Bittersweet

by Nevada Barr

  She held herself together to open the door for him, and when he was gone, down the walk and into the street, she slammed it with all the force she could bring to bear. Dandy, asleep under the table, raced into the bedroom, her tail fuzzed into a bottlebrush.

  14

  EVERY DAY, IN THE EVENINGS, WHEN THE MINERS STREAMED DOWN the main street like a river of coal, blackening the snow with the dust from their clothes, Imogene watched for Joseph to come up her walk. Sometimes she would meet him on the street or in a shop. If they were alone he’d say, “Nothing yet. Perhaps tomorrow,” and smile or touch her arm in silent reassurance.

  The third of April came, the day of the school-board elections, and still Imogene had not heard. In the late afternoon, smart in a navy skirt and a white shirtwaist, she checked her image in the glass one last time. A black fitted jacket was folded on the chair beside her; she put it on and pulled her sleeves straight. Outside the window, the sky was dark and low. Gusts blew scattered pellets of snow against the panes. People hurried in from the street, holding on to their hats, their mufflers and collars turned up against the cold. The school was filling up.

  Imogene opened the door and the cat darted in, nearly tripping her as she stepped outside. The lilac bushes in front of the school had only just started to bud. The sudden cold would kill the blooms this year.

  Her name was shouted on the wind; from far down the street, Joseph Cogswell was hailing her. Imogene waited, making no move to meet him, and he broke into a trot.

  “I’ve got to talk with you,” he said as soon as he’d recovered his breath. “Can we go inside?”

  “You can tell me here,” Imogene returned. Her gabardine skirts snapped like whips in the wind.

  “Very well.” He rubbed his nose and looked around uncomfortably. “Very well. I’m sorry to do this, Imogene, but I’m going to have to ask you to resign your position as a teacher. I got a telegram from Philadelphia.”

  “I’m not to teach anymore?”

  “I’m sorry.” He handed her the telegram.

  TO JOSEPH COGSWELL

  CALLIOPE, PENNSYLVANIA

  IMOGENE GRELZNIK WAS FIRED ON SEPTEMBER 21ST 1873 FOR IMMORAL CONDUCT TOWARD A FORMER STUDENT.

  SPENCER THRESHER

  ACTING PRINCIPAL

  SOUTH PHILADELPHIA PRIMARY SCHOOL

  Imogene crushed the paper and dropped it in the slush. The wind rolled it under the steps.

  “I want you to come to the meeting, Imogene. I’ll just say that you’ve decided to take your leave and you can say whatever you like for the reason. There’s no need for anyone to be hurt more than need be—you’ve done well by us, and that’s not changed. We’ll make it a farewell and you can go or stay as you see fit.” He talked quietly, comfortingly, lightly holding her elbow as though he were merely escorting her to dinner or the theater. Numbly, she let herself be guided the short distance to the school.

  Someone had lighted the stove, and with the fire and the press of people, the schoolroom was pleasantly warm. Sarah sat with her mother near the front, the baby playing happily on his grandmother’s lap, his bright eyes seeming to miss nothing. Clay and Karen sat with Mrs. Beard. Karen, silent and lumpish between clay and her mother-in-law, looked as though she had not bathed or washed her hair since the wedding. Clay held their daughter on his lap. Her little fist patted his hand, barely big enough to close on his sausagelike fingers.

  Mrs. Cogswell stood apart. Her gaze fixed on her husband the moment he entered with Imogene.

  “Joseph…”

  “You stay out of this, Judith.” And he was past, smiling, greeting people, leading Imogene to the head of the classroom.

  There was a smattering of applause as Imogene reached the front of the room. Sarah waved, but the schoolteacher didn’t see her. Joseph seated her near the wall and, stepping behind the desk, rapped for silence with a ruler. Mothers gathered toddlers off the floor and onto laps, where they couldn’t get into mischief, and people shuffled expectantly.

  “Before we start with the elections and whatnot,” Joseph began, “there’s something I’d like to say. Imogene Grelznik has been the teacher here for three years. Three years is the longest spell we’ve had a teacher. And in that time, Miss Grelznik’s turned the school from a drafty shack used by subscription teachers who charged two dollars a head—and drank most of that—into a warm, fit place for us to send our children. And if words and energy could have done it, she’d have built a brand-new school. For the first time, youngsters coming out of Calliope can stand up beside their cousins schooled in the East and not be ashamed. I think we’re all willing to admit Miss Grelznik’s responsible for all this.”

