A Deadly Shaker Spring (9 page)

Rose tried to be even-handed toward all Believers, but she had to admit that Elsa was not one of her favorite sisters. Elsa came from poor hill-country stock and had left her husband and grown sons less than two years earlier to join the Shakers. None of this disturbed Rose. The Society welcomed anyone who wished to become a Believer—whether rich or poor, learned or unschooled. Elsa, though, was inclined to hubris and unseemly ambition, and no amount of confession or correction seemed to cure her of these sins.

“Well, a person's gotta wonder, that's all. Leavin'
thy work like that, a person's gonna wonder,” Elsa said.

The softer voice rose in tone, but the words were still indistinct.

“Nay, I ain't sayin' I spread rumors around, but bein' a Believer and all, I know my duty.”

Rose decided to make her presence known, though her enthusiasm for the visit had dimmed considerably.

Sarah and Elsa raised their heads and grew silent as Rose entered the room. Each was hunched over her own sewing desk at opposite corners of the large room, as far away as they could get from one another.

“Good day, Sisters,” Rose said. “I knew many of the sewing sisters would be helping with the planting today, so I've come to help you, if I can.”

Elsa responded with a grunt and a nod of her head.

“So kind of you, Eldress,” Sarah said. Her skin was pallid, and she wore a bandage around her head.

Needles, a pin cushion, and embroidery floss lay on Sarah's sewing desk. The warm patina of the desk's aged pine surface glowed in the sunlight from the east window. Sarah herself was plain, but an exquisite seamstress, creating beauty with every stitch. When she spoke, her lithe fingers barely slowed as they guided her embroidery needle in and out of the fabric with sureness.

Elsa's stitchery, on the other hand, was effective but graceless. Her desk held messy piles of fabric scraps and sewing implements. Her round, flat-featured face registered boredom. She shot a malevolent glance over at Sarah before bending again to the work dress she was mending.

The room was brightly lit by the large, clean windows
lining the walls. Between the windows, pine strips studded with shiny maple pegs circled the entire room. Nearly every peg held some object, from chairs and a flatbroom to partially finished garments on hangers. Several empty sewing desks had been pushed against the walls until they were called for again, probably after planting season, when more sisters would be free. In the center of the room stood a large cutting table covered with a length of fine, dark blue wool. Tissue pattern pieces were pinned along the fabric, their edges touching so as not to waste any of the precious wool.

Since neither Sarah nor Elsa offered her a task to do, Rose wandered over to the table. She picked up a pair of shears that lay on the corner.

“Shall I cut this pattern for you, Sarah?” she asked.

Sarah's head bobbed up, her brown eyes protruding even more than usual. “Oh nay, that's all right, you needn't bother. You don't usually . . . I mean, I'll be getting to it just as soon as I've finished putting these initials in Brother Hugo's new shirt.” She lowered her eyes again to her needlework.

Rose hesitated, the shears already open. “I don't mind at all,” she said. “I know I haven't helped out in the sewing room as often as some other places, but you've only the two of you until planting is done, so I'd truly like to pitch in. If you'll let me.” She knew it would be a mistake to sound as if she were challenging Sarah's oversight of the sewing. She closed the shears and waited.

Sarah looked up again, this time with a frown. Rose glanced over at Elsa just in time to see the last of a
crooked grin directed at Sarah. Rose permitted herself a quiet sigh. This conversation would be tougher than she'd anticipated. The two women were clearly battling, an unfortunate consequence of having Elsa in a room with any other sister.

“All right, then, Eldress,” Sarah said. “You can cut if you really want to. I appreciate the help.” Her voice always sounded as if it should belong to a more delicate woman.

“Just call me Rose, please, Sarah,” Rose said, laughing. “I'm not sure I'll ever get used to ‘eldress,' it makes me feel as if I'll take off my cap and find nothing but wisps of white hair.”

This drew a timid grin from Sarah and a snicker from Elsa.

