The next day, I sent a note into town with Cook for Charlotte, asking if I might dine with her that evening. Her reply was in the affirmative, and so when the time came I set out into the warm summer evening, leaving Nox at home.
Charlotte opened the door of the cottage before I could even knock. “Come in,” she said. “I’ve made us some beef stew, if that suits.”
“That is perfect,” I said, stepping inside. I glanced quickly around. “Your mother is not home?”
“No,” Charlotte said, closing the door behind me. “She had to leave to attend to a birth.”
“And she did not need you to come along to assist her?” I asked.
Charlotte shook her head. “She said she’d send for me if I was needed, but she expected it to be an easy birth—Mevrouw Van Buren has borne four healthy children already.”
It was too easy, too convenient. I had been planning to draw Charlotte out into the garden if needed, for Mevrouw Jansen likely would not approve of the favor I intended to ask. Yet now it was unnecessary—almost as if Mevrouw Jansen, in the same uncanny way that her daughter sometimes had, somehow knew and was giving us her blessing.
Or it is a happy coincidence, and that is all, I told myself.
We served ourselves and carried our bowls and spoons out to the tiny dining room off the kitchen. Charlotte fetched some wine, and lit a few candles and lamps against the growing dark.
We chatted idly as we ate, Charlotte filling me in on the latest village gossip while I tried to think of the best way to bring up the favor I needed. Charlotte would help me in any way she could, but in this case I knew she would have reason to be reluctant.
I shouldn’t have wasted a thought on it, however, for once we’d both finished eating, Charlotte laid her spoon down and looked at me seriously. “All right, Katrina. Out with it.”
“Out with what?”
“You came here tonight to ask me something,” Charlotte said. “So you might as well do so.”
“How did you know?” I asked.
She waved a hand dismissively. “I know you better than anyone.” she said. “I can tell when you’ve something on your mind.”
I sighed, pushing my bowl away. “Very well. I do have a favor to ask of you.”
“Another?” she asked. Laughter tinged her voice as she added, “You do not need more herbs already, do you?”
“No!” I said, giggling before I grew serious again. “No, it’s something else.”
“Well, do not keep me in suspense.”
“Well…” I looked down and fiddled with my spoon. “My father has given Brom permission to court me, and he has already begun doing so. Or trying to.”
“No!” Charlotte exclaimed. Yet then she shook her head and closed her eyes. “In truth, I am not surprised. I had expected it.”
“Yes, I was not truly surprised, either,” I said. “He came to call yesterday and insisted I go walking with him. It did not last long, is the best thing I can say.”
“Whatever did you talk about?” she asked. “He did not try to speak to you of love, did he?”
I laughed humorlessly. “I suppose he thought that was what he was doing,” I said. “In the end, we argued, and why he expected anything else I cannot say.” I did not mention that we argued about her.
Charlotte shook her head in disgust. “You have my sympathies, Katrina. But what has this to do with a favor?” Her face fell slightly. “I am afraid I have already thought of poisoning him, but that is too easily traced back to me.”
I laughed. “No, it is not that. It is just…” I sighed. “Everything seems so uncertain,” I said. “With Ichabod. I tell myself that I will let nothing stand in the way of our marriage, but I know this is not what my parents would choose for me. I … I will defy them if I must. For him. But that path is rife with its own uncertainties, the nature of which I cannot yet know. It is difficult to bear, all this anxiousness. And so I…” I looked up at her and took a deep breath. “I need to know for certain. I need to know if we will be together, he and I.”
“And how am I supposed to know?” Charlotte asked. Her tone had cooled slightly, as if she knew what was coming. “If I had any such assurances to give you, Katrina, you know that give them I would.”
“Yes, but … you have ways of finding out, do you not?” When she did not answer, I lowered my voice slightly, though there was no one to overhear us. “I thought you might consult the cards for me.”
She exhaled slowly, eyes closed. Only a trusted few knew that the Jansen women even possessed the tarot cards. I knew that, during the war, an injured French officer fighting on behalf of the Americans had, while recovering in the Jansen cottage, taught Mevrouw Jansen to divine the future using the beautifully painted deck of cards that he possessed—a pastime that was all the rage in France at the time. Yet whatever uncanny ability Mevrouw Jansen possessed made the reading of the tarot cards more than just a pastime, and so it was for Charlotte as well, once her mother taught her. It was not a service that Mevrouw Jansen offered to the public; even the easy-going villagers of Sleepy Hollow would be mightily unsettled if they knew the things the Jansen women could see with the help of the deck.
“Do you know what you’re asking of me?” Charlotte asked finally.
“I do, Charlotte. Believe me. I would not ask if I did not have to.”
“You do not have to. You could wait and see what your future holds, as everyone else must.”
“This is no idle curiosity!” I cried. “This is my future, and the man I love, at stake!”
She was silent, and absolutely still, for a long time. Then she rose and picked up our bowls to take to the kitchen. “Very well,” she said aloud. “I will do it this once, Katrina. And I know it goes without saying that you cannot tell anyone.”
