Chapter Six

I saw Annie later the next afternoon, crossing the lawn with the torch in her hand, the other shielding the fire from the wind. I didn’t know it at the time, but it was the last time I would see her alive.

Annie did not appear for dinner, and though I thought nothing of it, Mrs. Amber was bothered by her absence.

“Have you seen Annie?” she asked me.

“I saw her crossing the lawn with a torch, just before dinner,” I replied.

“Yes, that was what I thought.” She pushed absently at her food. “You don’t think she would go to the glass house? Inside?” But she quickly answered her own question. “No, not her.”

“I’m certain she’s okay, most likely Mr. St. Claire had a job for her.” To hear those words aloud pricked me with jealousy. I was ashamed for it, and rushed on speaking. “She’ll show up any moment.”

“Probably,” said Mrs. Amber, distractedly.

If only at that moment I had the foresight to know the complex web that was enveloping me. Perhaps at that very moment I would have risen and instinctively known that her life was at risk. Perhaps it might not have been too late; we could have found her in time. But I shall never know, because in my naiveté, my childish, self-absorbed ignorance, I could not see what was right before me.

We finished dinner and I put away the dishes while Mrs. Amber went to search the house for Annie. I went to my room, set aside the meat for Maxie and lay on the bed, hoping that Annie would return and that I could sneak out again later. But that was not to be.

Mrs. Amber knocked on my door a short time later. “Mr. St. Claire is organizing a party to search for Annie. We have checked the glass house. She was not there. Mr. St. Claire does not want you along. He told me specifically to lock you in your room.” There was a note of accusation hanging in her voice, but she was too concerned about Annie to pursue it. “I’m going to join him. You might hear us calling out.”

I lay there in my bed as my room darkened and went to black. Strange, panicked voices carried on the wind and for the first time, a real fear for Annie crossed my mind. Where had she gone?

Poor Lucas, forced to relive yet again the search for a missing woman.

I heard Maxie at my window, but she was restless, and spooked by the yells and shouts. She would not come to the window, so I tossed my food onto the ground, and she grabbed it and slinked off into the shadows.

Time stilled, and I counted the passing moments from shout to shout, knowing with each call of their voices that she had not yet been found. Finally, sometime long after I lay down, I slept, but my dreams were furtive. I dreamed of Celeste, that I was searching the island for her, but I could not locate her.

* * *

They found Annie in the morning.

Another servant came and unlocked my door, telling me the gravity of the situation. I went straight to the cliffs, seeing the group of people gathered there. When I arrived and peered over the side, I turned aside, closing my eyes, but I could not push away the image that I had seen.

There was Annie’s body, petite and lifeless, facedown in the shallow waves. With each swell of the water, her arms and legs would move, and in a horrible comedy of sorts, she looked like she was trying to climb the rocks, to rescue herself, as if she did not yet realize that it was already far too late.

The torches were still lit all the way down the stairs, except for the last, the one closest to the house. I recalled the first time I met her, when she was carrying the torch and told me of her reluctance to light the bottom torch. I wondered if she had fallen before she lit it? Or had she refused, and fallen on her return to the manor? I suppose it didn’t matter, but somehow her fear, her aversion of the glass house weighed on my mind.

The glass house. It was brilliant that morning, in the soft light of the rising sun. Pinks and gold colors spun through its walls and blazed in an ecstasy of color. It was almost vulgar against the backdrop of human suffering. But still it blazed on, without regard to poor Annie’s plight. Indeed, I had never seen it lit by the morning light, and it was pristine, more beautiful than I had ever seen it before.

I hung there, suspended, transfixed, watching the men as they descended the stairs in a single file. The sheriff was at the lead, his uniform and hat a commanding sight. Two of the men waded into the knee-deep water, climbing over the rocks, and when they reached her body they hesitated before lifting her.

It was a relief to see how gentle they were when lifting her body. It was then that I looked away, overcome with emotion and grief, and a new memory, of my jealous thought when she and I had heated words. What was it that I had thought? I had wished she were out of my life. Out of his life. How awful.

It was a perfect morning, the sky a thin, high color of blue, only a few strands of clouds that would be brushed away by the wind. I felt a hand at my elbow, and I looked to see Mr. St. Claire beside me.

“It is an unthinkable tragedy,” he said. His face was impassive as stone, and yet I saw the lines between his brows were deepened by his sleepless night of worry.

“I did not know her very well,” I said in an almost apologetic tone. “Not yet, at least.”

“Now that opportunity is taken forever.”

“Just like that,” I continued. “It seems horrible how quickly a life can be snatched away.”

His lips drew together, his whole face tightened.

“I’m sorry,” I said quickly, realizing too late the error of my impulsive words. “How thoughtless of me.”

“Nonsense,” he replied coolly, dismissively. “One tragedy has nothing whatsoever to do with the other.” His words were so certain, said with complete authority, and yet I sensed doubt in his words.

One simple fact lay unspoken between us and it burned brighter than any torch. I had wished her gone. I choked back a sob, a confusing mixture of guilt and sorrow, and Lucas patted my back. I peered again at his face, searching for any signs of grief that pointed to something deeper than that of an employer. There was none, only his firm bearing and impassive gaze, staring straight ahead into the wind.

The sheriff and his men had strapped Annie’s body to a stretcher, and had begun the arduous task of carrying her lifeless form up the staircase. I noticed Mrs. Amber at the top of the staircase, standing resolutely with her hands folded over her waist.

When the men reached her, she moved aside, and reached out gently to touch a lock of Annie’s dark hair that had slipped out from beneath the sheet. Such a simple gesture, and yet it seemed so extreme to come from such a harsh woman. I warmed a bit to Mrs. Amber in that moment.

Lucas had left my side and gone to walk beside the sheriff. The sheriff handed Mr. St. Claire the torch, now darkened with seawater, and Lucas walked with his usual stiff gait, looking thoughtfully at the torch as he talked to the sheriff.

Mrs. Amber approached me. “Mr. St. Claire has given the staff the day off,” she said. “There will be an inquest, of course, though it seems to be a formality. It looks like a true accident.”

My heart felt black as night. “I prefer to work, Mrs. Amber. To keep busy.”

She nodded and said absently, “Idle hands.” She turned to the manor and began to walk away. “Well, if you’re going to get on with it, I have a list for you. I suppose that we’ll need someone new to light the torches.”

“I’ll do it,” I said quickly, no hesitation at all.

“Well that’s the quickest anyone has ever offered before. You’re a good girl to be quick to step up and fill Annie’s role.”

When we reached the mansion, Mrs. Amber was true to her word, and supplied me with a list of duties that kept me busy all day long.

Mr. St. Claire left the next day on a business trip, and it took many weeks for things to settle into a normal but somber pattern. I quickly took to lighting the torches each evening and did my best not to look down where Annie had fallen. I went to the glass house as often as I dared and Maxie was my only company. Her belly was growing and she was forced to waddle along beside me, her belly swaying from side to side.

The sheriff declared Annie’s death an accident, and the house seemed to return to life a little bit after that. It wasn’t until Mr. St. Claire returned that things began to slide from bad to worse.