Sycamore Hill (37 page)

“Seems to me the town could have given her more than two plaques,
a cheap pine casket and some sentimental words over her grave,” he went on
brutally frank. I flinched.

“Everyone respected and loved her,” I said shakily.

“Sure. So much so that if it hadn’t been for her niece’s husband
owning a boardinghouse, Miss Greer would have rotted in some charity home
somewhere,” he continued ruthlessly. The cold possible truth of his words made
me recoil.

“Is this why you wanted to talk with me?” I emitted tremulously.
“Because if it is, I would just as soon not hear more!”

“I know you cared for Miss Greer.” He disregarded my plea. “You
were good friends with the old lady. I don’t think she would have wanted the
same kind of life for you.”

His comment about Ellen being an old lady irritated me, and my
mouth tightened. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I mean working for fifty years and then getting nothing for it
but what you’ve got in your hands.” He indicated the loathsome plaques. Why
wouldn’t he just go away and leave me alone?

“It doesn’t matter,” I whispered painfully.

“It should then,” he said, irritated. “You’ll be just like her,
you know. Working here year after year, giving everything you’ve got to people
who don’t care a penny about you. Then when you’re old and of no more use to
them, they’ll kick you out and expect you to fend for yourself.”

Of course, that would not happen to me. I would not be allowed to
stay here in Sycamore Hill. Not once my secret became known. But somehow that
did not matter now. I did not see so far ahead. I did not want to see any
farther ahead.

“You shouldn’t be so concerned, Mr. Hallender. And I don’t know
why it should matter to you so much what happens to me.”

“Because I’m in the same position Miss Greer was, only I haven’t
got a niece with a boardinghouse,” he said bitterly. “I wouldn’t want to see
the same thing happening to you as well. Someone’s got to get out.”

“I don’t understand.” He wasn’t making any sense to me at all.

“It’s so simple. I’ve got a little money saved. I’ll loan it to
you so you can go someplace else and start anew.”

My eyes opened wide. “Why should you want to do that for me?” I
hardly knew this man, and yet he was offering me his savings. Why?

“Just what I said, Miss McFarland. So you don’t end up like Miss
Greer, wasting your life for people who just don’t give a damn.”

“I don’t see teaching as a waste of my life, Mr. Hallender,” I
assured him honestly, smiling ruefully. A flicker of impatience plus something
else passed quickly across his face. He looked down at the grave by which I was
standing.

“Beats me why you would even want to go back to that place with
everything that’s happened there.”

“You mean because Ellen died there?” I asked, and then shook my
head, “It doesn’t frighten me.” There were other things worse.

“She isn’t the only one who died there,” he said calmly. I did not
say anything for a moment, but my heart was thudding with alarm. He looked down
at the grave again.

“Please explain,” I managed finally.

“There was a teacher just before you—”

“Prudence Townsend. Yes, I know.”

“You’re standing by her grave,” he said, and I stared down in
surprised horror.

“But I understood she was a young woman,” I stammered.

“Younger than you, I’d guess.”

No one had ever told me that Prudence Townsend was frail or
sickly. I looked down at the grave, at the wooden cross where the earth had
sunk in slightly. “How did she die? And why is she buried here, outside the
cemetery?” I asked in a hushed tone.

“She was buried here because the priest said she couldn’t be
buried in consecrated soil,” he answered my second question. “A couple of men
dug this grave in the dead of night so the children would never know about it.
It didn’t even have a marker. No one knows who put this one up.”

“But I don’t understand. Why all the secrecy? Why was she buried
here?”

“Because Prudence Townsend hanged herself, Miss McFarland,” he
said quietly, and there was a cold expression on his face.

“Dear God,” I gasped. “But why?”

“Who knows?” He shrugged, disinterested. “Probably couldn’t stand
the loneliness. But that’s why they had trouble finding another schoolmistress.
Word got around these parts about what happened. No one wanted to live in that
place, not after someone hanged herself there. People are superstitious, even
if they don’t like to admit it. Some were saying Miss Townsend was still
there.”

