by Lea Wait
“You’re lucky. She smelled of salt pork and rancid whale oil,” I told him as we headed for the next house.
“You’re too young to be a soldier,” said Charlie. “She hugged Joe and me because she thinks we might die in the war.”
“Charlie! How can you think such things?” I said, glancing at Owen. He looked as though he was about to burst into tears.
“It’s true,” said Charlie. “We’re not children. Owen’s still a little boy.”
Mrs. Dunham wasn’t the last, either. Mrs. Chase and Mr. Young both advised Charlie and me not to join up until the situation was clearer. Mr. Giles, on the other hand, came to the door, rifle in hand, asking if we’d heard yet where a man could go to enlist.
“Haven’t heard nothin’ about that, sir,” I told him.
“You will soon,” Mr. Giles answered grimly. “And when you do, I’ll be there. Those Southerners aren’t going to mess with my country and get away with it. Not likely. And any man who’s a patriot will be right there with me. You remember that, boys.”
Trusty trotted along with us, occasionally barking at a passing horse or a darting squirrel. Everywhere there were exciting smells. He sniffed hay dropped from a rumbling farm wagon and ran after a barn cat, until I called him back.
“Maybe Dr. Cushman would like a broadside,” said Owen. “He’s a good doctor. Mr. Dana pulled out my Pa’s tooth when it hurt real bad, and left part of the tooth behind. Dr. Cushman pulled out the rest of the tooth, and there was hardly any blood.”
“We’ll go to his office next,” I agreed.
Dr. Cushman’s office was in his home on High Street, near the church and the courthouse.
Most folks who lived in big houses on High Street were like Captain Tucker, and made their living from the sea. They’d built their homes where they could watch the ships in Wiscasset Harbor coming and going, their fortunes ebbing and flowing with the tides.
A few of the boys who’d been playing soldier that morning were still chasing each other from one side of the Green to the other.
“Don’t you want to be playing with the others, Owen?” Charlie asked as we walked up the hill. “We can carry the rest of the bulletins. You don’t need to stay with us when you could be having fun.”
“I am having fun,” Owen said. “I’m not little, like those boys. I can help you and Joe.”
Trusty returned from investigating a trail that looked as though a rabbit had briefly emerged and then gone back to his lair.
“Owen, you’re only nine. Some of those boys are older than you are. You can’t just follow us around all the time,” said Charlie.
Owen’s smile vanished.
“You’ve been a big help today,” I added quickly. “Charlie just wants to be sure we aren’t keepin’ you from your friends.”
“They’re not my friends,” said Owen. “They’re just boys.” He looked away from the Green. “What did you and the spiritual lady talk about, Joe? When you met her on the street.”
“We talked of the fog, and the black ice.” Would I betray Nell if I told Owen and Charlie she’d fallen? “She wasn’t dressed for Maine weather. We talked about that, and Trusty, and I walked with her back to the Mansion House. I wasn’t with her long.”
“Did you tell her your father’d been at one of her sessions?” Charlie asked.
“She remembered him. She said spirits came to her when they had important messages to give to people left behind. She said she’d been hearing spirits since she was very young—that talking with them was tiring, and she often had headaches.”
“Could she talk with my brother, do you think?” asked Owen.
“I don’t know. I don’t think she can talk with everyone who’s died. It has to be someone who needs to contact someone still living.”
“I’d like to get a message from my brother,” said Owen. “But he was so little. He didn’t even talk much when he was alive. He probably doesn’t have anything to say now.”
“He’s probably happy in Heaven,” agreed Charlie. “And if he’s happy, he doesn’t need to reach anyone here.”
Owen nodded.
Dr. Cushman’s office was on the first floor of his grand, three-story house.
“Dr. Cushman, sir, would you like to buy a one-page bulletin with news about Fort Sumter?” I asked when he opened the door. Dr. Cushman’s office was the only one like it in town. Stuffed robins and egrets and puffins and gulls and passenger pigeons and eagles, and even a large snowy owl that the doctor had shot, hung on the walls.
