NOT MUCH NEWS from town reached the Van den Maagdenbergh farm. Penny was far more aware of the fall leaves and the brilliant purple fireweed that shot up all over the woodlot than of anything that transpired in Minerva. Cora dug the potatoes and planted the winter wheat. At the kitchen table, Penny worked on her lessons and read The Odyssey. At last she decided that maybe Penelope wasn't such a bore. She liked the way she gave Odysseus a run for his money in the end, was amused by the hints that she could see through his disguise, and admired the way she didn't automatically melt in his arms when he revealed himself to her. What Penny liked best was that, even after his twenty-year journey and their long-awaited reunion, Penelope insisted that he listen to her story and her dream of geese before allowing him to tell her of his adventures.
One November morning, Cora was napping upstairs with the baby, exhausted from a sleepless night. Phoebe was teething. Cora had been short-tempered recently, probably from lack of sleep. Penny hoped it was just temporary, but she found herself getting lonely sometimes.
She occupied herself with the messy work of hollowing out a pumpkin. She tossed the seeds and loose pulpy fibers into a pail for the geese, now confined to a pen for the cold part of the year. Thanksgiving was coming up—Phoebe's first—and Penny wanted to surprise Cora with a real Thanksgiving dinner. That meant making pumpkin pie, cranberry sauce, and scalloped potatoes. Instead of buying a turkey from the butcher's in town, she would finally work up the nerve to kill one of the nine geese she'd been fattening up during the five months she had lived here. They would have to slaughter at least one for Thanksgiving and one for Christmas, otherwise it would be too pricey keeping them fed all the way through winter when there was nothing for them to forage outdoors.
Her mother made roast goose for the Hamiltons every Christmas. One of these Sundays, she thought she would finally go visit her. It was hard, though. She hadn't seen her in so long, she didn't know what she would say to her anymore. Each Sunday came and somehow she put it off, fearful of what would happen if she knocked on the Hamiltons' back door. Maybe her mother would be mad at her for staying away so long. Maybe she would be indifferent. But she kept promising herself that she really would visit her, sometime before Christmas.
Lately she'd been trying to recreate her mother's old recipes by trial and error—her fried chicken and angel food cake. For Thanksgiving, she would try to remember the way her mother had prepared the pumpkin pies and roast goose. Following her memory, Penny took a freshly sharpened butcher's knife and cut the pumpkin into small segments to make it easier to remove the hard rind. She made herself remember how her mother had cut the raw pumpkin flesh into cubes, then simmered them in a pan of water with a cinnamon stick. Going into the pantry to hunt for cinnamon, she only found a jar of cloves.
She tossed some cloves in the pan as a substitute for cinnamon. Their scent filled the kitchen, and soon steam clouded the windows. Sitting at the kitchen table, she tried to write the remaining steps of the recipe. When the pumpkin flesh was cooked through, her mother had taken it out of the pan and mashed it with a potato masher. After letting it cool, she had folded in heavy cream, molasses, brown sugar, eggs, allspice, and freshly ground nutmeg. Then her mother had poured the mixture into a rolled pie crust and baked it.
Her mother's goose recipe, handed down from her grandmother, was even more elaborate. Penny found another scrap of paper and jotted down everything she could remember. Her mother had stuffed the goose with seasoned breadcrumbs, almonds, and raisins. Had she basted the goose with anything? How long did a goose have to cook? It would be pointless asking Cora, who knew even less about these things than she did. For a moment, she imagined her mother was in the kitchen beside her and could answer all her questions, take her through the recipes step by step.
Penny was clearing the pumpkin peels off the kitchen table when she heard the car come up the drive. She wondered who it could be. The ice deliveryman didn't come anymore now that the weather had turned cool. They kept the milk and eggs in the unheated pantry.
Rubbing the steam from the windowpane, she looked out and saw a touring car, its leather hood drawn up like a wrinkled bonnet. No one in Minerva possessed such a sporty auto—it looked like something out of a magazine. After giving her hands a quick wash, she tugged off her apron and stepped outside. The crisp air made her shiver, rubbing her arms as she watched a young man step out. He was hatless, the wind ruffling his chestnut hair. He wore a loose jacket and was carrying a box wrapped in pink gift paper under one arm. Squinting in the strong autumn sunlight, he shaded his eyes with his free hand and gazed at the house. When he caught sight of her, he waved. Then he stepped forward, his gait marked by a limp.
The faded image from those old photographs sprang to life. She could hardly quell her excitement as she went out to meet him, could barely resist the urge to shout out his name. He had Cora's hair, her green eyes.
"Hello, miss. You must be Penny." There was something curious about the way his tongue slipped around the words. He didn't sound American anymore after his years overseas.
"You know my name?" She couldn't hide her delight.
