Ghosts of Graveyards Past (32 page)

The crowd in the square grew louder as red and gold fireworks whistled the tune to
Dixie
. “I'll still write about them,” she said, watching the color stream down. “Tell their story, or as much of it as I know. Then, they won't be forgotten, no matter what happens with the cemetery.”

He leaned closer, trying to be heard above the festivities. “Will you come back?” he asked, blue eyes finding hers with a look of quiet expectation.

Amelia's words floated in the back of her mind, stirring her own doubts for this sudden connection, a spark born as fast and bright as those which appeared overhead. Perhaps it would go out just as quickly. Ten days was a short time for any decision involving the heart.

“I don't know,” she said, finally. “I just…I'm not sure it would work.”

She could see the hurt flicker briefly in his glance. “Not that I'm saying you're wrong,” he began. “But these last few days—I've only felt this way once before. I thought it must mean something.”

Regret welled in her throat, an ache she fought back. ”Maybe it does mean something. A sign that you're ready to move forward. Be part of the world again.” She did not say with her. It seemed impossible to say after so short a time; to pin all his hopes of a future on a single person, whom he'd scarcely known, seemed wrong.

“You have a place in this community, same as everyone else here tonight,” she said. “People who might appreciate your skill if you didn't hide it away.”

He shook his head. “We've been over this. It's not that simple for me.”

“Important choices seldom are.” There was so much else she wanted to say, but none of it was coming out right. The more they spoke, the further apart they grew. Literally, even with Con standing to face the activity in the square.

“They don't even know what they're celebrating,” he said. “An end to superstition? An imagined curse? An illness? It's just a made-up story at this point, to them and to everyone who comes here tonight.”

She followed his glance, seeing the audience that was scattered across the roped-off downtown, watching the colored lights crackle above them. Kids in costumes or with painted faces were hoisted onto their parents' shoulders, pointing wildly to the bursts of color overhead.

Fluttering above, the banner with its Celtic symbols was faintly visible in the lamplight.

Jenna looked at Con to find his back was still turned to her. Quiet fell between them.

In the square, shouts and cheers went up for the lights that blazed across the sky.

 



 

They hadn't really said good-bye, something that occurred to Jenna as she packed her bags later that night, folding clothes and sliding papers into a folder. Her camera, with its pictures from the last several days, rested back in its case. When she developed the film, there would be one of Con, his blue eyes staring back at her from the spring.

All she could picture now was the look on his face right before he left. The way he gently squeezed her arm, his parting words swallowed by the sound of the festival breaking apart. She had watched him disappear in the mass of strangers, wondering if she just made the worst mistake of her life.

Common sense told her it was the only choice to make. Her life was a road, after all, constant changes in the path to each new story she sought.

His was vulnerable and hurt, tucked away inside a wood that looped back on the past hundred years, unchanged by everything but neglect.

Morning brought an overcast sky, and rain that pattered against the windows of the historic inn. Jenna waited third in line at the desk, her room key in hand, along with her credit card. It took her a moment to recognize the woman in the sensible tweed skirt and flats who entered the lobby door.

Josephine Maudell's nurse, a relieved look on her face as she spotted the writer. “Looks like I caught you just in time,” Mollie said, folding an umbrella to leave by the door.

Jenna smiled, moving to give the older woman a hug. “I'm so sorry about Josephine,” she said.

“We all are, hon. It was coming on for a while now, but that doesn't make it easier.” With a sniffle, she pulled back to look Jenna in the face. “You really brightened up her world those final days,” she said. “Gave her a sense of purpose again, like when she still ran the society.”

“I was looking forward to hearing more of her stories,” Jenna said.

The woman chuckled. “She was looking forward to telling them. In fact,” she said, rooting through the bag she carried, “she found something to give you that day if things had worked out. She meant to do it before, but said it went clean out of her mind—her memory wasn't as good lately, you know.”

She handed Jenna a small leather book, a size that might easily fit in a pocket. The binding was cracked in several places, no print of any kind on the cover or spine.

“What is it?” she asked, a strange tingle passing through her with the book's ancient appearance.

“A diary from one of her kinfolk—well, the kind with several ‘greats' in their name.” She laughed. “She said which one, but I've clean forgotten the name. The handwriting looks a little hard on the eyes. I guess you'll know what to do with it, though.”

“Should I take this?” she asked. “It must belong to someone else now—some relative—”

The nurse shook her head. “None of them would appreciate it half as much as you,” she said. “She wanted you to have it. To remember her by, if nothing else.”

“Thank you,” Jenna said. She opened the cover. No date or name was inscribed to give her a clue how it related to her work. Still, Josephine must have thought it would be helpful. That was reason enough to look through it, and to cherish it in the memory of the history-driven figure who was so thrilled by her research.

“Are you ready to check out?” The clerk was peering expectantly at her over the cash register.

Mollie gave her a last hug. “Good luck, hon. I'll be looking for your book to come out.”

Was it coincidence? Jenna kept the book in her hand as she checked out, feeling the leather that was rough, but fragile at the same time. Instead of exiting, she took her bag to one of the chairs in the small sitting room. She stared out the window, the book resting on her lap. Her agent expected her to be in Louisiana by nightfall, already booking a room for her at a local hotel. She should save this for later, yet she didn't move.

Why couldn't she let this go? All the other cemeteries had loose ends, with graves she couldn't identify. This place had been special, somehow. Personal in a way that none of her research projects ever were before.

She looked down at the book she held, afraid to open it and find another glimpse of the truth that always managed to evade her. Steeling herself for disappointment, she flipped past brittle pages, where handwriting was crammed to fit the space in small loops.

