The street is muddy from snowmelt and frost coming out of the ground, so I keep to the gravel path alongside the fence in front of the Dickinson properties. It takes me five minutes to walk from Kelley Square to the Evergreens. It’s the kind of fanciful place you might be finding in a book. A jumble of towers and porches and balconies with a cupola like a crown and windows shining in all directions. Pretty as a Faery glade in May, it is, with the house hiding behind flowery shrubs and ornamental trees, but today it looks winter brown and witchety.
I open the gate and close it behind me. My heart’s pounding a sight too fast. I’m not feeling bold as I was this morning. Wondering what I’ll have to say to convince Mattie D not to sell the Homestead. If she’s selling it. Could be Rosaleen has her story all wrong. Wouldn’t be the first time.
I start up the flagstone walk. Don’t remember ever going to the Evergreens this way—I was always cutting along the path between the two houses. I can’t stop myself from looking east, and there’s the Homestead, flecked in sunshine. It tugs at my heart. I have half a mind to follow the path, though it’s hard to make out now, overgrown with scraggly vines and brambles. But it would be a grand thing, letting myself in the back door and taking a peek in the kitchen.
Instead, I keep my feet on the stones and climb the steps to the fancy front door. I feel bold, but I’ve no mind to be slinking round to the back like a servant. I wonder who’ll be answering and if I’ll be let in. I’ve lost track of all the maids Sue and Mattie D have had over the years. Seems like half the domestics in Amherst worked at the Evergreens one time or another—even my own niece Meg.
I scold myself for fretting like I’m still a servant and need to worry about such things. I’m not a maid anymore. I own and run the best boardinghouse in Amherst. Paid for its building with my own money and never skimped on furnishings. I remember how scandalized Mary was when I bought real Belleek porcelain for the dining table. Said it was a shameful waste of money, for the boarders wouldn’t care. A rough lot, she said they were.
“They’re from Ireland, every last one,” I’d snapped at her. “And why shouldn’t they be having a bit of comfort and a clean place to live when they’re far from home? ’Tis a lonesome thing living in a strange land and it’s my own money I’m spending, after all.”
Sure, she’d clapped her mouth shut after that and never said another word about my china. A rare thing for herself, not to be giving her opinion on everything under the sun.
I knock on the door and wait. After a bit I hear footsteps and the lock turning. But when the door opens, I step back—I’m that surprised. For it’s Mattie D herself standing there. Tall and thin as a stick she is—there’s more meat on a chicken’s forehead than the woman has on her bones. She’s done up in a drab gray suit with not a trace of ribbon or lace. Not even a bow at her throat. The Sisters of Mercy would be approving, but I’m not a nun nor ever wanted to be, no matter I’ve been Catholic all my life.
Looks like Mattie D’s surprised as myself. She’s giving me a confounded frown, and I can see she doesn’t know who I am. Sure, it never crossed my mind she wouldn’t recognize me.
“Margaret Maher,” I say to help her remember.
Her face shifts. “Maggie?”
“Aye,” I say. “It’s been an abundance of years, but ’tis myself, surely.”
“Whatever are you doing here?” Even in the shadows, her eyes look the way they did when she was a girl—wary and sad. There’s something frayed about her, makes me want to smooth her cheek under my hand.
“I’ve come for a friendly chinwag,” I say.
Her wide, down-turning mouth tightens. So like her father’s mouth, it is. Not that I’d ever be telling herself so. I know she’s still bitter about him, though he’s been dead twenty years—but who could be blaming her after what he did to his family?
“A chinwag,” she says. She’s not moving from the doorway.
“Aye,” I say. “Folks say you’re selling the Homestead. I’m thinking that can’t be true. So I came to find out.”
Her face pinches up, just like that. All hard lines and sharp angles. “You’re still the same Maggie, I see. Nosy as ever.”
Feels like a slap across my face, her words. My temper comes up and I have to pinch myself to keep civil. “Sure now, there’s no call to be taking that tone,” I say. “I amn’t a maid now, nor have I been one for seventeen years. You’d best invite me in like a proper guest.”
