tone of the swarm raised in pitch and urgency. And then Gretchen
could feel the mean and venomous stings, on the back of her hands, one just above her eyebrow; she gasped in pain, frightened to move, frightened to stay still. Celia and Rebecca were in the center of the swarm too—but had continued to play peacefully in front of the mirror, wasps crawling across their faces and arms, covering them so that they were encased in an undulating blanket of black and yellow.

Sickened by the sight of the girls and dizzy from the stings and frenetic movement of the insects, Gretchen shuddered as thread-thin legs crawled across her face. Finally Hawk grabbed her hand and yanked her into the library, slamming the door behind them. His arms were covered with welts. He looked at her face and she could see his concern, she could already feel her eye swelling.

Hope stood by the open window, shooing out stray wasps and looking desperately for some way to make an escape.

1860

James has been home now for three weeks. Everything in my being longs to be by his side and yet I think about nothing but escaping from this town and the demands of my gender. I think of it every day. Were it not for James's friendship and encouragement, I think I would lose my mind. Valerie Green has married and seems happier than ever. Her husband works for the Axtons and I often see him walking with George.

I have saved almost enough to leave. Almost. And I am braver than ever—helping hide and guide people several times a month, feeding them in the chantry of the church. George and James and I make a good triumvirate, just as I imagined. But even this work will not keep me here in town, will not keep me from getting my education. Also, Troy Female Seminary is closer to the Canadian border. I can continue to help in the struggle from a different point on the Railroad.

My parents still go through my room searching out any evidence of “dangerous activities,” and I'm sure they would be scandalized by finding this journal. Especially the parts about James's first days home and our night beneath the stars.

But if they could see the things I've seen, I don't think they could go on living the way they do.

People covered with the marks of torture. Starved, subsisting on what they could forage in the woods. Thirsty, exhausted, hunted. Women so broken from their babies being taken from
them, they can barely speak. Some newly wounded, the smell of blood and infection overwhelming. For every person we save there are thousands of others enduring the horrors that they escape. For every person we save there is a racist, a so-called “patriot” ready to commit more brutal acts.

By our tally we have helped guide more than sixty people to freedom in the last two years. Some people have stayed. James is building a congregation unlike any other in the state.

My parents think they can ignore politics and ethics—the more they seem like regular folks the less they will have to think about the horrors that are a part of our history. And they think I don't know. They think I don't remember my grandmother—but I do. I remember her dark skin. And her dark eyes. I remember her smiling, holding me on the porch swing. Mother thinks because she and her sisters can pass for white our troubles are over.

She and my father say that things are better now, and that I am being rash and reckless even in talking too much about race. But if things were better why would they be afraid of anyone finding out? Why would they tell me to stay where I am? Why would they insist we keep quiet and keep our heads down? It's simply fear.

Our very blood carries the whole story. The hunter and the hunted. The slaver and the enslaved. The awful split at the bottom of the soul that states irrefutably: this is what it means to be an American.