The Sparrow Sisters (31 page)

Emily knew nothing about plants, but she could guess that this was not the nursery that the police officer had described at the trial. It was certainly not the one she'd heard about from people she'd interviewed. The woman at the library described a heavenly place, lush as Eden, full to bursting with useful beauty. She had whispered (not just because she was in a library) that the Sparrow Sisters Nursery was an enchanted place and admitted that more than one woman in Granite Point had found her heart's desire through Patience, and not a few more had let her patch them up when they didn't.
Now that's a story,
Emily thought as she pulled out a flashlight. She swung it in a circle, feeling only a little foolish, and more than a little ner
vous as the dead and dying threw shadows on each other. It was as if everything had been rendered in black and white, all color leeched away by God knew what. But then she saw a blaze of bright pink, another of purple, and she followed the beam to a stand of tall flowers. The top of the hooded blossoms swayed above her hip. She reached to touch one but instead she took out her phone and snapped pictures. Not exactly above-the-fold stuff, but it did make for an interesting contrast: the living among the dead. She'd have to find out the name of the flower. And when she did, learning that it was foxglove, the very plant at the heart of the trial, Emily knew she had a real story. She was able to upload her blog by nine o'clock and return the
New York Times
call minutes later.

W
HEN
H
ENRY RESUMED
his testimony the next day, the rain was so loud against the tall windows that a microphone had been set up next to the witness chair. This made Henry have to lean in every time he answered, putting him off balance as he braced his thigh against the chair. Paul Hutchins began the session by asking him questions about what he saw Patience do with Matty.

“She let him come to the Nursery any day he wished,” Henry said. “She made him feel like a regular kid, at least for a while.”

Rob Short flinched when he heard that. He rubbed his hands over his face; he'd forgotten to shave and now was beginning to look like the Rob Short the town had come to know.

“Did you ever see the defendant feed him anything, give him one of her remedies?”

Henry was certain in his answer. “No,” he said firmly. “All I ever saw him eat was a cookie from Baker's Way”—he paused—“wait, I ate that cookie,” he said.

The audience laughed and the judge glared.

“So Matthew Short never consumed anything in your presence?”

“No.”

“What did Patience Sparrow give you, Dr. Carlyle?”

“She didn't give me anything,” Henry said.
Did she?
he thought.

“Yet you said that she relieved your pain.”

“Yes.” Henry remembered her touch and hoped he wouldn't have to describe the coverlet. Even now he couldn't explain it, the way the violets stayed soft as silk, fresh as paint. He still couldn't sleep without it. He still dreamt only of Patience.

“How?” Paul Hutchins stepped back, sharing the stage with everyone. “If you are so sure that she didn't give you one of her remedies, how did she take your pain away?”

“I don't know,” Henry said, and he didn't, not really.

“Right, you don't know if she slipped something into a drink or a bit of food.” Hutchins was fairly strutting now, and Henry wanted to leap out of his chair at him.

“Listen to me.” Henry gritted his teeth. “Patience did not try to trick me or sneak anything into me. She did not lie to me about her abilities, she never promised me anything she
couldn't give. I am a doctor. I can't explain what happens in my science, why one person lives and another dies. How one woman has three perfect children and another is barren. I don't know why I can't fix someone and Patience can.”

Charlotte Mayo stood in the back of the courtroom. She had been staring at the back of Sorrel Sparrow's head, wondering if she'd released her husband to be with the oldest sister. When Henry's voice dropped into a growl, she started listening again and recognized herself in his words. She looked at Patience, who was turned slightly in her chair, facing her husband and Rob Short across the aisle. In the set of Patience's neck Charlotte saw defeat, and in that moment she didn't think she could bear it. She knew the Sparrow Sisters (or certainly one sister) were the very things that had always kept Simon separate from her. But now she didn't want to see them so broken. It seemed as if everyone in the town had broken with them. It wasn't just the terrible weather, the fishermen painting houses in their salty jeans, the tourists who took one look at the blighted elms along Main Street and turned around, their RVs and boat trailers swerving as they left. People were biting and angry. The men came home with their hands already outstretched for a drink, the women sat at their counters staring at their groceries as if they'd forgotten how to feed their families. Granite Point was failing; the Sparrow Sisters Nursery was only the first sign.

