The Sparrow Sisters (34 page)

“Okay, then,” Emily said. “I guess that's good news.”

Ben couldn't speak.

“Well, I still want that interview with the witch,” Emily said firmly. “My story's not finished.”

Ben was still trying to find the strength to climb the steps when the entire courtroom came pouring out the doors. He scanned the crowd for Nettie, for Sorrel. He knew he looked more than a little crazed as he talked himself forward, step by step, whispering, “Excuse me” and “Please, please,” as he swam upstream. Nettie found him and pulled him back into the hall.

“It's over,” she said and wrapped her hands around Ben's big biceps. “You're shaking!”

“I'm a wreck,” Ben said and drew Nettie in until she was safe against him. He picked her up and pulled her out of the flow of people. Nettie pushed down on his arms and tilted her head until she could kiss him square on the lips.

Patience and Henry were alone in the courtroom. Simon and Sorrel had walked out with Charlotte. After Judge Adams's
declaration, Rob Short was led from the room by the bailiff who couldn't wait to get back to Patience about his psoriasis. Now Patience stood in front of Henry. He couldn't stop smiling, and she put her finger against the tiny half-moon scar at the corner of his mouth. She remembered how she had run her tongue over it the first time she kissed him. Henry could not believe his luck: that he'd found Patience at all and then that she wanted him and now that he had gotten her back. They didn't speak for long moments, not just because the birds were singing again and were terribly loud.

S
ORREL LOOKED AROUND
the Nursery. Under the sunlight, in the sweet cacophony of birdsong, the soft air that seemed hardly to have any weight at all, the damage was beyond imagining. In the middle of the driveway, just in front of the shed there was a still-smoking black mess. Sorrel bent to see if she recognized the plants—she knew that much: it was definitely a pile of burned vegetation.

“Haven't they done enough?” Sorrel whispered. She picked up a broken, thorny rose cane and poked. The smell was pungent and choking, and she turned away and dropped the stick. “Jesus,” she said and went for a shovel.

Charlotte had left Simon on the town hall steps talking to Emily Winston and a cluster of reporters. The sight of several television cameras privately thrilled her. This could only be good for Simon's practice, she'd thought. Take that, Papa Mayo.
She'd had to wait, her Mini growling, for the parking lot to clear enough for her to leave. By the time she found herself on Calumet Landing, it was obvious that she meant to go to the Nursery. She smelled the burning foxglove as she turned in.

Sorrel was shoveling sand over everything so that, after it cooled, she could dump it into the pickup and take it away. Charlotte pulled up, and Sorrel stood the shovel at her side and stared.

“Hi,” Charlotte said as she climbed out.

“Thank you, Charlotte. You saved us all today.” Sorrel thought both their voices sounded thin, too high and uncertain in the quiet.

“Saved?” Charlotte shook her head. She didn't feel particularly saved. “What is that?” she asked, pointing at the foxglove.

“Probably a final love note from the vandals who trashed the Nursery.” Sorrel twirled the shovel between her palms.

“Vandals?” Charlotte asked. “More like an angry mob. This place is a disaster.” She looked out over the damage. “Boy, the guys are going to regret this once Patience gets back on track. Maybe she should just curse all the men and be done.”

“Oh, I have no doubt that if she could, she would,” Sorrel said. “But in case you didn't get the subtext today, Patience is incapable of harm.”

“I got it, Sorrel,” Charlotte started to snap but backed off. “I always got that about Patience.”

Charlotte held her hand out. “Give me that,” she said. Sorrel gave her the shovel and went for another. Together they tamped
down the foxglove. Together they went into the shed and sat across the unused counter.

“You love Simon,” Charlotte said.

“I did,” Sorrel agreed. “But that was long ago, and we're different people now.”

“Not so different. Simon still loves you. He never stopped.”

“Oh, Charlotte, that's not true.” Sorrel meant what she said. If she and Simon really loved each other, they would have found themselves beyond the playground.

“Don't be patronizing. Simon looks at you as if you're water in the desert. He looks at me as if he's waiting for me to change.”

