Spirit Lost

by Nancy Thayer

  She was high; not happily high but alert, manic. She wanted to interrupt the two housewives with their lightship baskets over their arms, to touch them and say, “I’m going mad, I think. My husband’s having an affair with a ghost, and I think I can do something about it. Don’t you think that’s mad?”

  But she pushed her cart on by, automatically stocking up on food she could keep by her in the attic. Vaguely in the back of her mind were thoughts of a siege.

  She loaded the car with sacks of groceries, drove to the house on Orange Street, and then, on a whim, drove on past it, down Mulberry to Union Street, and back through town to Brant Point. She parked the car and, tying the hood of her parka tightly around her head, walked through the sand, against the wind, down to the edge of the water. Giant snowflakes fell on her, the air whirled with them; there were so many of them, and yet they fell in such complete silence.

  This time the frosty air that bit into her lungs provided comfort. She breathed deeply, as if fortifying herself against the dark, cold claustrophobic air of the attic. Hands pushed down deep in her pockets, she stood on the water’s edge and looked out at the sound.

  Today had brought an Amsterdam sky, the kind that had taught Vermeer and Rembrandt about light. Fat blowing clouds, luminescent and pastel, low and laden with snow, their upper edges rimmed with golden light, hung over Nantucket Sound and the island. From these clouds the gentle snowflakes in their feathering fall whispered past great-masted fishing boats and the huge orange machines that were halted today from their work on the building of the new Steamship Authority building.

  Willy turned slowly on the sand, not thinking now, just looking at the small boats rocking in the harbor, at the occasional parting of clouds so that a shaft of sunlight streamed down on the tall church tower while gentle snowflakes fell around it.

  Her body was buffeted by icy winds. She let herself be hit and thought of how little she could imagine of life in nineteenth-century Nantucket. She had read Moby-Dick and other accounts of whaling adventures, and now she remembered some of what she read: the disasters, the ships sunk in the black of night in the middle of the ocean, the limitless depths of the sea, the men eaten by whales or lost in lifeboats, starving, the women waiting on the lonely island, spending years and years without the touch of a man. Nantucket, Willy thought, is still one place where we can learn that this world is not the safe and tame place we would like to believe it is. So much is wild, so much unknowable—so much unthinkable. The world is as black and terrifying and cold as the ocean on a stormy night, as cold and heartless as her dream of falling helplessly through the icy void of space. There were mysteries and horrors and adventures and braveries that had happened in this world that were past her imaginings. Just thinking of this helped her now, gave her strength.

  Flags of storm warning flew at the Coast Guard station; by night this gentle snowstorm would be in full blast, and the sky would be as dark and raging as an ocean. The white snowy clouds, even now, were deepening, garnering layers and strength, turning gray. Only occasionally, as Willy stood watching, did the sun brighten the edge of the snow-heavy clouds. But when it did these clouds became gilt-edged for a moment, and a path of sparkling brilliance fell through the air and across the land, and Willy knew that somehow there must be a love to save them all.

  Chilled to the bone but somehow invigorated, Willy climbed back into the Wagoneer and drove back into town. A thought occurred to her, and she stopped at the Atheneum and went in. The librarian, at her request, directed her to the Nantucket section in general and to the fat old tomes of Nantucket history in specific. Willy sat reading, feeling her fingers and toes tingling as they warmed up inside this graceful room. It was not long before she found the section about “The Widowed Bride,” the same account that John had read. But Willy, although just as fascinated by the story and the pictures, did what John had not thought to do: She turned the page.

  And found the rest of Jesse Orsa’s story.

  “Ha!” she said aloud, triumphant, bitter. And she returned the book to the librarian; now she was armed, ready to go home.

  Chapter Nine

  It was just after noon when Willy returned to the house on Orange Street. She dropped one load of groceries in the kitchen, then sprinted up the stairs to the attic to check on John. The sight and sound of the peaceful village and all the normal people who inhabited it, the housewives and checkers at the A&P, the librarian, the gum-chewing young girl who sold her her newspaper at the Hub today, had filled Willy with a sense of normalcy and optimism, and as Willy climbed the stairs, she said aloud to herself, “At least my heart will be in great condition after all this exercise.”

  John was asleep. He had moved from the chair to the bed and lay across it, uncovered, sunken in a profound sleep. He did not stir when Willy leaned over to brush his hair off his forehead.

  Willy brought the comforter up and tucked it around him. She sat at his side on the bed awhile, looking at him. He truly looked horrible. And he had seemed physically weak today, shaking and debilitated. She could not remember when she had seen him really eat. But why would he be starving himself? It was just that he had seemed to lose all interest in food—and if he were having an affair with a ghost, or thought he was, no wonder he had lost interest in food. Loss of appetite was a common consequence of falling in love. Still, this was extreme, and she was worried. She determined that when he next awakened, she would make him eat if she had to force him at gunpoint. Although, of course, what a foolish thought; she didn’t own a gun, didn’t know how to use one. She would have to do something, though, to make sure he got some nourishment. If he wouldn’t eat solids, she could make a rich, healthy eggnog.