She blinks—two, three times—and tightens her shoulders so she’s taller, though I wouldn’t have thought such a thing possible—she’s a good head taller than myself already. “The Homestead is legally mine to dispose of, as you are well aware,” she says. “Now please leave.”
Seems I have my answer.
“I don’t know how you can part with the dear old place,” I say, and—no surprise—tears prickle my eyes. “It was Miss Emily’s whole world. What would your mother say?” I watch her face, hoping to find the flicker of guilt I’m sure must be lurking. “You’re betraying Miss Emily, you know. It was her home. Wouldn’t surprise me if her spirit’s still lingering.”
She gives her head a shake, like a horse refusing the bridle. “Let me make it clear to you”—she’s glaring at me now and speaking slow, like she’s talking to a child—“this is not your concern. It has nothing to do with you.”
I glare right back. Mary was fond of saying God mixed the mettle too strong in me and likely she was right—I’ve always been headstrong and willful, forever bedeviling Mam and herself when I was a girl. But being a servant, I learned to hide it from those who paid my wages. So maybe Mattie D doesn’t know my true nature.
“ ’Tis plain somebody needs to be talking sense into you,” I say in a voice hard as her own. “And since there’s no one left but myself who’s known you since you were a girl, I’m thinking it is my concern.” Now I’m in a fury, and not disposed to hide it. “The Homestead does have to do with me. And you know it’s so. I’m the one lived there thirty years. God’s truth, ’tis more my house than yours, no matter the name on the deed.”
“I’ve asked you to leave,” she says, and her voice sounds exactly like Sue’s. “Now I’m ordering you.”
Hard as stone the woman is. Just like her grandfather—and my memory of the Squire in his library holding Tommy’s letter pops up behind my eyes. There’s a heave in my belly, for the old feelings still cling like barnacles on a ship’s keel.
“Suit yourself,” I say. I turn and march back down the walk.
* * *
God’s truth, I’m in a fury. It’s been a long time since I was this stirred up. And I’ll not be letting it go—the Homestead ought to be owned by somebody who knew Emily. And there’s no call for Mattie D to be treating me like I’m nobody. I’ve known her since she was a child, and many a time looked after her when her mam and Emily were putting their heads together over poetry. How often did I praise the funny little stories she wrote when she was a girl or serve her the biggest slice of chocolate cake? How many times did I comfort her after one of Austin’s scoldings? Lord, I practically helped raise her.
She’s changed even more than I thought. Maybe Rosaleen’s right and she’s got too full of herself. All those grand airs and fancy trips to New York and Europe, not to mention marrying that foreign husband. It strikes me I’ve not seen Alexander Bianchi for a long time—years maybe. Nor even heard gossip of his coming and going like I used to. I wonder if he’s still in Amherst.
Sure, I’ll never understand what Mattie D sees in him. He always looks puffed up and proud—like an English duke. Smiling in a quare way makes me think he’s hiding something under his great mustache. His eyes cold as stones in winter. There’s something slippery about the man, to be sure.
It’s sad the way a man can get a hold on a woman. How even a worldly, traveling woman gets her heart twisted around a man’s smile. One of the qu
are mysteries of love, I reckon.
Heaven help me, I ought to know.
Chapter Nine
1874
Five years I’d been working at the Homestead when Patrick Quinn came knocking, right in the midst of my washing up after the noon meal. In truth, I wasn’t inclined to open the back door to some stranger’s foolishness. Most in Amherst knew better than to be stopping by the Homestead on my afternoon off. I shook the dishwater from my hands and wiped them dry with the rag tucked into my apron strings. Even so, they were soapy and sore and I had the devil of a time turning the doorknob.
The rain was coming down hard and made no sign of stopping anytime soon. I gave my hands another wipe and took a wary look at the lad on the back stoop. He was a man grown but untidy as a boy in his rumpled coat and crooked hat with little rivers of water running off his shoulders. Sure, I’d never laid eyes on him before. But I couldn’t let him stand there with the rain filling his boots now, could I?