“You have changed!” Sorrel said. “Look what you did for Patience. But more, Simon has changed.”

Charlotte turned and walked out the shed door. Suddenly she just couldn't stand another minute of being the noble Charlotte. She wanted to be the sharp Charlotte, the stiff, cool, numb one who only a few weeks ago would have been willing to spend the rest of her marriage with a man who didn't want her just because she hated failure. She'd almost convinced herself that she didn't want him either. But then she'd seen Simon as he took on Patience Sparrow. She'd seen him fill in the sketchy outlines of his own fine character. He became the real Simon who made the Sparrows feel safe in a way she never let him do for her.

Charlotte took a step and her sandal snapped. She stumbled and found Sorrel at her elbow. She kicked the shoe off and the other one too and stood in her bare feet on the cooling sand.

“Fuck!” she growled. “God Dammit!” she screamed into the sky. Starlings, larks, and mockingbirds startled up from the tupelo trees ringing the Nursery.

Sorrel began to laugh and as her voice rose, the birds returned and settled back into the trees, their song louder even than Charlotte's shout.

I
t would be late August before anyone really registered that the Sparrow Sisters Nursery looked as if the lost summer had never happened. Roses climbed the shed, entwined with dark purple clematis, leaves as glossy as satin. There were no thorns. Patience's cupboard was overflowing with remedies, and the little barn was often crowded with seekers. The half acre of meadow was wild with cosmos and lupine, coreopsis, and sweet William. Basil, thyme, coriander, and broad leaf parsley grew in billowing clouds of green; the smell so fresh your mouth watered and you began to plan the next meal. Cucumbers spilled out of the raised beds, fighting for space with the peas and beans, lettuce, tomatoes, and bright yellow peppers.
The cart was righted out by the road and was soon bowed under glass jars and tin pails of sunflowers, zinnias, dahlias, and salvia. Pears, apples, and out-of-season apricots sat in balsa wood baskets in the shade, and watermelons, some with pink flesh, some with yellow, all sweet and seedless, lined the willow fence. Rob Short had indeed replaced the gate and lock, but there was no need. There was not a single soul in Granite Point who would dare to push the Sparrows.

The town recovered, too. Although the wisteria had to be replanted again on the town green, and the lobsters were neither so big nor so plentiful as in other years, and the painted mermaid was rubbed paper thin by all the fishermen. Chief Kelsey took his family on vacation to California.

When Charlotte went to see Henry Carlyle, uneasy over her lethargy and lack of appetite, he needed only the briefest look to say the whispered words he hadn't heard the first time they were spoken. Charlotte called Patience before she even got home, and Patience, of course, pretended to be as surprised as Charlotte. Simon burst into tears in front of his secretary.

Nettie and Ben went to see Matty's grave late one afternoon when the sun was already beginning to lower too early. They held hands as they stood before the tangle of lobelia and alyssum that softened the raw soil. After she watered the flowers, Nettie reached up to cup Ben's jaw and kissed him.

Patience and Henry found in each other the balm they didn't even know they needed. What began for them both in a
flurry of heat and sweat, an irresistible tide of passion and want, shifted into gentleness. When Patience stroked Henry's leg, he hardly noticed anymore. The tighter she held him, the closer he pulled her. If there was magic to be found, that was it.

And Sorrel? That is a story for another time . . .

I
want to thank Grub Street in Boston for encouraging writers to create and discuss their work with generous, like-minded people in a clean, well-lighted place. In particular, novelist and teacher Sophie Powell gave me the wings and the courage to share
The Sparrow Sisters
for the very first time and for that I am so very grateful. My agent, Faye Bender, showed me that my voice had beauty and worth and that there was indeed someone out there willing to listen. Brave editor Lucia Macro was the someone who heard that voice and gave it the shape and strength needed to really sing out. Much gratitude to my small and dedicated writers' group for hard truths and gentle guidance. Finally, thank you to David, who isn't the least bit surprised that this dream has come true for me.