After Alice Fell(67)

“You’re just like her,” she says.

I hesitate, my hand to the doorframe, then lower my gaze to the floor. “I’m sorry. The morning’s events have overcome me. I’m not in my right mind.”

She throws her glass; it shatters against the wall just by my head. “You should be careful what you say. You might end up just like her.”

“Stop it.” Lionel steps between us. He presses his hand to Cathy’s shoulder.

“Get your hand off me.” Her words are low as a hiss.

“New life,” he says to her. Then he looks at me. “New life.”

I give a curt nod and walk out.

Most delusions have an element of truth.

Not snap peas. The pillow was embroidered with more delicate flowers. Sweet alyssum.

My mother’s eyes so hollowed with death. I held her gaze. One slow blink of entreaty. I dreaded this day, no matter how often I prayed for it.

“I can’t.”

Her mouth spread into a grimace. Please . . . Pleading, her voice a tight wheeze. Pushing the pillow at me and please.

I took the pillow. “Wait in the hall, Alice.”

But she didn’t. She spied it all from the doorway.

And after, the pillow still gripped tight in my hand, I turned to my sister. “There is no cruelty in mercy.”

She stared at the pillow’s tassels. Such a cheerful spring green.

“You must never say a word.”

But mercy to one is cruelty to another.

“I’m sorry.” My throat tightens against that shame of what I’ve done. You must never say a word. It is my fault. I am culpable for all of it.

A thump to the door of my room makes me jump. “Not now.”

Another thump, quieter, like a soft kick to the frame. The light from the hall glows under the door. Two feet in shadow. One foot then resting on the instep of the other. A toe lifting and tensing.

“Auntie?”

I cross to turn the key.

Toby stares up at me. He’s carrying the magic lantern, held tight to his belly and chest. Both pockets of his trousers bulge with rectangle boxes that poke the fabric. “You missed dinner.”

“I wasn’t hungry.”

“I thought we could watch a show.”

“Well. I see.” I glance down the hall to the parlor.

“They’re playing cards,” he says. “Old Maid.” Then he shrugs.

“That’s a terrible game.”

“It’s for babies.” He lugs the lantern to the desk, pulling the slide boxes from his pockets and stacking them in readiness. He grabs the matchbox from the floor and hands it to me to light the oil. He turns the machine so the lens faces the wall, then digs through the mending for a petticoat to drape over the rocking chair. But the flicker of light is half on the cloth and half on the wall.

“Here.” I move the petticoat to the wardrobe, closing the top of it in the door. I gesture to the rocker. “Now, you can take the seat of honor.”

He closes the door, then clambers to the chair. He doesn’t rock but sits still with his hands in his lap and legs hanging loose. “I brought Old Mother Hubbard. And the one Alice had in the trunk. But not The Presidents because I know them all. Do you know them all?”

“I do.” I tilt the top slide box to read it. The 7 Wonders of the World.

“Do you know the vice presidents?” he asks.

“Have you watched these?”

He shakes his head. “Are they interesting? Because the presidents aren’t.”

“There’s pyramids and great statues and marvelous magic gardens.” I can’t open the box one-handed. “Can you?”

He pulls off the lid and reaches for the first slide, pinching just the edge. “Can I put it in?”

I nod and take the box, resting it in my lap.

He swings the hinge and slides the glass in place. The image, a bright wash of greens and browns and pinks, spills across the wallpaper. When I turn the lantern, the image flickers against my sleeve. A morass of flowers, the door to a building, open, a man shown from the back, in a tall hat and his hands clasped behind him. Just the shoulder and the arm of a woman clad in pink, the rest of her body outside the glass frame. There is a black “1” at the bottom of the image.

“The Gardens of Babylon, I think.” I pick out the first card from the box and tilt it to read in the image’s light. But it isn’t right; it is written in pencil, the letters so faint I must bend close to make them out as I read aloud. “ONE: I saw her with him—”

“That’s Papa,” Toby points. “By the barn.”

I stare at the image on the wall. Lionel. In the shadows of the barn, the gray-and-white muzzle of Cathy’s dapple mare. Cathy’s hand outstretched. Cathy in pink with lace at the wrist. “It can’t be . . .”

I return to the lines of text on the card, scanning the words.

—and he said no not you I do not want you anymore you’ve ruined everything. And she said she wouldn’t leave and then he pushed her and said he’s chosen. Don’t come here anymore! He said. But she did come.

Nothing on the card’s back.

Toby picks at his lip. “Why did she paint him into the Blableeon Gardens?”

“Babylon,” I mutter, then replace the card and pick out the next.