"My sister mentioned you in her letters. She said what a godsend you are. I'm Jacob Viney, by the way. Cora's brother."
"I know! I saw all the pictures of you."
"She showed you pictures of me?"
Penny bit her lip. There, she had given herself away for snooping. "When did you get here?" she asked, to change the subject. "Cora said you lived in France."
"I sailed over in October. I promised her I'd come and see the baby." He held out the pink-wrapped box. "This is for Phoebe."
"Oh, that's sweet." It occurred to Penny that Jacob was the first person ever to bring Phoebe a present. She wondered if he had brought it all the way from France. "Cora's taking a nap," she told him. Looking at Cora's bedroom window, she saw that the curtains were still closed. She must not have heard the car. "The baby kept her up all night."
A man appeared at Jacob's side, taking Penny by surprise. She hadn't seen him getting out of the car. "This is Penny," Jacob said to the man. "Penny, I brought a friend along. I didn't think Cora would mind. This is Adam."
"Hello there, Penny." Adam took off his flat-brimmed sports cap and shook her hand as though she were a fellow adult. A little older than Jacob, he was easily the handsomest man she had ever seen. His honey-blond hair was swept back from his forehead. He had a thin mustache like a movie star's. It was impossible not to fall under his spell when he smiled at her like that. Jacob cleared his throat. Adam winked at her before letting go of her hand, which was warm and tingly from his grip. "Pleased to meet you."
"Come inside." She led the way. "Won't she be happy when she sees you." She flashed a smile at Jacob, who ducked his eyes.
"It sure smells good in here." When they entered the kitchen, Adam sniffed the air appreciatively, then lifted the pot on the stove where the pumpkin flesh and cloves simmered.
"I'm stewing pumpkin," Penny told him. "To make pumpkin pie."
"I love pumpkin pie," said Adam.
Penny showed them into the parlor and gestured at the velvet sofa. Jacob set his gift down on the side table.
"Well," said Penny, "I better tell her you're here."
But Cora was already thundering down the stairs.
Penny stepped in her path. "Cora, guess what?"
"You idiot!" She shoved Penny brutally aside, slamming her against the doorjamb so hard that Penny saw stars. Her legs buckled beneath her and she slid to the floor. Dazed, she watched Cora dash past her and lunge for the Winchester rifle, hanging above the parlor mantelpiece. But Jacob and his friend stood in her way, blocking her. When Cora saw her brother, she faltered. A gasp came out of her. He took hold of her arms.
"Cora, please. We just want to talk."
Penny sat up and raised her hand to her cheek. Her fingers probed her skin. There would probably be a bruise before it healed. She tried to catch Cora's eyes, but her face was a bloodless mask. Penny looked away from her and began to cry. "You're crazy."
Adam knelt beside her on the floor. "Did she hurt you, Penny?" His eyes were big with concern. After helping her to her feet, he took a handkerchief out of his pocket and pressed it into her hand. "Here you go, dear."
Struggling loose from her brother's hold, Cora made another attempt to get the rifle. This time Adam restrained her, holding her around the waist, her arms pinned to her sides as she kicked and fought.
"You bastard!" she screamed.
Penny stared at her without moving. Without feeling anything except the pain along her cheekbone.
Jacob took the rifle down from its perch. Edging quickly past Adam and Cora, he handed it to Penny. "Put this away somewhere safe," he whispered.
"Penny!" Cora was pleading. "Penny, help me."
For five months she had lived with Cora and taken care of her baby. After all they had been through together, Cora had called her an idiot and slammed her into the doorjamb. The hateful gossip about Cora came back to her. That woman's dangerous, as crazy as they come. Well, now she'd gotten a taste of it. Penny turned her head and walked away.
"Penny, come back here!" Cora's voice was hoarse with rage. "I trusted you."
Carrying the rifle, Penny escaped through the kitchen and out the back door. In Cora's bedroom, the baby was crying, screaming like her mother. She heard someone—Jacob?—running up the stairs while Cora went on cursing. Penny's hands shook so hard, she had to put the rifle down on the stack of firewood on the porch. Drying her eyes with Adam's handkerchief, she noticed the initials crisply embroidered in the corner: AE.
She thought her legs would give out. She had to sit down on the splintering porch steps. Adam Egan. The handsome stranger was the man Cora had cut out of the pictures. And she had let him into the house. But none of it made sense. He seemed so reasonable, so kind. That story about him breaking down the door and knocking down Roy Hanson—well, that was just gossip she'd heard at Renfew's. She had no proof that it ever happened. Cora herself hadn't mentioned it. None of the stories she had heard seemed to match up with the actual man. If he was so awful, why had Cora's brother agreed to come along with him? She thought about the cut-up pictures in the photo album. There was so much about Cora she didn't know.
Her face buried in Adam's handkerchief, she listened to their voices.