Owen shivered. “The birds all have eyes,” he whispered to Charlie. “They’re looking at me.”
Dr. Cushman took a copy of the paper and handed me a penny. “Thank you. I’m impressed with how well you’ve been running that newspaper of yours.”
“There’s bound to be a lot of news now,” Charlie put in, “with the war and all, and with Nell Gramercy in town, making predictions. We have an exclusive interview with her tomorrow.”
Dr. Cushman frowned. “That young woman’s presence in Wiscasset is an unfortunate folly. She’s encouraging people to think they can contact the dead.” He shook his head. “I have the sad job of ministering to people who are leaving us for the hereafter, and I have to say, I’ve never seen any of them return.”
“They don’t return. They just leave messages with Nell for people who loved them,” I said. “She got a message from my brother Ethan, for my father.”
The doctor looked at me. “I heard that, Joe. My wife was over to your family’s store yesterday. She said your father was helping put merchandise out, and was feeling much better.”
“He is,” I replied, nodding.
“Sometimes recovery comes in strange ways,” Dr. Cushman said. “But people need to understand that there’s a line between the world of the living and the world of the dead.” He looked out into the empty street. “Although you can’t know the number of times I’ve wished I could make that line disappear, or at least change the moment it comes to one of my patients.”
“I hope I never have to go to that doctor,” said Owen, as we headed back down the hill. “When he fixed my father’s tooth he came to our house. We don’t have dead birds.” He looked up at me. “Dr. Cushman won’t shoot Gilthead, will he?”
“I’m sure he won’t,” I assured him. “Everyone in town knows Gilt-head’s a pet.”
But I wondered whether Dr. Cushman would pay the Bascomb family a visit should Gilthead ever die of natural causes. I hadn’t seen any parrots in Dr. Cushman’s collection.
Chapter 17
Monday, April 15, morning
“Joe, Joe—come quick! There’s trouble! Fighting down at the Custom House!”
I was rightening up the office after Sunday’s work. I’d already made good use of the broom, and had just added the income from the Fort Sumter bulletin ($1.10, for a new total of $47.50) to the accounts book when Charlie’s voice echoed up the stairs.
Fighting at the Custom House? Could Southerners have already attacked this far north? What weapons would they have? As I ran down the stairs to follow Charlie down Water Street, I felt in my back pocket for the knife Pa had given me last Christmas. It was meant for whittling, but most days I carried it with me, finding it handy for cleaning type and other chores. But what good would a small blade do in a war?
The street was full of men, women, and children running toward the massive stone and brick building down near Whaleship Wharf. A few men even waved muskets. Not many in town ever had need of weapons. Not before now.
A crowd had gathered in front of the Custom House steps. Mr. Cunningham, Wiscasset’s customs collector, in charge of inspecting ships arriving from foreign ports, was holding the American flag high. That was the moment I realized it wasn’t flying above the Custom House as usual.
“I refuse! I will not fly this sacred flag over a building representing a country that has declared war on its own states!” Mr. Cunningham shouted. “I care not what that so-called president o
f ours says! The Southern states should be reasoned with, not declared our enemy. Lincoln is wrong, and I will not follow a command against my principles!”
“Traitor!” screamed old Mrs. Fairfax from the crowd, shaking her cane at Mr. Cunningham. “Those Southerners fired on our boys! On United States soldiers!”
“She’s right!” yelled Mr. Dana, the pharmacist. “Lincoln’s our president. Raise the Stars and Stripes!”
“Traitor! Traitor!” The crowd took up the cry.
Without thinking, I found myself chanting along.
“I’d rather burn down this building than raise our sacred flag when it no longer represents the United States our forefathers created—the United States we love and honor!” shouted Mr. Cunningham.
“Try to burn down the building, you idiot!” yelled someone else. “The building’s strong, like the Union, made of stone and brick. It won’t burn because of one man’s opinion.”
“We’re going to war just because some slave-lovers want to change the way other people live!” bellowed Cunningham, trying to be heard above the crowd. “Let people live the way they want to live! Every state should make its own rules! Why should we send our sons to fight in a place we’ve never even seen?”
