Mrs Churchill came close to me, wrapped her arm around my shoulder and held tight. She leaned into me and began whispering but there was the smell of sour yoghurt snaking out from somewhere inside her and it made me dizzy. I pushed her away.
‘We need to get your mother, Lizzie.’
There was noise coming from outside, coming closer to the side of the house, and Mrs Churchill ran to the side door and opened it. Standing in front of me were Mrs Churchill, Bridget and Dr Bowen. ‘I found him, miss,’ Bridget said. She tried to slow her breathing, she sounds like an old dog. ‘I went as fast as I could.’
Dr Bowen pushed his silver, round-rimmed glasses up his narrow nose and said, ‘Where is he?’
I pointed to the sitting room.
Dr Bowen, his wrinkled forehead. ‘Are you alright, Lizzie? Did anybody try to hurt you?’ His voice smooth, honey-milked.
‘Hurt me?’
‘The person who hurt your father. They didn’t try to hurt you too?’
‘I’ve seen no one. No one is hurt but Father,’ I said. The floorboards stretched beneath my feet and for a moment I thought I would sink.
Dr Bowen stood in front of me and reached for my wrist, big hands, and he breathed out and in, his air swiping my lips. I licked them. His fingers pressed into skin until they felt blood. ‘Your pulse is too fast, Lizzie. I’ll remedy that as soon as I check your father.’
I nodded. ‘Would you like me to come in with you?’
Dr Bowen. ‘That’s . . . unnecessary.’
‘Oh,’ I said.
Dr Bowen took off his jacket and handed it to Bridget. He headed for the sitting room, took his brown, weathered leather medical bag with him. I held my breath. He opened the door like a secret, pushed his body into the room. I heard him gasp, say, ‘Lord Jesus.’ The door was open just enough. Somewhere behind me Mrs Churchill screamed and I snapped my head towards her. She screamed again, the way people do in nightmares, and her noise rattled through my body, made my muscles tighten and ache. ‘I didn’t want to see him. I didn’t want to see him,’ Mrs Churchill screamed. Bridget howled, dropped Dr Bowen’s coat on the floor. The women held each other and sobbed.
I wanted them to stop. I didn’t appreciate how they reacted to Father like that, they are shaming him. I went to Dr Bowen, stood next to him at the edge of the sofa and tried to block sight of Father’s body. Bridget called, ‘Miss Lizzie, don’t go in there.’ The room was still and Dr Bowen pushed me away. ‘Lizzie,’ he said, ‘you mustn’t be in here.’
‘I just want . . .’
‘You cannot be in here anymore. Stop looking at your father.’ He pushed me from the room and shut the door. Mrs Churchill screamed again and I covered my ears. I listened to my heart beat until everything felt numb.
After a time, Dr Bowen came out of the room, all pale and sweat, and yelled, ‘Summon the police.’ He bit his lip, his jaw a tiny thunder. On his fingertips were little drops of blood confetti, and I tried to imagine the ways he had touched Father.
‘It’s their annual picnic,’ Mrs Churchill whispered. ‘No one will be at the station.’ She rubbed her eyes, made them raw.
I wanted her to stop crying and so I smiled and said, ‘It’s alright. They’ll come eventually. Everything will be alright, won’t it, Dr Bowen?’
Dr Bowen eyed me and I looked at his hands. I thought of Father.
I was four when I first met Mrs Borden. She let me eat spoonfuls of sugar when Father wasn’t watching. How my tongue sang! ‘Can you keep secrets, Lizzie?’ Mrs Borden asked.
I nodded my head. ‘I can keep the best secrets.’ I hadn’t even told Emma that I loved our new mother.
She spooned sugar into my mouth, my cheeks tight with the sweet surge. ‘Let’s keep our sugar meal between you and me.’
I nodded and nodded until everything was dizzy. Later, when I was running through the house yelling, ‘Karoo! Karoo!’ and climbed over the sitting room sofa, Father yelled, ‘Emma, did you let Lizzie into the sugar?’
Emma came into the sitting room, head bowed. ‘No, Father. I swear it.’
I ran by them and Father caught me by the arm, a pull at my socket. ‘Lizzie,’ he said while I giggled and hawed, ‘did you eat something you weren’t meant to?’
