Nathaniel (25 page)

Michael, who had taken little part in the discussion, said nothing, though he didn’t believe what Eric’s father had said. He’d thought about it all afternoon, and no matter what anybody said, he knew that somehow he’d made the colt die. He hadn’t wanted to—all he’d wanted to do was help Eric—but still, he’d done it.

And he couldn’t tell anybody. For one thing, no one would believe him. And he couldn’t say how he’d done it, because he didn’t know. Sighing inaudibly, he decided it was one more thing he could never talk about.

As Janet and Ione attacked the dishes, the two boys headed upstairs toward Michael’s room. But when they came to the landing, Eric stopped, gazing up at the trapdoor to the attic. “What’s up there?”

“I don’t know,” Michael replied, his mind still on the colt. “Nothing, I guess.”

“Why don’t we go up and look?”

A moment later Michael had dragged a chair from his room and climbed up on it. He was barely able to reach the folding ladder that gave the attic its only access. It creaked angrily as he pulled it down, but when he tested his weight on it, it seemed secure enough. He climbed up and pushed at the trapdoor. It stuck for a moment, then gave way, dropping a shower of dust on him. Michael poked his head through the trapdoor.

“Go down and ask Mom for a flashlight,” he told Eric. “It’s too dark to see anything.”

Five minutes later Eric crowded up behind Michael, flashlight in hand. “Let me see.”

“Give me the light,” Michael replied. “It’s my attic, and I get to look first.”

Reluctantly, Eric passed the light over, and Michael switched it on, throwing a weak beam into the blackness of the attic. “Wow,” he breathed. “It’s all full of old crates.” He scrambled up into the attic, and Eric followed. “What do you think’s in ’em?”

Eric shrugged in the gloom. “Let’s get my dad and bring them down.”

Fifteen minutes later, the contents of the attic had been transferred to the living room. There were five crates: old pine boxes held together with hand-forged nails, their boards dry and brittle, shrunken with age. The last thing they brought down was an ancient trunk, and when Leif Simpson had deposited it, too, in the living room, the six of them gathered around, staring at the strange collection. Peggy Simpson, with the curiosity of her two years, was busily trying to open one of the boxes with her stubby fingers.

“Do you have a hammer and screwdriver?” Leif eventually asked. “We’ll never find out what’s in them if we count on Peg.”

Michael found the tools in the kitchen drawer that had already been established as a catchall. “Which one first? The trunk?”

“Let’s save it for last,” Janet suggested. “Let’s do the boxes first.”

“They’re crates,” Michael corrected. “Boxes are made of cardboard.”

“Never mind,” Janet replied. “Just open them.”

One by one, Michael and Eric began prying the lids off the crates. The first one was filled with old china, thin and delicate, with an ornate floral pattern done in pink against a white background.

Janet picked up one of the plates, examining it carefully. “I know what this is,” she said. “It’s French. My grandmother had some of this.” She flipped it over. On the back, faint but distinct, was the Limoges mark.

“It’s ugly,” Michael pronounced, already beginning to pry at the second crate.

Janet and Ione exchanged a knowing look. “It may be ugly, but it’s valuable,” Janet said. Then, as she passed one of the plates to Ione, the lid came off the second crate, revealing a cache of battered cookware.

“That’s old, but I don’t think I’d call it valuable,” Leif Simpson remarked, holding up a badly dented tin coffeepot with a hole in the bottom. “Why would anyone keep this?”

In the third crate there was a wooden toolchest, bereft of its contents, and the fourth produced a mass of old linens, rotted with age, which crumbled in their hands as they tried to pick them up. Finally Michael pried the lid off the fifth crate.

“My God,” Janet whispered. “Look at it. Just look at it.”

“Wow.” Eric reached out and touched an elaborately tooled coffeepot. “Is it real?”

Inside the box, wrapped in disintegrating paper, was a large set of sterling: the coffeepot, a matching teapot, creamer and sugar bowl, and a tray to hold them all. Below the coffee service they found a condiment caster, each of its silver-topped glass cruets and pots carefully wrapped. In a separate box, there was a set of silver flatware, all of it as heavily decorated as the coffee set. The value of the china faded into insignificance as Janet assessed the silver.

Suddenly the sound of Michael’s voice echoing Eric penetrated Janet’s mind.
“Is
it real?”