“Come in before the weather beats you to it,” I said, pulling the door wide. Wasn’t till he was inside did I see how tall he was. Near big as Tom Kelley, and handsome besides. The kind of looks to be making the blood rush to my face when I was younger. But I was over all that now. Already three years past thirty and seen enough of the world to know there’s a wide ocean between good looks and good deeds.
He slid the hat off his head and gave me a proper nod. “I’m Patrick Quinn,” he said, and didn’t he have the music of Tipperary on his tongue? Gave me a quare little shiver, for it was a sorry place where I came from, and at that time, I didn’t relish the remembering.
“And what might you be wanting?” I handed him the rag to dry himself.
“I’m looking to speak with Mr. Dickinson,” he said. “James Gallagher sent me.”
“Best be speaking to myself, then,” I said, bold as a bucket. I wasn’t of a mind to bow and scrape to a stranger, especially when I had no idea who James Gallagher was. “I’ll give the Squire your message soon as he gets home.”
“A squire is he?” said Patrick, holding his hat in one hand and wiping his forehead with the other.
“He’s an important man.” I scowled at the water dripping off his hat onto the clean floor.
“I know that surely,” Patrick said. “He’s in the Massachusetts legislature. And from what I hear, he’s rich and miserly as Queen Victoria herself. But that don’t make him a squire.” His dark eyes were glistering and the corners of his mouth quirked up.
“Whist! Stop your tongue!” I was shocked at his boldness. Not that he was wrong about the Squire. But it wasn’t right for some stray lad to be slandering the man in his own house. I saw Patrick’s smile had disappeared, so maybe he was having second thoughts for acting the maggot. I snatched my rag out of his hand. “You’d best tell me your message and be on your way,” I said. “I’ve work to do.”
He shook his head. “My instructions are to give it direct to himself. So I need to know when he’ll be home.”
“ ’Tis no business of yours,” I snapped.
“I’ll wait till he comes, then,” said Patrick. And didn’t he commence undoing his coat buttons before my eyes? Sure, it surprised me. I wasn’t used to having my words flouted in my own washroom.
“You can button that right back up,” I said. “He won’t be back till tomorrow’s train from Boston.”
His mouth quirked again and I saw I’d just told him what he was asking. Sure, I don’t know why I did that. It just came out.
“Would you be knowing a place I can stay the night, then?” he asked.
Right off I thought of Tom’s brother James and his wife, Ellen, living next to Tom and Mary. They took in boarders from time to time if somebody put in a good word. But I’d never heard of Patrick Quinn, had no idea where he came from or what business he was up to. And it nettled me he wasn’t trusting myself with his message.
“There’s the Amherst House just up the street,” I said. “In the center of town, it is. And if that’s too costly for you, there’s lodgings over the river in Northampton. A bit of a walk never did anybody harm.”
A gust of wind came up and the rain pelted down, rattling the windows. It couldn’t have rained harder—it was coming down like Judgment Day. Sure, it was as if God Himself was scolding me for lacking charity. And Patrick wasn’t smiling anymore.
I didn’t like the lad and he was no friend of mine. But there he stood, looking so downcast the thought of turning him out into the weather made me gloomy myself. That’s the way it is with me—I get cross but it won’t last.
“Sure, never mind that,” I said. “Best you be waiting here till the rain lets up. Give yourself a chance to dry out.”
“ ’Tis tempting me, you are.” He gave me a sweet, pleading look.
I pointed at the water dripping off his coat hem. “Take that thing off and hang it on a peg before you make a bog of my washroom.”
He shed the coat, but said not a word of regret for the puddle I’d be wiping up. It was plain there was a bit of the rascal in him too, for wasn’t he biting off a grin while he was obeying? Nettled me all over again. I turned back to the stack of dirty pots still waiting in the sink. I wasn’t half done with the washing up and my afternoon off was wasting away.