"Please don't go on like that, Cora." Adam spoke gently. "I just want to talk to you. We brought a present for the baby."
"Jacob, get him out of here!"
"Cora." Jacob's voice was anguished. "Please. It doesn't have to be this ugly. I swear to you, we only came to have a rational discussion."
"I don't see what there is to discuss."
"Don't you think it's normal that he wants to see his daughter?"
"Well, how did he even know about the baby?" Betrayal shot through her voice. "You told him. I never should have written to you. He wouldn't have known if you hadn't—"
"Cora, I'm not the one who told him."
"He's telling the truth," Adam said. "I heard about it from people in town."
"Who would tell you that?"
"I'm sorry, Cora, but some people here think you're strange and talk about you behind your back."
All the while, Phoebe cried. They talked around her, occasionally drowning her out.
"He asked me to come along," Jacob said. "To persuade you to talk to him. He wants to reconcile with you. You don't have to go back to him, just hear him out. Please."
"I want to make my peace with you, Cora. It's time we sat down and talked it through."
She laughed bitterly.
"We have the child's welfare to consider. Now that I know I have a child. I want to make things better between us. I love you, Cora."
"Some kind of love."
"We've come all this way," said Jacob. "Now I'm going to leave you and Adam for an hour. You can decide yourself what you want to do, but at least talk to him first."
"You are not leaving me alone with him. Jacob! Don't you dare walk out that door! Don't you dare..."
Jacob stepped out on the porch and shut the door behind him. He was carrying the crying baby. "Let's go somewhere and let them talk," he said to Penny.
"Jacob!" Cora yelled from the other side of the closed door.
He started walking away from the house while Cora kept calling his name, her cries pursuing him across the back yard. The faster he moved, the more exaggerated his limp became. When Penny caught up with him, she didn't know what to say. Hand on her face, she nursed her sore cheek.
Jacob looked at her sideways with eyes just like Cora's. "Did she ever hurt you like that before?" He was shaking. "I've never seen her like that. So full of hate. I nearly didn't recognize her." Balancing Phoebe's weight in one arm, he rubbed his eyes. "We used to be so close."
Penny turned her head so he wouldn't see her cry. "I never thought she could do that to me."
They reached the orchard of trees stripped of their fruit. Only a few shriveled leaves clung to the gnarled branches. Jacob regarded his niece, who had stopped crying and now stared up at him.
"She looks just like her mother," he murmured. "When she was a baby."
"She's been a real good baby." Penny tried to make herself sound normal. "Just a little colic now and then."
They reached the hammock, full of dead leaves.
"So her name's Phoebe." Jacob seated himself on the edge of the hammock. "She picked a pretty name for her."
"Phoebe Helena." Penny watched him rock back and forth with the baby in his arms. He held her so tenderly, his face softening. He must love babies, she thought. This was obviously not the first rime he had held one. Phoebe seemed fascinated with him, too. She realized it was the first time the little girl had ever been held by a man.
"I didn't think Cora would be overjoyed," he said. "But I didn't think our visit would be like this, either." He bowed his head.
Penny took a deep breath. "She said she had to run away because he was cruel to her. She told you that, didn't she?"
Jacob laughed bleakly. "She didn't tell me a thing for the longest time." He paused. "I love my sister. I would never let anyone hurt her. If she had told me more, I might have been able to help her. But she had to do it all on her own."
Suddenly there were too many things crowding Penny's head, and none of them fit together.
"He begged me to come with him today. He thought I could coax her into being reasonable." Jacob shook his head. "I wish I knew what to do."
She sat down on the brittle autumn grass and hugged her knees to her chest. Jacob, she realized, was just as bewildered by all this as she was. "But do you believe her or not?" she insisted. "About Adam being cruel? She said her best friend wouldn't even believe her."
Jacob closed his eyes. "He swore to me that he never mistreated her. Of course, married people have their private problems. Something happened between them—probably a thing another woman could forgive. But Cora's not a forgiving person. She was always so extreme. Even as a child, she had the most terrible tantrums. She exaggerates things, flies into a passion."
Penny touched the sore skin around her cheekbone. She kept seeing Cora's face, that look of utter betrayal before she pushed her into the doorjamb. I trusted you.
"Once she has a grudge," Jacob said, "she holds on to it forever. Seems to forget that everyone is human just like her. Adam said that after she left him, he regretted every mistake he ever made. But she wouldn't even let him apologize."
"Did she tell you anything about why she left him?" Penny tried to imagine Cora writing out a letter to her brother.
Jacob was silent for a moment. "When he wrote to me saying that she ran away, I couldn't believe it. He was devastated. When he was a little boy, his mother abandoned the family and eloped with a lover. They never heard from her again. To have Cora run off like that was his worst nightmare. He really wanted children, too, so when he found out she had concealed the baby from him, he nearly fell apart. He told me he couldn't sleep at night thinking that Cora hated him and was here alone with the baby, living like some outcast. Then I wrote to her, wanting to hear her side of things. Six months went by without a word. So I wrote to her again."
