HARE

37

AS HETTY STIRRED AWAKE the next morning, she thought the gentle tapping was rain on the window. Opening her eyes, she found it was not rain, but her husband. Sitting up on his side of the bed, Benjy tapped one foot against the bed frame while reading through the papers. The only sign that Benjy had moved since she had fallen asleep was the stack of papers around him.

When they returned to the house, they washed the cemetery dirt away, raided the pantry, and turned their attentions to the papers once more. They went over everything from the grave-robbing angle, trying to see something they had missed. Their efforts gave them no new answers. Isaac Baxter was the most likely suspect in Charlie’s death, but Benjy shook his head whenever Hetty suggested confronting the man directly. This was too carefully done, he claimed, and they needed to be careful themselves if they wished to uncover the truth.

At some point, Hetty stretched out on the bed intending to just rest for a moment, but once she shut her eyes, sleep came for her.

“Did you sleep at all?” Hetty absently touched her hair, pushing back hairpins that shifted while she slept.

“A bit.” Benjy absently rubbed the stubble on his chin. “If this is about grave robbing, everything changes, including the who and the why.”

“Baxter has plenty of motive.”

The tapping stilled. “Go back to sleep if that’s all you have to say.”

“Maybe you’re the one that should sleep if you’re not seeing the obvious.” Hetty moved across the bed and grabbed the closest piece of paper next to him. “Alain is dead. Geraldine has no motive. Darlene and George have ties that are by association and no relation to grave robbing. Same with Eunice and Clarence. Then there’s Baxter—”

“Who’s your top suspect because of the club, its members, and debts. But anyone else in a high-ranking role could do the same.”

“Maybe it’s someone we don’t know. There’s Judith to consider. She’s got to fit in there somewhere.”

“It’s someone we know, just not as well as we think,” Benjy said, in a way that left her uncertain if he’d heard her or not. “I feel like I’m missing something, but what could it be?”

“You need to sleep,” Hetty urged. “The potions Penelope gave you do not bring true rest.”

“How can I rest? It’s finally coming together . . . I can see it now. If I hadn’t been so distracted, I would have already figured it out.”

“We were both distracted,” Hetty murmured. “This case isn’t like the others. Everything we learn about it strikes close to the heart. When strangers are murdered, we discover their secrets. But when it’s someone we know that’s dead, we end up learning secrets about ourselves. It’s like Charlie dying made me take a look at everything around me, and when I did, I realized finding my sister is no longer important to me.”

He stared at her as if she’d sprouted another head.

“I want to find her, of course,” Hetty said quickly. “I want to see her again. Searching for her is like me telling stories at parties. I tell them because I don’t want to talk about myself. I put on a show to distract, to keep people from getting too close. I want to find my sister, but looking for her gives me an excuse. It allows me to say, ‘I can’t buy this, I’m saving for a telegram.’ ‘I can’t be a teacher because I need to be able to leave once news of her arrives.’ ‘I won’t move to a better apartment because I can’t settle anywhere until I find her.’ Excuses—that’s what I turned my sister into.”

Benjy took her hands, stopping her words with a gentle touch. “That’s not true at all.”

Hetty shook her head. “You saying those words doesn’t make it less true. Our lives would be very different if I hadn’t insisted on searching.”

“So would have a number of things.” He patted her hand before letting go. “You must be specific—haven’t you learned this by now?”

As always Hetty found herself slightly stunned at the ease he said such things. “You really don’t have regrets?”

“I believe it was you who told me that I don’t do anything I don’t wish to do.” He kissed her cheek and grabbed the set of papers by her side. “Though I can be persuaded.”

As he shuffled the papers, he picked up a hairpin. He twisted it so the light caught on the bird perched on a branch.

Benjy held it out to her.

“Try not to lose this,” he said. “The rest came out twisted or broken.”

“You mean not up to your exacting standards.” Hetty stuck the pin into her hair with care.

“If I’m going to give you something, I want it to be the best it can be.” He absently patted the bed frame. “Why do you think all this furniture is here?”

“They didn’t fit our box of a room.”

This set of furniture was better than the set that had ended up in the boardinghouse—as if he had it made and only afterward realized it wouldn’t fit. She always knew he liked things just so, but it cast a different light to know it was solely for her good opinion.

“Maybe it’s a good thing you were so precise.” With certain emphasis she added, “When I saw the hairpin, I realized I love you.”

Delight spread across his face, and she made a note to say such things more often, for the sight was divine.

“If that was all it took, I should’ve made you more of these a long time ago!”

“Maybe,” she teased, “given all the pins you ruined.”

“Why do you think I made them in the first place? I’m often in great need of them.”

The map had gone up while she slept. But it didn’t have any of its pins, and not because he had forgotten their placements.

“You could only find my good pins, couldn’t you?”

Hetty laughed when he said nothing, and fetched the pins herself.

“Remind me of the places again,” she said, moving to the map.

He named the places closest to where her hand hovered instead of the order of how they found them.

“We can’t forget this alley.” She placed the pin where they’d found the body of the brother of the surly cemetery owner. “That collar.” She shivered. “I hate thinking about it. I know we didn’t look at it that closely, but I wonder what we could have found on it. Some collars had the name of the slave owners engraved on the inside. I knew some people who even kept them, mostly as a reminder about who reparations should come from. I know you told me most were melted down. I wonder where this one came from?”