‘I ate fruit.’
Father came right into my face, smelled like butter cake. ‘And nothing else?’
‘And nothing else.’ I laughed.
Emma looked at me, tried to peer into my mouth.
‘Are you lying?’ Father asked.
‘No, Daddy. I would never.’
He had searched me over, searched dimpled cheeks for signs of disobedience. I smiled. He smiled. Off I went again, running and jumping and I passed Mrs Borden in the kitchen and she winked at me.
When the police arrived a short time later they began taking photos of the dark-grey suit Father wore to work that morning, of his black leather boots still tied over ankles and feet. Flashbulbs broke every six seconds. The young police photographer said he would prefer not to photograph the old man’s head. ‘Couldn’t someone else do it? Please?’ he said, wiped the back of his hand over his forehead, like oil was dripping from his head.
An older officer told him to go outside while they found a real man to finish the job. They didn’t need a man. A daughter would suffice. I had lovingly looked after Father all morning and his face didn’t scare me. I should have said, ‘How many photographs do you want? How close would you like me to get? Which angle will lead you to the murderer?’
Instead, Dr Bowen gave me a shot of beautiful warm medicine underneath my skin that made me feel feathery and strange. They seated me in the dining room with Mrs Churchill and Bridget and said, ‘You don’t mind that we ask each of you some questions, do you?’
The little room was cloying and heavy with the odour of warm bodies and grass, of police mouths smelling of half-digested chicken and damp yeast. ‘Of course not,’ Mrs Churchill said. ‘But I shall not discuss the state Mr Borden was in.’ She started to cry, made a whirlwind sound. In my mind I drifted away to the upstairs of the house where everyone became an echo. I thought of Father.
An officer kneeled in front of me, placed a hand over my hand and whisper-spat into my face, ‘We will find who did this and come after him with our full force.’
‘Men do such horrid things,’ I said.
‘Yes, I suppose they do,’ the officer said.
‘I hope Father didn’t feel any pain.’
The officer stared at his hands and cleared his throat. ‘I’m sure he didn’t feel too much.’ He gripped his notebook. ‘I wondered if you could tell me everything you remember about this morning?’
‘I’m not sure . . .’
‘There are no wrong answers, Miss Borden.’ A sing-song voice. His Adam’s apple bobbed, made me think of Halloween games.
I looked the officer in the eye and grinned, there are no wrong answers, how kind he was to put me at ease. I knew for sure God would smile on him from now on. ‘I was outside in the barn and then I came in and found him.’
‘Do you remember why you were in the barn?’
‘I had been trying to find lead sinkers for my fishing line.’
‘You were going to go fishing?’ Scribble, scribble.
‘My uncle is going to take me. You should see what I can catch.’
‘You’re expecting him to visit?’
‘Oh, he has already. He’s here.’
‘Where is he?’ the officer asked, a pony searching for feed.
‘He’s out conducting business. He arrived yesterday.’
‘We’ll need to ask him questions.’
‘Why?’ My fingers beat together, pulsed beat, beat, beat, beat, all the way into the centre of my body. I followed the feeling, looked down at myself, noticed a soft, grey pigeon feather stuck on my skirt. I picked it off, rubbed it between my fingers, got all hot and boiled.
‘Miss, I hate to be blunt, but a murder has occurred. We must ask your uncle if
he saw anyone unusual outside.’
I flashed up at him, ‘Yes. Yes, of course.’ I stuffed the pigeon feather into my palm, carried it like love.
The officer kept with questions. I glanced around the room, then up at the ceiling, tried to see through spider-web cracked plaster and wood into the rooms above: a few hours before I had been up there, had seen Father and Mrs Borden help each other ready themselves for the day. Mrs Borden had plaited her light-grey, thick-mop hair and pinned it to the top of her head and Father had said, ‘Always charming, my dear.’ They did that from time to time, their being friendly and pleasant to one another. The officer kept with questions and a fog settled in my mind.
Next to me, I heard Bridget squeak to a second officer, ‘Her sister is visitin’ a friend in Fairhaven. She’s been gone for . . .’
‘Two weeks,’ I interrupted. ‘She’s been gone for two weeks and it’s time she came home.’
The second officer nodded, gruffed, ‘We’ll send for her immediately.’
