The Winds of Marble Arch and Other Stories

by Connie Willis

  Anne had felt too tired to fight him anymore. She had put the packet of food down on the pew and turned away.

  “Leave the door open,” Elliott had said. “I don’t like being shut in this coffin of a room. And tell me when Victoria’s father comes home again with all my debts honored.”

  He will never come out, Anne had thought despairingly, but now, standing on the landing watching her father, she thought, He has come out after all, and hurried down the steps. When she reached the foot of the stairs, her father turned to her and said accusingly, “It is Miss Thatcher. She has come to call.” He walked past her up the stairs without another word.

  “It was improper of me to come,” Victoria said. “Now your father is angry with me.”

  “He is angry with me. You have done nothing improper, unless showing kindness is improper.” They were still standing in the wind at the door. “Won’t you come in?” Anne said. “I’ll make some tea.”

  Victoria put her hand on Anne’s arm. “I did not come to call. I—now I must ask a kindness of you.” She had not worn gloves, and her hand was icy even through the wool of Anne’s sleeve.

  “Come in and tell me,” she said, and once more she thought, It’s Elliott. Victoria stepped into the hall, but she would not let Anne take her black cloak or bonnet, and when Anne went to shut the door, she said, “I cannot stay. I must go to Dr. Sawyers. He—a body has been found in the river. Near Haddam. I must go to see if it is Elliott.”

  A tremendous wave of anger swept over Anne at Elliott. She almost said, “He is not dead. He’s in the robing room,” but Victoria, once she had started, could not seem to stop. “My father has gone to Hartford,” she said. “There was some trouble about gambling debts of Elliott’s. My brother is still at sea. We have had no news of his ship. Elliott’s father is too ill to go. My father went in his place to Hartford, and now there is no one to see to this. I cannot ask Elliott’s father. It would kill him to see—I came to ask your father, but now I fear I have angered him and there is no one else to—”

  “I will go with you,” Anne said, throwing on her gray pelisse. It was far too light for the cold day, but she was afraid to take the time to go back upstairs for something heavier for fear Victoria would be too distraught to wait. I cannot let Elliott do this, she thought. I will tell her what he has done.

  But there was no chance. Victoria walked so fast that Anne nearly ran to keep up with her, and the words flowed out of her in great painful spurts, as if an artery had been cut somewhere. “My brother should be here by now. There’s been no word from New London, where they are to dock. He cannot have been delayed in port. But the storms have been so fierce I fear for his ship. I wrote him on the day that Elliott was first missed. I knew that he was dead, that first day. My father said not to worry, that he was only delayed, that we must not give up hope, and now my brother Roger is delayed, and there is no one to tell me not to worry.”

  They were on Dr. Sawyer’s doorstep. Victoria knocked, her bare hands red from the cold, and the doctor let them in immediately. He did not take their wraps. “It will be cold,” he said, and led them swiftly down the hall past his office to the back of his house. “I am so sorry your father is not here. It is no work for young ladies.” If they would only stop, she would tell them, but they did not stop, even for a moment. Anne hurried after them.

  The doctor opened the door into a large square room. It made Anne think of a kitchen because of the long table. There was a sheet over the table, dragging almost to the floor. Victoria was very pale. “I do not like this at all, Victoria,” Dr. Sawyer said, speaking more and more rapidly. “If your father were here—It is a nasty business.”

  Anne thought, As soon as she sees it isn’t Elliott, I will tell them. Dr. Sawyer pulled the sheet back from the body.

  It was as if the time, so hurried along by them, had stopped stock-still. The man had been dead several days. Since the storm, Anne thought. He was drowned in the storm. His black coat was still damp and stained like her cloak had been when she had tried to wash away the mud. He was wearing a white silk shirt and a black damask vest. There was a gray silk handkerchief in the vest pocket, wrinkled and water-spotted. He looked cold.

  Victoria put her hand out toward the body and then drew it back and groped for Anne’s hand. “I’m sorry,” Dr. Sawyer said, and looked down at the body lying on the table.