She waited, but when Benjy didn’t say anything, she turned around. He was looking in her direction, but his gaze had slipped past her.

“Benjy,” she said, snapping her fingers. “What’s gotten into you?”

He started. “Did Oliver throw it all away?”

Hetty didn’t know what he was talking about, but she had seen that expression on his face many times before. Asking him questions wouldn’t give her any useful answers.

“Let’s ask him,” she suggested.

Benjy was already out the door and bolting down the stairs before she could finish her sentence. In the clamor, there was a crash, followed by a yell, then grumblings.

The door to the cellar was still swinging on its hinges when Hetty reached the main floor.

“Aren’t you going to run downstairs after him?” Oliver waved a hand absently. Pegasus flashed in the air, and the table moved back into place.

“I’ll catch up to him soon enough,” Hetty said. “Is Penelope here yet?”

“Haven’t seen her. Although she might not be needed anymore. Benjy seems to be recovered enough to nearly run me over.”

“I’ll let Penelope be the judge of that. Oh, and when she returns she won’t be alone. Darlene will be with her.”

“Wonderful, more company! Am I running a boardinghouse now? Where people come and go as they please?”

Hetty started at this last bit. “You knew we’d left last night?”

“The wards on the door were perfect. I expected it, to be honest, while you’re working a case—” Then, struck by an idea, Oliver gasped and turned toward the cellar door. “Tell me there isn’t another dead body down there! If there is, by the stars, I swear—”

“Nothing to worry about,” she assured him. “He’s just checking a few things. You kept Morris Stevens’s things here, didn’t you?”

“Figured you’d need it.”

“Thank you for that. And for letting us stay.” Hetty twisted her fingers, trying to figure the most elegant way to say her next words. “Although, we might be here longer than planned. We moved out of our room.”

“I may not be a brilliant detective that solves fascinating mysteries like you, but I was able to deduce that when you came back with the tub, thank you very much. You don’t have to tell me why,” he added hastily. “I don’t think I can handle the reason. Stay as long as you need. Even if it means you never leave.”

Hetty blinked. “I thought you said that if we all lived under one roof, one of us would lose our head and it’d be simpler if it was you?”

“Did I?” Oliver grinned, and it was like seeing the sun after days of storm clouds. “Don’t recall.”

“You’re awake.” Thomas poked his head in from the next room, newspaper in hand. “If you want something to eat, there might be leftovers in the kitchen. Eunice Loring brought something over earlier this morning. I think there was a card for you.”

“She didn’t stay?” Hetty asked.

“Had to leave. Said it was important, but not enough to whisper a word to me. More curious how she knew to come here.”

“Penelope is the start and end of that question,” Oliver said. “But that’s not important.”

“It’s not?” Thomas asked.

“Nope. I need to talk to you.”

Oliver pushed Thomas into the next room. “Go get something to eat,” he said to Hetty, and then firmly shut the door behind him.

Hetty pressed an ear to the wood. She heard murmuring voices but no discernable words to make the effort worth it.

In the kitchen, she found an empty pot, recently scraped clean of grits. There was some hard cheese and fruit about, but she also found a hunk of dried meat.

As Hetty bit into it and chewed, she saw the dish that Thomas mentioned. It was a pie, although Hetty couldn’t tell what fruit made up the filling. Propped next to it was a letter: a belated thank-you to Hetty for sewing Eunice a new dress . . . and then a request to help with a project at Eunice’s house, something for her husband.

Hetty stared at the lies. She had never made clothes for Eunice. Eunice had never mentioned a project.

She turned the page around. Scrawled in a corner was a crescent moon and a sun.

Their calling card for those in need of help.

Eunice had reached out to her. Several times. Mostly under guises and small lies meant to attract attention. This was the boldest overture yet. Was it something domestic? Eunice had wanted Moonleaf for a reason. Maybe there was no miscarriage, but simply a desire not to bring a child into a dreadfully unhappy marriage. Or something more.

Something dreadful that left Eunice moving about quietly instead of speaking plainly.

Swallowing her food, Hetty went down into the cellar.

A light, bright enough to be a contender for a small sun, blazed over Benjy’s head as he studied the broken halves of the collar they’d found on Morris Stevens.

The burnished silver was spotted with blood, giving the markings along it a rusted appearance.

“I’m going to see Eunice,” Hetty announced. “She sent a note. I think she’s in trouble.”

“I’d say that’s a safe bet.” Benjy held up the collar and tapped at the name inside:

Meade.

“That name is familiar.” Hetty frowned. “Why do I know it?” She looked down at the crumpled note in her hand.

Then she remembered.

She’d been standing in a long line at the Freedmen’s Bureau when she’d heard the name spoken by the man waiting in line beside her.

“Meade is the name of the family that owned the plantation Clarence left behind,” Hetty said. “But this can’t be his collar. He told me he got free by being sold to a sympathetic owner.”

“He might have lied about that,” Benjy said. “And a few other things too. How would we know? We don’t know him that well. Which explains everything.”

Everything that Isaac Baxter could have done, Clarence could have done just the same—maybe even more easily, since no one pays attention to him. And why would they? He had a good excuse to be every place where they’d discovered trouble.

And Clarence had been everywhere, Hetty realized. She’d dismissed him because he was Clarence: boring, predictable, harmless Clarence. But maybe not so harmless.

Hetty’s hand tightened over the note.

“Eunice can explain things,” Hetty said. “She’ll give us the answers we need.”