I saw Owen’s father moving to the back of the crowd.
“Because we’re all Americans!” came from the crowd.
The chant of Traitor! Traitor! Traitor! began again, and the crowd began to surge up the steps, toward Mr. Cunningham, who backed up against the high Custom House doors, clutching the American flag to his chest.
A shot rang out.
Chapter 18
Monday, April 15, mid-morning
The crowd went silent at the sound of the gun.
“Godfrey mighty,” Charlie whispered. His face was pale.
You wouldn’t believe how quiet it was. No one seemed to know what had happened—or what might happen next. I felt hot, and then cold, and although I’m not usually a praying person, I found myself saying a silent prayer that war wouldn’t come to Wiscasset.
Then Sheriff Chadbourne strode to the top of the Custom House steps, holding an old musket in his hand. It was smoking.
“Thom, either you raise that flag and do your duty as customs collector, or I’m bound to arrest you on grounds of civil disobedience.”
Mr. Cunningham raised his chin high. “I won’t collect customs for a country that makes war with itself over a states’ rights issue.”
Sheriff Chadbourne sighed. “Then you’ll have to come with me.” He looked down into the crowd. “Henry, come take our nation’s flag from Thom here.” Then he spoke to everyone. “Folks, show’s over. The Custom House is closed for today. Anyone’s got customs issues, see me at the courthouse.” He took Mr. Cunningham by the arm and marched him through the crowd as some jeered.
“I’ll bet he’s taking him to the old jail on Federal Street,” Charlie said.
“Likely,” I nodded. The old granite building had been there since the War of 1812. It wasn’t a place anyone wanted to spend a single night, let alone a longer stay. Still, it was the Lincoln County Jail, and jail wasn’t supposed to be a place you looked forward to visiting.
Gradually the crowd broke up, as there didn’t seem to be any more excitement at hand. Charlie and I started back toward the Herald’s office.
“Guess I’ve got the first story for my next issue,” I said. “I didn’t think I’d have a new story so fast.”
“Have you thought of any questions for Nell?” Charlie asked. “Our interview’s at one o’clock.”
“I have a few,” I told him. “Not many.”
I wasn’t looking forward to seeing Nell again, after what had happened Saturday night. It hadn’t been the right place to ask my question, and with what the Belfast mariner had told us, I was more confused than ever about Nell and her voices.
“Let’s get a list of questions together,” said Charlie. “We should stop in at the telegraph office first, though.”
Others had had the same idea. A crowd had gathered by the time we got there. Mr. Johnston was standing outside his store, delivering the news.
“President Lincoln has called upon the various states of the Union to contribute a total of seventy-five thousand volunteer members from the various state militias to suppress the Southern insurrection, such volunteer state militia to be dispersed within ninety days.”
“Only ninety days, Joe! He thinks it’s all going to be over in ninety days,” said Charlie. “That’s barely time for troops to rally and be trained.”
“Who among us is going to be patriotic and save the Union?” someone in the crowd yelled.
No one answered.
“What’s going to happen next?” I said quietly, more to myself than to Charlie. I knew one thing for sure: I had another bulletin to get out. If I didn’t sleep, and if Charlie and Owen kept helping me, maybe I’d still be able to make Mr. Shuttersworth’s deadline.
“I’m not sure,” said Charlie. “I suspect there’ll be a lot of talking and drinking in statehouses. Does Maine even have a militia? I’ll bet Governor Washburn is figuring that out right now.” He grinned and slapped me on the shoulder. “C’mon. We have to talk with your Miss Gramercy before the world changes again. She says she can see the future; maybe she knows what will happen next.”
Chapter 19
Monday, April 15, 1:00 p.m.
“Miss Gramercy and Mrs. Allen are awaiting your arrival in the blue parlor,” said old Mr. Turner. He owned the Mansion House, and had presided over the lobby there for as long as I could remember. I detected a twinkle of amusement in his dignified words, and I swear he winked at me as I passed him on my way up the wide front staircase.