  It was Elliott.

  “It’s about time you got here,” Elliott said, getting up. He had been lying on the pew, his coat folded up under his head. He had unbuttoned his shirt and opened his black vest. “I’ve been wasting away.”

  Anne handed him the parcel silently, looking at him. There was a gray silk handkerchief in the pocket of his vest.

  “Did you go to tea at Vicky’s?” he said, unwrapping the brown paper from the slices of bread, the baked ham, the russets. He was having some difficulty with the string. “Comforting the bereaved and all that? What fun!”

  “No,” Anne said. She watched him, waiting. He could not untie the string. He laid the packet on the seat beside him. “We went to Dr. Sawyer’s.”

  “Why? Is my revered father sinking or does pretty Vicky have the vapors?”

  “We went to see a body, to see if we could identify it.”

  “Ugh. A grisly business, I should imagine. Pretty Vicky fainting with relief at the sight of some bloated stranger, Dr. Sawyer ready with the smelling salts—”

  “It was your body, Elliott.”

  She had expected him to look shocked or furtive or frightened. Instead, he put his hands behind his head and leaned back against them, smiling at her. “How is that possible, sweet Anne? Or have you been having the vapors, too?”

  “How did you get from the river to Haddam, Elliott? You never told me.”

  He did not change his position. “A horse was grazing by the riverside. I leaped upon his back, the true horseman, and galloped home to you.”

  “You said you got the horse at an inn.”

  “I didn’t want to offend your sensibilities by telling you I stole the horse. Perhaps I overjudged your sense of delicacy. You seem to have no qualms about accusing me of—what is it exactly you’re accusing me of? Murdering some harmless passerby and dressing him in my clothes? Impossible. As you can see, I am still wearing them.”

  “My cloak is ruined beyond repair,” she said slowly. “My boots were caked with mud. The hem of my dress was stained and torn. How did you manage to ride a horse all the way from Haddam in a storm and arrive with your boots polished and your coat brushed?”

  He sat up suddenly and grabbed for her hands. She stepped back. “You did all that for me, Anne?” he said. “Waiting on the island, drenched and dirty? No wonder you are angry. But this is no way to punish me. Locking me in this dusty room, telling me ghost stories. I’ll buy you a new cloak, darling.”

  “Why haven’t you eaten anything I’ve brought you? You said you were famished. You said you hadn’t eaten for days.”

  He let go of her hands. “When should I have eaten it? You’ve been here all this time, badgering me with silly questions. I’ll eat it now.” He picked up the paper packet and set it on his lap.

  Anne watched him. His hands were windburned to a dark red. The body’s hands had had no color. It was as if the river had washed it away.

  Elliott fumbled with the brown paper on the bread. “Bread and cake and my own sweet Anne. What man could ask for more?” But he still didn’t open the packet, and after a few minutes he replaced it on the seat. “I’ll eat it after you’ve gone,” he said petulantly “You’ve made me lose my appetite with all this talk of dead men.”

  When she went back the next day, he was fully dressed, his gray handkerchief neatly folded in his vest pocket, his coat on. “What time’s the funeral?” he said gaily. “The second funeral, of course. How many funerals shall I have, I wonder? And will I have to pay for all the flowers when I return?”

  “It is this afternoon,” Anne said, wondering as so
on as she said it if she should not have lied to him. She had dressed for the funeral, thinking all the while she would not go see him, that it was too dangerous, concentrating on dressing warmly in her brushed and cleaned wool merino, on taking her muff. But the key was in her muff, and as soon as she saw it, she knew that she had meant to go see him all along. It was just like the night she had gone to meet him on the island. She had not cared about warmth then, only about not being seen, and she had dressed in her black cloak and her black dress, her black bonnet, as if she were going someplace else altogether. As if, she realized now, she were dressing for a funeral.

  “This afternoon,” he repeated. “Then Victoria’s father is back from Hartford?”

  “Yes.”

  “And my father, is he well enough to attend? Leaning on his cane and murmuring, ‘A bad end. I knew he would come to a bad end.’ Is it to be a graveside service?” Elliott said, picking up his hat.