“Now go on and sit in the kitchen,” I said, pointing to the doorway. “There’s a rocker by the stove. And don’t be touching anything.”
A dimple showed in his right cheek, but he gave me a nod and went through into the kitchen while I got busy with my work. His footsteps told me he wasn’t sitting in the rocker but walking around the room, likely poking his nose where it didn’t belong. And what lad’s nose belonged in a kitchen anyway, unless he was a cook? Struck me he might be finding Emily’s corner, where she kept her papers for writing ideas. I began fretting and hurried myself along so fast the pots didn’t get their usual shine.
I was drying my hands when I came into the kitchen, ready to give him a good scolding. But there he was, sitting in the rocker like I told him, looking me up and down. Melted the words right on my tongue, that look. Hadn’t been given one like it since George Garrett tried stealing kisses from me in Clarinda Boltwood’s kitchen. It rattled me, remembering George’s soft mustache tickling my neck, and didn’t that same sugary feeling come into the pit of my stomach? Seemed a lifetime ago I was working for Clarinda and flirting with her boarder.
“You keep a lovely kitchen,” Patrick said.
“ ’Tis a cheery enough place.” I was still warm from thinking of George, so I blathered on a bit. “Bigger than most with plenty of light and this pretty yellow paint around the windows.”
He nodded. “There are worse places to be working, surely.” I smelled the damp on him, mixing with the whiff of burning wood.
“You’re soggy to the bone,” I said. “A cup of something hot will do you good. I’ll wet the tea.”
“Thank you kindly.” He gave me that look again, making it clear he was liking what he saw. I put the kettle on, added wood to the firebox, and got cups and saucers from the pantry. “Go sit at the table,” I said.
He rubbed his neck and got up slow. It was easy to tell his bones were aching. Took a few minutes but I was soon putting a cup of hot tea in front of the lad and sitting down with my own. I couldn’t help noticing he stirred in three big lumps of sugar when I passed him the bowl. Took his tea sweet, he did. So I sweetened my own.
I watched him drink. I wasn’t nettled anymore but I was still curious what his message was. “Maybe you can give your message to the Squire’s son,” I said. “He’s a lawyer like the Squire and they share the same office. He’ll likely come by in a bit. Most days he brings the mail and chats with his mother and sisters.” I knew there was a chance Austin wouldn’t come at all. Since the Squire had been elected, Austin was spending time dallying at the courthouse in Northampton or gadding about in his fancy new ca
rriage. Rumor was he favored driving around the countryside with a friend by his side. Man or woman, didn’t seem to matter. Though it was unlikely even Austin would be out in this downpour.
He shook his head. “ ’Twas Mr. Edward Dickinson inspected the Hoosac Tunnel for the legislature. So he’s the one I’m needing to see.”
Sure, I remembered the night two months past when the Squire returned from his trip to the tunnel, looking tired and troubled. Had two friends with him, both needing food and a place to sleep. While they sat in the front parlor, I had to scurry around, making up the guest beds and putting together a cold supper.
For a minute my head felt as full of bees as Emily’s garden. “Did you come from North Adams yourself, then?” I asked. “ ’Tis a long way for walking.”
He chuckled. “I took the train, to be sure.”
Of course he did. I felt the fool but asked my next question anyway. “So you work on the tunnel, do you?”
Give me a long look, he did, solemn as the Pope. “That I do,” he said after a minute. “It’s a hellhole of a place. I’ve seen more than one strong Irish lad blown to smithereens before my eyes.”
Sure, I couldn’t think what to say. I knew there’d been some bad accidents digging that tunnel. It was all rock under the mountain, folks said. Just three months ago in the newspaper, there was a story of a man killed in a blast, leaving his children fatherless. Felt like a stone in the bottom of my belly when I read about those young ones. Eight of them there were, and the littlest still in her cradle. Sure, it wasn’t the sort of chat I wanted to be having with anybody, let alone a stranger. I was sorry I asked.
So I turned to other things—how long was the ride from North Adams to Amherst? How did he come to Massachusetts? Did he still have family in Ireland?
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