Friday, April 12, evening
Both sides in Charleston were still firing late that afternoon. Faces at Wiscasset taverns were getting grimmer, but only a few men still waited at the telegraph office. Events were happening more slowly than most had thought. Or hoped.
Meals had to be cooked, oxen shod, boats caulked, babies fed. Life must go on.
Owen and Charlie left the office to get their suppers, but I stayed to complete the week’s accounts and ensure supplies for next week’s Herald and any special editions were in order. Knocking on wood, I figgered I could just make it through the next ten days before Mr. Shuttersworth showed up with his hand out.
I’d said a silent prayer of thanks when Mr. Dana came by in the afternoon to order business cards for his pharmacy. Luckily, I had plenty of the heavier paper the cards required. It’d take a dozen special orders like his to come up with the cash I needed, but every order counted. I’d already started Owen setting type for the cards.
Warm daytime temperatures had fallen sharply. Now thick fog filled the streets. My boots skidded where the morning’s puddles had frozen. I was glad to reach home and inhale the welcoming smells of chicken broth and baked bread. It was a minute or so before I realized Trusty hadn’t greeted me at the door.
“Trusty?” I called. “Trusty?”
“Trusty’s in the yard,” Ma called from upstairs. “I was about to bring him in. This dank fog’s no weather for even a dog to be out in for long. Thank goodness you’re home.”
I lit the tin kerosene lantern with the glass front and went outside. “Trusty?” No answering bark. I checked the dooryard fence for openings. Small paw prints were all over the muddy earth, but there were no holes in or under the fence. Trusty must have climbed the woodpile again and jumped over the fence into our neighbor’s yard.
I held the lantern out as far as I could. Sure enough, a half-dozen logs had fallen from the top of the pile into the yard.
If Trusty had left the yard, he’d have headed for Water Street. I worked there, and Mr. Chase’s butcher shop on Union Wharf was his favorite stop. Mr. Chase always gave him a treat. But no one would be at the butcher shop at this time of night.
“Ma?” I called up the stairs leading to our sleeping chambers. “Trusty’s gotten out. He’s probably headed toward the river. I’m going after him.”
Ma came to the top of the stairs. “Do be careful, Joe. The fog and black ice will be worse on the piers than here.”
“Trusty could slip into the Sheepscot.”
“As could you. Step sharply.”
“I will, Ma.”
By now, even the mud on the empty streets was freezing. Most people in Wiscasset were safe and warm behind shuttered windows glimmering with oil lamps. The telegraph office and taverns were open, but they weren’t close to where I guessed Trusty’d gone.
I held the lantern ahead of me, low, hoping the light would be reflected in invisible patches of ice on the narrow street. I skidded twice, and once slid and landed on my rear, spilling some of the oil from the lamp onto the frozen mud. The oath that came from my lips was not the sort I’d print in a family newspaper.
Long wharves met the land at Water Street. Shops and stalls there sold everything needed by the mariners and their vessels that sailed from the Sheepscot River. A few tradesmen lived above the stores, but at this time of night the southern end of the street was left to the tides and bats and night birds.
Now was the season when small vessels were pulled out of dry dock for summer, shipyards launched winter-built vessels, and ships set sail for foreign seas after wintering in port for repairs and time ashore for their captains and crews.
“Trusty!” I called out, peering ahead through the mists. “Trusty, come!”
The fog was heaviest here, in some places obscuring vessels and piers entirely. Swirling in lacy patterns, it teased me, lifting momentarily to reveal a docked ship or shuttered shop. I aimed my lantern so its light wouldn’t be reflected in the mist. I’d been confused by shimmering ghostlike reflections in past fogs. I shivered, remembering.
Every few minutes I called again. “Trusty!”
If there were spirits in Wiscasset, they would be here now. If the dead came back to what they loved, then Ethan would be here, for sure. He’d loved the sea, and the soft mysteries of the fog.
“Trusty! Come!” The masts on the ships anchored in the harbor looked like a forest of leafless trees that appeared and then disappeared. Where was that dog?
