Songs from the Deep

by Kelly Powell

  —L

  It’s their last piece of correspondence. I want desperately to scrub the words from my mind, the knowledge that my father sent the Osrics to their deaths that day. It was no strange mishap, no coincidence. Llyr went without the means to protect himself and his family, forgoing iron because my father advised him to, because my father told him it was safe.

  How did Jude find it? The letter wasn’t in one of the volumes he borrowed. I hadn’t taken it from the trunk.

  I lift my eyes to him. “How did you get this?”

  He places one hand on the plaster wall. “It was in one of your father’s books,” he says. “You… It was all that was left in the trunk, so I…”

  “So you opened it.” My breath comes shallow. “You opened it and took what you found.”

  He looks at me strangely. “It was my father’s handwriting, Moira. Don’t tell me you wouldn’t have done the same.” His hand falls from the wall, his eyes flitting over my face. “You knew about this.”

  I bow my head, shoulders hunched. “Only after the funeral—my father’s funeral. I found it sorting his things.”

  When I venture a glance in Jude’s direction, it’s like someone’s struck a match to him. He doesn’t look lost as he did on the night of Connor’s death, or empty as he did when I accused him of murder. He snatches the letter back, holds it to his chest, and the searing anger in his eyes is something out of my nightmares. “That was four years ago,” he says. “All this time, you… You had no right.”

  I swallow. “I knew you’d be upset.”

  “Oughtn’t I?” His face crumples. He clutches the letter hard against his shirtfront, as if hoping the ink will bleed into his heart. “This is why you never visited, isn’t it? Because you were keeping this from me.”

  The day sirens stole away his family, Jude spent the night at our house. My father brought him into the drawing room, and though I’d been sent to bed, I crept back down the hall to spy from the doorway.

  Jude sat on the sofa by the hearth. A cup of tea steamed on the table before him, but he didn’t touch it. He stared into the fire burning in the grate, a wool blanket wrapped around his thin shoulders. “I want to take a boat out as soon as it’s light. If I can find something… I’d like to have something to bury.” His voice was so flat, so hollow, it scared me.

  In the chair across from him, my father leaned forward. He looked bone-tired in the firelight, as though he’d aged a decade within the day. “I won’t be one to keep you from the harbor, but you needn’t be out there. There’s plenty of other men to handle this. I’ll handle this.”

  Jude didn’t answer for a long while. When he did, he simply repeated, “I’d like to have something to bury.”

  “Aye,” said my father. Fire crackled in the hearth, charred wood shifting. “Aye, I know.”

  I shivered from where I hid behind the sideboard. I knew I was intruding on private matters, matters of Jude’s grief, but I couldn’t find the will to move. As I watched, Jude turned to face my father. He said, “I don’t want to fall asleep.”

  “Would you like me to stay with you?”

  “Yes.” Jude’s voice cracked, halfway to a sob. “I don’t want to be alone.”

  In the hall of the cottage, I curl my arms around myself. I’d kept this secret dreading Jude would fault my father, blame him, never mind the fact that this was what our fathers did. They were all fascination and no fear when it came to chasing sirens.

  “I used to lie awake at night, wondering how it could’ve happened.” Jude pales markedly. “I could never puzzle it out. It didn’t occur to me, you see, that they might’ve gone out there without any iron.”

  I cast my eyes down, tears blurring my vision. “Jude…”

  “Your father… He just—” The rest of his words seem to catch in his throat. He pauses, taking a breath. “You should’ve told me. I deserved to know.”

  I look up to see his gaze has returned to the letter. He clings to it as though it might vanish at any given moment, his hands red and chapped against the page.

  To think just yesterday I considered burning it.

  “What can I do?” I ask. “How can I…? How can I put this right?”

  He shakes his head. “This isn’t something you can put right, Moira.”

