The Endless Forest
Page 175

She smelled of the warm bed and of Daniel, smells that were unfamiliar to Callie but ones she recognized all the same as belonging to the marriage bed. Where Martha had been with Daniel, where Martha spent every night with Daniel. It took all Callie’s concentration to ban those images from her mind.
“Callie,” Martha said. “You are covered with blackfly bites.”
She touched her face. “I didn’t even notice.”
“I’ll get you some lotion.” Martha started to get up but Callie stopped her by taking her wrist.
“Not yet,” she said. “Let me tell you what I came to say first.”
Martha’s steady gaze held hers for three heartbeats, and then she nodded.
When Callie had finished relating Lorena’s story, Martha folded her arms tight against herself and then leaned forward to rest her brow on the table.
After a moment she felt Callie’s hand on her shoulder, her touch as light as silk.
She said, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the Bleeding Heart. I don’t know what I was afraid of.”
Martha raised her head. “My mother,” she said. “And clearly with good reason. But Callie, there’s no need to apologize to me. She’s my mother, and it should fall to me to set things right. If I only knew how to do that.”
“We’ve done that. It’s safe now, from her.”
“No,” Martha said, almost too sharply. “I don’t want you to sell the orchard. She can’t take that away from you again; it’s not right. How did she find out about the Bleeding Heart?”
“I don’t know,” Callie said. “But I intend to find out.”
“Wait. What if Daniel bought the orchard?”
Callie said, “It’s right that Levi should have it. I know you won’t understand, but I want him to have it. He’s lost more than any of us.”
Martha studied Callie’s face for a long moment. She saw weariness and resignation and something of relief, and anger, held tight in a closed fist.
“There’s more,” she said. “I can see it, Callie. How can I help you if I don’t know what you’re up against?”
Callie turned her face toward the window. The sky was lightening, the world moving toward dawn.
“All right,” she said finally. “But don’t interrupt me or I’ll lose my nerve. It’s about Harper.”
“Harper? The boy who drowned?”
Callie drew in a sharp breath and nodded. “Right after Jemima went off and left Nicholas behind, Harper started hanging around the orchard, asking questions. Lots of questions about the trees and the harvest and pressing. How much money could a person make if crops were good and the jack was strong? What was the best apple we grew? Did we have to take our jack out to the cities to sell it, or did people come in to buy, and a dozen more.
“It made me more and more nervous, so I finally asked him right out, why was he so interested in apples? Was there something he was supposed to find out for the Fochts? He closed up tight as a drum and swore up and down it was all his own idea, Mr. Focht had no interest in farms or orchards and especially not in apples. The more excuses he made, the clearer it was to me that something was wrong.
“So I went to talk to Levi. I told him the whole story, and that turned out to be a mistake.”
“Callie—”
“Don’t interrupt me. Levi gets real quiet when he’s mad, you probably remember that. And he never said a word to me when I told him about Harper’s questions. He just nodded and walked away. The next day Hannah and Birdie came across Harper’s body.”
She dropped her head. Martha was still clasping one of her hands, and Callie pulled it free, gently.
Martha’s thoughts began to spin; she imagined a trial, and reminded herself there were no witnesses to whatever had happened on the lake. As far as anyone knew Harper had fallen and hit his head on rocks or a submerged tree trunk, just as everyone had come to the conclusion that Cookie Fiddler’s death was an unfortunate accident and nothing more.
Except Levi and his brother Ezekiel. They had always believed Jemima had had something to do with their mother’s death, and they had been right.
Martha said, “I don’t think you should tell anyone else about Harper.”
Callie’s shoulders folded forward and began to tremble. The first tears dropped on the table, and then Callie let herself be drawn up against Martha.
She wept as Martha had not seen her weep since her mother’s burial. It hurt her to think what Callie had been enduring, the secrets sitting like rocks in her belly. Levi was the person she had worked with every day of her life, someone she trusted, someone who looked out for her when no one else had taken the time. Even now, well married and secure, she could not bear the idea of losing him.
A healthy, friendly boy of seventeen years was dead because he had shown an interest in the orchard and a particular apple.
“It is possible,” she said aloud. “It is very possible he did just slip and fall, and that no one had anything to do with his death.”
It was as if Callie didn’t even hear her, and the reason for that was clear: She was sure in her heart that Levi was responsible.
Very gently she said, “I’ve been thinking this through now for a while. You saw the carriage and horses and servants she brought with her. The house Lorena described, the one in Boston, all of that indicates that she has had quite a lot of money at her disposal. If all goes well with the orchard a good amount of money will come in, but not until you’ve got enough bearing trees, and Jemima has never been patient.”