The Spirit Room (15 page)

Trailing after Izzie up onto a small dock, she walked behind her sister, feet drumming on the wooden planks. When they got to the end, they sat and dangled their legs over the blue water. The water wasn’t still like this very often on Seneca Lake. It always stirred and churned, churned so hard it had swallowed up Mamma. Gripping the edge of the dock tightly with both hands, she stared straight down past her shadow to the rocks and muck below.

“
The lake still makes me sad.” Clara stopped swinging her legs, gazed up toward the horizon. Geneva harbor to the west, hillsides of cleared pasture surrounded by narrow rows of trees to the east, three steamboats and many sailboats scattered on the water as far as she could see. She started to count the sailboats, but Izzie interrupted her at eight.

“
That sailboat she took was just over there.” Izzie pointed toward a row of upside down skiffs along the bank.

A tear welled at the corner of Izzie’s eye. Clara was glad she wasn’t the one that found Mamma. It might be the worst thing in Izzie’s life, as long as she lived, finding Mamma drowned like that. She wrapped an arm over Izzie’s sturdy shoulders. It always made her feel small to reach around Izzie. Even when they were old, she would always be the little sister.

A fisherman raised his oars and pulled his craft to another spot closer to shore, probably in hopes of finding a luckier spot. Fool fisherman. The oars creaked in their locks and chopped at the water, scaring a pair of mallards. The two ducks flapped their nut-brown wings and scooted off. Screening her eyes with a hand, Clara followed the birds until they were tiny spots in the sky. She glanced back at Izzie who was also squinting after the ducks. A tear rolled out of Izzie’s eye and crawled down her cheek.

“
Papa is better now, don’t you think so, Izzie?”

“
I still worry. He’s slowed down drinking liquor before, but then every time he starts up again, he changes for the worse.” Izzie brushed the tear away.

Izzie would never ever trust him, thought Clara. “Why don’t you ever give him a chance? He is trying hard this time. It’s different. He’s trying to make up for Mamma being gone.”

“
I want to give him a chance this time, honestly I do.”

Clara took the gritty stones from her pocket and tossed one into the water. It broke the surface, then was sucked down, spreading ripples upon ripples. She began counting the ripples but the way they flowed into and out of each other confused her.

“
There’s a special reason I am hoping Papa is stronger this time. Can you keep a secret, just for a few days?”

“
What is it?”

“
Can you? Between you and me only, not even Billy?”

Clara bit down on the inside of her lip. Not telling Billy was going to be hard. Could she promise that? Izzie never had secrets, though. She crossed her heart then plunked stone number two into the water.

“
Clara, do you think you could ever do the séances without me, or with Euphora instead of me?”

Clara squeezed a fist over her remaining stones. She knew it, knew it, knew it. Izzie was starting to hear voices after all and wanted to become famous without her.

“
Do you want to be a medium, a real one, by yourself?”

“
Clara, when are you going to get that out of your mind? I’ve told you over and over. I am not gifted and I am not going to be gifted.”

“
Mrs. Fielding and Anna said you were. I know you don’t want to become like Mamma, but you aren’t Mamma. You’re you. You could use your gift and you wouldn’t be loony.”

Izzie’s throat looked tight, then went red. She was about to yell. Clara braced herself, but Izzie waited a long moment, then finally smiled.

“
Doctor MacAdams proposed marriage to me.”

“
No. How could he? You haven’t even courted.”

“
Yesterday at the Hygienic Institute.”

“
What did you say?” Clara ground the damp stones around in her palm.

“
I have to think about it and get to know him better.”

“
Do you want to?”

“
I believe I do.”

Izzie’s gray-green eyes turned clear like the lake. Clara knew that look. Izzie did want to marry him. She had that smart, clear, questioning look on her face, like when she was reading a book and she’d look up from it and stare out at nothing trying to understand what she had just read. Sometimes she’d say something about what she was reading and sometimes she’d turn the page and keep going. But why on earth did she have that clear, smart expression about Doctor MacAdams? He wasn’t very handsome and he wasn’t young. He just plain wasn’t good enough.

“
But he’s old, isn’t he, Iz?”

“
I like that, actually.”

“
I mean too old. You can’t marry an old doctor.” Leaning all the way back, Clara lay back on the dock, the blue sky cloudless above her.

“
Well, I might marry him. That’s why I want to know about you and the séances.”

“
What does that have to do with it? You could still be part of the Benton Sisters. Lots of mediums are married. Doesn’t Mrs. Fielding have a husband in New York City?”

“
Mac is going to move to Rochester. I would go with him.”

Clara shot up onto her feet. “Rochester? Holy rolling Moses, Izzie. That’s far.”

“
It’s not very far. There are trains, stagecoaches, packet boats on the canals.”

“
But it’s not Geneva. We would never see you. You can’t leave now.”

“
I’m seventeen. I have to leave sometime.”

“
You don’t have to leave. You could marry someone here. We could find someone here. What about a young medical student from the Geneva Medical College? We could easily find one for you.”

“
I’m sorry, Little Plum. You’ll still have Billy and Euphora with you. If anything terrible happens with Papa, I will come back and get you, all of you. I promise.”

Clara thrust the fistful of rocks at the lake. Water splashed up at Izzie’s dangling feet.

“
How will I do the séances without you?”

“
You can do them on your own with Papa’s sneaky information. I’ve watched the seekers. You dazzle them. You are uncanny, Clara.”

“
I need you, though. We have to be together, like the Davenport Brothers or the Fox sisters.”