  I hesitate. His words feel like a door closing, like a ship leaving port. Panic jolts my heart into beating twice as fast. “What does that mean?” When he says nothing, I hide my hands in the pockets of my cardigan, biting my lip. “Connor’s murderer is still out there. We still haven’t questioned—”

  “All right, enough.” He closes his eyes. “I need to be alone.”

  I try to keep my voice regular. “For how long?”

  He stares, incredulous, and I wish to disappear beneath the floorboards. More than anything I want to be away from here, on the cliffs, with my violin in hand and salt air filling my lungs. I move toward the door, pull up the latch. “I’ll be off, then.”

  Jude remains quiet, but he looks over just as I step out. For a second, for a heartbeat, our eyes meet.

  I shut the door behind me.

  * * *

  I reach the harbor before the fishermen set out for the morning. It’s still early and dark enough for lanterns, the small lights traversing the docks as men ready their boats with lobster pots and trawls. The sun has yet to appear, but the sky lightens each passing minute, the horizon streaked pale yellow.

  Heading down the main pier, I look about for Gabriel Flint. He’s not at the dockside; instead, I find him gathering rope in the boathouse. The building is old, made up of clapboard siding and open archways, the wood faded by the sun. The inside smells just like the outside—like kelp and fish and brine. Nets hang from the rafters, creels and lobster pots stacked against the walls.

  Flint pretends not to see me until I’m too close to ignore.

  “I have words for you,” I say.

  “Well, poor timing, Moira. I’m busy.”

  Patience is a virtue I’ve never had in abundance, and I certainly don’t have room for it now. As he hoists the corded rope onto his shoulder, I snatch hold of it. “That was hateful what you did to Jude Osric. You know good and well he doesn’t drink.”

  “I don’t see him taking issue with it.” Tugging the rope from my grip, he adds, “What concern is it of yours, anyway?”

  “He told me what he said to you. About Connor.” I cross my arms. “What concern is that of yours?”

  “Just being curious.” He smirks. “I suppose you think that’s criminal of me.”

  My lip curls. He pushes his cap back, turns away, and heads for the line of boats still anchored at their moorings. He’d questioned Jude that night and gotten answers. He knows I believe Connor was murdered—though when we sailed to Lochlan, he didn’t seem opposed to the idea either. At least when Jude was set to take the fall for it.

  I’m out of the boathouse and on Flint’s heels in an instant. “What do you think they’ll do with Russell Hendry?” I ask.

  He spares me a glance. “I hear they’re keeping him locked up till trial.”

  I still can’t comprehend what drove Russell to tip that poison in the sea. Did he really have so little interest in his freedom? Was he that enraged over Connor’s death? He could’ve been coerced, perhaps, blackmailed—any number of possibilities.

  But I want more than possibilities. I want facts and hard evidence, all lined up in front of me. I want answers.

  Flint says, “And I don’t know where he got those cans, before you ask.”

  Through gritted teeth, I ask something else entirely. “Do you know where I can find Warren Knox?”

  He raises a brow, perplexed, but nods toward the boats. “He’ll be setting off, same as everyone.”

  I start in that direction, my boots clacking against the rotting wood of the dock. Men turn to watch me, pausing in their work, the lines around their eyes crinkling. A few of them—of the elder generation—tend to keep rowan sticks in
the pockets of their overalls alongside the iron nails they have for protection. They’re the ones who took to blood sport in the past. I think they worry the sirens might smell that blood on their hands and desire some in return.

  The last of the lobster traps are stacked on deck. Crews begin casting off their mooring lines. I spot Warren Knox on a boat with half a dozen other men and dash over, calling out to him.

  “You oughtn’t be down here, Miss Alexander.” He says it friendly-like, but I know where I’m not wanted. Lately, it’s quite a number of places. The harbor, the police station, the lighthouse. Only those at the dance hall seem in want of my presence—or rather, in want of my fingers on violin strings and my hand around a bow.

  The realization leaves me cold. “I wanted to ask you about Connor,” I say.

  Warren’s expression clouds over. He doesn’t say anything at all, disregarding me as someone passes the stern line over to him.

