Maplecroft (The Borden Dispatches #1)(51)
More likely, it’d serve the purpose of confusing the gardener, next time he needed entrance into the shed out back. Small price to pay, in my estimation.
? ? ?
Lizbeth came back to bed with tea, and when she wasn’t looking, I added a few drops of the soothing syrup. If she noticed anything was different, she didn’t mention it. She downed the tea quickly (surely scalding herself), but I didn’t mind, because then we were free again to untangle from our robes and sheets, and retangle to our hearts’ content.
Later, when I came tripping lightly downstairs wearing Lizbeth’s robe, I saw a candle or two lit downstairs by Emma’s sleeping place. She was up, damn her—reading or writing, and within full view of my only passageway into the kitchen, to the cellar door.
So I gave up temporarily, thinking that I could try again some night when the cool weather returned, and the elder Borden had returned to her spot upstairs.
Back in Lizbeth’s room, she too was stirring. “Where were you, dear? Where did you go?” she asked.
“I only wanted some water,” I purred at her, as I slipped back between the light covers, and pulled my skin up against hers. “Go back to sleep.” I drew her into my arms. She felt very warm and soft, all drowsy kitten and velvet skin.
“I am very sleepy,” she said, and of course she was. I’d have been astounded to hear otherwise. If I hadn’t successfully worn her out, Mrs. Winslow should’ve done it.
“Close your eyes, then. I’ll sing you to sleep.”
“No, don’t do that.”
For a brief second, I took offense. “You don’t want to hear me sing?”
She shook her head, rocking it against my bosom. “Of course I do. But I’d prefer to stay awake . . .” She yawned. “Rather than insult you by drifting off during the performance.”
I squeezed her, and adjusted myself on the pillows, so that I was lying on my back with her head atop my chest, and my arms around her more comfortably. “You’re a silly thing,” I told her, but I loved her, and maybe all love is silly in its own way.
“You, too,” she said in return, and then she was out again. Her breath was damp and sweet against my skin, and it was lovely, this evening alone in bed, with the butter-soft moonlight to keep us company and no one ringing a bell for attention.
I petted her hair and tried to enjoy the moment, but in the back of my head, I was wondering how much more I ought to give her in a dose—in order to keep her sleeping soundly while I explore.
? ? ?
This was all the night before last.
It’s still warm enough now that Emma remains downstairs again, but the old familiar chill is creeping back into the air, and I think we’ll reinstate her to her proper bed this afternoon. This will all be so much easier when I only have to sneak past one of them.
But I can’t put it off too much longer.
Eventually Lizbeth is bound to notice that the key she wears isn’t the one she thinks. Somewhere a clock is counting down, waiting to reveal my deception. But I don’t know where it is, and the only way past it is downstairs, through a strange door, and into whatever mystery awaits me beyond it.
Emma L. Borden
APRIL 22, 1894
I finished the article I was working on, the one about the mollusks, that I’d promised to send off to the editor of Marine Life last month. I was a little late, but as far out as their schedules run, I won’t worry much about it. If it’s that great a problem, they can refuse to run it, and I’ll sell it to Aquatic Quarterly. The lead biologist they consult is still that fellow at the university, my long-distance friend Dr. Zollicoffer. (To the best of my knowledge, that is.) He’ll see to it that the piece finds publication, one way or another.
Speaking of that great man . . . I haven’t heard from him in months now. I hope he’s well. Perhaps I should send him a letter, or scare up a sample that might entertain him. The samples I’ve sent thus far have been gruesome, but well received.
The last missive I received from him requested more specimens like that one sample . . . the strange and smelly piece I sent him last year. Lizzie was confident that it was a half-rotted version of something ordinary on the beach, but my scientist’s eye told me otherwise. Alas, I haven’t seen any others since. He’ll have to content himself with the one I sent.
I’m glad I passed it along. He seemed to enjoy it, and Lizzie wouldn’t let me keep it in the house. It’d be a pity for the thing to go to waste, unexamined.
It is late. I ought to be asleep, but I’m finding it difficult this evening. I’d blame the balmy weather, for it certainly hasn’t helped; but no, the real problem is Nance—to no one’s surprise.
Not to mine, anyway. Sometimes Lizzie is hard to read.
I know she loves the girl, but for heaven’s sake. If she loves her that much, she needs to invent an excuse and send her packing. Now is really not the time for visitors, least of all rowdy visitors who snoop, badger, fight, and ultimately yowl like a cat in heat, as if I can’t hear through the floors. I’m feeble. I’m not deaf.
I’m sure that she and Lizzie both felt like the opportunity to banish me downstairs was a good thing, and I don’t even care about that. It was my idea, to give them some time alone. I appreciate their impetus to carry on behind my back rather than in front of my face—honestly, I do—but all the tiptoeing around was becoming tedious.