She remembered the slim envelope with the foreign stamps and the unreadable look on Cora's face when she told her the letter had arrived.
"When she finally wrote me back, she didn't sound like herself anymore. Her handwriting was different, too. It was as though she was taken over by something else."
Penny shivered. Suddenly the ground beneath her had grown too cold. Struggling to her feet, she rubbed her arms to get warm.
"She's changed so much." Jacob looked lost. "She used to be so clever and accomplished. Beautiful, too. She dazzled everyone."
The pictures in the album, Penny thought. The beautiful debutante in the flowing gowns.
"Now she's so full of hate," he went on. "How can anyone live like that? And what about the baby? It's a horrible thing for a child to be set apart from the rest of the world on account of her parents' mistakes."
Penny stared at the naked branches clawing the sky. She saw her breath in the air. "Phoebe's going to catch a chill. Wrap her in your jacket."
Jacob passed Phoebe to her before taking off his jacket. While Penny swaddled the baby, Jacob pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his trouser pocket. He tried to light a match, but the wind blew out the flame. Phoebe began to cry. Penny hugged her tightly, rocking and soothing her. She held out her index finger for Phoebe to grab and made funny faces until the baby smiled and started drooling on her uncle's jacket. Jacob shivered in his thin sweater.
"You fooled me," she said. "I would never have let him in the house if I'd known he was her husband. Now Cora thinks I did it on purpose." She paused as Phoebe latched on to her braid. "She'll never go back to him. If that's what you think, you've got another thing coming."
"She doesn't have to go back to him," he said. "He just wants her to be civil and to acknowledge him as the father of her child. He wants to support her. There's no reason why Cora has to struggle all alone. If she wants to stay here, I'll stay with her, help her out with things. Families need to stick together in times like this."
Cora isn't exactly struggling all alone, Penny wanted to point out, she has me. But maybe that didn't count in the big picture. Jacob probably thought she was just a kid, a hired girl, good for chores but not someone who could help and protect Cora, or ease her out of her bitterness. She wasn't her real family.
"Cora says you have a fiancée in France," she said instead. "Won't she miss you if you stay here instead of going back there?"
Jacob nodded soberly. "It's not an easy choice to make. But I have to do something for my sister. Take a look at this." Reaching into his pocket for his wallet, he took out a small photograph.
Here was the young Cora with her long tresses wound around her head, her smiling face beside Adam's. He gazed at her with absolute devotion, as though he could not bear to look away. Penny had to admit that they made a handsome couple. They looked so happy together. Cora seemed to glow. Once she had been smitten with him, all right. But even more obvious was how much Adam adored her. He was too crazy about her, she thought, to let her go without a fight. Perhaps he loved her far more than she had ever loved him. Maybe that was where the trouble had started. She remembered fragments of the shouting match.
"How did he find out about the baby?" she asked. Adam said he had heard about it from people in town, but that didn't make sense. People might talk in Renfew's, but who would bother writing a letter full of local gossip to some stranger in Evanston, Illinois?
Jacob seemed reluctant to speak about it. "He hired a private detective."
Penny recalled the man she had seen at the store back in summer. The one with the tanned face standing near the pyramid of apples. "Why did he do that?"
"It's not what I would have done. But Adam said he had to do something. Trying to conceal a child from the father is serious business. She lied on the birth certificate."
"How do you know she lied?" Penny's face went hot.
Jacob looked at her for a second, then laughed. "She said unknown. Well, unless another man steps forward and claims that he's the father, the baby will be legally seen as Adam's."
This was so complicated, she didn't want to start thinking about it. She snuggled Phoebe for comfort. It was too cold out here. Of the three of them, only the baby was warm.
Jacob moved his foot over the grass. "I have to say, some of the things they dug up about her sound far-fetched. I know she's unconventional in the way she dresses and acts, but it seems a little too much to say she's guilty of transvestism." He looked pale. "They said she served intoxicating liquor to the Mexicans at harvest time." He gazed at Penny, his forehead wrinkling. "And to you, too, and you're underage."
Penny shrugged. "The others might have had some wine, but I never touched the stuff."
Jacob looked at her intently. "Then they said she was cozy with one of the Mexicans. Supposedly they have a sworn witness saying he saw them kiss. That in itself is grounds to have the baby taken away." He shook his head. "Did that really happen, Penny?"
"No," she said firmly. "I never saw her kissing anybody."
