“I’ll look forward to our reunion, Miss Werner. I’ll come to you again when the time is right.” He gave her a wicked smile, full of carnal promise . . . then stepped into the shadows. He was gone.
Deirdre clasped the grimoire to her chest and hurried downstairs.
“There you are!” Miss Munro stood to greet her, a look of irritation etched on her face. “I was about to come looking for you. A lay pastor arrived from St. Michael’s. I had to show him to Miss Darrow’s room. He’s praying with her now.”
“I’m sorry. I had to go to the washroom.” Deirdre offered the grimoire to Miss Munro and stepped back, her arms crossed over her waist. The headmistress opened the book, turning the pages faster and faster. When she got to the end, she scowled as she read. For a moment, Deirdre worried the book had betrayed her. But when Miss Munro closed it with a decisive thwack, then returned it to Deirdre, she smiled warmly.
“Just as you said, Miss Werner. Only recipes. And a rather good one for gingerbread I might ask to borrow for the holidays.”
A wash of relief went over Deirdre, and she beamed, dropping a perfect curtsy. “Thank you, ma’am.”
“You may return to the dance, if you wish.”
“I . . . I couldn’t do that.” She had to make sure that Gentry would make good on his word. “Not with Phoebe in such a state.”
A few moments later, Esme emerged from Phoebe’s room and stepped into the hall. Deirdre took note of the redness in the corners of her eyes and the deep rivers her tears had cut through her powder and rouge. “The pastor asked me to leave, so that he might say prayers for Phoebe’s soul,” Esme said. “She’s no longer awake. It won’t be long.”
“Well.” Miss Munro cleared her throat. “I’ll pay the orchestra and dismiss our guests before I notify the coroner. We can’t have all of Charleston gossiping about a hearse showing up during a party.”
After Miss Munro swept downstairs, Esme’s quiet weeping became heaving sobs. Deirdre did her best to soothe her distress. “There, now. Don’t cry.”
“I can’t help it.” Esme hiccupped and wiped at her eyes with Deirdre’s offered handkerchief.
“I’ve never seen you so upset. I didn’t realize you and Phoebe were that close.”
“Well. We were at one time. I was her . . .” Esme bit her lip and turned to the window.
“Her what, Esme?”
“Friend. Her first roommate.”
“You were more than roommates, weren’t you?” Jealousy and anger overtook her. She grasped Esme by the shoulder, turning her. “I might have known that was the reason she’s been so cruel to me. She was jealous!”
“Oh, Deirdre.” Esme sank onto the settee and rested her head in her hands. “Please don’t be angry.”
Deirdre sat next to her, holding the grimoire on her lap. She felt as if something inside her had shattered into a thousand brittle pieces.
“After Sam, I was terribly lonely. One night, Phoebe confessed that she’d never been kissed. One thing led to another, and—”
“I don’t need to hear more.” Deirdre put up her hand.
“Things went sour after that. I blame her religion, mostly. She knew her father would never approve of our friendship once he found out about my inclinations. Last winter, after returning from Christmas holiday, she started shunning me and took the room downstairs with Constance.”
“That hypocrite,” Deirdre said, seething. Her guilt over poisoning Phoebe thinned with her jealousy. “She threatened to tell Miss Munro about us! Held it over my head.”
“I was afraid you’d be angry. And you are. I don’t love her. I swear it. But she’s dying. Am I not supposed to make peace with her and with myself for what happened between us?”
“Her bullying isn’t the worst of it. She’s been sending Constance to our room to snoop. She told Miss Munro I have a witch’s book and that I poisoned Phoebe. I could be hanged for that, Esme!”
“Why, that’s ridiculous. You’d never do such a thing.”
Deirdre’s guilt once more pricked her conscience. Esme thought better of her than she deserved.
“It’s going to be all right. Just calm yourself and we’ll find a way through this. You’ve done nothing wrong.”
But she had. And then she’d trusted Gentry—put her fate in the hands of a liar and a demon. She could almost feel the noose tightening around her neck, choking the life from her. And what would come after? Surely hell awaited a murderer—especially one who had just sold her fate to a devil. Deirdre longed to run, to hide. But where could she go where Gentry wouldn’t find her?
“Esme . . . I need to tell you—”
Just then, hasty footsteps echoed on the stairs. Likely the coroner. Panicked, Deirdre shut the grimoire and put it aside. Miss Munro and Constance emerged from the stairwell, a man dressed in black following them. His round face was reddened by his climb up the stairs. He seemed quite agitated. “As I’ve said, Miss Munro, I do not have a lay pastor named Gentry in my parish, and I did not send anyone else. I’ve no idea who’s in that room, but he is not from St. Michael’s.” He stalked down the hall, Miss Munro and Constance bustling behind him. Esme and Deirdre rose as one to follow.
As they neared the death-shrouded room, Deirdre’s ears began to ring distantly. “Esme, what does the pastor in Phoebe’s room look like?”
“He’s tall, young. Good looking. He was very charming and gracious to me.” Esme gave her a puzzled look. “Why?”
Miss Munro opened the door to Phoebe’s room and gave an astonished gasp. “Oh, my heavens.”
Had Phoebe expired? Deirdre worked her way forward until she could see inside, expecting the worst. The ringing in her ears became a scream. She thought she might faint.
There Phoebe sat, reclining against the headboard, a Bible propped on her lap with the bloom of life in her cheeks. “I’ve just had the strangest dream,” she said, stretching as if she’d woken from a long Sunday nap. “I dreamt that I died, but an angel came and kissed me and brought me back to life.”
TWENTY-FIVE
GRACELYNN
1931
I run from the flaming tent into the night, careening with the rest of the townspeople in a panicked, tangled herd. Sparks spiral upward, embers popping as they consume what’s left of the tent. People bat at their flaming hems and hats. The acrid scent of burning oilcloth and singed hair assaults my nostrils.
“Where’s Harlan?” Al Northrup stumbles toward me like a drunk. His beady eyes are red and swollen. He grasps me by the shoulders and shakes me. “Goddammit, girl, I asked you a question. You seen my boy?”
“Not since he tried to choke the life out of me.”
“Goddammit,” he swears again, pulling off his hat to swat out a stray ember on the dry grass. The fire is spreading—snaking away from the tent’s tattered remains and winding through the alfalfa in flickering rivers. The wind picks up and fans the flames. A nearby blackberry thicket starts to burn.
“Somebody get the fire brigade!” Northrup yells, and then stumbles off, baying Harlan’s name. A pack of three men tumble into a farm truck and fly off toward town, sending up a spray of gravel and dust.