Evergreen

by Marissa Doyle

  Her breath caught. John Rookwood was the most loathsome person she had ever met. If she made him jump off the rock face he himself had threatened to throw her over minutes before, Isham and Rookwood would lose one of its partners, and she would have prevented probably dozens or hundreds more presidents from being killed and battleships from being blown up. She would be doing the world a favor, and all it would take was one horrible man’s death—

  Black and white, Miss Boisvert? Or gray?

  For a long moment she stared at him. If she did make him jump off the mountain, then she might as well find Mr. Rookwood and directly join Isham and Rookwood. She would be the same as him.

  “Give that to me,” she said quietly.

  He handed her the gun, eyes still fixed on hers. A string of drool rolled out of his open mouth.

  “Now—go. Do not let anyone see you. And leave this place as soon as you possibly can.”

  Without hesitation, he dropped to all fours. He crawled to the shelter of another boulder, and another, away from the group nearby admiring the view till she could no longer see him.

  She collapsed into the balsam scrub, welcoming its rough prickles, and found enough strength to tease a shadow from under it to conceal herself. She lay still for a long time, staring up at the milky, rain-washed blue of the sky. She heard Ted’s eager, “There! Look over there!” and the colonel’s repeated, “Beautiful country! Beautiful country!” But she also felt the clouds that had been scattered by the Shadows’ departure regathering, and in a matter of minutes the sun had vanished and a cold mist had descended—though it lacked the icy threat it had held before.

  She listened to the colonel and his companions make their way off Mount Marcy’s top as the weather closed in again. She would leave in a moment, too, when she felt less shaky.

  She had stopped the Rookwoods from killing Colonel Roosevelt and John Rookwood from killing her—all with her puny dryad powers that suddenly didn’t seem so puny. The trees here had helped her, though they hadn’t been “hers”—imagine what power, say, Mum could command with the help of her little forest at home.

  And it was suddenly much easier to imagine how Grand-mère must have felt, losing her forest in France after the Germans burned it down in the war. She herself was about to lose a forest she loved. She would have to leave the Adirondacks when the Roosevelts did, and she wasn’t sure she would be able to say farewell to these trees without completely breaking down. If only she could stay…but this wasn’t the ancient times when a dryad could choose her wood and live there as she pleased. And these woods did not know how to live with dryads; they would be just as happy without her. But she would never forget them. Never. They had taught her what she was, without knowing it themselves.

  When rain started to fall in earnest once more, she pulled herself stiffly to her feet. For a moment she gazed down at the balsam scrub at her feet, then bent and touched it. “Thank you for everything, cousin,” she said softly.

  Before she left, she threw John Rookwood’s gun off the mountain.

  * * *

  There was no Crow to guide her as she left the top of Mount Marcy, but she was a dryad, and dryads did not get lost. It rained hard on and off, which chilled her and made her wool skirt abominably heavy, but it did wash the worst of the mud off.

  She couldn’t help, though, occasionally looking over her shoulder as she descended back into the trees. Mr. Rookwood must be still be somewhere on the mountain. For the first time, he had failed to complete a commission. Would he be angry? Vengeful? Somehow she doubted it; vengeance would not be an advantageous use of his time. But she still looked behind her every few moments until she regained the trail down to Lake Colden. Neither Mr. Rookwood nor his brother would risk being seen there, as they were supposed to be fishing on Lake Schroon.

  And as for Kit… But she wasn’t sure she was ready to think about Kit yet.

  Alice was waiting for her at the cabins when she at long last stumbled wearily into the camp. “Well?” she demanded. “Where’s my father? What happened?”

  Grace bent to wring the water from her skirt. “I’m quite well. Thank you for asking.”

  “Grace!”

  She sighed. “As far as I know, he’s still up there somewhere with Mr. LaCasse and the boys. I thought I heard them say something about going down to a lake to eat lunch, but that was a while ago. Do you mind if I sit down for a moment?” She looked over Alice’s shoulder at the open cabin door.