Arf!
The sound wasn’t close by. Maybe I’d only heard the low moan of a ship’s rigging grinding against its mast.
“Trusty!”
ARF!!
This time I was sure: The bark was louder. I ran, carefully, toward the sound—toward the corner where Water Street met Main Street, and then Main Street became the red Long Bridge across the Sheepscot. In winter ice gathered around the bridge’s pilings, and the wooden bridge itself became a treacherous pathway of thick ice. Even now, black ice from the dampness and fog would cover the boards, making them slick and dangerous. Trusty wouldn’t have ventured onto the bridge, would he? A small dog could easily slip off into the icy salt water.
I called again. “Trusty?”
The answering bark was soft, but close by. I turned. For a moment the fog cleared, and it looked like the mist circled around a slight figure standing in the doorway of Mr. Pinkham’s stationery store.
Then Trusty ran toward me, feet slipping wildly on the ice but tail wagging like mad. I dropped the lantern and swept him up in my arms, burying my face in fur wet with fog. His tongue lapping my face was rough and warm.
“There you are! You should have known better than to run away in the fog!” Trusty’s whole body shook with delight.
“I can see he’s your dog.” The white-hooded figure stepped carefully out of the mist.
“What are you doing out in this weather?” I asked, staring. “It’s dangerous on the streets.”
Nell Gramercy laughed. “You’re here, too! I couldn’t stand being inside any longer. I wanted to see the river in the fog.”
“There isn’t just fog. There’s black ice—ice you can’t see. You’d best get back to your inn.”
Nell hesitated. “Your dog . . . you called him Trusty? Trusty found me. I was staring at the river. It changes, you know, every second. I saw faces there, in the mist.”
I gulped. “I’ve lived here all my life. I assure you, there are no people on the river now, miss.”
Nell shrugged. She was as small as I remembered; her head only came up to my shoulder. “Sometimes there are people no one else sees. What is across the bridge?” She took another step toward me and slipped on the ice. I grabbed her arm to keep her from falling.
“I’m afraid I came north unprepared.” She stuck out her foot, displaying a stylish leather boot clearly not meant to be worn on icy streets. “I expected April to be warmer.” Even in the gray mist I could see her blush. “Before you got here I tried to walk back up the hill, but I slipped. And fell.”
She held out her left hand, as a child would do to show a sore spot. The palm of her thin white kid glove was torn. Kid gloves sold in our store were expensive. Most women in town wealthy enough to own a pair saved them for elegant occasions.
“I’ll get you back to the inn,” I said. “That’s Long Bridge—longest bridge in the State of Maine, folks say—more than three thousand feet long. It goes over to Davis Island, in Edgecomb. You can’t see the island now, because of the fog.”
“Do many people live there? I thought of walking across before I found out how icy it was.”
“A few families. And Fort Edgecomb is there. It was built to protect Wiscasset during the War of 1812.”
“It’s old, then.”
“People talk about fixin’ it up, but never seem to do so. It’s a nice spot for a picnic. Or a game of hide-’n’-seek for children in summer.”
Nell shivered. “I’m cold. I’ll let you help me to the inn. I’m staying at the Mansion House.”
I put Trusty down, hoping he’d stay with us. Nell took my arm as though she were a grown woman, not a twelve-year-old. No one had ever taken my arm before. I sure hoped I didn’t fall on my rear again while she was trusting me to help her stay upright.
I held the lantern and we started carefully up the hill.
“I should introduce myself,” she said. “I’m Nell Gramercy, from Albany, New York. No one knows I left the inn. My aunt and uncle think I’m resting. They’d be furious with me if they knew I’d left. I’m embarrassed at having to ask for help, but I don’t know how to get back up the hill without falling again.”
“I’m Joe Wood, from Wiscasset, Maine.” I grinned, thinking how Charlie would howl if he could see me now. “I own a newspaper and print business in town. I know who you are. I’ve heard you can talk to the dead.”