Sworn witness? Suddenly she faltered, breathing hard. Gilbert. That rat. It was all her fault—she was the one who believed his sad story, let him in the house. She was the one who talked Cora into giving him work, a place at their table. An invisible cord tightened around her throat. There aren't many people I trust. But I trust you. Her hands were so unsteady, she feared she would drop the baby. "Here," she whispered, delivering her into her uncle's arms. "Take her."
She was an idiot, all right. Let Adam into the house. Invited him right into the parlor. She felt herself stagger again from the way Cora had shoved her aside in her mad rush to get the rifle.
"Penny." Jacob looked at her as he rocked the baby. "You have to understand."
Phoebe's eyes moved back and forth as she hypnotized herself on the bare twigs and branches. A bird perched above them and sang a few feeble notes before flying away.
"Cora's all the family I have left," he said. "We used to be best friends. She told me everything. Adam saved my life. He's like a brother to me." Jacob swallowed hard, the tendons in his neck tightening. "I don't know how she thinks she can bring up a child living the way she does. A baby needs a father. I've seen so much go to ruin." He paused. "I just want them to be happy. Marriage isn't easy, you know. It takes work ... understanding. Both people have to keep trying. I gave him my word. I always worried about her. When she was nine years old, our parents gave her a pony."
Penny nodded, thinking of the photograph of Cora astride the shaggy pinto. My Birthday, 1907.
"She would ride it without saddle or bridle. Just hang on to the mane and then she'd be galloping away, breakneck, and suddenly she'd lift her arms and pretend she was flying. She'd be holding on to the pony with just her legs squeezing its flanks, egging it on faster. Our parents let her run wild. I was always afraid she'd get herself killed."
Penny squirmed. It was the cold sinking into her, going straight to her bladder. "Excuse me," she whispered, turning around.
"Where are you going?"
"I have to pee." She winced, saying it so plainly to a man.
"Don't go in the house," he said.
"I'll go to the outhouse," she muttered, already moving away from him. Phoebe began to cry. Left alone with a stranger. Penny wanted to turn back and hold her, but she was ready to burst. Walking fast, fists clenched, she made her way to the back yard, the clump of evergreen shrubs that hid the outhouse. She couldn't stomach that stinking hole, so she squatted in the grass, her skirt hitched around her hips. As she stumbled to her feet and pulled her underpants back up, she found herself peeking over the bushes at the house. An invisible tendril was tugging her. You couldn't live with someone for five months and take care of her baby without sharing something. Without loving her. Penny, help me. I trusted you. If Cora had been exaggerating about her husband, then she wanted to find out for herself.
The back door was closed. Penny pressed her ear against it but heard nothing. Creeping around the side of the house, she made for the outside trapdoor that led down to the cellar. She tugged on the iron ring, pulling the blistered door slowly, inch by inch. The wind hid any noise she made. Then she stole down the stone steps into the cellar, which was as wide as the house above it. She tiptoed across the cold earthen floor until she stood beneath the parlor. Adam's feet creaked overhead. His voice rang out, calm and measured. Splinters of sunlight shone through the gaps in the floorboards.
"...what do you say we wipe the slate clean?"
"You don't fool me."
"Come on, Cora." He let out a loud sigh. "Tell me how you're getting along out here. Give me an honest answer."
"I was doing just fine until you showed up." Venom flooded her voice.
He managed to respond without losing a beat. "You don't look fine. You look worn down. If you don't mind my saying it, you've aged."
"You mean I grew up," she said flatly. "I'm not some orphan girl you can push around—"
He cut her off. "Can you really handle this life?" He sounded genuinely concerned. "Running a farm and raising a baby on your own?"
"I told you, I just want to be left alone."
"What would happen if your hired girl got fed up and walked out on you? I think she just might do that, considering the way you belted her."
"I didn't belt her." Cora sounded as if she might cry. "I pushed her too hard ... by accident."
He laughed sadly. "Oh, Cora."
"You're a fine one to talk," she said.
"Say this girl is afraid to go anywhere near you now. What happens if she leaves? You'd never manage on your own."
"What happens if you get sick out here? Who'll take care of you and the baby? And what if the baby gets sick?"
"I'll get the doctor," she said tightly.
"You didn't even get the doctor when you went into labor."
Cora was silent.
"I think you'll agree that living alone out here isn't in your daughter's best interest. I think you know that deep down yourself." He waited for a minute, giving Cora a chance to speak. She did not reply.
"Have you ever thought what it's going to be like when she gets older? The way you dress and carry on, how are they going to treat her? Your daughter will be a pariah. You've turned yourself into a pariah. Well, you're condemning her to a life of hate and ridicule."
"How can you say—"
"You made a mistake, Cora. All right, I admit we both made our mistakes. But we can make everything better again. You have your brother back. He came all the way from Europe just to persuade you to come home."
"Your house is not my home." Her voice shook.
He ignored her remark. "We can be happy again." He sounded so seductive, like a movie actor who had the power to make any woman melt in his arms. "Don't you want to give your little girl a real family?"