  “Yes,” she said in alarm. “Where are you going?”

  “With you, of course. To the funeral. I missed my first one.”

  “You can’t,” she said, and backed slightly toward the door, clutching the key inside her muff.

  “I think,” he said coldly, “that this little game has gone on long enough. I never should have let you dissuade me from walking in on the first funeral. I certainly shall not let you keep me from this one.”

  Anne was so horrified she could not move. “You’ll kill your father,” she said.

  “Well, and good riddance. You shall have someone to bury then besides this poor stranger who is masquerading as me.”

  “We are burying you, Elliott,” she said, and there was something in his face when she said that that gave him away. “You know you’re dead, don’t you, Elliott?” she said quietly.

  He put his hat on. “We shall see if my fiancée thinks I am dead. Or her father. How glad he will be to see me alive and free of debt! He shall welcome me with open arms, his son-in-law to be. And pretty Vicky, she shall be a bride instead of a widow.”

  Anne thought of Victoria’s kind gray eyes, her little hand holding Anne’s hand in the doctor’s kitchen, of Victoria’s father, grim-faced and protective, his hand on his daughter’s shoulder. “Why are you doing this terrible thing, Elliott?” Anne said.

  “I do not like coffins. They are small and dark and dusty. And cold. Like this room. I will not let them lock me in the grave as you have locked me in.”

  Anne sucked in her breath sharply.

  “They will be so overjoyed they will quite forget what they have gone to the cemetery to do.” He smiled disarmingly at her. “They will quite forget to bury me.”

  Anne backed against the door. “I won’t let you,” she said.

  “Dear Anne, how will you stop me?”

  She had not locked him in, not since the funeral. She had left the door unlocked each night in the hope that he would come out. “Leave the door open,” he had shouted after her, but he had not opened it himself. When she went back the door was still shut, as if she had locked him in. “I will lock you in,” she said aloud, and clutched the key inside her muff.

  Elliott laughed. “What good will that do? If I am a ghost, I should be able to pass through the walls and come floating across the cemetery to you, shouldn’t, I, Anne?”

  “No,” she said steadily. “I won’t let you.”

  “No?” he said, and laughed again. “When have you ever said no to me and meant it? You do not mean it now.” He took a step toward her. “Come. We will go together.”

  “No!” she said, and whirled, opening and shutting the door behind her in one motion, pulling on the knob with all her strength till she could get the key into the lock and turn it. Elliott’s hand was on the knob on the other side, turning it.

  “Stop this foolishness and let me out, Anne,” he said, half laughing, half stern.

  “No,” she said.

  She put the key in the muff, and then, as if that had taken all her strength, she walked a few steps into the sanctuary and sank down on a pew. It was the one she had sat in that day of the funeral, and she put her arms down on the pew in front of her and buried her head in them. Inside the muff, her hand still clutched the key.

  “Can I be of help, Miss Lawrence?” Reverend Sprague said kindly. He was wearing his heavy black coat and carrying the Service for the Burial of the Dead.

  “Yes,” Anne said, and stood up to go to the cemetery with him.

  The coffin was already in the grave. The dirt was heaped around the edges, as dry and pale as the grass. The sky was heavy and gray. It was very cold. Victoria came forward to greet Reverend Sprague and speak to Anne. “I am so glad you came,” she said, taking Anne’s gloved hand. “We have only just heard,” she said, her gray eyes filling with tears, and Anne thought suddenly, He has already been here.

  Victoria’s father came and put his arm around his daughter. “We have had word from New London,” he said. “My son’s ship was lost in a storm. With all hands.”

  “No,” Anne said. “Your brother.”

  “We still hope and pray he may not be lost,” Victoria’s father said. “They were very near the coast.”

  “He is not lost,” Anne said, almost to herself, “he will come today,” and she did not know of whom she spoke.

