“And making us crazy,” said Rapp.
“And possibly psycho.” Lia made a face at Rapp as he laughed at her.
“I would like to see my room first, if I may.” Emma ran down the short flight of stairs to the second-floor hallway.
“This is the nursery where my brothers sleep. Guest room. Guest room.” She tapped at the doors as she walked. “This is my bedroom.”
Keko sat on Emma’s bedroom floor, frowning. She reached out to Rapp. “Here, help me up.” She slapped dust off the back of her jeans. “This is where Sonnet is staying.”
“My room. You were sitting where the bed goes,” said Emma.
Keko nodded. “Yes. I need to get out of here.”
They trundled down the stairs and out to the porch where Keko gulped for air. “I have never had such a clear reading of someone. I’ll need to take a break and come back later. I’m completely overwhelmed.”
Evan came running through the trees. “We found a barn collapsed on what might be an old carriage. Follow me!”
He led them up and through a forested hill to a mound of wood where Uncle Jack hauled weathered boards from the heap and tossed them to the side. Slivers of dark blue paint and black metal glinted from underneath.
“It appears to be Father’s carriage,” said Emma. “It was usually stored in the lower barn. This barn”—she paused—“was being constructed.” She pinched the end of a long-corroded nail from where it lay on the ground next to the splintered lumber and raised it out in front of her, twirling it in the drab light.
Keko’s gaze rested on Emma. “Wait, Jack.” She ran her hands across a board. She scrutinized Rapp, roaming over his face and down his body. “Jack, do you have ancestors from these parts?”
“Not that I know of. Why?”
She stared at Rapp again and then swung her gaze hard at Emma. “What is it? Tell us.”
Emma raised her head from the nail, with no choice now but to tell the truth. “He was building this barn when I . . . went away. He . . . he is my betrothed. It’s our secret, our pact.”
She gripped the nail tight in her fist until it hurt. “He appears similar to you, Rapp. Indeed, so similar, it’s as if he were your elder brother. His name is Tor. Tor Loken.”
“Tor Loken? There’s someone in Monte Cristo who looks just like me and has my last name? You knew all along and never said anything?”
“I’m sorry. I wanted to, but . . .”
“Our Loken heritage is from Sweden,” Uncle Jack interrupted. “Is that where he’s from, Emma?”
“Yes, from Sweden.”
“This is the beau? The suitor?” said Lia. “Why didn’t you tell me he looked just like Rapp? This coincidence could be some sort of— I don’t know—a clue or reason this crazy thing happened.”
Emma looked at them all and wished she could begin anew. Why had she not told these good people? They had every right to be angry. They had given her everything, and she had given them nothing of herself in return.
“And aren’t you like fifteen years old? Betrothed? Doesn’t that mean engaged in old-speak?” Niki crossed her arms.
“Yes, but it will be a three-year engagement. Tor and I swore ourselves to secrecy. I should have told you, but I was frightened. If my mother were to discover this secret . . .” Emma shuddered. “He has no one to recommend him. A carpenter who works with his hands. Tor, the immigrant and Emma, the entitled, are two names that should never be spoken together. Society would cast me out and my family would be shamed.”
Lia looked sick. “How . . .”
“We plan to leave together for Seattle when I finish school. Just disappear. I’ll be old enough by then to not have the law after Tor. If I went away, truly, I doubt my mother would mind.”
“So, Sonnet’s dealing with a guy who thinks he’s engaged to her and who happens to be a long-lost Loken relative who looks just like Rapp,” said Niki. “And, dealing with a crazy mother who seems to be abusing her. What she must be going through right now! Show them, Rapp.”
He handed the newly found photo to Evan. “She’s being attacked by Emma’s mom.”
“And, these . . .” Niki held out the yellowed papers. “It’s hard to make out. The writing is so swirly and faded. It’s some sort of correspondence from . . .” She bent the papers toward the light. “It says ‘The Oldfield’s School for Ladies, Baltimore, Maryland.’ And here . . . ‘Emma Sweetwine, age fifteen. Registered: September 3, 1895.’”
“Oh, my god! They’re sending Sonnet to Baltimore.” Jules shivered and threw her arms around herself. “What will we do if that happens?”