  Mrs. Cogswell’s face was growing a deep shade of crimson. Every time her husband looked toward the back of the room, she’d tried to catch his attention and he’d avoided her eye. Finally she broke her aggressive silence. “This has gone far enough,” she declared.

  There was a confused silence; the people looked from Judith to her husband and back.

  “Judith,” Mr. Cogswell warned, “before you say anything, let me finish.”

  “I will not. I’ve stood here and listened to this long enough. You and that schoolteacher of yours have been pulling the wool over the eyes of this town. People have a right to know.” The words snapped out like thrown stones, and no one had time to respond. In her hand was a brown envelope with the words Head man at school Calliope Penna scrawled across the face. She took out a folded sheet of paper and opened it.

  “Judith, that’s enough,” Mr. Cogswell shouted, but all eyes were on his wife.

  “This letter came in the mail over a week ago, and I kept my tongue in my head, but I think the time’s come it would be a wickedness to keep quiet. This letter came over a week ago, like I said, and I take no pleasure in reading it. It’s from a Mr. Darrel Aiken of Philadelphia.”

  Mrs. Cogswell had everyone’s attention. She began to read: “ ’I would have wrote sooner but Imogene Grelznik made so careful to keep her whereabouts a secret it’s took me this long to find her. If she’s teaching in your school then whatever she told you about leaving here is a lie. She was run off for behaving indecent and immoral toward a young girl, my sister, who is now dead. I found her acting with my sister the way only a man ought to act toward a woman who is his lawful wedded wife.

  “ ‘I wrote to warn you against her that she craves unnatural things and I don’t want no brother or father to have to see what I saw betwixt them two and live knowing it. Respectfully yours, Darrel Aiken.’ ”

  Judith finished. People continued to look at her because they couldn’t look at Imogene. Mrs. Cogswell folded the page, creasing it sharply between her thumb and forefinger, and laid it down on a desk. “Somebody had to do it,” she said, “and I waited longer than was right.”

  Sarah held Matthew to her, her lips against his hair, and watched Imogene. The schoolteacher sat erect, spots of color burning in her cheeks. As people found voice and a confused babble arose, Imogene crossed to the desk and picked the ruler out of Joseph’s hand. It cracked on the desktop, and there was quiet. Holding the eyes of the people she knew, she looked from one to another: mothers and fathers of the children she taught, merchants from the shops where she traded, former students—she held them and she began to speak.

  “Mary Beth Aiken was one of my students and a very dear friend. I was there when she died.” Imogene’s voice was strong, defiance clipping the edges. “Darrel Aiken is a drunken ne’er-do-well. If on the strength of this man’s letter you would condemn me…” People were settling back into their seats, the power in Imogene stilling their fear.

  Karen looked around the room. People were relaxing; Miss Grelznik was winning them back. Her eye lit on her husband, and the handsome face of his brother flashed through her mind. Hatred filled her, she jumped to her feet, her chair crashing over against the floorboards. Pointing at the schoolmistress, she cried, “I saw them!”

  All eyes turned to her. Karen swell
ed with the attention. “I saw her kissing Sarah Tolstonadge,” she lied viciously. As one, the townsfolk took a quick breath. Pleased, Karen embroidered on the lie: “They was doing it when they didn’t know I was there. I was looking through the window—the bedroom window.”

  Sarah’s eyes grew wide. “Karen,” she cried, “that isn’t true! You know it isn’t!”

  “Imogene was kissing on her like a man. In the bedroom. And Sarah pregnant out to here,” Karen insisted and, looking pleased with herself, maintained a smug silence while Sarah’s world unraveled.

  “You’re lying,” Sarah breathed, then screamed, “You’re lying!”

  Chairs were scraping, people coming to their feet.

  “No!” Imogene shouted. “It is not true. Not Sarah. No! Please, God, listen to me!” Her words were swallowed up; everyone was yelling at once. Sam Ebbitt pushed through the milling crowd and grabbed his wife by the upper arm, jerking her to her feet. Sarah cried out and held tight to the baby. Sam plucked her son from her arms, handing him, shrieking, to Margaret. “Look after the boy,” he commanded, and half-led, half-dragged Sarah toward the door.