I could feel my face turning very white as Hallender continued.
“So Hayes said he’d write East to one of the schools.” And the head of the
school had by chance been a friend of Bradford Dobson. “They all decided among
themselves to keep the story about Miss Townsend a secret. They let the place
go until you came.” He gave a harsh, mocking laugh. “They were all half
expecting you to come running out of there the first night. When you didn’t,
they figured all the stories about the ghost were just that—stories. You
wouldn’t have stayed on in there otherwise.”

Staring at the grave, I thought of the ghost in the schoolhouse.
Now I knew who she was and why she was there. She was not a figment of my
imagination.

“She hanged herself from the front beam. The one nearest the desk.
I figured she tossed the rope up over the beam, tied it around her neck and
then jumped off the desk.”

I shuddered.

“She must have figured it would break her neck,” he went on. “But
it didn’t. She must have kicked for quite a while before she finally died.”

I pressed my hands over my ears. “Don’t...” I felt him watching my
face. I felt sick.

“I’m sorry,” he said when I finally lowered my hands. “My offer
still goes. Why don’t you think about it?” I did not answer, and he looked
grim. “I hope what I’ve told you hasn’t upset you too much.” I stared at him.
“But you did ask,” he said defensively. Then he walked off, leaving me standing
beside Prudence Townsend’s grave.

***

Heedless of the darkening sky, I wandered in the hills behind
town, finding the solitude my grief craved. I cried for Ellen, whom I had
loved. Then I sank into a tortured despair over my own situation. When it
became noticeable that I was pregnant, I would lose my livelihood. What would I
do then? Could I go to Jordan and ask his help? No. I shook my head at the
thought. I had some small bit of pride left, and I would rather die than ask
his help. I did not want to live on his charity, while suffering his eternal
contempt.

That depressing notion kept repeating itself in my mind. I thought
about Prudence Townsend. She had hanged herself because she could no longer
bear the loneliness. I knew it was Prudence who haunted the schoolhouse, but
now the supernatural was less frightening to me than the natural state of my
own life, and the dismal future.

It began to drizzle, and the dampness slowly seeped through my
shawl. I hardly noticed, but continued to walk, head down, thoughts whirling in
answerless questions and confusion. When the sky opened up, weeping its
torrents down upon me, I ran for shelter beneath one of the ancient oaks that
were scattered about. By the time I reached one, I was bone-cold and drenched
to the skin. I waited for what seemed an eternity before deciding that the
storm would not abate for hours. I would have to go on.

The water streamed down from my face. My clothing stuck to me,
weighing me down. Trudging down the slopes, I saw the schoolhouse, like some
pathetic relic, in the storm darkness of late afternoon. The rain was beating
its primitive cadence on the leaky roof. Water cascaded down, pouring onto the
grass of the schoolyard. Little rivulets had already formed and were running
down McPherson. Puddles grew in the center of the street. By morning the
streets would be mud.

Exhausted and freezing, I dragged myself up the back steps. I
snatched up the bucket, knowing I would need a hot bath if I were to avoid a
chill. After dumping my sodden shawl on the floor, I headed back out into the
rain to get water from the well. When I returned, I set the filled bucket on
the stove and bent to take kindling from the box. My fingers were numb and
clumsy, and I had to strike the long match several times before it ignited.

It seemed forever before the fire was going strong. While I waited
for the water to heat, I stripped out of my wet clothes and dried myself with a
rough towel. Wrapping myself in a blanket, I sat down near the stove, waiting
for the chill to melt from my bones.

I felt like a drowned rat with my hair plastered against my head
and my skin bloodless-white and goose-bumped. Finally, the water began to
steam, and I gingerly lifted the bucket down from the stove and poured the
contents into my bathtub. Testing the water, I waited another few minutes
before stepping in and kneeling down. I washed my body with a washcloth and
then dried myself again. Some of the chill was gone, but I was still cold. I
pulled on my nightgown and wrapped myself in the blanket like a caterpillar in
a cocoon. Then I huddled near the stove for warmth.