“Of course,” I called after her, feeling excitement and fear coursing through my blood. “I will take it to my grave. The Headless Horseman himself could not pry it from my lips.” I felt a twinge of superstitious regret as the words passed my lips, as if by invoking the Horseman’s name he could now somehow hear us.
She did not reply, merely passed back through the room a moment later and climbed the staircase to the upper floor. She returned with a small bundle wrapped in a piece of dark blue silk. Moving aside some of the candles on the table, she unfurled the silk to reveal a deck of well-worn yet gorgeously illustrated cards. She spread the cloth over the table before her, leaving the cards at its center. She placed her right palm atop the deck and took a deep breath, eyes closed. I shivered slightly at the sight of her, her long, wavy red hair down about her shoulders, the candlelight casting her features into shadow. She looked mysterious and magical and otherworldly indeed. And though I would mean it as a compliment—for she looked powerful and beautiful—I could never tell her so.
She exhaled slowly, and after what seemed like several minutes she opened her eyes. “Very well,” she said again. She picked up the cards and shuffled them, their edges soft and pliable from many years of use. Then she placed the deck back down, this time closer to me. “Cut the deck with your left hand,” she instructed me. “And as you do so, think hard on the question you are asking. Make it a yes or no question, and ask it in your mind three times.”
I cut the deck, my mind furiously reciting my question. Will Ichabod and I wed? Will Ichabod and I wed? Will Ichabod and I wed? Then I nodded confirmation.
“I am going to do a simple three-card spread,” she said, her voice low as she picked up the cards again. “Past, present, and future. The first card is your past, what has been, and what is now behind you in regards to the question you have asked. The second card is your present, what your circumstances are now. And the third and final card is your future: what is to come, and what the ultimate answer to your question will be.”
I felt my first flicker of foreboding. What if I did not like what the future holds? What if I got my answer but I could not bear what I heard? Perhaps I should not have asked.
But it was too late to go back now. Charlotte had already placed the first card down on the table between us. To me it was upside down, though I could make out the image of a man walking along his way, looking as though he were whistling a tune, while the edge of a cliff waited nearby.
Charlotte exhaled as she considered the card. “The Fool,” she said. “The Fool is a naïve traveler, one who is about to embark on a great journey. He is optimistic and hopeful and unaware of the danger and risks that may await him.” She pointed to the cliff. “Remember, this is your past. This is where you began with whatever is at the root of your question.” She glanced up. “So in this case, your relationship with Ichabod.”
“Yes,” I said, my mouth strangely dry. I cleared my throat. “Yes. I fell in love and made love to him with scarcely a thought for the consequences. I did what I wanted simply because I wanted to do it. Only lately have I imagined it may not work out as I wish.”
Charlotte nodded. “That is my reading of the card in this situation, as well.” She placed her hand on the next card on the deck.
The room grew strangely warm and stifling, the walls seeming to shift around me. I blinked my eyes several times, trying to clear the haze that settled over them in the dimness.
Charlotte placed the next card beside The Fool. A man and a woman stood naked, their hands outstretched toward one another. An angel hovered in the sky above them.
“The Lovers,” Charlotte announced, and a chill went down my spine at how appropriate the card was. “A card that signifies relationships. You have a chance for true love, and a decision you make in regards to this relationship will have long-lasting consequences for you.” She glanced up at me, and our eyes locked.
“Yes,” I said aloud at last. “That is certainly … most appropriate.”
“Tonight the cards have proven themselves very accurate indeed, which is not always the case.” She smiled slightly, as if to break the tension. “So far they are not telling us anything we do not know. I have found when I get an unexpected card for the past and present I must consider it more carefully, and how its meaning may apply to the situation at hand. Often I gain much greater insight into it as a result.”
I scarcely heard her. Her words seemed to trail off, as though she were speaking to me from a great distance. My attention had been captured by the flickering of the candle to my left. It whispered to me as the flame danced and undulated, beckoning me to look closer, to listen more carefully …
I stared into the center of the flame, and I somehow fell into it, as though it had grown to envelop me. It expanded around me, until all I could see were images within it, like shadows cast against the great wall of a barn.
The faraway whinny of a horse. Shadows moving through the forest, one chasing the other—a man. Two men. Panting, and heavy footfalls against the dirt. The sounds of a brutal struggle, and that far off whinny yet again. And the violent, unmistakable sound of a blade being drawn from its sheath.
I screamed, and just like that the pictures vanished. The wall of flame that had become my mirror melted away and was only a candle again. I screamed again, this time from sheer shock.
“Katrina!” I heard Charlotte cry, her hands already grasping my arms. Swiftly she crouched beside my chair. “Katrina, what happened? Are you all right?”
I gasped for air. “It was him,” I gasped. “I saw him. It was him.”
“Who?” Charlotte asked. “Brom? Ichabod?”
“No, no.” My voice wavered. “It was the Headless Horseman. I saw him.”
“The Horseman?” she asked, her tone tinged with disbelief. “You … saw him? How?”