Silent and helpless, Team Switch looked around at each other.
“What we’ll do is we won’t give up hope,” said Evan, finally. “We can’t.”
Emma’s heart ached for her friends, and she felt even worse for Sonnet who was now subject to the abuse that would have been hers to endure. She peered over Niki’s shoulder and read the ominous words for herself. As if she were the white-ruffled lamp in Lia’s room, her switch was pressed and the light in her head turned on.
“Of course, my mother is sending me to boarding school. What a perfect plan to rid herself of the unwanted daughter. But if I were there, I would run away before I was forced on a train to Baltimore. And Sonnet must, too.”
She unclenched her hand. The rusty nail sat like a relic from the Roman Empire in her palm. It stained her skin with flakes of red ore, as if they were specks of ancient, dried blood. She knew the last time the nail had been touched by a person, that person had been Tor.
Out of every dreadful thing she had witnessed in this long-dead place, the one-hundred-and-twenty-year-old nail bothered her the most. She glanced over the pile of boards where Rapp still stood. He had not moved his eyes from her face.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Sonnet
1895
The scissors were cold against my forehead, and the thread stretched my skin and stung as Doctor Withers tugged it out. He set the pile of crusty strands aside and patted my hand, still hanging over me, closer than he needed to be. “There now. You are much better. You gave your dear mother and me a scare the other day.”
Dear mother.
His sweaty body was still wrapped up in a heavy wool suit as if it was winter, and he still smelled like tobacco and cheese. He ran his hand down my side and across my belly as if it was a doctor thing to do. I struggled out from underneath him as he pressed his scratchy body against me. I waited in the far corner next to the fireplace, holding my breath and pretending to study the bricks.
He took his sweet time packing everything up, a dangerous obstacle between me and the bedroom door. I reached over and wrestled the window open. I would squawk for help, kick and push him over against the doll, and bolt for the hallway if I felt him sneaking up behind me.
Bess walked in with three men and three empty trunks and set me free. “Your mother wants me to start packing, miss. I shall finish up tomorrow when the rest of the clothes are delivered. Skedaddle now. You are just in the way here. We’ll keep the door closed so the boys can’t see. Run along.”
I rushed past Doctor Withers, giving him the same hellish look I had given the Gold Nugget Hotel doorman, and ran from the room. He slid out behind me with the men. Creep.
I banged down the back stairs to an empty kitchen, where I knew I wouldn’t be followed. On the counter sat the last two pieces of blackberry pie. I grabbed the pie tin and a glass of milk and walked out to the front porch. Down at the barn, Jacob was running and pushing Miles on the swing, their long blond hair flowing out behind them. When they saw me, they waved and called, “Come push us, Emma.”
My two precious boys in this house of horrors wanted me to play. I scarfed up the pie and milk on my way to the swing and then took over for Jacob, pushing Miles as high as I could. He rocked and screamed, his joy piercing the late morning sky.
It was Jacob’s turn. He clambered up on the swing. I pushed and pushed, sending his litt
le body flying toward the heavens. He ripped across the wind, as ecstatic as any little boy would be, and that joy thrilled me back, as delicious as the blackberry pie I had just devoured.
“Good morning, Miss Emma. Good morning, Master Jacob, Master Miles.”
I towed the swing to a stop. Jacob, Miles, and I lined up in front of the young man. “Good morning, Mister Loken.” My tongue flicked imagined pie crumbs off my lips.
He unfroze his eyes from my mouth and smiled down at the boys. “I’m meeting your father here today. He wants to see the work progressing. Do you approve of the new barn?”
They nodded their heads. “Yes, sir,” said Jacob.
Tor swung his head over his shoulder and then back at me. “Will I see you tonight at the fair?”
I shrugged. “They don’t tell me anything. My status in that house is basically like a big, dumb doll.”
“Just in case, I’ll look for you.”
Sunshine filtered through golden hair hanging out from under his hat. A dusting of sawdust sat on his cheek and caught in his curls. In this parallel universe of time my body hummed with a yearning so intense it stunned me. I reached for his hand and pulled him close. He touched a wayward strand of my hair, sweeping it from my face. Our heads came closer. We smiled at each other. . . .