No matter. The important thing was that Charlie and I were going to talk to Nell.
The blue parlor was the room in back of the ballroom—where the Allens and Nell had been Saturday night. We stood outside its door for a moment. Charlie spit on his hand and smoothed down his cowlick. I took a deep breath and tried not to be nervous.
Nell Gramercy was just a girl, wasn’t she? She’d seemed normal enough when we’d talked on the street. I was more nervous at seeing her aunt than I was at seeing her. What if I said something wrong—or insulted her by asking the wrong question? What if her aunt said we had to leave, the way her uncle had called off her session Saturday night?
I told myself I wasn’t nervous at all about talking to Nell Gramercy. Even if she was a girl who talked to dead people.
I screwed up my courage and knocked on the door.
“Come in,” Mrs. Allen called.
Nell was sitting on a love seat in front of the fireplace, dressed in her usual white, although today her shoulders were wrapped in a pale blue lace shawl.
Her aunt, a grand woman in every sense of the word, sat in the chair closest to the love seat. Her hooped skirt was made of brown watered silk. That silk was expensive. Ma only ordered it when one of the women up on High Street or their dressmakers requested it. Mrs. Allen indicated that Charlie and I were to sit on the two chairs opposite them.
“My uncle tells me you publish a newspaper here in Wiscasset,” said Nell. Her eyes were very clear and blue. I hadn’t noticed that before. She didn’t look as though she had a headache today. While I hoped she’d say something about meeting me earlier, I knew she couldn’t. Her aunt and uncle couldn’t find out that she’d left the inn by herself.
“Yes,” I answered. “I own a print shop, and publish the Wiscasset Herald, a weekly newspaper, as well as special editions when there’s important news.”
“You must be very busy now, with news of the war coming in at all hours,” said Nell.
“Indeed,” Charlie said. “We just heard that Lincoln has called for seventy-five thousand volunteers. And this morning there was a scuffle down at the Custom House. The local customs agent didn’t want to raise the Stars and Stripes because he didn’t support the president’s position on states’ rights.”
“
And yet you’re taking the time to speak with me.”
“Your story is of great interest to our readers,” I said. “No one of your . . . sensitivities . . . has ever visited Wiscasset before. Can you tell us how long you’ve been in touch with spirits who’ve . . . passed over?”
“All my life, I think,” said Nell. “Even as a very young child I remember hearing voices of people who were not physically in the room, and sometimes seeing visions that others did not. I learned not to mention these things, for fear others would think me mad.”
“And what brought you to believe you were not?” asked Charlie.
“When I was six, my older brother Luke went skating on a nearby pond with some of his friends. I was helping Mother in the kitchen, and suddenly I had a vision that Luke and one of his friends were skating near ice that I somehow knew would not hold them. I screamed as I saw them break through the ice and flounder, and then, not come up. Of course, my mother was alarmed that I was so distraught. As soon as I’d calmed down, she listened, and sent one of my older sisters—for I was one of seven children—to bring Luke home, so I could see that all was well.
“My sister was gone longer than she should have been, so all at home were anxious. She brought Luke’s body home on a board, along with the body of his friend. Both had drowned.”
Charlie and I sat, horrified. And fascinated.
“After that, I was afraid when I saw things that hadn’t happened yet, or were about to happen. And soon I began to hear from those who’d passed over. Many people were afraid of my gift. Others saw it as a blessing. My dear aunt and uncle, with whom I now travel, taught me to see it as a way of helping people on this side to understand their grief. To free themselves of guilt and sadness. To live full lives, until it’s their turn to go to the other side.”
As you can imagine, I was wondering what Nell’s uncle had done to support himself and his wife before Nell had come to live with them. Did they even have a home? She hadn’t mentioned one, other than the house she’d shared with her parents and brothers and sisters. She said one brother had died, but where were her other siblings? From all I’d seen and heard, it seemed that she and her aunt and uncle traveled all over the country, their lives revolving around Nell and her voices—and those who would pay for her services.