“It’s real,” Janet assured them.

“Maybe it’s plate,” Ione Simpson suggested.

Janet shook her head. “It’s not plate. It’s sterling, and it couldn’t have been made much after 1820.”

“How can you tell?”

Janet smiled wryly. “One of my hobbies over the last few years has been drooling over things like this in stores on Madison Avenue. Believe me, I know what this is.”

“But whose is it?” Eric suddenly asked.

Michael threw him a scornful look. “It’s ours, stupid. It’s our house, isn’t it?”

Eric ignored him. “But where’d it come from?”

“I don’t know,” Janet said softly. One by one, she picked the pieces up, examining them carefully. Though they were heavily tarnished, she could find no dents or scratches, and none of the sets seemed to have pieces missing. “But I think Michael’s probably right. If they’ve been in the attic as long as I think they have, they’re probably ours.” Suddenly, her anticipation heightened by the discovery of the silver, she turned to the trunk. “Pry it open, Michael. Maybe it’s full of gold!”

Five minutes later, with some help from Leif Simpson, the old locks gave way, and the boys lifted the lid. Their first feeling was one of disappointment—the trunk seemed to be filled with nothing but old clothing. Carefully, Janet and Ione lifted out garment after garment, all of it seeming primitive in contrast to the silver and china. The materials were coarse homespuns, and much of the stitching was inexpertly done. Below the clothes—mostly dresses and shirts—there was a tray containing some shoes, a few pairs of rotted cotton hose, and some moth-eaten woolen socks. Below the tray, more clothes.

Buried at the bottom, Janet found a book. She took it out of the trunk and held it under a lamp. It was a small volume, bound in leather, with a leather strap held fast by a small gold clasp. The clasp was locked, but when Janet gently tugged at the strap, it easily tore away.

“Damn,” she swore softly, immediately regretting the curiosity that had caused her to damage the volume. Gingerly, she opened the cover. The first page was blank, but starting with the second, the pages were filled with an uncertain script, done mostly in black ink. Janet glanced up, but no one seemed to be paying any attention to her. Instead, they were engrossed in examining the contents of the various boxes. Ione was carefully sorting the silver, while her husband unwrapped the china. Peggy had found a wooden spoon, and was happily beating on the bottom of a rusted pan, while the boys examined the trunk, in search of a secret compartment.

Impulsively, Janet turned to the last page of the diary. The script seemed to her to be particularly shaky, as if the writer had been ill or nervous about something. Slowly, she deciphered the old-fashioned penmanship:

14 March, 1884—Spring comes, and it is almost over. Nathaniel and I still live, but when they find out what Nathaniel has done, I am sure they will kill him. In the meantime, though, my baby grows inside me, and it is better that some of us live than that all of us die. I have decided to tell them a man came for the children, and though they will not believe me, and will think me daft, perhaps it will save Nathaniel—all that matters now is that Nathaniel and my unborn child survive
.

Janet reread the passage several times, and then slowly closed the little book. She held it in her lap, staring at it. A moment later her eyes drifted to Michael. As if feeling her gaze, he turned and looked at her, as did Ione Simpson. It was Ione who spoke.

“What is it?”

“It’s nothing,” Janet replied. “Just an old diary.”

Janet let Shadow out the back door, and watched as he disappeared into the darkness, intent on making his evening rounds of the little farm. Then, knowing the dog wouldn’t be back for a while, she went upstairs, tapped on Michael’s door, and stuck her head into his room. He was in bed, his head propped up on his left hand, reading.

“Where’s Shadow?” he asked.

“Prowling,” Janet told him. She sat on the edge of Michael’s bed and took his hand. “I want to talk to you about something,” she said.

Michael looked nervous, but didn’t turn away. “A-about what I saw?”

Janet nodded. “And about what you said about that little girl—Becky—today. That you think someone killed her and buried her in Potter’s Field. What made you say that, honey?”

Suddenly Michael’s eyes filled with terror. “I—I can’t tell you. I—I promised not to tell anybody.”

“Not even me?”

Michael nervously twisted the bedcovers in his clenched fist.

“Please?”

“You won’t tell anyone? Anyone at all?”

Sensing that her son’s fright was genuine, Janet promised.

“I—I lied to you,” Michael said at last, his voice quavering.

