The Witch of Willow Hall

by Hester Fox

  There is nothing more I would like in the world—short of it never having happened in the first place—than for Catherine to clean up her own mess. But that won’t happen.

  Even though it makes my stomach curdle, I force myself to give a tight smile. “That’s a good idea, Cath.”

  She snaps her gaze to me in surprise, but then her expression softens, and a flicker of gratitude lights her eyes.

  Mother’s shoulders slump a little. I’m taking advantage of her weakness, knowing she won’t fight. But I also know that if Catherine isn’t married safely soon that an entirely fresh scandal will be laid at our doorstep, one that Mother does not have the strength to handle.

  * * *

  Mother sends an invitation to Mr. Barrett requesting his presence and that of Mr. Pierce at dinner the next week. I had thought that my heart was dead, that it would never beat fast and excited again, but to my surprise—and shame—as I dress with Catherine that evening I can’t help the nervous flutter in my chest at the thought of seeing Mr. Barrett.

  Catherine is in a rare good mood, rooting through her gowns and pulling out different options, even going so far as to insist that I borrow her best silk shawl, a creamy buttermilk-colored one that I’ve always coveted.

  Emeline would have made a game of it. We would have pretended that we were spies, dressing up as genteel ladies to infiltrate some sort of military ball where powerful men would fall over themselves to tell us secrets in the hopes of securing a dance with us. I blink back the hot tears that seem to linger so close to the surface every day now that she’s gone.

  If Catherine notices, she doesn’t say anything, instead handing me her lip rouge.

  I hesitate. It feels wrong to be dressing up like this when we should still be in mourning. A clean dress and neatly done hair is one thing, but painting my face feels like something else entirely. I give her a weak smile, and dab my finger in the pot.

  The hours have flown by, and evening is settling in around the house. “Catherine,” I say. She’s rooting around in her desk for a necklace. I look down at my lap. “Do you...that is, do you ever think about that night?”

  Her back is toward me, and her intake of breath is so small I almost miss it, but it’s sharp, quick.

  “What night?” She continues opening drawers.

  “You know what night. After the dance... Do you ever think about it? Think what would have happened if we hadn’t left Emeline alone?”

  Now she does pause, slowly retrieving her necklace and shutting the drawer. “Why should I think about that? What’s done is done.”

  Seeing my face, she softens a bit. “Hand me those earrings, would you?”

  I hand them to her. Her hand bobbles ever so slightly as she guides the pearl drops in, but her voice is light and even. “You think it’s your fault, don’t you?”

  I don’t say anything.

  She sighs. “The way I see it, you can always trace it back to something. Did you leave her alone? Yes, but we all thought she had gone to bed like she was supposed to. Should she have had more sense than to run off to the pond by herself? Of course she should have, she knew better than that. Maybe it’s Father’s fault for moving us here. Maybe it’s Mother’s for never taking an interest in us anymore. Maybe it’s mine for causing all the rumors in the first place, driving us from Boston.”

  I’m behind her, fastening the clasp of the necklace. It’s the gold one with the little C charm. When she says this last part the auburn curl at the nape of her neck quivers. I stay my hand. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn’t this flash of honesty. I’m suddenly awash with loneliness, so close to Catherine yet so far away. I want to put my chin on her shoulder and cry with her. I want to ask her so many questions and try to understand. But she’s already standing up and giving herself a last look over in the mirror.

  “Anyway,” she says brightly, “as I said, what’s done is done and it’s no use wallowing in guilt. Now,” she says, straightening and turning to me, “are you ready to go down?”

  How I wish I could feel as light and blithe about it as her. But there is one question I must ask her, something that has been clawing away at the back of my mind since her revelation the night of the dance.

  “Catherine,” I say evenly, “who’s the baby’s father?”

  She goes completely still, and then stands up abruptly, moving to the window.

  “Catherine?”

  “Oh, what do you care?” she snaps without turning around.