  Still he slept. Willy rose and walked around the attic. Aimee was curled up asleep in one of the brocade chairs. Willy ran her hand over the back of the chair; it was so lovely, so elegant, made of such beautiful material. Just now there was nothing in the attic that frightened her or that hinted of ghosts and passions and confusing jealousies. It was just a large, bright unfinished room with a marvelous view. Willy walked to the window and stood looking out. The clouds were darkening now, the snow was falling more thickly, and she understood that night would come early and with it a dangerous storm.

  She spent the afternoon bringing in the groceries and preparing a small stockade of food for the attic. She brought a picnic basket filled with sandwiches and fruits, thermoses of hot coffee and tea, a flask of brandy for herself—just in case, she thought—and a tin of cookies left over from Christmas. John still slept. After rummaging around in her sewing room, she chose several small pieces of embroidery work to do in the attic. She could not bring the banner of seasons for the church up; it was too large and needed to be spread out on a table. But she had a baby blanket she wanted to finish for little Peter and a summer nightgown she was decorating for herself. She brought up two novels and the newspapers.

  Still John slept. She sat in a brocade chair, embroidering while the afternoon faded away. She knew that if someone asked her now what she thought she was doing, she would have to answer that she didn’t know, she wasn’t even thinking about what she was doing. She was waiting. She was trying to be ready.

  A little before five, she went down the stairs one more time. She had forgotten to bring up a tin of cat food for Aimee. She went to the front door, opened it wide, and just stood there awhile, letting the icy air blow over her. She stood there for the light, the remaining light, as if she could soak it in like a staying thing, as if she could stand there now and let the remaining light fall over her and close around her, providing her with a shield, a safeguard from the dark and whatever it might bring.

  Orange Street was one of the main thoroughfares in Nantucket, a major one-way street running from the center of town to the airport and to roads leading to schools, residential sections, and shopping districts. Today it was strangely quiet, and no snowplows had come yet, so the street was sloppy with rutted snow. The wind was alive now, howling and
whipping the snowflakes into frantic whirlwinds, and the heavy black cables enclosing telephone and electrical wires swung menacingly above the street.

  The Constables had few neighbors now; most of the houses surrounding theirs were owned by people who lived elsewhere most of the year and opened their houses here only in the summer. So as Willy stood watching in the open doorway, she saw no warming glow in windows as people turned on lights in empty rooms, saw no familiar figures passing back and forth inside houses. The street was very quiet—except for the howling of the wind.

  At last one person, so protected against the cold by winter garments that Willy could not tell if it was a man or woman, came past, head down, hurriedly stamping through the snow. Willy was so glad to see this real live person with its bulky hooded coat that she wanted to call out a greeting. But of course she did not. And soon the person was out of sight, leaving Willy feeling even lonelier than before. Night and the storm were closing in.

  What shall I do, Willy wondered, shall I tie some garlic around my neck or tape two pieces of kindling together to form a cross? No, that’s protection only against vampires, I think. She smiled at her thoughts, although she was shivering from the cold. Her teeth were chattering. But she was loath to close the front door and shut the house off from the rest of the world. When she did shut it, she did not draw the large brass bolt through as she did every other night. Tonight she was not afraid of anything human that might enter from the street.

  The streetlights were on. The black night had come. Willy sighed and went up to the attic.

  The door leading from the second-floor hall to the attic was shut and locked from the inside. Willy turned the handle, knocked on the door, pounded on the door, but it would not give.

  She was shut out of the attic.

  “John?” she called. “John? Open the door, John!”

  There was no answer. She pressed her ear against the door and listened. She could hear nothing.

  “John!” she called again. “Dammit, John, come on, open the goddamned door!”

  It was a heavy wooden door with an old-fashioned metal latch; the lock on the other side was a black metal bolt drawn through a metal ring. No key would open this door.

  Willy raced through the house, turning on every electric light she could as she passed, and frantically searched through the cupboards in the kitchen for the household tools. But it was as she feared: The tools were in the basement. Willy had always hated basements because of the odd mouse she had seen in basements as a child, because of old horror movies she had seen, and simply because she hated being underground in dank, shadowy places. She hesitated by the cellar door.

  Then she unlocked it, opened it, and plunged downward. The overhead light switched on by a hanging chain and swung eerily back and forth as she clattered down the wooden stairs. Shadows streaked back and forth around her as she moved. She and John had never been great as handymen, but they did own a tool chest, and she found it on an old table in the corner. She found the hammer. Nearly sobbing, she ran back up the stairs, leaving all the lights on.

  “John!” she called when she was once again next to the attic door. “John, open this door or I’ll break it down! I mean it! This is crazy! Open the door!”

  She waited, listening, and then began slamming at the door with the hammer.

  It was surprising how little effect her blows had. She might as well have been chipping at marble with a nail file. At first only the paint gave, cracking, then breaking away, but finally, after her determined hammering, the old wood began to splinter. She aimed her blows near the latch when she realized that she would not be able to break the entire door down, and after what seemed an eternity of frantic pounding, she had created a large enough jagged gap for her to reach her hand through the wood and draw back the metal bolt that unlocked the door.