  Alice stepped aside but followed her in, still firing questions. “Didn’t you talk to him? How did you stop the Rookwoods? Where are they?”

  “I don’t know. Far away, I hope.”

  “They tried to kill my father, and you let them go?” Her voice was incredulous.

  “What was I supposed to do to them?” Grace sat on the edge of one of the bunks, fighting the temptation to stretch out on it and nap for three hours. “I’m lucky I was able to keep them from hurting your father.”

  “You should have done something. You’ve done everything else, haven’t you?”

  “Alice, don’t. Just…don’t.”

  “Don’t what? Don’t is the only thing I’ve heard from you this summer, except maybe for the you shouldn’t haves.” Her mouth twisted. “The worst part is, you were right. We probably wouldn’t be here right now if I’d listened to you about Kit.”

  The pain in her voice drained away any of Grace’s annoyance. “Yes, we might have been somewhere else,” she said gently. “And your father might be dead now instead of alive. The Rookwoods were determined to get to him.”

  “Maybe. But maybe not. Maybe I could have saved him in that case, instead of you.”

  There was nothing Grace could say that wouldn’t make matters worse, so she stood up. “Let’s go back to Tahawus. It’s getting late.”

  It was a long, quiet five miles, punctuated by frequent rests when Alice’s ankle began to hurt too badly. Only when they were nearly home did Grace speak. “I expect we’ll be leaving in the next day or two. You’ll be going to Washington.”

  Alice didn’t look at her. “The president will die?”

  “Mr. Rookwood seemed to think so.”

  She didn’t respond for several minutes. “I don’t want to go there,” she finally said.

  “But I thought you couldn’t wait till you—”

  “Well, I’ve changed my mind.”

  Grace waited a moment, then said, “You could come back to Boston with me. Your grandparents—”

  “Do you think I want to do that either?” Alice stopped walking. “You’ve been my best friend for years. You tried to keep me from making an idiot of myself with Kit. You saved my father from being shot or pushed off the top of a mountain. You’re also the one who Kit really loves and were able to save my father when I couldn’t, and you’ll have to excuse me if I can’t stand the sight of you just now.”

  They didn’t speak for the rest of the walk home.

  Chapter Nineteen

  By nine o’clock the next morning, Grace and most of the Roosevelts were climbing into the wagons that would take them back to North Creek and then home.

  Colonel Roosevelt was not with them. A runner had found him yesterday afternoon having lunch on Lake Tear of the Clouds, bearing the news that President McKinley had taken a turn for the worse. He’d departed for Buffalo last night after telegrams arrived confirming that the president was not expected to survive the night. Somewhere on a dark, rainy road between the Lower Works and Aiden Lodge, he had become the president of the United States.

  Alice was also not with them. A letter had arrived from friends she’d made in New York last winter inviting her to stay at a nearby camp. Rather than going with her stepmother and the children to their home in Oyster Bay, she decided to leave directly for Santanoni. Her goodbyes to Grace as she climbed into the waiting buckboard were hurried and perfunctory. “Well, so long,” she called, not meeting her eyes. “Maybe I’ll see you in Chestnut Hill sometime.”


  “I’ll write.” Grace tried, and failed, to catch her glance.

  She shrugged, and the buckboard started down the rutted road.

  Grace knew that she if she wrote to her friend, Alice might respond…or she might not. She mourned for her as they rattled down the muddy track to North Creek; the Trouble Twins, the weeks of living in each others’ pockets and finishing each others’ sentences were no more. It was probably bound to happen—her and Alice’s lives were about to become very different. Alice would be living in the White House, eldest daughter of the president—and she? Back to Mum and Papa in Chestnut Hill…and who knew where after that. Right now, she wasn’t capable of speculating on what even the next day would bring.