  I care because something is very wrong and in a few moments two young men will be in our dining room, each completely besotted with her and at her mercy. When she first told me of her condition I had assumed that it was Mr. Pierce, and that it had happened that day we went to the pond. But she’s already starting to show—just a little—and that was barely over a month ago.

  The curtains are closed, but she’s staring at the window, her eyes misty. For the first time in my life my older sister looks lost, and it’s unnerving. “Catherine?”

  She’s playing with the C necklace again, her face etched with misery. “If I told you,” she says, her voice low, “you would be sick.”

  It’s the way she says it. The necklace runs through her fingers and something heavy sinks within me. I know. My first impulse is to tear the necklace from her neck, to hurl it out the window. It’s only a little thing, filigree gold, but I imagine it smashing through the window, landing in a pile of shattered glass on the lawn outside.

  “They weren’t rumors,” I whisper. It was true, true all along. My head spins as another piece of my world crumbles beneath my feet. “Did he...did he force himself?”

  “No!” She launches herself at me, taking me by the shoulders and shaking. “Never! Those vile things everyone said about me, about us...those self-righteous gossips, clucking like hens, they had no idea what really went on. They said that I seduced him, and that he was so depraved that he...” She spits. “None of them understand what we share, how it’s always been him and me. How ever since we were children he was there for me, my protector, my friend.”

  Her fingers dig into my collarbone, sending ribbons of pain through my body. “You’re hurting me.”

  Catherine looks at me blankly and then pushes me away, turning and standing with her back to me. “You don’t understand,” she says. “No one understands.”

  I don’t want to understand. How did I never see it? Was it right there in front of me all along? All the times they walked arm in arm, laughing together at some private joke, was it as lovers? All the times that they shut me out, said that I would just get in the way... Maybe deep down I knew, but just didn’t want to admit that it could be possible.

  My body is heavy and the room is too small. She’s still talking, looking at his miniature on her desk and stroking the little gilded frame with loving fingers.

  “Do you know how hard it’s been? It’s like having half my being torn from me and hidden away where I can never find it. Everything, every part of me aches for him. And there’s nothing I can do about it! All I can do is sit here, growing big with his child. The most I can hope for is a marriage, a loveless one, but one that will at least save me—us—from further scandal. And even then, I’ll grow old without him. Oh.” She lets out a long sigh, her white shoulders falling like the broken wings of a bird.

  She’s sick. There’s something inside of her, something damaged. That’s the only explanation. For all her vanity and all her games, her bright smiles...they just mask what lies beneath.

  Her lips curl into a bitter smile. “You might have told Cyrus that there was a sister willing to overlook his character and lack of fortune in return for a husband. If I don’t get a proposal out of Mr. Pierce soon then, well...”

  Swallowing hard, I force out the question I’m afraid to know the answer to. “Or Mr. Barrett?”

  She can throw her
self at Cyrus for all I care, but Mr. Barrett... I press my palms against my eyes, desperately trying not to envision them standing hand in hand at the altar, of Mr. Barrett taking her to bed in his house just beyond the trees. She would be sentencing him to a life without love, using him for nothing more than his name and protection.

  Her expression loses some of its venom, and she looks faraway, thoughtful. “Yes,” she says, “perhaps there’s still hope with Mr. Barrett.”

  Just then there is a knock at the door downstairs. Catherine and I look at each other. “Ah! Speak of the devil.” She takes a deep breath, pastes a bright smile on her face and trips out of the room, humming as if she hadn’t a care in the world.

  I linger in the doorway, my chest tight, as I watch my sister walk away, swollen with our brother’s child.

  15

  AS SOON AS I set foot downstairs, I know this was a mistake. Mother is withdrawn, barely noticing as Catherine flits around her, placing fresh flowers in the vases. Even Father is subdued; he hasn’t pulled out any papers to show our guests, and he sits in his chair, swirling a glass of Madeira side to side without drinking. It’s too soon for entertaining, even if it’s only Mr. Barrett and Mr. Pierce. It’s too soon to make polite conversation and sit down together and eat and laugh as if nothing has happened. Catherine’s revelation rests on my shoulders heavy and constricting as a noose. When Ada shows Mr. Barrett and Mr. Pierce in, it’s all I can do to lift my head and murmur a greeting from dry lips.