  As she drew her hand back through the wooden hole, the splintered wood rasped along her hand, cutting her, but she didn’t care and hastily wiped the speckling streak of blood off on her sweater. She yanked the door open and raced up the stairs into the attic.

  “God dammit, John!” she called as she climbed the stairs, “what do you mean by locking me out, this is my house as much as yours, you have no right—”

  But John was asleep on the bed. The heaters were off, and the room was painfully cold. The only light that was on was the one Willy had automatically pulled on as she came up the stairs.

  “John?” Willy asked hesitantly. She crossed the room and looked down at him. He was profoundly asleep. The cat stood on the end of the bed, her fur ruffled, her eyes wide.

  “All right, then!” Willy said, turning and addressing the air, “all right!” She stomped around the attic, exaggerating her movement, the force and noise of her actions making her feel braver and stronger and bigger. She switched on the heaters and turned on every electric light.

  “All right,” she said again, “go ahead and fight dirty. Fight as dirty as you can. I’ll fight dirty, too!” She walked back to the bed, looking around her as she walked. “I’ll tell John about you—all about you. I’ll bet he doesn’t know everything, I don’t think he read everything, I don’t think he turned the page, I don’t think he knows the truth about you! Why, you’re just pathetic!”

  She knelt by her husband, and taking his shoulders in her hands, she shook him until at last he opened his eyes. It took him a few moments to focus, to see her, and then he said, so weakly she could scarcely hear him, “No, Willy.”

  “Yes!” Willy said. “You keep awake and you listen to me. John, I don’t think you know everything about this gorgeous ghost of yours. I don’t think you know that she needs you because she couldn’t keep her own husband. He left her—” Still holding on to John, Willy looked up at the attic, where nothing was visible, but the air seemed prickling with a presence. “He left you, didn’t he! Your husband left you for another woman! Ha!” Willy looked back down at John, whose head had fallen back and whose eyes were closed. “You listen to me!” she ordered. She propped him on pillows and rubbed and pulled at his face with her hands until he opened his eyes and looked at her.

  “You didn’t read the entire account, John,” Willy said. “You didn’t turn the page. It’s true that when the Parliament returned, the officers told Jesse Orsa Wright that her husband had died at sea, but that wasn’t the truth, and they all knew it. Gradually the truth filtered up from the crew to the town and finally to Jesse Orsa herself: Her husband didn’t die at sea; he deserted the ship in order to stay on a Marquesan island, living with a brown-skinned, black-haired, illiterate island girl he had fallen in love with. He gave up command of his ship, he gave up his wealth, his entire way of civilized life, he gave up everything in order to live on an island with an island girl. That’s why she wants you, John. She couldn’t keep her own husband, and so she wants to steal mine.

  “You’re pathetic!” Willy shouted, enraged, turning back to whatever hovered in the air near her. “No wonder you’re a ghost! If your husband had died at sea, your soul would be with his in death, but he was with another woman in life, and he’s with her now in death. You’re alone! You have no one, and so you want to steal my husband, and I won’t let you! Ha, what a pitiful little thing you must be; you couldn’t keep your own husband even after only a few months of marriage. Oh, John,” Willy said, turning back to her husband, “don’t you see?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” John said, his voice a whisper. “That doesn’t matter, Willy. I’m hers. It’s done.”

  “No, it’s not done!” Willy cried, but John’s eyes closed again, and he slumped in her arms.

  She let him fall back against the pillows, let the bed take his entire weight.

  “Sleep, then,” she said, “but I’m not leaving your side.” Willy rose and clenched her fists and looked around her. “I’m not leaving him!” she yelled into the space of the attic. “You can’t have him!”

  The wind was screaming now, and shafts of icy air spun through the attic. With thr
ee small pings, the electric heaters went off and all the lights went out.

  “It’s all right,” Willy said, talking to herself, to whomever, whatever, might be listening, “I’m not afraid. You can’t frighten me. I can see from the window that the lights on Orange Street are out, too; they warned us when we moved here that the island often has power outages. I’m not afraid!”

  Holding her sweater tightly around herself against the cold, Willy clattered down the two flights of stairs to the dining room, where she kept candles. She had many different lengths and colors of them, and she grabbed up a handful and two packets of matches and stuck them in her pocket. Then she lit a candle that stood in a silver candlestick on the dining room table, and, walking carefully now so she would not create a breeze that could cause the flame to flicker, she made her way more slowly back up to the attic. She was shaking all over, and she was so alert with each one of her senses that she was in a kind of vivid pain.

  As she walked down the hall from the first-floor staircase to the second, she glanced at the doorway to her sewing room. Even though the room was plunged into total blackness, Willy could sense that something was different there, and shielding her candle with her hand, she entered a little ways into the room.

  The sewing room was in a shambles. Yarns and needles and material and threads lay in twisted piles on the tables and chair and floor. Unwittingly making whimpering sounds, Willy stretched out her hand and carefully drew into the heart of the room, trying not to step on any of the fabric.