“Spirits of the departed come to me,” Nell corrected. “I don’t know why, or how. It’s been happening since I was very young.”
“My father was at your spirit circle the other night. You delivered a message from my older brother, Ethan.”
“I remember your father, and the spirit of your brother. Your brother was young when he moved on, wasn’t he?”
“He was fifteen when he died.”
“I’m sorry.” She paused. “I had brothers, too, once. I hope the message helped your father.”
I nodded. “It did. Pa seems to be sorrowing less. He’s helping Ma at our store again.”
“I’m glad. Spirits come to me because they’re not at peace, or because they feel someone they left behind is not.”
We made our way carefully up the street, Trusty following close behind.
“Then you really hear the voices of dead people?” I couldn’t help but ask her directly.
“Not all the time. And I don’t hear them exactly; I sense them,” said Nell. “It’s hard to explain. And it’s very tiring. That’s why I was lying down this afternoon. I had one of my headaches.”
“Ma gets headaches. She drinks peppermint tea or powdered charcoal in water.”
“Does that help her?”
“I guess. She doesn’t have to lie down a lot.”
“She’s lucky. Sometimes my headaches last for days, and I can’t eat or sleep. My uncle gives me medicine, but it doesn’t take the pain away; it lifts me above the pain. Sometimes I wish I didn’t have commitments to people. Then I could hide in a dark place for hours. This afternoon I felt a little better and hoped some fresh salt air would clear away the pain and shadows.”
“Has it?”
“I guess it has.” Nell smiled. “I’ve been so worried about getting back to the inn over the ice I haven’t had a chance to think about my head. I must be better!”
Up the hill, a block ahead of us, several men were standing outside the telegraph office.
“Wait,” Nell said, stopping. “Why are all those men there?”
“Waiting to hear the latest news from Charleston,” I explained. “The telegraph office is in Mr. Johnston’s store.”
“Then take me to the back door of the inn, please.”
“But that’s half a block farther than the front door.”
“I don’t want anyone in town to see me. They might start asking me questions about the future, or about their loved ones. And my uncle will be sitting with his brandy and cigar in the tavern or lobby of the Mansion House. He’d be furious if he knew I’d gone out alone. The back door is best.”
“How did you leave without his seeing you?”
Nell grinned and tightened her grip on my arm as we made our way across a patch of thick ice. “Down the back stairway and through the kitchen. My aunt was napping, and the maid told me how.” She squeezed my arm. “They don’t usually leave me alone. I’ve tried to get away on my own other times, but never managed before.”
“Get away? You mean you can never leave your aunt and uncle?” Of course, girls had to stay closer to home than boys. But Nell was famous. She traveled. Somehow I’d expected her to have more freedom than others.
“My aunt and uncle schedule my work so I have little spare time. They say they’re protecting me from this world, so I can more innocently speak with the next.” She grimaced. “Perhaps so. But I miss the freedom I had growing up, when my spirits were free to come and go as they pleased, not as my uncle demanded. And I was free to explore this world as well as the next.” She had wide blue eyes. “I love the scent of the sea, and the softness of the fog, here. But if I don’t return to the Mansion House soon, I fear my uncle will be very angry.” She quickly corrected herself. “He’ll be concerned about my well-being.”
“Then, Miss Gramercy, I shall conduct you back to the kitchen.”
“It’s Nell,” she said. “I get so tired of people calling me ‘Miss Gramercy.’ I’d like to be just plain Nell to someone besides my aunt and uncle! And, after all, you’ve saved me from being frozen by the river.”
Trusty barked.
“And, of course, Trusty, you must call me Nell, too.”
What would Charlie think? Miss Gramercy—Nell—seemed just like anyone else. Excepting she talked to dead folks, of course. But the way she spoke about it, she could have been describing the color of her hair, or how tall she was. It was just part of her, something she could do.
How could I write an article saying Nell was tricking everyone if she really did hear voices? Some religious folks said God talked to them, and no one said they were crazy. How was this any different?
I slept little that night, trying to puzzle it out.