Rose felt the sharp shears slice through the soft wool and let the silence grow in the room. She knew so little about Sarah. The sister was in her early thirties, but her painful history gave her an older look. She had lived among them as a child. Rose remembered her as a timid little girl with whom she had had little contact. As Rose recalled hearing from other Believers, Sarah's mother had sent for her, when she was still quite young, and raised her to adulthood. She had come back to North Homage about two years ago, reporting that her mother had died. Sarah had a sadness about her but kept the reasons to herself. Her confessions were earnest but along the lines of “gazing out the window instead of working,” or “showing a hint of temper.”

Rose glanced up to catch Elsa watching Sarah instead of mending. When Elsa realized she'd been caught, Rose said, “Elsa, you seem tired of mending.
The kitchen sisters are short-handed, so go ahead to the kitchen and help with the noon meal. They'll appreciate it. Go on, just leave the mending, it'll keep.”

Elsa's face moved swiftly from relief to suspicion. But she put down her mending.

“I thank thee,” she said and clumped out on sturdy legs.

Rose went back to her pattern cutting until Elsa's footsteps receded down the staircase. She put down her shears and picked up Elsa's unfinished mending.

“I'll just finish this, shall I?” She took down a ladder-back chair from its wall peg, and placed it next to Sarah's sewing desk.

Sarah shifted in her own chair and chewed on her lower lip.

“You do enjoy fine needlework, don't you, Sarah?”

This earned a shy nod.

“Your work is excellent, you know, and well appreciated, I assure you.”

A quick, tiny smile.

“Did you learn it here in the village as a child, or did your mother teach you?”

Sarah's needle hesitated. “Here, at first,” she said. “I learned from Sister Ariel. I loved to watch her stitch, and she gave me special lessons, even though I was so young. I kept it up afterwards. Sewing gave me comfort.”

“Of course, Sister Ariel. She was a wonderful seamstress, and such a kind person.”

“I loved her,” Sarah said. “I was so sad to hear that she died while I was with my . . . while I was away.”

“We were all sad to lose her, but I'm sure she is happy to be where she is, Sarah. You will see her again, you know.”

Sarah's head bobbed in a quick nod as she made a finishing knot in her embroidery floss and snipped the end with a small pair of scissors. Placing the garment in a nearly full basket next to her chair, she reached for another from a second basket.

“Tell me, are you happy with us, Sarah?”

The needle paused in mid-stitch. “Yea, of course, Eldress, I've said so many times.”

“I know you have, but I just wondered: Do you ever miss your own mother, your family?”

Sarah cut and separated a length of yellow embroidery floss. She picked up the garment, a deep-brown work dress, and began embroidering initials inside the collar.

“The Society is my family,” she said, without lifting her eyes. “In a way, I guess they always have been. My mother is here.” She flashed an unreadable glance at Rose. “Sister Ariel was as much my mother as anybody, and Sister Josie, and Eldress Agatha. I am happy here and I never want to leave.”

“Tell me about your mother.”

Sarah's head jerked up. “What . . . what do you mean?”

“Well, what was she like?”

“Beautiful,” she said. “She was beautiful. I don't look like her.”

“As I remember, you went to live with her as a youngster,” Rose prodded. “What would you have been, seven or eight years old?”

“Six.” Sarah kept her eyes on her work as she spoke.

“What did she enjoy doing? Did she sew, like you?”

“Nay.”

Rose felt as if she were trying to pry information from the fieldstone fence outside the Sisters' Shop.

“Sarah,” she said, switching from gentleness to a firmer tone, “I have been told something that disturbs me, something about you.”

This time the needle stopped completely.

“There are reports that you have left the Sisters' Shop for as much as an hour on mysterious errands, and even that you've been out past bedtime. I can't help but notice that you have avoided confession for weeks.” She halted at the look of anguish and fury on Sarah's face.

“
She
told you, didn't she. Elsa has been telling tales about me.”

“No sister has told me anything.” It was the truth, since only Wilhelm had told her, but Rose felt as uncomfortable as if she were lying. She wanted to discuss Sarah's behavior, not who told what to whom.