Banging drummed across the clear air. Above the porch, a shadow moved inside the turret where someone was using their fists to pound on one of the windows.
“Mother,” whispered Jacob. He and Miles edged up close to my sides and took each of my hands.
“I must go.” Tor tipped his hat and loped away from us, back up the hill.
The boys and I stood next to the limp swing and waited.
“EMMA! I want you over here. Now!” Thorn seethed at us from the porch with Kerry dodging around behind her in the shadows of the doorway.
I sauntered over with the boys, leaving the pie tin and empty milk glass behind in the dirt. “Yes? We’re playing . . .”
“You disrespectful . . . take Jacob and Miles, Kerry . . .” She never took her eyes off mine. Her yellow hair puffed and quaked, and beads of sweat were closing in on her poodle-dog bangs. “You—come in the house. You dare exhibit your wanton behavior in front of my sons.”
“Mother—”
“No, Jacob. Your sister is in trouble now. It is no one’s fault but her own.”
On the roller coaster again, I tore around a dusky corner heading straight toward Tor’s darkness and desolation. Jacob and Miles whimpered. I stood without moving, their little hands stuck to mine, my eyes still on hers. She came down the stairs and grabbed at my arm. I yanked it from her. I felt what little bit of wisdom I had draining away.
“Sending me to Baltimore isn’t good enough for you? You need to whip me, too? You’re nothing but a big bully. Taking out your frustrations on a defenseless girl.”
“Why, the insolence, the willfulness. You imagine I am too stupid to know what’s going on between you and that—that low-born immigrant. I can see you from the window, Emma, and in front of everyone. You are a slut. Just as your mother was.”
My mother—was?
“Please, please you mustn’t use those words, Mother!” Jacob sobbed. His tiny nails dug into my fingers. Miles wailed and clutched my dress, tripping as he moved behind me. Kerry ran down the stairs and tried to wedge her little body between us. Thorn twisted her arm and hurled her away.
She had her hands on my shoulders, squeezing, pushing, shaking.
“You wonder what’s wrong with Jacob—” I couldn’t help myself. I slid into a white-hot place and screeched into her face. Over a week’s worth of pent-up anger and frustration tripped from my mouth. “Your craven treatment of Emma is what’s wrong with Jacob. He suffers because of it. You think he doesn’t notice? You think it doesn’t affect him? If you were nice to her, he’d be fine—he just wants you to love Emma. Just love her. But you can’t see beyond your hate.”
“High and mighty, talking as if you were Queen Victoria. Jacob is my boy, not yours. They are mine. They will never be yours.” Trumpeting like an enraged elephant, Thorn backed away and then lunged. Her arm swept up and came at me with lightning speed. Kerry grabbed at it but it was too late. Thorn’s fierce slap across my face rang out over the tops of the boys’ screams. Taking Jacob and Miles with me, I skid over the gravel and flew face-first into a rose bush. I crashed down through its fat stem and branches into the neatly raked dirt tucked around it.
I unearthed my head from the thorns and rolled onto my side, rubbing dirt from my eyes. Bess and Cook stood in the doorway, their mouths hanging open. The men working on the barn had started to run down the hill. In the uproar, none of us heard the black-and-blue rig racing up the road.
John was raging, his feet barely touching the ground as he shot from the carriage, Maxwell on his heels. He waived his arms around forcing the workers away as he ran to us. “I have everything under control! Go back. Continue your jobs.” He jerked his head to Bess and Cook. “Back in the house with you two. Cook, prepare the mid-day meal for the boys. Maxwell, take the carriage to the barn.”
He dragged me up and knelt in the dirt, taking his sobbing sons into his arms. “There, there.” He stroked their shiny hair and kissed their wet cheeks. “Kerry, take the boys up to the nursery and get them ready to eat. Clean them and change their clothes. Bandage any cuts.”
He glared at his wife. “Go to the study, Rose. There has been enough of an outdoor spectacle today.”
I watched them all go. Like ants, they scattered, off to do their jobs. Attempting to turn madness into sanity.