Charlotte slipped out of the court and ran to the bathroom, her heels clicking so loudly in the empty hall that inside the room Sorrel turned her head at the sound. Cold water settled
Charlotte's stomach, but just in case she sat on the ratty bench by the door. She put her head down on her knees and waited, thinking about what she needed to do. Simon now spent more time at Ivy House than he ever had when he longed openly for Sorrel. They hardly ever spoke of anything but the case anymore. The last time Charlotte and Simon had made love was after the Founders' party. There was a desperate quality to Simon that night and as she clung to him, Charlotte knew that he was already far away. She also knew that she loved him, she cared if he was happy, more than she did herself, which surprised her. The day before she had gone to Patience Sparrow, driving her mother-in-law's car, her hair under a baseball cap. They met at the gates, out of sight. Charlotte needed her help, and that was something she could never tell Simon. And, even after bringing Patience's remedies home, she couldn't yet bring herself to slip them into Simon's water, for that's what Patience told her to do. Charlotte hid the three blue bottles behind her face creams so disturbed by her own actions her hands shook. When she consulted Dr. Carlyle some weeks after, she dismissed Patience with a defensive sneer. What else could she do? She'd sworn Patience to secrecy. Charlotte still believed in the established order of things; she'd always believed in keeping secrets.

Charlotte Mayo stood up and dug her phone out of her bag. She walked out of the town hall as she started texting.

Simon began his cross-examination of Henry Carlyle with an apology.

“I know this is hard for you, Dr. Carlyle,” he said. “You are
a physician and a soldier, and we are asking you to testify to something none of us can even define.”

Henry nodded. He saw that Simon had sweated through his suit jacket.

“Do you believe that Patience Sparrow is capable of harming anyone?”

“No,” Henry said.

The night before, Henry had made his own apologies. He had offered to fall to his knees in the front hall when he arrived at Ivy House and had gotten the first laugh in days out of the Sisters. He didn't know why or how they could find anything funny about his testimony that morning. Agony still rolled through him every time he thought of how thoroughly he'd exposed Patience. But as she pulled him into the kitchen, her finger hooked through his belt loop, Patience just said, “Hush.”

So now, as he stared at Simon Mayo, Henry was determined to earn the forgiveness Patience promised him.

“Can you tell us what you discussed with Patience Sparrow the day before Matthew Short's death?”

“Patience wanted me to take Matty on as a patient. She was concerned that he hadn't been supervised since Dr. Higgins retired.”

“And what about his father? Why wasn't he involved in Matty's care?”

“Objection,” Paul Hutchins said. “Rob Short is not on trial here.”

Judge Adams looked at Rob Short.
That man is a mess,
he thought.
Who's to say if he even knew where his kid was?

“Overruled,” Judge Adams said. “I wish to know how Matthew's care was administered.”

Henry looked at Simon, who nodded.

“As far as I could tell, Matty did not take his medication as prescribed.”

“How could you tell this?”

“He was alternately agitated or lethargic, and his symptoms were consistent with irregular dosage of both his anti-anxiety and anti-OCD meds.” Henry paused. “As you can see from his patient file, his prescriptions were, in fact, not kept up-to-date. I had not yet seen him in my office. I can only testify to his behavior when I saw him at the Nursery.”

“But you agreed to talk to Rob Short about taking over Matty's treatment?”

“Yes, at Patience's urging.”

“Do you know why Matthew Short came to the Nursery every day?”

“He had nowhere else to go.”

Henry and Simon looked at Rob Short along with everyone in the room.

“What is your relationship to Patience Sparrow?” Simon spoke only after he was sure everyone had time to despise Rob Short a little.

“I love her.”