“Sarah, if you are in any kind of trouble, I urge you to confide in me. I can't help you if I don't know what's going on, and I do want to help you.”

Sarah secured her needle by weaving it through the fabric in her lap. “Truly, Eldress, I have nothing to tell you. She's been lying about me. She's just jealous, that's all, she's jealous of me and everyone.” She looked at Rose again, her mouth set in a hard line. “If you really want to help me, send Elsa to work somewhere else. You don't even have to send anyone
else to help me. I usually have to redo her work, anyway, so I'd be ahead if I was working on my own.”

Rose sighed as the bell rang for the noon meal. “I'll see what I can do. In the meantime, come along and eat at my table. On the way, we will set a time for your next confession.”

“I'll be there shortly, Eldress. I just want to finish up a stitch or two. Samuel needs this new work shirt right away.”

Caleb Cox thrust his hands in the pockets of his worn jacket and fastened his eyes on the trees Sarah would come through on her way from the Sisters' Shop to him. He was sober—always as sober as possible for Sarah. Lately it had gotten tougher, though.

Dry leaves crackled. Caleb stiffened, alert. It might not be Sarah; could be any Shaker out on an errand. But it was Sarah, and he watched fondly as she walked through the budding apple trees. She wasn't what a lot of men would call pretty. Wisps of light brown hair escaped her heavy woven bonnet. Her brown eyes protruded maybe a bit too much, her shoulders were too narrow, and her hips too wide. But Caleb's war-battered, booze-deadened heart quickened at the sight of her hopeful smile as she spotted him. He held open his arms and Sarah ran to them. He held her tightly, afraid to loosen his grip even to kiss her.

“Cal, I'm getting really scared,” Sarah said, putting her hands on his chest and pushing away from him. “You haven't told me everything, have you? What's really going on?”

Caleb sighed and pulled her close again. To tell the
truth, that was one reason he always made sure to be sober around Sarah. Not just because he loved her and didn't want to lose her, but because if he got drunk and opened his stupid big mouth, he'd tell her everything, and that would be the end.

“Nothin's going on, Sarah. I'd tell you if there was, honest. It's just what I told you before.”

Sarah frowned at him. “Then explain how those rats got in the schoolhouse. And that awful newspaper; who wrote that?”

Caleb started to back away from her, but she caught his arm.

“And why did someone hit me?”

“What? I thought it was an accident.”

“I didn't tell any of the brethren, but I know I didn't fall down the stairs. Someone hit me, twice.”

Caleb stared at her. “That wasn't supposed to happen,” he mumbled. “Damn it, that wasn't supposed to happen.”

“Caleb!”

“Sorry, Sarah. Sorry. Look, I'll take care of things and make sure you're never hurt again, okay? I'll never let anyone hurt you again.”

Sarah's trusting expression almost warmed the chill taking hold of his heart. Seemed like there was more going on than even he knew, and, damn it, he'd find out what. He'd stay sober as long as it took. Yet even as he made the vow, he thought of Jack Daniels waiting on the orange crate in his room, and more where that came from. He pushed the enticing image from his mind.

“Look what I brought for you,” he said, slipping the journal page out of his jacket pocket. “My friend
found another one for me. He said we're gettin' closer to who might've killed your mother.”

Sarah drew in her breath with hopeful excitement, as he'd known she would. She slowly opened the folded sheet, as if she didn't want to know its contents but couldn't keep herself from looking. Her eyes widened as she read it through.

“Does your friend really think he can figure out who this man is—this man who took advantage of her?”

“Yeah, pretty sure.”

“It says here that her soul was pure, that she was innocent. She was, wasn't she?”

Caleb nodded, feeling a little sick to his stomach. He knew different, but he could never tell Sarah. It would kill her.

“Whoever wrote this loved her very much.”

“Yes.”

“Caleb?” She looked shyly up at him. “Is my hair the same color as hers was? I can only remember her with her hair covered up, and I can't ask anyone around here because then they'd know who she was.”

Caleb pulled a strand from beneath her cap and wound it around his index finger. “Yes,” he said. “It sure is.”

Sarah wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him.