  Curtains drawn and the door bolted, no candles lit against the night, Imogene rocked herself before a cold grate, her eyes open but unseeing. Unsettled by her strange behavior, Dandy had given up crying for her dinner and vanished into the bedroom.

  Around midnight the snow turned to sleet and the wind drove it against the windows and down the chimney in icy drafts. Roused by the cold, Imogene lay down in the bed fully clothed and pulled the covers over her. Dandy came to nestle against her warmth, kneading at the pillow with her claws and purring.

  Several hours before dawn, Imogene was snatched from an uneasy doze by a low thump. Motionless, she lay listening. Her breathing rushed loud in the dead air of the room and she could hear her heart pounding against her ribs. She held her breath. There was nothing—then a soft, sliding sound. Throwing back the covers, she crossed to the bedroom window and, pulling the curtains apart a bare half-inch, put her eye to the slit. The storm had blown itself out. The night was moonless and the shadows protected their secrets. She settled the curtains closed again. A barely audible cry, seeming to have no place of origin, came to her through the close darkness. It sounded like the muffled wail of a baby. The hairs prickled on the back of her neck as she groped her way to the bedroom door. “Who’s there?” she whispered. Her voice was higher than usual, and she cleared her throat. Nothing. Slipping her shoes off, she padded silently into the kitchen and grabbed the matches from the stove. Back in the living room, she struck one and held it over her head. The room was empty but for the two glowing eyes of the cat, watching curiously from the bedroom. The match burned to her fingers and she shook it out. Again in the dark the sound was there—the soft shush of something rubbing against the house. She grabbed up the fire tongs. Creeping on noiseless feet, she made her way to the door and pressed her ear against it. A faint sound of scratching could be heard through the planks. Holding her weight against the wood to relieve the bolt, she drew it back, careful not to let the metal rasp; then, grasping the handle, she raised the fire tongs and jerked the door inward. It pulled out of her hands as a shapeless bundle of humanity fell against it, and Sarah Ebbitt crumpled to the floor. Faint starlight picked out her features above the cumbersome layers of an oversized man’s coat.

  Imogene lowered the fire tongs and dropped to her knees beside the prone figure.

  “I came in the pony cart,” Sarah mumbled. Her eyes were lost and she was nearly senseless.

  “Shhh. Shhh.” The schoolteacher lifted her to her feet, helped her inside, and rebolted the door.

  Imogene shoved the pothook to the back of the fireplace. The kettle was heavy, full of molasses boiling down for candy. Quickly she built a fire and lit the lamps. Sarah wouldn’t sit, but leaned woodenly against the mantel, her forehead resting on the stone; she trembled until her skirts quaked. Sam’s old mackinaw hung loose on her small frame, the sleeves falling over her hands. Her long hair tumbled in a mat around her face, hiding her eyes.

  “It’ll be warm in half a minute,” Imogene said. Gently she took the coat from the young woman’s shoulders. As it slid down, she saw that her blouse was dark with blood, the red stain feathering under her arms and trailing in colored streamers down her skirt, where the shirred cloth soaked up the blood. “Oh Lord. Oh my Lord.” Imogene whipped the coat to the floor.

  “He whipped me.” Sarah slumped against the stone. “I came here in the pony cart.” She was slurring her words, her hands clamped on the mantel for support. Imogene had to pry them loose. One was swollen, the fingers puffy and discolored. Imogene took it between her own hands as gently as if it were a wounded bird. “Your hand,” she said softly. “The one you paint with. What did he do to your hand?”

  Sarah looked at it, noticing it for the first time. Painfully she flexed the fingers; they were not broken. “Oh.” She blinked to clear her thoughts. “I must have hurt it on Sam’s face.”

  “You hit Sam Ebbitt? My dear, whatever possessed you?”

  Sarah hung her head. “He called you a name.”

  “My little love,” Imogene whispered.

  Sarah’s knees were buckling. She could no longer stand. “Can I sit down now?” She pleaded.

  “Of course! I’m not thinking right. Of course you can.” Imogene helped her kneel on the rug before the hearth.