Henry surprised Simon. He'd expected Henry to say what
they'd discussed, that their mutual concern for Matty had brought them together. Simon had to scramble for another question, and he had the time as Judge Adams warned the whisperers into silence.

“Was Patience still treating Matthew Short?”

“No, she stopped two days before his death.”

“Why did she stop?”

“She said she was concerned that Matty was ill, that his condition was more complicated, more serious than she could handle.” That's not helpful, Henry thought as he saw Hutchins scribbling away on his pad.

“In other words,” Simon continued, “Patience Sparrow refused to do anything to harm Matthew Short.”

“Objection, hearsay.”

“Sustained.” Judge Adams nodded at Simon.

“Did she continue to treat you formally with her plant remedies?”

“No. I never asked her for a specific remedy.”

Patience looked at her hands and wondered if it was perjury if you didn't know you were lying.

“If you had asked her, would she have made a remedy for you?”

“Yes, she wanted to.”

“But you refused?”

“Look, I know exactly what Patience did to me. For the first time since I was wounded, I was happy. Maybe that's what it took to take the pain away.” He looked at the judge. “If that
is the kind of witchcraft she does, the magic Patience Sparrow makes, then I am begging you to leave her to make it.”

Every person who had ever been treated by Patience held a breath as they listened to Henry. As one, they let it go, and it was as if a sweet breeze swept through. Even Rob Short felt it and closed his eyes, leaning his head against the back of his chair. He didn't open them until Judge Adams called for order although the room was as silent as if it had been emptied. Rob thought he knew what it felt like to be loved like that; he was almost certain that Matty's mother had made him hold his breath because he was too amazed to take the next one. In that moment, Rob Short began to doubt.

As Paul Hutchins had his final pass at Henry Carlyle, he began to feel the change around him. The chairs had cleared during the last recess; now only a few people scattered the back of the room. Rob Short was huddled behind the prosecution table as if he was cold instead of sweating. When court was called for the day, Paul Hutchins left as soon as the judge did, before Simon and the Sisters rose from their seats. Henry watched Hutchins go as he stood drinking cup after cup of water from the cooler beside the men's room. He gave Henry a curt nod before he realized he'd left Rob Short behind. God knows what the man might say.
That's it,
he thought,
I've lost the edge here.
There'll be no call to indict Patience Sparrow now. I won't be riding any of this to a bigger, better place.

Nettie Sparrow picked a newspaper off a bench and held it over her head as she and her sisters ducked out of the town hall
and into the rain. Henry and Simon followed them. Ben was waiting for everyone at Ivy House. Patience felt claustrophobic, the people she cared about pressing into her. She almost wished for the solitude of the little jail.

Everyone smelled like wet dog as they peeled off their layers. Simon looked completely wrung out, even though his face ran with water. Nettie tossed the sodden newspaper onto the hall table and moved into the kitchen. Patience picked it up; it would stain with its damp.

“Don't read any of that,” Ben said and held out his hand.

“Why?” she asked and looked at the paper. “Has the
New York Times
hauled out their burning stake too?”

“It's that blogger from the courthouse, Emily Winston,” Ben said. “She's all over this.”

Patience looked down the page until she read the byline. When she saw the picture of the digitalis, she held it up to Sorrel.

“This is from the Nursery,” she said. “How did she get this?”

“Well, obviously she was out there.” Nettie took the paper back into the kitchen with her. She read quickly through the first paragraphs until the room filled up. Nettie shoved the newspaper under the sink and turned to the cupboards. Ben came to stand beside her.

“Can I help?” he asked.

Nettie let him come out to the garden with her. No one could face hot food so she picked lettuce and cucumbers, scarlet radishes and nasturtium blossoms, and placed them in the
basket Ben held. Nettie bent to pinch off some basil and sat on the edge of the bed to reach in for tomatoes. Ben watched her, the basket like a toy in his big hands.

“I think we should talk to her,” he said. Nettie looked up at him. The rain had stopped and everything, including Ben, was steaming in the sudden sunlight.