  And all the while they clopped and bounced down the road, she was aware that she was leaving the trees she’d fallen so much in love with. She tried to fix them in her memory—the silhouette of their tops against the sky, their scent, the wind in their branches. She’d gathered a little bag of balsam needles from beneath the tree in her hollow; now and then she took it out and buried her nose in it.

  The sleepy village of North Creek was nearly unrecognizable; it was full of hired wagons hitched every which way, and newspaper reporters milled in the streets, anxious to talk to anyone who might have a connection to the Roosevelts. They almost mobbed the wagons that she and the Roosevelts rode in. It took the few available members of the railway police, the village’s chief constable, and a horde of volunteer deputies to keep them from overwhelming Mrs. Roosevelt and the children as they tried to climb down from the wagons and make their way into the train station. Most of the reporters assumed she was Alice and mobbed her too. Ted gallantly tried to fight them off until a voice she knew called, “Grace! Grace Boisvert!”

  Grace gasped. “Papa!”

  And there he was, pushing his way through the shouting newspapermen until he arrived, hatless, at her side. Grace would have liked to throw herself into his arms, but she couldn’t in front of all these people.

  He linked arms with her and pushed into the train station. “We’re on the next train to Albany. Where are your bags?”

  “I’ll make sure they’re taken care of, sir.” Ted had followed them; he was taking his position as man of the family very seriously. And Grace suspected he wanted to say goodbye to her too. Once they’d found a not-too-crowded corner she held out her hand to him. “Thank you, Ted. It has been a pleasure meeting you—and fishing with you. I hope that if you ever come to Boston with your sister, you’ll call on us.”

  He turned bright red but took her hand and shook it with quiet dignity. “Thank you, Miss Boisvert. You…” He gulped. “I liked fishing with you too!” And then, as if another word would be too much, he nodded respectfully to Papa, gave her one last look, and disappeared into the crowd.

  “An admirer of yours?” Papa asked. But his teasing smile was halfhearted; he was examining her as if to reassure himself that she was unharmed and whole.

  “Alice’s oldest brother.” The thought of Alice made her sad all over again. She took his arm and squeezed it. “Papa, why are you here? You couldn’t have known I was coming home—I was going to wire you here to let you and Mum know to expect me. Did you guess that President McKinley wouldn’t…that he…” She steadied her suddenly shaky voice. “That we would be leaving Tahawus sooner than planned?”

  “No. But we got your last letter.” He glanced around the crowded station as if to make sure that no one was listening.

  “My letter?” She tried to remember what she might have said in it that would have brought him here all the way from Chestnut Hill. “I don’t understand.”

  He took one more furtive look around them. “Henry Rookwood. I had a hard time dissuading your mother and grandmother from coming as well, armed with torches and pikes.” He looked at her closely. “Did anything happen?”

  Did anything happen? Grace wanted to laugh and then to weep. Weeping won.

  He handed her his handkerchief when she soaked through her own, and when she was calmer, he herded her onto the Albany train and found them a pair of seats in the back of the last car. “Tell me,” he said.

  He listened without comment as she told him what had happened from their arrival in Newport up to last night, though she noticed his jaw tighten occasionally and the knuckles of his clasped hands whiten at a few points. It wasn’t until she told him what she had done to protect the colonel from the Shadows that he spoke.

  “Did you feel better about being a dryad then?” he asked gently.

  Grace dabbed at her eyes with his handkerchief. “I don’t know. I did what I could.”

  “That’s all anyone can do in life, sapling,” he said. “That and try to learn so that, the next time, you’re better equipped to face what life gives you.”

  She nodded. “There’s more,” she said, and told him about John Rookwood and how she had contemplated making him hurl himself from the top of the mountain. “It was… I could have done it. I know I could.” For some reason, she couldn’t banish from her mind the image of his staring, open-mouthed face as he handed her his gun.

  “But you didn’t.” Papa’s voice was soothing, but his brows were drawn.