  Catherine and Mr. Pierce move off immediately together to their corner in the parlor, and I watch them with a queasy stomach. For as little thought as I usually give to Mr. Pierce, I can’t help the pang of pity for him that runs through me; he has no idea the breadth and consequence of the snare Catherine is setting for him.

  “Miss Montrose.”

  Mr. Barrett moves out of the shadowed doorway and gives me a stiff bow of his head. “I confess I was surprised to receive an invitation so soon after...” He trails off, frowning into the corner where Catherine is speaking in soft tones to Mr. Pierce.

  “Yes, well, we wanted to...thank you.” I never would have agreed to this dinner, championed Catherine’s cause, if I had known then what I know now about her condition.

  The conversation is stilted, painful, both of us going through the motions of saying the right things. What happened at the pond hangs between us, heavy and unspoken just as I knew it would. I can’t look at Mr. Barrett without seeing him emerging from the water, face white and jaw set, Emeline hanging from his arms. And he must look at me and see a foolish girl, jealous and petty, someone who would entertain a suitor at her own sister’s burial.

  We sit down to an informal meal of roast beef and potatoes. Catherine and Mr. Pierce are the only ones who are oblivious to the mantle of gloom that sits over the rest of us, though even Mr. Pierce has the good sense to keep his voice low, his look deferential when speaking to Mother.

  Ada has barely cleared the first plates away when Mr. Pierce pushes back his chair and stands up. “I’m so sorry, but I’m afraid I have an engagement in town and must say good night.”

  “Oh, that is too bad,” Mother says, but the relief in her eyes at having one fewer person to entertain is palpable.

  Catherine’s face falls. She forces a bright smile, but there’s no hiding the tight lines around her mouth. “But it’s so early yet!” she protests with a nervous little laugh. “Surely you won’t leave us so soon.”

  I give her a swift kick under the table. The sooner this torturous dinner ends, the better. But she only glares at me and squares her shoulders in defiance.

  Mr. Pierce bows and assures her that if his engagement weren’t of the most pressing variety he would stay for hours yet, but unfortunately it is. If Catherine was hoping for a proposal tonight, then her hopes are quickly dashed.

  “Mr. Barrett, you aren’t leaving us so soon too, are you?” she asks, turning her gaze sweetly on him.

  He should go, leave us to our grief. But my eyes are greedy for him, my skin alive at the knowledge of him so close by. I don’t know what would be more unbearable: for him to leave, or for him to stay.

  Mr. Barrett looks up, pausing his glass midair. He flickers the swiftest of glances at me before clearing his throat. “It’s growing late. I think perhaps I should accompany August.”

  “Oh, nonsense,” Mr. Pierce says with an easy smile. “I’m more than capable of navigating these country roads. Stay, stay.”

  Catherine nods eagerly in agreement. “At least stay for coffee,” she says with a wheedling pout.

  Mr. Barrett looks uncomfortable, but to his credit his voice is gracious and genuine. “Yes, of course. Coffee would be lovely.”

  Mr. Pierce takes his leave, and we move back into the parlor. No sooner does the front door click shut than Catherine has angled her chair in Mr. Barrett’s direction, leaning in low to him to offer to pour his coffee.

  Mother announces that she has a headache and must retire, but that she hopes Mr. Barrett will stay and enjoy the coffee and cake that Ada has brought in. Father acts as reluctant chaperone, but within a few minutes he’s nodding over his newspaper and soon after is snoring with abandon on the settee.

  Mr. Barrett sits with his back straight, coffee in hand while Catherine asks him shy questions and blushes at his answers. She knows just what will work on him as opposed to Mr. Pierce, how to use his quiet, dignified personality to her advantage. I watch with increasing agony, helpless to do anything but sit mute as a statue while Catherine charms and flirts her way into Mr. Barrett’s heart.