"You're so full of lies."
"Cora. How can you say that? Everything I've told you is the honest truth. I think if you can be honest with yourself—"
She interrupted him. "If you really mean no harm, then turn around and go away. Now."
"It's not so simple, Cora. She's my daughter, too. I have a say in her upbringing."
"You have no proof of that," she said, a wicked satisfaction creeping into her voice.
"I told you we have all the proof we need. The detective gathered the evidence. The attorneys filed the papers."
"That's not what I'm talking about. You have no proof that she's your daughter."
It was the only time in the conversation that he faltered. Penny listened to Cora's footsteps. She seemed to be heading for the door. But then he must have stepped in her path and blocked her.
"You lied on the birth certificate." Something in his voice had changed. Penny took a step sideways and rubbed her cold arms.
Cora burst out laughing. "Oh, I'd like you to prove that I was lying."
Adam said something Penny couldn't catch. She heard his heavy footsteps and Cora's lighter ones backing away from him. He was pushing her into a corner.
"We can settle this among ourselves, Cora, or we can settle this in court. You decide. I think that even you have to admit we have enough evidence to have you declared unfit for motherhood."
"Why didn't you pay a visit earlier, then?" she asked. "If you already had all the paperwork in place in September?"
"I was waiting for your brother. You don't think I'd do this without his permission, do you?"
Penny felt something icy grip at her. He was lying. He had tricked Jacob, lied to him, too. Used Jacob to get his foot in the door.
Cora didn't speak. The silence stretched on for over a minute. Adam's feet moved forward, then Penny heard a sharp cry.
"Get your hands off me."
"I'm still your husband. I can touch you if I want."
The shuffle of feet overhead sent dust falling on Penny's face.
"I could have you put away. The detective says most people around here think you're insane. Even that little hired girl says you're crazy."
"She didn't say that."
"Oh, yes, she did. And your brother was there to witness it. Jacob's already signed the papers to have you committed."
Don't believe him, Penny wanted to shout. She wanted to run and get Jacob, but Adam would just twist her words around and say that she was lying.
"You're wrong. He would never..." Cora's voice trailed off into a choking sputter.
Penny couldn't breathe. A weight was pressing down on her, forcing the air from her lungs.
"So tell me what it was like when you kissed that Mexican. What's the matter, sweetheart? Wasn't I good enough? You had to do it with some wetback?"
"Stop it!"
Penny heard a body slam against the wall, then a drawn-out scream.
"Jacob!"
But off in the orchard, Jacob would never hear his sister crying his name. Penny heard a thud, a body falling to the floor. She listened to Cora struggle, then hit the floor again, sobbing helplessly. Adam was breaking her down, piece by piece.
"I'll do anything you want," she told him. "Just stop."
But he wouldn't stop.
Penny's feet made no noise as she climbed the cellar steps. Hired girls could be quieter than anyone, quieter than thieves. On the porch, she had to wipe the sweat from her palms and press them against her thighs until they stopped shaking. Then she took the rifle from the top of the woodpile and slipped in the door. She stole through the kitchen and into the parlor. His back was to her. He was bending over Cora, who thrashed on the floor.
"Let her go." Penny had meant to shout, but her voice came out in a whimper. He spun around in less time than it took her to draw breath. She wasn't braced to fire, hadn't remembered to cock the trigger. For a moment, he looked thrown. Then he jumped forward and wrestled the rifle away from her.
Cora came at him from behind, tried to get it, but he swung around and struck her in the face with the rifle butt. Penny watched her go down. It all happened so fast. While his back was still turned, Penny grabbed a vase and hurled it, hitting the back of his head. She watched him turn and stumble, then she sprang forward and wrenched the rifle from his hands. Cora was still on the floor. In a second, Penny had the rifle braced against her shoulder. She cocked to fire, her finger on the trigger.
When he staggered to his feet, his face was taut with rage. She no longer recognized him as the smiling man she had shown into the house. His eyes met hers with a force that made her tremble and nearly drop the rifle. She was standing between him and the door, blocking his escape. Her mind moved fast, trying to figure out what a man like him would do when he had been caught knocking his wife around. Some stupid hired girl had witnessed how he behaved in private.
"Penny, watch out!" Cora shrieked, but then her voice was lost.
Be fast, be fast. A voice inside ordered her to step aside and let him out. She only had to let him pass. Even with her as Cora's witness, no one would take a hired girl's word over a surgeon's. She was just Penny Niebeck, no threat to this man. Nothing she said or did would have the power to hurt him. But, clumsy in her terror, she couldn't step away fast enough. The image of a pressure cooker flashed through her brain. The parlor was a pressure cooker with Adam and Cora trapped inside. She was the lid. Now the temperature was so high, the whole thing would explode unless she ...
