Bellflower steps down from the pulpit to stand in front of me. He regards me coolly. “When did you come to Tin Mountain, Miss Doherty?”
“In the winter of my fourteenth year.”
“And how did you come to live with Deirdre Werner?”
“She’s the mother of my aunt by marriage. Valerie.”
“So, you bear no blood relation to her?”
“No. I do not.”
“Interesting.” Bellflower walks back and forth in front of me, three times. “Miss Doherty, will you stand, and turn your back to the congregation?”
Acrid, cold fear winds up my throat. I sit, stock-still, afraid to move.
“If you are innocent, you’ve no reason to be concerned by what I’ve asked. Now, please stand.”
I reckon I don’t have much of a choice, so I do as he says. When I feel his hands, cold on the back of my neck, I freeze. Then, in one motion, he rips the flimsy jailhouse shift I’m wearing down to my waist, exposing my back to the crowd. There’s a collective gasp. Bellflower runs his fingers up my back, tracing the treelike lines of the witch rash. Where his fingers touch my flesh, it burns like fire.
“Deirdre had the same mark,” he whispers in my ear, his hand resting between my shoulders. “So did Betsy.”
“Leave her alone! Don’t you touch her!” It’s Abby. She rushes up the aisle, her eyes feverish. She nearly gets to Bellflower before Sheriff Murphy wrestles her away. “Get your hands off me!” She thrashes, wild as a bobcat. “Gracie!”
Murphy wrangles her outside, into the churchyard.
Suddenly, a loud groan sounds from above, metal twisting and screaming as it’s wrenched from wood. The chandelier crashes to the floor, landing on some of the congregants. They fight their way out from underneath it. I see blood on the floor.
Everything devolves into chaos. Val pulls on Bellflower’s arm, and while he’s swatting her away, I see my chance. I run for the door at the side of the altar and into the rectory, then outside. Humid air hits my face like a wet mop. Storm clouds boil on the horizon. Big ones, all gray green and lit with lightning. People stream out of the church like they’re running from the devil. I reckon they are, they just don’t know it. High above, in the steeple, the bell starts tolling erratically. The air crackles with static.
I’m too weak to run, so I hide instead, tucking behind a gravestone at the rear of the church. I’ve never been the praying sort, but I pray now. I don’t know what else to do. I never wanted any of this. Bile rises into my throat, and I retch onto the parched ground, vomiting raggedly.
And then I see Abby. She stumbles through the churchyard and its helter-skelter stones. Her eyes are wet with tears. “Gracie!” she hollers. “If you can hear me, you’ve gotta run! They’re gonna kill you if you don’t. I’m so sorry! I’m so, so sorry. I should have spoken up for you sooner!”
I rush out from between the graves. “Abby!”
When she hears me, she turns, smiling as she starts toward me. Then, her smile fades as footsteps beat through the cemetery behind me. Abby screams. “No! Leave her alone!”
Someone grabs my wrist, wrenching my arm. I howl as the fine bones shatter.
“Here she is! I got her!” Al Northrup bays. “You’re gonna pay for what you done to my boy, you little whore,” he hisses, rank spittle hitting my face. “Right here and right now.”
THIRTY-TWO
DEIRDRE
1882
Deirdre’s labor pains came on late in the day as a storm crackled overhead, lightning cleaving the sky over the mountainside. The first cramps hit her low in the back, just as they did with her menses. She was able to walk them out easily, so she drew more water from the springhouse, stoked the fire to make tea and porridge, and watched the clock.
Within a few hours, the pains had worsened. They now felt like hammer blows. She chewed on a shard of willow bark to ease the pain, but it did little to help. The next cycle was fierce enough to pull the first childbirth cry from her throat. Valerie startled in her sleep at the sound, little fists flying above the top of her crib.
Apart from hasty trips to the mercantile, for which she wrapped herself in shawls and corseted herself tightly to hide her growing belly, she had sequestered herself in her cabin with Valerie after Hannah’s death, keeping Hannah’s secret and her own well tucked away. Winter was colder and fiercer than any winter on record, and Pa had wired her to say he would remain in Colorado until summer. At first, she’d found this fortuitous. It was one less lie she’d need to tell. Now, with late spring in full flower, and not even a letter, she was certain he had fallen to some wilderness calamity and would never return. She was likely an orphan now.
How would she bear this baby on her own, in secret, without anyone knowing? What if something went wrong, as it had with Hannah the first time? She didn’t think the baby was breech—she’d felt little feet wedged between her ribs often enough in the past few weeks to gather the baby was pointed in the right direction—but still, she was afraid.
She might make it to the Nilsson farm before her pain grew so keen it tied her to the bed. Ebba lived there alone now. Deirdre had always trusted Ebba. Could trust her to help bring the baby. But then Ebba would be party to her secret. Gentry might come back and use Ebba just as he’d used Phoebe and Esme.
The thought brought a clench of raw grief and regret as the next spasm seized her. A moment later, a warm trickle ran down her thigh. Her waters had broken. She lifted her skirts to inspect them. Clear, no hint of black or green. It was a good sign.
The cabin had grown far too hot. She’d stoked the fire to excess. She stripped down to her shift and contemplated throwing open a window to let in the cool, rain-soaked air. If she did that, somebody down the hill might hear her labor cries and come nosing around.
No one in Tin Mountain could ever know about the baby.
But he would know about the baby.
She still dreamt of him sometimes. Her shadow demon. Still imagined him watching her as she lay alone in the darkness, awaiting his seed to flower fully in her womb. He’d said he’d return in fifty years, but what if he refused to wait? What if he appeared as soon as the child was born, to spirit her away to some snarling netherworld?
It was a girl. She was sure of it. Had dreamt of her, too. The beautiful woman she would become.
Her stomach hardened and clenched once more, stealing her breath. Deirdre grabbed hold of the bedpost and worked her way to the floor, on her hands and knees. She rocked slowly, rounding out her spine and arching like a mad cat, measuring her breath and counting through the pains. The shaking time would come next, and her body would take over for her then.
Valerie stirred in the crib, letting out a long, reedy cry. Deirdre swore. She worked her way up from the floor and crossed to the crib, picking the baby up and shushing her back to sleep. The child was always restless. She was thin, too. Deirdre had been tempted to bring Valerie to her own breast for sustenance, but was afraid it might trigger an early labor, so she’d had to suffice with syrup-sweetened goat’s milk from Ebba’s farm.
Just as Valerie had settled, a knock came at the door. Deirdre froze, her breath hitching with another contraction. The knock came again, louder this time. Valerie woke fully, her face reddening as she wailed.