The Night Mark(52)

When she went back into the house, she nearly knocked over Dolly, who was perched on a ladder in the center of the living room floor. She was cleaning the glass mantels on the light fixtures. The stuff on her cleaning rag wasn’t just dirt. It looked like soot. Was that a side effect of gas lighting? Soot everywhere? No wonder Dolly put “clean house lamps” at the top of her chore list. Soot plus gas plus heat could equal a house fire. Was there anything in 1921 that wasn’t specially designed to kill her? She should go outside in the next thunderstorm and throw metal lawn darts while eating some lead-based paint and huffing asbestos dust. How did anyone survive to adulthood? Many didn’t, Faye knew, including Faith Morgan. Faith had drowned last night, hadn’t she? And now Faye was here taking her place, living the life Faith would have lived. For what purpose, Faye couldn’t begin to guess, but she would give anything to know.

Faye puzzled it over as she helped Dolly clean the downstairs lamps. Soon she was too tired to think of anything. Her arms ached. Her back ached. Her neck ached. Living in the past was literally a pain in the neck. Did naps exist in 1921? Even if they didn’t, Faye would invent them.

When they finished the lamps, Faye called it a day before she fainted from the heat and the exertion. She stripped down to her slip and lay on top of the covers in her room. It was hot and stuffy in the house but she was too exhausted to care. The moment her head hit the pillow, she was out, and she dreamed of nothing, not even Will.

Eventually hunger pains woke Faye from the deepest, hardest, most dreamless sleep of her life. Hunger and the pressure in her bladder. She pulled her sore and tired body off the bed, groaning like an old man forced to rise from his rocking chair. When she fumbled for the light switch on the wall, she remembered the house had no light switches. Reaching up she pulled the cord for the gas lamp on the ceiling. A dim light no brighter than the tail of a single firefly sputtered into existence. Earlier today while cleaning the lamps with Dolly, she’d learned the secret of operating the lights—the right cord turned the lamp on, and the left cord turned it off. Simple enough. But as the lamps took several minutes to reach their full brightness, a candle or a kerosene lantern was the better option when light was needed immediately.

By the flickering light of the gas lamp, Faye found a match, a candle and a small silver candleholder. She slipped out of her room and into the hall, not bothering to put anything on over her white slip. Apart from her single small fire, the house was cloaked in inky darkness and eerie quiet. Would she ever grow accustomed to living in a house devoid of the usual sounds of modern life? The buzz of a refrigerator. The soft roar of air-conditioning. The whir of a ceiling fan. The hum of fluorescent lighting. Nothing made noise in this house but her feet, her breathing and the hardwood floors as she crept across their boards to the bathroom.

“Dolly?” Faye called out before realizing how incredibly pointless that was. Surely she’d gone home by now anyway. How long had Faye slept? It was dark out, but that could mean the sun had just set or the sun was close to rising again.

After leaving the bathroom, Faye took her candle and crept down the stairs.

“Carrick?” she called out and received no answer. She raised her candle to the mantel clock and read the time—ten thirty. She’d slept for six straight hours, and Carrick was up at the lighthouse already. She made a mental note that if she ever got back to 2015, she’d write a book on the cure for insomnia she’d discovered in 1921—backbreaking manual labor.

Faye took advantage of the empty house to snoop some more. Luckily Faith had been living at the lighthouse for hardly more than a week, according to Carrick, so it made sense she’d still be settling in and learning the ropes. Faye had to wonder how Faith had gotten here and why she’d chosen to flee to Carrick after receiving what must have been a brutal beating by her husband, Marshall something. Faye admired the girl for running away. That was probably a rare feat in 1921, when even the law took the side of abusive husbands. The law, the Church and society, as Carrick had said. If Faith had trusted Carrick with her life, perhaps Faye could, too.

Unfortunately, Faye found no useful clues about Faith as she poked her nose in drawers and cabinets. The single item she found of interest was a telegram addressed to Carrick.





Chief Morgan

Received news that your daughter will join you at Seaport Station

Pleased to have additional personnel at light





Records updated





Our thanks for your service

It was signed by Beck, Sixth District Superintendent, and dated three days ago. Carrick had taken quite a risk lying to his supervisors about her. He was a good man, which made it even harder to be there. Surely a good man deserved to know the truth, but Faye couldn’t bring herself to tell him. What would she tell him even if she could?

Carrick, I know I look like Faith and sound like Faith, but I’m not her...

Carrick, do you believe in reincarnation?

Carrick, have you ever seen the TV show Quantum Leap?

No, none of those would work. She had no choice but to go on playing this role until God or fate or whoever was pulling the strings sent her back where she belonged. If that ever happened. She’d tried. She’d gone out to the water last night, waded in and waited for a wave to strike her and drag her under again. It seemed as if Faith had been doing the same thing last night. But not quite. She hadn’t been wading in the water; she’d been standing on the end of the pier. It was worth a try anyway.