John called back to me as he entered the house. “You too, Emma. You are old enough now to hear this. Come.”
The entryway mirror reflected an ugly red welt in the shape of a hand stretching from my mouth across my cheek to my ear. A thorn stabbed into my lip. I ripped it out. Fat drops of blood fell to my dirty white shoes. Scratches scarred my chin and cheeks and dirt smeared my ripped linen outfit. The bow sagged from a hank of fallen hair. I pulled it out. Like a wild, repulsive animal, my mop of copper hair hung in my filthy, bloody face.
John waited for me and shut the study door. Thorn glided to him, her hips swaying back and forth under her dress. She laid her dainty hand on his lapel. He swiped it off and pushed her from him. “Sit down, Rose.”
John beheld the battle’s damage stretching from my head to my feet. He traversed the war wounds across my face. I saw little fissures cracking his heart. “Has this happened before, Emma?”
“She deserves—”
“Quiet!” he roared. He held up his hand. “For once, Rose, let the girl speak.”
“She hates me,” I said. “She won’t leave me alone.”
“Your own niece, Rose! Your niece and my daughter,” said John.
Niece? What? I fell backwards into a chair.
Rose attacked. “My sister was no better than a prostitute—and now her daughter is, too. I will not stand for it, John. Not under my roof!”
“A prostitute? Your sister was a girl of fifteen.”
“Oh, my sister knew what she was doing—trying to catch herself a rich husband.”
“And what about you, Rose?”
Her head shot back as if she’d been hit. “I am upstanding. Godly. I deserve a man of society, of means. I desire our family to be of you and our sons and myself. No reminders of past sin. Nothing unclean. Can that be wrong?”
“Unclean? Emma is family, an innocent human being, not a reminder of sin. You, Rose, are divested of all sympathy, human decency, and understanding.”
Thorn jutted out her chin. Like a dog with a bone, she wouldn’t let go. “She is a bastard, John. A child born of immorality.”
John exhaled. He hung his head. His powerful hands lay on his knees in tight balls. He whispered into his lap, “Our child is not a bastard. Our child was born of love.” He raised his head to me. His eyes were wet. “She was just fifteen when you were born. Your mother, Emma. Your beautif
ul, sweet, good mother was the daughter of the maid who worked in my parents’ home. The daughter of our Irish maid.” He turned to his wife. “Your younger sister, Rose. The daughter of a maid. Just like you.”
“You promised to never mention this!” Blue-snaked veins undulated in her neck.
“And you promised to love Genevieve’s child if I married you—” He thundered back.
The grandfather clock, as steady as the rising sun, as solid as the earth we humans called home, marked its beats as the Sweetwine husband and wife faced each other in double fury. It gonged once—lunchtime. I could smell tomato soup, probably sitting in its beautiful china tureen on the dining room sideboard, waiting for its diners, unnoticed, just like me.
The drama was played out, the actors exhausted.
John’s handsome face sagged. “Now. There has been enough scandal. When word gets out, as it surely will, the whole town will be wagging their tongues. To counteract this, we will, as a family, go to the fair tonight. And again tomorrow. We will all get along. You will not ruin my reputation over domestic matters. Do you understand me, Rose?”
Instead of tears of defeat dribbling down her face, she gathered herself together and pursed her lips. She narrowed her eyes at me.
“Rose! Do you understand me?”
She nodded.
“Good. Send some of your powder to Emma’s room and have Kerry fix up her face with it before we leave for the fair later today. Emma will be gone on Sunday—your wish that I have gone along with. I expect you to control yourself until then.”
He looked at me finally like a father should look at his child. “I should have involved myself in this . . . this debacle a long time ago. I blame myself, my dear girl. I bowed away from family matters when my gaze should have held steady. I have avoided a very real problem in this—” He wobbled his head. “This grand house of ours. I am sorry, Emma. You go now. I shall have your lunch sent up on a tray.”
It was like I had left my body sitting on the chair, and was a pair of eyes floating around under the ceiling, looking down at the show. I was bothered way more than I should have been. After all, these weren’t my parents, and this wasn’t my life.
But Not Forever Page 14