  I can do nothing but watch as they push away from the dock. Morning fog skims the water, waves ebbing into foam. Warren’s boat makes its way out of the harbor, and I turn to make my way back up the cliff.

  Once I reach the moors, my gaze shifts unerringly to the lighthouse. I tear my eyes away, silently berating myself. I ought to be glad for Jude Osric. Now he knows better than to treat me kindly. Now he’s free of my treacherous self.

  I go home only to grab my coat. I’ve other business to attend to, and though it feels like eons since I woke to Jude standing at my window, it’s still the dawn of that day. Slipping my hands into my coat pockets, my fingers touch upon a bit of paper. I take it out, unfold it, and realize what it is.

  It’s the note he left me when I stayed the night in the keeper’s cottage. A note I tucked away and promptly forgot about. I picture him writing it, taking it down the hall, sliding it under the guest room door.

  Morning, Moira.

  I crumple the paper in my fist.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CATRIONA FINLEY APPEARS both mystified and exasperated to observe me at her desk again. “What’s the nature of your visit this time, Miss Alexander?”

  On the other side of the room, two gentlemen sit, quietly conversing. From the corner of my eye, I catch the pair glancing in my direction. I turn fully to stare at them until they look pointedly elsewhere.

  To Catriona, I say, “I’m here to see Russell Hendry.”

  “He hasn’t been put on remand for you to harass him.”

  “I’m not here to harass him.” I put a bit of steel into my voice.

  She returns her attention to her typewriter, typing something and pushing the carriage back. “I can give you an hour with him. If he agrees to see you.”

  My mouth quirks in a half smile. “I’d be much obliged.”

  An officer escorts me to the cells just as when I came to visit Jude. I walk down the now-familiar hall, unnerved by that familiarity. It’s worsened when I realize Russell has been placed in the same cell. He sits on the wooden bed, leaning back against the wall. I can imagine Jude seated in the corner as before—the memory impressing upon reality until I see him there, head ducked, one knee to his chest.

  That ghost of Jude Osric looks up to hold my gaze.

  On the bed, Russell folds his arms. A shard of sunlight enters through the barred window, casting lines over his pale face. He leers at me in such a way that my hands curl into fists.

  “What do you want, Moira?”

  “To talk.”

  He looks away, eyes half-lidded. “That so?”

  I bare my teeth as he did at the harbor. When his attention slides back to me, I level him with a glare. “Tell me where you got that siren poison.”

  “Told you on the dock it was none of your business.”

  “It wasn’t your business to kill two sirens,” I snap. “But you went and did it anyway.”

  He grips the edge of the bed. “I heard tell you paid Wick a visit in here,” he says.

  I swallow. For some reason the words twist my stomach, quickening my pulse. That phantom likeness of Jude is still pressed against the wall. He watches me, waiting for my answer.

  “That’s the truth,” I reply.

  “Aye.” Russell rubs the stubble on his chin. “I reckon they see rightly now.”

  “What’s that?”

  “No human person killed Connor. It’s our blood in the sea, but we’re not the ones to spill it. Those sirens will pick us clean off this rock if we let them.”

  My insides roil. “We’ve spilled more of their blood than they have ours.”

  “I’m not arguing with you about this.” He scoffs. “I know what you’re like. What your father was like. They’ll have hunting parties organized soon enough, and you better stay out of the way.”

  I imagine the boats going out with harpoons and poisons, returning with siren bodies piled on deck. I was so young when they were hunted; the occurrences seem closer to myth than the here and now.

  Fear snares me in its claws. How could I play music on the cliffs while others sharpened their knives the very same morning? How could I sell pastries at my mother’s stall as vendors hawked necklaces strung with siren teeth?

  I ask Russell, “Did someone give you those cans?”

  Sitting straight, he scrubs a hand through his hair. His eyes fix on the floor, his profile split between shadow and light.

  Beyond the jail corridor, a door slams open like a thunderclap. The sound sets my heart pounding, and I turn my head toward it. Voices echo from the lobby, rising in volume.