“
I have to make my own choices.” Izzie took Clara’s hand and pulled her back down next to her. “We knew this day would come.”

“
What if Papa refuses permission? He hates doctors.”

As Izzie softly stroked the back of Clara’s hand, Clara imagined all the big holes Izzie would leave in her life. There were already all the holes Mamma had left…in her rocking chair, at Mrs. Purcell’s dining table, next to Papa in bed. Now there would be more and more holes, everywhere empty holes, everywhere, but worst of all, in the Spirit Room. The chair directly across from Clara at the séance table would be a sorrowful chair no matter who sat in it. Clara sighed deeply.

And besides that, whenever Papa tried to force Izzie into, or out of, anything, it was trouble. If Papa forbid the marriage, it would be muskets and cannons firing off, the War of 1812 all over again.

“
Let’s skip stones.” Izzie rose and started back down the dock.

“
I don’t know how, Izzie.” Scrambling up, Clara grabbed the front of her dress and bolted to catch up.

“
I’ll teach you.”

Once down on the shore, Izzie began searching. “There are a thousand skippers here. They have to be flat like little buckwheat cakes.” She shoved up her dress sleeves and knelt by the water.

Clara reached her at the shore, knelt nearby. The muck smelled like fish, frogs, stinky wet earth. Dipping her hand into the water, Izzie brought out a shiny gray stone with flecks of pink.

“
Get as many like this as you can, then I’ll show you.”

Clara rolled up her sleeve. When she reached into the water, the cold bit her like a snapping dog, but she didn’t flinch. She clenched her teeth down and started rounding up the buckwheat stones and filling her pockets, twelve in one, fourteen in the other until her dress was heavy and the wet rocks soaked through her petticoat, chilling her legs.

A few minutes later they were standing on the shore, each with a small pile of stones. Clara jammed her red, tingling hand under her armpit to warm it.

Turning her shoulder to the lake, Izzie released the stone so that it sailed perfectly low and true, like the mallards. It touched the glassy surface once, popped up magically into the air, then touched down again, then up again, four, five, six and finally it sank into the lake and was gone, leaving a trail of six sets of circles.

“
See? Try it,” Izzie said.

For a long time, Izzie demonstrated, instructed, guided, and encouraged her, but one after another Clara’s stones plummeted into the lake. But Clara wasn’t going to give up. If Izzie could do this skipping, and she knew Billy could do it, she could too. When her heap of rocks was depleted, she found more. She kept trying. Izzie was patient like an angel, never yelling, never calling her names.

Izzie had always been in Clara’s life because she was the oldest. It couldn’t be any other way. Izzie always protected her, led the way, and stood up to Papa when he needed standing up to. And sometimes when he didn’t.

“
Izzie, if Papa disappears or hurts Billy more than a rough slap, you’ll come help us? Will you promise?”

Izzie slowly lowered her eyelids as though she were deep in thought, then raised them and looked Clara straight in the eye. “Yes, Little Plum. If Papa goes wrong, I’ll come and fix things.”

Clara let her arms hang down and glanced around at her strewn stones. There. That one would fit her hand nicely. She picked it up. Taking her sideways position, shoulder to the water, she took a deep breath and held it. As she drew back her arm and then swung it around, she felt the rhythm, the angle, the speed, the flow she had seen on Izzie and she let go. The stone swept out over the lake into the glare of the sun and landed delicately like a miniature weightless platter on the water. But then it rose up, and dipped down, again, again, three, six, eight, nine, ten before drifting under the water’s skin.

She beamed at Izzie. “There. I’m a dabster at it. You could never do ten.”

Fourteen

ON SUNDAY, IZZIE WOKE EARLY and prepared for her day with Mac. Billy and Euphora were downstairs doing chores, but Clara was just waking in bed in the Blue Room. Izzie leaned over her sister. “I might be some time. It’s a splendid day and I think I will go for a long, long walk on my own,” she said.

Clara eyed her with a suspicious arched brow and she was right to do so. Izzie had arranged to go on a carriage ride with Mac and didn’t want to explain herself. She knew she couldn’t keep her plans from Clara forever, but she’d tell her later. Turning and bounding down the front stairs, Izzie set off so quickly that no one in the house had the chance to ask where she was going.

Mac was waiting for her in front of the Geneva Hygienic Institute with an open cabriolet and dapple mare. Tipping his hat slightly, he smiled at her as she approached.

“
Good morning, Izzie. We have a beautiful day for our ride.”

“
Good morning, Mac.”

He was handsome, contrary to what Clara thought, but not in an ordinary way. He was confident, finely dressed in black and gray striped trousers, stovepipe hat, leather driving gloves, a blue silk tie, black wool greatcoat, and underneath, a deep blue waistcoat. During the night, a light spring rain had fallen, leaving a sheen on everything. It was a glorious morning.

Izzie took Mac’s hand and climbed onto the seat. Settling herself, she shifted and straightened the skirt of her good dress, her gray and blue plaid, and the two petticoats underneath. Mac walked around behind the cabriolet and then hoisted himself onto the seat next to her, taking the whip and reins. He moved, perhaps not gracefully, but carefully.

Izzie had only been in a carriage this fancy a handful of times back in Ohio with her friend Julianna’s father and mother.

“
Do you have everything you need?”

“
What do I need?”

She held out her empty hands, palms up.

“
Nothing.” He grinned and flicked the leather reins.

As the dapple trotted ahead, Izzie felt a shiver of excitement. Not only was this her first courtship with a man, but it was a man who might soon be her fiancé.