I pointed wildly to the candle. “There,” I said. “In the flame. I was staring into it, and … it seemed to be calling me, somehow. And I could see…” I let out a sob and buried my face in my hands. “I could see all sorts of things.”
Charlotte embraced me, rubbing a hand on my back. “It is all right, Katrina,” she said. She drew back, frowning. “What else did you see?”
“I…” Suddenly the words for which I was reaching all seemed silly, overblown, dramatic. Like the words Master Shakespeare might use in one of his plays about witches. “It was nothing, I am sure,” I said. “Fanciful dreams and imaginings, nothing more. I got lost in a daydream, that is all. I am overwrought and overtired and it is nothing more than that, I’m sure.”
Charlotte did not look so certain. “I do not know if that is all it was,” she said slowly. “Fire does not reveal its secrets lightly.”
I stared at her as though she had started speaking in tongues. “What do you mean?”
She sighed. “There are those who can see visions, sometimes in water, sometimes in stone or glass, sometimes in fog or clouds, and sometimes in fire. Fire visions are rare, and always meaningful.” She gave me a look heavy with significance. “Of course, one would have to have the Sight.”
I shot her an incredulous look. “What nonsense is this? Visions? The Sight? Me? That is all very well for you, Charlotte,” I said. “I know you have seen things. But me? I have never—”
“I do not think that is true, Katrina,” she said gently. “You have told me many times of your dreams of the Horseman. And I have always told you I thought they had meaning.” She gestured toward the candle. “It would seem I am right.”
“But that … that’s…” I could not form the words. I had never had the kinds of visions Charlotte did, back when she would still whisper of them, before Brom’s terrible deed and she became too afraid to speak of such things to anyone, even to me.
Or, at least, I had not had visions until now.
I tried to laugh, but it was a sorry imitation of the sound. “This is madness,” I said, covering my face with my hands. “Madness.”
“I do not think so.” She squeezed my hand tightly. “Tell me what you saw.”
Those fleeting shadows and images I had glimpsed, as though through a dark veil, began to come back to me. “I saw figures, one chasing the other through the woods,” I said slowly. “I heard a horse’s whinny, and sounds of a struggle. And I heard…” I recalled the sound, and a shiver went through my whole body. “I heard the sound of a blade being unsheathed. The Horseman’s sword.”
Charlotte was silent for a moment. “But did you see him?”
“Only his silhouette. And only quickly.” I shuddered, my whole body wracked, as I remembered how I so casually invoked the Horseman earlier. He had heard, and he had responded.
She nodded, lost in thought. “I wonder what it means,” she murmured.
“As do I, I assure you.”
She rose from where she was crouched beside me. “Perhaps we should stop,” she said, nodding toward the cards. “The reading. Maybe it is best if we do not continue.”
A part of me wanted to agree, but the rest of me had to know, despite this vision that suddenly felt like a most dire omen. “No,” I said. “No, we are almost finished. We must…” I swallowed. “I must know what is on the last card.”
Charlotte hesitated. “Are you sure?”
I nodded, resigned.
Slowly she sat back down in her chair. “Very well,” she said, taking a deep breath. I did the same, trying to calm my still-racing heart.
When she turned over the final card, I gasped, a scream caught in my throat.
It was plain enough what the card was without Charlotte telling me, but still she spoke. “The Devil,” she said, her voice laden with sorrow and dread.
I closed my eyes, as though that would make the card, and the horrible picture of the winged beast upon it, disappear. “No,” I said.
“Do you already know the meaning of this card?” she asked, as if hoping she would not have to explain it.
“No,” I said. “But I can gather it means nothing good.”
“No,” she conceded, her tone heavy. “It does not.” She paused, as though steeling herself, and when she spoke again her tone was flat. “The Devil signifies a negative state of affairs. Destruction. You cannot remedy the evil he represents; you can only hope, with good fortune, to escape it.”
“No,” I said, feeling as though I were gasping for breath again. “No, it cannot be. This cannot be my future.”
With one swift motion, Charlotte gathered up the three cards—The Fool, The Lovers, and The Devil—and swept them back into the deck. “It does not have to be,” she said, sounding unconvinced. “The cards are not foolproof. They can lie, or be meaningless, they can be misinterpreted—”
“How could we possibly have misinterpreted that?” I demanded, gesturing to the spot on the table where The Devil card had lain. “You said yourself—the first two cards were perfectly, strangely accurate. Why should they be so, but not the last one?”
“Fortune-telling of any kind is an uncertain art, Katrina,” Charlotte said. “Nothing is absolute.”
“Why did you read for me, then? Why did the idea of doing it scare you so much?”
She knelt beside my chair again and took my face in her hands. “You control your destiny,” she told me, looking into my eyes. “You and no one else. What is on a painted bit of paper will not change that unless you let it.”
I grabbed her wrists. “Even you don’t believe that, Charlotte,” I whispered. “Especially you. You can’t. Not with the things you’ve seen.”
She bit her lip but did not speak.
My face crumpled, and tears began to roll down my cheeks. I slid from the chair to the floor, and Charlotte wrapped her arms around me, rocking me like a child as I cried.