She stepped back, but not soon enough. He was coming straight at her. Cora was face down, no longer moving.
"Look what you did to my wife. Look what you did. We were just having a conversation."
Coming straight at her. The force that had moved Cora's hands when she pushed her against the doorjamb, that had moved her mother's hand when she slapped her, now screamed in her body. Something ignited inside her, telling her to pull the damn trigger. She would miss, of course she would. It was just to keep him from taking the rifle away. Who knows what he would do if he got the rifle again? She told herself, Just shoot and miss. Then he would run past her out the door, run to Jacob in the orchard and tell him that the fool girl nearly shot him.
He was coming at her with a face so frightening it made her cry out. It was something automatic, some instinct that moved her finger on the trigger. She forgot to brace. The impact threw her back against the wall. She screamed at the roar of it, a Winchester rifle going off in a parlor. Outdoors the sound would have rung out over the fields, echoing away, but here it had nowhere to go. It could only ricochet against the walls with their faded paper, that pattern of blue morning glories. A pressure cooker. She was the lid and then it had blown.
She had never thought what happened if you shot a man in the chest at such close range. The force knocked him against the far wall. He slid to the floor, his pure white sweater ripped open from the single bullet, his wound like raw meat. His blood puddled on the oak floorboards. No amount of scrubbing and bleach would ever make that stain disappear. His eyes were frozen wide open.
A noise wrenched out of her throat. If she telephoned Dr. Lovell, he would come with the police. He would open his black book and make her sign her name with his silver fountain pen. It would go on record. A minute ago, that man had been alive. Now he was...
"Cora."
Rising from her broken huddle on the floor, Cora stared at her, then at her husband. Her face was white as candle wax. His white sweater had gone red. Saturated. Penny couldn't look anymore at what she had...
"Cora, here." She held out the rifle. "Take it." When Cora reached for the Winchester, her hands were shaking hard.
"I'm sorry," Cora whispered, her face twisting to the side. "Penny, I'm so sorry." Her jaw was puffy from the blow with the rifle butt. Her nose was bleeding.
They heard footsteps, the baby's wailing. Jacob appeared in the parlor doorway. His face went papery when he viewed the body on the floor and then his sister with the rifle in her hands. He looked at Penny, who covered her face and began to cry. Before she could say a word, Cora spoke, each word loud and distinct.
Penny uncovered her face and shook her head. Jacob only looked at his sister, who wiped the blood from her nose on her shirtsleeve.
Jacob's eyes were red. He started blinking hard. "My God. Cora."
Cora set the rifle down and, skirting past her husband's body, went to take Phoebe from Jacob's arms. Without the baby's weight to anchor him, Jacob seemed to collapse, leaning against the doorjamb. He breathed in quick and shallow puffs. Penny watched his collar go up and down, up and down.
She had to say something. If she didn't speak up, she would be guilty of something even worse. "No. Cora didn't do it."
Cora cut her off. "You are my witness," she told her brother. "I shot him. Penny came in when she heard the shots. Penny, this is between me and my brother. Take the baby upstairs." She pressed the baby into Penny's arms, then pushed her out of the room.
"But Cora." Penny was faint, the inside of her mouth so bitter she feared she would vomit. "I did it." Her words were lost as Cora closed the parlor door in her face.
"She's in shock," she heard Cora tell Jacob on the other side of the door. "She's just a child, and look at what she saw."
Phoebe thrashed in her arms. The baby had wet and soiled herself in her uncle's jacket. On weak legs, Penny forced herself up the stairs to Cora's room. She laid a towel on Cora's dresser, then set the baby down, stripping the stinking layers off her. It was the messiest diaper she had ever seen. Wetting a cloth at the washstand, she wiped Phoebe's bottom clean. Wiping a baby's bottom with the same hands that had just shot a man.
"We have to call the police," she heard Jacob say. His voice came from directly beneath her—they had moved to the kitchen.
"None of this would have happened," said Cora, "if you'd just left me alone."
"He swore he would never hurt you."
"I bet he told you all kinds of things."
What Jacob said next was too muffled for Penny to make out.
"Listen to me, Jacob. He fooled you. Just like he fooled everyone."
Penny managed to pin a fresh diaper on Phoebe and find fresh clothes for her. A clean blanket to wrap her in. Although the baby wanted to be held, she put her in her quilt-lined basket, which she had nearly outgrown. Bundling together the soiled diaper, blanket, and Jacob's ruined jacket, she stepped out into the hallway. She should go down right now and soak the whole mess in the laundry tub, but she...
"I'm sorry," he said. "Cora, if I had known, I would never have come out with him. I'm so sorry."
"Are you going to turn me in?" she heard Cora ask. "You know, they could put me in the electric chair."
The smell of scorching pumpkin began to overpower the stench of baby shit.