  Picking up a book, I pretend to be absorbed in the story, though it might not even be in English for all I know. I steal glances over the top of the pages, my face burning, my mouth dry. I’m just about to tear my gaze away and force myself to read, when Mr. Barrett catches me staring at him.

  Before I can drop my eyes, Catherine intercepts the look. “Lydia,” she says in a pointed tone, “weren’t you saying before dinner how tired you were?”

  Her voice is sweet, but there’s a flinty determination in her eyes.

  “I...” I open my mouth, ready to deny saying anything of the sort. She’s made her intentions more than clear, and do I really have the spirit to battle Catherine tonight? Can I find in myself the will to laugh and smile and bat my eyelashes alongside of her, all in the vain hope of catching Mr. Barrett’s fancy?

  “Yes,” I say, standing. “I am tired. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll say good night as well now.”

  * * *

  The heat has finally broken, but I need air, I need to clear my head of the image of Catherine’s awful secret growing beneath her gown, the image of my other sister pale and lifeless in Mr. Barrett’s arms. Instead of returning to my room, I head outside. Cursing, I trip over the rock propping open the door and stumble into the night. My clothes are too tight on my body, it’s hard to breathe. Yanking off my gloves, I leave them wrinkled in the drive as I start walking toward the road.

  We’re ruined and I don’t even care. Catherine has driven the final nail into our coffin. Every time she spoke longingly of London it was because he was there. Every time poor Mother wrung her hands because a friend turned their face from us in the street it was because of her. Every time Father reproached her for how she let herself be portrayed in the papers, why, she knew all along that those columns spoke the truth. How could she do this to us? What if the baby is born damaged, proof of its unnatural beginning? How will Mother bear it?

  I double back away from the road and up behind the house. The windows glow yellow and warm, and inside Mr. Barrett and Catherine are sitting tête-à-tête as Father, oblivious, snores softly in the corner. If I was heartsick at the thought of Mr. Barrett’s hands on Catherine before, I’m seething now that I know the truth behind her motives. And this is the family that I mourned? This is the family that I would have done anything to keep
together?

  The woods have grown thick and unfamiliar, and I stumble blindly with outstretched hands. The lace at the hem of my dress snags and unravels. I can’t believe I let Catherine primp me up. I feel dirty, and I smear off the lip paint with the back of my hand. She’s right, it was her fault. If it weren’t for her and Charles we never would have come here. But Catherine was also right about another thing: what’s done is done. And if Emeline can’t be here, then I will go to her.

  The weeping willow greets me, swaying despite the lack of breeze. Come, Lydia. Come to me and spill your troubled soul. I won’t judge. When the stonemason is finished with Emeline’s gravestone it will bear a weeping willow bent over an urn, that tree sacred to Persephone, to the underworld. That tree that the Greeks believed bestows the gift of poetry and understanding, of transcendence, but only to those willing to descend into the darkness. For Emeline it’s either a beautiful tribute or a cruel irony.

  I carefully take off my shoes, lining them up at the rocky edge of the water. My stockings are next. I peel them off and neatly fold them, placing them next to the shoes. Out come my earrings, off with the pearl hairpin that Catherine stuck in so deep. I shake my hair out so that it spills down my neck and back, my scalp tingling. Lighter and lighter. I can’t take my dress off myself, so I hike it up, tying the torn lace and silk in a knot at my thigh.

  Everything is so clear now. My body is light, my mind free of the tangled thoughts that have plagued me for weeks. No more sick Catherine and Charles, no more Cyrus, no more Mr. Barrett, no more spirits forever lurking at the periphery, no more aching loneliness.

  The water is smooth and tepid and I barely feel it swallowing first my ankles, then my calves, the back of my knees.

  I want to know. I have to know. What did it feel like? What filled the last moments of my sister’s life? Was it quick and peaceful, like slipping into the embrace of a pleasant dream? Or did she panic, fighting for air as the water stole her breath away? The willow watches me, nodding. I know. Come, Lydia. Come and I will show you.