A woman's hand, but not as elegant as the doctor's had been. She scanned the page for clues to its author, breath catching when she saw the year noted at the beginning of each entry.

Eighteen sixty-two: the same year as the epidemic, and Arthur's enlistment in the Confederacy.

Its narrative, though plain, gave a vivid sketch of the one who wrote it down. Jenna pictured a girl on the verge of womanhood, shy and modest by nature. A heart that felt deep devotion for its Creator, and for the family that was split apart when the war claimed her brother's service in arms.

Summer gave way to fall with a flip of the pages. On November 1
st
came a brief account of the Mischief Night prank, the journal's owner writing:

 

This symbol is not familiar to my own eyes, but Granny Clare saw it once on a grave in the Highlands. I don't much care for the look of it. The dye the children used is almost the same color as blood, and I wish someone would scrub it off. No one does, though, so I must get used to it, I suppose.

 

Jenna paused. This was familiar to her; not just the phrases, but something about the writing itself. She felt as if it was tugging at her sleeve, some remembrance just beyond her reach.

She turned the page. Further down, she noted the first signs of the epidemic. The boy Charley's death, the school teacher, and another name she recognized from the gravestone rubbings she had made. The words were tumbling into her mind faster now as she read them.

November 16
th
1862: They found Mr. Roan today. Two boys peeked through his window on a dare, and saw the poor body lying on the floor. I heard they buried him in the grove where his family rests, and that someone has cut that same mark into the stone that Papa uses for those in the cemetery. No one seems to grieve his loss, but I feel sorry for Mr. Roan that he left no friend to mourn him.

 

Jenna continued on, forgetting to breathe as she read.

 

Many come to see the doctor or to stick a note under the door asking for medicine. It is terrible to see how she wears herself out, hardly sleeping or eating between the work she does. I help her as best I can, but there is little for it except to pray this illness will soon leave our midst.

 

Jenna leaned closer, silently mouthing the words preserved in the long-ago journal. Other guests who passed by offered her strange looks, but she didn't care. Her only concern was for the hundred and fifty year old secret that might be buried somewhere in the faded binding. Not knowing what to expect, she turned another page.

 

 

 

 

25

 

The doctor took ill last night.

 

Nell's pencil hovered above the page, hesitant to finish this painful thought. She blinked back tears, fighting the urge to give in to her emotions—a mixture of sadness and, strangely enough, hope, despite all that had transpired.

Hours before, she had left the doctor resting upstairs, the letter from Arthur clasped between her hands. The awful news it bore made Nell wonder if either of them would ever see him again. She could not help thinking of him dying in a crowded hospital corridor miles from home. It was a pain that paled only when compared to the loss of faith he described so bitterly according to Mariah's words.

Nell tried to write him, crouched over a candle's flame at the parlor's desk. All the words of comfort seemed stale, so she laid her pen down mid-sentence to stare at the dying embers in the hearth. Eyes drifting closed in silent prayer, she pictured a dark-haired youth in a hospital bed, his features battered and weary. He was lost right now, scarred in ways other than physical injury. She believed his faith was deep rooted, though, too long entrenched to simply die without a fight.
Let him see Your hand guiding him
, she thought. Leaning her head against the desk, she let the hair fall across her face, blocking the dim view of the parlor.

She woke in early morning to the sound of a heavy thud upstairs. Half-asleep, she imagined it was Henry rising—only there was no Henry, not upstairs anyway. With this realization, she was awake again, listening. The sound of movement was coming from Henry's old room, the doctor's quarters.

Nell took the stairs with haste. Pushing open the door to the doctor's room, she found Mariah sprawled beside the writing desk.

“Please,” Mariah said weakly, glancing up at her. “The daybook. I need to write—”

“You need to rest,” Nell corrected. Gently, she pulled the sick woman to a sitting position, supporting her slender frame. She wondered whether to call for her father's help. He would be in the barn already, tending the livestock before his ride to the smithy forge. Her mother would be with him. Granny Clare still asleep in the bedroom downstairs, where the heavy quilts were her best defense against rheumatism on winter mornings.

“Hold onto me,” she instructed, draping the doctor's arm around her own small shoulders. Staggering upward, she pulled them both to a standing position and moved to the bed, where the covers had been left in disarray. Tangled up with a shawl was a large volume that Nell quickly placed aside as she eased the doctor against a stack of pillows. “Let me fetch the others from the barn—”

“No, wait.” A hand gripped her arm, pleading with her to stay. “There is something I must tell you, before I have not the strength left. This fever muddles my thoughts, but I am certain that what happened—what I saw—was more than imagination.”

“What did you see?” Nell asked, troubled from the intensity in her gaze. The boy, Charley, had been the same, she realized. His mind wandered to other times and places while she clasped his hand beside the bed.

“It was a dream,” Mariah said. “But a sign, as well, I think. An answer to prayer.”

Had she misheard? Nell could think of no response, her glance falling on the leather volume still open on the bed. The Bible she read aloud from the night before and then placed on the side table when she left. Meaning Mariah had opened it again later that night, despite the doubt she expressed when they talked.

“I prayed He would guide me,” Mariah said, words coming fast between breaths, “and then I had such a strange dream. Of a river with soldiers drowned below, and a washerwoman on the shore to clean the burial clothes.”

This reference to the
bean nighe
made Nell shiver, as if talk of superstition from the doctor's lips confirmed her fears.

The doctor looked as if she might faint with the recollection of her dream. “They died in the water,” she gasped, “water stained with crimson—”

“This is too distressing for you,” Nell interrupted, wishing she would let her go for help. The hand clinging to her was so desperate, though, she couldn't leave even to call for help from a window.

“When I woke, I knew.” Mariah's voice was hoarse. “Knew the water has caused our suffering these past weeks.”