"All I'm asking is twenty-four hours before you tell anyone," said Cora. "Just give me a chance to escape."
Someone downstairs began to weep in hoarse jagged gulps. It wasn't Cora, Penny realized after a few seconds. She heard Jacob ask his sister if there was anything to drink in the house.
"There's wine in the cellar," Cora said. "Just sit down. I'll get it for you." She heard Cora go out. Penny remembered she had left the cellar door wide open.
This was completely out of hand. Jacob thought his sister had killed the man who had saved his life in the war. She had to go down there, tell him the truth. Call the police herself.
She stood at the top of the stairs, about to take the first step down, when she heard Jacob sobbing again. Cora returned to the kitchen and tried to comfort him. She, too, was weeping. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. Their voices blurred together. Turning around, Penny retraced her steps to Cora's room, scooped the complaining baby out of the basket, and sat on the edge of Cora's bed.
Phoebe wouldn't stop crying. After a while she started screaming. It had been hours since Cora had last nursed her. Finally, after the room had turned golden with the light of early evening, Penny heard Cora come up the stairs. She looked different; the swollen skin on her jaw had turned sickly yellow. Something in her eyes looked glassy and haunted, as though she really had been the one to fire the rifle. It hurt just to look at her face. Without a word, Cora took the baby and opened her shirt. Penny walked to the window and looked out at the touring car with its leather roof. It seemed to rest lower on the ground somehow. It had to be a trick of the light, of the long shadows cast by the low, blinding sun.
"Did you take the pot off the stove?" Penny asked. "It was burning."
"Yes, Penny. I took care of the pot."
She turned to look at her, a woman with a worn-out, beaten face and a baby at her breast. Cora was in tears. "I hurt you, didn't I? When I pushed you like that. I never meant to hurt you."
Penny's hand automatically found the sore spot on her cheekbone. "Why did you lie to your brother? I did it!"
"Honey, don't shout like that. We'll talk about it later. I promise."
"But—"
"Penny, please. I have to stay calm while I'm doing this. Could you start packing your things?"
She had to breathe in fast to keep the blackness from rushing into her head. "Pack?"
"We can't stay here anymore. You know that."
Penny went across the hall to the room with its shelves of books that had been her world for the past five months. Avoiding the mirror, she tore off her dress. It must be marked with blood. She put on an old winter dress of scratchy wool that was too tight across the chest. Pulling out her flimsy wicker suitcase, she packed her clothes and squeezed her schoolbooks in around the edges. She packed Javier's carved wooden bird. When she set her suitcase in the hallway, she saw that Cora, too, was packing, working fast, with fierce concentration. Phoebe lay in her basket, lulled into a milky sleep.
"Take your suitcase down and put it in the back of the pickup," Cora told her. "Put your bicycle in there, too."
"Where are we going?"
"I'm not driving through Minerva, but I can take you to Sandborn."
Something cold washed over Penny. Sandborn, where the county court and prison were. The county asylum, where they'd sent Sadie Ostertag for axing her four children.
"Penny, we need to hurry. When you go downstairs, don't talk to my brother. Just leave him be."
Penny found him slumped in the rocking chair, facing the wall. A drained glass and an open wine bottle rested beside him on the floor. Had he passed out, she wondered, or was he in a state of shock? Either way, it didn't matter. She slipped out the door. After she had loaded her suitcase and her bicycle into the pickup, she remembered the animals—if she wasn't there to feed them, they would die. There was so little time. She ran into the barn to fork down hay for the cow, then raced to the poultry pens and opened the doors so the chickens and geese could escape. There were still late berries in the woodlot for them to forage. The chickens probably wouldn't survive the winter, but the geese would. She was convinced they would turn wild. They were fierce enough to thrive, to defend themselves from bobcats and foxes. Even when the snow lay thick on the ground, they would endure somehow—they were that tough. Their clipped wings would grow back and they would fly away.
She crept past Jacob and back up the stairs. "Did you pack all the clean diapers?" she asked.
Cora was holding a thick winter coat of royal-blue wool. "This was meant to be your Christmas present." She handed the coat to Penny. "Put it on and button up. It's supposed to snow tonight." Then she gave Penny the basket where the baby slept. Picking up her suitcase, Cora led the way down the stairs, stopping to get her rifle. Jacob still sprawled in the rocking chair, his face turned to the wall. Penny noticed an envelope on the kitchen table, the words To Whom It May Concern made out in Cora's elegant script.
"We have to go." Cora stepped between Penny and the kitchen table, blocking her view of the envelope.
"What about your brother?" Penny whispered.
"Leave him be."
When they climbed into the pickup, the sun was low in the sky. A sharp crescent moon hung over the horizon—a new moon. Penny knew it was setting, not rising. Tonight the moon would set along with the sun.