The Winter People(69)

“But Gertie wasn’t killed, Sara. She fell.” He tried to keep his voice calm and level; his best you’ve-got-to-see-reason tone, like a parent reprimanding a small child.

But hadn’t some part of him been wondering all along if it had truly been an accident? How had Gertie’s hair been cut? Who hung it up in the barn?

Sara only smiled. “We buried Gertie in the dress she was wearing when they found her in the well. I need to do this, Martin. I need to know. I need to know if it’s her.”

“Her? Her who?”

“Auntie. Though Auntie died so long ago … The spirit of Auntie. I need to know if she killed our little girl.”

“You think Gertie was killed by a spirit?”

“I don’t know!” she said, exasperated. “That’s why we have to dig her up. Don’t you see?”

She looked at him long and hard, waiting for a response.

“Don’t you, Martin? Don’t you need to know the truth?”

He stayed silent.

Gertie had been laid to rest in the small family cemetery behind the house. Beside her were the graves of Sara’s parents, her brother, Jacob, and Gertie’s tiny infant brother.

“Sara, Gertie’s been in the ground for two weeks now. Have you thought about the … condition her body will be in?” It was dreadful to imagine, and he felt cruel bringing it up, but he had to find a way to stop her.

She nodded. “It’s only a body. An empty vessel. The little girl I love is out there still, in the beyond.”

Martin took in a breath.

Calm. Be calm.

He felt his face and ears burning, his heart hammering away in his chest.

He remembered seeing Sara come out of the barn the day Gertie disappeared. How he had gone in just after and found the fox pelt gone and the hair hanging in its place.

A terrible possibility began to dawn—something that he hadn’t allowed himself to believe in, or even to consider, until now.

Could Sara have killed Gertie?

She may even become dangerous.

He looked down at the note scribbled in childish handwriting. He tried to recall his daughter’s penmanship, but could not quite picture it. To his eye, the note Sara had produced looked more like the writing of an adult trying to write like a child.

Was this Sara’s way of confessing? Did she know there was something of hers tucked in the pocket of poor Gertie’s dress?

The room seemed to tilt slightly, and Martin grabbed onto the table to keep his balance.

He looked at Sara, his beautiful Sara, and wanted to weep and scream and beg her not to leave him, beg her to fight against the madness blossoming inside her.

He remembered handing her the Jupiter marble he’d just won from Lucius when they were children—how she’d been so beautifully radiant that he’d given it over without even thinking; he’d have given her anything then, same as he would now.

She was his great adventure; his love for her had taken him places he’d never dreamed of going.

“If you won’t help me, I’ll do it on my own,” Sara told him now, her body rigid, ready for a fight.

“All right,” he sighed, knowing he’d lost. It was over. “But we’re going to do it properly. I’m going to go into town to get Lucius. He should be here, don’t you think?”

Sara nodded. “The sheriff, too. Bring the sheriff.”

“Definitely,” he promised, standing to go get his coat and hat. “You just sit and wait. A job like this, it isn’t a thing any mother should have to do. We’ll take care of it when I get back. We’ll take care of everything.”

He leaned down and kissed her cheek. It felt hot, dry, and papery, not at all like skin—not at all familiar.





Visitors from the Other Side

The Secret Diary of Sara Harrison Shea



January 31, 1908


For the past three days, I have been a prisoner in my own home.

It was quite a scene when Martin and Lucius came back from town and found me waiting with the shovel over Gertie’s grave. The air was frigidly cold. My fingers and toes were numb from standing outside, waiting. Still, I kept firm hold of the shovel as the men climbed out of Lucius’s carriage and approached. I was standing right over the place we’d buried her, the wooden cross with Gertie’s name carved into it teasing, taunting.

“What are you doing, Sara?” Lucius asked, his voice low and soothing, as if he were talking to a small child.

I explained the situation to him as calmly as I was able. Told him about the note, the crucial clue in Gertie’s pocket. Surely he would see reason.

“Put the shovel down, Sara,” Lucius said, moving toward me.

“We need to dig her up,” I repeated.

“We’re not going to do that, Sara.” He was closer now. I knew he intended to stop me. So I did the only thing I could think of—I raised the shovel and I swung.

Lucius jumped back; the shovel just grazed his coat. Martin was on me, wrenching the tool from my hands.

It took both men to carry me inside.

“We need to see what’s in her pocket!” I cried. “Do you not care that our girl was murdered?”

Lucius ripped up a sheet and tied my arms and legs to the bedposts. Restrained me like a madwoman. And Martin allowed it, assisted him.