  Sarah’s mouth was dry, and she tried to swallow unsuccessfully. “My back. He made me take my clothes off and hold to the bedpost.”

  “Let me look.” A dozen small wooden buttons, sticky with blood, closed the back of Sarah’s shirtwaist, another ten or twelve hung loose where her fingers had not been able to manage them. The blouse fell open and Sarah held it over her chest. Imogene turned the girl’s back to the firelight. A whip had cut heavily, the lash splitting the flesh every time it was laid on. Five slashes clawed from her right shoulder to her waist, like the track of an immense cat. Blood had poured down, obscuring the skin and making odd patterns where the fabric of her shirtwaist had left its mark.

  Imogene stared at the ruined back; the fine white skin cut to ribbons, black knotted blood puckering the edges of the gashes.

  Sarah would carry these scars with her always.

  “My poor darling.” Tenderly, Imogene ran her finger down the line of Sarah’s neck and shoulder, the young woman’s skin like silk to her touch. “Oh, my poor dear.”

  Sarah let her blouse fall and the firelight played over her breasts. They were heavy with milk, the nipples large and dark against her skin. A long, tremulous breath quivered deep in her chest; she turned to Imogene. “He hurt me bad.”

  The older woman’s eyes were bright with unshed tears and there was a streak of blood on her face where she had brushed back a lock of her hair. “I know he did,” she said softly, and gathered Sarah to her, stroking her hair and talking quietly. Sarah tilted her head back, eyes closed.

  “Dear girl, I wish I could keep you safe. Here with me,” Imogene whispered. “But you must go back to Sam. My love, you’ve a baby now.” Sarah locked her hands behind Imogene’s neck and held so tightly that the schoolteacher had to fight for breath. “You will heal. Go home. People will forget.” Sarah clung to her as a man holds to a raft in stormy seas.

  The latch rattled; the women froze and instinctively Imogene’s arm came up to protect Sarah. With sudden violence the door burst open. The bracket that held the deadbolt ripped from the jamb, spraying splintered wood across the room. Red-faced, neck swollen with anger, Sam Ebbitt filled the doorway.

  “I thought you might’ve run here.” Paying no more attention to Imogene than he would to a cat, Sam pulled his wife from the floor and shoved her toward the rocker. “Get your clothes on.” Sarah fell to her knees, toppling the chair. He booted her in the rump, and her face smacked into the wood. A thin line of blood traced down her chin from a split lip. Sam grasped her by the back of the neck and, forcing her left arm behind h
er, wrenched off her wedding ring. Then, shoving his wife’s face near the hot metal grate, he said, “in the Bible they brand whores. I ought to brand you, let you wear what you are on your face.”

  Imogene pushed by him and snatched the pothook to her. As she closed her hand over the iron rod, her palm sizzled, and the smell of burning flesh was in the room. She lifted the half-filled kettle from the hook and slopped some of the boiling sugar syrup down Sam’s back.

  With a roar like a wounded bear, he released Sarah and fell back. Imogene held the pot high, ready to throw the rest in his face. Sam started forward and she cocked her arm. “I’ll blind you, Sam Ebbitt. I swear to God I will.”

  “You’re the devil’s own.” He spat, and the spittle struck her shoulder, hanging there in a gob. “You’ve taken her; take her to wife and burn in hell.” He hurled Sarah’s wedding ring at her where she cowered on the floor. “God forgive you, because I won’t!” And Sam was gone. They could hear the pony cart drive away, his horse tied on behind; the silence he left was so absolute it rang in their ears.

  Imogene put the kettle back on the hob and closed the door, pushing a chair against it to keep it from swinging open. The fire brushed Sarah’s face with orange light as she crouched, half-naked and sobbing, by the hearth. In the fold of her skirt, something glinted dully. Imogene knelt beside her and lifted the wedding ring from where it had fallen. The gold shone warm and worn.

  She worked the circle of jade from her little finger and replaced it with the gold. Her palm and fingers were blistered, and the rings pulled away the burned skin. “Give me your hand, Sarah.” She slipped the jade ring onto the third finger of the girl’s left hand.

  Sarah’s fingers closed on hers, and her tears broke out afresh. “I’m afraid. I’m so afraid. Don’t ever leave me, Imogene.”

  “Not ever.”

  15