  “Let us pray,” Reverend Sprague said, and Anne thought, Yes, yes, hurry. They all moved closer to the grave as if that could somehow shelter them from the iron-gray sky. “‘In the midst of life we are in death,’” Reverend Sprague read. “‘Of whom may we seek for succor, but of thee, O Lord?’”

  Anne closed her eyes.

  “‘For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.’” It was beginning to snow. Reverend Sprague stopped to look at the flakes falling on the book and lost the page altogether. When he found it, he said, “Pardon me,” and began again. “‘In the midst of life…’”

  Hurry Anne thought. Oh, hurry.

  Far away, at the other side of the cemetery, across the endless stretch of grayish-brown grass and gray-black stones, someone was coming. The minister hesitated. Go on, Anne thought. Go on.

  “‘That every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.’”

  It was a man in a dark coat. He was carrying his hat in his hand. His hair was reddish-brown. There were flakes of snow on his coat and in his hair. Anne was afraid to look at him for fear the others would see him. She bowed her head. Reverend Sprague bent and scooped up a handful of dirt from the edge of the grave. “‘Unto the mercy of Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we commend the soul of our brother departed and commit his body to the ground, earth to earth—’” He stopped, still holding the handful of earth.

  Anne looked up. The man was much closer, walking rapidly between the graves. Victoria’s father looked up. His face went gray.

  “‘Unto the mercy of Almighty God we commend the soul of our brother departed,’” Reverend Sprague read, and stopped again, and stared.

  Victoria’s father put his arm around Victoria. Victoria looked up. The man began to run toward them, waving his hat in the air.

  “No,” Anne said. With the toe of her boot she kicked at the dirt heaped around the grave. The dislodged clumps of dirt clattered on the coffin. Reverend Sprague looked at her, his face red and angry. He thinks I murdered Elliott, Anne thought despairingly, but I didn’t. She clenched the useless key inside her muff and looked down at the forgotten coffin. I tried, Victoria. For your sake. For all our sakes. I tried to murder Elliott.

  Victoria gave a strangled cry and began to run, her father close behind her. Reverend Sprague closed his book with an angry slap. “Roger!” Victoria cried, and threw her arms around his neck. Anne looked up.

  Victoria’s father slapped him on the back again and again. Victoria kissed him and cried. She took his large hand in her small gloved one and led him over to meet Anne. “This is my brother!” she said happily. “Roger, this is Miss Lawrence
, who has been so kind to me.”

  He shook Anne’s hand.

  “We heard your ship was lost,” she said.

  “It was,” he said, and looked past her at the open grave.

  Anne stood outside the door of the choir room with the key in her hand until her fingers became stiff with cold and she could hardly put the key in the lock.

  There was no one in the church. Reverend Sprague had gone home with Victoria and her father and brother to tea. “Please come,” Victoria had said to Anne. “I do so want you and Roger to be friends.” She had squeezed Anne’s gloved hand and hurried off through the snow. It was nearly dusk. The snow had begun falling heavily by the time they finished burying Elliott’s body. Reverend Sprague had read the service for the burial of the dead straight through to the end, and then they had stood, heads bowed against the snow, while old Mr. Finn filled in the grave. Then they had gone to tea and Anne had come back here to the church.

  She turned the key in the lock. The rattling sound of the key seemed to be followed by an echo of itself, and she thought for a fleeting second of Elliott on the other side of the door, his hand already on the knob, ready to hurtle past her. Then she opened the door.

  There was no one there. She knew it before she lit the candle. There had been no one there all week except herself. Her smallheeled footprints stood out clearly in the dust. The pew where Elliott had sat was thick with undisturbed dust, and in one corner of it lay the comforter she had brought him.

  The toe of her foot hit against something on the floor, half under the pew. She bent to look. The packets of food, untouched in their brown paper wrappings, lay where Elliott had hidden them. A mouse had nibbled the string on one of them, and it lay spilled open, the piece of ham, the russet apple, the crumbling slice of cake she had brought him that first night. A schoolboy’s picnic, Anne thought, and left the parcels where they were for Reverend Sprague to find and think whatever it was he would think about the footprints, the candle, the scattered food.