‘Good. This is too much for me to take alone.’
Then Bridget said, ‘I lock the doors. House is shut tight all the time.’ The second officer took notes, wrote furious until sweat formed through his thick moustache. Sometimes Father’s beard would wet with anger and when he spoke to you, came close to your face so you could hear his words, the wet would stroke your chin and sink in. A fog settled in my mind. I had the feeling of wanting to stroke Father’s beard and face until he looked like the past. I glanced at the sitting room.
‘And you know for sure the doors were locked this morning?’ the second officer asked Bridget.
‘Yes. I had ta unlock the front door this mornin’ ta let poor Mr Borden in when he came home early from work.’
The way Bridget spoke about Father made me smile. I turned to face her and the officer. ‘Actually,’ I said, ‘sometimes the basement door isn’t locked.’
Bridget looked me over, her caterpillar eyebrows cracked like earth, and the second officer took notes, took notes. My feet traced circles across the carpet. I opened my eyes wide, felt the house move left then right as the heat ground into walls. Everyone pulled at their necks to unloose their tightly wound clothing. I sat still holding my hands together.
Outside, I could hear swarms of people lining themselves out the front of the house. Voices sounded cannon fire. I swayed with the heat, heard the nails in the floorboards give themselves up. The sounds of pigeon feet tacky-tacked across the roof and I thought of Father. The sun moved behind a shadow and the house popped. I jumped in my chair. Bridget jumped in her chair. Mrs Churchill too. ‘Seems we all have fright,’ I said, wanted to laugh. Mrs Churchill started crying again, made my skin shiver. Inside my head a butcher pounded all sense out of my ears and onto the dining table. My corset groped my ribs and small pools of sweat filled the spaces between arms and legs. Bridget stood from her chair, pulled her dirt-white skirt away from the backs of her thighs and went to Mrs Churchill, comforted her. They spoke. Police took notes, entered and exited rooms, watched me.
I wiped my palm across my face, let the feather fall onto the carpet, noticed tiny droplets of blood sitting on my fingers. I put them to my nose then my mouth. I licked, tasted Father, tasted myself. I swallowed. I looked down at my skirt, discovered blood spots. I stared at the stains, watched them become rivers across my lap, I know these rivers! and I thought of the times I played in the Quequechan River with Emma when we were younger, the way Father would yell out to us from the banks, ‘Don’t go in too deep. You can’t be sure how far down it goes.’
My body craved a past with Emma and Father: I wanted to be small again. I wanted to swim then fish, have Emma and me dry ourselves under the sun until our skin cooked. ‘Let’s be bears!’ I’d tell her, and we’d grow brown and giant, our bear paws swiping each other’s black noses. Emma would draw blood and I’d dig into her fur-covered ribs, touch her heart with my claws. Emma would want to swipe me again but Father would say, ‘Emma, be kind to Lizzie,’ and we’d embrace each other.
It was only two years ago that I was on my grand European tour. The freedom I had. Emma wasn’t there to tell me how to behave or what to say and so I got myself a life. On Father’s insistence I went with cousins, Bordens of blood and of marriage who I barely spoke to back at home, and we set sail, gulped ocean winds, learned how to stand against waves. The things we did.
Rome. My Boston-made shoes got stuck in mosaic-stone sidewalks, made me stumble, look a fool. I bought new, Italian calf-leather boots, walked straight lines, walked as a lady should without raising eyebrows. I’d walk, ears full of that fast Italian, made me want to jump into that sing-song, be spoken from one mouth to the other.
Everything reminded me of how small Fall River was, how big I was finally becoming. Over there the Spanish steps, covered in blooming lavender and carpet-red-coloured azaleas, men and women climbing to the top, sun-kissed faces, kissed lips, two white and black goats pulling a small grey wooden cart of orange and green vegetables, my cousin and me standing at the base of a marble fountain, pointing to a deep, Roman-red building, whispering, ‘John Keats lived inside!’ aren’t I the cultured one.
Over there, men wearing rabbit-felt fedoras sat in circles drinking mud-heavy coffee. Over there, girls dressed in Virginlaced communion. Over there, three people reading. Over there, pigeons shaking out wings, pecking seed. How I wanted one to take home. Over there, over there, over there. Eyes widened with all the things I saw. I knew more about the world than Emma did and that made me happy. I sent her postcard after postcard so she wouldn’t feel like she was missing out, gave my love, gave her reason to miss me more.