  “No, I…” She swallowed. She wasn’t sure she could tell him how tempted she’d been to actually do it. “I didn’t know I could do such a thing. Mum never said…”

  “I didn’t know either. Some of you are more powerful than others, I know. You might be one of those more powerful ones. Your grandmother...” He hesitated, then seemed to decide not to finish that sentence. “The fact that you had just been using the trees’ power might have enhanced your natural ability.”

  “Oh.” Grace remembered how John Rookwood had stared at her the day they met. She had been with the balsam tree in her hollow a short while before; perhaps it had started then.

  He sighed. “I just wish…”

  “What?”

  “I— There’s nothing to be done about it, but I fear that once Henry Rookwood finds out what you were able to do to his brother, he’ll—” He shook his head.

  He’ll not rest until he has you working for him, Grace finished for him in her head. Or sees you dead. She shivered, and Papa took her hand and held it tightly. He held it while she cried again, and after when she fell asleep on his shoulder. It felt good to let all the tension of the last few weeks out at last. Papa was taking her home, and at least for a little while she didn’t have to think.

  * * *

  By the time they arrived in Boston that evening, she was drooping like an unwatered plant. Mum took one look at her and put her to bed. She stayed there all the next day, sleeping.

  When she finally got up, she dreaded going downstairs to face the family. But everyone treated her like an extremely fragile vase. Mum brought her out to sit with her trees, who sang to her. Grand-mère did her hair for her (with Mademoiselle’s Secret, no less) and rubbed her hands and feet with oil of lavender. Even Dorothy refrained from galloping around the house and brought her pears from the tree behind the house, which was an enormous sacrifice on her part as she usually tried to eat them all before anyone else could get to them. Grace assumed it was because Papa had told them what she had told him on the train. At first she was glad, because it meant she wouldn’t have to relive it all by retelling. But when, after dinner the third day she was home, Papa suggested they gather in his study, her stomach flip-flopped.

  Mum spoke first. She made Grace sit next to her on the sofa by the fireplace and held her hand while she spoke. “Darling, as you might have guessed, we’ve been talking about what happened. And the first thing we want to say is that we are extremely proud of you.”

  “You saved the president of the United States from a pair of very powerful wizards,” Papa added. “I confess that I would like to have known who it was that gave them the commission.”

  “I would not,” Mum said firmly. “I like being able to sleep at night, thank you. It’s a pity that Colonel Roosevelt will never know what
you faced to save him, though.”

  “Grace knows what she did,” Grand-mère said calmly. “That is enough. I am more concerned with what is left.”

  They all fell silent. “The Rookwoods,” Papa finally said.

  Mum gripped her hand too tightly for a minute. “When I think of Henry Rookwood playing up to you like that—”

  “He didn’t, Mum. That was what made it so…so… He wasn’t pretending.” He really was that kindly man who’d pretended to fish so he could enjoy the peace of the lake…when he hadn’t been using its solitude to practice drawing Shadows to him to capture and unleash on the unsuspecting Colonel Roosevelt.

  “Yes, but to try to convince you to work for him—”

  Papa cleared his throat. “Grace, we are concerned that he won’t give up. You beat him. He’s either going to want revenge or to try even harder to get you to join him.”

  “I don’t think revenge is something he cares about. It wouldn’t be a rational use of his time.” John Rookwood, however, was much less rational than his brother. And as for their junior partner…but she could not yet face following that line of thought.

  “Whether he is or not, we have discussed the situation and what the best course of action might be—”

  Grand-mère made a dismissive gesture. “Talk, talk, talk! I do not know why we must have all this chatter as it is very simple. Grace must go to France.”

  Mum jumped in hurriedly. “Not if you don’t want to, of course, darling, but we think there are a lot of good reasons why you should consider it. It will get you away from the Rookwoods, for one thing. And give you a change of scene, help you make some new memories to push aside the old ones.”

  Grace let them go on talking because it seemed to make them feel better. When they finally ran out of things to say and looked at her expectantly, she said, “Yes, I think I’d like to go. At least for a little while.”