  I take off without another word.

  When I open the door, my lips part, the sight before me prickling the hair at the back of my neck.

  Jude Osric stands in the center of the room.

  At first I think it’s another apparition, but no—this is the real Jude, flesh and blood, breathing hard like he’s run across the moors. It’s plain he left the lighthouse in a hurry. He wears neither coat nor hat, his work shirt rolled to his elbows and missing a front button. A streak of ash marks the curve of his jaw.

  “Moira.” He takes me by the shoulders, wide-eyed. “Are you all right?”

  I frown up at him. “How did you know I was here?”

  He looks around, eyebrows drawn together. “I—I got a note. It said… you’d been arrested.” His gaze returns to my face. He breathes in, exhales. “I see… I see now that’s not the case.”

  “No.” A sense of unease creeps over my spine. “I only came to speak with Russell.”

  Jude steps back, his expression now mirroring my confusion. I watch his Adam’s apple shift as he swallows, and the unease I feel transmutes into something akin to dread.

  Why would someone leave Jude a note like that? Deliberately false, so easy to expose, unless they knew he’d race over as a result? Unless they just wanted him gone.

  Numbness seeps through my skin, through my bones, down to the very marrow.

  “Jude,” I say, “I think we ought to get back to the lighthouse.”

  * * *

  We pass the walk through town and over the moors in painful silence. Recovered from his initial fright, Jude seems to recall his grievances against me. He sticks his hands in his trouser pockets, his eyes on the ground. The wind picks up, freeing strands of hair from my bun, and dense clouds gather above us, predisposed to rain.

  “Weather’s turning,” I say.

  “Yes,” says Jude, without looking up.

  It’s my one and only attempt at small talk.

  The lighthouse looms ahead, austere before the gray sky. Jude quickens his pace, then takes off, breakneck. I speed after him. He skids to a stop on the path, staring at the cottage door, and raises a hand to cover his mouth.

  Deep gouges mar the wood in a crisscrossing pattern. Stepping closer, Jude presses his fingertips to them. He makes a faint, distressed sound and pulls his skeleton key from his pocket, hands trembling as he tries the lock. It clicks open, the door swinging inward. A folded bit of paper lies in the entryway, as if slipp
ed through the mail slot. Jude picks it up, looking it over. His eyes widen. “Moira,” he chokes out. “Moira.”

  I take the paper from him. On it only two words are written.

  Stop looking.

  Connor’s killer was here, today, just moments ago. I glance around, half expecting to see them in the distance, as I saw that figure walking toward us on the moors. Instead, my gaze latches on to something else. Part of Jude’s garden is just visible from here. I see green sprouting from the dark soil—alongside a grooved stick of polished wood. “What’s that there?” I ask.

  Jude sets his sights on where I point. His mouth turns down at the edges. We head over together, and he kneels, pulling the object free.

  The blade of the knife is grimy and stained brown. It could be dirt, but the smear across the steel looks more like blood. Jude stares, frozen. It’s another moment before he uncurls his fingers from the handle, the knife dropping with a thud.

  “In my garden,” he whispers.

  I crouch beside him. “It’s meant to scare us. That could well be animal blood.”

  Jude doesn’t appear to hear me. He says, “They put this in my garden,” and pushes his fingers into the earth, trying to tether himself. His breathing turns shallow, ragged at the edges.

  Anger coils about me. Someone sent Jude off so they might damage his home, leaving a bloodied knife for him to find. The longer I dwell on it, the more furious I become.

  “They’re watching us,” Jude gasps. “They know…”

  “Breathe, Jude. Just breathe.”

  He does so, squeezing his eyes shut. Minutes pass, and after a while he says, “I can’t have this. I need to… If the police ever…”

  I pick up the knife. The handle is sun-warm in my grip, the edge of the blade still looking sharp enough to cut. Jude’s eyes dart to my face. “What are you doing?”

  I meet his gaze. “I’ll get rid of it.”