I ate and drank what I wanted in Paris. Butter, duck fat, liver fat, triple-cream brie, deep cherry–red wines, pear, clementine and lavender jelly, crème cakes, caviar, escargot in sautéed pine nuts and garlic butter. I did what the French did, licked my fingers, didn’t care if people saw, what they thought. Father would’ve hated it, would’ve told me I was uncouth. I ate everything up, ate his money, was delightful everywhere I went. I learned how to wrap my tongue around accented vowels, spoke to this stranger and that. Nobody knew me, didn’t expect anything from me. I wanted to stay like that forever.
I the explorer. The strolling I did. One day I saw a woman throw herself into the Seine, swim like a swan under arched white-stone bridges, under Pont Saint-Michel. The noises she made, an opera. She smiled, floated along, disappeared. I clapped my hands, bravoed the way she had taken charge of herself. If only Emma had been able to see. How far a woman could travel if she really put her mind to it. And I put my mind to it.
My skirt stuck to my thighs, Holy! Blood leeches, and I began peeling the heavy fabric away, tried to cover the tiny bloodstains on it. From the sitting room, Dr Bowen opened one of the doors that led into the dining room and said, ‘We need sheets for the body.’ The way he said body made my teeth grind. I shifted in my seat, tried to sneak a look into the sitting room to check if Father was alright.
Mrs Churchill asked, ‘Bridget, where are the Bordens’ sheets?’
‘They’re in the cupboard in the guestroom. I’ll come with ya.’
‘You’ll need to take the back stairs,’ an officer told them. ‘Keep away from the sitting room, ladies.’
They nodded, left the room and feet sounded out small percussion rhythms as they walked up the back stairs across the carpet. Someone handed me a glass of water. I sipped. The clock on the mantel ticked ticked. I sipped again. Dr Bowen placed his hands on my forehead and asked me how I was feeling. I began an answer when two long screams sounded from the floor above. ‘What in God’s name?’ Dr Bowen said.
Two long screams again. ‘Somebody! Somebody help us!’ Bridget yelled. The screams, the screams.
TWO
EMMA
4 August 1892
I PRESSED AGAINST Helen’s windowpane, felt the morning sun; warm like Mother’s touch. How it prickled my skin. How it made me think of her, all these years withou
t. She would come into my bedroom and raise the curtain. I wanted her to stay, wanted to be her, just so I could have her forever. But baby Alice would cry from another room and mother would leave me. Alone. Then years later baby Lizzie would cry and I began to understand that there was no such thing as forever.
The morning sun. A bird flew by the window and I put Mother thoughts away.
Everything in Helen’s house was quiet: not a clock, not a foot on floorboards, not a raised voice, not a slammed door, not a father, not Abby, not a sister. My cheeks rounded to the size of a hot-air balloon. I had not had a sister for two weeks, had not had to think about someone else’s needs, feelings, heart. In this house my mind had been all for myself.
I pressed harder into the windowpane, thought about how, after I finished here in Fairhaven, I would run away, travel distances of foreign blue-stoned streets, sketch them in my workbook, colour my fingers with pastel wax crayon. Afterwards I would cleanse my hands in deep seas and on the off chance that I might think of my family, send a postcard that would simply read: Adventure continues. I would make a point to send a postcard from the places Lizzie had never reached on her own European tour, remind Father that I had sacrificed a lot to keep Lizzie well behaved and that I was deserving.
And when I did eventually return to American soil, I would move away from Second Street and live hermitically, quietly. Live like Maria a’Becket, paint my own Northern Lights. There would be no more Lizzie, no more Father, no more Abby. Finally, at forty-two, there would be no more pretending.
The sun shifted and my shoulders widened. My body growing. Downstairs in the kitchen, Helen thumped a cast-iron kettle on the stove, made me jump.
Helen called out, ‘Emma, tea?’ She almost sang it.
I smiled. ‘Yes. Always yes.’
The difference between houses.
Before I travelled those sixteen giant miles to Helen’s house in Fairhaven, Lizzie had begged me to stay at Second Street, not to leave her.
See What I Have Done Page 2