“Why would you want to do that?”

“I was scared.”

“Of me?”

Michael shook his head.

“Of Grandpa?”

“I—I’m not sure. I guess so.”

Janet reached out and gently removed the bedclothes from Michael’s hand. “Why don’t you tell me what really happened?”

Slowly, Michael began telling his mother as much as he could remember of what had happened that night.

“And on the way home, I saw something,” he finished. “But it wasn’t Abby.”

“Then what was it?” Janet pressed.

“It was Nathaniel,” Michael whispered. “I saw Nathaniel, and I talked to him, and I saw someone else, too, but I’m not sure who it was.”

Janet swallowed. A knot of tension had formed in her stomach. “You saw Nathaniel, and you were talking to him,” she repeated.

Michael hesitated, then nodded in the darkness.

“But Nathaniel’s just like Abby. He doesn’t exist, honey. He’s only a ghost.”

“Maybe—maybe he’s not,” Michael ventured. In his memory, Dr. Potter’s words returned, the words with which he’d described Nathaniel:
‘He looked like you, and he looked like your father.…’

“All right,” Janet said patiently, still unsure of exactly what Michael was trying to say. “Let’s assume Nathaniel isn’t a ghost. What did he say that scared you so much?”

Michael racked his brain, trying to remember what Nathaniel had said, the exact words. But they were gone; all that was left were the warnings. And a vague memory.

“He—he said they’d brought us something. A—a baby.”

“A
baby?”
Janet repeated, unable to keep her incredulity out of her voice.

Again Michael nodded. “They were burying it out in the field.”

Janet’s heart began to pound. “What field?”

“The one down near the woods by the river. Potter’s Field.”

“And you think it was Aunt Laura’s baby they were burying?”

Again, Michael’s head bobbed.

Janet paused for a long time, then reached out and touched Michael’s face, tipping his head so his eyes were clearly visible. “Michael, are you sure you saw any of this?”

“I—I think so.”

“You think so. But you’re not sure.”

“Well—” Michael faltered, then backed off a little. “It was dark, and I couldn’t see very well, except when Nathaniel was with me. Then I could see real good.”

The knot in Janet’s stomach tightened. What was he talking about now? “You could see in the dark when Nathaniel was with you?”

Michael nodded.

“All right,” Janet told him. “Now, what about Becky?”

Michael squirmed. “I—I’m not sure. But I bet whoever she is, she’s in Potter’s Field, too.”

“But we don’t even know who she is.”

Michael swallowed hard, then spoke in a whisper. “I don’t care,” Michael said, his voice reflecting his misery. “I bet they killed her, too.”

Janet gathered her son into her arms. “Oh, Michael,” she whispered. “What are you saying? Why are you saying these things?”

Michael met her gaze evenly. “Nathaniel,” he said. “I’m only saying what Nathaniel told me.”

“But sweetheart, Nathaniel doesn’t exist. You only imagined all this.”

Michael lay still for a long time, then slowly shook his head. “I didn’t,” he said softly. Then: “Did I?”

Outside, Shadow began barking.

That night, long after Michael had fallen asleep, Janet remained awake. She read the diary over and over, read all the entries, describing how Abby Randolph and her children had tried to survive the winter of 1884.

How the food had run out, and they had begun to starve.

How one of the children—the youngest—had gotten sick and finally died, and what Abby had done with its remains.

And then, one by one, the other children had died, but never again was there a mention of illness. And in the end, all of them were gone except Nathaniel, who, along with his mother, survived.

“…   Better that some of us live than that all of us die …”

She went to bed finally, but didn’t sleep. Instead she lay staring into the darkness, the words drumming in her mind. Perhaps, she told herself, it didn’t mean anything. Perhaps it was nothing but the ravings of a woman driven mad by the loneliness of the long prairie winter. Or perhaps it had been written somewhere else, packed in the trunk for shipment, and never unpacked again.

Finally, near dawn, she drifted into half sleep, but even in her semiconscious state she could hear the name:

Nathaniel …

She shivered.

There could be no question of the roots of that terrible ghost story now, for she had found its confirmation. Inscribed on the flyleaf of the diary, barely discernible in faded pencil, was the proof: the name Abigail Randolph.

But why were Abby Randolph’s things in this house? Who had put them there?