I must have dozed off, for when I next looked at the fire, it had
burned down to orange coals. I stoked it again and wondered if I would ever
feel warm. When I awakened later, it was well into night. I stood up, feeling
stiff and sore. I sighed deeply and rubbed my back, remembering with a wry
smile what Elizabeth Hayes had said about the symptoms of pregnancy. I had
every one. I lay down on my bed.

There was a scuffling noise in the schoolroom. It was too early
for my lady of the schoolhouse, I thought, and I was too despondent to care
anyway. Nothing seemed to matter anymore. Ellen was dead. Jordan did not love
me. I was alone. Oh, God, I was so alone.

I dozed again, wrapped in my blanket. When I was awakened later,
the rain was still pounding on the roof. A leak had opened in the center of my
quarters, and I got up to put something beneath it. The ping of drops against
the metal bucket sounded loud in the room. I lay for a long time, listening to
it. In time my eyes closed slowly, lulled by the rhythmic beating of rain on
the roof and the droplets splashing into the bucket. Then I heard the crying.

Every few minutes it would start, softly and plaintively. It had
happened so many times before, it had ceased to alarm me. But now there was
added meaning to it. I remembered Tom Hallender’s story about Prudence Townsend
and how she had died in the schoolroom. I remained still on my narrow, lumpy
cot, but gradually I began to feel restless with the continued desolate moaning
that came from the other room. I unwrapped the blanket from my legs and got up.
The floor was icy beneath my bare feet, but I had no slippers. I drew the
blanket up around my shoulders and cuddled inside it.

Again the crying started. Almost unaware of what I was doing, I
entered the schoolroom. It was freezing cold, and there were several leaks
puddling the wood floor. As soon as I had opened the door, my lady of the
schoolroom had stopped crying. I wondered if it were all illusion, as Ellen had
once said. Then I remembered her face in death. Terrified, trying to scream.
Had she seen the ghost? Or had the expression only shown fear that death had
come to claim her? After all, I had never seen the ghost. I had only heard the
faint crying and once smelled an essence of lavender. Was I now allowing Tom
Hallender’s story to strengthen my beliefs that the ghost did in fact exist?

I looked about the room, and there, on the beam closest to my desk,
hung a rope. There was a noose at the end. I shuddered. I remembered the
details of Prudence Townsend’s death, as related by the sheriff. Had the ghost
put the rope there? Where had it come from? Once before, it had been there, and
I had pulled it down in a moment of fear-filled panic. Now that I understood,
it did not seem so frightening somehow. I approached it, staring at it with a
cold feeling in the pit of my stomach. No emotion seemed to penetrate. I felt
curiously numb. Then I looked at the desk and chair, and once again I
remembered Ellen.

I am alone, I thought, suddenly bereft. Totally, forever alone.

As though sharing my pain, the lady of the schoolroom began to cry
again. It seemed to come from nowhere... and yet everywhere, surrounding me
like a shroud. My skin goose-bumped. The faint lavender scent I had experienced
once before drifted into the room. I turned slowly, expecting to see some
physical evidence of her presence. But there was nothing, and the crying
stopped again. The room was filled with the sound of rain beating on the roof.
I stood in tortured stillness until my muscles ached. My eyes roamed the room,
searching. There was nothing but the shadows dancing on the walls.

I thought of the funeral, and an image of Jordan flashed in my mind.
My hand slowly moved down over my abdomen, and a desolation so fierce filled me
that I felt pain from it. My baby... and Jordan’s. It was here inside me,
waiting for life.

What then? A child unloved by its father, shunned by the community
because of the sins of its mother? To be labeled a bastard all his life? The
word ricocheted through my mind, growing louder. A bastard. Jordan’s bastard. I
thought of Diego and the pain I sometimes saw in his expression. A confusion
and longing mingled. Did I want that for my baby? And what was the solution? I
thought of Prudence Townsend hanging from the front beam, and suddenly her act
seemed my only answer.